Today I Learned (Volume 2)
talking points: hew draper's graffiti, the airplane that could only turn right, counting cats, and internet rabbitholes about a temporary city in the desert
Small bites of information to start your week.
Hew Draper
One of the best-known pieces of Tower of London graffiti is this magnificent item:
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Hew Draper was your average 16th century English innkeeper, by many accounts, but it seems someone had it out for him. In 1560, Draper was thrown into the Tower under accusations of sorcery1, reportedly for placing a curse on a noblewoman and her husband.
Draper insisted on his innocence, claiming he’d been previously interested in magic but had burnt all his magical books. This magnificent astrological carving seems to indicate a depth of astronomical knowledge beyond mere curiosity. It’s a fascinating contrast to the rest of the Tower graffiti, much of which is poorly-done standard Christian motifs.
What happened to Draper? According to The Guardian, his fate was lost to history. At least we still have this grim piece of art.
Flight 232
Takeaway: request the book Flight 232 by Laurence Gonzales and read it with great speed.
United Airlines Flight 232 was supposed to be one of those boring Wednesday flights between boring American cities. It was “Children’s Day”, so 52 children were aboard the flight, many traveling alone.
Everything was fine, until it wasn’t.
Titanium, it turns out, is quite particular, and can get nasty impurities when exposed to air while being turned from titanium ore into titanium airplane parts. One such impurity, called a hard alpha2 inclusion, causes the metal to become brittle.
The “fan disk” (big spinny thing inside one of the airplane engines) on this particular flight had this type of impurity. Every time the engine ran over 18 years of service, a cavity with microscopic cracks grew.
On this particular Wednesday in July 1989, the fan disk cracked until it shattered, and it took all three of the airplane’s hydraulic lines (and the ability to operate most of the plane’s “control surfaces”) with it.
The plane could no longer turn left. In fact, it could barely stay in the air.
Yet despite this, through a combination of luck3 and skill4 and ever-lower right turns, the plane made it to Sioux City airport, and made it to the ground. 184 people (more than half) survived an unsurvivable scenario, some with not even a scratch on them.
(The book, mentioned up top, is a real nail-biter, and well worth the read.)
Count the Cats
On a lighter note: how many cats are in the image below?
How many?
On Rabbit Holes
There are many types of rabbit holes you can fall into out there on the Internet, some good, some bad. Some rabbit holes align with your actual interests and passions5.
But my favorite type of rabbit hole (a term brought into the English vernacular by one Lewis Carroll himself) is the rabbit hole that I never, ever will actually do or be involved in, yet find myself fascinated to read about.
For me, this topic is Burning Man. (If you’re not familiar, Burning Man is an annual event held in the middle of the desert near Reno, Nevada. Once a hippie bohemian paradise, it is increasingly seen as a haven for the rich Silicon Valley influencers.)
Why? I absolutely cannot explain it.
I hate camping (give me a soft climate-controlled bed any day).
I’ve had enough desert experiences to last me a lifetime (I have lived through several haboobs).
I have neither the money or time to be involved in the event (it costs thousands of dollars in just tickets and transportation alone, to say nothing of the actual gear needed).
I am not handy and find the concept of dealing with broken mechanicals, generators, tents, etc all sounds absolutely terrible.
And yet I find myself fascinated.
I read every new thread on r/burningman with great interest, opining to myself about whether someone’s proposed gift6 will create MOOP7. I have opinions about sparkle ponies8, plug and play camps9, and how to get playa dust out of things10.
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I will never attend Burning Man and have no desire to do so. Yet I still find myself fascinated, lost down the rabbit hole.
Footnotes11, as always. Please share your own personal rabbit hole of fascination!
“Witchcraft” for the male-presenting genders. See also: “17 signs that you’d qualify as a witch during the Salem Witch Trials of 1692” at MentalFloss, with reasons including: being female, having argued with anyone ever, being young, being old, etc.
Anyone who’s ever been in a fic-based fandom, this term’s for you.
Among other things, a training check crewman was on the flight as a passenger, and had heard of a similar incident 4 years earlier. The accident occured in daylight in good weather, at a time when shifts were changing at the local hospital. The local Air National Guard was on duty that day, and the local government had implemented safety drills earlier that year. And UAA operated under “crew/cockpit resource management”: standard now, but uncommon at the time (every crew member is expected to speak up and captains are expected to listen to the crew, instead of having the captain as sole final authority).
Most pilots who’ve tried to replicate this landing in simulators never even made it to the ground.
E.g.: I enjoy reading, so deep dives into books and authors are in my wheelhouse. Or the many times I’ve been involved in some sort of fandom and learn more than I should about the actors, production, etc.
One of the Burning Man tenets is unconditional gifting, the concept of giving back to the intentional community being created out of nothing in the desert. Here’s the other 9 principles.
MOOP = “material out of place”. Will the gift create MOOP? Often, yes.
Newbie burners who have amazing outfits and are otherwise not prepared for the desert experience.
A “plug and play” camp is set up and taken down entirely by hired staff; those residing in these camps only have to enjoy the music and art.
Vinegar.
I have spent infinite more time reading trivia about Disney's animated films than watching them