THE BRITISH THREAD II

Horses for courses I told you, Spendy. We need North Sea expertise here.

Italian specialities are grand opera, fast cars and la dolce vita.

Well, and Italy is famous for this special navy diving unit which is known as the precursor of modern Naval Special Forces, founded before WWI

If I'm not mistaken they sank a couple of British battleships in Alexandria harbor in 1941 using one man submarines.

We should remember that McTag is a Scot and must uphold the national tradition.

I think Spendi's last observations about the actual factors influencing the selection of cruise ship captains may be apt.

It seems, as if this really is more than a bit British/English centered - especially, when you look additionally at this comment.
Most victims are Germans, most passengers were Germans (and our tabloid printed reports of 'German heroes' as well).

I think it's stupid to start kindergarten games about this tragedy.

The captain made (at least) three fatal mistakes - missed the turn after the "showboating", didn't slow down afterwards, and most fatally didn't ran the ship aground on the (sandy) beach.

It will take some time until we really know, who was responsible of what.
But it won't take as long as that until the last victims are found.

The Express really is a foul paper, owned by a pornographer.

I know: in the 60's, my guest-parents didn't want me to buy it - so I made my experiences with this paper already then (of course I got it )

This is quite an intersting article on how the disaster affects the national psyche.



http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/18/costa-concordia-hero-villain-italy?INTCMP=SRCH

As someone remarked on one of the maritime blogs: "Cruise ships run into rocks and reefs on a semi-frequent basis, but most passengers survive."

Just recently an US cruise ship did so, too.

Personally, I've always tried to avoid larger rocks and reefs when I run my ship aground .... but that was a landing craft

According to the CBC, sorry no links, this is the 3rd time this ship has run aground. Apparently, on it's maiden voyage, when it came time to christen her, the champagne bottle failed to shatter. Bad tidings I guess...

Lots of details remain unclear, including how much time elapsed from the initial grounding to the fatal list, (from the available commentary it was at least 30 minutes, and exactly where the grounding occurred (though it appears the ship hit the rocks on the small island to starboard of the narrow channel through which ot passed on a northerly course inbound to the harbor). Despite these information deficiencies I find the examination of the available details in an attempt to figure out what happened quite intriguing.

The distance from that channel to the seawall where the ship came to rest is about one kilometer. It's a safe bet the ship was doing at least 12 kts going through the narrow channel between the island outcroppings - anything less would have been real madness in such a vessel. At 12 Kts that distance would be covered in about 3 minutes. One photo I saw of the damaged hull looked like a deep puncture in the hull - suggesting perhaps that the ship had an easterly (starboard) component of velocity when it grounded. This could have been the result of an uncompensated offshore wind that drove the ship on the rocks or the swing of the hull in a late port turn to avoid imminent grounding.

The captain was quoted as saying he let go of the port anchor to dissipate the ship's headway and swing the ship around the anchor leaving the damaged starboard side towards the shore. If so, this was an intelligent maneuver and one that probably saved many lives. I'm not sure there really are any "sandy shallow slope beaches" on the island, or indeed that the ship could have turned 90 degrees to port in the available space with any appreciable headway. The reports all cite darkness and at least a partial loss of electrical power on the ship, some time before the fatal list occurred. These vessels have steerable external "pods" enclosing the electrically powered motors that drive the ship. It is possible that the ship suffered a cascading loss of electrical power after the grounding, disabling at least some of its propulsive power. It is also believable that one or more of the steerable propulsion pods was literally scraped off the hull in the grounding, perhaps inducing the electrical failure.

The deep part of the very narrow channel through which the ship passed is hardly two or three times the underwater beam of the ship. Had they not taken this route, we can be sure the accident would not have occurred with nearly 100% certainty. Taking a high freeboard vessel like that through such a passage adjacent to a hilly island with all the attendant variable winds and currents was foolhardy in the extreme, and -in my view - sufficient reason to replace the captain, even if no grounding occurred. His failure to directly supervise the maneuver greatly exacerbated the failure, and suggests a grave lack of seriousness about his central responsibilities. The reportsd that this and other company vessels had done this repeatedly before, merely confirms that (1) if one repeatedly takes a 5% chance of loosing the ship for virtually no benefit, one will eventually lose a ship, and (2) there is a serious problem with the company's management.

Thank you, George.

In a lengthy conversation between Lord Justice Leveson and the Director General of the BBC at the enquiry into Media ethics, which has been going on for two months, it was agreed that neither of these august gentleman has any idea what to do.

I get a good impression of Leveson and it's unlikely he would want to show his hand at this early juncture. Ian Hislop was good last week, wouldn't you say?

I think that when Leveson has heard all the evidence, he will come out with something sound; quite like what we have now, but with penalties.

Will Rebekah Brooks appear? I don't like that woman.

Another punt into the long grass eh?

They can't, maybe daren't, see the real problem Mac. Not enough gentleman are being produced who not only would not tap peoples phones but have, in the past, given their lives to defeat those who would.

If media is staffed by rats what else do we expect? Rats are rats.

What, other than cynicism, could possibly have resulted from Darwin?

I can't stand the sight of wanker Hislop.

You cheeky sod. It's an Inquiry- Leveson is supposed to be gathering information, and probing witnesses. He's not about to make policy on the hoof, is he?
Or have I missed another one of your obscure points?

I think Private Eye fulfils a useful function, is rarely wrong, and breaks many a story ahead of the mainstream rags. More power to Mr Hislop's pen.

I have a few hundred old PEs Mac. From the old days of course. As soon as Ingrams left so did I. I packed in Punch when Mr Boothroyd retired.

I'm beginning to see a connection between the controversial proposals to cap welfare benefits and the efficiency of domestic appliances and high class convenience nutrient.

Remember Shirley Porter.

As I said Mac, Lord Justice Leveson and the DG of the BBC concluded that they couldn't see a policy.

I might suggest that phone tapping be treated in the same way as gun crime.

Would you care to expand on that?

I think that most people would agree that the welfare benefits system is unwieldy and bloated. Maybe because they read The Daily Express and The Mail. Egregious examples of large families on housing benefits are frequently quoted. How frequent they are is hard to assess.

All these enormous welfare payments aren't going to claimants, they're going to landlords. How about a cap on rent?

Or one for goals at St. Mary's.