

Russian Smokejumpers - Mz
http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/natural-disasters/russian-smokejumpers/#page=1

======
themodelplumber
The photo in the article shows a jumper dropping out of an AN-2. That is a
very interesting aircraft, as it has a very low stall speed. Here is a video
where you can see it fly extremely slow without stalling:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mipf4nqrR74](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mipf4nqrR74)

From the pilot handbook, this gem:

"If the engine quits in instrument conditions (blind flying when you can't see
the ground) or at night, the pilot should pull the control column full aft (it
won't stall) and keep the wings level. The leading-edge slats will snap out at
about 40mph (64km/h), and when the airplane slows to a forward speed of about
25mph [40km/h], the airplane will sink at about a parachute descent rate until
the aircraft hits the ground."

[http://www.museumofflight.org/aircraft/antonov-2-colt](http://www.museumofflight.org/aircraft/antonov-2-colt)

I've read accounts of people jumping out of the AN-2 at low speeds, without a
parachute, and without injury.

~~~
masklinn
Alaskan bush planes already have very low stall speeds (contests are
impressive, they take off in under the length of the plane itself, and the
best pilots barely get any roll landing) but that's a whole new level of
crazy.

It's a pretty big plane too.

~~~
frenchman_in_ny
Flying like what you describe generally has a fairly significant headwind
component.

------
gouggoug
I'm an experienced skydiver, this is the first time I hear about smokejumpers
and I am absolutely amazed by what these people do.

Here is a raw footage from a helmet mounted camera of a smokejumper. You can
see his entire team jump, then see himself jump, experience the quietness
under canopy and realize the technicality of maneuvering such a canopy with
many pounds of equipment on you. Really incredible stuff:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz_6cq7dfVc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz_6cq7dfVc)

~~~
sebcat
Those guys should use big grab toggles, none of that "my rig needs to look
small and slick so I make my toggles hard to grab"-stuff.

~~~
fauria
Check these out: [https://www.apexbase.com/accessories/ez-grab-
toggles](https://www.apexbase.com/accessories/ez-grab-toggles)

~~~
sebcat
Thanks, but I already hav'em :)

------
bussiere
Some times simpler is better ... After it reminds me that life doesn't have
the same value in russia.

And as a french thanks they have this kind of abnegation :
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquidator_%28Chernobyl%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquidator_%28Chernobyl%29)

~~~
huhtenberg
> _life doesn 't have the same value in russia_

I was going to comment how this wasn't an accurate statement, but in
reflection it actually is. It's not that the powers that be are negligent with
dispensing their citizens' lives, it's that people themselves are more willing
to risk their lives, both heroically altruistically and sometimes without due
need at all. Buckling up is indeed for wussies, but then you do in fact have
the acts of extreme heroism like in Chernobyl. It's an interesting cultural
trait.

~~~
pilsetnieks
Chernobyl wasn't heroism, it was slave labor. The people that were made to
work there were gathered all over Soviet Union with no choice in the matter
and no knowledge about where they were being taken, what happened, and what
dangers they faced.

~~~
huhtenberg
If you say so.

~~~
mlvljr
We Russians are all about slavery, as everyone knows, yeah! Not even a bit of
heroism :)

~~~
BugBrother
The first response to Chernobyl was heroic. Fire fighters later died from
acute radiation poisoning.

But would it really surprise you if the Soviet leaders did as "pilsetnieks"
wrote and forced people to get high radiation doses without telling them?

Russia have outstanding traditions in e.g. math, literature, art and
engineering. That is not diminished by Russian leaders' traditions of
enslaving Russians (and others).

~~~
mlvljr
Kind thanks, but regardless of who's meant by the "others", I feel obliged to
point that our leaders' "Western partners" did quite a stellar job in that
department, too.

Speaking of the Ch. episode, while there were definitely criminal decisions
involved (local people not being told what exactly happened, and thus exposed
to huge risks), what "pilsetnieks" does is spreading "клюква", I believe.

~~~
BugBrother
> [Western world enslaved countries]

Ah, that is why USA had to build a wall to stop people fleeing to the freedom
of East Europe? :-)

Edit: On the other subject -- I can't find much on Wikipedia at all about the
construction of the sarcophagus.

~~~
mlvljr
You would not find any "slaves" to the the east of that wall, still -- but
look at the pre-60-ies Africa, for example, that was much closer.

Speaking of the sarcophagus, I'd start looking into the memoirs of both those
in charge back then, and those in actual action down there (both kinds of
sources will likely be not available in translation though).

~~~
BugBrother
I am sorry, but your description of East Europe is complete bullshit.

I assume you're Russian? Only Germans seem to learn about their own country's
atrocities in school/media. (I'll add Russia to the list of Turkey, Pakistan,
Japan, ...)

A brutal dictatorship, as Putin seem to work towards, means that the
controlling junta can treat the people as their own property.

As I wrote: If you have to lock people up to stop them from fleeing -- and the
guards even shoot on sight! -- it shows the relationship; leaving is theft of
valuable property, i.e. a slavery situation.

I have worked in Romania and have read/heard about how the spine of the people
were broken and how they were controlled.

For example: There were some German speaking people since the Middle Ages in
Transylvania. The adults were sent to Siberia. The broken survivors did get
home, years later... Another example: Political prisoners (but at least not
"criminals" which had just refused to sign over their land to the Party), were
just not going to survive prison.

And so on.

(Pre-60s Africa, during colonialism? Well, that is at least different compared
to the usual Soviet argument of blacks in USA. :-) )

~~~
mlvljr
You're beating the African card, or what? (Then, we could proceed to whether
the landlords should own the land in a rural underdeveloped country, whether
it really was "the party" it went to, if the Romanian government was
responsible for some indeed disgusting things going on there, or their Moscow
patrons, whether it is always "from slavery" or rather plain "into better
life" people are fleeing across the borders, and to the Transylvanian events)

My best commie cheers from the land of Brutal Dictatorship!

P.S. If your second line is indeed about Hitler regime being on-par (or
"better") than the pre- / or post-war Soviet one (despite declared political
goals, documented doings, and victim counts), just say so :)

~~~
BugBrother
Oh please, realize that almost directly it was clear that Soviet divisions
wouldn't again "visit" as an answer to democratization in East Europe, the
juntas were gone.

And Putin isn't brutal inside the borders, yet. The tendency seems clear. I
really wish the best for the Russian people, they if anyone on the planet
deserves better after the history. (It is not easy to go democratic for a
country with big income from natural resources, see "the oil curse".)

(I didn't compare with the German nazis, I noted that citizens are generally
not enlightened about atrocities done by their own country, but I'd guess
Soviet did have them beaten in absolute numbers. Number of millions, that is.)

~~~
mlvljr
That guess would be wrong by a decimal order of magnitude then :)

~~~
BugBrother
Hardly a factor ten.

Holodomor, the great purge, the red terror, forced resettlements, Gulag...
Values between 8 and 61 millions, depending on if the starving are part of
that.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_Communist_r...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes#Soviet_Union)

~~~
mlvljr
Now, that (and specifically, 50+ M starved to death by the "regime") is a what
I'd call a BS view :)

But merely the count of those executed during the "repressions" era / total
count of Soviet civilian losses during WWII is less than 0.1 (and USSR was not
the only side that has suffered from Hitler).

~~~
BugBrother
Bring your claims to the academic authors -- I quoted 8-61 million from the
wikipedia page, which quoted the researchers.

The researchers seem to differ in, amongst other points, how much of the
hunger was planned.

Quotes from the wikipedia page I referenced, with different researchers:

" _Some historians attempt to make separate estimates for different periods of
the Soviet history, with casualties for the Stalinist period varying from 8 to
61 million._ "

" _Several scholars [...] put the death toll at about 20 million._ "

" _no fewer than 15 million deaths_ "

" _Wheatcroft excludes all famine deaths as "purposive deaths," and claims
those that do qualify fit more closely the category of "execution" rather than
"murder."[4] However, some of the actions of Stalin's regime, not only those
during the Holodomor but also Dekulakization and targeted campaigns against
particular ethnic groups, can be considered as genocide_"

(About the last quote -- I don't get the difference of execution and murder,
when it comes to farmers whose only crime were to have been born.)

~~~
BugBrother
Addendum to the last paragraph: I think the last researcher thought the ones
killed through hunger were more random -- take most food from a population and
you don't know exactly _which ones_ will die. With murder, you are more
specific. At least, I can't find any other way of reading that.

Again -- argue what your schools taught you (or whatever source you have for
your claims) with the researchers on the subject, not with me. (Or go the
popular way and claim that Wikipedia and/or all the academic research are in a
conspiracy... :-) )

Edit: Anyway, as I wrote, the original point is that you can define living in
the Eastern Bloc as slavery. The slave owners did whatever they felt like to
anyone -- e.g. if individuals or groups complained about the situation or
tried to leave. Torture, murder, genocide and throwing complainers into prison
or a mental hospital. See Pussy Riot.

~~~
mlvljr
That was no more slavery than what was happening in the West in the same time
(protesters being fired at, i.e.).

On the last phrase: have you _seen_ Pussy Riot yourself? :) (not even asking
if you've ever listened to them -- as no one did)

Regarding school knowledge -- I'll claim that the sources listed on that page
are BS w/o even looking (although going one-by-one could by a truly fruitful
exercise in myth-debunking, probably) -- you may compare the then population
count to the figures you mentioned to get some initial suspicions.

~~~
BugBrother
>>That was no more slavery than what was happening in the West in the same
time

Oh, please... Extraordinary claims need extraordinary support. Post a careful
comparison.

We are back to the original point -- people had to be put in prison (with
guards that shot people fleeing!) to keep them in. The borders _and_
information were open in the West.

>>have you seen Pussy Riot yourself?

I've seen that in civilized countries, we don't throw people in jail for being
blasphemous. (And what in H-ll has artistic quality have to do with that?!)

>> I'll claim that the sources listed on that page are BS w/o even looking

As I guessed: "Or go the popular way and claim that Wikipedia and/or all the
academic research are in a conspiracy..."

Well, I have better things to do than argue with people claiming Wikipedia is
a conspiracy which misrepresent the present state of research -- without
knowing the subject enough to recognize the sources!!

That is a basic test for non serious debaters, sorry.

So bye.

~~~
mlvljr
>> Extraordinary claims need extraordinary support. Then just do it yourself
regarding the "Eastern Europeans _enslaved_ by Soviet leaders" one then! As
illegally crossing a border will get you detained or fired at in almost any
place now and ever, just as politically-motivated oppression is not a Soviet
invention (i. e. McCarthyism, for ex.). Regarding the emigration-preventing
regulations, that may be a perfectly understandable brain-drain prevention
practice stemming from the difference in income equalities between the blocks
(a qualified worker would sometimes earn more than the factory's manager to
the East of the curtain, a scientist with a well-established career earned
enough, too, but less than his colleague on the other side, most probably, and
a humble cleaning lady was a complete different story, I'm sure).

Speaking of _seeing_ PR, and the civilized practice: the folks in question are
not "a rock band who dared to say no to the dictator from a Cathedral stage
(in music!) and were imprisoned", but rather a group of political hooligans,
known initially for a group sex orgy in a museum (and an another alike event,
which I'll not describe here), who then performed several rush-into-cathedral-
and-start-cursing-and-jumping-around-with-a-guitar (sound to be overlayed
later) acts, until finally getting whoever saw this pissed off enough for the
freaks to be handled to the police (and then, the infamous trial happened).
(coming from your original "See PR" \-- you may indeed go and _see_ the
pictures).

Regarding renowned Wikipedia researchers in question -- you don't have to be
one to highly doubt their claims: with nearly every family in ex-USSR losing
members during what is called The Great Patriotic War here (the total losses
are officially > 20 M), both the collective consciousness of the nation, the
witnesses still alive, and their families share the memories of the losses'
severity. Same applies to the 1936-39 repression era (< 2 M executed being the
official figure), the ratio of "official figure" / "perceived impact", most
importantly, seeming to be close to that in the case of the War. Now, the
events costing 60 M in human lives would have roughly x3 the impact of the
War, and still there's nothing like that -- which brings to a conclusion of
roughly a 60/20 * 20/2 == 30x hoax!

And don't you dare to say that living here, we "don't know the subject enough"
:)

~~~
BugBrother
>>illegally crossing a border will get you detained or fired at in almost any
place now and ever,

 _Leaving_ a border will generally not make soldiers shoot at you from the
country you leave.

Being that locked in only happens to slaves and other prisoners.

And I think you know that.

>>Regarding renowned Wikipedia researchers

(I already noted that you learn differently in your schools, like most all
other countries with recent atrocities in their history.)

Sorry, if you argue against wikipedia without even looking at research
references I can't take you seriously.

I didn't read the rest.

~~~
mlvljr
>> Leaving a border will generally not make soldiers shoot at you from the
country you leave. Is it really so? Which countries can be left safely this
way, in view of the border patrols? :)

>> I didn't read the rest. Arguing through not listening may indeed be an
effective (albeit a solipsistic) strategy, but not in a public discussion :)

"Your schools covering up recent atrocities!", and Russian leaders
historically outperforming the West in enslaving nations -- is that really
what you've been taught?

Again, what cover up are we talking of? You very much cannot sell a 60 M dead
from famine story to anyone here, due to presence of alive witnesses -- but it
obviously flies much better over the curtain and far away. What _is_ taught
builds on information declassified during the 90-ies, when "dozens of millions
dead" claim was fashionable, but found no supporting ground, to quite a
surprise of those insisting on access to relevant documents and their
publication.

~~~
BugBrother
>> Which countries can be left safely this way, in view of the border patrols?
:)

You knowingly misrepresent my point. That is the only argument you have left.
Sad.:-(

People couldn't leave East Europe freely, unlike the democratic world. (Hell,
Romania _charged_ Germany/Israel to let German speaking and Jewish Romanians
leave.) And if they tried anyway, they were shot down.

Again -- I stopped reading after the first paragraph. If you hand wave at
references with links to real research, you're just not serious.

~~~
mlvljr
Well, in all seriousness, I cannot see what was misinterpreted; may be not
reading after the first paragraph could shed some light? Your real research
smells hoax, and one obviously needs to be on the other side of the ocean to
not notice that. Continue not reading :)

~~~
BugBrother
>>Your real research smells hoax

Discuss that on the wikipedia page, by presenting other research.

Oh wait, you don't know any.

Bye.

~~~
mlvljr
Farewell discovering more shocking (but well-researched) truth on Wikipedia,
keep up the good job believing in a cover-up of 50 M deaths from a 200 M
population :)

~~~
BugBrother
Yet another misrepresentation of what I wrote.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8372340](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8372340)

Original link:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_Communist_r...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes#Soviet_Union)

~~~
mlvljr
Subtract 8 from 61 (best combined with trying to force yourself to read what
you claim to not have had read above).

Good luck promoting your very own criteria for people being "slaves in a
prison country", may be one day the meaning of terms will change enough for
your original post (the one on the nations "enslaved" by Russian Leaders) to
make sense :)

~~~
BugBrother
As you know: In my references, most researchers seems to be between 15-20
millions.

My definition of slave:

Someone living with no rule of law. No human rights. E.g. their property and
_live_ s can be taken on a whim by their rulers. They are not allowed to
leave, or there are violent repercussions.

A typical communist state. And slavery.

What is unique with those criteria?

~~~
mlvljr
Ok, so we are down from the sensational 60+ M figures to 3-4 times less now,
that's progress (still questionable figures though) :)

A "typical" communist state from 50 years may not give its people what a
pedantic contemporary person would call a full set of "human rights", but
would provide free education, medicine, and so on (not to mention lesser level
of violent crimes often), how's that slavery?

[as regarding not being able to leave -- you can make an attempt and force
yourself to read above on that -- difference in income equalities, forming a
nice "brain drain potential" is a pragmatic reason to constrain emigration,
not some mysterious appetite of "party leader" for eating their own people
alive]

You know absolutely nothing about communism, so to say :)

------
jamessantiago
I always have mixed feelings when it comes to Russian "freedom." On one hand
it looks like a libertarian's dream where freedom (to not wear a seatbelt...)
is plentiful. On the other hand, it also reminds me of this:
[http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/19/anarchi...](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/19/anarchist-
cookbook-author-william-powell-out-of-print)

There's a fine balance between freedom and recklessness but I'm glad Russia
has smokejumpers and the like so we can see another way than that of most of
the western nations.

~~~
CmonDev
Thanks for generalizing. I assume everyone in USA owns a shotgun and a
trailer?

