199

I would say you best bet is to ask him haha.

Maybe he's that person just waiting and watching you from outside your window. The one you know is there, but through your 199 glances back, you've never been able to even catch a glimpse of him.

Thanks btw :)

i blame mecorx, making all these "guess the missing letter" hidden GAs.

Every now and then, you end up in a different GA. I guess odds are good that someone might get access to a private hidden one ;)

That is very odd indeed. Best bet is to add him and see what he says.

You are the support member lol You know everything. Also wow you are going to bed earlier today

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I agree with Kukeemon, It's mecorx's fault, sometimes we enter the wrong letter and it ends up being something else.

Avia S-199

Constructed in Czechoslovakia, with parts and plans left over from Luftwaffe aircraft production, the aircraft had numerous problems and was generally unpopular with its pilots. Czechoslovak pilots nicknamed it Mezek ("Mule"), while in Israel it was officially known as the Sakeen ("knife" in Hebrew). In practice, the aircraft was more often called Messerschmitt or Messer (which also means "knife", in German and Yiddish).

Kinda Ironic that the Israeli air force used Luftwaffe planes and equipment to secure their existence. I suggest watching Above and beyond if you have Netflix. It's a really interesting documentary.

Design and development

Avia continued building Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6s after the war under the Avia S-99 name, at two aircraft factories in Czechoslovakia: one of them officially called závod Avia (Avia Plant) (1946–48) and závod Avia-Jiřího Dimitrova (Avia-George Dimitroff-Plant, 1948–49) in Čakovice near Prague, as a post-war corporative part of the Automobilové závody, n.p. [Automotive Works, National Corp.], and the other one called závod Vysočany (Vysočany Plant, 1948–49) in Prague, as a corporative part of Letecké závody, n.p. [Aviation Works, National Corp.] but soon ran out of the 109's Daimler-Benz DB 605 engine after many were destroyed during an explosion at a warehouse in Krásné Březno.
The S-199 continued to use the Bf 109G airframe but, with none of the original engines available, an alternative engine had to be used. It was decided that as a replacement for the original engine, the aircraft would use the same engine (Junkers Jumo 211 F) and propeller as the Heinkel He 111 bomber. The resulting combination of parts was an aircraft with extremely poor handling qualities. The substitute engine with the propeller lacked the responsiveness of the Daimler-Benz unit and the torque created by the massive paddle-bladed propeller made control very difficult. This, in combination with the 109's narrow-track undercarriage, made landings and take-offs extremely hazardous.
The Daimler-Benz DB 605 engine allowed for a central cannon mount (Motorkanone in German) that fired through the propeller spinner. This was not possible with the Junkers Jumo 211, and so the S-199 used a version of the Luftwaffe's Rüstsatz VI modification kit, which consisted of a pair of MG 151 cannon, one each in a gun pod, one beneath each wing. This further impinged on the aircraft's performance. A final hidden danger lay in the gun synchronizer for the cowl-mounted MG 131 machine guns, which did not work as it was meant to, leading a few Israeli aircraft to shoot off their own propellers.
Around 550 S-199s were built, including a number of conversion trainers designated CS-199 (armed) and C-210 (unarmed). The first flight took place in March 1947, and production ended in 1949. The last examples were withdrawn from Czechoslovak service (with their National Security Guard) in 1957.

Operational history

Israeli agents negotiated the purchase of Avia S-199s from the Czechoslovak government in defiance of an arms embargo that Israel faced at the time. Twenty five aircraft were obtained and all but two were eventually delivered. The price for a fully equipped plane was $190,000. The first examples arrived on May 20, 1948, six days after Israel's declaration of independence and five days after the commencement of hostilities by Egypt. Forming Israel's first fighter squadron, they were assembled and sent into combat for the first time on May 29, attacking the Egyptian army between Isdud and the Ad Halom bridge, south of Tel Aviv. A few days later, on June 3, the type scored the Israeli Air Force's first aerial victories when Modi Alon shot down a pair of Royal Egyptian Air Force C-47s which had just bombed Tel Aviv.
The type proved unreliable and performed poorly in combat. One Avia pilot remarked "she tried to kill us on every take off and landing." Furthermore, maintenance problems meant that no more than five were typically airworthy at any one time. However the Israelis at this time had virtually very little training in the type, either in flight, tactics, or maintenance, and airfield conditions were far from ideal. These factors, coupled with the extreme desperateness of the combat conditions at the time certainly contributed to the loss and serviceability rate. The type, however as being the only fighter available to the Israelis at the time, was effective in ground attack and scored victories over its opponents, including the Spitfire. The Avias were mostly withheld from service by the end of October, at which time only six remained operational. The S-199 continued making sporadic sorties through mid-December; American pilot Wayne Peake flipped one on its back on December 15.

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Didn't someone post a couple months ago about someone getting into their private giveaway by searching google with their user name? Could that be the case here?

I've stumbled upon random giveaways when trying to find that one missing puzzle digit...

honestly... i'm starting to think there's some bot out there just bruteforcing GA urls to enter everything...

yes, i'm extra paranoid!

Just an idea, but did the link have l, I, 0, O or characters that look similar? Perhaps he was trying to enter something else.

Other users already said what I had in my mind so I can't help further. Anyway I was expecting a giveaway of this.

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jatan11t

Aliens. The answer is always aliens.

It's probably time to check those network logs and see who accessed that URL and what else they've been up to.

Edit: Or maybe it's just time for another character or two in the ID.

Speaking of puzzles... any plans on making another giant group puzzle? (The one you did hooked me to this site's puzzles section)

Also:

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I thought some private giveaways had shown up on Google searches before?

Will do some further research...

If i recall correctly this is your 200th thread, right? If so, happy 200 threads!

As it was correctly mentioned above, i would firstly ask the guy how he found the link and if i couldn't get a decent reply, i would ask cg. I can't imagine anyone having a better answer than him among this community.

Mecorx has not active puzzles. I suppose it is this puzzle http://www.steamgifts.com/discussion/rUlzX/lv-5 (borrowed mecorx's idea)

Jatan just want to add some information.

The same guy found the link of a giveaway I made for a few friends exactly a month ago, that means I didn't post the link here. But it was part of a puzzle train I made only for them, so he solved every puzzle and entered even more giveaways.

So, don't believe when he says it was a coincidence. This is probably something he does full time.

When he said someone blacklisted him for finding a giveaway, I thought he was talking about me. Now I'm not that sure of that, probably there are more with the same issue.