Monday, February 09, 2009

Why An Aeroplane Could Never Crash On Your House

Wing Commander Jimmy Joystick, Tory member for Buftingtontuftington ward, explains why modern aircraft never crash.

Many people have asked me recently: With all this talk of expanding our local airport, could an aeroplane crash on my house? I must say, this question really does make me laugh. What these poor blighters do not understand is that aeroplane technology has come on by leaps and bounds since the days Chalkie, Ginge and I were forever pranging our kites and bailing out over the briny in World War 1.

Nowadays, with all the modern flying aids at our disposal, it is unheard of for anything ever to go wrong. With literally 100,000,000 aeroplanes flying over our heads every hour, not a single one has crashed to my knowledge, so there is no need for any concern. Pilots these days receive much more training and are told that, when approaching an airport, they should be on a 'flight path' that enables them to 'touch down' on the 'runway' rather than crashing in Mr Jones's cabbage patch, which might have been acceptable in my day!

This new technology is beamed directly into the pilot's brain, enabling him to concentrate entirely on the task in hand without being distracted by such thoughts as what colour knickers the stewardess is wearing, or whether he would prefer a gin and tonic or scotch and soda upon arrival.

That's enough flying news - Ed.

51 comments:

Tony Flaig said...

I'm not quite sure what all this expansion stuff is about, as far as I can understand Infratil are just seeking to use the existing facilities that they have.

They own Manston, it happens to be an airport, end of story, really.

Its a bit like owning your home and making use of the bedrooms? I presume you have applied for section 12346 agreement with the council so that you can come back late from the pub.

If I was Infratil I'd just run the airport as an airport and screw local consultations.

This is pretty much bollocks

Richard Eastcliff said...

Hmmm. A pretty specious argument there Tony.

Maybe I'll buy the house next to yours and play my Iron Maiden collection at full chop on my 10kw sound system once or twice a night. It's my house, so I've got the perfect right, according to your argument.

Or has noise, let's say from local authority housing nearby, never annoyed you?

Anonymous said...

You once again miss the point. The question is what is best for the long term prosperity of the region?If the airport becomes busy then ramsgate will become a no go zone for anybody with any quality. Hence keeping the area in the doldrums. The airport was a military airport. It has been deemed to be too close to ramsgate. It's only being pushed now because of the misguiided choices of tdc/kcc. It should not be used. We will all be poorer if it is.

Tony Flaig said...

how about thin lizzy, zz top

Anonymous said...

Well I don't live under the flight path and I'm daft enough to think my idle neighbour will get off his arse and get one of those lovely jobs so I'm with Tony Big.

Richard Eastcliff said...

Only if I can request what type of plane flies over my bonce, Tony!

I'll take Cessnas and the occasional 737!

Anonymous said...

ECR Your attention has been drawn before to the matter of exercises (paid for by the public purse) run by Supt George Rogers when he was Head of Thanet Police.

Exercise One was a scenario of a passenger aircraft crashed on Newington Bridge. Mid incident an exercise purposes rabid dog came ashore at Ramsgate Harbour causing Supt George to temporarily depart the air crash scene to attend the harbour with his syringe hurling catapult. The lifeboat crewman taking the piddle by baying at a non existent moon found a syringe of instant anaesthetic stuck into one of his own half moons whilst George had insufficient time to even apologise.

No sooner had the Ramsgate swimming pool been pumped dry, by the local Fire Brigade damping down the surrounding property fires consequent on the airliner crash, then a local anti authoritarian celebrity (Known as Tiny Tim) rejected lifeguard advice and dived in to the empty pool from the springboard.

George phoned Tim's wife who helpfully informed him that Tim had a habit of going in too dry so she hoped the big bump on his head would be a salutory lesson to him.

Exercise two was a terrorist hi jacked airliner diverted to Manston for Thanet Police to step in, surround and defend the realm.

Armed police in chequered shoot me quick baseball caps dashed about hither and yon at the airfield. One intrepid copper commandeered a JCB at the airfield. "That is the aquifer contamination threat JCB" shouted George but was stymied when the copper asked what that meant.

Happily Michael Child was there recording the exercise for a future history of Thanet farce. Michale quickly explained that if there was spillage of a contaminant on to ground that the JCB was to instantly dig the top layers of ground on to the runway before the aquifer became contaminated.

Another copper started firing at the JCB bucket to show to colleagues how he had bounced bullets off a JCB bucket at the
6th Thanet Gun range.

Meanwhile an ambitious Afro Caribbean Met copper founded the Black Police Officers Assn and made all the institutionalized racist white superiors to scared to refuse him promotion. Ironically this effort meant that he remained unaware that no other ambitious officer would want to be in charge of Kent Plod.

Eventually the Afro Caribbean became Chief constable of Kent.

At a press briefing he was asked "Do you stand by the judgements of Kent Officers ?"

"Unreservedly" he replied.

"So it's official then. Authority thinks a plane crash on Ramsgate a highly likely scenario"

Can't argue with a professional like George Rogers eh Manston expansion supporters ?

Anonymous said...

Nope we cant!!!

Tony Flaig said...

I never heard to many complaining about all those fokkers flying overhead with EU.

As I mentioned in my blog,yesterday I had the good fortune to miss Bob Geldoff @ Heathrow but witness one of those Airbus A380's (super jumbos) and you could hardly hear it, still not as pretty as the old 747, Picture on Bignews.

Unknown said...

Sounds about right to me, the beaming bit that is...!

Aircraft have this nasty habit of gliding when the engines are turned off - that's unless something vital like a wing is missing and so like the Airbus in the Hudson River or even last year's crash at Heathrow, the sudden and unexpected loss of engine power on the glide path into a large airport, should put the aircraft down at a predictable point, hopefully on the runway itself unless of course I'm flying it and then it's anyone's guess where it will end up!

Anonymous said...

You were beneath a Superjumbo coming into land and you could hardly hear it?

Blimey. That sounds extremely unlikely. I think we will have to discount everything you say from now on.

Peter C said...

If all this really makes Ramsgate a "no go area", then it could help revive Margate as everyone tries to buy / rent property here... meanwhile I should be able to get a nice place in Ramsgate very cheaply. So Thanet still benefits.

Michael Child said...

I know of one incident where an aircrafts undercarriage failed to open, so flew round over Ramsgate for most of the night then opened its emergency braking parachute over town and belly landed at Manston.

The problem with being over the aquifer is even a simple thing like break failure, and an aircraft going of the end of the runway, could damage the aquifer permanently.

Tony Flaig said...

Anon 3:06 True it was relatively quite, not as loud as the 747 s, and I saw it take off so really you'd expect it to be a bit of noisy.

Still I think I've got bit of that tinnitus probably from standing near runways.

Anonymous said...

Peter you really are a selfish twat

Anonymous said...

Nothing can possibly go wrong.

An aviation expert

Michael Child said...

5.39 R101

Anonymous said...

Changing course...TITANIC could not sink!!

Anonymous said...

Can somebody tell me if Stephen Ladyman's claim that 80% of the flights will be away from Ramsgate is enforceable or true. The situation is much better if this is the case.

We really need to know.

Anonymous said...

6:01

Not workable or achievable due to jets errrr, needing lift and other important items like landing into the errr wind. Now a 5knt wind has been mentioned on the back of a fag packet at Cloud cookoo land at TDC.

I am sure i read somewhere that Eu Jet and Planetoids failed to reach this hallowed figure so expect some more wind from our politicians and TDC.

I can also reveal that this is going to cost the local tax payer to pay for yet more consultants reports for the reports that were written before the other reports... or you could say that your report has been reported for it to be reported on for another report to be reported on.

Now some wiser people will rightly be asking how does this comply with the EU regulations for the polluter pays principle, its been written by TDC on the back of a fag packet, but you have to look closer.

Tony if you are not sure what all the expansion stuffs about leave it to those that do!!!

Peter C said...

Smeggy, er, I mean anon 5:33, is this your new tactic, calling people "twats" instead of "stupid"?

Anonymous said...

A total lie then?

Anonymous said...

No Peter you are a stupid Twat (but you know that already).

n.b. From a well off new Ramsgate resident.

Anonymous said...

You should be glad the airport on Pysons Road doesn't still exist, we used to have two airports!

Anonymous said...

6:43, somewhat short sighted of you as a new Ramsgate resident. Didn't your Solicitor tell you about the airport? If not sue him/her, if he/her did you have yourself to blame for buying under a flight path. Its quite simple really!

Anonymous said...

There used to be an airport in Westgate-on-sea too.

Anonymous said...

It is impossible that anybody would be quite so idiotic as to encourage freight traffic to fly over somewhere as beautiful with as much potential as Ramsgate - in exchange for no jobs for the local community. Freight traffic has the potential to discourage all newcomers and their investment. You might as well have not built the fast train link.

Anonymous said...

Here you are, the Ramsgate Municipal Airport, in use up to the 1960s when ECR was still wearing brothel creepers and oiling his DA.
http://oldramsgate.blogspot.com/2007/02/out-of-town-and-miscellaneous.html

Ken Gregory said...

I can understand reasoned argument, I have difficulty with personal abuse. Peter C has always responded with reasoned argument, but those who oppose his point of view seem to heve one brain cell short of an euglena. Me I support the right of all to have their say, but not the right of those who abuse.

Anonymous said...

It won't be long before Manston goes the same way.

Head, SMEG said...

Pete, if I wanted to insult you I wouldn't do it anon. I haven't called anyone stupid either.

Stephen Ladyman can say what he wants, but he is not God so cannot guarantee it. The get out clause muttered is "weather permitting". Westerlys, the prevailing wind, which blow 70% of the time, over 5kmph have to be landed into, ie, over Ramsgate. If proper monitoring were in place, weather permitting flights could be enforced to land at the other end. To steal an "Anchorman" line, "...for 30% of the time, it works, all the time"

Anonymous said...

I would not call Peter Cs arguments reasoned. He has a point of view but it is not based on reasoned argument. 'If Ramsgate becomes a no go area then it could help to revive Margate'. Now even by Thanet standards that is not reasoned argument.
What we are talking about here is the threat of ruining the golden opportunity to develop Ramsgate that is presented by the new rail link with unnecessary noise from increased air traffic that will offer no jobs for local people. Endorsing cargo flights over Ramsgate without reasoned argument confines you to being a stupid twat.

Head, SMEG said...

and the point is not what direction, its the fact they are using it at all. Ramsgates gain is someone elses pain. Solidarity with all villages and towns on the flightpath. We are in this together.

Anonymous said...

I stand by my previous statement. Peter is a selfish twat.

I am not SMEG, I am not completely anti airport, but I am completely anti someone who is just manipulating this debate for a bit of fun because he's run out of cheesy photos of fat tarts to masturbate over and needs something else to keep him amused.

Anonymous said...

http://www.invicta-airways.co.uk/

Head, SMEG said...

7.31pm, peter lost all sense of reality when he supported local MP's to tell lies about Manston, its flightpaths, and the fact they keep on saying planes go straight out to sea.

7.58 He has already admitted he is opposing those against the airport just to annoy them. I'd just ignore him. It would be the worst thing you could do to him.

Peter C said...

Take a look at these Then and Now pics of Ramsgate Airport:

http://oldramsgate.blogspot.com/2007/02/out-of-town-and-miscellaneous.html

Do you really think industrial units are preferable to airports?

Anonymous said...

Why is everone saying that the expansion to the airport will ruin what (very little) potential Ramsgate has to offer? At the end of the day Ramsgate is far too overpriced for what you get and every idea TDC come up with to attract people to the ISLE DE THANET either fails or gets apposed by the local people. I say let the expansion go ahead, but i very much doubt it will 'take off' (exscuse the pun). The airport could create many jobs if the local people could be bothered to train to get the qualifications to do them. There would be the need for alot more ground staff, cargo handlers and so on...all you would need for this is a forklift licence, not hard to gain!!!

Anonymous said...

Surely BAWC will just pay for its existing staff at Stansted to relocate? There won't be any jobs for locals.

Peter C said...

Even if people reloacte here for jobs, it will still help the local economy as there's plenty of empty houses & plenty of shops that need more customers!

Anonymous said...

People seem to think of job creation and airports as there's the airport, that's where you'll work when the truth is that the vast majority of employment opportunities come from the service industries that support the airport. It is fair to say a lot of these exist within the local area of most airports but it is also true to say that service industries across the whole of East Kent and further will benefit from a succesful enterprise.

Anonymous said...

Yes Peter and anon - but that will be more than outweighed by the much better-off people who will be deserting the area in droves. The net effect will be a loss to the Thanet economy.

A few baggage handlers and carpet fitters doth not a thriving economy make.

Peter C said...

As relatively few people (even in Ramsgate) seem opposed to the airport then I don't think they'll be leaving in their "droves". The only people that will presumably be leaving are the Smeggers (who'll no doubt move near another regional airport to start a new group).

Anonymous said...

Actually most of the people I talk to in Ramsgate, who aren't dossers like you Peter, are against the airport. Believe me, they will be off quicker than a pair of one of your model's panties.

You pro-airporters must be criminally insane. Your vision for Thanet? Luton-on-Sea, Crawley-on-Sea, Hounslow-on-Sea. Airport towns may have higher employment but they are sh*t places to live. And they won't provide work for Thanet's unemployables - the immigrants will get the jobs. Which may, at least, motivate the unemployables to get off their backsides at last... to join the BNP. There's only one thing unemployables hate more than getting a job and that is an immigrant getting a job.

The only people who will benefit will be national store chains, and the local builders and developers (i.e TDC councillors) who will be able to sell their crappy little flats.

Peter C said...

Strange that they tell Mr Anonymous how against it they are, yet they tell our local councillors & MPs the exact opposite.....

Anonymous said...

Not strange at all. The councillors and MPs only hear the answers they want to hear.

Anonymous said...

They must realise that that they are wasting all the opportunities brought by the train link.

Over use of the airport would be suicide for Ramsgate.

Anonymous said...

Not just Ramsgate - Herne Bay, Broadstairs, Westgate, Sandwich and Canterbury will be affected. Only the 'f*cking tossers' in Cecil Square will be rubbing their hands with glee.

The only thing this is good for is Margate and the millionaires in Kingsgate. Selfish bastards.

Anonymous said...

Oh please just cos you sold a shoe box in Hackney to a Trarkwin and Imelda and brought a massive cheap house in Ramsgate, get over it media/design/tv/arts types, Ramsgate is just 'plane' awful, sorry but Phil Spencer is talking out his *rse... "oh look a waitrose Timothy, and its selling organic bio pea fritters, why Ramsgate must be a-ok!"...
Now Westgate on the other hand, now your talking... well if its good enough for Jerry hall...

Anonymous said...

She never lived there when she was married to Mick.

Anonymous said...

She loved it, always knocking about the place, well you would wouldn't you!