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OwlFancier posted:I like that they included the quote from apparently anglo hp lovecraft who is having conniptions about weird rocks. It really is freaky, in a way that photos really can't do justice to. The scale is just all wrong, and like he says the fact it sits on the side of a fairly steep hill makes it all the weirder. Your brain just sort of rejects it. Also because it's on the edge of the moor there's a constant blustery wind which just makes it all the stranger because your brain is just constantly saying "Well it should be moving or falling over, how is it not falling over?" (I was genuinely surprised to find out from that article that the stone for Tower Bridge came from that quarry though - my mum grew up in the area and we visited it a couple of times and I never knew that, and it's just yet another of those weird little connections between that bit of Cornwall and my little bit of London that keep getting thrown at me)
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Mar 10, 2022 17:59
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The Cheesewring reminds me of Brimham Rocks, also home to many unlikely piles of stones, as featured in a Bee Gees video.  Or the bizarre eccentrics in Kinder Plateau, or the Dartmoor tors. Rocks are weird.
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Mar 10, 2022 18:46
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Makka Pakka has a lot to answer for.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:11
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goddamnedtwisto posted:I imagine it smells like every posh-but-unoccupied house, equal parts linseed oil, brass polish and lavender. The first two are the base for a load of pretty evocative smells - combine them with bleach instead of lavender for an old hospital, the ghost of overboiled vegetables for a school, or (and I'm aware this is pretty fringe) with dielectric grease and shellac for an old telephone exchange. We need the old telephone exchanges to headquarter the revolution when it comes.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:16
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HopperUK posted:Makka Pakka has a lot to answer for. Stone Communism
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Mar 10, 2022 19:17
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Jaeluni Asjil posted:We need the old telephone exchanges to headquarter the revolution when it comes. We'll have to hurry - BT are going to be flogging a *lot* of them off, particularly the nice-smelling ones with the parquet floors, when they turn off POTS in the next few years.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:24
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Surprise, surprise, covid is on an upswing. Hospital admissions are up, deaths have stopped falling.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:34
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goddamnedtwisto posted:We'll have to hurry - BT are going to be flogging a *lot* of them off, particularly the nice-smelling ones with the parquet floors, when they turn off POTS in the next few years. How is turning off POTS going to affect folk? (genuine question). Can't see any telephone exchanges listed for sale  Didn't you post one before? Or was that someone else. Like 2 years ago or something? I wonder what might happen if someone purchased an old telephone exchange and hung up a banner outside saying "Revolutionary Headquarters"? And you could come in, have a cup of tea and a biscuit and chat poo poo about Marx, Lenin & co. Jaeluni Asjil fucked around with this message at 19:40 on Mar 10, 2022 |
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Mar 10, 2022 19:37
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Pablo Bluth posted:Surprise, surprise, covid is on an upswing. Hospital admissions are up, deaths have stopped falling. Bear in mind that a lot of deferred elective surgery and other non-urgent care is now starting up having been postponed because of the Omicron crush (well because of the criminal underfunding of the NHS but you know). A significant portion of the new positive tests are people being tested prior to, or on arrival at, a hospital visit for something else. Positivity rates are static and excess deaths are still low for the time of year. Now if the numbers start properly rising again (and more particularly if the "patients on ventilators" number starts trending upwards, bearing in mind it continued to decline all the way through the Omicron surge) then it's time to worry.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:43
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My entire Kent based family got COVID in the last week and the only person who had it progress to the lungs was my unvaccinated sister. I didn't love it, but I can see why people would not think to test for COVID. Everyone I know had a perfectly mundane headcold until you hit the fever.
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Mar 10, 2022 19:59
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Jaeluni Asjil posted:How is turning off POTS going to affect folk? (genuine question). It'll depend a lot on your exact situation, but broadly it'll be one of three possiblities: - Nothing changes in your house at all - BT put you on a voice-only FTTC service, the copper pair from the cabinet to your house stays in place. This will be the most common outcome for people in built-up areas. - BT replace your copper pair with a fibre pair, and your master socket with an NTE. This will be the situation where they roll out pure fibre, which will be about 30% of the country if you believe them - They actually just keep the old copper pair in place because it's too loving expensive to replace it - this will be the case for most rural areas and loads of edge cases (allegedly there's still tens of thousands of ISDN lines out there being used for all kinds of weird poo poo, from alarm systems to radio production, which they still haven't got a solution for) Someone else posted an old sub-exchange/repeater - basically a brick shed at the side of the road - that was on sale a while ago, the exchanges I'm talking about are the big buggers like Hampstead and Bishopsgate which are in extremely valuable locations and 90% empty, having been built in the era when you needed a bunch of women with plugboards to make a phone call. e: Speaking of, I'm going to add to my claim of being the first tourist in Aberdeen history by this weekend being the first ever person to go to Essex to visit an art gallery, the Brothers in Art exhibition of works by members of the East London Group, a bunch of between-the-wars working class artists based around the Bethnal Green Institute, is on at the Beecroft Gallery in Southend - among the paintings there will be this one: https://twitter.com/eastlondongroup/status/1131468685594583040 goddamnedtwisto fucked around with this message at 20:13 on Mar 10, 2022 |
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Mar 10, 2022 20:04
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goddamnedtwisto posted:It'll depend a lot on your exact situation, but broadly it'll be one of three possiblities: I don't have a landline at all now (my broadband is 4G). I went in a big old telephone exchange once in one of my careers, but I can't recall which or where! Maybe when I worked for an alarm company. Maybe around north-east London somewhere. Billet Road perhaps? Jaeluni Asjil fucked around with this message at 20:12 on Mar 10, 2022 |
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Mar 10, 2022 20:10
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Jaeluni Asjil posted:I wonder what might happen if someone purchased an old telephone exchange and hung up a banner outside saying "Revolutionary Headquarters"? And you could come in, have a cup of tea and a biscuit and chat poo poo about Marx, Lenin & co. How do you make sure the person asking you to pass the custard creams isn't MI5?
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Mar 10, 2022 20:13
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goddamnedtwisto posted:the big buggers like Hampstead and Bishopsgate which are in extremely valuable locations and 90% empty
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Mar 10, 2022 20:24
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Jaeluni Asjil posted:I don't have a landline at all now (my broadband is 4G). Nearest exchange is Highams Park - https://www.google.com/maps/@51.5971679,-0.0140563,3a,75y,323.41h,98.36t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sHMf4wqAnI5gzsXoA-dY-ow!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 - which I've been to and which definitely is a nice-smelling one. All those ones in the between-wars suburbs are a fairly similar design though. I wish I still had had access to them (and that BT wouldn't revoke it immediately if I were to do this) but there's definitely the material for a whole Youtube "Secrets of the telephone exchange" video series. I can't remember which one - I *think* it was Neasden or Wembley - but one had not only a mahogany-paneled formal meeting room but also a proper brass-railed bar and checker-tiled canteen. The old social club at Upton Park exchange had a couple of full-sized snooker tables (alas stacked on top of each other and sans balls and cues when I got there), and quite a few have magnificently steampunk conduit pressurisation systems.
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Mar 10, 2022 20:27
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goddamnedtwisto posted:Nearest exchange is Highams Park - https://www.google.com/maps/@51.5971679,-0.0140563,3a,75y,323.41h,98.36t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sHMf4wqAnI5gzsXoA-dY-ow!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 - which I've been to and which definitely is a nice-smelling one. All those ones in the between-wars suburbs are a fairly similar design though. https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-braintree-goes-automatic-1975-online One of my nans worked in an exchange for some years. I wonder what jobs all those women were able to do after they automated the exchanges.
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Mar 10, 2022 20:35
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On top of being huge (considering) Cardinal is weird because it's nowhere near Cardinal Street, which was demolished before it even got built, or anything similar, so I assume they were going for 'cardinal' as in pivotal or fundamental but on top of that it's a weird building because the combination of the tower bit (which looks like the only bit to most people) and the switch hall/battery bit gave it the layout resembling the nave and transepts of a cathedral of sorts. Architects literally only think about one thing and it's loving Augustine.
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Mar 10, 2022 20:41
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Guavanaut posted:Speaking of which, Cardinal is massive considering the size of the city it was built for, but in addition to acting as a hub for the whole city rather than just some district or other they also put a bunch of the international call trunking equipment and strange early digital switching in there for reasons. The GPO moves in mysterious ways, it's wonders to behold, but at a guess and a glance at the map I'd assume it was on the backup TAT route (the main trunk the transatlantic cables ran to the landing in Scotland basically ran along the WCML, but there were two backup routes, one up the A1 and one just sort of cross-country between the other two). Interestingly it doesn't appear on any of the maps of the old microwave relay network (but the only ones in the public domain pre-date it) but definitely looks like it's been built to be a microwave repeater, that huge machine space on the roof and what *looks* like tube-in-tube construction would definitely make it suitable (and it's only a few miles off one of the main trunks so it wouldn't have been hard to include it), but there's no kit other than mobile phone masts up there now.
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Mar 10, 2022 20:45
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Also hooting and hollering that the tallest building in Leicester wouldn't make it in the top 100 in Tower Hamlets, nestling in alongside Balfron Tower (yay) and 30 Harbord Square (boo) at joint-115th.
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Mar 10, 2022 20:58
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, ok, quick question. Borrovan is probably the best to answer this, but I made sure I couldn't get chucked out on the 26/2.What I need to do now is log the physical assaults by my my parents with the filth. Simple. Except for tge fact that as soon as they get out of nick, I'll be there first target. Should I get a lawyer? should I do it it at all? I'm all at sixes and sevens
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Mar 10, 2022 21:04
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Trickjaw posted:, ok, quick question. Borrovan is probably the best to answer this, but I made sure I couldn't get chucked out on the 26/2.What I need to do now is log the physical assaults by my my parents with the filth. Simple. Except for tge fact that as soon as they get out of nick, I'll be there first target. Should I get a lawyer? should I do it it at all? I'm all at sixes and sevens I think maybe you should call (or otherwise contact) one of the hotlines for advice: https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/healthy-body/getting-help-for-domestic-violence/
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Mar 10, 2022 21:17
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Trickjaw posted:, ok, quick question. Borrovan is probably the best to answer this, but I made sure I couldn't get chucked out on the 26/2.What I need to do now is log the physical assaults by my my parents with the filth. Simple. Except for tge fact that as soon as they get out of nick, I'll be there first target. Should I get a lawyer? should I do it it at all? I'm all at sixes and sevens I don't know how to help but I hope you're ok mate
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Mar 10, 2022 21:19
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Jaeluni Asjil posted:I think maybe you should call (or otherwise contact) one of the hotlines for advice: Also Shelter. You shouldn't have to choose between violence and homelessness. There's a chance you might be considered vulnerable for the purpose of the local authority's obligation to house, but you need expert advice. Shelter's a good starting point, if you need a lawyer & qualify for legal aid they'll be able to tell you. Really sorry that's happening to you mate.
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Mar 10, 2022 21:28
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https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/10/british-troops-awol-ukraine-russia-invasion-court-martial-boris-johnsonquote:British troops who leave to fight in Ukraine will face court martial, says PM
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Mar 10, 2022 21:32
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Hmm. it's not much in the the larger scale of things. I can only die once. I have already gone down the Jaeluni route, and am anxiously awaiting... Well anything. However, I have not reported them, and I need to, so my social worker says. I just need to to know how to muzzle the police.
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Mar 10, 2022 21:37
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Brendan Rodgers posted:How do you make sure the person asking you to pass the custard creams isn't MI5? Go vegan? No mi5 would think to pass a carrot stick and hummus
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Mar 10, 2022 21:38
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Brendan Rodgers posted:How do you make sure the person asking you to pass the custard creams isn't MI5? If your arguments are persuasive enough you might convert them!
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Mar 10, 2022 21:50
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Trickjaw posted:Hmm. it's not much in the the larger scale of things. I can only die once. I have already gone down the Jaeluni route, and am anxiously awaiting... Well anything. However, I have not reported them, and I need to, so my social worker says. I just need to to know how to muzzle the police. I don't know where you are located obviously, but this is what the Met say: https://www.met.police.uk/advice/advice-and-information/daa/domestic-abuse/how-to-report-domestic-abuse/ Other police domestic violence units are available.
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Mar 10, 2022 21:54
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Mar 10, 2022 21:58
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Trickjaw posted:I made sure I couldn't get chucked out on the 26/2.What I need to do now is log the physical assaults by my my parents with the filth. Simple. Except for tge fact that as soon as they get out of nick, I'll be there first target. Should I get a lawyer? should I do it it at all? I'm all at sixes and sevens I sit in rooms with the police for a living. From what I've seen, the biggest concern in situations like yours is usually that the victim cannot easily move away, and so the defendant will be able to find them again if they want to. This is a big if, but if you can sort out somewhere to safely be away from them, that they don't know where it is and can't easily find out, then you stand a very good chance of not being found if you don't want to be. That's the most important thing. You may well find that having a crime number increases your ability to access support services and get yourself out of there. You may well find that the officer who deals with you can help you to access resources that you don't know exist, and would have trouble finding on your own, if you tell them as much as possible about what your situation is and what you need. You will almost certainly benefit from knowing that while your parents are under arrest, you can make the move and be gone by the time they're out and they can't do anything. These things can only happen if you tell the police what is going on, and these things will all happen regardless of whether or not there is a realistic chance of your parents being convicted of anything, and regardless of whether you even want them to be convicted of anything. There is certainly also a chance that if you get the police involved, they will make a massive bollocks of it (and if that happens there are things you might do about it). However, I do think there is more of a chance than you think there is of them being helpful in at least some way, and you can increase your chance of getting a positive result out of them if you can try to think of them as potentially neutral, and not automatically hostile.
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Mar 10, 2022 22:21
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Trin Tragula posted:I sit in rooms with the police for a living Hi I'm interesting in getting into unsuccessful burglary, any advice?
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Mar 10, 2022 22:34
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Starmer went to Estonia (?) in order to look like he was doing something about Ukraine. Suffice to say he impressed everyone who met him. https://twitter.com/agitate4change/status/1501931072048680960
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Mar 10, 2022 22:49
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basically me everytime i try a handshake
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Mar 10, 2022 22:53
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Trickjaw posted:Hmm. it's not much in the the larger scale of things. I can only die once. I have already gone down the Jaeluni route, and am anxiously awaiting... Well anything. However, I have not reported them, and I need to, so my social worker says. I just need to to know how to muzzle the police. imo you should hone your body into the ultimate weapon and destroy your foes in a hail of relentless brutal strikes and powerful sweeping kicks
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Mar 10, 2022 22:55
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Are the UK telephone exchanges nuke proof or is that only the US who bothered with stuff like the long lines building? E: ah shite Trickjaw I don't have any useful advice but I really hope you can get sorted, loving families are horrible things sometimes. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 23:06 on Mar 10, 2022 |
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Mar 10, 2022 23:01
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NotJustANumber99 posted:Hi I'm interesting in getting into unsuccessful burglary, any advice? Successful burglary is much easier; but if you hear sirens, hide next door, it's the last place they'll look
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Mar 10, 2022 23:23
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OwlFancier posted:Are the UK telephone exchanges nuke proof or is that only the US who bothered with stuff like the long lines building? It's like you don't even *read* my 10,000 word posts about old underground stations! At the other end of TAT-1 (and subsequent transatlantic cables) from the Long Lines Building was Kingsway Hardened Telephone Exchange, very much nuke-proof, with similar sites in Birmingham and Manchester (well similar in that they were underground and hardened, not even the Metropolitan were trying to build tube lines that far out (Shut up Jago Hazard, I know you're watching, and I know the Met never built tube lines, I'm making a joke)). Other major trunk exchanges were moderately hardened but it was well understood that it was basically impossible to harden the entire network against attack. Obviously the old electromechanical kit would shrug off EMP and even be fairly resilient to direct blast, but anything more complex than that would be toast. HANDEL - the system that would sound the 4 minute warning and also regional fallout alarms - was also EMP-hardened. Also the most visible (but officially invisible) part of Bloomsbury exchange was also hardened against nuclear strikes, as we the rest of the microwave relay network. Trickjaw, I've no advice I can give you, all I can do is send you my support and solidarity..
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Mar 10, 2022 23:30
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I had a vague memory of something like that for the UK but I thought I was getting mixed up with your post about the microwave relay towers.
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Mar 10, 2022 23:31
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goddamnedtwisto posted:(allegedly there's still tens of thousands of ISDN lines out there being used for all kinds of weird poo poo, from alarm systems to radio production, which they still haven't got a solution for) I've encountered two, both pretty specific. One was in the post office where I grew up and ran the machine that turned out national lottery tickets, the other was at the Ricoh Arena in Coventry and was in case a BBC Commentary team turned up for any occasion and wanted to get their feed back to London without any extra kit.
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Mar 11, 2022 00:22
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OwlFancier posted:I had a vague memory of something like that for the UK but I thought I was getting mixed up with your post about the microwave relay towers. In fairness the bit about Kingsway was pretty truncated because even I thought the post was getting long. Also I'm not certain the Long Lines Building actually *is* hardened against blast, which sounds odd about a colossal windowless reinforced concrete slab, but that's sort of the point - hardened buildings are never that big and only very rarely so rectilinear. The devil will be in the details of the construction, but presenting such a large and completely unbroken face to a shockwave is really doing things the hard way. Back of the envelope, but it's going to experience at least 9 times the force from an identical overpressure that the BT Tower (only considered semi-hardened) would, and all those windows blowing out (and all the kit inside getting blown out) will mean the actual structural force felt by the BT Tower is even lower. AT&Ts *actual* hardened facilities are all safely buried under mountains in the middle of nowhere, so it's entirely possible the Long Lines Building was just a Brutalist architect getting his dream commission and being told "Please make the words gently caress OFF into an actual building".
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Mar 11, 2022 00:37
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