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Author Topic: Member Interesting, Hair Raising, Humorous or Otherwise Unusual Experiences  (Read 6776 times)

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AGelbert

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WATCH: Aircraft Nearly Crashes Into Sea During Landing Aboard USS Eisenhower
July 11, 2016 by Mike Schuler


Quote
new video released by the U.S. Navy shows the moment an E-2C Hawkeye aircraft nearly plunged into the water from the deck of the USS Eisenhower after an arresting cable snapped during a landing on March 18, 2016.

Details of the incident including video were released Friday by the Virginia-Pilot following a Freedom of Information Act request.

The video, which has since gone viral with more than 1.6 million views, shows the terrifying moment the arresting cable snaps, causing the aircraft to overshoot the runway and fall below the Eisenhower’s landing deck, only to appear moments later as it climbed back into view.

The Virginian-Pilot reports that eight sailors were injured in the incident. The U.S. Navy has blamed the accident on human error and an improperly programmed valve, the paper says.

https://gcaptain.com/watch-aircraft-nearly-crashes-into-sea-during-landing-aboard-uss-eisenhower/

Agelbert NOTE: The E-2C is a pocket sized version of the AWACS (B707 with a saucer on top). Back in the day when I worked airplanes, the E-2C was my favorite Navy aircraft. 


The Navy plays war games about 200 miles from land in various locations. They are called "Warning Areas" and have a number (e.g. W368").   

When the Warning area goes "hot", we ATCs had to vector civilian aircraft around the area. Inside, there would be fighters, aircraft carriers, submarines and E-2C aircraft fighting a mock war engagement.

When the exercise ended, all the birds that are not carrier based head for the nearest land base. Most of them are fighters with BINGO fuel status (Minimum fuel for a comfortable and safe return to base. Aircraft can fly and fight past bingo fuel in combat situations, but at considerable peril.)

This creates what is known as a "situation" for an Air Traffic Controller. 

WHY? Because I am faced with about 10 to 20 aircraft in a scattered group exiting the Warning area that all want to get to the Navy land base, most of which are BINGO fuel. I am supposed to give the BINGO fuel aircraft priority in sequencing but his makes no sense if a non-BINGO fighter is much closer to the base.  :P

In addition, it is well known among the fighter jocks that civilian ATC types cannot check their fuel gages to see if that pilot is trying to beat his pals to the base. ;)  ;D

Yes, fighter jocks are a sneaky lot. They are usually rather young, cocky and not very informative. YET, I still had to identify each one. THEN I had to give each and every one a clearance to the base (via radar vectors) and sequence them towards the base in enough order to avoid them getting too close to each other and the non-military aircraft out there.

The problem was complicated by some BINGO fuel fighter(s) calling several miles behind somebody CLOSER to the base who called a couple of minutes later.

So, faced with this huge pain in the arse situation, I would call on the E2-C that tracked everybody in the exercise, and knew where they all were, to ensure that the birds closest to the base called me first. This made my job quite a bit easier.

Alas, due to the nature of fighter jocks, this did not always work.  :(

If the flight conditions are visual, there is no requirement for a military aircraft exiting a Warning Area to call for a clearance. They can switch directly to the base tower/approach control frequency.

A flight of four that didn't want to "waste time" for a clearance by me went straight for the base. One of them mid-aired with another fighter I had just handed off to the base on approach. They were both killed. The Base tower controller went into a panic and closed down the base.

I then had to vector about 7 remaining aircraft with BINGO fuel to a civilian international airport about 20 miles away. It was a bag of worms but it all worked out. I received an at-a-boy from a squadron of F-14s at the base but that didn't bring back the people killed in the mid-air collision due to impatience and lack of respect for civilian ATC authority by fighter jocks.

Every time the Navy would have one of those war games on my watch, it was worry time. Unliike the fighter jocks, the E-2C crew were always professional and willing to help smooth the exit process from the Warning Area to the land base. 

E2-C pilots and crew  everywhere.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2016, 06:48:16 pm by AGelbert »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Getting ahead in life depends on three components: hard work, talent and luck. The first two are self-explanatory but the final one of luck is something most people are unwilling to acknowledge and if they do consider it tend to downplay how big a role it plays. To me luck means being born in the right place and at the right time. For example you can work hard as Eddie has done but if you were born in a small African village the chances of being as rich (materially at least) are far slimmer. Similarly if Eddie was born in the US but 500 years in the past he isn't going to be a well off dentist.

Not sure you can call that winning the lotto but where and when you are born, as well as what family you live does play a big part on how your future will turn out. In regards to family they say the best barometer of future success is to take the occupation of your father. Therefore it is safe to say that the things you have no control over can play a big part over your future. Off course the first two factors can contradict the latter especially the bit about family but if you are too far from the right place and/or time hard work/talent will not be enough.

When and where you were born is a HUGE portion of the DL Variable.  Also Race a big portion of the DL Variable.  For instance, lets say a Black Affirmative Action candidate was enrolled in Dental School the same year Eddie was.  Is it likely he would be as successful as Eddie?  Probably not, because first off he probably was not as well educated going in to dental school as Eddie.  Second, he would have faced more difficulty getting a practice up and running, because White people with money for expensive Dentistry would go to a White Dentist rather than a Black one.  Even Black people probably would go to a White dentist before a black one in the 80s.

In terms of the When DL, back in the 70s-80s when Eddie went to school, it was relatively CHEAP.  You could work your way through school accumulating relatively low debt.  Today's Dental student?  Fuhgeddaboudit.  You're in the hole $200K when they issue you the sheepskin and open the Gate for you to practice Dentistry.

In the Where DL sub-variable, Bill Gates has been quoted as saying if he had his skill set but was born in Africa, he never would have got anywhere with it.  He had a geek mind suitable for where he was born and when he was born.

Other DL involved here as well.  Over on TBP there used to be a Doctor A-hole a Proctologist.  LOL.  He died a couple of years ago rather unexpectedly.  He was an ass hole and I sure did not mourn his death.  A-hole however set up his practice in the WRONG location and his practice failed.  This ma have had something to do with the fact he was an ass hole though as well.  lol.

Then there are all the Aerospace Engineers who got screwed when the bottom fell out of that market in the 90s.  Smart guys, hard workers, well educated, but NO Aerospace Jobs!

Then all the hard working Air Traffic Controllers who got s h i t-canned by Rayguns.  A more stressful job does not exist than ATC, ask Agelbert.  It also takes a lot of smarts.  It was THEIR fault they were in the wrong f u c k i n g profession at the wrong time?  They didn't "Endeavor to Persevere" enough?

In my upcoming article, I focus on the problems of recent Law Skule graduates.  You will need to wait a couple of weeks for that publication though.

Meanwhile, Eddie's Horatio Alger arguments have been beaten to death, and he needs to find a new and better argument. :P

RE


Agreed.

I looked into what an African American Dentist is faced with in the USA. It is not, in any way, shape or stretch of the imagination, a level playing field compared to a white privileged Dentist like Eddie.

They have trouble getting a loan for the chair and the stuff. Back around 1970, John Adair, my deceased brother-in-law dentist (part Cherokee but looked white with red hair), took a Coast Guard Commission in exchange for them having paid a lot of his studies. He was able to set up after he did his years of service in private practice in Fort Lauderdale with a $25,000 loan from my old man. John was from a poor family in Kansas. He became a "winner" with help from my old man.

African American dentists go the ROTC route too in order to get their studies paid. BUT, after that, most of them don't have a father-in-law with the money to set up an office AND the PLACES they can set up, when it isn't a poor minority neighborhood, are MUCH FEWER than the options open to someone like John BECAUSE of WHITE PRIVILEGE.

So, African American Dentists have to work for a group (and get paid much less) OR go do prison dentistry until they accumulate enough money to set up a private practice. And YEAH, when they DO get a loan, they invariably pay higher interest AND are allowed a LOWER principal.

ALL THE ABOVE, when NOT PRESENT means MORE PROFITS the white privileged dentist gets for EXACTLY the same amount of hard work, lengthy studies and perseverance.

Everything I just said about Dr. John Adair and Dr. Palm (African American dentist in Burlington with a private practice) is true.

Yes, they are just two people. BUT, the SHAFTING that African American dentists get in the USA, despite their exemplary work ethic and above average intelligence (to make it through white dental schools being black, you HAVE to be VERY intelligent), is WELL DOCUMENTED in EVERY profession in the health care field.

Meritocracy, MY ARSE!

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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I just woke up from my mid-morning nap after waking up early this morning to do usual Diner tasks.  I had the most vivid dream in quite some time with a heavy doom theme.

I was visiting cousins at their house for Thanksgiving.  In reality their house was a very plain Levittown style tract house on Long Island, and the one in the dream looked a lot like it from the front.  However, on the back side wasn't their yard, it was right on the ocean with a cliff-like arrangement and two steel pins painted red holding the house to the cliff.

I was watching TV in the living room and made a comment to my cousin that she was the only person I knew who still had CRT tube televisions.  They always had old stuff and were very cheap about buying anything new.  I also had my laptop open on the desk.

There were other relatives in the kitchen getting the food ready, and a few more out on the back porch, when one came in and reported that one of the steel pins holding the house up had rusted through and the house was now only being held up by one pin.  He wasn't sure how long it had been like that though.  Nobody except me got too nervous about this and kept going about the task of getting Thanksgiving dinner ready.  I however decided I needed to at least get my laptop to safety so I unplugged it from the charger and then took it outside in the front of the house going through the garage.  There I noticed that at the front edge of the garage, there was a gap forming with the driveway.  I SCREAMED at all my relatives, "THE HOUSE IS GOING DOWN, GET OUT NOW!"

They began moving toward the front exit, but then the second pin snapped and the house quickly tilted and slid about halfway in the water.  This left a much larger gap and a kind of mini-cliff that the remaining relatives had to climb to get to safety.  There were some little kids who couldn't climb it and relatives went back down to get them.  I didn't go because with my bad arm and bad legs, I didn't think I could help the kids get out and I wouldn't be able to climb back out either.  Then the house broke off and slid completely into the water and all the relatives who had not made it out were lost.  There were a few of us standing on the cliff edge, with one of the guys crying, the owner of the house.

Then another relative asked what we were going to do about Thanksgiving dinner since the Turkey and all the fixin's had been washed out to sea?  I suggested that we could go to a Diner for Thankgiving Dinner.

Then I woke up.

Now, unfortunately unless you are truly amazing at dream interpretation, it's impossible to figure out what the event really is that is coming here or precisely how far off it is either,
but this is the most powerful premonition style dream I have ever had, so something big may be very near on the horizon.

RE


Thank you for sharing. I agree that it is a valid source of information, not to be discarded because of some moronic skeptical comments about food and obviously dead biblical characters.

Since it is about a calamity, it may be a warning in the form of a metaphor about a "house". Dreams often portray our God given premonitions in a symbolic manner. For example, a dream I had many years ago showed a person that was betraying me hugging a dark three dimensional shadow shaped like a human but without any identifying characteristics (torso, legs arms and a head but no individual fingers or viewable eyes, nose mouth, hair, etc.). Within a month I learned the problem was not the shadow, but the person hugging it BECAUSE the dream triggered an investigation by yours truly on the matter.

Years earlier I had a dream about my home filling with a giant wave of water. It wasn't water; it was something else. But the dream made me pay more attention to personal matters. It saved me a lot of grief within a year when the "water" was identified.

Sometimes, dreams are not symbolic, but quite accurate representations of the proximate future. During a particularly stressful time in my Air Traffic Control Career (lots of overtime during strike recovery), I dreamed that my right front tire had a blow out on my way to work. I parked the car and was befuddled when I went to change the tire by the way it was sliced clean across the tire outer side.

When I woke up, the dream was still vivid. I told my wife about this weird dream. My wife was going to use the car so she would ride with me to work that day. The tires looked fine. Well, I ate breakfast and off we went.

About a mile from the Enroute Air Traffic control Center, I swerved to avoid something on the road that a car had just passed directly over without hitting.  It was a brake shoe (a half moon shaped part that some idiot had dropped on the road). The tire hit one end and the other knifed into my tire and caused a blow out. I pulled over and relived my dream in every detail seeing the slice in the tire.

Anybody here that is so stupid and ignorant as to discard dreams because they never got past pseudo scientific Freudian bullshit claims that dreams are simply psycho-somatic reactions to food is not worthy of respect.

Dreams CAN be about food, but to claim they are of no importance beyond that is bullshit.

NO, I don't expect certain well off people or sophistic hairsplitters to believe in the accuracy of my anecdotes. That would force them to question their tidy "modern" view of reality measured exclusively by the size of their bank account.  ;)

But everything I said is true.

RE, I once did not take particularly vivid dreams seriously. Experience taught me that is a mistake. There is quite a bit I will not go into here because there are too many mocking ass holes around that prefer sniping and jeering to taking the subject of dream interpretation seriously.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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 Since I am a bit of a 'no spiritual gain without pain' fanatic, I can never embrace Epicureanism, but I applaud your modest life style.

Don't worry, my body provides copious amounts of pain, and since I can't take ANY ingested analgesic for more than 2 days without becoming addicted, I get plenty of practice with Stoic endurance, too.

Yikes.  :( I never knew someone could become addicted to non-opiate and/or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (e.g. aspirin).

Tale care.

Back when I used to work airplanes, about six times a year I used to get such severe migraines at work that I could actually feel the spiking, throbbing pain tracking across the top of my scalp.  :(

You just couldn't get up and leave. You had to finish your shift WITHOUT any aspirin.

So, I was about three hours into heavy duty pain by the time I made it home. I used to call them Excedrin Headache number unlimited  :P. I had to get in a dark room after taking two extra strength Excedrins and press a pillow over my eyes. After about an hour, I would fall asleep and it would be okay. In all my years of working the boards, I had to be driven home on only one occasion.

Now I have psoriasis tracks exactly where the "pain tracks" traveled across my scalp. But I rarely get headaches and have never had a migraine since my time on the boards.

After 19.5 years of working for the FAA (the last third of which was as an automation analyst baby sitting an ATC mainframe and providing programming, troubleshooting and routine patches), I had a nervous breakdown. That is why I was retired with only 26% of my high three instead of 51%. That is why I am poor.

All those years of study, from two years pre-engineering to two years in becoming a commercial pilot and fight instructor to three and have years of concentrated study and OJT hell to become a journeyman radar air traffic controller, a year an a half of accounting and business administration, 3 and half years of pre-med and the equivalent of two years of computer science packed into 4 months of 8 hours days did not save me from economic disaster. :emthdown: 

So, according to certain 'survival of fittest' folks here, I am a failure and therefore deserve what I got for being a 'weak sister'. These 'people' will toss those who stumble, despite a lifetime of hard work and study, in the garbage and laugh at their misery and pain. They are fools. They eschew empathy and mock the downtrodden. I know. I was on the receiving end of their bankrupt world view.

Se la vie.


He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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http://nypost.com/2016/09/11/hillary-clinton-has-medical-episode-at-911-ceremony/




Interesting. As a veteran of some serious syncope episodes prior to my pacemaker implantation, I wish to inform readers that they way Hillary collapsed is precisely the way you pass out from syncope. It could also be a stroke but strokes usually take minutes, not seconds, to knock you out.

In syncope, your heart just stops in its tracks. About 10 seconds later, you are unconscious. The heart starts up on its own about 15 seconds later. Syncope is NOT a heart attack.

I just wanted to add that, minutes prior to a syncope, you feel fatigued and you get paresthesia (tingling in arms and head). This is because the heart is already stopping and starting for a second or two, not enough to knock you out, but enough to reduce the oxygenation in your extremities (tingling and pin pricks).

Hillary could have started to feel woozy, taken out, and then had the main (15 seconds or more) syncope at the SUV.

UPDATE:
I just found this. This doctor seems to agree with my diagnosis.  8)

Quote

Hillary Clinton almost fainted. I’m a doctor. It’s really o.k. | Dr. Jen Gunter

10 hours ago - Hillary Clinton left early from the 9/11 commemoration in New York as ... With near syncope it is pretty easy to intervene, as Mrs. Clinton's team did, and prevent the faint. ... breath as I am pretty confident that if Mrs. Clinton did have shortness ... with symptoms consistent with vasovagal or orthostatic syncope, ...

https://drjengunter.wordpress.com/2016/09/11/hillary-clinton-almost-fainted-im-a-doctor-its-really-o-k/

Agelbert NOTE:
The vasovagal syncope is the one where the heart stops. The Orthostatic syncope is caused by low blood pressure (hypotension) from rising up quickly from a sitting or squatting position. Also, soldiers at attention in a formation sometimes lock their leg muscles inadvertently causing loss of blood pressure. They keel over and wake up embarrassed. I DOUBT whether Hillary's syncope was orthostatic.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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By the way, AG, welcome back. Your voice has been missed.
By the way, AG, welcome back. Your voice has been missed.


Yes,
Glad your participating AG...


Thank you. I'm feeling better. I hope to be fully normal soon.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Quote
Agelbert: I was thinking the other day about my deceased dentist brother in law. He did his own lab work to increase his profit on crowns and such. I understand that dentists, like jewelers, could purchase gold when it was technically illegal to purchase it back before 1977 (approximate year).

I know jewelers do not pay the retail price. Do dentists get a similar discount? I know you folks don't use gold and silver as much as you used to, but I don't know whether you stopped using it altogether.

Can you enlighten me?

You are correct that dentists were allowed to legally possess gold after Roosevelt confiscated the gold of American citizens.
At that time, it was necessary to confiscate gold to keep people from using it as a substitute for currency, so that the USD could be devalued. By raising the price of gold from $20.67 to $35, the USD lost 40% of its buying power in one day.

Dental gold is not sold to dentists at a discount. It actually costs more, because it passes through an extra middle man, the dental gold refiners. There are four basic kinds of dental gold, and now (because gold is ultra expensive) many substitutes. Pure gold is too soft for dental work, and the different dental golds differ mainly by hardness. They are alloys, containing mostly gold and silver, and some platinum and/or palladium.

Many so-called "gold" crowns and bridges contain zero gold. That has been one way unscrupulous dentists have bilked patients and insurance companies over the last generation, although now it's getting harder to do, since some insurance companies demand to see lab receipts proving that the gold charge is legitimate.

Gold is still a fine material to use where esthetics aren't important, and when base metals are substituted, some sensitive patients have allergic symptoms. 

Gold will be around for a while in dentistry, but zirconium is rapidly becoming a cheaper, and still very acceptable substitute. And zirconium, although technically a metal, does not look like metal. It looks like porcelain.

As for me, I did stop doing silver fillings some years back and no longer keep silver on hand. I never actually kept silver metal  (or mercury) anyway, since I bought pre-capped amalgam (more convenient and safer for staff).  I still do a fair number of gold crowns, but I don't have an in-house lab.

The amount of gold in a crown might be 3-5 pennyweights (a pennyweight or dwt is 1/20 of a Troy oz.) so a typical gold cost for a crown is roughly $150 to $250. To that add typical lab labor and you get the doctor's lab bill for the crown, $300 to $500. So a crown you pay $1200 for amounts to $700 to $900 for the dentist's time and skill.

A zirconium crown total fee is still $1200, but the lab bill might be $200 total. You can see why zirconium is getting more popular with dentists. Patients do like the esthetics, as the crowns are now quite life-like in appearance.


     

 Thank you for filling in all the blanks I had on gold and dentistry. I had no idea they were using zirconium.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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My computer had a massive failure a week ago.   :( I tried to put a new hard disk in but that didn't work.

The hard disk MIGHT still be good and just the mother board is fried but I will have to find that out at a future date.

So, the HP Pavillion and about a year's worth of data are kaput.  :P  I did have some backup for tax stuff and legal but lost a bunch of pictures and doc that weren't essential. I also lost the "Favorites" list so I have to build that up slowly again.  :P  I am not real thorough at backing my stuff up. Mea culpa.  :-[ :'(

I have a 3.70 GHZ new Desktop Dell Inspiron i3-6100 cpu and 6GB of memory (expandable to more, of course). It's the cheapest thing around so that's what I got.  ;D

I'm still rebuilding things so it will be a while before I do my thing here again.  8)
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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My computer had a massive failure a week ago.   :( I tried to put a new hard disk in but that didn't work.  :emthdown: The hard disk MIGHT still be good and just the mother board is fried but I will have to find that out at a future date.

So, the HP Pavillion and about a year's worth of data are kaput.  :P  I did have some backup for tax stuff and legal but lost a bunch of pictures and doc that weren't essential. I also lost the "Favorites" list so I have to build that up slowly again.  :P  I am not real thorough at backing my stuff up. Mea culpa.  :-[ :'( :emthdown:

I have a 3.70 GHZ new Desktop Dell Inspiron i3-6100 cpu and 6GB of memory (expandable to more, of course). It's the cheapest thing around so that's what I got.  ;D

I'm still rebuilding things so it will be a while before I do my thing here again.  8)

Hi AG, You won't feel compromised with that i3 chip. It's one of the best values out there. 6GB of memory is adequate as well. Computers have gotten way ahead of what most of us use them for, and I have little doubt your new rig will prove more than adequate.

Agreed.     

My computer had a massive failure a week ago.   :( I tried to put a new hard disk in but that didn't work.  :emthdown: The hard disk MIGHT still be good and just the mother board is fried but I will have to find that out at a future date.

So, the HP Pavillion and about a year's worth of data are kaput.  :P  I did have some backup for tax stuff and legal but lost a bunch of pictures and doc that weren't essential. I also lost the "Favorites" list so I have to build that up slowly again.  :P  I am not real thorough at backing my stuff up. Mea culpa.  :-[ :'( :emthdown:

I have a 3.70 GHZ new Desktop Dell Inspiron i3-6100 cpu and 6GB of memory (expandable to more, of course). It's the cheapest thing around so that's what I got.  ;D

I'm still rebuilding things so it will be a while before I do my thing here again.  8)


Pencil, paper, filebox....

Yep.   8)
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Hey Hey AG.....
Glad your vertical & among the living.
Find a 4 year old Aquarian child to help with your computer being stuck on stupid.
I think I'm going to buy a new laptop after Christmas. Mine's starting to sloooowwww  waaaayyy down as well.
Gotta' love that Chinese planned obsolescence. 

Sidenote: Where the heck has Surly been. On assignment or just pissed about the shellacking Killary is taking around here ?

I don't know where surly is. RE probably knows.  8)

For avoiding computer woes, I recommend a utility I just found that can save you a LOT of trouble. Heat is a computer's worse enemy. If I had used this in my old system, I could have anticipated imminent failure and backed everything up adequately. The utility is called Core Temp and sits in the taskbar (when minimized). It monitors core temps continually.  ;D

I LOVE IT! Check it out. 

How to Monitor Your Computer’s CPU Temperature

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/ever-wonder-what-temperature-your-cpu-is-running-at/

CoreTemp DOWNLOAD page

http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Now if I can just stay clear of those cows, this should work out all right.  :D

How Newsworthy Were the Wright Brothers’
First Flights? ???


It may surprise you to learn that news of the first-ever powered airplane flight was not covered by the mainstream press.

It was actually a beekeeper named A.I. Root who first wrote about Orville and Wilbur Wright’s early flights in the pages of his obscure journal Gleanings in Bee Culture. Although Root didn’t witness the first flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in December 1903, he was on hand in September 1904 when the brothers took a plane up and circled around, returning to their starting place.

The Wright brothers had obtained permission to use a local cow pasture known as Huffman Prairie, a few miles outside Dayton, Ohio. The owner did not charge them, but he did ask that the Wrights make sure his livestock were not harmed. Root witnessed several other flights at Huffman Prairie and reported the successes in his beekeeping journal.

The first family of fearless flying: 

•The Wrights built a hangar at Huffman Prairie and began experimenting with their second airplane. They started to use a catapult device to assist with takeoff in lighter winds.

•The Wrights added weight to the front of their 1904 Flyer to shift the center of gravity forward and increase stability. They also moved the elevator farther ahead of the wings, which made the plane easier to fly.

•It took 49 flights for the Wrights to equal their Kitty Hawk flight time. The first circular flight lasted 1 minute, 36 seconds and covered 4,080 feet (1.2 km).

http://www.wisegeek.com/how-newsworthy-were-the-wright-brothers-first-flights.htm

Agelbert NOTE: Cows do not take kindly to being buzzed by airplanes. Back in 1966, the flight school I was attending at Opa Locka airport in Florida received numerous complaints from ranchers north of us (what was designated as the "practice area" for student pilots) between North Miami and Ft. Lauderdale (mostly open land at that time). The cows were being buzzed and having abortions. I never buzzed any cows or people. But there are stupid, empathy deficit disordered people in every profession, I guess. The only time you were supposed to be below 600 feet (the lowest altitude for ground reference maneuvers like turns about a point, pylon eights and S turns above a road) was when you were simulating an emergency landing (you got to about a 100 feet and then applied power when the instructor was satisfied that you would survive the forced landing and possibly not damage the aircraft).

I never went anywhere near a cow or a person. I saw cows and people and was perfectly aware of where they were at so I assume some idiots thought is was "fun" to buzz them. So it goes. There are way too many Homo SAPS among Homo Sapiens.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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I like this Texan.        


I was surprised I don't know this guy. I bet money I know somebody who knows him. LOL. Thank you!

You are welcome, Eddie. Check that dude out, if you can. He is having some marital problems but he seems like a straight shooter. Who knows, he may become a bona-fide Doomstead Diner. He has a following on U-tube of about 3,500 subscribers. I think he could use some help from a fellow Texan, even if it's just moral support.

RE, you may want to give him a holler too.  ;)

The problem with multi-hull boats is they are not self-righting.  So if you get rolled over or pitch poled, you are seriously **** and SOL.  If the trimaran folds, you can right it if the seas calm, but you cannot right a flipped cat in any way. Trimarans have the serious problem of a lack of room in the main cabin, not a great living space in general.

I experienced two flying jibes.  One not too bad on a small daysailer boat, it only pulled out a couple of cleats.  The other one worse, the boom got ripped off the mast on a 32 footer.  Very ugly, and expensive repairs for dad the pigman.

RE

I hear ya, RE, but I want to tell you about something I saw that you will find hard to believe. I certainly found it hard to believe. I was at the beach watching a dude sailing a Hobie cat. Of course that's a bit small for a catamaran but it IS a catamaran. Well, it FLIPPED! And the dude, WAY out over 200 yards away from the beach, stood on a pontoon and UNFLIPPED IT!.  :o  The mast came out of the water. After some scurrying around, he was sailing again. That guy knew his stuff!

A Hobie Cat in action

Of course you can't do that with a full sized catamaran but I like em' anyway!  ;D

 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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You are welcome, Eddie. Check that dude out, if you can. He is having some marital problems but he seems like a straight shooter. Who knows, he may become a bona-fide Doomstead Diner. He has a following on U-tube of about 3,500 subscribers. I think he could use some help from a fellow Texan, even if it's just moral support.

I dropped a note on his utoob page and he invited me to meet him sometime soon. I think he's going to be out-of-town for a few days, though.  I'll let you know how it goes.


Great!  I learned from watching his screeds that he used to be a Real Estate salesman and made some big bucks for a while until the crash. It appears he has struggled for about a decade. I watched the way he deals with and handles his dog. That alone told me he is a good, caring man. He cusses up a storm but considering the present situation, I cannot blame him.  8)

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Weren't the Krishnas those folks that hung around airports and sold pencils in guru outfits or something? As an air taxi pilot I had the experience of running in to them often. I do admit they were always polite and friendly.     I kind of felt sorry for them because they always looked like they hadn't had enough to eat.   :(

Given the time period you were doing that job, yes those were likely Hare Krishnas.

RE


Yeah, they must have been the ones.  8) I think they would have one shoulder bared in those outfits. That worked okay in the tropics...  ;)

I was kind of hungry in the days of being an air taxi rat myself. I had a mail run to two small islands for a while (Vieques and Culebra). I tried to make ends meet by importing goat cheese from Culebra but I couldn't get connected with the supermarket personnel that purchased quantities of food items.  So, I ended up eating the samples I bought. That was GREAT cheese!  ;D

When I flew from Vieques to Culebra I had to traverse a Navy fun and games blow stuff up area of the ocean. I got to see depth charges shot and large guns firing in real time. They were polluting the crap out of the Caribbean especially after the bomb, you know. They towed vessels that had been exposed to the nuke tests in the Pacific ALL THE WAY to Vieques and sank them off shore. Vieques has one of the highest cancer rates in the WORLD. Of course I'm sure the U.S. Navy had nuttin' to do wid dat....


Sorry for the ramblin' I'm getting old.



Great story AG.

Harry's fresh chum for the shark tank. Since JeRM slithered back under his rock,
I've adopted Harry as my new squeak toy.... 


Sorry for the ramblin' I'm getting old.

Don't sweat ramblin' on about your life history.  I love hearing anecdotes about people's lives.

I'm hitting the big 6-OH this year, and I wrote an autobiography to celebrate this momentous occassion.  ::) :icon_sunny:  lol.  It's so **** long even by my standards I'm going to spread out the publication in parts over the next few months.  Part 1 will go up in May.

RE

 


Great story AG.

Harry's fresh chum for the shark tank. Since JeRM slithered back under his rock,
I've adopted Harry as my new squeak toy.... 


lol :D

I needed a good laugh...thanks Azozeo 


 

WAR STORY TIME! 

There I was, flying my Piper Navajo in the year of our Lord 1970 through a hellacious thunder storm. I had a full load of adventurous bidness people (eight  ;D), I was young and I COULD FLY!   

 
Well, at least I thought so.  8)

Where were we? Right, the San Juan to Ponce run in the afternoon when the thunderheads on the south of Puerto Rico, which is usually about as wet as Arizona, were built up to really ugly dimensions.

Being a fearless flyer (most of the time), I was up to the task of delivering my paying passengers smoothly to the Ponce airport, of course. This was a bit challenging because the turbulence was a pain in the arse. Aircraft have seat belts for completely different reasons than cars, ya know.

The Captain's seat in the Navajoe (left seat in the cockpit) positions you so that you can reach the throttle quadrant with three pairs of handles on it. The red ones are the mixture control of avgas (130 octane green color) and oxygen. That Navajo had superchargers on it so you had to be careful with the mixture control or you would get power boosts that would unnerve the passengers. They don't like a twin engine aircraft sashaying this way and that, even for a few seconds. And it looks bad too. The whole idea of flying commercially is to convince those fine folks on board that you are a sort of limo in the sky so they will come back for another ride. Avoiding wiggles and bumps is a big deal.  :laugh:


The other pairs of handles on the throttle quadrant are for the propeller angle (blue color) and for the throttles( black color) for each 350 HP Lycoming gas hog. The blue ones are called pitch control handles. These are basically a variable gearshift for airplanes. They can also be used to "feather"  the prop if the engine quits to avoid drag.   I know. You are bored to tears so let's get on with the thunder bumper story.

I was at 5,000 feet on instruments (in the soup) heading southwest about 15 miles from the airport at around 220 knots. I was cleared for the "circling" VOR approach to runway 11. All that techno-babble means that I had to shoot a non-precision approach because Ponce was a two-by-nothing airport that didn't merit an instrument landing system (ILS - tells you how high you are until about 200 feet above the runway a mile or so away from the threshold).

A VOR is a Very High Frequency Omni-range device/building that looks like a 100 ft diameter sombrero. It puts out 360 radials that you can tune into with your VOR gizmo on the panel and tell if you are on the right or left side of the radial.

In a VOR approach, you first intercept the approach radial and follow it. If it's a "circling" approach, that means you are NOT lined up with the runway when you reach the minimum approach altitude at a specific time for the velocity you are traveling at.

If you see the runway, you circle (at Ponce I had to circle about 210 degrees!) to line up with the runway.

IF you do NOT break out of the soup or cannot see the runway at minimum altitude (it was about 1,500 above the runway here) and clocked time, you had to shoot a "Missed Approach" and climb back up to 6,000 feet and Hold (do 4 minute race track patters of one minute legs) at the PSE VOR on a specific radial and await another  approach clearance (or proceed to your alternate airport).

In this approach, after spotting the runway, I would be heading about 260 (west-south-westward) and have to spot the airport, fly south of, and then parallel to, the runway heading 290.

As soon as I was abeam the runway 11 threshold (it's runway 29 in the other direction but the wind is always coming from the east there so I couldn't just land on 29), I would circle to the right to 110 degrees (East-south-eastward) and land. Simple, RIGHT? 

I was traveling on a radial from another VOR station.

I had a second VOR gizmo (you have two on decent aircraft, sniff) set to the PSE (Ponce) VOR radial I wanted to intercept. So, as the needle began to center, I passed a fix from which I could start the approach.

I began a descent using a timed rate of descent along the approach radial.

You practice all this stuff a lot to get an instrument rating. BUT, when you are flying routinely, you RARELY need to shoot approaches on instruments in a DRY place like Ponce.

BUT, some days (it's mostly during the days, not nights) it just cain't be helped. THIS was one of those days.   

It was quite bumpy. as I went through 4,000 feet. I tightened my seat belt to make sure I would have no difficulty reaching the props and throttle while being bounced around.

No smoking sign: ON (in air taxis you always require the passengers to have their seat belts on).
Boost pumps: ON
Fuel: ON MAIN TANKS
Cowl flaps: OPEN
Flaps: 20 degrees
Gear: DOWN with three green lights (locked)
Mixture:  FULL RICH (handles full forward)
Prop Pitch control: FLAT PITCH (handles full forward)
Throttle: AS NEEDED to keep 500 feet per minute rate of descent (unlike a car, the throttle is used to control descent rate in an approach - you control velocity with the elevators).

CROSS CHECK: constant rescan of instruments and CLOCK to see how much time you have left to missed approach point. You want to make sure you reach the minimum altitude just before the time expires so you have the best chance of being low enough and near enough to spot the runway.

I checked my speed and the clock. More bumps and flashes of lightning.  :P The tower advises a heavy rain storm is in progress over the field with a visibility of less than a mile. That is VERY bad news for me because non-precision approaches CANNOT be executed completely when the visibility is less than a mile...
I say "roger" and prepare myself to have to do a Missed Approach.  :P

The tower informs me that the visibility SOUTH of the airport is above a mile and the storm is mostly on and north of the airport. 

I say "roger" and start to think fast.   I know this area like the back of my hand (famous last words  ;D) so there is NO WAY I'm gonna let that dumb rain storm GIT me. I KNOW all the high terrain is north of airport and I KNOW the land is flat as a pancake and near sea level SOUTH of the airport for the few miles to ocean.

SO, I figure I can cheat a little.  ;)

Descending through 3,000 feet,  I deliberately deviate about 8 degrees south of the approach radial. The soup continues as thick as ever and the lightning is more frequent, instead of less. I call the tower for a visibility update. They say the storm appears stationary with no sign of decreasing intensity except to the south.

I say, "roger" while my hand on the yoke is getting a bit on the sweaty side. I deviate another 5 degrees or so left of the approach radial.

I pass 2,000 feet and still nuttin'. I have 500 feet more I can legally descend and about 30 seconds left.

I keep descending past 1,500 ft (I was STILL in the soup at 1,500 ft) to 1,000 feet and begin to break out of the soup, but I can't see the runway.

The tower calls and reports the visibility is just above a mile!

I say, "Roger, please advise if you go below Special VFR (visual flight rules). Less than 3 miles but greater than one mile are known as "special" VFR rules that IFR (instrument flight rules) rated pilots like me CAN use to get around IFR rules and land in visual conditions legally.".  ;)

I reach the end of my time at 1,000 feet. I'm not in the soup (barely) but I can't see the airport (I am planning to head straight south over the ocean to stay away from the soup and regroup - I have no desire to go up in to that crapola at moment).

He says, " Roger, report the runway in sight for visual approach to runway 11. Wind is 090 at 15 gusting to 25 knots. Altimeter 2998 (approximation - that was long arse time ago  8)).

As he says that I realize the tailwind pushed me further towards the airport than I thought with my timed approach. A look hard towards that black ugly soup to the right and THERE is the runway!

Ponce tower, San Juan Air 533 has the runway in sight.

PSE TWR: Roger, San Juan Air 533 is cleared for a visual approach to runway 11. Visibility continues to be above one mile (I think he was making that up but what the hell.  :laugh: I knew he just trying to help. I couldn't see the tower cab!  :o)

AND NOW is when the FUN began.   

I fly WELL (nearly over the ocean) south and parallel to the airport at about 800 feet. I then fly over the city and carefully pick my land marks.

You see, when it's raining real hard, you can NOT see forward, but you can see straight down.  This is a rather dangerous thing to do, but if you think your a hotshot pilot, you might be dumb enough to try it.  ;D

I knew there is this hill about 500 feet high on the approach path to runway 11 within a mile or so of the runway. I knew that there was a hospital on that hill. I planned to have that just to my left. After passing that hill, there are two rivers, then an expressway next to the threshold. On the left of the runway was located the Serralles Rum plant that made Don Q rum. It had some large stacks on it that I didn't want to run into that also served as good land marks.

So, as the hill got abeam of my position going west, I circled to the right, maintaining the fiction that I still had the runway in sight (I no longer did, but don't tell nobody  ;D). I could see the ground and somewhat forward.

As I turned, over the city, towards the airport, I lost forward visibility as the rain grew heavy. I applied full flaps for the landing and increased the power to keep at approach speed (about 130 knots)). I had to keep my eyes glued to the ground and didn't want the aircraft to get away from me.

In passing, I must tell you that there was a passenger in the co-pilot's seat. The owner of the air taxi normally allowed that to make more money.      You only needed (FAA regs) a co-pilot when you had to BEGIN the flight in IFR conditions (which rarely happened). I got fired for organizing a union to force that bastard to put co-pilots on all flights, but that's another story for another time.  8)

Back to the high pucker factor approach, the tower is calling the wind and there is Prinair 4 engine De Haviland Heron ready for take off but being held at the apron due to my imminent arrival.

The tower clears me to land. I say, "roger".

I'm watching the city go by and the terrain rapidly goes up. THERE's the hospital on the hill!

I slightly bank left, going through 300 feet and see the two rivers, now 100 feet.

WHERE is the expressway? It's really coming down HARD!

I start to apply more power to stop the descent while looking down desperately (although my outward appearance was the calm cool Captain Kirk of the Star Ship Enterprise LOL!).

THERE I see the Heron 4 engine job right underneath me! I pitch the nose down slightly. I still can't see forward at all. It's like a waterfall going UP my windshield.

I'm slightly right of course. I find the runway centerline and see the left runway lights (they were on despite it being during the day because of the low visibility) and just try to keep them the same distance from the aircraft wing. I'm at about 50 feet. I throttle back all the way.

Rather than bank and lose the visibility I have to stay straight along the centerline, I use the rudder pedals to move the nose left or right.

I touch down. The Prinair crew that watched the whole thing says, "BRAVO!" on the radio.  ;D

I still can't see forward. I apply foot breaks while watching the runway lights to stay straight.

The aircraft stops. It's still raining cats and dogs out there. The tower orders Prinair to taxi into position and hold and orders me to taxi to the ramp with instructions to NOT open the door because the ramp crew has personnel with an umbrella coming  :D (normally the pilot opens that door).

I say "roger" and push hard right rudder to do a circling left turn on the runway (there was no taxiway at the 29 end of the runway).

As I did that followed by hard left rudder and differential engine power to help the turn, the passenger blurted out that he couldn't figure out how I did that because he couldn't see a thing. I calmly explained that you could see down and use land marks in my best Captain Kirk voice (while I hoped the passenger wasn't noticing that wiggle that had developed in my two knees right after the aircraft finally stopped).

When I finally reached the terminal, I smoked the most enjoyable cigarette I have ever smoked in my LIFE! 

No, I never had to do that again. When I bragged about it to my Airline pilot brother, he chewed my arse for 20 minutes reminding me of all the ways I could have killed myself and a bunch of other people.  :-[
So, I made  sure I didn't repeat the risky maneuver.

But, to this day, I'm HAPPY that I got away with it!

Piper Navajoe
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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FABULOUS Anecdote AG!!!!! 
RE


  Sir. I'm glad it helped you have a better day. 

 I can't wait until Surly finds out I once organized a UNION! Hopefully, he will relieve me of my "aparatchik" status for having worked for the feds (just kidding surly!  But now you know I 've always been a socialist at heart.  ;D). 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

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