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Nuclear Officers Napped With Blast Door Left Open
Lasrick writes "AP's Robert Burns reports that 'Air Force officers entrusted with the launch keys to long-range nuclear missiles have been caught twice this year leaving open a blast door that is intended to help prevent a terrorist or other intruder from entering their underground command post.' Why is that signifcant? At least one of the officers was napping at the time. Airforce officials said other violations like this have undoubtedly occurred and gone undetected. Yeesh. 'The blast door violations are another sign of trouble in the handling of the nation's nuclear arsenal. The AP has discovered a series of problems within the ICBM force, including a failed safety inspection, the temporary sidelining of launch officers deemed unfit for duty and the abrupt firing last week of the two-star general in charge. The problems, including low morale, underscore the challenges of keeping safe such a deadly force that is constantly on alert but is unlikely ever to be used.'"
It gets hot in there, and Johnson is always farting.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
Hey there troops, listen up! It's your job to sit in this drab, overbuilt concrete coffin, sitting on your lazy asses like the cold war relics you are, until such a time as you are instructed to commit the greatest mass slaughter in human history. Any questions?
You'd think about the obvious reasons for nuclear disarmament, but nobody ever spares a thought for the poor sods who have to sit there watching these doomsday devices: if they ever get used it's the end of the world, if they're ever attacked it will be with overwhelming force, and they are expected to be running their AAA-game 24/7/365, no holidays, no vacations.
(Interesting thought experiment: replace "nuclear weapons officer" with "megabank sysadmin")
If you planned to take a nap on the job - Why the hell wouldn't you close the door? It at least makes getting caught a bit less likely.
No longer in effect.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
A) There are two blast doors.
B) They are [REDACTED] meters below ground.
C) There is an elevator
D) They are their for more than a day, so they sleep.
This isn't really much of a deal. There is nothing that can happen that they can nap through.
Their Job is extremely boring, and their isn't a regular thing to watch. Like gauge, or pressure valves.
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"Except perhaps, closing the blast doors while napping."
That's what's this all about.
1. If you sleep, the door must be closed.
2. If the door is closed, nobody can catch you sleeping, even if you sleep at times when you shouldn't.
3. Ergo, always close the fucking door.
Yes, it's a sucky job. Often it gets assign to former pilot, and no one wants to do it.
F.E.* Warren Air Force base is horrid, it's in a horrid place, and threes things happen when someone goes there:
1) The retire
2) The put 100% of their effort to getting a new station
3) They just give up to get discharged.
I was their for 18 months. During that time promotions were frozen(Thanks Reagan!) We were at 30% staffing. Meaning I spent many weeks work 72 to 100 houre, straight. as in No sleep, or at best an hour a night Plus I was told no one in my classification would every get transferred out because that don't see staffing getting put back up to 100%
Plus, for some reason, they thought I was talking drugs, os about every month I had to go pee in a cup. I have no idea why they would think that
The security teams the send out to the site our horrible people who will rob you blind.
*Fuck Everybody Warren.
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It's ok, though, because between the NSA spying on literally everybody, the TSA feeling us up at the airports, and the government spending millions pursuing "terrorists" such as Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, there is no way somebody is going to be able to walk through an unsecured, open door and wreak havoc; because the sheer irony itself would tear a hole in space and time.
How about a nice game of chess?
It's a horrible, awful job. My father was in the airforce and maintained a lot of that equipment. Think of it this way, you are locked underground with 2 other guys. Everyone has a gun and have been psychologically tested to be sure that they could kill YOU immediately if ordered to, or if you hesitate in following an order. Spend 6 months with those guys and try and have meaningful interactions with them... oh right, you might have to shoot them to... so don't get too attached.
It's basically a recipe for the worst reality show ever. My father said the second he'd show up to work on stuff the guys would begin yapping their traps non-stop. Being the first human they'd seen in months that had no designs on shooting them in the head, he was their new best friend.
Lastly, the blast doors aren't the only doors. It's an entire facility. It just takes the blast doors a loooong time to open. So they dont close them unless they absolutely have to. Granted, his experiences were in the 60s and 70s so I'm not sure how much of it still applies. But I bet it's still pretty much the same.
On Slashdot 'marrying above your pay grade' usually means getting the tricked out version of a Real Doll.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Your dad has some facts wrong there bucko (especially if he is talking about Minuteman, the facts are a bit different for Titan II). They don't sit underground for months at a time. They go on 24, and sometimes up to 72 hour alerts. So the longest they go with out seeing another person is 24 hours, which I am sure most people on Slashdot do on a weekly basis.
It does sound like your dad is talking about Titan II, but even then its not nearly as bad as you make it out to be (still pretty shitty though) and better than MM LCCs (the Titan II facilities were much larger... but also built right next to the silo).
Far worse were SAC B-52 crew alerts. You'd go on on ground alert for days at a time, where you had to eat/sleep/live within running/short drive distance of your bomber and couldn't really leave.
He also has the kill your colleague if they don't follow an order thing wrong.
All those missiles can be controlled from another launch facility, so if one of the missileers doesn't want to turn their key, control of their silos is just assumed by another launch facility and their missiles are launched anyway.
The sidearms were for defense of the facility, not to use on fellow officers is my understanding.
Wax on, wax off baby!
How come we're not all dead? I thought (was told) there was a terrorist hiding around every corner.
That's why missile silos are round. Duh.
Oh, I think of the 'poor sods' in the missile silos... to laugh uproariously at them and how 'hard' they work. They're on duty in the silo for 24 hours once a week or so, and when they're not on duty they work 9-5 and get weekends off. When something in the system breaks, they phone home and someone else comes out to fix it.
I sat my missile fire control console six on, twelve off, mumble feet under the North Atlantic for sixty to eighty days a pop. If the system went down, it was on us to fix it. No nine to five. No weekends. No meals at home. No sunshine. And back then, the Walkman was brand new and the absolute height of personal electronics. (Not that personal electronics make up much for what you're missing.) I truly had to have my AAA game, because there were dozens of ways to die or be badly injured surrounding me 24/7 for days on end.
When it comes to a hard life in the strategic weapons world, the chumps out there with the prairie dogs aren't close to having the hardest. That (dubious) 'honor' belongs to my brothers and sisters boring holes out there in the deep blue.
x-FTB2/SS, USS Henry L. Stimson 655B 1983-87.
So... basically what you're saying is, the people our government puts in charge of the most deadly, destructive arsenal ever known are, essentially, the worst of the worst and laziest of laziest?
I wish I hadn't found that out.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese