Windbags and Black boxes

Speaking of windbags in my last post...according to today's news it seems that some buddies of his are now on their way to the conflict area. Perhaps these self-appointed guardians of justice feel that the local authorities need a lesson or two. Or perhaps they are merely replacing those arrested so that more revenge can be taken on more hapless souls lest the unending revenge should end. They are reported to be disguising themselves as fishermen and travelling on small boats with their faces covered. One can only hope that the weather will cooperate and they will be shipwrecked on some uninhabited remote islands.

According to the online dictionary, one definition of a windbag is: A talkative person who communicates nothing of substance or interest.

Hmm. Wonder if there are windblogs too?

Ahem! On to black boxes. The black boxes of the budget airliner that went missing on January 1 were located a few days ago 1800-2000 meters (nearly 1 mile) deep in the sea. At that depth only unmanned robots could function and it is doubtful that much other than the black boxes could be salvaged. In the interval they have decided that there are only three countries with the technology to retrieve them - France, US, and Japan. So now this week they are dithering over who would actually pay for it. (Remember, this is the country where everything must go through a committee.)

The families of the victims have by now become resigned to the fact that their loved ones are gone. Of course there is still some interest in knowing what the cause of the crash was. The airplane manufacturer and international safety boards would all certainly like to know. But of course it can be risky to find out - especially if the evidence showed something like poor maintainence or explosives or whatever. Could cost somebody a lot of money. So do you spend a lot of money to find out what might end up costing even more? All these things must be weighed carefully. But a spokeswoman for some board or other conveniently announced last week that even after retrieving the black boxes it can take 5 years to determine the cause of an accident. That is well beyond the public's attention span and should give any guilty parties plenty of time to disappear.

Time will tell but my guess is that concessions will be made, deals clinched, and eventually somebody will cough up the money and the black boxes will be retrieved. But I am not holding my breath that it will happen this week.