Tsunami Video: The Power and Kindness Of Man

It isn’t just Mother Nature being powerful here. It’s the power of human spirit and the kindness of man that makes the biggest impression.

Just when you thought you’d seen all the dramatic video from the Japanese tsunami comes one more cut. It isn’t just Mother Nature being powerful here. It’s the power of human spirit and kindness of man that makes the biggest impression.

Japan’s Nuclear Problem

Pouring seawater in means these power stations are done! That, of course, is the least of anyone’s concern.

Seawater. That was the scare word for me. Reuters reported

Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) workers on Sunday were pouring seawater into two reactor cores at the coastal Fukushima Daiichi power plant and were considering using seawater on a third. Authorities have been forced to vent radioactive steam into the air to relieve pressure in the plant and reactors at the company’s nearby Daini plant are also troubled.

Pouring seawater in means these power stations are done! That, of course, is the least of anyone’s concern.

“I am not aware of anyone using seawater to cool a reactor core before. They must be desperate to find water and the seawater was the only thing nearby,” said Richard Meserve, former chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Nuclear power is enticing. When it works well it works really well. Electricity produced at nuclear power plants normally comes with little environmental impact. Here’s the icing on the cake: The Department of Energy says after all costs are taken into account nuclear generation costs half as much per kilowatt hour than conventional fossil fuel plants! That’s a big deal.

Of course when nukes go bad the downside is catastrophic. The devastation Japan has already seen might be just the beginning.

Nuclear power production is similar to conventional power production: steam powers turbines. The heat that produces the steam comes from nuclear fission.

Here’s the rub. The fission must be kept under control otherwise the nuclear fuel will get very hot. We’re talking thousands of degrees hot!

If left uncontrolled temperatures can rise high enough to melt the radioactive fuel rods and breech the reactor vessel and containment structure. That would release uranium and it’s byproducts into the environment.

After Chernobyl the Russians were forced to permanently evacuate a sizable radius around the power plant. That’s already happened at least temporarily in Japan.

Using seawater to try and cool the reactor has been described by one expert as a “Hail Mary pass.” Hail Mary passes usually don’t work.

My Earthquake-Tsunami Explainer

No TV station for me now, but I do have a webcam and some editing software. Video production has been democratized!

When the earthquake struck Japan last week I missed being on-the-air where I could add a little context to what you were seeing. Meteorologists are usually treated as the station scientist. That was a role I embraced and enjoyed.

No TV station for me now, but I do have a webcam and some editing software. Video production has been democratized!

This little presentation isn’t as sophisticated as what I would have been able to do with the better equipment and more highly skilled folks I worked with for years. Hopefully it will give you a better understanding of what happened.

If you have any questions please leave them in the comments and I’ll do my best to answer them.

Click the test pattern to play the video.

Oops: I said Thursday March 11, but meant Friday March 11. Please excuse the error.

[jwplayer image=”/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/bars_000000.jpeg” mediaid=”9171″]

Wendie’s Japan Trip

My friend Wendie is back from Japan. I suggested she use Picasa to download and ‘improve’ her photos and Picasaweb to display them to her friends.

My friend Wendie is back from Japan. I suggested she use Picasa to download and ‘improve’ her photos and Picasaweb to display them to her friends. They’re both products from the “Google Boys.” They make their money if you have your photos professionally printed and use them as the middleman.

When she saw how all of this worked, and how easy it would be to pass the photos to her friends and family, she was pretty happy.

The truth is, there are lots of these hidden gems on the Internet – little out-of-the-way places that perform amazing time saving or value adding work, usually with no cost to you.

My dad, who teaches computing to lots of the seniors at his condo complex, sees this kind of result all the time. It’s part of the reason he’s a minor deity in Palm Beach County.

Here is the result of Wendie’s work.

Email When Friends Are On-The-Road

Hopefully Wendie won’t mind as I share some of her Japanese trip with you. She’s a very learned woman… but she doesn’t capitalize. I’m going to leave these as sent.

My friend Wendie is somewhere between Tokyo and New York. She’s on her way back to Miami via JFK after a week long trip to Japan.

Yeah, I’m jealous.

Though Wendie didn’t bring a computer with her, she did keep her friends and family up-to-date by sending daily emails. I’m not sure if she stopped at Internet cafes or used a PC at her hotel. Whatever the method, it worked.

I find these on-the-road messages some of my favorite emails, not only from Wendie, but from any travelling friends. I hope you feel the same way when I post on the blog during my vacations.

Hopefully Wendie won’t mind as I share some of her Japanese trip with you. She’s a very learned woman… but she doesn’t capitalize. I’m going to leave these as sent.

Day One:

i’ve already scoped out the area around the hotel.. it’s called shinjuku.. lots of shops, a massive train/subway station.. and found an ATM that took my

u.s. card and spit out the proper amount of yen.. then even gave me my card back..

what more could you want!

Day Two:

i did the “city tour” thing.. ended up sitting next to a nice woman from north carolina. so, at stop number 3 we ditched the tour, and ended up exploring a fabulous neighborhood calls asakusa… we found these amazing plastic food stores, and yes, i did buy plastic sushi… but only a few pieces, it’s really expensive! then we took the subway back to the neighborhood we’re staying at, grabbed a snack..

Day Three

it’s been a busy day….at the crack o’ 5:45 am i went down to the tsukiji fish market.. a massive market complex on the river here.. and it was amazing.. they hold a huge tuna auction every morning that is closed to visitors, but once it’s over, thousands of vendors set up shop selling fish, food, and just about everything else. there are bunch of teeny little restaurants all through this complex that sell sushi or ramen.. and i stopped into one of them for the best tuna sushi i’ve ever eaten…it was awesome.. i have a ton of pictures of the market… excellent photo op.

Day Four

so… if you go to mt. fuji… but you never actually view mt. fuji, because it’s snowing, the entire region is socked in with fog, and the road to the 5th station (halfway up the mountain) is closed due to ice, so you can only go to the first station … can you claim to have seen mt. fuji? or is the more proper response to say you have BEEN to mt. fuji.

Day Five

in kyoto. getting here was great.. the bullet train was a blast..nothing

like going 257 kilometeres an hour through the japanese countryside.. it was terrific.. and just 2 quick hours from odawara to kyoto… kyoto is very different from tokyo… no high rise buildings, and many shrines and temples clustered together.. plus, a wierd train

station that is either a fabulous example of modern architecture.. or… a horrible depiction of wierdness.. depending on your point of view.

Day Six

this morning i played tourist, visiting a magnificent shinto shrine.. the “golden pavillion”.. which is in fact covered in gold.. it’s a gorgeous day, weather wise, and it has been a lot of fun. tonight is going to be interesting.. it’s a night at a ryokan, or japanese inn… it’s in the gion section of kyoto… the geisha section… so my bed will be a tatami mat! tomorrow i am doing an afternoon tour outside of kyoto to nara… which is about an hour away and has one of the world’s largest bronze buddhas… note to all.. when you come to japan be sure to try the green tea ice cream.. it’s fabulous!

Day Seven

yesterday was terrific… the ryokan was in a wonderful, old area of kyoto

and we wandered around and stumbled on a massive shinto temple complex with a park… it was sunday afternoon, gorgeous weather.. and the place was packed with families enjoying the day… lots of adorable kids.. the japanese love children, and i have had the best time playing peek-a-boo with kids everywhere.. on the bullet train, in the parks, in stores… even with no common language, making a child laugh is universal… the whole afternoon was .. well, i:ve pretty much run out of adjectives..

That’s just a taste. I only plucked a short snippet from each day’s email. I think it’s enough for you to get a real feel for her journey.

I can’t wait to see the photos and talk with Wendie to hear more.

The World Traveler Calls on IM

I was on IM at 3:00 AM when a new window opened on my screen. It was a friend of mine. “I’m in Seoul,” he said.

“So, you’re a soul man,” I replied (using the cheapest joke I could think of. He’s in Korea for some sort of conference.

We didn’t chat for long, but he said I should go. It was the kind of place I’d enjoy… a country which resembles a gigantic Best Buy&#185. I look upon much of Asia that way.

The guy in Korea is someone I’ve known for 25 years. During that time he’s traveled everywhere for business and pleasure, including a few years living in Europe and more living in Asia.

He travels enough that my daughter suspects he works for the CIA. I don’t think so, but it’s a good fable.

There aren’t many things that bring out envy in me, but this is one of them. I’m not sure I need to travel enough to get extra pages added to a passport – I’d just like to need a passport. I’ve been to England once and the Caribbean many times. That’s pretty much the extent of my long distance travel.

I’d like to visit Oriental Asia – China, Japan, Korea, the Malay Peninsula, maybe Thailand. Sure I want to come home with electronics and optics, but I want to see where it happens. Photos and videos I’ve seen of teeming Asian cities are enticing.

Quite honestly, I don’t know what I’d do once I got there!

Europe doesn’t hold quite the same attraction. I can’t say why. Maybe it’s Europe is so 19th Century and Asia is so 21st. That’s no more than a guess.

Helaine says I probably wouldn’t do well on a 24 hour transpolar flight. I’m not sure I disagree. That’s a long time to have your knees in your chest, sleeping sitting up. My Southwest Airlines miles won’t help. I certainly know this trip isn’t her priority.

My on-the-road friend will be back in the states this weekend. It won’t be long before he’s traveling again. He racks up frequent flier miles like they’re going out of style. Maybe next time he’ll shoot some photos.

&#185 – His characterization. Obviously, he doesn’t know about the screaming match I once had inside a Best Buy. “Go ahead, call the police!” was one of the things I yelled. Need I say more?

Deep Throat Revealed

I woke up this morning , flipped on the TV and saw a ‘breaking news’ banner at the bottom of the screen on CNN. Breaking news doesn’t proffer quite the same importance it once did, but it still got my attention.

Deep throat revealed – that was the gist of the story.

This just might have been the best kept secret in Washington, the identity of Woodward and Bernstein’s Watergate source. Only four people knew for sure: Woodward, Bernstein, Ben Bradlee and Deep Throat himself… a claim now raised by W. Mark Felt.

Mark Felt was a high ranking FBI official. AP says he was number two at the bureau, putting him just below J. Edgar Hoover at the time.

His name has been linked to Deep Throat in the past, but he is not a high profile person. A quick Google search of “W. Mark Felt”&#185 shows only 292 hits. Even I’m better represented than that!

Woodward and Bernstein continued to protect their source until a few minutes ago when the Washington Post issued a confirmation. Over the years, as names were tossed out, they neither confirmed or denied what Felt today claimed. Before the confirmation, I was guessing, since this is in Vanity Fair which (in spite of its wimpy name) is very well respected for top notch writing and reportage, it’s true. I would expect this story has been well vetted.

Deep Throat’s tips were what broke open Watergate and finally brought down President Nixon. It is an excellent example of an unnamed source leading to credible journalism. Lately, unnamed sources have been under fire.

It’s funny that even today the White House offers up unnamed sources in a very structured way.

MR. McCORMACK: Ladies and gentlemen, this is the briefing you’ve all been waiting for — all day long. (Laughter and applause.) We have a senior administration official here who is going to be — has a few words to say about the President’s meetings with Prime Minister Singh of India and Prime Minister Koizumi of Japan. And then he’ll take a few questions from you.

With that, I’ll turn it over to our briefer.

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Hi. I’m the senior administration official. The President met with Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh this morning at 8:05 a.m. And he met with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi at 3:00 p.m. And let me tell you a little bit about those two, and then I’ll take some questions.

That’s from an actual White House briefing as documented on the White House website.

The White House uses unnamed sources for the same reason they’re used elsewhere. Sometimes, people who know news that must get out just don’t have the ability to speak freely. I’d rather they weren’t used without additional attribution, but I believe inside sources… protected unnamed sources… are an important part of journalism.

Now, how the heck did they keep this a secret for so long?

&#185 – By putting my search in quotes, Google limits its results to only those pages with the exact text I’ve entered. Searching for W. Mark Felt without quotation marks yield millions of entries, but most of them aren’t on topic.

Asteroid 2004 MN4 – Who Invited Him?

Forget Hubble and all the other fancy astronomical hardware. Sometimes the most interesting finds come from more pedestrian equipment. Take the case of Asteroid 2004 MN4, discovered in June at the Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona.

The find was made by astronomers from the University of Hawaii taking part in an asteroid survey. That they found it was luck. Like most other minor space discoveries, the information was dissemenated and filed away. Then, on December 18, another spotting from Australia. After that dozens of other observations were made.

Now with multiple sightings it was possible to figure out the orbit of this chunk of space rock… a flying mountain if you will. It looked like it could cross the Earth’s orbit and it was assigned a probability, a mathematical chance, it would hit the Earth.

Excuse me? Hit the Earth? No, really. In fact, it was possible to come up with a date: April 13, 2029

That’s the bad news. The good news was the probability was only one chance in 233. NASA said that’s “unusual enough to merit special monitoring by astronomers, but should not be of public concern.”

Then a day or two later, with more observations and number crunching, the probability changed. Now it was one chance in 63. Interesting, but not alarming for an event 25 years in the future&#185.

It’s changed again.

On Christmas Eve a little gift from NASA scientists. Now it’s one chance in 45… a 97.8% chance of missing… or for my fellow pessimists, a 2.2% chance that April 2029 might be a really good time to run up your VISA with no intention of paying it off.

On the Torino scale of 1-10, this little gem has suddenly gone to a 4. It’s the first object to even make it to two!

A close encounter, with 1% or greater chance of a collision capable of causing regional devastation.

We’re talking about an object estimated to have a 1,250 foot diameter weighing 1.5 billion pounds&#187. When it hits the atmosphere it will be traveling at 27,000 miles per hour. That would create an explosion equivalent to 1,400 million tons of TNT!

For comparison, the nuclear bomb “Little Boy,” dropped by the United States on Hiroshima, Japan, had a yield of only about 0.013 megatons. The impacts which created the Barringer Meteor Crater or caused the Tunguska event in Siberia are estimated to be in the 10-20 megaton range. The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa was the equivalent of roughly 200 megatons.

So, we’re talking large, but this is not the magnitude of the event that took out the dinosaurs. It would still be devastating. Certainly it would reshape any land it impacted. A water impact would cause tsunamis of epic proportion.

Again, this is 25 years away and the calculations are likely to change. Still, if this is the first you’re hearing about it, aren’t you surprised there hasn’t been more play in the mainstream press?

The way this works is, someone, somewhere with the power to influence other news budgets (NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, etc.) will run it and this story will pick up some traction. Until then, you heard it here first.

&#185 – I believe I have already scheduled teeth cleaning for that day.

&#178 – My conversion from 7.5e+10 kg to pounds is shaky at best. I’ll be glad to entertain corrections. No rush – we’ve got a few decades.

Lost In Translation

Steffie had plans tonight and needed to be in Trumbull. With the thought that roads might not be in great shape later in the evening, Helaine and I decided to drive her (instead of her driving herself) and spend the evening out.

We had dinner at Bennigans at the Trumbull Mall (French Dip and Chicken Noodle Soup, it’s an exciting life!) and then went to Fairfield to see Lost in Translation.

Neither Helaine or I know our way through Bridgeport, but I assumed going down Main Street would lead us to I-95. At some point, we became lost. Luckily, there was an electric company crew working on some project. I asked for directions, and one worker gave them.

“Go over that bridge that looks like it’s closed.” It was closed! Thanks.

I have not read anything but raves about this movie and so I wanted to see it. I could not have been more disappointed.

Though beautifully shot and well acted, the movie never got off the ground. I’m still not sure what it was about.

I find Bill Murray much more likable than I did when he first broke out on Saturday Night Live. Though the part he played wasn’t based on him, the character he acted sure seemed it. That’s not bad. As I said, he’s likable.

Scarlett Johansson, as a woman questioning her two year old marriage, was fine. Good acting in a dark role.

She is more attractive than she is beautiful. I’m not sure if that sentence makes total sense other than to say, I find physical beauty only one part of being attractive.

When all was said and done, Helaine complained that the movie had been very slow (though she enjoyed it more than I did). I concur.

There is one thing this movie left me with. I would love to go to Japan. In fact, I’d like to visit Asia in general. I don’t think Helaine wants to go, so this will be something that will only happen if there is another reason for going, and seeing Japan is secondary.

Interestingly enough, this was another movie with an all adult audience. At age 53, I was much younger than the median.