Fly-By-Wire Software Defects

Navigational software glitch forces Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptors back to Hawaii, abandoning first foreign deployment to Japanq
By Justin Wastnage
Lockheed Martin is rushing a software fix to Hawaii after 12 US Air Force F-22A Raptors en route to Japan for the stealth fighter’s first overseas deployment had to turn back because an unspecified problem with their navigation systems.


F-16 Problems (from Usenet net.aviation)
Bill Janssen
Wed, 27 Aug 86 14:31:45 CDT

A friend of mine who works for General Dynamics here in Ft. Worth wrote some
of the code for the F-16, and he is always telling me about some
neato-whiz-bang bug/feature they keep finding in the F-16:

o Since the F-16 is a fly-by-wire aircraft, the computer keeps the pilot from
doing dumb things to himself. So if the pilot jerks hard over on the
joystick, the computer will instruct the flight surfaces to make a nice and
easy 4 or 5 G flip. But the plane can withstand a much higher flip than that.
So when they were 'flying' the F-16 in simulation over the equator, the
computer got confused and instantly flipped the plane over, killing the
pilot [in simulation]. And since it can fly forever upside down, it would
do so until it ran out of fuel.

Visualizing

Follow this link and click on MBM VISION.

What do you see?

Israel Iran, USA Air Power

Ready for war

By Con Coughlin
Last Updated: 12:29am GMT 25/02/2007

The Iranians, on the other hand, learning the lessons of the Osirak debacle, have scattered their resources around the country. Obvious targets, such as the controversial uranium enrichment complex at Natanz, are set in specially constructed bomb proof bunkers that would require high-precision, bunker-busting bombs to inflict any serious damage.

Yet another challenge is presented by the recent arrival of the Russian-made Tor M1 anti-aircraft missile system as part of an arms deal signed between Moscow and Teheran last year.

"Of course, attacking Iran is not going to be easy, but we cannot just sit here and let the ayatollahs develop a nuclear weapons arsenal," said a senior Israeli defence official. "Doing nothing is just not an option."

Israeli defence officials are understandably coy about revealing precisely how far advanced their plans are for launching air strikes against Iran in light of the current diplomatic offensive at the United Nations to halt Teheran's enrichment programme ending in failure.

But that the Israeli Air Force, as The Daily Telegraph exclusively discloses today, is negotiating with US coalition commanders in Iraq for permission to fly through US-controlled air space suggests Israeli military planners have overcome most of the key technical hurdles, such as in-flight refuelling and target selection.

...



American armada prepares to take on Iran

By Damien McElroy aboard USS Eisenhower
Last Updated: 12:30am GMT 25/02/2007

It is four and a half acres of American power in the middle of the Arabian Sea but the influence of USS Dwight D Eisenhower stretches for hundreds of miles.
American armada prepares to take on Iran
Crew on board the aircraft carrier USS Eisenhower are on alert in the Arabian Sea

The aircraft carrier, backed by its sister vessel, a handful of destroyers and a shoal of support ships, has placed a maritime ring of steel around an increasingly unstable region.

While the Eisenhower is ostensibly assisting US operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is the looming threat of Iran that increasingly occupies its attention.

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Billion-Dollar Power Bills

Customers Get Billion-Dollar Power Bills
2007/02/22 03:02
Press Release from: ANCOSO Development GmbH
Perhaps his $24 billion electric bill will teach Richard Redden not to leave the heat running. Thanks to a printing error, Redden and more than 1,300 Weatherford utility customers this week received billion-dollar electric bills marked as late notices.

Irving-bases DataProse, which prints customer bills for Weatherford Electric, said the company was embarrassed by the error.

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Speeding Police, Citizen Stalkers

Magistrate judge to decide if couple will be prosecuted for 'stalking' officer
Published February 13, 2007 11:06 PM CST
A Bartow County couple will go before a magistrate judge today to see if they will be arrested for allegedly stalking a Kennesaw police officer by installing cameras to track neighborhood speeders.


Kennesaw officer withdraws complaint against Sipples
Rhonda Barnett
Staff Writer
Published February 15, 2007 12:15 AM CST
The Kennesaw officer who sought the arrest of a Bartow County couple in regard to them recording his vehicle with a camera and radar gun dropped his complaint Wednesday in Bartow magistrate court.

Officer Richard Perrone alleged that Lee and Teresa Sipple stalked him after they purchased $1,200 in video surveillance and radar equipment that allegedly tracked Perrone speeding past their home, which lies at the end of a steep hill, up to 17 miles over the speed limit.

Best Countries For Children's Well-Being

Sweden good for children's well-being
Published: 14th February 2007 18:05 CET

Sweden has scored highly in a UNICEF report on children's well-being in 21 of the world's richest countries.

The UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre examined six different aspects in an attempt to quantify children's well-being: material well-being, health and safety, education, peer and family relationships, behaviours and risks, and young people’s own subjective sense of well-being.

The Netherlands topped the survey, closely followed by Sweden. Completing the top five were Denmark, Finland and Spain .

Sweden got top marks on three of the measures: material well-being, health and safety and behaviours and risks. The country lost ground however in the area of peer and family relationships, ranking in 15th position.

Ireland and Canada both fared reasonably well, coming in at ninth and twelfth place respectively.

Of the 21 countries studies, the United States scored second lowest, with the United Kingdom occupying the bottom berth.

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Oxidating Free Radicals

Researchers suggest that naturally occurring antioxidants that are found in vegetables and fruits - especially muscadine grapes - provide the best source of antioxidants. Through innovative technology, Nutragrape has captured the antioxidant rich grape seeds in an effective daily nutraceutical.

Destruction Of Jewish State

Tehran, 7 Feb. (AKI) - Iran's ambassador to Syria, Mohammad Hassan Akhtari, said on Wednesday that Israel's destruction was imminent. "Concrete facts show that destroying Israel is possible," said the diplomat, in a speech during celebrations of the 28th anniversary of the 1979 Iranian revolution. "I hope I will be able to celebrate the next anniversary of the Islamic revolution in Palestine, as some elements and facts show that the destruction of the Zionist state is not only possible but imminent," he said.

Waste To Electricity

February 1, 2007

Scientists develop portable generator that turns trash into electricity

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - A group of scientists have created a portable refinery that efficiently converts food, paper and plastic trash into electricity. The machine, designed for the U.S. military, would allow soldiers in the field to convert waste into power and could have widespread civilian applications in the future.

...

Researchers tested the first tactical biorefinery prototype in November and found that it produced approximately 90 percent more energy than it consumed, said Jerry Warner, founder of Defense Life Sciences LLC, a private company working with Purdue researchers on the project. He said the results were better than expected.

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Photographing America

Photographing and Appraising Entire Cities

Zaio is in the process of photographing and appraising each and every property in cities across the country. That means every house, commercial building, industrial and institutional structure is being photographed and appraised property-by-property and street-by-street. We call this historic event “Photographing America.” The resulting database of images and valuations is called “GeoPic,” and is a useful resource for real estate, mortgage and insurance industries.

Fuel From Microbes

This seems to have real potential.

AP Heather Ishimaru
(1/29/07) - What if gasoline, diesel and jet fuel could be made without oil and made instead with sugar? An Emeryville-based company founded by U.C. Berkeley scientists is on its way to doing just that, with staggering environmental and economic implications.

This sugary solution could be what breaks America's addiction to oil.

Science has long understood how ethanol is made by adding sugar to yeast. But now using the same basic biological processes, scientists can re-program the microbes to make something closer to gasoline. It's cutting-edge technology commonly known as "synthetic biology" and it will change the way we fuel any vehicle that now relies on oil -- at least that's the hope at Emeryville-based Amyris Biotechnologies.