Shipping from Europe to USA

[Paul Koning]

> On Aug 22, 2019, at 2:57 PM, Peter Corlett via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
> 
> On Thu, Aug 22, 2019 at 06:30:10PM +0000, Henk Gooijen via cctalk wrote:
> ...
>> Only UPS did … and yes, the “horror” stories *are* true. They managed to drop
>> the package. Not from 4 inches above ground, but more, because a *steel
>> corner* had a dent!
> 
> Hence that old joke: "If being air dropped out of a C-130 into a minefield
> constitutes 'moderately rough handling', what constitutes 'very rough
> handling'?" "Being shipped UPS".

I'm reminded of a legendary story from a long time ago, of a DEC disk being air-shipped to a customer.  RP03?  Not sure, but something of that size class.

The story was that the shipping company hadn't strapped it down properly, so when the plane applied takeoff power, the drive slid backwards in the cargo hold.  Fast enough to exit the hold through the airplane skin, landing on the runway with a nice bounce.

The drive was taken back to Maynard, where it was observed that the corner of the frame was badly bent.  The techs propped it up on a cinder block and turned the drive on; it worked fine.

Sure sounds like a fairy tale, but it's a fun one.

	paul