Chapter 1 Accidents, Tragedies and Disasters
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On November 28 the Country Will Mark the 30Th Anniversary of the Erebus
Echoes from Erebus NO PEACE, NO AnSWERS, 30 YEARS ON n November 28 the country will mark the 30th anniversary of the Erebus disaster. + Cover story Mike White investigates why, after so long, the wounds are still so raw for so many and asks if saying sorry would be a step too far. OMIKE WHITE IS A NORTH & SOUTH SENIOR WRITER. PHOTOGRAPHS BY NIGEL ROBERTS, MIKE WHITE, LOU SANSON, AND FROM GETTY IMAGES. 36 | NORTH & SOUTH | NOVEMBER 2009 Two weeks before the crash, the first Air New Zealand sightseeing flight of the summer flies above Scott Base, and is captured on film by Nigel Roberts, then Scott Base’s information officer-photographer. On the morning of the crash, Roberts again waited with his camera, and listened as the Air New Zealand pilots radioed McMurdo Station. Then they went off the air. NIGEL. S. ROBERTS S. NIGEL. NORTH & SOUTH | NOVEMBER 2009 | 37 hat did they think heads of Collins and Cassin, see what they far beyond the 257 whose lives ended that day of in those last did, think what they must have. on the slopes of a smouldering volcano. seconds? What Investigators, judges, politicians, pilots went through their and the public have all overlaid rationality THE TALE OF Flight TE901 on November minds as the alarm on the unknown, done their best to explain 28, 1979, is well recited, from early morning screamed, warn- how the country’s worst aviation disaster Auckland takeoff to wreckage and ragged Wing they were desperately close to the could have occurred. koru in the snow five hours later. -
Vicki Kerr Airspace – Zones of Fidelity and Failure Phd Art 2014
Vicki Kerr Airspace – Zones of Fidelity and Failure Goldsmiths College, University of London PhD Art 2014 1 Declaration I declare that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Signed Vicki Kerr 2 Acknowledgements Firstly I would like to thank Richard Noble for being such an excellent supervisor. I would also like to thank Nigel Clark for his endless support, encouragement and assistance with ideas along the way. A special thanks for the love and support I received from my families – my London family – my partner Renee and her children Julia and Michael and my New Zealand family – my mother Sonya, sister Michelle, brothers Mark, Myles and of course my Dad, who had he been alive, would have been proud of my achievement. For technical assistance and inspiration I would like to thank Ian Stonehouse, Tolga Saygin, David Ferrando Giraut, David Spragg, Kevin Ward and Tom Allen. Thank you to Andrea Phillips and John Chilver for believing in my project from the beginning. I would also like to express my appreciation for the generosity of spirit and the knowledge I received from my PhD colleagues during our journey together. Thank you to all my friends who have helped me to enjoy my time writing my thesis, especially Mary Weston who organised many evenings out to the most extraordinary art and music events. 3 Abstract Given our increasing reliance on air travel to function in all aspects of society, it seems imperative to expand our knowledge of airspace and the social relations that air travel enhances and makes possible. My thesis offers a critical analysis of the technical safety systems that support air travel. -
Explorer's Gazette
EEXXPPLLOORREERR’’SS GAZETTE GAZETTE Published Quarterly in Pensacola, Florida USA for the Old Antarctic Explorers Association Uniting All OAEs in Perpetuating the History of U.S. Navy Involvement in Antarctica Volume 9, Issue 4 Old Antarctic Explorers Association, Inc Oct-Dec 2009 Staff members at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station gathering in early 2008 for a last photograph at the geodesic dome before its decommissioning SAVE THE GEODESIC DOME Condensed from a New York Times story by Henry Fountain geodesic dome that sheltered scientists and support Lee Mattis, who as a young engineer working for a workers at the South Pole for three decades is due to California company, came up with a way to erect the be demolished in the next few months, having structure and served as project engineer during its Aoutlived its usefulness at the bottom of the world. construction over two Antarctic summers, said the dome But a small group of polar veterans is trying to preserve “was a big part of the NSF effort down there.” the dome, arguing it is a signature feature of the United The National Science Foundation, or NSF, the federal States Antarctic program. They want the 55-foot-high agency that oversees polar programs, has agreed to aluminum structure taken apart the same way that Navy disassemble the top three rings, or about 45 triangular Seabees assembled it—bolt-by-bolt and panel-by-panel— panels, for eventual installation at a Seabee museum being for reassembly stateside. built in Port Hueneme, Calif. The bulk of the dome, which “If you saw anything about the South Pole, that dome has 904 panels and 1,448 struts in all, held together by about would always be the iconic symbol that you saw,” said 60,000 bolts, would be cut apart. -
Further Lessons from Mt Erebus?
________________________________________________________________________________________________________31ST11A Administration of a safety system: further lessons from Mt Erebus? Christine Standing* In any modern, high technology system, assuring its safety (i.e., an acceptably low risk of injury or death of users) itself constitutes a system, albeit with many elements less palpable than the technology itself. Developing such safety systems was first found to be necessary with the railways, and the necessity is even greater for aviation. Such a system must necessarily be administered, allowing human weakness to adversely influence its efficacity. 1. INTRODUCTION endeavour recognized that unmeasurable features could In 1979, an explosion was heard in the icy wastes of also be important [1]. Antarctica. Its echoes were heard in law courts in New Political theorist Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) is Zealand and around the world; the ensuing scientific possibly best known for her comments on the trial of Adolf investigation, including at least one doctoral thesis, Eichmann, a Nazi war criminal. Nazi crimes could not improved aviation safety; I shall argue that such science, have succeeded on the scale they did without a complex with its clear methods and transparency, is even more system of scientific administration. Regarding science, needed today. Arendt notes [2]: Declarations of “interest” are now commonplace in The action of the scientists, since it acts into nature published research papers; if there are none, many from the standpoint of the