Two news items for today

[Invicta]

One.  A gunman attacked passengers on a high speed train from Amsterdam to Paris,  Three Americans, two of them servicemen overpowered the gunman  A British businessman also joined in at the end.  When asked by journalists what he thought at the time, he said "I thought I was going to die anyway, so I might as well have a go."    These are all considered heroes and will or have met the French President.

Two.  I had a text from my daughter "One of the planes just crashed."  My wife then told me my daughter had been at Shoreham Air Show, I switched on the TV just as a breaking news message came up that a Hawker Hunter fighter from the 1950s had crashed on or near the busy A27 road. This is the Main Coast Road in the South of England.    The plane had crashed on the road in a fireball, hitting several cars and killing seven people.  Latest news was that the pilot had survived with life threatening injuries.

http://news.sky.com/story/1540055/seven-dead-as-airshow-jet-crashes-on-road

Edited August 22, 2015 by Invicta

[Invicta]

The four men are indeed heroes.  If they hadn't intervened many people could have been killed.  I salute them.

 

The pilot of the aircraft is still in hospital and is fighting for his life.  It is a wonder he wasn't killed immediately.  Police say that there were seven fatalities but when all the wreckage is removed the re may be more.  They believe there may be eleven, but up to forty people have been reported missing but some of those may be elsewhere.

 

 

[Rosie]

so sad.. praying

[Genevanpreacher]

Yes. Praying.

[MountainChristian]

France has treated them extra special for stopping a terror attack.

[Rosie]

and i appreciate that

[Ukulelemike]

They have, in fact, been knighted as french Knights.

[John81]

They apparently need to get some of those french knights onto the streets of Paris to protect tourists. I recently read an article about a South Korean pop singer on vacation in Paris who was robbed on the street. That lead to the rest of the article discussing the huge number of criminals in Paris who target tourists and they seem to prefer Asians as their targets when possible.

The article also stated pickpockets and purse snatchers were common against tourists in Italy too.

[Invicta]

My wife was on a course for teachers in Paris 1964-5.  She loved Paris.  We have been there a couple of time since.  We will be in the region on Monday next week.  I asked her if she wanted to stay a few days. She said she didn't want to as time we went it had changed and she didn't like it anymore.

In France there are numerous stops on the Autoroutes called aires de repos.  In German restplatz.  Aires have plenty of parking spaces; toilets and sometimes picnic areas.  In the UK we have motorway service areas which are supposed to be rest areas but have become large commercial centres, not much rest there.  But I digress.  

There have been reports that tourists stopping overnight in aires have been targeted by French criminals. We have stopped overnight in a caravan (trailer)  and just in our car and have never had any problems.