Signal Complexities!

 There is more to Train Driving?

Understanding your road (Track) is only the beginning of a more complex observation and trust in the signal control centers is the start of being a driver, wither passenger, underground or freight!

The driver must be watching and have good eyesight to obstacles on the road, from engineering workers, to the public and criminal activity, while speeds must be kept to, there are changes at times that have to be heeded?

On the Tube, Metro, Underground there may be slightly different rules, but crossing tracks is out of the control of the drivers and today much of it is in the hands of automation and now A.I. and in the near future more driver less trains will be in service all over the place!

Automation came in because of human error, due to being slack, lazy, but more likely tiredness and the actions leading to serious accidents from the introduction of railways and the underground?

Water Sports!

 Not near the Sea?

Since many people do not live near the sea, they have to find a alternative such as rivers, lakes and reservoirs that are the next best thing for small dinghies, water boarding and canoeing many other types and they are very popular!, 

Perhaps because in some cases they are safer, but on lakes and rivers currents do remain a danger to paddle boards and rafters, even in controlled environments, when errors of judgement are made?

Jet skiing and many motors sports can be done on a lake are worth the practice before doing on the sea and that applies to all the above since the sea is unpredictable than being flat calm in some cases!

Helicopters SAR and Civil!

 Search and Rescue and Civilian Usage?

Many helicopters most people think are for rich people who want privacy in travel, but they are wrong since many are used to ferry workers to our oil and gas rigs in the north sea and from time to time island communities in Scotland and the Scilley off Cornwall, Rathlin off N-Ireland and many other places to!

Helicopters are now common as air ambulances, saving may lives and transporting sick people over great distance from hospital to hospital apart of traffic and work incidents? 

Small types to large ones are employed in these essential roles in our modern world, getting over mountains and water are some of the key aspects of their roles!

Others are used by the national grid in relations to getting engineers to remote places to repair power lines after storms and bad weather, if not civil disturbances and deliberate acts of vandalism

 Meanwhile many are being replaced in some areas of work by drones, that are cheaper and can go places helicopters cannot, but they will also provide services in cities to move donor/ harvesting materials, blood samples and other, which cuts out getting stuck in traffic?

Other machines provide a taxi services for racing jockeys and moving materials that may be urgent for one reason or another and they also come in varied sizes!

The most common types in the U.K. Are the Airbus H135/145, Bell 207, Leonardo A189, 109, 139 and others in the family, the Airbus H225 is mostly deployed to gas and oil rigs and fitted out for 30-+, while the Sikorsky S-76 is the most popular air taxi and the S-92 for search and rescue?

Sailing remains a popular sport and Activity!

 Classic sail ships are the pride of many navies?

Many uses for sail ships have been found over the years in young peoples self-improvement programms and other leisure activities, apart from training naval crews in discipline and other!

Maintaining is one aspect of them, but rebuilding has also lead to many construction mistakes in the deign and at other times success in discovering new things that were lost?

Modern sail yachts are the state of the art today with the demands of better vessels for racing and others being sold on for avid sailors and for pleasure, if not also featuring in many movies and other!

Keeping the classics Going?

 How many aircraft and machines can be kept!

We all as nations and groups want to keep as much as we can to record 20th Century history, but can this collecting, restoration and re-builds be kept up!

So far many restorers and private collectors may eventually pass on to museum collections, but others would want to sell and recover assets for the work that they have done on their respective projects?

Many early aircraft of the first twenty years of human flight are now re-builds and are flying, adding some adventure to those basic and limited days and this come on our current electric revolution!

Vulnerability at Sea?

 Oil and gas tankers, hijacked and hit by Missiles!

With the current situation developing now between Iran and the U,S, revenge for the overnight attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities is putting the Hormuz strait and others in danger of being blocked and shipping lost, but revenge may come in the loss of aircraft and British interest as much in the region, if not in our own lands?

Shipping is large and hard to protect, this has been seen in the Red and Arabian seas already with the Houthis and earlier by Somali pirates, but now Iran has long range tentacles and they will use them to cause economic disaster on the world markets, if they want too with loss of life and limb!

Security guards will not be able to deal with missile attacks, they can prevent hijacking and maybe take down a few drones, arming ships with anti-aircraft weapons would make them military vessels and not civilian?

South-Wales Super Tram!

 Cardiff is to be the hub for new valleys Expansion?

The vision of the road rail tram is nothing new, but all the Welsh valleys are to be connected to the capital and then as a city wide tram service, breaking with the dependence of rail stock that is much of the time out of date and not reliable?

Now that the coal industry is gone and that there is a demand for a cleaner environment in the valleys and Cardiff city this new system will be much cleaner and serve more communities and new builds all over S/SE-Wales, with the potential to keep expanding it, if needs be!

Ireland's railway expansion and new Stock!

 Re-opining old lines with re-fits and the new 9000 Stock? 

Ireland is moving on with many improvements and connections to its system, the re-building of Kent street station in Cork city and the line open to Middleton has brought more business!

Meanwhile the line from Limerick to Galway, via Shannon airport also much ease and options to travel without the need of roads and now moving on to Galway via Taum for Clairemorris another new connection.

But it is the ageing stock on the DART Dublin area rapid transport that needs upgrading with the new trains to replace the German and Japanese stock!

Fun fare Disasters!

Bad maintenance and Negligence?

Most of us have been to a fun fair, circus or a pleasure park to enjoy the latest rides and the thrill of fear!

But when these rides go wrong fear of falling out of your chair from a height or being crushed is another matter of real fear and probable death?

The more complex the ride is the harder it is to maintain it and areas will be overlooked and not deliberately, since this is a family business that has to make the owners their worth of time and effort!

Many people still believe that show people are travelers or Gypsies, but they are seasonal contractors who entertain the public during the summer months.

There is a plethora of machines on the market, with new one coming out every year and contractors visit sites across the country to view and buy or sell older ones on to others who cannot afford the latest?

China cancels all new Boeing Orders!

 Hitting back at U.S. Tariffs?

Boeing itself could soon become history, because of Chinese rejection of new sales, for more European types such as the Airbus A350-900/100 that is now taking over long-haul operations around the world, but it will be loss of sales of the Boeing 737-MAX-8-200 that will knock the U.S. and the Chinese influences on SE-Asia!

Europe can also offer China their new Airbus A321-200NX to compensate the Boeing MAX and other sales from Russia, with joint developments mean no one will need American aviation in the civil market, and for now the U.S. will just have to depend on the military market for its Jets and systems, but for how long?

The demise of the Boeing 757 from civilian Service!

 Another long running success for Boeing?

What now for the 757, perhaps another ten to fifteen years as freighters before they end up being broken up for parts!

The success of the type was due to its long range and passenger capacity, but not before long it was in competition with the European Airbus A330-300/900 that is still flying and making waves with many airlines around the world?

Boeing still has the 767-400 and the 737-MAX series, but they are not wide bodies and the 777 needs a longer runway than what the 767 needed, with no provision for a replacement as yet, the market is now open to Airbus to introduce a newer A330-900!

Farming Robots!

 Automated Machines Progressing in Agriculture?

Naio Orio is a French company making waves with its 700Kg tool carrier that can work with brassicas and carrot and a host of other crops and coming in at 200,000 Euros for the big farmers is a splash in the pan!

Four models are now available working with a Dutch company they can offer a large selection of tools for automated work on the farms and is one of the many break through's that are being made in the field?

Solong Stena Immaculate!

 North Sea Incident?

Deliberate was it negligence or deliberate, one has to wonder and why at this time did it happen with the loss of one merchantman and two ships the SOLONG cargo carrier under a Portugese flag travelling from Scotland to Rotterdam in the Netherlands and Aviation fuel carrier STENA IMMACULATE under a U.S. flag on contract for the United States air force, anchored after arriving from Greece!

What could have been far worse, has not come to fruition as yet, but a danger to wildlife on East-Yorkshire coastline remains to be seen?

It remains unclear what was happening on the bridge of the SOLONG, while the STENA IMMACULATE was on an anchor ten mile east of spurn head and an inquiry will eventually tell us the truth of the matter?

U.S. Leading the way in the new Super-Sonic Age!

 Smaller business class Jets?

Britain, and France lead the way with the one-hundred seat Concorde until a crash in France twenty-five years ago ended a most successful trans-Atlantic affair, meanwhile only Singapore airlines operated the type and the Soviet-Russians operated their Tupolev TU-144 between Moscow and the far east, but the demand was not strong and the type was retired too!

On the other hand the U.S. has gone it alone with several larger Boeing concepts, but this new type will allow a one third version to be built more so for private and business flights and to be employed world wide, the secret to this type is perhaps alternative fuel, speed and operational costs being much lower than the original types?

One will just have to wait and see what will happen, or is this another red herring, pink elephants ect, that we will never see the light of day as so many went before!

Armored Electric?

 Musk has taken the Idea!

But it is not all going his way since one of his Tesla trucks was used in suspected home grown terror attack on a Trump hotel in Las Vegas!

The idea to turn his truck into an armored vehicle looks like a possibility for the future, but one is not sure if he will be the first, since many countries in Europe already have electric versions of utility vehicles and police and other emergency powered by battery?

If the Tesla does become available, then it would have a very limited market, since most countries world-wide still burn petrol and diesel!

Polish Aviation!

 Lots still to Offer?

Poland made a few wise choices when it was part of the Soviet Warsaw pact in that of developing its own aircraft to meet its own military, civil and others middle areas for service and despite a changing world this has continued today with new type of smaller aircraft and adaptions to its newer western jet fighters!

Where it has been successful is in helicopters and agricultural, but now it is moving into the liaison market, with smaller aircraft, the Eagle man, but it is the Sokol helicopter based on the Mil-Mi-4 that just keeps going and is cheaper for many developing countries?

Poland was not very successful developing the Iskra jet trainer, but it did improve its fleet of ageing MIG-17/19 jets with board fairings, something that the Peoples Republic of China followed in!

U.S. Aircraft Carrier hit in Red Sea!

 Trusted Russian media Reports?

Was this the last straw for Joe Biden, when the Houthis had the nerve to strike a U.S. carrier with two ballistic missiles in the northern part of the red sea and strike several other warships putting them out of temporary action!

The Carrier has returned to a undisclosed place for repairs and it is not clear if it has been replaced by another, it would seem that the U.S. defense systems was not able to cope with multiple forms of attack at the same time, so we now know that the U.S. navy is vulnerable at sea?

Apart from holes in the deck of the carrier we do not know how many aircraft, helicopters were lost of damages and how many crew were killed or injured, since when things go bad for the U.S. they refuse to release any information, but with this lack in basic security it is worrying time for the incoming Trump administration that they are weak on many fronts!

Tesla has joined the weapons of Choice!

 For International terrorism with the SUV and the Toyota pickups?

The world is changing for terrorism, the lack to explosives is evident but it is easier to kill people with what you can find in your kitchen and hire a SUV or a Tesla to get you point across mowing down peoples and hearing,  'the snap, crackle and pop!

Wither they kill five or fifteen, its a start on killing many more with a stolen truck as was seen in France and many other places, some incidents could be terror related but are being classed as out of control vehicles rather than deliberate?

In Germany over Christmas a mechanical digger was used to try to demolish a super store and the driver shot dead. Knife crime across the U.K. in cities is now normal and an everyday occurrence with both the police and the government doing their best to play it all down, since they are well protected and the rest of us have to hope for the best!