It is less than three weeks until the big event. I visited the site yesterday to do some prep. I’ll post more tonight but here are a couple pictures indicating the existing conditions and weather:
The road just to the north of the site.
The actual site. The hillside in the distance is the main target area. That is not fog in the air. It is snow.
White boomers against snow would be… interesting.
Those pictures were the scene at about 10:00 AM. It got better in the afternoon. I’ll have picture of that too.
We will paint or put brightly colored stickers on (some) of the targets. I don’t think the white on white issue will be that big of a deal. And clearing the snow with boomers will be fun.
I just worry about getting the targets, 1700 pounds of them, into the target area.
I worry about the reaction rate and the temperature being low enough to make the reaction too slow to sustain detonation on impact.
Two weeks ago when Caleb and I did our detonation tests, IIRC, the temperature was in the upper 30s. Agreed, we were using .22LR at close range rather than .223 or larger at long range but the test results were only slightly (on the order of 5 to 10 fps) different that other test results at warmer temperatures.
The temperature yesterday afternoon about 14:00 was 45F. The 15-day forecast is actually not that bad. And historically it will have to approach new records for those days to be cold enough to invalidate our tests.
We should do more tests on the effects of temperature. On a really hot sunny day was should test targets both packed in ice and in boxes painted black at long range with a .223.
I’m still trying to be positive, but laying in the mud isn’t much fun if it is cold!
That said, there are some 60’s and 70’s in that forecast, and I know that a day or two of that kind of temps and most of that snow will disappear, then some wind, and voila, beautiful ground!
Bill
Wind with temperature in the 60s and 70s would make a big difference. But we will need at least a week of really good weather or three weeks of ordinary but dry weather to make it “beautiful”.
We are on the edge of being able declare, “It’s going to be muddy this year.” Unless it’s windy and/or snowing and/or raining on the day of the event the shooters won’t be too adversely affected. It’s my staff attempting to get the targets built and into place that will be affected the most.
If it ain’t rainin’, it ain’t trainin’.
If it ain’t snowin’, it ain’t worth goin’.
One of the niceties of shooting outdoors is the wonderful variety of weather conditions we encounter. And no, I won’t be there this year. Next year, with Global Warming in full effect, maybe…
Thank goodness for glowbal warming… think how bad it would be otherwise! We had a few minutes of snow this morning here in Boise. My sweetie and I are going up the hill tomorrow and get in some end of the season snowshoeing. When we get back, would you like me to ship the shoes up to you, so you can get the targets out? 😉
Fun in the mud is fun nonetheless.
Snowshoes might actually help on the hill, placing targets.
I have a couple pair of snowshoes already. But I expect it’s going to be mud not snow that we are fighting. And did you catch the number “1700” in the comments above. 1700 pounds of explosives in 1600 targets that need to be moved about a quarter of a mile. Tell me what sort of equipment is going to make that an easy task when the mud is nearly knee deep–
AHHHH!!! I just got it! A helicopter.
Now, does anyone know a helicopter operator that is willing to move over 3/4 of a ton of homemade explosives over a 50,000 volt powerline?
A set of these on an ATV.