Eideard

 
Jetman does best commercial for an expensive watch – ever!

Found in Colorado

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is missing key information on who owns one-third of the 357,000 private and commercial aircraft in the US, a gap the agency says could be exploited by terrorists and drug traffickers.

The records are in such disarray that the FAA says it is worried that criminals could buy planes without the government’s knowledge, or use the registration numbers of other aircraft to evade new computer systems designed to track suspicious flights.

Next year the FAA will begin canceling the registration certificates of all 357,000 aircraft and require owners to register anew, the Associated Press news agency cited them as saying on Friday.

About 119,000 of the aircraft on the US registry have “questionable registration” because of missing forms, invalid addresses, unreported sales or other paperwork problems, according to the FAA.

In many cases, the FAA cannot say who owns a plane or even whether it is still flying or is no longer functional…

The amount of missing or invalid paperwork has been building for decades, the FAA says. Up to now, owners had to register their planes only once, at the time of purchase.

The FAA sent out notices every three years asking owners to update their contact information if needed, but there was no punishment for not doing so.

RTFA. It’s worth a chuckle over a truly incompetent bureaucracy.

It doesn’t require a great deal of smarts to be a criminal, anyway. But, it surely aids the heavy hitters when the context of day-by-day operations of a federal regulatory agency are about as thorough as Mexican border controls.

People scared of flying can now press a button on their iPhone to help them deal with their panic.

Long-haul airline Virgin Atlantic Airways has launched an application, or app, for its Flying Without Fear course which boasts a success rate of over 98 percent…

The airline said in a statement that this app was designed to help people overcome fear, be it of the unfamiliar aircraft, the strange noises a plane makes, or of losing control.

“Our first iPhone app will bring the benefits of our successful Flying Without Fear course to millions of people around the world who are now using mobile technology to make their lives better,” Richard Branson, president of Virgin Atlantic, said in a statement.

“The app will put many travelers at ease and enable them to prepare for their first Virgin Atlantic flight.”

I wonder what happens if and when you set foot on a different airline?

They flew like ducks and they landed like ducks, but they were never like ducks at all.

They were flying reptiles called pterosaurs with long, sharp beaks and wings for soaring. They lived in the days of their distant cousins, the dinosaurs, but evolved separately until they went extinct 65 million years ago – along with the dinosaurs and most other creatures of the time.

For the first time, a team of scientists, including a noted UC Berkeley paleontologist, has discovered the tracks that one small pterosaur made as it landed on the muddy shore of an ancient sea sometime between 150 million and 115 million years ago…

“These tracks,” Padian said, “tell us that this animal must have flapped its wings with its body upright, stalled in the air like many waterbirds do, and landed feet first just the way flying ducks like mergansers do today. Then, its newfound tracks show this pterosaur took a few short, stuttering steps, turned slightly to its left, and there the tracks stop.”

The first prints of the landing show long claw marks made as the flier apparently dug in its hind feet to stop. By the second step, two prints of the animal’s forefeet show up for the first time, according to the forthcoming report…

More than 30 of the intact tracks showing the passage of lighter pterosaurs have been carefully analyzed, but only one – the first ever discovered – revealed the precious trackway of the pterosaur’s complete landing. Its hind feet, the tracks show, were about 2 inches long, and the wingspread was about 3 feet, Padian said.

Although the discovery reveals much about the evolution of flight in the first vertebrate animals to reach the air, the scientists conclude that nothing in the tracks they have studied so far “provides any indication how these animals took off.”

I imagine they may used catapults to take off. Like early flying Christians.

A La Jolla helicopter pilot who turned up in an Internet video showing him engaged in sexual acts with a porn actress while flying over the city has had his wings clipped – again.

On Wednesday, the Federal Aviation Administration issued an emergency revocation of the commercial pilot’s license of David Keith Martz. He must surrender his license and will not be allowed to fly, said FAA spokesman Ian Gregor.

Martz, who previously had his license revoked twice and suspended twice, is appealing the FAA action, Gregor said. A hearing will be held before an administrative law judge, probably within the next 30 days, to determine whether Martz gets his license back.

The FAA trained its sights on Martz again in February after he turned up in a video on the gossip Web site TMZ. Originally shot in 2007, the video showed him fondling a porn actress, who then performed a sexual act on the pilot while he flew over San Diego.

Even worse. He was stupid enough to let the video loose on the Web.

Diabetes affects 24 million Americans and an increasing number of children. It can lead to limb loss and heart attacks. Yet people are more afraid of snakes and flying.

In an online survey by the American Diabetes Association (ADA), people revealed far greater fear of events that are much less likely to affect them. Percentage of respondents who fear:

Being in a plane crash: 16 percent
Snake bites: 13 percent
Being hit by lightning: 5 percent
A shark attack: 4 percent
Getting a disease: 5 percent.

Further, when asked specifically about diseases, 49 percent reported a fear of cancer, and only 3 percent cited a fear of diabetes.

Ironically, one in ten adults reports having been diagnosed with diabetes, while just 6 percent have been diagnosed with cancer, according to the ADA.

“While the impact of a shark attack, lightning strike or plane crash may be more immediate, the reality is, the consequences of mismanaged diabetes can have equally severe consequences that include loss of limbs or even death,” the ADA stated. “In fact, 491 deaths related to commercial aviation accidents happened in 2007 whereas diabetes contributed to 233,619 deaths in 2005.”

Snakes make for more exciting Reality TV.

OTOH – if you want to see Flying Snakes – check out this post.

Engineers have made a new tiny DelFly Micro air vehicle. This successor to the DelFly I and II weighs barely 3 grams, and with its flapping wings is very similar to a dragonfly. Ultra-small, remote-controlled micro aircraft with cameras, such as this DelFly, may well be used in the future for observation flights in difficult-to-reach or dangerous areas.

The DelFly Micro is a ‘Micro Air Vehicle’, an exceptionally small remote-controlled aircraft with camera and image recognition software. The Micro, weighing just 3 grams and measuring 10 cm (wingtip to wingtip) is the considerably smaller successor to the successful DelFly I and DelFly II. The DelFly Micro, with its minuscule battery weighing just 1 gram, can fly for approximately three minutes and has a maximum speed of 5 m/s.

The ‘dragonfly’ has a tiny camera (about 0.5 grams) on board that transmits its signals to a ground station. With software developed by TU Delft itself, objects can then be recognised independently. The camera transmits TV quality images, and therefore allows the DelFly II to be operated from the computer. It can be manoeuvred using a joystick as if the operator was actually in the cockpit of the aircraft. The aim is to be able to do this with the DelFly Micro too.

Big Brother will be flying through your picnic – and you won’t even notice.