As I was getting into my car in the parking lot, I looked up and saw a airliner at about 5000 feet. Not unusual as I'm about 20 minutes from a large international airport. The plane was making a long graceful turn, contrails streaming out behind it. As ridiculous as it sounds, I stopped to consider it carefully.

I felt a little foolish. Then I realized that there was a young mother standing not far from me who had stopped putting her child into the car seat and was doing the same thing. We both looked at one another, then just laughed at and went on about our evening.

What kind of a century is this going to be?

Oh, I dunno. One where every plane is a potential bomb?

Truth be told, I'm not worried about another plane being intentional flown into a target in the US in my lifetime.

Unless terrorists are absolutely covered in automatic weaponery (in which case they shouldn't be able to get on a plane in the first place,) passengers will leap on them and rip out their throat the second they try to take over the plane.

I saw a couple today. They're planes and not bombs in my mind until proven otherwise.

It certainly doesn't do any good to go on being scared of planes...We aren't all afraid of cars, after all...Not to make light of this tragedy...

Sure, we'll all think about this every time that we get on a plane for awhile, but we can't live in fear...

I live very near Mitchell Field, amusingly also called Milwaukee International Airport (I suppose Canada does count but...) and it was more disturbing hearing them land on Tuesday morning.

I hear them now. But I dread the one night a month or so they fly overhead. They usually cause a bit of shaking on approach and, even before this week, I've often thought of them crashing into houses and such. I can't imagine what I'll be thinking from now on.

But I'm not afraid of terrorists on Milwaukee, or most other, flights. More of accidents, especially now that I see what they can do.
-Andrew

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Quote:

Unless terrorists are absolutely covered in automatic weaponery (in which case they shouldn't be able to get on a plane in the first place,) passengers will leap on them and rip out their throat the second they try to take over the plane.

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And, in case any of your find yourselves in this situation and motivated to act, remember: Unclip the buckle-end of the seatbelt for a flail, and take your seat cushion as a shield. For lack of anything better, they might help.

Air traffic in the Burlington VT area is way down. Most of the planes I've seen are Air National Guard F-16s. A couple of them passed overhead this morning at 4 a.m. with afterburners. Shook the house and me--woke up thinking a plane was crashing. Damn weekend flyboys :)

I'm seeing and hearing flights of fighters, F-15s mostly, a lot more often now than I used to. I'm also seeing them in groups of 4 instead of 2 as well.

As far as commercial flights go, now I look up and can only see one or two planes in the sky at a time, instead of half a dozen or more.

Where in the world are you Mark Bussman?

I can't speak for Mark, but here in Tulsa, that's the case. We have an airforce base right near the airport, so it's not unusual to see F-16s flying about during relatively uneventful times. Of course, there are usually a ton of commercial flights, too. Now, there are far fewer commercial flights, and far more military aircraft.

In fact, the night the event took place, after the grounding of all planes, my aunt let her dog out. When she went to let him back in, she saw a plane in the sky, just above her house. "That's not supposed to be there!" she immediately thought, understandable panicked. It didn't take her long to figure out that it was a military aircraft, though.

Saint Louis, why?

"And, in case any of your find yourselves in this situation and motivated to act, remember: Unclip the buckle-end of the seatbelt for a flail, and take your seat cushion as a shield."

Murph, I know you mean this in the best way, and I love ya for it...but the image of a bunch of pasty gamers grabbing seat cushions and belt buckles brought a chuckle. Thanks man, I needed that, even if that wasn't the way you meant it :)

Well, perhaps that was part of my point -- but, seriously, getting hit up-side the head with the buckle would seriously hurt.

Mark--I was just curious. For some reason, I was thinking you were in my area (Seattle) but I haven't been seeing any military flights, myself.

You're thinking Bussman is in Seattle because Seattle and St. Louis both have the Boeing link. Mark may even work at Boeing here -- seems I remember something like that.

That's probably it. I wish we had all the military flights flying over head. That has to make you feel a bit safer, even if there's not a good way for a fighter to gaurd against the type of attack we saw on Tuesday.

Just heard a plane overhead an hour ago...right off the coast south of SF. I'm right under the flight path of SFO, gotten quite used to the sight & sound of planes.

I hadn't even noticed how quiet it had been last week until I heard this one.

No Mark, I don't work at Boeing. At least not yet... :) I have two friends that work for Boeing here in STL, and I'll hopefully be interviewing with them for a couple of different jobs in October (I'll graduate in May). One of the jobs is for a flight simulation software engineer position. It sounds like a lot of fun, especially if I get to play, ahem, work with the simulator hardware. :) It should go without saying that I want Boeing to win JSF.

Tim-- Sorry if my reply came off as sounding annoyed or something.

I've only seen a flight of 4 F-15s once while I was flying my R/C plane last Saturday. Before last Tuesday, it just wasn't unusual to see pairs flying around every once in a while. I didn't mean to give the impression that I was seeing them all the time. I'm hearing them about 3-4 times a day though.

Mark: No offense taken! Hearing fighter planes 3-4 times a day would be good for me. Heck, we don't hear military fighter jets that often unless the Blue Angels are in town.

Sparky: "I hadn't even noticed how quiet it had been last week until I heard this one."

This is what I was trying to get at in my original post. It's noisy around my house too. We have Boeing field, Sea-Tac and another smaller airport in Renton all within--I'm guessing here--5-15 miles, so it's usually quite noisy, but it blends into the background. When I saw the plane, it was just sort of profound because it seemed like a hush had fallen over the area since the attack. I guess with all the planes grounded, it actually had become quieter.

Isn't the JSF up to, oh, a hundred tons in weight now? I've got to wonder what the point of a unified fighter design that can't fit on a carrier is.

Uhh, I highly doubt it, considering that they land vertically, and there's no single engine that I'm aware of is capable of delivering 200,000 lb of thrust. For comparison, the Tomcat has a max gross weight of 72,000 lb, and the Harrier has a max vertical take off weight of 19,550 lb and the engine's rated at 22,000 lb of thrust.

I'll agree that I didn't really notice the sounds of aircraft were gone until they came back again.

I just checked over on Pratt & Whitney's website and found that the JSF119 engine is in the "40,000 pound thrust class." So the plane maybe has a vertical take off weight of about 35,000 lb and a short take of weight of about 54,000 lb if extrapolating from the Harrier's performance data is a reasonable thing to do.

The plane (Boeing's) is ugly as sin though.

Where did you get that figure, Jason? The competition requirements I've read say that the Air Force/conventional (carrier based) Navy version can way a maximum of 22,000 pounds empty and 50,000 lbs. take-off, and the STOVL version specs. 24,000/50,000 lbs. According to the all the articles I've read, both the Boeing and Lockheed (the slight favorite) competitors meet those specs. Both have also completed simulated carrier landing tests at Langley.

I made it up. :0

I just remember seeing some worried noises in the press a while back about how the plane's weight has just kept increasing in development, so the projected combat range kept dropping and dropping and possibly putting carrier landings in jeopardy. Maybe last year?

"I just remember seeing some worried noises in the press a while back about how
the plane's weight has just kept increasing in development, so the projected
combat range kept dropping and dropping and possibly putting carrier landings in
jeopardy. Maybe last year?"

I don't have any figures on that, but the part about the combat range is certainly more believable than the carrier role. The early versions of the F/A-18 suffered in combat range from the need to fill multiple missions. OTOH, a geniune fly-off competition like they're holding for the Strike Fighter I think would go a long way to keep the plane from getting too bloated.

From my understanding, for any aircraft to finish development at it target weight is nothing short of a miracle.

"I made it up. :0"

That's what I figured, but I wasn't certain.

Jason Levine, where did you find competition requirements? I only looked on Boeing's website for info but couldn't find any actual numbers for anything.

I'm told the Boeing test pilots refer to the plane as either "The Pelican" or "The Pregnant Guppy."

"Jason Levine, where did you find competition requirements? I only looked on Boeing's website for info but couldn't find any actual numbers for anything."

Here. This seems to be a fanboy page, but if you scroll the main page down, he has a nice requirements table.

"I'm told the Boeing test pilots refer to the plane as either "The Pelican" or "The Pregnant Guppy." "

The Lockheed plane, otoh, seems to have been quite deliberately designed to resemble the F-22. Maybe that's why it's considered the slight favorite?

Good lord, the Boeing looks like it's going to drop out a litter of babies any second. I have difficulty imagining Congress funding that sucker.

I went to the Jane's link, and the isolationist in me can't believe we're considering selling these things to Italy and Turkey.

I've been told that half the the branches say that Boeing's plane is just too damn ugly. The other half doesn't care how ugly it is and would buy it anyway if it's better. I've heard two things that Lockheed's plane has as advantages due to it's crazy lift fan system. 1. It's quieter than direct lift. 2. It can be operated at lower power settings. Personally, I don't know if the military is willing to accept such an unproven design concept. If you haven't seen schematics of the lift fan arrangement, you should go over to Lockheed's page and look at it. I'm looking but can't find it yet.

Re: Selling them to Italy and Turkey. A friend of mine said that JSF is our version of the TIE-Fighter, i.e. the crappy disposable aircraft we sell to everybody else in order to make money to build better aircraft for ourselves.

The F-22 isn't just Lockheed's either. And the same will probably happen with JSF no matter who wins, tho for the F-22, Lockheed and Boeing were partners to begin with I believe.

Found Lockheed JSF videos, the very last one listed is one of the lift fan system.

"A friend of mine said that JSF is our version of the TIE-Fighter, i.e. the crappy disposable aircraft we sell to everybody else in order to make money to build better aircraft for ourselves."

Yeah, you don't see us offering the F-22 to everybody and his uncle.

The lift fan system, of course, is only for the U.S. Marines/Royal Navy STOVL (or whatever order those initials go in) version. I would think that having a separate fan system, while mechanically pretty exotic, would make it easier for the pilot to transition between level and vertical flight than swiveling the jet exhaust as is done with the Boeing and the Harrier.

"I've been told that half the the branches say that Boeing's plane is just too damn ugly. The other half doesn't care how ugly it is and would buy it anyway if it's better. "

Didn't they something like that about the A6? And look what a charmer that one turned out to be over 40+ years.

Also, to the original topic here, I've seen planes almost constantly. I live North of DC, and have been seeing flights of jets and helicopters all day every day for the past week. I had this spectacular realization looking at them that first day, flying so low that I could read their tail numbers. I've always thought of warbirds as beautiful things, expressions of engineering and national pride and capability. But this day it was like seeing a large shark feed for the first time. I saw them flying low and fast, and wondered, just for a minute, what it would be like to be on the wrong end of one of them. The terror that it would cause, watching the munition detach from the wing, or seeing the flash as the cannon fired. These things were designed to bring massive destruction to our enemies.

And we have thousands of them. All with highly-trained pilots itching to be used to avenge and protect us.

There's going to be a lot of hurt come out of this. I guess it just never hit me until I thought about it in terms of the people lost, the anger and determination of the country. Any one or two of these planes can carry the destructive potential to duplicate the damage of the crashed airliners. I want us avenged. I want the people who plan and execute these things brought down. I'm just very sad over what the human price tag will end up being.

I guess it's like Tom's "Outlines" of people, in an eerie and cold, quiet way.

Does this make sense to anyone? I don't know if my words are good enough to express it.

I think in this moment of national tragedy, we should all turn to Lilarcor, the talking two-handed sword from BGII, for commentary on national attitudes related to military retaliation:

'Kill it! Kill it before they're all gone!'

'Hey, you wanna kill that over there? C'mon, let's kill something!'

I haven't even finished BG1 yet...

What's a good class for that game? My original character was an MU, but she was very readily trashed.

On the topic of fighters, I saw a flight of F-18s on the Saturday preceding the WTC thing. Similar to what kazz mentioned, I regarded them with a sense of awe, a high point in flight engineering. Of course, now the thought of regular fighter patrols makes me frown a bit when I consider the purpose.

About BG characters, mages are significantly deadlier in BG2 due to spell triggers and contingencies. They're enough of a nuisance that I ended up turning my bard into a dart-throwing, 'breach' casting anti-mage specialist.

- Alan

"would make it easier for the pilot to transition between level and vertical flight than swiveling the jet exhaust as is done with the Boeing and the Harrier."

I'm pretty sure that Boeing's JSF plane has it's front nozzles fixed downward since I do know there are doors that cover them. I'm not sure off the top of my head if its rear nozzle vectors thrust downward (I think it does), but I know that the Lockheed's does.

"Does this make sense to anyone? I don't know if my words are good enough to express it."

Makes sense to me. I saw an F-14 fly for the first time at an airshow over Labor Day weekend, and couldn't get over how cool it was and how it was almost beautiful to watch fly. They also did an Army Aviation reenactment trying to show what it was like in Vietnam. Watching a Cobra doing strafing passes and was are essentially Hammerheads at 200' to reverse its course was breathtaking. At the same time, one realizes what those machines' true purposes are.

"I want us avenged. I want the people who plan and execute these things brought down. I'm just very sad over what the human price tag will end up being."

Me too.

Kazz - I think, in my admittedly limited experience with BG1 (I moved on to 2 right after, and haven't gone back -- yet) that the easiest classes to play through the original are a fighter/thief and a ranger. If you want to keep 'maging,' I think a multiclassed fighter/mage would live long enough to develop good mage abilities.

The problem with multiclassed characters is that, once you start getting up there, it takes a really long time to level up...

Hmm. I saw that Scooter had some sort of elfie ranger-type that he played through all 3 games. I'll have to re-check that article and see what he thought of it, since he seems pretty rabid on these games.

Scooter, are you looking here? Any ideas?

Yeah, Scooter and I had almost identical parties, if I recall correctly, midway through BGII. I'm now nearing the end of BGII, preparing for the expansion pack.

Hey, in case anyone reading this can tell me -- any reason that I shouldn't go through Watcher's Keep now, just before chapter 7. I mean, is it really intended for expansion pack traversing, and not Shadows of Amn traversing, or does it matter?

It doesn't really.
I waited until the expansion pack before tackling it because I felt the conclusion to the main game was more pressing.

I recommend taking a week or two off if you can Michael. The expansion is great but I wish I had taken more time to... er... savor the end of the monumental task that was BG2 before heading off on another quest so soon.

-Andrew

Well, really, no more often than I get to play these days, I'm sure I'll have a week off whether or not I want to!

I've got plenty of diversions, though, if I need a breather. I've got a couple of unopened games around. I could always play one of those...

Really, the reason I started Watcher's Keep now is because I ventured into chapter 7 and felt like I could be better "prepared" to tackle all those Adamantine Golems. I really hate those things. My magic-heavy party doesn't fare all that well against creatures that are immune to magic...Some better weapons and another level or two would be helpful. (I know, I know, that's not very true to the spirit of an RPG, but chapter 7 just wasn't very fun as it was. I need to "beef up" a little.)

Actually, I originally backed up because I discovered that I missed the spot where I get Aerie brought back to life, and while I was back there I decided to take care of some other stuff. Watcher's Keep, I thought, would be good for experience.