- On Monday I went flying; during the flight, I shot some landings at the Hayward airport; it is more or less right across the bay from the Palo Alto airport. As I was flying downwind for an approach to land on runway 28L, I heard an unusual radio call: “Hayward Tower, Boeing 5017 November…” My CFI and I looked at each other, wondering what kind of aircraft it was. Turns out it was the Experimental Aircraft’s B-17, Aluminum Overcast, come to town for a visit! (Their tour is this weekend, when I’ll be in Huntsville, so I did the virtual tour instead. So should you.) He landed while I followed in trail, but it took him long enough to clear the runway that I had to go around– so I got to overfly a B-17. Bonus: I could see our friendly neighborhood Zeppelin about 10nm to the north as I executed the go-around. Some flights just can’t be improved on…
- …but others can. Case in point: the Indian Air Force has purchased 872 MiG fighters since 1966. Since then, they have crashed 482 of them, killing 171 pilots. That’s a loss rate of 55%! I can’t find official data on accident rates (as opposed to total numbers of airframes lost) for the IAF, though an article (whose link I lost) cites a loss rate of somewhere between 0.83 and 1.07 per 10,000 hours. For comparison, see the USAF mishap data from 1947 to 2006 (see the “Destroyed” column), which appears to be calculated per 100,000 hours. It’s surprising both that the IAF has such high total losses and that their mishap rate seems to be pretty steady. (Interesting side note: the USAF apparently flew 25% more hours during “peacetime” in FY 1993 than in the midst of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars in FY 2007!)
- From the “could you possibly find a more obvious research result?” department: “…The surprising result is that relationships in which the man is happier than the woman are significantly more likely to come to an end relative to relationships in which both partners are similarly unhappy.” You don’t say. In other news: water is still wet, and Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.
- I was excited about Bo’s mention of Mad Anthony’s XXXTRA HOT Private Reserve hot sauce… but for $10 a bottle plus $10 shipping, Im thinking I’ll pass. That’s a high barrier to entry just to try it. On the other hand… mmm, delicious spice… so I might have to get some anyway. (Related note: just ordered a refill of Blair’s Death Rain habanero chips, yum!)
- Great persuasive essay from Brian about willpower and desire in relation to fitness. Go read it. And then stay out of the snack closet.
- Attention Tony: now that I know of the existence of The Aviator’s Guide to Ireland my interest in visiting Ireland has gone up about five notches.
- I wish I could convince Amazon to stop cluttering up their home page with top-center ads for womens’ clothing and the Kindle Fire. I don’t want either of them, nor am I likely to suddenly change my mind; if they put up ads for things I might actually buy it would be better for both of us.
Category Archives: Musings
Thursday trivia #58
Filed under aviation, General Stuff, Musings
“See something, say something” stupidity?
This week a Delta Air Lines flight from Detroit to Chicago was quarantined upon arrival by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Why? Because CDC thought the woman might have monkeypox. Why on earth would they think that? Therein lies the story.
First off: according to the CDC themselves, monkeypox kills between 1% and 10% of people in Africa who contract it. So, it’s worse than chickenpox, but not up to the level of Marburg or ebola.
So, Lise Sievers went to Africa to work on her pending adoption of two special-needs children. During the four months she was there, she developed what the Minneapolis Star-Tribune describes as a “bad rash” that she thinks was caused by bedbugs. One of the boys she’s adopting also has what her son, Roger, described as “pus-filled bumps.” Still with me? Lise has a rash. Her son-to-be has bumps.
In a phone call with her mother, Lise mentioned the rash and the bumps. Her mother, no doubt with the best of intentions, called a local hospital and asked them (and I’m paraphrasing here) “What kind of treatment do you need to get if you’ve been in Africa and have pus-filled bumps on your skin?” I’m sure that the hospital staff jumped at the chance to make a diagnosis over the phone; I hear doctors love that stuff. Anyway, somehow the story got garbled until the hospital staff thought that Lise, the passenger, had the pus-filled bumps. At some point, a bright star at the hospital decided “hey, this might be monkeypox,” so they did the natural thing: they called CDC… who then quarantined the airplane for a couple of hours.
Is this a “better safe than sorry” thing, or an ignorant overreaction?
I don’t blame Lise’s mom; here’s what Lise’s son Roger had to say (a textbook example of “Minnesota nice” if I’ve ever seen it):
“It was all misinformation from a speculative call that my grandmother made,” Roger Sievers said. “She’s just a concerned old lady. As sweet as can be. And she makes a mean banana bread, I can tell you that right now.”
It should be said that I bow to no one in my respect for the CDC, particularly their Special Pathogens Branch, nor my desire to avoid a pandemic. However, if I recall, we weren’t even quarantining entire airplanes when there were known cases of H1N1 or SARS aboard. This seems like a bit of an overreaction to say the least. The CDC’s page on airline travel sets out their requirements for cabin or flight crew aboard an airplane who suspect that someone aboard has communicable illness: basically the pilot’s supposed to call ATC and tell ’em that someone aboard has Belgian waffle disease or whatever. Seems reasonable enough.
On the other hand, it sure does seem like the hospital people jumped the gun a bit. This seems like a textbook case of “if you see something, say something” carried to an extreme. At least I can take some comfort from the fact that the TSA wasn’t involved.
(Bonus for those who read to the end: The Last Psychiatrist’s review of Contagion. Contains spoilers.)
Filed under General Stuff, Musings, Travel
Thursday trivia #57
- I have long been fascinated by the history of Bell Labs, perhaps one of the best-known research outfits in the history of the modern age. There’s a new book, The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation, that looks like it might be interesting, so it’s on my Amazon wish list now.
- Speaking of my wish list: I love it that I have a single location to keep track of every interesting-sounding book I run across. It’s much easier to add books to the list than to read them, though, so periodically I have to make a pass through the list and cull it a bit.
- Yet another reason why I love O’Reilly Media: their newest book is the Illustrated Guide to Home Biology Experiments. It’s intended for home schoolers, but who wouldn’t want to read it?
- And speaking of biology: Brain freezes are caused by dilation of the anterior cerebral artery. Yep, really. Now you know! (Reading that story did make me want some ice cream, however.)
- And speaking of brains: I’ve been spending some time lately trying to wrap mine around the concept of storyboarding in iOS 5. There sure is a lot to learn; if you’re interested I recommend starting with this tutorial and working your way on from there.
- Speaking of working: women may soon be working in the Marine Corps’ infantry, artillery, and other ground combat jobs. After thinking about it quite a bit, I’ve come to believe that they’re taking the right approach: try sending some women to the Infantry Officers’ Course and see how it goes. In parallel, they are developing new, gender-neutral fitness tests. In theory, these tests should make it possible to set a standard that applies to men and women. Meet the standard and you’re good to go; fail to meet it and you’re not. If this actually happens, fantastic. Gunpowder & Lead said it best: “I think women should have the same opportunities as men to serve in our military, provided they can meet the necessary standards to ensure the maximum possible safety and effectiveness of our combat forces.”. Me too. As with “don’t ask, don’t tell,” I believe that the Marine Corps will lead the way in integrating women into ground combat forces if that’s what we’re directed to do.
- Twin-engine airplanes are supposed to be safer than single-engine planes, and in most flight regimes they are. But see this video of a horrible accident for a counterpoint: the pilot’s trying to land with one engine out. His turn to final approach is too tight, so he skids to try to make the runway. This causes the wing with the dead engine to enter an aerodynamic stall, which in turn causes a spin, with catastrophic results. Takeaway: don’t do this.
- Another takeaway: subscribe to the Flying Lessons newsletter, which is a weekly compendium of annotated aviation accident reports. Great reading, though sobering.
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
The Last Psychiatrist
No, it’s not a movie title, it’s the name of a blog: a very hard-hitting, complex, and yet highly readable blog. Here’s just one pull quote, from his (we all think the blog’s written by a man, but how can you tell?) review of The Descendants:
I’m simply posing the general question: since the audience has learned nothing from their own parents, and they don’t read 19th century Russian literature, what is their model for love in the 2nd decade of marriage? They don’t have one. Which is why when this demo finds themselves in the 2nd decade of marriage they feel unfulfilled, anxious, depressed, is this all there is? They have nothing to guide them except The Discovery Channel and mommy blogs, and they lack the courage to analyze their ennui, so these movies serve the important function of pretending that it’s normal. “Oh, yeah, that’s exactly what I’m feeling.” Fine, but don’t you also want to know why you feel that way? There are, of course, plenty of people with normal marriages who still love each other despite the absence of windfall inheritances and relentless drama. But they won’t be seeing this movie.
If that resonates with you, fire up your RSS reader and get on with it. You will find his articles frequently incisive, often maddening, occasionally inscrutable, and always provocative. (But why he hates pantyhose so much, I have no idea.)
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Ten Things I’ve Done (That You Probably Haven’t)
This is admittedly an old meme. I missed the original round in 2006, and the revival in 2010, but maybe it’s time for another round. Even if not, here’s my list.
- Been interviewed on CNN.
- Sat in the captain’s chair of a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.
- Gone pistol shooting with a member of the US Olympic pistol team. (He beat me, but not that badly. At least that’s what I tell myself.)
- Climbed the Harbour Bridge in Sydney.
- Received a meritorious spot promotion from the Commandant of the Marine Corps.
- Been mistaken for a local pediatrician. At the hospital. By a delivery nurse. Who asked me what to do with a patient.
- Performed CPR on an 18-month-old who had fallen into a swimming pool and drowned, successfully resuscitating him.
- Rebuilt a 1957 Chevy Bel Aire and a 1964 Corvette Stingray.
- Drove my rental car on the Monaco Grand Prix race course in Monaco the day before the race.
- Toured the “secret” tunnel system underneath Temple Square in Salt Lake City.
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #55
- The Marines have landed in Darwin, Australia, and the situation is well in hand. I had an interesting discussion with a coworker about whether this was a provocation of the Chinese or a necessary move to register our continued interest in the Pacific Rim. I lean towards the latter, but not everyone agrees.
- I’ve finally started watching Game of Thrones after having read all of the books. So far I’m delighted, in particular by the characterizations. Barristan Selmy, Syrio Forel, and a host of other characters are very much as I imagined them, and the set design is superb. (However, I did wonder why all the characters have British accents. The BBC has one possible answer.)
- Why’d I take the plunge? U-Verse had a promotion: 3 months of free HBO. I signed up and immediately fired up the HBO Go app on my Xbox. It works superbly, including Kinect integration for voice control. The HBO Go app also works well on my Mac, so I connected it to the hotel-room TV here in San Diego and watched Game of Thrones on it too. WELCOME TO THE FUTURE.
- I really like the new Trending app for iOS. It combines stock data with news about the companies in your portfolio. Since it’s free, go get it.
- Fascinating story on ferries in Alaska. There’s more to it than you might have suspected.
- Scalzi’s Fuzzy Nation: fun, quick read. Recommended.
- Today’s fun cloud computing game: anyone can play.
- Tuesday and Wednesday I went running at Shoreline Park in San Diego. It was beautiful: sunshine, sailboats, a few SH-60s. Here’s a panorama I took with Photosynth:
Filed under Friends & Family, Musings, Travel
Thursday trivia #54
I have a large backlog of stuff to blog about but it’ll be a few weeks yet before I accumulate enough free time to do so. I’m in San Diego right now, working with the Institute for Defense Analyses to test our Digital Tutor students’ performance. It’s been a blast so far and I am very much looking forward to seeing the final results. Herewith a few assorted and mostly random notes.
- Ever think about how you’d read a mathematical equation to a blind person? Me neither, but publishers of math textbooks have to make their materials accessible to all students. Think about it.
- This article in Ad Age talks about how magazines are posting large gains in digital circulation. This may seem unsurprising, but I have found very few magazines whose apps on the iPad work really, really well. Most are inferior to the experience of reading a paper magazine. As a magazine writer, I am intensely interested in how this transition works for Windows IT Pro now that they’re all-digital.
- If you’re not reading Lowering the Bar, you should be.
- I’d like to think that if I had as much money as Jeff Bezos I’d do cool things like this: finding the F-1 engines from the Saturn V that launched Apollo 11.
- John Carter deserves a bigger audience: it was a fun thrill movie, great for what it was. The boys and I found it quite entertaining in a summer-movie kind of way.
- There’s a terrific iPad G1000 simulator in the App Store. The picture below shows it with a course laid in from the Palo Alto airport (KPAO) to Santa Clara-South County (KE16). It’s remarkably complete and I’ve had a great time using it along with Max Trescott’s G1000 book.
Filed under Musings
Deer collisions at airports
Today’s random walk on the Internet produced some unexpected, and yet surprisingly interesting, results. I was checking the weather forecast at an airport and noticed that they had an AWOS (automated weather observation service) phone system. You can call the AWOS to listen to a computer-synthesized voice reading you the current and forecast conditions– so I did. The AWOS material was followed by a human-recorded message with additional information, including the advice “Use caution for deer on runways.”
I thought that was funny, so I texted a friend who lives near the airport. Her reply: “I wonder how many airplane-deer collisions there are each year?” That got me to wondering, so I started searching.
First, I found the FAA’s Wildlife Strike Database. Despite my recent and seemingly-exhaustive study of the FAA’s regulations and rules, I didn’t know they had one.. but they do. Pilots can voluntarily report strikes, and you can search the database by type of animal, state, or airline. The animal types include hummingbirds of various kinds, alligators, and yellow finches. The database is good for hours of fun; for example, I found no alligator strikes reported in Louisiana from 1960 to today, but 14 in Florida, 11 of which were at one airport (which I will now plan to avoid, thank you very much.) You can download the entire database for more detailed analysis, but I don’t have time to do so right now. Maybe on my next vacation…
Then I found this great paper: Deer on Airports: An Accident Waiting to Happen. First of all, it’s from the proceedings of the 18th Vertebrate Pest Conference. How cool is that? I wonder whether the definition of “vertebrate pest” includes lawyers, telemarketers, Lotus Notes administrators, and other kinds of common pests, or just those from the animal kingdom. (Note to self: this year’s conference is in Monterey in a few weeks; perhaps I should drop by. The conference program looks really interesting.) Anyway, the paper was published in 1998, so it’s a bit dated, but it describes findings from 343 deer strikes over a 14-year period. Conclusion: dusk at November is the time your aircraft is most likely to hit a deer, and the average cost of an aircraft-deer encounter is $74,583. The last sentence of the abstract sums things up nicely: “Deer removal by professional shooters, in conjunction with permanent exclusion with 3 m high fencing, is the preferred management action.”
Now, where’d I put that deer rifle?
Oh, sorry; back to the post. Anyway, I didn’t get a comprehensive answer, as I haven’t yet found more recent statistics on the number of deer strikes, but I’m going to keep looking.. and you better believe I’ll keep my eyes peeled for alligator, deer, elephants, and other vertebrates that might infest my takeoff, landing, and approach paths.
Let’s be careful out there.
Thursday trivia #45
- Here’s a very cool review of the inaugural flight of ANA’s first Boeing 787. I’m envious.
- I think I know what my next iPhone programming project will be… in my spare time, chuckle snort guffaw. (But I’m not telling. Hint: it involves Exchange.)
- Saturday I’m running the Ho Ho Hustle in downtown Pensacola. This will be my last 5K of the year, so I hope it’s a good one!
- I am thankful that my sons don’t have to take this 1869 entrance exam to Harvard, ’cause none of them could pass it. I wouldn’t either (although I know a couple of people who could, so… um.. does that help?)
- Today my Navy students are taking a four-hour midterm, then tomorrow they have a two-hour practical exam. I’m not sure who will be more glad when they’re done: them or our instructor staff.
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #44
Welcome to week 10 of my extended visit to Pensacola! Presented for your consideration:
- This excellent article summarizes what happened to Air France flight 447. My only quibble is that the author doesn’t explain what it means to be in “climb” or “TOGA” very well. Both of those refer to thrust lever positions– marked by detents in the thrust levers– that you can select. When you select TOGA, you’re commanding full power from the engine; when you select “climb”, you’re enabling the auto-throttle (which you can then manually enable or disable). From what I understand about the A320/A330/A340 series, one of the checklist items you’d want to verify in a situation like that of AF447 is that the thrust levers are in the “climb” detent and and that auto-throttles are enabled.
- Newt Gingrich? Really?
- “Knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.” — Plato
- The same personality traits that make someone a good pilot may also make them more prone to struggle with depression.
- I hope this guy isn’t right; I’d hate to see big-deck carriers go away given how important they are to our national defense.
- Yet another security flaw confirms why I don’t use or recommend Android devices.
Filed under aviation, General Stuff, Musings
Overthinking problem solving
One of the really interesting things about my work here in Pensacola is that I get exposure to a wide range of problem-solving strategies. Our goal, of course, is to teach students how to solve problems using logical, repeatable steps; when they get here many of them have never had to solve any kind of complex problem (or, really, any kind of problem at all involving computers, radios, etc.) so they don’t have a good conceptual framework on how to do it.
Other students come in with the standard-issue trial-and-error methodology already in place: if something’s broken, I’ll just keep making changes until I fix it. This can be a pretty dangerous mindset. It’s one thing to solve your own problems on your own computer this way, but following the same strategy on a network that all 5,000 people aboard your aircraft carrier depend on isn’t likely to have happy results.
To supplant this process, we start with the basics:
- Did you verify the problem? Is the problem you saw the same as the problem that was reported? This is important because users’ problem reports are often imprecise or even flat-out wrong. Even when the problem description is precise, a non-technical user may report related symptoms, not the real underlying problem.
- Once you think you know what the problem is, how could you tell if that was really the problem? This is pretty straightforward: before you start trying to fix the problem, what are you going to do to identify the true root cause?
- Once you’ve identified the problem, how could you fix it? Some problems only have one solution; others have many. Before you try to fix anything, you should be able to identify candidate solutions that might solve the problem and select the appropriate one
- As you take steps to fix the problem, what tests can you perform to see if your fix is doing what you want? For multi-step solutions, checking your progress along the way is important.
- Did you verify the solution? This is critical, and it’s something students have to be trained to do because most people don’t do it, or if they do, don’t do it in depth.
As students make the transition from ad-hoc problem solving to a more systematic approach, one of the things that some of them tend to do is overthink the problem and/or the solution. This is natural because so much of the material they’re learning is completely new. The natural tendency is to dive in and try to apply all the detailed knowledge you’ve just gotten, but sometimes the problem is simpler than you think.
Our students have a term for this: “to nuc” a problem is to overthink something or go into too much detail. The term comes from the term “nuc,” used to refer to someone trained in the Navy’s nuclear power program. Nucs are legendary for being extremely well-trained, being able to master all the minutiae of nuclear reactor operations, and being somewhat nerdy. So when a student says that she nuc’d a problem, that means that she was looking too deeply for the cause or solution to the problem. This is a really hard problem to guard against, and I don’t have a good repeatable solution for it yet, other than asking them “are you nucing this?” when they seem to be diving too deep.
This is just one of the many fascinating issues that you run into when you’re teaching people using a revolutionary method. Doing what’s never been done before is hard sometimes…
Filed under General Tech Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #42
How fitting: this is the last Thursday on which I’ll be 42. Today’s trivia:
- Today is the 236th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. Happy birthday and Semper Fidelis!
- Today is the 42nd anniversary of the first broadcast episode of Sesame Street. I thought about making a rude Elmo joke but in honor of their anniversary, I will merely say that I’m very much looking forward to watching Being Elmo.
- Today is also the 36th anniversary of the sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald. To celebrate, I will refrain from listening to any Gordon Lightfoot today.
- Fellow MVP Paul Cunningham put together a nifty script to remind you that it’s time to back up your Exchange databases. I commend it to your attention.
- I only have this to say about Joe Paterno: what a shame that his career ended this way, and what a shame that the victims suffered unnecessarily because of the silence– and collusion– of those who knew but didn’t act.
- If I were going to buy a drone, this would be my first choice.
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #41
I’ve been in Pensacola working at the US Navy’s IT A-school. Short summary: you should be very proud of the dedication and work ethic of the members of your Navy. Now I’m in Greenwich teaching the final Exchange Maestro event for 2011, thence to Mountain View for a night in my own bed, then to Vegas for the Exchange Connections show and then, finally, back to Pensacola.
With all this teaching and travel going on, my blogging of late has been limited; without further ado, this week’s trivia edition:
- No one seems to know what the actual average mailbox size is for Exchange mailboxes. In fact, most organizations don’t seem to know what their own averages are, much less what the industry-wide average is.
- Steve Yegge is the kind of guy I’d like to work with.
- Really, New York Times? An article on how to be hip and Mormon on the front page of your Thursday style section? Who exactly do you think the audience is for this? I’m guessing that the overlap between would-be Mormon hipsters and NYT readers is probably pretty small.
- This year’s Marine Corps birthday message.
- Hopefully this year I’ll make it to the MVP Summit. Well, next year, I mean.
- The more I run, the better I like running. I’m sure there’s a metaphor in there somewhere.
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #39
Wow.. long time, no post. I’m getting ready to embark on a large project down in the home of Naval Aviation and that, along with visiting the boys every other weekend and trying to finish my pilot’s license, has kept me super busy. Without further delay, here’s this installment of Thursday trivia.
- I can’t overstate how many birds there are in and around the Palo Alto airport. Tons of geese and huge clouds of gulls make the already-challenging process of navigating the traffic pattern for takeoffs and landings even more tricky. However, I stand by my belief that if I can fly safely in the congested, controlled, bird-filled skies here in the Bay Area that everywhere else will seem easy by comparison.
- As much as I like the U-Verse feature set, the picture quality here in Mountain View is pretty poor on some channels. It’s impossible to tell if this is because the source material is poor or because U-Verse is stepping on it, but it’s definitely a downer. For example, “The Simpsons” on Fox looks good, but older episodes on the local CW affiliate are terrible. Most sports channels are medium- to poor-quality. Even Showtime isn’t great. Makes me miss Buckeye.
- I’ve really enjoyed using Spotify to check out new music, in large part because so much of it is awful and I can quickly find that out for free. And, of course, C89.5 is a regular part of my listening routine.
- Fleet Week is almost upon us again. Last year was great; I hope I’m in town for this year’s edition.
- Windows 8 looks really slick, but I’m probably more excited about the improvements in the server edition. 2300+ PowerShell cmdlets? Yes, please!
- Too many projects, not enough time…
Filed under General Stuff, Musings
Thursday trivia #38
- As a Simpsons fan, this cartoon of Simpsons-inspired GOP front-runners made my day.
- I really enjoy reading Michael Ruhlman’s blog. I took his advice on letting stock sit unrefrigerated at face value, but then he retracted it in a very edifying, and somewhat frightening, post. Good thing I hadn’t actually made any stock and let it sit out or anything. Too dangerous.
- A comic book biography of Richard Feynman? Sign me up!
- Here are some beautiful aerial photos of various parts of California, many from places near where I live. Enjoy.
- Even if you don’t like airplanes (in which case, I am sad for your loss), Neptunus Lex is worth reading just for the character descriptions and dialog. Check a sample.
- When I go to Ireland, it will have to be a time when I can visit Kilkee.
- Bring me my fighting trousers.
Filed under Musings
Paul's Down-Home Page 