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Frightening Discovery

The dust billowed up, at first just a thin band of silver grey glinting in the eerie light before becoming a thick cloudy storm that would burn your eyes and blind you if you looked at it for too long. The craft began it's slow descent, carefully seeking a smooth landing area. At first no one noticed the small crags emerging as the loose surface dust cover of over a million years of deposits was blown away. It  revealed not only the few sharp rock projections, but also the unmistakable features gradually appearing nearby. At first just a white brow, then large deep eye sockets until a near perfectly preserved human skull projected through the clearing mist. The cameras panned around the plain of Elysium Planitia to the skull that no one had expected to see. The crew began the necessary tests as they could hardly believe their eyes. They worked in awestruck silence recording and checking like they had been trained and had done a hundred times before. This time things seemed  mo...
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Percy Pilcher - 1st Airplane inventor?

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Percy Sinclair Pilcher  (16 January 1867 – 2 October 1899) was a British inventor and pioneer aviator who was his country's foremost experimenter in unpowered flight near the end of the nineteenth century. After corresponding with Otto Lilienthal, Pilcher had considerable success with developing hang gliders. In 1895, he made repeated flights in the  Bat , and in 1896–1897 many flights in  the  Hawk  culminated in a world distance record. By 1899, Pilcher had produced a motor-driven triplane, which he planned to test at Stanford Hall in Leicestershire on September 30, 1899 to a group of onlookers and potential sponsors, including the eminent Member of Parliament John Henniker Heaton, in a field near Stanford Hall. However, days before, the engine crankshaft had broken and, so as not to disappoint his guests, he decided to fly the  Hawk  instead. The weather was stormy and rainy, but by 4 pm Pilcher decided the...
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An unfortunate Royal snub.

Princess Anne is involved with over 300 charities, organisations, and military regiments, with a focus on sports, science, disability, health, and international development. Her significant work includes her lifelong patronage of Save the Children, where she has supported efforts in child health, education, and disaster relief globally. She is also a patron of the Riding for the Disabled Association (RDA), supporting riders and coaches for disabled individuals, and the Carers Trust, which helps people caring for family members. Back in the 1990's she attended a charity concert involving lots of semi professional artists. All unpaid and giving their time for free. You know the type of thing, good competent singers, comedians, magicians and novelty acts. Entertaining but not West End stars. The acts rehearsed all day, and some the day before as it was such an honour to perform before The Princess, with sound checks, decisions on costumes and songs etc. I had the pleasure t...
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Too Many Traffic Signs.

Am I the only one that is annoyed at the large amount of traffic signs these days? We often don't notice them in our own town or city, but when you go somewhere new or unfamiliar there are hundreds of them. It really is hard to see them all let alone read them. So my group, (there's only me at the moment), have some plans.  1. Firstly, yellow lines, they're everywhere! Not needed IMO. On every approach, road or cycleway leading into a large urban area you place 1 sign up with brief parking restrictions that apply when you pass the sign. It would say 'No vehicles are allowed to stop for more than 10 minutes for any reason on any road except in an emergency. Any unattended vehicle will be liable to be clamped and impounded after 10 minutes. A fine of £1,000 plus £500 every day it is unclaimed.' Or similar. So that's all yellow lines gone. The town is already looking better. 2. Now for speed limits. Remember those signs about parking? We add to it a simple line, th...
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