A portable shelter, an executive parachute, a war bag and a robot journalist are just a few of the new American shopping hits
Dafna Levy
Dilbert buys a parachute
The phrase Shopping Therapy has taken on a new meaning since September 11, 2001.
The Americans are probably the ones who invented the journey to cheer up the mind through ironing credit cards and purchasing countless unnecessary things, and this year the shopping focused on said products
to assist in survival in the event of a terrorist attack similar to or worse than the one that occurred then. Some of them are very sophisticated, others are just very expensive, and these also help mainly in alleviating the feeling of helplessness.
In the American press, most of the new sophisticated products are called "survival kit of a new kind". In other words, in addition to the water bottles, food cans and band-aids, such kits now also contain parachutes that open at low altitude, cell phone devices that work even in extremely difficult terrain conditions, gas masks and even - so the newspapers report - cages with canaries for quick detection of gas, as was customary in the past in coal mines. The anthrax envelope attack, which hit the United States in the days after the collapse of the Twin Towers, led to the development of aquariums where rubber gloves are installed and inside which suspicious envelopes can be safely opened. Chemical companies began selling kits to detect anthrax in drinking water.
"New York" magazine has put together an essential shopping list for those who are preparing to survive in style. The entire shopping basket should cost the anxious American citizen $21,494, and it includes, among other things: a mobile shelter for living in field conditions ($2,700), war bags - backpacks that include a first aid kit, knives, ropes and more ($329, or at a bargain price, only $250 for a similar bag from the surplus of the Israeli army), personal radios ($3,000), solar batteries ($450 each), a shower A mobile ($80), a folding bicycle ($1,200), a personal parachute ($900) and also a towed cart that is a kind of stretcher for carrying people and heavy objects, which can function easily in any terrain conditions ($759).
The company Executive Chutes (chutes for executives) from Michigan has developed tiny parachutes, intended for those who work on the high floors of skyscrapers and may one day be forced to leap out of the window. According to the company, the parachutes were developed by a team of consultants from the fire brigade, aeronautical engineers and professional paratroopers. The first models of these parachutes were ready for sale several months before the attack on the towers, but since last September they have been sold at the rate of hundreds of units every day,
And a large part of the orders are made centrally by companies whose offices are located in skyscrapers, not necessarily American: such parachutes were also purchased in Japan, Malaysia and Europe. The parachutes cannot be navigated, but they are durable, and even if you rub them against the edges of the building, they keep their shape and carry the bearer safely to the ground, at a speed of about 17 km/h, which is lower than the speed of a parachutist.
Another company, Apco Aviation, has also developed tiny parachutes designed for jumping from tall buildings in dense urban areas. They can be used from a height of 30 meters or more, they weigh two and a half kilograms, and their canopy covers an area of about 30 square meters when it is unfolded. The chances of someone using such a parachute to sprain or break their leg while jumping are high, but so are their chances of surviving a fall from the building. There is no need to practice using such a parachute; It is compressed into a container that must be fastened to the back and is activated immediately with a slight pull of the straps. The parachutes are packed in a kind of backpack and are sold at a price of about 800 dollars per unit.
A large influx of consumers to the cell phone companies was recorded in the USA after September 11, including many who purchased a second or third device, equipped all members of the family with such phones and purchased a large number of spare batteries. Motorola introduced this year for the first time a cell phone whose battery is manually charged. is based on technology developed by the Freeplay company, which also markets radios, flashlights and even a portable computer, all powered by manual energy and intended for use in situations and places where there are difficulties in energy supply. Charging the phone's battery manually, in the so-called Free Charge charger, allows five minutes of talk, or several hours of standby, for every 45 seconds of operating the charger.
The new charger was developed not only for emergency situations but also for trips, fishing trips, mountain climbing and any use of the phone away from a power source. It is also equipped with a display that shows how much usage time is left in the battery at any time.
Locating missing relatives and children in an emergency can be done more easily with the help of tracking systems based on satellites, of the type accepted for GPS navigation. The tracking system is installed inside a small wristwatch-like device, which is very easy to wear on the arm. At any given moment, the company, named Wherify, whose offices are located in the American Silicon Valley, can find out the exact location of the person wearing the device, provided he subscribes to its services of course. A parent who attaches his child to such a tracking device will be able to locate it through the company's website. The device itself also has an emergency button, the activation of which allows the company to locate the child within about 60 seconds. The device is designed like a clock and it also has a summoner. Its price in the US is $400 and an additional $25 monthly subscription fee.
The American company Shelter Systems offers a variety of mobile shelters, a kind of extremely durable and easy to set up tents, for the use of people who will be forced to abandon their homes and live in the field, outside the urban areas. These shelters are lightweight, resistant to rain and designed in several forms, including domes or tents. In the days when they are repaired, you can put them in the yard and use them as a guest room or as a studio.
Thermal suits are intended for use in large fires and in combination with filters and gas masks also in areas contaminated with gases. They are cooled with a water system and isolated from the dangerous environment. Originally, such suits were developed for firefighters and rescue workers and those who work in dangerous places, but since September 11, they are also sold to tie wearers and office workers, who prepare for emergencies. The cooling system of these suits works with the help of a 24 volt battery and you can safely move in them for four consecutive hours.
One of the interesting technological developments produced by the wave of global terrorism is a tracking system capable of locating known criminals quickly, with the help of a hidden camera implanted in a large crowd. The system is currently being tested by the London Police, in several areas of the city. Its name is The Mandrake face recognition system and it works in combination with a complex array of closed-circuit cameras installed in the city. She scans the material captured by these cameras in real time and searches for facial features of known criminals from the police database scanned into the computer. When the system detects a face similar to those from the database, it alerts with a loud beep, and the camera operator examines the image and decides whether to call the police. In the future, they hope to identify missing people in this way as well, even though the activation of the system has already sparked a wave of protests from privacy seekers.
And an original development that was born with the American invasion of Afghanistan: Afghan Explorer, an electronic journalist, a robot designed to replace journalists in dangerous battle zones, to ensure a free flow of information even from places that journalists cannot reach because of the danger or because entry is prohibited (Ran in the photo above). The robot was developed in the laboratories of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, and is powered by solar cells. It has a monitor, on which its operators can write lines of text to communicate with locals they meet, a microphone, a recording device and a digital camera, and it is built to pass through difficult areas and transmit information directly from the field to the newspaper systems.
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