The Curious Case of the Missing Story

Every morning one of the first things we do is check the New Zealand media to see what's been happening at home while we were sleeping.  Yesterday morning we woke to the following headline in the New Zealand media, Man Dives Off Tower Bridge In Taxi Protest.

The headline caught my eye for several reasons: drama, danger - that bridge is bloody high, protest and I had just blogged a bit on the Olympic Lanes which were at the centre of the protest.  I see the London cabbies' point about the lanes.  London traffic is bad enough without the Olympics, but with the Games and then the removal of access to entire lanes, driving in London will be a nightmare.  How are paying taxi passengers going to take it when they get charged for sitting in traffic with a wide open lane just next to them?  A £130 fine isn't going to make it worth the cabbie breaking the law to satisfy the angry passenger.  Is it?

Anyway, I thought, well, this is a story to watch through the day.  What a way to draw attention to your cause?  He must have been arrested.  There will be comment on rights and wrongs.  What did the Mayor think?   After all, the bridge was chosen because the Mayor's offices are near by.

I turned the BBC Breakfast progamme on.  Nothing was being reported.  I bought the Guardian and the Telegraph later in the morning and nothing in them either.  Now, the protest happened in the late afternoon the previous day.  There was plenty of time to do the story.  I wondered what was up?  Did the New Zealand media get it wrong?

I turned to Google.  The story was being reported around he world, but not in London or the UK. There were a few UK minor stories about the protest and maybe a couple of blog posts mentioning the jumper at the time it happened.  The only UK based media with a full story was the BBC website, but that was not being broadcast widely, if at all, domestically.

It was all very odd.  I mean this is the land of scandalous reporting of minor details of people's personal lives and the land of reporters who hacked the phone of a murdered teenager for a story, but a man jumps off a bridge in protest and nothing - zilch, nada.

I get that you don't want to encourage the let's-try-this-at-home brigade by showing it over and over.  The guy was damn lucky to have survived.  Clearly, the tide was high, he pick the right place and he was very lucky on his timing.  But why NO reporting?  The rest of the world thought it newsworthy. Was it because he lived?  Or, is there some law, code or agreement that stops the media from reporting such matters?  And, if there is, what other stories have the British media agreed not to tell us?

Just In Time - It's Summer!

Olympics Count Down in Trafalgar Square

The Great British Summer all the advertising has been talking about has finally arrived.

Well, I guess we can't be sure it's 'great' yet, but it's started.  It was sort of here yesterday, but today there is no doubt.  It's Summer beautiful - not a cloud in the sky and warm, very warm.  And, it's supposed to last until Friday!

Yeah, I know, that doesn't seem to be anything to get excited about, but hey, this is the longest hot dry spell we've had since late May.   June was the wettest on record and July was heading that way until today.

To celebrate arrival of The Great British Summer, I went on a long walk through town after my torture session at the gym this morning - yep back to a trainer and it's Mr Way Fit.  I wanted to pick up our Eurostar tickets for Paris next month.  So, it was off to St Pancras International Station and then a walk back home before my legs ceased up.  Mr Way Fit IS definitely trying to kill me.  For three days after the first session last week, standing up hurt, sitting down hurt, walking hurt, breathing hurt, basically if I moved it hurt!

Anyway, the walk in the sunshine was quite enjoyable.  I notice quite the buzz developing around town with the London 2012 Olympics only four days way.   There were people everywhere and most weren't speaking with British accents or even speaking English for that matter.  Cops were everywhere and they were being put to good use.  I literally saw four instances of cops holding maps that had been handed to them by tourists and London's finest were pointing out the way to this or that in baby English.  These weren't the cops carrying the rifles or machine guns or what ever those big guns are that you see wandering the streets these days.  Those cops were not surprisingly being given a wide berth.

Olympic Defences

First it was surface to air missile batteries on apartment blocks and in parks around the Olympic Stadium and Village.  Then, yesterday, for the first time since World War II a British warship was brought into the Thames to defend the city.   It wasn't any old Navy ship either.  It was the largest one in the Royal Navy, the amphibious assault ship, HMS Ocean.

Mind you, the HMS Ocean wasn't designed for river duty.  So, it only just managed to just squeeze through the Thames Barrier.  Had it been a mere 10 or 15 feet wider, it would not now be moored at Greenwich ready to take part in the police and military Olympic defence exercises going on this weekend.

We've been warned that over the long weekend, there will be helicopters and war planes flying over the city and police and military vehicles in the streets.  We went for a walk along the Thames this morning and came across some of the river exercises.  First a landing craft of some sort went by.  Then, as we crossed over Tower Bridge six black speed boats complete with machine guns and men dressed in black with balaclavas covering their faces sped out of the Navy base and up the Thames.

A few days ago, I heard a racket over head.  I went to the window to see what was up.  A jumbo jet being escorted by two military jets, one on either side, was flying over head.  This may have been an exercise to reassure, but looking straight up at their underbellies, I wasn't so assured.  I mean where would it have left me and our neighbours if they had decided to shoot it down just then!