Friday, February 15, 2013
Meteor Goes BOOM!
A series of explosions in the skies of Russia’s Urals region, reportedly caused by a meteor shower, has sparked panic in three major cities. Witnesses said that houses shuddered, windows were blown out and cellphones stopped working.
A bright flash was seen in the Chelyabinsk, Tyumen and Sverdlovsk regions, Russia’s Republic of Bashkiria and in northern Kazakhstan.Lifenews tabloid reported that at least one piece of the fallen object caused damage on the ground in Chelyabinsk. According to preliminary reports, it crashed into a wall near a zinc factory, disrupting the fiber-optic connections of internet providers and mobile operators.
Witnesses said the explosion was so loud that it resembled an earthquake and thunder at the same time, and that there were huge trails of smoke across the sky. Others reported seeing burning objects fall to earth.Police in the Chelyabinsk region are reportedly on high alert, and have enacted the ‘Fortress’ plan in order to protect vital infrastructure.
Office buildings in downtown Chelyabinsk are being evacuated. Injuries were reported at one of the city’s secondary schools, supposedly from smashed windows. No other injuries have been reported so far.An emergency message published on the website of the Chelyabinsk regional authority urged residents to pick up their children from school and remain at home if possible.
A bright flash was seen in the Chelyabinsk, Tyumen and Sverdlovsk regions, Russia’s Republic of Bashkiria and in northern Kazakhstan.Lifenews tabloid reported that at least one piece of the fallen object caused damage on the ground in Chelyabinsk. According to preliminary reports, it crashed into a wall near a zinc factory, disrupting the fiber-optic connections of internet providers and mobile operators.
Witnesses said the explosion was so loud that it resembled an earthquake and thunder at the same time, and that there were huge trails of smoke across the sky. Others reported seeing burning objects fall to earth.Police in the Chelyabinsk region are reportedly on high alert, and have enacted the ‘Fortress’ plan in order to protect vital infrastructure.
Office buildings in downtown Chelyabinsk are being evacuated. Injuries were reported at one of the city’s secondary schools, supposedly from smashed windows. No other injuries have been reported so far.An emergency message published on the website of the Chelyabinsk regional authority urged residents to pick up their children from school and remain at home if possible.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Car Pooling
“Construction workers were buying houses an hour or more away from where they worked and there is no public transportation for them, so I started documenting how people used their cars,” explained Cartagena about the project, “how they drive to work or drive home, how they personalize their cars based on the neighborhoods in which they lived, and I started looking down from buildings and bridges to see how cars looked. It’s not uncommon to see the carpoolers, but I had never seen them from that perspective.”
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Are You Running Any Of These High Risk Android™ Apps?
Occasionally we learn about apps in the Google Play™ Store that might have serious negative effects on your device. Examples of these effects could be:
- Loss of functionality (e.g., loss of data connection)
- Unexpected high data usage
- Battery draining 2 or 3 times faster than normal
- Security or privacy exposure
Happy Chinese New Year: Year Of The Snake
I went back into my archives of photos and found some that show off the fun of Chinese New Year!
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Saturday, February 09, 2013
Big Jenga Gets Some New Twists!
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- You Drink (Have a drink)
- They Drink (Select someone else to have a drink)
- Game face (Show the crowd your game face)
- Taunt (Taunt your opponents)
- ARG! (Talk like a Pirate for one turn)
- I’ll Be Back (Talk like Arnold Schwarzenegger for one turn)
- Pop Out (The next block you extract must be popped out with the tip of two fingers like a chest thump)
- Shake It Off (While the next player is working their turn you have to shake all over until they are done)
- Blind Luck (Once you have selected a Jenga board to remove you must do the actual removal with your eyes closed)
- Broken Toe (For the remainder of the game you must pull all future pieces while standing on your tippy toes)
- Stand Up (Tell a joke to the crowd)
- Star Crush (Tell the crowd what Hollywood Star you have a crush on)
- Hand Switch (Pick someone to play with their opposite hand for the rest of the game)
- Touchy Movey (Everyone must remove the FIRST piece they touch for one round)
- Do Over (Put this piece back where you got it from and pull a new one) works once per game.
- Celtic Heritage (Do a jig around the Jegna pile)
- Tea Pot (Sing and act “I’m a little Tea Pot”)
- Reverse (Reverse the order that players take their turns)
- Gun Show (Show the crowd your guns)
- Dammit Jim “I’m A Doctor Not a Brick Layer!” Hand this piece to the next player to place on top of the Jegna tower)
- No Guts, No Glory (You may no longer pull pieces from the center of any row this game)
- Free Pass (Do not place this on top of the tower this turn. On any future turn, you may place this instead of pulling a new piece)
- Back To You (Everyone else skips one turn and you go again)
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When did you start THIS?
The 20 Loneliest Outposts At the End of the World
When humanity's not trying to destroy itself, its steadily redefining its boundaries. Every passing year, we create further-flung outposts in places nature never intended to us to inhabit. Here are the loneliest places mankind has made its bed in search of the unknown, the overwhelming, and the great.
Congress — not email — destroyed the Postal Service
You know that feeling of pleasure you get when you see someone stand up to a bullying, incompetent boss? It’s viscerally satisfying, isn't it?
That’s the way I felt this morning when I heard Postmaster General Patrick Donahue announce that the U.S. Postal Service intended to move forward with a plan to stop Saturday delivery of mail, effective sometime in August. In doing so, Donahue stuck his thumb in the eye of the U.S. Congress, the mail agency’s ultimate boss. Bravo, Mr. Donahue?
That’s the way I felt this morning when I heard Postmaster General Patrick Donahue announce that the U.S. Postal Service intended to move forward with a plan to stop Saturday delivery of mail, effective sometime in August. In doing so, Donahue stuck his thumb in the eye of the U.S. Congress, the mail agency’s ultimate boss. Bravo, Mr. Donahue?
Nemo?
Yes, The Weather Channel’s new names for winter storms are catching on, much to the chagrin of the National Weather Service, which has advised its forecasters not to follow the channel’s lead. But some airlines, governors’ offices and media outlets are all playing along, publishing advisories with the Nemo name.
The Sticky History of San Luis Obispo, California's Bubblegum Alley
If you step on a piece, it ruins your day. If you find a chunk under your desk, it’s time to squeal. But in San Luis Obispo, California, it’s perfectly OK to chew a big hunk of chicle and stick it on the walls of Bubblegum Alley. There are even several gumball machines right outside the alley’s entrance to gather up a plethora of gumballs before entering.
18 Complicated Scientific Ideas Explained Simply
A few months ago, Randall Munroe of the webcomic xkcd published a description of the Saturn V rocket using only the 1000 most frequent words in English. Under this restriction, the rocket was called "up-goer five," the command module was "people box," and the liquid hydrogen feed line was "thing that lets in cold wet air to burn." The comic inspired Theo Anderson, a geneticist who supports accessible science education, to build a text editor that would force the user to write with only the 1000 most frequent words. He then invited scientists to describe what they do using the editor.
Scenes From the History of Snow Removal
In some areas, the weather outside is pretty frightful. And since you've no place to go but outside to shovel, get cozy and read about snow removal in the good old days.
Thursday, February 07, 2013
What and How Do U-2 Spy Plane Pilots Eat During Their 12 Hour Missions?
Here's a fascinating look at what and how the USAF's finest pilots eat while flying America's favorite spy plane: the A-12. Second only to the A-12 Oxcart and its brother, the SR-71 Black-Bird being a A-12 pilot is an extremely physically demanding job, often requiring 12 hours of flying.
The Thrill of Flying the SR-71 Blackbird
I can tell you about the SR-71 Blackbird's titanium frame, its Pratt&Whitney J58-P4 engines, or its genesis. But that's not important. What really matters is the thrill of flying it in an extremely dangerous mission, as remembered by this pilot.-JD
Wednesday, February 06, 2013
Meanwhile In Russia
That is exactly what is happening right now on the Kamchatka Peninsula in eastern Russia, and all the action has been caught on camera by a Moscow film crew.
Since November the Shiveluch, Bezymianny, Tolbachik, and Kizimen volcanoes have been erupting simultaneously.
The Kamchatka Peninsula has the highest concentration of active volcanoes on Earth and the four volcanoes are all located within 180km of each other.
Taking advantage of the rare phenomenon, a photography crew from the film company Airpano used a helicopter to visit all the volcanoes in one day.
Since November the Shiveluch, Bezymianny, Tolbachik, and Kizimen volcanoes have been erupting simultaneously.
The Kamchatka Peninsula has the highest concentration of active volcanoes on Earth and the four volcanoes are all located within 180km of each other.
Taking advantage of the rare phenomenon, a photography crew from the film company Airpano used a helicopter to visit all the volcanoes in one day.
Monday, February 04, 2013
Roll forward the doomsday train
The US is mulling over radical ideas for how to operate and deploy its aging cache of nuclear missiles – including a vast subway network.
Sunday, February 03, 2013
Canada's Magical Ice Hotel Inspired by Jules Verne
Canada's Hôtel de Glace, the unique ice hotel, is back this season for its 13th annual reconstruction. The magical castle-like lodge is built each year with a new themed design out of hundred of thousands of tons of ice and snow. We got a glimpse of last year's wondrous icy architecture featuring elaborate carvings inspired by nature, but this year's construct appears to focus far more on the beauty of the wintery season as explored through its "A Journey to the Center of Winter" theme, inspired by Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth.
China's Skies: Toxic levels of pollution
No country in history has become a major industrial power without creating a legacy of environmental damage. China is clearly not an exception. The speed and scale of China's rise has brought an unprecedented pollution problem. Public health is reeling. Pollution has made cancer China's leading cause of death according to the Ministry of Health. Ambient air pollution alone is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. The factories and spewing automobile engines recently caused hundreds of flights to be cancelled in and around Beijing. Stores are selling out of face masks and the government struggles to figure out this political challenge and provide relief of the long-term burden on its people.
For 40 Years, This Russian Family Was Cut Off From All Human Contact, Unaware of World War II
But, peering intently through his windscreen in search of a landing place, the pilot saw something that should not have been there. It was a clearing, 6,000 feet up a mountainside, wedged between the pine and larch and scored with what looked like long, dark furrows. The baffled helicopter crew made several passes before reluctantly concluding that this was evidence of human habitation—a garden that, from the size and shape of the clearing, must have been there for a long time.
North Korea 'under martial law'
North Korea has been placed under martial law and Kim Jong-un has told his front-line troops to "be ready for a war," according to South Korean media reports.
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