I Know, I Know, I Said We'd Had Enough Of Starships
But that's BOOJUM! for you, an unreliable narrator and hostile witness rolled into one scrofulous package.
Besides, given what you know of us by now, do you reallllly think we'd just trot out another sci-fi icon and blather on about it?
SURPRISE! I'm going to do just that, because this means deconstructing the expectations of the expectations of deconstructing, if you see what I mean. Art!
The Robbie Williams of starships. Or somethng.
What I need to yark on about now are flying boats, a variety of plane that you're probably not very familiar with, as their heyday was over seventy years ago. Don't confuse a flying boat with a float-plane, as the two are different, even if flying boats have floats, since float-planes don't have boat. Art!
This is a South Canadian Curtiss Model F Flying Boat and yes, the trans-Atlantic cousins did steal a march on the rest of the world, even if a M8 had come up with a flying boat design in 1911. Art!
This is a float-plane. Compare this with the Curtis Model F, where the hull comes into contact with water and needs to be streamlined to minimise resistance. Perfidious Albion, being an island with a global empire, took a very close interest in flying boats and developed their own, as did the South Canadians, with a far-flung A Short 184 empire set of friends in the Pacific. Art!
This is the Consolidated PBY 'Catalina', a big beast of a bird used for patrol, recon and rescue in the trackless wastes of the Pacific. Art!
A not-very Short Sundeerland flying boat, with puny humans for scale One of Roy Cross's best efforts
This marine monster is the Short Sunderland FB, and here in the lower picture you can see the hull design. These birds were nicknamed "The Flying Porcupine" because they bristled with machine guns, including up to sixteen firing forwards the better to sweep unsuspecting U-Boat crews to a watery doom. You can't see any bombs or depth charges as they were stored internally and winched out under the wing when needed.
Also included was a small galley, because the Shorts were expected to mount looooong patrols, to the duration of 14 hours, covering the North Sea and the Atlantic on recon or combat patrols. Art!
One of the advantages of a flying boat was that it merely needed a large body of water to operate from, rather than long, vulnerable, expensive runways, a point I distinctly remember an "Eagle" annual making, although they were thinking along the lines of diminutive flying boat fighter aircraft. Art!
Saunders-Roe built 3 prototypes, which were interesting if unsuccessful. O well.
"But Conrad!" I hear you quibble. "What about -"
PATIENCE! SILENCE! I am coming to the item that will explicate today's title.
First of all, a flying boat bears a certain resemblance to a ship. There. One-quarter explained. For the next, Art!
This is one of the inter-war South Canadian flying boats that dominated international travel, run by Pan Am airlines. They were not as efficient as a conventional plane, but then they needed only an open body of water to land on, rather than the enormous runway required by said conventional plane. They were fitted-out to a very high standard, and the head of Pan Am had the bright notion of calling them 'Clippers', after the fleet sailing ships of the latter nineteenth century.
There you go, three-quarters of the title explained. Art!
This is the 1980 iteration of a 'Clipper', number N68NA, and it's here because it's official Pan Am name was - waitforitwaitforit - 'Star Light'.
Your Honour, I rest my case.
More Money Misery!
Conrad forgot to check on the dollar-ruble exchange rate since Friday last week, and was prompted to check by a couple of malicious Tweets on Twitter <snaps fingers at Elong Tusk>, with the old pun "The ruble is rubble". Art!
By the way, the Ruffian National Wealth Fund, which has been propping up the ruble (just not recently) and paying off their monthly deficit, was stated to stand at $54 billion back in Q1. I have now seen a quote by another economic expert that it's now down to $40 billion, which lends credence to RCB Deputy CEO Zabotnik, who admitted the NWF will run out by 2025.
Good times!Not for Elvira. Elvira is sad.
Ice Ice Ice Ice Ice Ice Ice Ice Ice Baby
More to do with 'Europa Clipper', NASA's mission to Europa, Jupiter's moon that sports an icy crust that hints at hidden depths. Art"
EC will orbit Europa, not descend to the surface, which would take a different type of probe, one able to conduct a soft landing. As mentioned, there is the prospect of a sub-crustal ocean beneath the ice - which lies 16 miles thick. So there is 0% prospect of drilling for it, which makes all the fissures and breaches in the ice handy-dandy access points.
There were a few numpties in the BBC's Comments section, which seems to have been retired as it's not present on the webpage any longer. "Watch out, they're coming to exploit not explore!" warned one swivel-eyed loonwaffle. Art!
Righhhhhhhht. A 3.6 billion mile round trip that takes twelve years and costs £4 billion, all to return a thimbleful of brine. Yeah right. I don't think 'exploit' means what you think it means in reference to this.
Adding A Bit Of Depth
As you should surely be aware, I am now running the Italian Front 1914 scenario in "The Great War In Europe", and am also reading the British volume of the Official Histories about the British army's involvement in Italy. The maps provide a useful indication of how constricted the geography was, forcing the Romans to attack along the same front repeatedly. Art!
Interestingly enough, the progress you see here was achieved over the span of two and a half years, with the Romans suffering heavy casualties to get not very far. Kind of reminds me of another conflict .....
ANYWAY the Romans do have the excuse that they were fighting a literal uphill battle, against Austro-Hungarian troops who were secure in trenches and bunkers excavated from the mountain rock, after having to cross two rivers in the first place. The Romans were also seriously short of heavy artillery and Cadorna, their big chief-in-charge, was always wheedling the Allies to give him some of theirs, usually to a loud NO.
Our Journey With Berni
Continues! We are only up to Number 20 and there are still 70 left to go, and that's before the 'Frankenstein' sub-set AND the other FPG sets. We could be here for some time, folks. Art!
This is the best you're going to get unless you sort out a card by purchasing a collection yourself. Knock yourself out.
Finally -
Ow Ow Ow, full of a cold and feeling like excrement seven days boiled, sorry if you can't unsee it, I'm having to live it. Perhaps a mask would be in order, as I've got to go do the weekly shop. NO! it cannot be postponed, we are low on bread products and Lurpak.
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