Your mother has eyes in the back of her head. Chicago Public Schools sends parents a text message when their child is not in class or the kid's grades slip. Mayor Daley attends a demonstration. Chicago is not the only school district to use this technology. It's used in Calloway County, Kentucky. Memphis, Tennessee, and Saratoga Springs, New York, to name a few. It's not just used for monitoring your kids' grades. In San Antonio, you can also monitor the presidential propaganda that's fed to your kids! But what if you want to monitor the text messages your kids receive? Radar alerts you when a "suspicious" person texts, calls, or emails your kid.
posted by desjardins on Sep 18, 2009 - 36 comments

The Deadly Cost of Swooping In to Save a Life (single-page version): Deregulation and America's health care system combine to make medical helicopters increasingly dangerous.
posted by parudox on Aug 20, 2009 - 28 comments

Real men catch fish like this.
posted by dg on Mar 17, 2009 - 47 comments

Even the cheesiest novelist wouldn't dare write this one: Greece's most notorious criminal, kidnapper Vassilis Paleokostas, breaks out of a maximum security prison by grabbing onto a rope ladder dangling from an accomplice's hijacked helicopter, as guards open fire and a woman shoots back from the chopper. This happens as he's being transported to a hearing to face charges related to breaking out of jail in 2006 by grabbing onto a rope ladder being dangled from a helicopter hijacked by his brother, bank robber Nikos Paleokostas, hailed by some poor Greeks as a modern day Robin Hood. There are already half a dozen Facebook fan clubs. Sadly dull video of the departing chopper here. The pilot, found tied up, and four prison guards have been arrested.
posted by CunningLinguist on Feb 23, 2009 - 50 comments

"US helicopter raid" in Syria. Could this be an October Surprise? Many have hinted this election's October Surprise will be the capture of Osama Bin Ladin or a resurgence of terrorist activity. As we recall, news media had jumped on a McCain Aide who claimed a terrorist attack would benefit McCain in the Election.
posted by Bathtub Bobsled on Oct 27, 2008 - 91 comments

523 years after his original drawing, DaVinci's parachute design is proven to actually work. There was an earlier attempt, but apparently the wooden frame specified by DaVinci likely would have seriously maimed the jumper. Perhaps not entirely coincidentally, the 2008 jump was made from a helicopter - another one of DaVinci's concepts.
posted by webhund on Apr 28, 2008 - 15 comments

An arborist in a helicopter Arborist Todd Irvine gets a ride in a news chopper, photographing and annotating Toronto’s tree canopy – still largely in place and vibrantly colourful due to winter’s late arrival. [more inside]
posted by joeclark on Nov 16, 2007 - 23 comments

1995 world Rally Champion Colin McRae has died in a helicopter crash with his 5 year old son.
posted by gergtreble on Sep 15, 2007 - 54 comments

Two news helicopters met in a deadly midair collision today while covering a police chase on live television (video, tragic but not graphic).
posted by hermitosis on Jul 27, 2007 - 107 comments

Charging moose brings down helicopter.
posted by flapjax at midnite on Mar 5, 2007 - 36 comments

A somber video with music purporting to show the downing of a US helicopter surfaces on the New York Times and YouTube. Some background here.
posted by lupus_yonderboy on Feb 19, 2007 - 59 comments

Heli-Africa - Wildlife photographer Michael Poliza's photo journal from a just completed 2 month helicopter tour from Hamburg to Cape Town. These are a few samples to potentially whet the appetite.
posted by peacay on Dec 2, 2006 - 8 comments

One-button helicopter game for FFF.
posted by Mister_A on Nov 17, 2006 - 38 comments

Metal Storm Limited specializes in weapon systems featuring rapid fire electronically fired bullets, up to 1 million a minute. The weapons platform can be used to make the worlds strongest handgun as well as be used to equip unmanned drones with firepower. The most frightening of which is perhaps the "dragonfly" micro copter. Their site has a number of videos showcasing some of the various weapons applications. Metal Storm has been around for a while, without getting a product to market, but with a recent influx of funding it doesn't look like they are going to go out of business any time soon.
posted by reverendX on Jul 10, 2006 - 50 comments

"The Hayward Fault is locked and loaded. It is ready to fire at any time." The U.S. Geological Survey has a Google Earth-based "virtual helicopter tour" and other annotated views of The Hayward Fault. There's a 70% probability of a major earthquake hitting the San Francisco Bay Area before 2030, and Hayward is the most likely fault [PDF] for an earthquake (or is it?). Bad things will happen. Fortunately we're completely unprepared. [more inside]
posted by kirkaracha on Mar 10, 2006 - 37 comments

Imagine what it might feel like to get hit in the head by a rotating helicopter blade. Johnny Lowe found out two days ago -- and has survived to earn the nickname "Chopper".
posted by soiled cowboy on Dec 28, 2005 - 25 comments

Gen H-4 The world smallest co-axial helicopter (Japanese site) with video here [wmv]. {via}
posted by tellurian on Oct 25, 2005 - 29 comments

To the summit of Everest by helicopter.  Is nothing sacred? (direct link to WMV video)
posted by planetkyoto on Jun 2, 2005 - 32 comments

Because spaceflight, in and of itself, is just way to easy. On 08 August 2001, NASA launched Genesis. It was a spacecraft that would spend 1125 days in space, including 884 days collecting 0.4 milligrams of solar particles. At that point, it would launch a 500 lbs return vehicle that would travel 600 mph back to earth. When it enters the atmosphere, at approximately 11:55am EST on Wednesday of this week, it will be going close to twenty-five thousand mph. Oddly enough, this is the easy part of the mission.

Because then, two minutes later, NASA is going to catch it. In mid-air. With a helicopter. Really.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow on Sep 7, 2004 - 32 comments

Custom paint job on Afghan Hind attack chopper. Impressive, but why? (Via Gizmodo)
posted by marvin on Jul 3, 2004 - 23 comments

Police seize Vietnamese farmer's unlicensed, homebuilt helicopter This NYT/AP report convinced me that globalization truly dooms that American middle class pitted against such dedication. Yankee tinkering once provided a foundation for the North American industrial revolution. But now:' The farmer said he won't give up, vowing to sell his house or 25 acres of land if that's what it takes to get the license. "If I cannot do it, my children or my grandchildren will do it,'' he said. '
posted by troutfishing on Feb 16, 2004 - 38 comments

Remember the Coastal Records Project? When I first heard about this, I applauded, then wasted a couple of hours looking at the nice pics. But I couldn't help wondering when they'd run into some compound of a celebrity who'd put up a stink (okay, I was hoping it would be Ah-nold, and there'd be a scene reminiscent of his movies, stinger missile launched from his patio at the helicopter...) alas, it's only Barbara. Still, does this only make me wonder if our celebrities are helping push through laws to establish themselves in a higher class than us peons? Please note that the irony of rich people suing each other isn't lost on me, and I'm not trying to put forward that it could be any one of us touring in a helicopter doing this. But I mean, the guy's taking picture's of the whole coast, not just some star-map, coastline version. Until this lawsuit, I'd wager, only the most dedicated stalker would've known this was her place. But now...
posted by Busithoth on Jun 1, 2003 - 12 comments

California Coastal Records Project. Rich guy with a helicopter and a digital camera posting high-resolution pictures on the internet of every mile of the California coastline, 500 feet at a time. (Related Washington Post article.)
posted by Wet Spot on Nov 4, 2002 - 16 comments

The war on drugs claims forest as casualty. A forest fire that burned out of control for almost two weeks and devastated over 50,000 acres near San Diego was caused by a helicopter looking for pot farms, a California Department of Forestry investigation has concluded. [link via disinfo]
posted by drezdn on Aug 17, 2002 - 33 comments

Fly The Copter You think it's easy flying a radio-controlled helicopter into somebody's head. My hi-score is 418. See if you can beat it.
posted by sahrens428 on May 2, 2002 - 20 comments

Here's something you don't see every day.. The north Texas radio station KVIL 103.7FM has a traffic copter which has flown nearly every weekday without fail for years. It's a regular sight in the sky for Dallas commuters. This morning, it became traffic. Engine failure led to an emergency landing on a city street. Avoiding power lines and oncoming traffic, the pilot lost the tail rotor assembly but otherwise landed his copter intact. A near catastrophe was averted by a very capable, steely-eyed missile man of a pilot. The three reporters in the copter with the pilot suffered only minor injuries. A very lucky day. It coulda been a lot worse.
posted by ZachsMind on Apr 11, 2002 - 12 comments

Whizzy, spinny, Enterprise/UFO looking like thing. SimiCon, a Norwegian company focused on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles is developing a circular craft that uses both rotors and a low profile jet in order to provide the high performance of a fixed wing craft along with the VTOL capabilites of a helicopter. Looks pretty cool.
posted by zeoslap on Feb 4, 2002 - 13 comments

Geez this sounds familiar. Helicopters manned by Americans involved in shootout with Columbian guerillas. Just advising you understand. . .
posted by aflakete on Feb 22, 2001 - 10 comments

Life imitates television! Helicopter escapes -- just like a Quinn-Martin Production! Where is Barnaby Jones when you need him?
posted by elgoose on Jun 5, 2000 - 2 comments

It's a chopper, baby.
posted by veruca on Mar 24, 2000 - 0 comments