Real stealth helicopter or a movie prop? UPDATED: It's a fake,

WIRED DANGER ROOM: 

It’s either one of the biggest aviation news scoops in the last decade, or the latest in Hollywood fakery. Today ace aviation reporter David Cenciotti circulated the above photo, apparently depicting a stealth helicopter similar to those used by the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command in the May 2011 raid that killed Osama Bin Laden in his Abbottabad, Pakistan, compound. The photo originally appeared with little notation on Photobucket.

Thing is, a movie about the Abbottabad raid entitled Zero Dark Thirty features prop stealth helicopters that, coincidentally, appear to be loosely based on Cenciotti’s own reporting from last summer. Check out the 38-second mark in the official trailer for a glimpse of the controversial film’s version of the “Silent Hawk” helicopter, as the press has dubbed it. Looks a lot like the thing in the photo, if you ask us.

Cenciotti agrees. “It looks like it may really be the mock up for the new Osama Bin Laden movie,” he tells Danger Room.

Zero Dark Thirty, directed by Kathryn Bigelow — she of Hurt Locker fame — is slated for a December release. To support the production, the White House, Pentagon and CIA all offered Bigelow and her screenwriter Mark Boal unprecedented access to government sources and facilities.

But Special Operations Command chief Adm. William McRaven insists his command was not involved. “I have no interaction and no one on my staff has any interaction with — what’s her name? Bigelow?” McRaven told Danger Room in May.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE

Enhanced/inverted freeze frame from Zero-Dark-Thirty trailer showing stealth helicopter:

Blogger's note: After examining the image closely and the one in the trailer it is clear that this is most likely a movie prop. There seems to be no radar absorbent gold tint on the cockpit windows and the tips of the pitot tubes should be angular - cut like a diamond - plus the tail that was recovered at the bin Laden compound bore silver anti-infrared paint like F-22s wear. -Steve Douglass

UPDATE: Later today this video still - reportedly from a yet to be released trailer for Zero Dark Thirty popped up, laying to rest the rumor that someone had managed to take a snap of the still secret bin Laden raid stealth helicopter.

Although the quality is bad, it is clearly the same helicopter (prop) and hangar seen in the large photo above.

There also seems to be another "stealth helicopter" in the (dark) right corner of this video frame. The hangar doors also match the ones in the trailer.  Case closed - it's a prop but a pretty savvy way of generating some internet buzz!

-Steve Douglass

Jet Blue pilot freaks out - again.

AMARILLO -- Courts documents filed in Amarillo today, say that Clayton Osbon suffered a psychotic episode on August 3 at a federal correctional facility. 

The Federal Court received a letter from the Complex Warden of the Federal Medical Center requesting that the evaluation period for Osbon to be extended by 30 days to October 15. 

The final evaluation report is to be prepared and provided to court with 14 days of the October 15 deadline.

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Curiosity on Mars!

TOUCHDOWN CONFIRMED -- Curiosity has landed! 


The Mars Science Laboratory has successfully deployed Curiosity to explore evidence of life on the red planet. Congratulations NASA! Yet another giant leap for mankind. 


Minutes after the landing signal reached Earth at 10:32 p.m. PDT, NASA received the first images from Curiosity: the rover's view of its own shadow in this image from inside Gale Crater on Mars.

United airliner vs goose - goose looses.

A United Airlines flight has landed safely after colliding with a bird as the plane approached Denver International Airport.

Flight 1475 from Dallas-Fort Worth came into contact with the bird Tuesday morning.

A United spokesman says no one was hurt. Denver TV stations showed images of the plane with a large dent just below a hole in the nose.

"It's always dangerous when an aircraft hits a bird. In this case, it was something that the crews have been trained to handle. The aircraft has redundant systems that can take care of the problems caused by this bird strike," said Col. Stephen Ganyard.

Bird strikes cost the airline industry $600 million in damage every year.

Read more: http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/national/Grab_WXYZ_huge-hole-in-united-airlines-plane-after-it-collides-with-bird1343814773736#ixzz22ItuUIhn