Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2018 April 14

= April 14 =

Dealer as in the Tomb Raider film
How do you call the kind of dealer shown in the current Tomb Raider film, where Lara Croft sells her locket, and in the end buys her pistols? --KnightMove (talk) 06:25, 14 April 2018 (UTC)


 * At a guess (lacking knowledge of the franchise): a pawnbroker? —Tamfang (talk) 07:47, 14 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Yes. A Pawn shop. In many US states, it's pretty common for them to buy and sell firearms. ApLundell (talk) 02:12, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Rockets or air defense?
In pictures like what we see are the US rockets, or Syrian air-defense battery? And why can you see the beginning of them? They are long range, why don't they shine all the way? --Hofhof (talk) 14:03, 14 April 2018 (UTC)
 * There are no U.S. rockets. They used precision strikes from slow-moving cruise missiles. That is phosphorus tracer rounds from anti-aircraft batteries. Sleigh (talk) 00:32, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, this is a common misconception caused by the phrase "cruise missile". Cruise missiles are essentially unmanned aircraft with explosives inside. Military drones are, of course, just an evolution of this, enabled by improved technology. --47.146.63.87 (talk) 02:05, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
 * "Slow moving" is relative, of course. Tomahawk cruise missiles use basically 1970s technology, and travel at about 550 miles per hour (900 kilometers per hour), which is pretty fast and comparable to airliners. They have turbofan jet engines, not rocket engines. Of course, the cruise missile platform has been modernized in many ways over the years, but they are nowhere near as fast as an intercontinental ballistic missile. That is quite old technology as well. Cullen328  Let's discuss it  05:13, 15 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Except that an airliner doesn't cruise along at that speed at 50 feet off the ground, which Tomahawk does.  Alansplodge (talk) 19:05, 15 April 2018 (UTC)