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BIRD'S EYE VIEW
Page 30
Page 31
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BY THE HAWK
• An armed robber who chose a Number 12 bus as his getaway vehicle didn't reckon on the long arm of the law being on-board. The unlucky felon hopped on the bus in London's Regent Street clutching £50,000 stolen from the Leeds Building Society.
Other passengers helped an off-duty policeman tackle and disarm the robber who was eventually overpowered and escorted off the bus at Picaddily Circus. The policeman was alerted when he saw the man flee from the building society with a cashier in pursuit. The gun was found to be a fake.
Rather more successful is Jack Kelm, an 82-year old from Greeley in Colorado. Selfstyled supremo of the Colorado Over the Hill Gang, Kelm was wanted by the Colorado police for nearly a dozen armed holdups since he turned 80.
Kelm's speciality was to rob the bank and make his getaway on a 10-speed bicycle. He was finally captured by the police following a fairly leisurely "lowspeed" chase.
• Hampshire bodybuilding specialist United Services Garages has won a contract to produce the latest vehicles to bear the famous Ferrari name and prancing horse emblem — a pair of trailers which, with 38-tonne Iveco Ford tractor units are worth around 2200,000 apiece. The trailers' planned loads will be worth even more because they will be used to transport Formula 1 racing cars.
Every cubic centimetre of space has been used, from storage for 100 wheels above the work benches, to belly-line compartments with sliding racks for racing engines. One of the trailers will be used as the team's computerised nerve centre, with the cars sending out signals about braking, acceleration, G-forces and engine temperatures as they hurtle around the track.
• Interlink parcels founder Richard Gabriel has joined the super-rich, according to a recent Sunday Times magazine guide to the 200 richest people in the country. In eight years, Gabriel and his mother, Rosemary Budgen, have built up Interlink into a £45 million business. The family's 70% stake is now valued at a cool E30 million.
• Remember 18 months ago when Roads and Traffic Minister Peter Bottomley announced the use of these vehicles on motorways to warn of forthcoming moving roadworks?
At the time, Bottomley said: "They will only be used when traffic is light and the signs can clearly be seen by drivers, giving them time to move out of the lanes being used by the working vehicles."
It seems that some drivers' eyesight has proved worse than Bottomley thought. Motorists have been crashing into the rear of these sign trucks even though many travel on the hard shoulder.
Now local authorities are trying to minimise the danger and reduce the damage to their vehicles by buying giant cushions from American supplier Hale Road Safety. The cushions simply fix to the back of the sign truck, thereby reducing the impact of any unwelcome advances.
• Stroud police station had a surprise visitor recently in the form of P-reg Opel Kadett. The vehicle crashed through the station's glass front door, demolishing a brick wall and wooden seats in the process, before coming to rest inches from the police desk.
Officer on duty Sergeant Bernie Swatton did not make a move — indeed he couldn't; he was pinned to his desk. But this did not stop him taking the particulars of the Opel and its driver.
A 28-year-old man is helping police with their enquiries. The Hawk wonders if he is also helping with the clearing up.
• Toad crossings may sound like something concocted by a mind on the turn but drivers on the A490 near Welshpool will soon be faced with "Toad Ahead!" warning signs put up by the Montgomeryshire Wild Life Trust.
• The spirit of Perestroika is seen in improved trading relations between the superpowers. While the Russians consume as many Levi jeans as their foreign exchange restrictions allow, the Americans are lapping-up an altogether more macho product — the Belaz S19 dump truck.
The Belaz S19 is big. It has a maximum payload of 75 tonnes and all-wheel-drive, and is proving popular in the US mining industry.
Spurred on by its US success, Belaz has linked up with MAN to develop a longhaul, heavy-duty on-road truck powered by an MAN diesel engine. The two companies now plan to develop trucks for Third World markets.
• What is the oldest load you have ever carried? Baked beans past their expiry date, a trailer full of betting slips for last year's Grand National, or a Lufengosaurus?
The latter is a 200-millionyear-old dinosaur discovered in China and currently being transported from the Natural History Museum in London to its, next date in Stockholm.