Folks should read page A17 of todays The Press newspaper, there's a good article on a new report detailing the complete cover up of key information about their nuke testing crimes.
This stuff gets me pretty riled up, the french are a pack of arrogant cunzzors, and also being the only nation to have ever engaged in direct terrorism against NZ I reckon they should be immigration blocked.


French testing Hydrogen bomb on Mururoa atoll to see if it works ok.

Looking for troubles?
Get a life. You're getting arongant and pathetic.

What's this got to do with kiting? You can't blame the whole French nation for the actions of a few arrogant bastards (or should that be batards?). Think of the good things the French have given us - croissants, pasteurised milk, the language of lurv... and last but not least, inflatable kite technology (although the sneaky buggers did put a patent on it...). We all have skeletons in the closet - including NZ (who split the damn atom in the first place?).

BTW - kiting was BALLISTIC at Brighton today .

The wonderful thing about having more french people living in the South Pacific is that they can complain vociferously the next time someone from their home country makes noises about letting off an atomic bomb in their backyard.

Without sounding trite, Kanus, globalisation increases the amount of really pissed off stakeholders! Every year the population of New Caledonia gains another 1000 permanent Frenchies from the mainland, and if you think they got pissed about drinking the milk of two headed chernoble (sp) cows in France.....

And I would be surprised if most kiwis were not aware of the french testing in the pacific - it was quite the hot topic when I was a kid, and for a six year old to remember the fuss it must have been a humdinger.

Can I ask what the current fascination is? Are you angling for a falling out over fallout?

PS: John has a point: this is a kiting forum, but I love the fine kiwi tradition of making everything political!

Ahhhhhh... eeeeeexcellent. You are of course correct John, in that this has nothing to do with kiting unless you were planning on a kiting trip to that particular atoll group. I was in fact 'angling for a fallout' and have received my prize. In reality I have no unusual dislike of the French above or beyond that of the average kiwi, particularly of those whom have seen fit to escape to these fair shores. Heck I'm a mongrel of German and English breeding, neither of which have a proud history. At least the French had the good sense to choose a remote atoll... whereas the British didn't waste all that time and effort and just perfected their firecrackers in above ground testing on the Wimmera plain in SE Australia (an obvious point I was expecting). I was slighted by an arrogant meddling nosey busybody, sorry, although this forum is pretty drab because it is so monofocal and apolitical. I see nothing wrong with discussing current events and the media also, I mean it was a poignant (thank you france) article to be sure. What with all the kerfuffel over the Iranian nuclear ambition and so on. And on top of that, at new years over a jug of Otagos finest in an old Clyde pub, Allan warbled on for ages about this very topic. He was blah blah blah about coverups and how the French authorities ordered all the local population onto two atolls at the end of the chain and about how they complained they were cursed islands where people died. And so they did. And there in plain print in todays press the article mentions the "ciguatera", a natural fish poisoning from a certain type of coral there. Poisoning which has effects difficult to distinguish from those of increased radiation exposure. The Northeaster was so strong today that I could stop peddling during gusts biking up the steepish top section of the rapaki track with a tail wind.

mmmm gusting ne 42 knots on the meter at aramoana today, i could only just hold it together on my 13, danger phil on his 12 did 50m, then dragged outa the water across the beach, up the dunes and stopped when he grabbed two handfuls of marram grass!

i aint put that much sand on a kite when setting up for a loooong time

I find it real hard to self launch it in wind over 25knots as it flaps around to much. How the hell do you keep it flat?

Craig why didnt you just put your size 20 shoes on your kite to hold it down, I'm sure that would of done the job
Seen you in Stance, can I have your autograph big boy. :oops:

yes for a one time only payment of $69.95, form a queue no pushing ladies pleeeeeez.......

folding over the upwind tip as normal but twice as much sand

then at the flappy end just keep biffing sand onto it, not a pile just let it spread out, somewhere between the middle of the kite and the end, when it stops flapping thats enough, oh and pull the kite out flat from the downwind end to keep it flat

gotta watch it coz the extra sand will try and deflate the kite and the more air the better in high winds

full depower and up it goes.....

also heard that a taco launch is good in high winds too, tip to tip sand both tips and launch like you would off the water, never tried it though

of course it wasn't 42k on the water but it was easily over 30

Don't try and dress it up - you're from Taylorville...dirty old, crook o' the river Taylorville. Just like the whitebait from below the Grey river outfall pipe you are 'export quality', but don't get any flash ideas, you're still one of them!

PS, It's Woomera, you nong.

Everyone missed the point of this thread!

What pub in clyde where ya in for new years?

My goodness your right, was a cobwebbed memory, sounds similar. I didn't think I was dressing it up, actually I am from a long line of dirty old blacksmiths from Taylorville, hard to dress that up, not that there's a need. Pub in Clyde? no idea, street was closed and full of people boogying and it was pretty dark.

http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/lcj/wayward/ch16.html
This site makes interesting reading about what the brits got up to.

Used it for the crims may as well blow up parts of it as well. Go the empire!

Chirac's new hope published today...
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article339823.ece
Would be nice if he fails in the elections.

i thought you'd be more of a BBC kind of bloke.

Unfort' if Chirac doesn't get in, the National Front might. Then there will be an even bigger issue to deal with rather than what the french did in the past.