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Flat Earther's Homemade Rocket Launcher Breaks Down in His Driveway (desertsun.com)
The Desert Sun has an update on the progress of 61-year-old self-taught rocket scientist 'Mad' Mike Hughes:
A man who believes Earth is flat, and was ready to launch himself from a rocket in California on Saturday afternoon to prove it, has canceled his plans. At least for now. Not having the required federal permits plus mechanical problems with his "motorhome/rocket launcher" forced self-taught rocket scientist "Mad" Mike Hughes to put his experiment on hold. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management "told me they would not allow me to do the event ... at least not at that location," Hughes said in a YouTube announcement, amid international attention over his plans to launch into the "atmosflat."
"It's been very disappointing," he said... "My feeling is that one of the top executives at the Bureau of Land Management called Needles, California, saying... 'What's going on? Who permitted this?'" Hughes said. Plus, as he and his team were preparing to leave Wednesday, the motorhome/rocket launcher broke down in his driveway, he said... His plan is to try again next week.
"It's been very disappointing," he said... "My feeling is that one of the top executives at the Bureau of Land Management called Needles, California, saying... 'What's going on? Who permitted this?'" Hughes said. Plus, as he and his team were preparing to leave Wednesday, the motorhome/rocket launcher broke down in his driveway, he said... His plan is to try again next week.
He hopes someday his rocket will go higher than a building.
Both Mad Mike and the Coyote have been shopping at ACME.
These flying wings can get to 15,000+ feet and are under $10,000 including training. (highest paraglider of any kind was 24,848 feet)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Bonus points- you can't see curvature of the earth from that low.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
... as he and his team were preparing to leave Wednesday ...
Meaning, his wife, dog, and two grand-kids visiting for Thanksgiving -- all holding globes of the Earth they got at the airport gift shop (and, yes, that includes the dog).
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
“I don’t believe in science,” said Hughes, whose main sponsor for the rocket is Research Flat Earth. “I know about aerodynamics and fluid dynamics and how things move through the air, about the certain size of rocket nozzles, and thrust. But that’s not science, that’s just a formula. There’s no difference between science and science fiction.”
I can't even ...
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
That's what the globe producing lobby wants you to think.
There's a reason they call it a global conspiracy.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Kind of sums it all up.
Why is Snark Required?
>"forced self-taught rocket scientist "Mad" Mike "
"scientist", really? Seems like a very odd word to use in a summary explaining he seriously [??] thinks the earth is flat?
Perhaps self-taught mechanic, or self-taught assembler or something.
There is a massive conspiracy to cover up the fact that the earth is flat. That is why secret operatives sent by no other than the United Nations and led by Colonel Kofi Annan personally broke his trailer. Once the truth gets out about what you see when you rocketeer above 300 feet, the world will never be the same again. What is that I hear you say? There are buildings taller than that? Those buildings are only real up to 299 feet. Everything above that is a strikingly realistic hologram. In fact, if you get into an elevator in a very tall building and press the button for the top floor, you are never seen again. They take you out of the elevator on the "extraction floor" at 299 feet, take you to the secret underground United Nations subterranean train station that was secretly built under every tall building 200 years ago, and send you on a one way journey to the edge of the world. What happens when you get there? You get thrown over the edge. Where do you land when they do that? On your ass of course.
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
There's a reason they call it a global conspiracy.
Damn straight. Those conspiracy theorists are flat wrong. Good thing there are level headed people in charge.
If you read the article, he states he does he does NOT believe in science. "There’s no difference between science and science fiction.”, he continues. So, in the name of "Non-Science", lets encourage this asshat to an expedient joining of the Darwin Awards club.
So he builds a rocket expected to reach 1,500 feet.... When there is an 11,500 foot mountain 50 miles from Amboy with a trail right to the tippy top.and a 360 degree view of the horizon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Call me crazy but I really don't think this has anything to do with 'flat earth', science or rockets. He got his picture in the paper. End of story.
I'm not convinced this guy is really a "flat earther." Apparently, he only started "believing" in it within the last year or so, and after his first failed Kickstarted didn't generate enough backers. Suddenly, he starts advertising his Flat Earth chops and his follow up Kickstarter gets the attention needed for proper funding.
Sounds more like a marketing tactic to me...
Anyway, I'm not trying to call the guy out as some kind of Flat Earth Wannabe or anything, but the media seems really committed to playing right into his hand.
He might have hit one of the turtles.
They just want to keep their monopoly on chemical reactions and Newtonian mechanics.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
I once used an Estes C6-7 to launch a Revell model of a 1966 Thunderbird that belonged to my cousin. We never found the wreckage, so I assume it made it out of the Earth's gravitational field and is probably orbiting the Earth. My cousin was pissed off, but it was either his model Thunderbird or his hamster, so I'm pretty sure he got off easy.
You are welcome on my lawn.
I drove through Needles, California back in August when we moved here to the Central Coast from Houston. I can understand why he would want to launch himself into space.
You are welcome on my lawn.
There is no reason to level disdain and malice toward this man.
He has his own sort of courage and intellect, let him be.
Alas, no. His "courage and intellect" are not helpful. His motivation is not the kind of good-faith naïveté that seeks to discover new things. It is the kind of stubborn blindness that seeks to affirm rigid beliefs that are not supported by evidence.
Let him be? Perhaps. But let's not celebrate his ignorance.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Turtles..all the way down...
I don't have any problem with someone who wants to see how high he can shoot himself in a steam rocket *for thrills*. Or for the satisfaction of building and operating a really dangerous contraption.
The problem I have is the arrogant ignorance of thinking that *proves* something.
When I was in college I learned to read tarot cards on a lark; I saw them in the bookstore and the design appealed to me. It turned out I was really good at it, uncannily good at it. But it's purest egotism to believe that kind of thing makes you special or magical. An honest postmortem of an uncanny-seeming reading will show that it's the subject's reaction to the often divergent interpretations open to you as a reader that guide you to a reading that is personally significant to them.
The point is that you can convince yourself you have access to truth that other, more ordinary people around you don't have, if you never look for a truth that's bigger than yourself.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.