onetrack

The additional lamp post repair is going to look cheap as compared to that wing repair. I hope they have a good insurance company.

It appears the European airports use the taxiway width marking system. I guess the Americans consider any EU system to be highly deficient.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/search/eham/@52.2997218,4.7557522,171m/data=!3m1!1e3

A Qatar B777-200 cargo aircraft. Nothing that a couple of million won't fix, I guess! I saw where all 4 aircrew got fired on the spot.

The taxiway they were on has a width limit of 36M, a bit short of the 61M wingspan of the B777-200.

You'd think the airport would paint the width on the taxiway to reduce the risk of errors, but maybe that would conflict with other numbering systems.

......then the handle came away in his hand! Never to fear, he could still bale out, because he still had adequate height. So he pocketed his trusty .45 Colt, slid the canopy back, reached up with both arms and grabbed the top of the windshield with both hands (as he'd been taught), and pulled himself out into the slipstream, and threw himself over the side of the fuselage.

He went tumbling down, over and over, until he spreadeagled himself and stabilised his fall - then, as he went to reach for the parachute ripcord, he realised to his horror, that.......

(Re Cappys breathtaking Afghanistan news item above, it truly is staggering, that the wearing of a simple turban instead of a baseball cap, could turn a simple former speedway aficionado and truck salesman, into a fearsome terrorist of world renown. Please tell us this isn't true, and there has been a dreadful reporting error, because Cappy has been relying on a combination of Al Jazeera and SkyNews journalists for his intelligence reports, and as we all know, putting "Intelligence" and "News Journalists" into the same sentence, is one of the greatest oxymorons produced since Trump uttered "truthful hyperbole".....)

"........'44 (that's 1944, not 1844, he added), I was assigned to a base located on an Island just a few hundred NM's from Darwin (modesty prevents me from naming that Island, or the base, in case innocent parties are caught up in a backlash, he added), where it was my job to undertake routine daily reconnaissance runs in the base duty aircraft, a very tired Wirraway."

"Now, I realise many of the younger generations here have no idea what a Wirraway is, but I can tell you, it was regarded as a very substandard fighting aircraft by many, but in my capable hands, it was a formidable fighting machine! I'm only advising you of this, as my story involves myself in this lone Wirraway, 500 fanatical remnant Japanese soldiers on this island, and no less than THREE attacking Japanese Zeros!"

The audience went deathly quiet as they realised, here was a reticent WW2 veteran with a previous unacknowledged story of valour and possible awards - if only someone in authority, had known about Cappys amazing adventure, that was about to be revealed.

"The afternoon went like this", said Cappy. "I took off into towering thunderstorms, typical of that era, and I had to fly at 50 feet to even have a modest chance of seeing where I was going. Further to that, I had been advised, just prior to takeoff, that.........

Spacey, you sound a bit confused. De Havilland didn't build the Dakota, Douglas Aircraft Company built it. Did you mean some other model of De Havilland, or did you confuse the manufacturer of the Dakota?

I've never had the pleasure of a ride in a Dakota, but I've ridden in a Caribou DHC-4, and in a Fairchild C-123 Provider - both P&W radial-engine powered, and rough as guts! The Caribou's slow speed was a great way to view the countryside, though!

When I was a mining contractor, in the early 1990's, a large and reputable mining equipment supplier, that had recently undergone a major business expansion, expanded their workshop to recondition the large diesel engines used in their equipment - work which had previously been carried out by independent engine reconditioners.

Within a matter of weeks, the company had blown-up engines returned to them in numbers that were totally unacceptable. An inquiry was initiated to find out the reason, or reasons, for the reconditioned engine failures.

The inquiry revealed that the reconditioned engine re-assembly was haphazard - with mechanics starting on one component re-assembly, being diverted to other jobs, leaving the re-assembly incomplete - and others who took over the engine component re-assembly, unsure or presumptuous as to what the other engine fitter had done, or not done.

The company initiated new workshop repair procedures where a component was fully re-assembled by the one person, without interruption - and as each fastener was torqued to specifications, it was marked with a cross with white paint marker - and the marking and tightening was verified physically by another person.

The result was a reduction in reconditioned engine failures to almost zero. All it took was proper procedures for checking and verification to be put in place, and the chances of engine failure dropped away to barely-measureable levels.

Don't tell me that numbers of aviators have crashed simply because they didn't sight loose nuts? - or that they even installed nuts, and didn't address whether they had the ability to come loose or not?

I was under the impression that was a very basic part of building kit aircraft and flying, ensuring that fasteners had no ability to come unscrewed in flight.

I can remember a bloke with a microlight at Beverley, W.A. in the 1980's - he took off with the fuel tank tap in the "off" position. He got up to about 100-150 feet, and then dived straight back down again, when the engine stopped. The result was fatal.

The kicker to the story? The bloke was a former crash investigator for BASI! He'd probably examined the wreckage of dozens of aircraft, where the pilot made simple errors - not realising he would become a victim of his own simple error!

When I first spotted the Palmyra name, it brought up memories of its namesake airfield, on a coral atoll in the middle of the Pacific Ocean .....

http://www.airfields-freeman.com/HI/Airfields_W_Pacific.htm#palmyra

Bruce, both are available in PDF format. But they aren't cheap.

https://baselegaviation.com/store/

If you're using o-rings in contact with petrol, you're better off to use Viton/Fluorocarbon o-rings, rather than Nitrile/Buna-N o-rings, as Viton o-rings are more durable.

https://www.nes-ips.com/viton-vs-nitrile-o-rings/

I must be one of the lucky ones, then. I sell a few items a month on eBay, and use Australia Post to deliver most of the items (used to use Sendle a bit, but they got too dear) - and I've never had an Australia Post parcel go missing in 22 years of buying and selling on eBay. I do like to have tracking on parcels, this is a big help, but quite a few of the items I sell fit in a "large letter" size, where tracking isn't available, and none of them have ever gone missing, either.

I send items all the time from W.A. to East Coast places, and some are as remote as Cattle Stations.

I have had a couple of items disappear with USPS, though. One was a brand new camera. But the seller refunded my payment in full. I have had a specially-ordered toner cartridge destroyed by over-zealous Australian Customs officers, who put a knife through the toner cartridge! - releasing superfine black powder everywhere!! They simply taped it up and sent it on - leaving me to find a totally useless toner cartridge.

I've had a couple of foolish Americans send me unasked-for vegetable material - one sent items in a used fruit box, and Customs hit the roof! The other American grew garlic, and thought he'd send me free samples!

Once again, the Customs people chucked a fit. I explained that in both cases, I didn't request anything of plant or vegetable origin, so I escaped with just a lecture by letter.

If I had a dollar for every aviation startup that "will be in production this year", I'd be a rich man. Many have promised to be in production for decades, and still have little to show for all the hype.

There's no new, groundbreaking technology in the Heron engine - just a smaller version of the big turboprops.

Despite the hype and glitzy marketing, it's the things these companies constantly fail to mention - as regards certification, long-term reliability testing, and fuel economy - that you have to ask awkward questions about - and get real answers.

No turboprop engine has ever been produced that could be called "fuel efficient", and fuel efficiency is what gains you sales in todays world.

Too much "teaser" marketing, and a total lack of company information or information about the people behind the project, to give it much weight at present.

You might as well throw your spare coin into some upstart cryptocurrency, instead of laying down deposit money for a Heron turboprop, the risk is about the same level.

Nothing in their advertising or website even reveals where they're located, but the phone number country code indicates Greece. Massive secrecy about your corporate structure, location and operations isn't a good look.

https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/news/2021/03/09/start-up-enginemaker-testing-130-shp-mini-turboprop-engine/

Passports don't get lost in the mail, they generally get stolen. Passports are gold for crims, just like new credit cards in the mail. I'm surprised both these items aren't sent by registered and signed-for mail.

US$299 is around AU$430. Most blokes wouldn't bat an eyelid at forking out that amount, to purchase a new kitchen aid, to keep the better half happy. You can't even buy a half-decent new mobile phone for that kind of money.

Q hasn't gained any more friends amongst its pax, with another major stuff-up when flights from Broome/Pt Hedland/Newman stopped at Geraldton, because they couldn't land in the fog at Perth airport.

The pax just got dumped in the terminal with bugger-all support, couldn't even get their warm clothing off the aircraft. Good one, Q!

Perhaps one day Allan Joyce will realise how little support Q has got left - from both pax and employees.

Q must be using some ancient aircraft on the Northern W.A. run, if the ones they use don't have CAT III landing abilities - or if the pilots on this run don't have the CAT III qualifications.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-07-27/passengers-sleep-at-geraldton-airport-terminal/101272948

The most amazing boat and refuelling exercise I've ever encountered, was when the Missus and I were touring around Fremantle Harbour one afternoon, I think it was about 1991. Suddenly, we spotted this humungous boat - all plastic fantastic and futuristic styling, complete with massive satellite dish and gleaming gold fittings everywhere. Absolutely awed, we walked over to inspect it. It was the "Oceana C", the just freshly built, 55M runabout for the Sultan of Brunei!

I watched ga-ga as a bloke hung onto a 100mm fuel hose that was ticking over a litre meter that currently read about 60,000 litres! I asked the bloke how much fuel it took, and what was powering it?

He said, "It takes 83,000 litres, and there's 2 engines producing 7,000HP, driving 2 KaMeWa waterjets. We're doing the delivery run! We have to fuel up again in Exmouth, then across to Christmas Island, and fuel up again, then we've got just enough to reach Brunei!"

I said to the bloke, "I guess it helps to own a large number of oil wells if you want to run something like this!" He just grinned - Oceanfast did very well, out of that little order!

https://www.superyachttimes.com/yachts/oceana-i

Kalgoorlie has been used more than once as an alternative when things went pear-shaped at Perth - usually really bad fog. But now Perth has Cat III, so fog is no major problem now for the heavies. But Kal is not exactly close to Perth.

I think Cunderdin is also an alternative? I'm amazed at the number of huge, long sealed runways that have appeared in the North of W.A. as the miners install their own major airports, in some pretty remote spots!

Nah, anyone who supports the wrong football club has to immediately be suss - there's something seriously wrong with that bloke! 

When I'm approaching strangers doing something wrong, I assess the situation as regards that persons physical appearance - and whether that physical appearance might mean that the person reacts to mild chiding, in an abusive and possibly violent or vicious reaction, that involves a personal physical attack. So, yes, sorry to say, I sum up people by their appearance, based on their typical racial record.

However, I've been wrong, I was attacked once in a vicious murderous manner by a young white male, when I tried to stop him assaulting his female partner in the street. I only escaped a murderous attack by retreating to my vehicle and making a getaway, while he ran alongside me for 400M, trying to attack me in the vehicle. He really was a piece of work, and I only realised the type I'd accidentally encountered, when 3 carloads of police rolled up to arrest him. 

......grinned from ear to ear. This was more like the real country life he enjoyed. He opened the gun cabinet, and carefully inspected all 28 firearms he owned, stroking his chin while deep in thought.

There must be some way he could mount at least 17 of the weapons on his Drifter, to end up with it looking like a miniature XB-40 - something the rabbits would squeal in terror at, the instant they sighted it, let alone feel the flying lead coming from it, as CT dive-bombed every rabbit burrow, or every group of constantly-fornicating rabbits he spotted. Finally, he knew what he was going to do. He set up......

That's a definite Yes - and it gets worse as you get older.

Despite the current hatred of Q, I don't think its correct to blame Q management for the fuel mayday call - fuel management and uploading is up to the Captain, is it not?

The problem was simply major congestion at Perth, meaning that number of aircraft were being put into a holding pattern to try and manage the arrivals in a professional manner.

When the crew of the Q flight were advised that they were going to be put into a holding pattern that was going to be at least 16 mins, the crew then realised they would then be landing with below the stipulated minimum fuel reserves of 40 mins fuel. So they had little choice but to declare a fuel emergency.

The fuel Mayday call is a contentious issue, but all the crew of the Q flight were doing was following stipulated procedures.

It's a long way from the East Coast to the West Coast, and no doubt fuel use must be managed carefully, especially when you understand they're more often than not running against the jetstream, and they're also fairly regularly running into adverse weather.

Now there's another reason not to go electric! The batteries don't reduce in weight, as you complete your trip! - unlike your liquid fuel!