Twin Tours TV show

MDNick · Feb 7, 2002

Harv,

Kinda agree with you. It was a bit less than I was hoping for I guess. It was informative as you said in some aspects.

I really feel for the design engineer. As an engineer, he probably knows deep down that it's collapse wasn't his fault, but that would not make the pain any less. When the little stuff I work on fails and all it means as I have to try again, I feel like a failure. Can't imagine what it must be like for him. I guess that's why he makes the big bucks, big risks.

It bothered me somewhat that all the scrap metal is going to some recycler in the far east. Don't we do anything ourselves anymore?

Nick

pdxman · Feb 7, 2002

Nick, agree with you on my feelings for the design engineer. You could tell he was emotionally strained by the occurance with 'his building'. He said that what occured was outside the boundries of thinking at the time it was designed. I didn't catch all of it, but they did have structural design considerations in the event a Boeing 707 hit the building (lost in fog). Boeing 707 was the common plane in those days and the 767 of today has much more devastation capability.

I was also disturbed that the beams were being cut up for smeltering in Asia. Did you see the large loader try to remove one of those beams from the truck? Thing was so huge it shook the camera when it fell. Imagine it falling from the building.

njrqs · Feb 7, 2002

Bird

Have sent you a PM on the matter.

If this comes through, we can say that the TBN spirit will live in Australia with some Physical property of a fellow US TBN'er !!!

Cheers

Bird · Feb 8, 2002

Got it, Neil. I'll get it in the mail.

Wingnut · Feb 8, 2002

Dumb question, maybe ... but I'll jusmp in anyway.
Do you use NTSC signals over in Oz, Neil? I'd hate to see Bird go to all that trouble to no end.
I thought that the use of the several flavours of PAL were used everywhere except here in the USofA.

WingNut

MDNick · Feb 8, 2002

Won't matter so long as his VCR can run VHS, and that is what he mentioned up above. Or am I missing the boat too?

Bird · Feb 8, 2002

Wingnut, I'm like MDNick (or worse). I haven't the foggiest notion what you're talking about with "NTSC signals" and "PAL", but anyway it's a plain vanilla VHS T-120 tape so I think it'll work in Neil's machine./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Wingnut · Feb 9, 2002

Sorry Bird ... not trying to confuse matters but I was just trying to make sure you weren't wasting a whole lotta time and stamps for nothing.
Yes ... VHS is VHS ... but TV is not TV. It's the signal (ie. PAl vs NTSC) that dictates HOW it gets recorded on the video tape. It you record on a NTSC vcr and he tries to watch it on a PAL vcr .. the results are ... well, incredibly ugly, and impossible to watch.
I may be a little bit off here ... but I believe the major difference is in the scan lines ... think trying to watch the new HDTV (high definition) on a normal TV ... the new signal has twice the scan lines ... so you only see half the picture ... in horizontal streaks across the screen.
SO ... you just want to make sure that his vcr is the same signal type.
To make it realy simple ... we all speak languages ... but they're not all the same???

Bird · Feb 9, 2002

OK, Wingnut, I've got the idea (notice I didn't say I understand 'cause I still don't understand how you can send a picture through the air to a TV set, or how these computin' contraptions work)./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

At any rate, I guess we'll find out the answer to your question eventually 'cause I mailed that VHS tape this morning. That was also kind of an interesting experience. Our small town post office normally only has one person there; the postmistress. However, since it's Saturday and she's on a day off, her substitute was there. The poor lady took one look at the package, and asked, "Where's the zip code." I showed her there is a number between "Queensland" and "Australia" and told her I didn't know if they called it a zip code in Australia. So she weighed it on one scales, then tried a different scales, and after 2 or 3 attempts, pronounced it to be 13 ounces. I told her that was fine, my scales showed slightly under 12 ounces, but I'd go for the 13. I told her to just send it the cheapest way. So after a long pause while she stared at the package and the scales, she went to a bulletin board and thumbed through some papers there, then she went around a partition and I could see that she was thumbing through papers there. Then she went to a telephone and called someone, and told me, "He has a computer." There was a long conversation, but eventually they came up with a price, and while she was still on the phone, she went to another "bin?", looked through it, and came up with a form for me to fill out to state (in less than 2 inches) exactly what was in the package (easy enough "VHS cassette tape). Then I had to fill out the sender's name and address, the recipient's name and address, the value of the contents, whether it was a "gift", "commercial" (or something else, I've forgotten what), and sign in two places that it did not contain anything that was illegal to send in the mail, and acknowledging the fact that the form would be kept on file by the post office for 30 days./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif I'll bet it was the first time that gal has ever seen a piece of mail going outside the USA./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

MossRoad · Feb 9, 2002

That's a great story. I remember going to the 5 and 10 as a kid and they had a little post office in the back. He knew everybody and everybody knew him. I miss those days, and I'm only 41 /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif