I think this is one of the few things as late that makes me feel genuinely proud to be British, because, beneath the hostility that feels so rife across our country recently, we’ve so many good people making things like this happen. Bravo.
As the persons said, they are not observing it in real life.
This is what I also have observed in various contexts as well. Social media is not a representation of what real people think. Most people in real life does not comment in social media, or they comment on inconsequential or trivial things....
Social media gets distorted by a handful of extremists who are motivated, and by commercial interests. A lot of the nastiest stuff is not even posted by British people, but people masquerading as British: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgpyn30dp3o
This is only happening in order to protect the UK states' control over the territory.
Altruism isn't the priority - just the pitch. The real priority is to ensure Tristan Da Cunha remains property of the UK - which, if the colony were to fail, would be immediately endangered. This is why the imperial military is involved, not civilian organizations - the military target is to ensure the island remains the property of the UK.
I know exactly what you mean. But for me there's an even greater emotion here... relief. At a time when everything feels so utterly divided, it's such a relief to see a positive story that everyone can celebrate and feel proud of, regardless of their stance. Better, it's a story that can't be politicised one way or the other, it has a purity about it. I think if we had more positive stories like this, our political & ideological differences wouldn't seem so all consuming.
It certainly involved a lot of skill and expense, but how many more lives could be saved if the same money had been spent on improved traffic safety or NHS in general?
Wow, logistics to <remote place> are very expensive! We could spend that money better in the cities!
Wow, logistics in <city> is expensive! We could spend that money better in rural areas!
I read about a new road tunnel in London last year, a ten-digit price tag for about 1km of road IIRC. I'm 100% sure some people suggested that that money could have been better spent in rural areas.
The one thing you seem to be missing in your anticolonialist tirades is the fact that Tristan was uninhabited. It’s not like native peoples were displaced by the British colonists, right?
Many self-described anticolonialists forget that "self-determination" doesn't actually mean "people who live far away from the mainland should just fuck off and take care of themselves".
I've experienced it a bit as a Frenchman (and we have quite a few remote territories as well) who has lived on a couple of remote places (that were uninhabited as well before becoming French, but that shouldn't actually matter) and it's incredible how puny, short-sighted and simply egoistical some people can be.
I'm saying that it is common for some people to advocate for jettisoning other parts of their country, especially if they are far away from where they live.
No, you're correct Britain is a collection of islands in the northern hemisphere. This however is an island in the Atlantic ocean and is a British Overseas Territory.
People respond to inspiring stories that show what is possible. Inevitably that means choices that might not match what a perfect allocation looks like.
Quiet, bland execution in government will get you voted out. Technocrats tend to come in after corruption, but they don’t usually last.
There's been repeated efforts to depopulate the Island by the UK government because it's expensive when you have to do drops like this - the people living there want to be there and prior to them getting there it was an uninhabited island.
I'm not really sure it meets the definition of a colony in the modern sense of the word.
It's a small price to pay to keep political control. Probably not the entire motivation here, but generally countries like keeping their remote islands and settlements lived in because it represents a claim of the land by proxy.
One thing I often ask myself in these situations:
What do the inhabitants on these islands actually do?
There are 259 of them in this case.
Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import? Do they live off the cruise ships they supply? And do people generally stay there or do young people generally move to mainland?
Edit: For economy, it looks like they live off exporting langustas.
The UK built a crayfish processing facility so that they could have income. They also sell stamps and a few handmade crafts such as knitted socks. There are a few government jobs and they must make some money from tourism. And they all grow potatoes for their own consumption.
There's actually Street View images, so you can take a look, also at the agricultural plots southwest of the town (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato_Patches ). There's some sheep, cattle and (I think) donkeys as well.
>Are they self-sustaining? How do they pay for stuff the want to import
Generally the modern day population of these types of islands are simply cover for the government to maintain political control of an area of ocean surrounding them. Same deal with the Falklands, Orkney/Shetland, etc. To that end their entire existence is more or less subsidised because of this.
Orkney is only 20 miles from the UK mainland so I'm not sure that's the reason. People there make fudge which is pretty good. Until recently (1956) it hosted a major Royal Navy base.
Isn’t the hosting of a naval base a good example of this island being subsidized because the government wants to control the waters around it? And it being close to mainland is another reason, you don’t want another country having an island that close to you.
Those two aren't quite comparable; Orkney's been inhabited since before ancient Egypt. Tristan's much more recent, from when we needed stopping points everywhere for sailing ships to pick up water etc.
This recent article[1] answers a lot of these questions with great photos too. I would go so far to say it’s the most authoritative piece to date. Previously [2].
I think this was also a “look what we can do at short notice” kind of exercise. Just in case a country was thinking of maybe trying to take over another set of islands in the south Atlantic
yes, definitely reminds the famous bombing raid on Falklands.
The distance of 2700 km a typical small ship - like say this Costa Guard cutter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legend-class_cutter and sure South Africa do have ships like this - would have made in 2-3 days. No risk and probably much cheaper compare to the described paratrooping.
Though i do think that the paratrooping was nice, just to show that as a civilization we can.
On the other side i think it also shows our civilization failure to develop long range VTOL - say like this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piasecki_16H_Pathfinder - helicopters with pusher have been reaching 2000 km range, and additional fuel tanks would have gotten such one to 3000km, yet we just don't have such helicopters (or other long range VTOLs) around.
I'm no expert but that looks like an impressive feat of skill, coming blind through the clouds and picking out a relatively small patch to land on. Remember also it is late autumn there, pretty windy (according to TFA) and the wind would probably be doing weird things off the sea around those cliffs. All in all, very cool.
Agreed. The story is great, too. A really interesting logistical challenge that arose from unusual circumstances.
There's probably something to be said for the fact that TDC is a small, remote community, so it shouldn't be surprising that its website is reminiscent of a smaller, more communal web... but I'm not going to try to read too much into it and let the story stand on its own.
Until recently TDC had a very slow FCDO satellite link that required their website to be quite basic in order to actually be viewable on computers on the island.
They now have a fast Starlink connection, but I’m glad they’ve kept the website as it is.
Sweet ... I saw the original video just the other day. The fact that they just dropped in from 7K feet, then proceeded to do medical stuff is the very definition of "bad ass".
On windswept shores where oceans foam,
Far from the bustle and noise of home,
The island watched the grey skies part,
With hope returning to every heart.
Across the vastness the RAF flew through,
With medicine, medics, and military too,
Parachuting in with skill and courage on our shore,
The impossible was accomplished to the core.
Tristan da Cunha, proud and small,
A community who always stand together through it all,
Neighbours helping each other, such an amazing sight,
Hoping everything done before the loss of daylight.
It is not 'very nice'; it's often generic and lacking in any insight or striking imagery, the meter is ragged and inconsistent while the rhymes are often padding or outright slant (through/too, shore/core?). But I will grant it this: despite the AABB quatrain meter making it look exactly like AI slop, the flaws and errors show that it's probably genuinely amateur-written (as does a '100% human' rating in Pangram).
Nah, if the meta shifts too far, people will just prompt for lower quality like errors, the same way that if Pangram use gets too widespread, people will just start using anti-Pangram prompts and rewrite services. And since people largely don't notice or care, even here, that meta shift is going to take a long time.
Were the ICU nurse and Doctor trained for the tandem jump previously - I've not seen that said in any of the stories published. Or did they just find a random ICU nurse and Doctor who was up for it?
It does not take anything more than listening to instructions and remaining calm to do a tandem parachute. Doctors and nurses on average have those skills. And those who volunteer for a mission like this undoubtedly do.
Go on the Kremlin's official website and search for "on the historical unity of russian and Ukrainian people". Check the date, read the text, and understand that this was never about NATO or what Ukraine did. putin just is just a megalomaniac obsessed with restoring the russian empire/ussr.
My point is that when we compare the two, one is vastly more megalomaniac and expansionist. And the one spreading its influence east, provoking Russia.
And the one benefiting insanely from the war, without caring at all about its "allies".
> My point is that when we compare the two, one is vastly more megalomaniac and expansionist.
The one that grew through conquest and oppression from a small city-state to the largest country on the planet that spans 11 timezones and still lusts for more?
Ahaha you are not serious yeah ? Are we talking that far back ? Okay. As opposed to a former colony that eradicated the native populace of the americans ?
Polar stations are even more inaccessible during polar winter with months of total darkness and it is just too dangerous to reach them. The winter-over crews need to be completely self-sufficient until the sun rises again.
For the big McMurdo US base they have flown in a few times in the winter for extremely important life or death medical reasons (last year: Aug 25 [1]) For the smaller other country bases it tends to be too dangerous and impossible. They are not able to use mcmurdo and the americans cant help either.
The general rule is that the Americans don't fly during the winter but they do tend to downplay and not publicize the times when they do fly.
From what I gathered from the article the person who got off was a resident of Tristan? They have such limited shipping options that this might have been the only way for them to travel from any mainland. Not sure though, but I don't think they got off there to seek medical assistance.
