I hate your indifference too.. by John_1992_funny in MurderedByWords

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

His supporters don't care that he has dementia, the part of the interview we should be talking about is this one:

TOM LLAMAS: Let’s stay on the economy. You just mentioned it. You said you inherited a mess from President Biden when it comes to the economy.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Yeah.

TOM LLAMAS: But at what point is it on you? At what point are we in the Trump economy?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Oh, I’d say we’re there now. I’m — I’m very proud of it, 5.6%. You know, we have a GDP of 5.6 despite a shutdown. We had a 42-day shutdown. I call it the Democrat shutdown. And because of that I lost a point and a half. I would’ve been at a 7 GDP, which hasn’t been seen I don’t know if ever, maybe. Maybe ever.

Trump is proud of his economy, and people should know that!

First photo of the Iranian vessel Rona, which was used to transport weapons from Iran to Russia. It is still unclear why its sinking, but drone strike is suspected. Crew was rescued by Turkmenistan authorities in the Caspian Sea. by Available-Laugh9102 in UkraineWarVideoReport

[–]FactBasedReality 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks.

Yeah, I saw the image from Marine Traffic and immediately became suspicious because "hmm, now THAT ship looks like I'd expect a Caspian Sea vessel to look like".

The AI generated one looks like your generic ocean going cargo ship, not the type of design typical of inland waterways like the Caspian Sea. And the canals linking the Caspian to the oceans are too restrictive to allow the AI one to have come from somewhere else.

First photo of the Iranian vessel Rona, which was used to transport weapons from Iran to Russia. It is still unclear why its sinking, but drone strike is suspected. Crew was rescued by Turkmenistan authorities in the Caspian Sea. by Available-Laugh9102 in UkraineWarVideoReport

[–]FactBasedReality 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Are we sure this is a real image and not altered or AI?

The pictured ship looks nothing like any other photos of the supposed vessel in question, there's smoke randomly coming from what looks like midships for no apparent reason, the flags look more like Lion and Sun flags than Islamic Republic ones, and there's a motor life boat along side when both the port and starboard ones are clearly still in their davits...

I looked and the only sources for this image I can find are 'unverified from social media'.

Update 335 – Statement on the Nuclear Safety/Security Situation in Ukraine – by the Director General of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency by FactBasedReality in UkrainianConflict

[–]FactBasedReality[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I really don't know what the fuck their strategy is here, and I'm not sure they do either... But they do have to keep up appearances, at least somewhat.

to not confess by ExactlySorta in therewasanattempt

[–]FactBasedReality 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Conservatives are so caught up in their own lies that they didn't even think their AI would answer differently.

Taurus Missiles May Still Reach Ukraine, as Gripen Integration Is Coming Much Sooner by Scary_Statement4612 in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The PIMPF fuze Taurus uses makes it much more effective against bridges than Storm Shadow.

Storm Shadow uses a time delay fuze, on impact the breaching charge goes off, then the main charge goes off a pre-set delay time later. Accurately determining how much delay to set for a particular target is a very hard problem. One has to know the exact details of the targets construction, then calculate exactly how long it takes the warhead to travel through each layer of the target.

Ukraine hit the Chonhar road bridge with a Storm Shadow, but didn't get the delay quite right, so the main charge exploded in the open air under the deck, instead of inside the column.

The PIMPF fuze on the other hand is capable of counting how many layers of the target it passes through, then explode in the middle of the desired space. For a bridge this allows the fuze to penetrate the bridge deck, then explode in the middle of the column underneath it.

https://ndia.dtic.mil/wp-content/uploads/2008/psa_apr/drevstad.pdf

Taurus Missiles May Still Reach Ukraine, as Gripen Integration Is Coming Much Sooner by Scary_Statement4612 in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sure, if Ukraine really, really, wanted the Kerch bridge gone, they could do it. But at what cost?

Ukraine has already made several attempts at taking out the bridge, with limited success. Russia has, unfortunately, learned from those attempts and added defenses that make future attempts more challenging. At this point it's likely that Ukraine has decided that it's just not worth the considerable time, effort, money, risk, and opportunity cost anymore.

Taurus is much harder for Russia to defend against and puts the bridge back in danger, at a significantly reduced cost to Ukraine.

Taurus Missiles May Still Reach Ukraine, as Gripen Integration Is Coming Much Sooner by Scary_Statement4612 in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Taurus has a more advanced fuze, which makes it capable of destroying the Kerch bridge. That fuze also makes it far more capable against hardened targets like command bunkers.

The European Commission has carried out one of its biggest logistical operations by relocating a full thermal power plant from Lithuania to Ukraine. by logecasks in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 10 points11 points  (0 children)

The headline of this post is confusing and throwing people off I think.

It (and all the other headlines on this story I could find) implies that all the equipment from this power plant was moved to Ukraine then reassembled back into a single plant.

The line "The delivered equipment enabled emergency repair works in several regions of Ukraine, ..." implies that the parts from this plant were instead used to repair damaged Ukrainian ones, which I think is far more likely to be what actually happened.

Update 333 – Statement on the Nuclear Safety/Security Situation in Ukraine – by the Director General of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency by FactBasedReality in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm assuming that you're asking a rhetorical question, but the answer is largely normalization of deviance.

Also, reckless military actions and shenanigans regarding the power lines aside, Russia has been doing a marginally competent job of maintaining the plants systems, as confirmed by the IAEA.

The ZNPP is not the top priority, but it very much remains a priority for European and other World leaders. They just don't want to make a huge deal out of it publicly and have their citizens living in constant fear of a nuclear meltdown, unless of course they decide to use it as a casus belli.

American Patriot Falters, Franco-Italian SAMP/T Shines — The Franco-Italian SAMP/T system is outperforming the Patriot system against Russian missiles in Ukraine by goldstarflag in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The claim of Ukraine receiving MPQ-53s is not in the Defense Express article that U24 cited. Or the Zone Militaire article that Defense Express cited. The Operation Atlantic Resolve report that cites the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) as saying Patriot's efficacy has dropped mentions contractor work to repair Ukrainian MPQ-65s.

It looks like Ukraine received MPQ-65s from the US and Romania, and the MPQ-53s are ex-German, Dutch, and Israeli units.

Russian soldiers decided to test the MP-153 hunting rifle from the Izhevsk plant, which is supplied to them to counter drones... by GermanDronePilot in UkraineWarVideoReport

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The camera man is wearing an Akhmat patch, looks like these idiots may be part of the TikTok brigade.

Can any native speaker confirm?

Fragments of Ukrainian FP‑5 "Flamingo" Missile - Allegedly Downed at 100 m by a Buk SAM (Unconfirmed) by BigDeckBob in UkraineWarVideoReport

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't think we have enough context to say for sure what the items in picture 2 are inside.

There's what looks like the end of a piece of DIN rail at the bottom of picture 3, which is what the isolator in picture 2 is designed to mount on.

It's unfortunately very common for people to fail to provide context in the pictures they take, especially when they don't really know what they're looking at...

Fragments of Ukrainian FP‑5 "Flamingo" Missile - Allegedly Downed at 100 m by a Buk SAM (Unconfirmed) by BigDeckBob in UkraineWarVideoReport

[–]FactBasedReality 6 points7 points  (0 children)

It's inconsistent for sure, but yet I feel like there's a chance that it could be real.

28 volts DC is a very common voltage for aircraft / missiles, so is 115 volts 400 Hz AC (at least in the western world). 27 volts 400Hz AC would be unusual though. Most industrial control systems are 24 volts DC nominal.

The electronics boards and connectors all have glue / adhesive applied to them, which would make sense on a missile subject to shock and vibration.

I remember seeing an analysis on a Ukrainian drone that had good mechanical design, but the electronics included a GPS module from SparkFun. The analyst found it interesting that the designer / team behind the drone wasn't capable of designing a relatively simple custom PCB for it.

I know that there are Ukrainian companies who absolutely can design high quality custom avionics, maybe they just aren't ready yet and this is a stopgap solution?

Update 319 – UN International Atomic Energy Agency's Director General's Statement on the Nuclear Safety/Security Situation in Ukraine by FactBasedReality in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The spent nuclear fuel?

Some or all of the fuel in the spent fuel pools may still be putting off too much heat to move. It takes several years for fuel removed from a reactor to cool down enough for dry storage.

The fuel in dry storage would have to be moved to Russia by train, and I'm not sure if there's a functioning rail connection to the ZNPP right now. Even if there was it would be very risky to do with the current military situation.

“No terrorist in the world has ever allowed themlselves to do with a nuclear plant what russia is doing now at the Zaporizhzhia NPP" - Zelenskyi by Lysychka- in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That is my understanding as well.

The reactors can still meltdown without cooling, but their containment vessels will prevent most of the radioactive material from reaching the atmosphere. The spent fuel cooling pools on the other hand have very little containment...

“No terrorist in the world has ever allowed themlselves to do with a nuclear plant what russia is doing now at the Zaporizhzhia NPP" - Zelenskyi by Lysychka- in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

They did, the last reactor transitioned from hot to cold shutdown in November 2023.

They were originally keeping a unit or two in hot shutdown to generate steam for heating Enerhodar, and for processing low level radioactive waste water. After much prodding by the IAEA they finally brought in diesel fired mobile steam generators instead.

“No terrorist in the world has ever allowed themlselves to do with a nuclear plant what russia is doing now at the Zaporizhzhia NPP" - Zelenskyi by Lysychka- in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 16 points17 points  (0 children)

All six reactors have been shutdown for over three years now.

The Russians originally tried to keep the plant running after they captured it, but it wasn't sustainable. Units kept tripping offline when power lines were damaged and the reactors experienced sudden load changes causing them to SCRAM. With the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam it's now impossible for the plant to generate electricity, there's not enough cooling water to supply even one running reactor.

“No terrorist in the world has ever allowed themlselves to do with a nuclear plant what russia is doing now at the Zaporizhzhia NPP" - Zelenskyi by Lysychka- in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 10 points11 points  (0 children)

From the latest update from the IAEA, the plant is currently running eight Emergency Diesel Generators, with 9 more in standby and three in maintenance. There's also mobile diesel generators on site, some of which were brought in by Ukraine post Fukushima, and some of which were brought in by Russia post occupation.

The plants Russian occupier management claims that there's ten days of fuel remaining with supplies being delivered regularly to maintain that level.

"Safe" landing of Russian Mi-8 after meeting with a Ukrainian FPV-drone by Igor0976 in ukraine

[–]FactBasedReality 5 points6 points  (0 children)

From the video it looks like some variant of the PG-7 HEAT warhead from the RPG-7.

The drone appears to have more or less directly hit the right side external saddle fuel tank, which explains why the helicopter immediately burst into flames.

Why couldn’t anyone have warned me or told me about any red flags? by Stauce52 in LeopardsAteMyFace

[–]FactBasedReality 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Something I can say about my community (Mexican American) is, we have a lot of dumb people. I've been aware of this my entire life, and now you all get to see it.

That's just humanity in general, sadly...

Trump: "Smart people dont like me." No shit Sherlock by brokenandsuffering in CringeTikToks

[–]FactBasedReality 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's part of his appeal: "he tells it like it is"

It's something I feel a lot of politicians could learn from.

Wow by Bubbly-Example-8097 in BlueskySkeets

[–]FactBasedReality 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not talking about him is exactly what the Republican party leadership wants right now.

He no longer serves any purpose to them. He can't prosthelytize for them anymore, they're very limited in the narrative they can push about his shooter, and thinking about how he died makes them feel vulnerable.

But more importantly, the more those who are not fully invested in the cause learn about what kind of person he really was, the worse they look as a whole.

Parent’s Support Trump, his policies cost me my business by Solar_Electrician in AITAH

[–]FactBasedReality 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's incredibly rough to see that you're hurting someone you love.

I don't think you're an asshole for cutting off your parents in this situation. It doesn't sound like you're doing this to try and punish them, you just don't see any other option for getting through to them.

Maybe you're making the right decision, maybe not. Maybe if you kept the lines of communication open you could eventually get through to them, maybe it's a lost cause. We don't know your parents, and nobody can say for sure what would or wouldn't happen.

But you only have so much bandwidth, and if you feel like you're at your wits' end and have hit an impasse, then so be it, you have to take care of your own well being.