With Christmas 2011 passed, there are still the Winter Festivals of News Years and Up HellyAa to enjoy before the hard slog that 2012 promises.
Best wishes from the FIRE Project team
An enlightening Up HellyAa
December 30th, 2011Christmas Greetings from the FIRE Project
December 23rd, 2011
佃亁
Rocket science in plain language, from Haynes
June 28th, 2011
NASA Space Shuttle
Owners’ Workshop Manual
1981 onwards (all models)
Dr David Baker
Format: Hardback
RRP: £19.99
ISBN: 978 1 84425 866 6
With the final mission of the NASA Space Shuttle programme currently scheduled for 8 July fans of spaceflight can pick up the ultimate souvenir – the Haynes NASA Space Shuttle Owners’ Workshop Manual – perfect for when the soon to be defunct shuttles turn up on eBay…
Published to mark a trio of historic dates – the 50th anniversary of the first ever manned space mission (12 April 1961), the 30th anniversary of the Shuttle’s first mission (12 April 1981) and the final flight of Atlantis, (currently scheduled for 8 July) the NASA Space Shuttle Owners’ Workshop Manual includes the full story behind the world’s first re-useable spacecraft.
New FIRE Project News Portal Opens
June 25th, 2011
A new FIRE Project news portal opened today.
Broadly Boats News is dedicated to Commercial and Leisure Maritime news.
Part of the 2011 development program for the FIRE Project, the new portal introduces new functionality which will be progressively switched as other elements in the FIRE Project on-line intelligent information resource complete their upgrades and enhancements.
New Firetrench eBookshop Opens
May 13th, 2011
The new Firetrench eBookshop has opened to public access today. This is part of the 2011 portals upgrade programme for the FIRE Project on-line information resources.
Best Wishes for 2010
January 1st, 2010January 1st, 2010
The FIRE Project team wishes all our readers a Happy and Successful 2010.
For us, 2009 has presented many challenges and has seen the FIRE Project achieve a number of important targets, moving into the next Project phase.
There has been a significant increase in readership for all portals, which is a great reward for the efforts of our volunteers.
We welcome comment and suggestion from our readers to help us to improve the presentation and content of all of the portals and of the Central Information Resource.
We greatly appreciate contribution of material for our news columns and databases. During 2010, we will be providing facilities for contributors to add material directly to the FIRE Project system.
The coming year will bring its own opportunities and challenges and we hope that every reader will find success and happiness.
FIRE Project volunteers
One Hundred Years of British Naval Aviation
December 4th, 2008
Just out, this eBook tells the story of British Naval Aviation, and a gripping story it is.
Fly Navy 100 will celebrate one hundred years of the Fleet Air Arm in May 2009.
The full story of British Naval Aviation starts during the Napoleonic Wars at the start of the Nineteenth Century.
Since 1908, the Royal Navy has fought a continuing battle to retain or regain control of naval aviation. Royal Navy aviators have been transfered into the Army’s Royal Flying Corps, then back under Admiralty service when the Royal Naval Air Service was formed one month before the outbreak of war in 1914, then transferred into the newly formed Royal Air Force in 1918, before returning to the Royal Navy in 1937 as the Fleet Air Arm.
The author has begun with the papers of Admiral Thomas Cockrane, followed the use of balloons and man-carrying kites, into the story of powered naval flight, two World Wars and a selection of other conflicts in which British Naval Aviation has played an important role. The author then continues on into the future with new carriers, supersonic STOVL fighters and the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles that are starting to take over roles from manned naval aircraft.
The eBook contains a great many images, including images that have never been seen by the public before.
Visit the eBookshop at: tinyurl.com/6p2zaq
IMO chief makes direct appeal to Security Council for Somalia piracy action
November 22nd, 2008
IMO Secretary-General Efthimios E. Mitropoulos has issued a call at the highest level for a coordinated and cohesive response, both internationally and nationally, to combat the scourge of piracy off the coast of Somalia.
Yesterday (20 November), in a personal briefing to the UN Security Council in the context of the latter’s consideration of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s report on the situation in Somalia, Secretary-General Mitropoulos told Security Council members about the scope and extent of the problem which, he said, was a matter of grave concern. He also outlined a series of actions the Security Council might consider taking to address the situation. In particular, he requested that the Security Council take appropriate action:
“Vertical” round the world solo yachtsman to give fundraising talk for local RNLI lifeboats
November 11th, 2008
Adrian aboard Barrabas off the Siberian coast
Date: 11/11/2008
Author: Adrian Don, Volunteer Lifeboat Press Officer
Reference: Tynemouth 045 2008
Tynemouth and Cullercoats RNLI lifeboat stations are asking people to join us for an extraordinary event.
Adrian Flannigan, solo yachtsman, will re-live his adventures to raise funds to help keep our lifeboats saving lives at sea.
Adrian has a reputation for delivering a fascinating and lively talk, capturing his audience completely.
Adrian became the first person to complete a ‘Vertical Circumnavigation’ of the planet in 2008, having endured an epic 405 days of sailing and 31,000 lonely miles.
The event takes place on Friday 14 November 2008, from 6.30pm (start 7.30pm prompt) at South Tyneside College, St Georges Avenue, South Shields, NE34 6ET.
Tickets: £8 (adults; £5 (students / senior citizens); £10 (on the door)
TICKETLINE: 0191 266 1037 or 07703 323 086
Email: info@storrarmarine.co.uk or info@thepolarfront.com
Over The Top
November 9th, 2008
This is an inspiring story and it holds the reader from the first page.
Good books inform and entertain. This is a good book. The author is a writer who embarked on an extraordinary adventure. The result is a well-written book. The adventure was the first attempt to complete a vertical or bi-polar circumnavigation by sea. The idea took root while the author was a teenager. The events of life conspired to delay the adventure for three decades. Many have a dream, see it delayed and never pluck up the courage to make it happen. Flanagan sets the scene with a brief and readable background to his life before the adventure. The task he set himself was considerable. He had to acquire the necessary skills of seamanship, find and equip a suitable boat and then sail his dream. That would have been a serious challenge for a novice sailor, but he planned a course that would tax the most experienced yachtsmen. It involved sailing from the South Coast of England, down through the Atlantic, past the Falkland Islands, round Cape Horn against prevailing wind and currents, north through the Pacific to the Bering Strait and then along the Russian northern coast, round the top of Norway and down the North Sea to the English Channel and back to Southampton Water. The preparation was compressed into less than a year and the expedition was largely funded by mortgaging his home and using all his savings. The voyage was full of extreme tests, not least in obtaining the first permission from the Russian Government for a single-handed sailor to transit the Russian Northern Sea Route.