What Hath I Wrought?

News report from 1981 about the Internet
maugantiasx
41 years ago I got my Bachelor of Arts degree in Computer Science back in 1980 and look what happened. Yes, I know it's not all my doing, but me and a zillion other guys with busy minds and busy fingers got busy and here we are, good, bad, or indifferent.

Via IAman

A-4C Skyhawk

A-4C Skyhawk

Photographer Don Fitzgerald provides some context:

A VA-144 A-4C Skyhawk operating as War Paint 312 (BuNo 149532) armed with Mark 82 Snakeye bombs receives a catapult ready thumbs up for a strike mission launch into North Vietnam from USS Kitty Hawk CVA 63 operating from Yankee Station, Tonkin Gulf, South China Sea in January 1967. 50mm with 2X extender from the 06 observation deck(Vultures Row).

Yankee Station

Back in the day, there was all this noise about Vietnam, but nobody ever mentioned the giant Chinese island of Hainan right there, 70 miles away off the starboard bow. There were two locations for Yankee Station depending on the year. The one shown on the map is the later one and is correct for the photograph.

Previous mention of Skyhawk here.

Vulture's Row above the flight deck of USS Ronald Reagan 2007

USS Kitty Hawk hangar bay Persian Gulf 22 March 2003

Mark 82 Snakeye bomb

CZ-52

CZ-52

Possibly my favorite handgun. Tam has a good story about her experience with the CZ-52 eighteeen years ago. It rings a bell with me because I mentioned it indirectly in another post a couple of days ago.

Lcuille Ball, Godmother of Star Trek

Mary Shelley and Lucille Ball

I know the famous Lucille and her show I Love Lucy, but I had no idea she had anything to do with Star Trek. The official Star Trek site has the story. (Wait, there's an official Star Trek site? Silly, of course there is.) Also, I didn't realize how old I Love Lucy is. It ran from 1951 to 1957. I thought it was from the 60's at least.

Natanz Nuclear Facility Sabotage

Natanz Nuclear Enrichment Facility, Iran

EXCLUSIVE: Mossad recruited top Iranian scientists to blow up key nuclear facility - The Jewish Chronicle

When I reported about this eight months ago, I speculated that the damage was either due to stupidity, sabotage or Israel. Turns out it was the last two. It was a impressively complex operation. Attacks were carried out on three or four sites simultaneously using a variety of methods including a take-apart drone firing missiles.

People are setting up quadcopter drones to deliver all kinds of mayhem like arming them with machine guns or turning them into suicide drones by arming them with bombs. Missiles are another matter. Large winged drones often carry missiles, but not too many quadcopters. I did find this picture of one from Ukraine:

Matrix UAV Demon drone. Image Credit: Matrix UAV

Technically it is carrying an RPG (Rocket Propelled Grenade), not a missile, but that might be what they used. Missiles can be heavy. A Hellfire missile weighs a hundred pounds and a Sidewinder weighs close to 200. It would take a substantial quadcopter to lift that big a payload.

Natanz Nuclear Facility

I wanted to see what this place looked like, but when I pulled up Google Maps, I found that the 3D view button was missing. Also, when you zoom out far enough to see whole continent, you will notice that the map projection they are using has changed. And they didn't even ask me, the dogs. To get the 3D view, you need to use Google Earth. Natanz is roughly 150 miles south of Tehran.

Fire at Sparky's

Fire at Sparky's

There was a fire a week ago at Sparky's. I'm just now getting around to posting this because reasons.

Sparky's is a truck stop on Highway 20 just north of Rockwell City, Iowa. It's fairly new, I mean it wasn't there when we got married a zillion years ago. We've been there before.

Truck that started the fire

Rumor has it that the brakes on a semi-truck locked up and when the truck pulled in, the accumulated heat in the brakes set the tires on fire and as the truck was parked next to the building, one thing led to another and the whole place went up in smoke.

Fauk Fauci

 

Jim Jones (left) Anthony Fauci (right)

alt fin next level has a post up about the damage COVID-19 policies are doing to people, civilization and society world wide:

Fauci’s Policies Bringing On Pandemics of Depression, Suicide, Child Abuse, Drug Overdose, and Non-Covid Mortality

COVID-19 might be killing people, but we have just started to see the damage being done to society as a whole. Suck it up cupcake, nobody gets out of here alive.