JonathanF“The History” tells me that there were only two, prototype “Mk.IV” Spits, which were adapted as Mk.XII and Mk.21 prototypes respectively. If that helps at all.
JonathanFThan you Jonathan. Please do remind those who make decisions that it is (or was) a particularly good example and is one of your oldest exhibits and one which draws interest from visitors. It was also donated in good faith having been prepared to an excellent level by the Navy.
Sorry Airgage, I’m employed elsewhere these days. You could do worse than write them a letter. I know they at least get read. It should also be possible to find out what’s planned for the Sea Vixen.
JonathanFNo comment on the Sea Vixen then?
Oh, you mean Roobarb’s speculation about it being on a disposal list? No idea I’m afraid. But tough decisions have to be made; not every museum can have an example of every type, and each of them is going to have to revisit its collecting policy in light of the other museums in the UK and their respective remits. It’s something that comes up fairly regularly on here as I’m sure you’ve noticed.
JonathanFI couldn’t agree more Roobarb, with the 25th anniversary of the Falklands war almost upon us the Pucara should be placed prominently on display with other representative types associated with the war.
From the IWM website.
The Imperial War Museum is thus the national museum of twentieth century conflict. It illustrates and records all aspects of modern war, and of the individual’s experience of war, whether allied or enemy, service or civilian, military or political, social or cultural. Its rôle embraces the causes, course and consequences of conflict and it has an essentially educational purpose.
Can’t seem to see a Falklands exemption in this statement.:D
Creaking Door, don’t worry about the photo.:)
Septic.
No doubt the Pucara could do with some work, but it’s not been ignored as far as interpretation goes. It was part of a Falklands anniversary display in 2002.
JonathanFI had assumed that F. was a retrospective designation applied postwar or maybe late war. If you’ve never found a reference, that’s about as conclusive as I think we’ll going to get!
JonathanFNo idea why an autopilot system (particularly of such early vintage) would have “momentary” inputs; the idea of an autopilot is to hold a given course (or at least to keep the aircraft straight and level), isn’t it?
Could it have been a misremembered practical joke along the lines of “push forwards, houses get bigger” etc?
JonathanFThat happened whilst it was sitting outdoors at Lackland (?) back in the States.
JonathanFthe doseage levels are very small, gamma levels are almost insignificant at 12-18 inches away. But it’s the transport mechanism that is of point. The risk is very low in normal circumstances. However, injesting Radium or Radon DUST from old instruments is bad news. Normal exposure of inhaled Radon GAS naturally, is exhaled from the body quickly, and dealt with by your lung defence, but some radium and radon DUST inhaled Into your lungs and respitory tract from open instruments, can stay lodged inside your lungs, continuing to decay, emiting alpha, beta and gamma isotopes from inside the body, which is very harmful.
There is no “debate” over the effects of inhaled radium and radon dust. Once attached to dust particles their decaying isotopes inside the lung, will cause cancers eventually. With a half life of 1600 years, the product decay, continues inside your lungs for the rest of your life, the damage is cumulative over 20-30 years.
The message, which should be clearly conveyed is leave well alone and follow the previous rules.. i.e. avoid opening hot instruments, have them behind glass cabs and displaying those with flaking dials or no glass is not a good idea.
Sorry I didn’t word my post particularly well; the “debate” I referred to was that regarding external risk, not inhaled/ingested. The latter is clearly a serious threat (witness the “Radium Girls”), but only from open sources. Naysayers in this thread were (I thought) questioning the risks posed by dials with intact glass, where the risk is somewhat comparable to wearing a radium-painted watch. Albeit the cockpit dials would be much further away from the body and exposure would be only for minutes at a time. The resulting increased risk of cancer development (the only conceivable threat) is therefore likely to be very low, but nonetheless very hard to quantify. The main thing being that the exposure of members of the public to other radiation sources outside the museum cannot be accounted for.
JonathanFHow did you see through the highly constructed disguise on this posting ?
It’s all thanks to the Special Farces training I underwent back in ‘nam. Dagenam that is.
JonathanF[Sarcasm On] Congratulations to Forum Members!!
Having observed the ongoing war of words with Kenneth Williams from the relative safety of the shadows it would seem that you really showed him up for the quack he certainly is.
You really hammered home to him just how stupid, implausible and misguided his theories really are. No matter that he might be an old, lonely and deluded man living out his last days trying to relive a time when he felt vital and was important to someone. You saw right through that obvious camouflage and went on attack. Congratulations you are indeed heroes of the Aviation Forum. You are all being too modest when you suggest that all he got form you Glorious Warriors was “just a good ribbing.” You stomped all over him! Twenty or thirty against one – don’t give it a thought; his dangerous ideas had to be silenced.
That fact that the war with Kenneth Williams (KWI) quickly moved from any consideration of the facts (or even tolerance of an old fool) to vicious personal attacks is hardly the fault of the Glorious Warriors of this Forum. He deserved it and you gave to him in spades. The most recent thread where Kenneth Williams is once again attacked is in the true spirit of this forum. All Praise ye Glorious Warriors!
But, there is indeed a hero among heroes – Your moderator Moggy! Without regard to his personal safety Moggy used his position to direct the various battles of WKI. Moggy insured that the outcome of the war against this heinous enemy was never in doubt. Moggy, here’s to you! You drove out this awful threat to the Aviation Forum with the help of the Glorious Warriors. Best of all you won’t let it simply go away. No, not you, ye hero of heroes. Our moderator is always on guard and ready to slam Williams at every opportunity. Moggy should be awarded the DFC (Distinguished Flaming Cross) for his efforts above and beyond. [Sarcasm Off]
Even if every negative thing said about Kenneth Williams is true you should be ashamed of yourselves!
Clearly there are members of this forum with detailed and specialized knowledge of a very important part of our collective past. There are members who obviously gave of themselves in a valiant struggle to insure we all have the rights we enjoy today – even the right to say stupid things in a public forum. Others members demonstrate a passion to learn about that past and honor it by keeping that time alive in the hearts and minds of those who were not there. All members and their passions have been cheapened by this unfortunate and avoidable incident.
If it all had played out differently Mr. Williams might have found a friend here – I think he needs one.
You may begin your attacks of me on my mark . . . . . . mark!
Hi Ken.
JonathanFClearly the levels of radiation we’re talking about are tiny. Open sources (cracked glass) and ingestion/inhalation are the only short-medium term risks as far as I know. However, the effects are difficult to quantify and much like global warming, the debate is extremely “hot” itself. With sufficient study (and we’re talking establishing the cause and effect of radiation and cancer development with thousands of other variables), it could turn out to be a situation like that of mobile phones on petrol forecourts. i.e. in hindsight, not a genuine risk. But, with the risks still unproven, the authorities are not apparently prepared to accept the potential risks, and so we find ourselves in this situation, erring on the side of caution.
That the risks of closed sources are extremely low is not, IMO, in doubt. BUT aircraft with any radiation source do warrant restricted access because of the key point here; that museums cannot control the exposure of visitors outside the museum; if a visitor is being exposed in other places (working in a nuclear plant, exposed to Radon, whatever), the exposure received from a given instrument might put them over their “allowance” and conceivably, they could have an increased risk of developing cancer.
Yes, there are ways around this if the resources are there; the easiest thing to do (especially where access is not allowed regularly anyway, for conservation or staff time reasons) is to deny access. Another option, as has been mentioned, is to remove and store the instruments. The IWM came up with a good cost-effective solution with the Halifax nose at Lambeth; replace the “hotter” instruments with hi-res photos. But that’s a popular, walk-through exhibit – it’s not a solution that can be applied to every aircraft on display or in storage, as without entering cockpits, most are fine as-is.
JonathanFWonder if the rest of the ‘Camel’ is available ? I need something to sit on while I eat my turkey!
Well, there are two of these rare and valuable objects listed by this seller…
JonathanFTalk about low flying: anyone remembers the Russian contraptions called ‘Ekranoplan’? You’ve gotta love those Russian inventions…..
http://video.google.nl/videoplay?docid=2200021317530929051&q=Ekranoplan
http://video.google.nl/videoplay?docid=-3166475295084294680&q=Ekranoplan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSYmSnpQ360
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsGIg4NLwPQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfa5oW0yX4gTillerman.
Nifty, but not technically “flying”.
JonathanFThis only proves the lengths to which the New World Order will go to to cover up the facts of history.
😀
JonathanFThis has potential and interesting parallel with the nickname of the Sea Harriers in the Falklands – “La Muerte Negra”, for “the black death”. It’s documented by both sides, with the implication from ours being that the Argentines were afraid of them, and the story from the horses mouth being that it was meant in a very matter-of-fact way, mindful of the threat they posed to the unwary and the dark grey colour scheme they wore.
Perhaps something was the case in this case? What needs to be trawled are Allied newspaper articles (both forces or civilian?), for the earliest reference. The problem is of course that one would be attempting to prove a negative, and wouldn’t know when to stop their research as a dead loss! It’s the same with the myth of the two-fingered salute originating with the English archers at Agincourt; no-one can show a source for that one either. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I would tend to assume as you have that it was a propaganda/psychological warfare thing. I’d love to be proved wrong though.
The nickname itself is alive and well in the 21st century:
from the delightful http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/user-posts?id=55001
My favorite nickname for the A-10 was given to it by the Muslim Fascists. They call it Whispering Death.
and anecdotal evidence of the media’s hand in keeping the name going……
aka Whispering Death – I think that was what they called it on the Discovery channel
(re the A-10 also).
Then we have the M1 Abrams tank:
In 1991, Abrams tanks spearheaded the assault into Iraq, and those Iraqi tanks which survived destruction from the air to battle the Abrams were often destroyed by an enemy they never even saw. With its muffled turbine whine, the tank was nicknamed “Whispering Death.”
also applied to motorbikes….!
Ian Jardine @ Mar 17th 2005 10:21AM
Back in 1960s in England a great motorcycle company called Velocette produced a 200cc flat twin watercooled motorcycle called the LE. It was used a lot by Police. It was so quiet that it got the nickname “whispering death”.
and trains too!
When I joined the railways, the V sets were referred to as The Whispering Death – on track, you just don’t hear them coming.
As an aside, there’s the Corsair with the similarly descriptive/poetic nickname of “Whistling Death” attached to it, plus an an artillery shell. An interesting thread here about yet another aircraft associated with the nickname – the P-38 (including a perspective from a native of Japan).
This really does all smack of urban myth; I’d say (perhaps justified) wishful thinking/morale boosting in terms of “we have what we perceive to be a powerful weapon system, and this is what we think the enemy should call it whilst cowering in the nearest bunker”. It seems to me that it’s clearly a Western nickname for things that seen as potentially dangerous due to being unusually quiet, not an Eastern one (though of course it could have been lifted from the Beau nickname and applied to later things). As a cool stock phrase, “Whispering Death” is much more likely to have spread around Allied troops and airmen as a myth that could be applied to whatever type they happen to work with, than it is that their Japanese counterparts coined it as a genuine mark of respect and/or fear for a single aircraft type. Just speculation really. Someone needs to bring the evidence!
[much edited to make sense!]
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