Steve Fossett

[NoneYa]

We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
with very little vegetation?

Makes no sense

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 10:36:35 -0400, NoneYa > wrote:

> We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
> are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
> that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
> airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
> with very little vegetation?
>
> Makes no sense

No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.

Imagine a satellite snaps a picture of Wittman Field during Airventure. Assume
it has a high enough resolution to allow individuals to be recognized. There
are 400,000 people on the grounds at the time...and you want to find one
particular person. You don't know where he was at the time the photo was taken

That means you will have to zoom in on, individually, each person visible on the
image. With average luck, you'll have to examine 200,000 individuals before you
find your friend.

(Heck, here's an aerial photo of Oshkosh:

http://www.airventure.org/2007/media/images/1_Aerial_from_SW.JPG

....just try to COUNT how many people are visible)

Keep in mind, too, that this isn't a mug shot...unless they were pre-warned, the
people in the image won't be looking at the camera. If you take the picture
from directly overhead, all you see it a bunch of caps. But even if the picture
was taken obliquely, some folks will be turned away from the camera, or holding
a cup to their mouths, blocked by other people, inside the exhibition halls, or
using a portajohn, or lying under a tree, or even unexpectedly off the grounds
entirely.

The problem is analogous to the Fossett search. Let's assume the camera gives
the equivalent of viewing an area 500 feet by 500 feet. That is about .01
square mile. With a 10,000 square mile search area, that gives one million
500x500 foot blocks to examine.

And remember all those persons who were turned away or kneeling down, tieing
their shoes, in the Oshkosh picture? After nearly two weeks of an intense air
search, the lack of success is probably because Fossett's Decathlon doesn't
strongly resemble an aircraft any more. It's undoubtedly crumpled, it's quite
possibly burned. By now, it's probably dusted with the "dirt and sand" you
refer to, making it blend in even better.

The persons who would examine the imagery wouldn't be looking for the big white
"+" of wings and fuselage, they'd be looking at every apparent bush, every
apparent rock, to guess if sometime, in the past, it just may have been an
airplane. How long should they examine each block? If each takes two minutes,
we're talking well over 30,000 labor hours. Every shadow on the image might
hide wreckage, so you'd better have another set of photos taken at a different
time of day. AND look at those.

Finally, finding hidden objects in imagery is a *military* specialty your
typical Ikonos analyst doesn't practice. If you want experts to look for the
plane, you're going to have to go to the government...and those folks are pretty
busy on some pretty important tasks.

Ron Wanttaja

[Newps]

Ron Wanttaja wrote:

>
> No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.
>

That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
and find the one plane.

[muff528]

"Newps" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> Ron Wanttaja wrote:
>
>>
>> No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.
>>
>
> That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of other
> planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try and
> find the one plane.

Except that Fossett's plane may or may not look like an airplane now. Or it
may
be partially or wholly obscured by vegitation, water or shadows.
Or both.
TP

[Ron Lee[_2_]]

>Makes no sense

Or he landed on a whitish lake bed, flipped over and you are trying to
find a whitish underbelly on top of white dirt. I keep watching news
hoping that he will have been found alive but those hopes are fading.

Ron Lee

[Tater]

On Sep 9, 9:36 am, NoneYa > wrote:
> We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
> are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
> Why can't we find a wrecked
> airplane in Nevada??

they are doing so.

still a ton of data for the computers to churn through.

why not take some computer programming courses to see why such things
are difficult.

a starter course on photography can also give you some clues.

on the other hand, he could have drilled in so hard that there may
only be a patch of dirt slightly darker than the surrounding dirt.

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 10:20:40 -0600, Newps > wrote:

> Ron Wanttaja wrote:
> >
> > No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.
>
> That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
> other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
> and find the one plane.

As I originally posted,"After nearly two weeks of an intense air search, the
lack of success is probably because Fossett's Decathlon doesn't strongly
resemble an aircraft any more. It's undoubtedly crumpled, it's quite possibly
burned. By now, it's probably dusted with the "dirt and sand" you refer to,
making it blend in even better....The persons who would examine the imagery
wouldn't be looking for the big white "+" of wings and fuselage, they'd be
looking at every apparent bush, every apparent rock, to guess if sometime, in
the past, it just may have been an airplane."

Just because a section of the image DOESN'T contain a *recognizable* aircraft
doesn't mean the wreckage of Fossett's plane isn't there. You could certainly
shorten your search time if you only searched for intact airplanes that were not
covered with dust. But I don't believe the Decathlon is just sitting parked,
undamaged.

Here's a picture of a Twin Beech crashed in the desert:

http://www.aircraftwrecks.com/images/archive3/twin_beachcraft.jpg

Noticed how the crumpled portion of the main section seems to blend into the
desert. The tail cone is fairly obvious (this close), but remember the
Decathlon was fabric covered...it may have burned away, and all they'll see is s
skein of blackened 3/4" steel tubes. It probably looks closer to this:

http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/images/lancaster_desert_500.jpg

It's been two weeks. Certainly one doesn't want to give up hope; after all, an
elderly woman lost for two weeks in the Pacific Northwest was recently found
alive. But then, she was in the woodlands, not a desert. How much water was
Fossett carrying?

Ron Wanttaja

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 19:52:30 +0200, Martin > wrote:

> On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 10:20:40 -0600, Newps > wrote:
>
> >>
> >> No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.
> >
> >That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
> >other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
> >and find the one plane.
>
> and use software to compare old images with new ones to identify changes.

You'd have to have before and after photos with matching positions and view
angles of the satellites/aircraft or the photos you're comparing will be taken
from two different angles. You'd have to have the "before" photo taken at about
the same time of day and the same time of year, since the shapes of all the
shadows will be different, otherwise.

Finding a "before" picture might be a bit challenging. After all, it's
desert...how often is someone going to shoot a high-resolution picture of it?
The older the "before" picture is, the more natural changes will have occurred
and the more false positives. You'll have to hope no bushes have died off since
the previous photos were taken, that no new ones have grown, that the wind
hasn't pushed any dunes around, that no four-wheel-drive enthusiasts have cut
new tire tracks, etc. etc. etc. Having to chase down ~50,000 false positives
might slow things down a bit.

I'm a space (spacy?) guy, not a computer sciences type, but it seems to me that
the processing capability needed will be stretching the current technology.
Let's assume you've got a ground resolution of 3 feet. That's ~1760 pixels per
linear mile, 176,000 pixels per single row, or about 30 gigapixels total. Give
it a lousy 256-bit color, and that's about a 7.6 terabit image. Excuse me, TWO
7.6 terabit images, since we'll be comparing them.

Sure, the US Government might have the capability...but they'd be comparing
photos taken with same camera, taken just days or weeks apart, from the same
orbit, at the same time of day, etc. In any case, they are not likely to let a
set of civilians waltz in and borrow their computers.

Ron Wanttaja

[Thomas Borchert]

Newps,

> That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
> other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
> and find the one plane.
>

Hey, "we" can't even find Osama when "we" have 6 years to try (in a similar
landscape, I might add).

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

[Thomas Borchert]

Ron,

> Finding a "before" picture might be a bit challenging. After all, it's
> desert...how often is someone going to shoot a high-resolution picture of it?
>

Well, FWIW, it's a part of desert that (I was told) contains one of the largest
ammo storage facilities in the world. So it might just be photographed a little
bit more often. That said, I still think you're absolutely right about the
chances of finding it.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 21:09:53 +0200, Thomas Borchert
> wrote:

> Ron,
>
> > Finding a "before" picture might be a bit challenging. After all, it's
> > desert...how often is someone going to shoot a high-resolution picture of it?
> >
>
> Well, FWIW, it's a part of desert that (I was told) contains one of the largest
> ammo storage facilities in the world. So it might just be photographed a little
> bit more often.

Yeah, but do you think those who DO have the pictures of the ammo facilities are
gonna offer them up? :-)

Ron Wanttaja

[Thomas Borchert]

Ron,

> Yeah, but do you think those who DO have the pictures of the ammo facilities are
> gonna offer them up? :-)
>

True. It's at Hawthorne, BTW. Even the Google Earth pix aren't bad.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 11:19:40 -0700, I wrote:

> It's been two weeks....How much water was Fossett carrying?

Ooops, my bad: One week.

Ron Wanttaja

[Adhominem]

Ron Wanttaja wrote:

> That means you will have to zoom in on, individually, each person visible
> on the image. *With average luck, you'll have to examine 200,000
> individuals before you find your friend.

.... and that's why you can help with the search:

http://www.mturk.com/mturk/preview?groupId=9TSZK4G35XEZJZG21T60

You get presented with a recent satellite image of the area and can flag it
if you think it bears further investigation (note: the site is a preview,
you have to click "Accept HIT" to actually submit your opinion). If enough
people do this, we might actually manage to scan the entire area of
interest in a short time.

Ad.

--
The mail address works, but please notify me via usenet of any mail you send
to it, as it has a retention period of just a few hours.

[El Maximo]

"NoneYa" > wrote in message
...
> We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that are 2 inch's
> wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars that are 12 inches wide. Why
> can't we find a wrecked airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt
> and sand with very little vegetation?

WE?

What part are you taking in the search?

[Matt Whiting]

Thomas Borchert wrote:
> Newps,
>
>> That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
>> other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
>> and find the one plane.
>>
>
> Hey, "we" can't even find Osama when "we" have 6 years to try (in a similar
> landscape, I might add).

True, but I don't think Fossett is trying to not be found. :-)

Matt

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 22:23:37 +0200, Adhominem > wrote in >:

> ... you can help with the search:

>http://www.mturk.com/mturk/preview?groupId=9TSZK4G35XEZJZG21T60

>You get presented with a recent satellite image of the area and can flag it
>if you think it bears further investigation (note: the site is a preview,
>you have to click "Accept HIT" to actually submit your opinion). If enough
>people do this, we might actually manage to scan the entire area of
>interest in a short time.

I did 102 hits. I only suggested further review on
one of them.

Had to stop a couple of times to prove I was human.
I wrote a macro to do the clicking for me.

Marty
--
Big-8 newsgroups: humanities.*, misc.*, news.*, rec.*, sci.*, soc.*, talk.*
See http://www.big-8.org for info on how to add or remove newsgroups.

[Bob Fry]

>>>>> "Martin" == Martin > writes:

Martin> and use software to compare old images with new ones to
Martin> identify changes.

I guessing you're not a programmer.

Our $40G/year intelligence expenditure mistakenly identified WMD in
Iraq. Does anybody remember Colin Powell insisting before the
UN--with photgraphic evidence--that WMD's were there?
--
"Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere!"
--President Bush, joking about his administration's failure to find
WMDs in Iraq as he narrated a comic slideshow during the Radio & TV
Correspondents' Association dinner, March 25, 2004

[Jon]

On Sep 9, 10:36 am, NoneYa > wrote:
> We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
> are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
> that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
> airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
> with very little vegetation?
>
> Makes no sense

to a bigot, reality makes little/no sense.



<http://www.spacecomputer.com/systems/archer.html>

[Bob Fry]

>>>>> "ad" == adhominem > writes:
ad> ... and that's why you can help with the search:

ad> http://www.mturk.com/mturk/preview?groupId=9TSZK4G35XEZJZG21T60

ad> You get presented with a recent satellite image of the area

Hey, are the folks organizing the Google Earth search handing out the
searchable images in a deliberate fashion? You know, so the area is
systematically viewed, not randomly.
--
If you go to a party, and you want to be the popular one at the
party, do this: Wait until no one is looking, then kick a burning
log out of the fireplace onto the carpet. Then jump on top of it
with your body and yell, "Log o' fire! Log o' fire!" I've never
done this, but I think it'd work.
- Jack Handey

[Roger (K8RI)]

On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 10:36:35 -0400, NoneYa >
wrote:

>We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
>are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
>that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
>airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
>with very little vegetation?
>
>Makes no sense

Makes a lot of sense to me. Tain't all that easy even with image
comparison. Too many variables, irregular shaped objects, and
changing landscape along with no recent data/images for a base line.

We can easily find lots of things when we are looking at either a
small area for something specific of any area where we look for
"anything", but not something specific in a very large area. That is
extremely difficult. When it comes to pattern recognition, computers
are very good at looking for some specific shape, but not good at
finding that shape when it's been altered. The algorithms for complex
pattern recognition are very sophisticated and typically take lots of
computing horsepower.

On top of that if there is any brush around, airplanes can be
extremely difficult to spot even from 500 or a 1000 feet.

A Bo went down between here and MOP a few years back. That area runs
probably between 50 and 100 people per square mile. They put it
between two trees and walked out. The FAA inspectors couldn't readily
find the plane so to save time the two guys took them back in and as I
understand it still took them a few hours to find it.

[donzaemon]

yeah he's certainly not evading but the big question is "why didn't his elt
go off ?"
what scenarios fit this ... he experienced a health problem and got the
plane down ?
doesn't seem like an experienced pilot like him would forget to set it off
by hand after a forced landing ....
Do they sometimes fail to go off on impact ?



"Matt Whiting" > wrote in message
...
> Thomas Borchert wrote:
>> Newps,
>>
>>> That's a bad analogy, we're not looking for one airplane in a sea of
>>> other planes. Remove all the planes in the picture except one. Now try
>>> and find the one plane.
>>>
>>
>> Hey, "we" can't even find Osama when "we" have 6 years to try (in a
>> similar landscape, I might add).
>
> True, but I don't think Fossett is trying to not be found. :-)
>
> Matt

[Ron Wanttaja]

On Mon, 10 Sep 2007 15:27:35 +0900, "donzaemon" > wrote:

> yeah he's certainly not evading but the big question is "why didn't his elt
> go off ?"
> what scenarios fit this ... he experienced a health problem and got the
> plane down ?
> doesn't seem like an experienced pilot like him would forget to set it off
> by hand after a forced landing ....
> Do they sometimes fail to go off on impact ?

As someone else posted, severe crashes can sever the ELT antenna. Sadly, it's
the scenario that best fits the apparent lack of signals from either his ELT or
his wrist-mounted PLB.

Ron Wanttaja

[Thomas Borchert]

Donzaemon,

> Do they sometimes fail to go off on impact ?
>

More often than sometimes, it seems. If they are not 406-Mhz-units,
that doesn't help either.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

[Thomas Borchert]

Bob,

> Our $40G/year intelligence expenditure mistakenly identified WMD in
> Iraq.
>

Not really. They wanted to see WMDs, because the politicians wanted
them to see them - and so they did. The government paid, and got what
it paid for.

--
Thomas Borchert (EDDH)

[Matt Whiting]

donzaemon wrote:
> yeah he's certainly not evading but the big question is "why didn't his
> elt go off ?"
> what scenarios fit this ... he experienced a health problem and got the
> plane down ?
> doesn't seem like an experienced pilot like him would forget to set it
> off by hand after a forced landing ....
> Do they sometimes fail to go off on impact ?

Yes, they do fail sometimes to go off on impact.

Matt

[Ron Natalie]

Now you are talking about something I know something about. I have
written the image search software that pretty much has 90% of the
US intelligence market. There are two things you need:

1. Satellite tasking over the area.
2. Enough dedicated eyeballs watching the monitors who know
what to look for.

Believe me, even the commercial satellites such as Digital Globe
have enough information (time / location) and if DG wanted to
collect imagery, they probably could over a weeks time do it.
However, whose going to pay them? Satellite time costs money.
It's not just a bunch of data sitting in a google earth like
database of the entire world. Things are collected as there
is a demand.

[NVArt]

For Steve's sake, I hope he's still hiding in the back of the hangar
with Paris.

[Robert M. Gary]

On Sep 9, 7:36 am, NoneYa > wrote:
> We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
> are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
> that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
> airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
> with very little vegetation?
>
> Makes no sense

The high quality Google Earth pictures are all done with aircraft.
Googe has had aircraft up to update the search area so you can help
search right now on Google Earth.

[Andrew Sarangan]

On Sep 9, 12:01 pm, Ron Wanttaja > wrote:
> On Sun, 09 Sep 2007 10:36:35 -0400, NoneYa > wrote:
> > We can take pictures of objects on the Earth from space that
> > are 2 inch's wide. We can take pictures of objects on Mars
> > that are 12 inches wide. Why can't we find a wrecked
> > airplane in Nevada?? A place that is mostly dirt and sand
> > with very little vegetation?
>
> > Makes no sense
>
> No, you just have to understand the realities of the process.
>
> Imagine a satellite snaps a picture of Wittman Field during Airventure. Assume
> it has a high enough resolution to allow individuals to be recognized. There
> are 400,000 people on the grounds at the time...and you want to find one
> particular person. You don't know where he was at the time the photo was taken
>
> That means you will have to zoom in on, individually, each person visible on the
> image. With average luck, you'll have to examine 200,000 individuals before you
> find your friend.
>
> (Heck, here's an aerial photo of Oshkosh:
>
> http://www.airventure.org/2007/media/images/1_Aerial_from_SW.JPG
>
> ...just try to COUNT how many people are visible)
>
> Keep in mind, too, that this isn't a mug shot...unless they were pre-warned, the
> people in the image won't be looking at the camera. If you take the picture
> from directly overhead, all you see it a bunch of caps. But even if the picture
> was taken obliquely, some folks will be turned away from the camera, or holding
> a cup to their mouths, blocked by other people, inside the exhibition halls, or
> using a portajohn, or lying under a tree, or even unexpectedly off the grounds
> entirely.
>
> The problem is analogous to the Fossett search. Let's assume the camera gives
> the equivalent of viewing an area 500 feet by 500 feet. That is about .01
> square mile. With a 10,000 square mile search area, that gives one million
> 500x500 foot blocks to examine.
>
> And remember all those persons who were turned away or kneeling down, tieing
> their shoes, in the Oshkosh picture? After nearly two weeks of an intense air
> search, the lack of success is probably because Fossett's Decathlon doesn't
> strongly resemble an aircraft any more. It's undoubtedly crumpled, it's quite
> possibly burned. By now, it's probably dusted with the "dirt and sand" you
> refer to, making it blend in even better.
>
> The persons who would examine the imagery wouldn't be looking for the big white
> "+" of wings and fuselage, they'd be looking at every apparent bush, every
> apparent rock, to guess if sometime, in the past, it just may have been an
> airplane. How long should they examine each block? If each takes two minutes,
> we're talking well over 30,000 labor hours. Every shadow on the image might
> hide wreckage, so you'd better have another set of photos taken at a different
> time of day. AND look at those.
>
> Finally, finding hidden objects in imagery is a *military* specialty your
> typical Ikonos analyst doesn't practice. If you want experts to look for the
> plane, you're going to have to go to the government...and those folks are pretty
> busy on some pretty important tasks.
>
> Ron Wanttaja

There are techniques other than straight visual images for detecting
objects, although I am not sure if any of them are being used in this
context. Examples are infrared hyperspectral and polarimetric
imaging.

[Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe]

"Ron Natalie" > wrote in message
m...
> Now you are talking about something I know something about. I have
> written the image search software that pretty much has 90% of the
> US intelligence market. There are two things you need:
>
> 1. Satellite tasking over the area.
> 2. Enough dedicated eyeballs watching the monitors who know
> what to look for.
>
> Believe me, even the commercial satellites such as Digital Globe
> have enough information (time / location) and if DG wanted to
> collect imagery, they probably could over a weeks time do it.
> However, whose going to pay them? Satellite time costs money.
> It's not just a bunch of data sitting in a google earth like
> database of the entire world. Things are collected as there
> is a demand.

GeoEye has already collected the images.

http://www.avweb.com/alm?amazon_stevefossett&kw=Flash

Should yield the dedicated eyeballs.

--
Geoff
The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.

[donzaemon]

is there a way to know just how far the new images extend ?
it seems they don't cover the area I want to look at.


"Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe" <The Sea Hawk at wow way d0t com> wrote in message
news:IdqdnaxSYN1XWnjbnZ2dnUVZ_ramnZ2d@wideopenwest .com...
> "Ron Natalie" > wrote in message
> m...
>> Now you are talking about something I know something about. I have
>> written the image search software that pretty much has 90% of the
>> US intelligence market. There are two things you need:
>>
>> 1. Satellite tasking over the area.
>> 2. Enough dedicated eyeballs watching the monitors who know
>> what to look for.
>>
>> Believe me, even the commercial satellites such as Digital Globe
>> have enough information (time / location) and if DG wanted to
>> collect imagery, they probably could over a weeks time do it.
>> However, whose going to pay them? Satellite time costs money.
>> It's not just a bunch of data sitting in a google earth like
>> database of the entire world. Things are collected as there
>> is a demand.
>
> GeoEye has already collected the images.
>
> http://www.avweb.com/alm?amazon_stevefossett&kw=Flash
>
> Should yield the dedicated eyeballs.
>
> --
> Geoff
> The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
> remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
> When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.
>