title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: "Mercenaries" contains unlockable skins as rewards for completing certain in-game tasks. For instance, picking up a certain number of National Treasures will allow playing as an NK Elite. Some cheat codes unlock the numerous hidden characters such as the leaders of each faction. This being a LucasArts game, it is also possible to unlock both Indiana Jones and Han Solo as playable characters. However, the differences between skins are only cosmetic and will have no effect on gameplay or the main character's attributes.


title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: The game's orchestral soundtrack was composed by Michael Giacchino with Chris Tilton. It was performed by the Northwest Sinfonia and released on a 21-track CD. The sound design was done by Ellen Meijers, who visited Travis Air Force Base to record the sounds of actual C-5 Galaxy cargo airplane hydraulics, landing gears, and generators to add realism to the gameplay.


title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: "Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction" received "generally positive" reviews, according to review aggregator Metacritic.


title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: Ryan Davis, former editor of GameSpot, said the action is greatly varied and "fundamentally satisfying", the world is immersive, and the game has "gorgeous graphics". Davis also said the exaggerated physics in the game is sometimes too much and the quality of the sound effects is uneven. Davis said the game is "a much better game overall" than "Full Spectrum Warrior", a game that Pandemic Studios previously developed. Davis said that at first the game looks like a "Grand Theft Auto" knockoff due to similar elements such as a third-person perspective, the ability to get in any vehicle you see", but that "Mercenaries" is more non-linear and mission-based. Davis said "most of the ground-based vehicles feel a little too floaty". Davis also wrote: "It's amazing how close the game scrapes to reality without actually breaking through, and its use of a slightly fictionalized North Korea as a setting can be very immersive. But despite the game's commitment to a quasirealistic scenario, the action is fast and loose". Davis noted the voiceover performances of Peter Stormare and Carl Weathers as particularly well done. In Japan, where the PlayStation 2 version was ported and published by Electronic Arts on April 28, 2005, "Famitsu" gave it a score of two nines, one eight, and one seven for a total of 33 out of 40.


title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: "Detroit Free Press" gave the Xbox version all four stars and called it "a great diversion from everyday life". "The Sydney Morning Herald" gave the game four-and-a-half stars out of five and said "while it's not quite as epic as [""], the combat within "Mercenaries" is more focused and polished, thanks to tight controls, amazing graphics and clever physics". "The Times" gave it four stars out of five, saying "the visuals are first rate. News footage sets the scene of the chaos, while short in-game cut-scenes intertwine seamlessly with the action". "The New York Times" gave it a similarly favorable review, saying "while most such games overlay this free-form world with rigidly structured missions, Mercenaries allows the player almost as much freedom in action as it does in travel". "Maxim" similarly gave it eight out of ten and said: "Missions full of vehicles to wrangle and people to off feel like a cross between 'Grand Theft Auto' and 'Metal Gear Solid' with a dash of 'Contra' thrown in for spice. Destroy everything and get paid; this is foreign policy at its finest".


title: Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction

text: "Mercenaries" was banned from shelves in South Korea for depicting war in its still-hostile region, as was "Ghost Recon 2". Almost two years later, in 2007, the Game Rating Board of South Korea lifted the ban on these games.


title: Deck (ship)

text: A deck is a permanent covering over a compartment or a hull of a ship. On a boat or ship, the primary or upper deck is the horizontal structure that forms the "roof" of the hull, strengthening it and serving as the primary working surface. Vessels often have more than one level both within the hull and in the superstructure above the primary deck, similar to the floors of a multi-storey building, that are also referred to as decks, as are certain compartments and decks built over specific areas of the superstructure. Decks for some purposes have specific names.


title: Deck (ship)

text: The main purpose of the upper or primary deck is structural, and only secondarily to provide weather-tightness and support people and equipment. The deck serves as the lid to the complex box girder which can be identified as the hull. It resists tension, compression, and racking forces. The deck's scantling is usually the same as the topsides, or might be heavier if the deck is expected to carry heavier loads (for example a container ship). The deck will be reinforced around deck fittings such as the capstan, cleats, or bollards.


title: Deck (ship)

text: On ships with more than one level, 'deck' refers to the level itself. The actual floor surface is called the sole; the term 'deck' refers to a structural member tying the ships frames or ribs together over the keel. In modern ships, the interior decks are usually numbered from the primary deck, which is #1, downward and upward. So the first deck below the primary deck will be #2, and the first above the primary deck will be #A2 or #S2 (for "above" or "superstructure"). Some merchant ships may alternatively designate decks below the primary deck, usually machinery spaces, by numbers, and those above it, in the accommodation block, by letters. Ships may also call decks by common names, or (especially on cruise ships) may invent fanciful and romantic names for a specific deck or area of that specific ship, such as the "lido deck" of the Princess Cruises' "Love Boat".


title: Deck (ship)

text: Equipment mounted on deck, such as the ship's wheel, binnacle, fife rails, and so forth, may be collectively referred to as deck furniture. Weather decks in Western designs evolved from having structures fore (forward or front) and aft (rear) of the ship mostly clear; in the 19th century, pilothouses/wheelhouses and deckhouses began to appear, eventually developing into the superstructure of modern ships. Eastern designs developed earlier, with efficient middle decks and minimalist fore and aft cabin structures across a range of designs.


title: Deck (ship)

text: In vessels having more than one deck there are various naming conventions, numerically, alphabetically, etc. However, there are also various common historical names and types of decks:


title: Deck (ship)

text: A traditional wood deck would consist of planks laid fore and aft over beams and along carlins, the seams of which are caulked and paid with tar. A yacht or other fancy boat might then have the deck canvased, with the fabric laid down in a thick layer of paint or sealant, and additional coats painted over. The wash or apron boards form the joint between the deck planking and that of the topsides, and are caulked similarly.


title: Deck (ship)

text: Modern "constructed decks" are used primarily on fiberglass, composite, and cold-molded hulls. The under structure of beams and carlins is the same as above. The decking itself is usually multiple layers of marine-grade plywood, covered over with layers of fibreglass in a plastic resin such as epoxy or polyester overlapped onto the topsides of the hull.


title: Deck (ship)

text: Generally speaking, the method outlined for "constructed decks" is most similar to metal decks. The deck plating is laid over metal beams and carlins and tacked temporarily in place. The difficulty in metal construction is avoiding distortion of the plate while welding due to the high heat involved in the process. Welds are usually double pass, meaning each seam is welded twice, a time-consuming process which may take longer than building the wood deck. However, welds result in a waterproof deck which is strong and easily repairable. The deck structure is welded to the hull, making it structurally a single unit.


title: Deck (ship)

text: Because a metal deck, painted to reduce corrosion, can pick up heat from the sun, and be quite slippery and noisy to work on, a layer of wood decking or thick non-skid paint is often applied to its surface.


title: Deck (ship)

text: The process for building a deck in fiberglass is the same as for building a hull: a female mould is built, a layer of gel coat is sprayed in, then layers of fiberglass in resin are built up to the required deck thickness (if the deck has a core, the outer skin layers of fiberglass and resin are laid, then the core material, and finally the inner skin layers). The deck is removed from the mould and usually mechanically fastened to the hull.


title: Deck (ship)

text: Fiberglass decks are quite slick with their mirror-smooth surfaces, so a non-skid texture is often moulded into their surface, or non-skid pads glued down in working areas.


title: Deck (ship)

text: The thickness of the decking affects how strong the hull is, and is directly related to how thick the skin of the hull itself is, which is of course related to how large the vessel is, the kind of work it is expected to do, and the kind of weather it may reasonably be expected to endure. While a naval engineer or architect may have precise methods of determining what the scantlings should be, traditional builders used previous experiences and simpler rules-of-thumb to determine how thick the deck should be built.


title: Deck (ship)

text: The numbers derived by these formulae gives a rough number for determining the average thickness of materials based on some crude hull measurements. Below the waterline the thickness should be approximately 115% of the result, while upper topsides and decks might be reduced to 85% of the result.


title: Marina City

text: Marina City is a mixed-use residential-commercial building complex in Chicago, Illinois, United States, North America, designed by architect Bertrand Goldberg. The multi-building complex opened between 1963 and 1967 and occupies almost an entire city block on State Street on the north bank of the Chicago River on the Near North Side, directly across from the Loop. Portions of the complex were designated a Chicago Landmark in 2016.


title: Marina City

text: The complex consists of two , 65-story apartment towers, opened in 1963, which include physical plant penthouses. It also includes a 10-story office building (now a hotel) opened in 1964, and a saddle-shaped auditorium building originally used as a cinema. The four buildings, access driveways, and a small plaza that originally included an ice rink are built on a raised platform next to the Chicago River. Beneath the platform, at river level, is a small marina for pleasure craft, giving the structures their name.


title: Marina City

text: The Marina City complex was designed in 1959 by architect Bertrand Goldberg and constructed between 1961 and 1968 at a cost of $36 million, financed to a large extent by Building Service Employees International Union, a union of building janitors and elevator operators, who sought to reverse the pattern of white flight from the city's downtown area. When finished, the two towers were both the tallest residential buildings and the tallest reinforced concrete structures in the world. The complex was built as a "city within a city", featuring numerous on-site facilities including a theater, gym, swimming pool, ice rink, bowling alley, stores, restaurants, and, of course, a marina.


title: Marina City

text: Marina City was built in a joint venture with Brighton Construction Company (owner: Thomas J. Bowler) and James McHugh Construction Company. James McHugh Construction Co. subsequently built Water Tower Place in 1976 and Trump Tower in 2009, both of which were also the tallest reinforced concrete structures in the world at the times they were built. Marina City was the first building in the United States to be constructed with the Linden climbing tower cranes.


title: Marina City

text: WLS-TV (ABC Channel 7) transmitted from an antenna atop Marina City until the Willis Tower (formerly known as Sears Tower) was completed. Local radio station WCFL operated out of Marina City in the office building of the complex. Local television station WFLD (FOX Channel 32) had its studios and transmitter at Marina City for 18 years until they were bought by Metromedia.


title: Marina City

text: Marina City was the first post-war urban high-rise residential complex in the United States and is widely credited with beginning the residential renaissance of American inner cities. Its model of mixed residential and office uses and high-rise towers with a base of parking has become a primary model for urban development in the United States and throughout the world, and has been widely copied throughout many cities internationally.


title: Marina City

text: The two towers contain identical floor plans. The bottom 19 floors form an exposed spiral parking ramp operated by valet with approximately 896 parking spaces. The 20th floor of each contains a laundry room and gym with panoramic views of the Loop, while floors 21 through 60 contain apartments (450 per tower). A 360-degree open-air roof deck lies on the 61st and top story. The buildings are accessed from separate lobbies that share a common below-grade mezzanine level as well as ground-level plaza entrances beside the House of Blues. Originally rental apartments, the complex converted to condominiums in 1977, but still contains a number of rental units.


title: Marina City

text: Marina City apartments are unusual in containing almost no interior right angles. On each residential floor, a circular hallway surrounds the elevator core, which is in diameter, with 16 sector-shaped units arrayed around the hallway. Apartments are composed of these units. Bathrooms and kitchens are located towards the inside of the building. Living areas occupy the outermost areas of each unit. Each unit terminates in a semi-circular balcony, separated from living areas by a floor-to-ceiling window wall. Because of this arrangement, every single living room and bedroom in Marina City has a balcony.


title: Marina City

text: The apartments are also unusual in that they function solely on electricity; neither natural gas nor propane serves any function. The apartments are not provided with hot water, air conditioning, or heat from a central source, as was the common practice at the time the towers were built. Instead, each unit contains individual water heaters, heating and cooling units, and electric stoves; residents pay individually for the electricity needed to run these appliances. This might have been a financial decision on the part of the building owners; at the time these towers were constructed, local electric utility Commonwealth Edison provided expensive building transformers at little or no charge, provided the buildings were made all-electric.


title: Marina City

text: In addition, the residential towers are noted for the high speed of their elevators. It takes approximately 33 seconds to travel from the lower-level lobby to the 61st floor roof decks.


title: Marina City

text: The towers were awarded a prize by the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects in 1965 for their innovation.


title: Marina City

text: The appearance of the towers is said to have inspired a similar design for the Corinthian Tower in New York.


title: Marina City

text: In 2007, the condominium board controversially claimed to own the common law copyright and trademark rights to the name and image of the buildings, although they do not own the parking garage portion of the buildings located below the 20th floor. They have claimed that any commercial use (such as in film or other media, such as on web sites) of pictures of the buildings or of the name "Marina City" without permission is a violation of their intellectual property rights.


title: Marina City

text: In celebration of the 2018 Illinois Bicentennial, Marina City was selected as one of the Illinois 200 Great Places by the American Institute of Architects Illinois component (AIA Illinois).


title: Marina City

text: The complex houses the House of Blues concert hall, restaurant and bar, the Hotel Chicago, 10Pin Bowling Lounge, and four restaurants (Yolk, Smith and Wollensky, Katana, and Dick's Last Resort).


title: Marina City

text: The House of Blues concert hall was built in the shell of the complex's long-disused movie theater. Similarly, the hotel was built in what was once the Marina City office building. In order to accommodate Smith and Wollensky, the former skating rink was demolished. Pedestrian and vehicular access to the residential towers and the raised common plaza were redesigned. In 2006, decorative lighting was installed around the circular roofs of the mechanical sheds that top each tower; the towers had not contained any such lighting since the 1960s.


title: Blanket party

text: A blanket party (also known as "locksocking") is a form of corporal punishment, hazing or retaliation conducted within a peer group, most frequently within the military or military academies. The victim (usually asleep in bed) is restrained by having a blanket flung over him and held down, while other members of the group strike the victim repeatedly with improvised flails, most often a sock or bath towel containing something solid, such as a bar of soap or a padlock.


title: Blanket party

text: In 2015, a United States Army veteran was diagnosed with PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) after being the victim of a blanket party during basic training in the late 1970s.


title: Blanket party

text: The term "blanket party" was popularized by the Stanley Kubrick film "Full Metal Jacket". In the film, members of a basic training platoon give a blanket party to Private Pyle, an inept member of their platoon, whose mistakes have led to group punishment given repeatedly to the entire platoon.


title: Jeff Leach

text: Jeff Alexander Leach (born 12 February 1984) is an English actor, writer and stand-up comedian. He has also worked as a television and radio presenter with shows airing in the UK, USA, Australia and Europe. He is most well known for appearing in feature films "The Smoke" as Dean and "London Town" as Ronnie, as well as voicing Simon "Ghost" Riley in . On television he hosted a number of shows for BBC Switch, BBC Three and E4.


title: Jeff Leach

text: Leach was raised in London by his cockney engineer father and Leach was raised in London by his cockney engineer father and Macedonian drama teacher mother. Educated at the John Lyon School for boys in Harrow he obtained a degree from the University of Warwick in English Literature and Theatre Studies. He got a presenting job a BBC Switch show entitled "The Surgery" on BBC Two. After presenting "Scene Stealers" for BBC Switch and "T in the Park Festival" for BBC Three Leach had a stint as presenter of Big Brother's Big Mouth on E4. During 2009–2012 he became the face of Virgin Media and their Music on Demand channel which saw him present each year from V Festival, provide comedy continuity links for all of the content on the channel and interview artists such as Lady Gaga, Example, Kelly Rowland and Professor Green.


title: Jeff Leach

text: Between 2010 and 2012 he was signed up by the UK branch of Current TV to present two series of their show "What Did I Do Last Night?" in which the cameras followed the antics of young British people on a night out who were then shown their behaviour back to them following morning, when hungover. Leach was also signed up by BBC One to present The National Lottery Draws. During this time he hosted other shows for Current TV including an exposé on the dangers of male escorting entitled "Male Hookers Uncovered" in which Leach became a male escort for the purposes of the immersive documentary. Following on from this he presented one more documentary about sex addiction for BBC Three called "Confessions of a Sex Addict".


title: Jeff Leach

text: In 2014 London Live launched in the UK and Jeff Leach became the presenter and executive producer of his own series called "Jeff Leach +1". In 2019 he recorded an episode of "Dinner With Dani" for Amazon Prime and during 2020 he recorded multiple live shows for Comedy Central's stand-up comedy series "This Week At The Cellar" in the US, all recorded at the Comedy Cellar his home club in New York City.


title: Jeff Leach

text: Leach began his stand up career in February 2010, performing on the UK comedy circuit and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. He was a finalist in the London New Comedian Award 2010, Laughing Horse New Act 2011 and a semi-finalist in the Leicester Square New Comedian 2011. He performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2011 and 2012 with promoters Live Nation becoming a Top Ten Finalist in the Amused Moose Laugh Off Competition 2012. In 2013 Leach began dating fellow comedian Katherine Ryan, from Canada but their relationship ended.


title: Jeff Leach

text: His first professional theatre work was with the Royal Shakespeare Company during the Complete Works of Shakespeare Festival season playing the lead in Lope de Vega's 'The Capulets and the Montagues'. In 2013 Jeff completed a role in short film "Shop Girl Blog" and played rocker Lenny in online comedy series "The Chaos". During 2014 he played the role of Simon in Channel 4 show Hollyoaks and also He also played the role of Dean in feature length independent British gangster thriller film "The Smoke".


title: Jeff Leach

text: During 2015 he appeared in a number of short films, won a comedy award on the industry website Shooting People and at the Berlin Short Film Festival.


title: Jeff Leach

text: Leach began his game career in 2015, voicing Walla Crowd, Prince Stefan, Sergeant Carleon, Peeves (voice) Field Marshal, Narrators, Power Tech Ardanno, Star Destroyer Comm, Catwalk Stormtrooper, ..., Simon 'Ghost' Riley, Mammoth, Space Marine, and Astra Militarum.


title: Jeff Leach

text: On 9 May 2021 Activision announced that they have cut ties with Leach due to alleged misogynistic comments he made on "Tauntfest" in 2017 and a Livestream in late 2020. Leach claims the comments were taken out of context and that he was actually responding to an Internet troll.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Motichoor Chaknachoor is a 2019 Indian comedy drama film directed by debutante Debamitra Biswal and produced by Rajesh Bhatia and Kiran Bhatia under Woodpecker Movies Private Limited in association with Viacom 18 Studios. Starring Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Athiya Shetty in the lead roles. The film also stars Vibha Chibber, Navni Parihar, Vivek Mishra, Karuna Pandey, Sanjeev Vats, Abhishek Rawat, Sapna Sand and Usha Nagar in supporting roles.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: It follows the story of a 36-year-old man, Pushpinder Tyagi, working abroad in Dubai, trying to find a wife back home in Bhopal, meets his much younger neighbor, Anita "Ani" Awasthi, who wants to marry someone settled abroad.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: The film was theatrically released in India on 15 November 2019. Although the subject got mixed reviews, it earned praise for Nawazuddin Siddiqui's performance. On 24 January 2020, the film was released on Netflix and it was instant hit with the audience and trended for six weeks amongst Top 10 viewed movies.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Anita "Anny" Awasthi, a girl from a middle-class family in Bhopal, has turned down several marriage proposals because she is desperate to marry an NRI and settle abroad. Ani meets her neighbor Pushpinder Tyagi, an accountant in Dubai who has returned to Bhopal to find a bride. He is 36 years old and is desperate to marry any willing girl no matter her appearance or personality. His mother Indu, is concerned only about the dowry her son can fetch. Ani's unmarried aunt, Prabha, encourages Ani to convince Pushpinder to marry her so she can settle in Dubai.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Pushpinder and his family meet an apparently wealthy family for a marriage proposal. Both families agree for marriage, Indu makes a demand for dowry to which girl's family rejects. In a fit of rage, Indu calls off the wedding. Realizing that Pushpinder is a mama's boy who would never cross his mother, Ani talks him into eloping with her. When they show up back at the family's doorstep already married, the two families are forced to accept their marriage and start preparing for a wedding ceremony.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Despite Indu's anger that Ani's family cannot afford her dowry demands, the wedding goes ahead as planned. When Ani's father discreetly offers Pushpinder a portion of the dowry amount, he refuses to take it because he does not believe in the concept of dowry. Ani overhears their conversation and gains more respect for Pushpinder. Nevertheless, she feels no attraction for him and cannot consummate the marriage.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: News arrives from Dubai that Pushpinder has been fired from his job there, to which he reveals that he has secured a job in Bhopal and plans to settle here. This enrages Indu and Ani, who both desperately want Pushpinder to move back to Dubai. Soon Pushpinder is offered his Dubai job back with raised pay. Indu tells Pushpinder to take the job, to which he refuses by saying Dubai doesnot suit him, he misses everyone and wishes to stay close to his family.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Indu then advises Ani not to consummate the marriage until he agrees to return to Dubai. Pushpinder, overhearing them discuss their plan, argues with Ani and slaps her. Infuriated Ani goes back to her parents' house but her father tells her to work it out as it was her decision to marry Pushpinder. She leaves both homes and stands outside her house until Pushpinder's grandmother convinces her to come inside. Ani stays angry with Pushpinder even after he makes some attempts to reconcile.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: One night, Pushpinder abruptly leaves for Dubai. He leaves a note to Ani in which he apologizes for slapping her. He also encloses a one-way ticket to Singapore so that her dream of settling abroad may yet come true. In Pushpinder's absence, Indu and Ani see the error of their ways. Indu regrets forcing Pushpinder into working in Dubai to satisfy her financial needs. Ani regrets marrying Pushpinder without any personal attachment solely from a desire to leave India. Meanwhile, Pushpinder, unable to leave his family behind, returns. His sudden reappearance sparks a reconciliation with Indu and Ani. Pushpinder and Ani dash off at last to consummate their marriage.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: The film was shot extensively in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh. The highlight of the film was that all actors were speaking the Bundelkhandi language, and had to attend workshop to learn the dialect perfectly.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: Director Debamitra Biswal was accused and caught in Rs 32 lakh fraud. A statement petition filed on 6 November 2019 at a court of sub-judge in Saran Chapra Bihar (Suit no 855 of 2019) states that Biswal has admitted to selling the rights of the movie and taking the money fraudulently without the knowledge of production house and studio


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: The film's music is composed by Bharat – Hitarth, Ramji Gulati, Arjuna Harjai, Amjad Nadeem Aamir and Siddhart Amit Bhavsar while lyrics are written by Kumaar, Siddhart Amit Bhavsar and Bharat Menaria.


title: Motichoor Chaknachoor

text: "Motichoor Chaknachoor" was highly anticipated, but due to its conservative release model, earned little at the box office. However, it was a decent success on Netflix. Despite touching upon important subject like dowry and fascination of NRI lifestyle, the film underperformed commercially.


title: Hyperpower

text: A hyperpower is a state that dominates all other states in every domain (i.e. military, culture, economy, etc.); it has no rivals that can match its capabilities, and is considered to be a step higher than a superpower.


title: Hyperpower

text: Although the United States of America has arguably exhibited the traits of a hyperpower Post-Cold War, its global influence has begun to decline relative to other potential superpowers. More specifically, the United States, as a global power, no longer dominates in every domain (i.e. military, culture, economy, technology, diplomatic) in every region of the world.


title: Hyperpower

text: The British journalist Peregrine Worsthorne coined the term in a "Sunday Telegraph" article published March 3, 1991. After the end of the Cold War with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, some political commentators felt that a new term was needed to describe the United States' position as the lone superpower. French foreign minister Hubert Védrine popularized the term in 1998, because from France's position, the United States looked like a hyperpower, although the validity of classifying the United States in this way was disputed.


title: Hyperpower

text: The term has also been applied retroactively to dominant states of the past. In her book "Day of Empire", American professor Amy Chua suggests that the Achaemenid Empire, the Tang dynasty, the Roman Empire, the Mongol Empire, the Dutch Empire, and the British Empire were successful examples of historical hegemons; the Spanish Monarchy, Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, and Third Reich were counters; and she reflects on assertions that the United States is a modern hyperpower. In a historical context, it is usually understood to mean a power that greatly exceeds any others in its political environment along several axes; Rome did not dominate Persia, Ancient India or China, but did dominate the entire Mediterranean area militarily, culturally, and economically.


title: Memory address

text: In computing, a memory address is a reference to a specific memory location used at various levels by software and hardware. Memory addresses are fixed-length sequences of digits conventionally displayed and manipulated as unsigned integers. Such numerical semantic bases itself upon features of CPU (such as the instruction pointer and incremental address registers), as well upon use of the memory like an array endorsed by various programming languages.


title: Memory address

text: A digital computer's main memory consists of many memory locations. Each memory location has a physical address which is a code. The CPU (or other device) can use the code to access the corresponding memory location. Generally only system software, i.e. the BIOS, operating systems, and some specialized utility programs (e.g., memory testers), address physical memory using machine code operands or processor registers, instructing the CPU to direct a hardware device, called the memory controller, to use the memory bus or system bus, or separate control, address and data busses, to execute the program's commands. The memory controllers' bus consists of a number of parallel lines, each represented by a binary digit (bit). The width of the bus, and thus the number of addressable storage units, and the number of bits in each unit, varies among computers.


title: Memory address

text: A computer program uses memory addresses to execute machine code, and to store and retrieve data. In early computers logical and physical addresses corresponded, but since the introduction of virtual memory most application programs do not have a knowledge of physical addresses. Rather, they address logical addresses, or virtual addresses, using the computer's memory management unit and operating system memory mapping; see below.


title: Memory address

text: Most modern computers are "byte-addressable". Each address identifies a single byte (eight bits) of storage. Data larger than a single byte may be stored in a sequence of consecutive addresses. There exist "word-addressable" computers, where the minimal addressable storage unit is exactly the processor's word. For example, the Data General Nova minicomputer, and the Texas Instruments TMS9900 and National Semiconductor IMP-16 microcomputers used 16 bit words, and there were many 36-bit mainframe computers (e.g., PDP-10) which used 18-bit word addressing, not byte addressing, giving an address space of 2 36-bit words, approximately 1 megabyte of storage. The efficiency of addressing of memory depends on the bit size of the bus used for addresses – the more bits used, the more addresses are available to the computer. For example, an 8-bit-byte-addressable machine with a 20-bit address bus (e.g. Intel 8086) can address 2 (1,048,576) memory locations, or one MiB of memory, while a 32-bit bus (e.g. Intel 80386) addresses 2 (4,294,967,296) locations, or a 4 GiB address space. In contrast, a 36-bit word-addressable machine with an 18-bit address bus addresses only 2 (262,144) 36-bit locations (9,437,184 bits), equivalent to 1,179,648 8-bit bytes, or 1152 KiB, or 1.125 MiB — slightly more than the 8086.


title: Memory address

text: Some older computers (decimal computers), were "decimal digit-addressable". For example, each address in the IBM 1620's magnetic-core memory identified a single six bit binary-coded decimal digit, consisting of a parity bit, flag bit and four numerical bits. The 1620 used 5-digit decimal addresses, so in theory the highest possible address was 99,999. In practice, the CPU supported 20,000 memory locations, and up to two optional external memory units could be added, each supporting 20,000 addresses, for a total of 60,000 (00000–59999).


title: Memory address

text: Word size is a characteristic of computer architecture denoting the number of bits that a CPU can process at one time. Modern processors, including embedded systems, usually have a word size of 8, 16, 24, 32 or 64 bits; most current general-purpose computers use 32 or 64 bits. Many different sizes have been used historically, including 8, 9, 10, 12, 18, 24, 36, 39, 40, 48 and 60 bits.


title: Memory address

text: Very often, when referring to the "word size" of a modern computer, one is also describing the size of address space on that computer. For instance, a computer said to be "32-bit" also usually allows 32-bit memory addresses; a byte-addressable 32-bit computer can address 2 = 4,294,967,296 bytes of memory, or 4 gibibytes (GiB). This allows one memory address to be efficiently stored in one word.


title: Memory address

text: However, this does not always hold true. Computers can have memory addresses larger or smaller than their word size. For instance, many 8-bit processors, such as the MOS Technology 6502, supported 16-bit addresses— if not, they would have been limited to a mere 256 bytes of memory addressing. The 16-bit Intel 8088 and Intel 8086 supported 20-bit addressing via segmentation, allowing them to access 1 MiB rather than 64 KiB of memory. All Intel Pentium processors since the Pentium Pro include Physical Address Extensions (PAE) which support mapping 36-bit physical addresses to 32-bit virtual addresses. Many early processors held 2 addresses per word , such as 36-bit processors.


title: Memory address

text: In theory, modern byte-addressable 64-bit computers can address 2 bytes (16 exbibytes), but in practice the amount of memory is limited by the CPU, the memory controller, or the printed circuit board design (e.g., number of physical memory connectors or amount of soldered-on memory).


title: Memory address

text: Each memory location in a stored-program computer holds a binary number or decimal number "of some sort". Its interpretation, as data of some data type or as an instruction, and use are determined by the instructions which retrieve and manipulate it.


title: Memory address

text: Some early programmers combined instructions and data in words as a way to save memory, when it was expensive: The Manchester Mark 1 had space in its 40-bit words to store little bits of data – its processor ignored a small section in the middle of a word – and that was often exploited as extra data storage. Self-replicating programs such as viruses treat themselves sometimes as data and sometimes as instructions. Self-modifying code is generally deprecated nowadays, as it makes testing and maintenance disproportionally difficult to the saving of a few bytes, and can also give incorrect results because of the compiler or processor's assumptions about the machine's state, but is still sometimes used deliberately, with great care.


title: Memory address

text: In modern multitasking environment, an application process usually has in its address space (or spaces) chunks of memory of following types:


title: Memory address

text: Some systems have a "split" memory architecture where machine code, constants, and data are in different locations, and may have different address sizes.


title: Memory address

text: For example, PIC18 microcontrollers have a 21-bit program counter to address machine code and constants in Flash memory, and 12-bit address registers to address data in SRAM.


title: Memory address

text: A computer program can access an address given explicitly – in low-level programming this is usually called an , or sometimes a specific address, and is known as pointer data type in higher-level languages. But a program can also use relative address which specifies a location in relation to somewhere else (the "base address"). There are many more addressing modes.


title: Memory address

text: Mapping logical addresses to physical and virtual memory also adds several levels of indirection; see below.


title: Memory address

text: Many programmers prefer to address memory such that there is no distinction between code space and data space (see above), as well as from physical and virtual memory (see above) — in other words, numerically identical pointers refer to exactly the same byte of RAM.


title: Memory address

text: However, many early computers did not support such a "flat memory model" — in particular, Harvard architecture machines force program storage to be completely separate from data storage.


title: Memory address

text: Many modern DSPs (such as the Motorola 56000) have three separate storage areas — program storage, coefficient storage, and data storage. Some commonly used instructions fetch from all three areas simultaneously — fewer storage areas (even if there were the same total bytes of storage) would make those instructions run slower.


title: Memory address

text: Early x86 computers use the segmented memory model addresses based on a combination of two numbers: a memory segment, and an offset within that segment.


title: Memory address

text: Some segments are implicitly treated as "code segments", dedicated for instructions, "stack segments", or normal "data segments". Although the usages are different, the segments do not have different memory protections reflecting this.


title: Memory address

text: In the flat memory model all segments (segment registers) are generally set to zero, and only offsets are variable.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M939 is a 5-ton 6×6 U.S. military heavy truck. The basic cargo versions were designed to transport a cargo load over all terrain in all weather. Designed in the late 1970s to replace the M39 and M809 series of trucks, it has been in service ever since. The M939 evolved into its own family of cargo trucks, dump trucks, semi-tractors, vans, wreckers, and bare chassis/cabs for specialty bodies. 44,590 in all were produced.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: In the late 1970s the M809 series 5-ton (4,536 kg) 6x6 trucks, based on a 1949 design, were becoming old and mechanically dated. It was still a useful type, with 35,000 in service. A "Product Improvement Package" was developed to rebuild and update the M809 series into the M939 series. A new cab and hood are spotting features, but there were also other improvements.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: In 1982 AM General, who built all M809s, began rebuilding M809s into the M939 and M939A1 series at their South Bend, Indiana plant. They would rebuild 24,100. A follow-up model, the all-new M939A2 series, was produced by Bowen-McLaughlin-York/BMY in Marysville, Ohio. They would build 20,490. In 1991 the M939 series was replaced by the all-new design M1083-M1091 Medium Tactical Vehicles.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: All models of the M939 share a common basic chassis, cab, hood, and fenders. The basic truck is a 6×6 (three axles, six wheels, all of which are powered) heavy truck. Early M939s were rebuilds of M809 vehicle chassis with a new automatic transmission, transfer cases, cab, and hood. Suffix –A2 are new production with later model Cummins engine. The vehicles have a wide variety of configurations and weights.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: Note that the motor and tire specifications, along with other improvements, apply to the A2 versions (and A1 versions) of each base model listed below. There is an M928, an M928A1, and M928A2.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M939 and M939A1 models use a Cummins NHC 250, a naturally aspirated inline 6 cylinder diesel engine developing at 2100 rpm and of torque at 1,500 rpm. This was the standard engine of the M809 series. The M939A2 models use a newer and smaller Cummins 6CTA8.3 turbocharged inline 6 cylinder diesel engine developing at 2100 rpm and torque at 1,500 rpm.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: By 1980 fewer soldiers knew how to shift manual transmissions and heavy-duty automatic transmissions had matured so the M809's manual was replaced with an Allison MT654CR 5-speed automatic. This is easier to drive, shifts better, and has less shock to the chassis than a manual transmission.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M809 had an unusual 2-speed transfer case that engaged the front axle automatically, a more modern and conventional model was used. It could shift between low and high ranges while moving. In the low range the front axle is automatically engaged, in the high range the driver controls it.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M809 series used Rockwell-Standard double-reduction axles with a 6.44:1 ratio. New production M939A2 use a similar Meritor model, also with a 6.44:1 ratio. Steering boxes and some other components have also changed. Entire components are interchangeable but the component parts are different.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: A ladder frame with three beam axles, the front on leaf springs, the rear tandem on leaf springs with locating arms, was used.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M939 series uses 11:00 R20 tires with two tires per side per axle in the rear (rear tandem duals). This allows a heavy load to be carried on improved roads and most US trucks in the past have used them. The M939A1 and M939A2 series instead use oversized 14:00 R20 tires with a single tire on each side per axle, still with a tandem setup. Single, larger tires in a line (having the same track) work better and get stuck less often on soft ground. M939A2 series vehicles use a central tire inflation system (CTIS).


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: There are three wheelbases (measurements are from the centerline of the front axle to the centerline of the rear tandem). The short, used for tractors and dump trucks, is , the long ("standard"), used for cargo trucks and wreckers, is , and the extra-long, used for long cargo trucks and expansible vans, is .


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M809 series had an unusual air-over-hydraulic braking system, The M939 series have a commercial type air-brake system modified for military service.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M923 (M925 w/winch) was the standard cargo version of the series. It had a body with drop sides so it could be loaded from the side by forklifts. It had a bottom hinged tailgate. Side racks, troop seats, and overhead bows with a canvas cover were standard.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M927 (M928 w/winch), with an extra long wheelbase, had a long box. There was no drop side version. Side racks and overhead bows with a canvas cover were standard but no troop seats were fitted.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M929 (M930 w/winch) was a dump truck used to haul sand, gravel, dirt, rubble, scrap, and other bulk materials. It had a dump body with cab protector and a tailgate that could hinge at either the top or bottom. They could be equipped with overhead bows, tarpaulin, and troop seats, but the relatively small size of the body limited their passenger or cargo load.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M931 (M932 w/winch) was a semi-tractor used to tow semi-trailers up to . A front-mounted winch was optional. Unlike commercial trucks the fifth-wheel could also pivot side to side, making a more flexible connection to the trailer. Even so, off-road performance was limited.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M934 (M935 with a hydraulic lift-gate) had a van body with a slide out section on each side. When the sections are extended the working floor was over wide. The body could support of communications equipment.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M936 was a wrecker used to recover disabled or stuck trucks and lift large components. A rotating, telescoping, and elevating hydraulic boom could lift a maximum of . Although the truck was not meant to carry a load, the boom could support when towing. They had front and rear winches, outriggers, boom braces, and special extra-heavy duty rear springs for stability. Chains, chocks, block and tackle, oxygen-acetylene torches, and other automotive tools were carried.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The M939 to M945 were chassis with cabs, meant to carry specialized bodies. They were available in long and extra long wheelbases, and with or without front winches. The largest was the M945 used for Ribbon Bridge transporter bodies


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The safety of the M939 series of trucks has been criticized, especially braking performance and stability when loaded. In 1999 the U.S. Army began retrofitting anti-lock brake systems to the M939 trucks. Until the trucks were modified, they were limited to a top speed by an Army-wide safety order.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: Prior to that improvement, 26% of all Army vehicle accidents and 53% of all Army vehicle accident fatalities were in M939 series trucks. From 1987 to 1998 the series made up 9% of the total U.S. Army vehicle inventory, but accounted for 34% of all fatal accidents.


title: M939 series 5-ton 6×6 truck

text: The problem seemed to be that the torque converter would "lock up" in 2nd gear, and would not unlock easily. When the driver attempted to brake hard, often in a sudden or 'panic' stop, and accidentally locked the brakes (no wheel movement, tires skidding), this would kill the engine; this also killed the power steering, and the driver would suddenly be unable to steer. Too often, the truck would veer sideways and either hit something or roll over.


title: Kavan Smith

text: Kavan Joel Smith (born May 6, 1970) is a Canadian actor known for playing Major Evan Lorne in "Stargate Atlantis" and "Stargate SG-1", as Agent Jed Garrity in "The 4400", and as Leland Coulter in "When Calls the Heart".


title: Kavan Smith

text: Born in Edmonton, Alberta, Smith was raised by his father after his parents divorced. He attended the University of Calgary for a year and a half and then enrolled in the performing arts program at Mount Royal University. He began his acting career with a leading role in "Destiny Ridge" in 1993. In "Stargate: Atlantis", Smith appeared in 29 episodes as the recurring character Major Evan Lorne. He also appeared in two episodes of "Stargate SG-1" (the episodes "Enemy Mine" in Season 7 and "The Road Not Taken" in Season 10) as Major Lorne.


title: Kavan Smith

text: He has also guest-starred in numerous television shows including "Supernatural", "Smallville", "Sanctuary", "Tru Calling", "Battlestar Galactica", "Outer Limits", "Human Target", and "The Twilight Zone". He had a recurring role as Deputy Andy on Syfy's "Eureka". Smith co-starred with Felicia Day in the 2012 SyFy film adaptation "", which tells the modern dark story of Red Riding Hood. He also had a starring role in SyFy movie "Metal Shifters" in 2010.


title: Kavan Smith

text: In addition to acting, Kavan has also narrated the Canadian-made documentaries "Combat School" and "Jetstream".


title: Harm principle

text: The harm principle holds that the actions of individuals should only be limited to prevent harm to other individuals. John Stuart Mill articulated this principle in "On Liberty", where he argued that "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others." An equivalent was earlier stated in France's "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen" of 1789 as, "Liberty consists in the freedom to do everything which injures no one else; hence the exercise of the natural rights of each man has no limits except those which assure to the other members of the society the enjoyment of the same rights. These limits can only be determined by law."


title: Harm principle

text: The belief "that no one should be forcibly prevented from acting in any way he chooses provided his acts are not invasive of the free acts of others" has become one of the basic principles of libertarian politics.


title: Harm principle

text: In R v Malmo-Levine, the Supreme Court of Canada claimed that there was no such thing as the harm principle, even though it had been found to be a principle of fundamental justice in the courts below and had been found in all the key documents in the formulation of the concept of justice in Western society, including but not limited to the first English and French Constitutions, John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty, and modern case law.


title: Harm principle

text: The Harm Principle is found in article 5 of the first English-language constitution from 1647: "An Agreement of the People for a firme and present Peace, upon grounds of common right and freedome . . .", presented to the Army Council, E. 412, 21. October 28, 1647:


title: Harm principle

text: The Harm Principle is found in articles 4 and 5 of the first French constitution (and first nationally-adopted constitution) from 1789: Declaration of Human and Civic Rights of 26 August 1789:


title: Harm principle

text: The harm principle was first fully articulated by the English philosopher John Stuart Mill [JSM] (1806–1873) in the first chapter of "On Liberty" (1859), where he argued that:


title: Harm principle

text: Mill also put the harm principle within his list of rights that sprung from liberty. It was found within his list of political rights (political activities that did not involve harm to others) - but also within his non-political liberty rights - his "tastes and pursuits" - activities which did not involve politics and did not involve harm to others:


title: Harm principle

text: One might rightly argue that the "pursuit of Happiness" mentioned in the 1776 US Declaration of Independence was one of the "tastes and pursuits" that Mill had in mind:


title: Harm principle

text: The Harm Principle is also found in recent US case law - in the case of the People v Alvarez, from the Supreme Court of California, in May, 2002:


title: Harm principle

text: In their decision in R v Malmo-Levine, the Supreme Court did not explain how the Harm Principle was both 1) not a principle of fundamental justice, and 2) found in all these sources of fundamental justice.


title: Harm principle

text: Even if a self-regarding action results in harm to oneself, it is still beyond the sphere of justifiable state coercion.


title: Harm principle

text: Harm itself is not a non-moral concept. The infliction of harm upon another person is what makes an action wrong.


title: Harm principle

text: Harm can also result from a failure to meet an obligation. Morality generates obligations. Duty may be exacted from a person in the same way as a debt, and it is part of the notion of duty that a person may be rightfully compelled to fulfill it.


title: Harm principle

text: In On Liberty, J. S. Mill writes his principle does not apply to persons judged as mentally ill, "barbarians" (which he assimilated to minors) and minors while the "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen" does not concerned women, slaves, foreigners and minors, as they were not citizens.


title: Harm principle

text: However, the second maxim also opens the question of broader definitions of harm, up to and including harm to the society. The concept of harm is not limited to harm to another individual but can be harm to individuals plurally, without specific definition of those individuals.


title: Harm principle

text: This is an important principle for the purpose of determining harm that only manifests gradually over time—such that the resulting harm can be anticipated, but does not yet exist at the time that the action causing harm was taken. It also applies to other issues—which range from the right of an entity to discharge broadly polluting waste on private property, to broad questions of licensing, and to the right of sedition.


title: Harm principle

text: The United States Libertarian Party includes a version of the harm principle as part of its official party platform. It states:


title: Harm principle

text: Scholars have argued that the harm principle does not provide a narrow scope of which actions count as harmful towards oneself or the population and it cannot be used to determine whether people can be punished for their actions by the state. A state can determine whether an action is punishable by determining what harm the action causes. If a morally unjust action occurs but leaves no indisputable form of harm, there is no justification for the state to act and punish the perpetrators for their actions. The harm principle has an ambiguous definition of what harm specifically is and what justifies a state to intervene.


title: Harm principle

text: Scholars have also said that the harm principle does not specify on whether the state is justified with intervention tactics. This ambiguity can lead a state to define what counts as a harmful self-regarding action at its own discretion. This freedom might allow for an individual's own liberty and rights to be in danger. It would not be plausible for a state to intervene with an action that will negatively affect the population more than an individual. The harm principle scope of usage has been described as too wide to directly follow and implement possible punishment by a state.


title: The Vandals

text: The Vandals are an American punk rock band, established in 1980 in Orange County, California. They have released ten full-length studio albums, two live albums, and have toured the world extensively, including performances on the Vans Warped Tour. They are well known for their use of humor, preferring to use their music as a vehicle for comedy and sarcasm rather than as a platform for more serious issues. As of 2000, they are signed to Kung Fu Records.


title: The Vandals

text: The band's lineup fluctuated significantly over their first nine years, though founding members Steven Ronald Jensen, guitarist Jan Nils Ackermann, and first consistent drummer Joe Escalante remained regular fixtures. Of the early members, only Escalante has remained through all subsequent incarnations of the band. The current lineup of Escalante, Dave Quackenbush, Warren Fitzgerald, and Josh Freese has remained intact since 1990 and is generally considered far removed from the band's early 1980s incarnation. Since 2002 Escalante has released all of the band's albums through his Kung Fu Records label, with Fitzgerald generally producing.


title: The Vandals

text: The Vandals formed in 1980 in Huntington Beach, California, by guitarist Jan Nils Ackermann. Soon vocalist Steven Ronald "Stevo" Jensen (1959 – August 21, 2005) was found and he and Ackermann practiced and performed with a rotating cast of other members before a permanent lineup coalesced to include bassist Steve "Human" Pfauter and drummer Joe Escalante. Other early members included Steve Gonzalez on bass and Vince Mesa on drums.


title: The Vandals

text: The band quickly built a reputation in the Los Angeles and Orange County punk rock community. The Vandals distinguished themselves in their scene by sticking to humorous subject matter rather than the typical social and political topics addressed by most punk bands of the time.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1982 the group became the second band to sign with Epitaph Records, the Los Angeles label run by Bad Religion's Brett Gurewitz, who released their first EP "Peace thru Vandalism". The record contained several songs that would become fan favorites and remained in the band's live set well into the 1990s, including "Urban Struggle," which became a local hit after receiving airplay on KROQ-FM's "Rodney on the ROQ" program.


title: The Vandals

text: Most of the record's subject material was drawn directly from the band's own experiences in their local punk rock scene. "The Legend of Pat Brown" told tales of a substance-abusing friend of the band who was notorious for causing mayhem, while "Pirate's Life" dealt with the experience of riding Disneyland's "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride while taking LSD. The aforementioned "Urban Struggle" dealt with the constant fights that would occur between the punk rock fans who congregated at a Costa Mesa club called the Cuckoo's Nest and the country music fans who gathered at nearby Zubie's. "Anarchy Burger (Hold the Government)" approached the philosophy of anarchism, advocated by many early punk bands, from a humorous perspective and became one of the band's most popular songs throughout their career.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1984 the band appeared in the film "Suburbia" by invitation of director Penelope Spheeris, who had also directed the influential "The Decline of Western Civilization". They also played a benefit concert for the Cypress College Young Republicans, along with the Circle Jerks, the Dickies and D.I., an action which prompted derision from the traditionally leftist and anarchist punk community. It would not be the last time the band's actions would draw criticism, with their music generally maintaining an apolitical position.


title: The Vandals

text: When Pfauter left the band in 1984, Eric VonArab (Love Canal) filled in on bass while the band was writing and rehearsing for their first album until Brent Turner was brought in to play bass on the recording of that album, "When in Rome Do as the Vandals". By the time of its release in 1985 on National Trust Records Chalmer Lumary had joined as the band's full-time bassist. The album explored different musical styles and contained several songs that would become fan favorites. "Ladykiller" incorporated scratching and dance beats, while "Mohawk Town" explored a mixture of punk rock and country music. Personality clashes between members led to Stevo's departure from the band shortly thereafter. He was replaced by Dave Quackenbush of the band Falling Idols, who has remained the Vandals' vocalist. In 1987 the band appeared in another Penelope Spheeris film, "Dudes".


title: The Vandals

text: By 1989 Lumary had left the band and Robbie Allen joined them in the studio to play bass on the album "Slippery When Ill". The album was something of a departure from the punk rock formula of their previous releases, fusing country and western styles with their humorous brand of punk into a sound the band called "cow punk," somewhat mocking the resurgence in popularity of country music in their native Huntington Beach. The joking style confused many of their fans and the album would remain in obscurity until its 1999 re-release as "The Vandals Play Really Bad Original Country Tunes". By the time of the album's release the band had recruited new drummer Doug MacKinnon and Escalante had moved to bass, a position he would remain in for the rest of the band's career.


title: The Vandals

text: Following the release of "Slippery When Ill" the band went through several lineup changes, as drummer MacKinnon and founding-guitarist Ackermann both left the group.


title: The Vandals

text: With Escalante asserting control over the band, Stevo, Ackermann, Lumary, and T.S.O.L. drummer Todd Barnes played a show billed as the Vandals, later as S.N.I.V. (Stevo's New and Improved Vandals). Escalante has stated that the older members relinquished control of the band's name and rights to him in exchange for permission to play the show, but the others deny this claim and point out that Escalante served an injunction against them during the performance preventing them from further use of the name and music.


title: The Vandals

text: The departure of Ackermann and MacKinnon left Escalante and Quackenbush searching for a new guitarist and drummer. The Vandals had previously played shows with a band called Doggy Style and had been intrigued by the wacky antics of their guitarist Warren Fitzgerald, and they soon recruited him as their new permanent guitarist. Also around this time Escalante and Quackenbush made many visits to Disneyland, where they witnessed Josh Freese playing electronic drums in the children's cover band Polo on the Tomorrowland Terrace stage. They persuaded him to join, solidifying the Vandals lineup of Quackenbush, Fitzgerald, Escalante, and Freese which would remain constant throughout the rest of their career (with occasional substitutes filling in for Freese).


title: The Vandals

text: In 1990 the new lineup recorded "Fear of a Punk Planet", an album which established their presence amongst an emerging new crop of California punk rock bands including Green Day, NOFX, the Offspring, Rancid, Pennywise, and Sublime. It spawned their first music video, for the song "Pizza Tran," which received airplay on local punk and rock television shows.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1992 Escalante graduated from law school and became a television executive at CBS, using money from his job to finance the band and his television connections to allow them to play on late-night rock shows. At a New Year's Eve party at which Escalante was unable to play, actor Keanu Reeves filled in for him on bass. Fitzgerald and Freese, meanwhile, moved towards careers as professional musicians. Freese became a sought-after studio drummer, while Fitzgerald began a three-year stint as guitarist for Oingo Boingo.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1992, Freese and Fitzgerald formed Xtra Large with vocalist Darren McNamee and Big Drill Car bassist Bob Thomson. Xtra Large released one album on Giant Records, titled "Now I Eat Them".


title: The Vandals

text: In 1994 the band released "", a live album and video which featured mostly performances of songs from "Peace thru Vandalism" and "When in Rome". From this point on the band would play fewer and fewer of these older songs in their live sets, concentrating instead on newer material.


title: The Vandals

text: By 1995 punk rock had gained nationwide mainstream popularity, and the Vandals signed to Offspring singer Dexter Holland's new label Nitro Records. They released the album "Live Fast, Diarrhea" to positive reception and supported it with tours throughout the United States and Europe, including a spot opening for fellow Orange County rockers No Doubt. The album and band garnered increased attention thanks to an episode of the popular television show "The X-Files" in which actor Giovanni Ribisi played a character who wears Vandals T-shirts and listens to their music.


title: The Vandals

text: 1996 saw the release of "The Quickening", a slightly more nihilistic and aggressive album that was supported by a music video for "It's a Fact." That year Escalante and Fitzgerald also founded the record label Kung Fu Records, initially created in order to release an album by the Riverside band Assorted Jelly Beans. The label also released the soundtrack to the movie "Glory Daze", which featured music from both the Vandals and Assorted Jellybeans and a theme written by Fitzgerald. At the end of the year the band also released a Christmas album, "Oi to the World!", on Kung Fu. Although it remained the band's most obscure release for several years, the title track became somewhat famous when it was covered by No Doubt in 1997. Their version was produced by Fitzgerald and made into a music video. Other than "Oi to the World!," songs from the album are generally not part of the Vandals' live setlist, except for their annual "Winter Formal" concert at which they generally perform the album in its entirety. "Sweatin' to the Oldies" was also re-released by Kung Fu in 1997 with bonus tracks.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1998 the band released "Hitler Bad, Vandals Good", their most popular album yet which focused more on lighthearted humor with songs such as "My Girlfriend's Dead" and "I've Got an Ape Drape." The band continued to tour, including stints on the Vans Warped Tour. In 1999 they re-released most of "Slippery When Ill" as "The Vandals Play Really Bad Original Country Tunes" on Kung Fu. The members also starred in the Kung Fu-produced internet television series "Fear of a Punk Planet", later released on DVD.


title: The Vandals

text: 2000 saw a trio of releases from the band, beginning with a 10-year anniversary edition of "Fear of a Punk Planet" that was released by Kung Fu. This was followed by "Look What I Almost Stepped In...", their final album under their contract with Nitro. Because of other musical commitments Freese was unavailable to play on the album, so substitute Brooks Wackerman filled in as drummer for the album's recording and some accompanying tours. At the end of the year Kung Fu re-released "Oi to the World!", making it much more widely available than it had been in previous years. Escalante also launched the Kung Fu imprint Kung Fu Films in 2000 with the release of the film "That Darn Punk", in which he starred and the other band members also appeared. The Vandals also contributed new songs to the film's soundtrack.


title: The Vandals

text: By the end of 2000 the Vandals had fulfilled their contractual obligations to Nitro Records, and moved their operations fully to Kung Fu. The Kung Fu label had grown since its founding in 1996 and was well-positioned to provide the recording, marketing, and touring support the band's popularity now necessitated, including marketing and touring opportunities in Japan. With Escalante acting as president of the label the band's operations could also run more smoothly. In 2001 the band performed on the entire run of the Vans Warped Tour.


title: The Vandals

text: The band's first new album for Kung Fu was "Internet Dating Superstuds", released in 2002. They held an online contest in which the winners were each awarded a "date" with one of the band members. These "dates" were filmed and included on the CD-ROM portion of the album, which used an internet theme in its artwork. They once again performed on the Warped Tour, and would play select dates on subsequent Warped Tours over the next 3 years. The "Sweatin' to the Oldies" video was also re-released on DVD that year by Kung Fu.


title: The Vandals

text: In July 2003 the Vandals filmed a live concert album and DVD at the House of Blues in Anaheim as part of Kung Fu's "The Show Must Go Off!" series. It was released the following year and featured mostly songs written from 1995 to 2002. 2003 also saw the release of "Hollywood Potato Chip", which strayed a bit from the pop-punk formula of their 1990s work.


title: The Vandals

text: In December 2004 the band traveled to Iraq and played several shows for US troops in the area, with drummer Byron McMackin of Pennywise filling in for Freese. Some fans and contemporaries in the punk community criticized this decision, claiming that it implied the band supported the US-led war in Iraq. The band members defended their actions by pointing out that their music is deliberately apolitical and that whatever their individual political views might be, they were eager to show support for the troops. This was followed by a tour of Europe, on which some dates were cancelled due to protests and picketing by groups who felt the band's actions constituted a pro-war stance.


title: The Vandals

text: In 2005 the "Shingo Japanese Remix Album" was released, composed of versions of the band's songs remixed by Japanese DJ Shingo Asari. That August the band played a benefit show for the legendary New York rock club CBGB. In the same month, original singer Stevo died of a drug overdose.


title: The Vandals

text: In April 2006 the Vandals once again returned to the Middle East with McMackin to perform for US troops, this time in Afghanistan. They continue to tour when the members' schedules permit, as they also have other music-related obligations outside the band. Freese continues to act as a studio drummer for a multitude of recording artists. Fitzgerald writes and produces songs and albums for other artists as well as movie scores, and occasionally acts, having starred in the Kung Fu film "Cake Boy". Escalante continues to own and operate Kung Fu Records and Kung Fu Films, signing bands and making films such as the "Show Must Go Off!" series and "Cake Boy". He retired from legal practice in 2005 and hosted the call-in radio show Barely Legal Radio on Indie 103.1 FM, where he dispensed entertainment and legal advice to aspiring musicians. In May 2006 he became the station's drive-time morning show host, replacing former Mighty Mighty Bosstones singer Dicky Barrett. In 2007 the Vandals played the first four dates of the Warped Tour.


title: The Vandals

text: In August 2008 the Vandals played nine dates of the 2008 Warped Tour with Sum 41 drummer Steve Jocz filling in for Josh Freese, who was touring with Nine Inch Nails. On August 12 the band released "BBC Sessions and Other Polished Turds", a collection of rare songs and b-sides, exclusively as a digital release.


title: The Vandals

text: In January 2015, the band recorded a version from the song "I'm An Individual", originally recorded by the Australian footballer Mark "Jacko" Jackson, for the Australian Soundwave 2015 Compilation, launched in February of that year.


title: The Vandals

text: In 1989, the original Vandals reformed with original singer Stevo, Jan Nils Ackermann on guitar, Chalmer Lumary on bass and with Todd Barnes on drums, playing a show. Legal matters ensued, preventing further performances. Then, In 2008, the original Vandals reunited once more under the new moniker of "Anarchy Taco" as to prevent further legal action and restrictive measures on the group's original members.


title: The Vandals

text: Similar to the 1989 reunion, Anarchy Taco was put together by the band's founder, Jan Nils Ackermann. The band collects alumni Steve "Human" Pfauter and Chalmer Lumary from the group's original records, as well as vocalist Worm, and drummer James. The group's setlist usually encompasses the material recorded by the band from 1982–1984.


title: The Vandals

text: A CD re-release combining "Peace thru Vandalism" and "When in Rome Do as the Vandals" had also been in print since 1989 through Time Bomb Recordings with the credit "all songs written by Joe Escalante." The former members asserted that most of these songs had been written before Escalante joined the group, that he had misappropriated their intellectual property, and that he had not paid them royalties due from the licensing of these songs. Lawsuits ensued, resulting in an undisclosed settlement which allowed Escalante to continue licensing the band's back catalogue. A subsequent licensing of the song "Urban Struggle" for the movie "Jackass Number Two" credited the group as a whole.


title: The Vandals

text: Due to Josh Freese's job as a full-time studio drummer he has sometimes been unable to play live or on tours with the band. Temporary drummers have included:


Police uniforms and equipment in the United Kingdom have varied considerably from the inception of what were the earliest recognisable mainstream police services in the early 19th century. As various laws in the mid-19th century standardised policing in the United Kingdom, the uniforms and equipment become standardised. From a variety of home grown uniforms, bicycles, swords and pistols the British police force evolved in look and equipment through the long coats and top hat, to the recognisable modern uniform of a white shirt, black tie, reflective jackets, body armour, and the battenburg-marked vehicles, to the present-day Airwave Solutions radios, electric vehicles and tasers.


title: Police uniforms and equipment in the United Kingdom

text: Police uniform and equipment varies enormously per police force or service and different uniforms and equipment is used for different situations. The lists here are not exhaustive, nor specific for each force, but give a general overview of typical uniform and equipment (colloquially known as 'kit') used in the United Kingdom.


text: Various items of equipment are usually carried on the duty belt of uniformed officers, although some have pouches attached to their stab vest, eliminating the need for a belt. Plainclothes officers may wear a harness, which can be worn under clothes. They usually have:


text: Extra equipment, such as a first aid kit (including a pocket mask, disposable gloves, germicidal wipes, hypoallergenic tape, wound dressings, a triangular bandage, and sterile plasters), may be stored in a patrol car.


text: For much of the twentieth century up to the mid-1990s, male police officers wore a dark blue (almost black) tunic with polished silver buttons (gold for the City of London Police), and trousers of matching colour with a sewn-in truncheon pocket. No stab vest was worn and much less equipment was carried than is today. Following concerns about police officers' safety, it was suggested that the uniform should be changed.


text: From the 1990s, it was generally accepted that the police could patrol in "shirt-sleeve order" which meant that they need not wear the jacket, as its widespread use was an impediment in some situations. In 1994, the Home Office, with the co-operation of many chief constables, changed the uniform to black trousers, shirt, blue NATO-style V-neck jumper, stab vest (typically with pockets, pouches and other compartments), service belt (duty belt) and reflective jacket.


text: Although there are minor variations in the styling, pattern and insignia, the police forces of Great Britain, Jersey, Guernsey, the Isle of Man and Gibraltar all wear very similar uniforms. In general, these have taken their lead from the Metropolitan Police Service, due to it being recognised as the first Home Office police service in England. The base colour is a very dark blue, almost indistinguishable from black (and recently often is black), which earned the police the nickname of the "boys in blue".


text: The Metropolitan Police officers were unarmed to clearly distinguish them from military enforcers, which had been the system of policing seen before the 1820s. Their uniform was also styled in blue, rather than the military red. Despite the service being unarmed, the then Home Secretary, Robert Peel, gave authorisation to the Commissioner to purchase fifty flintlock pistols, for exceptional incidents that required the use of firearms. As time progressed, the obsolete flintlocks were decommissioned from service, being superseded by early revolvers. At the time, burglary (or "house breaking" as it was then called) was a common problem for police, as house breakers were usually armed. Due to the deaths of officers at the hands of armed criminals in the outer districts of the Metropolis, and after much press coverage debating whether Peel's service should be fully armed, the Commissioner applied to the Home Secretary to supply all officers on the outer districts with revolvers. These could only be issued if, in the opinion of the senior officer, the officer could be trusted to use it safely, and with discretion. From that point, officers who felt the need to be armed, could be so. The practice lasted until 1936, although the vast majority of the system was phased out by the end of the 19th century.


text: From 1829, to 1839, Metropolitan Police officers wore blue swallowtail coats with high collars to counter garroting. This was worn with white trousers in summer, and a cane-reinforced top hat, which could be used as a step to climb or see over walls. In the early years of the Metropolitan Police, equipment was little more than a rattle to call for assistance, and a wooden truncheon. As the years progressed, the rattle was replaced with the whistle, swords were removed from service, and flintlock pistols were removed in favour of revolvers. Initially, police constables were required to wear their uniforms at all times, whether they were on duty or not. A cloth brassard or arm band, with black and white vertical stripes, known as a "duty band", was worn on the left forearm while on duty and removed at the end of the shift. In an emergency, duty bands could also be issued as the sole item of uniform if large numbers of special constables were required. The City of London Police are the last service to use the duty band.


text: In 1863, the Metropolitan Police replaced the tailcoat with a tunic, still high-collared, and the top hat with the custodian helmet. With a few exceptions (including the City of London Police, West Mercia Police, Hampshire Constabulary and States of Guernsey Police Service), most forces helmet plates carry a Brunswick star. The helmet itself was of cork-faced with fabric. The design varied slightly between services. Some used the style by the Metropolitan Police, topped with a boss, while others had a helmet that incorporated a ridge or crest terminating above the badge, or a short spike, sometimes topped with a ball. Luton Borough Police (1876-1947) wore a straw helmet in a similar style to the Bermudan police helmet, with a small oval plate. During WW2, all police services wore a plain peaked cap, or a military style steel helmet when appropriate.


text: The tunic went through many lengths and styles, with the Metropolitan Police adopting the open-neck style in 1948 (although senior and female officers adopted it before that time). Senior officers used to wear peaked pillbox-style caps until the adoption of the wider peaked cap worn today. The custodian helmet was phased out in Scotland in the early 1950s.


text: Female officers' uniforms have gone through a great variety of styles, as they have tended to reflect the women's fashions of the time. Tunic style, skirt length and headgear have varied by period and force. By the late 1980s, the female working uniform was identical to the male uniform, except for headgear and sometimes neckwear.


text: The commissioners and other senior-ranked officers of the Metropolitan Police and the City of London Police wear a full dress ceremonial uniform on state and special occasions (e.g. Trooping the Colour). This includes a high-necked tunic with silver or gold trimmings and is worn with a sword and a cocked hat.


text: Peaked caps and bowler hats are the basic headgear for police officers: a peaked cap for men, and a round bowler style hat for women.


text: The custodian helmet is worn on foot duty by male constables and sergeants (outside Scotland). There are several patterns, with different forces wearing different types. Although some Scottish forces have used helmets in the past, they are no longer worn in Scotland. West Yorkshire Police abandoned the custodian helmet in 2015. Thames Valley Police abandoned the custodian helmet in 2009 due to budget cuts, but brought them back into service in 2018 due to high demand, instant recognition and popularity with police officers and the public.


text: Baseball caps Cheshire Police phased out custodian helmets in the 1990s in favour of the peaked cap and bowler hat. These were in turn replaced with baseball caps in 2016. Lancashire Police made a similar move in 2017, followed by Gloucestershire Police in 2019. Northamptonshire Police removed the Custodian helmet in 2017 and replaced it with a baseball cap, but removed the baseball caps in 2018 and brought back the Custodian helmets.


text: West Yorkshire Police and (from May 2018) Hertfordshire Constabulary give female officers the option to wear a peaked cap instead of a bowler if they prefer to do so. Similarly, Staffordshire Police allows female officers to wear custodian helmets for public order duties if they so desire.


text: As of September 2021, Essex Police no longer restricts any force-issue headwear by gender. Any new officer recruited since may choose between a custodian helmet or bowler hat, plus an additional peaked cap.


text: The Metropolitan Police approved the use of name badges in October 2003, and new recruits started wearing the Velcro badges in September 2004. The badges consist of the wearer's rank, followed by their surname. Senior officers wear these in no.1 dress, due to the public nature of their role.


text: The uniform of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) is bottle green, divergent from the dark blue traditionally used in Great Britain. This reflects the Irish roots of the force, which is descended from the Royal Irish Constabulary, whose uniforms were a very dark green, almost black. Although the colour remained the same, when the Royal Ulster Constabulary became the Police Service of Northern Ireland in 2001, the term "bottle green" was adopted in the place of "rifle green" as it was seen as having less of a military connotation, in keeping with the spirit of the time. The only other notable difference from the uniforms in Great Britain is that PSNI officers are issued Flak jackets in place of the stab vest normally used in Britain. The custodian helmet was never worn by either the RUC or the PSNI, although a similar design known as the "night helmet" was worn on night shifts by the RUC until the early 1970s, and previously by the RIC.


text: Personal radio systems were first issued to police officers and installed in police cars in the 1960s (resulting in the demise of the "police box" telephones made famous by "Doctor Who"). In 2004, British police forces began change radios from analogue, to digital TETRA (Terrestrial Trunked Radio) system for communications, called Airwave.


text: Prior to the introduction of Airwave, all police radio systems were force-specific, with limited capacity for forces to talk


text: to neighbours or to facilitate working in groups away from the direction of the control room. Interoperability with other emergency services was also poor, and was criticised in reports after the Hillsborough and Kings Cross disasters. Most forces’ equipment could not transfer data or text messages – a growing operational requirement. Few had any form of encryption and were susceptible to monitoring by anyone prepared to buy cheap scanning equipment. In addition, almost every force had areas in which the police and other emergency services operated without effective radio coverage.


text: By the end of 2004, the majority of the existing police radio spectrum, which was subject to serious interference in some areas, was to be withdrawn and replaced by a new spectrum of superior quality, dedicated to use by public safety organisations, on which users would be required to use digital equipment. Knowledge of this change reinforced the need, already identified by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and the Home Office, for a new radio strategy. A Review of Radio Communications in the Police and Fire Services of England and Wales was inaugurated, a parallel review was carried out in Scotland, and the Public Safety Radio Communications Project was born.


text: In the United Kingdom (with the exception of Northern Ireland), the majority of police officers do not routinely carry firearms. This originates from the formation of the Metropolitan Police in the nineteenth century, when police were not armed, partly to counter public fears and objections concerning armed enforcers.


text: However, the Ministry of Defence Police, Civil Nuclear Constabulary, Police Service of Northern Ireland, Belfast Harbour Police and the Belfast International Airport Constabulary are issued firearms as a matter of routine. PSNI officers are also permitted to carry their firearm off-duty.


text: Every territorial police force has a number of officers who are routinely armed in units generally called Armed Response Vehicles. Certain specialist squads, such as the Flying Squad, Special Branch, Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection, Royal and Specialist Protection, and officers protecting airports along with government buildings, are routinely armed.


text: The British Transport Police have armed officers who have been specially trained in firearms operations, and were first deployed in early 2012. These officers are mainly stationed in London, and their primary focus is on the busiest stations. When they need to deploy officers outside London, they work closely with local police forces.


text: Other private or specialised police forces, such as ports police or parks police, are again generally unarmed in Great Britain and rely on armed support from territorial police forces, if needed.


text: Until recently, Tasers were issued only to Authorised Firearms Officers, and their use of them was governed by the same rules of engagement as regular firearms. In November 2008, the then Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, announced that 30,000 non-firearms officers would be allowed to carry them. The government announced funding of £8 million to purchase 10,000 Tasers for the police forces in England and Wales. The Metropolitan Police commissioner announced in December 2011, that police were to be routinely armed with these weapons following the deaths of police officers earlier that month. However, as of 2020, the majority of officers in the Met are still yet to be armed with Tasers.


text: Tasers are regarded as prohibited weapons under the Firearms Act 1968, and their possession is an offence. Police constables are exempt as Crown servants.


text: Officers may carry either a CS or PAVA (also known as Captor) incapacitant spray. Their effects are designed to be short-lived and exposure to fresh moving air will normally result in a significant recovery within 15–20 minutes. The CS spray issued by UK police services contains a 5% solution of CS whilst Captor sprays contain a 0.3% solution of PAVA. PAVA is significantly more potent than CS.


text: Aerosol incapacitants are classified as prohibited weapons by virtue of Section 5 of the Firearms Act 1968 and possession of such sprays is therefore illegal by the general public. They may only be possessed with the authority of the Defence Council or the Scottish Ministers. Police officers, as Crown servants, are exempt from the requirements of the legislation and can have lawful possession of an incapacitant spray whilst acting in their capacity as a constable or where necessary for the purposes of their duty.


text: Until the mid-1990s, most police forces utilised a 14 inch long traditional wooden truncheon. On 20 June 1994, Home Secretary Michael Howard authorised the use of batons. Long, rigid American-style batons were then introduced, first by the Metropolitan Police and then by other forces, but in many places these were short lived, mainly due to their being unwieldy in most operational circumstances.


text: The use of batons varies across the country, and each force selects which baton is best able to fulfil its needs and provide the best protection to officers. Expandable batons are popular, although side-handle baton or straight lock baton is used in some forces. Some forces in the North of England use a one-piece baton, and other officers can choose to use this style of baton, after passing the appropriate training.


text: Batons are offensive weapons; the following are offensive weapon offences under the Criminal Justice Act 1988:


text: The list of weapons regarded as offensive for the purposes of the act includes "straight, side-handled or friction-lock truncheons (sometimes known as a batons)" in the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) (Amendment) Order 2004 and "telescopic truncheons" in the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (Offensive Weapons) Order 1988. The restrictions on the activities listed above do not apply "for the purposes of functions carried out on behalf of the Crown", which includes water bailiffs, immigration officers and police constables. In addition, police constables have "lawful authority" to possess batons.


text: Except for rapid response units, motor vehicles were rarely used except in rural districts (and even there, bicycles were more common). However, following the 1964 Police Act, the police became increasingly motorised and it is now rare to see an officer on foot patrol except in city or town centres, and then rarely alone. More recently, police forces have begun to put officers back on the beat as 'community' or 'neighbourhood' patrols. In an increasing number of urban centres police bicycle units are used to provide a quick response in congested areas, pedestrianised areas and parkland, as well as carrying out patrols. A bicycle patrol provides a balance between the distance covered by a motorised patrol and the approachability of the foot patrol.


text: Incident Response Vehicles (IRV) are generally used when a '999' call has been received regarding an ongoing incident or emergency. Usually an IRV would be assigned to the call, as their continual patrol of an area reduces their deployment time. Response vehicles tend to be capable of the safe use of speed.


text: Larger, more powerful vehicles are used by Road Policing Units and Armed Response Units due to the fact that they carry out tasks such as pursuing stolen cars, responding to emergencies in a larger area, or carrying a larger amount equipment than an IRV. It is for that reason that many of the vehicles are estates and 4x4s. Officers are required to be trained as 'advanced drivers', allowing them to operate higher-performance vehicles. Some advanced drivers are also trained to TPAC standard, allowing them to engage in the tactical phase of a pursuit and perform Tactical Pursuit And Containment (TPAC) maneuvers.


text: Most marked police vehicles are white or silver with retroreflective livery markings on the side. These markings usually take the form of a blue and yellow battenburg markings along the side.


text: Unmarked police vehicles are used for a variety of purposes, including undercover operations or road policing duties.


text: Police Helicopters are required by the CAA to be marked in a standard 'high conspicuousness' paint scheme, to make them more visible and avoid the possibility of air proximity hazards with other low-flying aircraft. This paint scheme, also used by UK military training helicopters, requires them to be black on the sides and underneath, and yellow on top. When seen from the ground, these helicopters are black but this is to make them more visible against the sky as a safety feature (and yellow against the ground when seen from above). One of the most common helicopters used by the police is the Eurocopter EC135, alongside four EC145. Four Vulcanair P.68 aeroplane are also utilised.


text: In England and Wales, the National Police Air Service (NPAS) operates all police helicopters and planes. Police Scotland and PSNI operate their own air support units.


text: Forces with significant waterways to police maintain police watercraft, ranging from Zodiac dinghies to Arun class former RNLI lifeboats.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: California's Mount Shasta has been the subject of an unusually large number of myths and legends. In particular, it is often said there is a secret city beneath its peaks. In some stories, the city is no longer inhabited, while in others, it is inhabited by a technologically advanced society of human beings or mythical creatures.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: According to local indigenous tribes, namely the Klamath people, Mount Shasta is inhabited by the spirit chief Skell, who descended from heaven to the mountain's summit. Skell fought with the Spirit of the Below-World, Llao, who resided at Mount Mazama, by throwing hot rocks and lava, probably representing the volcanic eruptions at both mountains. Writer Joaquin Miller recorded various related legends in the 1870s.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: Mount Shasta has also been a focus for non-Native American legends, centered on a hidden city (called Telos) of advanced beings from the lost continent of Lemuria. The legend grew from an offhand mention of Lemuria in the 1880s. In 1899, Frederick Spencer Oliver published "A Dweller on Two Planets", which claimed that survivors from a sunken continent called Lemuria were living in or on Mount Shasta. Oliver's Lemurians lived in a complex of tunnels beneath the mountain and occasionally were seen walking the surface dressed in white robes.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: In 1931, Harvey Spencer Lewis, using the pseudonym Wishar S[penle] Cerve, wrote a book published by AMORC about the hidden Lemurians of Mount Shasta that a bibliography on Mount Shasta described as "responsible for the legend's widespread popularity". This belief has been incorporated into numerous occult religions, including "I AM" Activity, The Summit Lighthouse, Church Universal and Triumphant, Love Has Won, and Kryon.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: According to Guy Ballard, while hiking on Mount Shasta, he encountered a man who introduced himself as Count of St. Germain, who is said to have started Ballard on the path to discovering the teachings that would become the "I AM" Activity religious movement.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: According to a legend, J. C. Brown was a British prospector who discovered a lost underground city beneath Mount Shasta in 1904. Brown had been hired by the Lord Cowdray Mining Company of England to prospect for gold and discovered a cave which sloped downward for . In the cave, he found an underground village filled with gold, shields, and mummies, some being up to tall.


title: Legends of Mount Shasta

text: He told his story 30 years later to John C. Root, who proceeded to gather an exploration team in Stockton, California. About 80 people joined the team, but, on the day the team was to set out, Brown did not show up. Brown was not heard from again.


title: Ikhwan

text: The Ikhwan (, The Brethren), commonly known as Ikhwan min ta'a Allah (), was a traditionalist religious militia made up of traditionally nomadic tribesmen which formed a significant military force of the ruler Ibn Saud and played an important role in establishing him as ruler of most of the Arabian Peninsula in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.


title: Ikhwan

text: The Ikhwan first appeared around 1902. They were the product of clergy who aimed to break up the Bedouin tribes and settle them around the wells and oases of the sedentary Arab populations, mainly those of the Najd, on the grounds that nomadic life was incompatible with the strict conformity of their interpretation of Islam. The newly Islamicized Bedouin would be converted from nomad raiders to soldiers for Islam. The cleric/teachers of the Ikhwan were dedicated to their idea of the purification and the unification of Islam, and some of the newly converted Ikhwan rebelled against their emir Ibn Saud, accusing him of religious laxity. The conquest of the Hejaz in 1924 brought all of the current Saudi state under Ibn Saud's control. The monarch then found himself in conflict with elements of the Ikhwan. He crushed their power at the Battle of Sabilla in 1929, following which the militia was reorganised into the Saudi Arabian National Guard.


title: Ikhwan

text: According to scholar David Commins, around 1913, the same time that Ibn Saud regained al-Hasa, there emerged in obscure circumstances a zealous movement known as the Ikhwan (Brethren). Salafi ulama went out to domesticate nomadic tribesmen, to convert them from idolatry to Islam and to make them soldiers for Saudi expansion. The Ikhwan became zealous religious warriors united and motivated by idealism more than allegiance to Ibn Saud. The result was a rebellion by some of the Ikhwan against their creator, who crushed them and in so doing reasserted dynastic power over the religious mission.


title: Ikhwan

text: The arid, remote region of Najd had been ruled by the House of Saud and religiously dominated by the Islamic revival movement known as Wahhabism (with some exceptions) since the mid-18th century. Wahhabism was a movement of townspeople, and traditionally thought of the beduin nomadic herders as "bearers of religious ignorance, "jahiliyyah", and thus as raw material for conversion". To remedy this situation, the beduin were gathered in agricultural settlements known as "hijra", where they were to be taught farming, crafts or trades and how to be "proper Muslims". There were 52 "hujar" (plural of "hijra") by 1920 and 120 by 1929. Ikhwan were known for wearing white turbans rather than the traditional Arab "Kufiya" (roped headcloth), and for covering their faces when they encountered Europeans or Arabs from outside Saudi Arabia.


title: Ikhwan

text: The pacification of the tribesmen was not entirely a success, and the former nomads continued their raids, which now had religious sanction and were bloodier than before. Unlike nomadic raiders, the Ikhwan earned "notoriety for routinely killing male captives" and for sometimes putting "children and women to death". From 1914 to 1926 Ibn Saud and Wahhabi religious leadership allied with him urged the Ikhwan to not attack or harass other nomads and townspeople of the Najd. From 1926 and 1930, the conflict was more serious, and effectively a rebellion and attempt to overthrow Ibn Saud by a minority of the Ikhwan leaders. With the conquest of the Hejaz in 1925, Ibn Saud had completed his territorial expansion and negotiated border agreements with his neighbors, the British protectorates of Transjordan, Iraq and Kuwait. Some Ikhwan leaders wanted to continue the expansion of the Wahhabi realm into these states, and launched raids into them. This left Ibn Saud responsible for military attacks originating in his country and facing British military power if he did not stop them.