uh, good luck I guess?

David Last, former president of the UK’s Royal Institute of Navigation, is sceptical about USAF’s ambitions to counteract the effects of solar wind. When solar storms disrupt GPS signals, the entire side of Earth facing the sun is affected, he says. Ironing out those disturbances would require an extremely large and speedy intervention. “You don’t calm a stormy sea by filling in the gaps,” says Last.

reminds me of Project Stormfury

The killings, part of the Obama administration’s targeted assassination program, are aiding terrorist recruitment and thus undermining the program’s goal of eliminating such fighters, the veterans added. Drone operators refer to children as “fun-size terrorists” and liken killing them to “cutting the grass before it grows too long,” said one of the operators, Michael Haas, a former senior airman in the Air Force. Haas also described widespread drug and alcohol abuse, further stating that some operators had flown missions while impaired.

In addition to Haas, the operators are former Air Force Staff Sgt. Brandon Bryant along with former senior airmen Cian Westmoreland and Stephen Lewis. The men have conducted kill missions in many of the major theaters of the post-9/11 war on terror, including Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“We have seen the abuse firsthand,” said Bryant, “and we are horrified.”

An Air Force spokesperson did not address the specific allegations but wrote in an email that “the demands placed on the [drone] force are tremendous. A great deal of effort is being taken to bring about relief, stabilize the force, and sustain a vital warfighter capability. … Airmen are expected to adhere to established standards of behavior. Behavior found to be inconsistent with Air Force core values is appropriately looked into and if warranted, disciplinary action is taken.”

The main reason is that substantial parts of American airspace, especially away from the crowded northeast, are set aside as Military Operating Areas, or MOAs. Planes flying on IFR flight plans—where, again, the pilot goes where the controller says to go—are routed around the MOAs when they’re active, or through them if the controller has cleared a safe route with the military authorities. Planes flying under Visual Flight Rules are allowed to enter the MOAs even when they’re active—unlike Restricted Zones (for instance, over a nuclear-submarine base) or Temporary Flight Restrictions (like the gigantic one that surrounds all of Washington DC, or goes with the president wherever he travels).