MythBusters Bust House 631
ewhac writes "The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that the MythBusters accidentally sent a cannon ball hurtling through Dublin this afternoon, punching through a home, bouncing across a six-lane road, and ultimately coming to a rest inside a now-demolished Toyota minivan. Amazingly, there were no injuries. The ball was fired from a home-made cannon at the Alameda County Sheriff's Department bomb range, and was intended to strike a water target. Instead the ball missed the water, punched through a cinder-block wall, and skipped off the hill behind. Prior to today, the MythBusters had been shooting episodes at the bomb range for over seven years without major incident. It is not clear whether Savage/Hyneman or Belleci/Imahara/Byron were conducting the experiment."
Not to be too pedantic (Score:1, Funny)
But this is posted on Wednesday morning, and the summary says "this afternoon". Has /. gone psychic?
Busted! (Score:5, Funny)
Professionals my ass. I can do more damage than that by trying that at home, amateurs.
Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
Interns? (Score:4, Funny)
One of the interns who are never visible on the mythbusters episodes probably did it. I think they just photoshop in Jamie and Adam on most episodes.
Remember (Score:5, Funny)
Intercontinental! (Score:5, Funny)
MythBusters (Score:4, Funny)
Having run out of myths, those at MythBusters have to broaden their definition of "busting"...
Wow, impressive (Score:5, Funny)
They shot a cannonball all the way from Alameda to Ireland?!? Holy shit, those guys are good!
Footage (Score:2, Funny)
So... will we ever see the footage?
My bet is no... It was probably destroyed within 10 minutes of the incident.
On-site producer to camera-men: "Initiate liability protocol!"
Re:Up stairs and through walls (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Funny Stuff (Score:3, Funny)
Since you've apparently never been explained the meaning of the word "nap", let me provide a link to the definition:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/nap [thefreedictionary.com]
Re:Intercontinental! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
Frankly, I would consider it an honor to have my minivan crushed by a Mythbusters experiment.
Best. Episode. Ever. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Remember (Score:5, Funny)
Someone once compared that show to Last of the Summer Wine; Three old men getting into mischief.
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:4, Funny)
They said as much: "the MythBusters had been shooting episodes"
But frankly "the MythBusters had shooting episodes" would have covered that as well...
Re:What is wrong with journalism. (Score:5, Funny)
Misfortune my ass. They'll be telling that story for the rest of their lives. Top THAT at a bar.
"I once caught a huge bass."
"I once banged a really hot girl."
"Yeah, well I once had a cannonball shot through my house by the Mythbusters."
Re:I thought (Score:4, Funny)
Probably not. They'll get fired, arrested, mysteriously disappear from prison, and coincidentally, the DoD will have a new "Mythical" or "Buster" kinetic/ballistic weapons research team!
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Funny Stuff (Score:5, Funny)
Heh. Spoken by a true non-parent.
It's called: "baby asleep in the crib, Parents having nookie very quietly in the bed." Many many parents have done it.
Unless, of course, we have a night-shift worker parent and a very tired child care parent. Which also makes sense.
Sometimes you sleep when the baby does.
Re:Funny Stuff (Score:5, Funny)
Really? That's the part of the story that makes you say hmmm? The fact that reportedly a 6-inch cannonball fired from a homemade cannon busts through a cinder-block wall, then bounces off a hillside, then flies 700 yards and bounces again, then goes through a front door, bounces up a stairway and into a bedroom where it proceeds to bust through a stucco wall, and after all that, still had enough energy to fly over to a neighboring house hitting its roof and destroying a few roof tiles, crosses a six lane highway (still in the air, presumably) over into another neighborhood and crashes into a parked minivan shattering its windshield and destroying its dashboard is all copacetic with you, but taking a nap in the afternoon makes the story hard to believe?
Re:OK, here is my myth submission to Mythbusters (Score:5, Funny)
Be careful.
First they'll build a scale model 6" high and do some "math". Then they'l knock up a 6-foot section of a life size wall and call it plausible. They'll they "upscale" things and end up building a wall around the equator and blowing it up.
Re:I thought (Score:5, Funny)
The ball was fired from a home-made cannon at ... a water target
The nerds who couldn't shoot straight.
The ball was fired from a home-made cannon at the Alameda County Sheriff's Department...
All of a sudden a Bob Marley song is running through my head...
Re:Remember (Score:5, Funny)
Bomb ranges don't generally have cannons. That would be like living near an airport and expecting a boat to crash into your house.
Re:Best. Episode. Ever. (Score:5, Funny)
At least until they "accidentally" create a singularity that destroys half a state, and permanently alters the rules of our relative space-time.
And today, a Very Special Mythbusters at the Large Hadron Collider!
Myth: Creating Strange Matter and allowing it to escape containment could cause the Earth to be completely converted to Strange Matter and end life as we know it!
Will it make a boom? Let's find out!
Coming soon December 12, 2012!
Myth Busted (Score:5, Funny)
I'd like to see them try to replicate the "myth" that a cannonball that is initially fired at a bunch of water can wind up skipping off a hill, go through a house 700 yards away, go through 6 lanes of traffic and come to rest in a car.
They probably won't be able to do it again and declare it busted.
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
For a second there... (Score:4, Funny)
I thought they conclusively demonstrated that it's plausible if not outright confirmed most of the time, it actually IS Lupus.
never mind.
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
I'm pretty sure Discovery will cover it, and probably give them a substantial bonus and invite them to participate in the episode to boot.
I think they've already participated in the episode.
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
They'll be listed in the credits as "Cannon Fodder."
Re:Not to be too pedantic (Score:3, Funny)
People are not arrested and prosecuted for accidents
They're talking about America, Land of the "Free", where you can be arrested and prosecuted *for crossing the road in the wrong place*!
Re:Adam was quoted as (Score:5, Funny)
Keep the wreckage! (Score:5, Funny)
Frankly, I would consider it an honor to have my minivan crushed by a Mythbusters experiment.
I thought this as well. I'd be tempted to turn down the insurance settlement and just keep the wreckage, especially if you can keep the cannonball, too. You could probably get a LOT of money for it at auction from a fan who wants the famous Mythbusters experiment that went horribly wrong!
Re:Not to be too pedantic (Score:5, Funny)
Dublin?
Can they demolish the rest of the place, and then move on to Pleasanton?
I think they'd do good, were they to level everything along the 680 corridor - up to Altamont.
Re:Remember (Score:4, Funny)
I'm guessing that the vast majority of the people who live in the area are unaware of the existence of the [BOMB] range.
Interesting. I guess the vast majority of the people who live in the area also happen to be deaf.
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Re:I thought (Score:2, Funny)
I certainly didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition.
Re:Remember (Score:4, Funny)
I would expect someone who works in special effects to have at least secondary expertise in the area of physics.
You can expect that all you want, yet here we are.
Re:Not to be too pedantic (Score:5, Funny)
science is about formally testing and verifying any kind of knowledge, and sometimes, even when we think the answer is obvious, it turns out differently than we expect and we learn something from it.
For instance, one of my classic physics experiments in high school: We dropped two differently weighted object, using a ticker-tape mechanism to time the fall. Contrary to all expectations, the heavier object fell faster. Consistently. After basking in our moment of triumph for demolishing all understanding of gravity since Galileo, we were told to explain the difference as related to the friction of the ticker-tape.
Re:Busted! (Score:4, Funny)