Jaunted - Tag: death

Some Travel Logistics Questions We Have for The Rapture

JetSetCD — 2011-05-20T17:10:28-05:00

If The Rapture does indeed occur tomorrow, as all the pamphleteers in the Times Square subway station say it will, then don't worry; we aren't going anywhere. The righteous will be swooped up into heaven or wherever, and we've simply cursed too often during flight delays and wished ill of annoying seat mates far too much to be included in that bunch.

Regardless, we do have some questions about the logistical side of having millions of people fly up into the air all at once tomorrow. God wasn't available for questioning as he's probably tidying up upstairs in preparation, so we'll just put our wonderings out there:

· So 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17 states "For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call, and with the sound of the trumpet of God." We want to know if Jesus will show up on Air Traffic Control screens as a solid blip, or is he just basically like air?

Abbottabad: Osama Bin Laden's Compound in Abbottabad Has Tourist Destination Potential

JetSetCD — 2011-05-02T09:36:20-05:00

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Last night, when President Barack Obama announced the killing of terrorist al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, history was made at the same time as a town in Pakistan lost its innocence. Abbottabad was named by Barack as the place in which bin Laden had made his mansion hideout home. He wasn't in caves, he wasn't in Afghanistan, and he wasn't going to escape this time. A recently built home, surrounded by walls and within an affluent community, was where the last stand between Osama and the USA took place, with the US' Navy SEALS emerging victorious in under 40 minutes of covert operations.

As such, Abbottabad is today the center of much curiosity; it's even been trending on Twitter all night thanks to Abbottabad-based Twitter user Sohaib Athar—@ReallyVirtual—who lives in the town and who unknowingly live-tweeted the mission several days ago, hearing as he did helicopters overhead and bursts. Sohaib moved to the relative calm of Abbottabad to work on his IT business and escape the fighting in Lehore, Pakistan. This isn't all that extraordinary, since Abbottabad is a huge tourist destination; in fact it is considered one of the most beautiful cities in Pakistan.

The Dangers of Stepping Onboard a 'Tourist Boat'

JetSetCD — 2011-04-04T12:04:47-05:00

The Ha Long Bay sinking

If there's something we've learned over the last year, it's never to trust an overnight "tourist" cruise in Southeast Asia. It was only a little more than a month ago that such a boat sunk in Vietnam's Ha Long Bay, killing 12 in only 30 feet of water. The safety (or lack of) in these boats is to blame, and nothing has illustrated the issue better than the story of "Adventurous Kate," who survived a shipwreck in Indonesia.

Kate is author of her own blog about traveling Southeast Asia on her own, which she has been doing continuously since October of last year. A week ago, on Monday March 28, she was enjoying a 5-day cruise to visit the famous Komodo dragons of Komodo Island when her tourist boat hit a reef and promptly sank, causing her and her fellow travelers to abandon ship and swim to the closest island—Komodo, with its dragons.

The reason they swam? Half of the life jackets onboard were unusable and both lifeboats failed. Their luggage was waterlogged and left behind, and what they did eventually reclaim had been pillaged by the boat's crew.

Three of the Most Macabre Tourist Attractions Opening This Year

JetSetCD — 2011-03-10T09:41:38-05:00

You don't need us to tell you this, but tourists really love to see some morbid things. Just think about it...the Paris Catacombs, Concentration Camps, famous graves and worse. To help sate the public's desire for the macabre, more new Thanatourism attractions open every year, but it looks like 2011 will be particularly dark. Here's the top three to look forward to:

· "Old Sparky" Electric Chair, Ohio
It was just reported that a particulary shocking exhibit will hit Columbus, Ohio's Historial Museum on April 1, and this is not an April Fool's Joke. "Controversy: Pieces You Don't Normally See" will be limited to guests 18 year old and up, because what's on display may be disturbing: Ku Klux Klan hoods, mental patient restraints, and "Old Sparky," the electric chair that brought capital punishment down on 315 inmates for over 30 years. No, you won't be allowed to sit in it. More info here.

Just What We Need, Another Hitler Tourist Attraction

Jennifer Kester — 2011-01-31T13:16:17-05:00

Ukraine is obviously needing a little help in the tourism department. First, it has the bright idea to give tours of Chernobyl, and now the country is banking on a Hitler attraction to bring in the tourists.

Plans are in the works to turn Wehrwolf, Hitler's Eastern Front military headquarters near Vinnytsia, central Ukraine, into a museum. The facility is scheduled to open May 9, the anniversary of Victory Day over Nazism.

Continental Airlines is Now a Convicted Concorde Murderer

JetSetCD — 2010-12-06T06:29:29-05:00

The remembrance stone in Roissy, France

Just over ten years after the deadly day, a French court has found Continental Airlines guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the July 2000 crash of the Air France Concorde, which took the lives of 109 passengers and crew and another 4 on the ground. So just how did this come to be, that another airline is convicted of murdering the entire flight of another airline? It all goes back to a small piece of metal.

The tragedy of the Concorde AF Flight 4590 is well known, but here's a sentence to refresh your memory: a Continental Airlines DC-10 flew out of Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport. The plane wasn't properly maintained, and a 12" x 17" piece of titanium (that shouldn't have been on the plane anyways) fell of it onto the runway at CDG. The Concorde took off next, and the metal strip burst a tire, pieces of which then ruptured a fuel tank, which then did all sorts of damage and turned the Concorde into a flaming projectile that crashed into a motel outside the airport. The structural fragility of the areas damaged in this crash caused all Concordes to be grounded for the time being, and all Concordes ceased flying in 2003.

Three Ways to Celebrate 'Dia de los Muertos' at Home

cmb — 2010-11-01T14:08:02-05:00

Today, as you're coming down from your sugar high, don't forget you don't have to go far to get into the spirit of Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead.

Day of the Dead, celebrated each year on November 1, has traditionally brought families in Mexico together to pray at cemeteries for those who have died, usually their family members. You can recreate the tradition in your hometown by taking a drive through your closest ornate cemetery or searching for some of your ancestors' grave stones.