Another year, another decade

I just had knee replacement surgery and am recovering at home on New Year’s Eve (or should I say Hogmanay?). This severely limits my activities and 2019 will be in the rear view mirror by the time this article goes to press! This year will be completing a decade and on such occasions we tend to take a look back and then forward.

Really significant anniversaries are millennia, bringing to mind the so-called ‘millennium bug’, ie the threat of the technological apocalypse of Y2K, now 20 years in the past, and now remembered largely as a silly case of mass hysteria. How did it affect you in the operation of NDT activities?

I remember Hogmanay in Scotland and first footing! It is a tradition that is supposed to bring luck and prosperity to the household for the New Year! The ritual involves the first person to cross the threshold of a household from the outside in a new year. The first foot should be male, tall, dark and handsome, bringing symbolic gifts: coal for warmth, black bun or shortbread for nourishment, salt for flavour and a wee dram of whisky to warm the heart.

I never did get selected to be the ‘first foot’, although I had three of the pre-requisites!
So, I am sitting watching the New Year festivities across the world and the USA time zones on the television and I do not think I will make it to midnight Pacific Standard Time!

Since my sources for events of interest in the North American sphere are limited by my recent surgery, this month’s article will be quite brief.

NDT does deserve a look into the future, as least as far as the next decade. I am suggesting that readers of this column submit their vision about how NDT will change in this period and what they see as the effects on the NDT workforce and equipment development.

I wish all my readers a happy and prosperous New Year.

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