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STRAIGHT&LEVEL

fiightglobal.com 8-14 March 2016 | Flight International | 33

100-YEAR ARCHIVE

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From yuckspeak to tales of yore, send your offcuts to [email protected]

Seaplane catch

The French authorities at

Dunkirk report that a German

seaplane was

picked up at

10am yesterday,

three miles north

of Middlekerke Bank. It had

come down at 9pm on

Wednesday when returning

from Holland. One of the

observers was drowned, and

the other was picked up and

made prisoner.

Turkey stuffed

British forces have occupied

the small island of

Kastellorizo which

lies less than a

mile off the

southernmost

point of Asia Minor, where the

Italians had a seaplane base.

If Turkey should join in the war,

it is just as well that this base

should be in Allied hands.

Fatal DC-8 crash

A DC-8 of Canadian Pacific

Airlines undershot in poor

visibility while

coming in to land

at Tokyo

International on

the night of March 4,

crashed into a bank on the

edge of Tokyo Bay and

caught fire. There were only

seven survivors among the

62 passengers and nine

crew on board.

Is there a dossier?

As the Gulf War ended its fifth

week, senior Allied officers

said that there is

hard evidence

that chemical

warfare

ammunition has been

distributed to Iraqi artillery

batteries in Kuwait and

southern Iraq.

Heck of a job

to understand

There is no hiding place from

HR-driven yuckspeak. A job ad

for an “A350 wing lower cover

clean area technical support” at

Airbus’s Madrid plant lists the

following main responsibilities:

“Measure business

performance via collection,

consolidation and synthesis of

performance indicators.

“Manage performance through

root cause analysis, risks/

opportunities identification,

recommendations in order to

enable decision making.

“Identify/drive improvement

projects to reach targeted

performance. Support internal

and external best practices

identification & sharing.”

Oh, and, if time, help build

some wings.

Hot date

Addressing ISTAT Americas on

29 February, CFM International

boss Jean-Paul Ebanga could not

resist the obvious product plug:

“It’s the Leap day,” he declared.

It’s good for EU

Ryanair is publicly backing

Britain to stay in the European

Union ahead of the country’s

referendum in June. Boss

Michael O’Leary says being in

Europe is better for UK jobs,

tourism and growth, and is

urging all staff and passengers

eligible to vote to support

continuing membership.

Can this be the same O’Leary

who delivered an anti-Brussels

tirade at an EU innovation

summit four years ago, in which

he urged his audience to “as

that unless he is elected

President, Boeing will be

compelled by a devalued

Chinese currency to “move its

assembly operation” there.

Continuing on the hyperbolic

theme at a rally near the

airframer’s North Charleston

factory later, he thundered: “It

will be cheaper to build in

China. Then all of a sudden

your Boeing plant in this area

will go and... no politician will

be able to stop it. Because

they’re all talk and no action.

They don’t have a clue.”

Presumably with one

exception.

quickly as you possibly can: get

the hell out of Brussels.”?

He went on: “Go back to your

countries, and stay away from

here as much as is humanly

possible. Because Brussels,

those of you who know the Star

Wars Trilogy, this is the evil

empire. The Berlaymont

[Commission HQ] is the Death

Star, where any hint of

innovation is left at the door as

you walk in to meet with

bureaucrats and politicians,

who you can always tell when

they’re telling lies because their

lips are moving.”

Smashing China

Still on politics, does someone

need to explain to Donald

Trump the difference between

a delivery centre and an

assembly plant?

Speaking in South Carolina

during the Republican

primaries, the property tycoon

claimed that China had forced

Boeing to “build a huge

assembly facility” in the country

in return for 737 orders (it’s a

modest completion centre).

This way for the evil empire He then went on to predict

Isopix/REX/Shutterstock

One of the most eclectic collections of post-war aircraft re-

opens on 25 March. Two of the Second World War hangars at

the National Museum of Flight near Edinburgh have

undergone a major restoration. One will house military

aircraft including the English Electric Lightning and this de

Havilland Sea Venom; the other civil types such as the

Scottish Aviation Twin Pioneer and Britten-Norman Islander.

De Havilland

ZUMA Wire/REX/Shutterstock

Playing his Trump card

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