I just picked this up from the internet wires when I got in this evening.

Apparently, a French military show has gone horribly wrong as live rounds have been fired during a showpiece demonstration in place of blanks.

16 cilvilians are reportedly wounded, four of them critically, including a young child.

The incident occurred at a barracks in Aude near Carcassonne during a hostage-freeing demo scenario. The scenario had been acted out several times before hand and on the sixth run, apparently live rounds were in use.

The incident seems like a terrible mistake where live rounds have been accidentally issued to a soldier involved in the display. Police however are not discounting the possibily of ‘foul-play’ at this time.

Those injured are in hospital care in Toulouse.

Due to a change in motoring law[French], drivers traveling into France on or after the 1st of July 2008 will need to take a Hi-Vis vest with them in the car. It is not immediately clear whether a hi-vis is required for every occupant of the vehicle but with the compact size and light weight of modern vests, there seems no reason not to.

The update to the law also seems to make mention of a requirement to carry a displacable warning triangle but I was of the opinion that this was already the law in France.

Common sense says that one high visibility vest should be stowed somewhere within the cabin that the driver can reach. Any further hi-vis vests could be stowed in the boot an accessed in an emmergency by the driver (already wearing theirs). The driver will need to access the warning triangle at the same time and deploy it along the road to give other motorists advance warning of the break-down or accident.

Halifax’s Standard Variable Mortgage (SVR) interest rate now stands at 7.1%

The Halifax rate is often quoted as a benchmark for the UK and this now illustrates the widening disjunction between mortgage interest rates and the Bank of England base rate at 5%

Fixed rate mortgages are now averaging 6.75% for a 2 year fix and 6.72% for a five year fix. To my mind this indicates that the banks are not projecting much easing in the medium/long term either.

In the mean time, Halifax’s regular saver rate hit 10% for 12 months.

Unfortunately, it is rather hard to track SVR historically for individual banks. If anyone has historic data series for any bank’s rates, please let me know on the comments form below.

It appears to be flashing all over the newswires that an Israeli Border Policeman has shot himself at Ben Gurion airport in Israel as French President Nicholas Sarkozy and his new wife Carla Bruni were leaving to return to France.

The incident occurred during a farewell ceremony in the presence of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Israeli President Shimon Peres. French bodyguards rushed the French president and his wife onto the waiting aircraft wile the situation was secured.

The Israeli PM and President returned to Sarkozy’s aircraft after the incident to bid final farewell prior to the flight leaving.

Update: Jerusalem post reports the man shot was a Border Policeman. Also noted is a comment from Israeli policeman Micky Rosenfeld who denied reports that there had been an assassination attempt on the French president.

Update: Although it’s still not 100% clear as to whether it was an accident or suicide, the Border Policeman has now been confirmed as having died from his injuries.

Update: BBC News has a video clip of Sarkozy and Bruni being hurried on to the plane although Sarkozy appears to stop for a moment to wave a brief apollogy for leaving so suddenly. Most of the security ’suits’ appear to be reaching for weapons including one ‘heavy’ who looked like he just might have an ‘automatic briefcase’.

I was out and about on two occasions this evening, the first time on foot, the second on my push bike.

It was frankly eerie. At the end of the evening rush hour, walking along a side road about 200 meters from a main artery on the other side of some buildings, the usual familiar background ‘hiss’ of tyres on tarmac wasn’t present. Certainly there was traffic but nowhere near as much as usual.

Later when I took to the road by bicycle, I was even more surprised as the general absense of heavy traffic. I found my self travelling along one stretch of a normally busy A road for a minute or two where I was the only vehicle moving. I also encountered a higher than normal number of other cyclists and a few walkers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no tree hugger and indeed I own a car but it hasn’t been off the drive in days; the fuel is just too expensive.

Fuel in the UK is now £1.17/litre for petrol or £1.30/litre for diesel (The equivalent of US $8.52 / US Gallon)

There was still a small contingent of lunatics on the road it seemed though. First there was the original ‘boy racers’ in barried-up shopping trollies doing their level best to anhiallate themselves and others and the inevitable Evo VII crowd burning more fuel per inch than anyone else on the road. Clearly the credit crunch hasn’t quite caught up with these demographics yet.

One thing is for sure, the UK’s economy can’t survive if all the motorists are priced off the roads.

American motorists are crossing the Mexican border in order to obtain cheaper, subsidised fuel for their cars.

The price of petrol [gasoline] in Mexico is around $1.40 a US gallon cheaper than in the USA. This has seen Americans living close to the border crossing over despite the threat of drugs related border violence in order to fill up their cars.

Some motorists waiting to fill up in the daytime heat in Tijuana even came to fisticuffs with others waiting for fuel. The demand for fuel from American motorists is so great that supplies in Tijuana are running short. The drug cartel killings which scared away much of the American tourism in the area do little to deter an American with his mind set on getting his fix of gasoline.