Wednesday, November 30, 2022

Some goings on at Casa De Garabaldi

 A few things going on here...I will go in Chronological order....First off, I was leaving work, first cold snap we had, under 32 degrees, was outside on the ramp all night....you get the picture.....it was cold..well anyway...I leave work...to go to Forest Park to get my hair cut by the same lady that has been cutting my hair since I got out of the service in 1991. Well she wasn't there yet, so I was headed to Chicfila in Forest Park and on the way there,...

 


Hit Road Debris.......and got a Flat....

It was cold out there changing the tire, but fortunately....if you want to call it that...I was dressed for it

The Poor Focus Looked different with that crappy donut on it...I had to take back roads all the way home after my haircut, Luckily I know all the backroads from my time as a Domino's Pizza Driver from way back because I sure as hell wasn't going to take that damm donut on the interstate...


I called my automotive shop that I use and told them what had transpired and asked them to order me a tire and they had a tire for me that afternoon....


       Now the Car is back to Normal.


The Spousal Unit got tickets to Manheim Steamroller at the Fabulous Fox Theater in Downtown Atlanta


     I always wanted to see "Manheim Steamroller", and finally saw them.  The guy that formed them "Chip Davis" was known for "Convoy" that song by C.W. McCall that came out in the 1970's.


Some Pics from the show...



   I was very impressed, and I liked the show, and next month "Trans Siberian Orchestra" is coming to Atlanta and we are talking about getting tickets.

I went and stood in line for Early Voting for the Run-off for the U.S. Senate Seat that is between the Incumbent Warnock(D) and his Challenger Walker(R)  Well it went to a run-off in the General Election and Warnock has 4 times the money in his war Chest for attack ads and they are pouring in the money from out of State.  My Governor Brian Kemp has been running ads supporting Walker, he is the only GOPer supporting Walker whereas the Ads and Billboards For Warnock are inundating the airways.  I wonder where the rest of the GOP is?

Well I did my part and voted for Hershal Walker.  I don't know if it will do any good or not, but I went and voted.

  Now Some Age Humor......


    This one hurt........I picked it up on Farcebook....



Monday, November 28, 2022

Donald Scott "Killing For Land" Eminant Domain Abuse from 1992

 I have never been a fan of "Civil Asset Forfeiture", in my mind, there has always been the possibility of abuse by agencies of .gov to pad their budgets.  I understand the premise, to snag the property of drug dealers who have been buying their property by illegal income, I get the allure, but I also have heard of many seizures of people going somewhere to buy a car or boat  or a business expense and they are carrying cash and get pulled over and the police find the cash, and they call it "drug money" and keep it forcing the victim to go to court to try to get their money back and frequently they can't so it is free money for the agencies making abuse attractive because they use the extra money for extra equipment and what have you and it isn't accountable like regular tax payer money...it is like a "Slush Fund" for extra uses.   Asset forfeiture properly used is a good tool against those that profit in the drug trade, but there is no checks and balances and frequently citizens get caught up and the rights against "Search and Seizures" don't apply because they use the "War On Drugs" and this short circuits a lot of those legal protections.

    I was reading F.W.P "Liberty's Torch" and I twigged on it and got more information on it and decided to post it after learning about it.



By Paul Ciotti
© 2000 WorldNetDaily.com

Recent revelations about rampant police perjury have made Los Angeles juries so mistrustful of law enforcement that attorneys for Los Angeles County are in some cases offering plaintiffs multi-million dollar settlements, rather than risking the possibility of far larger damage awards should the cases ever go to trial.

In one of the more infamous instances of alleged law enforcement misconduct -- the killing of the reclusive Malibu millionaire and rugged anti-government individualist Donald Scott in his ranch house by Los Angeles sheriff's deputies in 1992 -- county and federal government officials tentatively agreed last week to pay Scott's heirs and estate a total of $5 million in return for their dropping a wrongful death lawsuit.

Furthermore, they made the settlement despite the deep conviction, says deputy Los Angeles County Counsel Dennis Gonzales, that the deputy who shot Scott was fully justified and -- even though the sheriff was never able to prove it -- that the heavy-drinking Scott was growing thousands of marijuana plants on his remote $2.5 million Malibu ranch.

Early on the morning of Oct. 2, 1992, 31 officers from the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, Drug Enforcement Administration, Border Patrol, National Guard and Park Service came roaring down the narrow dirt road to Scott's rustic 200-acre ranch. They planned to arrest Scott, the wealthy, eccentric, hard-drinking heir to a Europe-based chemicals fortune, for allegedly running a 4,000-plant marijuana plantation. When deputies broke down the door to Scott's house, Scott's wife would later tell reporters, she screamed, "Don't shoot me. Don't kill me." That brought Scott staggering out of the bedroom, hung-over and bleary-eyed -- he'd just had a cataract operation -- holding a .38 caliber Colt snub-nosed revolver over his head. When he pointed it in the direction of the deputies, they killed him.

Later, the lead agent in the case, sheriff's deputy Gary Spencer and his partner John Cater posed for photographs arm-in-am outside Scott's cabin, smiling and triumphant, says Larry Longo, a former Los Angeles deputy district attorney who now represents Scott's daughter, Susan.

"It was as if they were white hunters who had just shot the buffalo," he said.

Despite a subsequent search of Scott's ranch using helicopters, dogs, searchers on foot, and a high-tech Jet Propulsion Laboratory device for detecting trace amounts of sinsemilla, no marijuana --or any other illegal drug -- was ever found.

Scott's widow, the former Frances Plante, along with four of Scott's children from prior marriages, subsequently filed a $100 million wrongful death suit against the county and federal government. For eight years the case dragged on, requiring the services of 15 attorneys and some 30 volume binders to hold all the court documents. Last week, attorneys for Los Angeles County and the federal government agreed to settle with Scott's heirs and estate, even though the sheriff's department still maintained its deputies had done nothing wrong.

"I do not believe it was an illegal raid in any way, shape or form," Captain Larry Waldie, head of the Sheriff's Department's narcotics bureau, told the Los Angeles Times after the shooting. When Scott came out of the bedroom, the deputies identified themselves and shouted at him to put the gun down. As Scott began to lower his arm, one deputy later said, he "kinda" pointed his gun -- which he initially was holding by the cylinder, not the handle grip -- at deputy Spencer who, in fear for his life, killed him.

Although attorneys for Los Angeles County believed Scott's shooting was fully justified, they weren't eager to see the case go to trial. Recent widespread revelations of illegal shootings, planted evidence and perjured testimony at the Los Angeles Police Department's Rampart Division were making the public mistrust the police.

"I've tried four cases (since the Rampart revelations)," said Dennis Gonzales, a deputy Los Angeles County counsel. And in each case, he said, jurors have told him that the possibility that police officers were lying was a factor in their vote.

"You have to be realistic as to public perceptions," he said.

Nick Gutsue, Scott's former attorney and currently special administrator for his estate, put it more bluntly: "(Gonzales) saw he had a loser and he took the easy way out."

Ironically enough, the county might have had a better chance of winning a court battle if it had allowed the case to go to trial when Scott's widow and four children first filed their lawsuit back in 1993. The county blew it, says Gutsue. It adopted a "divide and conquer strategy." It prolonged the lawsuit's resolution with a successful motion to throw legendarily aggressive anti-police attorney Stephen Yagman off the case. Then it filed a time-consuming motion to dismiss the estate from the lawsuit.

In the process, says Gutsue, new revelations of police misconduct began appearing so frequently that the public's attitude toward law enforcement began to change. "It was one scandal after another," says Gutsue. "(County attorneys) stalled so long that the (Rampart scandal) came along and their stalling tactics backfired."

Although county officials still maintain that Scott was a major marijuana grower who was just clever enough not to get caught, his friends and widow maintain that his drug of choice was alcohol, not marijuana. As a young man, Scott lived a privileged life, growing up in Switzerland and attending prep schools in New York. Later he lived the life of a dashing international jet setter who was married three times, once to a French movie star, and who had gone through two bitter and messy divorces by the time he moved to his Malibu ranch, called Trail's End, in 1966.

Although well-liked and generous to friends, Scott drank heavily, could be cantankerous and deeply mistrusted the government, which he suspected of having designs on this ranch, a remote and nearly inaccessible parcel with high rocky bluffs on three sides and a 75-foot spring-fed waterfall out back.

"You know what he used to say," his third wife, Frances Plante, told writer Michael Fessier Jr. in a 1993 article for the Los Angeles Times magazine, "He'd say, 'Frances, every day they pass a new law and the day after that they pass 40 more.'"

To Los Angeles County officials, the fact that Don Scott got killed in his own house during a futile raid to seize a non-existent 4,000-plant marijuana farm is just one of the unfortunate facts of life in the narcotics enforcement business. It doesn't mean that sheriff's deputies did anything wrong.

"Sometimes people get warned and we don't find anything," Gary Spencer, the lead deputy on the raid and the one who shot Scott, told an L.A. Times reporter in 1997, "so I don't consider it botched. I wouldn't call it botched because that would say that it was a mistake to have gone there in the first place, and I don't believe that."

Someone who did believe that was Ventura County District Attorney Michael Bradbury. Although Scott's ranch was in Ventura County, none of the 31 people participating in the massive early morning raid, which included officers from the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, the DEA, the National Park Service, the California National Guard and the Border Patrol bothered to invite any Ventura County officers to come along. Furthermore, once Scott was shot, Los Angeles County tried to claim jurisdiction over the investigation of Scott's death, even though the shooting occured in Ventura County.

To Bradbury, it was easy to see why. L.A. County wanted jurisdiction. In a 64-page report issued by Bradbury's office in March of 1993, Bradbury concluded that the search warrant contained numerous misstatements, evasions and omissions. The purpose of the raid, he wrote, was never to find some evanescent marijuana plantation. It was to seize Scott's ranch under asset forfeiture laws and then divide the proceeds with participating agencies, such as the National Park Service, which had put Scott's ranch on a list of property it would one day like to acquire, and the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, which heavily relied on assets seized in drug raids to supplement its otherwise inadequate budget.

For something written by a government agency, the Bradbury report was surprisingly blunt. It dismissed Spencer's supposed reasons for believing that the Scott ranch was a marijuana plantation and accused Spencer of having lost his "moral compass" in his eagerness to seize Scott's multi-million dollar ranch. As proof of its assertions, the report pointed to a parcel map in possession of the raiding party that contained the handwritten notation that an adjacent 80-acre property had recently sold for $800,000. In addition, the day of the raid, participants were told during the briefing that Scott's ranch could be seized if as few as 14 plants were found.

In order to verify that the marijuana really existed, at first Spencer simply hiked to a site overlooking Scott's ranch. Discovering nothing, he subsequently sent an Air National Guard jet over the area to take photographs of the ranch. When this also failed to reveal anything, he dispatched a Drug Enforcement Administration agent in a light plane to make a low level flight.

The DEA agent, whose name was Charles Stowell, said he saw flashes of green hidden in trees which he believed were 50 marijuana plants. At the same time, Stowell was uncertain enough about his observations -- which he had made with the naked eye from an altitude of 1,000 feet -- to warn Spencer not to use them as the basis for a search warrant without further corroboration.

In an effort to confirm the marijuana sighting -- Spencer by this time had decided that Scott was growing marijuana in pots suspended under the trees -- Spencer asked members of the Border Patrol's "C-Rat" team to make a night-time foray into the ranch. Despite two separate incursions, they failed to find anything except barking dogs. The following day a Fish and Game warden and Coastal Commission worker went to the ranch to investigate alleged stream pollution and do a "trout survey" on the dry stream bed. They too failed to see any marijuana. Two days after that, a sheriff's deputy and National Park ranger visited the ranch again, this time ostensibly to buy a rottweiler puppy from Scott. The Scotts were friendly and gave them a tour of the ranch. Once again no one saw any marijuana.

This lack of confirmation notwithstanding, four days later Spencer filed an affidavit for a search warrant saying that DEA Special Agent Charles Stowell, "while conducting cannabis eradication and suppression reconnaissance ... over the Santa Monica Mountains in a single engine fixed wing aircraft ... noticed that marijuana was being cultivated at the Trails End Ranch 35247 Mulholland Highway in Malibu. Specifically Agent Stowell saw approximately 50 plants that he recognized to be marijuana plants growing around some large trees that were in a grove near a house on the property."

To attorneys with a lot of experience with warrants, Spencer's affidavit didn't look like much. "On a scale of one to ten," says former district attorney Longo, "I would give it a one."

Despite the affidavit's deficiencies -- among other things, Spencer didn't mention that none of the people participating in any of the previous week's incursions had reported any marijuana -- Ventura Municipal Court Judge Herbert Curtis III issued a search warrant which, in the words of the Bradbury report, became Scott's "death warrant." After Scott's death, a helicopter hovered over the area in which the marijuana plants were believed to have been growing. There were no pots, no water supply, no marijuana. There was only ivy and even that wasn't in the location where the marijuana was supposed to be.

Larry Longo, a friend of Scott whose children used to play with Scott's children, says it's absurd to think that Scott had marijuana plants hanging from the trees.

"I went up there right after the shooting. The trees were 200- or 300-year-old oak trees. The leaves under them hadn't been raked in a hundred years." If Scott had been growing marijuana under the trees, the leaves would have been disturbed and the tree bark broken. "There wasn't a single mark on the trees. There was no water supply."

Besides, says Longo, "Donald might have been a lot of things, but he would never be so dumb as to cultivate marijuana on his property." If for no other reason, he didn't need the money. Any time he needed cash, all he had to do was call New York and they'd withdraw whatever was necessary out of his trust fund. At the time of Scott's death, there was $1.6 million in his primary trust account.

The Bradbury report caused a huge ruckus in Los Angeles County. Sherman Block, the sheriff at the time, denounced it and issued a report of his own which completely cleared everyone, and California Attorney General Dan Lungren criticized Bradbury for "inappropriate and gratuitous comments."

Cheered by his apparent exoneration by Sheriff Block and Attorney General Lungren, sheriff's deputy Spencer subsequently sued Bradbury for libel, slander and defamation. After a long and bitter fight, including allegations that Bradbury suppressed an earlier report which concluded that Spencer was innocent after all, a state appeals court declared that Bradbury was within his 1st Amendment rights of free speech when he criticized Spencer. The court also ordered Spencer to pay Bradbury's $50,000 legal fees, a development that caused Spencer to declare bankruptcy. According to press reports, the stress from all this caused Spencer to develop a "twitch."

Spencer wasn't the only one affected by Scott's killing. Scott's wife, Frances, was so strapped for cash, she subsequently told a judge, she considering eating a dead coyote she found on the side of the road. According to her attorney, Johnnie Cochran, as quoted in the Los Angeles Times, she is currently living on the property while she holds off government claims to seize it for unpaid taxes. In 1996, the massive Malibu firestorm destroyed Scott's ranch house and the outlying buildings. As a result, Frances Scott currently lives in a teepee erected over the badminton court, albeit a teepee with expensive rugs and a color TV.

Scott's old friend and attorney Nick Gutsue recently said he had mixed feelings about the settlement. While he was glad that Scott's widow and children didn't have to go through the horror of reliving Scott's death in a jury trial, at the same time was disappointed that he never got a chance to clear Scott's name.

"I asked for an apology and exoneration of Scott," said Gutsue. "I never got one. I was told it was against their policy." That's one reason, said Gutsue, he always wanted a jury trial. In a settlement, no one has to admit any guilt.

"Of course," said Gutsue, "$5 million is a pretty good sized admission."


 

 

 

Saturday, November 26, 2022

Airplane collides with Firetruck during Drill

  I got this report in my email last week and I pulled this together from several different sources. 

Incident Facts

Date of incident
Nov 18, 2022

Classification
Accident

Flight number
LA-2213

Departure
Lima, PerĂº

Destination
Juliaca, PerĂº

Aircraft Registration
CC-BHB

Aircraft Type
Airbus A320-200N

ICAO Type Designator
A20N

A LATAM Chile Airbus A320-200N, registration CC-BHB performing flight LA-2213 from Lima to Juliaca (Peru) with 102 passengers and 6 crew, was accelerating for takeoff from Lima's runway 16 at about 15:11L (20:11Z) when multiple fire trucks with flashing lights and sirenes sounding crossed the runway in front of the accelerating aircraft. The crew rejected takeoff at high speed (at about 125 knots over ground) but wasn't able to avoid contact with fire truck #3 although the truck tried to turn around turning right (into direction of the aircraft). The right main gear collapsed causing the aircraft to veer right towards the right hand runway edge coming to a stop partially off the runway about 2500 meters/8300 feet down the runway. A fire erupted around the right hand engine (PW1127G), all occupants were able to evacuate the aircraft. 4 passengers received serious and 36 passengers received minor injuries. The aircraft sustained substantial damage, the fire truck was destroyed. Two fire fighters on board of the truck involved in the collision did not survive, a third fire fighter on the truck involved received serious injuries.

The airline reported all occupants of the aircraft survived the accident. There were 102 passengers and 6 crew on board.
Lima's Airport Authority reported all passengers were "doing well" and are receiving the attention of their teams. According to recordings the fire truck(s) entered the runway without clearance. The fire trucks had been responding to another aircraft that had suffered mechanical problems. On Nov 19th 2022 the Airport Authority reported that works to remove the aircraft from the runway have begun. In the late evening of November 19th 2022 the airport authority announced, the aircraft had been moved off the runway in a very complex operation, repair works on the runway have begun. The runway had received extensive damage both in depth and length.

On Nov 20th 2022 Lima's Airport Authority (LAP) reported in a written communique, that a pre-planned response time exercise was performed by the Rescue Team, in which it was to prove that a response to an emergency on the runway would not take any more than 3 minutes. The exercise had been coordinated between the airport and the Air Traffic Authority (CORPAC) and set to be carried out between 15:00 and 16:00 local time on Nov 18th 2022. CORPAC (Control Tower) confirmed the start time of the exercise at 15:10L, the impact with the LATAM aircraft happened at 15:11. The exercise was duely authorized under the current aeronautical regulations. (Editorial note: this communique does not mention, whether the vehicles were cleared to enter the runway by tower or whether the pre-coordination with CORPAC also included that the vehicles would be cleared to enter the runway without actual tower clearance, in other words tower would halt all traffic at 15:10L).
On Nov 21st 2022 Peru's Ministry of Transport and Communication in its role as Civil Aviation Authority stated, that the communique by LAP was essentially correct, however, this communication and coordination did not mean that the trucks had been cleared to enter the active runway. The exercise is authorized, but this does not mean that using this exercise there is anyone cleared to enter the runway, in particular if there is an aircraft moving on the runway. At this time there is no comment available, whether the trucks were cleared to enter the runway or not. However, the ministry confirmed the LATAM aircraft was cleared for takeoff.

Medical Services reported 102 passengers and 6 crew were evacuated from the aircraft, 24 passengers were taken to hospitals with injuries. The numbers were later updated stating 4 passengers received serious and 36 passengers minor injuries.
The local prosecution office reported two firefighters died in the accident, another one was injured. The office have opened an investigation to determine the facts and possible culpability and are currently reviewing the CCTV recordings.

Peru's Comision de Investigacion de Accidentes de Aviacion (CIAA) opened an investigation into the accident.
On Sunday Nov 20th 2022 at 00:00L (05:00Z) the runway was opened for takeoffs and became fully available some time later. Flight operations at Lima Airport have resumed.

The transcript of the communication on ground frequency (tower frequency not available) in the crucial time between starting of the exercise (20:10:00Z) and the collision reads with all times in UTC (according to the ground recording Recate 6, Rescue vehicle #6, took position on taxiway Alpha near but outside the runway strip at 20:04, obviously being the target of the exercise, Ground cleared Recate 6 to a position 90 meters from the runway axis indicated by traffic cones).
Accident: LATAM Chile A20N at Lima on Nov 18th 2022, collision with fire truck on takeoff
By Simon Hradecky, created Friday, Nov 18th 2022 22:36Z, last updated Tuesday, Nov 22nd 2022 11:25Z

A LATAM Chile Airbus A320-200N, registration CC-BHB performing flight LA-2213 from Lima to Juliaca (Peru) with 102 passengers and 6 crew, was accelerating for takeoff from Lima's runway 16 at about 15:11L (20:11Z) when multiple fire trucks with flashing lights and sirenes sounding crossed the runway in front of the accelerating aircraft. The crew rejected takeoff at high speed (at about 125 knots over ground) but wasn't able to avoid contact with fire truck #3 although the truck tried to turn around turning right (into direction of the aircraft). The right main gear collapsed causing the aircraft to veer right towards the right hand runway edge coming to a stop partially off the runway about 2500 meters/8300 feet down the runway. A fire erupted around the right hand engine (PW1127G), all occupants were able to evacuate the aircraft. 4 passengers received serious and 36 passengers received minor injuries. The aircraft sustained substantial damage, the fire truck was destroyed. Two fire fighters on board of the truck involved in the collision did not survive, a third fire fighter on the truck involved received serious injuries.

The airline reported all occupants of the aircraft survived the accident. There were 102 passengers and 6 crew on board.

Lima's Airport Authority reported all passengers were "doing well" and are receiving the attention of their teams. According to recordings the fire truck(s) entered the runway without clearance. The fire trucks had been responding to another aircraft that had suffered mechanical problems. On Nov 19th 2022 the Airport Authority reported that works to remove the aircraft from the runway have begun. In the late evening of November 19th 2022 the airport authority announced, the aircraft had been moved off the runway in a very complex operation, repair works on the runway have begun. The runway had received extensive damage both in depth and length.

On Nov 20th 2022 Lima's Airport Authority (LAP) reported in a written communique, that a pre-planned response time exercise was performed by the Rescue Team, in which it was to prove that a response to an emergency on the runway would not take any more than 3 minutes. The exercise had been coordinated between the airport and the Air Traffic Authority (CORPAC) and set to be carried out between 15:00 and 16:00 local time on Nov 18th 2022. CORPAC (Control Tower) confirmed the start time of the exercise at 15:10L, the impact with the LATAM aircraft happened at 15:11. The exercise was duely authorized under the current aeronautical regulations. (Editorial note: this communique does not mention, whether the vehicles were cleared to enter the runway by tower or whether the pre-coordination with CORPAC also included that the vehicles would be cleared to enter the runway without actual tower clearance, in other words tower would halt all traffic at 15:10L).

On Nov 21st 2022 Peru's Ministry of Transport and Communication in its role as Civil Aviation Authority stated, that the communique by LAP was essentially correct, however, this communication and coordination did not mean that the trucks had been cleared to enter the active runway. The exercise is authorized, but this does not mean that using this exercise there is anyone cleared to enter the runway, in particular if there is an aircraft moving on the runway. At this time there is no comment available, whether the trucks were cleared to enter the runway or not. However, the ministry confirmed the LATAM aircraft was cleared for takeoff.

Medical Services reported 102 passengers and 6 crew were evacuated from the aircraft, 24 passengers were taken to hospitals with injuries. The numbers were later updated stating 4 passengers received serious and 36 passengers minor injuries.

The head of the fire fighters at Lima Airport reported that two fire fighters persished in the accident, a third was taken to a hospital with serious injuries and is in the Intensive Care Unit in stable condition. Later the head of the firefighters added, the surviving fire fighter was diagnosed with a fracture at the base of his skull, severe head trauma including bruises of the brain stem and facial trauma, the vital functions are stable, the neurological compromise can only be assessed at a later time. The next 24 hours will be crucial. On Nov 21st 2022 the condition of the injured firefighter was still assessed critical.

An ATC report states in writing that the rescue vehicle entered runway 16 from the west at the height of taxiway B without authorization and collided with flight LA-2213. Emergency procedures were invoked and rescue vehicles cleared onto the runway to deal with the accident. The runway was NOTAMed closed.

On Nov 21st 2022 CORPAC, Air Traffic Control, stated categorically, that no vehicle had been cleared to enter the runway. CORPAC confirmed there was coordination for an exercise to be carried out by rescue services, however, this did not affect the runway and was to be held outside the runway strip.

The airline reported that they do not know what the fire truck had to do on the runway and why it was there. They had no information about an emergency drill. In any case the normal procedure would be that any vehicle needing access to the runway would need to communicate with tower and obtain clearance to enter the runway. Their aircraft was cleared for takeoff.

The local prosecution office reported two firefighters died in the accident, another one was injured. The office have opened an investigation to determine the facts and possible culpability and are currently reviewing the CCTV recordings.

Peru's Comision de Investigacion de Accidentes de Aviacion (CIAA) opened an investigation into the accident.

On Sunday Nov 20th 2022 at 00:00L (05:00Z) the runway was opened for takeoffs and became fully available some time later. Flight operations at Lima Airport have resumed.
 
 

    Here are the Fire engines racing to the accident after the collision

Still image out of CCTV: moment just before the collision:
Still image out of CCTV: moment just before the collision


The remains of the fire truck #3 involved in the collision:
The remains of the fire truck #3 involved in the collision


The aircraft after the fire was put out:
The aircraft after the fire was put out


The aircraft after the fire was put out
 






 

Thursday, November 24, 2022

Thanksgiving 2022 to my Friends

 This is loaded into the scheduler thingie, I have to work...Unfortunately my job is that the flying public wants to get somewhere and my employer prides itself on the reliability and timeliness of our fleet, and maintenance cancellations are a nono. So enjoy the Turkey, Ham or whatever, I will be home later to get leftovers ;)

                              For those that already have their Christmas lights up .....


 Go out and enjoy Thanksgiving, Ignore the people trying to scare the crap out of you to not get together with your family because of "fears".  We are not guaranteed tomorrow, and to deny time with your family because of "fears" is a crappy thing to do to them.  Have fun, spend time with your family and friends, watch the Cowboys and the Lions play football.. Traditions.....It is what make us Americans....And tell the powers that be to pound sand...

  Remember to have fun, enjoy the camaraderie of Family and Friends and don't talk politics, unless your liberal Aunt or Uncle start it, then have fun stirring things up, LOL

I clipped this compliments of alex@ammo.com
Thanksgiving is the oldest national holiday in the United States. However, it’s observation is not a continuous presence in American history. While the celebration of Thanksgiving predates even the founding of the nation, it was proclaimed by George Washington, then ignored by Thomas Jefferson. From then on, it was sporadically observed until Abraham Lincoln, who once again introduced a National Day of Prayer and Thanksgiving to the United States.
Indeed, it was Lincoln who set the day as the last Thursday in November. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt changed the day between 1939 and 1941, which was highly controversial. The days were called “Franksgiving.” Roosevelt changed the date because retailers communicated to him through the Retail Dry Goods Association and the Secretary of Commerce, that the late date of Thanksgiving that year (the last day of November) might negatively impact retail sales. It was considered bad form to put up Christmas decorations or put on Christmas sales before Thanksgiving.
If only we still lived in such times.
In 1942, Congress set Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday of the month, and here it has stood since then.

The Early Days of Thanksgiving

Harvest feasts date back centuries, with the earliest “thanksgiving” celebrations in the New World dating to the 16th Century with the French and the Spanish. The Commonwealth of Virginia had regular celebrations of this type dating back to 1607. The first permanent settlement, Jamestown, Virginia, had a thanksgiving celebration in the year of its founding, 1610. 
Of course, anytime someone says “Thanksgiving,” one immediately thinks of the Pilgrims. “Thanksgiving” as we know it is generally dated back to when the Pilgrims first celebrated it in 1621. This was in response to a successful harvest, however, it was not the first of a consistent celebration. The Pilgrims celebrated this only sporadically.
No one is entirely sure when the Thanksgiving celebration took place. There was a three-day celebration following their harvest, sometime between September 21 and November 11, with the Feast of Michaelmas (September 29) being the most likely date. We do, however, know that all 50 surviving Mayflower passengers were there, as well as 90 Native Americans. The feast was cooked primarily by four women, all of whom were on the Mayflower. Two years later, in 1623, following another boat of colonists arriving, the first civil (not religious) Thanksgiving took place in July.

The Revolution to the Civil War

The day of national Thanksgiving jumped around until the founding of the nation. During the late Colonial period, the Continental Congress merely recommended the day be celebrated by the various colonies. Samuel Adams drafted the first national proclamation, issued in 1777 – something to remember when you tip back one of his beers while watching the game. Revolutionary Commander General George Washington set the date in December of that year to celebrate early revolutionary victories. 
In 1789, President George Washington would proclaim November 26, 1789, to be a National Day of Prayer and Thanksgiving. This day also provides the roots for America’s National Day of Prayer. In 1795, Thanksgiving was celebrated, again by presidential proclamation, on February 19. President John Adams continued the tradition in 1798 and 1799. The tradition was undone by deist and skeptic President Thomas Jefferson. President James Madison revived the tradition in 1814, but it remained sporadic until the Civil War. Many governors proclaimed celebrations statewide. 
In November 1863, however, President Lincoln made the celebration national again. He was inspired by an editorial series written by “Mary Had a Little Lamb” author Sarah Josepha Hale. Secretary of State William H. Seward wrote the proclamation. During this period, traditions were regional and some of the food is decidedly not what we would consider to be traditional Thanksgiving fare today (pigeon pie, for example).

Franksgiving

Franksgiving is one of those things like the court-packing plan that made FDR’s opponents squeal with laughter. FDR’s moving of the date of Thanksgiving caused his opponent in the previous election, Alf Landon, to compare him to Hitler. James Frasier, chairman of the Plymouth, Massachusetts board of selectmen heartily disapproved of the change. 
The change caused a number of problems, not least of all holiday travel plans. Football teams around the nation played before empty stadiums because they couldn’t change their schedule. Many games were cancelled. In what is a familiar scenario to anyone who has followed 21st-century politics, Democrats narrowly supported Franksgiving (52 to 48), Republicans widely despised it (79 to 21) and most of America didn’t like it (62 to 38). 
All told, 23 states and the District of Columbia recognized the new date, while 22 preferred the traditional date. The remaining three (Colorado, Texas and Mississippi) went with both dates, meaning there was plenty of time off for everyone. In 1940, 32 states and the nation’s capital went with Franksgiving, while the remaining 16 opted for what was called “Republican Thanksgiving.”
A report from the Department of Commerce issued in 1941, found that there was no difference in retail sales due to the day of the month. Indeed, barely more than a third of all retailers even observed Franksgiving. What’s more, only two out of every seven Thanksgivings would fall on a fifth Thursday rather than a fourth. Still, a joint resolution of Congress, signed into law by President Roosevelt, permanently moved the date to the fourth Thursday, where it has stood ever since. Most states concurred, and while revelry was on the back burner thanks to the war, Thanksgiving in its final form took root by 1945. 
If you ever find yourself watching the Merrie Melodies cartoon Holiday Highlights, you’ll notice a reference to two different Thanksgivings – one for Republicans and one for Democrats – that will now make sense to you. 
Texas was the last state to observe the traditional “last Thursday” Thanksgiving in 1956.

Thanksgiving Haters

While it has its roots in European harvest festivals, there is perhaps no more quintessentially American holiday than Thanksgiving. Americans eat more food this day than they will any other day of the year, including the Fourth of July and Christmas Day. Unsurprisingly, there are people who think that the celebration of Thanksgiving is shameful and should be abandoned. 
Both liberal college professors and some Native American activists believe the traditional story of Thanksgiving has been whitewashed by conquerors. They believe in replacing the day with a National Day of Atonement and fasting. Other prominent Native Americans such as Tim Giago, who founded the Native American Journalists Organization, believe that the celebration of Thanksgiving is a synthesis of both European and Native American traditions and is, as such, uniquely American. 
The rest of us, however, will enjoy stuffing ourselves with turkey, slipping into a tryptophan coma, and waking up just in time to catch the big game or the parade. Real Americans, as it turns out, would much rather enjoy a day off than complain

Wednesday, November 23, 2022

"The Story of a RC-135 intercepting a Soviet "Bear" Strategic Bomber

 I ran across this story on Quora and thought it was pretty neat. and I shamelessly Cut and pasted it.  It reminded me of my days in Germany during the Cold War the way "The Game" was played.


 

The current RC-135 fleet is the latest iteration of modifications to this pool of -135 aircraft going back to 1962. Initially employed by Strategic Air Command to satisfy nationally tasked intelligence collection requirements, the RC-135 fleet has also participated in every sizable armed conflict involving US assets during its tenure.

RC-135s were present supporting operations in Vietnam, the Mediterranean for Operation El Dorado Canyon, Grenada for Operation Urgent Fury, Panama for Operation Just Cause, and Southwest Asia for operations Desert Shield, Desert Storm, Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. RC-135s have maintained a constant presence in Southwest Asia since the early 1990s.

Once an RC-135 was even diverted to intercept a Soviet Tupolev Tu-95 Bear strategic bomber, Roberto Benitez, who worked on USAF RC-135 aircraft, recalls on Quora.

‘One day a Soviet Tu-95 Bear recon bomber overflew the Alaska mainland. It wasn’t the first time.

‘The radar station notified Alaskan Air Defense Command (AADC) of the intrusion. There was only one minor problem, AADC was asleep at the wheel and had no fighters on alert.

RC-135S Print
This print is available in multiple sizes from AircraftProfilePrints.com – CLICK HERE TO GET YOURS. RC-135S Cobra Ball 55th Wing, 45th Reconnaissance Squadron, 61-2663 – Offutt AFB, NE – 2015

‘So AADC called SAC at Eielson AFB in Fairbanks to see if they had any aircraft available to respond. Well, it just so happened that they had a Boeing RC-135 training in the area (close enough to give backend specialist a chance to monitor the Soviets for training), but over the Alaskan mainland.

‘The RC was diverted to do the intercept. The RC snuck up on the Bear from low rear and then pulled up alongside. It was a surprise to the Soviets. They were even more surprised when the RC backend crew asked them in Russian if they were lost. Of course, they were (uh huh). So, in Russian they were told where they were from, their unit, where they were, how to get home, and cheerfully escorted out of US airspace.’

Benitez concludes;

‘Once got home, our unit painted a red star on the nose area and renamed the RC-135 (reconnaissance) to an FC-135 (fighter/interceptor).’

Photo credit: Crown Copyright and U.S. Air Force

Tu-95MSM