vantazach

we have to burn more oil, so we can melt the ice, so we can raise the sea, so we can burn more oil

the strait might actually be getting wider and deeper with each bomb, so...

The Fast and the Curious?

As soon as they refuse unlawful orders, and I’m a veteran saying that.

everyone's laughing at the shoes but it's actually a far more humane way of hobbling them than the old methods

can you really blame them?

these Iranians are doing more about the Epstein class than almost anyone in the US government is

I'll bet the FBI expected to trace them during the zoom call. Impressive if the hacker dodged that too

what in the world

he's totally frozen by the question until Leavitt gives him an out at 0:18 when she says "You don't know"

I've heard it's very nice this time of year

deleted a couple of posts I had sourced from the Maldives Times because I don't think it's real news

I have some bad news for the Iranians about Trump commitments

reaching previously only theoretical levels of Finding Out

(Guardian) — Iran has spurned two messages from Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, seeking a ceasefire as its leaders sense it is not losing the war and the US president is at the minimum feeling the political pressure.

@theguardian.com
www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

for me too. I didn't know how insidious they could be

wikipedia says "counter-mining" is usually the last resort, so I think you're probably right

Mobile mine The mine is propelled to its intended position by propulsion equipment such as a torpedo. After reaching its destination, it sinks to the seabed and operates like a standard mine. It differs from the homing mine in that its mobile stage is set before it lies in wait, rather than as part of the attacking phase. One such design is the Mk 67 Submarine Launched Mobile Mine[61] (which is based on a Mark 37 torpedo), capable of traveling as far as 16 km (10 mi) through or into a channel, harbour, shallow water area, and other zones which would normally be inaccessible to craft laying the device. After reaching the target area they sink to the sea bed and act like conventionally laid influence mines.

probably (?) not something Iran is using, but who knows what's for sale out there

Modern influence mines are designed to discriminate against false inputs and are, therefore, much harder to sweep. They often contain inherent anti-sweeping mechanisms. For example, they may be programmed to respond to the unique noise of a particular ship-type, its associated magnetic signature and the typical pressure displacement of such a vessel. As a result, a mine-sweeper must accurately mimic the required target signature to trigger detonation. The task is complicated by the fact that an influence mine may have one or more of a hundred different potential target signatures programmed into it.[97] Another anti-sweeping mechanism is a ship-counter in the mine fuze. When enabled, this allows detonation only after the mine fuze has been triggered a pre-set number of times. To further complicate matters, influence mines may be programmed to arm themselves (or disarm automatically—known as self-sterilization) after a pre-set time. During the pre-set arming delay (which could last days or even weeks) the mine would remain dormant and ignore any target stimulus, whether genuine or false.[97] When influence mines are laid in an ocean minefield, they may have various combinations of fuze settings configured. For example, some mines (with the acoustic sensor enabled) may become active within three hours of being laid, others (with the acoustic and magnetic sensors enabled) may become active after two weeks but have the ship-counter mechanism set to ignore the first two trigger events, and still others in the same minefield (with the magnetic and pressure sensors enabled) may not become armed until three weeks have passed. Groups of mines within this mine-field may have different target signatures which may or may not overlap. The fuzes on influence mines allow many different permutations, which complicates the clearance process.[97]

once you put a computer and enough sensors on a mine, you can do all kinds of fun tricks like respond only to particular combinations of magnetic signature, noise profile, and pressure displacement

The bubble jet effect occurs when a mine or torpedo detonates in the water a short distance away from the targeted ship. The explosion creates a bubble in the water, and due to the difference in pressure, the bubble will collapse from the bottom. The bubble is buoyant, and so it rises towards the surface. If the bubble reaches the surface as it collapses, it can create a pillar of water that can go over a hundred meters into the air (a "columnar plume"). If conditions are right and the bubble collapses onto the ship's hull, the damage to the ship can be extremely serious; the collapsing bubble forms a high-energy jet similar to a shaped charge that can break a metre-wide hole straight through the ship, flooding one or more compartments, and is capable of breaking smaller ships apart. The crew in the areas hit by the pillar are usually killed instantly. Other damage is usually limited.[85]

modern mines don't aim to blow a hole in a ship directly, it's more effective create and collapse a giant bubble under it to generate the "bubble jet effect": a pillar of water like a shaped charge that can punch through the ship or even lift and drop it enough to break the keel

Since World War II, mines have damaged 14 United States Navy ships, whereas air and missile attacks have damaged four. During the Korean War, mines laid by North Korean forces caused 70% of the casualties suffered by US naval vessels and caused 4 sinkings.[40]

since WWII, mines are a little over three times as successful as air and missile attacks against USN ships

Moored contact mines with plummet Sequence of laying a moored contact mine with a plummet A special form of moored contact mines are those equipped with a plummet. When the mine is launched (1), the mine with the anchor floats first and the lead plummet sinks from it (2). In doing so, the plummet unwinds a wire, the deep line, which is used to set the depth of the mine below the water surface before it is launched (3). When the deep line has been unwound to a set length, the anchor is flooded and the mine is released from the anchor (4). The anchor begins to sink and the mooring cable unwinds until the plummet reaches the sea floor (5). Triggered by the decreasing tension on the deep line, the mooring cable is clamped. The anchor continues sinking down to the bottom of the sea, pulling the mine below the water surface to a depth equal to the length of the deep line (6). Thus, even without knowing the exact seafloor depth, an exact depth of the mine below the water surface can be set, limited only by the maximum length of the mooring cable.

clever mechanism for setting a mine a chosen distance below the surface without knowing the water depth

The Germans developed a pressure-activated mine and planned to deploy it as well, but they saved it for later use when it became clear the British had defeated the magnetic system. The US also deployed these, adding "counters" which would allow a variable number of ships to pass unharmed before detonating.[36] This made them a great deal harder to sweep.[36]

what's worse than a mine that goes off when a ship passes it? a mine that waits for some number of ships to pass and then goes off for the next one

Their flexibility and cost-effectiveness make mines attractive to the less powerful belligerent in asymmetric warfare. The cost of producing and laying a mine is usually between 0.5% and 10% of the cost of removing it, and it can take up to 200 times as long to clear a minefield as to lay it. Parts of some World War II naval minefields still exist because they are too extensive and expensive to clear.[2] Some 1940s-era mines may remain dangerous for many years.[3]

each day of mine laying can create over six months of removal effort

he was just following (executive) orders

this junkballing Czech electrician is a folk hero in Japan for striking out Ohtani in the last WBC (stopped for photos/autographs etc) but he's retiring after this bc Czech league ball doesn't pay the bills.
I love the way he took in in this one last surreal moment before going back to normalcy

and that was their argument, that it will speed up review. I don't disagree that whitespace should be consistent, but it also doesn't require a datacenter to reformat the file the way they want

clients reviewing my first code for them yesterday were super happy with the design and function, but noticed some inconsistent whitespace and asked, incredulously, "did you not use copilot for this??" now I've been assigned a license and instructed to use it... to do formatting 😭

I'd greet them as liberators

I think firing missiles from a school is better than firing missiles at a school, actually