Five Years

Yesterday was my fifth anniversary at Boeing.

In those five years I have worked 10,715 hours, including 1,467 hours of overtime.
I have taken 48 vacation days, 41 sick days, and 60 holidays for a total of 1,192 hours of paid time off. I have never worked more than five consecutive pay periods (two weeks each) without working at least some overtime. For a 27 month stretch in 2006-2008, I worked at least some overtime EVERY pay period.

I have worked on two major airplane development programs (787 and 747-8). I have witnessed two first flights.

I have had four managers (Monday I will get a fifth) and six leads.

I have designed and released hundreds of parts and assemblies, input to two certification plans, and authored dozens of other documents.

I have presented information to the FAA, numerous airline customers and potential customers, management up to three layers above me, and other Boeing groups.

I have witnessed half a dozen structural tests, most of which I authored the test plans for and one where I designed the test apparatus.

And as of yesterday, I am fully vested in the pension plan.

On The Move: Week 6

The sixth and final week has come and gone; I met my goal every day!

July 19: 5,202
July 20: 5,049
July 21: 6,148
July 22: 9,753
July 23: 5,015
July 24: 5,255
July 25: 5,036

Week 1: 45,669
Week 2: 42,766
Week 3: 48,157
Week 4: 42,192
Week 5: 45,473
Week 6: 41,458

Total: 265,715 steps.
Daily average: 6,327

History of Nuclear Testing

Found this on a blog I read:

http://www.informationdissemination.net/2010/07/history-of-nuclear-testing.html#disqus_thread

Its a ~14 minute video showing the locations of nuclear tests from 1945-1998. In that period it shows 2,053 tests, including the Hiroshima and Nagasaki warshots. Per wikipedia, some of those represent multiple detonations.

Myself, I had no idea that during that period we averaged three tests a month, weighted heavily towards the middle and latter part of that period.

I'm not as surprised that the US lead in tests - 1,030, not counting the two warshots. I'm quite surprised that France is as far up as they are - 210 tests; more than twice as many as the UK, China, India, and Pakistan combined (and some of the UK tests were in the continental US).

The possible Israeli test isn't shown, and since this is only up to 1998 North Korea's tests aren't included.

There have been over 500 tests in my lifetime.

On the Move: Week 5

Just a few days left to go, and still on track.

July 12: 8,193
July 13: 5,383
July 14: 5,143
July 15: 8,329
July 16: 8,322
July 17: 5,071
July 18: 5,032

Snap, Crackle, and Pop!

I love the sound of structural testing in the morning! It sounds like... um... rice crispies!

Well, maybe not, but one of the things I like about my job is that every so often I get paid to break things. The company prefers to call it 'destructive structural testing to failure' but I like 'breaking things'. :-)

In this case, I got to do some of the breaking hands-on, and the test was a complete success.