Gitmo inmate “art” in Disneyland

(via the whole damn web – Neatorama is one resource)

An artist out in California managed to sneak into Disneyland this past holiday one night and set up a Guantanamo Bay inmate inside the Rocky Mountain Railroad ride. The inflatable doll was dressed in prisoner orange with shackles on his arms and legs. I’m sure Disney executives didn’t find this funny, but I see the humor in it.

Families visiting Disneyland on their holiday this week saw a life-size Guantanamo bay inmate standing inside the Rocky Mountain Railroad ride at Disneyland in Anaheim California.

disney-guantanamo-bay-inmate-statue.jpg

The sculpture, consisting of an inflatable doll dressed in an orange jumpsuit with its hands and feet manacled remained in place for one and a half hours before Disneyland’s security staff shut down the ride and removed it amid fears over public safety.

[tags]Disneyland Guantanamo Bay prisoner art[/tags]

Gas!

No, no – not the kind of gas that guy who sits a couple of cubicles away from me has.  This is about deadly chemical use during war – specifically the risk of chemical attack against Americans during World War II.  The Modern Mechanix blog has all the gory details, as revealed in the April 1946 issue of Modern Mechanix magazine.  This is a long article, but it has lots of interesting information in it.

America was ready to give and take if the Axis had turned loose with the most inhumane of all modern weapons!

LOOK carefully at the pictures on these pages—if you’ve been wondering what we would have done in case the Axis powers had introduced deadly chemicals in the recent war.

It seems fantastic, weird and remote, now that the shooting is over. But here are the brutal facts, revealed for the first time by the Army’s Chemical Warfare Service. It was alert and ready to retaliate in heaping measure had our enemies used gas. Although the U. S. is not a party to any treaty or other agreement not to use gas, we have long been committed to the policy that we would not resort to this horrible weapon unless it was first employed by our foes. The fact that our troops were fully prepared for offensive and defensive gas warfare undoubtedly stopped the Axis from challenging us on this score.

Continue reading “Gas!”

Flight Simulator X demo

flightsimxlogo.gifIn case you haven’t already heard, the demo for Microsoft’s newest incarnation of Flight Simulator, called Flight Simulator X, is now available for download.

Flight Simulator X Trial Version

The Flight Simulator X trial version includes two airports, three missions, and three different aircraft. All of the missions take place at St. Maarten in the Caribbean.

Missions:

Getting Started (Novice)
flightsimx-img13.jpgPlane: de Havilland Beaver DHC2
Details: Geared towards first time flyers, this step-by-step tutorial mission shows you how to get off the ground and up in the air so you can explore the ocean and island of St. Maarten. Of special note is the fact that the Beaver is a float plane so you won’t have any runways to worry about. You’ll be taking off and landing in the ocean.

Flour Power
Plane: AirCreation Trike Ultralight
Details: This mission has you behind the controls of an ultralight, a very easy to fly glider. The object of the mission is to drop sacks of flour attached to your ultralight onto various objects and targets scattered throughout the area surrounding St. Maarten. You’ll be scored on both speed and accuracy. Try not to drop any flour on spectators or dolphins, as you’ll be assessed a time penalty.

Caribbean Landing
Plane: Bombardier CRJ700
Details: The most challenging of the three included in the trial version, this mission will essentially be a take-off and landing of a Bombardier CRJ700 in a technically challenging airport. You’ll need to manage air traffic chatter and surrounding AI planes efficiently to succeed.

My flight abilities are nil.  Yet I still love flight simulators.  I have the past 3 versions, and will likely pick this one up, too.  I also have the last 3 versions of XPlane.  If you want to try your hand at flying, I can easily recommend either of these simulators, but be prepared to spend time really learning your stuff if you want to do anything that feels even remotely not “OMFG I suck at this” when using either sim.

[tags]Flight Simulator X, Flight Sim news[/tags]

Posting via email

I have set up email posting for the site. This means that I can more
easily put articles up when I’m at work (where I can no longer access
the site). Hopefully I’ll be more regular in posting with this feature
enabled.

The end of food allergies?

(via Blue’s News)
This article at the BBC indicates that scientists believe we could well eliminate food allergies in the next 10 years.

Experts at the BA Festival of Science, in Norwich, heard that vaccines could be created against the molecules which trigger allergies.

The scientist leading the research – Dr Ronald van Ree, from Amsterdam University – said a vaccine with no side effects was in sight.

. . .

Speaking about the research, Dr van Ree told festival delegates: “Taken together, these new developments provide good opportunities to develop strategies for the treatment of food allergies, both preventive and curative.”

He said it was now possible to produce altered versions of food allergy molecules in the laboratory.

“Importantly, this allows scientists to develop hypo-allergenic variants of these molecules for application in safer immunotherapy that will induce little or no side effects,” the scientist told the meeting at the University of East Anglia.

“Effective treatment will end the fear that food-allergic patients have for unwanted exposure to food allergens.”

Some of you already know me as a bit of a skeptic.  I’ll continue that tradition here.  In 5-6 years, we’ll get an update on this that we’ve moved slower than initially expected, and that now (i.e., the year 2011 or so), we really are just 10 years away from eliminating food allergies.  And this time, we really mean it.  At least, until 5-6 years later when scientists confirm that things are progressing slower than anticipated, but really, it will only be 10 more years, at most, before food allergies are wiped out.

I hope I’m wrong – I’d love to see food allergies eliminated.  But the body is damn tricky in how it works.  And as Jurassic Park taught us, any time you try to alter nature, nature finds a way around your changes (or something like that).

[tags]End of food allergies, Sciencists predict 10 years to end food allergies[/tags]

Smart speed monitor gives speed and license plate

(via Engadget)

smart_speed_check.jpg

Drive too fast in the UK and you might get a more personal notice of it than you are used to seeing. A new speed checking device is being tested that not only puts up your speed, but if you are going too fast also puts up your license plate number. I’m guessing this wouldn’t work as well for a lot of US states, since many don’t have front license plates. But if this catches on over-seas, expect mandatory front license plates and the import of this gadget to keep an eye on more motorists. And shortly after, be prepared for automated tickets based on this device.

Highways consultant firm Atkins came up with the idea in a bid to boost safety for road workers. A radar detects the speed of oncoming cars and flashes the words ‘slow down’ and the reg plate of vehicles exceeding 55mph. In a trial on the M42 in the Midlands, almost half of drivers breaking the limit slowed.

[tags]Speed monitor shows speed and license[/tags]

Books with murder verboten on planes?

Sometimes, I can’t figure out for sure if there is a collective complete brain shared among all the people making up the dumb rules we have to live with since authorities successfully used intelligence methods to stop a terrorist attack. This latest involves a man travelling from London to Berlin. Because he had forgotten to remove a cream from his luggage, he was subjected to extra security screening. I don’t like that (which you already know if you’ve read much of my recent posting) but I can live with it – that’s a rule we know about, and he made a minor error and had to pay for it.

While security officers were checking his back, they found a book titled “Murder in Samarkland” which greatly concerned them. This story of former British ambassador Craig Murray’s [bad] experiences in Tashkent (Uzbekistan). That is, it’s based on factual events. But that didn’t seem to matter security personnel.

“Is that about terrorism?”, asked the lady that examined my onboard luggage. “Humm, well, it contains mentions of that, but it’s about your former ambassador to Uzbekistan and more about diplomacy”, I replied politely. “Does it have al-Qaida in it?” I looked a bit confused. “What?” – “Well, I have to check this with my manager, the rest of your stuff is fine, though.”

The manager then came after a minute or two. “Hello Sir, can you tell me about this book?” “Sure, it is about Craig Murray, former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan.” “Where, if I may ask, did you buy this book?” – “Well, it is available at any Waterstones here in Britain. I just bought my copy in the Angel branch yesterday.”

“I am afraid you cannot take this onboard, Sir.” You must be kidding me. I just spent 20 pounds on a book that, despite arousing some controversy in the UK, should not be banned onboard a flight to Germany. I understand that the terror plot (which coincidentally seems to have an Uzbek dimension) makes for some overwrought nerves.

More wow moments in time. Yes, a book is allowed, unless it has a scary word in the title.

[tags]More troubles for air travellers, Book with “Murder” in the title not allowed on a plane[/tags]

Nuts? Electricity = Ahhhhh

Sometimes, I marvel at the things we try in our attempts to make everyone “normal” in life. The latest thing I’ve chuckled over is electroshock, just because I wonder how the idea that this would help someone ever came up. Specifically, this bit on electric shock being used to treat the insane at Modern Mechanix (from the way back in November 1940 issue of Popular Science) made me think about this.

med_insane_patients.jpg

Insane Patients Helped by Electric Shock Treatment

Fighting insanity with electric shock is the most dramatic recent advance in the field of medicine. At the New York State Psychiatric Institute, in. New York City, seemingly hopeless cases of the most common forms of insanity, schizophrenia and dementia praecox, have been shocked back to apparent mental health by the new treatment. Electrodes, at the ends of a caliperlike instrument, are placed just in front of the ears on the patient’s head. From seventy to 100 volts of current pass through his brain. The result is a violent convulsion resembling an epileptic seizure.

In some cases, a single electric shock achieves what seems to be a medical miracle, restoring the patient to sanity. Previously, insulin, snake venom, and metrazol, have been used to produce shock. The electric treatment is painless, leaves no after effects, and costs less than shock-producing drugs.

[tags]Modern Mechanix, Insane patients helped by electric shock[/tags]

British Airways considers aerial photography dangerous?

Well, this is just shockingly unfathomable. While flying home from India, Josh Simons wanted to take a few landscape photos at 35,000+ feet. After snapping only a few pictures, a flight attendent closed his window shade and informed him that aerial photography is not allowed on British Airways flights for security reasons. WTF?

On my recent trip back from India on Britis h Airways, I was inspired by Julieanne Kost’s recent book, Window Seat (not to be confused with another book of the same title by Dicum) to snap some landscape photos at 35000 feet. I think we were over Iran at the time. After taking several shots, imagine my surprise when one of the BA attendants closed the window shade and informed me that it was against British Airways policy for passengers to take such photos for security reasons. I thought she was kidding, but the head attendant confirmed what I had been told. And that it had nothing to do with where we were flying.

One commenter on the article says his checks with other employees of British Airways indicate this aerial photography ban is not company policy, but could not account for Josh’s experience.

[tags]British Airways bans aerial photography?, Photos from 35000 feet considered a security risk?[/tags]

T-Shirts can now be security risks

Poor Dave Osborne. Seems he was a threat to everyone on his flight. Thankfully, someone in security knew how to eliminate the threat.

A TOURIST was told to turn his T-shirt inside-out at an airport — as a picture of two guns on it was deemed a SECURITY RISK.

Dave Osborne, 21, was bound for Newark, New Jersey, when guards hauled him out of the queue for his Guns N Rollers T-shirt.

They told him the two pistols on the front could constitute a security risk and upset passengers.

He was ordered to turn his top inside out before boarding.

The design engineer from Lichfield, Staffs, said: “I am all for extra security but this was just plain stupid.”

I agree, Dave. I agree.

Last night bosses at Birmingham International Airport apologised and said security guards “over-reacted”.

Gee, you think?  You know, I’m really thinking I need to add a “Stupid people/procedures” category for my site.
I won’t post the image, as the site has a right-click blocker saying “Blah, blah, protected image.” Yes, this is easy to disable, but if they don’t want me posting their image, I won’t. Just hit the site to see the security risk just recently discovered by the amazingly brilliant people who are protecting us all.

[tags]Security providers proving dumber over time, T-shirt a security risk due to scary word[/tags]