If, that is, NASA was the organization that it should be. If the NASA of the mid 1960’s had continued through to today.
Jan 102020
Jan 102020
I haven’t watched Amazon’s “Jack Ryan” series. I heard season 1 was good… and I’ve heard that season 2 was a trash fire. After watching this review, I can believe it.
Basically, it seems that season 2 revolved around Venezuela being an economic basketcase run by bad people. Well… sure, because that’s the actual factual case for Venezuela. But it seems that “Jack Ryan” has decided to rewrite history and claim that Venezuela is this way because of a pseudo-right wing government… and that the heroic opposition is just a female version of the socialists who in reality trashed Venezuela in the first place.
Those of you who remember the awesomely awful action movies and TV shows of the 80’s doubtless remember Our Heros going to some Latin American craphole run by tin pot dictators. And when you’d crack open your World Book encyclopedia set, you’d find no mention of the craphole country… because Hollywood simply invented it. And that’s a fair way to go. Invent a country and you can claim anything about it you like. But when you use a *real* country and your show isn’t explicitly an alternate history show, ya gotta kinda stick to the facts. Those same 80’s action shows that featured fictional South American, Caribbean, Asian and African countries would also often send Our Heroes to places like East Germany and the Soviet Union… where Our Heroes would tangle with commies. Not Nazis or emperors or magical wizard realms, but the bad guys who were actually there. So why does “Jack Ryan” swap out the actual bad guys in Venezuela with not just fictional ones but 180-degree-off-axis bad guys? Really only one reason springs to mind as being at all realistic: the writers want to use the humanitarian disaster that is Venezuela, but they still like the ideology that produced it. You can’t show the electorate that the policies pushed by Bernie and AOC will lead to Americans being forced to eat their pets; do that, and Bad Orange Man might get re-elected!
So, yeah, I guess I can scratch “Ryan” off my “must watch” list.
Jan 092020
The Forester Ultimate Customized Kit Special edition is entertaining named, to be sure. It’s exactly the sort of thing that I would have absolutely zero interest in, and nor would the press, except for that one little detail…
Jan 092020
Air Force Displays Model Of Exotic And Potentially Revolutionary Hybrid Electric Airlifter
@AFResearchLab unveiled novel distributed propulsion concept vehicle at #aiaaSciTech – incorporating array of electric fans could be basis for ‘vision vehicle’ for future @usairforce STOL tactical airlifter pic.twitter.com/UXfdrehXr7
— Guy Norris (@AvWeekGuy) January 8, 2020
The propulsion system may be efficient, but it has the appearance of not being a particularly stealthy one, which makes for a schizophrenic contrast with the clearly stealthified fuselage. Amusingly, if you look closely the USAF insignia on the wings of the model are *deeply* engraved.
Jan 092020
Oh ye gods…
Can You Locate Iran? Few Voters Can.
This. This right here. This is *exactly* why I do not support efforts to make voting easier or to legally mandate that everyone vote. Because not everyone is either smart enough or educated well enough for their vote to be *worth* counting. If you guessed that Iraq is actually Iran… well, you’re wrong, but I guess not too far wrong. But if you guessed Romania or freakin’ *England* or the got-damned middle of the Med is Iran… sit down, shut up, don’t vote.
But it gets worse:
Australia? Kansas? The mid-Atlantic ridge??? This, gentlemen, is how Bernie and AOC gets elected.
Jan 082020
Much of the history of aerospace that still exists does so because someone broke the rules and kept something they were told to destroy. Behold:
Avro Arrow blueprints on display after sitting in Sask. man’s home for decades
One would hope that these blueprints have been properly digitized.
Jan 082020
Continuing the report into a less interesting section, that of ground based services that in 1985 Rockwell thought might be profitable. these ideas included STS Marketing Services, Consolidated Space Operations Center, DOD “Schedule C,” Payload Certification from NASA, Commercial Payload Software Services, Commercial ASE Services, and Turn Key Launch Services.
Up next: More Interesting Stuff.
More after the break…
Jan 072020
A Ukrainian 737 went down shortly after taking off from the Tehran airport, taking 180 passengers with it. It’s not too often that modern jetliners burst into flames in mid air. Getting shot down by twitchy Iranian missile operators seems not unlikely.
#Breaking First footage of the Ukrainian airplane while on fire falling near #Tehran pic.twitter.com/kGxnBb7f1q
— Ali Hashem علي هاشم (@alihashem_tv) January 8, 2020
Jan 072020
Gotta wonder how they think this can possibly be a good idea.
Iran Strikes Back: Missiles Rain Down On American Forces In Iraq
Not a whole lot of details yet, but it *seems* kinda halfassed.
An interesting point is raised:
Iranian-backed Iraqi militias have been firing rockets at bases housing U.S. forces on a semi-regular basis for years now. An attack involving 30 or more rockets would be in line with an earlier attack on K-1 base in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk in December 2019. That attack killed a U.S. military contractor and reportedly led to the U.S. government’s decision to kill Soleimani.
Yeah, all those rockets worked out so well before.
Jan 072020
The Landmaster is one of the best sci-fi vehicles ever built, from one of the cruddier sci-fi movies ever made. Its unusual wheel arrangement and body articulation were not pure fantasy affect, but were real-world concepts that were tested and shown to have *some* advantages. Behold:
There’s even this RC Landmaster someone built. Performance-wise it’s unimpressive, but it does show how the wheels work, including the passive “crawl” of the Lockheed-patented “Tri-star” wheels:
But then there’s this…. thing. Produced by a Russian auto modifier, that third wheel does nothing useful but get spun around by the other two. It’s… ummmm… yeah.
When I first glanced at the thumbnail that YouTube threw up I thought that this vehicle had a true Tri-Star system on the aft end, but a half-second’s further examination of the rear wheel well showed that that was impossible. A Fiat with a Tri-Star rear wheel would be a ridiculous thing, but potentially cool; the arrangement it actually has baffles me. Adding a second set of wheels, even if unpowered, could be used to spread a heavy load, but adding a third wheel like this that contacts both of the road wheel seems to do little but add drag to the system, on top of added mass and reduced interior volume.
My gast is flabbered.
But hey, in digging up the Landmaster vids I found this guys channel. He made a Landmaster CAD model and then a 1/25 scale resin kit. It looks pretty spiffy, and seems (at least as of August 2018) to be selling them.