Environmental News

I still do not see the link I tried to post here another try

https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/us7000pn9s/pager

Myanmar besides being poor is for years in civil war (maybe they do not call it that) and military bombings continued even after earthquake.

Some aid has arrived. Mandalay airport control tower has collapsed according to reports. That could be worked around, but not if runways are damaged. Yangon airport (far to the south) is operational.

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Prompt rescue and recovery are top priorities now 42 hours after. But it is difficult to avoid commenting on building collapse photos already online. I saw one in Mandalay tipped over while two adjacent appeared undamaged. This seems clearly foundation not correctly tied to uppers.

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Starlink service in region includes only Bhutan. I would hope for more to be added quickly, but it depends on uplink sites.

 

When floods are described as "unprecedented" it most often refers to history of instrumented streamflow measurements. Few such records exceed 100 years, to reach beyond is done statistically by probit modeling. This and its limitations are well understood by statisticians, but not by public at large I suppose.

For some locations, evidence of paleofloods can be compared to modern records. This publication is about that:

‘Unprecedented’ recent floods swamped by prev | EurekAlert!

Science can always be improved upon and it's good to notice when that happens.

 

Bristlecone pine forests are very old and one is at least at some risk of burning

World's oldest trees threatened by California's Silver fire - Los Angeles Times

Which would qualify as unprecedented during the thousands of years lifespans of trees there. Personally I doubt they will get cooked. It also makes me want someone to look for charcoal in such forest soils which would provide evidence for paleofires. More emails to send ... it's always something ...

 

Myanmar update

Myanmar: UN seeks additional $240 million to bolster earthquake relief | UN News

Less informative than we might wish, but this disaster is getting overshadowed by events elsewhere.

 

Keystone pipeline flowing again after rupture last week:

Keystone Pipeline restarted after oil spill in rural North Dakota | AP News

Because this pipeline was in much earlier media, we can expect that all its problems will get reported. There was an earlier rupture, yes? Anyway, overall delivery and leakage data can be compared to other petro transport systems; trains and trucks. As petro transport will surely continue, it will be good to know performance of different systems.

 

Conservative Americans consistently distrust science:

Conservative Americans consistently distrust | EurekAlert!

Well, that's as it may be. But I will whip this media writer.

"Science helps solve major societal problems, such as pandemics and climate change"

This is clickbait headlining, and "such as" is no cure. Before science was used for societal benefit, innovations were empirical. Steam engines, cotton ginning and 'traditional' plant and animal breeding were 'try a lot of things and see what works well'. Incandescent light bulbs.

Science changed/superseded this by providing knowledge bases to optimize whatever needed to be made. Electric motors, airplanes, rocket engines, electronics -> microelectronics -> internet. There is a whole lot more to medicine than pandemics!

If you want to make something new now empirically, have at it. If you want to be efficient, use science.

Apparently one of my buttons got pushed.

Anyway, as partial cure to 'Some Americans have gone off the deep end', see also this:

Scholars disprove existence of ‘crisis of tru | EurekAlert!

 

Always up for another 'radio astronomy on far side of moon' article:

Looking at the Universe’s dark ages from the far side of the Moon - Ars Technica

They all talk about prohibitive HF and VHF emissions on earth, which is fair enough. But the rest of the story goes unstated, unless y'all have seen it somewhere. With no (nada zip) radio transmitters on earth, it will still be a non-ideal place for this. Because it has a thick atmosphere that is rich in ions up yonder. Lower atmosphere has water and vertical temperature gradients that lead to lightning and other electrical discharges. All that means static, and that means high and time-varying noise floors on (at least) the mentioned frequencies.

Go back before Marconi or even before macaroni, it was already bad. Actually I want to say that all bio-habitable worlds would be similar.

Bio-habitable worlds: Good places to be, but bad places for many types of astronomy.

 

Agricultural soils with toxic metal contamination are a global problem:

Up to 17% of global cropland contaminated by toxic heavy metal pollution, study estimates | EurekAlert!

This media summary does not have maps, but link to publication shows all as it is open access.

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There are many ways to address this. Some crops take up much less of these from soils than others. Conventional or modern genetic breeding can make them worse at it. Fallow crops could be chosen to take up lots, thus clean soils. (to be dumped somewhere), Some mushrooms take up lots, but approach this with caution. Many crops use mycorrhiza for nutrient uptake, and those might do some horizontal gene transfer and acquire metal-uptake capacity from said mushrooms.

 

Insecticide spraying in occupied cabins:

https://www.transportation.gov/airconsumer/spray
Aircraft Insecticide: Why Certain Plane Cabins Are Sprayed Before Departure

It may always be phenothrin, a pyrethrin, and far from the worst one in armementarium. But close your eyes, slow respiration rate, and mask up if ya got one (yes they block this aerosol).

Twere more than 40 years ago I sat for cabin spray arriving in Costa Rica. Dun no what they used then, but it dinna kil me.

 

"many toothpastes contain lead" Well dang that is undesired, Lead packaging ended 2005 (very late!) and remaining must be from poorly chosen ingredients. And lack of govt insight to make it absent in commercial products.

Lead may be the easiest thing to object to. It is remarkably neuro damaging. It is super easy to detect. Commercial-product formulators will always have lead-free ingredients to chose from. Possibly a few pennies more expensive.

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Distant past, possibly amusing. In religion class (attached to public school) teacher instructed us "you cannot put toothpaste back in tube". Intending to be helpful, I said "just unwind the bottom end of tube and put it back in there". I received no points for insight.

 

Slang used here by me are flourishes to deceive readers that I am 'of you'; not pure distant nerd, not other-govt tool, nor chatbot. Is it workin' ?