Quis Est Mentiri (Who is lying)?

Well, someone is. Today's liars daily (aka The Daily Mail) is carrying a "story", quoted on the BBC web page, about how those sneaky Russians blanked GPS signals and satellite comms to/from the aircraft carrying his Great Most Exalted and Infallible Excellency Grant Shapps to and from Poland. (I see it has now spread to some real newspapers such as the Guardian, Independent etc. oh, and old Aunty BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-68569676). According to the rag known as the Mail, the aircraft suffered a 30 minute black out "as it was flying over the Baltic Sea". Did it now? Furthermore, they claim "the sustained high-tech assault on the plane's hardware is believed to have been run from the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad." Sounds serious; GPS "knocked out"? "Where are we Captain"? Buggered if I know, GPS is not talking to me. This needs a good dose of looking at.

Well, the aircraft, a Dassault Falcon based at RAF Northolt and forming half of the so-called Royal Flight, reg  G-ZAHS, took his Highness, Shapps to an air base in Poland, Olsztyn. It landed there at 10:53 GMT. Having completed his photo ops, it departed this airbase at 16:23 GMT, declaring it was off to Oslo. Except it wasn't going anywhere near Oslo. Flying out of the Polish air base in a north westerly direction, it climbed to 16,000ft and declared it was diverting to Northolt. Gerraway! It should be noted that Kaliningrad is due north of the Polish air base, some 50 miles or so distant. The plane flew across Poland, crossing the German border south of Stettin, skirting Berlin and landing at Northolt at 18:25.

At no time did this aircraft go anywhere near Kaliningrad, neither did it venture over the Baltic Sea. Ever! 

It may be worth mentioning here that, at the time this was "occurring" (or not), airliners from Air India, Finnair, Ryanair and Aeroflot all managed to navigate safely through the area without all bumping and banging into each other.

So, someone is telling fibs. The question is Who? Well, on the one hand we have the MoD. Well known for hiding the facts etc, justifiably in some cases. They are also currently engaged in banging the "government's" drum, coming up with all manner of fairy tales to suit the government's agenda, particularly where Russia and Israel are concerned.

And, in the other corner,  we have dodgy Grant. It would be convenient here to refer you to the Wikipedia page on Shapps. Or, look up the story on how he sold suckers a book which promised to help you make $20,000 in 20 days. The e-book cost $497 and advised the suckers to come up with some crap idea and sell it to other suckers. He was also, at one time, the chairman of an organisation named BBYO. This is a youth group which promotes Zionism. So, I suppose we can look forward to the RAF delivering much needed "aid" to Israel soon!

What more can I say? Oh! I bet you didn't know this; the airaft involved and its sister G-ZABH, may be flying for the RAF Royal Flight but the RAF don't own them though. The owners are Centreline Air Charter Ltd. So, rather than purchase 2 aircraft, they thought it would better to rent them from others. Nothing new there though. When the RAF needed air tankers that could also be used as cattle trucks, shuffling troops around, they contracted AirTanker to provide the aircraft and, approximately every 6 months they would be re-painted and fly holiday makers around for Thomas Cook or Condor. Here's one; G-VYGK except when flying for the RAF it became ZZ340: https://kelvindavies.co.uk/kelvin/details.php?image_id=35643 This one is currently flying troops from Brize Norton to Rzeszow in Poland, just 91 miles from Lvov!