When people think of Idaho, they often think of our Famous Potatoes. Others might think of all the famous actors who live in Sun Valley. I found a web site that combines both -- Idaho's most famous food with our most famous celebrity -- Dawn Wells!
As all true guys know, Mary Ann was much, much hotter than Ginger on Gilligan's Island, and Dawn has certainly aged well. As Idaho's most involved resident celebrity, Dawn helped draw interest into the 1st iTuber Video Contest; the best videos are linked from here, and you can see all the videos that entered here. So sit back, relax, and watch a bunch of 2 minute, not-at-all-completely-cheesy (not!) homemade videos extolling the glory of the humble potato.
Now This Is Weird...
From ABC News, about a "submarine-like" vessel found in the East River just off Brooklyn, near the Queen Mary 2, this morning:
Normally, I'm not much of an alarmist, but this one doesn't smell kosher. I really can't think of any non-nefarious reasons someone would want to sail a vessel like that around New York, and drug-smuggling doesn't really make sense; you could just drive your load around the city. If they didn't find anything, maybe this was a dry run? I don't like to ethnically profile anyone, but if it turns out the "Sailors" have Middle Eastern names, I'm gonna say this could be the tip of something much bigger.
On the other hand, it could just be a bunch of guys doing guy things in a guy-like way.
Bell-ringer 1152 03 Aug: A commenter mentions that it kind of looks like a replica of the Turtle. There was one built a few years back; the web page describing it is here. It says it was last on the East Coast. Might someone have been doing something for a movie and there was a miscommunication with the police at the pier?
An updated story from the local ABC affiliate in NYC says that "no threatening devices or materials were found on board the vessel." So, if it was terroism-related, it looks like it was a dry run.
Update 1211 03 Aug: Here's another picture of the submersible:
The first Reuters report on the incident makes it look less likely to be terrorism related; it appears that there was one guy inside the submarine, and two others were towing it in an inflatable boat:
Update 1302 03 Aug: Never mind. It did turn out to just be guys doing guy things:
Well, it enlivened an otherwise not-very-exciting day in submarine news.
Update 2142 03 Aug: It turns out that rather than just regular guys being guys, it was a "waterborne performance artist" who intentionally wanted to get close to the Queen Mary 2.
Update 1028 04 Aug: Here's an article about the "artist" and his background, which includes a link to his website. The NYC art community is full of all sorts of interesting characters. (Note that I don't think they're all completely strange -- I have a cousin who's a working artist in the City.)
Authorities are questioning three men after pulling them from a submersible vessel in the East River in Brooklyn, N.Y., according to reports from ABC affiliate WABC.Here's a picture of the vessel:
The men were captured near the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal in downtown Brooklyn, near the massive cruise ship the Queen Mary 2, just after 11 a.m.
The intent of the three men being held by police remains unclear, but the initial indication is that it did not appear to be terror-related. They have not been identified by police and no charges have been filed.
The orblike vessel, with a circular hatch on the top for entering and exiting, remains moored in the East River in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn. It was equipped with oxygen tanks, WABC reported.
Normally, I'm not much of an alarmist, but this one doesn't smell kosher. I really can't think of any non-nefarious reasons someone would want to sail a vessel like that around New York, and drug-smuggling doesn't really make sense; you could just drive your load around the city. If they didn't find anything, maybe this was a dry run? I don't like to ethnically profile anyone, but if it turns out the "Sailors" have Middle Eastern names, I'm gonna say this could be the tip of something much bigger.On the other hand, it could just be a bunch of guys doing guy things in a guy-like way.
Bell-ringer 1152 03 Aug: A commenter mentions that it kind of looks like a replica of the Turtle. There was one built a few years back; the web page describing it is here. It says it was last on the East Coast. Might someone have been doing something for a movie and there was a miscommunication with the police at the pier?
An updated story from the local ABC affiliate in NYC says that "no threatening devices or materials were found on board the vessel." So, if it was terroism-related, it looks like it was a dry run.Update 1211 03 Aug: Here's another picture of the submersible:
The first Reuters report on the incident makes it look less likely to be terrorism related; it appears that there was one guy inside the submarine, and two others were towing it in an inflatable boat:A police statement said there were two men on the inflatable boat and a third inside "a partially submerged vessel that appeared to be designed for underwater navigation."So, it looks like it's moving from a "terrorist dry run" angle to a "what the hell were those guys thinking" kind of story.
"All three males are expected to be charged with a number of violations and both vessels will be secured by the Harbor Unit," it said.
The submersible had a small round hatch on top and appeared to be a replica of the Turtle, an early submarine used in the U.S. Revolutionary War.
Update 1302 03 Aug: Never mind. It did turn out to just be guys doing guy things:
In the end, it turned out to be just a couple of guys fooling around with a historic replica - no link to terrorism whatsoever.Here's another picture that makes it look a lot more like the Turtle:
"File it under weird," Balboni said. "They appear to have put the sub in the water at Red Hook to see if it would float, and it got carried within the secured area by the current."
The Coast Guard responded to a report of a "semi-submersible device" in the water near the luxury liner off Pier 41 late Friday morning, said Petty Officer Seth Johnson.
The pedal-powered "turtle", a replica of a historic submersible vessel, was being towed by people in an inflatable rowboat.
Its owner was Philip Riley, of Brooklyn, the Coast Guard said.
The three men were issued two violations, one for trespassing on the safety zone around the Queen Mary 2, and the other for unsafe sailing because the submersible didn't have a system in place for avoiding collisions, the Coast Guard said.
The submersible was carried by strong currents to within 25 yards of the ship.
"If it had been at night, you could have imputed intent," Balboni said, "but they put this thing in the water in daylight in one of the most closely watched areas of the port." Homeland Security Department spokesman Laura Keehner confirmed "there was no nexus to terrorism."
Well, it enlivened an otherwise not-very-exciting day in submarine news.Update 2142 03 Aug: It turns out that rather than just regular guys being guys, it was a "waterborne performance artist" who intentionally wanted to get close to the Queen Mary 2.
The man, Duke Riley, a heavily tattooed Brooklyn artist whose waterborne performance projects around New York have frequently landed him in trouble with the authorities, spent the last five months building the vessel as a rough replica of what is believed to have been America’s first submarine, an oak sphere called the Turtle, said to have seen action in New York Harbor during the Revolutionary War.Fiberglass coating of a plywood boat is supposed to be pretty tricky, so the guy's really, really lucky he didn't drown. No "honorary submariner" designation for you, jackass!
Mr. Riley’s plan was also military, in a sense — though mostly metaphorical, given that he is an artist. He wanted to float north in the Buttermilk Channel to stage an incursion against the Queen Mary 2, which had just docked in Red Hook, the mission objective mostly just to get close enough to the ship to videotape himself against its immensity for a coming gallery show...
...In an interview at Pier 41 on Thursday afternoon, after Mr. Riley called a reporter to alert him to the planned excursion, the artist said he first became interested in building the submarine after reading about the Turtle in history books. (By some accounts, the original submarine’s attempt to attach an explosive to the bottom of a British warship failed, but the device detonated near the ship and caused the British to move their vessels. Other accounts say the sub never even launched.)
Mr. Riley built his eight-foot-tall submersible not from oak but from cheap plywood, coated with fiberglass and topped off with portholes and a hatch bought from a marine salvage company. Pumps in the bottom allowed him to add water for ballast or remove it.
Update 1028 04 Aug: Here's an article about the "artist" and his background, which includes a link to his website. The NYC art community is full of all sorts of interesting characters. (Note that I don't think they're all completely strange -- I have a cousin who's a working artist in the City.)
"Hey, Shipwreck": The Fourteenth Episode
Head on over to TubeDaze to check out the 14th episode of the enormously popular space submarine video saga:
In this episode, a nuke is treated with unseemly disrespect by the coners, and bad jokes are told on the midwatch. The 2nd part is believable; the first doesn't really ring true to this old Eng -- I don't ever remember a Nuke actually saying, "For the love of Rickover", and the nukes generally out-pranked the coners by about a 10:1 ratio. Maybe it's different in the future, though.
For more on the very talented creator of "Hey, Shipwreck" (an active duty submariner on recruiting duty here in Idaho) check out the most recent "Navy Wife Radio" episode that features an interview with Patrick Hrabe by submarine wives Wendy and Marie.
In this episode, a nuke is treated with unseemly disrespect by the coners, and bad jokes are told on the midwatch. The 2nd part is believable; the first doesn't really ring true to this old Eng -- I don't ever remember a Nuke actually saying, "For the love of Rickover", and the nukes generally out-pranked the coners by about a 10:1 ratio. Maybe it's different in the future, though.
For more on the very talented creator of "Hey, Shipwreck" (an active duty submariner on recruiting duty here in Idaho) check out the most recent "Navy Wife Radio" episode that features an interview with Patrick Hrabe by submarine wives Wendy and Marie.
Russian Submersibles Back To Surface At North Pole
Over the last week, there's been a lot of news coverage of the Russian expedition to the North Pole seafloor; the Russians apparently plan to use "data" gathered by the subs to claim the Arctic Ocean up to the North Pole as part of their territorial waters. While this won't ever be recognized (barring the election of a Kucinich Administration here in the U.S.) it certainly seems like the Russians pulled off a nifty bit of submarining, assuming their claims of actually reaching the seafloor are true. From the latest article in The Moscow Times:
As they said, the most dangerous part of this mission was getting both mini-subs back to the surface without getting stuck under the ice -- either to the same hole they left from, or into a reasonably thin polynya. I'm personally wondering if they actually did take the trouble to actually go to the seafloor under the Pole -- loss of one of the subs would have been a big propaganda defeat for the Russians. They did a "test dive" a few days back, and there's no reason they couldn't have taken the photos and videos they're releasing now back on Sunday -- and even collected the "samples" they're going to provide. If they really wanted to prove they were there, they should have put a pinger on their package containing the Russian flag they left at the Pole. They may have, although I didn't see mention of one in any of the articles.
The bad news for the U.S. is that we can't even go to confirm if they were there or not. While the Alvin could reach the depths, we don't seem to have an icebreaker manly enough to escort her up there. Hopefully this may spur Congress and the Navy to coming up with funds for a new generation of deep submergence vehicles.
Somewhat off topic: Does anyone know the story behind the DSV-5 (ex-Nemo)? Everything I could find seemed somewhat mysterious. (For general information on non-commissioned submersibles, check out Eric's roundup of links.)
A Russian flag was planted on the North Pole seabed Thursday as man reached the bottom of the top of the world for the first time in an expedition likely to accelerate the scramble for rich underwater deposits.Here's a picture alleging to show one of the submersibles on the seafloor:
Two mini-submarines, Mir-1 and Mir-2, carried three-man crews more than four kilometers below the Arctic surface and back up again in a nine-hour operation. A mechanical arm dropped the rust proof flag on the seabed from Mir-1 as part of Russia's attempts to bolster its claim for a vast part of the Arctic floor...
...The two submarines descended from a 25-meter-by-10-meter opening in the ice early Thursday morning. The first vessel was piloted by Sagalevich, who manned the submarine that took the footage of the wreck of the Titanic used in the Hollywood film by the same name.
"The most difficult part of the operation was surfacing," said Begak.
The submarines, which are only 8 meters long, had to make sure they found the opening, and not the 1 1/2-meter-thick ice. Begak said it was "like hitting a hole the size of the eye of a needle."
Mir-1 appeared above the water eight hours and 40 minutes after submerging, spending 40 minutes below the ice before it found open sea, Begak said. Mir-2 surfaced an hour later.
As they said, the most dangerous part of this mission was getting both mini-subs back to the surface without getting stuck under the ice -- either to the same hole they left from, or into a reasonably thin polynya. I'm personally wondering if they actually did take the trouble to actually go to the seafloor under the Pole -- loss of one of the subs would have been a big propaganda defeat for the Russians. They did a "test dive" a few days back, and there's no reason they couldn't have taken the photos and videos they're releasing now back on Sunday -- and even collected the "samples" they're going to provide. If they really wanted to prove they were there, they should have put a pinger on their package containing the Russian flag they left at the Pole. They may have, although I didn't see mention of one in any of the articles.The bad news for the U.S. is that we can't even go to confirm if they were there or not. While the Alvin could reach the depths, we don't seem to have an icebreaker manly enough to escort her up there. Hopefully this may spur Congress and the Navy to coming up with funds for a new generation of deep submergence vehicles.
Somewhat off topic: Does anyone know the story behind the DSV-5 (ex-Nemo)? Everything I could find seemed somewhat mysterious. (For general information on non-commissioned submersibles, check out Eric's roundup of links.)
Shift Work
Blogging's been light the last few weeks as I've tried to get my not-as-young-as-it-used-to-be body back into the "shift work" routine. I switched over from a standard Monday-Friday daytime job to a Sunday through Wednesday (or Tuesday) 12 hour shift where I work over in Boise. It's actually fewer hours per week, but I'm finding that getting up earlier in the morning is making me want to go to bed earlier, which has been cutting into my blogging time. It got me to thinking how I ever survived the submarine (and specifically nuclear power) versions of shift work.
Most nukes first become familiar with "shiftwork" during their six months at NPTU right after Nuke School. The shiftwork schedule has changed since I first went through it back in '85. There are quite a few ways of making sure your people can cover 24/7 operations with a reasonable quality of life -- the way the Navy did it back then was just about the worst. For staff personnel in Idaho, the shift calendar started on Wednesday at 1600; you did 7 days on "Swing Shift", working from 1600-2400. You got off at 2400 on Tuesday, and then were back to work 48 hours later (0000 Friday) for 7 days of "Mid Shift" (0000-0800). This ended at 0800 Thursday; 48 hours later, you're back at work for seven days of "Day Shift" (0800-1600). Finally, at 1600 Friday, you started the glorious "4 off" (actually 120 hours), and then the cycle started again. (Students had it even worse -- they had 12-hour days until they got qualified; they did the extra 4 hours before Swing and Mid Shift and after Day Shift normal hours.) This method of shiftwork was the most efficient way to have 4 crews of people cover everything with the most "fairness". (In this case, "fairness" means everyone gets equally screwed.)
Idaho had the same schedule when I went through as an officer student in '89-'90, but by the time I showed up in Charleston as a Shift Eng, they'd added a fifth crew, and added an extra week to the cycle -- instead of a "4 off" after Day Shift, you had a normal weekend, and then did a week of Monday-Friday again before the "long" break. During this "T-week", the crew would get all their mandatory training done, and wouldn't (theoretically) have to stand watch in the plant. In practice, there'd always be someone on shift getting sick or going nutso, and since the crews were all minimally staffed, the T-week crew was a good body pool to cover any shortfalls.
Once you got to the boat, you learned what Navy shiftwork was really all about. Since submarines don't have a lot of extra people on the crew, most boats end up only having enough qualified guys to run three shifts. That means your next day off is whenever you're done with shiftwork. For pre-commissioning crews, nuclear shiftwork can last several months -- believe me, it sucks. You get to go home, but you never really get to get away from work. Essentially everyone I served with in the 'yards said they'd much rather be at sea than in shiftwork.
Having had experience with both civilian and Navy shiftwork, I've decided I like the civilian version better. Although I have to work 12 hour days, we get 4 months on Day Shift before rotating to Night Shift, plus I get a "4 off" every two weeks! It's like a little bit of heaven twice a month.
(Related side note: Back when I was at the prototypes, and was younger, it seemed like most people got their bodies acclimated from Swing to Mid Shift by staying up all night partying after the last day of Swings. I don't know if it was only called an "LDS Party" in Idaho, or if it was known by the same name on the east coast.)
Most nukes first become familiar with "shiftwork" during their six months at NPTU right after Nuke School. The shiftwork schedule has changed since I first went through it back in '85. There are quite a few ways of making sure your people can cover 24/7 operations with a reasonable quality of life -- the way the Navy did it back then was just about the worst. For staff personnel in Idaho, the shift calendar started on Wednesday at 1600; you did 7 days on "Swing Shift", working from 1600-2400. You got off at 2400 on Tuesday, and then were back to work 48 hours later (0000 Friday) for 7 days of "Mid Shift" (0000-0800). This ended at 0800 Thursday; 48 hours later, you're back at work for seven days of "Day Shift" (0800-1600). Finally, at 1600 Friday, you started the glorious "4 off" (actually 120 hours), and then the cycle started again. (Students had it even worse -- they had 12-hour days until they got qualified; they did the extra 4 hours before Swing and Mid Shift and after Day Shift normal hours.) This method of shiftwork was the most efficient way to have 4 crews of people cover everything with the most "fairness". (In this case, "fairness" means everyone gets equally screwed.)
Idaho had the same schedule when I went through as an officer student in '89-'90, but by the time I showed up in Charleston as a Shift Eng, they'd added a fifth crew, and added an extra week to the cycle -- instead of a "4 off" after Day Shift, you had a normal weekend, and then did a week of Monday-Friday again before the "long" break. During this "T-week", the crew would get all their mandatory training done, and wouldn't (theoretically) have to stand watch in the plant. In practice, there'd always be someone on shift getting sick or going nutso, and since the crews were all minimally staffed, the T-week crew was a good body pool to cover any shortfalls.
Once you got to the boat, you learned what Navy shiftwork was really all about. Since submarines don't have a lot of extra people on the crew, most boats end up only having enough qualified guys to run three shifts. That means your next day off is whenever you're done with shiftwork. For pre-commissioning crews, nuclear shiftwork can last several months -- believe me, it sucks. You get to go home, but you never really get to get away from work. Essentially everyone I served with in the 'yards said they'd much rather be at sea than in shiftwork.
Having had experience with both civilian and Navy shiftwork, I've decided I like the civilian version better. Although I have to work 12 hour days, we get 4 months on Day Shift before rotating to Night Shift, plus I get a "4 off" every two weeks! It's like a little bit of heaven twice a month.
(Related side note: Back when I was at the prototypes, and was younger, it seemed like most people got their bodies acclimated from Swing to Mid Shift by staying up all night partying after the last day of Swings. I don't know if it was only called an "LDS Party" in Idaho, or if it was known by the same name on the east coast.)
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