Winged Heroes

[Tizer]

The US military playing at Star Wars! An F-35 fighter will be pitted against the drone fighter. I notice Elon Musk says: "The F-35 would have no chance against it" - so I hope the F-35 wins! (As you'll guess, I don't like Musk.)
`Combat drone to compete against piloted plane' LINK

[Whyperion]

Is the drone fully automatic? The obvious is to attempt an unexpected manovoevre within the Drone Software by the pilot thereby gaining an aircraft advantage. in theory though should not two drones against each always result in stalemate - a bit like pitting two chess computers against each other ? The only Drone v Drone advantage would be one with a better processing power or a numeric advantage.

[plaques]

Not my idea of catching a flight. These people are crazy. Flying Two minute YouTube.

[Stanley]

Couldn't agree more Ken. Certifiable.

[Whyperion]

Should we note, in slightly foggy conditions RAF Lakenheath: US fighter jet crashes into North Sea At time of writing I have no report of finding of craft or pilot . F-15C Eagle, from the 48th Fighter Wing at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, crashed shortly after 09:30 BST while on a training mission.

[PanBiker]

I though pilots now had GPS beacons? In which case it should be easy enough to find him. If not, why not in this day and age? I can tell to within a foot or so where I am anywhere on the planet with my mobile phone.

[Whyperion]

Speed probably. Alas Aircraft found, and Pilot, both in irrepairable condition.

[Tizer]

I'm hoping this video will be available - I watched it but when went back I copied the link to paste it here I find the page is there but the video is blank...
`HMS Queen Elizabeth: On board the Royal Navy's new aircraft carrier' LINK
`For the first time, British and American jets are flying together, as they launch from the Royal Navy's new aircraft carrier. It's the final exercise for HMS Queen Elizabeth, before the carrier sets sail in early 2021 for its first operational deployment. The BBC's defence correspondent, Jonathan Beale, was invited on board..'.

Viewing the video of F-35s landing vertically made me wonder why they didn't take off vertically. After some searching I found this forum page which explains why: LINK

[Stanley]

I know I am a cynical old fart but I don't find that video in the lest reassuring (It played BTW). I assume that that was the intention in inviting the BBC on board. 'Eggs in one basket' comes to mind. I look back at the strategies in place at the beginning of WW2, the navy was still in Battleship mode even though their day had passed. There are many references to generals preparing to fight the battles of the last war, my question is whether what we look at is exactly this. One hypersonic missile could be enough to shatter illusions.
But what the hell do I know about it.

[Tizer]

The US is already making the changes in response to China's missile threat. It's scrapping it's giant nuclear-powered carriers in favour of small versatile warships. But Russia and China are still building bigger ones.

[Stanley]

One of the big problems we have is that we have never fully accepted the fact that the days of empire and gunboat diplomacy have long gone. Britain is now a second tier nation, still important but not because of size and strength. The sooner we accept it the better, we need a well equipped efficient defence force where the emphasis is on quality not size. Go and dig into defence procurement and maintenance of assets and the same picture emerges in every area, deterioration caused by lack of investment in the day to day things. The available money is going into 'glamorous' vanity projects like mega-carriers and jets at £70million apiece. Meanwhile married quarters rot, numbers of personnel fall and day to day matters fail. Look at the problems with mental health in old squaddies and weep.

[Stanley]

This is aviation related but definitely not Winged Heroes. See THIS three week old report from the NY Times, it slipped me in the fog of Covid. Worth reading, it is totally damning of the culture and management at Boeing just as they are moving towards towards recertification at long last. Question is, has anything changed? Could you trust the Max or Being itself?
They are nowhere near out of the woods yet. What will other country's certification authorities decide? With the recession in air travel does anyone need the planes back in service?

[Tizer]

Delegation of certification to manufacturers....now why does that make me think of Grenfell Tower, I wonder.

[Stanley]

Exactly Peter, it was a situation wide open to abuse. I see also that many airlines are refusing to accept 787s made at the new plant in Florida. Too many instances of bad build standards. Meanwhile Boeing are considering closing the Washington plant, many think due to it being unionised. A company heading the wrong way I think.

[Tizer]

Another nail in Trump's political coffin!

[Stanley]

Reading between the lines the root of the problem at Boeing is that they got a new CEO who made no bones about the fact he was going to 'shake the company up and bring it into profit'. He did that but on the way damaged the ethos which had been so successful with some wonderful planes. Good engineering and safety standards lost the battle against profits and dividends for the shareholders. The result is a disaster, made worse of course by the general recession in the industry due to the pandemic.
I can't help keep going back to the fact that for decades we have been told that 'cheap' business travel and face to face meetings was essential. The pandemic has damaged that concept with modern communications supplanting old fashioned travel with all its inconveniences and expense. Will the glory days ever return?

[Tizer]

Biden has a different approach to Russia, compared with Trump...
`US bombers deployed to Arctic skies from Norway base' LINK

[Stanley]

I look at something like that and think of the cost..... Human beings aren't fit to run a toffee shop let alone a planet!

[Tizer]

I chanced on `Trev Clark's Obscure Aviation History Page' this morning. Here's a couple of photos to wet your appetite!...

[Stanley]

Wonderful Peter. Love the Ford Major as well, definitely my era. Would the date be around 1954?

[Tizer]

Clark's caption says `On this day, 59 years ago..' and the post is only days old so I make it 1962. I did a search and confirmed it through this web page: LINK
The pilot was badly injured but survived to fly again. I liked the bit where it says he was unconscious but was `woken by jets of cold water from the greenhouse's sprinkler system'!

[PanBiker]

From a picture composition point of view I would think that the one of the Lightning with the farmer and tractor in front is a perfect example of being in the right place at the right time. Pilot was lucky though, no doubt about that!

[Stanley]

That's what I thought was one of the most remarkable things about the affair.

[Tizer]

We watched a TV programme last night about the Avro Lancaster bomber. It mentioned about it being developed from the twin-engine (RR Vulture) Avro Manchester and showed some old photos. What caught my eye was that one photo showed an aircraft with 4 engines that looked like the Lancaster but it had three tail fins. Both the Lancaster and the Manchester had only two tail fins, so I guessed the three-fin plane was a Lancaster prototype. Looked on google this morning and found that to be true, as shown in this web page: LINK They tried the plane with three small fins but settled on two large outer fins instead.

I also noticed that twice the programme showed Lancaster designer Roy Chadwick with his colleagues in an office discussing a polished solid wood model plane on the desk. Although it was implied that this was a model of the Lancaster prototype I could see it was the Avro York design which was to be a transport plane. A bit of furtling this morning reveals that they were planning the design of both these planes in parallel but the York got put on hold for 2 years due to the need to concentrate on bombers and that's why the York (although it had three tail fins) is usually thought to be a follow on development from the Lancaster. The model is shown in this web page (no: LINK

[PanBiker]

I finished off my remembrance cross distribution at Gill this afternoon. I only had my this years "not founds" to set up in the cemetery and churchyard and for the two lads who are in the lower overgrown part of the churchyard. It was plain when I got down there this morning that there was a funeral assembling. I had a quick look and the internment was going to be in the churchyard. I set up the ones in the cemetery and nipped down to the bottom of the churchyard for the two commemorated down there. I could see the grave was prepared quite near to the tree where I always set the crosses up. So I decided to come away until after lunch.

Sally has the car on Wednesday afternoon for Silsden grandma duties and dog walking. I got her to drop me off at the start of Gill Lane. I walked down and sorted the Churchyard crosses. Blades were just finalising tidying the grave site. On my way walking back I took the opportunity of photographing the local Yarn Faries creation for the post box outside the Rolls Bankfield factory which is why I have posted in here.