Archive for January, 2009

If you did a Google search between 6:30 a.m. PST and 7:25 a.m. PST this
morning, you likely saw that the message "This site may harm your
computer" accompanied each and every search result.

According to Google, "This was clearly an
error, and we are very sorry for the inconvenience caused to our users."

How did this happen?

We periodically update that list and released one such update to the site this morning. Unfortunately
(and here's the human error), the URL of '/' was mistakenly checked in
as a value to the file and '/' expands to all URLs. Fortunately, our
on-call site reliability team found the problem quickly and reverted
the file. Since we push these updates in a staggered and rolling
fashion, the errors began appearing between 6:27 a.m. and 6:40 a.m. and
began disappearing between 7:10 and 7:25 a.m., so the duration of the
problem for any particular user was approximately 40 minutes.

Piper Seneca Crash

From WTRF:

Plane Crash Near Tri-State Airport In Wayne County - WTRF-TV - WTRF.com

KENOVA -- According to the Federal Aviation Administration, the
plane was a twin-engine Piper PA-34 registered to Wesvin Inc. of
Wilmington, Delaware. The Piper PA-34 aircraft is configured to seat
six.

Tower controllers at Tri-State Airport in Wayne County tell the
National Weather Service they lost radar contact with the plane about
three miles southeast of Tri-State Airport. That is in the area of the
intersection of Route 75 and Plymale Branch Road near Lavelette.

Walter Stroud lives near the crash site. He was in his garage this
afternoon and heard the plane fly very low over his home. He went
outside and saw the plane bank hard for a turn before it hit a
high-voltage power line and burst into a fireball. Stroud says he lost
sight of the plane as it disappeared over the trees.

At the time the plane went down, the National Weather Service reports
wind out of the west at 5 mph, visibility was 2 miles with light snow
and the broken cloud deck was at 1000 feet. The temperature at the time
was 27 degrees.

Route 75 was closed for about an hour, but has now re-opened. Traffic
is moving slowly, however, drivers are blocked from Plymale Branch
Road.

Emergency crews were quick to respond. West Virginia State Police and
Wayne County Sheriffs deputies have secured the area. Volunteer
firefighters from Ceredo, Kenova, Lavalette and England Hill are also
on scene. Power crews are also there trying to deal with the downed
power lines. Workers from the West Virginia Division of Highways have
been working to clear Plymale Branch Road so crews can get to the crash
site.

Redoubt Volcano

Here are some links to the Redoubt Volcano in Alaska that is currently making the news:

Flight 1549 game

Video game simulates Hudson plane landing -- Newsday.com

Want to be like Sully? The crash-landing of US Airways Flight 1549 into the Hudson River has inspired a free online video game: "Hero on the Hudson."

The game gives players a scenario - "Both engines are out. The plane is too low and too slow to make it to the airport. You decide to make emergency landing in the river" - and allows a player to control the aircraft using the computer keyboard's left and right arrows.

With a successful landing in the water, you are a hero just like pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, whose skill meant the survival of all 155 people on Flight 1549. If you don't land the plane successfully, it unceremoniously crashes and sinks in the digital river.

"I think it's natural for someone to want to capitalize on a sensational event like that," said Todd Wissing of Raleigh, N.C., an 18-year veteran pilot with American Airlines. Though Wissing had not heard of the game, he said, "It sounds like it might not be in the best taste, but the fact that the event itself had a happy ending makes it a bit more palatable."

The game elicited mixed feelings yesterday from some of the flight's survivors.

"People are crazy," laughed Diane Higgins, 58, from her home upstate in Goshen. "They have nothing better to do with their time, I guess."

Others, however, were given pause.

"All of this is still so fresh and new," said Alexandra Spera, 39, of Charlotte, N.C., whose husband, Vince, was a passenger on the flight. "To inject humor into it? I don't know if I'm ready yet."

The video game by Orbs Games Limited - which lists its chief executive as Andriy Sharanevych of Kiev, Ukraine - was the featured game Friday on the Web site Tastyplay.com. Players gave it 31/2 stars on a five-star scale.

According to his biography on an online social networking site, Sharanevych has a bachelor's degree from National Technical University of Ukraine in Kiev and operates several video-game Web sites. He responded Friday to an initial e-mail, but did not answer questions sent via a subsequent e-mail.

To veteran pilots such as Bob Ober of East Setauket - a pilot with Delta Air Lines and a simulation instructor for more than 15 years who had not played the game - the game is "not the least bit representative of being a pilot."

And, he said, one doesn't have to be a pilot to see the game is tasteless. "It would be like if they made a video game of an execution," he said.

Flight 1549 Game:

Music in the Geico Commercial is…

The music is in the Geico commercial where the two caveman are on their motorcycles is, The Sounds - "Hurt You".

The music in the Geico commercial where the cavemen is on the moving sidewalk at the escalator is "Remind Me" by Royksopp.

And the latest music is a remake of "Somebody's Watching Me" by Mysto & Pizzi which you can download directly from the Geico website.

Free Youtube Font – Alternate Gothic No.2

Found a free place to download the font used in the Youtube logo.  Check it out:

http://www.fontstock.net/download/11412/Alternate-Gothic-No2-BT.html