Anybody ever hear of the Horton brothers??? How about the HO229???
Advance warning, this is a LONG video (45 minutes) but worth it if you have time and are an airplane buff!
This is a fascinating story, and one that was ‘close hold’ for many years. Thanks to NG and NatGeo, we now know how ‘good’ their design was. And frankly, it’s scary as hell how close they came to the proverbial “game changer”…
The brother’s Wiki page is HERE.
They take ‘such’ good care of me!!!
But I’m ‘still’ trying to figure out if that is was a cookie or extra packing material!!!
And just in time for the latest trip from hell no less… If I use the glow in the dark stuff, maybe I can actually FIND the bathroom(s) in the middle of the night!
Thanks y’all (you know who you are)!
Over the weekend, we came four votes away from the United States Senate giving our Constitutional rights over to the United Nations. In a 53-46 vote, the senate narrowly passed a measure that will stop the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The Statement of Purpose from the bill read:
To uphold Second Amendment rights and prevent the United States from entering into the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
The U.N. Small Arms Treaty, which has been championed by the Obama Administration, would have effectively placed a global ban on the import and export of small firearms. The ban would have affected all private gun owners in the U.S., and had language that would have implemented an international gun registry on all private guns and ammo.
Astonishingly, 46 of our United States Senators were willing to give away our Constitutional rights to a foreign power.
Here are the 46 senators that voted to give your rights to the U.N.
Baldwin (D-WI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bennet (D-CO)
Blumenthal (D-CT)
Boxer (D-CA)
Brown (D-OH)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Cardin (D-MD)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Coons (D-DE)
Cowan (D-MA)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Franken (D-MN)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Harkin (D-IA)
Hirono (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kaine (D-VA)
King (I-ME)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Merkley (D-OR)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murphy (D-CT)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Sanders (I-VT)
Schatz (D-HI)
Schumer (D-NY)
Shaheen (D-NH)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Udall (D-CO)
Udall (D-NM)
Warner (D-VA)
Warren (D-MA)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Wyden (D-OR)
Remember this in 2014 please…
Words have meanings…
Drone- n.
UAV/UAS- unmanned aerial vehicle/unmanned aircraft system, is an aircraft without a human pilot on board. Its flight is controlled either autonomously by computers in the vehicle, or under the remote control of a pilot on the ground or in another vehicle.
More and more of these autonomously controlled units are coming into existence in the military and are not weaponized. They are programmable to fly specific missions/patterns without intervention.
RPV/A- Remotely piloted vehicle/aircraft, is an aircraft first envisioned by Nicola Tesla in 1915, later utilized by the Army/Air Force in WWII and still in use today with Predator/Reaper/Global Hawk.
These systems are not autonomous, requiring both a pilot and a sensor/weapons operator (depending on the variant). Per USAF documents (so figure the CIA units in the covert ops are similar), it requires roughly 200 people to actually conduct 24 hour operations and perform a strike (includes pilots/sensors, maintenance personnel, command chain, overwatch chain, approval chain for strikes and intel support.
The word “Drones” draws immediate fire from both the left and the right, with images of Predator aircraft firing Hellfire missiles with controllers in some far away location (like Creech).
Depending on which side of the equation one falls on, they may be FOR or AGAINST use of any of the three types depending on what level of privacy/freedom they care about.
For example, what if a UAV is operated by the Fire Department or a volunteer group and not a police organization. Does this get it away from the spying on your neighbor fears that the law enforcement mission seems to conjure up? Or does it bring up even MORE issues of spying??? Think about the PETA types that are flying quadrotors (UAS) to ‘spy’ on bird hunters…
The other question is who will develop a list of policies and procedures for when and how the information collected- audio, video files, internet, IR, other; and how will be stored and who will have access to them and when or IF they be destroyed.
This is what the FAA says…
In the United States, the United States Navy and shortly after the Federal Aviation Administration have adopted the name unmanned aircraft (UA) to describe aircraft systems without a flight crew on board. More common names include UAV, drone, remotely piloted vehicle (RPV), remotely piloted aircraft (RPA), remotely operated aircraft (ROA). These “limited-size” (as defined by the FAI) unmanned aircraft flown in the USA’s National Airspace System, flown solely for recreation and sport purposes such as models, are generally flown under the voluntary safety standards of the Academy of Model Aeronautics,[22] the United States’ national aeromodeling organization. To operate a UA for non-recreational purposes in the United States, users must obtain a Certificate of Authorization (COA) to operate in national airspace. At the moment, COAs require a public entity as a sponsor. For example, when BP needed to observe oil spills, they operated the Aeryon Scout UAVs under a COA granted to the University of Alaska Fairbanks. COAs have been granted for both land and shipborne operations.
The term unmanned aircraft system (UAS) emphasizes the importance of other elements beyond an aircraft itself. A typical UAS consists of the:
For example, the RQ-7 Shadow UAS consists of four UAs, two GCSs, one portable GCS, one Launcher, two Ground Data Terminals (GDTs), one portable GDT, and one Remote Video Terminal. Certain military units are also fielded with a maintenance support vehicle.
Because of this systemic approach, unmanned aircraft systems have not been included in the United States Munitions List Category VIII – Aircraft and Associated Equipment. Vice versa, the “Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems” are clearly mentioned at paragraph 121-16 Missile Technology Control Regime Annex of the United States Munitions List. More precisely, the Missile Technology Control Regime Annex levels rocket and unmanned aerial vehicle systems together.
The term UAS was since adopted by the United States Department of Defense (DOD) and the British Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
The term used previously for unmanned aircraft system was unmanned-aircraft vehicle system (UAVS).
Now having read all that, there is still the question of where the government and companies will actually be ‘allowed’ to fly these systems over the US for ‘testing’…
Note- The FAA say NOTHING about data collection!
Meanwhile, folks are flying the hell out of them basically illegally (like the guys out of Germany. Team Black Sheep or something like that) and some agencies are flying them for any number of reasons…
So people are now spinning up over privacy issues with these flying systems, but what about wearable camera systems or the new Google Glasses that are coming on line, the license plate readers that can be see in most metro areas on patrol cars, security cameras, street surveillance cameras, and other handheld video collection methods (can we say cell phones).
Where/how do you draw the line? Or do you just go with the flow and try to limit your exposure??? Or move the hell out in the country???
At least we still HAVE choices, and I guess we should be thankful for that…
Remember, words have meanings, and KNOWING those different meanings give you dramatically different perceptions of what may be/is going on under the ‘guise’ of “it’s no biggie, they’re just drones…
15 Bogus predictions from the original earth day, and governments starting enacting policies that for the most part do nothing more can cost us money and/or make money for those raising the issue
“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” • George Wald, Harvard Biologist
“We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation.” • Barry Commoner, Washington University biologist
“By…[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions….By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.” • Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University
“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation.” • Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day
“Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half….” • Life Magazine, January 1970
“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable.” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
“Air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.” • Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“We are prospecting for the very last of our resources and using up the nonrenewable things many times faster than we are finding new ones.” • Martin Litton, Sierra Club director
“By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate…that there won’t be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill ‘er up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, `I am very sorry, there isn’t any.’” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
“Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction.” • New York Times editorial, the day after the first Earth Day
“Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.” • Sen. Gaylord Nelson
“We have about five more years at the outside to do something.” • Kenneth Watt, ecologist
“The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.” • Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
Today, Earth Day, the eco-wackos will surely get their day moment in the spotlight and their soundbites on the nightly news. They’ll predict a future even grimmer than they predicted 43 years ago.
And they’ll be just as wrong 43 years from now. Just sayin…
Oh yeah, and Ehrlich? He studies butterflies… Wald? Political activist and Harvard Biochemist. Watt? Apparently a professor emeritus from UC Davis, no other info… Commoner? Biologist Washington Univ St. Louis, political activist. He was a leading ecologist and among the founders of the modern environmental movement.
Reading Borpatch’s post on travel routing HERE, brought back ‘fun’ memories of SATO and their enforced routing they used to shove down our throats while on military travel…
A few (well QUITE a few) years ago I was down in Bay St. Louis, MS for a meeting. Getting there was pretty straight forward- SFO-STL-MSY, rent a car and go.
Coming back? Well, not so much… They had me scheduled MSY-ATL departing at 0700, with a two hour layover; ATL-DFW, change airlines, THREE hour layover; DFW-LAS-LAX, change airlines AGAIN, two hour layover; LAX-SFO. I would have finally arrived at SFO at something like 2200 that night…
So I asked the agent at MSY what the cost difference was between my ‘current’ schedule and a more direct flight to SFO. Turned out it was literally THREE damn dollars! She changed my flights, I paid the $3 (in cash), and was back home by 1300.
But… It seems I had violated ‘policy’ by rescheduling myself without SATO’s approval, so PSD was directed not to pay my travel claim until everything was sorted out… Two months and at least 8 or 10 letters, statements and voucher copies later, I still had not been paid for that trip or the other three trips I’d been on. I finally went to the staff admin officer to try to get some help and get paid (this was back in the day when you got a government credit card but had to pay the balance yourself)…
He stepped in and tried to unscrew it, but was getting nowhere until he got the boss involved. Turns out the ‘discrepancy’ that was holding everything up was where the receipt was for the $3, since I’d changed official travel orders! Of course, since I’d paid cash, I had NO receipt…
Thankfully, the bosses wife worked for that airline and she was able to track the agent down. I called the lady and she was nice enough to give me a cash receipt on the correct form once I’d explained what happened! Of course it took another week to get to me, and finally about three months after I’d committed the ‘violation’, I got paid for all the trips (and got the damn credit card paid off)…
Every trip after that, I meticulously checked what SATO was doing to me BEFORE the trip, and if they tried to screw me over, I fought it and got it changed before I ever left (and boy did I learn a LOT about the OAG and city pairs, and how to use that damn book)…
Of course, sometimes my luggage took those ‘other’ routes without me… Including one time when my bag got lost on a DIRECT flight!
So yeah, I ‘do’ know that routing through Timbuktu… BTDT, never did get the damn luggage back…
And a word of warning here, if you have meds you need, ALWAYS carry at least a 7 day supply in your carry-on. And spare glasses if you need them… Don’t count on your bag actually getting to you in a timely fashion. Even today, I never check a bag unless I absolutely have to, and even if I’m carrying the bag on, I still have meds in my backpack.
Yeah, yeah, I know you smell something burning… Sigh…
Warm, sunny Florida my dyin ass… Cold and rainy was more like it! It was warmer in DC than Florida! I saw one guy in Orlando with a PARKA on!
Rental car agencies SUCK! I don’t care which one you use, they all seem to ‘conveniently’ forget you actually took the fuel option when you are dropping off at a different airport than you picked up at… That way they can charge you the extra $50-100 and get away with it (they think)… I tied up one agent for a half hour before I finally got that cluster unscrewed (and three phone calls to the original airport)! Then they tried to pull the old, “I’m sorry but the contract is already closed” trick, so I told her to go find the manager- Mysteriously, she was able to fix it…
And if you fly a lot, pay the money and get the TSA Pre-check! Yesterday morning at 0630, the line at MCO was already 30 minutes long in the ‘regular’ and ‘elite’ lines!!! By using the Pre-check line I was through in 4 minutes (if I’d had to wait in the regular line, I’d have missed my flight)! Apparently they were NOT allowing people who were ‘late’ to jump the line, and were going strictly by position in line. Normally, if somebody is going to miss a flight, they will pull them up, but not yesterday (or at least not that I saw).
Made the flight with about 10 minutes to spare, chatting with the bus drivers, they indicated they were seeing anywhere from 10-30 minute delays due to ATC at various airports. Seems they are racking and stacking airplanes in holding and trying to ‘manage’ the flow into and out of the bigger airports. Luckily we snuck in during a gap in the major overseas and Western arrivals, so we pretty much had a straight in and actually made the gate on time. Go to Politico HERE for an update…
Interestingly, on arrival back at IAD I noticed quite a few Federal Police (read DHS) in Tac gear with Level 3 Armor on and pistols in thigh rigs; all of them in pairs patrolling the concourse and the arrivals area. When I went to take a picture of two of them, I was told, “NO pictures allowed due to security!!!” And as they walked off, one of them kept looking back at me to see if I was taking a picture of their backs…
Sheesh… I ‘thought’ this was still America, but I’m beginning to wonder???
And this story just warmed the cockles of my heart…
First the kid is arrested over his t-shirt (NRA of course)
At the root of every gray hair, there is a dead brain cell…
Perks of reaching 60…
Or being over 70 and heading towards 80 or beyond!
1. Kidnappers are not very interested in you.
2. In a hostage situation, you are likely to be released first.
3. No one expects you to run — Anywhere.
4. People call at 9 PM (or 9 AM) and ask, ‘Did I wake you?’
5. People no longer view you as a Hypochondriac.
6. There is nothing left to learn the hard way.
7. Things you buy now won’t wear out.
8. You can eat Supper at 4 PM.
9.. You can live without sex, but not your glasses.
10. You get into heated arguments… about pension plans.
11. You no longer think of speed limits as a challenge.
12. You quit trying to hold your stomach in no matter who walks Into the room.
13. You sing along… With elevator music.
14. Your eyes won’t get much worse.
15. Your investment in health insurance… Is finally beginning to pay off.
16. Your joints are more accurate meteorologists than the national weather service.
17. Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can’t remember them either.
18 Your supply of brain cells is finally down to a manageable size.
19. You can’t remember who sent you this list.
AND THE MOST IMPORTANT THING:
Never, NEVER, NEVER , under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill, and a laxative on the same night!!!
An odd little story from the Marine Corps history…
Chosin Reservoir Korea, December 1950…
It’s ALWAYS about communications… And the ‘fog of war’…
h/t JP
Or is anybody else noticing that the Boston bomber appears to be gussied up in the photos that seem to be populating the MSM today??? I saw one pic that looked like a HS graduation with a rose in his lapel. It seems they are determined to portray him as being as harmless as possible (just like Travon Martin)…
And apparently all the lawyers are champing at the bit to take his case, saying they can get him off due to the lack of Miranda warning…
And any bets whether either of them had a gun permit??? So how would have a new background check law have stopped them??? And lastly, 200+ rounds fired and they didn’t take them both down???
And another piece of history bites the dust…
The Navy Annex was never intended to last long or, for that matter, to house human beings. The 1 million-square-foot complex, perched on an Arlington County hill overlooking the Pentagon, was designed as a temporary warehouse but pressed by wartime needs into service as offices for the Navy and Marine Corps.
Seven decades later, including more than 50 years as Marine Corps headquarters, the Navy Annex is coming down.
It also housed Navy Personnel and Detailing back in the day… The first time I ever came to DC to visit my detailer to try to get a set of orders (and failed), I got LOST in that damn rabbit warren of wings/floors/hallways blocked off… It was ‘almost’ as bad as the Pentagon