text:
Murdered Blackpool lecturer killed with crossbow was conned out of £220,000 before his death
Lancashire neighbours celebrate huge windfall in People's Postcode Lottery
Chorley duo caught red handed with drugs sentenced
Two men who were involved in supplying class A drugs in Chorley have been punished by the courts.
By Stef Hall
Monday, 7th June 2021, 3:45 pm
Michael Hesketh, 35 of Buckshaw Hall Close, Chorley, and Lewis Harrison, 22, of Baldmoor Lake Road, Birmingham, both admitted possession with intent to supply cocaine
and heroin after being arrested on February 25 last year.
Hesketh also admitted assaulting his sister and her friend, and breaching a restraining order in a separate incident.
Sessions House
Preston's Sessions House Court was told the men were found in possession of 70 wraps of crack and heroin valued at around £710 and £30 cash.
An i-Phone and ticklists were also found.
Chorley woman, 46, jailed for five and a half years for drug dealing
David Traynor, prosecuting, said three men were seen leaving a flat by police who then stopped them.
Two of the men ran away but were caught nearby.
The third man remains wanted.
Defending Hesketh, whose flat was used as a base for packaging the drugs, Anna Chestnutt said he committed the offences after finding he was living in a property 'far beyond his means'.
She said he had met Harrison through a mutual friend and it was suggested he could start dealing drugs to address his financial situation.
She pointed out the offending took place over a short lived 16 day period before they were caught and as such, no money was ever earned.
Judge Simon Medland QC said: " There were more than 70 wraps of these poisonous drugs in possession of a third party who has absented himself and has not yet been arrested, but the three of you were jointly involved in it.
"There was photographic evidence indicating a large amount of money. It is obvious from the number of wraps themselves and the price charged for this stuff that a significant amount of money could have been accrued in a short amount of time."
Hesketh received 30 months in prison for the drugs offences and an extra six months of breach of the restraining order and assaults, making a total of three years.
But the judge accepted Harrison had developmental problems, that his role was "subordinate to the other two men" and he had never served a jail term before.
He imposed two years, suspended for two years, with a three month curfew and rehabilitation requirement.
The court ordered the forfeiture and destruction of the drugs, phone and money.
The Lancashire Post is more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription to support our journalism. For unlimited access to Lancashire news and information online, you can subscribe here.


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The Untold is a four piece hard rock and progressive metal band based in Chicago Illinois. The band formed in September of 2017, released their first single The Lowly Beggar Man in December, then continued to release a second single then their debut EP Stories of Life and Death by August of 2018. The music of The Untold is rooted in hard rock and progressive metal, though the band stays dynamic as they write songs that bridge the gap of the overly technical to the catchier mainstream. The band is currently working on new material that will be released in Summer of 2019
A Deeper Dive Into The Untold
The band's formation in September of 2017 was not a complete one. From September to early 2018 the band only consisted of Luke Dupuis (guitar and vocals) and Alex Kennedy (drums). They wrote and rehearsed together at Columbia College Chicago where they both attended, and released their first single in December of '17. By early spring of 2018 the duo finally found bass player Rob Runnels and guitarist Cole Dillow. The four piece recorded the band's second single, Stranger which was written by Kennedy and Dupuis during their time as a duo. In June of 2018 the band began to play on stages and developed an energetic and engaging live show that kept progressing with each performance. By August the band released their debut EP Stories of Life and Death. The songs off of the album ranged from thrash prog, to groove metal, to 80's power ballad, to ambient acoustic to pop hard rock and beyond. The songs are dynamic, though they are cohesive with the sound of The Untold. The album's lyrics speak to life struggles, the mystery of death and the issues with world around us, all through the theme of storytelling. Since the EP, the band has continued to play live, write new material and work on the next steps towards playing to a bigger and broader audience. The band plans to bring their amalgam of influence and sound to the entire world, and looks forward to the future.
The Untold Live

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
2-Butenedioic acid (Z)-, ester with 1,2-propanediol, compd. with 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol
Regulatory process names 2 CAS names 1 IUPAC names 3 Other identifiers 1
Print infocard Open Brief Profile
Danger! According to the classification provided by companies to ECHA in REACH registrations this substance is harmful if swallowed, causes serious eye damage, is harmful to aquatic life with long lasting effects and may cause an allergic skin reaction.
This substance is registered under the REACH Regulation and is manufactured in and / or imported to the European Economic Area, at ≥ 10 to < 100 per annum.
This substance is used in articles, by professional workers (widespread uses), in formulation or re-packing, at industrial sites and in manufacturing.
Other release to the environment of this substance is likely to occur from: outdoor use in long-life materials with low release rate (e.g. metal, wooden and plastic construction and building materials) and indoor use in long-life materials with low release rate (e.g. flooring, furniture, toys, construction materials, curtains, foot-wear, leather products, paper and cardboard products, electronic equipment).
This substance can be found in complex articles, with no release intended: vehicles and machinery, mechanical appliances and electrical/electronic products (e.g. computers, cameras, lamps, refrigerators, washing machines).
This substance can be found in products with material based on: fabrics, textiles and apparel (e.g. clothing, mattress, curtains or carpets, textile toys), leather (e.g. gloves, shoes, purses, furniture), metal (e.g. cutlery, pots, toys, jewellery), paper (e.g. tissues, feminine hygiene products, nappies, books, magazines, wallpaper), wood (e.g. floors, furniture, toys) and plastic (e.g. food packaging and storage, toys, mobile phones).
This substance is used in the following products: coating products and inks and toners.
This substance is used in the following areas: printing and recorded media reproduction.
This substance is used for the manufacture of: machinery and vehicles.
Other release to the environment of this substance is likely to occur from: indoor use and outdoor use resulting in inclusion into or onto a materials (e.g. binding agent in paints and coatings or adhesives).
This substance is used in the following products: coating products, inks and toners and pH regulators and water treatment products.
Release to the environment of this substance can occur from industrial use: formulation of mixtures.
Release to the environment of this substance can occur from industrial use: in the production of articles and of substances in closed systems with minimal release.
Release to the environment of this substance can occur from industrial use: manufacturing of the substance.
A majority of data submitters agree this substance is Skin sensitising
Details of dossier compliance checks and testing proposal evaluation.
PACT - Public activities Co-ordination Tool
Public (risk management) activities co-ordination table
Tool showing an overview of substances in various key regulatory processes that authorities are working on.
Testing proposals - previous consultation
2-Butenedioic acid (2Z)-, ester with 1,2-propanediol, compd. with 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol
2-Butenedioic acid (Z)-, ester with 1,2-propanediol, compound with 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol
Salts of 2-(dibutylamino)ethanol with condensation products of (Z)-2-Butenedioic acid with 1,2-propanediol
EC Inventory, C&L Inventory, Pre-Registration process, Other


This interesting and historical 28 page booklet was written by James W. Tisdale of Asheville, North Carolina.
A great opportunity to read about what this southerner was thinking about the 1954 Desegregation decision….JUST 2 YEARS LATER.
Written by Tisdale, and this item came from the Tisdale estate. Good condition except for light yellowing.


text:
Symfony Blog:
Interview with Pawel Jedrzejewski, founder of Sylius project
The Symfony blog has a new post featuring an interview with Pawe? J?drzejewski, the founder of the Sylius project - an ecommerce platform based on the Symfony components.
Sylius, an e-commerce project based on Symfony components, recently released its 1.0.0 stable version. After several years of work and thousands of commits from hundred of contributors, Sylius is now ready to take the e-commerce world by storm. We chatted with Pawe? J?drzejewski, founder and leader of the project, to celebrate this milestone.
In the interview Pawe? answers questions about the project itself, why it stands out from some of the other ecommerce projects, the state of ecommerce and why they chose Symfony components as the base for the project.
tagged: symfony interview sylius ecommerce platform component
Link: http://symfony.com/blog/interview-with-pawe-jdrzejewski-founder-of-sylius-project
Armin Weihbold:
Diving into API Platform - Part 2
Armin Weihbold has continued his series looking at building APIs in PHP applications in part two covering the use of the API Platform project as a base. You can find part one here if you need to get caught up.
He picks up right where the last article ends and continues setting up the Docker environment for the application. Once he figured out a small snag in the setup he was able to get the basic documentation (the list of endpoints) up and running.
Next he creates a "material design" administration interface using React showing how he pulled in the requirements he needed to get the interface up and running. Code is included for the interface and a screenshot is included so you can see the end result.
tagged: api platform apiplatform project tutorial series part2 frontend docker
Link: https://medium.com/@koyaan5/diving-into-api-platform-part-2-1ce890c0b85f
Gonzalo Ayuso:
PHP application in SAP Cloud Platform. With PostgreSQL, Redis and Cloud Foundry
Gonzalo Ayuso has a tutorial posted to his site showing you how to create a PHP application on a SAP platform that includes PostgreSQL and Redis via Cloud Foundry.
Keeping on with my study of SAP's cloud platform (SCP) and Cloud Foundry today I'm going to build a simple PHP application. This application serves a simple Bootstrap landing page. The application uses a HTTP basic authentication. The credentials are validated against a PostgreSQL database. It also has a API to retrieve the localtimestamp from database server (just for play with a database server). I also want to play with Redis in the cloud too, so the API request will have a Time To Live (ttl) of 5 seconds. I will use a Redis service to do it.
He then walks you through the process of setting up both the platform and the application:
creating the services in cloud foundry
create our application (with either Silex or Lumen)
built out the features
running the application locally for testing
connecting to the cloud servers for PostgreSQL and Redis
set up logging
set up basic authorization
Full code and configuration is included for each step of the way (with Lumen examples included because Silex is "dead").
tagged: application tutorial development sap cloud platform postgresql redis
Link: https://gonzalo123.com/2017/09/25/php-application-in-sap-cloud-platform-with-postgresql-redis-and-cloud-foundry/
HHVM Blog:
The Future of HHVM
The HHVM project (an alternative PHP runtime from Facebook) has made a major announcement on their blog - beginning with version 3.24 they'll no longer be trying to keep parity with the PHP language now that it has moved into PHP 7.
The HHVM team is happy about the direction PHP has taken with PHP7, and we're proud of the role we've played in pushing the language and runtime to where they are today. Since the PHP community is finally saying goodbye to PHP5, we've decided to do so as well.
Our next LTS release, 3.24, will be cut about four months from now and will receive support for one year thereafter. It will also be the last HHVM release that commits to PHP5 support. This aligns with PHP's own timeline of sunsetting PHP5 at the end of 2018.
[...] PHP7 is charting a new course away from PHP5, and we want to do the same, via a renewed focus on Hack. Consequently, HHVM will not aim to target PHP7. The HHVM team believes that we have a clear path toward making Hack a fantastic language for web development, untethered from its PHP origins. We'd do ourselves and our users a disservice by positioning HHVM as an uncommon, less well-documented, less compatible PHP7 runtime.
The post then lists out some of their goals for the HHVM/Hack projects moving forward including reinvesting in open source and staying focused on their needs for the platform and language. It then talks about some of the upcoming changes you can expect around support of current versions of popular PHP tools and work on tools created specifically for Hack.
tagged: hhvm facebook platform hack language project goals php5 php7
Link: http://hhvm.com/blog/2017/09/18/the-future-of-hhvm.html
Cal Evans:
Mautic Step 1 – Configuring an Email Service Provider
Cal Evans has continued his series covering Mautic, the PHP based self-hosted marketing automation platform. This is step one in the process with his previous post in the series introducing Mautic and why he's trying it out.
This is the second post in a series titled "My Journey into Mautic". If you are starting here, you might get an incomplete picture, you may want to check out the previous articles.
There are two things that really confuse me about Mautic, properly configuring an Email Service Provider (ESP), and segmenting & tagging. We'll tackle the latter one in a later post, but the former is an important topic. It is also one that I do not fully understand. What is presented here is what I have learned through trial and error. it my be partially or wholly incorrect. If you find something that I've gotten wrong, please, by all means, correct me in the comments.
He starts by defining what an ESP service is and what it's useful for. While he had done the self-hosted email server in the past, he recommends paying for a service these days, deciding for his needs on Mailgun. He covers the difference between transactional and broadcast emails followed by the setup process he followed to get Mailgun up and working with his Mautic install.
tagged: series mautic marketing automation selfhosted platform tutorial email service provider
Link: https://blog.calevans.com/2017/06/25/mautic-step-1-configuring-an-email-service-provider/
My Journey Into Mautic
Cal Evans, in a search to help make the marketing efforts for some of his products easier, has kicked off a series showing how to install and configure the PHP-based Mautic marketing automation platform.
Those that know me know that I have an obsession with marketing. I mean I'm no good at it, but the topic fascinates me. Almost all of the podcasts I listen to on a regular basis are marketing related. One topic in particular that interests me is "Marketing Automation". Marketing Automation covers a huge swath of topics and since I am not an expert at the, I won't attempt to explain them.
[...] Because I am interested in Marketing Automation and want to start applying the techniques in the projects I run. I started looking around for vendors who could provide these services. What I found is that most SaaS vendors assume that everybody who wants to use their software has deep pockets.
Without these "deep pockets" (pricey services) at his disposal, Cal looked for other options and found the self-hosted Mautic instead. He starts with a definition of his requirements including that it should be Open Source, that it should integrate with WordPress and he can contribute back to the project. He ends the post by outlining his planned platform using Mautic, WordPress, Mailgun, Mailchimp and Ditigal Ocean.
tagged: mautic marketing platform opensource series part1 automation
Link: https://blog.calevans.com/2017/06/03/my-journey-into-mautic/
Raphael Stolt:
Keeping your CLI integration tests green on Windows
Raphael Stolt has a new post to his site for the PHP on Windows users out there helping you to keep your integration tests green when little things (like line ending differences) can cause issues between the Windows and unix-based platforms.
Lately on a Windows system, some failing integration tests for CLI commands utilising the Symfony Console component caused me some blip headaches by PHPUnit insisting that two strings are not identical due to different line endings. The following post documents the small steps I took to overcome these headaches.
He starts with the error message that the failing test was giving, a slightly unhelpful response with the "actual" and "expected" values looking basically the same. He suspected it to be something different with the encoding or line endings (a common issue between Windows and Linux platforms). To confirm his suspicions he looked deeper into the Symfony Console code and, on locating the difference, extended the "CommandTester" class to automatically disable the "decorated" setting across all tests.
tagged: phpunit testing integration green windows platform decorate tutorial
Link: http://raphaelstolt.blogspot.com/2017/03/keeping-your-cli-integration-tests.html
Colin O'Dell:
Installing PHP 7.1 December 2nd, 2016
With the recent release of PHP 7.1 you might be asking how you can quickly and easily update your current installation, regardless of the platform. Thankfully Colin O'Dell is here to help with this guide to upgrading to v7.1 on multiple Linux distributions, OSX and Windows.
PHP 7.1 has been released, bringing some great new features and enhancements to the language such as nullable types, the iterable pseudo-type, catching multiple exceptions, and much more.
Here's a brief guide on how to install PHP 7.1 on several different operating systems.
He includes instructions for Ubuntu, Debian, CentOS/RHEL, Mac OS 10.6+ and Windows. Complete commands and links to the downloads are also provided. You have no excuse now not to upgrade - get downloading!
tagged: install php71 multiple platform tutorial linux osx windows
Link: https://www.colinodell.com/blog/2016-12/installing-php-7-1
Laravel Spark Site Launched (and Screencast Posted)
A highly anticipated project in the Laravel community - Laravel Spark - has officially launched its site providing more information about the product and its upcoming release. Laravel News gives its own brief summary of Spark in a new post:
Spark is a complete scaffolding for building a SaaS app including authentication, password reset, billing plans, payment method updates, invoices, coupons, user impersonation, and more with support for Stripe and Braintree.
The official release date is April 19th, next Tuesday, and although no pricing is on the site the rumor is it'll be less than $100. This will save you many hours from building it all yourself.
For those interested in finding out a bit more in-depth about the product, check out this recently released screencast over on the Laracasts site where Taylor Otwell shows the basic setup and features of the platform.
tagged: laravel spark platform screencast laracasts release website
Link: https://spark.laravel.com/
Liip Blog:
Magento 2.0 Release
On the Liip blog there's a post about the release of Magento 2, the latest and hugely reworked version of the popular eCommerce platform. The post walks you through the installation of this latest update using a pre-configured Vagrant machine.
I've downloaded my M2 sample from the official Magento website, there I also found an archive with sample data. For a setup I used a pre-configured Vagrant machine according to the installation guide for Magento server. This installation guide offers two options: easy and advanced. Let's try the easy way first ;) M2 has an installation wizard, so it is supposed that even a none technically prepared user can install it successfully. And indeed, it looks easy.
He walks through some of the issues he had importing the data during the installation, ultimately, falling back to a command line call to push the large sample data into the platform.
You can find out more about this release and get the latest version over on the Magento website with plenty of information about what's been improved, added and how to get started using this latest version.
tagged: magento2 release install import data ecommerce platform
Link: https://blog.liip.ch/archive/2015/11/18/magento-2-0-release.html


It's a new day in America, or so we're told. More like that ghastly movie "Day After Tomorrow" if you're one of the millions who have seen your job go away or a good portion of your retirement account. We kept hearing that "the adults are in charge now", funny, we haven't heard that lately.
Buffoonery is in full bloom from Washington all the way down to little old Longmont. Let's start at the top and work our way downward, literally and figuratively. From the Telegraph UK, in reference to President Obamas snub of British Prime Minister Brown: "Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest." But what parties they are throwing!
And this gem of true class: "Mr Brown handed over carefully selected gifts, including a pen holder made from the wood of a warship that helped stamp out the slave trade – a sister ship of the vessel from which timbers were taken to build Mr Obama's Oval Office desk. Mr Obama's gift in return, a collection of Hollywood film DVDs that could have been bought from any high street store, looked like the kind of thing the White House might hand out to the visiting head of a minor African state." Yep, in over his head. Maybe Hillary Clinton was right.
Which brings us to our local, ahem, leaders. From the Times-Call: "A Longmont lobbying effort, including Dove chocolate squares taped onto sheets of talking points, fell short of securing federal stimulus funds for a new Diagonal Highway interchange. Before the start of Wednesday night's Denver Regional Council of Governments meeting, Councilwoman Karen Benker distributed the chocolate-bearing fact sheets — and a letter from Mayor Roger Lange — arguing the case for a $25 million interchange at Colorado highways 119 and 52. Benker is Longmont's representative on the DRCOG board…" It gets better.
In another Times-Call story, at the same DRCOG event (reminder of previous sentence – "Benker is Longmont's representative on the DRCOG board"): "No one stepped forward at Wednesday's hearing to testify in support of Longmont's application for the McIntosh Lake trail proposal." Did this part occur prior to the other? Was she out buying a $3 bag of Doves? The result was the same whether Councilmember Benker was there (in the first case) or not (in the second case) – nothing for Longmont. Thanks for the great representation!
But what did get approved? Among other things, a project for Nederland that will help them with their Frozen Dead Guy Days. Ironic that Ms. Benker should choose chocolate from a huge food conglomeration (I happen to love Doves by the way – only if dark) at around the same moment news breaks of Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory closing its store at the Twin Peaks Mall (another place I love and will miss). It's almost like dancing on the grave of your constituents who just lost their jobs. Wait, someone did that too, Congressman Jared Polis about the Rocky Mountain News shutting down.


text:
Vehicle Catalytic Converter Thefts Increase In CU
By Vivian La
Catalytic converters are typically removed with a machine-powered saw and can be done fairly quickly, according to Julie Morris, KCM Auto Care owner.
Photo: Seth Sawyers/CC BY 2.0
URBANA – Auto shop owners and law enforcement in Champaign-Urbana are seeing an increase in vehicle catalytic converter thefts.
Catalytic converters make toxic exhaust fumes less harmful for the environment and are located on the underside of vehicles.
They also contain precious metals like rhodium, platinum and palladium that can sell for upwards of $19,000 per ounce, which is driving the increase in thefts, according to a Tully Lehman, a spokesperson for the National Insurance Crime Bureau.
"They're sliding under with saws and cutting them on both ends and pulling them right out," Julie Morris, owner of KCM Auto Care in Urbana, says.
Morris says she's noticed a significant increase in converter thefts in the past few months. One of her employees had theirs cut off in a Wal-Mart parking lot and six cars in one of her shop's parking lots were hit as well.
Auto experts say replacing these converters can range from $800 to $2,500.
It isn't just cars either. Morris runs a truck rental business and says someone cut off the converters of all the large trucks in the parking lot.
At the University of Illinois, there have been eleven converters stolen this year, according to University Police spokesperson Patrick Wade. Most have occurred overnight in University parking lots to school-owned vehicles and the total damage to all these vehicles is estimated to be about $25,300.
Wade says he doesn't recall any catalytic converter thefts occurring last year.
"It's kind of spotty, but this happens in clusters every few years," he says. "Every once in a while, the market price of those metals will spike, and that's when we start seeing the thefts."
The National Insurance Crime Bureau released a study in March which found an exponential increase in catalytic converter thefts since the start of the pandemic.
Illinois is one of the top five states for catalytic converter thefts, according to the study, but this is also a national problem.
Lehman, the spokesperson for the bureau, says by looking at insurance claims from the past year, there is a "strong correlation between increase in thefts and the increase in value of the metals contained."
Lehman says the highs of these metals for this year, according to Kitco, were $27,000 per ounce of rhodium from March 19 to 22; palladium at $2,885 per ounce on May 4; and platinum at $1,266 per ounce on February 19.
Travis Loflin, who works at TMS Auto Repair in Champaign, says he suspects that these metals are being sold on the black market.
"Truth be told, these people are being really dumb about it because you just can't steal one and take it to a scrapyard and sell it. You have to sell it to a licensed dealer," he says. "There must be someone on the black market because I don't know where the heck they're selling them."
Loflin says one of the best ways to help with the increased thefts is to engrave the vehicle identification number, or VIN, into the converter. This way, licensed buyers can tell the converter was stolen and police can use the VIN to track down sellers.
When it comes to prevention, Morris says "there's not much you can do unless your car is parked in a garage."
Loflin says people can buy shields for catalytic converters, like those that are specially made for Toyota Priuses, but they may only delay the inevitable.
"We've entertained this idea at work, trying to come up with stuff," he says. "But it will only delay it from happening. They can still get to it."
Editor's note: This story originally said that the metals in catalytic converters were selling for up to $19,000 per pound. The correct figure is $19,000 per ounce. We regret the error.
Vivian La is a student journalist for Illinois Newsroom. Follow her on Twitter @vivian_la_.
TAGS: auto industry, cars, catalytic converters, Champaign, champaign-urbana
Vivian La is a sophomore at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign studying journalism. She is a reporter and an assistant news editor at the Daily Illini. In addition to being a reporting intern, La is part of the inaugural IPM student newsroom. Aside from journalism, La enjoys watching science documentaries and is a flute player in the Campus Band.
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text:
gPhoto je sada programů a knihoven pro práci s digitálními fotoaparáty. Kromě stahování fotografií z fotoaparátu umožňuje gPhoto i jejich načítání a vzdálenou konfiguraci či focení (pokud to fotoaparát umožňuje).

gPhoto je svobodný software zveřejněný pod licencí GNU Lesser General Public License

Podporované fotoaparáty a platformy
gPhoto podporuje přes 1200 přístrojů (podle údajů z dubna 2010). Program se připojuje prostřednictvím Picture Transfer Protocol, případně Media Transfer Protocol. Řada fotoaparátů které nejsou podporovány přímo v gPhoto se chová jako USB flash disk, tudíž jsou podporovány přímo operačním systémem.

Jedná se o multiplatformní software, který funguje v Linuxu, FreeBSD, NetBSD a řadě dalších Unix-like systémů.

Programy
gPhoto obsahuje knihovnu libgphoto2 jako základ pro další aplikace a rozhraní pro příkazový řádek. Oficiálním grafickým rozhraním je gtkam, k dalším aplikacím patří program digiKam pro KDE, gThumb a F-Spot pro GNOME.

Reference

Externí odkazy

 Domovská stránka gPhoto
 Seznam podporovaných fotoaparátů

Fotografický software
Prohlížeče obrázků
Software pro Unix
Svobodný software

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
biroto start page
Search for cycle routes or tours
Go to retrieval with search criteria
Go to retrieval with map
Search for POIs in the vicinity
FAQ and instructions
... of Accommodation
... for providers
about touring cyclists
Close menubar
Multi-day bicycle touring
cycle routes and travel reports
Multi-day bicycle touring in Europe
Print the page content is only available to registered and logged in users and only as a tourbook!
EuroVelo: Baltic Sea Cycle Route (Hansa circuit)
No. of cycle route EV10
Cycling Guide EuroVelo: Baltic Sea Cycle Route (Hansa circuit)
Add accommodation, sights or infrastructure
Stage planning - add target locations
Download GPX file of route
Link this route
Create a new message to »biroto-Redaktion«
Please wait - map data are loading
0.429800000|0|8596252
Added on 05 Oct 2011,
Cycle route metrics
Total distance in km
Cumulative elevation gain in m
Avg. slope uphill in %
Cumulative elevation loss in m
GPS track data
Information about rights to the gps-track data
Rights owner
OpenStreetMap and Contributors + biroto-Redaktion (biroto.eu)
Rights characteristic / license
Contains information from OpenStreetMap, which is made available here under the Open Database License(ODbL)
Link to the description of the license
opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/
GPX file taken from
www.openstreetmap.org/browse/relation/2689634
GPX file uploaded
by biroto-Redaktion on 30 Sep 2019
Track points in total
Track points per km (avg)
Start/endpoint
Start location
Lappeenranta, Southern Finland, FI (46 m NHN)
Narva, EE (12 m NHN)
In Estonia
cyclingeurope.org/
Travelreport by Jan Rueten-Budde
European Cyclists Federation
Cycling guides/maps:
Esterbauer bikeline: Ostseeküsten-Radweg
Teil 1: Schleswig-Holstein. Von Flensburg nach Lübeck. 1:75.000, wetherproof/tearproof, German
Teil 2: Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Von Lübeck nach Ahlbeck/Usedom mit Rügen, 690 km, 1:50.000, wetherproof/tearproof, German
Teil 3: Polen. Von Ahlbeck/Usedom nach Danzig. 1:75.000, wetherproof/tearproof , German
Detlef Kaden: Berlin - Stettin - Danzig - Marienburg
A cycling guide: ready to go: Tourguide, maps, German
Esterbauer bikeline: Ostseeküste Baltikum (Riga-Tallinn) , German
For the following countries there are dedicates routes available for the respective parts of the Baltic Sea Cycle Route:
For the gap in Russia see
Iwangorod - Vyborg - finnish border
Travelreports (13)
Beds4Cyclists (407)
Worth visiting (138)
Travel reports about cycle tours
Klaipeda-Pukarags
A stage of the tour »Iron Curtain Tour, part 1: Klaipeda-Grense Jakobselv« of user Ottocolor
Pukarags-Karosta
Karosta-Ventspils
Ventspils-Roja
Roja-Riga
Riga-Limbaži
Limbaži-Uulu
Uulu-Paatsalu
Haapsalu-Vihterpalu
Vihterpalu-Tallinn
Tallinn-Lepispea
Lepispea-Mereoja
Mereoja-Narva
Beds4Cyclists, worth visiting and infrastructure
Dist. to route
Elevation AMSL
Rating for cyclists
Border Checkpoint Brusnitshnoje-Nuijamaa
FI-54230 Nuijamaa
Border checkpoint
Hours of opening
Saimaa-kanalen
Lappeenranta (Swedish: Villmanstrand) is a city and municipality situated on the shore of the lake Saimaa in South-Eastern Finland, about 30 kilometres (19 miles) from the Russian border. It belongs to the region of South Karelia. With approximately 73,000 inhabitants (31 March 2016) Lappeenranta is the 13th largest city in Finland. The neighboring municipality of Joutseno was consolidated with Lappeenranta on January 1, 2009, and the neighboring municipality of Ylämaa on January 1, 2010. Lappeenranta is known as an international university city in Finland with Lappeenranta University of Technology and Saimaa University of Applied Sciences which together have approximately 13,000 students from 68 countries. Lappeenranta is also a commercial centre of South-East Finland and the meeting point of the EU and Russia, 215 km from both Helsinki and St. Petersburg. Location on the southern shore of Lake Saimaa makes the city the region's centre for tourism. Lappeenranta is second most visited city by Russian tourists in Finland after Helsinki and it competes with Helsinki for the largest share of tax-free sales in Finland.
Lappeenranta was originally formed around a headland pointing to lake Saimaa. In the 16th century, the market place moved from Lappee's old centre Kauskila to the current fortress headland. The first mention of Lapwes, as it was called, is in a privilege charter from 1542 that subjugated the market place under Viborg's authority.
The town was chartered in 1649 by Queen Christina of Sweden, legitimizing the trade in the then popular marketplace of Lapvesi. However, the parliamentary privilege charter and the coat of arms were attested in 1652 after the town layout by Erik Aspegren was affirmed. At the time, Lappeenranta was an important port for tar.
Between 1721 and 1743, Lappeenranta was the capital of Kymmenegård and Savonlinna province.
In 1741, the battle of Villmanstrand was fought between the Swedish and Russian armies in the Russo-Swedish War of 1741–1743. The battle ended in a Russian victory. The town was pillaged, wooden structures including the provincial chancellery were burnt and the ecclesiastical archives damaged.
The municipalities of Lappee and Lauritsala were annexed to Lappeenranta in 1967. Nuijamaa joined in 1989. During the financial downturn of 2009 and 2010, Joutseno and Ylämaa respectively merged into Lappeenranta.
Lappeenranta is known as a summer city, mostly due to its closeness to the Lake Saimaa. Europe's 4th largest lake. The eponymous GoSaimaa (www.gosaimaa.com) provides all the touristic activities in the area. In addition, its inland location means that summers tend to be warmer and winters colder than along the coastal areas.
Lappeenranta does have a healthy winter tourism industry. Various cabins around Lake Saimaa, as well as numerous snowmobiles, Nordic skating, floating in the river, reindeer rides, paragliding, skiing and sledding tracks draw a fair number of winter visitors.
The proximity of the Russian border is increasingly visible in the number of Russian tourists visiting the city. In fact, Lappeenranta is closer (195 km or 121 miles) to Saint Petersburg than Helsinki, the capital of Finland (220 km or 140 miles). The presence of Russian tourists is noticeable by the many Russian registered cars on the streets and the use of Cyrillic letters in signs of some shops.
Places and events
The old fortress, with a number of museums, cafés and the oldest Russian Orthodox church in Finland.
St. Mary's Church of Lappee, an 18th-century wooden church in the center of the city.
The harbour area, with cruises to Vyborg and the nearby Saimaa Canal.
The central market place, where you can enjoy the local specialities, such as meat pies known as "Atomi" (atom) or "Vety" (hydrogen).
The Night of The Fortess, a two-day cultural festival held in early August.
The Lappeenranta Ballet Gala in late August.
The annual Lappeenranta National Singing Contest.
The biggest sand castle in Finland is built next to Port of Lappeenranta every summer.
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Lappeenranta. (2017, February 12). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 17:15, February 16, 2017, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lappeenranta&oldid=765153375
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Denver, officially the City and County of Denver, is the capital and most populous municipality of the U.S. state of Colorado. Denver is in the South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains just east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The Denver downtown district is immediately east of the confluence of Cherry Creek with the South Platte River, approximately 12 mi east of the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Denver is nicknamed the Mile-High City because its official elevation is exactly one mile above sea level, making it the highest major city in the United States. The 105th meridian west of Greenwich, the longitudinal reference for the Mountain Time Zone, passes directly through Denver Union Station.Denver is ranked as a Beta- world city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. With a 2015 estimated population of 682,545, Denver ranks as the 19th-most populous U.S. city, and with a 2.8% increase in 2015, the city is also the fastest-growing major city in the United States.
The 10-county Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area had an estimated 2015 population of 2,814,330 and ranked as the 19th most populous U.S. metropolitan statistical area. The 12-city Denver-Aurora, CO Combined Statistical Area had an estimated 2015 population of 3,418,876, which ranks as the 16th most populous U.S. metropolitan area. Denver is the most populous city of the 18-county Front Range Urban Corridor, an oblong urban region stretching across two states with an estimated 2015 population of 4,757,713. Denver is the most populous city within a 500-mile radius and the second-most populous city in the Mountain West after Phoenix, Arizona. In 2016, Denver was named the best place to live in the USA by U.S. News & World Report.


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text:
Archive for the 'Juno' Category
United Launch Alliance (ULA) and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) have struck a deal to end a 13-day strike.
Astronaut Drew Feustel received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Purdue University, from space.
Last Wednesday, Drew Feustel and Ricky Arnold completed a planned 6-hour and 31-minute spacewalk aboard the International Space Station.
The only orbital rocket launch since my last post on May 15th was a Chinese Long March 4C rocket carrying the Queqiao satellite. Queqiao will be a a communications relay satellite for the upcoming Chang'e 4 lunar rover mission.
China also launched a notable suborbital rocket this past week. A private Chinese company OneSpace Technology, performed the first launch of their OS-X suborbital rocket.
Next week there are some interesting launches planned. On Monday, May 21, Orbital ATK will launch a Cygnus on its way to the ISS from Wallops Island Virginia. On Tuesday, May 22, SpaceX will launch a Falcon 9 rocket form Vandenberg in California.
This is a nice composite of images from Juno's first 11 orbits of Jupiter.
NASA is planning to send a small helicopter to Mars along with the 2020 rover mission.
Posted in astronauts, China, Falcon 9, Friday Links, ISS, Juno, Jupiter, Mars, Mars 2020, NASA, New Space, Orbital ATK, Planetary science, Rockets, Spacewalk, SpaceX, Technology, ULA | No Comments »
Mattell launched a new line of "Inspiring Women" Barbie dolls. The release includes a doll of NASA's Katherine Johnson, made famous by the movie Hidden Figures.
JPL posted a 360-video from inside the InSight lander test lab (this is the next mission to Mars launching in May).
Westworld director Jonah Nola showed the below video during a SXSW panel this weekend.
National Geographic's March issue features NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson on the cover and an article by Nadia Drake which profiles a handful of other astronauts.
Two rocket launches since my last post a week ago:
March 6 – SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying two satellites for commercial companies.
March 9 – Arianespace launched a Soyuz rocket from Kourou carrying three communications satellites for O3b.
There has been a lot of talk lately of China's defunct Tiangong-1 space station, and it's imminent uncontrolled plunge back to Earth. Predictions are for early April.
NASA released some new imagery data and science results from the Juno probe in orbit of Jupiter. Some of the intriguing mysteries uncovered include the strange polar cyclones and the 3,000 kilometer deep wind patters. Phil Plait has an excellent summary at his blog.
Another asteroid on an interstellar hyperbolic orbit has been discovered. This object is likely from the Oort cloud, which makes it different than 'Omuamua, which is believed to have originated in interstellar space.
Posted in China, ESA, Falcon 9, Friday Links, InSight, JPL, Juno, Jupiter, NASA, Pop Space, Rockets, SpaceX | No Comments »
The year of 2017 will be remembered by most of my readers for reasons totally unrelated to spaceflight. It was a tumultuous year with political turmoil, social strife, acts of violence, and devastating natural disasters. Unfortunately, it is these negative stories that tend to embed themselves in our memories as we witness the arc of history unfold. Even when we zoom out to a wide angle view of decades or centuries, it is violence and conflict we remember. What were the biggest events of the 20th century? Wars, economic collapse, threats of annihilation, and social strife. I don't have to remind you though, as a space fan, that most of the world shares at least one bright memory of the difficult last century: Apollo 11.
In a similar way, I'm hoping that through all the difficult times we face as a society in the 21st century, that spaceflight can be one of those bright spots that is a source of optimism and hope (although, surely not the only source). As Bill Nye is fond of saying "space brings out the best in us." Spaceflight is an outlet for positive creative energy. Spaceflight applies technology in new ways, often leading to new inventions and sometimes entire industries. Spaceflight allows us to conduct important research that applies directly to the interests and concerns of everyone on Earth – from medical studies onboard the ISS to weather and climate satellites to space telescopes looking out for Near Earth Objects (NEOs).
Spaceflight is a bipartisan endeavor universally loved by young and old alike because it taps into something innate in us. Whether it's the love of exploration and discovery or just the appeal of astronauts as wholesome hometown heroes, space has always been an easy sell to the public. Very few other uses of time and money are as generally noncontroversial (although we like to argue over specifics). There was a chance for space to get swallowed up in the political turmoil in Washington, DC this past year. Luckily, that didn't happen. Instead, the space industry had another great year with very few setbacks.
Some readers may take issue with that statement and want to argue that it was not a great year for space. After all, NASA still has no confirmed administrator, XCOR went out of business, several programs slipped their launch dates (JWST, SLS, Orion), and Cassini ended its mission at Saturn (leaving us with a dearth of outer solar system probes). But if we look at those space programs or missions that are active and flying, we see lots of success in 2017 with few failures. The loss of Cassini should probably be spun as a positive story anyway – the planned retirement of a historic program of exploration – 13 years in Saturn orbit.
Other than the few things I listed above, the only other major setbacks of 2017 would be the five complete launch failures shown below (there were one or two other partial failures). Both Japan and New Zealand (Rocket Lab) lost rockets on their maiden launch. India, China, and Russia all lost one rocket each. The two remaining major space powers – ESA and USA – did not have any launch failures.
Country Vehicle Payload Maiden launch?
Japan SS-520 nanosat Yes
New Zealand Electron none Yes
China Long March 5 Comm sat No
India PSLV Nav sat No
Russia Soyuz Various No
2017 actually had the lowest launch success rate since 2011 and yet overall it felt like a very successful year (launch success was about 93% instead of the usual 95%). A few things contribute to this being a good year for rockets. First of course, is that 2 of the failures were test launches. If you remove them from the accounting, we are back at 95%. The second big reason is that none of the other failures led to an interruption in logistical support for the ISS. From 2014 to 2016, ISS operations lost four uncrewed logistical support rockets. After a string that bad, the last 13 months of successful flights (ten missions in all) feels positively blissful.
The third, and maybe most important reason this was a great year for rockets, was that SpaceX had no failures this year. In 2015 they lost an ISS resupply mission on ascent. In 2016 their year was cut short at 8 missions when a rocket blew up on pad 40 at Cape Canaveral. The backlog of customers was looming for a long 6 months while SpaceX worked on recovering from that latest failure. Then, last January they returned to flight with a launch for Iridium and haven't let up since. Their accomplishments include: no launch failures, a record 18 launches, a record 15 first stage recoveries, and first reuse of a first stage. The other American providers, ULA and Orbital ATK, also had good years with 8 and 3 successful launches each with no failures.
As long as we get to space with chemically propelled rockets, everything hinges on how well our rockets are flying. We can't really do a retrospective on the year without looking at these numbers. This has always been true, but what is particularly poignant from 2017 are those 18 launches from SpaceX. That's fully 20% of all launches. Not only that, but they flew a lot of important missions. In 2017 alone they launched four times to the ISS and at least twice for the US military. In 2018 they plan to launch several times for NASA, including to the ISS as well as the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). At this point, it's pretty clear that when SpaceX has a good year, the space industry has a good year.
In addition to the 10 successful cargo launches to the ISS this year, there were also 4 flawless crew launches to keep the record of 17 straight years of crewed operations going. NASA stepped up to 4 full-time USOS crew (which includes Japanese, Canadian, and European flyers), enabling even more research. NASA is now in full utilization mode of the ISS. Hundreds of experiments are being conducted each year – from physical science to medicine to biology to botany to astronomy – and each SpaceX Dragon brings up more externally mounted autonomous payloads such as last year's aerosol monitoring payload (SAGE III) and a neutron star telescope (NICER), among others. The ISS has become an important platform for efficiently deploying small satellites, with dozens launched from the Japanese robotic arm last year.
The ISS looks well positioned for the future, with a healthy manifest of crew and payloads coming up as well as the exciting prospect of even larger crews, once Boeing and SpaceX successfully demonstrate flight of their new crew transportation systems. In the meantime, important maintenance has been ongoing to ensure that ISS can operate well into the 2020s. Early in the year a Japanese cargo vehicle, an HTV, brought up a new set of lithium ion batteries, the first in a series of battery replacements over the next few years that will keep the solar power flowing. The batteries were replaced in a series of 3 spacewalks last January. Ultimately, ISS astronauts would complete 10 successful spacewalks last year with no major issues.
The year in ISS was underscored by Peggy Whitson's amazing flight. At 57 years old, Whitson now holds the record for most days in space of any American astronaut in history (665) as well as an impressive 60 hours of EVA time that puts her number 3 all time behind Anatoly Solovyev and Michael Lopez-Alegria. Peggy's 289 day mission was almost entirely unprecedented. Not only was Whitson praised as a "space ninja" by her crew mates for her work onboard the ISS, but even made a wide impression outside of NASA and received a Woman of the Year award from Glamour Magazine. The crews aboard the ISS continue to bring the wonder of spaceflight home to us through their social media engagement and excellent educational outreach events. If you aren't checking this link for the latest pictures from space every morning, you are missing out on a little bit of daily wonder.
The ISS is of course not the only game in town. NASA has very active planetary science and astronomy programs, not to mention similar missions from ESA, JAXA, and other agencies. 2017 saw no new launches of solar system probes (that's right, zero) but many active missions made progress and the only "failure" being the end of Cassini. Mars is incredibly active with 8 missions. Two NASA rovers, Opportunity and Curiosity, are providing a wealth of insights into the wet history of Mars. The most exciting discoveries from those robots are likely yet to come. Two asteroid sample return missions, OSIRIS-Rex from NASA and Hayabusa 2 from JAXA, remain in interplanetary cruise phase. New Horizons is on its way to visit a Kuiper Belt Object next year, Juno remains in orbit at Jupiter, and Dawn continues to explore the largest asteroid, Ceres.
Some of these missions we heard big news from this year, such as Cassini's analysis of the ocean plumes from icy Enceladus. We also gained a new understanding of the winds and storms of Jupiter from Juno. Not to mention the absolutely stunning images we have been treated to from JunoCam.
But overall, space exploration, especially planetary exploration, is a long game. Spacecraft take years to reach their targets and then spend sometimes months or years (at least for orbiters and rovers) slowly collecting the data they need to learn something new from our mysterious solar system neighbors. So there were no splashy launches or touchdowns in 2017. Instead, the hard work from years past continued to pay off with well built spacecraft going about their daily business. 2017 was a great year in this respect. Years like this lay the foundation for big discoveries to come; it's just that we have to wait a bit for the papers to be published. The only real downer this year is probably that Curiosity's drill is still out of commission.
There is of course, a lot more to cover. Spaceflight is a big industry that goes far beyond just the ISS or big planetary exploration missions. New Space, for instance, had a lot of interesting updates this year. In addition to Rocket Lab making their first launch attempt, Blue Origin demonstrated further progress on their New Shepard vehicle as well as their BE-4 engine, Virgin Orbit moved a few steps closer to their first test launch with several engine tests, and Sierra Nevada conducted their first free glide flight in several years.
Then there's astronomy. So much is happening in astronomy these days that it deserves a lengthy retrospective all its own. Here are some highlights of last year in a quick paragraph. Many interesting exoplanets were discovered, such as the fascinating Trappist-1 system with three potentially habitable planets. But Ross 128b is my favorite potentially habitable planet, because it is less than 11 light years from Earth. Let's go! Other exciting developments in astronomy included more neutron star collisions discovered via gravitational waves and also the fascinating cigar shaped something known as 'Omuamua which flew through our solar system from somewhere this past October (more to come on this we hope).
As we look to the future, we can see that there is a lot to learn. The ISS has years of science to conduct – managers are furiously looking for more ways to maximize timelines and target the most likely breakthroughs. Meanwhile there are dozens of worlds here at home in our solar system yet to explore, not just with probes already launched but many to come (launches to Mars, Mercury, and the Moon in 2018). And most intriguing of all, there are thousands upon thousands of worlds to explore out there, beyond our own star.
The more we look, the more we find. And the more we find, the more questions we think to ask. This is the optimistic and worldview expanding impact of science. We are losing the explorers of the last century – Apollo legends Gene Cernan, Dick Gordon, and John Young all passed away in their 80s in the past year. But it's hard not to see the vast opportunity available to the current generation of explorers in this century. Perhaps some day we will look back at this time period as a changing of the guard. It is hard to say without the benefit of hindsight. If nothing else, for those of us that are inspired by scientific discovery and exploration, 2017 showed us that spaceflight can be – and probably always will be – a candle in the dark.
Previous year in review posts
2016 year in review.
2015 year in review: Part I and Part II.
Posted in astronauts, astronomy, Blue Origin, Cassini, Ceres, China, commercial crew, Dawn, Enceladus, ESA, Extrasolar planets, ISS, Japan, Juno, Jupiter, JWST, Mars, MER Rovers, Moon, NASA, NEOs, New Horizons, New Space, Orbital Sciences, Orion, Planetary science, Rocket Lab, Rockets, Russia, Saturn, Sierra Nevada, SLS, SpaceX, Virgin Orbit | No Comments »
2017 Link Dump
Here's my roundup of all of the year-end summaries posted by various space agencies and space reporters.
NASA's year in review video:
ESA's year in review video:
NASA headquarters photographers' best images of 2017.
Space.com's top space science stories of 2017.
Space.com's top spaceflight stories of 2017.
Mashable's top 5 space stories of 2017.
Parabolic Arc's analysis of worldwide rocket launches for 2017.
Top planetary science stories of 2017, from The Planetary Society.
Or if you prefer audio, here's The Planetary Radio's year-end wrap-up show.
Top stargazing images of the year from EarthSky.
And for non-space context, here's the year in pictures from around the world:
Boston Globe Year in Pictures: Part I
Boston Globe Year in Pictures: Part II
Washington Post's year in photos
Posted in ESA, Extrasolar planets, Friday Links, ISS, JPL, JSC, Juno, Jupiter, JWST, Mars, Mission Control, NASA, New Horizons, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, politics, Rockets, Saturn, Science, SLS, SpaceX | No Comments »
Space Camp USA, in Huntsville, Alabama, unveiled a new outdoor display of one of the former Shuttle Training Aircraft.
NASA completed some egress testing of the Orion capsule in the Gulf of Mexico.
Here's a nice short video that will help you get to know Randy Bresnik, who is launching to the ISS next week.
I also enjoyed this short biographical video about Ana Fisher, one of the first American women astronauts.
The latest of NASA's medium-duration isolation spaceflight analog crews, HERA 13, finished their mission last week.
The independent NASA visitor center in Houston, Space Center Houston, has announced a Kickstarter campaign to help raise additional funds for their project to restore MOCR2 in the Christopher C. Kraft Mission Control Center on the Johnson Space Center campus. MOCR2 is most famous for being the flight control room during the Apollo 11 lunar landing. However, it was used for every Apollo flight starting with Apollo 8, as well as many Space Shuttle missions. In addition to being a site of much triumph (Apollo 8, Apollo 11, STS-1, etc) it was also the active control room during the Apollo 1 fire and the launch of Challenger on STS-51L. Here's the Kickstarter link. I have already pledged!
Google has posted a brand new "street view" tour from inside the International Space Station! To get to it, navigate to NASA Johnson Space Center on Google Maps and drop the street view icon right on top of Building 9 Space Vehicle Mockup Facility.
Up on the actual ISS, the crew has been busy getting ready for the arrival of the next crew on July 27th. The Progress cargo craft departed with trash on July 20th.
But the NASA crew of Jack Fischer and Peggy Whitson still had time to share their mission with us with a couple informative videos:
Only one rocket launch since my last post on July 9th. Russia launched a Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan carrying payloads for commercial companies, including an impressive array of small "Dove" satellites for American company Planet. Even more impressively, Planet captured this beautiful footage of the launch from one of their spacecraft already in orbit:
To celebrate two years since the New Horizons flyby of Pluto, NASA released this amazing video that simulates a flyover of Pluto using mission imagery.
Speaking of the New Horizons mission, NASA's amazing airborne observatory SOFIA did a special mission to catch an occultation of 2014 MU69, the Kuiper Belt object that the probe will visit next. Check out Phil Plait's post on the event for some actual images of the occultation.
Out at Jupiter, NASA's Juno probe did a close flyby of the Great Red Spot and returned some amazing images.
Posted in Apollo, astronauts, Friday Links, HERA, History, ISS, JSC, Juno, Jupiter, Mission Control, NASA, New Horizons, Pluto, Rockets, Russia | No Comments »
Funeral services were held for Gemini and Apollo astronaut Eugene Cernan in Houston on January 24th.
The Russian workhorse heavy-lift rocket, the Proton, is currently grounded due to a new hardware recall. The rocket may be grounded through the spring, delaying a backlog of commercial flights.
The new US presidential administration and Congress are starting to have an impact on NASA's plans. A few notable things happened in the beltway over the past few months.
Acting NASA administrator Robert Lightfoot is looking into whether the first SLS flight could be crewed by astronauts rather than unmanned. This would potentially move up the timeline for NASA's exploration plans by several years.
An authorization bill in Congress could direct NASA back to having Orion capable of supporting ISS crew flights as a backup to the Commercial Crew plan.
The Sierra Nevada Corporation is proposing that their Dreamchaser spacecraft could be used for a sixth Hubble servicing mission.
Severe weather in Louisiana on February 7th included a tornado which struck NASA's Michoud facility near New Orleans. NASA facilities sustained damage but all employees are safe with no major injuries.
There have been five successful orbital rocket launches since my last update on January 23rd:
On January 24th, Japan launched a military communications satellite on an H-IIA rocket.
On January 28th, Arianespace launched a spanish communications satellite from French Guiana on a Soyuz rocket.
On February 14th, Arianespace launch telecommunications satellites for Indonesia and Brasil from French Guiana on an Ariane 5 rocket.
On February 15th, India launched a wide array of small satellites (104 in all) on their PSLV rocket.
On February 19th, SpaceX launched an uncrewed Dragon spacecraft to the ISS on a Falcon 9 rocket from Florida.
And of course, here's the awesome video of the Falcon 9's first stage booster returning to Landing Zone 1 at CCAFS.
Up on the ISS, two cargo spacecraft departed. First, the Japanese HTV left ISS in late January. It stayed in orbit for another week with plans to conduct a tether experiment. However, the tether failed to deploy. HTV was followed quickly by the departure of Progress MS-03 from a nadir facing port of the space station.
NASA has decided to leave the Juno probe in it's longer 56-day orbit around Jupiter instead of the planned closer 14-day orbit. This decision is based on anomalies seen with the probe's main engine and worries that another burn will not go per plan.
Posted in astronauts, Friday Links, History, Hubble, India, ISS, Japan, Juno, NASA, New Space, Orion, Planetary science, Rockets, Russia, Sierra Nevada, SLS, SpaceX | No Comments »
2016 In Review – Part I
2015 year in review posts: Part I and Part II.
Part I – Exploration
Spaceflight, as a many-hundred billion-dollar sector, is a broad and complex industry. Even if we focus in on "exploration" – which is the primary focus of this blog – so that we can ignore military and commercial uses of Earth orbit, we are still left with a global list of activities, studies, missions, and companies. This means there is a lot of stuff going on. 2016 was a busy year with many exciting missions from several different countries. This diversity is great, but makes it hard to boil down the events of last year into a coherent story. Even within NASA, we have the ISS program, with its own highs and lows, and the totally separate and just as successful planetary science portfolio of missions. Those missions keep on going, regardless of whether the most recent cargo delivery has made it to our astronauts in orbit, for instance. Meanwhile, in China, the CNSA is continuing to grow as a nascent space power with new rockets, new launch sites, and a brand new space station. Then there's Russia, Japan, Europe, India, and more. If any theme can be found at all in the events of last year it is that space exploration continues to be a diverse and global endeavor. Putting any nationalism aside, this should give us hope that despite the ups and downs of the economies or space budgets in any given country, that exciting times lie ahead.
It's hard to start a summary of 2016 in spaceflight without acknowledging that the United States had a major election, with a new President to be inaugurated this week. Any presidential transition leads to uncertainty in the future of government programs, including NASA. Often election years leave the federal government in a continuing resolution. A continuing resolution means that Congress has yet to pass a budget for the year. This leaves NASA and other agencies working under last year's budget levels, with no increase for inflation or otherwise. The election was a big story for the country in a lot of ways, but NASA and its programs are most likely to feel the effects in 2017, as it tries to continue with business as usual as it waits for new priorities and a new budget.
While 2017 may bring about change (or not), 2016 was another good year for NASA's flagship space exploration missions. NASA had no major failures last year, just the usual hiccups and challenges (space is hard, after all) and even launched a new planetary exploration mission: OSIRIS-REX, which is on its way to visit an asteroid in 2023. In fact, last year showed that NASA is still a clear leader in planetary exploration, with probes in action all over the solar system. The NASA fleet at Mars remains strong, with two rovers on the surface and two probes in orbit. New Horizons received a mission extension and is on its way to a Kuiper Belt Object rendezvous in a few years. Meanwhile, the probe Juno made orbit at Jupiter and started scientific observations. Unfortunately, Juno has some sticky propellant valves and missed some of its early science orbits when it entered "safe mode." Fortunately, the probe was brought out of safe mode and completed a Jupiter flyby in December. Most of the probe's 20-month mission is ahead. Hopefully Juno's worst days are in the past! Out at Saturn, NASA is still operating the Cassini probe, which has been in orbit since 2004. Sadly, 2017 will see the end of Cassini, as it destroys itself in dramatic fashion, with a dive into Saturn's atmosphere.
Two other planetary missions of note from other countries had some action last year. ExoMars (a joint mission between ESA and Russia) launched and made it to Mars. However, its companion lander, Schiaparelli, was unable to make it safely to the Martian surface and crash-landed. Thus, NASA remains the sole space agency to have safely brought a spacecraft to the surface of Mars… having done so seven times. Of course, we shouldn't forget that the Soviet Union is the only country to have ever landed a probe on Venus! A feat which has not been repeated since 1982, and does not appear to be repeated any time soon, as most space agencies focus on asteroids and the outer solar system in their planetary science missions. Venus is not forgotten though, as Japan was able to begin doing science with their Akatsuki orbiter at Venus last year.
Following the theme of "space is hard," Japan had a pretty devastating failure when their new X-ray telescope Astro-H, or Hitomi, went out of contact after reaching orbit. Fortunately, Japan already has a strong space program and seems mature and professional enough to learn from their mistakes – they released a failure report very quickly after the accident. They currently have an asteroid sample return mission, Hayabusa 2, en route to its target in 2018, which we should all be very excited about. NASA has a strong relationship with JAXA, and will be curating the Hayabusa samples here at the Johnson Space Center when they return.
In human space exploration, the story continues to be the International Space Station. The ISS had an exciting year, partly because NASA and ESA continue to send charismatic astronauts who manage to make the mission feel very personal to all of us following back on Earth. It was a great year for following astronauts on Twitter, including Jeff Williams, Kate Rubins, Tim Kopra, Tim Peake, Scott Kelly, Shane Kimbrough, Thomas Pesquet, and Peggy Whitson. It's hard to see how this trend will do anything but accelerate, as it's a cheap and easy way for NASA to connect with the American public and share its mission. Scott Kelly of course returned from space early in the year and retired from NASA on a high note. Since the "year in space" was such a success, both operationally and as a public affairs bonanza, it seems likely NASA will want to try more longer duration expeditions in the future.
On the more nuts and bolts side of things for the ISS, all major mission events went well last year, with both the arrival and installation of the new IDA2 docking adapter and the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM). BEAM is an exciting demonstration of where human habitability in Earth orbit may be able to go in the future with inflatable structures. It is exciting to think that the technology may spinoff a private-public partnership with either or both of the companies Bigelow and Axiom to expand the ISS with new large inflatable modules in the future.
The ISS did face some minor setbacks of its own, although not quite as dramatic as in more recent years. Two rocket failures impacted ISS logistics: the SpaceX explosion on the pad in Florida in September and the loss of a Russian Progress resupply mission in December. The good news for NASA was that the SpaceX failure was not an ISS mission, but it meant a delay to the next planned resupply flight of a Dragon capsule, now scheduled for February. ISS is well stocked on supplies thanks to a Japanese resupply mission that also flew in December and the Orbital ATK Antares rocket returning to flight status in October. Even with both Japanese and American rockets able to keep ISS supplied, having the Russian Soyuz rocket family grounded must always make mission managers uneasy. After all, it is the same rocket family that failed in December that also delivers crews to the station. We are not in uncharted territory, as expedition schedules were in limbo after similar accidents in 2011 and 2015. But the ups and downs of the launch vehicle sector are a continual challenge not only for NASA's ISS program but for dreamers who envision hundreds of people at a time into deep space for colonization. ISS truly is the foothold where we must learn first, and is a great proving ground for those dreamers.
The ISS accounts for over 2,000 person days of space experience a year. The day-in and day-out slog of operating an aging orbital laboratory and learning to live there is slowly but surely preparing us for what comes next. This experience is shared by a partnership of 15 nations (USA, Canada, Russia, Japan, and 11 countries from ESA). However, the rising nation of China finds itself on the outside. Just like in many other sectors, China is finding its own way in space. Last year was a good one for the China National Space Agency (CNSA). Not only did they launch a brand new space station, Tiangong-2 and send a crew of 2 on a 30-day mission to the outpost, they also debuted a brand new Long March 5 heavy lift launcher while matching the US in successful launches on the year – twenty-two. A new medium-lift rocket, Long March 7, also debuted from a new coastal spaceport on Hainan Island, which should give CNSA more flexibility. CNSA's recent white paper publically published outlining their five-year plan shows ambition but also should be a douse of cold water on people expecting a space race between China and the USA. China certainly has a lot to be proud of as only the third independent nation to place humans in space. But they have a long way to go to put themselves on par with the modern space programs in America and elsewhere. I look forward to their planned lunar sample return mission in 2017, which will give them a lot of "street cred" if they pull it off!
Obviously these are not the only happenings in space exploration and related science areas. I could go on about the exciting developments in exoplanet astronomy, a field that may provide worlds to explore decades or centuries from now, for example. We continue to live in a golden age of space exploration that started with the Galileo probe to Jupiter in the early 90s. For me, 2016 was a testament to the true diversity of the state of space exploration and should serve as a reminder to avoid tunnel vision. There are many facets to how we explore. It's not just about shiny new rockets and capsules and astronauts, but its also not just about gathering science through a space telescope or a distant robotic probe. All these pieces fit together to move forward the state of our knowledge about the universe together. One of my favorite examples of this from last year was astronaut Kate Rubins' work on gene sequencing while aboard the ISS. Talk about two sectors that do not traditionally intersect, at least not in the minds of the general public. Diversity – both in the space agencies doing the exploration as well as the type of exploration – will keep the dream alive. I can't wait to see what we do on ISS this year but I also look forward to news out of China and India as they learn what it takes to fly in space.
The biggest problem with keeping up this steady cadence of exploration is how all these space agencies will pay for it, as the world faces challenging fiscal and security issues. Space is exciting – and important – but it is far from the first priority when it comes to setting budgets in most parts of the world. Fortunately, we have disruptive new players in the launch sector that can help us keep costs down. More on that in my next post.
Posted in Benefits of Spaceflight, Cassini, Ceres, China, Dawn, ESA, ExoMars, Extrasolar planets, Futurist, India, ISS, Japan, Juno, Mars, MAVEN, MER Rovers, Mission Control, MSL, NASA, New Horizons, New Space, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, Pluto, politics, Rockets, Rosetta, Russia, Saturn, SpaceX | 1 Comment »
SpaceX posted an update to their accident investigation regarding the rocket that was lost on a launch pad in September. Here's a direct link to their anomaly updates page. They hope to return to flight this year.
In launches, it has been a slow couple of weeks, with only two orbital launches since my last post on October 16th. It was quality over quantity though, as both launches were important and anticipated missions for ISS operations.
First, Orbital ATK was able to finally launch their upgraded Antares rocket with a Cygnus cargo craft on its way to ISS. The rocket launched on Monday October 17th and was captured at the ISS almost a week later on Sunday the 23rd. The delay was necessary due a higher priority launch and docking of three crew aboard a Soyuz (see below).
On Wednesday, October 19, the Soyuz rocket carrying the second half of Expedition 50 finally launched (after a spacecraft problem delayed them several weeks). The launch, rendezvous, and docking were flawless. The new crew of Shane Kimbrough Andrei Borisenko, and Sergey Ryzhikov arrived at ISS on the 21st.
There were 8 people in space only briefly (recall that two Chinese taikonauts are hanging out on their own space station right now). Expedition 49 had to hand over command to new Expedition 50 commander Kimbrough on the 28th before Anatoli Ivanishin, Kate Rubins, and Takuya Onishi undocked on Saturday night and landed safely a few hours later.
Speaking of the Chinese taikonauts, they docked successfully to the Tiangong-2 space station on October 20th and plan to stay for several weeks.
The ExoMars mission arrived at Mars on October 19th. The orbiter (known as TGO – Trace Gas Orbiter) made a successful orbital insertion burn but unfortunately, contact with the Schiaparelli lander was lost at the planned time of touchdown. The lander is suspected to be lost, but NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) was able to image the lander's crash site, which should help with investigations. Below is an animated GIF showing the recent appearance of the lander in MRO imagery:
And here's a closeup from the MRO's HiRise camera.
In other bad news, the Juno spacecraft went into safe mode during its closest approach to Jupiter on October 18 and was not able to obtain scientific data. This came only a few days after an engine burn had been cancelled. Fortunately, mission controllers were able to command Juno out of safe mode on October 24 and perform at least one "trim" maneuver. The mission timeline will be impacted by the problem but there are still dozens of orbits left in the primary mission to gather data.
Here is a nice post with images about the preliminary results from Juno so far.
Speaking of spacecraft beaming data back to Earth, the data downlink from the New Horizons probe of its Pluto flyby last July has finally completed, 15 months later!
Posted in China, ExoMars, Friday Links, ISS, JPL, Juno, Mars, NASA, New Space, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, Pluto, Rockets, SpaceX | No Comments »
An opinion piece by Barack Obama appeared in CNN last week discussing his vision for America's future in space and particularly, future missions to Mars.
Amid talk of a schedule slip of the first Starliner missions, Boeing announced they will need to add an aeroskirt for their launch configuration atop the Atlas V rocket (follow the link for an illustration).
Astronauts on the ISS opened up the BEAM module for another round of inspections (that's the "expandable" module that was added back in May). Meanwhile, NASA announced that it is seeking commercial partners to build new functional modules for the ISS. Of course, the supplier of BEAM, Bigelow Aerospace, is one of the companies seeking the contract.
The launch of Orbital ATK's Antares rocket (returning to flight almost 2 years after the last one failed after launch) was delayed until tomorrow evening due to a technical issue.
Earlier this evening, China launched a manned Shenzhou capsule with two crew aboard. They are heading to the new Tiangong-2 space station for an extended mission. When the latest ISS Soyuz crew launches in a couple of days, there will be 8 people in space! It has been very rare for the number to grow above 6 since the last Space Shuttle mission five years ago.
Due to some sticky valves in the Juno spacecraft's propulsion system, the probe will not be making a scheduled burn to reduce its orbital period from over 50 days to just 14 days. NASA is waiting another orbit (so, until December) to investigate and then try again.
Astronomers have discovered a new distant unnamed object (2014 UZ224) which may be large enough to qualify as a "dwarf planet". The object is smaller than Pluto and orbits about 5 times farther from the sun.
The ExoMars/Schiaparelli mission – a joint mission between ESA and Roscosmos – had some critical mission events today, including separation of the Schiaparelli lander and a critical orbital maneuver to setup for orbital insertion next week.
.@ESA_EDM & me now travelling last 3 days to Mars separately. Schiaparelli will land while I'm entering orbit on 19 Oct #ExoMars pic.twitter.com/f8Pl4wcaNp
— ExoMars orbiter (@ESA_TGO) October 16, 2016
Orbit-raising manoeuvre at 04:42 CEST will run no longer than 1min:46secs and deliver a change in speed/direction of 11.6 m/sec #ExoMars
— ESA Operations (@esaoperations) October 17, 2016
The engine burn will raise @ESA_TGO's trajectory to several hundred km above #Mars, so that we miss the surface, unlike @ESA_EDM #ExoMars
Posted in astronomy, Boeing, China, commercial crew, ESA, ExoMars, Friday Links, ISS, Juno, NASA, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, Rockets | No Comments »


Pride and Prejudice. Mrs Darcy. HD Wallpaper and background images in the Pride and Prejudice club tagged: pride and prejudice keira knightley elizabeth bennet.
This Pride and Prejudice wallpaper contains bridesmaid and maid of honor. There might also be portrait, headshot, and closeup.


text:
the Grimsby Town fanzineJeremy Clarkson is a wanker
A rough guide to... Coventry City
Cod Almighty | Article
Good times, bad times, you know they've had their share. When the club left home to play at Sixfields. Well, the suits didn't seem to care.
The horror, the horror.
They used to be somebody. They used to be contenders. Now they don't even have bums on seats. And it's all down to money. The worst thing that ever happened was moving to a shiny stadium on the edge of town. Now they are close to the edge of oblivion, thanks to a hedge fund.
How? Why? When? Who? Coventry City are owned by the odious Otium Entertainment, a subsidiary of sickening sleazeballs SISU, a hedge fund. It's a tale so sad and convoluted that simplified summarising will not suffice. Read this for the flavour of the tasting menu. There are still court cases going on, right now, with claims and counterclaims and suing and very little wooing of that basic economic unit, the Coventry City football supporter.
Where are they now? Highfield Road from 1899, a new ground in 2005, chucked out of it in 2013, spent a season playing in Northampton, and then came back to the bland bowl of the Ricoh Arena in 2014.
There used to be a time when football was about feet and balls. Let's talk balls.
Jimmy Hill, Mick Coop's penalty, chocolate shirts, Jimmy Hill, Keith Houchen's flying header, Kevin Drinkell's bicycle kick, Jimmy Hill, vegetarian pasties made of chicken, Jimmy Hill, Blatter baiting at the Olympics and, finally, Cyrille Regis.
And Jimmy Hill.
What have you been up to?
It all started in the summer of love, 1883, when bicycle makers Singers founded a football team, and in 1892 this became Coventry City, who joined the Football League in 1919. And nothing much happened at all for the next 40 years. Their only claim to fame was the FA's dithering over whether they were Third Division (South) or Third Division (North). They hold the distinction, with Town, of having played in every league of the Football League. The Premier League, you say? That's just accountancy in sponsored leisurewear. That's what got them in their present pickle: the price of fame was just too high.
Like Pompey, Coventry's history is full of flirtations with fame and financial ruin. Relegations avoided in the 1920s with dark mutterings about the bribing Bantams (their original nickname). The 1930s saw goals, goals, goals and debt, debt, debt, but their real golden years were the 40 years from the 1960s to the millennium, since when they haven't had a prayer. Jimmy the Chin arrived in 1961, changed the kit, changed the nickname, changed the nappies and changed their world forever as Coventry swung like a pendulum do, promotions and cup runs two by two.
Today, everything is different, they have to wait around like everyone else outside the Blinger League. They're an average nobody. They get to live the rest of their footballing life like a schnook
Promoted to the first division in 1967; played in the Inter Cities Fairs Cup in 1970 and then walloped by Bayern Munich; permanently not relegated throughout the 70s and 80s in mysterious end-of-season games; won the FA Cup in that 1987 cracker (check out Graham Rodger with real human hair). They were the Stoke City of the early Premiership years and then, in 2001, it all ended.
See, the hardest thing for Coventry was leaving the life. They had it all: paper bags filled with cash in the kitchen, anything they wanted was a phone call away. But everybody had their hands out. Everything was for the taking. And now it's all over. And that's the hardest part. Today, everything is different, they have to wait around like everyone else outside the Blinger League. They're an average nobody. They get to live the rest of their footballing life like a schnook.
So they're back where they started in 1959, before they went electric under the Jimmy Hill Experience. The rock-'n'-roll lifestyle has taken its toll, and all they have left are memories and a few old photographs of them standing near the footballing Fab Four. Expect them to pop up in a BBC4 Friday night documentary with a baffling anecdote involving Mick Quinn's moustache and a tumbler full of flaming sambuca. That's when football had characters, eh?
What kind of season did you have?
This club is going like a ghost club. Fans won't go no more. The people getting angry.
Oh my word, what can we say? At least they didn't have far to go to not watch cobblers after those wilderness years at Northampton. That's like Town playing at Skegness. Tennis balls stopped play at the Ricoh in February.
They couldn't score, they couldn't stop the opposition scoring. They were embarrassingly terrible. The only passion and fight came from the fans in the stands, with plastic toy pigs, flares, insults and those tennis balls all thrown towards the pitch at various games last year. They cared enough to make a point, while the players didn't care enough to even get a point from most games. What a shambles.
Like Town, they burned through three managers and a revolving set of bewildered and befuddled players. They started with Tony Mowbray in charge and sacked him before Christmas as it dawned on them that this was their darkest hour. In came a man with a reputation: Mr Russell Slade. A reputation for being a 'safe pair of hands'. Unlike his keeper. Fifteen games and three wins later, Slade was replaced by Mark Robins, an old bunny boiled in Scunny. Is it only professional cynics who think Slade's heart wasn't in it with that Big Job with Big John Fenty on the horizon?
I can't lie to you about their chances, but they do have our sympathy. No-one wants to get closer to the hedge fund. The birth of a wrong, the death of a dream. Those rapacious capitalists in SISU won't sell to anyone, no matter what the price, so they may limp on, limp on with hope in their heart as their dreams be tossed and blown in the Chancery Division of the High Court.
So here we are in deepest July and they have managed to sign players, despite having Tommy Widdrington as head of recruitment. And to play games of football – something that was not guaranteed after the shambolic shenanigans of the SISU seasons. They have high hopes of remembering to cut the grass before games – something that was not guaranteed to happen last year. McMulty from the Blades, Vincenti from Rochdale, McDonald from those Cobblers. Solid and effective professionals at this level. They look like men who know how to use a mower.
Perhaps Coventry crossed the line around the change of the summer and no-one noticed? They do look likely to be less of a pushover under Rockin' Robins, but who knows anything before the second test has finished?
The people of Mercia just want their club back before they can get back to where they once belonged.
There are only two things the world needs to know: Grimsby is not in Yorkshire, and Coventry is NOT IN BIRMINGHAM.
Coventry is right on the edge of England's phonetic crossroads. Don't mention Crossroads! That's right, Miss Diane, it's all nonce words to the south, normal words to the north of 'em. The general Southern English feature of the longer 'a' in words such as bath and path (becoming like the nonce words barth and parth) starts to occur, regardless of class or geodemographic grouping, across an east-to-west band of settlements somewhere between Southam and Banbury. That's why they talk funny. Or maybe you think that a load of crarp?
Historically Coventry was the most important seat of ribbon-making in the UK, then the centre of the bike world, slowly morphing from the Great Horseless Carriage Company to Rover and the production of London black cabs. They still make things now and then, here and there. It isn't what it was.
It's the city that surprisingly sent us the soundtrack of our lives. Ah yes, I remember you-oo. Frank Ifield and the velvet voice of Vince Hill paved the path of pop for the two-toners… and Pete Waterman
The Germans may have bombed Stan Boardman's chippie, but they really did bomb City's turnstiles during the Coventry blitz, where 800 died. A day before Coventry had the finest medieval centre in Britain. A decade after and Coventry had the most monstrous city centre in Britain (and yes, I have been to Scunthorpe).
Benjamin's Britten's War Requiem was composed for opening of the rebuilt cathedral, complete with a Jacob Epstein sculpture. Dame Ellen Terry and Philip Larkin were born there and William Shakespeare once went to buy some butter in Binley, so local legend has it.
For you and me it's the city that surprisingly sent us the soundtrack of our lives. Ah yes, I remember you-oo. Frank Ifield and the velvet voice of Vince Hill paved the path of pop for the two-toners… and Pete Waterman.
Excuse me while I adjust… my glasses… Did you know that the scenes in The Italian Job with the Minis thrashing through the sewers was actually filmed in Coventry, as it had Britain's biggest sewer pipes? Now, not a lot of people know that.
You must be… the first
It's a city of firsts, if not thirsts.
The first ever British car was built in Coventry and, during World War II, it was twinned with Stalingrad, becoming the first in the world to do that city twinning thing. The local bigwigs didn't do it for the scenery and a swanky municipal freebie, you know, but they did bring back the devastation and concrete aesthetic in rebuilding the old town. Have you ever tried going round the inner ring road? The first town plan to have been modelled on Dante's Inferno.
Ernie Hunt won the first ever goal of the season on Match of the Day in 1970-71. A decade later those sly blues made Highfield Road the first all-seater stadium in Britain, and were the first in the League to have kit sponsors. They were the first ever to repent their sins and unconvert an all-seater stadium, bringing back standing pronto after protests. The seating killed the atmosphere. Jimmy did it for the game as a whole.
The hedge funders almost kept up the tradition of footballing firsts. One of their idiots in charge suggested the introduction of a 'text a substitute' option during matches, to raise funds. Supporters would be given a number they could text, at premium rates of course, to say who the manager should take off and who should come on. An announcement would be made at an unidentified "appropriate time" revealing the most (un)popular vote and the manager would be under instructions to comply with 'the market'.
And now they are our first home game of the season. How apt.
If you'd like to comment on this piece, please use the Cod Almighty feedback form. Thanks.
Photo via Wikimedia Commons by Snowmanradio CC BY-SA 3.0
More from this season... A Cambridge too farA rallying call to Town fansA rough guide to... ChesterfieldA rough guide to... Coventry CityA rough guide to... Forest Green RoversA rough guide to... Lincoln CityA rough guide to... Port ValeA rough guide to... Swindon TownA slow news WednesdayA traditional Grimsby Town rantAn open letter to the Mariners TrustApril and May 1998Behind the lines: an alternative view of the Chesterfield gameCod Almighty - A Statement by The Board of GovernorsCome togetherEnter Jolley and enter hopeFish, football, but no Grimsby?Footprint in the snowFour managers, two seasons, one final chanceGTFC for the Many: taking the club back to the communityGTFC Question Time: Q1 - can the Mariners stay up?If the supporters are unitedRees, love and understandingRenewing my vows: the B team boycott matchRight place, right time: following Town in the late 1980sSeasons in the sunSteady progress: Hurst's lesson for Town fansSteve Plowes: a tributeThe blame gameThe Blundelles: a female perspective on the beautiful gameThe carrierThe future must be youthThe Johnny Scott story part 2: World Cup heroThe Johnny Scott story, part 1: from Busby Babe to Blundell Park favouriteThe lowest of the lowThe Official Unofficial GTFC Calendar 2018The Wembley XI: the definitive teamTime and the CoventrysTime to goTommy of the Town: Episode 1Tommy of the Town: Episode 10Tommy of the Town: Episode 10.5Tommy of the Town: Episode 11Tommy of the Town: Episode 12Tommy of the Town: Episode 13Tommy of the Town: Episode 14Tommy of the Town: Episode 15Tommy of the Town: Episode 16Tommy of the Town: Episode 17Tommy of the Town: Episode 2Tommy of the Town: Episode 2.5Tommy of the Town: Episode 3Tommy of the Town: Episode 4Tommy of the Town: Episode 5Tommy of the Town: Episode 6Tommy of the Town: Episode 7Tommy of the Town: Episode 8Tommy of the Town: Episode 9Tommy of the Town: Episode 9.5We are not WorthyWe have the players but do we have the shape?What does your club mean to you?What if… George Tweedy had not had fluWhat if... John Newman had acted like a modern manager?
Rough Guide • Coventry City • fourth division • ownership and takeovers