Front cover of the book Autos Biographie by Jacques Godbout
Jacques Godbout has found a very interesting way to present his autobiography. The cars that he once owned or rented , even those who he attempted to drive without success, become the link that the reader follows to travel around the world, always learning something new about the author’s life.
This is a refreshing book, filled with humor, where the author presents his family and many other people with whom he studied or worked, including Robert Bourassa, a former Prime Minister of Quebec.
Back cover of the book Autos Biographie by Jacques Godbout
As a citizen of Quebec City, I was surprised to learn that it is the rounded shape of the St-Laurent bar, inside Château Frontenac, that inspired Jacques Godbout and three of his friends (Paul Buissonneau, Gilles Carle and Jacques Languirand) when they were asked to sketch the beautiful Montreal Expo 67’s pavillion “L’homme dans la cité” (Man in the Community).
The Harlequin in front of the Jean Gaulin refinery in Lévis, 2017.
The picture above shows the Harlequin, a bulk carrier built in 2012 that has a 9.7 meter draught. It sails under the Cyprus convenience flag. On June 18th 2017, when the photo was taken, it was in front of the Jean Gaulin refinery in Lévis, Quebec, and was about to cross the Atlantic heading to Rouen, France. The Jean Gaulin refinery is Quebec’s largest refinery and ranks second in Canada when it comes to refining crude oil.
The photo was taken at 21:07, just before nightime. Since I was positioned on the highest floor of the Quai des Cageux wooden tower, there were constant vibrations associated with people going up and down the stairs. The tower’s movement combined with a moving vessel made the use of of tripod totally useless. It was thus necessary to make a handheld photo, which seriously increased the risk of a blurred picture considering the lack of light.
A Canon EF 85mm f/1.2 II USMfixed lens installed on a Canon 5DSRfull frame camera helped to make a successful shot. The fact that this kind of lens requires very little light increases the photographer’s margin of manoeuver. It would obviously have been possible to increase the ISO to 6000 and more to compensate for the poor lighting, but that would have degraded the photo’s quality. The ISO was thus limited to 2000, with a shutter speed of 1/200 sec and a 1.6 aperture.
In order to limit the risk of a blurred picture, it was necessary to follow the movement of the ship with the camera. The closer one gets to immobilizing the ship in the viewfinder, the better the chances of a defined photo.
Since the ship was farther than it appears on the picture above, some cropping was mandatory to bring the vessel to a decent size. If the ISO had been too elevated to start with, the ensuing photographic grain would have been too big after the cropping and the quality of the picture would have suffered. With an ISO limited to 2000, the image kept a decent definition.
For other pictures of ships on my website, click on the following link : Ship photography.
Two Porter Airlines Bombardier Q-400 on the Toronto Billy Bishop airport
That is what happens when there is only one taxiway and both pilots refuse to give way…
You have certainly realized that there are no conflict here and that, a fraction of a second later, both Porter AirlinesBombardier Q-400 aircrafts continued taxiing, one towards the ramp and the other one towards one of the runways of the Toronto Billy Bishop airport in Ontario.
Few seconds before, I was watching both aircrafts getting closer with each other. Being of the same format, it was possible to get a special effect. Every fraction of a second counts when doing street photography so I took several shots and chosed the one that allowed the minimal space between the two aircrafts.
The title of this French book could be translated as: “Memories without glory: the confessions of an airline pilot”. A bit of modesty was certainly required in order to publicly expose one’s own flying mistakes, especially when that person is an airliner captain.
Front cover of the book: “Souvenirs sans gloire – Les confessions d’un pilote de ligne”
However, the book does not relate only some of the errors made by the author, Michel Vanvaerenbergh, but also those of the crew members working at the time for the Sabena airline company.
Generally, flying errors are discussed in private and corrective actions are published by each airline company for their staff in order to limit the risk of repeating the same mistakes. But to actually publish a book on one’s own mistakes is quite original and also very useful. Beginners or experienced pilots will certainly profit from the author’s past experiences.
Some of the stories are quite scary: on several occasions, the reader realizes that the pilots and passengers were lucky to survive a flight. Once, the pilots had to decide if a runway was long enough for take-off. They did not have the appropriate documents on board to calculate what was needed and the Sabena office was closed. They estimated that they could do it but realised too late that is was not the case, seeing the end of the runway approaching quickly. They forced the Boeing off the ground before it had reached the appropriate speed. The aircraft refused to climb for seven minutes. That meant that the aircraft was close to stalling and that everyone on board nearly escaped death.
Back cover of the French book: “Souvenirs sans gloire”
The author tells the story of crew members under the influence of alcohol with whom he had to deal with. There is also the unbelievable account of a test flight with Yemeni pilots who never used the appropriate charts to adjust the parameters of the aircraft. To make it easier, they preferred assuming the aircraft was always at its maximum weight.
On a few occasions, too much assertiveness from pilots and crew members almost resulted in an airliner crash.
The literary style has only one objective: go straight to the point. So forget any fanciful writing. Moreover, there are no paragraphs in this small book, something to which I was not used. But those are only details and the reader can easily deal with them.
Considering the intensity of real life stories, “Souvenirs sans gloire” is certainly a book not to be missed, especially for the aviation enthusiast.
