The statues at the Wheel are quite a bit smaller than the ones out at the river end of the canal. I think this photo is of the big ones. Only an hour's (ish) walk between them,mind.
A day without learning is a day wasted. I didn't know that. These are the ones I saw at the wheel in 2008
I wasn't aware of it either, to be honest. I was on an overnight in Falkirk and took a bus out to the Wheel - which I really enjoyed, by the way. Great watching that wheel in action lifting canal longboats over a hundred feet in the air. The whole area is so well done - plenty of access, nice visitor centre and cafe and the inevitable gift shop. But I was REALLY disappointed with the size of the Kelpies statues and thought I must have been hoodwinked by camera angles or something. It wasn't until I spoke to a local about it that I learned the larger statues were at the end of the canal about a mile away. So near ...... and yet - so far away. Next time! Edit:- sorry, not a mile away but about 4 miles away!
Had a few flights sitting in the back of a Chinook in the eighties the noise and vibrations scared the crap out of us, the only bit I liked was getting off the damn thing.
You can just see the outline below the angels hands... There are messages on some of the blades... Families who had lost loved ones due to knife crime and violence were invited to engrave an everlasting message on a blade which will be included on the monument. We were astounded at the sheer volume of requests we received. We are still working through these everlasting message requests from families across the country who can’t travel to Shropshire to see the sculpture in person.
Some of my more scary moments in this life have been while inside those beasts. The whine of the turbines almost stung your ears. We worked largely with some of the most intrepid pilots in the world so they had pretty big balls. They were also some of the most skilled so that allowed for their audacity. 2 videos of CASEVAC work, both Brit crews. The first really depicts the clinical focused determination to get that kid out, from the Anglian Regt. That's pretty much business as usual for these guys- unflinching while task-saturated, totally in the zone. The 2nd was in support of US troops in contact, from my old Alma Mater. The dedication of ISAF CASEVAC crews was nothing short of extraordinary.
Thanks for the info, @Iron! I didn't know what the wrecks were...just saw the photo on a scuba diving e-mail I get and found the image fascinating. Thanks for making it even more interesting. Just looked up the Print Eugen on wikipedia.
That’s Kwajalein Atoll. The US Navy dumped nearly 200 aircraft there right after WW2. Those are Douglass SBD’s, but there’s multi-engine bombers, top-tier fighters of the day, and transports lying all over the sea bed there. Most of the planes discarded in Kwaj are those SBD’s. They were the main USN attack aircraft for most of the war. Kind of a tragic waste really. To think they could still be flying today in the hands of collectors and museums. Airworthy WW2 aircraft are getting extremely rare.
You are right. My father was a dispatch rider for the Royal Corps of Signals during the war and recalls in his memoirs “I entered Victoria Street from the Westminster end (London area run) just as a bomb blew the front out of the building on the right. I was covered in glass and other muck but managed to stay upright so got back home OK.” And we think twice about taking the bike out if the roads are a bit damp.
With that many superstructures built you would have thought that some of them would have had residents in them?
Letting the brake fluid run all over the callipers, wheel rims and tyres was not very clever. Also can he even see those underslung mirrors? Burnouts have always left me rather nonplussed. Why purposely destroy a perfectly good tyre?
