"To this day, people in Chicago are still scared about being murdered for talking about Barack Obama being gay or about what goes on at Trinity United with the still-active "Down Low Club". Young, gay, black men are mentored into the club and are eventually paired up with often unattractive and difficult to deal with straight black women who never have boyfriends (since guys don't want to have anything to do with them). A friend of mine in the "Think Squad" of prominent black professionals I talk to regularly calls these women "heifers" and says it's very common for "cake boys" to be paired up with "heifers" so that "dummies are fooled" into thinking they are straight."
McConnell believes that over the last 20 years, Serco has integrated operations of the FAA Contract Towers, Defense Red Switch Network and Paradigm mil-sat communications systems so that Serco air traffic controllers can impute ad hoc waypoints into remotely hijacked aircraft; trigger crash/mid-air explosions and pre-position ground crews to remove evidence of Down Low Club snuff-film murders – cf. Lorretta Fuddy FAA Contract Towers, Molokaai 11/12/13.
McConnell invites Virgin Galactic CEO Sir Richard Branson to contact him for a briefing on the world's largest air traffic controller Serco and its alleged use of FAA/Red Switch and Paradigm networks to crash passenger aircraft for Down Low Club snuff-film and death-by-plane events.
McConnell also invites Sir Richard to conduct a private investigation of 32-year veteran Serco manager Bob Coulling and his tradecraft skills needed for a Virgin explosion and wag the dog script, especially Coulling's experience in electronic warfare, tagging, asset recovery and paedophile image analysis for MOD, GCHQ, CESG, Police, Home Office, Serious Organised Crime Agency, Ministry of Justice and Customs and Revenue and Immigration Service.
Prequel 1: #2161: Marine Links Red-Switch Serco's Cake-Boy Swapping to Sodomized Spy In Fort Meade Bag
Prequel 2: #1787: Marine Links MI-3 Wi-Fi HUBZone to Marcy Molokai Murder, Fuddy Birth Certificate
Reporter: Virgin Galactic was too eager with spacecraft
Virgin Galactic Ship Crashes, One Pilot Reported Dead
SpaceshipTwo Crashes in Virgin Galactic Test crash California| Tourism rocket Explode
(Now you see it!)
(Now your don't!)
Jeremiah Wright - Obama's mentor - Hate speech
Serco... Would you like to know more?
Serco's track record in the provision of such vital services started over 40 years ago when the government entrusted it to maintain the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System at RAF Fylingdales. From this landmark contract, the company has established a strong reputation in the defence and aerospace markets for reliability, innovation and successful long-term working partnerships.
Serco is an international service company, which combines commercial know-how with a deep public service ethos. It improves services by managing people, processes, technology and assets more effectively. Serco's people offer operational, management and consulting expertise in the aerospace, defence, health, home affairs, local government, nuclear, science, technology, transport and commercial sectors. http://www.serco.co.uk"
"SKY-HIGH HUBRIS
November 1, 2014
Virgin Galactic's Flight Path to Disaster: A Clash of High Risk and Hyperbole
Sir Richard Branson's a consummate salesman, but his rhetoric and hopes got ahead of his company's engineers.
It was always recklessly optimistic of Sir Richard Branson to imagine that he could go straight from experimental test flights of his Virgin Galactic SpaceShip Two to carrying passengers in a matter of months.
That's not the way that things work when you're pushing at the edge of the unknown, as this program was.
And yet there was Sir Richard, only a few weeks ago, suggesting that once the ship had fired up its rocket motor with a new kind of fuel he would be riding the first passenger-carrying flight early next year.
He's never seemed either to understand or admit how many technical challenges had to be faced before space tourism could be an everyday event, as safe and simple as flying an airline.
Every milestone in aviation and aerospace has been reached only after exhaustive and often dangerous testing.
The closest parallel to the Galactic challenge is the example of Chuck Yaeger being the first man to successfully fly at supersonic speed in 1947.
It was called, rather dramatically, breaking the sound barrier. In fact, there was no barrier but there was much to be discovered about changes to the controllability of an airplane as it surged beyond the speed of sound.
Yaeger's Bell X-1 rocket ship was a one-off experimental machine. It would be years before air force pilots could safely fly the supersonic fighters that evolved from these test flights into a very different form.
Yet Virgin Galactic posited the notion that an experimental test vehicle and the final form of a "spaceship for tourists" could be identical.
Both a rocket engine with a temperamental record and an airframe of revolutionary design and construction had to be proved safe. And not just safe for test pilots, but safe enough for the long line of celebrities who had signed up to ride the rocket.
All the Virgin Galactic test flying was done under a special experimental permit issued by the Federal Aviation Administration. To reach the point where SpaceShip Two could be cleared for carrying passengers Galactic needed to move from the experimental permit to being awarded an operator's license.
That required a new 180-day review by the FAA to establish that all the systems were thoroughly tested and fail-safe. But remember, this was uncharted territory for the FAA just as it was for Galactic. Indeed, by submitting to the FAA review Galactic was being asked to set the standards for all who followed... if they could.
It was a very tall order. Branson wanted a vehicle that could carry six passengers, two pilots and reach a speed of 2,500mph and a height of around 65 miles, ten times the height at which an airliner cruises.
By any measure, this accident will have set back the development program by years. Will backers want to pour ever more money into this black hole?
When the FAA certifies a new airliner as safe it is normal for the airplane builder, like Boeing or Airbus, to put as many a six airplanes into the test program, all flying at the same time, to test every aspect of the design and its safety—and this for a technology that is in most parts wholly mature. Even then it can take several years to receive certification. The principle is clear: the design must have multiple redundancies so that no single failure can jeopardize the airplane.
But here Virgin was fielding only one test vehicle that embodied a whole set of completely untried systems. Everything was being staked on the two test pilots being able to anticipate potential failures and the ground engineers likewise poring over the test results to detect weak points before they had catastrophic results. Despite this, Virgin asked the FAA to begin their review for the operator's license in August 2013, and that was when the 180-day clock started ticking.
However, as that period neared its end it was obvious that SpaceShip Two was nowhere near completing its test flights and passing every safety milestone that it needed to. So Virgin voluntarily asked the FAA to stop the clock.
The program was facing its most daunting test, firing up the rocket engine to full power and for long enough to reach that apogee of 65 miles high.
Early this year a test flight proved that the fuel being used for the rocket would never meet that goal. The power delivered by the rocket motor was uneven and tricky to control. On the first powered test flights the pilots had prematurely to shut down the engine.
Then a critical change was ordered—a fuel using a new formula that was thought to be more stable and deliver more power. This fuel was repeatedly tested on the ground. But no ground test can replicate the conditions of a flight—key factors like temperature, air pressure and far lower gravitational pull affect the way the fuel behaves.
On Friday morning the pilots prepared for the first flight with the new fuel. There was, I am told, a two-hour delay caused by concerns about the temperature of the fuel. Nonetheless, the test pilots, both known to be scrupulous in their preparations, felt confident enough to go. So SpaceShip Two was lifted aloft by the mother ship, WhiteKnight Two, and separated at 40,000 feet to "light the candle" as rocket ignition is called. Disaster followed.
There are many consequences to this failure. Not the least is what it implies for the financing of the project. After years of delays the costs have gone beyond a billion dollars. More than a third of that money has come from Abar, an investment fund based in Abu Dhabi. (This was made available in return for an undertaking by Virgin to build a space tourism base in the Gulf.) By any measure, this accident will have set back the development program by years. Will backers want to pour ever more money into this black hole?
Then there is the case of Spaceport America in New Mexico, near the small city of Truth & Consequences. This cost local taxpayers $212 million to build in the hope that they would become the center of the new industry of space tourism.
It's not exactly clear how many people have signed up to ride SpaceShip One – Galactic has claimed that as many as 800 people have paid deposits on the $250,000 fare but the numbers are squishy. For these people the disaster over the Mojave Desert is a sobering wake-up call. What to many must have seemed the prospect of a spectacular joy ride is now better appreciated as a thrill from the very edge of what is safely attainable.
From the beginning in 2004 there has always been a credibility gap between the fairground hyperbole of Branson's formidable publicity machine and the scientific reality of the enterprise. Somehow, probably because he is such a consummate showman, Branson has been able, year after year, to override the story of continual delays, flagrant over-promises and a voracious, seemingly open-ended budget. This time it's different. A National Transportation Safety Board investigation will deliver a forensic rigor that has been so far lacking. It will strip away the vocabulary of the promoter. And it will reveal the world as lived daily by the engineers and test pilots who knew how much was left to be understood among the hazards of the dream."
"Branson spaceship explosion: The 'missed' warnings
Sir Richard Branson's company and US authorities were repeatedly warned about safety issues surrounding Virgin Galactic's rocket engine system
By Robert Mendick, Edward Malnick and Rob Crilly in New York
9:29PM GMT 01 Nov 2014
Sir Richard Branson's space tourism company Virgin Galactic has been accused of ignoring a series of warnings that its $500 million rocket was unsafe for flight.
A number of senior aerospace engineers repeatedly voiced fears over the design of Sir Richard's SpaceShipTwo and the safety protocols surrounding its testing.
The Telegraph has seen emails and other documents in the public domain — dating back several years, and as recently as last year — in which the engineers warned of the dangers of Virgin Galactic's rocket engine system.
It also emerged on Saturday that three senior Virgin Galactic executives — the vice-president in charge of propulsion, the vice-president in charge of safety, and the chief aerodynamics engineer — had all quit the company in recent months.
The Virgin Galactic spacecraft, which was scheduled to begin passenger flights early next year, blew up in the sky above the Mojave Desert in California during a test flight on Friday.
01 Nov 2014
The incident, in which one pilot died and another was seriously injured, puts in jeopardy Sir Richard's dream of space travel for passengers, each paying $250,000 (£156,000).
The dead pilot was named as Michael Alsbury, an experienced American test pilot.
His widow, Michelle Saling, said: "I have lost the love of my life. I am living in hell right now."
His co-pilot Peter Siebold, 43, was undergoing surgery on Saturday night after sustaining serious injuries.
Scaled Composties, the US aerospace company which employed the pilots, said Mr Siebold has been "alert" and talking with his family and doctors.
Wreckage lies near the site where a Virgin Galactic space tourism rocket, SpaceShipTwo, exploded and crashed in Mojave, California
Virgin Galactic, in an attempt at damage limitation, initially dismissed the explosion as an "anomaly". However, aerospace experts insisted that it had been a disaster waiting to happen.
Tom Bower, an investigative journalist and Sir Richard's biographer, described the crash as "predictable and inevitable". He said: "It's a very crude rocket."
Sir Richard arrived at the crash site on Saturday insisting that "safety has always been our number one priority". He admitted that only if the problems that caused the crash could be overcome would the programme continue.
The Telegraph can disclose that Sir Richard's company, as well as US authorities, were warned about safety issues on numerous occasions, as long ago as 2007 when three engineers died in an explosion during testing of a rocket engine on the ground.
Carolynne Campbell, the lead expert on rocket propulsion at the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS), said: "This explosion is not a surprise. None whatsoever, I am sorry to say. It is exactly what I was expecting. It was Russian roulette which test flight blew up."
She had first warned Virgin Galactic about the danger of its nitrous oxide-propelled engines in the aftermath of the 2007 disaster, and has repeated those warnings since.
In a study published in 2010 on her website and sent to Sir Richard's company as well as to the US authorities, she wrote: "We are not confident that ... we yet know enough about N2O [nitrous oxide] to consider it a safe oxidiser for use in passenger flight.
"In the light of what we do know, safety must remain a major concern."
In the study, she questioned Virgin Galactic's claim on its website that its rocket system was "benign" and "stable".
In emails sent by Geoff Daly, a US-based British rocket scientist, to officials at the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) last year, he warned of another disaster if test flights were given the go-ahead.
At the time, Virgin Galactic had planned to begin its first passenger flights in December 2013, although the date of the inaugural flight had been repeatedly postponed.
In the emails, published on a US government website, Mr Daly wrote on July 13 2013: "We respectfully request a response from you on what actions the FAA will be taking with respect to the permit issued and the operations as planned in the Mojave and New Mexico facilities.
"Remember three people have been killed and numerous persons injured by a prior explosion involving N2O in this motor design. We do not need another incident on the ground/flight line or in the air."
In another email — this time to the US Chemical Safety Board and sent on July 17 2013 — Mr Daly wrote: "Sir Richard Branson, his two children, Justin Bieber [the singer] and one other will be the first passengers to fly into space during this coming December 2013, and everyone realises there is a problem, even the engineers ...have said so off the record."
Tomasso Sgobba, executive director of IAASS and the former head of safety at the European Space Agency, said that Virgin Galactic had refused to share information with industry experts outside the company and declined to have its rocket design peer-reviewed.
Representatives of Virgin Galactic had refused to come to IAASS meetings, he said.
"They operated in secrecy, which is difficult to understand," said Mr Sgobba. "They don't use modern techniques in putting safety into the design.
"They use outdated methods like testing and then seeing what happens. There has been no independent oversight.
"There is no peer review. I have been saying for some years now this was an accident waiting to happen."
Mr Bower, who exposed the safety concerns surrounding the project in his biography of Sir Richard published earlier this year, said: "What happened yesterday was very sad for the pilot obviously but it was predictable and inevitable.
"All the engineers in California working on the project I've spoken to said it was very dangerous."
US investigators on Saturday began examining the wreckage to determine what went wrong.
One area of focus will be claims that the test pilots had requested a two-hour delay in take-off due to concerns over the temperature of the nitrous oxide in the fuel tanks.
SpaceShipTwo was being tested ahead of a possible passenger launch in March. It was the first test flight using a different hybrid fuel system.
In May this year, the company and its partner firm Scaled Composites said they would switch from using a rubber-based solid fuel burned in a stream of nitrous oxide, which had caused engine instabilities in earlier test flights, to a plastic-based solid fuel called thermoplastic polyamide also burned in nitrous oxide.
It was claimed the new fuel would be more reliable and more powerful.
In a statement on its website on Friday, the company said: "During the test, the vehicle suffered a serious anomaly resulting in the loss of the vehicle."
A spokesman for Virgin Galactic said: "The investigation of the accident is now in the hands of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and we are not permitted to make any comment whatsoever until that investigation has run its course."
The NTSB investigation is its first involving a manned spacecraft. It was unclear if there was a "black box" flight recorder.
Sir Richard dismissed claims that Virgin Galactic had ignored safety warnings.
"To be honest I find it slightly irresponsible that people who know nothing about what they are saying can be saying things before the NTSB makes their comments," he said.
He added: "We aren't going to push on blindly. To do so would be an insult to all those affected by this tragedy.
"We are going to learn from what went wrong, discover how we can improve safety and performance and then move forwards together.
"We owe it to our test pilots to find out exactly what went wrong and once we find out what went wrong, if we can overcome it, we'll make absolutely certain that the dream lives on."
Sir Richard later insisted the programme could be "back on track" within four to six months "if it is a clear-cut cause and one that can be fixed"."
"New military hotline [operated by Serco] directly links top brass to U.S.
Canada is installing a hotline that will allow military brass and politicians to talk with their American counterparts during a time of war or in any other crisis.
BY THE OTTAWA CITIZEN JANUARY 14, 2006
Canada is installing a hotline that will allow military brass and politicians to talk with their American counterparts during a time of war or in any other crisis.
About $20 million is being spent on what is called the Defence Red Switch Network. The communications system is already running in some locations, including the defence minister's office and other undisclosed sites for the military's senior leadership. The system will provide a link for the Canadian government to various U.S. military headquarters as well as the North American Aerospace Defence Command, the joint U.S.-Canada alliance that monitors air and space approaches to the continent.
After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, there was criticism that senior Canadian officials, including then-prime minister Jean Chretien, were out of the communications loop during the initial stages of the terrorist strike.
The Citizen obtained documents on the red switch network under the access to information law, but Defence Department officials censored almost all details. They claimed releasing the material would be "injurious" to the defense of Canada, its international relations, as well as the detection of subversive or hostile activities.
The newspaper, however, found the details of the supposedly secret network, including its cost to taxpayers, on the department's own public webpage. Details of a similar system that would allow U.S. President George W. Bush to communicate with his top level commanders was also on a Pentagon webpage.
Canadian military officials were not available to explain why information about the network is considered secret when such details have already been put out in the public domain by both the U.S. and Canada.
The red switch network is considered secure, meaning that it has technology to prevent its transmissions from being monitored or intercepted [Except for the Heartbleed bug]. Presumably the Canadian system can link up with the president's network.
Martin Shadwick, a strategic studies professor with York University, said such a system makes sense in that Canada and the U.S. share a common goal in protecting North America. He noted that similar communications systems existed during the Cold War.
But analyst Steve Staples said the hotline is another example of the growing integration of the U.S. and Canadian militaries and the increased involvement of the Canadian Forces in American-led operations. "This system just allows the Canadian military and government leaders to get their orders from Washington more quickly," said Mr. Staples, an analyst with the Ottawa-based Polaris Institute.
The Citizen requested information on the red switch network almost four weeks ago, but military officials have not been available to comment.
But according to the Defence webpage, the network "allows access to the U.S. system (Forces wide) and will enhance north/south and internal connectivity -- particularly during times of crisis."
According to a Pentagon site, the network provides the president, secretary of defence, joint chiefs of staff, combatant commanders and selected agencies with secure voice communications up to the top secret level. The system is for use during war and other emergencies. Other U.S. defence and federal government agencies can access the network if they have approval from the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, according to the site. The website also includes a [Serco!] phone number that U.S. government officials can call to request entry to the network.
Mr. Staples said the level of secrecy in Canada surrounding the network is disturbing. "I think the Defence Department is worried that Canadians are going to realize the extent our military is being integrated into the U.S. system," he added.
Critics have warned about a new wave of secrecy at the Defence Department. Officials there are censoring information in official documents released to the public even though the same material is already available on government Internet sites. Some critics say this blanket of secrecy raises questions about government accountability and openness. Last week, the Citizen reported the Defence Department is withholding information about the Pentagon's missile shield that is already on the U.S. government's websites, while at the same time claiming the security of Canada could be harmed if the names of senior American officers treated to a taxpayer-financed reception more than a year ago are released.
In addition, the newspaper obtained two missile shield briefing notes sent to Defence Minister Bill Graham. The department had originally told both the newspaper and an investigator with the Office of the Information Commissioner that those records, one of which discusses U.S. efforts to develop space weapons, never existed.
© © CanWest MediaWorks Publications Inc."
"International Federation of Air Traffic Controllers' Associations (IFATCA) unites the professional associations of air traffic controllers from around the world. In total, it represents over 130 of such organisations, with a combined membership of over 50,000 air traffic controllers.
The Federation is registered in Switzerland, but maintains a permanent office in Montreal, Canada.
The goals of the Federation include promoting safety, efficiency, and regularity of international air navigation, aid in the development of air traffic control systems, procedures and facilities and promote knowledge and professional efficiency among air traffic controllers.
They do this by closely cooperating with national and international aviation authorities, and as such are represented in a large number of bodies that are looking at the present and future developments in air traffic control.
Their ultimate goal is a world-wide federation of Air Traffic Controllers' Associations.
The Federation publishes a quarterly, called "The Controller"."
Yours sincerely,
Field McConnell, United States Naval Academy, 1971; Forensic Economist; 30 year airline and 22 year military pilot; 23,000 hours of safety; Tel: 715 307 8222
David Hawkins Tel: 604 542-0891 Forensic Economist; former leader of oil-well blow-out teams; now sponsors Grand Juries in CSI Crime and Safety Investigation
Field McConnell, United States Naval Academy, 1971; Forensic Economist; 30 year airline and 22 year military pilot; 23,000 hours of safety; Tel: 715 307 8222
David Hawkins Tel: 604 542-0891 Forensic Economist; former leader of oil-well blow-out teams; now sponsors Grand Juries in CSI Crime and Safety Investigation
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