Reuters UK: Russia believed to have jammed signal on UK defence minister's plane - source

https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/russia-believed-have-jammed-signal-uk-defence-ministers-plane-source-2024-03-14/

British Defence Secretary Grant Shapps walks to attend a cabinet meeting in London, Britain, March 6, 2024. REUTERS/Toby Melville/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

LONDON, March 14 (Reuters) - Russia is believed to have jammed the satellite signal on an aircraft used by defence minister Grant Shapps to travel from Poland back to Britain, a government source and journalists travelling with him said on Thursday.

According to a government source and journalists, the GPS signal was interfered with for about 30 minutes while the plane flew close to Russia's Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad.

Mobile phones could no longer connect to the internet and the aircraft was forced to use alternative methods to determine its location, they said.

The Russian defence ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's spokesperson confirmed the incident had happened on Wednesday but added it was "not unusual".

"While travelling back from Poland yesterday, the plane carrying the Defence Secretary and his delegation temporarily experienced GPS jamming when they flew close to Kaliningrad," the spokesperson said.

"It didn't threaten the safety of the aircraft and it is not unusual for aircraft to experience GPS jamming near Kaliningrad, which is of course Russian territory."

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they said the same ish when that plane Ron Brown was on crashed mysteriously into a whole ass mountain, and killed everyone on board

Ronald H. Brown, the U.S. secretary of commerce, is killed along with 32 other Americans when their U.S. Air Force plane crashes into a mountain near Dubrovnik, Croatia. Brown was leading a delegation of business executives to the former Yugoslavia to explore business opportunities that might help rebuild the war-torn region.

Brown, born in Washington, D.C., in 1941, grew up in New York City’s Harlem neighborhood, where he worked as a welfare caseworker before joining the U.S. Army. After holding positions in the National Urban League, an advocacy group for the renewal of inner cities, he became a member of the U.S. Supreme Court bar and served as chief counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee. In 1989, he was elected chairman of the Democratic Party National Committee, becoming the first African American to hold the top position in a major political party in the United States.

As chairman, Brown played a pivotal role in securing the 1992 election of Bill Clinton, the first Democratic president in 12 years. In 1993, Clinton appointed Brown to be the first African American secretary of commerce, a position he held until his death in 1996.

Rishi you betta thank yo stars that you got a warning, before the murder happened cause this was just that. a warning.

the idea of Draxum in academic settings is vastly entertaining to me

You know, for as much as I've seen the head cannon that Aziraphale is autistic (at least, by human standards) I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone talking about the very real possibility that he scripted the conversation during the ineffable divorce and was majorly panicking when Crowley didn't respond in a way he'd prepared for. Like to me, a certified autistic, the way he talks in that scene sounds like he was running out of pre-written responses to get Crowley to agree to go with him, then proceeded to resort to a mixture of repeating himself and speaking from his desperation.

just generally musing to myself what makes thematic and plot sense for the link clink ending after reading some other people's takes the past few days. no real conclusions here, just some thoughts tied together with a string.

I've seen arguments that what needs to happen is that Lu Guang needs to accept Cheng Xiaoshi's fate and move on without regrets. This idea that the past has to remain as-is and you have to move on is a thread that the show has played with quite a few times. It's written into the very rules underlying the dives. The most obvious instance being the earthquake arc, where Cheng Xiaoshi was unable to save Chen Xiao's mum, but he *was* able to deliver the messages and thereby help CX gain closure. It's laid out by Lu Guang that it *was* worth it to deliver the words, and Cheng Xiaoshi takes this conclusion with him when he confronts Emma. (Of course, the fact this lesson was given by *Lu Guang* casts a different shade over the whole affair. I don't think it can be entirely discarded, given LG even admits he's going against his own rules, but it reads more like something he's trying and failing to convince himself of.)

So, the past has to stay as it is. We see a few different approaches to this idea in s2 - of people refusing to move on and trying to change the past. Qian Jin wants to force his wife "not to cheat"; he wants to alter her behaviour because she didn't act as he wanted. Li Tianchen wanted to change how *he* acted back then, even if indirectly, because he sees himself as his mother's killer, and thinks this is the point at which his tragedy was locked into place. They both thought their 'tragedies' were down to a single event. It's not that simple.

Lu Guang wants to personally protect Cheng Xiaoshi by controlling all scenarios. Not exactly taking his will, but limiting his choices. There's probably a whole post to be made on how QJ/LTC/LG each approach the agency of the ones they want to protect, but that's not for now.

Anyway, Li Tianchen as the foil to Lu Guang. At the end of s2, he has in theory let go of Li Tianxi but in practice he's just burying himself deeper by following Liu Xiao. Trying to entirely shun the past so he can believe that he still has some element of control. Both LTC and LG are at the extreme ends of clinging on vs letting go and that means the correct answer has to lie somewhere in the middle. Not shunning the past, but accepting it, and using that resolve to move forward.

So, Liu Xiao. We don't have much on him but what we do have is his belief that uncertainties should become certainties. He's deterministic and set explicitly as the counter to Lu Guang, whose own aim is to change events rather than lock them into place. They both want to *control* all aspects, but for differing reasons. In fate vs free will, it makes sense that our protagonist is on the side of free will, but it's interesting that he's presented himself so much as the opposite previously. He and CXS haven't exactly switched places, but to the audience, they've definitely taken on traits of the other.

Liu Xiao's whole spiel about how all options will eventually lead to the same outcomes, with him set *against* Lu Guang, very much seems like it's a setup for a "defeat fate" type plotline though. It's hammered in that there is no escape, no other option. Are we expected to accept this? It doesn't seem so. It's something I'm struggling to reconcile somewhat with the earlier messages about accepting the past, but maybe that's not quite it. Maybe it's about control vs freedom?

Trust fall. Every dive with LG and CXS is an act of mutual trust where they need to act in tandem. Dives go astray when one party acts without the other. For CXS, this is about him acting against LG's instructions (texting Emma's parents, staying in the earthquake dive). For LG, this is about him withholding info because he doesn't trust how CXS will react.

Lu Guang needs to put his trust in CXS before his withholding of information creates an unresolvable rift. He needs to stop trying to control CXS in order to keep him safe. We saw how that spun out for Li Tianchen and Li Tianxi. LG needs to put the choice into Cheng Xiaoshi's hands and let him decide his own fate. It reminds me of how Cheng Xiaoshi laid everything out for Emma and let her decide whether to live. It was only outside interference that prevented her, but she did make the choice to survive. And she did it by remembering those small moments. By accepting that tragedy happens but there are still people that make it worth it.

For LG and CXS, they need to mutually trust each other and that's how they'll find their way through.

do you have any other pjo alter human hcs? 👀

Yes!

Leo being dragonkin and Jason being a wolf therian are my two main ones. Like i mentioned in that other post, I imagine Leo's is more spiritual-origin and Jason's is specifically more psychological-origin from being raised by Lupa's pack. I already went over some of the dragonkin!Leo ones in the previous post so I'll focus more on the wolf therian Jason ones here- (under a cut for length)

Because all the Romans are trained by the wolves, plus a small friendly monster population in New Rome that includes dog-headed people, Jason just. does not think twice at all about identifying so strongly as a wolf. He just presumes that's a normal thing. Everybody else just thinks he's being Very Roman so they don't question it either. It probably isn't until he goes to CHB that he realizes not everybody feels like that.

That doesn't stop him and Leo from having a conversation about feeling like a wolf/dragon respectively and continuing to presume that it's totally not an identity thing they're gonna be thinking about A Lot later on and either Everybody Just Feels Like That or they're both just got the same oddly specific unique thing going on (it's not like it'd be the only thing - they're also both Hera's champions. maybe it's just a champions of Hera thing). It's fine, they'll figure it out eventually. Piper is extremely confused about what they're going on about though.

Jason is excited a very normal amount about the concept of werewolves. He's totally not mad that he wasn't able to defeat Lycaon in battle and gain shapeshifting powers. Definitely not. He's also definitely not jealous of Frank for having shapeshifting powers, or jealous that Nico and Reyna got to fight the lycanthropes more.

Leo is also immensely jealous of Frank's shapeshifting and is heavily considering trying to bargain with the gods to swap his fire powers for that.

Jason has an encyclopedic knowledge of like every werewolf myth from different mythologies and folktales and he WILL excitedly infodump about them.

The Greco-roman werewolf myths may have not turned out for him, but the minute Jason finds out that Norse myths are on the table he's begging Annabeth if they can go visit her cousin. For science. Just to see if the Norse werewolf myths are any better. By the gods he will figure out if safely and ethically becoming a wolf is possible somehow. (He has definitely also asked Reyna to use Circe magic to turn him into a wolf before. Up to interpretation how that went down.)

Jason using claw weapons!!!!! He definitely has fought with his teeth before but he gets his hands on some nice hefty and sturdy claws and he is THRIVING with them. If he could get some sort of teeth armor/weapon to use too, he would. Unfortunately that one's a bit harder to get so his real teeth will have to do for now, when an option. (He definitely bit Krios and is 100% up for using his teeth in a fight you cannot convince me otherwise)

Speaking of biting - Jason is a biter, just in general. He affectionately chews on/nips at his friends as both an oral stim AuDHD thing and a 'kin thing. Also playfighting/sparring with them. He'd probably get into quadrobics and parkour as well if given the opportunity.

Leo's not so much into that sort of very active stuff (or very platonically affectionate stuff). He's mostly hanging out with his hoard of machinery in his den Bunker 9. They're still shiny things, they're still his hoard. He's a bit more territorial of Bunker 9 than he'd like to admit since it's his space (also combo dragonkin brain/autism stuff) but trying to explain why is way too much of a headache for him, and most people stay out of there anyways so it doesn't come up much which is fine by him.

In terms of more dragonkin-affirming activities though, despite his aversion to fire, Leo's fallen asleep in a fireplace/bed of coals/etc a couple of times in his life and he will never admit how comfortable and affirming that was for him. He does also generally feel a bit better about his fire powers if it's just the fire-resistance part, or if he's breathing fire specifically (because also it's just cool, and how can he not feel like a badass super big and strong dragon when he's literally breathing fire?) (that time in BoO he totally let loose his fire and turned into functionally a supernova of flames was also weirdly affirming for him and he doesn't know what to do with that information). He's also probably tried making arm stilts before, just to see what they're like, and if he could improve the design at all to feel and look more natural.

...Atypical pronoun sets? Atypical pronoun sets. It'd probably be awhile before they actually start using them, but I think both Leo and Jason might vibe at least a lil with he/its for otherkin/therian reasons. Leo also probably dre/drem/dris. I also think Jason would particularly vibe with wolfgender. He didn't know that was an option and once he does he really likes it. (Also have you seen the masc wolfgender flag? Look at that and tell me that's not Jason.)

Camp Jupiter probably has more alterhuman folks than CHB, just in terms of population sizes and also just given how they're trained/raised it probably comes up more over there. This does somehow simultaneously make Jason more convinced that it's just an average thing but also less aware that being otherkin/a therian is even a thing.

My friend and I have talked a lot about the absolute weirdness potential that might occur with being an alterhuman demigod. Can you imagine being some creature from mythology and then finding out not only do they actually exist in that exact moment in your world, but also they will try to hunt you down? Something something intense alterhuman linguistic debates about if you're a mythological monster does that qualify more as therian or otherkin (based on the proposed delineation of therian = real world creatures / otherkin = mythological/legendary/etc)? (second philosophical/linguistic debate happening in the background of feral/animalistic = therian / less feral/animalistic = otherkin delineation but if that monster was originally a mortal then which do they qualify as?) (third conference happening behind that one of demigods journaling their experiences as monsters who were originally mortals and how that impacts them as demigods.) The awkwardness that must exist from being like hydrakin or something and then having to fight a hydra. Or being a different kind of hydra than exists in the riordanverse (or, weirder, being hydrakin but Monster Donut hydra specifically and having to explain your odd inexplicable connection to donuts before you figure out that's a thing).

Again: Leo making 'kin gear for demigodsssss. Maybe he's the one who makes the claw weapons for Jason, who knows.

For other major characters: Annabeth would definitely be totally fascinated by daemonism and probably experiment with it at least a bit. Nico I could see vibing with voidpunk. Hazel I could also see vibing with just general label alterhuman relating to her whole being-revivied-from-the-dead situation. Maybe same for Thalia for the same reasons, or Thalia even vibing with being like dryad-hearted/kith due to the whole pine tree thing.

I got another ask about this so there will be more headcanons along these lines soon as well.

ppl always confused as to how i can be gay but also essentially be aromantic/asexual (to a degree i am confused as well); best way i have to explain is just to say im married to Peace and Quiet And Being Alone

This painting is about navigating difficult times in a relationship and blocking out outside noise and interference.

Focusing on the connection between two people.

It also shows how when we have misunderstandings it is hard to separate what the person is actually trying to communicate (white lines) and our preconceived notions and perceptions (yellow lines) of what they are trying to say.

Where the hell are all the 3rd and 4th year students? Shouldn't there be hundreds or thousands of them assisting the heroes? With teams just as or stronger than RWBY and JNPR? Are they all just getting high and playing cards with the Grimm just off camera? That's the only explanation. Also Tyrian and Hazel jointly taking out every huntsmen in Mistral by themselves will always be a stupid ass pull.

RWBY worldbuilding bad 😔

ppl will go “i’d notice if society was going to sacrifice a marginalised group of people and if they said that it’s ok that a bunch of people would die then i would stand against it” and then they’ll hear people saying “well only disabled and vulnerable people will die of covid” and go “yes this is normal and ok and fine”

western and russian scientists haven't been collaborating w/ climate change research. a lot of russian data is missing/inaccessible to the west rn and probably vice versa. playing childish games with the most important issue of our era. i hate humans they're fucking retarded man. and I hate russia specifically.

my personal hc is that ford actually has a god awful relationship with nearly everyone in the pines family and like. he's mostly fine with it. it's more of an annoyance to him. the only one that actively hurts is stan, because stan wasn't supposed to be Just Family. but he's physically incapable of just saying that he's hurt so he simply Doesnt.

but like, other than that? he doesn't feel that he lost much. "family" isn't for people like him (this idea switches between god complex 'I'm so much better than the average person'/'I'm an autistic gay man with a visible ""deformity"" who's only skill is being smart ofc no one would want me in their family')

stan still hasn't really processed this in the 30 years he's been pretending to be ford bc he desperately wants to have a family. he wants family more than anything, it's everything to him! he wants kids and relatives and a busy house and the lack of it is eating him from the inside out.

and he can't add together how little ford seems to have interacted with everyone. how little they seemed to see of him and how little he told them about what his job was. because he could've had that, right? ford could've had their fathers respect! he could've settled down! he could be everything they were Supposed to be, but instead he had a mental breakdown in the woods and stan can't figure it out

I'm building a sims canon and throwing sims I've wanted to develop more into it. Hotori is officially the first, her lore will come later.

I want to reduce the number of sims I have so some of the ones in my gallery will be made downloadable (I also want to update a few of that are already shared). Idk which ones just yet. I don't want to just delete them cause that would be a waste. I don't play at all so they just kinda sit there all lonely. It's sad.

sta.rdew manages to capture a summer vibe well with it's music and overall audio, however unfortunately as a professional disliker of the vibe in question, the experience ends up being unfortunately grating as hell.

i've been thinking about maybe putting the library episode in Minor Interference, and the funny part is even though all the turtles canonically know sign language in that fic it would probably go almost exactly the same as canon

has anyone else noticed that ppl who present themselves as honest and ask for clear communication are not the ones who do communicate clearly and are not necessarily that honest

Ive been playing bg3 offline for 2 months bc I refuse to update and have to redo mods. but I finally decided to update today bc there were quite a few new mods I wanted.

anyway why the FUCK are there also updates for skyrim special edition and fallout new vegas on steam??? like bethany esda I am so fucking sick and tired of yall lmao. modders have been fixing shit for years and we're fine now, we've been fine, just leave shit the fuck alone!