A couple of Scout AH1s in a barn on a farm near Alresford, North Hampshire about ten or twelve years ago. One was grey/green and looked in excellent condition sitting on its skids, and the other was green/black and looked a little more like it had been stored for a while (I think it was on a trailer). I was visiting someone at a cottage next to the yard and happened to park next to the open doors due to cows being herded through, and so was forced to wait with both these machines literally an arms length from me.
I did ask the couple I was visiting if the farmer was a pilot but they didn’t know anything about the choppers and little about the goings on. The doors were closed when I went back and there was nothing that fitted the bill when I flicked through a copy of Wrecks and Relics.

And the first time I came across the Meteor T7 at a garage in Hastings, I forget how many years ago that was but it was just so unexpected.

That’s powerful stuff and all so very very true. Anyone can see that. By the by, have you ever appeared in pantomime ? It is after all that special time of the year.

We’ve done this, John. You were the back end of the cow, remember?

But I am glad that you recognise the insanity behind the Farage-monster who compares an organisation trying to bring hope and bring down hate with an organisation trying to bring fear to Europe and the rest of the world. Be nice if you could list all the things that are true, rather than make a lame statement that might be taken by yourself as searing sarcasm.

Indeed snafu, a marvellous endeavor.

Why, thank you, although I do detect the equivalent of a ‘but’ approaching…

Now, let’s take all those remoaners to court, and get them to apologise to all the those who voted to leave the EU, for slander.

(Remember, all those ‘racists’, ‘xenophobes’, ‘uneducated’, and ‘old’ people who voted leave the EU).

Firstly, how old are you? I ask without really wanting to know since you will find that for the most part it was the older sections of the population who voted out, so I could be making an assumption about you with that query. I don’t need to ask about John’s age – Lloyd George knew his mother…
Secondly the fact remains that the reasons given by the majority of leavers have solidly resided in the racist, xenophobic and uneducated field – witness the murderer of Jo Cox – and therefore there can be no slander, just as leavers branding those who don’t share their views as being unpatriotic and whatever won’t get an apology.
Thirdly – this is Farage bad mouthing the widower of someone who was killed by an extremist; I mean, gosh, Nige, I wonder why this guy has a bee in his bonnet about haters and their friends? Wonder what Farage would have said if this had been the next of kin of one of his supporters moaning about immigrants…although I think we all know the answer to that one: a demand for martyrdom just like the Nazis did.

It’s interesting to note how a great many of the remoaners are masters of double standards and hypocrisy.

If I were one of them, I’d be worrying more about who might take them to court for slander and/or libel, rather than concerning themselves with trying to raise cash and attempt to commence ‘vendetta’ legal action against Mr ‘Far Right’ Farage!

Vendetta? Remind me, please, who was it bad mouthing who again? Sorry but when you are in the public eye, like that which Farage craves so,so dearly, you need to watch who you slag off or else you end up in court (like Katie Hopkins does, so frequently) and wondering how much you will have to fork out in damages.

But then again, they are (as we’ve been reminded on many an occasion) the ‘smart’ people, and no doubt know better.

And don’t you forget it. (Is this one of the truths John was going on about?)

Unfortunately, he rather spoils his diatribe by conveniently glossing over the open door immigrant policy inflicted upon not only the hapless Deutchers by Mutti but, also that inflicted upon the equally hapless British by Gordon (he of the bigot) Brown and the Boy Wonder Bliar, completely without the approval of the electorate.

It is not his place to pass comment on that – his wife was not killed by an immigrant in Europe but by a right wing nationalist: sorry John, an opportunity missed to blame filthy, violent foreigners. Has Farage ever said anything about the death of Jo Cox?

Coxie incurs further self injury by skidding on a juicy banana skin and making solid contact with terra firma by failing to differentiate between the violence and death meted out all over the world by his new best mates from the Near and Middle East and the so-called far right who haven’t killed anyone.

And why would he? He is not a wannabe politician in waiting, unlike Farage who makes digs when the sky is way out of sight.
His new best mates? Oh dear, John – you must have the Farage info pack open before you, typing all this guff without understanding what the words mean! A woman is murdered, a woman with whom you would have disagreed with politically, and you side with your patron saint of looney in pasting her husband and a group who are against hatred in all its forms as being in favour of death and violence because they are not singing from the Farage song book. Tell us, John, if Brendon Cox has not differentiated, can it be proven that Farage has shown any differentiation either, between the groups fighting in the Middle East (or are they all just two sides of the same dungheap and it doesn’t matter who wins because either will start on us sooner or later) or the extremist right wing groups throughout Europe who are quite forthright when it comes to being violent and dealing out death?

I really don’t like it when people tread on dreams.

Indeed, like your thousand year reich-dream that was also trodden on?

Good grief – the village idiot has been let out again, trash talking whilst waving an empty bottle in the air and slurring his views for transmission. Such an embarrassment…

Nigel Farage faces the prospect of legal action after accusing the widower of Jo Cox of having links to extremism because of his support for the group Hope Not Hate during a radio discussion on the Berlin Christmas market attack.

Speaking on LBC Radio on Tuesday, Farage suggested that Brendan Cox “would know more about extremists than me” because of his connections to Hope Not Hate, a campaigning charity that seeks to combat political militancy, especially from far-right groups.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/dec/20/nigel-farage-accuses-jo-cox-widower-brendan-cox-of-supporting-extremism

He does try very hard to keep himself in the public eye, what with his on-going death threat claims that the police (still) know nothing about and his fantasy that Downing Street has banned government ministers from talking with him. Now he faces being taken to court by the group – you couldn’t buy that sort of publicity!
Of course, he will next try giving his speech to the country on Christmas Day (or try, not sure anyone wanted to run with that idea) and then this time next week he will be seen standing outside his pub – sorry, home – claiming that he never wanted an honour anyway so it is not the snub from the government the Daily Express insist it is. He wanted his life back but relishes his moment in the spotlight – we will never get his fifteen minutes back, I can tell you.

This morning, on LBC radio, former UKIP leader Nigel Farage launched an outrageous attack on us, on Brendan Cox, husband of murdered MP Jo Cox, and by association on everyone who believes in HOPE not hate. Our lawyer has just sent Farage a letter demanding he retracts and publicly apologises or we will begin legal proceedings against him.

Help us take Nigel Farage to court. Please donate.

https://donate.hopenothate.org.uk/page/contribute/farage-to-court

What a marvellous endeavour – take Farage Gump to court and get him to apologise for slander. Please donate, if only to really stick John Green’s nose out of joint!

Three years? Five years?

(Until it flies at Legends…)

Maybe someone believes that Orbis Publishing, makers of partworks (anyone remember the 216-part Illustrated Encyclopedia of Aircraft, for example?), had its own aeroplane and didn’t want to publicise it…;o)

Relax – they disappeared after being acquired by De Agostini (football stickers, and build your own… in dozens of parts mags).

As I said, I’m not really into ships – but that seems a LOT of money for three years’ service to the nation. Does someone in charge of our defence have a lack of foresight? … or is technology moving faster than I think?

So if she’s not actually unseaworthy how come we’re so sure she won’t be sold on?

I believe her last refit was more of a marking time type of thing, making sure that she WAS SEAWORTHY and could be used until she was paid off for the last time, which was why it was ‘just’ £40m. Had they had serious plans for using her beyond 2014 then they would lopped off the ramp, no need for it since there were no Harriers to be had and it was useless for anything else – but that would cost more than they would be prepared to pay, even for just a bit more deck space.

Who would we have sold it on to? It was a Harrier-carrier and we had just blotted the copybook by showing how much confidence we had in them by unloading all of our Harriers!
The Harrier was a real bit of kit, but it was apparently very man intensive for both the pilot and maintenance schedules. You fly Harriers you can bank on there being problems – witness the Thai navy and their history with HTMS Chakri Naruebet (they commissioned their carrier in 1997, buy nine former Spanish Matadors (first generation Harriers) to fly from it and in under two years there was just one in flyable condition due to a lack of spares. The Matador was officially retired from Thai service in 2006 and the Thai navy is left with a ‘white elephant’ that has little point other than use as a royal yacht) then ask yourself why another small nation would saddle themselves with V/STOL capability when there are other solutions which don’t require so much financial outlay.
The MoD tried to sell Sea Harriers to India and there was interest from Thailand but, as we all know, no one bought them; I am not sure if there was any attempt to sell the Harriers elsewhere but most of them went for spares use with the US marines.

There is seaworthy and there is seaworthy. When a carrier goes to sea, especially when there is tension in international relations, there is the possibility that it might have to delay going into port for several weeks; the matelots might be happy to keep the ship going for as long as possible themselves but eventually the ship would have to come in for essential maintenance – it would be be unseaworthy.
Since Illustrious paid off it would not be having any sort of maintenance what so ever unless there was a danger of it becoming majorly dangerous; lots of stuff had been taken off (tech, engineering, etc) to help with keeping the last of the Type 42s going or to be passed on to other vessels when theirs went technical.
Illustrious was not unseaworthy in the sense that it would be towed out into the Solent, let go and would have sunk within a few hours; it was unseaworthy in the sense that it had no way to generate power or propulsion, it was unable to do anything for itself. Had it been left to fend for itself for a couple of years more under the same conditions then there could have been concerns for potentially dangerous corrosion problems – with ships you will always be running to stand still, and a ship that is running will be easier to work with than one that has been sitting doing nothing for a few years.

Get in contact with their head office customer services, ignore the store and especially the manager (what manager is going to pass on a complaint about his store if he can possibly help it?), explain how you are fed up with the service you are not getting and make sure that this is passed on to someone much further up the food chain in head office, even if you have to request the email to do it yourself (that usually gets them really eager to help you!), just to make sure someone important knows why you are removing your business from them. Don’t forget to get all the names (mainly at the store but elsewhere if they give you the run around) to put in your communications and make sure they know why, especially those who were not that bothered.

Then go to your local newsagents and ask for them to hold a copy for you upon publication. I haven’t done it recently, mind you, but I believe there shouldn’t be a problem and you will be helping a local business. You might even gloat about this to your new friends at WH Smith…