From Geekosystem: [This is a must watch video / safe for work]
On Wednesday, thousands of Springfield, Ohio residents were left without power when a 275-foot smokestack being demolished fell the wrong way, knocking down two 12,500 volt power lines and crushing “several pieces of power equipment,” including a building that stored backup generators.
According to the demolition company that handled the work at the former Ohio Edison Mad River Power Plant (not a nuclear power plant –Ed.), the explosives detonated correctly, “but an undetected crack on the south side of the tower pulled it in a different direction. ‘Nobody’s happy with things that go wrong in life, and sometimes it’s out of our hands and beyond anybody’s prediction. … We’re all extremely thankful no one was injured,’ Kelly told The Columbus Dispatch.”
Watch the video below:
I can think of many metaphors for what this wayward tower represents: politics, the economy, and climate change come to mind. Anyone think of some specific metaphors…?
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j ferguson says:
November 12, 2010 at 8:12 pm
What? A tipping point behind us?
“Tipping Point” Pro CAGW
Or
“Unintended Consequences” Anti CAGW
It brought to mind this picture: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_FnVmmpOGmaM/TFGQFVl7SgI/AAAAAAAAAEs/03Wc2AykJFw/s640/demolition+of+own+tower.jpg
A picture which I think provides a metaphor for the personal challenge faced by any CO2 alarmist trying to back down from previous over-the-top claims and assertions.
My dad was an expert bushman and once got the contract to fell the enormous square-section brick chimney at the old and derelict local brick works. He used similar methods as he would for felling a tree, except for attaching a very long and heavy rope to the top, the other end tied to the back of his truck. He then removed bricks on one side as a scarf to create a ‘hinge’ on the opposing side. When he was satisfied the scarf was about right, he walked to his truck, climbed in and drove quietly away. The chimney measured its length behind the truck. No drama, no fancy hard hats or two-way radios, but no spectators either and a team of us to keep rubberneckers out of the drop zone. And a huge, very long heap of second-hand bricks.
Fred’s method wouldn’t be allowed today, much too much polution and adding to global warming.
Responsibilty is for some a burden to heavy. One can only hope that something unforeseen may be of help!
Contractor to parents of children spectators:
“No, you can not have our demolition research data! We have 25 years or so invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?”
Don’t you just love it when a plan falls apart!?
I have the perfect computer model for this 🙂
http://www.wildebeestgames.com/detonate.htm
(and it only costs you a lousy 5 euro’s)
Having some logging experience, I have found that trees do not always obey the intentions of the guy with the chainsaw.
John
Perhaps the Moon was in the Seventh House and Jupiter aligned with Mars ….
And note that good old Fred Dibnah didn’t need a hi-viz jacket or hard hat. Just his flat cap and dirty overalls. He was confident enough to stand only a few yards away even as it came down. What a man!
Joe Romm has endless rants about tipping points. Here we have one. This one is not reversible.
Prior to the explosion a spokesman for The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Chimney Change) said:
“Chimneys will fall to the right, this is attributable to human activities.”
National and international science academies and scientific societies have assessed the current scientific opinion, in particular on recent chimney events. These assessments have largely followed or endorsed the Intergovernmental Panel on Chimney Change (IPCC) position of January 2001 which states:
An increasing body of observations gives a collective picture of chimney change in the world and, other changes in the chimney system… There is new and stronger evidence that most of the chimneys observed falling to the right over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities.
No scientific body of national or international standing has maintained a dissenting opinion; the last was the American Association of Chimney Geologists, which in 2007 updated its 1999 statement rejecting the likelihood of human influence on recent chimneys falling, with its current non-committal position.
The Consensus position is that chimneys will fall to the right.
…Soot imbalance… Too much toward the left and the disastrous results….
There was a definitely artificial blast right at the end of the video. Pretty obviously an unexploded charge.
Who was the idiot that decided to put a whole group of schoolchildren underneath a live high-voltage line that was within falling range of the tower? That’s risking a lot of lives based on a risky calculation that, in this case, went bad.
Further from the IPCC spokesman: “We must mitigate for the impacts of chimneys falling to the right, we must regulate the space in the right hand shadow of all chimneys, governments must introduce a chimney tax to raise the funds immediately”
WUWT blogger said ” Have these “chimney scientists” even checked the angle of the dangle? Their models seem flawed, but they will not let us see the data!”
“Authorities with OSHA said they will not investigate because no one was injured”
What?
“We had a near miss that we could learn valuable safety lessons from but because no one got injured this time we won’t bother”
Sheesh!
Confirmation Bias and colossally bad safety practices. They were planning only for THEIR scenario, not taking into account that it might not turn out that way.
All accidents are preventable. And this outcome should have been considered and provided for.
This is your Planet.
This is your Planet in the hands of “Expert Data Adjusters”.
Even bigger Demo outfits plan on setting charges to the Planets’ climate, based on modeled outcomes.
Say ‘No’ to Climate Drugs.
The undetected crack happened when the smokestack was whacked with a hockey stick.
Hockey sticks cause all sorts of tall structures to improperly collapse, including ivory towers.
(Blue Note: About half of the population should be aware of how a whack from a hockey stick can cause their own long round structures to improperly collapse.)
☺
MjC says:
November 12, 2010 at 5:50 pm
No comment on the metaphors. However, here’s another implosion that went wrong: The Zip Feed Mill, in Sioux Falls, SD, on Dec 3, 2005.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7118529355131061026#
==============================
This one –so amazingly smooth, elegant and efficient– was managed by nothing fancier than a spontaneous arrangement of random natural forces. Not even explosives were needed.
Fred Dibnah again.
tallbloke says:
November 13, 2010 at 6:47 am
“Authorities with OSHA said they will not investigate because no one was injured” What?
“We had a near miss that we could learn valuable safety lessons from but because no one got injured this time we won’t bother”
Sheesh!
Tallbloke I’ve been around my share of aviation accidents, and I can’t say how many times I have seen the NTSB and FAA call “Pilot Error” when the accident scene
has wreckage scattered over a mile, in a line where the aircraft started falling apart.
including the remains of the engine that just blew up….
Could it be a metaphor for what has happened to the supposedly well planned scientific tower of Babble campaign against CO2? But then a crack began to appear in the foundation. When the tower of CO2 Babble fell, it cut off their [you fill in the blank].
The Climategate and Amazongate blasts to the base of the already-weakened CAGW/CC/CD monolith have it tottering, on the verge of total collapse. Exactly how, and in which direction it will fall is anyone’s guess, due to a myriad of cracks and fault lines. Those with common sense, like the child, will run, and its collapse will cause a great deal of damage to science and to careers. But, mankind will persevere, and perhaps emerge from the mayhem somewhat wiser.