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Submarines

The Oscar

 

Table Of Contents

Bushnell’s Turtle

Pioneer

American Diver

The Fish Boat

Bad Plumbing

Worse Bad Plumbing

HMS Trident’s Strange Guest

USS Scorpion

The K-129

Don’t Let Your Hydrogen Peroxide Leak

 

Bushnell’s Turtle

Table of Contents

In the mid 1770’s, During America’s War of Independence with England, David Bushnell, an inventive guy on the American side, created the world’s first attack submarine. Using whiskey barrel technology, he made a watertight, clam shell-shaped vehicle with barely enough room for one man. The thing,  Continue reading Submarines

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Expenditures

The United States Navy ordered a computerized bookkeeping system that was to have cost $33 million. As the project was being built the price climbed steadily higher. Finally, the price grew so high, the Navy gave up without completing the job. The Navy spent $230 million of our money and got absolutely nothing.

In a similar case, the Internal Revenue Service spent $187 million just to decide if they should buy a $1.8 billion computerized tax return system. They decided no.