1/72 Airfix Bloodhound

by Justin Davenport

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Silly Week 2006

 

THE DAY THE OIL RAN OUT

Yes, the world really did run out of oil in December 2012. In early 2012 a super bug escaped from a biological warfare lab….this super bug did not harm humans in any way and no one got sick from it. However, this super bug turned out to be one that thrived on a diet of crude oil. That’s right. The same stuff that kept industrial civilization going. Within ten months, the super bug had contaminated the world’s oil supplies to such an extent that they were all gone.

Naturally, the world’s civilization fell into chaos and had a very difficult time adapting to a world without internal combustion. Many, many crazy ideas were attempted by individuals, corporations, and governments world wide in an effort to keep some semblance of civilization going. One of the wildest and most impractical ideas was the U.S. Postal Service’s “Rocketmail” program. This program involved requisitioning stocks of decommissioned surface to air missiles to deliver mail from sorting centers to points up to 100 miles away, where the mail would be picked up by couriers on foot. UPS and FedEx tried similar programs, as did Canada Post, the European postal services, the Russians, the Brazilians, the Chinese, and others. The Rocketmail missiles occasionally exploded on their pads, and when they did fly, sometimes they didn’t get to the right place. Also, about 20 percent of the mail canisters suffered parachute failures, resulting in broken packages. A package sent by Rocketmail had less than a thirty percent chance of making it to its advertised destination within the time specified by the printed brochures. Early disasters with broken items (iPod super nano’s, Black Box resin cockpits, computer parts, etc.) caused the program to be eventually restricted to letters and postcards.

Canada Post tried to use surplus stocks of Bristol Bloodhound surface to air missiles to implement its own “Rocketmail” program. The missile pictured here was involved in a particularly infamous incident, when a shipper placed the wrong shipment labels on boxes marked “FRAGILE”. Despite standing instructions NOT to ship “FRAGILE” boxes by Rocketmail, a large and expensive shipment of women’s watches, crystal vases and diamond jewelry was placed in the nosecone of this Bloodhound based near Saint John, New Brunswick. The missile and its mail canister landed near Moncton with a thud….and local women rioted for three days when they heard what happened to their precious orders. Husbands and boyfriends cowered and attempted to calm their womenfolk, and more than a few guys ended up lonely. Ultimately all Rocketmail programs were shut down as the world found better ways to deliver the mail. A latter-day “Pony Express” and “Donkey Express” (for larger items) saved the day in the U.S. and Canada, and nuclear power plants eventually became the premier way to deliver electricity everywhere, with coal fired plants running a distant second and wind power third. Electric trains became the nation’s new transcontinental transport option and sub orbital rocket planes based on Space Ship One became the new standard for high-speed air travel. By 2027, world civilization had largely recovered from the near-death experience of 2012.

THE MODEL

I ended up with a 1/72nd scale Airfix Bloodhound SAM model after one of my IPMS Salt Lake City meetings. I only built the missile and the launcher, and I sprayed it with white primer and then gloss white. A Sharpie pen was used to apply “CANADA POST”. This missile may end up being repainted and redone as a standard British SAM, but I’ve got lots of other things I want to get to first.

Justin 

Photos and text © by Justin Davenport