Truth to Death Star "single weakness" theory?

[IQofshoesize]

In Star Wars, the Death Star was destroyed by a well-placed shot at its sole, "weak" point. Other movies also reflect similar themes - objects, machines, etc, - that are eradicated by a well-timed or perfectly-placed shot to some structurally "weak" area.

Is there any truth to this theory in real life? Could I take down a submarine, car, plane, aircraft carrier, train, etc. if I placed/shot the ___ at exactly the right place?

[smiling bandit]

Well, yes and no. There are a lot of things you could shoot, smash, or otherwise break which would completely disable almost any complex machine. You won't get runaway explosions, though - not even on a nuclear submarine. Of course, the Death Star (and evidently big Star Wars vehicles in general) used a ludicrously energetic power plant, so given that it's a Science Fiction movie, it's not unreasonable.

[Little Nemo]

Story tellers are stuck with this problem:

1. They want a hero of human-like abilities so the audience can relate to his struggles.
2. They want an opponent that's much more powerful so the struggle against him is meaningful.
3. They want the hero to win mainly by his own efforts so his efforts are meaningful.

The solution is for the apparently overwhelming opponent to have a small vulnerability. This allows the hero to defeat the opponent with having to match him on equal terms or rely on factors beyond his control.

But the real world doesn't have to comply with the rules of good story telling.

[Blake]

Is there any truth to this theory in real life? Could I take down a submarine, car, plane, aircraft carrier, train, etc. if I placed/shot the ___ at exactly the right place?

Hell yeah.

I have it on good authority that a person with a rifle can take out a tank with a single shot. Tank shells have two fuses. One is armed by impact when the shell is fired, the other causes the shell to detonate when it hits a solid object. In theory, a single bullet fired down the barrel of a tank at exactly the right time can deliver enough force to arm the first fuse. The impact of firing the shell will then cause it to explode, inside the breach of the cannon, and that is more than enough to kill all occupants of the tank. In reality the chances of pulling off such a shot are so ridiculously low as to ensure that it never happens. Apparently you would need to fire the rifle from extremely close to the tank, while the barrel is pointed directly at you, while the shell is being loaded but before the breech is closed. It's theoretically possible, but practically impossible.

In practice, battleships (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_battleship_Bismarck) have been taken out by a single torpedos launched by a light aircraft. In fact that event was reputedly the original inspiration for the "Star Wars" ending.

[Rick]

Does the name HMS Hood mean anything to you?

[RickJay]

HMS Hood didn't have one weak spot that Bismarck just happened to precisely hit; HMS Hood WAS a weak spot. The ship was fundamentally flawed in that it was underarmored for combat against a capital ship, and it could have been torn apart from shots all over it.

[Blake]

HMS Hood didn't have one weak spot that Bismarck just happened to precisely hit; HMS Hood WAS a weak spot. The ship was fundamentally flawed in that it was underarmored for combat against a capital ship, and it could have been torn apart from shots all over it.

More importantly a battleship, with a crew of a thousand men, firing with three dozen guns, and scoring a multiple direct hits, is not in any sense an individual taking it down with a well-placed shot.

[Colophon]

It would have to be a pretty great shot though. I wouldn't like to estimate the odds but they must be somewhere in the region of one in a million...

[fiddlesticks]

They couldn't hit an elephant from this distance...

[Saltire]

It would have to be a pretty great shot though. I wouldn't like to estimate the odds but they must be somewhere in the region of one in a million...Never tell me the odds!

[R. P. McMurphy]

Two attempts were made on the World Trade Center. In the first they thought they had found the weak spot but not quite. In the second, we all saw what happened.

If you watch the documentary which was done by [I believe] the Discovery Channel about the architecture of the buildings, the weak spot was found.

[Trinopus]

HMS Hood didn't have one weak spot that Bismarck just happened to precisely hit; HMS Hood WAS a weak spot. . . .

Nicely put!

And the Bismarck itself was disabled by one guy in a biplane, slowing it sufficiently that the British fleet caught up with it and pounded it to hell.

Biplane, X-Wing, same thing, really?

[CalMeacham]

I'm sure there were such cases.


The Death Star Trench sequence in Star Wars undoubtedly owes a lot to the film The Dam Busters (some shots are obviously taken from it, as is some of the dialogue). The real-life situation of The Dam Busters did demand getting a bomb in the right spot, but it wasn't just any bomb, and they actually got the bomb to the right place using a couple of low-tech "targeting computers" (NOT by turning them off). Have a look at my old Teemings column on this:

http://teemings.net/series_1/issue03/force.html

[Blake]

And the Bismarck itself was disabled by one guy in a biplane, slowing it sufficiently that the British fleet caught up with it and pounded it to hell.

Biplane, X-Wing, same thing, really?

I wish I had said that. ;)

[John DiFool]

Design tradeoffs almost always make this kind of thing inevitable-in the battleship examples you couldn't possible cover every square inch of the ship in thick armor, so you have to concentrate it in places where it would do the most good. That said, designers still made (and make) errors, such the Scharnhorst class BC's and their vulnerable boilers which jutted above the armored belt. The early German Panther tanks had a "shot trap" on the front of the turret which would deflect incoming shells downward into the turret ring, often blowing the turret completely off (or at best disabling it).

[XT]

It's called a 'golden BB'...and yeah, it happens in real life. The odds are long, but anything that humans make have flaws or weaknesses that could be exploited by a single, perfect, lucky shot.

-XT

[Heracles]

Two attempts were made on the World Trade Center. In the first they thought they had found the weak spot but not quite. In the second, we all saw what happened.

If you watch the documentary which was done by [I believe] the Discovery Channel about the architecture of the buildings, the weak spot was found.

It was my understanding that Al Qaeda's leadership expected the airplanes to do some damage to the towers, and hoped it would be extensive, but were surprised (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/1364905/Bin-Laden-didnt-expect-New-York-towers-to-fall.html) that the towers had collapsed to the ground.

[Rick]

More importantly a battleship, with a crew of a thousand men, firing with three dozen guns, and scoring a multiple direct hits, is not in any sense an individual taking it down with a well-placed shot.first off the Bismarck did not have three dozen main guns.
From the Wiki On the battle of the Denmark Straight Less than 10 minutes after the British opened fire, a shell from Bismarck struck Hood near her aft ammunition magazines. Soon afterwards Hood exploded, and sank within three minutes with the loss of all but three of her crew.
Note the the term a shell. Not hours of battering that finally beat her to submission, but a shell, as in one.
The proverbial golden BB. A 15" diameter BB that weighed as much as a Volkswagen, but a golden BB nonetheless.

[Bytegeist]

In theory, a single bullet fired down the barrel of a tank ...

Why, that's no bigger than a womp-rat.

[si_blakely]

It would have to be a pretty great shot though. I wouldn't like to estimate the odds but they must be somewhere in the region of one in a million...One in a million chances crop up nine times out of ten...

Si

[bengangmo]

Aren't humans ourselves a pretty good example of this theory? Let's see a four year old try to kill us by stabbing in the trunk, but if same four year old happens to get the jugular what happens?

[Shagnasty]

It's called a 'golden BB'...and yeah, it happens in real life. The odds are long, but anything that humans make have flaws or weaknesses that could be exploited by a single, perfect, lucky shot.

-XT

It happens in nature too. You can throw a rather soft ball not all that quickly into someone's heart zone and it will cause them to drop dead if you hit it at exactly the right time in between beats. It shorts out the normal heart rhythm and an unlucky few people are killed by it every year.

[Mangetout]

This concept is known as 'Achilles heel' - other mythologies have their own versions of it, even modern ones such as Superman (Kryptonite).

But in general, design processes tend to try to avoid any single point of failure. Of course, logically, for any entity composed of multiple different pieces, one of them must be the weakest - but that doesn't mean it must inherently be *very* weak.

[Blake]

first off the Bismarck did not have three dozen main guns.

Well it's a good thing nobody used the term "main guns" isn't it?

From the Wiki On the battle of the Denmark Straight
Note the the term a shell. Not hours of battering that finally beat her to submission, but a shell, as in one.
The proverbial golden BB. A 15" diameter BB that weighed as much as a Volkswagen, but a golden BB nonetheless.

Maybe you should try reading your own links?

A shell hit Hood's boat deck, starting a sizable fire ... Although unconfirmed, it is possible that Hood was struck again at the base of her bridge and in her foretop radar director....During the execution of that turn, a salvo from Bismarck, fired at a range of about 9 mi (7.8 nmi; 14 km), was seen by men aboard Prince of Wales to straddle Hood abreast her mainmast.

Do you get the difference now? "A shell struck near the aft ammunition magazines" and "a single shell was fired and struck near the aft ammunition magazines." Those two sentences do not mean the same thing, although you seem to believe that they do.

This Bismark fired multiple shells at the Hood. Several hit her, as many as 6, while most missed altogether. In no sense was this a "proverbial golden BB". The Hood was being pummeled simultaneously by two battleships and was struck a minimum of 3 times in a 5 minute period, with many, many more shots fired that missed altogether.

IOW exactly as I originally stated, and utterly unlike what you claimed.

By your bizarre interpretation, every vehicle or structure that was ever destroyed was destroyed by a "golden BB", just because one shot was finally the straw that broke the camel's back. It doesn't matter that the object was shot at a million times over a period of days, or that it was hit dozens of times, or that it was on fire and covered in gaping holes from that damage. So long as there was one final shot that destroyed it you call that a golden BB.

That is not a usage that anybody else accepts and definitely not what the OP was asking for.

A single bullet killed the Red Baron too. Do you also think that means that counts as an example? At at least 300 rounds of ammunition were fired at him in that encounter, and only one hit, that shouldn't matter should it. That one magic bullet killed him. That makes it a golden BB by your standards. :D

[Mangetout]

And yet Robocop never gets shot in the chin.

[Heracles]

And yet Robocop never gets shot in the chin.

Bravo! :D

[Machine Elf]

Could I take down a submarine, car, plane, aircraft carrier, train, etc. if I placed/shot the ___ at exactly the right place?

Car? Easy. One bullet - heck, just one BB - through the radiator will eventually piss away all of the coolant and lead to an overheat condition.

A BB might not penetrate a tire, but a bullet will, and will disable the car.

[Diceman]

What about the USS Arizona?

[Blake]

What about the USS Arizona?

As with the Hood, multiple hits from multiple sources over a prolonged time period. No magic BB, no individual taking it down with a well-placed shot. Just random chances with a barrage and one shot got eventually got lucky.

[Alka Seltzer]

HMS Hood didn't have one weak spot that Bismarck just happened to precisely hit; HMS Hood WAS a weak spot. The ship was fundamentally flawed in that it was underarmored for combat against a capital ship, and it could have been torn apart from shots all over it.

Not exactly. The armouring scheme offered marginal protection against 15 inch shells, and was flawed in other ways, but HMS Hood did have a positive zone of immunity against Bismarck's guns. If kept close to the optimum range, neither the belt nor deck armour could have been penetrated.

Blake's post contains a number of errors. Prinz Eugen was not a battleship, and there were only two confirmed hits on Hood. Hood wasn't sunk by cumulative damage, but by deflagration of the aft cordite magazine. By far the most likely explanation (http://www.warship.org/no21987.htm) for her loss is that a single shell penetrated the main belt. This seems to fit the terms of the OP rather well, placing a single shot in a critical area, but battleship guns aren't accurate enough for this. It was a lucky hit.

[muldoonthief]

The Arizona was struck by 4 bombs over a 10 minute time period, not really an "extended barrage". But the sinking wasn't due to a "single weakness", it was a general weakness of all surface ships of the time against aircraft. Battleships were built to fight other battleships. They weren't particularly well armored against 2000 lb armor piercing bombs striking the decks from directly overhead, since such things didn't exist (and weren't even contemplated to exist) at the time the Arizona was designed.

[SmartAlecCat]

You can always take out a dragon with one well placed arrow/sword in the weak spot.

[Johnny L.A.]

As with the Hood, multiple hits from multiple sources over a prolonged time period. No magic BB, no individual taking it down with a well-placed shot. Just random chances with a barrage and one shot got eventually got lucky.

This wouls apply to Death Star, wouldn't it? Fighters were shooting it up all over the place, and then Farmboy made a lucky hit. Sure, they knew the vulnerability and were trying to hit it; but there was more going on than just the trench.

[Rick]

My point exactly.
Hit twice some damage. One more hit and BOOM no more Hood.
Compare and contrast that to what it took to put the Bismarck down.

[Gary T]

...anything that humans make have flaws or weaknesses...Unless it's a one-hoss shay (http://www.legallanguage.com/resources/poems/onehossshay/). :D

[Quercus]

Not exactly. The armouring scheme offered marginal protection against 15 inch shells, and was flawed in other ways, but HMS Hood did have a positive zone of immunity against Bismarck's guns. If kept close to the optimum range, neither the belt nor deck armour could have been penetrated.

Blake's post contains a number of errors. Prinz Eugen was not a battleship, and there were only two confirmed hits on Hood. Hood wasn't sunk by cumulative damage, but by deflagration of the aft cordite magazine. By far the most likely explanation (http://www.warship.org/no21987.htm) for her loss is that a single shell penetrated the main belt. This seems to fit the terms of the OP rather well, placing a single shot in a critical area, but battleship guns aren't accurate enough for this. It was a lucky hit.Well, it's a matter of opinion, but I make a distinction between a lucky hit with a BB and a lucky hit with a volkswagon-sized armor piercing, exploding shell.

I mean, nobody expected the Hood to come away completely unscathed from a direct hit from a 15" shell. Sure, the Hood's armor was weaker than expected, and the shell broke through in the worst possible place, but to my mind it's not the same as a rifle bullet destroying a tank or a single shot destroying the death star. But, again, each to his own opinion on this one.

[Darth Panda]

I've heard that chimpanzees are vulnerable to being simultaneously punched on both sides of their head and will be instantly rendered unconscious by such an attack.

[av8rmike]

Perhaps the HMS Indefatigable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Indefatigable_%281909%29) in the battle of Jutland is a better example than the Hood? The armor on top of the gun turrets was thin enough that shells from the German battleships were able to penetrate down to the magazines and blow the entire thing up like a firecracker.

[randomface]

When I was touring an aircraft facility I talked to an older engineer about some of the biggest design flaws he had seen. I don't remember what aircraft it was, but he told me that one of the jets had multiple sets of hydraulic lines as backups but that they all ran through a single junction in the fuselage. It could take a beating all over the craft and would still be controllable but that if anything happened at that junction the craft would lose almost all controls.

[Johnny L.A.]

I don't remember what aircraft it was, but he told me that one of the jets had multiple sets of hydraulic lines as backups but that they all ran through a single junction in the fuselage.

The DC-10 had all three hydraulic systems close together directly below the #2 engine (in the tail). Since it was considered virtually impossible for all three systems to fail during one flight, there was mechanical back-up system (cables, push-rods, etc.). This is why the failure of the #2 engine on UA Flight 232 resulted in disaster.

[BobLibDem]

Two attempts were made on the World Trade Center. In the first they thought they had found the weak spot but not quite. In the second, we all saw what happened.

If you watch the documentary which was done by [I believe] the Discovery Channel about the architecture of the buildings, the weak spot was found.

I don't think the hijackers had a clue as to where they wanted to strike to bring the buildings down, nor did the second pilot have much time to adjust his shot based on the first. Any hit that started a large enough fire to start bringing the floors down is going to bring the building down. A lower hit would have trapped more people, but go too low and the firemen have a better chance to put out the flames before the steel softened to the point of collapse. In the end, the second hit was marginally more effective than the first, but certainly due to blind luck and not by design.

[JoelUpchurch]

It's called a 'golden BB'...and yeah, it happens in real life. The odds are long, but anything that humans make have flaws or weaknesses that could be exploited by a single, perfect, lucky shot.


Was US Air Flight 1549 taken down by a golden goose? :)

[Quercus]

Two attempts were made on the World Trade Center. In the first they thought they had found the weak spot but not quite. In the second, we all saw what happened.

If you watch the documentary which was done by [I believe] the Discovery Channel about the architecture of the buildings, the weak spot was found.

I don't think the hijackers had a clue as to where they wanted to strike to bring the buildings down, nor did the second pilot have much time to adjust his shot based on the first. Any hit that started a large enough fire to start bringing the floors down is going to bring the building down. A lower hit would have trapped more people, but go too low and the firemen have a better chance to put out the flames before the steel softened to the point of collapse. In the end, the second hit was marginally more effective than the first, but certainly due to blind luck and not by design.I think McMurphy was referring to the 1993 truck-bombing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombing) in the basement garage of the WTC as the first attempt, and the 2001 two plane crash as the second.

[Otara]

The interesting thing about the Hood is it used to be talked about more as a 'lucky shot' and over time has become less so. I remember it being written about as if there was a small gap in the funnel and only by sheer bad luck did it hit that point. I suspect this was mostly to preserve the pride of the UK, rather than admit it was really a disaster waiting to happen and pretty close to a straight repeat of Jutland battlecruisers.

Which kind of shows how attractive the achilles heel story is, theres a tendency to try and fit reality into it, to make outcomes seem more mythic than they really are.

Otara

[BMalion]

Aren't humans ourselves a pretty good example of this theory? Let's see a four year old try to kill us by stabbing in the trunk, but if same four year old happens to get the jugular what happens?

He is SO grounded.

[R. P. McMurphy]

I don't think the hijackers had a clue as to where they wanted to strike to bring the buildings down, nor did the second pilot have much time to adjust his shot based on the first. Any hit that started a large enough fire to start bringing the floors down is going to bring the building down. A lower hit would have trapped more people, but go too low and the firemen have a better chance to put out the flames before the steel softened to the point of collapse. In the end, the second hit was marginally more effective than the first, but certainly due to blind luck and not by design.

We may never know if the total destruction of the buildings was by design unless there is something in the documents confiscated during the bin Laden killing. My point was that after-the-fact a design flaw was recognized. In the documentary the architect admitted it and said it haunts him although I doubt that there are many people who blame him.

I think McMurphy was referring to the 1993 truck-bombing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombing) in the basement garage of the WTC as the first attempt, and the 2001 two plane crash as the second.

That was exactly my point. The 1993 truck bombing was obviously designed to bring down a tower. They thought they had the weak point. bin Laden's family is in the major construction business. Again, we may never know if he discovered the design weakness ahead of the event but it is not impossible.

[Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor]

I've got a bad feeling about this thread.

[Dissonance]

Well it's a good thing nobody used the term "main guns" isn't it?The only guns that were in range and she was firing were her 8 15" main guns. 'Guns' or 'main guns' are interchangeable for this purpose, and you said over three dozen guns were firing.

This Bismark fired multiple shells at the Hood. Several hit her, as many as 6, while most missed altogether. In no sense was this a "proverbial golden BB". The Hood was being pummeled simultaneously by two battleships and was struck a minimum of 3 times in a 5 minute period, with many, many more shots fired that missed altogether.

By your bizarre interpretation, every vehicle or structure that was ever destroyed was destroyed by a "golden BB", just because one shot was finally the straw that broke the camel's back. It doesn't matter that the object was shot at a million times over a period of days, or that it was hit dozens of times, or that it was on fire and covered in gaping holes from that damage. So long as there was one final shot that destroyed it you call that a golden BB.
As noted, Prinz Eugen was a heavy cruiser, not a battleship. The Hood wasn't sunk by a final straw breaking her back; the one shell hitting the magazine sunk her. The damage from other hits in no way contributed to her sinking, had those shells missed as well, the one shell in the magazine would have sunk her just the same.

[fiddlesticks]

I've got a bad feeling about this thread.

The sinking of the Hood was an inside job!

[Senegoid]

The solution is for the apparently overwhelming opponent to have a small vulnerability. This allows the hero to defeat the opponent with having to match him on equal terms or rely on factors beyond his control.

But the real world doesn't have to comply with the rules of good story telling.

Never underestimate the power of good story telling.
If it worked for David (1 Sam 17) (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Samuel%2017&version=NIV) it can work for you too! :p

[MonkeyMensch]

The only guns that were in range and she was firing were her 8 15" main guns. 'Guns' or 'main guns' are interchangeable for this purpose, and you said over three dozen guns were firing.

The first hit on Hood, which started a fire in her above (armored) deck rocket magazine was from Prinz Eugen's 8" guns, as they were her main armament and was in the van leading Bismarck at the time since Bismarck's radar was inoperative. The shot that penetrated her armor and caused the magazine conflagration that sank her was undoubtedly from one of Bismarck's eight 15" guns, all of which were in action.

As noted, Prinz Eugen was a heavy cruiser, not a battleship. The Hood wasn't sunk by a final straw breaking her back; the one shell hitting the magazine sunk her. The damage from other hits in no way contributed to her sinking, had those shells missed as well, the one shell in the magazine would have sunk her just the same.

Well put. I'd like to add a word about "lucky shot." I think the term "unlikely shot" is a little more descriptive and accurate, since you are trying to hit the damned ship anyway possible.

[Really Not All That Bright]

From the Wiki On the battle of the Denmark Straight
Nitpick: strait.

[kunilou]

The Lusitania (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Lusitania#Sinking)was sunk by a single torpedo.

And the Shuttle Columbia was brought down by a piece of foam insulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Columbia_disaster).

[kombatminipig]

The Lusitania (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Lusitania#Sinking)was sunk by a single torpedo.

And the Shuttle Columbia was brought down by a piece of foam insulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Columbia_disaster).

I don't think either of those count as examples of what the OP is requesting.

[RedSwinglineOne]

Fighters were shooting it up all over the place, and then Farmboy made a lucky hit. Sure, they knew the vulnerability and were trying to hit it; but there was more going on than just the trench.

Everything else was just support fire. They made it pretty clear that the fighters couldn't anything agianst the Death Star, and they didn't show any larger ships attacking.

Gold Leader: "Pardon me for asking, sir, but what good are snub fighters going to be against that?" General Dodonna: "Well, the Empire doesn't consider a small one-man fighter to be any threat, or they'd have a tighter defense."

[XT]

Ironically up until the 2nd world war, there were a lot of folks who still thought that battleships were pretty much invulnerable to air craft, even though demonstrations had been made of successful attacks by air craft against battleships in the late 20's or early 30's (IIRC). I think this perception started to change when the Brits attacked an Italian battle fleet in (again, from memory 1940) and damaged or destroyed like half the fleet using obsolete bi-planes equipped with torpedoes. IIRC, this is what really got the Japanese thinking about such tactics that later came together in their Pearl Harbor attack.

So, it wasn't just the Empire who thought that they were invulnerable to small attack aircraft. ;)

-XT

[Tastes of Chocolate]

There doesn't have to be just one weak point. There has to be at least one weak point, one of which is found.

Maybe the Deathstar would have blown up if women on decks 5, 8, 44 and 167 all simultaniously flushed tampons down the toilets at the same time that someone lit a cigarette in the sanitation deparment. Maybe Goliath would have fallen if David has stepped on his ingrown toenail. Maybe tha tank can be disabled by a number 2 wooden pencil jammed between the second and third (from the left) switches. Maybe a Bic pen (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LahDQ2ZQ3e0)can be used to pick a bicycle lock.

[Otara]

The closest real life example I can think of is the WW2 Elefant tank destroyer. Hugely armoured and almost invulnerable to other tanks frontally, but they didnt give it any ability to defend itself from infantry, making it far more vulnerable to them than it had to be. So the little guys could take out something that larger vehicles couldnt.

But it is a bit of a reach in that tanks generally are vulnerable to close attacks by infantry, and comparatively few were actually lost to infantry action, it was more a vulnerability in theory than in practise.

Otara

[Pantani]

Perhaps the HMS Indefatigable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Indefatigable_%281909%29) in the battle of Jutland is a better example than the Hood? The armor on top of the gun turrets was thin enough that shells from the German battleships were able to penetrate down to the magazines and blow the entire thing up like a firecracker.

Also there was a bad habit if by passing safty measures to increase the rate of fire in British warships. Charges were piled up in the turret rather than being brought up as needed from the magazine one by one and the protective doors between the turret and the lift to the magazine were left open to speed up bringing up shells. A hit on a turret would ignite the charges and the flash would travel straight down to the magazine.

[MrSquishy]

I've heard that chimpanzees are vulnerable to being simultaneously punched on both sides of their head and will be instantly rendered unconscious by such an attack.That is true, I have done it. It's hilarious.

[drastic_quench]

All Blackberry emails and messages go through RIM's servers unlike every other smartphone. This is a single point of failure no matter who your carrier is, and RIM has gone down before.