Friday, March 22, 2019

Stupid Idea Dept.























Story.

11 comments:

Jess said...

I can see where they would work, but would hate to clean one up after use. Then again, it makes it easier to find the bodies.

Anonymous said...

There really is one born every minute.
Only two ways to guarantee survival in a tsunami. Go out to sea into deep water, or get to high ground inland.
These things are going to kill people.

horsewithnonick said...

"In Soviet Dumbfuckistan, Tide pod eats you!"

Anonymous said...

Actually They came up with those in Japan after the Fukushima disaster. They plan to plant dozens of them in front of elementary schools in the flood zones. They got the Idea after finding a twenty year old teacher who had tied all of her kinder garden class together and then tried to get them to some place high enough to beat the wave. She and at least three other teachers died trying to save thirty babies. One of the teachers husbands is an engineer and came up with this as a way to at least give the babies ,small children and the teachers who would rather die than abandon them, and couldn't run away, a CHANCE at survival. It may not be the perfect solution. But IMO it is better than trying to tie 30 crying babies as high up a pine tree as you can . Then sing happy songs with them while watching death come. It may not be a perfect solution. But any hope would be better than that. The story was in Japan Today a couple of years back. --Ray

Anonymous said...

google the AAR for the Cascadia Rising MASSEX. Especially read the non-govt ones from hams and cert teams that participated, as those are more frank.

Remember that they were ready for the exercise, and fully staffed when they started.

Bottom line, FEMA changed their 'official' recommendation from 72hrs of self sufficiency to TWO WEEKS.

We all know 72 hrs is not enough, so for them to change to 2 weeks really means MUCH LONGER.

The amount of money they've spent moving critical infrastructure, schools, and medical facilities tells me they are taking the risk seriously. In other words, it's likely and it's devastating.

nick

Wayne said...

The tsunami is over. “Open the pod bay doors, HAL.”
“I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that “

Anonymous said...

No google account. Can't comment over there..
.
Cute, but can you go over Niagara Falls in it?
.
NSF

Nicus said...

I live on a remote section of the Washington coast, about 1,500 ft inland at 50 ft elevation. As such I'm definitely tsunami bait, so I've given a lot of thought to what happens when a 9.0 quake hits. Its impossible to crawl, walk, run, drive or otherwise relocate during the quake itself. Its just too violent. If you survive the apocalyptic shake that will last 4-5 minutes(!), you only have 10-15 minutes left to get to high ground before the water rises. Considering the often twisted state the land and forests are in after a really big quake along with liquefaction of the ground, it could be very slow going (see the 9.2 Alaska quake in 1964). High ground for me is 2 miles away.

About the only alternative is something like the pod shown in the picture. If you watch videos of the Japan quake in 2011 (I've studied hours of them), you will notice that boats survive quite well. A ruggedly built floating vessel has a good change of saving your life. There is also a good chance it will be swept out to sea when the waters recede. There were several people in Japan and even a dog found alive and uninjured several miles offshore atop the house roofs they were on when the tsunami hit. You could easily find yourself floating 5 miles offshore with rescue units far to busy onshore to spend any time searching the offshore debris fields. A missing element in the pod is some kind of self locomotion. I'd like to be able to power back to shore on my own once the aftershocks die down.

Felix Bellator said...

Add emergency locator beacon....

Aesop said...

@Nicus:

You've self-selected for Darwinian culling in a tsunami event.
It's free country.

But I would note that a bottle of Bombay Sapphire, Johnnie Walker Blue, or a really fine single malt would go for a lot less to assuage regret over your choices on the day than wasting money on a Tide Pod.

Tal Hartsfeld said...

Nothing like a false sense of security in what's an impossible situation to begin with.
Normal people are all the same: Whatever happens, no matter how tragic or disastrous, the individual always insists on being reassured that they'll come out of it alive, if not entirely unscathed, and that things can "get back to normal" as soon as possible so they can pick up and continue on with their life.