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The Government Modelmaking Shop That Helped Navy SEALs Capture and Kill Osama Bin Laden

Hot glue guns of death

By Rain Noe - September 14

A weird overlap between industrial design and assassinating a high-value military target: At some point during the planning process, you need to review a physical model.

For that reason exists the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency employs a team of modelmakers--people that we're guessing have architecture degrees--whose job is to accurately create FoamCore and 3D-printed mock-ups based on satellite photos and on-the-ground snapshots.

Here's a photo of one of those modelmakers:

Yes, he's shrewdly chosen to remain anonymous. If religious fundamentalists are willing to murder French cartoonists, they'll surely have no problem targeting a guy who's good with an X-Acto blade and a hot glue gun. Perhaps you recognize his work:

Here's a video interview with the dude and a look at that now-famous model he and his team made, unaware at the time that it was where Osama bin Laden was hiding:

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The Government Modelmaking Shop That Helped Navy SEALs Capture and Kill Osama Bin Laden

Eric Strebel

11 days ago

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6 weeks! that's a long time to build a model.
I love how they have a graphic about the scale of the model....hilarious.
Looks good. Just like visualizing products I can see how this would be super helpful to executing a plan on so many levels. I have met a few military model makers that work for the government, their work was always of very high quality and top notch. Some were IDr's others were train model guys.

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Rain Noe

I’m a lapsed industrial designer. I was born in NYC and figured I’d die there, but a few years ago I abandoned New York to live on a farm in the countryside with my wife. We have six dogs.