HMS Belfast

Since the end of November 2011, HMS Belfast has been closed due to an incident with a gangway. Normally I volunteer on board HMS Belfast, but with access to the ship not possible, I have been stood down as a volunteer on board HMS Belfast. However, it does give me time to reconcile past events as a volunteer and I hope it gives a useful insight into what a volunteer does on board HMS Belfast.

You may also notice that I have changed the blog theme with a new theme and also added a number of header photos to ‘liven’ up the blog. The aim of my blog is to be more aviation centric and also a show case of things that are aviation related. As mentioned earlier I do like to rant a bit and so a special category has been set up just for that, but that’s more fun and poke than anything else.

As a treat below are some of the aviation headers that are randomly displayed in this blog.

There is a good reason why I am doing this. It has been said that if you make a reasonable list of tasks that you can follow, you can achieve them, hence why people commonly have ‘quit smoking’, ‘go to the gym’ and ‘make more money’ on their list.

The trick I have found is to have a general goal and break it down to smaller goals to make it easier and that is what this manifesto is all about, a resolution on a resolution, you could call it Resolution 2012, but that is not what it is.

Airshows

The first thing to mention, being an aviation geek is to mention airshows. I do not have a natural passion for airshows, I find them restrictive, crowded, uncomfortable and troublesome when it comes to planning, but it is the same for any trip like a holiday.

I have an access option when it comes to Duxford airshows and so I hope to pull some interesting strings (that keeps costs down), also I hope to use the Duxford airshows as a test bed for photo techniques at airshows, what equipment to bring, how to set up the camera properly and photograph in challenging conditions.

Further, I hope to be going to Farnborough for a few days and take as many interesting photos as possible, after all, it is an international air fair and there has to be something interesting flying. Will Iran’s newly acquired RQ-10 UAV drone make an appearance?

The only question to my airshow season has to be The Royal International Air Tattoo (RIAT), I don’t know about it. Sure there’s going to be some interesting fast jets, but with my Aviation Intelligence (#avintel) questioning, I found a number of aircraft enthusiasts drumming Farnborough over RIAT.

Work

I am saddened that I am within the fringes of the lost generation who have lots of time and not much else to do. I do however have an ace card up my sleeve. I do have voluntary commitments. For those who know or follow me, I volunteer at HMS Belfast as a Warship Conservation Volunteer and at RAF Museum London as part of the Aircraft Restoration Team.

Since (at the time of writing), HMS Belfast is closed because of an incident, I am effectively been made redundant until the ship re-opens as a museum again, but RAF museum London is not and so I will just continue to work in a crashed Halifax Bomber.

A small hidden secret is that I have been working on some work experience and all I can say is that it ties with a career I want to follow. I would love to be an Aircraft Maintenance Engineer, but before I go and fully commit, there are a few things that need to be looked into. The first thing is to determine how good or bad I am with tools, secondly look at how well I work around aircrafts and machinery and thirdly how well I can learn to adapting changes in requirements; sounds as easy as pie.

However, work experience requires time, patience and money, so really looking for a small and good pay part time job is something to get hold of, but with a recession on the way, the strangling of jobs and prosperity is a concern.

One way to tackle this would be to go beyond what is comfortable or feasible. Spending less, saving more and working odd hours is the only thing to do and don’t think it applies to me, if you’ve read this far you know it can apply to you, so there, at least I am preaching more than my ego.

Activities

Work and no play is a very dull place to stay, and so 2012 will need to be a more interesting year despite the austerity measures taking place in Britain. As mentioned earlier, airshows will be something to work and practice for, but photography as a whole, in general is something I would like to improve.

Photography

To improve on my photography I intend to get hold of a proper tripod make more use of my flashgun and research more in different photographic techniques and to make things more interesting, use the museum as my photographic test bed. There is also good reason for this mentality, as later in the year, the Queen’s Jubilee is going to happen and one of the sentinel events is the Queen being on a barge sailing down the Thames.

Airsofting

On a different note, last year a friend of mine introduced me to Airsofting a shooting sport using life sized replica guns firing ball bearing (BB) pellets. Fun, is not the word I was thinking when having a go, enjoyment at releasing internal pressures of the year dressed up in DPM, well little boys need to grow up properly…

Others

So, anything else? Yes, the prospect of going to the gym is something I will definitely consider, but being an open-ended manifesto anything is open to interpretation and that also includes looking at learning to play the trumpet to rock climbing and anything that gets me out of the house.