I picked this up off the Vintage Race list... I've seen it before, hope
it's new to you...
Scientists at NASA had developed a gun whose purpose is to launch
dead chickens at extreme velocities. No, this isn't the result of
over-competitive engineers at the annual Goddard Chicken Toss
(though that would be a perfectly understandable consequence.) The
gun is used to shoot dead chickens at the windshields of airline
jets, military jets, and the space shuttle, (while they are parked,
that is) at that vehicle's maximum velocity it could be traveling
while in "bird space." As such, it simulates the frequent incidents
of collisions with airborne fowl, and therefore determine if the
windshields were designed strong enough.
British engineers, upon hearing of the gun, were eager to test the
gun out on the windshield of their new high speed trains. However,
upon firing the gun, the engineers watched in shock as the chicken
shattered the windshield, smashed through the control console,
snapped the engineer's chair backrest in two, and embedded itself
into the back of the cabin. (Luckily, the train was unmanned at the
time :o)
Horrified, the engineers sent NASA the results of the experiment,
along with the design of the windshield, and asked the NASA
scientists for any suggestions.
NASA sent back a one-sentence response: "Thaw the chicken first."
It could be one of those "myths", but is pretty believable! Only
American engineers would come up with such a test!
Alan Myers
San Jose, Calif.
'62 TR4 CT17602L
--
MZ
|