ianbee: this is instead of getting a dog

I do like a fenestrated tail rotor

Dauphins come in pairs! Note the special window so you can see what shoes the pilot is wearing.

Big yellow helicopters

I spent monday morning at RAF Leconfield looking at big yellow helicopters. This one looks new but it is 35 years old! And still our front-line search and rescue resource.

I got back home and realised that I hadn't taken any interesting photos. It's really embarassing, and a bit annoying. I'm so sorry. There isn't even one with the whole helicopter in it, just odd bits. In my defence it was very cold and I was very tired and had a hungry tummy and I was thinking of work things. Here's one of the side door and the winch cable, sorry, it's the best i can do. I'll try harder next time.

Miscellaneous emergency vehicles

I've been away looking at ambulances and helicopters this week. I discovered that if you take a big exhibition hall and fill it with hundreds of emergency vehicles all with blue flashing lights, you get a really bad headache almost immediately.

There were some innovative ambulance designs, which I may have trouble getting my organisation to fund. I rather liked this one, just for its sturdiness ...

And this one can take two patients ...

This one faught in the Falklands. The bulge on the rear door is the modification so it can take a stretcher across the back seat! Typically British inginuity. It's not missing an engine cover, it never had one in the first place. It's basically a Meccano helicopter. It even comes with a spanner (front seat).  

And there were lots of the usual little yellow helicopters too. It was nice to see a BK again.

I stayed with a friend near Oxford. She'd bought a sofa but couldn't fit it through her front door. Her house backs onto the park so we marched it past Waitrose and into the trees. The ground level in the park was lower than her garden, so I had to stand with my arms stretched above my head, balancing a sofa against a wall, whilst my friend ran around the block to haul it in from the other side. Great fun. Everyone should try it. 

Things you missed

The trouble with doing lots of things is that it becomes harder to write about them, because if you stop to write, you end up doing less. Plus I have always tended to write in my head, whether it be postcards, letters, blog posts or cheques. Once the rough draft has passed through my thoughts some sort of cerebral switch is flicked which indicates to my memory that the letter has actually been written, and sent. And the cheque was enclosed. So when I bump into you on the street I can't understand why you haven't heard my news, because I remember writing to you, I just didn't write it down.

Many blog posts have been written these past few weeks, but they are not here, so I guess they were all in my head. That means you missed the one about about the yellow helicopter.

 

And the highland cows.

 

 

The hilarious road sign.

 

And my role in organising a mass-knit of woolly pythonesque beards.

 

Never mind eh?

Thwopa thwopa thwopa

Busy week last week. I was billeted near London on an Aviation Medicine course. One of the highlights was a visit to the London air-ambulance pad.

 

They've got a lovely red helicopter. If you look carefully it hasn't got a tail rotor. No, it didn't fall off. It doesn't need one - which makes it ideal for landing in an urban environment. The way this tail-rotor-less aircraft works was carefully explained to us, and after listening intently I understand that it uses a combination of magic and fairy-dust to stay in the air.

 

During the time that I was visiting, the team responded to three separate incidents. It was amazing to stand on the roof-top and watch the machine take off, fly towards the horizon, circle, hover and drop down in the distance between the buildings. After a brief pause it took off again and appeared in the sky, returning to the pad. I'm not exposed to much trauma, as a paediatric nurse, so it was sobering to consider the volume, scale and range of tragic events that were unfolding beneath me.

Boat-bridge-helicopter

See that little sailing boat, on the left, just going under the bridge? I'm on it! Actually I was at the helm! Coordinating the intersection of boat-bridge-helicopter took some doing, I can tell you ...

Snowboarding by helicopter

I'm a bit busy here at the moment, so I thought I'd clear out the left-over New Zealand photos. Particularly the ones with the, um, helicopter in. Did I mention the helicopter? I've always wanted to go heli-snowboarding, and this year I saved my pennies and joined a trip to the Harris mountains where I spent a day being lifted onto precarious ridges covered in pristine powder.

 

 

 

I now have massive carbon-guilt. I'll need to get a worm-farm or something to make up for my extravagant day of selfish aviation-fuel saturated pleasure. But at least I have some great photos, and even better memories!

More photos from a helicopter

Three beaches and a hat and a helicopter

Here are a few recent photos, you can see my flat in the first, if you know where to look. The second was taken at Curl Curl Beach, about ten minutes drive north. The third is Chinaman's Beach, just round the corner. The next photo is of my new hat. I'm really excited because it's almost identical to my favourite hat which I lost in Leith shortly before I came out to Australia. You might think I won't get to wear it for a bit, but it can get pretty nippy here. The whole idea of Australia being hot is a bit of a myth. It might be hot in the middle, but it's certainly damp at the edges. In fact, my advice to anyone coming to Australia is "bring a jumper and a brolly". Finally there's a picture of a helicopter at dawn coming to rescue me.

 

Thwoppa, Thwoppa, Thwoppa

Hello. It's a busy week, my head is exploding with new knowledge and new names. I've had my CAO 20.11 briefing, which means that I am now exempt from listening to the safety talk on plane flights! I have learnt how to survive in a desert, and which bits of the helicopter you are allowed to use to start a fire in the event of a crash. I can now use a flare safely. I have been fitted for a helmet, which has a microphone and a smart little light for reading maps. I have also been shown how to eject the doors in the event of an emergency. I wish they hadn't shown me that, it's a big red knob that just cries out "play with me, play with me!"

Most exciting of all, yesterday I had my first flight! A dawn run over some mountains to a little hospital South of Sydney in a place called Nowra. First of many trips, I hope it never starts to feel routine ...