I’m thinking Mt Chimborazo in Ecuador…at over 20000 ft, it’s peak it the farthest from the center of the earth (while not being the highest above sea level thanks to the equatorial bulge).
Sure, it doesn’t remove air resistance or friction, but halving it, even cutting it by 1/3 is a massive leap in efficiency and negates much of the extreme engineering and materials needed to overcome the friction….plus, as you mentioned, there’s the rotational speed advantage from launching on the equator vs Florida.
Also, while extremely minor, there’s also a slight reduction in gravitational pull at those heights. A joule saved is a joule earned!

Using a mountainside might help with structural integrity, but it's not likely to give much air resistance advantage if I'm reading the math correctly. The 5 highest peaks in the US are all in Alaska and and range from just under 5km to just over 6km. Commercial jets using air resistance/density for lift fly at about 10km and even at 38km aerodynamic lift still carries 98% of the weight of the plane (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%A1rm%C3%A1n_line)

Air density is halved at 5km compared to sea level, but air resistance doesn't diminish as quickly (due to it being multiplied by velocity squared and drag coefficient), and only becomes irrelevant (for short-term purposes) around 100km at the Karman Line.

If we had a 5km peak in Florida, the lack of logistical costs might make the benefits worth it, and if we could build on one of Equador's 5km peaks, then there's the further advantage of equatorial location for optimal rotational advantage (part of the reason we launch from South Florida)

To be fair, it’s only meant to throw stuff to the point second stage rockets normally fire. Only 10000g….no problem, right?
Rail guns seem much more reasonable IMO. So does launching from a mountain top to avoid air resistance.

True. It is pissing ME off.

Unless you were, kindly, calling me a bitch?

(I know you aren't, I just couldn't resist making a joke I would never ever EVER make about someone else.)

So, the LAPD intentionally overloaded the containment system maximum by 1.5 lbs of explosives, and the safe load by 6.5 lbs…but since they can’t count they really put in nearly 3 times as much as they thought….then couldn’t figure out how it exploded!?!
Er mer gerd!

And now, suddenly, after admitting they thought they put 16.5 lbs of explosives in it, they say it’s capacity was 25 lbs, but for weeks and weeks they officially said it had a maximum capacity of 15lbs, but they only put 10lbs in it. Another case of the LAPD rewriting history and their story to escape responsibility. They never hit Rodney King too…he received minor injuries by falling while resisting arrest, remember?

Just a protest that went too far....you mean like the vast minority of BLM marches that ended with rioting? No, sorry, this was planned, organised, executed, and was planned by and supported from the Whitehouse, "it's gonna be wild", not a spontaneous over exuberance by people demanding they not be murdered by police where the organisers immediately and strongly denounce those causing damage and injuries and call for them to stop.


How is what you copied and pasted one word different from what I said?
The fbi released the information about him, including photos of him dressed in all black with his glasses hood and mask in the capitol and his posts and discussions with under cover agents outlining his intention to try to frame Antifa for the riot/coup by dressing like them in a press release, there's no crime of impersonating Antifa, nor a crime for having his friends do surveillance in public areas without an actual illegal action attached, but it will all be brought up at his trial and sentencing for....

Knowingly Enter or Remain in any Restricted Building or Grounds Without Lawful Authority to do so and Knowingly, and with Intent to Impede or Disrupt the Orderly Conduct of Government Business or Official Functions, Engage in Disorderly or Disruptive Conduct in, or Within Such Proximity to, Any Restricted Building or Grounds, When, or so that, Such Conduct, in Fact, Impedes or Disrupts the Orderly Conduct of Government Business or Official Functions

Disorderly Conduct on Capitol Grounds

Obstruction of an Official Proceeding....


In other words, charges for his actions during the failed violent coup for Trump that his supporters attempted that killed 5 and that he attempted to blatantly falsely blame on Antifa, just like you do.

Don't be surprised if conspiracy and terrorism charges come soon.

"According to the court record, at the time of his arrest he had several guns, including an AK-47, and the material to make 50 molotov cocktails. Not what you need for a peaceful protest, more what you bring to a violent government overthrow.
An undercover officer with the D.C. police first encountered Duong at the Capitol on Jan. 6, according to the government. Duong described himself as an “operator” and later explained that he wore all black to look like an anti-fascist activist, the government alleged in court documents. In video later seen by investigators, Duong is identified in court documents as shouting “We’re coming for you Nancy” and pushing a fellow protester toward the doors on the Senate side of the building.

"They stayed in touch, and a week later Duong allegedly told the undercover officer he was part of a “cloak and dagger” group that will “build resistances . . . for what will inevitably come.” In March, he told associates, “Keep your guns and be ready to use them.”

"He and others held “Bible study” where they discussed firearms explosives and other training, according to court documents; Duong also brought someone he described as a “three percenter” to one meeting. The right-wing Three Percenters movement, formed in 2008, is named after the false claim that only 3 percent of colonists fought in the American Revolution, many of it's members have been charged in the Jan 6 failed coup.
He talked about surveilling the Capitol building, and in February an associate took some footage of it, according to prosecutors. He also talked about freeing alleged rioters who were behind bars, saying, according to the government, “I see that as an opportunity. With every great revolution, you go to the prisons and you break them out.”
According to the court documents, he and the undercover agent toured the jail in Lorton, Va., where he talked about testing out explosives. He told the agent, the government alleged, that he was working on a “manifesto,” saying, “If I get into a gun fight with the feds and I don’t make it, I want to be able to transfer as much wisdom to my son as possible.” Prosecutors say he also discussed how far he could shoot on his family’s property in the event of a raid and said it could be the site of a second Waco.
He said at a meeting in June that he had collected Styrofoam and more than 50 wine bottles to make molotov cocktails but had held off on buying fuel “to avoid . . . being hit with a conspiracy charge,” according to the complaint filed against him. He told the undercover agent he had been saving motor oil from his car for that purpose."

Yep, sure sounds like a peaceful right wing protester to me, not another anti government right wing terrorist trying to blame their deadly anti American violence on the left....nooooooo.

You just can't resist can you.

Oh I could not resist. The vaults of youtube stupidity and offhand reactions are rich on this one, to the point of being blandly monotonous. Marxist! Defund! Paid for by our taxes!
Nowhere is his name mentioned, so the edited video could be debunked easily.

Even from this artificially short excerpt it is easy to see that in the first half he is describing not his own views but those of Coca Cola corporatespeak. In the second half he is explaining what Coca Cola means by that shit.

Nowhere does he add his own views on the matter at hand, so he could well be trying to warn the world that Coca Cola is doing it wrong. Or vice versa. Except someone edited out the facts and meaning and left just trollfood.

Those are decent points, but have absolutely zero to do with the mass abandoning of their positions. It was 100% due to one of their own being charged after beating nonviolent protesters. They originally admitted exactly that, and now that they aren't being supported in their walkout, they are coming up with excuses that didn't matter to them the day before the officer was charged.

I think they should have to pay for the training and equipment they now refuse to use.

What are you talking about? You think budget cuts caused time off to be cancelled?! It costs double to not rotate in other officers, because you pay those on duty overtime, it doesn't make it cheaper. Budget cuts were not the issue when these cops were doing crowd control, only now that they're suddenly called to account for their own actions. No time off temporarily, because of extreme circumstances, was not an issue until one of their own was charged. It's certainly not abnormal, and absolutely not because of budget cuts, it costs more.

No prosecutions is the norm, if I recall, over 98% of charges levied at protesters have been dismissed nation wide, mostly because police had no evidence to back the charges they brought. You might note, as described in the article, "Mr. Schmidt immediately announced that he would focus on prosecuting cases of violence or vandalism; protesters who simply resisted arrest or refused to disperse after a police order would not necessarily be charged." They are taking a stand against anarchic violent protesters, but not the peaceful protesters with a legitimate gripe about violent, racist, deadly police acting as an anarchist gang that believes rules only apply to you, not them.

There are few prosecutions in large part because police declare riots when all participants are peaceful and not causing damage, and police are almost always the one's giving the orders to remove the people they declared "rioters", and in most cases they have zero evidence to back up their declarations, and are as violent as possible, beating peaceful videographers and reporters who were trapped and could not disperse, then charging them with refusal to disperse and resisting arrest, even violence against police for attacking police batons with their faces.
(Edit: remember the freeway shutdown when they marched on the freeway, and police blocked them from exiting or continuing while a second group of police came from behind, forcing them into a small fenced in area with no exit, then charged them all with refusal to disperse and the few that tried to disperse were charged with attacking police officers who blocked every escape route, violently attacking anyone trying to leave...all on live tv?)
Many peaceful protests became riots only after police moved in to violently disperse protests, fully 1/2 were riots because counter protesters and bad right wing actors like proud and boogaloo boys were planting bombs, shooting crowds, starting fires, driving through crowds, and murdering police in an effort to paint protesters as violent anarchists. That is verified fact directly from the DOJ investigation.

It's not a Portland only thing, police abandoning their communities because, as they indicated to the DA, "“It was like, ‘There’s our team and there’s their team, and you are on their team and you’re not on our team. And we’ve never had a D.A. not be on our team before,’” Police assume they are on a team against citizens, and won't do their jobs if, by doing them wrong with bias and malice, they might be prosecuted. They are used to immunity, and don't know how to do their jobs without it because they are abusers of power.

One day after charges were levied they quit in solidarity with the criminal abusive cop, and came up with fake excuses later.

You seem to have missed "the Justice Department said that the city’s Police Bureau was violating its own use-of-force policies during crowd-control operations, and that supervisors were not properly investigating complaints." part.

In this case, I sympathize because Portland has refused to assist or back any of their police in the riots there. The DA has refused to charge anyone who resists arrest or refuses to disperse after police have been given orders to remove rioters (they are rioters. even the Mayor is now saying to stop calling them protesters and to call them anarchists instead).

Why would anyone want to go out, night after night, and face the same people you arrested the night before doing the same stuff?

The fact also exists that Portland has made massive cuts to the police budget. That has led to time off being cancelled for police, no rotations to move fresh police into the riot situations so the same ones have to deal with the face to face confrontations with no break, and the alternative policing option which was hands off was tabled. "A paramedic and a social worker would drive up offering water, a high-protein snack and, always and especially, conversation, aiming to defuse a situation that could otherwise lead to confrontation and violence. No power to arrest. No coercion."

There are a lot of problems with police, for sure. Portland's government is the driver behind these issues, though. Until they start taking a stand against these anarchist, violent protesters (who are PREDOMINANTLY white), the situation will not get better.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/09/us/portland-protests.html

this is a fine example of what a year locked up does to a body.

sure. willing to listen to the p o s s i b i l i t y of corona being manufactured, but have some hard evidence. please. in a country billions +, origins of swine, bird, and ABC123 lettered viruses - it's not unreasonable to expect a lab to be located in a region where the pandemic started.

as it is, not versed in immunology (nor psychology or 'why are the following me') so rely on those who know (and don't have stock in Alcoa). that and the experiences of a lifetime being ginned up preparing for the next life-altering bug.

herpes, aids, penicillin-resistant gonorrhea/syphilis/chlamydia/TB, cjd, zika, lyme, west nile, ebola or the plethora of viruses, of eastern origins, that could become the next Spanish Flu.*

all those diseases have natural origins.

so, yeah. this pandemic wasn't a surprise. no more than Hurricane Katrina (why did they build that bridge over Lake Pontchartrain) or why the ere-orange administration left a 'play book' for Virus X.

it was foreseen, it happened, and could happen again. much more likely another flaming arrow from natures' quiver. (shivers given via a quiver?)

Occam's razor, in essence (should have led w/that).


* even new strains of hepatitis caused waves for a while and there was a bit of time, a virus in the NW USA was akin to airborne aids but disappear as quickly as it came and schistosomiasis has come closer to our shores - - - AND NOW -https://www.livescience.com/mystery-brain-disease-cluster-canada.html that hopefully isn't the precursor to zombie-itis.

Yes, I see that.
My point being the training masks don't do a thing for covid beyond training the body to operate with air resistance. It's a big issue, people who don't care about safety ignoring reality to "comply" with mask mandates by wearing fishnet masks or other non filtered front discharge masks, then pretending they don't understand the difference.

I doubt these kids had trained with them anyway, they're more for high level athletes, so in this case they were not especially prepared to compete wearing effective covid masks....but likely neither had their competitors.