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The Zero-Armed Bandit
- batguano 11y agoI had never heard of this. Fascinating. This is why I read HN!
- klez 11y agoPrevious discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9725851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9725851 (two weeks ago)
- FeepingCreature 11y agoCould they just have put a box over it and then covered it in concrete? First thing that comes to mind, not sure why it wouldn't work.
- dfox 11y agoThe concrete would have to cure properly to have any significant effect, which takes time on the order of weeks.
- mrestko 11y agoIt wouldn't work because the bomb was full of nitroglycerin. Concrete is strong but it would only possibly dampen the explosion. Also recall that the bomb was set to detonate without any delay if it was subject to even slight vibration. I wouldn't have volunteered to cover it in concrete.
- jacquesm 11y agoOne way to turn a crappy bomb into a really powerful one is to constrain it in something that can be fractured. There are 'blast blankets' used in demolition and highway construction that are balasted but still open enough that the explosion itself can vent. Basically the effect is to reduce the slope of the build-up of pressure which significantly reduces the amount of damage an explosion will do.
- lost_name 11y agoI obviously don't know, but I'm hard pressed to believe that the people involved didn't consider simpler methods before determining the method most likely to succeed was to use C4. All I'm saying is that there's probably a good reason for the route they went with.
- mizzao 11y agoWow. Giving understandable instructions is important.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- zaroth 11y agoAmazing that it took basically a confession to find these guys, what a different world it was 35 years ago. Reminds me of the YouTube video on never talking to the police. A key tactic being to get you to say even one tiny little lie, if they can disprove anything you said, however irrelevant to the case, you've committed a serious felony and are now their pawn.
- mikehawkins 11y agoMy friend is a prosecutor and said basically the same thing. She recommended that any time the police read your rights and just want to ask you questions - immediately ask for a lawyer. Just keeps things much, much simpler for you.
- duaneb 11y agoNot everyone can afford the time or money invested in such an interaction. It is very, very valuable to understand your rights yourself.
- MaulingMonkey 11y agoNot sure if this is the one, but I'm rewatching it anyways: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc
- userbinator 11y agoBureau agents acknowledge that it is unlikely that even modern bomb squads and technology could make much headway disarming Big John's improvised explosive without setting it off. Any (3D?) imaging technology that would allow seeing inside the upper box with enough resolution to determine the wiring? Also: The inside surfaces of the boxes were lined with rubber sheeting, which were in turn lined with conductive foil. If something metal such as a drill bit or saw blade penetrated the outer metal casing and the rubber sheeting, it would close a circuit between the metal housing and the foil. How about cutting tools made of non-conductive materials?
- jacquesm 11y agoScrap from the foil and the metal housing is also conductive.
- raverbashing 11y ago> Any (3D?) imaging technology that would allow seeing inside the upper box with enough resolution to determine the wiring? Sure, which one? This is not CSI
- userbinator 11y agoThey were X-raying it already, so if they did it from enough angles they would probably be able to do something like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_computed_tomography_scanning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_computed_tomography...
- evan_ 11y agoThe best bet might have been to freeze the battery so it couldn't set off the blasting caps. Possibly by pouring liquid nitrogen into the top box through the panel with the switches.
- PanMan 11y agoWould liquid nitrogen trigger the float switch?
- wtbob 11y agosigh, yet another site which needlessly doesn't work without JavaScript. It's a pity, because the article itself is great.
- obstinate 11y agoThis ship sailed years ago. Kinda time to get over it.
- andrewschleifer 11y agoThe content is mostly there, it's just covered up. Using the inspector tools to delete the div with id 'loading' will reveal stuff.
- mordrax 11y agoI don't get it, the first time I heard this, I thought it was some big joke, but there really are ppl with js turned off? In 2015? Don't you need it to sign into anything... like HN? Or post a comment.
- probably_wrong 11y agoPrecisely, because it is 2015, people like me have turned off js and enable it selectively. Why? Because of all the security implications of letting a website run whatever it wants on your computer. It also breaks some of the tracking, which is a nice bonus.
- sbierwagen 11y agoHN doesn't depend on any clientside JS.
- mordrax 11y agoyou're right and that's pretty cool, looks like everything's statically served, simple html
- MaulingMonkey 11y ago
- mordrax 11y agoHe never saw his sons again... He died of liver cancer at the Southern Nevada Correctional Center This makes me sad. No matter what you did in life, all the ups and downs you go through, to die alone like this... spoiler... Honestly, I read up to the climax believing it was a hoax, never thought for a moment it was actually a real bomb! Here's a thief, decieve and steal. What good is it too have a armed bomb in the box.
- logfromblammo 11y agoThe extortion demand was for $3M. The repair bill was $18M. The bio of the mastermind stated that he lost significant amounts of money gambling at that exact casino. This suggests that the bomber was motivated as much by the casino not having that money as he was in getting it for himself. Not only did he have motive to use an actual, armed bomb, but he might have also included some form of secondary, such as incendiaries, to start fires in the damaged structure and make it a total loss rather than repairable.
- ryandrake 11y agoI'm actually kind of amused by that. All the stubborn casino owner had to do was pay the guys off and hope the cops finally caught up to them. But pride and "acting on principle" ended up costing him an extra $15M.
- mordrax 11y agohindsight's a bitch, there's a reason why the US govt doesn't negotiate with terrorists and the like. Plus they had gone past the 24hr mark and so ppl had more unanswered questions. Having said that, what were they expecting to come out of putting fake money in the bag!!! Had everything gone to plan, and the bomb was real, the result would have been the same!
- logfromblammo 11y agoIf you pay the Danegeld, you will never be rid of the Dane.
- stillsut 11y ago"American Hustle" meets "Speed", coming Summer 2017 no doubt.
- knodi123 11y agoIf I could talk to the bomber, I'd want to know- why actually use explosives? At the moment the main explosion goes off, your plot is over and your bomb is useless. At that point, you're not getting any money, and it's now a question of "will you get caught by the feds". And if you do get caught, having used dud explosives can only be to your benefit.
- slazaro 11y agoMy guess is that maybe dogs can sniff the device and check whether it's actually TNT or dynamite.
- knodi123 11y agoexcept they didn't, and couldn't. I was suggesting using clay or putty, perhaps with a light sprinkling of TNT for flavor. THAT would be equally terrifying but much less dangerous.
- gwern 11y agoYou only need enough to make the dog alert, which is not much at all. Dogs don't weigh, they detect.
- targetOO 11y agoLets say you don't get caught. Device 2 is going to get a whole lot more respect.
- ekarulf 11y agoI was really hoping for an retrospective about a multi-armed bandit learning algorithm that ran in production but never experimented, effectively yielding a "zero-armed bandit".
- liquidcool 11y agoThink of the ingenuity in crafting the device, and his business savvy to go from landscaper to millionaire (in the 70s). So much drive, and yet not enough to get himself to a GA meeting. Addiction's a bitch.