New supersonic Travel?

 Forgetting Concorde!

The way that the media are reporting supersonic travel is something new, the XB-1,when we have thousands of combat jets that can break the sound barrier many times over, but we also have the possibility of converting an America B-1 bomber to a civilian aircraft or re-start the Concorde program, but this is where the U.K. has given way to the states again?

Concorde could seat 100-110 passengers, but the current jets 20 to a planed 60, costs may be the main factor, but a converted B-1 could seat 28+ for starts!

So all the hype gives us the impression that this is something new when it is not, but many younger people may be fooled into believing another lie, such as that of Boeing and Space-X being the only things developed over the defunct Space Shuttle that could do the job!

Wales National Air Show 2022.

 Swansea Bay, it came and it went?

It was really just more of the same, hight lights for us were the Catalina flying boat and the Red Arrows, but we are sure that people who were at the appointed venue were not disappointed?

The show is a glorified recruiting ground for the armed services and with the war in the Ukraine, one has to wonder how much cannon fodder for it will be lost, if things were to escalate?

Other wise the Battle of Britain flight was impressive as usual, I think there were some disappointments of Sunday with aircraft not turning up due to either mechanical difficulties or unforseen operational problems as well as the Red Arrows being two aircraft short?

Happy New Year 2019!

Britain takes a lead in Electric Aircraft?

It would seem that the world is in a rush now to develop the electric engine in aviation and we here in the U.K. are making some leaps and bounds of our own? Norway, Poland, Israel and the U.S. have several of their own projects that we are hearing mush about, but so far they are limited in their viability!

Battery power has been around since the 19th Century, despite advances in Solar power cells and their adaption, the battery still remains the same in power outage and range! Space will perhaps help us replace the diesel engine, which has turned out to be more polluting than was once thought?

Yet about 85% of the worlds power is based on this engine alone, trains, trucks, farm machinery, construction and shipping! The task may look daunting but once electric engines are built on an industrial scale perhaps the world will be a cleaner place? 

Farm Machinery. Part-One.

Picking?

There has been much advancement in farming over the last seventy years with the introduction of automation and the cutting of the workforce. Seventy years ago it took fifty people to do a good job on an average sized farm, but today this is now down to less than a handful!

One area that has not as yet been effective is that of picking fruit, lifting vegetables is fairly fine but fruit is more difficult than it would seem? The robotics can do the job with apples and larger fruits, but soft fruit has not yet come up to the standards of the human touch or hand.

Wither Brexit comes or not the immigration policies on restricting European labour may decimate much of the British countryside when it come to asparagus and soft fruits? Many farms will have to stop growing strawberries, because it is well established as a fact that young people in this land see picking as below their demeanour?

Search and Rescue! Part-One.

Helicopters, Hovercraft, 4 X 4 vehicles, Lifeboats and Cutters?

Nearly every nation has a rescue service of some type and these are made up of the above mentioned and a few more items! 

One of the new tools in searching for injured people and animals is the drone cameras, as technology moves on these may get larger to deal with severe wind gusts and have longer ranges especially over lakes and the sea?

When looking at this one can only take from the well organised and trained members of the RNLI and Coastguards operated across the British Isles. 

The Augusta-Westland AW-139 and the Sikorsky S-92 are the mainstay helicopters of the Coastguard, but both Irish and British military helicopters may be called up in a national disaster such as flood rescue?

Russias New Toys!

Tested out on Us?

Spite may cost the lives of millions once more and another world war, if this nerve agent business is not ended with Russia?

Russia has some new toys it claimed last week and it has had to upgrade its weapon systems in light of the madness of both Donald Trump and Mrs. May's allegations?

There is still a lot going on in the world, Syria, Libya, N-Korea, and Afghanistan, the problems with Islamic terrorism have not gone away just because the media is not reporting much!

Britain has become obsessed with chemical weapons, but then last week it sold more shells to Saudi-Arabia to kill more people in Yemen!

The Russian federation boasts it has a sleeping drone torpedo and some new nuclear powered aerial drones, while it has upgraded all it Nuclear missiles and Soviet era technology. We know they have a new MBT, new Surface to air missiles they are selling to the Saudis and the Turks based on the BUC system.

Much of what we also know is that what we have seen in relation to the conflict in Syria, new aircraft, helicopters and ship launched missiles. But its now their capability to hit any where in the world that is worrying and also their claims they will defend N-Korea?

One has to wonder about China and what they could do, with all that licenced western technology against us?

Off to War Again?

HMS Queen Elizabeth is Preparing?

It looks as if we here in the U.K. are off to was with N-Korea soon, one thought it was going to be Russia? But it looks like we will have to support the U.S. President Trump and His U.S. forces in the far-east?

Britain was involved in the first Korean peninsula war, which brought about N and S-Korea, at the cost of 20% loss of Korean lives! The North-Korean leader is portrayed in the Western media as mad, but the reality is far from that claim!

The British Royal Navy will be putting our new aircraft to the test in the China sea and joining other NATO forces. One hopes that neither China nor Russia get involved in military action, but rather diplomatic roles?

This new carrier will prove itself with the Lockheed Martin F-35 deployment, and its range of BAE Missile systems, because it may get battered from N-Korean defence systems? It is not clear what Britain's role in this war is to be as yet?

The U.S has threatened a Nuclear strike, the first since 1945 in the region! The great dangers, will be if Iran, Pakistan get involved? It is estimated that thirty-one million people will die and a further ten to fifteen million suffer from the radiation fall out?

Fire Engines. Part-Three.

Aviation and at Sea.

Every airport across the world has employed specialist fire engines to deal with burning aviation fuel. We generally see this as foam being sprayed from powerful jets, it from years of gathered experience that this method has become a standard. 

Meanwhile fires at sea are extremely dangerous and can be fatal on most types of shipping, if they are not brought under control very quickly. It is the good old faithful Tugboat that has become the mainstay of the sea fire man. These vessels handle much more than towing and assisting shipping, they are fitted with extremely powerful jets and carry large tanks of sea water, than can be continually refilled.

Both in aviation and sea fire, much was learned from the Battle of Britain and the bombing by Nazi-Germany's Luftwaffe of the Port of London docks during World-War-II (1939-45). Tugboat on the river Thames were the most vital piece of sophisticated equipment at the time in fire fighting.

Trawlers. Part-Two.

Issues.

When we talk about the fishing industry today many people get upset about the lack of stocks and the problems of overfishing. Yet every nation that has a coast or large lakes will have fishing families that rely on the industry in one form or another.

People need to sit back and do some research into the history of the industry, one hundred years ago the traditional fish supper fed the masses of the working classes in Britain and Ireland and perhaps in a few other countries too.

The word sustainable is big amongst those who know very little about livelihoods and the dangers of working the seas and lakes with any kind of boats. Many fisher  people have been drowned on a lake with a line and hook, apart from severe weather at sea.

HST. 125.

Class 43 British Locomotives.

Please do not get upset, when I refer to these engines by that class. Because with the reclassification we tend to associate 43 as the old Warship engines.

The HST (High speed train) came out of the experimental class of advanced tilt technology and the 125 intercity was Britain's first high speed diesel a successful leap into the future.These were the first steps into the concept of the Channel tunnel trains or Eurostar.

These HST were built by BREL/PAXMAN at Crew works between 1975 to 1982, they are powered by MTU engine of 1565kW, 2250hp at 1500 rpm. Weight was 70.25 ton, with a top speed of 125mph. Continuous traction speed is just over 64 mph.

Since then they have been rebuilt to give them at least another forty years running life and in that process were re-numbered. Officially they are now Class 43/2.

They are much liked and remain a quality high speed train. They also carry many famous name plates and several have been fitted with cameras for work as departmental measuring train.

Emergency Service.

Fire, Police, Ambulance Services.

We are on the eve of 911, when terrorists flew four commercial airliners into three major buildings in the United States of America. The Twin towers in Manhattan, New York and the Pentagon in the capital Washington DC.

This was a day when the emergency services of any nation would be put to the limit. Reports after reports said 'that there was a failure in organization on the day.' A historical factor with the fire Department, which had not been resolved for over 100 years, lead to allowing their pride and competition to block off a determined effort to co-ordinate with other services. 

In Britain, there is co-ordination between services even in traffic incidents. Different agencies have all had to pull together to co-ordinate with each other. Much has been learned since 911, Madrid, Bali and 7/7, that we live in a different world of mass terror now. But also people are not as freindly or patient as they were much better maybe at one time.