Truckers n Trucking.

The current life-Line?

Road transport remains the essential way of moving goods around the place, between the rails and the sea ports! We may joke about white van man or woman, but much of what is being sold on-line at this time is coming through these poorly paid self-employed workers?

Throughout each country there are a host of distribution centres, some handle dry goods, electricals, while others are supermarket factories that turn out their branded products? There are also many regional medical and pharmaceutical centres that process or store essential medication and equipment!

At this time our motorways and roads are busy with the fleets of trucks that usually travel at night but now all the time. With the introduction of more electric vehicles, one supposes that in the next few years the familiar will be withdrawn and maybe even road trains might become more popular, currently one occasionally might see a funfair convoy of truck and mobile home and the Dutch truckers use split trailers?

Wasteful Carbon Emissions!

Moving Scrap?

Here in Wales one lives in the view of the massive sprawling TATA-Europe steel works and yet two miles away ships are taking filed down scrap metals to Northern Spain for recycling? To me this is just complete madness, despite companies making a profit from it!

Out government recently cancelled the M4 relief road or Motorway from Newport, Gwent to Cardiff in SE-Wales for some tag poles, while a plethora of new road links are popping up around the city to spoil the countryside and relieve the terrible congestion with most of this being planned for the westside, when it is really needed on the east side and connection to the new Severn crossing to and from England?

Much is claimed by the Europeans about what they want done, but when you see bottled water being moved by train and all the above you have to wonder who is telling the truth or just having a laugh with the naïve?

Brazil and the Amazonas!

Native Transport?

Brazil is in the media at this time for all the wrong reasons in relation to the destruction of the Amazon forest by burning, but there remains a serious drought in the region and much lightening activity something missed by the media reporting?

The natives of the region have adopted the motorbike as the best means to access the forest for its natural resources of crops and other fruits! Trucks carry a variety of products and not just timber from A to B through some extremely difficult terrain even at the best of times.

Brazil is a very modern nation with a successful arms industry and its aviation outlet Embraer, now selling commercial aircraft world-wide! But the ability to adopt some Indian style transport is clever something that has not as yet come to the fore in many other developing countries?

Roads? Part-One.

Paths to Roman Roads!

In times past there were not many roads anywhere in the world, most people moved along pathways through forest and swamp, while others travelled by boat on the sea, rivers and lakes of various types?

Important trade routes were the roads of the day and mostly used by the wealthy and merchants selling their wares? The Romans were the first to build roads that networked their cities and settlements, since they were very much into communications and needed to move their armies around the country, where there was no access to big rivers!

What was left after them was still being used up to this day, across Europe and the Middle-East. But the steam engine changed our world two-hundred years ago with the speed of travel and the ability to go through tunnels.

The German auto-ban or Motorway was the big 20th Century revolution in relation to the car, and after 1946 this has been the choke filled way to travel! More money today is spent on building and widening new roads and any other form of travel!

Engineering, Maintenance and Building. Part-one.

Railways need cared For!

Every railroad or way around the world has a dedicated fleet of rolling stock to cater for all engineering types work, from general maintenance to rebuilding sections that are outdated. 

Millions is spent each year on the upgrading of rail track, signals and preventing flooding? Every country has many different situations in realtion to climate from ice and snow to desert!

Much humour is made about wet leaves on the lines in the fall, but to some systems this is serious in relation to wheel slippage. Older trains are more prone to this problem, but it is hoped that the newer types of rail alignment and layout of the track sleepers willin the future not happen again.

Engineering trains were once the speciality of each company or country meeting the local needs or costs, but now that a standard fleet is available such as Bombardiers and Plieser's track machines and they can be exported around the world.

Snow Patrol. Part-One.

Vehicle Adaptions.

There is money in snow, one has only to ask the Swiss, French and Austrians! 

Many vehicles have been adapted to work in snowy conditions, while many more have been specifically designed to operate all the time. Caterpillar tracks have the great advantage over the wheel in moving through snow and ice, but there is much more to this area than one might think!

Many vehicles can be fitted with snow ploughs and they have a limited use in clearing roads to rails, but the problems only start when the snow freezes and is extremely difficult to shift. Many early types started life as military vehicles (British Army Viking) and are now standard civilian vehicles used in a huge variety of ways from utility to scientific research.

Skies work great, when the surface is flat and smooth with many aircraft and helicopters being capable of operations in high mountains and winter flying conditions. Kamov Ka-32

Tugboats. Part-Three.

Gas/Oil Rig Support Tugs.

These are perhaps some of the largest tugs that are in operation today around the world, they perform the moving of Rig platforms from builder shipyard to deployment for drilling in their various fields. Recently two tugs of this class came from the west of Ireland Bellmullet Gas field to Swansea Bay, the Mainport Ash and the Sentinel Star.

In recent filming one can compare the sizes of these vessels compared to the local Svitzer tugboats who deal with Bulk Carriers in and out of the Port Talbot roads, serving the TATA steel works.


This is where the money is today in tugboat work from large shipping to the oil and gas industry. I noticed in a recent TV programme that India was still using the older steam tugboats, that Britain had in the 1950s. 

Meanwhile some of the former Svitzer Tugs have now been sold to the Ukraine and are operating in the Black Sea from Odessa.