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Zeppelins on Patrol?

Posted by michael on from the truth-is-stranger-than-fiction dept.

Our Man In Redmond writes "Everything old is new again: The Seattle Post-Inteligencer is reporting that NORAD is considering deploying zeppelins along the west coast and Canadian border to keep an eye out for terrorists. Larger than jumbo jets, easier to repair/upgrade than satellites, this may be an idea whose time has come. Again."

2 of 261 comments (clear)

  1. Fly by Konster · · Score: 5, Funny

    The result of one of these flying into a building would be similar to me bouncing a marshmallow off of your forehead.

    It might catch you off guard at first, then piss you off as the shock and abject fright wore off, but no real harm would come to your forehead. The fate of the marshmallow wouldn't be the same, however, and this is to be expected.

  2. More like a nerf by wirefarm · · Score: 5, Funny

    The article said that these things would only have a structure for supporting cargo, which, I'm guessing would be hanging about where a blimp's gondola is, so I guess the original assumption about the marshmallow might be true. (I have no idea why the author of he article kept referring to them as dirigibles...)

    I'm pretty sure that if you plowed any sort of non-rigid blimp into any sort of skyscraper, the blimp would do a minimum of damage before being punctured - though if it managed to break some windows first, the occupants of the building might be running around talking in squeaky voices from inhaling al that helium, which would make for some very confused 911 operators I'm sure...

    Cheers,
    Jim in Tokyo

    --
    -- My Weblog.