Allison JohnsonThere have been many cases of world war remains being dug by unscrupulous treasure hunters who then just dump the bones. Digging an aircraft wreck is obviously a much bigger task, but undoubtedly there are some out there who would do such a terrrible thing.
They are certainly out there. The whole thought of it makes me sick and I think the people who are guilty of this should have the book thrown at them.
😡 😡 😡
Ali
Allison JohnsonThere have been several cases in the UK of human remains being found at a crash site by “wreckologists” and the authorities not being informed.
Many people are unaware of what has been done in this country in the name of “aviation archaeology”,I’m not just talking about war graves being desecrated but also of the damage which has been done to crash sites and the information which has been lost. One only has to ask where all wreckage recovered since the 1970’s has gone to get an idea of the scale of destruction which has been brought to crash sites.
I am not against crash sites being dug,but as suggested earlier in this thread there needs to be a far more professional approach to the dig and recording and long term preservation of the items found. I feel that the attitude of many involved in digging crash sites is very short sighted indeed and little thought given to future historians who might want to study items from a specific site.
One only has to look at some of the items offered on ebay to realise that many regard crash sites as a source of material to sell.
Just to clear things up,the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 applies to ALL military aircraft remains in the UK and UK waters. Under the act it is an offence for anyone to “Tamper with,damage,move,remove or unearth any part of a crashed military aircraft”.
Let the flaming begin.
I just had a look at http://www.divetheworld.com/Library/GovPapers/maritime_graves.pdf and did a search in the document for aircraft and it came up with nothing. Is this an incomplete version of the document? If so do you know where on the web I can find the complete article please?
Ali
Allison JohnsonThe Protection of Human Remains Act would only cover any excavations in England and Wales, I doubt if it could be stretched to cover any excavations in France and I would question how it would cover any wrecks in international water.
It also covers Scotland.
Ali
Allison JohnsonIn the Bader dig specific case, despite how it may have seemed on the programme, it was not just “dig in and yank it out”. It was several hours work.
You are seriously underestimating the skills of the dig master, in this case the very experienced Paul Cole, and the digger operator to carry out specific single operation delicate exposure of the penetrated material by removal of the adjacent base clay. This is well illustrated by my previous image post where the final couple of inches of base clay just fell off the fuselage to reveal that bright roundel.
In the extremely unlikely event, in this case, that particles of human remains had become evident as the ‘compressed ball’ of wreckage was separated out, the programme would have taken a completely different tack. The customary procedures of advising the local authorities/defence attaché etc and the treatment of the remains with due reverence would have been activated.
Mark
I don’t think that he was questioning the skills of the people who were involved in the dig. The question is about human remains.
Ali
Allison Johnsonhopefully MOD would hear about it in time…
I wonder if they would be so ineffective that any person guilty of doing such a thing would just be let off.
Ali
Allison JohnsonCould we explore the theory that these aliens deposited him in a Liverpool hotel, to serve out the rest of his war in luxurious captivity????
I was wondering when aliens were going to be mentioned. DONT GET ME STARTED!!!!! 😀 😀 😀 😀
Ali 😀
Allison Johnsonthink the chances of that happening are remote to be fair…
Only some a****le who has no interest in honouring the heroes of the past would try a stunt like that. Surely no one with even the remotest respect for the man who flew these machines would treat human remains in such a way?
It makes the responsible recovery of these wreaks by decent people, such as those involved in this project, all the more important.
That kind of behaviour would hinder any future recoveries too. The RAF would blow a gasket and change all the rules “again” and introduce more checks. Not that I have any problems about the checks as the document http://www.divetheworld.com/Library/RAFRelated/Aircraft%20Recovery%20Notes%20for%20Groups.pdf seems fairly straight forward and if you stick with the rules then it should be OK.
Ali
Allison JohnsonAllison – please find us a Barracuda or Stirling in a Norwegian fiord ! – France seems to be inundated with Spitfire data plates waiting to be found!
Norway is pretty cold…. Can’t you send me on a mission to find a Barracuda or Stirling in… say……….. Papua New Guinea or somewhere like that? I know that Stirlings didn’t operate there before you start down that line 🙂 but I need to work on my tan. 🙂 🙂
Ali
Allison JohnsonAlison – the Act had some amendments in 2002 regards protecting some of our better known warships which are not in British territorial waters . These amendments could very easily be applied to an aircraft wreck abroad if it was deemed that the crew contained within were not being afforded respect.
As for finding an aircraft – the Crown will certainly step on anyone if they feel that British Laws have been broken – the MOD could claim ownership of said aircraft remains – the excavation of human remains is a matter for the local Police and Coroner.
I had a look at the amendments and most of the amendments are the naming of particular sites and most of them are overseas.
I had a look at http://www.divetheworld.com/Library/GovPapers/maritime_graves.pdf and aircraft are not mentioned but there is another document there which is http://www.divetheworld.com/Library/RAFRelated/Aircraft%20Recovery%20Notes%20for%20Groups.pdf which is aircraft specific.
The second document says it covers UK territorial waters and international waters.
Ali
Allison JohnsonThis is something that i have asked before and i have to say that it still concerns me….what would have been the situation if the mk 9 hadnt been the expected aircraft? surely the use of the jcb could in those circumstances have serious implications ? Surely the recovery of remains and the treatment of same with the dignity and respect they deserve has to take precedence?
Exactly. I know that the Protection of Human Remains Act is law in the UK but what would have happened if remains would have been found in the wreck and it’s on French soil? Would the dig have been stopped and the authorities been called and a more digified excavation conducted? It wouldn’t have made good TV if remains were just yanked out and stuck in a bag would it.
Ali
Allison JohnsonFrom the Times,
IT IS the modern-day equivalent of turning base metal into gold, and Sean McCarthy believes that he has it cracked.
A free, infinite supply of pure energy could be sitting in a secure area of an unprepossessing unit in the Docklands of Dublin. Mr McCarthy claims to have created a perpetual motion machine, a device that can produce at least as much energy as it consumes, so that once it has been set running it can continue indefinitely.
Even Sir Isaac Newton, who spent years trying to turn base metals into gold, reputedly said: “The seekers after perpetual motion are trying to get something from nothing.”
The problem is that after allowing The Times and its physics expert, John White, into the office, Mr McCarthy decided not to let us see the machine. It is some form of an all-magnet motor and the only clue that he will give is that it looks like “a grandfather clock, without its pendulum”.
Having made its existence known through a full-page advertisement in The Economist, Mr McCarthy, 40, has been overwhelmed by interest from around the world — some of which has veered towards “death threat” territory. “We had one physicist who finished his rant by saying, ‘You had better watch your back’,” he said.
“We are getting bloggers putting out stories that this is a stunt to market Xboxes, that we are a call centre and that we have just closed down.”
The search for perpetual motion is considered heretical in the scientific community because it violates the First Law of Thermodynamics. Historically, those who set out to prove otherwise fell into one of three categories: sincere but wrong; a few cogs short of a self-blowing windmill; and money-grabbing fraudsters.
After the first British patent for a perpetual motion machine nearly four centuries ago, hundreds have followed.
Mr McCarthy is the head of an IT company that advises police forces across Europe on fighting fraud. “If I am proved wrong, this company is out of business and I will never work in this town again,” he said.
By the end of this month Mr McCarthy hopes to have assembled a panel of “the most qualified and the most cynical” scientists to test his machine.
Dr White, an atomic physicist at University College Dublin, had a straightforward question: “Why not publish your results in a peer review journal and go and collect your Nobel prize when you are vindicated?” He added: “If he is right, he will have solved the riddle of the Universe and brought peace to the Middle East.”
Mr McCarthy said that he had stumbled by accident across “a kinetic anomaly of magnetic fields” while developing a small wind turbine to power closed-circuit television cameras.
Some “very well-respected” scientists had tested the machine and achieved the same results, he said. But they refused to publish their findings because “this area is surrounded by fraudsters and the misguided. So we decided that either we should just drop this or find a different way to get science interested.”
The machine that could solve one of the world’s ills is shrouded in mystery. The Times got as far as a door marked “strictly no admittance” through which an animated-looking Frenchman disappeared.
Dr White’s verdict? “I haven’t seen a working device and he has created publicity in a way that is non-traditional to scientific verification.
Allison JohnsonFrom the Times,
IT IS the modern-day equivalent of turning base metal into gold, and Sean McCarthy believes that he has it cracked.
A free, infinite supply of pure energy could be sitting in a secure area of an unprepossessing unit in the Docklands of Dublin. Mr McCarthy claims to have created a perpetual motion machine, a device that can produce at least as much energy as it consumes, so that once it has been set running it can continue indefinitely.
Even Sir Isaac Newton, who spent years trying to turn base metals into gold, reputedly said: “The seekers after perpetual motion are trying to get something from nothing.”
The problem is that after allowing The Times and its physics expert, John White, into the office, Mr McCarthy decided not to let us see the machine. It is some form of an all-magnet motor and the only clue that he will give is that it looks like “a grandfather clock, without its pendulum”.
Having made its existence known through a full-page advertisement in The Economist, Mr McCarthy, 40, has been overwhelmed by interest from around the world — some of which has veered towards “death threat” territory. “We had one physicist who finished his rant by saying, ‘You had better watch your back’,” he said.
“We are getting bloggers putting out stories that this is a stunt to market Xboxes, that we are a call centre and that we have just closed down.”
The search for perpetual motion is considered heretical in the scientific community because it violates the First Law of Thermodynamics. Historically, those who set out to prove otherwise fell into one of three categories: sincere but wrong; a few cogs short of a self-blowing windmill; and money-grabbing fraudsters.
After the first British patent for a perpetual motion machine nearly four centuries ago, hundreds have followed.
Mr McCarthy is the head of an IT company that advises police forces across Europe on fighting fraud. “If I am proved wrong, this company is out of business and I will never work in this town again,” he said.
By the end of this month Mr McCarthy hopes to have assembled a panel of “the most qualified and the most cynical” scientists to test his machine.
Dr White, an atomic physicist at University College Dublin, had a straightforward question: “Why not publish your results in a peer review journal and go and collect your Nobel prize when you are vindicated?” He added: “If he is right, he will have solved the riddle of the Universe and brought peace to the Middle East.”
Mr McCarthy said that he had stumbled by accident across “a kinetic anomaly of magnetic fields” while developing a small wind turbine to power closed-circuit television cameras.
Some “very well-respected” scientists had tested the machine and achieved the same results, he said. But they refused to publish their findings because “this area is surrounded by fraudsters and the misguided. So we decided that either we should just drop this or find a different way to get science interested.”
The machine that could solve one of the world’s ills is shrouded in mystery. The Times got as far as a door marked “strictly no admittance” through which an animated-looking Frenchman disappeared.
Dr White’s verdict? “I haven’t seen a working device and he has created publicity in a way that is non-traditional to scientific verification.
Allison JohnsonIt can be done but is not cost effective.
A large communications-type satellite costs about £235M and weighs 4000+kg. It presently costs £4,700+/kg to get a satellite into geostationary orbit or £19+M. Satellite life is approximately 10 years or £25.4M/yr to operate. Two 36m wings will generate 16 kilowatts total output based on 30% efficiency by solar cells (no failures allowed in this example). Doing the math results in a cost of £181/kWh while your present residential electricity rate probably runs £.052/kWh (no taxes included).
You tell me if there is a cost-effectiveness problem.
Yeah but it was only a sci-fi program.
Ali
Allison JohnsonIt can be done but is not cost effective.
A large communications-type satellite costs about £235M and weighs 4000+kg. It presently costs £4,700+/kg to get a satellite into geostationary orbit or £19+M. Satellite life is approximately 10 years or £25.4M/yr to operate. Two 36m wings will generate 16 kilowatts total output based on 30% efficiency by solar cells (no failures allowed in this example). Doing the math results in a cost of £181/kWh while your present residential electricity rate probably runs £.052/kWh (no taxes included).
You tell me if there is a cost-effectiveness problem.
Yeah but it was only a sci-fi program.
Ali
Allison JohnsonImpractical for now. You’d need to put a lot of mass into orbit, and the current price to place items in orbit is pretty damn high. Until we find a cheaper method, things like this are going to remain pipe dreams.
As I said, it was a sci-fi program. Good idea though.
Ali 🙂
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