View Larger Map Band of Brothers , the best WW2 series ever made, was shot primarily at the airfield outside of Hatfield, England . The sets are still standing and are visible on Google Maps. I know where I’m when I’m next in the UK. (Which should be soonish; my pop just moved over there.)
Julian, age 7, heard that the Spirit Mars rover was stuck , and offered his idea to fix it . Turns out that’s a pretty good idea and one that JPL folks are already considering. The rover drivers were so pleased by Julian’s suggestion that they’re going to send him a reward . Update : NASA is naming the next rover “Curiosity”, a name offered by a sixth-grader .
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How to rescue the Mars rover by Julian, age 7
Remember ” Mars in Crayon ” yesterday? Curator Dan Goods has put more images from JPL online, including this comparison of the pastels sketch and the actual decoded TV image above. Though he used a brown/red color scheme, the thought that Mars was red did not enter his mind. He really was looking for the colors that best represented a grey scale, since that was what they were going to get anway. It is uncanny how close his color scheme is to the actual colors of Mars. It’s as if they came right out of current images of the planet. I’ve seen some of the other color schemes he tried and it could have been green or purple!
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More Mars in Crayon
You’re looking at the business end of a Lockheed M-21 Blackbird engine, currently on display at Seattle’s Museum of Flight, a place I first visited this week and which I cannot recommend enough. They have a real Blackbird cockpit on the floor next to the M-21 that you can climb into, shake the stick around, and make whooshing noises with your mouth to augment the ones coming from a little speaker. Even though all the instrument and control panels were cover in thick plexiglass, my heart still raced as I pretended I was cruising at Mach 3. If you can, peek into the second hatch and take a look at the screen the drone operator would have used. (I am presuming the whole rig is from another M-21, but maybe it was an A-12 or SR-71.) I don’t know what would be more scary: doing Mach 3 while able to see where you’re going, or only being able to look out from tiny windows on the sides.
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Photo: Lockheed M-21 engine
Calling this little box the ” Tiny SIM Card Spy Ear ” is confusing literalism the way only crapvendor Brando can do it. Here’s what it does: It’s basically a cellphone in a box with a microphone, letting you call in to its phone number and listen to whatever it can hear. It works on GSM only and charges over USB, so I’m presuming that means it has a built-in battery, as well. At $65 it’s not exactly cheap for all that it actually does, but spy craft is not a poor man’s game. (Unless it is .)
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Brando "Spy Ear" is a tiny cell phone that always picks up
Matthew Farley writes: “I thought you might appreciate
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Honda Civic travels one light second in ten years
Jim Merithew shoots and reports from a Topeka bunker that’s been converted into an appealing 18,000-square-foot home. [ Wired via The Awl ]
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Those Were The Days: Living in a converted missile silo
David Hambling at Danger Room : Over 90 million rounds of the “green” training ammunition has been used in the United States, since its introduction. It relies on a blend of tungsten and nylon, or tungsten and tin. That gives the bullets the same density and firing properties as the original, but without using lead. Tungsten was considered non-toxic. And, besides, it was believed that it was “non-mobile”, unlikely to dissolve and travel, so it wouldn’t get into the groundwater. But new research by University of Arizona Research Professor of Pediatrics Mark Witten points to a different conclusion: that tungsten may elevate the risk for cancer.
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Everything is Cancer: "Green" tungsten bullets may be carcinogenic
Pacific Gas & Electric, which provides the power for much of California, has announced their intention to purchase power from Solaren , a company which intends to put power-harvesting satellites in space, then beam the energy back to Earth. (And has a sci-fi logo to match.) PG&E is seeking approval from state regulators for a power purchase agreement with Solaren Corp., a Southern California company that has contracted to deliver 200 megawatts of clean, renewable power over a 15 year period. Solaren says it plans to generate the power using solar panels in earth orbit, then convert it to radio frequency energy for transmission to a receiving station in Fresno County. From there, the energy will be converted to electricity and fed into PG&E’s power grid. Next up: Dyson swarms . Or Goldeneye . Update : Cryptogon is incredulous about the validity of Solaren.
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PG&E wants to beam power from space
The Bros. Brick brings word that Jumpei Mitsui’s six-year project, the minifig-scale Battleship Yamato , is finally complete. Length: 6.6 meters (22 feet) from bow to stern Width: 1 meter (3 feet) at the widest point midship Scale: 1/40 Time to complete: 6 years, 4 months Parts: 200,000 LEGO elements Weight: 150 kilograms (330 pounds)
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Jumpei Mitsui’s monumental LEGO Battleship Yamato
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