Russia’s woes in building new tanks, repairing or even refurbishing old stocks, optics and ball bearings are all normally sourced from the west, so they have a severe shortage now hence the low output in armour etc.

Telegraph 31 May 2023: [url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/05/31/stop-hiring-useless-white-male-pilots-raf-told/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr]‘Stop choosing useless white male pilots’, RAF told[/url][QUOTE]The RAF instructed staff to stop choosing “useless [url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/02/02/had-skills-get-raf-white... Read More

[QUOTE]Qantas and Jetstar will fly from the new 24-hour airport when it opens in late 2026 with flights to Melbourne, Brisbane and the Gold Coast. The airline plans to base an initial five single-aisle jets such as the Boeing 737 (although this doesn’t rule out the forthcoming Airbus A321XLR or A220 aircraft) based at Western Sydney, with its low-... Read More

An Air India 777 operating from New Delhi to San Francisco has made an emergency landing in Magadan in the Russian Far East after an engine issue (GE engines). There is considerable concern about how Russia will behave towards Americans and others among the 216 pax and 16 crew as well as any GE engineers sent to fix the aircraft: [url=https://arch... Read More

Thank you Wensleydale, I'll jump to it and find something suitable. Have a go at this one. Read More

Being from Australia, up until last week I had never heard of this guy. ( I think now I may have seen him on TV on a UK layover). However, for reasons that I fail to understand, he is all over the news here at the moment. Doing a bit of inter web research, I see he is being absolutely destroyed in the UK. I fail to understand what he has done wron... Read More

There are a lot of soundings at the moment in relation to Eastern Ukraine and the possibility that Kiev Government will look to conduct a major attack on this area. In 2014 the people in this area disliked the Maidan Sq protests and did one of the own which was attacked by Kiev. As this area is populated by people with more Ethnic ties to Russia... Read More

Apparently it does for large values of one. Mathematical humour..... However, one of our (UK) major supermarkets can't cope with simple maths. At Christmas I bought quite a lot of discount food from said superarket and bunged most of it into the freezer. This week I pulled out a carton of tasty meatballs which said feeds four but after a quic... Read More

A Cessna C560 that has been unresponsive to ATC has crashed in Staunton Virginia. A number of air-defence assets were launched to intercept it.The aircraft was heading from Elizabethton, TN to Ronkonkoma, NY (Suffolk County) and was approaching DC and was unresponsive to Air Traffic Control, causing fighter jets from Andrews AFB to approach the Ces... Read More

China claims to have learned from SARS and not to be hushing up the current outbreak. A relative working in China has seen this notice. What should he make of it? Read More

I know there is a cohort of strong Putin supporters here, but this looks to be getting serious and his shtick might be going over for the home side, but maybe it is time for him to stop playing with matches. Lots of jaw-jaw going on at the moment as it should. Options, however, to give leverage to those talks seem limited in this scenario. Fo... Read More

[url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/golf/65825327]PGA Tour & DP World Tour agree shock merger with LIV Golf to end split in golf[/url] Looks like the Saudis have won (or bought) this one. Read More

BBC News - Bob Stewart: Conservative MP charged with racially aggravated abuse https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-65814126 Bob would have told them how it was, no nonsense. I too have been a victim, of someone crying fowl. Hope he gets off. Read More

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-sussex-65792206 I had to... CG Read More

A fascinating read charting a path through the U.K. history of nuclear incidents and accidents, to much to post here, fascinating read… Having done SST standby with normally about a dozen of us on call I find it rather amusing when they talk about the requirement to set up a 5 to 6 mile initial cordon around an incident involving a leak or f... Read More

Some of these do make at least a little sense, e.g. ROSUN = Rossendale, SANBA = Sandbach, BATLI = Batley. I understand GASKO is named for the hamlet of Gammersgill in Coverdale. But others such as KUXEM are a mystery to me. Is there a computer program that generates random but pronounceable five letter groups or are people actually paid to make the... Read More

Just read ABC, plane tail fire in Moranbah this morning. It said Charter flight with 77 people on board... I'm thinking potentially Alliance?? Anyone know? Read More

Extract from Le Figaro May 25th 2023 https://www.lefigaro.fr/actualite-france/adolescents-soldats-djihad-de-la-drogue-l-inquietante-uberisation-des-crimes-en-france-20230529 "Young s... Read More

[left]BBC exit poll giving Con 368 seats Lab 191 SNP 55 Lib 13 an 86 majority.. We have a couple of billboards up round here, large one for Con in the local horses field as normal, and a tiny one in a garden for Lab[/left] Read More

Now we are to be on reserve on layovers: stay in your room, able to leave at a moments notice, unable to plan anything. They can just get f**ked. Read More

[url=https://www.travelweekly.com.au/article/wondering-when-international-travel-will-restart-this-new-chart-could-hold-the-answer/?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_term=&utm_content=Wondering%20when%20international%20travel%20will%20restart%3F%20This%20new%20chart%20could%20hold%20the%20answer&utm_campaign=Travel%20Weekly%3A%20Thursday%2028... Read More

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-65435426People watching the Coronation will be invited to join a "chorus of millions" to swear allegiance to the King and his heirs, organisers say. The public pledge is one of several striking changes to the ancient ceremony revealed on Sat... Read More

The police seem to have completely lost the initiative in the media about these deaths and whether the police were chasing them. In reality , if they weren't they should have been : the rider was only 15 and therefore couldn't have insured and taxed the bike, had no driving-licence and was not wearing a helmet ( ditto the passenger ). The youths w... Read More

Unsure if this was a topic for this forum or JB - please re-site if necessary. " Prime Minister to use US trip to lobby for Ben Wallace to become next head of Nato Rishi Sunak also spent some time on the margins of the G7 meeting in Hiroshima last month lobbying for the Defence Secretary" The above is a headline from the Daily Telegraph and made... Read More

The news channels and the websites are all telling us what didn't happen but nobody is saying what did happen. Clearly something major happened as we know that two young folk died and 8 or 10 others were brought ashore and treated at the scene. So it was not getting mowed down by a jetski or powerboat. To affect that many people close in to th... Read More