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A Physicist with the Air Force

Posted by michael on from the meet-new-and-interesting-people,-and-kill-them dept.

An anonymous submitter - anonymous because of the database crash that wiped out several hours of data today, sigh - sent in this tale about the duties of a physicist during World War II.

5 of 221 comments (clear)

  1. Don't ride the bomb... by mikeage · · Score: 4, Funny
    From the article:

    At the pilot's insistence (I will not repeat his heated words), I dislodged the target by jumping on it while hanging from a bomb-bay rack and wearing a parachute, just in case.

    For those who didn't read the article (after all, if you did, this comment is worthless to you), he's talking about a training "dummy aircraft" for gunners to practice shooting at that didn't drop from the bomber that was carrying, and jammed in the bomb bay, preventing the doors from closing (which meant they couldn't land). Quite a hilarious mental picture if you ask me ;)

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    -- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
    1. Re:Don't ride the bomb... by warlock · · Score: 2, Funny

      Heh... that reminded me of the ending of Dr. Strangelove. Only it wasn't a dummy target, it was a nuke. Oh, and he wasn't wearing a parachute. Not that it would matter if he did anyway.

  2. So, they're hackers... by Rimbo · · Score: 3, Funny

    And I especially note this one:

    ``Requests for special slide rules grew. To respond quickly, I set up a paperwork-free design and production service. Our streamlined procedures took advantage of the fact that officers had a monthly liquor allowance but enlisted men did not. To secure a special slide rule, the requesting officer would pay with two bottles. I would pass these contributions along to the enlisted members of the 949th Topographical Company, who did the drafting, calculations, and reproductions. Somehow our service enjoyed a de facto priority second only to the production of mission maps.''

    My God...it's the grandfather of "Free as in Beer!" :)

  3. backwards vulnerability wild ass guess by StandardDeviant · · Score: 3, Funny

    sign change error? ;-)

    (how many times, if you were a technical student, have you ever calculated a negative mass or something and realized it was a simple sign error somewhere in the middle of a pages-long computation?)

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    News for Geeks in Austin, TX
  4. Flying tigers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    My favorite quote:


    Hobbs later served as president of the American Psychological Society.


    Sad that the tiger who provided such companionship to Calvin would one day finally go completely crazy.

    Anonymous cowards do too know how to spell, dammit.