HAS YOUR PILOT BEEN BREATHALYSED?

Less than a week after an airline won a major best airline award two of their pilots were arrested on suspicion of being drunk at the controls as they prepared to take off with 250 passengers on board.

Canadian airline Air Transat, which flies from Scotland to destinations in Canada have confirmed the arrests of Imran Zafar Syed, 37, and Jean Franco Perrault, 39, as they were about to take off from Glasgow Airport at 1.00pm on Monday July 18 and fly to Toronto. Following the arrests, which were thought to follow concerns of other Air Transat staff over “alcoholic impairment” the 250 passengers were led off the plane and put up in Glasgow hotels until they could join a replacement flight the following day. The two, who are represented by their union, have been refused bail and have been charged with breaching Section 93 of the Railway and Transport Safety Act 2003. Continue reading

MORE WOW FACTOR

Another roller coaster crash has again called into question their suitability for safe corporate events.

Following last year’s incident at Alton Towers that caused two young women to have leg amputations this one was on the inverted Tsunami ride at the M&D Theme Park, Motherwell, near Glasgow, where a number of the gondolas suspended below the track derailed and plunged 20 feet to the ground with two adults and seven children on board. One 12-year-old boy suffered serious chest, abdominal and leg injuries and an 11-year-old boy suffered serious arm and hand injuries. Continue reading

HOOKERS AND HARD ROCKERS

The 900-bedroom Cumberland Hotel, Marble Arch is to become the UK’s first Hard Rock Hotel, opening after re-branding in 2018 and the group’s 24th in the franchise.

The hotel does have some associations with rock and roll in that is was where revered guitarist, the late Jimi Hendrix kept a suite as a bolthole and for meeting with the prostitutes that were a big part of the Cumberland’s reputation in the 60’s and 70’s – “hot and cold running hookers” as one Hendrix associate recalls. Hendrix had several boltholes but stayed in the Cumberland after playing his last UK concert, the Isle of Wight Festival in September 1970 where he and the Doors gave performances described as “disappointing” though sets by Miles Davies, Joni Mitchell and the Who were widely praised. Continue reading

DEAL AT LANCASTER UNI

A day delegate rate of £25 per person is being offered by Lancaster University at their Green Lane Conference Centre, this applying to bookings placed before July 31 for September to December events.

The offer includes main meeting room hire and set-up, a deli-buffet lunch and morning and afternoon refreshments and is subject to availability. The centre has 14 rooms for up to 100.

Tel 01524 592444 email [email protected]

EDVARD MUNCH

It is folly to argue with Ingemar Bergman’s description of Edvard Munch, the 1974 documentary by Peter Watkins of the Norwegian Expressionist artist, as “a work of genius”, nor with another view that it is “one of the best films ever made of the artistic process”. Having watched this three hour and forty minute epic through twice we found it a fascinating, poetic and beguiling account of the troubled and often reviled artist who put so much of his damaged self into his paintings. Continue reading

Event Organisers Update June 2016 ISSUE 141

MORE DIE ON DANGEROUS COURSE Four more riders have been killed at this years Isle of Man TT races. This brings the total to more than 260 people killed since the race …

BOOZE LAW BITES The Lush Bar in Magaluf, where a British teenager claimed to have been egged on by bar staff as he drank 75 Sambuca and caramel vodka shots, is being …

DON’T BE LATE EasyJet passengers arriving at the security check with less than half an hour before their flight leaves will not be allowed to board. The new policy, which is …

SAFARI ROCK The famous Glastonbury Festival could be moving 15 miles west, from Worthy Farm, Pilton, Somerset to Longleat, Wiltshire in 2019. The organisers, who …

BIG LONDON SPACES To the Hilton London Metropole hotel, Edgware Road, one of Europe’s largest with 1,059 bedrooms, dining space for up to 2,000 and conference …

HOTEL NEWS
o Twelve guests were rescued by fire crews at the 22-bedroom three-star Rushmore …
o BLOC Hotels, which currently has a unit in Birmingham and one in Gatwick, is …
o The St Regis Hotel, Dubai has opened the Sir Winston Churchill Suite. This is 9,828 …

(1900) NOVECENTO It could be argued that when Italian film director Bernardo Bertolucci made “Twentieth Century” forty years ago in 1976, his memorable five-hour …

MORE DIE ON DANGEROUS COURSE

Four more riders have been killed at this years Isle of Man TT races. This brings the total to more than 260 people killed since the race, which brings in more than £250 million and attracts up to 50,000 valuable visitors every year, was started in 1907.

One of this years fatalities was Paul Shoesmith, 50, who has been honoured with a “Spirit of the TT” PR award by race sponsors Poker Stars, a gambling website based on the island. Race organisers are ACU Events Ltd. Continue reading

BOOZE LAW BITES

The Lush Bar in Magaluf, where a British teenager claimed to have been egged on by bar staff as he drank 75 Sambuca and caramel vodka shots, is being charged with illegally supplying alcohol to a customer who was obviously drunk, a law that also applies in the UK. The teenager, an 18 year-old man from the Midlands collapsed in the street and was treated in hospital for alcohol poisoning. Continue reading