THE Cub Report, 09.09.2013, Version- Master Of Hypocrisy
You all know I’m a big Formula 1 fan, a huge Ferrari F1 fan specifically, but I think it’s time for me to take a break. For the first time since the ’80s, I’m not going to follow F1 anymore. Last weekend at Monza was the clincher, F1 has become boring. Seb, the snotty young German with his Red Bull is unbeatable for the title, so there is very little reason for me to give two derns about the rest of the season. There are very few crashes, very few car failures, there haven’t been radical car changes in forever, and while thanks to DRS there is more passing, F1 racing has become a bore to me. If it should become more interesting, which it might next year when the turbos kick in, count me back in, until then there are hundreds of better uses for my time. Oh and, after decades of trying, F1 has become “cool” here in America, yet another reason to quit watching it.
Breaking Bad is an excellent way to waste time, but its time has nearly run out. Thus far the season has been a bit slow, but tonight’s episode cranked up the intensity. With 3 episodes to go, things are looking good for an epic ending to the entire series about high school chem teacher turned meth lord Walter White. Once BB is gone, there is a show even better to look forward to, Rectify on the Sundace channel. Rectify is slower paced than Breaking Bad, but much darker, more shocking, yet more realistic. Its only downside is that like BB it’s one of those PITA short series, you only get a small handful of episode per year.
Oh ya…… this is an rc column….
The entire BigSquidRC staff would like to wish our deepest and most sincere condolences to all the friends and family of Roman Pirozek Jr. We debated about posting the news last week about his unfortunate death while flying an rc helicopter, we decided against it as it was already everywhere from Good Morning America to CNN. Even though none of us knew Roman, we feel for the loss those around him are experiencing right now.
Which brings me to…
If you’ve read THE Cub Report for long, you know how vocal I’ve been about being pro-active with safety in the rc world. The time to implement safety measures is BEFORE someone gets hurt, not after. This year, to the best of my knowledge, there have been 3 deaths worldwide associated with large rc helicopters. The one in New York, an 18 month old girl in Malaysia who was in her fathers arms at the time, and a 41 year old man in Switzerland.
It is unacceptable that anyone, ever, dies from our rc hobby. Up till now we’ve relied on “common sense” to keep people from getting killed, unfortunately that has proven it does NOT work. So it’s up to us, everyday hobbyists, to put on our big boy pants and change things for the safer before a bunch of suits in Washington kills our hobby for us.
Some may say “all publicity is good publicity”, but in the case of the media panic caused by people dying form rc helicopter accidents, it’s terrible for the air hobby. Those big headlines even put the surface side onto the radar of the “do gooders that take away your freedoms to protect you” people in Washington.
I’m not much of an air guy, but parts of my job have me working with them. One of my best long time air buddies, a guy that has flown rc aircraft for decades, called 600/700/800 sized helis “flying lawn mowers”, that even in the most capable of hands are “scary to be around”. I myself have been at flying events, even just this year, where I did not feel comfortable due to the large sizes of machines flying around me being controlled by goodness knows who.
What I want to say here is- if you are in the air industry, you guys have a whole lot of fixing to do. If you don’t fix it right now by your own doing, some government agency will, and if you let it get that far the laws they put in place could likely ruin your side of the hobby. All you air guys need to take a good, long, hard look at maximum sizes, minimum safe distances, and lexan protection. When you are around something dangerous, you need to speak up and put it to an end. And remember, just because someone is flying in a potentially lethal manner, even if just around himself, the media/legal ramifications afterwards can and will affect us all.
Oh and please, please, let the surface side use this as our own wake-up call, to make changes before someone ends up senselessly losing a brother/son/father/friend to an unfortunate 8th or 5th scale accident. The surface side has needed a strong industry council for years now, not only for safety reasons, but also for the growing issues with overseas concerns.
If there is anyone out there in our industry that truly cares about the long term health of surface rc, I’d hope they would recognize that there is no better time than right now to get all the industry leaders together to speak about safety concerns. So many of the people in our industry devote their lives to putting out these incredible rc products to keep customers happy while making enough money to keep food on their plates, yet have not made it a priority to get together (via in person, conference call, or even a G+ Video Hangout) with other industry leaders to discuss the safety ramifications of the products hitting the shelves. It doesn’t need to be a priority, it has to be, and if we don’t make it one, we deserve the Tyco cars we end up with…
That’s it for this week, be safe out there and support your local hobby shops and bash spots.
YOUR Cub Reporter
