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Las Vegas Hotel Vdara an Accidental Death Ray

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the staying-there-next dept.

evanism writes "A hotel in Las Vegas is accidentally designed to be a massive parabolic dish that focuses the suns rays into a death ray! Burns hair, plastic and causes pain." It apparently lasts for several minutes during afternoons of bright sunlight, but if you need to perform science on it, you better hurry since they plan to ruin/fix it.

37 of 218 comments (clear)

  1. Too much money to fix, thing outside the box by grub · · Score: 4, Funny


    you better hurry since they plan to ruin/fix it.

    Rather than paying the incredible expense of re-engineering the hotel's windows they should just rename. Simply change the stationary and signage to "L'Hotel du Auschwitz".

    Hey, they could offer free tatoos, too. Tell people that they're lucky numbers.

    --
    Trolling is a art,
    1. Re:Too much money to fix, thing outside the box by jedidiah · · Score: 5, Interesting

      They should call out the Mythbusters. It looks like Archimede's death ray may have been vindicated.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    2. Re:Too much money to fix, thing outside the box by sumdumass · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I'm not sure causing pain and burning hair is exactly the same Archimede's death ray. At least not from the fables I remember reading. And melting plastic, well, I'm also not sure they had much plastic back then, let alone built boats out of it.

      Perhaps you could tell me more about this.

    3. Re:Too much money to fix, thing outside the box by pckl300 · · Score: 4, Funny

      They could take the Steve Jobs approach and just tell customers to avoid being in the hot zone

      --
      In the beginning, there was null.
    4. Re:Too much money to fix, thing outside the box by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      An elegant weapon, from a more civilized age

  2. It's a feature by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    They just haven't gotten around to installing the Sterling motors and generators yet.

  3. Post a warning? by crow · · Score: 2, Funny

    Wouldn't the simplest solution be to post a warning? They could set up an infrared camera to monitor where the hot spot is, and have a monitor displaying it, so people could avoid it.

    1. Re:Post a warning? by red_dragon · · Score: 5, Funny

      They could set up an infrared camera...

      Damn engineers and their overcomplicated solutions. Why can't people just look for where the smoke and smell of charred human flesh is coming from?

      --
      In Soviet Russia, Jesus asks: "What Would You Do?"
    2. Re:Post a warning? by krnpimpsta · · Score: 5, Funny

      Wouldn't the simplest solution be to post a warning?

      "Do not look into hotel with remaining eye."

      --

      New webcomic updated on Sundays: HERE

    3. Re:Post a warning? by vlm · · Score: 3, Informative

      Since the building is basically parabolic, won't the spot stay mostly stationary? I mean, isn't that the whole point of parabolic focusers?

      Try it some time and be surprised. Moving the sun with respect to the parabola is equivalent to moving the parabola with respect to the sun. And there is a strong microwave analogy. So, if the spot never moved, that would make radar systems rather hard to build (you'd have to use 80s era phased arrays instead of 40s era rotating dishes)

      --
      "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
    4. Re:Post a warning? by smooth+wombat · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Since the building is basically parabolic, won't the spot stay mostly stationary?

      Obviously neither you nor the mod who gave you insightful read the article because had either of you done so, you would have read the following:

      Fixing the problem isn't going to be easy. As the Earth spins, the sun moves across the horizon. But as the seasons change, the angle of the Earth to the sun changes too, meaning shadows - and in this case the hot spot - move in a different way. Putting in one row of thick umbrellas won't solve the problem because each day they would have to be a few feet back or a few feet forward from their prior day's position.

      One doesn't even need a parabolic reflector to experience this. Go to any city during a clear, sunny day and you will find hot spots being created from the nice, shiny windows on the flat (non-curved) buildings. While not focused like the rays from this building, you will feel substantially warmer.

      However, stand still for a few minutes, and as the Earth rotates and moves about the sun, the hot spot will move with it.

      I'm not the most brilliant person when it comes to science, but even I know what you said is wrong!

      --
      We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
    5. Re:Post a warning? by HereIAmJH · · Score: 2, Informative

      And the video I got, all 20m of it, was about Las Vegas pool parties being the new trend. It didn't even mention the Death Ray.

      --
      Another day, another update to a Google android app.
    6. Re:Post a warning? by Facegarden · · Score: 3, Informative

      The simplest thing is to dull the reflective surfaces of the offending parts of the building. This problem isn't unique, it's happened before elsewhere.

      They did that. When they designed it, they thought of this and added a film over the windows that reduces reflected energy by 70%, according to TFA.

      It still manages to raise temperatures by 20-30 degrees in the affected zone, and on a 110 degree day thats enough to melt plastics and people.
      -Taylor

      --
      Worldwide Military budgets: $2100 billion. Worldwide Space Exploration budgets: $38 billion. Really, world? Really?
  4. Images by cosm · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Interesting story. Dumbass images. Besides the burned newspaper bag and perhaps one obscure image of the parabolic hotel in question, every other image is just scenery or people partying in a pool. The fact that there are so many of them on the ABC website touts the true journalistic intent (or perhaps marketing, scantily clad women abound).

    --
    'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
    1. Re:Images by RDW · · Score: 5, Informative

      The article they probably got this story from is a bit more informative - complete with diagram!:

      http://www.lvrj.com/news/vdara-visitor---death-ray--scorched-hair-103777559.html

    2. Re:Images by Nadaka · · Score: 2, Funny

      Damn you, now I am going to have to read the article.

    3. Re:Images by oldmac31310 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Indeed. The embedded video had nothing to do with the story and made no mention whatsoever of the 'death ray' phenomenon supposedly exhibited by the hotel. And they didn't even have a NSFW tag anywhere. There I was waiting for something about the death ray hotel and all I got was a flood of images of drunken assholes jumping up and down in hotel pools. Crap story.

      --
      http://www.acetonestudio.com
    4. Re:Images by PRMan · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Nice job. Now Slashdot is going to get sued by Righthaven media for linking to the LVRJ.

      http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100928/16212911200/eff-comes-out-guns-blazing-in-countersuit-against-righthaven-stepens-media.shtml

      --
      Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
  5. Map view by eamonman · · Score: 3, Informative

    http://goo.gl/maps/ZpTd

    So it looks like if the sun is high up in the sky, from probably a S or SSE angle, you'd get some good ant burning action..

    So how would they fix that? Put up one of those porous billboard/shade deals that Flamingo does?

    --
    0- Eamonman Proud member of DNRC
  6. Or rent it out by tomhudson · · Score: 4, Funny
    They could rent it out to a couple of boys to raise cattle.

    After all, your beginners science class taught that "focus" is where the sons raise meat.

    1. Re:Or rent it out by Majik+Sheff · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That was a very mature pun, I can tell because it was fully groan.

      --
      Women are like electronics: you don't know how damaged they are until you try to turn them on.
  7. Same thing in the old Lucent building at Chicago by Magnus+Pym · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The architect thought it would be cool to have a massive dish-like glass structure on the side of the building, shaped like an enormous microwave antenna. Unfortunately, the thing focused the suns rays like a magnifying glass. The insides got really hot, especially near the security desk! Dont' know if anyone got burned, though.

  8. Re:PLEASE GO AWAY IDLE by Ultra64 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Because it's just soooo hard to scroll past it without clicking on it. Right?

  9. One pun over the edge by antifoidulus · · Score: 4, Funny

    Alright... that's it, that pun has to be paid for in blood...everybody dies.... I mean "Come on everyone, I'm taking you all to Vegas"

    --
    Monstar L
  10. Re:Death ray by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's not a euphemism, it describes exactly what it is. 'Death ray' on the other hand is a dysphemism, coined by bad journalism.

  11. I've heard of this before. by zero_out · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There was a news story several years ago about a fire that destroyed a family's patio, and damaged their house. The fire department couldn't figure out how it started, but then they discovered the dog's glass water bowl about ten feet from where the fire started. They tested their theory, and sure enough, the owners were filling the glass bowl with water at just the right time, and putting it in just the right place, that it magnified the afternoon sunlight into a spot that set fire to weather-treated wood boards.

  12. Same thing happened at Walt Disney Concert Hall by default+luser · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is hardly a unique event. If you let an architect go nuts trying to make a "modern" and "unique" building, he will inevitably build a magnifying glass.

    Architects are rarely versed in function, and are almost always about the form.

    --

    Man is the animal that laughs.
    And occasionally whores for Karma.

    1. Re:Same thing happened at Walt Disney Concert Hall by theIsovist · · Score: 4, Informative

      You've given one example, which is a building by Frank Gehry. He's an architect who made his millions by converting software made to develop jet fighters into "architecture". Is it any wonder his buildings attack people?

      I am a practicing architect, so please, let me fill you in. Architects take classes on sun angles and reflected light. Understanding how to make use of and control natural sunlight is a major part of modern architecture. I counter your example with a modern building designed by Steven Holl (a much more impressive architect IMHO). If you note on one of the diagrams, the building has been designed to strategicly filter light into different areas of the school based on certain landmark days. No death rays here.

  13. Re:Death ray by geekoid · · Score: 2, Insightful

    It is not Orwellian. It in no way implies the opposite effect. It is the more correct term. It in no way is destructive to the welfare of anyone. If it was killing dozens of people, you might have a point.well, you wouldn't then either. Unless they where removing all references to the deaths of others from all media.

    That said, the Hotel is missing a golden opportunity.

    Every knows it's no actually a death ray, but they could hype it up and do a tongue and cheek promotion.

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
  14. What Happens In Vegas by mattwrock · · Score: 2, Funny

    apparently leaves a mark!

    --
    "Ones and zeros were everywhere. I even think I saw a two!" - Bender
  15. Hooray! by Anne_Nonymous · · Score: 3, Funny

    S'mores for everyone!

  16. Rejected marketing slogan... by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 2, Funny

    What lies in Vegas, fries in Vegas.

  17. Hotels in Space by Cyclloid · · Score: 3, Funny

    In order to circumvent the treaty to not weaponize space, the USA plans to build "Hotels" in space.

  18. Re:The fix is by sconeu · · Score: 2, Insightful

    You forgot what is the most important thing from the hotel's POV.

    Significantly increased chance of lawsuit.

    --
    General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
  19. Re:Runs to Vegas by The+Archon+V2.0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    with large jar of mutant ants. Ooh crap. The jar is broken. The mutant ants are free! And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords

    I TOLD you that ant farm keyboard idea wouldn't work!

  20. This was the subject of an old sci fi short story by pjwhite · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I remember reading a story many years ago which was probably published in the late 1950s or 1960s. It was about an architect who murdered a rival by designing and having built a skyscraper with reflective widows controlled by a computer, ostensibly to maintain the interior environment of the building, but in reality as a way to focus the light of the sun on the rival's house, some miles away. The rival and his house were destroyed by a "mysterious" fire.
    I wish I could remember the name of the author and the the story title.

  21. Re:They did exactly that!! by plover · · Score: 2, Funny

    Read the whole article - the "solution" is to put in a small forest of very thick umbrellas! No joke, they are not touching the windows at all!

    Well, this certainly isn't the first time someone has tried to fix architectural flaws in windows with a patch that's nothing more than a coverup.

    --
    John