Spanish airmada

Spanish airmada

www.thesun.co.uk

A HUGE armada was being planned last night to rescue Brits stranded in the volcano air crisis by SAILING them home from Spain.

The Government was working on a scheme to tell UK citizens to get to Spanish seaports and be picked up by the Royal Navy.

It came as the spread of volcanic ash left a million Brits trapped abroad, threatening chaos today for schools due to reopen after the Easter holidays

Read more: www.thesun.co.uk...

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[edit on 18/4/2010 by Mirthful Me]

However runways in Spain, which now lies just south of the ash, RE-OPENED last night.

The UK's plan could see Brits stranded in other nations not affected by the cloud fly to Spain. Navy warships could evacuate them.

PM Gordon Brown has had talks with his Spanish counterpart and the Government's emergency committee Cobra will meet this morning.

Read more: www.thesun.co.uk...

isn't this a bit ott


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[edit on 18/4/2010 by Mirthful Me]

What the.... it's like sending warships to Florida because JFK is snowed in. Why don't they just get on a train or rent a car?

reply to post by jumpingbeanz


A tiny bit overboard...

I live on the SE coast in a Ferry port town and we have gone from 5 large ferries to 1 in the last 5 years... and the one that is left is really old and pretty skanky... so there is little to no capacity in the merchant fleet to do anything to help..

So what other option is there? at least the RN have some RoRo's (roll on/roll off) they can use..

Edit to add: the Way Mandy put it last night I can't help but feel he is simply trying to get a little politcal gain out of the situation, after doing nothing for 4 days (which is pretty disgusting really)

[edit on 19/4/10 by thoughtsfull]

Originally posted by mythatsabigprobe
What the.... it's like sending warships to Florida because JFK is snowed in. Why don't they just get on a train or rent a car?

Seriously, it's not like it's a transatlantic flight, there is a tunnel between the U.K. and Europe.

*if* all Euopean Govs work together they could put together a transport Network of coaches/trains/Ferries etc to move that volume of people around Europe.. as this is what really needs ot happen, the UK can not act in isolation..

i.e if the RN leaves a UK port it really needs to take those Nationals trapped in the UK with it and deliver them while collecting UK nationals..

So who will pick up the Cost??

Imagine someone from the US, Australia or Asia having to travel to a UK hub point for pick up and then to travel to say a Spanish hub to then be transfered to another airline to be taken home.. same process in reverse.. The cost of travel in that situation is going to be very expensive.. who pays for it all??

Originally posted by thoughtsfull

*if* all Euopean Govs work together they could put together a transport Network of coaches/trains/Ferries etc to move that volume of people around Europe.. as this is what really needs ot happen, the UK can not act in isolation..

i.e if the RN leaves a UK port it really needs to take those Nationals trapped in the UK with it and deliver them while collecting UK nationals..

So who will pick up the Cost??

Imagine someone from the US, Australia or Asia having to travel to a UK hub point for pick up and then to travel to say a Spanish hub to then be transfered to another airline to be taken home.. same process in reverse.. The cost of travel in that situation is going to be very expensive.. who pays for it all??

We're talking about governments here...do you really think they thought about the costs?

[edit on 19-4-2010 by yellowcard]

reply to post by yellowcard


Well to be honest my partner and I where discussing the issue when Mandy Mandelson was chattering on about rubbish on the News report...

And we said, given that they are a bunch of...... If they did send coaches they would be empty one way and be taken to the cleaners over the hire charges..

My partners company has a few employee's trapped in Europe and to get one to the nearest ferry port needed a car hire of 24hrs and the car hire companies rates where £2,000 ($3,000) for 24 hrs!!! so I dread to think how much it'll cost to hire coaches right now...

reply to post by jumpingbeanz


Well, it seem the Gov (listening to Gordo at the moment) is sending the Royal Navy Carriers, Assault Ships and RoRo's to the channel ports to bring people home

It is expected HMS Ocean and HMS Ark Royal should be in channel ports by the end of the day

HMS Ocean
www.royalnavy.mod.uk...

HMS Ark Royal
www.royalnavy.mod.uk...

Edit to add; hope one docks here, as that would be really cool

[edit on 19/4/10 by thoughtsfull]

Is this similar to the French one? Where by a group of boats tried to do a Dunkirk, yet they were stoped by French authoritys.

Anyway, on topic (sortta), Seems that Willy has been putting himself on the line-

"On Sunday, a British Airways Boeing 747 completed a two-and-three-quarter hour test flight at 40,000ft from Heathrow to Cardiff, via the Atlantic, the airline said.

Chief executive Willie Walsh, who is a trained pilot, and four crew were on board.

"The conditions were perfect and the aircraft encountered no difficulties. It will now undergo a full technical analysis at British Airways' engineering base at Cardiff," the airline said in a statement."

news.bbc.co.uk...

reply to post by Esrom Escutcheon Esquire


The RN are on their way to start collecting people, and bringing them back.. they should start arriving in the channel ports today, am guessing once they start that other smaller ships will start joining them

Strange the Gov has taken this route when BA has taken these flights and reporting no damage, so unless the Gov knows something we do not.. then this could simply be a PR stunt for the elections, since Gordo would get a good kick in if he did nothing..

I guess we'll have to wait and see

it is a bit ott to see navy warships ferrying people about, as posted earlier it'd be better if all the g'ments worked in conjunction.

Although I can see the eagerness to get these people home though, i'm working in a hospital at the moment and can say almost 1/3 of our unit's staff (who look after 80+ patients are stuck abroad. Now if agency staff are unavailable to cover those shifts (which will cost MUCH more) the shifts will have to run short which is a risk to patient safety, so imagine that across the uk. huge cost and risk from an NHS point

My mum works in a school as a technician, and she told me nearly half of the teachers are stuck in foreign countries (obviously nobody likes Easter at home?) This means if enough staff don't turn in, the school won't be able to open.

Granted, the cost will be huge to mobilise the RN, but imagine the cost to the economy when business can't open because staff haven't turned in etc. I'd imagine in a roundabout way putting money to the RN will come back into the economy by avoiding unnecessary closures.

it costs millions a year in sickdays, this would probably be classed as the biggest set of sickdays ever

EDIT:

Forgot to mention, do you really think that car/coach hire companies won't exploit this? BBC news said the other day Eurostar tickets have almost tripled, from around £60 to £170. It's probably cheaper to deploy a carrier than a fleet of sly exploiting coach companies about now! Not to mention a drive from Spain can take around 4 days by car, probably longer with a coach's limited speed.

[edit on 19/4/10 by Longy4eva]

This sounds like Dunkirk II

But what's the point? Can't people just catch a train from the UK to the EU mainland? And then from there drive anywhere they want?

A sea operation is certainly rather expensive especially a RAN operation.

Rather poorly planned and totally unnecessary.

Edit to add: the Way Mandy put it last night I can't help but feel he is simply trying to get a little politcal gain out of the situation, after doing nothing for 4 days (which is pretty disgusting really)

Well what do they expect politicians to do about it but expand government and suck up cash while achieving nothing? Nuke the volcano until it closes and the magma comes out somewhere less inconvenient?

[edit on 19-4-2010 by belial259]

Originally posted by mythatsabigprobe
What the.... it's like sending warships to Florida because JFK is snowed in. Why don't they just get on a train or rent a car?

too right, lol. Like how barcelona football team have to go by bus, and the english team fulham is saying its unfair.

The english seem to think they are the greatest since slice bread or something.

Barcelona european champions have to go by bus, but an english team is asking uefa for postponing because they say bus travel is unfair, lol.

reply to post by andy1033


It's not so much the English that are like that, wouldn't bother me..

Its more the ridiculously inflated egos that are floating round english football now. They earn £15,000 a week for chrissake, and that's not even the maximum!

I'd tell them to walk

reply to post by belial259


Or you could call it Corunna III which was a similar operation in 1809 to evacuation as Dunkirk

I think we have to do one per century

Tho the chunnel trains are limited to the amount of space and trains they can provide..

Tho sailing from my home town to France is usually 4 hours.. Dover is even quicker... You can cram quite a few people on a boat for a few hours, much more than you can transfere by train...

Personally I think the quoted figure of 200,000 Brits stranded abroad is an under estimation...

reply to post by Longy4eva


Exactly, Barcelona are european champions and they are going by bus to milan, while fulham want postponing the game as going by bus is unfair, lol.

reply to post by andy1033


I'm not a football fan so I am guessing by your comment that Barcelona are traveling across the Channel to play here and Fulham are refusing to cross the channel to plan in Europe???

Edit to add: jsut read your comment above, so Barcelona are not trying to get across the channel with the tens of thousands of others... so where is Fulham playing? in Britain? and refusing to travel??

[edit on 19/4/10 by thoughtsfull]

reply to post by thoughtsfull


fulham are to travel to hamburg = 579 miles

liverpool to madrid = 1293 miles

inter milan to barcelona = 607 miles

bayer munich to lyon = 474 miles

to be honest if Fulham think its unfair then why are Liverpool more than happy...roy hodgson (Fulham manager) is a known cry baby who will do or say anything to give Fulham an edge....i could go on but it would be off topic..but this may explain the underlying problems uefa hates english football


but anyway I just got word from a friend who was returning from Afghanistan(he is stuck in Cyprus) they have been told that they will be moving by boat to the mainland and then overland back to the uk.

I hope noone seriously thinks there going t be in for a easy ride simply because its the Royal Navy coming to save them. This is the beginning of the "Shock Doctrine" at work, where Marshall Law is implimented via Militaristic means. It frightens me that G.Brown thinks a Military vessel is more capable of looking after hundreds of stranded passengers than a kitted out Cruise-Ship is (especially having staff with experience.)

Were now entering the Dark Ages, and I can't help but feel the restrictions on flights is now nothing more than a larger agenda, given the fact 3x Airlines have sent up Aircraft for flights and found NOTHING.