Gray knew the giant globe’s nickname at the base. The Eight Ball.
I've highlighted this as a cautionary tale about research, which I love to do (to a fault). The "Eight Ball" is a cold-war-era research facilty in Fort Detrick. It gained that nickname as it's a huge spherical biowarfare containment chamber sitting atop massive pedestal legs, which lift it three stories high. Its so unusual and such a relic of that time that it's been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1977. Knowing I was going to set a scene here, I wanted to know exactly where on Fort Detrick's base that this massive lab was located. So I called up the base and set about going up the slow chain of command until I could reach someone to talk to. While doing so, I was playing with an early version of Google Earth on my laptop, which allows a user to zoom in pretty much anywhere on the globe--including Fort Detrick. So when I finally reached someone willing to talk to me at Fort Detrick, I was promptly told that the exact location of the Eight Ball was classified and could not be given out. Well, at that same time, on my computer I was staring down at Fort Detrick via Google Earth and identified the unusual structure of the Eight Ball from the air, along with its location--which I casually told the base personnel on the phone. They stammered a bit, and the call ended abruptly. Subsequently, months later I wanted to double check something else at Fort Detrick. So again I utilized the eyes-in-the-skies of Google Earth. Only I discovered the entire base was now grayed-out and unobservable. I think my call triggered that. So be careful when you research. There's no telling the unintended consequences. BTW, I'll save the story about my call to NASA, when I wanted to investigate blowing up the space shuttle (for my novel Deep Fathom). I think I'm still on some FBI watch list.
