Long term data storage (was: Disasters and Recovery

From: Philip.Belben_at_pgen.com <(Philip.Belben_at_pgen.com)>
Date: Tue Jan 19 10:38:54 1999

>> A recent program on Stonehenge on the Discovery channel said the RAF
wanted to
>> level Stonehenge with explosives, but the person who owned the land they
were
>> on refused to let them. *boggle* Is it just me, or does all this
suggest
>> that in the 1930s and early 40s good maps were much harder to come by
than
>
> A lot of it was propaganda to the British public to convince them how
> important the war was....
>
> Of course there were maps. Ordnance Survey maps were originally produced
> for military use (hence the name), but nowadays are available just about
> anywhere in the UK (most bookshops keep at least the local ones). During
> the war they were probably impossible to obtain, but before the war,
trivial.
>
> And you can bet they had got them in Germany as well. After all, the
> British certainly had German maps.

Yes, the Germans had good maps of Britain. At Bletchley I say on display a
German map of the UK 132kV electrical grid, as it was in 1938...

> The other thing that worries me is that Stonehenge is not the best
> landmark in that area. Salisbury Cathedral's spire is probably a lot
> easier to see from a distance.

Unique. But not so distinctive. Stonehenge is obviously Stonehenge.
Salisbury Cathedral is random_large_church_with_tall_spire. Seriously, if
I emerged from cloud somewhere in the South of England, and saw Stonehenge,
I'd know exactly where I was. If I emerged and saw Salisbury, I could
probably work it out, but it would be a lot harder.

But the original report - that Stonehenge was flattened - looks like a
clear case of local telling tall story to American tourist...

Philip.
Received on Tue Jan 19 1999 - 10:38:54 GMT