Other News Stories that might be missed from 2019 to date

[boatbuilder]

Latest post of the previous page:

[boatbuilder]

I guess they are wanting to learn to play 'Flight of the Bumblebee' by Rimsky Korsakov.

[boatbuilder]

[boatbuilder]

[boatbuilder]

Britain's oldest poppy seller who was dubbed the Auschwitz Goalkeeper after he survived the death camp for two years and kept his spirits up by playing football dies aged 102

An Auschwitz prisoner who survived and later became Britain's oldest poppy seller has died at the age of 102.
Former prisoner of war Ron Jones had been selling poppies for the Royal British Legion for almost 40 years and was set to continue his fundraising trend this year.
But after a short illness the World War II veteran from Newport, south Wales died in hospital surrounded by his family.
His son Leighton Jones, 73, said: 'I think getting to 102 years of age wasn't bad going.
'Not many people survived Auschwitz extermination camp,' he said.
'My father was fortunate and would speak for many hours of his ordeal.
'My family are also very proud of his determination to help the Poppy Appeal. He had been selling poppies for more than 30 years.'
'He was a loving father and adored his late wife.'
Ron was a soldier in the Welsh Regiment and was held by Nazis at Auschwitz E715 - a prisoner-of-war camp next to the main concentration camp - for two-and-a-half years.
However, he managed to keep his spirits up by playing goalkeeper in the POW football team once a week.
We didn't work on a Sunday so we used to play football,' he said.
'The Red Cross heard about it and brought four loads of shirts - English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh.
'So we formed our teams and we would play every Sunday. I was the goalie.
'When you're under those conditions it was a real pleasure to play football on a Sunday.

Full story

[boatbuilder]

[boatbuilder]

This is probably one of the most heart-warming stories of the year:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49729211

[Dave]

Australian hiker rescued after crawling for two days through bush 'carrying' broken leg.

An Australian bushwalker said he crawled for two days with “the whole bottom half” of his leg “loose” so he would have a chance of being spotted from the air.
Neil Parker, 54, was walking in Cabbage Tree Creek on Mount Nebo, north-west of Queensland’s state capital Brisbane, when he slipped and fell six metres down a waterfall.
The fall broke Mr Parker’s leg and wrist. From the safety of a hospital bed on Wednesday, Mr Parker said “my left foot below my ankle snapped in half… the whole bottom of my leg came loose”.

[youtube]KiaBVN7bnMk[/youtube]

[boatbuilder]

The British girl who went to meet her death row pen pal

Twenty-one-year-old Lorna Fitzpatrick has been writing to her American penfriend since she was 11. There's nothing particularly unusual in that - except he's a convicted murderer awaiting execution in Louisiana.
Casual references to visiting a pen pal on death row can bring conversations to a grinding halt. One time, when she was working at a children's camp, Lorna spotted a shop selling the kind of American sweets a prison bus driver had shared with her. "Does anyone want a Now and Later?" she had asked the other staff. "I had them on the bus to death row."
"You had them on the WHAT to WHAT?" they replied, astonished.
Lorna knows her situation is eyebrow-raising. But, sitting in her mother's kitchen, with one foot pulled up on the chair, arms around her knee, she seems kind and sensible - not someone likely to make friends with a man on death row out of a sense of rebellion or the desire to shock.
"I'm not saying it's not weird," says Lorna, who is from Newcastle in the north east of England. "It is weird - but really nice." It was awkward, though, when her penfriend sent a note to her boyfriend saying: "You better look after her - I'm on death row, so I know people."
"He didn't mean it. I thought it was really funny," she says. "My boyfriend didn't find it that funny."

Full Story: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-49814959

[boatbuilder]

Lucky isn't the word....

[boatbuilder]

WW2 Jewish survivors in rare reunion with Greek rescuer

A 92-year-old Greek woman has for the first time been reunited with two Jewish siblings she helped save from the Nazis during World War Two.
As a teenager, Melpomeni Dina hid six members of the Mordechai family before helping them flee.
A tearful reunion took place at the Holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem, more than seven decades later.
Such events used to be very common at the museum but this one is likely to be the very last of its kind.
Surviving siblings Sarah Yanai and Yossi Mor brought their 20 children and grandchildren to the event.
"There are no words to describe this feeling," Ms Yanai told reporters. "It is very emotional for us to be together again."
"We were hidden in her house. She saved all my family. Six persons... you can't imagine how dangerous it was for her, for her family, to keep us all... They saved our lives."

Read the full article by clicking the link underneath the video below

[boatbuilder]

I am railing: Sir Rod Stewart reveals his epic model railway city

He's one of rock's biggest stars, but Sir Rod Stewart has finally revealed the fruits of his other great passion - model railways.
In between making music and playing live, Sir Rod has been working on a massive, intricate model of a US city for the past 23 years.
He unveiled it as part of an interview with Railway Modeller magazine.
He then phoned in to Jeremy Vine's BBC Radio 2 show to rebuff the host's suggestion he had not built it himself.
"I would say 90% of it I built myself," he insisted. "The only thing I wasn't very good at and still am not is the electricals, so I had someone else do that."
Sir Rod has released 13 studio albums and been on 19 tours during the time it took to build the city, which is modelled on both New York and Chicago around 1945.
"A lot of people laugh at it being a silly hobby, but it's a wonderful hobby," he said.

Full Story with pictures

[boatbuilder]

[boatbuilder]

I found this story quite interesting from the point of view of how the communications evolved.

Britons escape after yacht sinks off Indonesian island

Four people - including two Britons - escaped after their yacht sank more than 50 miles off the coast of an Indonesian island.
The skipper raised the alarm after the boat, named Asia, hit an object in the water at about 21:00 GMT on Friday.
The UK coastguard, which helped co-ordinate the response, said the crew sailed a lifeboat to land, where they were found more than eight hours later.
Malaysian officials were alerted by the UK after Australia picked up the SOS.
Australian authorities contacted their British counterparts because the yacht appeared to be registered in the UK.
The UK Coastguard found no-trace of the ship on its records but did notice an alert on a US alarm system in approximately the same area.
They were then able to trace the skipper's wife, who was able to tell them where the ship had been heading.
This helped Malaysian authorities to finally make contact with the skipper at about 05:00 GMT.
A short while later, the crew were met by local police near the town of Bima, in the West Nusa Tenggara province.
Controller David Jones led the UK response from the National Maritime Operations Centre in Fareham, Hampshire.
He said he was "relieved" to know the crew were safe and that the operation "demonstrated good international working".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-50530305

[boatbuilder]

The REAL story behind rumours Queen was dead: Royal Navy makes red-faced apology and admits 'Gibbo' WhatsApp text that sparked worldwide scare was from military exercise

Royal Navy military personnel have taken the blame for leaking WhatsApp message that sparked a rumour that the Queen had died.
Officials have apologised for 'any misunderstanding' after claims that HRH had passed away went viral.
On Sunday 1 December, a screenshot from a WhatsApp group chat was posted on Facebook and Twitter.
Inside the image was a conversation believed to be between individuals serving in the Royal Navy stating what equipment personnel would need for an exercise to do with the royal's passing.

FULL STORY

I wonder what Morty can tell us about it?

[morty1753]

Sorry BB. Cannot divulge anything due to Official Secrets Act.

It will all be in my memoir when I publish.