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THE HOUSEFLY AIRFORCE
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Want the latest buzz on
spy craft? Well, read on..
of TheColumnists.com
I just finished reading an article about miniature flying machines that the government is trying to develop. These little contraptions will be able to fly undetected into hostile surroundings, take pictures of the bad guys or whatever and then fly back to the good guys for electronic debriefing.
These little guys would be as small as insects and packed with micro-electronic equipment designed to hear and see the environment around them but, unfortunately, it will take billions of tax dollars to get the bugs worked out of them.
I’m sure that some people think that this is a new and far out concept of technology but I can attest to the fact that, more than 25 years ago, a friend of mine actually built and commanded such a soaring Lilliputian air force. Well, pretty near.
Jim Brown is a person that you would want to be stuck on a desert island with because he would find a way to get you home. I have never encountered a person with the basic ingenuity and sheer imagination that this man has and this story will show you what I mean.
Many years ago Jim and I were working the night shift in a large control room at a local oil refinery. It wasn’t always easy to stay sharp at night, especially when the clock rolled past 3 a.m. Most of us would swill down lots of coffee and pray for the time to fly by, but Jim was never tired, bored or without a new scheme to try. He would pace the night away as his mind raced with ideas and that night a new idea dawned as a common housefly flew past his nose.
He proceeded to capture a dozen or more flies that had set up shop near the garbage can outside the control room kitchen. He put them in a jar and placed them in the refrigerator then he went back to his desk in the control room and began the delicate job of crafting paper airplanes out of computer paper. After an hour or so, he had made fighters, bombers and something that looked like a flying wing.
We watched him work but no one really knew what he was up to. He got up, fetched the jar from the fridge and settled back in the chair at his desk. At this point, the flies were practically motionless from the cold, so it was easy for him to pluck them out and place them on the wings of his planes. He used a glue stick to secure their little bodies; one fly for fighters, four flies for bombers (two to a wing) and seven or eight for his flying wing. When the flies warmed up, they became the engines that powered these planes all over the control room. We were amazed that they actually flew straight and true as we ducked the flying armada that screamed over our heads.
We had fun with this miniscule air force until our shift was over. Jim gathered the planes up and tossed them in the garbage as we left, but we knew that when we came back the next night, old Brown would have something new up his sleeve.
©2007 by Kent Holsather.
The illustration is from IMSI's Master Clips Collection, 1895
Francisco Blvd. E., San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506, USA. This column
first posted Nov. 26, 2007.
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