Old Fart

After all my years of visits to the area, I didn’t realise that the big lump in the sea was a piece of Mulberry Harbour, but the there are some wierd things in your area, particularly at Foulness, including the lines of redundant trains.
I’ve just been googling away and am surprised to see the bits that do survive, I’ve clambered about on the remains at Arromanches, but wasn’t aware of sections surviving in this country, though I remember going on holiday to Southsea in the 50’s and seeing some in Hayling Harbour. Has anyone written a decent book about the surviving sections.

Please don’t tempt fate over Canvey, I know a very nice couple who live there, plus a very ‘up for it’ married slapper who’s anybodies, but I won’t go any further down THAT path.

Yep the USS Richard Montgomery,

She was mooed on the Thames Estuary when the winds and tide changed diarection and she ran aground on the Sheerness middle sands on Sunday 20th August 1944, an attempt to refloat her was due to be made on 5th September 1944 but…

On Thursday 24th August 1944 her welded steel hull cracked and then on Friday 8th September 1944 she finally sucmed and broke her back. An amount of the 6000+ tons of explosives were recoved but an estimated 3200tons remain on the wreck.

Should she blow, the isle of Sheppy would be oblitirated anything left standing swallowed up bt the tidal wave, Southend would suffer considrtable blast damage and flooding from a tidal wave, Canvey would be lost under water with a high risk of the oil refinary being damaged the flood waters would be channeled up river with a large aera along the sides of the Thames flooding.

The govenment will anounce in the next few months what they plan to do with the wreck.

One option is to encase it in concrete, leave it alone the best has to be lift it and move it to deep water, when all along all the experts have said its too dangrous to move…

Wasn’t it carrying bombs for the USAF?
I remember being told that should it go up when there was low cloud overhead, that the resulting fireball would bounce back and take out Canvey.
Many years ago I used to do survey work for BP, which had a refinery at Grain, ( a terrifying place to go round, nasty stuff dripping everywhere ).
One day we had a meeting with some fairly senior management who took us out for a meal and a pint at the local pub, the Montgomery was clearly visible out the window.
When I asked them what their contingency plans were in the event of an emergency, they looked at me in disbelief, yes, they knew it was a wreck, but they had no idea what was onboard, no-one at BP had a clue about the potential danger, in fact, judgeing by their attitude at the time, they thought I was simply winding them up.
Perhaps why they shut down Grain a few years later.
The forts look very surreal, I quite fancy the trip on the Waverley, paddle steamers have a magical quality anyway.
Perhaps ‘Prince Michael’ will move to Shivering Sands, anyone know who owns it, MoD still?

oh dear, the pet shop boys………….

Will they be at Leg-ends?

I’d pay that sort of money to avoid James Blunt, pilot, former war hero, and pall bearer to the Queen Mother, but he’s still a whining git with no perceivable talent who struck lucky.
Don’t take it personally James, you’re just in the wrong job, stick to tanks.
Sorry to go off thread.
Glad you agree MontF, it’s not just me then.

Pete: I’ll take a bet you didn’t get champagne and a classy meal on your £18 ride and I don’t think there is a requirement to wear a dinner jacket, just no jeans allowed. I wonder if a nomex flying suit would ruin the atmosphere!

Depends on the position of the zip.

Champagne and a classy meal was available, ok as an extra, but I preferred to hang out the window at the front with me cans of beer, get eyefulls of smuts, a black, insect encrusted face, and feel the excitement of it all, especially when we hammered through Cambridge and all the divs on the platform ran back in panic.
Cool day out, there’s something about an A-4 pacific at speed when you are only a tender length away, saddo you think, but google and see what they look like, the finest locos ever built anywhere.

I’m not knocking the show or DX, I don’t care whether it was exactly the same stuff every year, I’d still go, I even like shuffling round the stalls as Italian Havard does, some of the gear in there is great, I particularly like the army surplus stuff, there used to be a dealer selling the most amazing uniforms, and they weren’t hideously expensive either, last year they were selling Spetznatz blue and white striped long sleeved tee-shirts for only a tenner, been after a Soviet flag for a while but never found one, not even the see through variety ( it’s OK, I’m only after Russian gear to wind up the Hungarian in-laws )
I do sympathise Stuart, it is expensive to take a family in, I’ve done it myself many times, then the kids get bored being dragged round the hangars, then they want to go on the roundabouts when something special is coming on, then they get bored with generally being there and start to be a pain, I’m glad I’m passed it.
Perhaps it’s because I’m an old git who can remember different times, I’ve said it over and over again, people are now just selfish and that is the bottom line.
Just as an example, I once got there really early in order to meet friends and relatives from the North, I chucked my stuff against the fence on top of the tank bank and stuck up a Union Jack as the prearranged meeting point. On arriving, we decided to leave our picnic gear insitu and go for a wander, I will say that people there don’t knick your butties.
On returning, someone had stuck a 5ft high windbreak in front of our little pile, great, we couldn’t even find it for a while and had to slide along the fence to retreive it, now you might say that we were up to the same trick of trying to claim a place early, but that was sheer ignorance as far as I’m concerned.
The other thing that cracks me up are the people that leave early to miss the traffic jam, we have an epic balbo building up and I can see the qeues for the exit forming already.
Best example of this was at Finningley a few years ago, my old man and I were comfortably sitting in our chairs just behind the fence when we were told to move by the RAF police, on asking why, we were told it was to let the traffic out, and this was only halfway through the show with the best yet to come.
The old boy was getting on then, but he adamantly refused, at which point he was threatened with ejection, nice, we spent the rest of the airshow looking at passing cars and sniffing fumes.
Sometimes explaining the negatives can help with the positives, assuming people take any notice of course.

Blimey – they managed four servicable Typhoons!

some kind of record?

If you look carefully you’ll see 6.

It did bring a tear to my eye when I saw the old girl go roaring across Kelvedon in formation with the Reds on Saturday, looked absolutely cosmic on TV over Buck House when they put on the red, white and blue smoke, the crowd obviously thought the same, but most were probably thinking, ‘whats that funny looking plane at the back doing there’.
Any news of whats happening in Marham next month.