Bon Accord

The loops were known as a "curle". Isn't that the mate on the left? Might just be my eyesight but it looks like three stripes and there's a lack of scrambled egg on his cap peak.

"I can see Chloe's from here...." Taken from a Federal/NZSCo cadet brochure, showing the cadets on MV DURHAM in Melbourne taken 1947. The caps were being worn for photographic effect. Changed days indeed....

Yet exactly the same could be said for the old museum, with the prime difference being accessibility of the exhibits was much better. It therefore stands to reason that the new building isn't worth the money and certainly not worth celebrating. Not forgetting the new building's proximity to the river, Glenlee, Queen Mary and Waverley make it all the more unfathomable that the Clyde Room has been lost.

It wasn't too far off the scales though, merely being at the expensive end of a rather limited market. 60019 was up for sale at the time for not much less. The point being that the Canadians were seemingly quite happy to get rid of their A4 at the time.

Looking at the seastate beyond the vessel, the rather photogenic sea conditions between the two ships will be caused by the respective wakes clashing.

I don't know for sure in this case, but there certainly are some crossovers up here without them.

About 20 odd years ago when Tony Marchington was looking for an A4 (and prior to buying 4472) he approached the owners of both North American A4s and whilst the Americans turned him down flat I think the Canadians offered the locomotive for £300,000 which was a bit OTT for the time. I recall reading this in a published interview with Marchington just after he bought the A3, quite likely in Steam Railway itself.

The location in question, looking south towards the scene of the incident.

The unit had just worked an Aberdeen-Stonehaven service and having disgorged passengers then utilised the trailing crossover at the south end of the station to regain the down line prior to working back to Aberdeen. As can be seen from the photographs it didn't quite make it. Being a trailing crossover there are no facing point locks and all points/signals (discs) are of the manual variety, operated from Stonehaven 'box which is at the north end of the station.

Would those cruise ships be such paragons of Britishness as P&O and Cunard perchance? Built abroad, owned in the US, registered in Bermuda (for tax/finance purposes) and with a mostly foreign crew?

The only bother we really have is that the port M/E has a recurring oil leak from underneath the engine which has been the case since 1995; since the space underneath is inaccessible without removing the engine then that is how it shall likely remain until we run her up the beach.The starboard M/E has a slightly out of alignment shaft (again since build), but it doesn't seem to do any harm.

In a similar vein an erstwhile employer of mine was one of the last companies to still run ships with a Doxford down below (3 and 5 legged variety), this going on well into this millennium. Getting parts was damn near impossible by then so several expeditions to the likes of Beamish and South Shields college were made by the Supers to either buy/barter for bits or use them as templates to make new! The current chariot has twin Mirlees Blackstone K8 Majors (built 1995) and getting parts is getting similarly more difficult.

Except that they won't always be flying at supersonic speeds. One of the times when such aircraft are at their most vulnerable is when conducting "show of force" close in manoeuvres to hostile ground targets either because they are unable to use their fitted weapons due to location/proximity to civilian targets (which is more common than many might think) or they have expended all suitable weapons. Such tactics were regularly used in Afghanistan and Iraq simply out of necessity and accordingly the odds of that "lucky shot" become ever smaller. It's also specifically worth remembering that our F35 shall not be the preserve of the FAA and be solely carrier or RNAS based; because we're doing the whole project "on the cheap" we shall of course have a joint F35 force (as was the case with the harriers), so in the event of suitable airfields being available** the RAF will undoubtedly claim first dibs and they'll be land based, which is when the sniper shot concept really becomes dangerous. **RAF will be involved weekdays only, assuming a Marriott or Hilton is also available nearby.

It's amazing what can be done when you've got £7 billion to play with, and in the same breath talking about cutting our frigate force (the backbone of the navy) even further.

If you think the RN has recruitment problems then Aus/NZ has it even worse.

Isn't that also a ScotRail branded Mk1 behind the 31?

Always watchkeepers in British ships and on vessels with crews from countries of British influence. In the maritime world there are so many terms which could be defined as archaic that you could easily fill a book with them. Considering watchkeepers/watchstanders, in British deepsea vessels there used to always be three ratings on watch with every officer. This harks back to the days before autopilots where each took a turn at the wheel and even after autopilots saw widespread adoption (1950s onwards) the three men on watch were retained and were always known as 1st wheel, 2nd wheel and farmer. The latter term dated back to the days of sail where the "farmer" on watch used to care for livestock carried onboard - in the days before refrigeration most ships carried live chickens and pigs so as to ensure a regular supply of fresh meat. Specifically the farmer was stand by man for the first hour, relieving the helmsman for a ten minute smoke fifty minutes into the watch, then doing two straight hours on lookout, after which he relieved the second wheel for a smoke, then retired to the messroom for the remainder of his watch, rousing himself only to wake the next set of watch keepers with tea and toast at one bell (15 minutes prior to the watch change). Of course all of that has disappeared into history now and there's few of us left at sea who would remember it.

I remember an interview with Callum MacRaild - I think possibly with David Wilcock - and bearing in mind he was a Fort William driver when asked what his favourite class of locomotive to drive had been, his reply was the Br Std 5.

It would seem the Std 5's were well thought of in Scotland and certainly on the WHL were apparently preferred to the Stanier version.

The last BR steam locomotive to be overhauled in Scotland was 62059 which left Cowlairs on 22nd September 1966. 62059 was allocated to Blyth North (52F) at the time and was withdrawn on 12th February 1967, a mere four and a half months later! As well as mechanical attention it also received a full repaint into unlined BR black

At least one Stanier 5 issue came with a small Snowplough in recent years.

Not a Calamity class was it? Most I sailed with in BPTC (during my second stint) was about 45 in an S boat of all things, albeit it a hard worked one. I've got a full set of Crossed Flags, which was the in house journal of NZSCo (my uncle was with them) and attached is a snap of the crewlists from November 1970 - they had 20 ships at that point and all Brit crews. It illustrates well just how many people even the smaller companies employed - I say smaller compared to some of the much bigger concerns of course.

Sailed with an old man once who liked to have everyone fully booted and spurred for weekly BOT sports, although I did wear it a couple of times for parties and other such social stuff. If I needed a head covering it was usually either a woolly bunnet or a wide brimmed cricket hat I picked up in Australia, depending on climate of course. This was the same old man who must have curled up with his copy of Wrinkles in Practical Navigation every night as one of his (many) other peculiarities was that he insisted that every day that noon actually was at noon, therefore more work for the second mate and obscure clock flogs every night of a few minutes here and there depending on where we were and where we were going. 53 men would be around average for a 5/6 hatch British tweendecker of the period (the 40-60 bracket was common depending on trade). If a British ship carried "Indian" ratings (that is, any from the subcontinent) the longstanding arrangement as I remember it was that those ships were manned on a 2 for 1 basis, i.e. 2 Indians for every Brit that would otherwise be carried. Hence how some of the comparable ships owned by the likes of British India Line, Ellermans, Clan Line, the Bank Line etc could have as many as 80-90 souls onboard depending on the particular articles of agreement. Inter Departmental Flexibility (to give GP it's Sunday name) changed all that of course, not that it was around for very long anyway as UK crews mostly disappeared shortly thereafter and we went back to the old system but with foreigners. Only ever came across pursers myself on those ships which carried passengers, even those which only carried a maximum of 12. Generally looked after all the crewing paperwork, passenger paperwork wages, overtime, customs, immigration, bond locker etc which would otherwise fall on the Master. Chief Stewards/Thief/Grocer were therefore limited to the catering side of things, although both Pursers and Grocers always did seem to share similar property interests in Spain... Of course containers then went and ruined it!