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saw this on the Grauniad about trident renewal.'Trident whistleblower says nuclear subs are insecure, unsafe and 'a disaster waiting to happen' - TRIDENT submarines are plagued by serious security lapses, beset by multiple safety blunders and are "a disaster waiting to happen", according to a nuclear weapons engineer turned whistleblower who is now being hunted by the police.
William McNeilly, who says he was on patrol with HMS Victorious from January to April this year, alleges that the Trident missiles it carries are vulnerable to a terrorist attack that "would kill our people and destroy our land". Infiltrators have "the perfect opportunity to send nuclear warheads crashing down on the UK", he claims.
He has written a detailed 18-page report called The Nuclear Secrets, which claims to lift the lid on the alarming state of the UK's ageing and short-staffed nuclear deterrent. He went absent without leave from the Royal Navy last week, is on the run and expects to be arrested. "This is bigger than me, it's bigger than all of us," he says. "We are so close to a nuclear disaster it is shocking, and yet everybody is accepting the risk to the public. If we don't act now lives could be lost for generations."
The risk was "extremely high", he told the Sunday Herald. "My information comes from good sources and I have no reason to lie. If change isn't made, a nuclear catastrophe almost certainly will happen."
McNeilly's report alleges 30 safety and security flaws on Trident submarines, based at Faslane on the Clyde. They include failures in testing whether missiles could be safely launched, burning toilet rolls starting a fire in a missile compartment, and security passes and bags going unchecked.
He also reports alarms being muted because they went off so often, missile safety procedures being ignored and top secret information left unguarded.
"It's just a matter of time before we're infiltrated by a psychopath or a terrorist," he says. "There were some people that I served with on that patrol who showed clear psychopathic tendencies." http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/13...
Trident is dangerous, and not to our enemies!
Will, this was a big deal when the story broke in Scotland a few months back, but the usual naysayers and vested interests tried to dismiss it out of hand. It sickens me to think that a danger of this magnitude is only 20 miles away from Scotland's most populous city.
If it were up to me, Trident would be moored outside the House of Commons, then we'd see how keen our MPs were on nuclear deterrent.
while I have no doubt that report is true, what do you think is likely to be the state of Russian nuclear subs? Doubly leaky I imaging
Will wrote: "You think it's worked in Ireland, Jim? Not if you talk to the ordinary people. I've a mate who has just bought one of the thousands of unfinished houses in ireland - cheaply I might add - from the ..."Current Irish youth unemployment 19.2%
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/irela...
Current Spanish youth unemployment 46%
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/spain...
Current UK youth unemployment. 13.6%
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/unite...
Current USA youth unemployment rate 10.3%
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/unite...
Even the Germans, who've totally screwed Europe by keeping a currency undervalued for their economy so having their exports subsidised by the rest have a youth unemployment rate of 7%
The last thing we need is politicians doing investment. It's always too expensive for what you get, look at Gordon Browns PFI spending which could comprehensively screw the NHS finances. Or Cameron's folly, spend billions to get people from some bizarre station outside Birmingham to London in twenty minutes less than you can now.
Will wrote: "saw this on the Grauniad about trident renewal.'Trident whistleblower says nuclear subs are insecure, unsafe and 'a disaster waiting to happen' - TRIDENT submarines are plagued by serious securit..."
It's interesting because as we built it, complaints come to us, because the yard is contractually obliged to fix them
Obviously security in Scotland isn't something we'd be told about, but faults with the kit would the the yards job to fix, at the yard's expense.
As for the crew, security checks on submarine crews has always been tough, but the job itself imposes mental stress. You can see that by what it did to him :-)
Just testing something...
Marc wrote: "while I have no doubt that report is true, what do you think is likely to be the state of Russian nuclear subs? Doubly leaky I imaging"I have no doubt that Russia's cold war relics are held together by sticky tape and blue tack, but if our laptop bombardiers are so keen on Trident, let them float it on the River Thames!
yes, the bit next to Oxford would be perfect
The thing about the fixing doesn't really work Jim. We have one being fixed, one at sea fully armed (as long as the firing button actually works, which is beginning to sound suspect!) and two on inservice training. So if the one with the weapons goes wrong, there's no actual capacity to fix it, is there?And I agree with RMF: if it's so safe, put it near London. We'd all be better off without the place anyway.
Jim wrote: "Will wrote: "You think it's worked in Ireland, Jim? Not if you talk to the ordinary people. I've a mate who has just bought one of the thousands of unfinished houses in ireland - cheaply I might ad..."Evidence there that austerity DIDN'T work in Ireland, then, isn't it?
It's never worked anywhere, and never will becausee it is an intellectually flawed theory
Will wrote: "The thing about the fixing doesn't really work Jim. We have one being fixed, one at sea fully armed (as long as the firing button actually works, which is beginning to sound suspect!) and two on in...And I agree with RMF: if it's so safe, put it near London. We'd all be better off without the place anyway. "
Oi!
Luv a Londoner
Will wrote: "The thing about the fixing doesn't really work Jim. We have one being fixed, one at sea fully armed (as long as the firing button actually works, which is beginning to sound suspect!) and two on in..."How do you mean, goes wrong?
Note, there are 58 missiles between the four boats and each boat can carry 16 but from 2010 they were going to cut that to eight (it may be that the remaining spaces are used by cruise missiles or a communications satellite launcher
So the boats on in-service training can do that carrying missiles and indeed may do
There's no problem with basing. We'd happily base them here, the jobs would come in handy, the investment on the docks would be welcome and it's hardly going to effect our security.
Will wrote: "Evidence there that austerity DIDN'T work in Ireland, then, isn't it?..."Well it worked far better than whatever they've done in Spain
G20 finance ministers (no doubt prodded on by Cameron) are predicting the collapse of economies, the death of the first born, and no salt sachets in salt and shake crips, if Britain leaves the EU. I warned people that the propaganda war that we in Scotland were subjected to in 2014, would turn its guns on England with the EU referendum.
Brace yourselves, ye yeoman of England :)
Yes, I heard that voting leave is about to visit an economic collapse on the whole world! It can't be worse that what they are doing to us now. I heard Boy George on the news last night saying he'd have to go for more cuts if the economy took a down turn, in flagrant disregard of the IMF's advice
Both sides of the campaign are boring as fuck and sound almost identical.There's nothing positive being shouted about.
Why not talk about the environmental and employee protection laws that being in the EU gives us for instance?
Well actually it was the UK and the USA that brought employee protection laws in in the first place :-)
In fact we're one of the few EU countries that actually applies the Animal Health and Welfare legislation :-(We were even sending meat back to Germany because it came from Slaughter houses where they weren't following procedures properly
I have been told by an investigative journalist who is following the trail, that the horse meat is scandal is still happening: the animals ae slaughtered in Ireland, and the meat goes into the UK, out into belgium, then gets processed and returned into the Uk as minced beef...
Will wrote: "I have been told by an investigative journalist who is following the trail, that the horse meat is scandal is still happening: the animals ae slaughtered in Ireland, and the meat goes into the UK, ..."Support your local butcher - that's my motto. Where I live, the fields and farm that supply our shop are not far away, so you know exactly where the meat's coming from, and what conditions the animals are in.
Will wrote: "Yes, I heard that voting leave is about to visit an economic collapse on the whole world! It can't be worse that what they are doing to us now. I heard Boy George on the news last night saying he..."
He knows as much about running an economy as I do about plankton living in the Indian Ocean!
Will wrote: "I have been told by an investigative journalist who is following the trail, that the horse meat is scandal is still happening: the animals ae slaughtered in Ireland, and the meat goes into the UK, ..."I wouldn't be surprised,the supermarkets are fighting a war and doing anything they can do to make margin
Beef is an international traded commodity and if the price in one country falls, it's easy to send it somewhere else. If a supermarket is selling cheap beef, it's not because it's good beef and they're screwing the supplier, it's because it isn't good beef because they couldn't get good beef for the price they're willing to pay.
Go to the local butcher and ask for a price for mince and if the supermarket is cheaper, then it's padded out with fat, or alternatively, horse
Eek, a politician with principles. That's scary
Rosemary (aiming to misbehave) wrote: "Eek, a politician with principles. That's scary"The principles don't bother me, she suffers from Salmonditis that's the problem. It's the thought of being talked down to till you die that is probably the worst torture.
I don't agree with Sturgeon's pro-EU stance (I'm voting to leave) but at least she's been consistent over the years, unlike a certain home secretary. And on another note, it's a bit rich for the Telegraph to complain about the scare stories coming from the Remain campaign.
The Telegraph was only to happy to peddle lies and smears against the Yes side during the Scottish referendum.
Let the bastards suffer a dose of their own medicine.
Does the Daily Telegraph sell many copies in Scotland?This is a genuine question, posed out of a pure quest for knowledge, I'm not asking it as part of a smartassed comment
Fewer than 20,000. Mostly in Edinburgh and St Andrews, I would imagine. And the odd hunting lodge in the Highlands ;)
Jim wrote: "Does the Daily Telegraph sell many copies in Scotland?This is a genuine question, posed out of a pure quest for knowledge, I'm not asking it as part of a smartassed comment"
I see the odd copy here and there, but circulation is generally low. In part, that's due to the general decline in paper sales for all newspapers, but in Scotland, there was a backlash against the NO supporting press by a lot of Yes voters, so newspaper sales have dipped.
I just wondered. It provoked me to actually look, and it seems that a lot of newspapers are suffering. Scottish ones probably suffer because they cannot hope for the economies of scalehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland...
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Jim wrote: "I just wondered. It provoked me to actually look, and it seems that a lot of newspapers are suffering. Scottish ones probably suffer because they cannot hope for the economies of scaleThe other problem is that newspapers are most popular in the central belt where they are easier to distribute.
And of course the real underlying issue is that all of them are struggling with falling sales because of the web and none of them have found a way to successfully sell digital. The result of this is that people will come to rely on on-line media for their news, and if we look at facebook we have a fair idea the accuracy of that. At least there is still Snopes
Grand Leader Snopes? ;)
Patti (baconater) wrote: "America. Horrifying."this may be what happens when an elite treats their underclass with contempt and doesn't bother spending money on educating them.
All those videos about chavs in Walmart that the upper classes have been sniggering about have come back to bite them
"Let them eat fast food"
Jim wrote: "And of course the real underlying issue is that all of them are struggling with falling sales because of the web and none of them have found a way to successfully sell digital. The result of this..."
I think people are also realising that the quality of journalism and analysis, in recent years, has gone down pretty sharply, and hence, they're ditching newspapers.
Personally, I think that journalists are too cosy with the establishment these days, to embedded with the people they're supposed to hold to account.
the establishment being their newspaper owners. They don't have the leeway to deviate too far from the owners' agendas.
Jim wrote: "I just wondered. It provoked me to actually look, and it seems that a lot of newspapers are suffering. Scottish ones probably suffer because they cannot hope for the economies of scalehttp://www...."
The Independent is the first 'serious' paper to give up print - wonder which one will be next?
see if "New Day" takes Trinity Mirror Group down. Anyone read it btw?
Patti (baconater) wrote: "America. Horrifying."You ain't seen nuthin' yet! ;-)
Marc wrote: "the establishment being their newspaper owners. They don't have the leeway to deviate too far from the owners' agendas."They do have the leeway to walk away and find another job. If this country needs anything it's hard hitting investigative journalism.
David wrote: "Patti (baconater) wrote: "America. Horrifying."You ain't seen nuthin' yet! ;-)"
I'm terrified you're correct. I think it's coming time to change our dollars to pounds. Or perhaps euros.
Or pork bellies...
Patti (baconater) wrote: "David wrote: "Patti (baconater) wrote: "America. Horrifying."You ain't seen nuthin' yet! ;-)"
I'm terrified you're correct. I think it's coming time to change our dollars to pounds. Or perhaps e..."
Bitcoins!
I was amused by Jim's effort to make sense of our situation by discussing class conflict, elites, etc. None of that applies. This is just about loonies taking over the asylum. But they seem to be turning on each other now, so we should be okay in the long run. Of course, as we become more and more of a comic-book country, kind of makes me wonder why I waste so much time writing books.
Hmmm.Investing in loonies might make sense. The Canadian dollar is quite low at the moment.
Patti (baconater) wrote: "Hmmm.Investing in loonies might make sense. The Canadian dollar is quite low at the moment."
Risky. Canada may face serious economic problems once the waves of refugees fleeing the US start arriving. But maybe Canada will build a wall and make us pay for it...
Patti (baconater) wrote: "From the New Yorker. Hmmhttp://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-..."
Well that's totally not racist. (Is Canadian a race? You know what I mean)
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The Beiderbecke Affair (other topics)The Grain Market in the Roman Empire: A Social, Political and Economic Study (other topics)
The Peasants Are Revolting (other topics)
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Osborne is failing to take advantage of the low interest rates to invest in our infrastructure - he'd rather sell it off to other countries, like China. He's dragged us almost into depression twice, and is too dogmatic to actually think about what he's doing.