World War 2 Trivia

1.) The heaviest tank ever built was the German Maus II-which weighed 192 tons. However, by the end of the war it had never reached an operational state.

2.) The Soviet Red Army once tried dogs to destroy enemy tanks. Dogs were trained to associate the underside of tanks with food and were fitted with 26lbs of explosive device trapped to their backs. Once the dog crawled under the tanks, the device detonates and explodes destroying the tank (and the dog). This strategy didn’t work much as planned as the dogs were trained using Soviet tanks so more likely to run under these than the German tanks. As many as 25 German tanks were put out of action this way during the battles for Stalingard and Kursk.

3.) One of the American light cruisers anchored at Pearl Harbour during the Japanese attack of December 1941 was the Phoenix. The Phoenix survived the attack unscathed. The Phoenix, at that time of her demise, was known as the General Belgrano.

4.) Everybody knows the name of the B-29 bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the Enola Gay. The aircraft responsible for the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki three days later is also a B-29, the Bock’s Car, and Nagasaki was not its original target – the intended target city was Kokura – which escaped as the bomber was under orders to attack only a clear target and the city was shrouded in smog at the time. Nagasaki was the first alternative target city.

5.) When World War II began, the U.S. government declared platinum as a strategic metal and its use in non-military applications, including jewelry was disallowed. To appease consumers who preferred platinum’s white luster, gold was substituted in platinum’s absence.

6.) During World War II, a German U-boat was sunk by a truck. The U-boat in question attacked a convoy in the Atlantic and then rose to see the effect. The merchant ship it sank had material strapped to its deck including a fleet of trucks, one of which was thrown in the air by the explosion, landing on the U-boat and breaking its back.

7.) The British Royal families are 100% German in origin; their original name was the House of Saxe-Coberg-Gothe. At the outbreak of World War II, they had to ‘de-Germanize’ themselves for fear of losing the throne. The name ‘Windsor’ was substituted, and was taken from one of the monarch’s castles. Queen Elizabeth II even had a cousin tried, and found guilty, at Nuremburg for war crimes.

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Airline Passenger Pre-screening Expected in 2009

A long-delayed government program designed to more accurately pre-screen the names of airline passengers against terror watch lists is expected to begin early next year.

Homeland Security Sec. Michael Chertoff announced the final rule of the program, Secure Flight, which would validate air traveler’s information so there’s less chance a person could be mistaken for someone else on a watch list. The program has been delayed several times because of privacy concerns.

Misidentification of passengers has been one of the biggest inconveniences in post-September 11 air travel, and widely known for putting Sen. Ted Kennedy, a few infants and thousands of innocent US residents through extensive searching and questioning before they were allowed to fly.

The FAA rules required that the airline only screen that passenger’s check baggage for explosives and not the passenger for carryon bags. Later versions of this program became controversial because of data mining elements that had aroused privacy concerns. Secure Flight does not include data mining which is the computerized searching of large databanks of information for clues to the identities of terrorists or criminals.

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Today in History: American Revolution; British naval fleet attacks Norfolk, Virginia

October 24, 1775 – Lord John Murray Dunmore, orders a British naval fleet of six ships to sail up the James River and into Hampton Creek to attack Patriot troops and destroy the town of Norfolk, Virginia. British Capt. Matthew Squire led the six ships into Hampton Creek and began bombarding the town with artillery and cannon fire, while a second contingent of British troops sailed ashore to begin engaging Patriots.

With reinforcements in place, the Patriots and militia pushed the British back to their ships, where the riflemen began picking off British troops from the decks of their vessels. Facing a humiliating defeat at the hands of an outnumbered local militia, Captain Squire ordered a full British retreat. In the unorganized and hurried withdrawal that followed, two British ships ran aground and were captured. The Patriots did not suffer a single fatality.

War Memorabilia

Space Tourist Gets His Money’s Worth

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The world’s latest space tourist, a computer game wizard and astronaut’s son who paid $30 million to fly to the space station, said Monday from orbit that he’s gotten his money’s worth.

With his 12-day adventure winding down this week, Richard Garriott said he felt fulfilled even before he rocketed away on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft on Oct. 12, thanks to all the training he got with astronauts and other space professionals.

Garriott said it’s been especially gratifying speaking from space with his father, retired astronaut Owen Garriott, 77, who flew on NASA’s first space station, Skylab, in 1973. The younger Garriott is the first American to follow a parent into space.

Back at NASA’s Florida launching site, meanwhile, attention was focused Monday on a mission that has been delayed. Space shuttle Atlantis was hauled off the launch pad and sent back to the hangar to wait until at least February for a trip to the Hubble Space Telescope.

Atlantis was originally scheduled to blast off this month on a mission to make various repairs and upgrade the telescope. But the Hubble broke down three weeks ago and stopped sending pictures, forcing NASA to figure out what went wrong and delay its mission until next year.

Shuttle Endeavour, now at the front of the flight lineup, will be moved from its launch pad to Atlantis’ spot this weekend. Endeavour had been poised to blast off as a rescue ship for Atlantis‘ crew if there was an emergency during the Hubble mission. Instead, Endeavour will carry seven astronauts to the space station on an equipment delivery mission; launch is targeted for Nov. 14.

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NASA Approves Hubble Plan

NASA is going ahead with a plan to restart the flow of science data from Hubble Space Telescope by routing around circuitry that failed a little more than two weeks ago. The unprecedented switchover is due to begin early Wednesday and if all goes well, the telescope would be beaming imagery back down to Earth by Friday.

The operation planned for this week will be done entirely by remote control from Hubble’s operations center on the Goddard campus in Maryland. Controllers will switch Hubble’s command and data handling system from the channel it was using known as Side A to a backup channel called Side B.

The very first image is due to show an internal lamp that is part of the apparatus for Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, which is currently inoperative due to an earlier glitch. The big upgrade for the telescope, involving the installation of two new instruments and the hoped-for repair of two others, will have to wait until Atlantis gets off the ground. NASA would also send up the spare command and data-handling unit for installation as a replacement part, assuming that the unit passes its ground testing. The telescope would continue to use Side B on the replacement unit.

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4 Killed in Helicopter Crash in Chicago Suburb

AURORA, Illinois – A medical helicopter crashed in a Chicago suburb, killing three crew members and a 13-month-old patient.

The transport helicopter was headed to the Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago from Valley West Hospital in Sandwich when it went down minutes before midnight, said Aurora police spokesman Sgt. Robb Wallers.

Children Memorial’s Hospital spokeswoman Julie Pesch initially said the little girl was being transported to the hospital because of epileptic seizures. She later said the child’s symptoms were not clear.

The helicopter belonged to the Air Angels, Inc., an emergency medical transport service based at Clow Airport in suburban Bolingbrook. Telephone calls to the Air Angels offices were not answered early Thurday.

However, Air Angels CEO Jim Adams told the Chicago Tribune that the helicopter’s crew included the pilot, nurse, and a paramedic employed by the company. He added the helicopter’s pilot did not report mechanical problems, and weather was not an issue.

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Houston TV Station Helicopter Crashes

CONROE, Texas – A Pilot and television camera operator died Monday October 13, when their helicopter crashed near Houston on the way to cover a news story, 2 dead.

KTRK, an affiliate of ABC, reported the helicopter it had leased was flying to the scene of a shooting when it crashed in a state forest near Conroe, on the northern edge of Houston’s suburbs.

Local stations showed video of burning trees and a pile of debris made up of pieces of the helicopter. The station’s SkyEye logo was partially visible on one piece.

The helicopter, Bell 206L4, was owned by Helicopters Inc., the company leases aircrafts to about 70 news organizations around the country.

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NASA to Push through Mars Lab Launch

NASA will push ahead with its plan for an October 2009 launch for the already over-budget Mars Science Laboratory despite ongoing technical and schedule difficulties all but certain to push the cost of the mission past $2 billion.

Officials in charge of NASA’s Mars program made the announcement Friday following a meeting with NASA Administrator Mike Griffin to discuss what to do about the mission in light of continued cost growth. Since mid-2006, MSL’s price tag has raised $300 million topping $1.9 billion in NASA’s latest public estimate.

Doug McCuistion, the director of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program said MSL will need more than $1.9 billion whether it launches as planned in October 2009 or its delayed two years later. McCuistion said NASA was not at liberty to say how much additional money MSL would need until it has a chance to square its budget needs with the White House and Congress.

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Plane Crash in Nepal Kills 18

KATMANDU, Nepal – A small airplane crashed and caught fire on Wednesday as it tried to land in foggy weather at a tiny mountain airport near Mount Everest killing 18 people, including 16 tourists from Germany, Australia and Nepal.

The 19-seat Yeti Airlines DeHavilland DHC-6 Twin Otter, which had taken off from Katmandu, snagged its wheels on a security fence during its landing at Lukla Airport, about 60 kilometers from Mount Everest.

The bodies of crash victims were flown back to Katmandu by military helicopter and were loaded by soldiers wearing jungle camouflage.

In 2005, nine passengers and three crew members survived a crash in a small Gorkha Airlines plane with minor injuries.

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India’s First Moon Mission

M. Annadurai, project head of India’s first unmanned mission said India will launch a locally built rocket for the country’s first unmanned mission to the moon on October 22. If there is any further delay of the launch, it will be because of the weather; otherwise, there are no technical difficulties, added Annadurai.

Originally, the launch was scheduled for April but delayed due to technical difficulties it has been given a window between October 20 and October 28 for takeoff from a southern India town.

It aims to map a three-dimensional atlas of the moon through high-resolution remote sensing and map the surface’s chemical and mineral composition.

As to future plans, India plans to send an astronaut into space by 2014 and a manned mission to moon by 2020. As part of preparations for that, it launched four satellites on a single rocket for the first time in January 2007, including one that was brought back to earth.

At least 16 Indian satellites currently orbit the earth, supporting telecommunications, TV broadcasting, earth observation, weather forecasting, remote education and healthcare.

India’s constellation of seven earth-observation satellites is the largest of its kind in the world, but its space program lags behind its Asian rival China, which in 2003 became only the third nation after the United States and the former Soviet Union to launch a man into space aboard its own rocket.

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