Maybe the Mayan's and these people are right and maybe I was wrong to dismiss them and use sarcasm and snark to belittle them, for today I had a revelation in the form of a marketing call from Time Warner Cable. A rough transcript follows:
Andy's Iphone rings - it's an 877 number.
Answering, "Hello?"
Nice voice on the other end, "Hello, this is Time Warner calling, how are you doing today?"
"Fine, thanks, and you?" (silent groan as I wait for the sales pitch).
"Great, thanks! I'm calling today about a new special we are running on home phone service - is this something you'd be interested in hearing more about?"
"Not really, thanks."
"Ok, well thank you for your time and have a good day."
(confused) "Uh, you too."
(End conversation)
I've received probably thousands of marketing calls over the years and none of them were nearly this pleasant. I almost want to call them back and find out what the deal is even though I don't need or want home phone service. Point being, if this isn't a sign of the apocalypse, I don't know what is.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised that many people still believe the airplane contrail seen near LA on the 9th was actually a missile. I've already mentioned how, once established, false notions become hard to dispel even when the evidence becomes overwhelming. It doesn't help when people with impressive sounding resume's, who should know better, keep these meme's alive.
Two in the latter category are being widely cited as evidence that it was actually a missile. The first comes from Doug Richardson, editor of Jane's Missile and Rockets, who is quoted in several news reports:
"It’s a solid propellant missile," he told the Times. "You can tell from the efflux [smoke]."
Richardson said it could have been a ballistic missile launched from a submarine or an interceptor, the defensive anti-missile weapon used by Navy surface ships.
It will be interesting to see if the next issue of Missiles and Rockets will run an article on it. Somehow I doubt it. I am guessing (and hoping) that once Mr. Richardson looks into it a bit more, he'll realize his first impression was incorrect.
Next is this article by Wayne Madsen who does have a long history of making conspiratorial allegations. The article sourcing is extremely vague, but apparently it's good enough for Madsen to simply declare that it was not only a missile, but a Chinese missile. Pentagon denials are merely spin. The article itself is filled with obvious errors - for example, he suggests the missile impacted on Chinese territory, but no Chinese SLBM's have the range to reach China from off the LA coast. In all, it's a pretty bad article but it does have a veneer of credibility which is sure to confuse non experts. Good conspiracy theories always do.
The best analysis I've seen on this actually comes from the Daily Show:
As Stewart notes, it's impossible for it to be a missile if the cameraman filmed it for ten minutes.
Here is, for example, an actual missile launch under similar lighting conditions:
There are two things to take from this video. First is the fact that in the real launch the missile drops below the horizon in less than four minutes. This is because it is arcing around the curvature of the earth. Secondly is the light on the plume. The missile starts out in darkness, then passes through the orange glow of twilight, then becomes bright as it gains altitude and it illuminated by the full sun. In the California "missile" video the entire plum was bathed in orange twilight. That means the entire plume (contrail) was at roughly the same altitude. Had it actually been a missile, it would have rapidly risen into full sun and would have been brightly illuminated as happened in the real rocket launch.
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