A year ago, we were getting ready to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing.
In a thrilling and ridiculous effort, I wrote 50 pieces in 50 days, for @FastCompany leading up to that anniversary, July 20, 1969 — all about what it was like to fly to the Moon.
2/ Going to the Moon was itself a thrilling and ridiculous effort.
When Kennedy said 'to the Moon!' in May 1961, it was an impossible task.
98 months later, Armstrong & Aldrin were bouncing around on the Moon.
3/ The race to the Moon required the best of Americans. And not just the best of American leaders.
It required the best of ordinary Americans.
Because it was ordinary Americans who did the work to get Armstrong & Aldrin to the Moon — inspired by the mission & the work.
4/ The race to the Moon is, in that way, the perfect story alongside the times we're living in now.
In the 1960s, we changed the world. Not just the world of space travel.
Civil rights. Education. Poverty. Feminism. Space travel. Rock and roll.
1969 and 1959 were an era apart.
5/ Over the next 50 days, I'm going to re-fire each of those '50 Days to the Moon' pieces (which are permanently collected on their own pages @FastCompany).
The people who took us to the Moon were bold & imaginative & determined — and also just like us.
On the bridge of the container ship Dali, 4 minutes from disaster, there's one critical moment we haven't heard about yet.
The very moment the ship lost power the 1st time.
What did the pilot do, right then?
His first thought, apparently, was safety — the bridge looming ahead.
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⤵️ NTSB photo of the bridge of the Dali...
2/ The 1st 'event' leading up to the collision that the NTSB notes in its timeline is 1:24:59—when alarms on the bridge indicate power failure.
The ship was without electricity, engine power, lights, navigation, radio.
Dali was dark, literally & in terms of communications.
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3/ The first thing the pilot did — apparently within the first 30 to 60 seconds of the ship going dark — was take out his cell phone and call harbor pilot dispatch.
He told his dispatcher: We've lost power, close the bridge. Close the bridge.
Sam Bankman Fried sentenced to 25 years in federal prison for the FTX crypto fraud.
Below from @WSJ — a great chart comparing him to other major white collar criminals.
SBF gets a decade more than Jeff Skilling from Enron. Twice as long as Elizabeth Holmes.
2/ Here's the WSJ account of this morning's sentencing hearing.
US Dist Judge Lewis Kaplan said he thought SBF was a risk to commit future fraud if freed; didn't seem to tell the truth on the stand; and lacked 'any real remorse.'