Tag: Accidents

It’s lucky the harbor was shallow…

  Here’s a video clip of the small container vessel MV Mentari Crystal capsizing at the dockside at the Port of Tanjung Perak in Indonesia last Monday.  Note the explosive snapping of a mooring line 9 seconds into the video.  It wouldn’t have been healthy to be caught in the whiplash! She ended up with… Continue reading It’s lucky the harbor was shallow…

*Sigh* 24 years without hitting an animal, and then…

  I’ve done my best to be a good driver in the USA, despite coming from a country where we drove on the correct other side of the road.  It took a bit of adapting, particularly considering that my first driving experience in this country was in Los Angeles, where six-lane freeways and high-velocity, high-profanity… Continue reading *Sigh* 24 years without hitting an animal, and then…

Er . . . oops?

  gCaptain brings us a video of a collision between a dredger and a tanker in the Malacca Straits earlier this month. The incident reportedly happened October 2 at the TG Beruas Anchorage near Malacca. The dredge in the video is believed to be the Oceanline 5001. It’s unclear what caused the dredge to slam… Continue reading Er . . . oops?

How the heck did he land that plane safely???

Readers are doubtless aware of the mid-air collision a few days ago between a US Marine Corps F-35B strike aircraft and a KC-130J tanker aircraft during air-to-air refueling.  The pilot of the F-35B ejected safely before his aircraft crashed, while the KC-130J’s pilot was able to crash-land in a farm field, saving the lives of all… Continue reading How the heck did he land that plane safely???

He risked his life to keep us safe – and lost it

I was saddened to read this report. A helicopter pilot fighting the California wildfires died Wednesday morning when his aircraft went down in Fresno County, officials said. The pilot was on a water dropping mission when the chopper crashed about 160 miles south of San Francisco, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said… Continue reading He risked his life to keep us safe – and lost it

The Beirut blast: nitrates, yes, but was anything else involved?

I’m quite prepared to accept that fireworks sparked the massive explosion in Beirut, Lebanon yesterday.  If you look at video of the incident, the initial fire shows sparkling minor explosions all around the central smoke, typical of ignited fireworks.  As for the enormous blast that followed, I’m also prepared to believe it involved thousands of… Continue reading The Beirut blast: nitrates, yes, but was anything else involved?

Doofus Of The Day #1,063

Last month I wrote an article titled “This is why you don’t fly in Third World nations… unless you have at least one First World pilot in the cockpit“.  In it, I pointed out: There are incompetent and/or inadequately-trained and/or completely untrained pilots in many Third World countries, where a bribe to the examiner can… Continue reading Doofus Of The Day #1,063

This is why you don’t fly in Third World nations…

… unless you have at least one First World pilot in the cockpit.  That’s been a hard-and-fast rule of mine for decades, and I think it’s one of the reasons I survived living and working in the Third World for as long as I did.  I know I’m far from alone in observing that precaution,… Continue reading This is why you don’t fly in Third World nations…

Did nobody think about the weights and masses involved?

Last week an incident at Aberdeen airport in Scotland saw a DHC Dash 8 Q400 commuter airliner (empty and powered-down) roll unchecked across the hardstand, to run into an Embraer ERJ-145 parked on the other side.  Total damage to both jets is likely to run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. The incident was… Continue reading Did nobody think about the weights and masses involved?