Jeff Liebermann wrote:

On Sat, 09 Mar 2013 14:43:04 -0500, "Michael A. Terrell"
wrote:

Still better than fighting a forest fire with nothing but a backpak
water tank, and a shovel.

Been there, done that, but only once. I think it was about 1966. I
was doing something useless in a Cal Poly Pomona dormitory, when
someone from the state forestry service arrived asking for volunteers
to fight a fire. This was in the days when it was fashionable to
empty the colleges, instead of the jails, to fight forest fires. We
were soon on our way to do battle with a brush fire burning in the
bottom of the San Gabriel River (now known as the 605 freeway) near El
Monte. It's not every day that a dry river catches fire, and I wanted
to be part of the experience. Our job was mostly to haul cut brush
away from the river banks, so the adjacent houses would not burn. The
bulldozers just couldn't work among the rubble on the river bottom.
There were no fatalities or major injuries. We did loose a few due to
exhaustion from being out of shape and not drinking enough water. We
were at it for about 12 hrs, with erratic breaks, until another motley
load of student arrived to relieve us.


Mine was on the Ft. Greely reserve, in the Buffalo Drop zone. I had
just finished 40 hours on duty in two days when I was dragged out of bed
and told I had volunteered to fight a fire cased by two idiot officers
who shot at a rabbit whit a M16, and hit the rock it was sitting on. It
ricochet and hit the gas tank on the tactilely equipped jeep they had
taken from the motor pool and it exploded. Hundreds of acres of heavy
forest were on fire, and we were to dig a fire break by hand. They lost
the tanker in heavy smoke, and had to bring another truckload of water.
A helicopter was dropping water on the flames, but the smoke was so
thick you could only see about eight feet most of the time.


It's a good thing you
didn't work at a munitions plant, instead of Lingerie.

True. I haven't worked much with explosives, but I came close.
Pollack-Benedict(?) construction was building the Simi Valley freeway
between the north end of the San Fernando Valley and Simi Valley. The
connecting pass was plagued with large granite boulders, typically
about the size of a large 2 story house. This was too much for the
earth movers, so blasting contractor was hired to break them apart.
Everyone assumed that during blasting, that the 2 lane highway, next
to where the freeway was being built, could be closed to traffic.
Nope. In provide the illusion of safety, some traffic control was
needed. What better use for expendable students.

A desperate call was made to San Fernando Valley State College (now
known as Cal State University, Northridge) for anyone with RF
experience. Of course all the ham radio operators immediately
responded. 4 of us were hired to direct traffic, but more
importantly, to yell at anyone with a 2-way radio in their vehicle to
turn it off or risk having their transmitter cause a premature
explosion. Signs highlighting the danger of radio transmissions in
the area were installed at key locations, and generally ignored. It
seemed that the local public service, public safety, and VIP drivers
didn't really like the idea of driving for about 20 minutes without
their radio. I had to settle for having them unscrew their
microphones or promise not to transmit until clear of the area. There
were no explosions, but I was genuinely concerned. Many years later,
I discovered that a radio was unlikely to cause a blasting cap to
explode, but at the time, it was generally accepted that it was
possible.


I saw a lot of those signs when we made a trip to Florida in '66.
They were building I-75, and very few sections were open for any real
distance. A lot of time was spent on US 27 and various old roads to get
from one section to the next. Often we were diverted from open sections
because of blasting.

OTOH, and uncle owned a huge quarry in Kentucky, and they had several
blasters on their staff to blow away the sides of the cliffs into the
quarry. He sold the crushed rock to the state to build the interstate
system in Kentucky.


How many people
have been killed by an exploding corset?

I have no idea. Googling for "exploding corset" yields only one
possibility:
http://www.lelong.com.my/kx/corset+exploding.htm

My father's factory (Tosca Lingerie) did not make corsets. It made
womens night wear, commonly known as lingerie.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingerie

However, I did work for a company that made corsets, which were
designed to contain an exploding waistline. I got a summer job in
shipping and receiving at Foundation Garments in Smog Angeles. The
bulk of their sales were male girdles offered for sale in the military
PX stores. At the time, the military was downsizing well after the
Korean War, and was using every excuse possible to retire overweight
and out of shape officers. The only quick solution was to
redistribute the flab with a male girdle. My employment was
uneventful, although I did obtain a new proficiency with profanity,
that has remained with me to this day.


No corsets in the PX, but the one on Alaska sold tights with a fly as
lightweight thermal underwear in cotton & Nylon. The box had a drawing
of a postman in shorts wearing them. When it was below -40, you wore
them with the regular thermals to keep from losing your legs to
frostbite. The damn things had a seam up the insides of the legs that
could rub you raw. I figured out really fast why the nylon (without the
seams) was never in stock.

They gave some guys 90 days to lose up to 50 pounds in '74. No
healthy way to do that, in such as short time frame. One of the
'broadcasters' (AKA: A 'Talking Head'/DJ) got written orders to lose
weight, or take a dishonorable discharge.