Monday - December 05, 2011
New Panamax Green Solution
Just because I’m a Conservative doesn’t mean I’m not in favor of green technology. The ones that work, I’m all for. Here’s one that might be able to cut the mustard.
You may have heard that the Panama Canal is being enlarged. It’s a multi-year project that is well under way. A new set of locks, much larger than the original pair, is being built on both sides. The project seems to be running on time. These new locks will allow much bigger ships to transit Panama. One ship builder is using those new size constraints to design a far more efficient VLCC oil tanker, and while they’re at it they’re adding on everything they can find to add to that efficiency.
The smallest dimensions of the [current] locks are 110 ft (33.53 m) wide, 1,050 ft (320.04 m) long, and 85 ft (25.91 m) deep. Because of clearance issues, the usable sizes are somewhat smaller (for example, the maximum usable length of each lock chamber is about 1,000 ft (304.8 m). The maximum size of the ships that can transit the canal is known as the Panamax.
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The new lock chambers will be 1,400 ft (426.72 m) long, by 180 ft (54.86 m) wide, and 60 ft (18.29 m) deep. They will use rolling gates instead of miter gates, which are used by the existing locks. Rolling gates are used in almost all existing locks with dimensions similar to those being proposed, and are a well-proven technology.
In late August [2009], traffic jams at the Atlantic and Pacific entrances to the Panama Canal impeded a healthy chunk of the world’s maritime commerce. Each day, on average, more than 40 massive ships, many of them three times as long as a football field and piled high with cargo, rode at anchor in impromptu fleets that stretched across the horizon. On the Atlantic side, most of the ships carried grain from the American heartland, bound for markets in Asia; the vessels on the Pacific side from the Far East were jammed with cars and electronics destined for the U.S. East Coast. Some ships with daily operational costs of $40,000 waited as long as a week for passage.
Ninety-three years after it first opened for business, the Panama Canal is finally maxed out. Designed before the Titanic was even on drawing boards and while the Wright brothers were still learning to fly, the canal today handles more traffic than its builders could have ever imagined. About 14,000 vessels carrying 5 percent of the world’s ocean cargo—280 million tons—pass through the waterway each year. Despite running the canal around the clock—at close to 90 percent of its theoretical maximum capacity—canal officials are struggling to keep up.
A VLCC tanker is an oil tanker built to carry about 2 million barrels of oil. That turns out to be the largest practical size for these giant ships; a few ULCC ships have been built but they are too large for most waterways, including the English Channel. Crude oil is a liquid, and 2 million barrels worth is a fixed volume. The new locks on the Canal will allow ships to be built that carry that same volume, but in a longer, shallower, relatively slimmer hull design, and that immediately translates into increased efficiency, even with the same basic shaped hull. Use a modern high-tech super hull design, like the ones used on racing yachts, and the efficiency increases even more. Now use the latest generation of pod propulsion motors and you’ve got a huge ship that’s fast and nimble with significantly reduced operating costs. Want to go further? Cover the massive ship in solar panels, and stick on a couple of dozen super efficient dynawing sailmasts, and it not only produces a large part of the electricity needed to run those motors, it also uses the wind to help move the ship along. Lastly, install high efficiency engines that run on LNG to help run the generators, and put a set of scrubbers in the smokestacks. Bottom line: a faster tanker that sails across the world for a whole lot less time and cost, and produces only a fraction of the pollution that the current ones do. And that’s exactly what Sauter Carbon Offset Design came up with. Nice going. Now build one and prove your concept.
Richard Sauter of Sauter Carbon Offset Design released his design for the “solar hybrid supertanker” today. If the ship is ever built, you can bet that some big oil company will be using it to tout its “green” credentials in short order.
Sauter’s certified carbon offset projects are aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from super yachts and ships. His design team, Sauter Carbon Offset Design creates ships reducing greenhouse gas emissions down 50-100 percent by using all the technology available.
SCOD Presents Deliverance, a DynaWing Solar Hybrid Supertanker that qualifies as the Largest and by far the Greenest Post Panamax Vessel to be built and as such is the most Economical form of Crude Oil Transport to and from any part of the Globe.
To reduce fuel consumption and GHG emissions by up to 75% this superior fluid dynamic Emax Supertanker obtains half of her power from LNG and the other half from the latest advances in Solar and Wind Power Technology.
The Emax Deliverance is a 2 million barrel 330,000dwt Supertanker designed specifically for the newly enlarged locks of the Panama Canal which will accommodate vessels that have a maximum length of 426m, a beam of 54m and a draft of 18 meters.
Being longer, narrower and having less draft than previous 2 million barrel VLCC’s, the hull of the Deliverance produces less drag which in conjunction with twin CRP Hybrid Propulsion Pods reduces fuel consumption and GHG emissions by 35%. An additional 20 to 30% reduction is achieved her 5,000 sq. meter
DynaWing Boom Furling sails and another 15 to 20% reduction by her Solbian Solar Power generating array. The realization of up to a 75% reduction is made possible by Mitsubishi’s Bubble Hull and Wartsila’s Coded Hybrid power system.Generally speaking the total power requirement for a conventional 330,000dwt Supertanker is 30MWs.By comparison the total power requirement for the advanced 330,000dwt Emax Solar Hybrid Supertanker is 20MWs; 10MWs from LNG, 10MWs from the Sun and Wind.
Nice. Even when the sails are furled, the material that they’re made from will work as Fresnel lenses to concentrate light on the solar panels, making them that much more efficient. And lest you think this is all some kind of daydream, it isn’t. It’s pretty much built using off the shelf parts. The ‘bubble hull’ already exists. So do the engines, the solar panels, and the propulsion pods. Even the high tech Dynawing thing is proven tech - it’s the kind of sail used on the latest America’s Cup racing yachts.
The Dynawing design gives the same amount of thrust as a more conventional sail on a mast 25% taller. Shorter means sturdier, and sturdier means cheaper in the long run. But with 20 of these on the Deliverance, totaling half a million square meters of sail area, what it really means is quite a lot of thrust that took no fuel whatsoever to create. Sailboats don’t have exhaust fumes.
Roll it all up and you’ve got a supertanker that can save as much fuel cost in 4 years of operation as it took to build the ship in the first place. Which means it pays for itself, even if the thing cost 15% more than regular ships to build. And with a 25 year lifespan, that means 3 million tons less CO2 in the atmosphere. Nice. Why pollute if you don’t need to?
Posted by Drew458
on 12/05/2011 at 11:31 AM
Filed Under: • High Tech • Oil, Alternative Energy, and Gas Prices • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •
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Permalink • Thursday - December 01, 2011
the world’s longest model train on 39,000ft of tracks over a quarter an acre
This is not only incredible, it’s an awesome undertaking. I love this kind of thing. Would love to go there. Darn, it’s only across the channel from us.
The article comes from THE DAILY MAIL
View full screen. Impressive! But you knew that already.
Take a ride with the world’s longest model train on 39,000ft of tracks over a quarter an acre that took 500,000 hours to build
(and it’s growing)By EMMA REYNOLDS
Last updated at 1:30 AM on 1st December 2011Welcome to the world’s largest model railroad, in which the whole of human life is faithfully recreated in miniature.
The Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg boasts more than 39,000 feet of tracks, on which 890 trains travel across a quarter of an acre of land.
And there is much more to the intricate creation than railway lines, with carefully crafted party-goers, lovers and mourners at a funeral making their way around the tiny planet.
Posted by peiper
on 12/01/2011 at 08:34 AM
Filed Under: • Fun-Stuff • OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •
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Permalink • Wednesday - November 23, 2011
Up, up, and awaaaay! Um, nope.
We were comparing airline stories at bowling league last night (we lost 2-5 against the 1st place team, widening their lead to 16). Our teammate Bob took his wife down to Panama last week for their anniversary and was on this flight. He said it was pretty frightening but the passengers were quite calm, at least until just before landing when the pilot came on the PA to tell everyone to brace for impact. Then they landed reasonably smoothly. Good job Continental!
A Continental Airlines Boeing 737-900, registration N53442 performing flight CO-1022 from Panama City (Panama) to Newark,NJ (USA) with 176 people on board, was in the initial climb out of Panama when the left hand engine (CFM56) ingested a bird and repeatedly surged. The crew shut the engine down and returned to Panama City’s Tocumen Airport for a safe landing on runway 03R.
Panama’s Civil Aviation Authority [at first erroneously] reported the aircraft [as a different one that] was headed for Houston,TX (USA), however, this flight reached Houston on schedule.
Continental Airlines confirmed their flight 1022 returned to Panama due to necessary maintenance.
Nothing like your airliner shaking like a paint mixer while watching a 10 foot fireball coming out of one engine to liven up a long boring flight!
The Boeing 737-900 had just left Panama City when the bird was sucked into the engine, causing the pilot to radio the control tower for help. The aircraft carrying 176 passengers returned safely to Tocumen International Airport. VIDEO
The pilot was able to shut down the engine and get the plane back to the airport. A passenger on the plane wrote on a messageboard today, “Finally landed in Newark at 12:30 am this morning via Miami. It was a very scary experience. We took a Buzzard into the left engine when climbing after takeoff. This made an awful noise. Sort of like a truck backfire but bigger and did not stop. There was an air Wisconsin pilot in uniform, who was a passenger on the plane. He was the one who walked up the isle and looked out the bulkhead window to see the engine on fire. Pilots and CO flight staff were calm and helpful. The flight attendant in coach was terrific and prepped us for emergency landing. Noise and vibration had us all scared. We did not land for about 20 long minutes. We were out over the water when the noise started. Landing was fine but we burnt the brakes and wheels. We sat on the runway for almost one hour before departing to a bus. It was calm on the plane but once in the terminal, people were crying and hugging.”
Posted by Drew458
on 11/23/2011 at 09:30 AM
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Permalink • Sunday - October 30, 2011
Now, way over here in this corner, we have …
The first Navy airship commissioned in 50 years had its public presentation Wednesday inside Hangar 1 in Lakehurst, the scene of so much history in lighter-than-air flight — and a center for its potential renaissance.
The MZ-3A is the Navy’s scientific test platform for surveillance cameras, radars and other sensors, and won’t be deployed outside the United States. But it’s very significant as a return to an older technology, and there have been two years of testing “to prove LTA (lighter-than-air) has a place in our military construct,” said Cmdr. Jay Steingold, the commanding officer of Scientific Development Squadron One.
The airship is a modified A-170 built by the American Blimp Corp., capable of flying at up to 10,000 feet and cruising at around 50 mph. The Navy began the project in 2006 “to use it as a flying laboratory. The airship is a good platform because it’s very stable, and easy to take things on and off,” Huett said. “A lot of times you want to go slow.”
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“Airships bring affordability to the game. You can operate an airship for 40 percent of the cost of fixed-wing or helicopters,” said Huett
After 47 years, the U.S. Navy effectively terminated Lighter-Than-Air (LTA) operations, August 31, 1962, with the final flight of a ZPG-2 airship at Naval Air Station Lakehurst. Emblazoned with red, white and blue stripes on her rudders acknowledging the Navy’s Centennial of Flight and earliest days of Navy airship operations, the MZ-3A boasts a proud heritage and now serves as the only manned airship in the United States Navy’s inventory.
Built by American Blimp Corporation, the MZ-3A is propeller-driven by two 180 horsepower Lycoming engines producing a top speed just under 50 knots with an operational payload capability of up to 2,500 pounds.
The manned 178-foot LTA craft can remain aloft and nearly stationary for more than twelve hours, performing various missions in support of technology development for Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) concepts.
“Airships offer extreme utility in C4ISR roles and patrol missions where persistent stare and reliable communications are often more important than speed,” said Bert Race, MZ-3A Government Flight Representative and Project Manager. “Our MZ-3A has proven that an airship is a very effective platform for mission system research and development.”
The MZ-3A is government-owned and contractor-operated. The contractor, Integrated Systems Solutions, Inc., employs highly qualified commercial blimp pilots whom the Navy has approved to command the airship.
Scientific Development Squadron ONE (VXS-1), stationed at the Naval Air Station, Patuxent River, Md., is the U.S. Navy’s sole Science & Technology research squadron. Commissioned, December 2004, VXS-1 employs NP-3D Orions, RC-12 Guardrails, Scan Eagle UAS, and most recently, the MZ-3A in its support of NRL-priority airborne research efforts. Since its transfer to VXS-1 in 2009, the MZ-3A has accumulated more than 1,000 mishap-free flight hours in support of the Naval Research Enterprise and recently provided assistance during the tragic Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill in 2010.
The A-170 is the largest blimp model built by ABC. The next generation of Goodyear blimps will be rigid internal framed airships; “real" Zeppelins, built in cooperation with the Zeppelin company. Their first one, an NT model, is due in 2013, and will be half again as long as this Navy blimp, with double the gas volume. Even so, the Navy’s MZ-3A and all the airships Goodyear owns, including the 3 new ones they’re building, could fit with ease inside Hanger One, a building so large that it is said to have it’s own weather inside.
Posted by Drew458
on 10/30/2011 at 12:29 PM
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Permalink • Thursday - October 13, 2011
Oops
Yesterday:
Opening new terminal is a ‘defining moment’
Monroe Louisiana - Monroe Mayor Jamie Mayo couldn’t help but smile as he toured the new Monroe Regional Airport terminal one last time before Monday’s official grand opening.
The grand opening and ribbon cutting ceremony for the new $35 million Monroe Regional Airport Terminal is at 4:30 p.m. Monday.
“It’s going to be a historic day for the city of Monroe,” Mayo said. “It’s an awesome moment for all of us. It’s emotional as well because we’ve worked so hard to get to this point. Without question, it has been the No. 1 project during my administration. It’s very gratifying to know this will change the gateway into and out of Monroe and the entire northeast Louisiana region.”
The first flight at the new terminal is scheduled to arrive at 8:17 p.m. Tuesday. The first flight out will occur at 6 a.m. Wednesday.
“The first set of passengers who fly into Monroe will probably be shocked when they get off the plane and walk through the loading bridges and come into a brand new facility,” Mayo said.
Today:
Missed connections
Monroe Regional Airport officials learned Tuesday passenger loading and unloading bridges at the new $36 million terminal are not being able to connect to airplanes.
Airport director Cleve Norrell confirmed Tuesday afternoon that some of the loading and unloading bridges at the new terminal appear they will not be able to connect to some of the airplanes.
He said airport officials are working to determine what caused the problem, if the issue resulted from a design flaw during the construction process or if it was a result of an error on the city’s part.
“We are checking them out to see what the problem is, but it looks like some of them will fit and some won’t fit,” Norrell said. “We’re not sure what will fix it right now, but that’s what we’re working on. There are a lot of variables, but we’ll know when we try to put them up to the plane. We’re working to remedy the problem.”
Oops. Still, it’s just a bit of a glich. I’m sure another couple hundred thou can fix things right up. But the real falling short to me is how they spent the money in the first place.
From what I can find out from visiting the “>airport’s homepage, it seems that about two dozen significant commercial flights a day flow through this airport, mostly going in and out of Dallas, Houston, and Atlanta. Wiki tells me they have 3 runways, with the longest one being 7500 feet. That limits this airport to jets smaller than the A320 and modern 737 size; they can fly the old MD-80s and the tiny corporate jets, but that’s about as big as they can go. If they’d spent some of that $35 million on upgrading and lengthening the runway to about 9000 feet, then they could have perhaps grown into a regional hub. Once upon a time Delta was centered out of here, but they moved on to bigger and better airports long ago. To be a playa in the major airport game you need to be able to land the widebodies, and that means long runways built strong enough to fly the heavies. At the very least you need to build to handle the mid-size planes like the A320 and the 737, which make up nearly 1/3 of all native flights, even to make a decent financial go of it. If you can’t do either then you may as well hang Maggie’s Drawers on a pole as a windsock, because your airport will forever just miss the target.
But hey, I’m sure the 900 passengers a day who use the main terminal will be impressed. For $35 million, they damn well ought to be. So good luck to Monroe Regional. And yes, “are not being able to connect to airplanes”, because grammar and writing skills are apparently no longer required to get a degree in journalism.
Monroe is the 8th largest city in Louisiana, located in Ouachita Parish in the northern part of the state, with a population of about 50,000. 3 miles east of town and only 79 feet above sea level, Monroe Regional Airport has two 5000 foot strips and one 7500 foot strip. During WWII more than 15,000 navigators were trained there.
Below the fold: a partial solution?
Posted by Drew458
on 10/13/2011 at 01:59 PM
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Permalink • Thursday - September 29, 2011
Driving the Recovery?
Motorway speed limits could be raised to 80mph to shorten journey times and boost the economy
The current 70mph restriction is rarely enforced, police often turning a blind eye to anyone driving at up to 10mph faster than the limit.
Experts have argued that by having a higher speed limit that is enforced more readily, drivers are more likely to have respect for the rules.
A report in the Daily Mail suggests potential changes could be discussed as soon as this month’s Conservative Party conference.
It states that it is now only a matter of time before the change to the law is brought in, although speed restrictions on motorways will be better enforced.
But the Department for Transport refused to be drawn on the matter, describing the report as “speculation”.
“We need to make sure that we are looking at the right criteria when considering what level speed limits should be set at,” a DfT spokesman said.
“This means looking at the economic benefits of shorter journey times as well as considering other implications such as road safety and carbon emissions.
“Any proposal to change national speed limits would be subject to full public consultation.”
The latest figures from the DfT show that nearly half of cars exceeded the 70mph speed limit on motorways last year.
Sounds like a good idea to me for over here too. But I would want state vehicle inspection standards raised to check somehow if cars were stable at those speeds, had the properly rated tires, and had proper brakes. Then I’d want a major effort from the police to enforce safe following distances. People drive on the highways of NJ at 80mph or better all the time ... right on each other’s bumpers. That is not safe driving.
But it would be nice for many of us to get to work 15 minutes faster, and if such a speed limit were to stay around, new cars could be given a more appropriate top gear so that they’d get the same mileage at that speed as they do at 65mph.
Perhaps a bit better driver training could help us, and the UK as well:
The problem with driving is drivers. Not you, dear reader, obviously – your three-point turns are vehicular ballet. It’s the rest of them. As roads have become busier, and our society more self-centred, drivers have become more volatile. And a ton of speeding metal is a lot with which to entrust an angry idiot. Today, even being a passenger is stressful. Although trains can be unreliable, they rarely get cut up on wet motorways, or honked at impatiently by another train travelling three inches behind them. And I can count on no hands the number of times I’ve seen a train driver mouthing curses at a fellow train driver while attempting to run him into a bollard.
In short, our roads would be lovely places to drive if only people didn’t keep driving on them.
Hmmm, maybe. But on the gripping hand, meting out just punishment for offenses behind the wheel seems to be a universal problem ...
Saudi King Abdullah has overturned a court verdict that sentenced a Saudi woman to be lashed 10 times for defying the kingdom’s ban on women driving.
The revelation was made by a government official, who asked to remain anonymous, and who would not reveal the king’s reasons for intervening in the case.
A day earlier, a Saudi court found Shaima Jastaina guilty of violating the driving ban, and sentenced her to 10 lashes, igniting a firestorm in the conservative Muslim kingdom.
It was the first time a legal punishment had been handed down for breaking the longtime ban in the ultraconservative Muslim nation. No laws prohibit women from driving, but conservative religious edicts have banned it.
I bet the Saudis won’t let women drive because there is no peripheral vision in a burkha. That, and they’re all a bunch of 7th century misogynists. But I’m having a happy moment here, daydreaming of NJ having Sharia-esque traffic police ... tailgating? 10 lashes, right now! Didn’t use your signals? 5 lashes, right now! Pennsyltucky Left Lane Dick? 20 lashes, right now! OGB*? 3 lashes when you finally get to where you’re going!
Ach crivens, it’s pouring again. Our third thunderstorm of the day. I am turning into an amphibian, I swear.
Posted by Drew458
on 09/29/2011 at 01:00 PM
Filed Under: • Economics • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles • RoPMA •
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Permalink • Tuesday - September 27, 2011
Aargh Matey, Thar Be Tray-zure
When the SS Gairsoppa was torpedoed by a German U-boat 70 years ago, it took its huge silver cargo to a watery grave. US divers are working to recover what may be the biggest shipwreck haul ever, valued at some $210 million.
Florida-based Odyssey Marine Exploration on Monday confirmed the identity and location of the Gairsoppa, and cited official documents indicating the British ship was carrying some 219 tons of silver when it sank in 1941 in the North Atlantic some 300 miles (490 kilometers) off the Irish coast.
Valued then at 600,000 pounds, the silver today is worth about $210 million, which would make it history’s largest recovery of precious metals lost at sea, Odyssey said.
“We’ve accomplished the first phase of this project—the location and identification of the target shipwreck—and now we’re hard at work planning for the recovery phase,” Odyssey senior project manager Andrew Craig said in a statement.
“Given the orientation and condition of the shipwreck, we are extremely confident that our planned salvage operation will be well suited for the recovery of this silver cargo.”
Recovery is expected to begin next spring.
After a competitive tender process the British government awarded Odyssey an exclusive salvage contract for the cargo, and under the agreement Odyssey will retain 80 percent of the silver bullion salvaged from the wreck.
The 412-foot (125-meter) Gairsoppa had been sailing from India back to Britain in February 1941 bearing a cargo of silver, pig iron and tea, and was in a convoy of ships when a storm hit. Running low on fuel, the Gairsoppa broke off from the convoy and set a course for Galway, Ireland.
It never made it, succumbing to a German torpedo in the contested waters of the North Atlantic. Of the 85 people on board, only one survived.
The Gairsoppa was laid down in 1919 and was a 5200 ton steamer for the British India Steam Navigation Company. When it was torpedoed, it caught fire and sank in 20 minutes, which allowed all the surviving crew to escape in lifeboats. Unfortunately rough seas claimed 2 of the 3 boats, and most of the 31 on the 3rd boat died from exposure before they reached land. To add insult to injury, that lifeboat was wrecked in the surf, drowning all but 1 crew member.
The boat in charge of the second officer set sail with eight Europeans and 23 Lascars aboard, but after seven days most had died of exposure and only four Europeans and two Lascars were still alive when the boat reached land on 1 March. Sadly, it capsized in the swell and surf of Caerthillian Cove on The Lizard, Cornwall and all occupants drowned except the second officer, who was rescued unconscious by a coastguard.
The wreck was found very close to where the U-Boat logs said it was sunk.
another source article with lots of pictures
Posted by Drew458
on 09/27/2011 at 03:39 PM
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Permalink • Saturday - September 17, 2011
Tragedy in Reno
RENO, Nev. — At least three people are dead and more than 50 injured when a pilot lost control of a vintage World War II-era plane and crashed at an air show in Reno.
Twelve people are in critical condition, and the death toll is expected to rise, says CBS News correspondent Karen Brown.
Witnesses describe the scene as absolute carnage, reports Brown.
Thousands of fans come every year to the Reno Air Race to get the thrill of the event - like NASCAR on steroids, with planes going more than 500 miles per hour. But yesterday, thousands watched in horror when a P-51 Mustang pitched upward, rolled and plunged nose-first into the edge of the crowd of spectators.
“Boom! Right into the grandstands,” said photographer Jerry Maxwell. “I couldn’t believe it.”
The plane, flown by a 74-year-old veteran Hollywood stunt pilot, then slammed into the concrete in a section of VIP box seats and blew to pieces in front the pilot’s family and a tight-knit group of friends who attend the annual event in Reno.
Veteran airman Jimmy Leeward among dead in Reno
“It absolutely disintegrated,” said Tim O’Brien of Grass Valley Calif., who attends the races every year. “I’ve never seen anything like that before.”
Dozens of victims lay on the tarmac. The most critically injured, were airlifted to nearby hospitals, carried on stretchers. Others, clearly wounded, walked into emergency rooms.
Pilot Jimmy Leeward of Ocala, Fla., died in the crash Friday after apparently losing control of the P-51 Mustang, which spiraled into a box seat area at the National Championship Air Races at about 4:30 p.m. Friday. Leeward and at least two others were killed; dozens were injured.
Family members were at the air show and saw the crash, said Reno Air Races President and CEO Mike Houghton.
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Leeward’s pilot’s medical records were up-to-date, and he was “a very qualified, very experienced pilot,” Houghton said. He’d been racing at the show in Reno since 1975.
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Maureen Higgins, of Alabama, said Leeward was the best pilot she knew. She was at the air show and said she could see his profile while the plane was going down. He was married and his wife often traveled with him.“He’s a wonderful pilot, not a risk taker,” she said. “He was in the third lap and all of a sudden he lost control.”
Authorities say it appears a mechanical failure with the P-51 Mustang — a class of fighter plane that can fly in excess of 500 mph — was to blame. Some credit the pilot with preventing the crash from being far more deadly.
“If he wouldn’t have pulled up, he would have taken out the entire bleacher section,” said Tim Linville, 48, of Reno, who watched the race with his two daughters.
“The way I see it, if he did do something about this, he saved hundreds if not thousands of lives because he was able to veer that plane back toward the tarmac,” said Johnny Norman, who was at the show.
Posted by Drew458
on 09/17/2011 at 09:03 AM
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Permalink • Friday - September 02, 2011
Less Terminal
TSA to demonstrate new security scanners at Newark Liberty International Airport
Passengers with privacy concerns may soon feel less exposed when flying out of Newark Liberty International Airport, where officials say full-body scanners modified to produce cartoon-like, cookie-cutter images will be unveiled today.
The new images produced by the reprogrammed scanners — which have been likened to a gingerbread man — will replace the specific, anatomically detailed outline of individual passengers that has been criticized by religious groups, civil libertarians and elected officials as an invasion of travelers’ privacy.
All 11 full-body scanners at Newark Liberty have been reprogrammed to produce the new imagery, and will go into use within weeks, once screeners have been trained to use them, said Lisa Farbstein, a spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration.
The TSA will demonstrate the new technology this morning at Newark’s Terminal B.
“This new software ... auto-detects items that could pose a potential threat using a generic cookie-cutter type of outline of a person for all passengers,” Farbstein said. “It’s the same image whether the person is 17 years old or 47 years old, male or female, tall or short.”
If the technology does not detect an anomaly, it won’t produce any physical image, just a simple “OK” against a green screen. Otherwise, the object’s location will be indicated by a box superimposed on the cookie-cutter image.
The TSA began testing the new software in February, and last month announced it would be installed this fall on all 241 millimeter wave scanners nationwide, including the 11 at Newark. The total cost of the new software is $2.7 million, including research and development, Farbstein said.
The TSA is testing similar privacy enhancing software for the 250 other scanners in use at airports nationwide, so called X-ray backscatter scanners which subject passengers to a small dose of radiation. None are used at Newark.
The ACLU has sued the TSA to learn whether the images produced by the reprogrammed scanners are simply overlays, with the original, detailed images preserved unseen in digital form, with the chance of being leaked or misused.
A earlier ACLU suit revealed the U.S. Marshals Service in Florida had created a database of 35,000 full-body images scanned at a federal courthouse in Orlando.
“These machines are designed to store the images,” Jacobs said. “Even if they don’t show them.”
I think I agree with the ACLU. I don’t trust the TSA and their army of ghetto trash workers. Hey, even a broken clock is right twice a day.
Posted by Drew458
on 09/02/2011 at 01:52 PM
Filed Under: • Government • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles • Science-Technology •
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Permalink • Thursday - August 11, 2011
A few days off
Not going to be much posting from me for the next couple of days. I’ve got a window job on a good sized house, and then I have a pair of doors to install. And my usual Sunday work of course. Good thing I spent half of today in the kitchen cooking. Chicken curry, meat sauce, several nice quiches. I’m set.
So here you go ... something to keep you occupied ... majorly clicky clicky but still SFW ...
Hey, it can’t be redheads all the time ya know. Sometimes it’s a blonde, sometimes you just have to wing it.
Posted by Drew458
on 08/11/2011 at 09:04 PM
Filed Under: • Art-Photography • Eye-Candy • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles • work and the workplace •
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Permalink • Sunday - July 24, 2011
Buy Your Tickets Now?
Airlines are tossing consumers aside and grabbing the benefit of lower federal taxes on travel tickets.
By Saturday night, nearly all the major U.S. airlines had raised fares to offset taxes that expired the night before.
That means instead of passing along the savings, the airlines are pocketing the money while customers pay the same amount as before.
American, United, Continental, Delta, US Airways, Southwest, AirTran and JetBlue all raised fares, although details sometimes differed. Most of the increases were around 7.5 percent.
For consumers who wanted to shop around, only a few airlines were still passing the tax break on to passengers Saturday night, including Virgin America, Frontier Airlines and Alaska Airlines.
The expiring taxes can total $25 or more on a typical $300 round-trip ticket. They died after midnight Friday night when Congress failed to pass legislation to keep the Federal Aviation Administration running.
That gave airlines a choice: They could do nothing — and pass the savings to customers — or grab some of the money themselves.
“We adjusted prices so the bottom-line price of a ticket remains the same as it was before … expiration of federal excise taxes,” said American spokesman Tim Smith. US Airways spokesman John McDonald said much the same thing — passengers will pay the same amount for a ticket as they did before the taxes expired.
They declined to say whether the increases would be rescinded if Congress revives the travel taxes.
Several federal airline-ticket taxes expired when Congress adjourned for the weekend without passing FAA legislation. Lawmakers couldn’t break a stalemate over a Republican proposal to make it harder for airline and railroad workers to unionize.
Air traffic controllers stayed on the job, but thousands of other FAA employees were likely to be furloughed.
Airlines stopped collecting a 7.5 percent ticket tax, a separate excise tax of $3.70 per takeoff and landing, and other taxes. Those add up to about $32 on a round-trip itinerary with base fare of $240 and one stop in each direction.
Other government fees for security and local airport projects are still being collected. They boost the final cost of that $240 base-fare ticket to $300.
Passengers who bought tickets before this weekend but travel during the FAA shutdown could be entitled to a refund of the taxes that they paid, said Treasury Department spokeswoman Sandra Salstrom. She said it’s unclear whether the government can keep taxes for travel at a time when it doesn’t have authority to collect the money.
Some airlines that didn’t raise fares sought to turn the controversy to their advantage. Spirit Airlines said it would pass tax savings on to consumers while rivals “have not been so generous.” It warned travelers that Congress could end the tax holiday at any time, so book a flight quickly.
Virgin America hawked tickets with the slogan, “Evade taxes. Take flight.” For a September trip between Dallas and San Francisco, Virgin America was $7 to $24 cheaper than United, Continental and American.
Meanwhile, the airlines - those gigantic business enterprises that you would think were “too big to fail” but are forever declaring one kind of bankruptcy or another - are raking it in.
The Transportation Department says it will lose $200 million a week until Congress restores the taxes. J.P. Morgan analyst Jamie Baker said airlines could take in an extra $25 million a day by raising fares during the tax holiday. That’s a tempting sum for airlines that have struggled against high jet fuel costs for most of the last three years.
Airline tickets have had several price increases so far this year, pretty much across the boards. For a deregulated industry that competes so hard that many airlines have gone out of business in the past 3 decades since deregulation, they sure seem to be able to march in lockstep at a moment’s notice when they feel like it. Go figure.
The last time one of these air travel taxes expired, most airlines passed the savings on to the customers. This time, nada. Whatever happened to that trickle down economic theory? I think it’s leaving a yellow puddle on the floor.
Personally, this gives me incentive to hope that a budget impasse continues in DC for months. I just bought tickets for a late fall vacation, and I wouldn’t mind being able to get a refund of some of the tax money.
Posted by Drew458
on 07/24/2011 at 02:21 PM
Filed Under: • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles • Taxes •
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Permalink • Monday - July 18, 2011
The Bad Ferry Godfather
Fervent faith in ferries fries frustrated folks? Ferry fracas fluffs faithful’s feathers? Foolish fatheads forge fiscal follies?
ROCKY HILL, Conn. (AP) A round of budget cuts in Connecticut is forcing the nation’s oldest operating ferry to close.
Historical archives say the Rocky Hill Ferry has been crossing the Connecticut River between the towns of Rocky Hill and Glastonbury continuously since 1655.
It is among two historic ferries that Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s administration has put on the chopping block to close a $1.6 billion budget gap.
Historical documents say the ferry began with pole-operated boats run by families from the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
The state took over its operation in 1915 and Connecticut archivists say it has been in service longer than any other ferry in the United States.
Golly, maybe the government should have left this alone and let free enterprise provide a solution? No, actually I don’t think they could have. The ferry is actually considered part of the road I think, akin to a toll bridge.
The Rocky Hill - Glastonbury Ferry, owned and operated by the State of Connecticut and part of CT Route 160, passes between Ferry Lane, Glastonbury, to Meadow Road, Rocky Hill, during the warm half of the year: usually from April 1 until October 31, river conditions permitting. Usual hours of operation are Monday to Friday: 7:oo AM to 6:45 PM. On Saturday and Sunday it runs from 10:30 AM to 5:00 PM. Usual fees are: $3 per care (including driver) and $1 for each walk-on or biker. (Commuter discount rate with prior purchase of coupon book: $2 per car.)
The 356 year old vector originally was 2 guys with poles and a raft, but these days it’s a 60 foot barge and a little tugboat. According to Connecticut’s own DOT analysis the ferry moves an average of 300 vehicles a day annually, though it’s only open 7 months of the year. That’s 109,500 vehicles, plus pedestrians and cyclists, which means the little 1000 foot float across the river generates at least a quarter million dollars a year in revenue, perhaps as much as half a million. How much more than that does it cost to pay 4 to 6 bargemen and gas up a little 100hp tugboat? Too much, according to Governor Daniel Malloy, who plans to close this ferry and another one like it.
Problem is, there is no other way across. The state never built a bridge there, and the next nearest one is more than 8 miles up the river. Oops.
And speaking of up the river, it may actually be against the law for this little piece of history to be closed. Oops again!
Local and state officials met with concerned citizens in a standing-room only meeting at the Hadlyme Hall Sunday night to discuss the ramifications of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s proposed budget cuts. Malloy’s proposal includes cutting both the Hadlyme-Chester and Rocky Hill-Glastonbury ferry services to help balance the state budget, cuts some argue may be against the law.
Town and state officials, along with a group of concerned citizens, are looking into two state statutes. Statute 13a-252 guarantees the continued operation of the ferries and 13b-31d calls for a public hearing prior to altering or improving a state highway designated as a scenic road. Route 148 and the Connecticut River both fall under the scenic highway designation.
By law the ferries are registered historic structures and thus protected. Perhaps that’s a bit silly, but it’s the law nonetheless.
“It’s not about what ‘makes sense’,” said East Haddam First Selectman Mark Walter. “We have to fight this battle another way; we won’t win at a numbers game.”
Local folks gathered in several town hall meetings to protest the proposed closings. One local man, Edward Chiucarello, even had a protest song to sing.
Dave Scampoli, of the CT River Ferry Preservation Association, was in attendance, along with other board members, to help rally support to preserve the historically significant state ferries.
“There are so many other places to cut the budget,” he said, “the ferry (Rocky Hill-Glastonbury) is a connection back to 1655, before the United States, before the formation of Connecticut, before the Declaration of Independence.”
Connecticut law lets the state set the toll rates, but it says the ferries will be operated at the state’s expense. There is no law that ties the toll revenue the ferries generate to their operating expenses. Gosh, maybe they should do that. Or maybe raise the tolls a little? Or maybe try to renegotiate the bargemen’s contract? There are only 3 ferries in the whole state; how big a local do these guys really have, maybe 2 dozen members at the most? Local articles say the Rocky Hill ferry costs $345,000 per year to run, which means the revenue it generates just about balance it’s costs. If that number is the net cost to the state, then somebody is wasting money somewhere, though to be fair that could include non-amortized expenses like the new barge and the recent river dredging. Yeah, I’d raise tolls a quarter for bikes and 50¢ for cars.
Meanwhile CT Governor Malloy is getting a black eye from having to play the bad ferry godfather. Just wait till the real budget cuts start coming.
extra links in the comments area.
Posted by Drew458
on 07/18/2011 at 11:58 AM
Filed Under: • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •
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Permalink • Wednesday - July 13, 2011
Not a Good Day at Duxford
Duxford Imperial War Museum was hosting its annual and hugely popular Flying Legends event on Sunday when the accident happened.
The crash involved two planes, one being a P-51 Mustang and the other a Skyraider.
Dutch photogrpaher Johan Boerman captured this amazing image of the pilot of the P-51 parachuting to safety.
The pilot of the other plane was uninjured, managing to land his heavily damaged plane.
David Quinton, from Woodhurst, who shot the footage below, said he was watching the display from a field in Thriplow and recording the planes with an HD camcorder.
“We didn’t realise what had happened at first,” he said. “We were just hoping everyone was ok. Because it was so low we didn’t know if the parachute would open.”
Another eyewitness said: “The P-51 is the aircraft that has crashed with the pilot managing to leave the aircraft and parachute to safety with the plane coming down on the perimeter of the airfield out of site of the crowd.
“The Skyraider managed to make an emergency landing with a large portion of the starboard wing missing.
“An announcement later from the tannoy informed everyone that the pilot of the crashed plane had landed safely and walked to the ambulance.”
The planes were taking part in an annual Flying Legends show in Cambridgeshire when they clipped wings over agricultural land.
The accident sent one plane plummeting to the ground and forced its pilot to bale out before parachuting to safety. The craft, reported to be a P-51 Mustang, came down to the south west of RAF Duxford, just after 5pm on Sunday. The second plane was able to fly on and land, no one was injured.
Mark Brown, a pilot from Warminster who witnessed the crash, told CambridgeFirst how the second aircraft, a Skyraider, lost a “large chunk of its wing tip” which fell to the ground. He said the crash happened after three planes formed a triangle before peeling off to the left.
“As they did that the leader and the one that was following clipped each other,” he said. “It went into a bit of a dive then sorted itself out. The other aircraft dived away from the airfield. They were only about 100 feet at this point. “Then we saw someone jump out and a parachute open.”
Others described seeing “large chunks of metal” fall to the ground before one entered a dive and hit the ground behind some trees.
A spokesman for the show’s organisers, Imperial War Museum Duxford, said: ’The pilots of both aircraft are safe and have been treated by the Ambulance Service.
‘The cause of the incident will now be investigated by the Air Accident Investigation Branch and the museum is therefore not able to comment on the likely cause.’
...
A spokesman for the AAIB said: ‘The Air Accident Investigation Branch is aware of the incident and are sending a team to investigate’.The Flying Legends airshow at the aerodrome, home of the Imperial War Museum Duxford, featured Spitfires flying together with ‘Buchon’ Messerschmitt-style fighters for the first time since the making of the famous 1968 movie Battle Of Britain.
...
Today, the aerodrome is one of the Imperial War Museum’s five sites across the country, where exhibits too large for its London headquarters are stored, restored and displayed. Over the weekend, more than 55 aircraft participated in the war plane displays, which were jointly organised with the Fighter Collection.It was the first time the Hispano Aviación HA-1112 M1L ‘Buchon’ single-engined fighters had flown alongside Spitfires since the filming of the famous Battle of Britain movie, scenes of which were filmed in the skies over Duxford.
All the links above have the video, but the last link, to the Daily Mail, has the best photos. Warbird air crashes at the Duxford show are not uncommon. It seems they lose one or two old planes every few years. This time the pilots got out safely; that isn’t always the case.
Not being a pilot, from what I can tell from the video is that the idea was for the 3 planes to all do a hard banking turn to the left so that at the end of the turn they would be all in a line nose to tail. The first Mustang pulled up and banked, then the second one waited a second to make his move, then the Skyraider went. Looks like the plan was for the Skyraider to turn inside the other two and go from last in formation to first. His wing clipped the first Mustang partway through the turn, which caused the Mustang to go into a flat spin off camera to the right, at which point the pilot ejected. I think the planes were a good bit higher than the 100 feet the witness guessed; it takes time for a parachute to open and in the first picture above you can see that the chute is jut blossoming and the pilot still has several hundred feet to go before hitting the ground.
h/t to Lyndon B
small update: Cllr Andrew Wallis posts the story and points out that this crash was at the very very end of the show, after wave after wave of planes flew by for the finale. A Fokker DR-1 Triplane also had a minor ground loop on landing and nosed over. No injuries. Theo has the promo video featuring a good number of other planes but not the crash. It has great footage of the Triplane dancing in the sky and turning around practically in it’s own length. Which is possible when you can fly at 30mph instead of 400mph. Nice.
Posted by Drew458
on 07/13/2011 at 09:16 AM
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Permalink • Tuesday - June 28, 2011
Never Enough For Obama
This is a Smart Car. You may have seen them around. It’s the tiniest little thing you’ve ever seen with a windshield; the Smart Car has a 73 inch wheelbase, is just over 5 feet wide, and is less than 9 feet long. With it’s 1 liter, 3 cylinder engine that makes just 70hp and gives the two seater an anemic 12.8 second 0-60 time, the Smart Car delivers 33mpg around town and 41mpg on the highway.
According to Obama, this vehicle is way too big for you, way too powerful, and gets terrible gas mileage.
WASHINGTON—The Obama administration is considering a fleetwide average of 56.2 miles per gallon for all new cars and trucks sold in the US by 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported late Saturday citing two people briefed on the matter said.
The proposal would roughly double current fuel-economy targets, and would likely raise the price of some cars by several thousand dollars.
...
US officials presented the proposal to representatives of Detroit auto makers last week to determine the costs of such a proposal, said one of the people briefed on the matter. This person emphasized that the 56.2 mpg figure was floated as a means to kick negotiations among California, environmental groups and the auto industry into the final phase, and that the numbers could change.The administration has said previously that it is looking at requiring cars average between 47 and 62 mpg by 2025.
Environmental groups and the state of California have pressed for the 62 mpg target or something close to that, while the industry has lobbied for a target on the lower end of the administration’s range.
...
The targets for 2025 would build on the administration’s requirement that autos average 35.5 mpg by 2016.
Fleetwide average. That means that he wants cars and minivans and light trucks that deliver far, far greater mpg than average, to balance out what few larger or more high performance vehicles are allowed to be sold. Which could mean that the above vehicle, which looks like a frog with wheels attached, could be the SUV of the future. Because it gets such awful gas mileage.
Now that’s the Change I’ve been Waiting for.
Posted by Drew458
on 06/28/2011 at 12:12 PM
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Oil, Alternative Energy, and Gas Prices • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •
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Oh, and here's some kind of visitor flag counter thingy. Hey, all the cool blogs have one, so I should too. The Visitors Online thingy up at the top doesn't count anything, but it looks neat. It had better, since I paid actual money for it.
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