Who's up for an easy £5 million?

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

Pyecrete

That means we need:
Wood people.
Concrete people
Moulding people.
Mixing people.

That means your final payment will be a negative one.

 

[Bullet2012]

Are we talking a nice foncrete raft or a floating raft!

lots of ISUP lashed together will do the trick .

 

[500e]

Lashings now there's a thought
PS.
@8ob are you on your way north

 

[8ob]

Lashings now there's a thought
PS.
@8ob are you on your way north

I am on my way back, the skirt up here have ginger beards,hairy legs and I cant understand a word they are saying

Bob

 

[slim_boy_fat]

Step forward John

Passing on that one atm @Parm - I've got enough motor problems to be going on with....

 

[Wedg1e]

You do know the St Nazaire raid was nothing to do with the u boat pens, but the dry dock, which was successfully put out of commission until the end of the war?

Yes... and as I recall was partly responsible for Hitler's 'commando order' which decreed that any foreigners engaged on non-confrontational operations (i.e. sneaking around and planting bombs, lurking in the woods and attacking behind the lines with the Maquis, the Italian partisans etc.) would be executed whether in or out of uniform. That had ramifications for Op. Frankton, the SAS fighting in the Vosges, the Great Escape prisoners among many others.
A further irony was that the Germans didn't dare send Tirpitz out from the Norwegian fjords as she was the last big floating target, so she never needed the dry dock anyway. Arguably (isn't the passage of time great) it would have been better to wait until Tirpitz WAS in the dry dock because at least she'd have been a sitting duck with open approaches, unlike where she stayed hidden.

 

[Wedg1e]

All the techniques so far mentioned incur a large risk of vibration setting off the cargo, thereby negating the purpose of the exercise.
What we need is a strong acid that works underwater, that can dissolve the base of the masts and allow them to be lifted away (keep them under tension from some nearby vessels while the acid does its work).
Of course acid is dangerous stuff, the usual rule is that you add acid to water and not the other way around, so we just park a tanker full of acid next to the wreck with a hose over the side and allow the acid to wash around the masts.
I've run the numbers and assuming the metal is 10mm thick (I'm not up on ships' masts), and based on experiments using ferric chloride to dissolve copper while making circuit boards (it's only a matter of scale ) I think we'd need no more than 387,000 gallons of acid and about nine weeks to complete the job, that's if I have the decimal point in the right place.
So if the bean counters can put up some figures to have a couple of suitable vessels on-station for that time, plus crews, plus the acid of course, which I leave to the chemists among you (must be immiscible in saline and ideally gel-based to slow down the rate of dispersion)... you get the idea

 

[500e]

Further in depth recon required @8ob
The job starts Monday early around 0950bst so turn around the boys are depending on you
@Parm. Seems under utilised at present

 

[Keith 66]

I once stayed at the Royal hotel in Sheerness, it was actually quite good. The Top Banana night club down the docks way was reputedly quite lively, a mate spent some time chatting up a tranny there once, It told him "My names tony with a Y". Just down the road is Queenboro, slightly more salubrious espesially since the glue factory shut. The Admirals arm micro pub is excellent. Sheppey is a strange place.

 

[500e]

Sounds like Imingham

 

[addjunkie]

I once stayed at the Royal hotel in Sheerness, it was actually quite good. The Top Banana night club down the docks way was reputedly quite lively, a mate spent some time chatting up a tranny there once, It told him "My names tony with a Y". Just down the road is Queenboro, slightly more salubrious espesially since the glue factory shut. The Admirals arm micro pub is excellent. Sheppey is a strange place.

So when I were younger and dafter than I am now, I was in the merchant navy, I visited both sides of the medway during my time, with fruit into Sheerness, oil into the Isle of Grain, also coal from the North east into Kingsnorth power station. I have memories of getting slightly worse for wear in both Hoo, and Sheerness. Sheerness was a proper sea port, with all that goes with it. Hoo from what I remember was quite a nice place.

Sounds like Imingham

An odd place I went there too......the County pub rings a bell. But it was a long time a go

 

[daleyd]

Yes... and as I recall was partly responsible for Hitler's 'commando order' which decreed that any foreigners engaged on non-confrontational operations (i.e. sneaking around and planting bombs, lurking in the woods and attacking behind the lines with the Maquis, the Italian partisans etc.) would be executed whether in or out of uniform. That had ramifications for Op. Frankton, the SAS fighting in the Vosges, the Great Escape prisoners among many others.
A further irony was that the Germans didn't dare send Tirpitz out from the Norwegian fjords as she was the last big floating target, so she never needed the dry dock anyway. Arguably (isn't the passage of time great) it would have been better to wait until Tirpitz WAS in the dry dock because at least she'd have been a sitting duck with open approaches, unlike where she stayed hidden.

Hmmm Well, I’m not sure this raid was attributed in any way to hitlers commando order - that was generally acknowledged to be the result of a raid on Dieppe, plus some others where allied commandos had bound the hands of prisoners and then killed them - the commando order was retribution for these supposed indiscretions.

As well as this the raid was never intended to slow the Germans down - it was always intended as a way of preventing Tirpitz having a base from which to roam the Atlantic, in which case it is generally considered to have been a success. Bearing in mind not that much earlier the sister ship Bismarck had sunk the Hood with loss of ~1500 lives and badly damaged Prince of Wales. If it got out in the Atlantic with air cover and u boat escort then it could have caused mayhem for convoys. It’s always good to look back at these things from the knowledge we have today, but the decisions taken at the time, with their limited information available seem pretty logical when viewed in that context.

 

[Wedg1e]

Hmmm Well, I’m not sure this raid was attributed in any way to hitlers commando order - that was generally acknowledged to be the result of a raid on Dieppe, plus some others where allied commandos had bound the hands of prisoners and then killed them - the commando order was retribution for these supposed indiscretions.

As well as this the raid was never intended to slow the Germans down - it was always intended as a way of preventing Tirpitz having a base from which to roam the Atlantic, in which case it is generally considered to have been a success. Bearing in mind not that much earlier the sister ship Bismarck had sunk the Hood with loss of ~1500 lives and badly damaged Prince of Wales. If it got out in the Atlantic with air cover and u boat escort then it could have caused mayhem for convoys. It’s always good to look back at these things from the knowledge we have today, but the decisions taken at the time, with their limited information available seem pretty logical when viewed in that context.

The reference to 'slowing them down' was my take; granted they had to try and fix the dry dock in case it was needed, but in such terms the Dams raid had a far greater effect on diverting resources - including pulling manpower from building the Atlantic Wall defences which could have made the D-Day landings (or any other attempted landing) even harder.
Not sure where I saw the dock raid as part of Hitler's justification for the commando order, but in any case it's reasonable to assume that because we pulled off so many sneaky jobs like Bordeaux, St. Nazaire, the minisub raid on Tirpitz, the capture of the Bruneval radar, the SAS getting started in North Africa etc. where the Germans thought they were fighting a straightforward 'march in and take over' war, everything would add up. And of course it was a bit bloody two-faced of them to complain about us shooting a few of theirs whilst tied-up when they were systematically wiping out unarmed civilians, but that's another matter...

 

[Bullet2012]

While we are all talking about this, remembering today is 6th June, a very different day in 1944.
All gave some, Some gave all.

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

While we are all talking about this, remembering today is 6th June, a very different day in 1944.
All gave some, Some gave all.

As my Uncle said, he went ashore on the second wave. To set up HMS Belfast Forward OP for her guns.

"War doesn't decided who is wrong or right.
War just leaves those who are left."

 

[slim_boy_fat]

War just leaves those who are left."

And it's the victors who write/rewrite history.

 

[Keith 66]

Well it looks like the job is still up for grabs. BBc Essex doing their annual scaremongering story about the wreck. Apparently tenders have been invited three times by the Mod to remove the masts & nobody wants the job!
I cant say im surprised. There was an explosives man on the radio & his attitude was leave it alone. Think the risk of a ship plowing into it is rather higher.

 

[grim_d]

I am on my way back, the skirt up here have ginger beards,hairy legs and I cant understand a word they are saying

Bob

Oh stop it, I'll get frisky.

 

[500e]

Hope all interested parties have read (attachment) due diligence is required, I feel some here are not taking this task seriously, Inflation is becoming a worry
https://assets.publishing.service.g..._data/file/806176/SSRM_Survey_Report_2017.pdf

 

[Bullet2012]

Right as my share of the proceeds has now all been spent, I have found us another project.
This one is a bit safer as no explosives are involved.
booty seems to be all old machines and steam stuff.
who’s in ?

Shipwreck off Alderney identified as steamship Virago

The "once in a lifetime discovery" was part of the merchant fleet that built the British Empire.

www.bbc.co.uk