11 September 2009Suppose you gave a Party and nobody came !?
Big Screen Launch Flops!!
That much hyped Market Square 'Last Night of the Proms' spectacular, fails to hit the right Note.
Nobody Came.
Well what can you say. The general public failed to materialise. The free union jacks were waiting, the jazz band played on, the dancers danced...but joe public stayed at home to watch the X Factor. "Dont worry it will pick up when the Proms starts" said one gloomily faced enthusiast, but it didnt.
Mostly, those officiating from Councils made up the bulk of the crowd. I believe a reputed 75 invitations were sent out to Councillors but apart from those officiating only four showed up. Cllr David Hannent, Cllr Jan Tranter, Cllr Kit Smith, Cllr Sue Chandler.
Those officiating were as follows.. (all councillors).. Bernard Butcher, Chairman of DDC, Sue Jones, Mayor of Dover , Ronnie Philpott, Mayoress, Nigel Collor DDC KCC, Joe Trussler Mayor of Sandwich, Ben Bano Dep Mayor of Deal..and the Chairman of KCC John Davies. As we said above, apart from these few councillors officiating, and the few mentioned above who turned up with an invitation to attend, the vast bulk of councillors didnt show..had no interest.
The blue chairs were laid out in a railed off area waiting for said councilors, but remained empty. After a time some members of the public wandered or straggled in and took the seats, but all chatted away amongst themselves failing hugely to be engaged by a filmed event beamed in from 100 miles away. The gasping sound of stifled yawns could be heard on Mars. After the intermission yours truly slipped away into the dead of night, leaving union jack abandoned on seat, and on the way home indulged gustily in a bag of warming chips! It had been a chilly night, made even chillier by sitting still in front of the screen for hours on end, so a warming bag of chips from the Castle Street purveyor was very welcoming. Oh Dear!
The pictures: Main shot shows a rear view of Bernard Butcher on left and Sue Jones on the right, gazing in the direction of the big screen, no doubt wondering how many more hours there were left to do. The picture on the right shows a section of the 'crowd'. I tried with this picture to give the impression there was a crowd..to flag up the event if you like, but after a while I abandoned all hope of doing that and resigned myself to the fact that it was the Dover equivalent of a bleak night on the Moors!
Paul Boland
* * * *
Fire! Well it looks to have been a bit of a hectic friday for the emergency services. Not only were there a number of accidents all over the place, one illustrated below, but they had this fire to contend with down the far side of the western docks last evening. It drew the attention from yours truly after hearing a series of wailing fire engines scream past in staggered succession. Not sure how long it had been burning before these shots were taken but there were already fire engines there at the scene, so Im assuming they had lessened the intensity by the time of the pix, although a number of engines continued to arrive. The pictures were taken as it was beginning to get dark and from a considerable distance away. Ive now added another picture below but please note this third one is an
enhanced image to try and give a better feel as to what it was actually like at the time...without the camera constraints imposed by the darkening sky. PB
Freaky Friday!
Well sheesh! I dont quite know how to describe this one. A freak accident for sure. A car travelling within the grounds of the actual Gateway residential area, hit another with such force as to power both the stationary car (the silver one)and itself through a hedged garden and a brick wall of some solidity...popping the silver automobile and itself up onto the seafront lawned area, to the total gobsmacking incredulity of the few passers by. The force must have been enormous.
We understand the elderly driver was badly shaken.
However it truly could have been very nasty indeed..the potential was there for much worse as the car clearly careered out of control.We dont normally do the crash thing on doverforum, but this is so unusual, as the episode was not even on the Queen's Highway, and of course happened for convenience right outside where yours truly abides. Below you can see the assorted angles and of course the multiple services that turned up to deal with the problem.
On the left we have an airborne shot taken just a tad later. The silver car was parked in the disabled parking bay you can see on the left. So some force needed to cause that much shift. The noise was horrendous, I believe, as I myself had just arrived on the scene later by chance. PaulB
The features on Boulogne are now in
ALL RECENT FEATURES
