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Inside a Charlotte man's world of music piracy
If you wanted to download pirated music over the past few years, then Rocky Ouprasith was your man.
In 2013, he ran the nation's second-biggest illegal music file-sharing site, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Ouprasith illegally distributed recordings "in the millions," prosecutors said.
The young Texas transplant living in northwest Charlotte operated RockDizMusic.com and the related RockDizFile.com.
The feds finally shut the sites down last fall, ending a nearly 3 1/2-year run. Ouprasith, 23, pleaded guilty in August to one count of criminal copyright infringement.
Ouprasith admitted the pirated material's market value was between $2.5 million and $7 million. Prosecutors cited "conservative" copyright infringement estimates totaling nearly $6.1 million, but the RIAA believes the actual total is much higher.
On Tuesday, Ouprasith will be sentenced in federal court in Virginia. He faces a maximum of five years in prison and fines of up to $250,000 in addition to forfeiting nearly $51,000 in proceeds.
This is serious business. You're stealing millions of dollars from people.
Brad Buckles, music industry anti-piracy executive
The case offers a glimpse into the shadowy and lucrative world of online music piracy.
It involves Russian and Dutch computer servers, ripping off artists from Kelly Clarkson to Linkin Park and a website started by a teenager that at one point had 7.5 million page views in a month, court records show.
The RIAA came across his site and eventually turned over its findings to federal authorities, said Brad Buckles, the trade group's anti-piracy executive vice president.
"This is serious business," he said. "You're stealing millions of dollars from people. And people go to jail for stealing millions of dollars."
A new player
Ouprasith's attorney, Bobby Howlett Jr. of Norfolk, Va., did not return calls for comment. But interviews, a review of social media sites and court documents, including Ouprasith's plea agreement and statement of facts, provided details of the case.
Growing up, Ouprasith moved from Texas to several places in North Carolina before his family settled in Charlotte. He developed a fondness for video games and computers, and was a semester away from graduating from West Mecklenburg High when the family returned to Texas to open a grocery store.
Ouprasith eventually moved back to Charlotte.
It's unclear whether this was in North Carolina or Texas, but after a community college wanted to charge him out-of-state rates he couldn't afford, "Rocky felt like he was stuck at this point, so he began pursuing more work using his computer skills," his attorney stated in a legal filing. "Ultimately, this is what brings him before the court."
In May 2011, when he was 19, Ouprasith launched a website where people could find and download songs and albums for free. He called it RockDizMusic.com.
It was fortuitous timing. A little over half a year later, the FBI busted a massive, online piracy ring and seized the website Megaupload.com.
Several people were arrested, including the site's flamboyant founder Kim Dotcom, who was captured in his New Zealand mansion. Authorities estimated the site cost film and music companies more than $500 million in copyright infringement.
Other sites shut down to avoid Megaupload's fate, Buckles said, while a number of smaller ones jumped into the vacuum.
"They set up basically similar services that Kim Dotcom had been doing," he said. "We started watching for new players, and RockDizFile was one of them that came to our attention."
Promoting piracy
Here's how Ouprasith pirated music.
He found digital copies of copyrighted songs and albums online, Ouprasith acknowledged in a court filing, and processed the files to his site listing RockDizMusic.com as the publisher.
Ouprasith also obtained content by encouraging users to be "affiliates" and upload music to his website. They were paid based on the number of times people downloaded the songs and albums they uploaded.
RockDizMusic.com offered thousands of singles, music videos, hundreds of albums and mixtapes for download.
To download a file, people only needed to click a few hyperlinks that would lead them to RockDizFile.com or a related site. It was all free. And much of the music was available to download on Ouprasith's sites before it was released to the public, according to RIAA.
$6.1 million The estimated value prosecutors cited of the pirated material
7.5 million Page views for RockDizMusic.com in January 2014
Ouprasith promoted the websites on social media. For example, on Facebook, he ran a RockDizMusic T-shirt logo design contest, updated people on the latest improvements to the site and provided links for free MP3 downloads like this: "Check out Drakes new track on Rockdizmusic!!!!"
Ouprasith rented computer servers in Chicago, Canada, France and Russia. He also used online data hosting services, known as "cyber lockers," in France and the Netherlands to store the pirated content that users could download, court records showed.
Ouprasith gave the product away but still cashed in.
On a Skype chat that authorities recovered from one of Ouprasith's laptops, he boasted of making $75,000 to $80,000 in 2013 and spending up to $66,000 on his business. It's unclear exactly how much money Ouprasith made off of the sites in all.
Ouprasith sold premium subscriptions for up to $90 a year that offered faster download speeds and other features.
Then there were the ads. He had deals with at least nine online ad firms to advertise on his site for unnamed "major retailers and service providers." At one point, he averaged $3,000 to $4,000 a month from ad revenue alone.
Ad money, Buckles said, is the most common revenue source for pirate sites. "They are basically giving away stolen property to get eyeballs onto their site, and that translates into money."
Name-brand companies are far removed from dealing with the websites, Buckles said. Rather, there are layers of subcontractors and resellers involved in getting an ad on sites delivering certain demographics.
709,410 Number of times users downloaded music fron RockDizFile.com in a six-month period
In October 2013, Ouprasith went corporate. He started running the operation through RPO Productions LLC, which he incorporated in North Carolina based out of his home address.
A couple weeks later, he posted on Facebook, "Ppl always asked why am I always working on my sites and what more I can I possibly do that would take up so much of my time."
He said he finally figured out the answer: "I realized that the most successful ppl in life are sustainable, always changing and adapting to new environments. Whether you're a teacher, a web developer or some successful business owner you gotta stay up to date and be on top of things."
'We were being gamed'
Last January, according to Ouprasith's stats, RockDizMusic.com had more than 7.5 million page views, 1.6 million site visits and 937,116 unique visitors.
But music fans weren't the only ones checking out his work.
All that activity attracted the attention of copyright holders, law enforcement, RIAA and another trade group, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.
They were acutely aware of the cost of piracy. The U.S. music industry's revenues have fallen by more than $7.6 billion since 1999, RIAA said, with piracy as the main reason.
But RIAA no longer estimates pirating totals; it's too difficult given the range of available music platforms. In a recent one-year span, for instance, RIAA found and removed 20 million links to illegal music files.
In 2013 and 2014, Ouprasith received hundreds of emails from trade groups and copyright holders demanding he immediately remove the illegal files. But he either ignored the requests, claimed he removed them or temporarily removed them before posting different links to the same files.
"It looked like we were being gamed on our take-down notices," Buckles said. That's when RIAA contacted the U.S. Department of Justice.
In October 2013, a federal agent in Virginia went on RockDizMusic.com and was redirected to RockDizFile.com, where he downloaded Clarkson's "Wrapped in Red" album, Linkin Park's album "Recharged" and The Wanted's songs "Glow in the Dark" and "Summer Alive" from a computer server in The Netherlands. All the downloads infringed on copyrighted works.
Between October 2013 and April 2014, investigators found, Ouprasith uploaded about 810 copies of copyrighted songs to his sites, and RockDizFile.com users downloaded those files about 709,410 times.
Finally, on Oct. 15, 2014, federal authorities executed search warrants on Ouprasith's Charlotte home and a Chicago computer server, while authorities in France and the Netherlands raided other servers he used. Ouprasith waived his rights and admitted the scheme.
The case was investigated by the Homeland Security Investigations, with the help of other U.S. federal officials as well as Dutch, French and Canadian authorities.
Jurisdiction is in Virginia because that was where the investigating agent first downloaded the music, said Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Eastern District of Virginia. He declined further comment.
In its last 12 months of operation, RockDizFile averaged 4.45 million site visits a month, according to the RIAA. The only music piracy site that had more traffic was Sharebeast.com, which the FBI shut down in September. RIAA said it had sent that site more than 100,000 copyright infringement notices.
In recent court documents seeking a more lenient sentence, Ouprasith's attorney said his client's life changed forever on the day he was arrested.
"He has lost what he has put all his hard work, dedication and time into within a few short hours due to the raid at his home and these resulting charges."
People clicking on Ouprasith's websites now see a notice that the sites have been seized by the federal government.
To Buckles, the case shows how easy it is to set up a scheme for giving away someone else's property and making money off of it. "At the end of the day," he said, "people have to recognize there are consequences."
On Tuesday, inside a federal courtroom in Virginia, Rocky Ouprasith will learn just what those consequences are.
Researcher Maria David contributed.
Adam Bell: 704-358-5696, @abell


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Burkina Faso, finalists of the 2013 African Cup of Nations have named their provisional squad for the 2015 African Cup of Nations tournament in Equatorial Guinea.
Coach Paul Put has named some top performers of their epic run the last time out with Jonathan Pitroipa and Alain Traore making the 24-man squad.
The full provisional squad for The Stallions:
Moussa Germain Sanou (WC Beauvais/FRA), Abdoulaye Soulama (Hearts of Oak/GHA), Moussa Fofana (RC Kadiogo/BUR)
Bakary Kone (Lyon/FRA), Mohamed Koffi (Zamalek/EGY), Wilfried Balima (Sheriff Tiraspol/MDA), Steve Yago (Toulouse/FRA), Paul Keba Koulibaly (Horoya FC/GUI), Narcisse Bambara ( Universitatea Cluj/ROM), Florent Rouamba (Bastia/FRA), Issa Gouo (AS Kaloum/GUI)
Jonathan Zongo (Almeria/ESP), Moussa Yedan (Al Ahly/EGY), Bertrand Traore (Vitesse Arhnem/NED), Djakaridja Kone (Evian/FRA), Charles Kabore (FC Kuban/RUS), Préjuce Nacoulma (Mersin Idmanyurdu Klubu/TUR), Adama Guira (Sonderyesk/DEN), Abdou Razack Traore (Kardemir Karabuk Sport/TUR)
Jonathan Pitroipa (Al Jazira /UAE), Aristide Bancé (HJK Helsinki/FIN), Issiaka Ouédraogo (Admira Wacker/AUS), Alain Traore (Lorient/FRA), Banou Diawara (RC Bobo/BUR)
Burkina Faso have been drawn in Group A with tournament hosts Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and Congo Brazzaville.

subset: commoncrawl


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To register, view your current registration status, or cancel your registration for a course, please sign in using your McGill ID and Minerva PIN. If you do not know your ID and PIN, please contact IST Customer Support Help Desk at 398-3398.
OD - Organizational Development module
Reflection Cafe - The Players of Cultural Change
|0.25 days
|Target population:
|M's and Excluded positions
|Course objectives:
|We know that culture figures prominently in changing an organization. Where it has been and what it stands for, will significantly determine where it is able to go. You have to manage culture to manage change. To manage culture you have to understand what plays what role in sustaining, challenging and shifting that culture.
The objectives for this session are to:
• Recognize the range of different behavior patterns that emerge once a culture change has been launched.
• Understand what these responses mean , why they occur, and how you can work with them to ensure sustained change.
• Learn to gauge how people are really feeling about change.
Back to course listing.


text:
Black button tank top: 1
Blue full skirt: 1
Black birkenstocks: 6
Green v-neck: 2
Striped tank top: 1
Dark denim shorts: 4
White crop shirt: 1
Denim shorts: 2
Neutral birkenstocks: 4
I road tripped to update New York this weekend with my brother and sister. It was fantastic! Cooler temperatures, gorgeous views, and sunshine. I wore my dark denim shorts each day (and boot cut jeans at night) with a different shirt each day.


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Our Products
We design and manufacture exhaust silencers, exhaust hose, and exhaust water injection systems to control exhaust noise, with or without water separators, for both propulsion engines and generators.
We also manufacture "dry" silencers and exhaust systems where needed. We manufacture noise insulation material to control airborne noise. We supply the renowned Aquadrive coupling to reduce vibration – and hence structure-borne noise – as well as avoiding engine alignment problems.
We manufacture alarm systems to detect overheating exhausts and blocked sea-water strainers. We supply the Wavestream bilge water filtration system, and in the area of pollution control we are a leader in the developing field of soot burners for large exhaust systems.


text:
|Quentin Read <quonton79@...>
|Wednesday, January 1, 2003, 23:19
Hod uv Nokta Kanto klid:> I like Ulm. It has a nice sound. > > Is there any particular reason that "th" was written > with the crossed d > rather than the thorn? I'm not used to it yet since > I've seen that character > used to represent /D/. > > >The most important words are the seven auxiliary > verbs, used to determine the > >basic sense of a phrase or sentence. > > I do a similar thing in Harpelan, although the > auxiliaries carry different > information. Can verbs be written without an > auxiliary, and what does that > signify?The th character is the Icelandic "eth" where it represents the th sound of then - I like the way it looks and it gives it a Germanic-like feel, like the umlaut letters that basically correspond to German. The verbs as yet cannot be written without an auxiliary ("auxiliary" is the correct terminology, isn't it?) -Q. Read __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com


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Kilimanjaro Horse Safari
Kilimanajaro on your right, Giraffe and elephant on your left
The wide steppes ahead...Grab life by the reins – ride through the heart of Africa!
Imagine being on horseback in the middle of wide open savannah, beginning from Hatari or Shu'mata – with no road, fence or buliding in sight / the warm gaze of giraffes following your journey move below the snows of Kilimanjaro which glints gently in the afternoon light. Suddenly your senses are on high alert as something flits away from your silent approach – it is a magnificient oryx with her calf running to join the nearby herd – woken from their slumber beneath a large flat – topped acacia tree. A Bateleur eagle soaring high above has been keeping his beady eye on the riders as they wind their way through the bush and across dry floodplains below, past oversize termite mounds and inquisitive gazelle – on their way to a seemingly non-existent camp at the base of Africa's highest mountain - Shu'mata. There, cool drinks, a blazing fire, good food and comfortable beds await you and water and feed for the night is laid out for the horses. This is the timeless savannah nestled between Tanzania's Kilimanjaro, Meru and Longido mountains – a place made famous by Hemingway in his books "The Green Hills Of Africa" and "The Snows Of Kilimanjaro". This is the land where the Maasai warriors still herd their cattle amongst elephant, zebra and gazelle...
Together with our partner Kaskazi Horse Safaris, the Tanzanian experts for horse safaris we go deep into the bush and together enjoy the wonders africa has to offer, the magnificient wildlife, the scenery and the magical interaction with the local tribes who inhabit these areas. All this viewed from what back in the days also used to roam wild, the horse.
- Be a strong intermediate or advanced rider
- Be able to control the horses' speed and direction at all times
- Be in a good health condition
- Weight limit: strictly 15 stone, 210 lbs or 95 kg
- Have a light weight riding hat with you
- Wear long chaps for protection against thorns
Destination: Kilimanjaro NP, Amboseli Wildlife Area
Season: December – March, June-November
In cooperation with Kaskazi Horse Safaris and Arusha National Park we are planning a horse safari through the bushes and savannahs of Arusha National Park. Discover a totally different landscape while riding through the rainforest passing by giraffes and buffaloes and colobus monkeys greeting from above.


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She's british singer, author song, dancer. Fuck this celeb brunette!
Cheryl Cole and her hungry tight snatch. Satisfying the enormous sex hunger of mouthwatering celebrity Cheryl. Hot celeb slut!
Gisele Bundchen spreading her firm buns and getting fucked in the ass with no mercy… Mila Jovovich handling two meaty rods at once… Paris Hilton uncovering her true fetish-addicted self… Famous Comics is a site that will show it all and much more to you on its dirty realistic celebrity sex parodies!


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Cardiff and Vale College raises money for Cardiff Food Bank
Enterprise Workshop students celebrated their first term at Cardiff and Vale College with an Autumn Harvest Fayre recently, raising money for Cardiff Food Bank.
The Enterprise Workshop is a course for adults with learning disabilities. The event included a bake sale with Welsh recipes made from seasonal ingredients, fruit and vegetables sourced locally and from the College garden alongside potted plants from the garden.
The day was held at the College's Trowbridge campus but was also attended by students from the Pathways to Independence course (based at the Barry campus) providing a great opportunity for students and staff from both campuses to meet and celebrate the event together.
Cardiff Food Bank is a charity who help local people suffering financial hardship. They collect and redistribute food contributions to people in need. The students from Enterprise Workshop will be visiting the Food Bank this term to see how the money and food they collected has been put to good use. Altogether four boxes of food were collected at the Autumn Fayre, donations from both staff and students.


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5 -
Home of the Brave and Land of the Plenty
At Toronto, we were divided up into parcels of a size which equated to the
number of available beds for the cadets at the aeronautical schools in the
south-east sector of the USA, ie in Florida, Georgia and Alabama. The whole
affair was known as the Arnold Scheme, named after USAAC General H H ('Hap')
Arnold, a far-sighted officer who devised the plan, allowing the use of
American flying schools and facilities for the training of British cadet
pilots, to assist the UK effort against the Axis powers. Other schools were
started in the USA for the training of British cadets only, termed British
Flying Training Schools (BFTS); these were complementary to the Empire Air
Training Scheme operating in Canada and Rhodesia. The schools of the Arnold
Scheme were differently set up. The contract called for Britain to accept that
its cadets would be subject to decisions (and possibly laws) made by the US
Army, although an RAF liaison officer would provide advice in any
confrontation; this is my understanding of the policy as seen, although I
cannot be certain of its details. It must be remembered that the USA was not at
war at the time, and this dictated the policy, especially as some of the
schools would be training US cadets alongside those of Britain.
I was one of a batch of 100 cadets exactly, despatched on a train on 1
October 1941 with a destination of the School of Aeronautics at Lakeland,
Florida, about 30 miles east of Tampa. We arrived next day and were each
alloted a bed in a long two-storey wood-clad building which housed 50 beds on
each floor. This building formed one side of a square with a similarly-sized
building directly opposite. The square was grass-covered with pathways along
and across. The building opposite housed, on its ground floor, offices for the
few Army Air Corps supervisors, and for administrative and medical personnel,
with the remaining space taken up with beds for ten cadets. The upper floor was
totally occupied by 50 cadets. The curriculum was to cover ten weeks at this
school. Under the US-style training, the new intake into the school was known
as the 'lower classmen' for its first five weeks, after which it became the
'upper classmen' when a new intake arrived and the old upper class had departed
for its next stage of training. Simple arithmetic made it obvious that, of the
100 cadets who arrived on 1 October, only 60 or fewer would remain on 4 November.
And so, the fearful prospect which spoiled the fun was that 40% or more of us
were going to catch a train back to Canada to become bomb-aimers or air-gunners
or fitters or just 'erks'. Very few of these 'washouts' as they were termed,
managed to persuade the RAF postings people at Toronto that they had been
failed simply because of the limited space available at the US school and not
on their ability as pilots; those who succeeded were absorbed into the Empire
scheme for further pilot training. But when it was rumoured that the US
authorities objected to the pilot re-treading of any cadet whom they had failed
on the Arnold course, transfer to the Empire scheme was stopped, and all Arnold
failures had to be re-mustered.
The flying instruction at this Primary school was provided entirely by
civilian pilots (most of them being very experienced flyers) except for two or
three US Army Air Corps check pilots who monitored progress at around the 10,
40 and finally 60 flying hour points; the check pilots made the decision to
'washout' those who did not satisfy their requirements.
The total course in the South East Army Air Corps Training Centre (SEAATC)
comprised three stages, viz Primary, Basic and Advanced, each stage covering
ten weeks at different locations. The aircraft used were the Stearman PT-17 at
Primary, the Vultee BT-13 at Basic and the North American AT6-A at Advanced.
The PT-17 was a biplane with a Continental 220hp power unit; at Basic the BT-13 was a monoplane with a
fixed undercarriage and powered by a Pratt & Whitney 450hp engine. The
AT6-A used at Advanced was a monoplane better known to the British as the North
American Harvard, using a Pratt & Whitney 550hp engine. The Basic and
Advanced schools were run entirely by US Army Air Corps personnel for flying
and ground military training; some civilian groundschool instructors were used
for meteorology and the description and workings of the engines in use.
The easy-going flying-club atmosphere of the Primary school was replaced by
the US type of military discipline at the Basic (and Advanced) schools, as
demonstrated in films of the US Army's West Point, the US Navy's Minneapolis or
the later USAF Colorado Springs. To the British cadets many of the US military
traditions seemed childish and, considering that Britain was at war,
unacceptable. Their 'hazing' and 'honour' systems were such as to disgust most
British personnel; the former was seen by us as persecution and the latter as a
complete abnegation of honour (eg telling teacher that a colleague had done
something wrong). On the other hand, I have always had a high regard for
American flying training standards and never ever regretted being taught that
part of the syllabus by the US system.
* * *
* *
The form filling, medical inspection and ID photographs were soon completed.
We were given details of the course and told that we were not allowed to leave
the school confines until 'open post' was declared, normally occurring on
Saturdays and Sundays. Our RAF uniform was not to be worn outside the camp (the
one exception being to allow us to parade through Lakeland on 11 November,
Armistice Remembrance Sunday). Hence the issue of the grey suits, which were
binned on the first opportunity we had to buy clothing which fitted properly.
The weather was incredibly balmy, it being the optimum holiday season in that
part of the States. Spirits lifted as we gorged ourselves on huge steaks,
quarts of milk, any amount of bacon and eggs, and fruit galore, far removed
from the rations and blacked-out gloom of the UK at war, which we had just
left; because of this, perhaps a touch of the guilt crept in. Around the camp
and in the air, we clothed ourselves in jock-strap or swim-suit under the
US-issued lightweight coverall in the sub-tropical heat of the day, changing
into RAF summer-dress uniform in the evening, ie blue shirt with uniform
slacks, supported by an RAF tunic belt - and some of us wore US brown/cream
two-tone shoes with this rig, rather than the regulation black ones.
At last we marched down to the flightline operations hangar. Lined up on the
tarmac in line-abreast were the bright-blue fuselage, yellow-wing PT-17s,
attractive-looking biplanes. We were allocated in flights of five pupils to one
instructor for the course. Mine was a medium-sized, tough looking stocky chap,
like a balding Al Capone somewhat, carrying a standard southern accent, a Mr
Sandifer. He liked his fat cigar and, I suspect, his Budweiser.
On my first flight, belted up in the rear cockpit, I knew at once that I was
in a medium that I was always going to enjoy. From my voracious reading of
aviation books at home, I did not need to be told what effect an aileron,
elevator or rudder had in controlling an aeroplane and I very quickly managed
to get about in the air. Take-off held few terrors, but landing safely looked
as if it would require some work. But the real anxiety at this time was how to
avoid being washed out and sent back to Canada, a failure which your family and
friends at home would soon know about and which you would have to live with for
the rest of your days. The fear was at its height in the early phase, but it was to last to
the very end of the 30-week course, as demonstrated by the washout of one of
our flight when he was within ten hours flying time and one week of graduation.
Sandifer was a bit of a hard taskmaster. You could tell that he was
confident of his ability to fly well and that he wanted to produce pupils who
knew as much about flying as he did. This was demonstrated alarmingly by the time I had amassed 20 flying
hours, when I found myself his sole pupil, the other four being back in Canada.
I do not claim that I met Sandifer's high standards absolutely; it may well
have been that he thought it would be prudent to retain one 'Limey' cadet to
ensure his job security. However, he did refer to me as his star pupil and I
suppose I was big-headed enough to believe him. By the time I was approaching
10 flying hours I was getting a bit apprehensive about not having gone solo.
Some pupils had already done so, therefore the fear of washout built. Training
was mainly confined to landings at one or other of the satellite fields at this
point, and to simulated forced landings, the instructor having suddenly slammed
the throttle shut to the idle stop and watched you struggle to get into a
suitable field, pointing into wind, then opening the throttle when he estimated
you might make it or kill yourself, if you were on your own. I breathed a sigh
of relief when, 17 days after my first flight and after a 47-minute spell of
unremitting take-offs and landings, Sandifer braked to a halt at the
marshalling point, climbed out of the front cockpit with the engine still
idling and bawled in my ear "It's all yours mister. Take off, fly around
within sight of the field for twenty minutes, then come back and land." It
was heaven to me as I handled the Stearman and did what I liked with it without
the bulk of my instructor obstructing my vision ahead or bitching at me. From
this time, I knew that I would always perform better on my own without being
watched by any pilot whom I thought was my equal or superior; I suspect it is a
feeling felt by many pilots.
Strict accuracy was demanded on some manœuvres, for example on spinning,
forced-landing practise and on pattern flying and normal landings. Spinning was
initially a violent and disorientating manœuvre but gradually its components
became understood, especially when proficiency was reached, to react accurately
to a request from your instructor to "Do a two-and-a-half turn spin
mister". You had to check that there was no other aircraft below
(heaven help you if you did not) then line up flying straight down the track of
a road, pull up to the stall, before kicking the rudder into the spin; you
counted the times the road came into view and at the completion of the second
turn recovered by kicking full opposite rudder and stick fully forward and out
you came facing in the opposite direction, fully unstalled. You had to make
sure you could do it ten times out of ten, as you could not afford to make a
mistake when your check by the US Army instructor took place.
The landing exercises were held in a sort of show-jumping fashion with
faults given for lack of success at the fences. There were four special events,
called stages, comprising six landings per stage whereby a series of strict
approach patterns had to be flown, the throttle cut to idling at a particular
point on each pattern, and a landing made so as to touch down straddling a
target line drawn across the field at right angles to the final approach (refer
to Figure 1). The throttle was not allowed to be opened again and any
trickling-on of power meant a nasty number of faults for that approach. The
event was flown solo, but a panel of instructors on the ground had very
sensitive ears. The target line had two lines parallel to it, one about 30
yards beyond and the other the same distance short. If you overshot into the
area beyond the target line, you had to undershoot on the next landing (to
demonstrate that you had corrected your approach) and so on. Straddling the target line
allowed you to overshoot or undershoot it on the next touchdown, as you wished.
I cannot recall the exact points system, if I ever knew it, but was made aware
that a well-flown pattern, and a 'greaser' three-point touchdown were to your
benefit - provided that all the touchdowns were inside the overshoot/undershoot
limit lines.
As time progressed, I was becoming more confident, perhaps too confident,
and an event occurred which could have ruined my aviation career. Lakeland
airfield was not generally used for circuit-and-landing training but rather for
take-offs and landings in transit to and from the satellite fields. It had one
runway and a part perimeter track, and though intended for Primary school
training activity, was also used by a few private flyers and every other day by
a Lockheed airliner which dropped airmail and the occasional passenger whilst
on its way between Jacksonville to the north and Miami to the south. We carried
no radio in our PT-17s, so were briefed that the airliner would be on a
straight-in approach to land whenever a yellow cone was hoisted on a pole at
the marshalling point of the runway, and that the airliner had priority. I
taxyed out for a solo aerobatic sortie, full of the joys, lined up on the
runway and rolled. There was not a cloud in the sky, a really superb day. I got
to about 200ft on the climb and had just started turning left when the sun
disappeared and a great shadow passed overhead. I looked up for the cloud and
choked when I saw the Lockheed directly above, thundering past on an overshoot.
I carried on with my sortie but had no heart for it and eventually screwed up
the courage to return and land. With my tail between my legs, I dragged self
and parachute to the crewroom. Sandifer approached red-faced. "Better go
and see the Ops Manager" said he. The Operations Manager, a civilian pilot
greatly respected for his experience and gentlemanly demeanour, looked at me,
saw the abject depression on my face and gave me a suitable blast. I waited for
the sentence, having pleaded guilty. It was a 'boot-outable' case as far as I
could see, and I wondered which train I would be catching for Toronto. Then he
said "Go and fetch your parachute, son". Was he going to take me up
and drop me overboard? When I returned he said "Walk with your parachute
out to the 'Tee'" (a runway direction pointer on the ground at the centre
of the airfield). "Then stay there and think until I call you in." I
was there for about two hours sweltering in the afternoon heat, until a jeep
eventually turned up and the driver said I was to walk back. As I trudged past
the Ops Manager's office on my way to the crewroom, I think I detected a hint
of a smile on his face when I looked in through his window. I'll bet he didn't
report my misdemeanour to the US military gents or I would have been a 'gonner'.
Figure 1 - Circuit & Landing
Stages and Target Lines
It was with some relief to us that our final day approached, but just prior
to it, by one week and one day, Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese, and
the USA was at war with the Axis powers. War or no war, however, the training
régime continued with no detectable change. I was sad to leave Lakeland. Its
citizens went out of their way to make us welcome and we greatly appreciated
their hospitality - a friend of mine who was there visits a family at Lakeland
to this day.
Before recounting my tales of training at Basic school, I will tell of an
event which came to our notice at Lakeland, the result of which may be
interesting. Each intake of the Arnold Scheme was given a Class code, my intake
being the Class of 42D, indicating that it would be the fourth class to
graduate to Wings standard in 1942. When we arrived at Lakeland, a school
magazine had been produced by the pupils with a page devoted to the obituary of
a cadet from a previous Class who had completely disappeared on a solo flight
and had been posted missing presumed dead. Neither his aircraft nor any
wreckage was found on land, and it was considered that he must have come down in the sea; the Gulf
of Mexico is only about 30 miles to the west of Lakeland. It seemed like a
Bermuda Triangle situation as we now know it. But why was he over the sea? The
answer to that could only have been due to the prevailing weather conditions,
the lack of adequate instrumentation in the rear cockpit, the absence of any
radio communication equipment and the lack of instrument flying instruction up
to that time.
Assume that a cloud layer of up to eight or nine tenths cover existed. The
rear cockpit of the PT-17 had no airspeed indicator fitted (to ensure that the
pupil learned to fly by feel of the controls, wind in the wires, position of
struts aligned with the horizon, and engine RPM) and there was no artificial
horizon. Penetration of cloud of any significance was, therefore, deliberate
suicide and was forbidden. My view is that this student poked his nose up
through a hole in the cloud and buzzed around the cloud tops, simulating low
flying perhaps, but then couldn't find a hole through which to descend. In
other words he was trapped above cloud and could do nothing about it but fly
aimlessly seeking a partial cloud clearance, or bale out. This would account
for the general surmise that he ended up over the sea, ran out of fuel and
ditched, or baled out.
The story seemed to have ended when some months later we of Class 42D were
in our final phase of the complete course, a magazine produced by our Arnold
Scheme HQ told that some small amount of PT-17 wreckage, plus the numbered
undercarriage, had been washed ashore on the Gulf coast; everyone's surmise
seemed to have been confirmed. Until I met one of my Lakeland colleagues in
London after the war and over a drink he asked if I remembered the mystery
surrounding that student's accident. I said I did, and he then said "Well,
I have heard that the pilot concerned walked out of a German prisoner-of-war
camp when it was overrun by the Allies in 1945". It was known that in 1942
U-boats had been allowed to refuel somewhere on the Gulf coast by German
sympathisers, to permit them to attack Allied convoys sailing along the US
eastern seaboard. This student might therefore have found the hole in the cloud
he sought, but over the sea, descended and spotted a submarine which then shot
him down, or he ditched or baled out alongside, and was taken prisoner - the
submarine being a U-boat. Germany could not report the missing pilot as a
prisoner-of-war, otherwise it would have confirmed the illicit refuelling and
put the German sympathisers at risk at that time. I would have liked to have
had these events verified; I am sure I am seldom believed when I relate what I
know of the story.
On 16 December 1941, with the USA now at war, we left Lakeland by train and
were pitched into the rigorous vicissitudes of US military life at Cochran
Field, Macon, Georgia, some 300 miles to the north. We sensed a considerable
change from the country-club atmosphere of Lakeland as soon as we stepped from
the Army buses which had brought us from Macon railway station. We could see
the hangars and the airfield at the southern end of the large parade-ground
square from our disembarkation point at the northern end, which was bordered
and dominated by the administration block - where resided a tyrant whose name
became synonymous with all we detested of the disciplinary methods of the US
style of military training, and of West Point in particular, since that was
where Lieutenant Knight (the aforementioned tyrant) sprang from. Behind the
administration block were a number of barrack-blocks, wooden-clad, two-storeyed
structures reminiscent of the forts of Custer's 7th
Cavalry in Indian-country. We were allotted to these, where we would suffer
until Advanced training afforded us a reprieve. Posted on a notice-board
therein was a timetable of what was known euphemistically as 'processing',
which would commence on the following day. Processing was a régime designed to
break you mentally and physically; it occupied the whole of one half of each
day, the other half fortunately being reserved for flying. The processing
timetable was made up of periods of drill (US Army style) of 25 minutes,
dressed in different varieties of uniform and flying clothing. There was no
rest during each 25-minute period, at the end of which a bell would sound,
whereupon you were required to run to your barrack-block, change into the next
variety of uniform and run back to your alloted place in your squad before the
sounding of the next bell some seven minutes later, and so on. If you were
unlucky enough to arrive a millisecond (even a nanosecond) late, you collected
a number of 'demerits', each representing one hour of marching up and down the
stoop of a punishment area, usually with a full pack on your back.
Even the half-day given to flying training was marred by the needless
adherance to the Army 'bull'. For example, at this time of year the
sub-tropical heat of the day was tempered by the freezing mornings when we
paraded for the march from the Admin block to the flightline, so we all turned
up in our RAF flying suits (Sidcots) designed for the icy conditions when
flying over Europe in non-heated RAF aircraft; light US-issue coveralls were
worn when the sun got up. When flying finished at lunchtime, we marched back
carrying our Sidcots, which were too hot to wear with the temperature then in
the eighties. But Knight espied us from his lair in the Admin block and issued
an order to us not to wear the Sidcots in future. When we complained bitterly
to our RAF liaison officer, he managed to get the order rescinded but Knight
demanded that if we wore the Sidcots to march down in the morning, we would be
required to wear them on the march back also.
We were fortunate, however, in escaping the worst effects of the traditional
'hazing' during our service under the US Army. The Oxford English Dictionary's
definition of the word quotes 'bullying' and 'persecution'; it is therefore
incredible that the US military not only allow it in their cadet training
schools, but advocate it. Our grapevine had it that the RAF cadets of Class
42A, being the first of the British intakes into the system, had an upper class
of US cadets to contend with throughout. Class 42A contained some ex-Army
personnel who had experienced the German blitz on the retreat of the British
Expeditionary Force to Dunkirk in 1940 and who had subsequently remustered to
the RAF. They had arrived at the school tired from their long train journey
from Toronto and were relaxing on their beds in the lower classmen block.
Shortly, a few US cadets (newly upper classmen) arrived and attempted to 'haze'
the ex-Dunkirk veterans by ordering them to "Take a brace, mister" -
at which the victim was supposed to adopt a ridiculously exaggerated position
of attention. The perpetrators, needless to say, quickly found themselves fully
clothed under a cold shower in the ablution area! Other forms of this childish
bullying were attempted While eating in the mess hall, for example, an order
might be put to a lower classman to "Eat a square meal", requiring
the victim to spoon his food into his mouth by means of vertical and horizontal
movements only, whilst sitting in an exaggerated position of attention. No
British cadet, as far as I know, ever dared to visit this sort of humiliating
treatment on any British lower classmen, so it rapidly disappeared from the
training menu wherever British cadets served.
The aircraft used for Basic training, the Vultee BT-13, was an over-stable
monoplane which might be thought too easy and simple for a training aircraft.
It was safe enough though, and a confidence-builder in terms of instrument
flying, formation flying and night flying; it did not seem to be capable of any death-threatening tantrums, and certainly none
occurred at Macon in my time. It had one primary instrument which many pilots
would say was indispensable, but this was the first time we had used it - we
had managed without it for 60 flying hours on the Stearman PT-17 - the airspeed
indicator (ASI). We would never again fly an aircraft without one, except on
the occasional semi-emergency when it became unserviceable, of which I can
boast four incidents. Perhaps our Primary training stood us in good stead in teaching us to be instinctively aware of the feel of an
aircraft, rather than having too slavish an acceptance of control via the
flight instruments alone. (The early de Havilland Vampire Mk 1 was a case in
point. It could readily be g-stalled, or made to break away in a pull-away
turn. A modification to compensate for this was introduced whereby weights were
inserted in the elevator control run to increase the stick force per g.)
Perhaps the most dodgy situation during Basic training was, believe it or
not, approach and landing whenever the grassed area of the field was unsuitable
for taxying, take-off or landing following heavy rain, when the going became
too soft. In this case the broad runway was used exclusively, but it joined the
large parking apron by one lead-in strip only; there was no perimeter track. At
one side of the runway, lengthwise, was a black-painted strip about the width
of one-and-a-half BT-13 wingspans. The black strip was used solely for taxying
out to the end of the runway for take-off or by those taxying back to the apron
after landing, depending on the runway direction in use, as broadcast on the
radio by the air traffic controller in the tower. The snag with this
arrangement was that the duration of each training sortie was restricted to one
hour, with four periods per morning and four per afternoon, with a short break
between each period. To keep strictly to time therefore, the 'off' became a mad
scramble to reach the runway lead-in strip as close to the front of the pack as
possible; we are talking about 40 to 50 aeroplanes in the pack. The 'off' was
announced by the control tower broadcasting "This is a take-off
period", which lasted for five minutes and was then followed by a landing
period of five minutes, and so on. You can guess what is coming; 40 or 50
aircraft were going to be hovering over the defined entry point on the downwind
leg exactly 55 minutes after the take-off mêlée already described, trying to
position themselves on their starting blocks when the gun went off to announce
"This is a landing period". If you survived the hurdle of getting on
to the downwind leg, you were likely to be edged out during the turn to the
crosswind leg (a square traffic pattern was used) by aircraft which carried
instructors, who showed their muscle by cutting inside solo pupils, thus
gaining a place ahead in the queue for finals and an earlier cup of coffee with
a longer break between sorties. It was normal to have up to half-a-dozen
aircraft on finals, controlled only by an instructor parked in an aircraft by
the runway threshold, with hand-held mike and binoculars, calling which number
(as displayed on the aircraft) may land and which had to overshoot and go round
again, the ratio being one to land per four to overshoot in most cases. This is
not an exaggeration. It should be noted that Macon airfield had, in
fact, two runways, crossing each other at about the centre of the field - but
the effect was that whichever runway was in use, the description above applied
as though there was only a single runway, taxying not being allowed on the
out-of-use runway. A perimeter track would have made operations much easier.
An extra fear crept in to the flying training as the halfway mark approached
- our first stab at night flying. We did not know what to expect. I do not
believe that many pilots can truthfully claim that they like night flying; it
is not for nothing that the well-known aviators' maxim states 'Only birds and
fools fly, and birds don't fly at night!'. (The word 'fools' is often
substituted by another, and of course we now know that a lot of birds do
fly at night.) We had all been well-instructed in instrument flying before being let loose in an
aircraft at night, so we felt confident enough about maintaining control at
night once airborne. It was the apprehen- sion when landing at night which was
the hairy bit. You must have wings level and flare at the correct height above
the runway threshold to make a decent landing at any time; in daylight you can
see if you meet these conditions. If the flight conditons are such that you
cannot be absolutely certain of them, eg no horizon, or no certainty of your
height over the threshold when you flare (on a very dark night with little
illumination to guide you) some guesswork is needed. If your guess makes you
flare too high above the runway, you drop like a stone at the aircraft stall
point at an increasing vertical velocity - which the undercarriage oleos do not
like. Flaring too low, on the other hand, simply means flying straight into the
ground at the particular rate of descent you have adopted, which also
displeases the afore-mentioned oleos. But thanks be, the difference in night
flying at Macon in the well-lit USofA as opposed to that in say the UK at war,
was similar to a Liverpool v Arsenal evening soccer match under full
floodlighting, to such a match after the complete electrical failure of the
lighting, including that of the stands and terracing. Our first night sorties
therefore, were flown in the comfort of a completely floodlit runway with the
added bonus of aircraft landing lights. It was, as they say, a dawdle. As we
gained experience, the airfield floodlighting was extinguished, leaving the
aircraft landing lights as our only aid to illumination when landing. But at
the back of my mind the thought of night flying in the UK, clothed in its
virtual total darkness under the blackout, made me hope and strive for a
day-fighter posting when training ended!
To complete the flying curriculum at Basic, I have said something already to
the effect that instrument flying a BT-13 was no problem. The aircraft was as
steady as you could wish and it was easy enough to maintain the desired
manœuvre when under the hood - a device which was used to blot out the external
view through the canopy during practise instrument flying There was no
indication of aircraft attitude (such as that given by an an artificial horizon)
however, and attitude had to be obtained from a turn-and-slip indicator used
with cross-reference to the airspeed indicator, the altimeter, and a rate-of-climb/descent
indicator. This led to a chant sung by all the instructors incessantly as you
battled with the instrument indications, of "Needle, ball and airspeed;
needle, ball and airspeed" until you got sick of the sound of it. (Needle
and ball was the US term for the RAF's 'turn-and-slip' instrument.) This ditty
will be written for ever on the minds of all those British cadets who suffered
As for formation flying, I have always regarded this as one of my strong
points (and my later experience will support this, I feel). The BT-13 could be
held as steady as a rock on the lead aircraft in any manœuvre conducted at
Basic training. At this stage, of course, we were restricted to gentle flying
in the mode; there was no line-astern or formation on an aircraft which was
already formating on another. In fact, only two aircraft comprised any close
formation element at Basic.
And so our time at Basic Training School ended in the enjoyment of the half
of it which dealt with flying aeroplanes. As to the other half, the military
ground training, I will leave it to you to judge whether or not it was good for
us. Perhaps Lt Knight was right to see how much of the 'bull' we could take.
But was there not something odd about his sneaking around the barrack-blocks in
our absence, inspecting our beds to determine, by use of a protractor, if our
bedding was made up with blanket corners at 45 degrees, plus or minus a minute
limit, and that the blankets were pulled taut enough over the bed to make a
nickel coin (five cents) bounce off the top blanket by a particular distance
when dropped from a point exactly horizontal to his nose while he stood at attention? That was why I
was not sorry to see the back of the place.
Finally, we waited anxiously to hear which of the two Advanced Training
Schools would be our next and last destination under General Arnold. It was
understood but not written anywhere as far as I was aware, that those cadets
who had shown a flair for formation flying, aerobatics, and displayed personal
characteristics appropriate to a fighter pilot, would go to Craig Field, Selma
in Alabama to complete their training, whilst those with a bent for steadiness
and solidity would be sent for bomber-type training at Dothan, also in Alabama.
I was overjoyed to learn that I was to go to Selma.
I moved to Selma in late February 1942. It lies approximately 50 miles to
the west of the State capital of Alabama - Montgomery. The accent on training
at Selma now shifted to flying, which pleased most of us, although I detected
apprehension on the faces of some cadets when we heard that fatal accidents had
occurred a month or two before our arrival.
The flying training took on an operational aspect with most sorties having
procedural or tactical lessons to learn. Instrument flying was more exacting
and required high accuracy at set flight patterns. Formation flying was now
done in what US pilots termed three-ship and two-ship formation (refer to
Figure 2 and 3).
Figure 2 - Two Ship Formation
Three-ship consisted of Vic (V) or echelon port or starboard
by three aircraft, but I cannot recall that we flew a three-ship line astern,
and with hindsight it was probably because the instructor, who always flew in
the lead aircraft of the formation, would not be able to observe the
inexperienced No 2 and No 3, a dangerous situation for him, to which I can
testify from my own later experience as an instructor at a fighter Operational
Conversion Unit. The 'two-ship' formation (in USAAC parlance) was a tactical
one of four aircraft comprising two sections of two aircraft per section. It
was virtually identical to the RAF's low-level battle formation as flown in the
early jet age 1950s and 1960s. In the two-ship, the No 2 of each section flew a
stepped-back echelon on his leader at about 50yd spacing; the No 2
section-leader stepped back on the opposite side to the lead section's No 2 at
about 100yd, with his own No 2 stepped back on the opposite side to the No 2 of
the lead section. It is a very flexible formation allowing hard turns to be
made in manœuvring, and was probably a precursor of the USAAC's 'finger-four'
formation used in wartime operations.
Cross-country flying was done in loose Vic formation of three or four
aircraft and over longer distances than hitherto. Night flying, however, was
the régime to cause nervous flutters. On the syllabus was night formation
flying which we cadets considered to be impossible; you cannot formate on an
aeroplane you cannot see, we thought! But it was possible, as we found, with
sufficient illumination of the aircraft formated on coming from its navigation
lights and the engine exhaust glow on the silvery bare aluminium skin of the
AT-6A, and from the general illumination from a normally cloudless sky and the
brilliantly lit- up towns and highways of Alabama. It remained in the mind
however, could it be done in the UK at war on a dirty moonless night? A touch
of this came on one of the three night- formation cross-country sorties we had
to fly to complete our night programme. The route was from Selma to Montgomery,
an easterly track for 50 nautical miles (nm), then a turn to port on to roughly
north for 90nm to Birmingham, then returning whence we came.
Figure 3 - Vic, Echelon and
Line-Astern Formations
Cruising altitude was to be about 10,000ft. There were no navigation aids (other than
pilot/contact navigation) on the Selma-Montgomery legs. On the Montgomery-Birmingham legs a series of six visual beacons were spaced at
intervals of about 15nm along the track (for civil aviation use mainly) each of
which flashed a letter of the Morse code, so that all that was required was to
have a handy piece of paper with the letters of the beacon code series written
out in the correct order, and to overfly each beacon, from which could be seen
the next one. Thus the whole cross-country was a piece of cake navigationally,
provided that the visibility was good enough.
The outbound part of the flight to Birmingham and the return to Montgomery
passed uneventfully. We turned to starboard to the west over a well-lit
Montgomery and settled on our heading for Selma. I checked our position on
track to ensure that the instructor knew what he was about navigationally, a
practice I was to adopt throughout my flying career. In this case the highway
from Selma and the River Alabama were the only notable and detectable ground
features, all else being lost in darkness. I was on the port side of the
formation (the No 3 in Vic). Suddenly we entered what seemed a large patch of
cumulus cloud. There was no radio call heard by me from the instructor to close
up the formation prior to entering the cloud nor any sign of a heading change
by him to avoid it. He just ploughed straight on. I had no time to close up on
the leader and now could not see the other two aircraft; so I had to turn away
to port to avoid a possible collision and I quickly found myself alone within
the cloud. Additionally, my radio had completely failed at or just before the
event so I was now in a threatened position if I could not find the airfield at
Selma before my fuel ran out. Fortunately, I had timed my deviation from the
original heading and now turned back, presumably behind the other two aircraft,
to regain track for Selma, then commenced a descent to try to pinpoint myself
once I had come below the cloudbase. (I had discarded the idea of a return to
Montgomery because of the complexity of barging in to its well-used civilian
airfield, with no radio to request a priority landing.) Luckily, when I was
down to about five miles from Selma, the rain let up, visibility improved and I
spotted the airfield at the two o'clock position or so.
I then had the problem of getting landing clearance from the tower. I could
not assume that they were aware of my circumstances and I dared not enter the
traffic pattern for fear of collision with other aircraft already in the
circuit, even though I could not see any. So I dived directly at the control
tower and used my landing lights to Morse-code the message 'no R/T', then
pulled up when about 500ft above the recognised pattern height. This I did
three times to ensure they had got the message, then I joined the pattern and
landed, although I saw no responding green light from the tower (runway
controllers were not generally on duty, as far as I was aware, except under the
hair-raising runway approaches at Macon, already described). Oddly, I was not
de-briefed by anyone or required to file a report after landing and the whole
matter was apparently put down to a radio failure. I do not know to this day whether
or not the formation leader was aware that he had led his flock into an
accident- threatening situation, or if he had made any R/T call to close up the
formation or to order a heading change to remain clear of the cloud, or even to
advise Selma tower that I was adrift with an unserviceable radio. My opinion of
him was such that, from then on, I felt a preference to lead any formation of
which I was part when flying from A to B, and to trust few others to do it as I
would wish.
Our training at Advanced School was now within three weeks of ending and for
this final period we would be based at the then USAAC test-flight centre at
Eglin Field in Florida, near Pensacola, where we would do nothing but fire the
single machine gun mounted above the instrument panel in the AT-6A's cockpit
and discharging 0.50-inch calibre shells through the propellor arc at a flag towed by another aircraft for air-to-air
deflection shooting, and at a surface target for air-to-ground firing. A
brilliantly enjoyable ending to the whole course.
But I must end the story of this phase with another anecdote of the military
ground training which may be as amusing to you as it was to me - except for its
rather nasty ending. At both Macon and Selma, the end of the day's work was
always signified by a massive parade of all the cadets on the base, to 'beat the retreat'. The Americans love to
march in large square blocks of men (some 7 x 7, or was it 8 x 8 in our case?).
Four such blocks marched off from the Administration Building at Selma one
evening, to the parade square to face up to the flag 'Old Glory'. The
culmination of the parade was the lowering of 'Old Glory' to the tune 'Taps',
played by the base's large brass band, and since 'Old Glory' is held in such
high esteem in the USA, two men are required to handle the lowering to ensure
that no part of the flag touches the ground. Also, the ceremony must be
conducted in such a way that the flag begins its descent exactly on the first
note of 'Taps' and the rate of lowering is so judged by the rope- handler that
the flag is in the hands of the catcher exactly upon the final note. No problem
there, you may say. But Murphy's law applied on this occasion - the flag got
stuck half-way down No amount of tugging and twisting by the two British cadets
involved could free it apparently, as the tune slowly but surely approached the
final coda. Suddenly, with about two bars of music remaining, the flag repented
and hurtled at speed through the arms of the horrified catcher and landed in a
heap on the ground. Although the men were from our own number, a muffled gasp
of amusement could just be heard from our end of the parade. I regret that as a
result of this breach of the US conduct rules, both the rope handler and the
flag catcher were on their way back to Toronto a day or so later.
On 24 April 1942 we marched up to the airfield church and were presented
with our Graduation Diploma signed by General Stratemeyer, and had our US Army
Air Corps wings pinned on to our RAF tunics to signify our coming-of-age in
aviation. Next day we wandered one after another, into the office of the RAF
Liaison Officer who handed out our RAF wings - the prize we all had awaited for
nearly a year. We wore both sets of wings on the way back to Canada on 27 April
1942. Of the 644 Aviation Cadets who had set out on 1 October 1941, only 342
returned so adorned.
We were held in a Canadian transit camp at Moncton, New Brunswick, until a
suitable ship became available to join a convoy and brave the U-boat infested
North Atlantic. The ship was the twin of the 'Duchess' class vessel which had
failed us on the Clyde on that September day in 1941. This time its sister did
not, and regular Catalina and then Spitfire convoy patrols assured us of a
welcome to Blighty to spite the Hun. After a short spell of leave, we gathered
together again at a reception centre in the Bath Hill Court Hotel in Bournemouth, where we were held for a month to hear of our next posting.
Copyright Ó
William C. Wood 1997.


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London Political Summit 2017 will hold at London Metropolitan University on Friday, November 17, 2017, the annual event is organized by Ring4Change; a global pro-democratic organization based in the United Kingdom in collaboration with London Metropolitan University , Wazobia Global Network, publishers of Wazobia Global Times Newspaper and WGT Magazine, BEN Television and other organizations.
Delegates from United Kingdom, Africa and United States of America will be participating at the summit. Many distinguished speakers across the globe will be addressing the summit. The theme of the summit is "Nationalistic Tendencies: What Future for Global Citizenship?"
Check the link to the event registration page on eventbrite below.


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A Podcast from the wonderful New Welsh Review: Me talking all about our Wales Arts International trip to South India to learn about Carnatic art music with Dr Robert Smith. Never realised quite how often I use the word 'incredibly' before! Working with Divakar Subramanium at the School of Indian Film Music we learned about… Read more »
Monthly Archives: November 2014
Sarah Waters
I'm terribly excited, I must confess. It isn't every day, even working as a journalist, that you're offered the chance to interview one of your literary heroes. This week I chatted to novelist Sarah Waters for Cardiff's Buzz Magazine. We chatted on all manner of topics; from lesbian sex to British social history; from feminism to… Read more »


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Posts Tagged 'PS1'
Leather and Linen
It seems like leather and linen on a bag goes pretty well together. Net-a-porter.com recently updated with two bags of such pairing from Proenza Schouler and Chloé. Proenza Schouler PS1 medium linen satchel Chloé Billie leather and linen shoulder bag Very chic, casual and comfortable looking when carried. I personally adore the PS1 and the […]
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Tags: Billie, Chloé, Netaporter, Proenza Schouler, PS1, Satchel
Ain't these just love? Designed by Lazara Hernandez and Jack McCollough, the PS duo who met in 1999 at the Parsons School of Design in New York. "Proenza Schouler" is the name of their thesis project they worked together on and also after their mother's maiden names. Since 2002, the launch of Proenza Schouler hit […]
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Tags: Florence, Italy, Jack McCollough, La Garconne, Lazara Hernandez, Netaporter, New York, Parsons School of Design, Pitti Immagine, Proenza Schouler, PS1


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Today I came across a quote I found very interesting. It was written in 1926 by a Japanese Christian leader named Kanzo Uchimura. One of his main goals was to establish a truly Japanese church and Christian movement rather than have a Christianity that was viewed as a western import.
Here's his critique of American Christianity:
I like Uchimura's focus on establishing a truly indigenous Christian movement in his country - I believe that should be the goal of all mission work.
I think there is something to what he says about American Christianity, although I don't fully agree with his critique.
On one hand, what he says about how Americans tend to measure success in ministry similar to how they measure success in commerce is often true, and definitely deserves consideration.
On the other hand, Kanzo Uchimura himself came to faith in Christ through the efforts of American missionaries in Japan, and I think the focus he mentions of American Christians to make as many converts to Christianity as possible is a noble, and Biblical thing.
As one who is American but has lived outside of the US for many years now, I have gained a bit of perspective on American culture and mentality by being able to observe it from the outside. Despite all the critiques that could be (and are often) made, there are some very positive things that I see. For example: American people are generally very generous, and are quite willing to give of what they have to help people in need or to support causes that they believe in. That is a praiseworthy thing. Also, Americans tend to have an entrepreneurial spirit - which amongst believers can create a culture of being willing to step out in faith and attempt great things for God. The parting words of William Smith Clark, the American missionary who trained the local evangelists who led Kanzo Uchimura to the Lord were: "Boys, be ambitious!" I believe that culture of being willing to step out in faith and follow the Lord wherever he leads is something which is not American, but very much Biblical, and something which Jesus taught and demonstrated in his life and ministry.
What do you think?


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Don't miss your opportunity to own the rarely available and award-winning Wentworth. Nestled on a premium waterfront lot, the home has 600K in upgrades. Featuring a black marble double staircase, large balcony, Opalina Crystal flooring, private guest suite, fully outfitted club room, oversized pool, elevator, Creston smart system, and a double marble driveway. The white kitchen will astound you with its contrasting contemporary quartz countertops, stainless steel backsplash, and top of the line appliances. Retreat to your master suite that features its own sitting room that could easily be converted into a 5th bedroom or a private office. The timeless and stylish appointments will reflect the taste of those accustomed to the best in quality design, finishes and lifestyle.
Property Type:Single Family Detached
Year Built:2016
Sq. Feet:6019
Date Sold:9/21/2018
Lot Size:0.26 Acres
Agent ConnectCall Now: (561) 235-7800
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Detailed Maps
Community Information
Address:17535 Cadena Drive Boca Raton, FL 33496
County:Palm Beach
City:Boca Raton
Subdivision:The Oaks
Zip Code:33496
Neighborhood:The Oaks
School Information
High School:Olympic Heights Community High
Middle School:Eagles Landing Middle School
Elementary School:Sunrise Park Elementary School
Bedrooms: 6
Bathrooms: 5 Full / 3 Half
Year Built:2016
Style:< 4 Floors
Construction: Block, CBS
Built Desc: Resale
Parking: Driveway, Garage - Attached
Roof: Barrel
Features / Amenities
Total Sq. Ft.:6019
Interior Features: Elevator, Entry Lvl Lvng Area, Foyer, Pantry, Roman Tub, Split Bedroom, Volume Ceiling, Walk-in Closet
Equipment: Dishwasher, Disposal, Dryer, Generator Whle House, Range - Gas, Refrigerator, Water Heater - Gas
Flooring: Carpet, Marble
Furnished: Furniture Negotiable
Pool: Heated, Inground
Dining Area: Eat-In Kitchen, Formal
Window Treatments: Impact Glass
Pets Allowed: Yes
Restrictions: Lease OK
Exterior Features: Auto Sprinkler, Covered Balcony, Covered Patio, Fence
Security: Burglar Alarm, Gate - Manned, Motion Detector, Security Patrol
Cooling: Central, Electric, Zoned
Heating: Central, Electric, Zoned
Master: 19x20
Kitchen: 18x12
Living Room: 17x20
Property Features
Lot Size: 0.26 Acres / 11226 Sq. Ft.
Lot Dimensions:80x140
Lot Description: 1/4 to 1/2 Acre
View: Lake, Pool
Water Frontage: 80
Utilities: Cable, Electric, Gas Natural, Public Sewer, Public Water
Directions:Clint Moore Rd. west of Lyons. Thru gate,1st right, left on Cadena.
Tax and Financial Info
Terms Of Sale: Conventional
Taxes: City/County
Tax Amount: 23269.60
Tax Year: 2017
HOA: Mandatory
HOA Fee: 856.70
HOA Fee Frequency: Month
SchoolsClick map icons below to view information for schools near 17535 Cadena Drive Boca Raton, FL 33496.
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Listing Information Last Updated 4/19/2019
Listing provided courtesy of Lang Realty/Br.
All listings featuring the BMLS logo are provided by Beaches MLS Inc. Copyright 2019 Beaches MLS. This information is not verified for authenticity or accuracy and is not guaranteed.© 2019 Beaches Multiple Listing Service, Inc.
Property Summary
17535 Cadena Drive
Boca Raton, FL 33496
Boca Raton, FL 33496
List Price: $1,927,500
MLS # RX-10421111: This property at 17535 Cadena Drive, Boca Raton, FL 33496 is located in the The Oaks subdivision and is listed for $1,927,500. MLS # RX-10421111 has been on the market for 377 days.


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Ernest Cu is currently the President, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Globe Telecom. He has over two decades of technology, general management and business development experience spanning multi-country operations. Prior to joining Global Telecom, he was the President and Chief Executive Officer of SPI Technologies. He has also held several key executive positions for Crestec Los Angeles, including Vice President and Chief Financial Officer and has also served as Executive with Bank of America as well as Chairman of eTelecare International.
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Ernest holds an MBA from Northwestern University's, Kellogg School of Management, Illinois and a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Management Engineering from De La Salle University in Manila.


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Location (with MAP): Metal at Edge Hill Station
Date/Time: 18 December 2015. 6:00pm - 7:30pm
Event: Art Event - Metal: Process: 'Nude' with Matthew Herbert
ical feed: iCal
Process: 'Nude' with Matthew Herbert
**This event will start at 18.00 SHARP!**
'Process' gives access to artists as they develop work at Metal. Part discussion, part sharing of work-in-progress, it's a great opportunity to get close to the creative process.
This edition of Process will feature Matthew Herbert discussing his new project, which sees him developing a new album of music on the theme of 'the nude' while in residence at Metal.
Process is free but space is very limited. Click here to order your free tickets.


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*indicates a film/performance I have not yet seen
bold indicates my pick
Best Performance by a Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture
Bérénice Bejo - The Artist
Jessica Chastain - The Help
Janet McTeer - Albert Nobbs*
Octavia Spencer - The Help
Shailene Woodley - The Descendants
Logic: Going wild card right off the bat. The Descendants has a lot of support (5 nominations), and Wooldley is the breakout star of the film. The ladies from The Help could split (Spencer was great, but I don't see the film winning more than one award), McTeer doesn't have a realistic chance, and Bejo, a presumptive frontrunner (in the most-nominated film), lacks the pizzazz that the HFPA typically goes for. A sweep for The Artist wouldn't shock me though.
My Hypothetical Vote: Spencer. I thought she gave the best performance (with Woodley second).
Snubs: Chastain in Take Shelter or The Tree of Life, Melissa McCarthy - Bridesmaids, Kirsten Dunst - Melancholia, Kiera Knightley - A Dangerous Method
Best Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture
Kenneth Branagh - My Week with Marilyn
Albert Brooks - Drive
Jonah Hill - Moneyball
Viggo Mortensen - A Dangerous Method
Christopher Plummer - Beginners
Logic: Plummer is the clear frontrunner and likely Oscar winner, but a case could be made for any nominee besides Mortensen (great, but not up to his usual transformative standards). Brooks is a close second and a legitimate Oscar threat, but Drive clearly didn't resonate with the HFPA. Branagh is just the type of actor and performance that usually does well here. Hill is, I think, a real dark horse (especially if Moneyball picks up any other awards). Plummer seems overdue for some awards recognition though, and this should be his year.
My Hypothetical Vote: Brooks. Just so Drive could win something (and I think the performances are about equal).
Snubs: Corey Stoll - Midnight in Paris, Patton Oswalt - Young Adult
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Jodie Foster - Carnage
Charlize Theron - Young Adult
Kristen Wiig - Bridesmaids
Michelle Williams - My Week with Marilyn
Kate Winslet - Carnage
Logic: God bless the HFPA for actually recognizing comedic performances. And, yes, Williams was great as Monroe, but the movie wasn't a comedy (or a musical) -- more of a lightweight diversion. Not the stuff awards are made of. And since The Artist seems poised to win Best Comedy, this will be the voters' chance to reward the surprise hit of the summer, Bridesmaids. As for the others, Theron was very good (the movie, not so much), and Carnage was excellent but ultimately too small of a film to be a threat.
My Hypothetical Vote: Wiig. The Carnage ladies were second, but they split my hypothetical vote of one.
Snubs: none
Best Performance by An Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Jean Dujardin - The Artist
Brendan Gleeson - The Guard
Joseph Gordon-Levitt - 50/50
Ryan Gosling - Crazy, Stupid, Love*
Owen Wilson - Midnight in Paris
Logic: HFPA + French dude. 'Nuff said. But I'll expound (as I'm wont to do). The Artist was the most nominated film and could very well walk away with the most awards. I don't think it was actually as good as that, but it does seem to be right up the HFPA's alley. And Dujardin is certainly deserving -- it's the showiest performance of the year (in a good way). Gleeson and JGL were both excellent, but they picked the wrong year. Gosling and Wilson are just here because they're famous.
My Hypothetical Vote: Gleeson. The most unique performance/character of all the nominees. Dude crushed it as well.
Snubs: Both John C. Reilly and, especially, Chrisoph Waltz for Carnage, Charlie Day - Horrible Bosses
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama
Glenn Close - Albert Nobbs*
Viola Davis - The Help
Rooney Mara - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo*
Meryl Streep - The Iron Lady*
Tilda Swinton - We Need to Talk About Kevin*
Logic: So yeah. I've only seen one of these performances. So this is purely based on what I've read. Mara and Swinton don't figure to be serious threats (I'm looking forward to both films though). Close and Streep are respected veterans and can't be dismissed (and I'm not necessarily looking forward to either film). I think Close especially has a good shot at an Oscar. But I'm going with Davis because a) the movie/subject matter is total awards bait, b) the movie had a lot of other nominations but might not win anywhere else, and c) she's actually quite good (although not as good as Spencer). So there.
My Hypothetical Vote: Davis. Only one I've seen.
Snubs: Saoirse Ronan - Hanna, Elizabeth Olsen - Martha Macy May Marlene
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama
George Clooney - The Descendants
Leonardo DiCaprio - J. Edgar*
Michael Fassbender - Shame
Ryan Gosling - The Ides of March
Brad Pitt - Moneyball
Logic: He's George fucking Clooney, that's why. Pitt is a real challenger, but it's a baseball movie and it's the HFPA. His performance also didn't require as much range as Clooney's. Fassbender was actually probably better than both of them, and I thought his schlong could have snagged a Supporting nom. Gosling was nominated for the wrong movie (Drive, duh) and Leo is this year's "Makeup Is Not The Same As Acting" nomination (presumably, as I haven't seen it, nor was I particularly interested).
My Hypothetical Vote: Fassbender. It's a flawed movie, certainly, but nobody portrayed a flawed character better than Fassbender this year.
Snubs: Ryan Gosling - Drive, Michael Shannon - Take Shelter, Gary Oldman - Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Best Screenplay - Motion Picture
Michel Hazanavicius - The Artist
Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon, Jim Rash - The Descendants
George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Beau Willimon - The Ides of March
Woody Allen - Midnight in Paris
Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin, Stan Cherwin - Moneyball
Logic: Talk about a loaded category. The only one that would surprise me with a win is The Ides of March, which wouldn't be here without Clooney's name attached (and probably shouldn't be anyway). I think Moneyball goes away without a trophy, although Zaillian and Sorkin's names certainly gives one pause. Believe me, I know a lot more goes into a screenplay than dialogue, but I can't see The Artist winning (especially as the story was largely derivative). I really think The Descendants has a great shot, but this has the makings of a "spread the wealth" night, so Woody Allen takes this in a mild upset (great script though).
My Hypothetical Vote: Allen. Although it would be great to see Dean Pelton from Community give an acceptance speech.
Snubs: Hossein Amini - Drive, Mike Mills - Beginners, Roman Polanski and Yasmina Reza - Carnage, Annie Mumulo and Kristen Wiig - Bridesmaids, Will Reiser - 50/50
Best Director - Motion Picture
Woody Allen - Midnight in Paris
George Clooney - The Ides of March
Michel Hazanavicius - The Artist
Alexander Payne - The Descendants
Martin Scorsese - Hugo
Logic: Man, this is one tough three-horse race to handicap. Allen and Clooney don't figure to be in it, but I could see the trophy going to any of the other three. Despite a lack of support in any other category, I think Hugo has a real shot at the two major awards. I'm not sure if I've ever seen such a charming love letter to cinema -- and I'm not sure if I've ever described a Scorsese movie as "charming" before either. I would probably put Payne in 3rd place at this point, but he's definitely not out of the running. In the end though, I think the voters go with Hazanavicius for the boldness of making a more-or-less silent film in this century.
My Hypothetical Vote: Hazanavicius. The movie was clearly very meticulously made, and both Payne and Scorsese have better directing jobs on their résumés.
Snubs: Nicolas Winding Refn - Drive, Steven Soderbergh - Contagion, Pedro Almodóvar - The Skin I Live In
Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
The Artist
Midnight in Paris
My Week with Marilyn
Logic: I previsioned it. But seriously, I don't see it going down any other way. Bridesmaids is the only serious challenger (maaaybe Midnight in Paris), but the HFPA usually goes with movies that will also likely be nominated for Oscars in this category (and The Artist is probably the current Best Picture favorite). Both 50/50 and Midnight in Paris are deserving nominees but aren't heavyweights here, and I can't for the life of my figure out why My Week with Marilyn is nominated here. It's gotta be The Artist here.
My Hypothetical Vote: Midnight in Paris. Probably top-5 of the year for me. A whimsical meditation on nostalgia that overcomes its excess of Wilson.
Snubs: Beginners, Carnage
Best Motion Picture - Drama
The Descendants
The Help
The Ides of March
War Horse*
Logic: While I would love to see Hugo pull off the upset (and I think it can), The Descendants has too many nominations in other categories to not win. Although it is the HFPA and they don't play by the normal rules, I can't see a movie with no acting (Hugo, War Horse), writing (same two, plus The Help), or directing (The Help and Moneyball again, plus War Horse -- how did that one sneak in, by the way?) nominations winning. Interesting that The Ides of March is the only other film with nominations in all three categories. But I think it's too indelibly American to win. On the other hand, The Descendants' story is pretty universal. That, combined with Clooney's star power and the previously mentioned other nominations, puts it over the top.
My Hypothetical Vote: Hugo. I was surprised by how taken I was with the movie. It hit all the right notes -- pitch-perfect.
Snubs: Drive (obviously), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Melancholia
TV Awards: I don't pay nearly as much attention to the TV awards, so I'll abstain from guessing. I'll just say that I hope Game of Thrones wins everything and that Glee loses everything. Get on that, HFPA.
That's my fiftieth of a dollar, and I'm sticking to it. Caveat: All picks subject to change. Eagerly awaiting the show -- can't wait to see Gervais in action again. Oscar nominations are just around the corner, and I'll post my best movies list after I see the last few awards contenders. Until then...


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Our upcoming engaging young persons event not only includes sharing best practice from within the sector but also representatives from local colleges discussing work
experience for post 16 year olds, apprenticeships and partnerships to see how museums and colleges could potentially work together.
Arts Connect West Midlands will also be joining us to give an overview of Arts Award and how you can become an Arts Award Supporter.
There are two opportunities to attend this event:
Tuesday 9 February 10am - 4pm, Rugby Art Gallery and
Join Jessica Hartshorn, Learning Outreach Officer at Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, and Roy Job, Head of Department Visual and Performing Arts & Hair and Beauty
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This event is open to Accredited museums and those officially working towards Accreditation, click here to book your place:
Wednesday 10 February 10am - 4pm, Shrewsbury Museum and Art Gallery
Alongside Karen Hayward, Agency Manager Shrewsbury College of Arts and Technology, join Matt Johnson, Museum Outreach Officer at Nuneaton Museum and Art Gallery who will be sharing a young curators project which specifically focussed on engaging SEBH /SEMH pupils.
This event is open to Accredited museums and those officially working towards Accreditation, click here to book your place:
More detail and booking information for all our current training programmes can be found here
If you have any questions please don't hesitate to contact us.
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A large national business law firm recently tapped Cogility Software Corporation to provide next-generation legal case management software solutions. The $1 million software contract will provide the law firm a comprehensive suite of legal market capabilities, including analytics and lifecycle management.
Cogility, a wholly owned subsidiary of Acquired Sales Corp., will develop a solution that will serve general counsels and legal teams, which will have access to a web-based system that includes budget portfolios, cases and budget management tools.
"Our software allows clients to focus their resources, to optimize their budgets, and to become better informed as a large amount of data is fused and transformed into actionable intelligence," said Cogility CEO Dan Terry. "Our legal analytics solutions will provide senior executives with unprecedented insights into the economic value and risks of each case with supporting facts and analytics. Our technology analyzes complex, high-volume and often-conflicting data, and pushes the information to the users in a timely, intuitive and easy to understand process."
Cogility offers a number of solutions that help improve clients' processes, including case file management, web UI, evidence accrual, geospatial-temporal mapping, link discovery, tasking and collaboration.