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Ed Smylie, Who Saved the Apollo 13 Crew with Duct Tape, Dies at 95

(www.nytimes.com)
107 points sohkamyung | 1 comments | 16 May 25 14:03 UTC | HN request time: 0.227s | source
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aaron695 ◴[16 May 25 15:08 UTC] No.44006410[source]▶
> Duct Tape

NASA says gray tape.

You'll find some documents say duct tape, but here it was gray, transcript -

https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/static/history/alsj/...

"space-age baling wire" I think is velcro

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allknowingfrog ◴[16 May 25 16:54 UTC] No.44007573[source]▶
Did "duct" tape become the standard nomenclature at some point? I learned many years ago that "duck" really is the correct term, because the tape was originally made of cotton duck cloth.

Lots of people assume that "duck" is actually the misunderstanding, and that it must be a slurring of "duct", but there's no history of using duck tape on ducts. It's the wrong tool for the job, and the wrong name for the material. I'm surprised to see that sources like the NYT and Wikipedia are using "duct tape" as the preferred term.

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1. kube-system ◴[16 May 25 17:55 UTC] No.44008153[source]▶
> there's no history of using duck tape on ducts.

There is. Post-WWII the tape was marketed and sold by the Melvin A. Anderson Company for air ducting.

https://www.duckbrand.com/about