Old & New Technology

In England and Ireland in our first couple of days we have been interested in some of the technology we have seen, so I'll share a couple that we have managed to photograph.


The first we saw in Chester.  It was one of the aircraft modified to carry parts of the airbus A380 between the various manufacturing sites.  It looks like a huge beluga whale.  This one was photographed through the windscreen of the car as we were driving along and as you can see, we have power lines through the middle of it.  We almost missed it.

As we were driving in Northern Ireland we were held up behind this guy riding along on his bike while pushing a motor mower.  He wasn't particularly successful at it as he fell off a number of times.  We deliberately stayed behind him until we could get this photograph.  Throughout our trip in Ireland, the traffic was held up by cyclists, even on main roads.  The roads are so narrow that it is impossible to get off to the side, so you just have to wait.  Of course there were cycle races (rain, hail or shine) which held us up as well.

Ireland is known for its horse racing, and there are racecourses everywhere.  I think I only noticed one trotting track, but of course you have to exercise the horses somewhere, so why not along the road to the pub!









The Irish fishing fleet is not nearly as large as it used to be, but there are still a lot of fishing boats around.  They need to be pretty tough to put up with the weather in the Irish sea.









We saw this strange looking contraption off Portaferry (N.I.) at the entrance to Strangford Lough.  It wasn't being used at the time, so you can see the workings.  It is a tidal-powered electricity generator. As you might be able to see, it has two propellors on the end of each of its arms which are lowered into the tidal race between the sea and the Lough.  For the technically minded it is a twin rotor 1.2MW SeaGen and it generates 10MWh of energy.  It was installed in 2008.  For more information (and a clearer picture) see http://www.seageneration.co.uk.  At least one other tidal generator is being trialled here as well. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evopod