NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub • Hacker News Board

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#41

Post by ceejayoz » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:36 PM UTC

comrh wrote: post #31

Yikes: AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,Each,720,2006-04-12 AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,Each,720,2006-04-12 AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,Each,720,2006-04-12 AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,Each,720,2006-04-12 AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,Each,720,2006-04-12 AL,MONTGOMERY,1010-00-691-1382,"LAUNCHER,GRENADE",1,E…

Presumably for tear gas / smoke rounds?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#42

Post by giarc » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:36 PM UTC

geetee wrote: post #26

geetee wrote: post #24

What in the world do police need parachutes for?

Monroe, Kentucky's refrigerator was a steal for only $2,394,800.0

Morgue?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#43

Post by base698 » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:37 PM UTC

pinoceros wrote: post #27

geetee wrote: post #24

What in the world do police need parachutes for?

BASE jumping?

You certainly aren't BASE jumping with military parachutes. At least not more than once.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#44

Post by wisty » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:38 PM UTC

It's lucky crime rates have dropped so low. You wouldn't want this kind of hardware lying around if there was any chance the wrong king of person could get their hands on it.

It would make a great movie or game premise though.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#45

Post by idlewords » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:38 PM UTC

rrggrr wrote: post #34

Disappointed but I guess not surprised to see the small number of helicopters, armored vehicles and assault rifles provided to southern border states. Federal government appears happy to distribute heavy weapons anywhere except where they are needed most as evidenced by actual incidents.

You realize the Mexican War is over?

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#46

Post by staunch » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:40 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #39

One county on the map has ~16k population and 640 military surplus assault rifles. If they're equipped with 30 round magazines, they can shoot everyone in the county without reloading once.

No, they couldn't shoot more than a few people before thousands of armed citizens made them stop.

To help clarify things: the city of LA has 10,000 police officers and 1,000,000+ armed citizens.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#47

Post by pavpanchekha » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:41 PM UTC

thewopr wrote: post #16

Quick question, is the apache license really the most relevant for a dataset? Does that license apply? I ask only because I'm planning on doing something similar.

Roughly (I'm not a lawyer) data by itself is not copyright-able, but the organization and selection of data is, so most datasets do, in fact, have to come with a license to be usable.

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#48

Post by teachingaway » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:46 PM UTC

I see 205 of "Launcher, Grenade" followed by only 1 of "Laundry, Cleaner"

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#49

Post by amcnett » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:46 PM UTC

barsonme wrote: post #29

amcnett wrote: post #14

I was surprised to see a number of mine-resistant vehicles associated with very rural counties in Washington State. Not being completely sure whether a mine-resistant vehicle was a tank or not, I googled the term and came across this article: http://news.yahoo.com/as-wars-wind-down--small-town-cops-inh... Choice quote from the article: “Here’s the thing,” Shellmyer says. “Washington, Iowa, has 8,000 people. We have a…

I live in Puyallup, Washington and we've received (what I believe to be) an MRAP. (It looks like one, but I've yet to see it outside of the building so I haven't gotten a very good look at it.) It's housed in the police/fire station downtown. Puyallup is a "city" of just under 40,000. Our crime isn't even too horrible ( http://www.piercecountycrimedata.org/NeighborhoodCrime/index... ) But we have an MRAP. It might be…

Maybe the MRAP was requested in the event that the Puyallup Fair (the WA state fair for the uninitiated) gets totally out of control.

RE: the meth labs, etc. it would be interesting to see usage data for the equipment. Who knows...if an occupied meth lab is raided every week, the vehicle could make sense (not that I have any tactical expertise in the slightest).

Re: NY Times releases military surplus gear data on GitHub

#50

Post by cmsmith » Tue, Aug 19, 2014, 9:48 PM UTC

Note that Washington, DC seems to have received 17 military cargo planes despite not having an airport (also shows up on nytimes.com piece). Is it possible that this is a mistake?