Ghost Mail Weekender

Happy Sunday Voornaam,

A lot of nervous flyers just got even more nervous this week after news broke of a mysterious and tragic mid-air collision between a passenger plane and a military helicopter near Washington DC’s Ronald Reagan Airport. But don’t panic - our resident trivia hound, Dominique, is here to remind you that most airplane emergencies end in a safe landing. Even the ones where the captain is halfway out the window.
That’s what happened on the 10th of June 1990, when the cockpit windscreen on British Airways Flight 5390 blew out thanks to incorrectly fitted bolts (we checked - it wasn’t a Boeing this time). Due to the rapid decompression of the cockpit, Captain Tim Lancaster was sucked halfway out of the window. His legs snagged on the controls while his upper body flailed outside.
Fortunately, flight attendant Nigel Ogden managed to grab Lancaster’s belt just in time, while the rest of the crew secured the cabin, reported the emergency and reassured passengers. With his head repeatedly slamming against the fuselage and his torso exposed to freezing winds, the crew assumed that Captain Lancaster was deceased, but First Officer Alastair Atchison refused to give the order to let him go, determined to land the aircraft with its captain still on board.
Finding the right co-worker is so important in your career.
For 20 harrowing minutes, various crew members held on to Lancaster’s legs as Atchison made an emergency landing at Southampton. Incredibly, Captain Lancaster survived his ordeal with only an assortment of frostbite, bruises, and fractures. Flight attendant Ogden suffered a dislocated shoulder and later PTSD, which caused him to end his flying career and seek greener pastures on the ground. And the wildest part? Five months after the ordeal, Lancaster went back to flying. Absolute legend.
If it turns out that there's more to this US air disaster than meets the eye, you would probably bet on Netflix to make the documentary, wouldn't you? The company isn't just the master of the docuseries, but also iconic multi-season stuff like Stranger Things. This is all part of the Netflix Originals strategy, which has been core to the company's growth to over 300 million subscribers. In her column this week, Dominique Olivier explores the cultural impact of the Netflix strategy and why it is so valuable.
If anyone from Netflix is looking for another great story, then the tale of Julia Albu and her 12,000km road trip across Africa in a Toyota Conquest just might do it. Read on for that story as well as Dominique's Fast Facts based on the strangest crimes of 2024.
Have a lovely day!

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Netflix: the Originals gamble

Julia's African Conquest

TL;DR: In June 2017, Julia Albu did what most 80-year-olds would never dream of: she packed up her 20-year-old Toyota Conquest (affectionately named Tracy), turned the key, and set off from Cape Town to London.
No big deal, just a casual 12,000 km road trip across Africa. The car was old, she was old, and their way of celebrating a combined century of existence was to take the long way round to visit her daughter in England.
Now, while the decision may have been made on a whim, Julia wasn’t reckless. She spent a full year planning the trip, plotting a route through the eastern side of Africa, rallying sponsors, teaming up with a literacy charity, and setting up a blog to share the adventure.
And what was the grand inspiration behind this audacious journey? Julia explained it best herself:
"I was in my kitchen, listening to the radio, when the host started talking about how much a certain politician had spent on cars for his wives. I was fuming. What a waste of money! So, on a whim, I called the station and said, ‘I’m 80, my Toyota is 20, together we’re 100, and we’re both in top shape - so I’m driving to London!"
The second she put it out into the world, the calls started rolling in. Friends wanted to know if she was serious. Which, of course, meant she had to commit. It wasn’t like she had a packed schedule; her long-time partner had recently passed, she was broke, and, as she put it, "I couldn’t knit." So why not?
Of course, no great adventure is without its hiccups. One of Julia’s biggest was arriving at the Kenya-Ethiopia border only to discover she didn’t have enough carnet sheets (essentially a car’s passport) to get Tracy across. Thanks to an unplanned detour through Uganda, she had run out. So, with zero fuss, she simply turned around and drove 10 hours back to Nairobi to fix the problem.
The other major challenge was money, or lack thereof. Fortunately, the universe seemed to have a soft spot for Julia and Tracy. Thanks to her blog, kind strangers along the route opened their homes, eager to hear the story of the feisty granny and her indestructible Conquest.
So how do you prep a 20-year-old hatchback for a cross-continental adventure? Julia had a very clear approach: minimal tinkering. The only major modification was lifting the suspension for better ground clearance (courtesy of her son-in-law). Other than that, it was just a full service, new tyres donated by her neighbour, and a little personal touch: reupholstering the interior in fabric she loved. Because if she was going to spend months in the car, it might as well feel like home.
When she finally rolled into London, Tracy had racked up over 366,000 km, and the mechanics at Currie Motors were stunned. After a full check-up, the only real maintenance needed was cleaning the brakes, replacing a rubber exhaust mount, and swapping out some suspension bushes. Not bad for a 20-year-old car that had just crossed a continent!
Sadly, Julia Albu passed away in October 2021. Her legacy lives on in every road trip dreamer who believes that adventure isn’t about age, it’s about saying “why not?” and just going for it. Also, it turns out that the Hilux isn't the only indestructible Toyota option.

Dominique's fast facts:
Strangest crimes of 2024

An assortment of facts that will only take you five minutes to read.

In March, a woman dressed in black broke into a bakery in Richmond, Australia and stole an iPad, a pair of chef’s shoes, some cleaning products and a few croissants. Video footage from a CCTV camera shows her doing a full yoga routine in the bakery parking lot before commencing with the break-in. She has since been dubbed “the flexible burglar”!

In April, police in Brazil detained a woman suspected of wheeling a dead man, who she said was her uncle, to a bank to withdraw a four-figure loan. Bank tellers called the police after they noticed the woman propping up the head of an elderly man in a wheelchair and trying to get his hand to clasp a pen.

In August a 38-year-old man entered an apartment in Rome, sat on the bed, and began reading a book that he found there. The 71-year-old homeowner eventually woke up, noticed the stranger in his room and alerted the police. The man denied any intent to steal, claiming he had fallen onto the balcony while admiring the view and simply started reading the book after discovering it.