Greyhound Attack
mike weber
his best chance they were headed toward Atlanta via
Nashville/Chattanooga, originating in Louisville. The number of times
i have driven that route is literally beyond my ability to count; at
one time people in several of the gas stations and truck stops along
I-24 knew me by sight.
Unless i am completely confused, Manchester, where he did the deed, is
about twenty miles before you get to Monteagle, at the top of the
mountain of the same name.
Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six miles of
seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade, which,
to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad grade in
the country).
The east-bound side, which they were running, is, i think, basically
the old US41 grade (the westbound, which runs around the other side,
more or less, of the mountain is gentler and less twisty both up and
down). It's been relined and eased quite a bit, and three runaway
truck ramps put in to replace the one it had before, but it's still
steep and twisty and long enough that all trucks have to pass through
a special inspection statio at the head of the grade where their brake
rigging is inspected with TV cameras, apparently.
Average speeds downhill run in the high fifties to low seventies,
despite its twistiness.
On your left is a near-vertical stone cutwall; the cutwall on the
other side going up has been gunnited to keep chunks of rock from
falling into the road. The one on the eastbound grade hasn't. And
the "Watch for falling rock" signs mean what they say -- there are
usually head- or larger-sized rocks on the shoulder or even somewhat
out into the inner lane. Did i mention that a couple of the
left-hander bends are almost blind for the inner lane?
On your right is a concrete "keyhole" barricade. And beyond that?
Nothin'
Well, nothing for a couple hundred vertical feet, anyway. Then there
is, i think, a pretty little rocky river.
So. Scenario.
It's whatever time it was on the main drag between Nashville and
Atlanta. If there it's real late at night, and there ain't ten or
more cars headed down, there will be trucks. Much oif the day there
will be an intermixture of trucks and cars running any speed from
somewhere in the forties (which trucks are required to hold it down to
and often do) to seventy-plus. ((We will not discuss my speed over
the mountain the one time i caught it completely deserted on both
sides back when i was driving the '77 Honda Civic 5-speed [which was
before they relinbed the grade].))
Trucks are mostly holding the right lane. Cars are all over the other
two lanes, including people nervously ready to dodge out of the inner
lane if they round a bend and find a rock half as big as their car in
their way.
And suddenly a Greyhound with a dead man's foot on the gas and a
suicidal maniac's hand on the wheel starts swerving back and forth
feom one side of the road to the other...
--
"Life's a game where they're bound to beat you, and time's a
trick they can turn to cheat you -- and we only waste it
anyway, that's the hell of it..." -- Paul Williams
<mike weber> kras...@mindspring.com>
Book Reviews & More -- http://electronictiger.com
Irv Koch
news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
> The guy who attacked the drivewr of that Greyhound in Tennessee missed
> his best chance they were headed toward Atlanta via
I thought about that. I'm surprised it's not been mentioned more or
before.
> Nashville/Chattanooga, originating in Louisville. The number of times
> i have driven that route is literally beyond my ability to count; at
Being more or less from Chattanooga, and having more relatives in
Nashville than anywhere else, I'm in the same category.
> one time people in several of the gas stations and truck stops along
> I-24 knew me by sight.
Well, OK, then, you've driven it even more than I have.
> Unless i am completely confused, Manchester, where he did the deed, is
> about twenty miles before you get to Monteagle, at the top of the
> mountain of the same name.
Something like that. Smyrna, Murfreesboro, Manchester, Tellahoma, Mount
Eagle. I may have the last two reversed. The point is, for those not
native to these parts is that there's this ... mountain (Colorado
citizens may laugh at this point) ... with REALLY steep grades on it.
If you get to the point mike's talking about, it's downhill at over the
legal limit for Interstates. They had to get a waiver on it. There's
all these "runaway truck ramps." SERIOUS BAD dangerous down the
mountain.
> Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
Right.
> If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six miles of
> seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade, which,
> to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad grade in
> the country).
See above. The curves aren't as bad as some places (Signal Mountain in
Chattanooga-metro), but it's nationwide known bad news as far as
Interstates go -- and professional truckers will go on and on about it.
> The east-bound side, which they were running, is, i think, basically
> the old US41 grade (the westbound, which runs around the other side,
Sorta kinda maybe. US41 plays tag with I24. A lot of the way between
Nashville and Chattanooga, they're merged. There are also, believe it
or not, decent (I won't say good) non-Interstate alternatives between
Chattanooga and Nashville. This is relatively recent. It's one of
those deals where the existing roads get improved, year by year, as
urbanization eats up space and the state works with local governments
for various reasons.
I'm buttressing your main point, though. It's only "bad" going from
Chattanooga to Nashville. The steepest part is "up." It's less bad
going down because you've gone on to the Cumberland Plateau. The way
the bus was going was to the mountain and then would have gone into the
valley(s) on the S/E side of the plateau. So going the way they were
would have not been just "bad" but "nationwide notorious bad."
> more or less, of the mountain is gentler and less twisty both up and
> down). It's been relined and eased quite a bit, and three runaway
> truck ramps put in to replace the one it had before, but it's still
> steep and twisty and long enough that all trucks have to pass through
> a special inspection statio at the head of the grade where their brake
> rigging is inspected with TV cameras, apparently.
Yup.
> Average speeds downhill run in the high fifties to low seventies,
> despite its twistiness.
Been there. Done that. Tried it with and without brakes (that is,
using "engine braking").
> On your left is a near-vertical stone cutwall; the cutwall on the
> other side going up has been gunnited to keep chunks of rock from
> falling into the road. The one on the eastbound grade hasn't. And
> the "Watch for falling rock" signs mean what they say -- there are
> usually head- or larger-sized rocks on the shoulder or even somewhat
> out into the inner lane. Did i mention that a couple of the
> left-hander bends are almost blind for the inner lane?
No, but keep typing. <half grin> I'll back you up on anything to say to
indicate how abnormal and unavoidably dangerous a stretch this is.
> On your right is a concrete "keyhole" barricade. And beyond that?
>
> Nothin'
Well, there's mountain side. A person on foot could walk/climb up and
down a lot of it without special equipment. And there are all the
crosses marking accident death scenes. Not to mention the railing.
Further down the mountain, one finds ghod knows how many burnt out
wrecked cars. In earlier days, I suspect, no one would have built
anything near the foot of the mountain because one could expect a
nightly rain of flaming vehicles. Not every night, of course, but too
darn often. We're talking a slope too steep to bother recovering burnt
out cars but with enough snags to keep them from going all the way down.
Unfortunately this stretch has so many problems that putting concrete
barriers the whole way isn't a good option.
> Well, nothing for a couple hundred vertical feet, anyway. Then there
> is, i think, a pretty little rocky river.
Whatever. I'm nit picking. Point is that anyone going off the road ...
like because someone cut the bus driver's throat, will probably meet a
horrible death.
> So. Scenario.
>
> It's whatever time it was on the main drag between Nashville and
> Atlanta. If there it's real late at night, and there ain't ten or
He did it in mid morning, IIRC. We will both agree that this stretch,
for various reasons, is not just a lot worse in the dark, it's so much
worse than a great deal of effort must be used to indicate why and how
much.
> more cars headed down, there will be trucks. Much oif the day there
> will be an intermixture of trucks and cars running any speed from
> somewhere in the forties (which trucks are required to hold it down to
> and often do) to seventy-plus. ((We will not discuss my speed over
I like the way you say "often do." It's actually more complicated than
that but the point is that the vast majority of trucks are going faster
than one might like -- OK if there's not a careening bus falling down
the road, but disaster otherwise.
I believe that you have not mentioned at this point that said stretch of
road is THE main choke point for truck and much other traffic between
the Chicago Midwest and Florida South. Yes, that can be argued, and is
much more so once I-24 joins I-75, but the point is that besides being
hellishly dangerous (and unavoidably so), it is almost always FULL of
trucks and cars.
> the mountain the one time i caught it completely deserted on both
> sides back when i was driving the '77 Honda Civic 5-speed [which was
> before they relinbed the grade].))
That stretch being deserted is rather rare, and more so as time goes on.
> Trucks are mostly holding the right lane. Cars are all over the other
> two lanes, including people nervously ready to dodge out of the inner
> lane if they round a bend and find a rock half as big as their car in
> their way.
Well, the rocks are an exageration. The slope has degraded over the
years to the point the BIG rocks are rarely in the road any more. That
doesn't stop old timers like you from being nervous. It does allow
newer people to think they can go normal speed and carelessness. We're
still talking a perfect place for a mass murder.
> And suddenly a Greyhound with a dead man's foot on the gas and a
> suicidal maniac's hand on the wheel starts swerving back and forth
> feom one side of the road to the other...
Right. I thought about that. Hard. If that crazy guy had waited until
night and/or after they'd gotten on the stretch from Mount Eagle
downwards, there's have been a lot more killed.
My wife says he must have just been listening to voices in his head and
thus did what he did based on the time of day or something. If those
"voices" had been a bit smarter, they could have killed a lot more
people.
Michael J. Lowrey
<<an excellent description of the Monteagle stretch of
I-40>>
> So. Scenario.
>
> It's whatever time it was on the main drag between Nashville and
> Atlanta. If there it's real late at night, and there ain't ten or
> more cars headed down, there will be trucks. Much oif the day there
> will be an intermixture of trucks and cars running any speed from
> somewhere in the forties (which trucks are required to hold it down to
> and often do) to seventy-plus. ((We will not discuss my speed over
> the mountain the one time i caught it completely deserted on both
> sides back when i was driving the '77 Honda Civic 5-speed [which was
> before they relinbed the grade].))
>
> Trucks are mostly holding the right lane. Cars are all over the other
> two lanes, including people nervously ready to dodge out of the inner
> lane if they round a bend and find a rock half as big as their car in
> their way.
>
> And suddenly a Greyhound with a dead man's foot on the gas and a
> suicidal maniac's hand on the wheel starts swerving back and forth
> feom one side of the road to the other...
Son, you got a dangerous mind!
--
Michael J. "Orange Mike" Lowrey
whose skin creeps at the thought
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
wrote:
snip
>See above. The curves aren't as bad as some places (Signal Mountain in
>Chattanooga-metro), but it's nationwide known bad news as far as
>Interstates go -- and professional truckers will go on and on about it.
Sounds like Cabbage Hill on Interstate 84, near Pendleton.
Cabbage Hill has several runaway truck ramps, plus it has the dubious
joy of being in a part of Oregon which gets Serious Winter Weather
(ice, snow, below zero temps...it's just five/ten miles from Meacham,
which is up top on the Blues, and Meacham is frequently among the
national coldest reported temps in the Lower 48). Over the top of the
Blue Mountains, along that section of the Oregon Trail where the
emigrants basically had to rope the wagons down. 2000 foot or so
elevation drop, fast...and it can feature freezing fog, snow,
ice....I've driven it in freezing fog, snow and ice. You creep along.
Trucks normally take it at 15/20 mph. You go from something like 5000
ft elevation to 3000 or so at Pendleton, in a five mile or so stretch.
A bus going off there would be serious nasty, especially if someone
timed it right so it went flying and crashed on the uphill section (up
hill goes parallel but below the downhill section, although at one
point I think the two sections seperate and go on different sides of
one ridge).
snip
>I believe that you have not mentioned at this point that said stretch of
>road is THE main choke point for truck and much other traffic between
>the Chicago Midwest and Florida South. Yes, that can be argued, and is
>much more so once I-24 joins I-75, but the point is that besides being
>hellishly dangerous (and unavoidably so), it is almost always FULL of
>trucks and cars.
Oy.
snip
>Well, the rocks are an exageration. The slope has degraded over the
>years to the point the BIG rocks are rarely in the road any more. That
>doesn't stop old timers like you from being nervous. It does allow
>newer people to think they can go normal speed and carelessness. We're
>still talking a perfect place for a mass murder.
Double oy.
Methinks I'm watching out while traversing our local mountain
passes....
jrw
David G. Bell
<K8_u7.1390$2p1.2...@newsread2.prod.itd.earthlink.net>
irv...@sprintmail.com "Irv Koch" wrote:
> "mike weber" <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
> news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
> > If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six miles of
> > seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade, which,
> > to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad grade in
> > the country).
I can't get my head around grades in percentages. Can anyone translate?
> > Average speeds downhill run in the high fifties to low seventies,
> > despite its twistiness.
>
> Been there. Done that. Tried it with and without brakes (that is,
> using "engine braking").
The type of engine makes a difference. Diesels give more braking, since
they have a higher compression ratio, and don't throttle the airflow so
much (some diesels have a throttle butterfly to create some vacuum for
servo-assisted brakes and such, but that doesn't apply to air brakes).
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
The singer who is no longer, and no shorter, than he was last week. He's
about the same length in his stocking moolies.
Irv Koch
"mike weber" <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
> > news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
> > > If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six
miles of
> > > seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade,
which,
> > > to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad
grade in
> > > the country).
>
> I can't get my head around grades in percentages. Can anyone
translate?
It's so steep that at a few points you feel like you're looking down a
steep set of stairs instead of a road.
> > Been there. Done that. Tried it with and without brakes (that is,
> > using "engine braking").
>
> The type of engine makes a difference. Diesels give more braking,
since
> they have a higher compression ratio, and don't throttle the airflow
so
> much (some diesels have a throttle butterfly to create some vacuum for
> servo-assisted brakes and such, but that doesn't apply to air brakes).
This tells me that the people who think doing it with a common gas
engine will ruin the engine are not entirely wrong.
David G. Bell
<FT2v7.2402$3i3.2...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net>
irv...@sprintmail.com "Irv Koch" wrote:
> ""David G. Bell"" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote in message > >
> "mike weber" <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
> > > news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
> > > > If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six
> miles of
> > > > seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade,
> which,
> > > > to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad
> grade in
> > > > the country).
> >
> > I can't get my head around grades in percentages. Can anyone
> translate?
>
> It's so steep that at a few points you feel like you're looking down a
> steep set of stairs instead of a road.
Sorry, I can't reconcile that with the mainline rail reference. A lot
of roads are steeper than you can run useful rail, without being
dreadfully steep.
Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
> > > Been there. Done that. Tried it with and without brakes (that is,
> > > using "engine braking").
> >
> > The type of engine makes a difference. Diesels give more braking,
> since
> > they have a higher compression ratio, and don't throttle the airflow
> so
> > much (some diesels have a throttle butterfly to create some vacuum for
> > servo-assisted brakes and such, but that doesn't apply to air brakes).
>
> This tells me that the people who think doing it with a common gas
> engine will ruin the engine are not entirely wrong.
Pick the right gear. Like the warning signs above Bigby say, "Low Gear
NOW".
The amount of energy which can be absorbed depends on engine speed.
The amount of energy which must be absorbed depends on vehicle speed.
Vlatko Juric-Kokic
wrote:
>My wife says he must have just been listening to voices in his head and
>thus did what he did based on the time of day or something. If those
>"voices" had been a bit smarter, they could have killed a lot more
>people.
Apropos the voices ...
The guy who did that was supposedly a Croat, and our police got a
request for identification. The name belonged to a veteran who had had
a police file for violent behaviour. No information whether he was
treated for PTSD.
vlatko
--
_Neither Fish Nor Fowl_
http://www.webart.hr/nrnm/eng/index.htm
vlatko.ju...@zg.hinet.hr
Irv Koch
> > > I can't get my head around grades in percentages. Can anyone
> > translate?
> >
> > It's so steep that at a few points you feel like you're looking down
a
> > steep set of stairs instead of a road.
>
> Sorry, I can't reconcile that with the mainline rail reference. A
lot
> of roads are steeper than you can run useful rail, without being
> dreadfully steep.
I have a vauge idea of the rail slope mike mentioned. I'm reasonably
sure that the road slope mentioned is MUCH worse.
> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
way down, on off on off.
> Pick the right gear. Like the warning signs above Bigby say, "Low
Gear
> NOW".
>
> The amount of energy which can be absorbed depends on engine speed.
>
> The amount of energy which must be absorbed depends on vehicle speed.
I don't know Bigby. I know Mt Eagle. <G?> Vehicles may start down
the grade at anywhere from 50 - 70 miles per hour. (A few may start
faster. They learn better, quickly.) Trucks will generally start much
lower as they've been forced through a special inspection station and
had bloody gore stories, all true, told them.
mike weber
>Further down the mountain, one finds ghod knows how many burnt out
>wrecked cars. In earlier days, I suspect, no one would have built
>anything near the foot of the mountain because one could expect a
>nightly rain of flaming vehicles. Not every night, of course, but too
>darn often. We're talking a slope too steep to bother recovering burnt
>out cars but with enough snags to keep them from going all the way down.
>
Someone once told me that back before the Interstate went in, the
locals could identify the sound of an 18-wheeler running away down
Monteagle from miles away and would show up at the most likely places
Down Below to collect Stuff.
He did say that the locals, unlike the Hatteras mooncussers, didn't
set fake lights on the slope to improve the odds...
<snip>
>My wife says he must have just been listening to voices in his head and
>thus did what he did based on the time of day or something. If those
>"voices" had been a bit smarter, they could have killed a lot more
>people.
>
News reports say that he kept asking questions about the route; he
also kept asking the lady (the one who reported originally that the
driver's throat had been cut) who was sitting up front if she'd swap
places withhim. When she finally refused definitively, that was when
he turned and cut the driver's throat.
mike weber
typed
>"mike weber" <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
>news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
>> The guy who attacked the drivewr of that Greyhound in Tennessee missed
>> his best chance they were headed toward Atlanta via
>
>I thought about that. I'm surprised it's not been mentioned more or
>before.
>
>> Nashville/Chattanooga, originating in Louisville. The number of times
>> i have driven that route is literally beyond my ability to count; at
>
>Being more or less from Chattanooga, and having more relatives in
>Nashville than anywhere else, I'm in the same category.
>
>> one time people in several of the gas stations and truck stops along
>> I-24 knew me by sight.
>
>Well, OK, then, you've driven it even more than I have.
>
Remember who i used to be married to; we made the run to Louisville
every couple of months for close to thirteen years, and Mel. and i
used to run up and down to Nashville.
mike weber
typed
>""David G. Bell"" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote in message > >
>"mike weber" <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
>> > news:3bbbf654.2552099@localhost...
>> > > If you've never been over Monteagle, it is something like six
>miles of
>> > > seven percent down grade (which is steeper than Saluda Grade,
>which,
>> > > to the best of my knowledge is the steepest mainline railroad
>grade in
>> > > the country).
>>
>> I can't get my head around grades in percentages. Can anyone
>translate?
>
>It's so steep that at a few points you feel like you're looking down a
>steep set of stairs instead of a road.
Vertical over horizontal; Seven down in a hundred forward. Six miles
forward at 7% gives you .42 mile vertically -- about 2200 feet.
>
>> > Been there. Done that. Tried it with and without brakes (that is,
>> > using "engine braking").
>>
>> The type of engine makes a difference. Diesels give more braking,
>since
>> they have a higher compression ratio, and don't throttle the airflow
>so
>> much (some diesels have a throttle butterfly to create some vacuum for
>> servo-assisted brakes and such, but that doesn't apply to air brakes).
>
>This tells me that the people who think doing it with a common gas
>engine will ruin the engine are not entirely wrong.
>
Actually, that's backward; it isn't "compression" you're running
against, as popular miscinception puts it, but rather that you're
using the engine as a vacuum pump with a restricted intake; an
unthrottled intake is actually less efficient as braking.
Engine braking isn't all that bad for your engine, no matter what type
it is; it might not ba all that wonderful or efficaceous wth an
automatic (i suspect the reason it seems to work better with a diesel
is that a diesel is likely to be running into a manual box).
mike weber
("David G. Bell") typed
>On Thursday, in article
> <FT2v7.2402$3i3.2...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net>
> irv...@sprintmail.com "Irv Koch" wrote:
>
>> It's so steep that at a few points you feel like you're looking down a
>> steep set of stairs instead of a road.
>
>Sorry, I can't reconcile that with the mainline rail reference. A lot
>of roads are steeper than you can run useful rail, without being
>dreadfully steep.
The "ruling grade" on Saluda Grade is 6%, which is the steepest
mainline, standard-gauge grade on a Class One railroad that i have
heard of; other mainline trackage may actually be steeper, but if it
is, it will be short stretches that overall don't affect operations.
"Ruling grade" is the steepest grade that is long enough to actually
affect the ease with which an engine can move traffic.
>
>Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
And that's prolly on a relatively rural road. This is like that for
trucks -- the lines in "Legend of the Bandit" at the beginning of
"Smokey & the Bandit" -- "The Monteagle Grade is steep and long, and
everyone who saw it thought the Bandit was gone..."
This is a Major Interstate Highway.
This is Six Miles.
I'll try to get you some pics, maybe some video.
mike weber
typed
>""David G. Bell"" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>
>I have a vauge idea of the rail slope mike mentioned. I'm reasonably
>sure that the road slope mentioned is MUCH worse.
Saluda Grade, near the Saluda on NC/SC border, i think, though some
articles i've read seem to think it's in Virginia. 6% -- i don't know
how long; remember that steel wheels on steel rail -- even at the best
of times -- have a much lower coeficient of friction that rubber on
asphalt/concrete, which can reach unity, i believe. From an article
in one of the railfan mags a few years back, i think that for steel on
steel the max runs like 0.25.
mike weber
<oran...@uwm.edu> typed
>> And suddenly a Greyhound with a dead man's foot on the gas and a
>> suicidal maniac's hand on the wheel starts swerving back and forth
>> feom one side of the road to the other...
>
>Son, you got a dangerous mind!
>
Actually, when i saw the online headline and checked on the story that
morning, i misread "Manchester" as *"Monteagle"* and thought he *had*
dropped off the mountain.
Joyce Reynolds-Ward
snip
>Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
>low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
>can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
>way down, on off on off.
The signs on Cabbage Hill in Oregon (6% or so with wicked curves) go
by weight and number of axles on the truck. Slowest speed is 15 mph.
Most of the time all the trucks I see are going down half on the
shoulder, poking along, and this is in *good* weather. Ice and
snow...which is typical winter condition...means long lines of chained
trucks creeping along or waiting up top and at the bottom until they
can go.
One of the biiig issues with brakes and big rigs is how fast they can
burn out on steep downhills with tight turns. Another nasty ugly is
Highway 58 between Eugene and Bend, the Willamette Pass. I used to do
that one with my parents quite frequently for business and recreation
stuff. 6% grade, two laner at the time, but three lanes in a lot of
it now. Lots of smelly brakes and scary times with loaded log
trucks..and those were *old growth* logs, three logs to a load, not
the tiny stuff you see now.
snip
>I don't know Bigby. I know Mt Eagle. <G?> Vehicles may start down
>the grade at anywhere from 50 - 70 miles per hour. (A few may start
>faster. They learn better, quickly.) Trucks will generally start much
>lower as they've been forced through a special inspection station and
>had bloody gore stories, all true, told them.
Ew. But yeah, fits both Cabbage Hill and Willamette Pass.
jrw
Marilee J. Layman
wrote:
>> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
>
>Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
>low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
>can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
>way down, on off on off.
And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
can't handle the mass and accelleration.
--
Marilee J. Layman
Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com
mike weber
<mjla...@erols.com> typed
>On Thu, 04 Oct 2001 22:56:54 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>>> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
>>
>>Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
>>low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
>>can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
>>way down, on off on off.
>
>And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
>can't handle the mass and accelleration.
>
As i saidf, three on this stretch.
David G. Bell
<p7mqrtk256d1qlmpe...@4ax.com>
mjla...@erols.com "Marilee J. Layman" wrote:
> On Thu, 04 Oct 2001 22:56:54 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
> >
> >Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
> >low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
> >can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
> >way down, on off on off.
>
> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
Now that I've got some figures, I'd class the gradient as not so steep,
but dreadfully long. Add in the corners, etc, and it would get very
nasty.
There's maybe some long steep stretches in Britain, such as the M6 over
Shap and the M62 between Bradford and Manchester, but nothing like as
long, and nothing like as much change in height.
And trying to change gear on a long hill can get you in a lot of
trouble.
So if you know the road, and the right gear to start in, you might be
slower than a lot of fools near the top, but you won't overheat
something and run out of braking capacity. The big problem with
articulated lorries is that the engine braking is all at the front, and
all the weight of the load is swinging off the back, trying to overtake.
And you have the corners...
Well, my Land Rover has a gross weight limit of 2020 kg, and you could
maybe sustain 50mph (driver comfort limited). The hill is about 670
metres in 7 minutes, which is an energy dissipation rate of about 30 kW
or 42 bhp. You get a lot of losses in an auto transmission, but a lot
of cars should be able to sustain that speed uphill.
Irv Koch
news:p7mqrtk256d1qlmpe...@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 04 Oct 2001 22:56:54 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> >> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
> >
> >Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
> >low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal
car
> >can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
> >way down, on off on off.
>
> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at the
end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go into
one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver with the
company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it. The "recovery"
(wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not anything I'd want
to contemplate either. Of course the alternative is a rather horrible
death.
Tim Illingworth
db...@zhochaka.org.uk "David G. Bell" writes:
>On Friday, in article
> <p7mqrtk256d1qlmpe...@4ax.com>
> mjla...@erols.com "Marilee J. Layman" wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 04 Oct 2001 22:56:54 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
>> >
>> >Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
>> >low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal car
>> >can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
>> >way down, on off on off.
>>
>> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
>> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
>
>Now that I've got some figures, I'd class the gradient as not so steep,
>but dreadfully long. Add in the corners, etc, and it would get very
>nasty.
>
>There's maybe some long steep stretches in Britain, such as the M6 over
>Shap and the M62 between Bradford and Manchester, but nothing like as
>long, and nothing like as much change in height.
7% is about 1 in 14, so 7 miles of it is a half-mile drop. There are
things like Monteagle in the Alps, I should think, but I don't recall
Shap as being anything that would induce fear. Which Monteagle does -
I really don't like having to brake to stay under 70mph, and knowing
that the small trees by the roadside are actually the tops of rather
large ones.
The M62 I haven't driven in many years (probably the late 70s). Shap
I last drove in 1995. Monteagle I last went over last year, I think -
it's on the way between my two step-sons (Waverly TN and Chattanooga
TN/Atlanta GA).
Tim
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Illingworth t...@smof.demon.co.uk Go not to Usenet for advice, for
Coveney, tim...@compuserve.com they will say both 'No' and 'Yes'
Cambs, UK tim...@cix.co.uk and 'Try Another Newsgroup'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Marilee J. Layman
wrote:
>"Marilee J. Layman" <mjla...@erols.com> wrote in message
>news:p7mqrtk256d1qlmpe...@4ax.com...
>> On Thu, 04 Oct 2001 22:56:54 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> >> Dreadfully steep is low range, bottom gear, in a Land Rover...
>> >
>> >Ah so. "18 wheelers" or 20 ton trucks or whatever are told "Shift to
>> >low(est) gear now" by signs along the road. A Land Rover or normal
>car
>> >can stay in high gear but your foot will be on the brake, most of the
>> >way down, on off on off.
>>
>> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
>> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
>
>Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at the
>end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go into
>one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver with the
>company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it. The "recovery"
>(wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not anything I'd want
>to contemplate either. Of course the alternative is a rather horrible
>death.
>
Plus possibly other people's horrible deaths.
Margaret Young
Any idea who has to pay the "recovery" bill?
I have always been terrified when driving anywhere people found it
necessary/appropriate to have those runaway ramps. They function as a
wonderful "venture here at your own risk" warnings don't they?
Margaret
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Irv Koch
<snip>
> >>Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at
the
> >>end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go into
> >>one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver with the
> >>company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it. The "recovery"
> >>(wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not anything I'd
want
> >>to contemplate either. Of course the alternative is a rather
horrible
> >>death.
> >>
> >Plus possibly other people's horrible deaths.
>
> Any idea who has to pay the "recovery" bill?
The company that owns the truck that used the runaway truck ramp.
"Recovery" is a fancy word for "wrecker" or "tow truck." The truck's
not wrecked but has to be hauled out of the mud, etc. There are similar
situations in which a "tow truck" is used for something besides towing.
It also takes slightly different expertise.
> I have always been terrified when driving anywhere people found it
> necessary/appropriate to have those runaway ramps. They function as a
> wonderful "venture here at your own risk" warnings don't they?
You betcha! And when, year after year, they add more of them to a
single stretch of road ....
mike weber
typed
>On Sat, 06 Oct 2001 00:11:02 -0400, Marilee J. Layman
><mjla...@erols.com> wrote:
>
>>On Fri, 05 Oct 2001 18:03:24 GMT, "Irv Koch" <irv...@sprintmail.com>
>>wrote:
>>
>>>Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at the
>>>end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go into
>>>one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver with the
>>>company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it. The "recovery"
>>>(wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not anything I'd want
>>>to contemplate either. Of course the alternative is a rather horrible
>>>death.
>>>
>>Plus possibly other people's horrible deaths.
>
>Any idea who has to pay the "recovery" bill?
>
Probably the owner.
Margaret Young
wrote:
>"Margaret Young" <mmy...@umich.edu> wrote in message
The road equivalent of "Danger, danger, Will Robinson".
Alan Winston - SSRL Admin Cmptg Mgr
>On Sat, 06 Oct 2001 11:43:05 -0400, Margaret Young <mmy...@umich.edu>
>>
>>
I've lost the plot, I think, but here's my question: What is the point
of fining the driver $500 (which can't be paid by the owner) for using
the runaway truck ramp?
I mean, I would think we don't want the drivers hesitating for one second
to use the truck ramp if they need it. The "recovery" costs ought to
adequately discourage frivolous use.
Is the $500 supposed to encourage the drivers to get their brakes checked?
Why would $500 do that if the plausible fear of fiery death doesn't do that?
-- Alan
===============================================================================
Alan Winston --- WIN...@SSRL.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU
Disclaimer: I speak only for myself, not SLAC or SSRL Phone: 650/926-3056
Physical mail to: SSRL -- SLAC BIN 69, PO BOX 4349, STANFORD, CA 94309-0210
===============================================================================
Irv Koch
> I've lost the plot, I think, but here's my question: What is the point
> of fining the driver $500 (which can't be paid by the owner) for using
> the runaway truck ramp?
Because the driver was supposed to have his brakes, etc. checked, before
he went down that stretch, shifted to lower gear, and otherwise made
darn sure his truck wouldn't get out of control. I supposed, if by some
weird chance (and I've seen it happen, but rarely), there was some kind
of wreck or incident in which the driver had to dodge, and ended up on
the ramp, they'd let him (or her) off.
> I mean, I would think we don't want the drivers hesitating for one
second
> to use the truck ramp if they need it. The "recovery" costs ought to
> adequately discourage frivolous use.
The driver doesn't pay for the wrecker bill unless he's an owner
operator. We want the drivers to hesitate a lot longer than one second
before they get on that stretch of road. They do. They didn't used to.
> Is the $500 supposed to encourage the drivers to get their brakes
checked?
Yes.
> Why would $500 do that if the plausible fear of fiery death doesn't do
that?
Because they don't die anymore. They just go out of control, maybe slam
a few cars to death, and then go on to the ramp.
We don't want them to take the chance. More important ... and since the
idiots who are idiots ... and end up on the ramp anyway ... didn't THINK
to start with, we want them ... PERSONALLY ... hit hard as can be
AFTERWARDS. Some truck companies are hard up enough for drivers that
they'll not fire them. Or, in a few cases, they don't deserve to be
fired.
Marilee J. Layman
As far as I know, the owner of the truck/car that ended up in the
gravel.
mike weber
typed
>""Alan Winston - SSRL Admin Cmptg Mgr""
>
>> I've lost the plot, I think, but here's my question: What is the point
>> of fining the driver $500 (which can't be paid by the owner) for using
>> the runaway truck ramp?
>
>Because the driver was supposed to have his brakes, etc. checked, before
>he went down that stretch, shifted to lower gear, and otherwise made
>darn sure his truck wouldn't get out of control. I supposed, if by some
>weird chance (and I've seen it happen, but rarely), there was some kind
>of wreck or incident in which the driver had to dodge, and ended up on
>the ramp, they'd let him (or her) off.
Just as the pilot of an airliner is not only allowed, but *required*
to nbot fly it if he thinks that that aircraft is not safe, the
dsriver of a vehicle is responsible for ensuring that that vehicle is
safe to operate.
mike weber
Illingworth) typed
>7% is about 1 in 14, so 7 miles of it is a half-mile drop. There are
>things like Monteagle in the Alps, I should think, but I don't recall
>Shap as being anything that would induce fear. Which Monteagle does -
>I really don't like having to brake to stay under 70mph, and knowing
>that the small trees by the roadside are actually the tops of rather
>large ones.
>
For some photo views, try http://www.ajfroggie.com/roadpics/tn/
The photo showing a "winding road" sign (the yellow diamond with
wiggly arrow; i forget if there is an equivalent international sign)
is on I-24 East just before you begin the Monteagle descent; that
stretch is the looping bends just before the lane split on the map.
The US64 interchange referred to is just off the map to the NW.
It is *very* uncommon for a US Interstate highway to need such a sign
-- from what i recall, the design requirements for the program
specified that curve radius and superelevation should be sufficient to
hold a runaway 18-wheeler at 80MPH.
The next few photos show the grade and are well-captioned; it looks,
in these photos, a lot less steep than it does from the driver's seat,
let me tell you. Note the proximity of the rock cutbank (it gets even
closer in some places) on the left in the first two photos of the
grade itself...
As you said, note (in the photo captioned "Runaway truck ramp, about
halfway down"), the rather pretty small trees to the right; they are
actually the tops of Rather Large Trees...
Keith F. Lynch
> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
Irv Koch <irv...@sprintmail.com> wrote:
> Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at
> the end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go
> into one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver
> with the company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it.
I'd think they'd want to *encourage* their use. With a hefty fine,
truckers in marginal control might be tempted to ride it out rather
than using the ramp, with potentially catastrophic consequences for
whoever's in their way.
> The "recovery" (wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not
> anything I'd want to contemplate either. Of course the alternative
> is a rather horrible death.
It's not always obvious that the only alternative is death. Maybe the
brakes are only a *little* flaky. Maybe the road is about to level
out. Maybe nobody is in the way. Maybe the trucker knows he will be
fired if his boss learns that he used the runaway ramp.
--
Keith F. Lynch - k...@keithlynch.net - http://keithlynch.net/
I always welcome replies to my e-mail, postings, and web pages, but
unsolicited bulk e-mail sent to thousands of randomly collected
addresses is not acceptable, and I do complain to the spammer's ISP.
Keith F. Lynch
> This tells me that the people who think doing it with a common gas
> engine will ruin the engine are not entirely wrong.
I've ridden in a car going down Pike's Peak, which is a longer descent
than anything in the Appalachians. Motorists there are encouraged
to use engine braking rather than their brakes. There are mandatory
brake temperature checkpoints on the way down, with literal cooling
off periods imposed when necessary. The car I was in passed
inspection every time. And its engine wasn't damaged.
I'm a little disappointed that the driver vetoed my suggestion to do
the descent with the engine off, coasting for miles and miles.
Keith F. Lynch
> Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
Fortunately, most nuts aren't very smart. Assuming it's even their
intention to cause as many deaths as possible, which it usually isn't.
Large-scale mass murder isn't really all that easy. I think that
the WTC attacks may have been pretty much the maximum possible with
today's technology by someone without either nuclear weapons or vast
numbers of followers (e.g. a full-scale army).
I suspect that Ebola and Anthrax are overrated, as is a poison gas
attack in a subway, or a soluble poison in a city's water supply.
Sure, you can get a few hundred easily enough, especially if you don't
mind being one of the victims yourself. But probably not more than a
few thousand. Computer viruses, power outages, and telephone outages
are annoying, but have seldom directly killed anyone. Nor would
anyone likely die of thirst if the water mains to NYC and Los Angeles
were bombed, though people would have to go without bathing or
watering their lawns for a while, and somebody would have to pay
for a lot of water trucks.
With future technology, all bets are off. With molecular
nanotechnology, it may be possible to disassemble all living things.
A "gray goo" attack. And a reasonably sized relativistic starship
crashed into our planet at full speed doesn't bear thinking about.
Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
small group to kill lots of people?
mike weber
typed
>"Marilee J. Layman" <mjla...@erols.com> wrote:
>> And if possible, there will be runaway ramps for trucks whose brakes
>> can't handle the mass and accelleration.
>
>Irv Koch <irv...@sprintmail.com> wrote:
>> Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at
>> the end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go
>> into one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver
>> with the company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it.
>
>I'd think they'd want to *encourage* their use. With a hefty fine,
>truckers in marginal control might be tempted to ride it out rather
>than using the ramp, with potentially catastrophic consequences for
>whoever's in their way.
Not on that grade.
<snip>
>It's not always obvious that the only alternative is death. Maybe the
>brakes are only a *little* flaky. Maybe the road is about to level
>out. Maybe nobody is in the way. Maybe the trucker knows he will be
>fired if his boss learns that he used the runaway ramp.
There is no "only a little flaky" in terms of truck air brakes on that
grade. They either are or they aren't.
Jason Stokes
>Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
>small group to kill lots of people?
There's that old science fiction standby, the super-virulent modified
influenza virus or similar. Possible with today's technology? Maybe just.
Avram Grumer
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
> With future technology, all bets are off. With molecular
> nanotechnology, it may be possible to disassemble all living things.
> A "gray goo" attack.
I'm not sure I believe in gray goo. Nanotech has limitations, just like
any other machinery. A nano that can dissasemble anything would have to
be very complicated, because it would need to know how to deal with all
possible bonds. This would also make it slow. It ought to be possible
to make a nano-killer that would do nothing but deactivate would-be
gray-goo and that would work much faster than the goo.
Also, nano needs energy. If the goo runs off of solar, starve it of
light to defeat it. If it derives energy from the stuff it
disassembles, flood it with something hard to disassemble that isn't a
good source of fuel. If it's powered by nuclear material, then it's not
going to find much new fuel in its prey.
--
Avram Grumer | av...@grumer.org | http://www.PigsAndFishes.org
Vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er va ivbyngvba bs gur Qvtvgny Zvyyraavhz
Pbclevtug Npg.
Kip Williams
There's the "Texas Chain Letter Massacre," from an old Saturday
Night Live "Weekend Update" segment:
"Make five copies of this letter and send them to your friends, then
kill yourself. Please do not break the chain!" 75 dead so far.
--
--Kip (Williams) ...at http://members.home.net/kipw/
"I was once falsely accused of perjury, and had to perjure myself to
avoid arrest." --Dashiell Hammett
Irv Koch
> Irv Koch <irv...@sprintmail.com> wrote:
> > Three of them, now. Dirt/mud with a big hill of more dirt/mud at
> > the end. Maybe some gravel. You're SUPPOSED to bog down if you go
> > into one. IIRC it's a $500 fine ... directly against the driver
> > with the company not allowed to pay it ... if you use it.
>
> I'd think they'd want to *encourage* their use. With a hefty fine,
> truckers in marginal control might be tempted to ride it out rather
> than using the ramp, with potentially catastrophic consequences for
> whoever's in their way.
I'm pretty sure there's no such thing as "marginal control" for these
purposes. The situation(s) we're talking about are not just abnormal
but highly abnormal.
For "normal" ... drivers (of which I seem to recall you're not) are
tought to dodge off the road into soft stuff (if available) to avoid
wrecks. That also assumes somewhat "normal" stuff along the side of the
road. Not in this case.
> > The "recovery" (wrecker) bill to haul something out of there is not
> > anything I'd want to contemplate either. Of course the alternative
> > is a rather horrible death.
>
> It's not always obvious that the only alternative is death. Maybe the
> brakes are only a *little* flaky. Maybe the road is about to level
Nope. Not here. ALMOST anywhere else, that could be true. In this
case ... it's do or die.
> out. Maybe nobody is in the way. Maybe the trucker knows he will be
> fired if his boss learns that he used the runaway ramp.
Again, not in this highly abnormal case. Like ... there's only 2 or 3
such situations in the entire USA. If the road is about to level out,
they've gone beyond the zone in which the ramps are needed. If nobody
is in the way ... which is not the real issue here but is becoming the
usual case, there is still only the alternative of use the ramp or have
total disaster -- which should have been prevented.
The arguements you make were used in the past. The death and wreck
count eventually resulted in the three ramps instead of the one that was
there before the arguement pretty much was crushed.
ALL the truckers, a contentious lot to say the least, eventually quit
bitching about the fine, etc. Well, not "all." Some no longer have
licenses and some simply won't take jobs that require they drive I-24
between Chattanooga and Nashville.
This is not a stupid authorities issue or "rights" or alternatives. And
it is thankfully a VERY rare case.
Irv Koch
> mike weber <kras...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> > Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
>
> Fortunately, most nuts aren't very smart. Assuming it's even their
> intention to cause as many deaths as possible, which it usually isn't.
>
> Large-scale mass murder isn't really all that easy. I think that
> the WTC attacks may have been pretty much the maximum possible with
Maybe. This was all written up in recent issues of TIME or similar.
The problem is ... we're going to find out ... the hard way ... soon.
<snip>
> Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
> small group to kill lots of people?
The population is going to go up, we can assume. Such attacks as you
describe WILL happen but the population breed back ... and harden attack
points.
I see undersea communities in our future. Not just underwater but
underground undersea with intense screening as to who is let in. Bad sf
stories....
Marty Cantor
> > Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
>
> Fortunately, most nuts aren't very smart. Assuming it's even their
> intention to cause as many deaths as possible, which it usually isn't.
>
> Large-scale mass murder isn't really all that easy. I think that
> the WTC attacks may have been pretty much the maximum possible with
> today's technology by someone without either nuclear weapons or vast
> numbers of followers (e.g. a full-scale army).
I really hate to ruin anybody's morning, really I do, but I find that
I have to disagree with the above paragraph.
Understand that the WTC towers were designed to withstand the impact
of a 707. They actually *did* hold up quite well to the actual impact
of the aeroplanes which hit them - it was the burning jet fuel which
brought them down.
Sports arenas and similar stadiums are *not* designed to withstand
aeroplane impact, so imagine that impact on a stadium with a capacity
of 100,000 or so people, with something like an international soccer
game or the superbowl or something going on at the time. The impact,
the burning jet fuel, the blocked exits - when talking of tens of
thousands of deaths it may not be in the low tens of thousands.
Now I will ruin your morning even more by disagreeing with the first
paragraph. The more the deaths, the bigger the "statement" and the
resulting terror. This is why terrorists/suicide bombers always go for
the crowd, the large aeroplane. Not as much of a statement is made if
the suicide bomber goes up to a single person and sets off his bomb or
if a hijacker takes over a Cesna as is made by going after larger
targets/more people.
You can all now go back and brood some more. As for me, I wish that I
could regain my mostly smartass mindset. I am tired of being angry
most of the time - angry, and frustrated. The fact that I saw this
escalation in the barbarian's War Against Western Civilisation many
years ago does not make me feel any better. This is one case when I
wish that I was wrong. I think that things are going to get worse and
these things are going to be this way for a very long time.
GAAAAAK, but I am feeling pessimistic this morning. I sincerely hope
that I did not ruin anybody's day. Sorry.
--
Marty Cantor
marty...@netzero.net
Erik V. Olson
>In article <9pontl$lal$1...@saltmine.radix.net>,
> "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
>
>> With future technology, all bets are off. With molecular
>> nanotechnology, it may be possible to disassemble all living things.
>> A "gray goo" attack.
>
>I'm not sure I believe in gray goo. Nanotech has limitations, just like
>any other machinery. A nano that can dissasemble anything would have to
>be very complicated, because it would need to know how to deal with all
>possible bonds. This would also make it slow. It ought to be possible
>to make a nano-killer that would do nothing but deactivate would-be
>gray-goo and that would work much faster than the goo.
This is, btw, known as "blue-goo."
--
Erik V. Olson: er...@mo.net : http://walden.mo.net/~eriko/
John Dallman
er...@physiciansedge.com (Erik V. Olson) wrote:
> Avram Grumer <av...@grumer.org> wrote:
> >I'm not sure I believe in gray goo. Nanotech has limitations, just
> >like any other machinery. A nano that can dissasemble anything would
> >have to be very complicated, because it would need to know how to deal
> >with all possible bonds. This would also make it slow. It ought to
> >be possible to make a nano-killer that would do nothing but deactivate
> >would-be gray-goo and that would work much faster than the goo.
>
> This is, btw, known as "blue-goo."
The gray goo scenario comes from the idea of self-replicating nano that
has a relatively high mutation rate. The idea was that it would soon
mutate to be able to eat anything it came across - and you don't need to
break /that/ many kind of bonds to be dangerous.
The problem with the blue goo as a counter to gray goo scenario is target
recognition: how sure can it be of recognising severely mutated versions?
It might just clear out their competition from not-so-mutated forms, or it
might start eating something else that we wanted to keep. Like us.
BTW, I'd like to apologise to Ken McLeod for missing a point of his from
The Stone Canal in a talk at plokta.con - he didn't have rapidly
reproducing grey goo, so the blue goo was reasonable.
However, all of this is predicated on nano that out-competes the
biological ecosystem in some way. The "how does it get its energy, and
keep from cooking when it uses it" problem is quite severe.
---
John Dallman j...@cix.co.uk
mike weber
typed
>Irv Koch <irv...@sprintmail.com> wrote:
>> This tells me that the people who think doing it with a common gas
>> engine will ruin the engine are not entirely wrong.
>
>I've ridden in a car going down Pike's Peak, which is a longer descent
>than anything in the Appalachians. Motorists there are encouraged
>to use engine braking rather than their brakes. There are mandatory
>brake temperature checkpoints on the way down, with literal cooling
>off periods imposed when necessary. The car I was in passed
>inspection every time. And its engine wasn't damaged.
>
>I'm a little disappointed that the driver vetoed my suggestion to do
>the descent with the engine off, coasting for miles and miles.
Good for the driver. That is a bad and dangerous thing to do for
almost any distance, much less miles and miles.
Even if you don't have power steering or brakes.
mike weber
typed
>Sports arenas and similar stadiums are *not* designed to withstand
>aeroplane impact, so imagine that impact on a stadium with a capacity
>of 100,000 or so people, with something like an international soccer
>game or the superbowl or something going on at the time. The impact,
>the burning jet fuel, the blocked exits - when talking of tens of
>thousands of deaths it may not be in the low tens of thousands.
>
Who needs a jet/fire? "Black Sunday" (is that right? suddenly it
looks wrong) isn't all that implausible a scenario if someone could
get the blimp. And the blimp is *supposed* to be there.
Michael J. Lowrey
>
> marty...@netzero.net (Marty Cantor)typed
> >Sports arenas and similar stadiums are *not* designed to withstand
> >aeroplane impact, so imagine that impact on a stadium with a capacity
> >of 100,000 or so people, with something like an international soccer
> >game or the superbowl or something going on at the time. The impact,
> >the burning jet fuel, the blocked exits - when talking of tens of
> >thousands of deaths it may not be in the low tens of thousands.
> >
> Who needs a jet/fire? "Black Sunday" (is that right? suddenly it
> looks wrong) isn't all that implausible a scenario if someone could
> get the blimp. And the blimp is *supposed* to be there.
WAS supposed to be there. Private aviation can't come
within 3,000 feet (ISTR) of a stadium nowadays; playing
bloody hell with the economics of companies that specialize
in towing ad banners over big games, frex; they're teetering
or going under hereabouts.
--
Orange Mike
Marci Malinowycz
news:3bc0a762.1783474@localhost...
> On 7 Oct 2001 00:49:53 -0400, "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> typed
> >
> >the descent with the engine off, coasting for miles and miles.
>
> Good for the driver. That is a bad and dangerous thing to do for
> almost any distance, much less miles and miles.
>
> Even if you don't have power steering or brakes.
Back in my days of Young And Stupid (today, I'm no longer Young), I was in a
car (without power anything) full of fellow students that had been camping
(unauthorized) on top of Spruce Knob, the highest point in West Virginia.
We'd managed to run out of gas up there, so we coasted all the way down,
aiming for the little gas station at the end of the road at the foot of the
mountain. Almost made it perfectly, as we coasted up to a gas pump, but the
driver had forgotten which side of his car had the gas cap, so we had to
push it the last few feet into position at the pump.
--
Marci Malinowycz
Kip Williams
I was looking at pictures in the "American Memory" section of the
Library of Congress's web site, and in a gallery of stereo slides
(mixed in, unfortunately, with single halves of stereo slides) there
was a gravity streetcar in Denver. The horse would pull it up the
hill, about a mile, then they'd have the horse stand on the rear
platform, and the car would roll down again. The picture clearly
shows the cart before the horse. Have a look:
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?hawp:2:./temp/~ammem_Zt6j::
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?hawp:3:./temp/~ammem_Zt6j::
Dang, didn't know they had two pictures of it until I searched just
then. According to the caption on the first one, it was the only
gravity car system in the world. If for some reason, these links
don't work, go to the HAWP (History of the American West Photos) and
search "gravity car."
Incidentally, these American West pictures also included, to my
surprise, a stereo pair of St. John's Church, in nearby Hampton,
Virginia. I guess it just happened to be in the collection of the
Denver Public Library, which is the source of the HAWP material.
One sad footnote: you can't download the full-size scans of these
for free. You can get blow-ups big enough to see okay on screen, but
they want you to buy them, and they aren't quite cheap. Still, I may
have to spring for a couple, as they have some shots of my home town
that I quite fancy.
--
--Kip (Cheapskate) Williams ...at http://members.home.net/kipw/
mike weber
<oran...@uwm.edu> typed
Without pore-extant fighter cover, they're going to have a problem
keeping the blimp from getting from where it's allowed to be to where
it would need to be for the attack.
Given that Turner Field (and Fulton County before it) is damend near
on the end of the runways ((slight exaggeration)) of the busiest
airport in the world, this must be Interesting for Atlanta-area Air
Controllers.
Nancy Lebovitz
>> Had he waited until they passed Monteagle and were headed down...
>
>Fortunately, most nuts aren't very smart. Assuming it's even their
>intention to cause as many deaths as possible, which it usually isn't.
There may be a gradual escalation, as each large act of terrorism means
that the following attacks need to be more drastic.
>
>Large-scale mass murder isn't really all that easy. I think that
>the WTC attacks may have been pretty much the maximum possible with
>today's technology by someone without either nuclear weapons or vast
>numbers of followers (e.g. a full-scale army).
Afaik, the WTC casualty count would have been significantly higher if the
attack had been later in the day and/or not on an election.
>I suspect that Ebola and Anthrax are overrated, as is a poison gas
>attack in a subway, or a soluble poison in a city's water supply.
A disease like AIDS with a long incubation period has some interesting
possibilities, but it would be hard to find a disease which is that
much ahead of generally available technology, and the slowness
would cause a lack of drama.
I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
cause real trouble in the civilized world.
>Sure, you can get a few hundred easily enough, especially if you don't
>mind being one of the victims yourself. But probably not more than a
>few thousand. Computer viruses, power outages, and telephone outages
>are annoying, but have seldom directly killed anyone. Nor would
>anyone likely die of thirst if the water mains to NYC and Los Angeles
>were bombed, though people would have to go without bathing or
>watering their lawns for a while, and somebody would have to pay
>for a lot of water trucks.
The interesting combination would be a simultaneous attack on
tunnels, bridges, and water mains, but that would be very hard to
coordinate. It might not lead to a tremendous number of deaths in
the short run, but the disruption would be enormous.
>With future technology, all bets are off. With molecular
>nanotechnology, it may be possible to disassemble all living things.
>A "gray goo" attack. And a reasonably sized relativistic starship
>crashed into our planet at full speed doesn't bear thinking about.
>
>Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
>small group to kill lots of people?
I'm not feeling quite as abstract about that sort of question as
I used to.
--
Nancy Lebovitz na...@netaxs.com www.nancybuttons.com
David G. Bell
na...@unix1.netaxs.com "Nancy Lebovitz" wrote:
> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
<bitter>
Just watch the farmers go bankrupt and move into cardboard boxes on the
Embankment. There's plenty of yummy food that can be bought for fuck-
all from other countries.
</bitter>
--
David G. Bell -- Farmer, SF Fan, Filker, and Punslinger.
The singer who is no longer, and no shorter, than he was last week. He's
about the same length in his stocking moolies.
Laura Burchard
>small group to kill lots of people?
Yes. Dams. There's a whole bunch of dams in the eastern US where one
person with decent engineering skills could take it out and drown tens of
thousands. There's dams elsewhere in the world where you could get to
hundreds of thousands.
In fact, the fact that terrorists up to now haven't gone for that sort of
thing has been my main comfort against fear of nuclear terrorism. Which is
why 911 scares me -- terrorism is no longer about causing the max amount
of fear while keeping the death toll low enough to keep from getting *too*
much attention and thus destruction. Terrorism is now about mass deaths,
and all bets are off.
Laura
--
Laura Burchard -- l...@radix.net -- http://www.radix.net/~lhb
X-Review: http://traveller.simplenet.com/xfiles/episode.htm
"Good design is clear thinking made visible." -- Edward Tufte
Joel Rosenberg
> In article <9pontl$lal$1...@saltmine.radix.net>,
> Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
> >Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
> >small group to kill lots of people?
>
> Yes. Dams. There's a whole bunch of dams in the eastern US where one
> person with decent engineering skills could take it out and drown tens of
> thousands. There's dams elsewhere in the world where you could get to
> hundreds of thousands.
>
> In fact, the fact that terrorists up to now haven't gone for that sort of
> thing has been my main comfort against fear of nuclear terrorism. Which is
> why 911 scares me -- terrorism is no longer about causing the max amount
> of fear while keeping the death toll low enough to keep from getting *too*
> much attention and thus destruction. Terrorism is now about mass deaths,
> and all bets are off.
>
> Laura
>
> --
Depends on which bets you're talking about. It's long been voiced US
policy, for example, that the use of biological weapons against the US
would be responded to brutally, with the use of nuclear weapons
definitely on the table, and likely to be employed. If -- as I think
is becoming clear -- what's going on in Florida is just that (although
not terribly effectively done; this stuff is apparently harder to do
than it appears), what is the US going to do, and to whom? (And note
the discussion in Starship Troopers about men and potatoes -- doesn't
matter whether or not you agree with Rico's or what you think is
Heinlein's answer, the more general question, reframed, is critical.)
Interesting lesson, that: if the bodycount is low enough and the
group or government behind it has covered its tracks well enough (and
just how well does the Iraqi Makhabarat have to cover its tracks to
give sufficient plausible deniability?), it's cheap.
If the terrorists had been out to maximize their bodycount, they would
have picked, say, the Superbowl or the World Series rather than, say,
the Pentagon (and the Pentagon may have been the secondary target --
why was the plane moving back and forth across the Washington sky?) or
even the WTC, and there's no reason to believe that they were rushed
into their timing -- except, perhaps, for the hypothetical number 19
and his mailing of the decidedly nonhypothetical anthrax spores to the
tabloid.
If you assume that the twin hit on the WTC was intended to take out
both towers -- and murder the people inside -- with maximum TV
coverage of the devastation, it's pretty clear that one of the real
questions going through a lot of folks' minds are just what the limits
of the US response will be, and the evidence, so far, is that it's
pretty limited.
In that light, whether the US gets all of Al Quaida and knocks out his
primary sponsoring government is only a small part of the equation --
the question is what other groups will learn from this about how
effective mass terrorism in the US is in affecting US policy.
Consider the lessons.
Abu Abbas taught the world that you can murder Americans with impunity
-- at least retail -- at least as long as they're Jews, and you're not
doing it in the US.
McVeigh taught everybody, in case we hadn't figured it out, that with
easily available substances, a man who is willing to take the risk of
getting caught can kill 168 people -- or more; OKC could easily have
been worse -- and affect US domestic policy in the way that the
terrorist (and, for that matter, nonterrorists) wanted. (Note the
different treatment of the Freemen vs. the Branch Dividians. Was that
why Janet Reno ordered such a different approach, so as not to excite
more Tim McVeighs?)
The Mukhabarat and Omar Abdel-Rahman taught everybody that a bombing
of the World Trade Center -- using similar technology as OKC -- that
killed only six people wasn't enough to get the reaction that they
wanted without an overreaction (from their POV) that they don't want,
and that the US would treat something at that level as a criminal
matter, and not as an act of surreptitious war. Hence "Ramzi Yousef"
and the 1996 terror campaign that, fortunately, didn't quite come
off.
(There was a missed lesson in advance of the first WTC bombing,
involving the murder of Meir Kahane by El Sayyid Nosair -- note that
the FBI seized 49 boxes of documents from Nosair's apartment, and more
than a few hints about the first WTC bombing. But the evidence was
swept under the rug -- it wasn't even provided to the prosecution in
the murder case, and Nosair was acquitted and carried out of the
courtroom on the shoulders of Mahmud Abouhalima -- until after the
first WTC bombing. Nosair is worth paying attention to -- he ran part
of Sheik Omar's network out of his prison cell -- but take a look at
that more interesting fellow, Mahmud Abouhalima -- note his connection
to "Ramzi Yousef" and the bin Laden network, and then take a good look
at "Ramzi Yousef"'s origin and sponsorship.)
And now bin Laden and his backers -- which certainly include the
Taliban, but certainly are not limited to the Taliban, anymore than
Omar Abdel-Rahman got "Ramzi Yousef"'s fingerprints into the Kuwaiti
government files as being a disappeared Kuwaiti citizen -- are
teaching everybody that, if you've got a small number of people
willing to be the front men, and take the fall, the price for six
thousand murders in the US is the fall of a shaky, militarily inept
government of the most vulnerable of the states involved.
Keith F. Lynch
> Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
> small group to kill lots of people?
Laura Burchard <l...@Radix.Net> wrote:
> Yes. Dams.
Good point. I have heard that there's one dam in Egypt whose sudden
destruction would result in over fifty million (!) deaths. If true,
I am astonished that they would ever have built the dam thing.
Hopefully, it's not all that easy to wreck one.
David Joseph Greenbaum
in fleeting electrons:
>Good point. I have heard that there's one dam in Egypt whose sudden
>destruction would result in over fifty million (!) deaths. If true,
>I am astonished that they would ever have built the dam thing.
>
>Hopefully, it's not all that easy to wreck one.
Aswan High Dam, 22 degrees 6 minutes north, 32 degrees 1 minute east
astraddle the Nile. It impounds, in Lake Nasser, 132 billion cubic
meters of water. It is the reason that the 1979 Camp David
Accords have persisted - during the 1973 war, Israeli war planes
paint-bombed the High Dam.
It has the highest concentration of air defence sites in Egypt.
Dave G.
--
One of the more popular cuts: pressed shank braised with smoker's
phlegm. It may take a few tries to get Uncle Hank to hack up enough
Lucky sauce, so be patient.
Keith F. Lynch
> There may be a gradual escalation, as each large act of terrorism
> means that the following attacks need to be more drastic.
Need for what? What's their goal? Killing for the sheer sake of
killing?
> Afaik, the WTC casualty count would have been significantly higher
> if the attack had been later in the day and/or not on an election.
I wonder if the lack of fannish casualties is due to the fact that
most of us are not morning people.
> A disease like AIDS with a long incubation period has some
> interesting possibilities, ...
I'm skeptical that anyone has the technology to develop a new disease
unless someone else has the technology to cure it. The bio-terrorist
threat is from the spreading of existing incurable diseases that are
found in nature.
Fortunately, most of them can't be easily spread. Presumably there's
a reason why nothing as deadly as AIDS or rabies but as contagious as
a cold exists. We would have evolved immunity to it long ago.
> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
It's easier to quarantine plants than to quarantine people. Plus,
unlike 1840s Ireland, we have a diverse food supply. No failure of
any one plant species would cause anyone in the civilized world to
starve.
If terrorists manage to kill one tenth of the corn plants, so what?
So corn prices would be ten percent higher for a year or two. But
if terrorists manage to kill one tenth of the PEOPLE, all hell would
break loose. No comparison.
>> Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
>> small group to kill lots of people?
> I'm not feeling quite as abstract about that sort of question as I
> used to.
I never did feel abstract about it. It's always been very real to me.
Note that:
* For the past 22 years, I've been living in a basement apartment
which is upwind from Washington DC, and which has no windows facing
toward that city.
* For the past four years, I haven't taken any domestic flights.
(I took the train to the 1998 and 2000 Worldcons, and caught a
ride to MilPhil.)
* For my whole working life, I've saved over half my after-tax salary,
and kept most of my money if a form that can't be traced to me.
* I've never owned a house or condominium. If necessary, I could walk
away at a moment's notice and never look back.
* I've long pointed out that this government-issued picture ID
business is a crock, which contributes not at all to safety.
See for instance my 1998 posting 69ce0l$5...@clarknet.clark.net,
available via Google.
* I was on the Capitol grounds on Saturday, September 8th, three days
before the terrorist attacks. (I was there for a book event). I
looked uneasily at the domed building, visualizing a 747 flying into
it (as happened in a Tom Clancy Novel), and considered what would be
the best thing for me to do if that happened.
Nancy Lebovitz
Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
>> There may be a gradual escalation, as each large act of terrorism
>> means that the following attacks need to be more drastic.
>
>Need for what? What's their goal? Killing for the sheer sake of
>killing?
If they're goals are to get a lot of publicity and/or to affect
government policy, what they're doing has to be shocking.
>> Afaik, the WTC casualty count would have been significantly higher
>> if the attack had been later in the day and/or not on an election.
>
>I wonder if the lack of fannish casualties is due to the fact that
>most of us are not morning people.
>
I don't think so. I bet we were mostly protected by mere luck:
Those dead in the towers were only a tiny proportion of the people
in NYC, and the numbers killed in the plane and at the Pentagon
were a smaller proportion of the country. I know of one fan
who was saved because she was late to work (but might well have
gotten out anyway), and talked with one who'd walked down from
the 70somethingth floor.
The vast majority of NYC fen were in the "might have been on the
subway" category, and didn't have any reason to be in the WTC towers
at all that day. I don't get the impression that many fans look for
non-standard-schedule work, though I'd be interested to find out
whether I'm wrong.
I get the impression that not many fen work for the military (for
reasons of temperment), and this may have improved the odds of
none getting killed at the Pentagon, but on the other hand, the
proportion of Americans in the military isn't all that high,
either, and the number killed at the Pentagon was only a tiny
proportion of those in the military.
Even so, I know people who'd lost close friends--I really think
we were just lucky.
>> A disease like AIDS with a long incubation period has some
>> interesting possibilities, ...
>
>I'm skeptical that anyone has the technology to develop a new disease
>unless someone else has the technology to cure it. The bio-terrorist
>threat is from the spreading of existing incurable diseases that are
>found in nature.
>
>Fortunately, most of them can't be easily spread. Presumably there's
>a reason why nothing as deadly as AIDS or rabies but as contagious as
>a cold exists. We would have evolved immunity to it long ago.
Does Ebola come fairly close?
Also, the disease doesn't have to be quite that bad. Polio or smallpox
would be quite deadly enough to count as terror weapons.
>> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
>> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
>
>It's easier to quarantine plants than to quarantine people. Plus,
>unlike 1840s Ireland, we have a diverse food supply. No failure of
>any one plant species would cause anyone in the civilized world to
>starve.
>
It's presumably possible to strike at more than one plant species at the
same time, and (I ask for more expert opinions here), monoculture may make
it possible to kill considerably more than 10% of a crop.
>If terrorists manage to kill one tenth of the corn plants, so what?
>So corn prices would be ten percent higher for a year or two. But
I don't think that stuff is linear.
>if terrorists manage to kill one tenth of the PEOPLE, all hell would
>break loose. No comparison.
Granted--but I think a lesser but significant degree of hell would
break loose if foot-and-mouth disease came to the US.
>>> Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
>>> small group to kill lots of people?
>
>> I'm not feeling quite as abstract about that sort of question as I
>> used to.
>
>I never did feel abstract about it. It's always been very real to me.
>Note that:
>
>* For the past 22 years, I've been living in a basement apartment
> which is upwind from Washington DC, and which has no windows facing
> toward that city.
>
>* For the past four years, I haven't taken any domestic flights.
> (I took the train to the 1998 and 2000 Worldcons, and caught a
> ride to MilPhil.)
Was that for concern about terrorism, or was it the ID issue?
Mike Scott
wrote:
>And now bin Laden and his backers -- which certainly include the
>Taliban, but certainly are not limited to the Taliban, anymore than
>Omar Abdel-Rahman got "Ramzi Yousef"'s fingerprints into the Kuwaiti
>government files as being a disappeared Kuwaiti citizen -- are
>teaching everybody that, if you've got a small number of people
>willing to be the front men, and take the fall, the price for six
>thousand murders in the US is the fall of a shaky, militarily inept
>government of the most vulnerable of the states involved.
Have you personally seen convincing evidence of the involvement of any
other state, or are you advocating bombing them just in case?
--
Mike Scott
mi...@plokta.com
Kevin J. Maroney
wrote:
>>Fortunately, most of them can't be easily spread. Presumably there's
>>a reason why nothing as deadly as AIDS or rabies but as contagious as
>>a cold exists. We would have evolved immunity to it long ago.
>
>Does Ebola come fairly close?
Not yet. No human Ebola strain is easy to catch. Ebola reston, a chimp
disease which is almost completely nonsymptomatic in humans,
communicates somewhat more readily, but still not as quickly as a cold
or as smallpox.
--
Kevin J. Maroney | k...@panix.com
Games are my entire waking life.
Keith F. Lynch
> I get the impression that not many fen work for the military ...
A fair number in WSFA do, or did. None of them happened to be in the
Pentagon on the 11th.
> ... the number killed at the Pentagon was only a tiny proportion of
> those in the military.
The number killed at the Pentagon was only a tiny proportion of the
number who were in the Pentagon. It wasn't like the WTC. All the
plane did was cave in about one tenth of one of the five faces of the
outermost of the five rings.
> Does Ebola come fairly close?
Nobody knows how it's caught. I guess not too many people are willing
to fool around with it and find out. But considering the rarity of
Ebola cases, it can't be all that easy to catch.
Two of Clancy's novels have terrorists breed Ebola so that it can be
spread through the air. I don't know enough about virology to know
how plausible this is.
> Also, the disease doesn't have to be quite that bad. Polio or
> smallpox would be quite deadly enough to count as terror weapons.
Good point. The current (?) issue of Newsweek says that a computer
simulation of a smallpox attack on the US was done, and that there
were over a million simulated deaths. Sigh.
Fortunately, smallpox isn't very easy to get ahold of. It supposedly
exists only in two (closely guarded) places.
However, I believe its complete genome is known, and has been
published in the open literature. I wonder how difficult it would be
to synthesize from that information.
> Granted--but I think a lesser but significant degree of hell would
> break loose if foot-and-mouth disease came to the US.
I doubt it. It doesn't even usually kill cattle, much less people.
And quarantining cattle is much easier than people.
>> For the past four years, I haven't taken any domestic flights.
>> (I took the train to the 1998 and 2000 Worldcons, and caught a
>> ride to MilPhil.)
> Was that for concern about terrorism, or was it the ID issue?
I consider the two issues inseparable. Bogus security attracts those
who like to break security. And its presense is a warning for people
of good sense to stay away. As well as being an offense against
liberty and human decency, and diametrically opposed to everything the
US is supposed to stand for. Why not go ahead and make the country
an Islamic monarchy while they're at it? Maybe *that* will stop the
attacks.
We now have even more bogus security. Sigh. The only thing
preventing a repeat of September 11th is that passengers are more
likely to fight back. It's not like terrorists couldn't still get
fake IDs, or real ones under false pretenses. Or like they couldn't
still bring knives on board.
Of course passengers would have a better chance at fighting back if
they weren't disarmed.
I'm pleased to hear that fewer people are flying, and that the
airlines are in serious financial trouble. Maybe they'll learn
something. Otherwise, good riddance.
Note that before September 11th, passengers and flight crews had
always been told to cooperate fully with hijackers, and let the
government handle things. Victims of all violent crimes were given
this same advice. I've always believed this is the worst possible
advice.
Amtrak has joined the airlines in demanding government-issued picture
ID. Idiots. If their customers have any backbone, they'll cease
being Amtrak customers.
I'm going to check and see if Greyhound is also being cretinous
and following the same bandwagon. If not, maybe I'll buy lots of
Greyhound stock.
P Nielsen Hayden
"David G. Bell" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> On 11 Oct, in article <9q3c9s$n...@netaxs.com>
> na...@unix1.netaxs.com "Nancy Lebovitz" wrote:
>
>> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
>> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
>
> <bitter>
> Just watch the farmers go bankrupt and move into cardboard boxes on the
> Embankment. There's plenty of yummy food that can be bought for fuck-
> all from other countries.
> </bitter>
As often happens when you make bitter comments about agricultural
issues, I can't quite figure out what your point is. But I would be
interested if you would elucidate more. Assume we've all just arrived
from Mars.
--
Patrick Nielsen Hayden : p...@panix.com : http://www.panix.com/~pnh
Electrolite: http://www.panix.com/~pnh/electrolite.html
Joel Rosenberg
I don't have access to the FBI files, if that's what you're asking.
But I don't think that the notion that support for Al Quaida has come
from states other than Afghanistan is really a serious question, do
you?
(In terms of "involvement", I wouldn't be at all surprised if it turns
out that absolutely nobody in the Taliban government knew the
specifics of the Black Tuesday plan -- unless you include bin Laden himself.)
Avram Grumer
P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 11 Oct 2001 18:46:14 +0100 (BST),
> "David G. Bell" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > <bitter>
> > Just watch the farmers go bankrupt and move into cardboard boxes on
> > the Embankment. There's plenty of yummy food that can be bought
> > for fuck- all from other countries.
> > </bitter>
>
> As often happens when you make bitter comments about agricultural
> issues, I can't quite figure out what your point is. But I would be
> interested if you would elucidate more. Assume we've all just
> arrived from Mars.
Won't he have to start out with a few screens describing multicellular
life?
--
Avram Grumer | av...@grumer.org | http://www.PigsAndFishes.org
Vs lbh pna ernq guvf, lbh'er va ivbyngvba bs gur Qvtvgny Zvyyraavhz
Pbclevtug Npg.
Susana Serras Pereira
"Nancy Lebovitz" <na...@unix1.netaxs.com> wrote in message
news:9q5giu$m...@netaxs.com...
<snip>
> >
> >I wonder if the lack of fannish casualties is due to the fact that
> >most of us are not morning people.
> >
> I don't think so. I bet we were mostly protected by mere luck:
> Those dead in the towers were only a tiny proportion of the people
> in NYC, and the numbers killed in the plane and at the Pentagon
> were a smaller proportion of the country. I know of one fan
> who was saved because she was late to work (but might well have
> gotten out anyway), and talked with one who'd walked down from
> the 70somethingth floor.
>
> The vast majority of NYC fen were in the "might have been on the
> subway" category, and didn't have any reason to be in the WTC towers
> at all that day. I don't get the impression that many fans look for
> non-standard-schedule work, though I'd be interested to find out
> whether I'm wrong.
>
> I get the impression that not many fen work for the military (for
> reasons of temperment), and this may have improved the odds of
> none getting killed at the Pentagon, but on the other hand, the
> proportion of Americans in the military isn't all that high,
> either, and the number killed at the Pentagon was only a tiny
> proportion of those in the military.
>
> Even so, I know people who'd lost close friends--I really think
> we were just lucky.
<snip>
In Wednesday's _Slate_ there was an interesting article about this,
"Life's Odds and Sept. 11 - No one I know personally was on the list.
Why?"
http://slate.msn.com/cx/Features/wtcknow/wtcknow.asp
It proposes a mathematical explanation, and has some interesting
links on the "small world", or "six degrees" problems. And there's
even an ObFandom in here: it links to an article entitled "Six Degrees
of Lois Weisberg". Lois Weisberg is, apparently, a Singer-type, who,
says the article, was who got Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and
"this guy Robert" together.
http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_01_11_a_weisberg.htm
(This last is probably news to no one but me, but I thought it was
fascinating.)
Susana, pondering what the word Clarke, Asimov and
R.A.H. used for her might have been, and
wondering who came up with it
Tom Womack
Susana Serras Pereira <susanaser...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>Lois Weisberg is, apparently, a Singer-type, who,
>says the article, was who got Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and
>"this guy Robert" together.
>http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_01_11_a_weisberg.htm
Visit www.gladwell.com. Do it now!
He seems to have written a ten-thousand-word explanatory essay, in the
best John McPhee model and, as far as I can see, to at least as good a
standard, roughly monthly. On subjects from six-degrees-of-separation,
through mosquito eradication, via Giuliani's clean-up of New York, to
(http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_12_06_a_clicks.htm) the McPhee
Essay On Modern Warehousing that I remember being hoped for here a few
years back.
And he's put them all up on his site.
Go there! Now! Marvel!
Tom, in college far too late because he's got all this wonderful candy
left to read!
David G. Bell
<slrn9scgdb....@hunding.localdomain> gra...@dsl.ca
"Graydon Saunders" wrote:
> On 11 Oct 2001 20:43:27 -0400,
> Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> scripsit:
> > Nancy Lebovitz <na...@unix1.netaxs.com> wrote:
>
> Diseases like that die out; they kill their host population and fail to
> spread. This is why the public health folks react to strongly to
> hemoragic fevers, since the combination of air travel and such a disease
> could run the death toll from 'a couple of villages', the foot transit
> speed impact, to 'millions'.
>
> >> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
> >> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
> >
> > It's easier to quarantine plants than to quarantine people. Plus,
> > unlike 1840s Ireland, we have a diverse food supply. No failure of
> > any one plant species would cause anyone in the civilized world to
> > starve.
>
> Generally correct, but you're leaving out that it's *mechanical*
> agriculture, and the fertilizer sources are both concentrated,
> vulnerable, and time dependent; blowing up the right couple-three
> fertilizer plants and possibly some rail bridges could cause a large
> general crop failure, and wouldn't be any harder to arrange than the WTC
> attack, quite possibly easier.
A Russian defector -- I can't recall the name, but he was GRU, and did
much to spread the idea of the Spetsnaz threat -- wrote of an incident
in the sixties involving a Soviet fertiliser factory. Used the name
Suverov? One book called "The Liberators"? My logic is very fuzzy
today.
If you want to imagine a major problem for Europe, affecting more than
just fertiliser, there's that gas pipeline from Siberia...
David G. Bell
dj...@cornell.edu "David Joseph Greenbaum" wrote:
> In a fit of divine composition, "Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> inscribed
> in fleeting electrons:
>
> >Good point. I have heard that there's one dam in Egypt whose sudden
> >destruction would result in over fifty million (!) deaths. If true,
> >I am astonished that they would ever have built the dam thing.
> >
> >Hopefully, it's not all that easy to wreck one.
>
> Aswan High Dam, 22 degrees 6 minutes north, 32 degrees 1 minute east
> astraddle the Nile. It impounds, in Lake Nasser, 132 billion cubic
> meters of water. It is the reason that the 1979 Camp David
> Accords have persisted - during the 1973 war, Israeli war planes
> paint-bombed the High Dam.
Paint-bombed? I never heard that before.
> It has the highest concentration of air defence sites in Egypt.
I am not surprised.
David G. Bell
k...@KeithLynch.net "Keith F. Lynch" wrote:
> Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote:
> > Does anyone have any other plausible scenarios for an individual or
> > small group to kill lots of people?
>
> Laura Burchard <l...@Radix.Net> wrote:
> > Yes. Dams.
>
> Good point. I have heard that there's one dam in Egypt whose sudden
> destruction would result in over fifty million (!) deaths. If true,
> I am astonished that they would ever have built the dam thing.
>
> Hopefully, it's not all that easy to wreck one.
The RAF still has one Lancaster bomber.
(Ghostly barking noises from the direction of Scampton)
(You know about the Black Dog legends in England, don't you?)
David G. Bell
k...@KeithLynch.net "Keith F. Lynch" wrote:
> > Granted--but I think a lesser but significant degree of hell would
> > break loose if foot-and-mouth disease came to the US.
>
> I doubt it. It doesn't even usually kill cattle, much less people.
> And quarantining cattle is much easier than people.
The UK outbreak seems to have been worsened by major official
incompetence in the first month or so. Death rates depend on species,
and the virus strain. Death rates in untreated cases can reach 20%,
there is little or no treatment beyond preventing opportunistic
infections of the lesions, and the lesions can lead to disabling injury.
Cow's tongues can drop off.
There's also some evidence of gasto-intestinal tract injury from the
disease.
David G. Bell
<avram-706458....@news1.panix.com>
av...@grumer.org "Avram Grumer" wrote:
> In article <slrn9scob...@panix3.panix.com>,
> P Nielsen Hayden <p...@panix.com> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 11 Oct 2001 18:46:14 +0100 (BST),
> > "David G. Bell" <db...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > >
> > > <bitter>
> > > Just watch the farmers go bankrupt and move into cardboard boxes on
> > > the Embankment. There's plenty of yummy food that can be bought
> > > for fuck- all from other countries.
> > > </bitter>
> >
> > As often happens when you make bitter comments about agricultural
> > issues, I can't quite figure out what your point is. But I would be
> > interested if you would elucidate more. Assume we've all just
> > arrived from Mars.
>
> Won't he have to start out with a few screens describing multicellular
> life?
Shorter answer: the people who sell food to the general public have a
near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the cost of
production. If we complain, we are told that they can buy food at the
same price from foreign sources.
These foreign sources don't have our costs, including the costs of
meeting health and safety standard which have been imposed on us by
those who buy our food.
It doesn't matter whose label is on the food you buy: without the
farmers there isn't anything for them to put a label on.
The current _average_ income is 75p per hour, and that average was
calculated after excluding those parts of farming most affected by Foot
& Mouth. And the boss of one of the supermarkets, a week or so ago,
told an audience of graduating students at an agricultural college that
farmers were paid too much.
Curiously, supermarkets in the UK have higher profit margins than in the
rest of Europe.
Tom Womack
David Joseph Greenbaum <dj...@cornell.edu> wrote:
>Aswan High Dam, 22 degrees 6 minutes north, 32 degrees 1 minute east
>astraddle the Nile. It impounds, in Lake Nasser, 132 billion cubic
>meters of water. It is the reason that the 1979 Camp David
>Accords have persisted - during the 1973 war, Israeli war planes
>paint-bombed the High Dam.
Ouch.
That made me shiver, in the middle of a warm day sat at a comfortable
computer.
I looked at the picture
http://www-ocean.tamu.edu/Quarterdeck/QD3.1/Elsayed/elsayed-dam.gif
and the High Dam is a massive chunk of masonry ... but
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/israel/nuke/index.html
suggests that by 1973 Israel had nuclear weapons pretty well sewn-up.
Ouch.
Tom
David Joseph Greenbaum
in fleeting electrons:
>In article <9q5e7q$2ko...@cit.cornell.edu>,
>David Joseph Greenbaum <dj...@cornell.edu> wrote:
>
>>Aswan High Dam, 22 degrees 6 minutes north, 32 degrees 1 minute east
>>astraddle the Nile. It impounds, in Lake Nasser, 132 billion cubic
>>meters of water. It is the reason that the 1979 Camp David
>>Accords have persisted - during the 1973 war, Israeli war planes
>>paint-bombed the High Dam.
>
>Ouch.
>That made me shiver, in the middle of a warm day sat at a comfortable
>computer.
>Ouch.
Yes. It is a chilling thought. A truly horrible thought. To quote from
Charlie Stross [Message-ID: slrn95lvga....@antipope.nsl.co.uk]:
>It's worse than that: the Aswan High Dam is probably the biggest
>geopolitical own goal in history.
>
>The dam currently holds back on the order of 100 Gt of water -- an
>outrageously unbelievable quantity, equivalent to a couple of medium-
>sized mountain ranges. And 95-98% of Egypt's population lives downstream
>of the dam, in a valley. Blow the dam (which admittedly will take an
>earthquake or a very large bomb -- probably a sub-surface nuke) and you
>release a wall of water a hundred metres high, travelling downstream at
>a couple of hundred kilometres per hour. By the time it reaches the Med,
>Egypt will have ceased to exist.
>
>By building the dam, Egypt handed Israel a huge force-multiplier in
>the regional cold-war stakes; even if Egypt went overboard on building
>nuclear missiles, the IAF could still shrug and say "so? we can kill 98%
>of your population with a single bomb."
>
>Obviously, Nasser didn't expect this when he hatched the scheme in the
>first place ...
Tom Womack
David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
>On Thursday, in article
> <slrn9scgdb....@hunding.localdomain> gra...@dsl.ca
> "Graydon Saunders" wrote:
>> Generally correct, but you're leaving out that it's *mechanical*
>> agriculture, and the fertilizer sources are both concentrated,
>> vulnerable, and time dependent; blowing up the right couple-three
>> fertilizer plants and possibly some rail bridges could cause a large
>> general crop failure, and wouldn't be any harder to arrange than the WTC
>> attack, quite possibly easier.
>
>A Russian defector -- I can't recall the name, but he was GRU, and did
>much to spread the idea of the Spetsnaz threat -- wrote of an incident
>in the sixties involving a Soviet fertiliser factory. Used the name
>Suverov? One book called "The Liberators"? My logic is very fuzzy
>today.
_The Devil's Alternative_ by Frederick Forsyth is a Cold War thriller
where the action is precipitated by a crop failure in the USSR, caused
by some kind of factory accident of this sort taking out the
Kazakhstan wheat crop whilst weather conditions took out the Ukranian
one.
[did you know that, for some books at least, Amazon has scanned in the
first chapter to provide some degree of Web-based browsing ... see
The propaganda would have that the Russian habit was to centralise
whilst Virtuous Capitalism tends to dispersed facilities, but I'm not
sure that's more than propaganda.
Tom
Arthur D. Hlavaty
<susanaser...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>It proposes a mathematical explanation, and has some interesting
>links on the "small world", or "six degrees" problems. And there's
>even an ObFandom in here: it links to an article entitled "Six Degrees
>of Lois Weisberg". Lois Weisberg is, apparently, a Singer-type, who,
>says the article, was who got Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and
>"this guy Robert" together.
>http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_01_11_a_weisberg.htm
Gladwell is an awesome writer and thinker, and everyone should read
_The Tipping Point_, but the story about the sf people is the one
thing he's written that doesn't feel right to me.
--
Arthur D.Hlavaty hla...@panix.com
Church of the SuperGenius in Wile E. we trust
E-zine available on request
Robert Shaw
"Keith F. Lynch" <k...@KeithLynch.net> wrote
> I'm skeptical that anyone has the technology to develop a new disease
> unless someone else has the technology to cure it. The bio-terrorist
> threat is from the spreading of existing incurable diseases that are
> found in nature.
>
> Fortunately, most of them can't be easily spread. Presumably there's
> a reason why nothing as deadly as AIDS or rabies but as contagious as
> a cold exists. We would have evolved immunity to it long ago.
Pneumonic plague is both, but it hasn't evolved antibiotic resistance.
A virgin field epidemic of smallpox or measles would qualify.
Are there any herd diseases that haven't jumped to humans yet?
Using such a disease could produce a virgin field epidemic, with
high mortality, at least until the virus evolved to be less lethal.
--
'It is a wise crow that knows which way the camel points' - Pratchett
Robert Shaw
Keith F. Lynch
> a near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the
> cost of production.
How is that possible? Wouldn't the food producers go out of business
as quickly as the dot com bubble burst? Outgo can't exceed income for
very long, for any industry.
Why don't farmers form their own cooperatives, and sell directly to
the public, bypassing the grocery stores?
Keith F. Lynch
I meant I hope it's not easy for a small terrorist group to wreck a
major dam. Obviously, any major government could do it.
I'm still baffled that anyone would build a dam whose destruction
would result in the total oblitaration of their whole nation.
Nancy Lebovitz
> <slrn9scgdb....@hunding.localdomain> gra...@dsl.ca
> "Graydon Saunders" wrote:
>
>> On 11 Oct 2001 20:43:27 -0400,
>> Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> scripsit:
>> > Nancy Lebovitz <na...@unix1.netaxs.com> wrote:
>>
>> >> I don't know whether there are lurking plant diseases which could
>> >> cause real trouble in the civilized world.
>> >
>> > It's easier to quarantine plants than to quarantine people. Plus,
>> > unlike 1840s Ireland, we have a diverse food supply. No failure of
>> > any one plant species would cause anyone in the civilized world to
>> > starve.
>>
end (as distinct from dramatic images on the tv), one would credibly
threaten the US with hoof-and-mouth disease instead of ramming airplanes
into buildings.
David G. Bell
wom...@ox.compsoc.net "Tom Womack" wrote:
> In article <20011012.12...@zhochaka.demon.co.uk>,
> David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
> >On Thursday, in article
> > <slrn9scgdb....@hunding.localdomain> gra...@dsl.ca
> > "Graydon Saunders" wrote:
>
> >> Generally correct, but you're leaving out that it's *mechanical*
> >> agriculture, and the fertilizer sources are both concentrated,
> >> vulnerable, and time dependent; blowing up the right couple-three
> >> fertilizer plants and possibly some rail bridges could cause a large
> >> general crop failure, and wouldn't be any harder to arrange than the WTC
> >> attack, quite possibly easier.
> >
> >A Russian defector -- I can't recall the name, but he was GRU, and did
> >much to spread the idea of the Spetsnaz threat -- wrote of an incident
> >in the sixties involving a Soviet fertiliser factory. Used the name
> >Suverov? One book called "The Liberators"? My logic is very fuzzy
> >today.
>
> _The Devil's Alternative_ by Frederick Forsyth is a Cold War thriller
> where the action is precipitated by a crop failure in the USSR, caused
> by some kind of factory accident of this sort taking out the
> Kazakhstan wheat crop whilst weather conditions took out the Ukranian
> one.
The one I remember was an overdose of a pesticide seed dressing, I think
arising from botched production of the seed dressing with a grossly
excessive concentration of the pesticide. Something like that could do
a lot of harm. But I don't recall if that was Forsyth.
The fertiliser plant story was more bureaucracy gone mad.
> The propaganda would have that the Russian habit was to centralise
> whilst Virtuous Capitalism tends to dispersed facilities, but I'm not
> sure that's more than propaganda.
Virtuous Capitalism is heavy contaminated by Stupid Government...
Marcus L. Rowland
Saunders <gra...@dsl.ca> writes
>
>Up until Hitler's War, no one had ever broken a dam from the air, and
>the idea that you *could* hadn't got all that widespread by the early
>fifties when they did the planning for the High Dam, I don't think.
>(not to mention that it would probably take a nuke to shift the thing,
>and if someone is willing to nuke you, you're not worried about the fate
>of your public works projects, not in fifties strategic thinking terms.)
I doubt you'd need a nuke. By the end of WW2 the RAF was dropping 10-ton
deep penetration bombs (Grand Slam) which were expressly designed for
blowing up the foundations of things like dams, factories, etc. You put
a big enough hole _underneath_ something like a dam (or somewhere that
experiences a lot of stress like the ends of it) and something is
probably going to give. And once things start to give the weight of the
water does the rest of the work.
--
Marcus L. Rowland
Forgotten Futures - The Scientific Romance Role Playing Game
http://www.ffutures.demon.co.uk/ http://www.forgottenfutures.com/
"We are all victims of this slime. They... ...fill our mailboxes with gibberish
that would get them indicted if people had time to press charges"
[Hunter S. Thompson predicts junk e-mail, 1985 (from Generation of Swine)]
Del Cotter
Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> said:
>David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
>> Shorter answer: the people who sell food to the general public have
>> a near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the
>> cost of production.
>Why don't farmers form their own cooperatives, and sell directly to
>the public, bypassing the grocery stores?
About five minutes from me, Reading's cattle market (at which I've yet
to see cattle sold, what with the various fiascos) has a regular
"farmer's market" at which fresh food is sold directly, with the growers
themselves on hand to explain the qualities of their product. I wish
they had them weekly.
--
Del Cotter d...@branta.demon.co.uk
Joel Rosenberg
> On Sat, 13 Oct 2001 12:51:19 +0100,
> Marcus L. Rowland <mrow...@ffutures.demon.co.uk> scripsit:
> > In article <slrn9sff04....@hunding.localdomain>, Graydon
> > Saunders <gra...@dsl.ca> writes
> >>Up until Hitler's War, no one had ever broken a dam from the air, and
> >>the idea that you *could* hadn't got all that widespread by the early
> >>fifties when they did the planning for the High Dam, I don't think.
> >>(not to mention that it would probably take a nuke to shift the thing,
> >>and if someone is willing to nuke you, you're not worried about the fate
> >>of your public works projects, not in fifties strategic thinking terms.)
> >
> > I doubt you'd need a nuke.
>
> The High Dam is blessed immense, for one, and for two, the IDF doesn't
> have a delivery mechanism for anything bigger than about 5000 lbs. So if
> they were going to, they might well have to use a nuke.
>
> --
Well, the last time that the IDF was in a position to threaten to do
that -- and quite credibly, although the actual threat delivered was
far more serious than that -- the only delivery mechanism necessary
would have been trucks and APCs.
(You do remember how the Yom Kippur war was won, and by whom, don't
you?)
Kris Hasson-Jones
<d...@branta.demon.co.uk> splashed into the river and bubbled:
During the season (late spring to early fall), there is a twice-weekly
farmers' market in downtown Portland.
During a different season (late spring to December 25), there is a
weekly artists/artisans/crafters' market in downtown Portland.
In all cases the person doing the actual selling from the booth must
be the person who grew/made the items being sold.
What I like even better, though, are the small organic farms springing
up (there's at least two inside the city limits) that sell shares of
the produce--for $250 a share, which provides weekly produce to feed 4
people during the entire harvest season (about May through September).
Each week you pick up your share, there are boxes set out of all the
different ripe produce that week and a sign saying how much per share,
such as 4 pounds of gold potatoes and 8 zucchini this week, depending
on what was harvested.
--
Kris Hasson Jones sni...@pacifier.com
David Joseph Greenbaum
in fleeting electrons:
>> The High Dam is blessed immense, for one, and for two, the IDF doesn't
>> have a delivery mechanism for anything bigger than about 5000 lbs. So if
>> they were going to, they might well have to use a nuke.
>
>that -- and quite credibly, although the actual threat delivered was
>far more serious than that -- the only delivery mechanism necessary
>would have been trucks and APCs.
?! Aswan is six hundred miles south of the canal crossing at Suez.
It's a far drive under hostile fire.
kcam...@cix.compulink.co.uk
k...@KeithLynch.net (Keith F. Lynch) opined:
> David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
> > Shorter answer: the people who sell food to the general public have
> > a near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the
> > cost of production.
>
> How is that possible? Wouldn't the food producers go out of business
> as quickly as the dot com bubble burst? Outgo can't exceed income for
> very long, for any industry.
>
We are certainly seeing that here in Yorkshire. Families that have been
farming the same land for umpty ump generations are coming to the conclusion
that there is just so much belt tightening and corner cutting one can do on
the household budget. So they are selling up and moving into town to a
council house and the dole. The farm families immediately surrounding the
Library are a little bit luckier. They can send their sons and daughters to
work at the Library for a regular wage. That might hold the farm together
for a couple more years.
> Why don't farmers form their own cooperatives, and sell directly to
> the public, bypassing the grocery stores?
This is starting to happen more and more. The larger farms have a farm shop
on the premises and the smaller ones do club together for the weekly or
monthly Farmers Market. Or you see signs by the road side advertising the
latest crop. That's fine for apples or potatoes, but not many housewives are
wanting to buy a bushel of prime wheat. And I would guess that by the time
one realises that wheat farming is never going to be profitable again, it is
too late to diversify.
Kim
--
KIM Campbell
Co-Convener Uk2005 Worldcon Bid
www.uk2005.org.uk
Keith F. Lynch
> Families that have been farming the same land for umpty ump
> generations are coming to the conclusion that there is just so much
> belt tightening and corner cutting one can do on the household
> budget. So they are selling up and moving into town to a council
> house and the dole.
Why aren't they selling up and moving into town and getting a job, as
earlier generations of ex-farmers did?
As farm efficiencies continue to increase, the proportion of the
population engaged in farming continues to drop. This is a good
thing. It frees up people to do other tasks, making the world a
wealthier place.
> And I would guess that by the time one realises that wheat farming
> is never going to be profitable again, it is too late to diversify.
Never? I would think that once enough wheat farms go out of business,
that wheat will become scarcer, and wheat prices will increase, making
the remaining wheat farms profitable. (Unless such time as there is
no longer much demand for wheat, which won't be any time soon.)
Joel Rosenberg
> In a fit of divine composition, Joel Rosenberg <jo...@winternet.com> inscribed
> in fleeting electrons:
> >> The High Dam is blessed immense, for one, and for two, the IDF doesn't
> >> have a delivery mechanism for anything bigger than about 5000 lbs. So if
> >> they were going to, they might well have to use a nuke.
> >
> >Well, the last time that the IDF was in a position to threaten to do
> >that -- and quite credibly, although the actual threat delivered was
> >far more serious than that -- the only delivery mechanism necessary
> >would have been trucks and APCs.
>
> ?! Aswan is six hundred miles south of the canal crossing at Suez.
> It's a far drive under hostile fire.
>
True, although I suspect that Sharon could have sent a column that
would have made it -- the Egyptian forces were frantically
repositioning themselves to try to block him doing a Sherman on Cairo,
and the diplomatic activity in the UN made it pretty clear that Sadat,
at least, was terrified that he'd succeed.
(I don't think he would have split his forces, mind; he was going to
throw everything he had at what was in front of him.)
Interesting fellow, Arik Sharon -- crossing the Suez in 1973 wasn't
the first time he'd disobeyed orders, although it worked out much
better than the first major time he did.
Lucy Kemnitzer
There are I think six of these, weekly, some of them all year and some
of them only from about April to November, in my little county.
Mostly organic produce, though certain crops are allowed with minimal
deviations from the organic standard and brussels sprouts apparently
get a free ticket to the worst poisons known.
And then there are several of these things called Community Supported
Agriculture, which are like subscription clubs, you pay them a set
rate each month and they deliver a huge box of nice stuff you didn't
choose and dog help you if you don't like kohlrabi and crookneck
squash. One is on behalf of the Homeless Garden.
But farmers also grow wheat and rice and beans and barley -- do we
really want to buy a sack of wheat berries and mill it and grind it
and make the bread ourselves? All of us? Or is it only the grocery
stores we want to bypass?
In every modern society I know anything about, food is heavily
subsidized. In the socialist countries it used to be the state that
subsidized food: the farmers got more money for the food than the
state got back from selling it. In capitalist countries, it's them
who do the farming who subsidize the food.
I understand that it is a social good that people should have
resources to spend on stuff besides food, but the fact is that we do
so at the cost of a tremendous amount of struggle and outright
suffering: in my area, there are thousands of people who grow and
package the food who simply can't afford enough of it to keep their
families healthy.
We could do it differently.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Lucy Kemnitzer
wrote:
><kcam...@cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote:
>> Families that have been farming the same land for umpty ump
>> generations are coming to the conclusion that there is just so much
>> belt tightening and corner cutting one can do on the household
>> budget. So they are selling up and moving into town to a council
>> house and the dole.
>
>Why aren't they selling up and moving into town and getting a job, as
>earlier generations of ex-farmers did?
Because there's no jobs for them. And there's no buyers for the land.
Not even the corporations who contract with them for the produce want
to buy that land and be saddled with its care and nurturing season
after season, whether the stuff is selling high or low.
>
>As farm efficiencies continue to increase, the proportion of the
>population engaged in farming continues to drop. This is a good
>thing. It frees up people to do other tasks, making the world a
>wealthier place.
The "efficiency" of the farms I see hereabouts is mainly that they
don't pay the workers what it costs to live in a modern society -- and
so they don't. While we here in town have computers and pay a small
fraction of our wages for food, the people who plant it and weed it
and water it and harvest it and put it into cushioned boxes so it
doesn't bruise live ten to a room, have no telephones, walk outside to
a bathroom, and drop out of school at fourteen because they need to
help the family.
Any improvements in technology are completely invisible in the
conditions of workers in the field.
I pass these fields on my way to and from work: the children of the
farmworkers are in my classes: every so often the local papers do a
big investigation and discover that the famrworkers' "camps" are still
hellholes to live in, and that the mostly non-unionized workers are
still being paid less than a living wage, and that they still work
inhuman hours in terrible conditions.
I thought they had outlawed the short-handled hoe, which breaks the
back of its user, forty years ago: but it's still out there. But they
do have porta-potties in the fields, so I guess I have to say that
modern technology has in fact affected the work of the farmworkers.
>
>> And I would guess that by the time one realises that wheat farming
>> is never going to be profitable again, it is too late to diversify.
>
>Never? I would think that once enough wheat farms go out of business,
>that wheat will become scarcer, and wheat prices will increase, making
>the remaining wheat farms profitable. (Unless such time as there is
>no longer much demand for wheat, which won't be any time soon.)
This is not how it works. Wheat in particular is an agribusiness
crop, which is the major reason why it is not profitable for farmers
proper. It's not subject to the visscisitudes of the mythical Market.
Companies either own the land or lease the land or contract with
farmers to grow the patented seed that can only be bought from the
corporation that owns the patent (i.e. you can't save your seed and
grow your own next year) -- the corporations set the prices and they
control the market too: I think you call it a vertical monopoly.
In wheat, the farmworker is a farmer who owns his land and is
entirely responsible for taking care of it so the corporations get the
profit from selling the stuff on down the line (largely to themselves,
right up to the point that you buy the frozen pizza) but the farmer
pays the cost.
I suppose the farmers could walk away from the land and their homes
and their equipment, with nothing but their clothes and dishes, and
try to make a new start that way: but probably the people who own
their mortgages would come looking for them. They certainly can't
usually sell the land: nobody would buy it.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Nancy Lebovitz
Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>
>In every modern society I know anything about, food is heavily
>subsidized. In the socialist countries it used to be the state that
Any theories about why it plays out that way? I can see that some
people get trapped in farming, but that doesn't seem to be the
whole story.
>subsidized food: the farmers got more money for the food than the
>state got back from selling it. In capitalist countries, it's them
>who do the farming who subsidize the food.
>
>I understand that it is a social good that people should have
>resources to spend on stuff besides food, but the fact is that we do
>so at the cost of a tremendous amount of struggle and outright
>suffering: in my area, there are thousands of people who grow and
>package the food who simply can't afford enough of it to keep their
>families healthy.
>
>We could do it differently.
>
Marilee J. Layman
<sni...@pacifier.com> wrote:
>On Sat, 13 Oct 2001 16:07:04 +0100, Del Cotter
><d...@branta.demon.co.uk> splashed into the river and bubbled:
>
>>On Fri, 12 Oct 2001, in rec.arts.sf.fandom,
>>Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> said:
>>
>>>David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
>>>> Shorter answer: the people who sell food to the general public have
>>>> a near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the
>>>> cost of production.
>>
>>>Why don't farmers form their own cooperatives, and sell directly to
>>>the public, bypassing the grocery stores?
>>
>>About five minutes from me, Reading's cattle market (at which I've yet
>>to see cattle sold, what with the various fiascos) has a regular
>>"farmer's market" at which fresh food is sold directly, with the growers
>>themselves on hand to explain the qualities of their product. I wish
>>they had them weekly.
>
>During the season (late spring to early fall), there is a twice-weekly
>farmers' market in downtown Portland.
>During a different season (late spring to December 25), there is a
>weekly artists/artisans/crafters' market in downtown Portland.
>
>In all cases the person doing the actual selling from the booth must
>be the person who grew/made the items being sold.
Yes, our farmer's market is like that, too.
>What I like even better, though, are the small organic farms springing
>up (there's at least two inside the city limits) that sell shares of
>the produce--for $250 a share, which provides weekly produce to feed 4
>people during the entire harvest season (about May through September).
>Each week you pick up your share, there are boxes set out of all the
>different ripe produce that week and a sign saying how much per share,
>such as 4 pounds of gold potatoes and 8 zucchini this week, depending
>on what was harvested.
There's a lot of these around here but I've never been able to find
people who want to go in on a membership with me. One of the farms
sells half-shares and I've been tempted to go ahead with that and see
if there's anything reasonable I'm able to do with the extra.
--
Marilee J. Layman
Bali Sterling Beads at Wholesale
http://www.basicbali.com
Kris Hasson-Jones
<mjla...@erols.com> splashed into the river and bubbled:
That's a good idea. I thought about trying to can some of it; it's
actually likely I'd eat most of it, though, as in summer my diet is
normally mostly steamed or raw fresh vegetables and fruit.
Marilee J. Layman
<sni...@pacifier.com> wrote:
>On Sat, 13 Oct 2001 22:11:57 -0400, Marilee J. Layman
><mjla...@erols.com> splashed into the river and bubbled:
>
>>On Sat, 13 Oct 2001 08:42:25 -0700, Kris Hasson-Jones
>><sni...@pacifier.com> wrote:
>>
>>>What I like even better, though, are the small organic farms springing
>>>up (there's at least two inside the city limits) that sell shares of
>>>the produce--for $250 a share, which provides weekly produce to feed 4
>>>people during the entire harvest season (about May through September).
>>>Each week you pick up your share, there are boxes set out of all the
>>>different ripe produce that week and a sign saying how much per share,
>>>such as 4 pounds of gold potatoes and 8 zucchini this week, depending
>>>on what was harvested.
>>
>>There's a lot of these around here but I've never been able to find
>>people who want to go in on a membership with me. One of the farms
>>sells half-shares and I've been tempted to go ahead with that and see
>>if there's anything reasonable I'm able to do with the extra.
>
>That's a good idea. I thought about trying to can some of it; it's
>actually likely I'd eat most of it, though, as in summer my diet is
>normally mostly steamed or raw fresh vegetables and fruit.
I haven't really cooked in a number of months, I'm sicker than I've
been for a while, so I don't know that I'd be able to can or freeze
that much. I was thinking if I could evaluate the status of the food
quickly enough, I could take what I wouldn't use to the shelter before
it got strange.
David G. Bell
<6sngstc2kbamcejn8...@4ax.com>
sni...@pacifier.com "Kris Hasson-Jones" wrote:
> On Sat, 13 Oct 2001 16:07:04 +0100, Del Cotter
> <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> splashed into the river and bubbled:
>
> >On Fri, 12 Oct 2001, in rec.arts.sf.fandom,
> >Keith F. Lynch <k...@KeithLynch.net> said:
> >
> >>David G. Bell <db...@zhochaka.org.uk> wrote:
> >>> Shorter answer: the people who sell food to the general public have
> >>> a near monopoly, and are consistently buying it at less than the
> >>> cost of production.
> >
> >>Why don't farmers form their own cooperatives, and sell directly to
> >>the public, bypassing the grocery stores?
> >
> >About five minutes from me, Reading's cattle market (at which I've yet
> >to see cattle sold, what with the various fiascos) has a regular
> >"farmer's market" at which fresh food is sold directly, with the growers
> >themselves on hand to explain the qualities of their product. I wish
> >they had them weekly.
>
> During the season (late spring to early fall), there is a twice-weekly
> farmers' market in downtown Portland.
>
> During a different season (late spring to December 25), there is a
> weekly artists/artisans/crafters' market in downtown Portland.
>
> In all cases the person doing the actual selling from the booth must
> be the person who grew/made the items being sold.
I'm afraid that the local farmers markets don't seem to match what I
hear about from the US.
What I've seen seems to be selling on snob value as much as anything,
with an infrequent market, and little or no sign of what might be
regarded as ordinary produce.
OK, maybe cheese. But ostrich-burgers?
Lucy Kemnitzer
wrote:
>In article <3bc8c56f...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
>Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>>
>>In every modern society I know anything about, food is heavily
>>subsidized. In the socialist countries it used to be the state that
>
>Any theories about why it plays out that way? I can see that some
>people get trapped in farming, but that doesn't seem to be the
>whole story.
Food is heavily subsidized because if we all paid the true cost of
food, consumers would not be able to consume stuff and there would be
no expanding economy anywhere.
In order to have surplus value you have to pay a lot less to produce
stuff than you can get for it when you sell it. There are a lot of
ways to do this, but they all, in some way or another, devalue the
work of the people who produce stuff. If it ever happened that the
stuff that was being made and the services that were being provided
were all dropping in prices in a coordinated way, or rising in a
coordinated way, and markets were all expanding at the same time in
the same way, maybe then the "magic of the market" that some people
invoke for every purpose to explain why there really aren't any
beggars on the street or hungry children or people looking for work
for months and months at a time would actually work the way that they
say it does, and rising tides would just float all the boats and
stuff.
But what actually happens is that we play sleight of hand with misery.
Food is naturally expensive. In faroff times it was the main thing we
spent our energy on: we decorated ourselves for a hobby, and we sang
songs for free. We've expended a tremendous amount of effort on
getting our food with less and less of our personal energy invested in
it. But automation is only part of the picture.
Yes, fewer and fewer people, proportionately, are actually employed in
agriculture. But the people who are employed in agriculture aren't an
elite corps of techies: they are the same hard-working, impoverished
people they have been. And a tremendous amount of effort is expended
in keeping them that way. Because if they were paid the true value of
their work, either food would become expensive for the consumer
classes, or the profit margin in the food industry would go down.
When David talks about the unprofitability of farming, remember, he's
talking about the unprofitability of farming for the active farmer --
not the person who is called a "farmer" in agribusiness, who is the
manager or shareholder in a large business that contracts to have
things grown (as in the berry business here), or runs the land
directly (as in the lettuce business here). The latter type of farmer
does not find farming unprofitable.
Archer Daniels Midland, for example: or Dole: they're doing very well,
thank you.
You know, I like food a lot. I adore food. I really think that the
people who produce these beautiful, wonderful, miraculous things for
me ought to be paid the full value of their work: I think they ought
to make a living wage: and I think there's a ton of resources floating
around that could be spent on that -- and instead it's being
concentrated in dead piles of excess booty.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Randolph Fritz
> In article <3bc8c56f...@cnews.newsguy.com>,
> Lucy Kemnitzer <rit...@cruzio.com> wrote:
>>
>>In every modern society I know anything about, food is heavily
>>subsidized. In the socialist countries it used to be the state that
>
> Any theories about why it plays out that way? I can see that some
> people get trapped in farming, but that doesn't seem to be the
> whole story.
>
Basically because it's a necessity, and people are (reasonably enough)
afraid of starvation, so there's heavy-duty manipulation of the
markets, and it's all slanted towards making the people who do the
work unable to avoid doing the work. I'll give you government
intervention in the markets in this case. Intervention in the
interest of creating oligopolies of producers, while putting workers
in an impossible position--most of the labor laws that protect other
workers apply to agricultural workers.
Given how efficient agriculture has become I can see no good reason
for agricultural employees to be so poorly paid--their incomes could
be as good as those of other skilled laborers and there would be no
problem with society feeding itself. This seems to me a case of
pre-industrial attitudes being maintained into the 21st century.
Randolph
Randolph Fritz
> interest of creating oligopolies of producers, while putting workers
> in an impossible position--most of the labor laws that protect other
> workers apply to agricultural workers.
^^^ *do not*
ooops!
Randolph
Lucy Kemnitzer
wrote:
I don't think there's anything the least pre-industrial about it. I
think the relationships between farmworkers and the land is largely
industrial, even farmers who farm. Farmworkers are alienated in the
technical sense of the word, in that they don't own a stake in the
process -- they work where they can, when they can, and there is no
sense of mutual obligation with the owners of the process. Farmers
who farm, people who work "their own" land, have a more complicated
relationship to the process, since they are bound to the land by
virtue of owning it or leasing it or sharecropping it: but the
entities who own the crop itself through one of the different ways
they do it, either more or less directly, still serve to alienate the
farmers from a big chunk of the process.
"Given how efficient agriculture has become" -- it has gotten that way
by this very process of disassociating the producers from the top
levels of the process. Advances in technology, in breeding, in
storage, distribution, packaging, refining, and processing, all
require money to research and apply, and the money comes from
somewhere -- it comes from the very bodies of the people who work the
land.
I'm not against computerized water timers, no, I like that stuff: but
we should be realistic about where the money is coming from for this
and ask ourselves if we would really rather spend five cents less for
a basket of strawberries, at the cost of the farmworker's children
going hungry.
Actually I wish they would put computerized water timers on the damned
irrigation equipment, maybe they'd slow down the salinization of the
water table. Which is another hidden cost of modern agriculture:
environmental damage. If we had to pay up front for the repair of the
environment from agricultural damage, and we categorized it as a cost
of food production, instead of waiting a generation or two down the
line and calling the cleanup costs something else, we might pay
attention.
Lucy Kemnitzer
Mike Scott
wrote:
>I suppose the farmers could walk away from the land and their homes
>and their equipment, with nothing but their clothes and dishes, and
>try to make a new start that way: but probably the people who own
>their mortgages would come looking for them. They certainly can't
>usually sell the land: nobody would buy it.
That's not the case in the UK, where I believe farmland prices are
holding up quite well.
--
Mike Scott
mi...@plokta.com
Mike Scott
wrote:
>I've been playing with the notion that if one wanted to achieve a political
>end (as distinct from dramatic images on the tv), one would credibly
>threaten the US with hoof-and-mouth disease instead of ramming airplanes
>into buildings.
The economic cost of the foot-and-mouth outbreak in the UK is probably
only 10% or 20% of the cost of the damage to New York. And that's not
counting the lives lost. Remember, foot-and-mouth doesn't cause
starvation, as meat from infected animals is perfectly safe for human
consuption. I don't think it's a large enough threat.
--
Mike Scott
mi...@plokta.com