Yes Yes Yes, I KNOW What You're Thinking
It doesn't take a Sherlock Holmes, or a Sexton Blake, to ponder on that vehicle* for The Stath, to with: "The Transporter", and if Art will put down that anthracite on toast -
That single pose pretty much sums up the entire film: Jason Statham being as tender and forgiving as a granite enema, rushing around, blowing things up and slaying the nameless extras.
Actually, I might classify it as a horror film, rather than a simple actioner, as it is TWENTY-THREE YEARS OLD. All Your Unpaid Film Critic remembers is that his last cargo turns out to be -
But that would be telling. Perhaps I should dig it out from the DVD depths and rewatch it.
ANYWAY please notice that today's title is written in a particular format, a cod version of how quartermasters list their equipment, along these lines: 'Cat o' nine tails, flogging, for the use of, issue one' and the like. You see - Art!
Your Humble Scribe was struck by this extract from the MP's traffic chart of their control point in Le Kef, Tunisia, during the fag-end of the campaign there. In case your eyes are too old and weak, or you cannot understand the typist's contractions, it means "8th Army Tank Transporters" and that there were 230 of them, taking over 4 hours to pass through the town.
Well now, I thought to myself, because that's what we do, is there enough there to sustain a whole Intro? Let's see! Art!
This is a Scammell tank transporter, and - you may be ahead of me here - it is transporting a tank, as nature intended it to. In this case an A9 cruiser (you can tell by the track wheels and bogies, and the small machine gun turret on the hull front) which tips the scales at 12 tons.
Okay, why the need for an extra vehicle to carry a lazy armoured vehicle around instead of using it's own motive power? O I thought you'd never ask!
First of all, especially in the desert, wear and tear made machines considerably less reliable than they ought to be, meaning that a tank would be fine for making a short trip, but on any long distance journey they risked breaking down. Art!
My guess is that this illo is pre-war, as the transporter looks pretty weedy, as do the roadside verges, which counts out the desert, and in France 1940 they wouldn't need a transporter thanks to a good road network and short distances.
ANYWAY the point stands - hefting a tank about saved petrol, because tanks are the least efficient things ever invented for mileage. It saved wear and tear on the tracks, which had a finite lifetime, and back in Blighty it prevented the roads being torn up by 30 vehicles trundling down it at 5 m.p.h. all weighing over 10 tons. In France - well, it was France. Art!
This is, again, from the pages of "The War Illustrated" and shows a Teuton encampment with their own tank transporter offloading a tank in the desert. There is no question that the Teuton recovery organisation was streets ahead of the British at this point, with their tank transporter crews going into action alongside their panzers, thus being able to remove anything broken down or knocked out and salvage it. The British might form a laager at night, claiming that the Hun had lost 25 tanks, only for dawn to break and there be only 5 panzers left derelict on the field of battle. Art!
This picture claims to be a tank being loaded onto a transporter, which Conrad jibs at, rather. It it's a tank transporter, where are the loading ramps? Plus, that A-frame seems to imply it's a trailer which was towed. And - trying to manhandle a steel beam into position to offload a tank? An accident waiting to happen. Art!
A splendid rear shot of a tank transporter, showing the LOADING RAMPS and a Sherman tank being ferried about. This is the way.
Here is a Crusader tank being ferried, with the crew still aboard, so possibly off to have minor repairs done; if it were anything major they'd be given a new tank whilst their dud was fixed. Also note that this TT appears to be the M19 model, purchased from the South Canadians to a British design, in order to cope with newer, much heavier tank models. Art!
There you go, nowhere near the desert. Here's an M-19 carrying a Churchill tank, which masses 45 tons, and which would have broken the old Scammell were it loaded upon it. Art!
Sorry, that's a terrible photo. Art!
This is a REME (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers) team about to winch a Lee tank aboard their TT, as the tank has no motive power of it's own and will be sped off for repair. Art!
This one looks desperately dangerous, BUT if Conrad recalls correctly, it's actually staged, though finding out for certain would take too long, so you'll just have to trust me. Art!
A slightly better rendition of the TWI original.
Hmmm, we've definitely done enough for an Intro and then some. By the way, tank transporters are still very much a thing, because metal monsters like the Chally are guaranteed to churn up the roads if they go trundling along them. Art!
Oshkosh TT and Chally, with puny civilian car for scale
Whilst On The Theme
As you should surely know, Conrad is interested in the North African theatre during the Second Unpleasantness, and has consequently acquired, in paperback form, the whole "History of the Second World War: The Mediterranean and Middle East". I intend to replace these with the original editions from the Fifties and Sixties, because the maps are a quantum level or ten beyond those in the paperbacks. So far I have Volume II, and have just ordered Volume IV. Not from these sellers - Art!
Guess who will regret such gouging when I take over?
Further To Transport Issues
I remarked yesteryon about how Aeroflot had been hacked by ambitious Ukrainian and Belarusian hackers, who appear to have waltzed around their databases with hobnail boots weighing as much as an A9 cruiser. The end results are far worse than Aeroflot stated - imagine that, Ruffian business enterprises lying - and are listed by 'Igor Sushko' on Twitter.
"Aeroflot's databases and information systems CREW, Sabre, Sharepoint, Exchange, KASUD, Sirax, Sofi, CRM, ERP, 1C, security systems, and other elements of corporate network structure were destroyed."
Not just damaged - destroyed. Art!
Crews are being sent home once they turn up at airports, as nobody knows what is going on, or whom to send where or when.
The cost estimates for this range between $10 to $50 million, and that it will take AF up to 6 months to recover IF they have back-ups to work from. If not, and given that this is cost-cutting embezzling short-sighted Mordorvia we're talking about, then more like 12 months. You will be able to tell how bad this event is, because if it's bad enough it will be forbidden to be talked about on state media and may get a 1" column on Page 7 of 'Kommersant'.
As I rather grimly joked, 'Next up - Aeroflot CEO falls out of aircraft window at 17.000 feet'. Wait for it, it will happen.
And To End Things On A Lo! Note -
Here's a sidebar item that caught my eye, and let me prod Art into action without reading to find out the resolution -
If this was in the UK, he's cruising for a legal bruising. Let me dig a little further.
Ah, from South Canada. The employee made a point of eating his large, messy, noisy lunch in the meetings, and after a couple of weeks of this, the (newly appointed Flexing My Muscles) manager stopped scheduling the meetings during lunch. His initial response to the employee complaining was 'We all have to make sacrifices'. Guess what retort the employee came back with when the manager complained about all the eating on camera?
Finally -
Break time, so I'm going to see how my Avocado and Coconut ice cream has firmed up in the freezer. Pics at 11.
* Do you see wha - O you do.
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