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I heard a story recently about a pilgrimage to Lourdes where the parishioners passed round a collection for the pilot. I think that's mad. He probably earns more in a month that most of those old dears do in a year. There should be guidelines on tipping. I only tip in restaurants - never taxis or barbers.

What does everybody else do? 

[Book by metallurgists blames rivets for Titanic tragedy]

Book by metallurgists blames rivets for Titanic tragedy
By CARLEY PETESCH, Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK - The tragic sinking of the Titanic nearly a century ago can be blamed on low grade rivets that the ship's builders used on some parts of the ill-fated liner, two experts on metals conclude in a new book.

The company, Harland and Wolff of Belfast,  Ireland, needed to build the ship quickly and at reasonable cost, which may have compromised quality, said co-author Timothy Foecke. That the shipyard was building two other vessels at the same time added to the difficulty of getting the millions of rivets needed, he added.

"Under the pressure to get these ships up, they ramped up the riveters, found materials from additional suppliers, and some was not of quality," said Foecke, a metallurgist at the U.S. government's National Institute of Standards and Technology who has been studying the Titanic for a decade.

More than 1,500 people died when the Titanic, advertised as an "unsinkable" luxury liner, struck an iceberg on its maiden voyage in 1912 and went down in the North Atlantic less than three hours later.

"The company knowingly purchased weaker rivets, but I think they did it not knowing they would be purchasing something substandard enough that when they hit an iceberg their ship would sink," said co-author Jennifer Hooper McCarty, who started researching the Titanic's rivets while working on her Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University in 1999.

The company disputes the idea that inferior rivets were at fault. The theory has been around for years, but McCarty and Foecke's book, "What Really Sank the Titanic," published last month, outlines their extensive research into the Harland and Wolff archives and surviving rivets from the Titanic.

McCarty spent two years in Britain studying the company's archives and works on the training and working conditions of shipyard workers. She and Foecke also studied engineering textbooks from the 1890s and early 1900s to learn more about shipbuilding practices and materials.

"I had the opportunity to study the metallurgy of several rivets," McCarty said. "It was a process of taking thousands of images of the inside of these rivets, finding out what the structure was like, doing chemical testing and computer modeling.

"Seeing the kind of levels we saw in different areas, in different parts of the ship led us to believe they would have ordered from different people," she said, adding this may have led to the weaker rivets.

The two metallurgists tested 48 rivets from the ship and found that slag concentrations were at 9 percent, when they should have been 2 to 3 percent. The slag is a byproduct of the smelting process.

"You need the slag but you need just a little to take up the load that's applied so the iron doesn't stretch," Foecke said. "The iron becomes weak the more slag there is because the brittleness of the slag takes over and it breaks easily."

Foecke said the main question was not whether the Titanic would sink after hitting the iceberg, but how fast the ship went down.

He believes the answer is provided by the weak rivets. His analysis showed the builders used stronger steel rivets where they expected the greatest stress and weaker iron rivets for the stern and the bow, where they thought there would be less pressure, he said. But it was the ship's bow that struck the iceberg.

"Typically you want a four bar for rivets," Foecke said, using the measurement for the strongest rivets. "Some of the orders were for three bar."

Harland and Wolff spokesman Joris Minne disputed the findings. "We always say there was nothing wrong with the Titanic when it left here," he said.

When the iceberg hit the Titanic, it scraped alongside the ship. Foecke said this affected a number of seams in the bow and the weak rivets let go, putting more pressure on the strong rivets.

"Six compartments flooded. If the rivets were on average better quality, five compartments may have flooded and the ship would have stayed afloat longer and more people would have been saved," Foecke said. "If four compartments flooded, the ship may have limped to Halifax."

The company does not have an archivist, but it refers scientific questions on the Titanic to retired Harland and Wolff naval engineer David Livingstone, who also has researched the ship's sinking.

He said he largely agrees with the authors' findings on the metallic composition of the rivets, but added their conclusions that the rivets were to blame for the sinking are "misleading and incorrect" because they do not consider the ship's overall design and the historical context.

"You can't just look at the material and say it was substandard," Livingstone said. "Of course material from 100 years ago would be inferior to material today."

He said he has found no document to support the argument that Harland and Wolff knowingly used substandard material. He pointed out that the Olympic, a ship the company built at the same time using the same materials, had a long life with no troubles. The third vessel turned out in the early 1900s was attacked and sunk in World War I.

Livingstone said he is not sure why iron rivets were used in the bow and the stern but believes it may have been because a crane-mounted hydraulic rivet machine could not reach those points. He said the iron rivets were wider to compensate for the difference in strength.

Contrary to Foecke's theory, Livingstone said, the Titanic did not go down fast compared to other ships that have sunk.

He said the Titanic did not capsize — as do most sinking ships — but maintained an even keel until the last moment, going down after about 2 1/2 hours when the weight of the water it took on became too much.

William Garzke, chairman of the forensics panel of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers based in New Jersey, said wrought iron was commonly used at that time, but steel was the newer, stronger choice.

Garzke, who also has studied the Titanic sinking, said the two scientists made a good point about the variability of the rivets, but "the problem is not the metallurgy of the rivets, it was the design of the riveted joints."

He said that the company used only two rivets at the site of impact, when three would have provided more strength and durability.



__

If it sounds too good to be true it probably is too good to be true!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7243213.stm

We had a new couple from the neighbourhood in for a game of cards tonight and chat turns to GAA matters as it always does in our house.

Well to cut a long story short this neighour of mine claims that the great Tom O'Hare who won a Senior Football All Ireland for Down in 1968 played for Burren. I alway thought he was a Mayobridge man.

I wasn't a 100% sure but my neighour is adamant that he played his football with Burren. He wanted to place a bet on who was right - I was having none of that I can tell you! (He doesn't know me very well obviously  )

They seem like a nice couple. Tonight was the first time we've had them round for the evening. If it turns out he has been winding me up it could be the last. 

[Alcohol And Sport: What effects does alcohol have on sports performance?]

Research has shown that alcohol is the drug most widely used by GAA players. Here is an article that explains the impact the drug has on high performance athletes. This sort of article should be used while coaching juveniles to get across the message that sport and drink don't mix.

Alcohol And Sport: What effects does alcohol have on sports performance?

Alcohol (ethyl alcohol, ethanol) is a drug, but technically it can also be classified as a nutrient because it provides energy, about 7 kcal per gram. One drink of alcohol is considered to be an amount typically found in 340ml of beer, 114ml of wine or 35ml of 40 per cent (80 proof) spirits. Alcohol affects all cells in the body but the most immediate physiological and psychological effects are on the brain.

These effects are dependent on the blood alcohol concentration (BAC). A number of factors may influence the BAC (eg, body size, body fat content, gender) but for the average male one drink will result in a BAC of about 25mg/L. The table highlights some common effects associated with increasing BAC.

Although alcohol is classified as a depressant drug, it may elicit a transient stimulant effect, and it has been theorised by some authors to be ergogenic for both of these effects.

Potential ergogenic effects
Alcohol may influence both psychological and physiological processes related to physical performance, but most of the theoretical ergogenic benefits have been related to psychological effects. Psychologically, alcohol may benefit performance by increasing self-confidence, decreasing sensitivity to pain, or removing psychological barriers to performance. However, the most prevalent use of alcohol in sports competition is related to its ability to reduce excess anxiety and hand tremor, important considerations for athletes involved in precision sports such as pistol shooting.

Potential ergolytic effects
Alcohol may also influence psychological and physiological processes in an adverse fashion and may lead to deterioration in physical performance. Obviously, many of the adverse psychomotor effects listed in the table could impair performance in sports requiring great skill, but a number of physiological effects could also be detrimental to other types of performance. For example, alcohol may depress heart function, interfere with liver function to cause hypoglycaemia, and lead to dehydration by suppressing the release of antidiuretic hormone.

Effects on psychomotor performance
The table indicates some of the psychomotor effects of alcohol with increasing BAC. Obviously, levels about 100m/L will interfere with almost all types of psychomotor skills. Although research findings are somewhat inconsistent regarding the influence of BAC below 50mg/L upon psychomotor performance, several studies have reported decrements in a variety of psychomotor performance tasks with BAC lower than 50mg/L. Complex psychomotor skills, such as the ability to react quickly to rapidly changing stimuli (eg, in tennis) are most likely to be unpaired at low BAC.

Strength, speed, power and endurance Several major review articles have concluded that alcohol has no beneficial effects on events characterised by maximal force development for short periods of time, such as laboratory tests of muscle strength and short-term muscular endurance, and both laboratory and field tests of speed. In several studies, alcohol actually impaired performance in tests of strength, power and speed. In prolonged aerobic endurance events, major physiological variables such as heart rate and oxygen consumption during submaximal and maximal exercise do not appear to be affected by alcohol, and, in general, neither is performance on tests of aerobic endurance. However, some investigators have reported a detrimental effect on performance in 800 and 1500m races.

Precision shooting sports
Although alcohol might best be used as an ergogenic aid for precision shooting sports, little research has been conducted relative to the effect of alcohol on actual performance. Although the available data are somewhat equivocal, studies supporting the anxiolytic effect of alcohol serve as the basis for banning its use in conjunction with such sports.

Melvin H Williams (Sports Science Update)

[Refs need help to go from club to Croker stage - psychologist]

From Hoganstand. Some interesting points.

Refs need help to go from club to Croker stage - psychologist23 January 2008

A leading sports psychologist says leading referees have got to be trained to adapt from officiating at low-profile club games to taking charge of major matches at Croke Park.

Cork city-based Canice Kennedy told a meeting of the National Referees' Association in Athlone last night (Tuesday) that media spotlight has pushed refs to their mental limits.

"Many of the referees are covering club games in front of small numbers and then they are thrust into the national limelight, perhaps in front of 60-70,000 people at Croke Park," Kennedy explained.

"That puts mental pressure on them which they are not normally used to and they need strategies to prepare for that changing environment.

"Of course the rules of the games are the same but the pressures are much greater. If a referee makes a mistake it will be highlighted and they will be criticised on The Sunday Game and they need to put in place a strategy to ensure this criticism does not affect them. The dame goes for players in many ways.

"The sad thing is that a referee could give an excellent performance, make 49 excellent calls but the 50th might be an error which turns a game. There is huge pressure associated with that."

Sound familiar? Read this story as a warning as to what can happen. People can get carried away with things on the Internet.

Everybody should take extreme care not to get carried away and lose your temper. If you find yourself getting annoyed, turn the computer of and go read a book for a while or talk to your family.

I would hate to read another story like this involving posters from this board.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,313343,00.html

[DON'T DO IT!]

This story should act as a warning to anyone who think of getting behind the wheel of the car after having a couple of pints. This girl was lucky - she wasn't actually over the limit - but it was still a humiliating experience.

DON'T DO IT!

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00260/chrissierussell_260895g.jpg

Thursday, December 06, 2007
As I stand at the roadside about to blow into a little plastic tube I start to feel irrationally guilty. Logically I know I haven't done anything wrong, this is just an enactment, a staging of what happens when you're stopped for drink driving, intended to give me an insight into what it feels like to be arrested for the offence.
But from the policeman telling me sternly to turn off my engine and get out of my vehicle, the people gawping at me from their cars as they drive past and my redfaced sense of shame - it all feels very real.

This Christmas many people will be tempted to get into their cars and drive home after drinking at office parties and nights out. Maybe they'll feel perfectly sober and maybe they'll get home safe but some won't.
Already this year there have been 98 deaths on Northern Ireland's roads, 19 of which involved alcohol. That's 19 lives lost because some drivers still think it's alright to get behind a wheel after having a drink.

I'm stopped just outside Downpatrick on a weekday morning after committing a driving offence (pulling out in front of another vehicle). The police have a right to stop drivers for driving erratically, if there's something wrong with the car such as an out-of-date tax disc or broken light or if they've committed a traffic offence like pulling out without signalling. Once stopped, if they suspect drink has been taken, it's the breathalyser.

Although the policemen I speak to have tales of people asleep in lay-bys and drivers three times over the limit, more often there are stories of people who have a little bit more to drink than they mean to, or people driving the morning after a big night out or people chancing a short drive home from the pub.
"There's no one 'type' of people that are caught drink driving and there's no time of day when it's more likely," says Sergeant Lawrence Speer from Roads Policing. "It's something that happens across the board ". My breathalyser test flashes up a red FAIL, my car is locked and Sergeant Speer escorts me into the back to the marked police car.

As I travel to the nearest available police station (which turns out to be Newtownabbey as all custodial suites are taken in Downpatrick) the long journey gives me plenty of time to think about what impact a drink driving offence would have on my life.

No licence means no way of getting to work and having no transport would seriously hinder my ability to do my job. I would be reliant on public transport, which, to where I live in the countryside would be expensive and erratic, and I could kiss my social life goodbye - although I was rapidly losing the taste for drinking. Worse would be the reaction of my family and employers when they found out.

"Quite often we have people blaming us for ruining their lives," says Constable Victor Molyneaux, driving me to the station. "They don't see that they are their own architect of what's happened."

As it goes I'm a well-behaved prisoner. But that's with the luxury of knowing none of this is real. If the tables were turned I've no doubt I would join in the ranks of people who sit in the back of the car crying, begging for the matter to be sorted out some other way, apologising and swearing it would never happen again. None of which would do me any good.

"Once you're caught there is no way back," explains Constable Molyneaux. "For us, it's more difficult when people are genuinely upset but there's nothing we can do."
Of course, people still try and beat the system. Constable Molyneaux tells me about people putting pennies in their mouths as they believe it will absorb the alcohol or chewing gum or drinking from water bottles and then claiming it was spiked with alcohol by police officers. People try and claim they weren't driving, that they've only had the one or they refuse to take the roadside breath test.

But even this is only delaying the inevitable. If police officers suspect a driver to be driving under the influence then he or she is legally obliged to give a sample, if not at the roadside then in the police station.

Refusal to do so is a criminal offence and will result in disqualification, a hefty fine and penalty points. There really is no way to win.
And no matter how drunk I was, I'm sure finding myself in a small, clinical looking room with three police officers and a highly sensitive machine guaranteed to register any alcohol in my system, would definitely sober me up. It's not the results from the roadside breathalyser that are used in court, but the two samples taken by the Lion Intoxilyser in the police station, the lower reading of which is then used in court. I can ask for a solicitor to be there but it's not a request that will delay the test. Even if a staff sergeant isn't available to operate the Intoxilyser, a doctor will be called to take blood or urine sample.

There's nothing physically unpleasant about blowing into the warmed tube of the Intoxilyser but it is tense waiting for the results and I have a horrible feeling of being trapped in an unalterable course of events when all I really want is to be far, far away. I have no one in the room to support me and (without having done anything wrong) I still find the procedure sickening, thinking of what it would be like if it was for real.

My results come back clear, the machine registers no alcohol in my system and I'm free to go. If I'd been over the limit then I would have been bailed to go until my court case when it would have been up to a magistrate to disqualify me, issue penalty points and decide how much I'm fined or whether I should face a custodial sentence.
Of course, the shame of being caught shouldn't be the main deterrent for drink driving. The police officers I speak to have first hand accounts of the carnage and lives ruined by drink driving with one recalling the case of a drunk driver who collided with a 19-year-old girl leaving her paralysed. The adverts we see on TV may be graphic but for some families, the incidents they portray are all too real.

Any amount of alcohol really is too much and if you're stopped for drink driving then it's lucky if you only ruin your own Christmas. The legal limit is essentially meaningless because while one person may be able to drink a pint, have their liver process the alcohol quickly and be fine to drive, another person may not and that's irrespective of gender, age, health, height or weight. The safest amount really is none. I realised this when I was sat in the back of a police car. Hopefully it won't take being in the same position for other drivers to come to the same conclusion.

A4SA is getting beyond a joke. He just started a quiz with the promise of an All Ireland ticket for the winner.
It turns out he doesn't know the answers to the questions and in some cases there are more than one correct answer. The All Ireland ticket is an old stub. I think he should be banned for a while until he wises up and quits messing about with foolish stuff like this. It's beyond a joke.

Admin - will you abide by the result of this poll?

A spelling mistake on the Internet led to a surprise trip to remote southern France for three Norwegian tourists who thought they were going to a Greek island, airport officials said Wednesday.

The family group from Torp-Sandefjord thought they had booked a flight to the island of Rhodes but instead the journey from Oslo took them via London to Rodez, capital of the mountainous Aveyron department.

According to airport authorities at Rodez some 10 tourists make the same mistake every year.

AP



The gothic cathedral is a major tourist attraction for people who visit Rodez in southern France.

God knows where Armagh4SamAgain will end up!

Is it just me or are Hardstation, Square Ball, Real Loais Lad and Ziggleo just the sadest bastards you've ever come across? They've just spent a Saturday night typing on a computer pretending to be in a pub. SAD. 

In fact Hardstation needs his bumps felt! 7 times he replied to himself when the other sad lads lost interest. Now that's really sad.

Lads - go to a real pub on Saturday nights and you may pick up the social skills to allow you to intregrate successfully back into society. There's a real world out there you know and real women and real beer.

I think there should. It's getting way out of hand.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6903310.stm
This is the biggest car dealership in the North. Has anyone any experience of them?

http://beehive.thisiscornwall.co.uk/default.asp?WCI=SiteHome&ID=661&PageID=73545

I came across this web site and I had no idea that hurling was played in Cornwall in the 1800s. I've always been interested in the history of the GAA and hurling and this was news to me. Has anybody any other information of Gaelic games played abroad other than by Irish immigrants?

[Antrim]

There seems to be a fair few towns and villages in the North that don't have GAA clubs. What clubs to people from these places play for? Here's a list of some I've identified. If you moved to one of these places who would you play for? Maybe there are clubs and I've never heard of them.
Copy and paste the list and put a club against the town, if there is one.
Are there any other large towns/ villages without clubs?

Antrim
Ballycarry
Ballyclare
Ballynure
Bushmills
Carrickfergus
Carnlough
Dervock
East Belfast
Mosside
Newtownabbey
Toomebridge
Whitehead

Armagh
Blackwatertown
Brownlow
Gilford
Loughgall
Tandragee
Scrava
Markethill

Derry
Ballyronan
Tobermore
Draperstown
Portrush
Portstewart
Maghera
Moneymore


Down
Annborough
Annalong
Ballynahinch
Bangor
Comber
Donaghadee
Dromore
Hillborough
Kilkeel
Loughbrickland
Moira
Newcastle
Newtownards
Portavogie

It's always quiet at this time of year so I was looking at the saved threads on the old board. Some great stuff there. Is there any way it can be archieved? I loved Ballintoys thread on Great GAA places in pictures, unsual club names started Lecale was hilarious, but my vote for the best goes to the TG4 Goal of 2005 (strated by Redhandfan). That's the one where everybody voted for the penalty by Muchay of cork in the womans final and really wound up the Tyrone posters (and TG4) . Great stuff!

See attached headline from BBC!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/northern_ireland/gaelic_games/6176770.stm