Ahhh it's real now - I am now officially a married woman and am not quite used to being referred to yet as 'Mrs Murdie'. It makes me sound old but I have to keep reminding myself that I am still young (honest!!)

The other thing that is seeming very real now is the Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft on which the Trent 1000 will fly (in case you hadn't figured it out yet, that's the engine I work on, so maybe I'll travel by boat in future?...), as it has now been unveiled to the world. Because these things don't come along that often they are always fairly glitzy occasions but the 787 event even took over a whole stadium in Seattle for the Boeing staff to watch live footage. I can't wait to see it fly for the first time later in the year. I will never forget the feeling of pride and satisfaction seeing the Airbus A380 and Trent 900's first take off and I hope that the 787 dreamliner is even more special. Some people get to see this stage of a project once in their career but I am already on my second and I am still fairly early in my career. One of the really cool bits of the unveiling though happened a day before - they had a flying display and landing of all the different Boeing 7 series family including the 747 Rolls-Royce flying test bed (FTB) where we fit a Trent 1000 in place of one of the normal engines to do some early flight testing before the 787 flies.

The project is really picking up pace now and is in one of its most exciting phases so keep an eye out for future blogs on its progress. If you want to see some pictures and info on the engine and its new technologies click on the following link:

http://www.rolls-royce.com/civil_aerospace/products/airlines/trent1000/1000.htm

That's all for now folks, see ya

As some may have noticed, I have been distinctly bad at blogging over the last six months - I do have a very valid excuse though -my spare time has been somewhat preoccupied with arranging my wedding. So, now with not long to go I thought I should start to introduce my future name - Vicki Murdie. At some point in the near future I will have to update my blog /biog details etc with the new name, it might even help it to seem more real (although I suspect the big white dress and large family gathering may help there too)!!

Work is quite hectic at the moment. I moved jobs within Rolls-Royce a while back (hmm another update to biog required!) and I now work on the Trent 1000 engine for the Boeing 787 dreamliner. I really enjoyed my previous job on the Trent 900 (for the A380 'superjumbo' aircraft) but after being there for a few years, I felt that it was time for a new challenge. The engine I now work on is in its development testing phase, one of the main aims of which is to prove to the certifying authorities that the engine is safe to fly. We have to do many different tests to demonstrate this, so my job just took on even more variety!! I still deal with the temperatures, pressures, speeds etc in the engine as I did on the Trent 900, but there it was flight test engines rather than development engines that I worked with. It sounds like a small change, but I have realised that it's a bit more different than I thought. So when I said it was time for a new challenge, I got what I asked for!! My job is complex, varied and, at times, stressful but certainly never dull................

I saw an article last week in the Daily Mail with a comment from Sir John Rose (Chief Executive of Rolls-Royce) about the decline of engineering and science within our universities and I have to agree with him that it is becoming an important issue. The gist of the article was that Rolls-Royce and many other major British companies are having to look to other nations to supply graduates for certain skill areas. It is certainly true that the team in which I work is made up of British, French and Greek and this is becoming increasingly common. Whilst large companies like Rolls-Royce are now generally seeking to encourage diversity amongst its employees to better reflect the international nature of their business and customers, it would be very sad if they could no longer find the skills they require within the UK graduate population too.

Personally, I feel the government's aim to get more and more young people into university has got its downsides (i.e. quantity instead of quality). It is therefore now becoming very expensive to go to university. With the introduction of top-up fees, people looking at subjects which require a four year Masters degree to get a good job (which seems to be the way that many engineering and science subjects are going), may be put off. Science and engineering degrees tend to have more lectures too, so a part-time job to help towards the cost of being at uni is not always easy to fit in. So I think things are only going to get worse over the next few years. Hopefully, at some point schemes to help support people studying the subjects this country really needs will come about to address this, but I have to admit that I am glad I have already got my degree! I know for me though that it has been worth it as I do really enjoy my job and would still do the same if I was 18 again now. So, I will continue to work happily alongside my international colleagues - and enjoy learning more about their cultures whilst teaching them some of the wierder bits of ours, but I do hope that I will not end up in the minority in the future...