700 Elephants?!?

[jymbee]

A reporter this morning, describing the upcoming launch of the Artemis rocket was gushing about how powerful the boosters were given the thing weights as much as "700 Elephants!!"

Ah, now there's an analogy I can relate to having hoisted so many elephants aloft in my day!

I can envision him preparing his script for the report... finding out how much this thing weighed then frantically searching for an appropriate multiplier given the weight of some kind of known object.

"How about elephants...They're really BIG and HEAVY... Perfect!!" Everybody can surely relate to that.

Ever since I noticed that the "it's bigger than a breadbox" analogy died out given how few people have breadboxes these days I guess, the weight and size analogies have gotten weirder with things like "the size of Rhode Island", "Olympic sized swimming pools" and of course "football fields" to name just a few (myself having never swam in an Olympic size pool, been to Rhode Island, or played football) but there's many more downright very weird comparisons.

I assume that some writers have extensive lists of the size and weight of hundreds of things, then just start doing the math trying to, I guess, impress the viewer/reader.

 

[krazeehorse]

How about 1400 motorhomes?

 

[CharlesinGA]

Its a new generation of journalist attempting to relate to people who simply DO NOT understand things such as units of measure. Football fields.... are we talking American football fields (120 yards (360 feet) long and 53.3 yards (160 feet) wide), or a soccer field (110–120 yards long by 70–80 yards wide.) which is also referred to as a football field?

Yes, the Olympic sized swimming pool is a common one. When you get to a hundred of those pools, just give me the proper quantity, cubic yards, acre feet, etc.

Remember the member of congress (Shelia Jackson Lee D-Tx) who described an AR rifle "as heavy as 10 boxes that you might be moving".

Charles

 

[PancakeBill]

A reporter this morning, describing the upcoming launch of the Artemis rocket was gushing about how powerful the boosters were given the thing weights as much as "700 Elephants!!"

Ah, now there's an analogy I can relate to having hoisted so many elephants aloft in my day!

I can envision him preparing his script for the report... finding out how much this thing weighed then frantically searching for an appropriate multiplier given the weight of some kind of known object.

"How about elephants...They're really BIG and HEAVY... Perfect!!" Everybody can surely relate to that.

Ever since I noticed that the "it's bigger than a breadbox" analogy died out given how few people have breadboxes these days I guess, the weight and size analogies have gotten weirder with things like "the size of Rhode Island", "Olympic sized swimming pools" and of course "football fields" to name just a few (myself having never swam in an Olympic size pool, been to Rhode Island, or played football) but there's many more downright very weird comparisons.

I assume that some writers have extensive lists of the size and weight of hundreds of things, then just start doing the math trying to, I guess, impress the viewer/reader.

I can at least relate to the Rhode Island analogy, having lived there 55+ years. I have seen a football field, but never played.

 

[jymbee]

... just give me the proper quantity, cubic yards, acre feet, etc.

Charles

 

[CamperAL]

It would seem that the term 700 elephants was borrowed from the Cradle of Aviation Museum, which used that term to describe the Apollo Saturn 5.

It is exciting to watch this and hope for success and safe travels for the astronauts. There is a diverse group of people on this voyage.

I know they had trouble with the heat shield in the unmanned test but they seem to have solved that problem. When they come in they will hit the atmosphere at 25,000 mph. Easy to bounce off the atmosphere if not done right.

 

[OldWEB]

Déjà vu....

Two thousand Olympic size swimming pools!

It seems that ever since "as big as a breadbox" became the default analogy for describing the size of any object even remotely that size, the media falls all over themselves in an attempt to explain just how large, tall, long things are they're reporting on with an analogy as if us mentally...

www.rvforum.net

 

[jymbee]

Déjà vu....

Two thousand Olympic size swimming pools!

It seems that ever since "as big as a breadbox" became the default analogy for describing the size of any object even remotely that size, the media falls all over themselves in an attempt to explain just how large, tall, long things are they're reporting on with an analogy as if us mentally...

www.rvforum.net

The elephant in the room, so to speak, and what people really need to know is exactly how many elephants fit into an Olympic size swimming pool!

Then you have account for species-- African vs. Indian elephants, bull vs female, etc. etc.

 

[boatbuilder1]

All this brings to mind the Monty Python quote "What is the velocity of an unladen sparrow?"

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

I wonder if those were African elephants or the smaller Indian variety? Makes a ton of difference (each)!

 

[8Muddypaws]

From an old logistics newsletter:
Units of measure will always be expressed in the most obscure manner imaginable. e,g. Furlongs per fortnight.

 

[PancakeBill]

When I first saw the title I thought maybe the movie 100 Mules had a follow-up movie.

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

Units of measure will always be expressed in the most obscure manner imaginable. e,g. Furlongs per fortnight.

Nowadays it's probably kilo-Furlongs...