(((Charles Fishman))) 💧 Profile picture
Jun 13, 2020 7 tweets 3 min read Read on X
You can't talk about flying to the Moon in the 1960s without talking about smoking. About cigarettes.

People building spaceships smoked.
People running Moon missions smoked.
Astronauts smoked.
America smoked.

fastcompany.com/90359002/why-y…

#Apollo51 Image
2/ Apollo was shrouded in smoke.

The MD who helped pick the first astronauts smoked.

Mission Control smelled of stale cigarettes, 24 hours a day.

One Apollo astronaut who smoked bummed a cigarette from a sailor who helped recovered him and his crewmates in the Pacific.
3/ This is #7 in the series I did last summer on the race to the Moon in the 1960s @FastCompany.

50 small moments from the incredible effort it took us to get to the Moon, leading up to the July 20, 1969 anniversary.

Those stories are perfect for this moment, too.
4/ During the 1960s — a decade of tumult and change that transformed race, politics, protest, gender, music, sex — ordinary Americans accomplished something that was impossible when they started:

They flew people to the Moon.

First 10 in series here:

fastcompany.com/section/50-day… Image
5/ Americans can do what we set out to do, what we determined to do.

In the 1960s, we just did it much of the time while smoking a cigarette.

fastcompany.com/90359002/why-y…
6/ If you have a few moments this Saturday evening, you should watch the video of the press conference introducing the first US astronauts.

Not only are many of the key figures smoking—the doctor who picked the astronauts, the astronauts themselves—they are doing it on TV.
7/ We tend to romanticize the 1950s & 1960s. Those Americans did great things.

But the US, & the world, are much better in so many ways than they were then, for most people.

The fact we don't blow smoke at each other anymore is just a small example.

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More from @cfishman

Mar 29
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.

—>

⤵️ NTSB photo of the bridge of the Dali...Image
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.

—>
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.

—>
Read 20 tweets
Mar 28
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. Image
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.'

—>

(Open free link)
wsj.com/finance/curren…
3/ Sentencings aren't the art of comparative justice.

But I'm not sure SBF's crimes are worse than Skilling at Enron or Holmes at Theranos.

Skilling has been free since Feb 2019.
Read 4 tweets
Mar 27
Again, a moment to pause & appreciate the cool professionalism of those in & around the Key Bridge at 1:24 am Tuesday.

Ship’s pilot radios in that ship has lost steerage & will hit bridge.

Someone (maritime control?) transmits urgent alert to Maryland/Balt police dispatch…

—>
2/ Police dispatched with just a few crisp phrases—ship has lost steering, close the bridge to traffic—and race to do just that.

No time for confusion. No time for … ‘What do you mean, close the bridge? Who says?’

4 minutes, alert to collapse.

Bridge successfully closed…

—>
3/ That’s amazing. Again, a system worked—a government system.

All those people just ordinary frontline workers in anonymous, sometimes invisible jobs.

Maritime radio operators. Police/fire dispatchers. Bridge police & state police.

All working 11p to 7a o’night shift.

—>
Read 9 tweets
Jan 6
Pause just a moment this evening & appreciate something from 24 hours ago:

An Alaska Air 737 had a hole torn in the side of it in flight.

The plane was 3 miles up, flying at 400 mph.

It stayed intact. The pilots landed in minutes. No one was seriously injured.

Incredible. —>
2/ For the people on board, it was a harrowing, even terrifying, few minutes.

But the training, aircraft design, engineering, safety, inspections — the fail-safe system worked.

Something went wrong. But that failure was stopped.

Great WSJ story…
wsj.com/business/airli…
3/ We often roll our eyes at how 'government never gets anything right' or 'government doesn't work.'

Air travel in the US and worldwide is super-safe. It's safer than walking along your own street.

Because the gov't, the safety agencies, the airlines, all work together.

—>
Read 10 tweets
Jul 24, 2023
I was nudged to wear a pink pullover to go see Barbie yesterday evening.

Barbie was a great movie — remarkable balance of camp, satire, serious & storytelling.

Really hard to pull all that off. The actual movie-making—set design, costumes, directing—is artful & absorbing.

—>
2/ Fun movie-making, fun movie-watching, just provocative enough.

Half the people streaming into our DC-area theater were wearing pink. You could spot Barbie moviegoers 3 blocks away.

That was cool. A brief burst of community. 'They're going to Barbie too!'

And…a mystery!
3/ Barbie The Movie often mocks, and outright critiques, Barbie the Toy.

Not gently or obliquely. Sharply.

At one point, a teen girl shouts: Barbie, you're a fascist!

Just to be clear: Barbie The Movie is a product of Mattel—the company that owns & sells Barbie the Toy.

Whoa!
Read 15 tweets
Jun 23, 2023
James Cameron is being interviewed by Anderson Cooper on CNN now...

'It certainly wasn't a surprise today.'

The submersible apparently dropped some ballast weights, Cameron says, in effort to abort dive.

He says pilot must have heard hull starting to delaminate & took action.
2/ Cameron on the carbon composite material as the hull of the submersible:

'It's completely inappropriate for this use.'

Wow. Says carbon composite is wrong material for 'external pressure' vessels — ie, subs — v. internal pressure vessels, like scuba tanks.

—>
3/ Cameron says carbon composites do NOT hold up under heavy pressure in successive dive cycles.

They deteriorate, unlike steel hulls. And that deterioration is hard to detect.

'This is known,' Cameron says. They picked wrong material, despite decades of science to contrary.
Read 6 tweets

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