Anthony has generously offered me space in his campground up North. As a young nerd I, of course, imagined eventually seeing a total eclipse at some point in my life and this is my chance.
I am now on the road and I won’t be back until at least Tuesday. Getting to Oregon should not be difficult as traffic has been spread out all through the week. However, at noon on Monday, everyone will be leaving at the same time. That will be fun.
I’m not sure if Anthony is back in charge next week or not.
There are a few posts scheduled through Monday and the guest posters with self-posting permissions have been told to get busy, so with luck there will be only a minor slow down, if any.
Tuesday may be a little thin. We’ll see. Feel free to use this post as an open thread. ~ ctm
Eight minutes already and not a single post. Everyone headed to the eclipse I wonder.
I’m already there!
Tryon Nebraska. looking at stars and drinking a cold one. Hope the thunderstorms hold off on Monday
I’m en route to Redmond.
Central OR has run out of gas.
It’ll be my second total eclipse in OR.
Thanks for moderating and have a safe trip and viewing.
Sign in Rufus said, “No fuel next 94 miles”, i.e. Madras. Sign before Shaniko said, “Event ahead, proceed with caution”. Madras a madhouse. Many Japanese from Warm Springs Reservation’s Kahneetah Lodge, which was rented in its entirety by a Japanese travel agency. Also ran into some Europeans at Albertson’s. Traffic bad in town but not on road to Redmond.
Plane crash killed two. Some 400 expected to land today or early tomorrow.
Good luck! I’m in Colorado and headed to Texas tomorrow so I’ll be swimming against the other fishes.
Take lots of pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Of the eclipse or the road trip?
both!….LOL
Oregon is supposed to be one of the few places with clear skies too!
YES!!!!:-)
OK, I’ll hazard a post. A bit informal but not intended to be trivial!
The sequestration of carbon has been a highly exercised topic. There’s a lot of carbon locked up in limestone and chalk. As a Brit, I’m in awe of all those zillions of critters (I forget their names) making calcium carbonate tests and then dying to eventually build our White Cliffs of Dover. However, even those Cliffs are dwarfed by the Alps, the Himalayas, the Rockies and others.
Now, here’s my question: is continuation of that particular carbon sequestration process now limited by lack of available calcium?
“limited by lack of available calcium?”
Plenty of calcium; it’s limited by lack of base to create the carbonate ions to precipitate. We’re pumping out CO2, which is acid. The only large scale sources of base are various basaltic rocks, which can only release their base after weathering. Critters can pump protons away to make the shells, but long term, something has to neutralize those protons, else they will just dissolve again.
No. Calcium is a major component of common and abundant igneous minerals like feldspar (K/Na/Ca aluminosilicate, the pink phenocrysts in common granite countertops). As the rock weathers the K, Na, and Ca leach into the ocean and form their respective chlorides. The Cl comes from weathering of other igneous rocks like sodalite and apatite. The residual aluminosilicates form clays. The calcium and potassium are taken up biologically, the sodium and chloride not so much, hence the oceans get progresively saltier. Biologically formed calcium (and magnesium–dolomite) carbonates get recycled primarily via subduction zone volcanism and secondarily by weathering. Without tectonics we would already have a dead world.
Pete, calcium is the 5th most abundant element in the earth’s crust and ocean basins (sediments and basaltic oceanic crust) at 3.5% just less than iron at 5%. Doomsters are commonly worried about “soluble” calcium and iron (needed by the living part of the plankton). The shells called coccolithispores are calcium carbonate, that make up the wonderful Cliff’s of D.
The linear thinkers don’t seem to get it that the very low solubility of calcium carbonate and iron compounds in sea water have always been so. The critters themselves have a biochemical process that extracts the always meagre necessary two elements and the seawater itself replenishes it back to its miserly limit (constant sediment from rivers, limey volcanics and lime sources along coasts, like the White Cliff’s stand ready).
They do need a good supply of carbon dioxide and the White Cliff’s and billions of tons of other shells, fish and other creature bones, plants and chemically precipitated limestones of Cretaceous Age enjoyed 10x the CO2 we have today. Indeed it seems the denser atmosphere made it even possible for the pteradactyl to fly!
Now comes the amusing part. With the high level of CO2 dissolved in seawater during the Cretaceous it would have decreased the alkalinity (pushed it a bit toward the acidity end) but, wonder of wonders, this greatly increased the solubility of abundant calcium and iron which would restore the alkalinity, but for the fecundity of the little beasties which would devour it leading to more CO2 solution and more calcium and iron solution into the ocean creating a process of continuous sequestration of CO2 in an orgy lasting millions of years (naughty plants were in on the love in, too) until… wait for it… the CO2 had been depleted to low levels. We are currently starting this cycle again, and by ‘we’ I mean mankind’s fossil fuel use returning CO2 to the atmosphere! As a last chuckle, the entire life process described is an endothermic one, i.e. it uses up heat!
…can’t change the pH until you run out of buffer…and what’s changing the pH makes the buffer
Latitude, buffer yes, but an inorganic buffer only retards the shift in pH, not stops it and when you have 4000 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere, this buffer is even less effective. The really tenacious buffer is when it is combined with biological activity as per my post above. Added CO2 largely makes more living things and while there doing this they are using up available energy – a cooling activity.
Pete,
Those (under the microscope) beautiful small creatures that made the white cliffs of Dover and the other side of the English (so you think…) Channel and much of the underground of SE England are one-celled plankton with a carbonate skeleton: Emiliania huxleyi or in short Ehux, still the most abundant shell forming plankton in the world. Very nice pages with lost of pictures and background information is at:
http://www.soes.soton.ac.uk/staff/tt/
“… the other side of the English (so you think…) Channel …”
Why am I reminded of the, perhaps apocryphal, English newspaper head line:
“Fog in Channel. Europe Isolated”
Ferdinand and everyone else who has responded to my post, my big ‘thank you’ to you all. This post is not intended to terminate the discussion, the more the merrier.
Ferdinand, my wife and I have rather too many microscopes (some whole, some in pieces) but my efforts to reduce chalk to a form suitable for microscopic examination have been a dismal failure. This includes the ‘freeze/thaw’ process – I’m lucky my freezer samples haven’t been presented on my dinner plate!
Ristvan, Nick & Gary, your replies have me feeling very contrite. I should have worked out the answer for myself, it’s not too many months since I worked through Holmes ‘Principles of Physical Geology’. My plea is that my grey cells are showing the effects of their fairly high-mileage, despite my efforts to keep them exercised.
I suspect Nick would approve of Holmes’ chapter on fossil fuels!
graphicconception,
Real English understatement, as only the English can… I do like that kind of statements and the dry humour of Monty Python, Falwty Towers,… (but my wife doesn’t at all, lucky I can watch TV on my PC monitor, so we can see our own likes…).
At the other side of the Channel, that is called Pas de Calais, but the original Flemish/Dutch name was Nauw van Kales (narrow of Kales, the original Flemish name of Calais). That NW part of France was originally – up to WWI – Flemish/Dutch, even when for hundreds of years part of France. As in WWI about 90% of local young males were killed in the trenches, there was a huge import of young men out of other parts of France to do the work in agriculture and fishery and much of the original Flemish language was lost over the years…
Some family history is involved here: my grandfather was living at the Flemish coast (Nieuwpoort) and did 11 trips to Iceland (period 1870-1910) to catch cod, halve a year long in winter. Of the crew some 10% per trip didn’t survive the harsh conditions, but he did (and as side effect: 11 children – one after every trip…). The fleet started in Dunkirk (Duinkerken/Dunkerque), France, but language was no problem then as they all spoke the same (Norse influenced) Dutch dialect…
Pete,
Preparing such samples for microscopic inspection seems not easy, to say the least… Found a description here:
https://www.kemet.co.uk/blog/petrography/rock-thin-sections
Even so, it seems that the fine constructions are at the edge of the posibilities of a light microscope and that you need an electron microscope – if you can afford one – to see the details.
Beware the insanity of hundreds of thousands of people trying to get to a location they have no familiarity with. There are already people stopping in the middle of the road here to take pictures of pronghorns. Tent cities have sprung up everywhere. So far, in spite of 90 degree temperatures, wind and dry grass everywhere, no one has started the prairie on fire. It’s early though. 🙂
An important point, too many greenhorns in one area can be a cause for concern. I live in NorCal. Today I am seeing the first mild smoke of the season in this area. Thankfully, there have been no fires nearby as the forest is dry at this point in time. Rain should not be far off though. I expect that this September will bring above average rains for the month to the West Coast, starting in the north.
Just something I read in a discussion group I’m in.
NOAA has made adjustments to the Law Dome ice core public CO2 data and eliminated 400K to 750K years before present when CO2 level were higher than at present.
Anyone else hear anything about this?
No but anything appears possible with a corrupt organization that is out of control and often deals in propaganda rather than science.
Trump needs to drain this Swamp also and demand NOAA return to Science ASAP
joep17901,
Seems impossible, as Law Dome DSS core gets only about 1,000 years back in time (the other two cores only 150 years). The only ice core that is that old (the second oldest Vostok is 420 kyears) is Dome C which gets 800,000 years back in time.
Of all samples, measured by two different labs independent of each other there was one outlier (339 plus/minus 56 p.p.m.v. – 1 sd) due to the use of solvent because the drill was stuck in the ice at the end of the season. The rest of the data are between 170 and 310 ppmv:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/epica_dome_c.jpg
From: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7193/full/nature06949.html?foxtrotcallback=true
NOAA has no influence whatever on these data, as these are measured by the University of Bern (Switzerland) and Grenoble (France)…
Joep17901: Very Bad info circulating in your discussion group. Find a new group; yours is terminally confused and unable to simple fact check. Sorry to be so blunt, but I just spent an hour researching this to make sure my memory was ‘accurate’. Skeptics need to stay as factually clean as possible, always. So, the easily verifiable via google-fu facts:
LAW dome is actually three ice cores. The earliest dates to 30000ya (30kya)—NOT 750kya. The most published of the 3 (MWP, LIA) goes back just 3kya. The reason Law dome is so interesting for the Holocene is it is a coastal East Antarctica high annual snow accumulation site, so high temporal resolution. Vostok goes back to ~450kya at lower but still decent resolution. Covers the last four glaciations; the CO2 lagging temp by ~800 years is best shown by Vostok, which Al Gore got backwards. See also essay Cause and Effect debunking several efforts to refute the inescapable Vostok data. Only Dome C goes back to ~800kya, but with accordingly poor resolution. There has been no data tampering with any of these ice core results, although different papers have different interpretations due to complexities like gas diffusion through ice. (unlike clearly diddled 20th century surface temp anomalies). All three sets of ice core data were multiply published, and all those papers still exist on line.
Your ice core adjustment ‘conspiracy theory’ just aint so.
Ferdinand is correct.
Law Dome has one of the highest accumulation rates in Antarctica. Law Dome cores only resolve a few thousand years, at most… but have the highest temporal resolution of any Antarctic ice cores.
There are two solar eclipses per year; the only thing unusual about this one is the “coast to coast” nature of this one. This isn’t an especially “good” eclipse, because totality is so short; 2.5 minutes.
There will be another USA eclipse on April, 2024, with the path of totality starting in the Pacific, up through Mexico, through Texas to Pennsylvania and into Canada. For that one, totality will last around 6 minutes.
With the right photograph, totality will last forever.
I’m WAY more interested in pictures of the landscape during the eclipse. You’ve seen one photo of an eclipsed Sun, you’ve seen them all. I want to see the eerie, un-natural cast it gives surrounding land forms.
yes, aphan- and if you get a great photo of specular reflections on wavelets on the water with silhouettes of trees or of moored boats- please share it.
i want something that’s spectacular in b & w ! (to burn on a box with my laser)
Yeah that’s what I have in my head….black and whites, or hoping for some fantastical “sepia” tones right before and after….
Agreed, Aphan. I might snap a picture of the totality, but other than that, I’m more interested in what overall effect of the eclipse is.
Two and a half minutes is a long time looking at a darkened sun. After 3 minutes, boredom sets in.
Eclipse Plan:
-02:00:00 Traffic
-01:30:00 Parking
-01:14:25 Threat of Citation
-01:13:00 Traffic
-00:48:00 Parking
-00:13:00 Snacks
-00:07:50 One Beer
-00:01:20 Check Facebook in Gloom
-00:00:58 Instinctive Panic [car keys not in ignition or pocket]
-00:00:42 Keys Found by Flashlight in Grass Behind Cooler
+00:00:00 Totality Begins; Crowd Noise Unbearable
+00:00:20 Shout, “Will you all please shut up!”
+00:00:55 Crowd Noise Has Resumed, Louder
+00:01:00 Glance Briefly At Sun [no glasses], Commit Totality To Memory
+00:01:05 Continuous Babble of Helicopter Parents Concerned About Eyes
+00:01:55 Glance at Sun Again; Note Corona
+00:01:57 Kid Takes off Glasses to Rub Eyes, Sees Me Glancing, Warns Parents
+00:02:10 Rebuking Parental Whisperers Warning Me of “Insta-Blindness”
+00:02:30 Comparing Instablindness Fears to Ancient Superstitions
+00:02:45 Parents Angry At Me Because Children Aware of My Unconcern
+00:03:15 Glance at Sun; Sliver Returning
+00:03:45 Escalating Crowd Babble of Concern For Eyes Again
+00:05:00 Packing Up; People Wearing Glasses Grope in ‘Dark’ for Sodas
+00:05:20 Hysteria that Even The Landscape Gloom Emanating Death Rays
+00:10:00 Regret that I didn’t settle for 90% Totality Quietly At Home
+02:00:00 Back At Work To Spend The Rest of the Day In Full Sunlight
LOLITD (laughing out loud in the dark)
I suspect your prediction/projection/prophecy will be 100% accurate and I didn’t even run it through a model!
Question for those ‘in the know”. Salem OR, near where I live, is in the path of totality. How many years will pass before that exact latitude and longitude are in the path of totality again? and how many years passed since it occurred previously (how long since the last total eclipse at that spot)?
The NASA Eclipse web site at http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse.html is ENTIRELY focused on this eclipse at present, but have a look at it next week. There are calculators to calculate the time of the next eclipse for any specific spot on the globe.
Approximately once every 360 years or so.
https://www.space.com/25644-total-solar-eclipses-frequency-explained.html
Enjoy folks, have a good one. WUWT will still be here, unless W burns it down :p
Absolutely NO Photography. This is 2017, an every moron is walking around snapping pics. And Erwin has already got Einstein the pics he needed. So sit back and actually take in the show 1887 style. Except in this case, maybe with some eye protection…. ;p
Just setup a generic email account to give out to all the unwashed pic takers if you want pics of your trip. It’ll give meaning to the life of some poor serf…
It would be wonderful were some WATSUP with thatter photographed the eclipse and gave a commentary with a field mike giving background sounds.
When at school I read an account that described the response of sulphur crested cockatoos that came to roost and settle down for the night, only to stir again as the eclipse passed.We of the Antipodes do not have this opportunity.
You have another two to look forward to.
https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/solar/2023-october-14
https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/solar/2024-april-8
I’m curious, While I understand the direct viewing excitement, what is the downside of watching the eclipse on TV especially if you are far away from the path of the total eclipse path close to NYC? Are their aspects that will not be captured on TV?
Total eclipses have a tremendous dynamic range of light. Only in the last decade or so have people been able to print decent images that show the full range with adequate contrast to see the details. To capture that in an image might take something like a very bright LCD screen that still shows stars as dim objects.
This will be my first total solar eclipse, I saw the 1994 annular eclipse in New Hampshire. There will be no comparison.
Haven’t gotten to a true total. But 3 50% partial so far. Helps to have lived for long stretches in different places.
Fondest celestial memory was driving from Chicago to the SW Wisconsin dairy farm, I would guess early 1990’s, west of Madison, maybe 1130 pm, dead winter probably late January. Below zero F, for sure. Hwy 14 is a two lane country road with no streetlights except in the occasional small towns like Black Earth and Muscoda (both named for logging rafter stops down the Wisconsin River back during the day). We were cruising along to the weekend at the farm (sledding, xcty skiing, snomobiling) and suddenly the aurura borealis appeared above us. Not just a little. In all its dancing, prancing, technicolor glory. We woke both sleeping kids, and had a memorable half hour drive under brilliant Northern Lights. In southwest Wisconsin.
Did Armstrong experience something on the Moon that he couldn’t have experienced by watching a TV show?
Ahem,
Fame
Fortune
Near Zero Gravity
Freeze dried dinners
Recycled urine as drinking water
Something only 11 other people experienced
Being the first person in human history to have to scrape moon dust off his shoes before coming back inside…
🙂
I’m not saying that ANYONE should feel compelled to drive for hours and hours and endure the traffic that has been choking 1-15 here for at least a week already, in the HOPES that they can find lodging/food/toilets when they actually arrive at a totality viewing location, but if one lives near to one, I cannot imagine not going outside and witnessing it personally. That’s a little like Armstrong choosing to stay inside the LEM because he could the Moon “just fine from the window”.
“Could SEE the Moon just fine from the window…”
Only the massiveness of it all. But mostly, it’s one of those things that puts in perspective, the other things in life you wonder about having not done. And lets you die easy knowing you didn’t really miss anything important…
Look at me, I’m in the 95% area, and am not willing to drive an hour south to be in the 100%. But unlike Halley’s comet, I will actually walk out the door, grab my welding mask and check it out….
CTM, happy road trip. Should be quite a show.
I live in South Carolina and don’t have to go further than my back yard. They are talking millions invading this area. We’ll see. Mostly cloudy is the forecast. Bummer.
I see dark clouds in your future!
Perhaps someone in the path of totality can point a IR meter Directly at the center of the moon, and take readings?
Charles,
I’m so jealous!! Tell Anthony we love him and miss him, and be SAFE on your trip!!
We debated going to her north Georgia cabin, where we would see 97% totality if we went down to lake Blueridge sort of out of the mountains. But events interferred, so we will have to live with 80% here in Fort Lauderdale. Starts here at ~1330, peaks at ~1500. The beach will be a good place to use the pinhole viewer learned from my youthful first eclipse experience. Making up a really good one (Al foil) from an old Macies inverted white cardboard Xmas gift box. Knew those would come in handy some day. Better than a cereal box becaused of the glossy white.
It seems these “once in a life time” events happen every 20 or 30 years.
Being able to view a total solar eclipse in the same location only happens approximately every 375 years. That’s a really long lifetime.
With all the ‘climate cash’ floating around, after +200,000 people died back in the Indonesia’s 2004 Tsunami, their system is broken. All 22 buoys are nonfunctional. It only takes 1.6 million pounds to maintain. The Climate Change scare, with a $100 billion promised, 10 billion allocated, cannot even muster up a few bucks to potentially save hundreds of thousands the next time around. It is easier to chase the CO2 dragon. Brown people matter.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/indonesia-earthquake-tsunami-early-warning-bouys-were-all-inoperable-as-78-magnitude-tremor-truck-a6909246.html
That is Indonesia’s problem, not ours.
Missing the point, the humanitarian assistance which is masquerading as climate monies, IF spent, could be much better allocated to actually save lives.
Duncan,
Indeed that is the idiotery of the whole CAGW nonsense: a billion a day is going into a non-problem, while real problems are not solved…
Have you thought about the fact that some of the real problems that are beg for attention and for real solutions are being caused by the affected people having to bear the added cost burden of the costs of the CAGW nonsense.
I think it would be fun for someone to check if eclipse temperature drops are still accurately shown in the historical temperature record. My hypothesis is that they are mostly there if it’s convenient for the global warmists and sometimes not there if it’s inconvenient.
Have seen a total eclipse 2002 in the middle of the desert in Australia. Normal number of inhabitants of the nearest village: 81. Visitors at that day: over 10,000… Including a lot of overyeared hippies, sun worshippers in old flowered VW vans, would-be or real professionals with camera lenses the size of the Mount Palomar telescope…
Anyway, it was not too crowded as there was a 30 km part of a dirt road where the eclipse was fully visible, so the people was spread out. All was well organized: every few hundred meters they had put a toilet at the side of the road. And at return a full size fair and music was waiting for the mass. The local grocery and pump station were sold out within an hour and probably had more sales than in a full year…
As the eclipse was only 30 seconds and we were busy taking pictures at low speed (still diapositives, you know) the eclipse was gone before we had a good look. Thus indeed, as Mat said: don’t take any pictures, just enjoy the show, including the audience…
FYI – the local news reports that Oregon is OUT of Port-A-Potties.
As we made a trip from Cairns to Adelaide that year with a rented camper, we didn’t need to queue at the roadside toilets as there was a Port-A-Potty in the van…
Impressive country anyway, with or without eclipse. A few years later we did the other side: Perth to Darwin even more impressive, but some extreme distances between “villages” (a few houses together) and fill up stations. One day we arrived at a petrol station, with a notice at the pump: “sorry, diesel is empty, delivery will be tomorrow.”. We just made it to the next station, 100 km further…
See a few pictures, including the eclipse, of our first trip (explanations in Dutch, but easy to understand):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/familie/nl_australia.html
I saw the eclipse in Winnipeg, way back in the 70s. There were all kinds of interesting things happening before and after. The light rippled on the ground just before totality, like the light on the bottom of a swimming pool. I suppose it got cooler too, but hey — Winnipeg in the middle of the winter. Who can tell?
I live in Minneapolis, which Google Maps says is six hours from the eclipse path on I-35. I’ll stock up the day before (jerky, energy bars, and bottled water) and if the weather looks good around Kansas City, I’ll head on down early. If I day-trip it, with luck, most people will already be there. If I leave immediately, I’ll probably get out ahead of them and be home that night. But just in case, I’ll pack a bag.
Good luck with that.
http://www.businessinsider.com/solar-eclipse-car-traffic-travel-delay-maps-2017-8/#the-maps-are-based-on-another-analysis-he-did-that-shows-how-close-americans-are-to-the-path-of-totality-and-how-long-it-would-take-to-make-the-journey-to-it-2
The DISTANCE normally takes 6.5 hours, WITHOUT the nuttery of the eclipse going on. The Minneapolis to eclipse center line looks like 6-8 and really close to 8-10. And that’s ONE WAY. I doubt you’ll find a hotel in either direction so I’d pack a blanket and plan on sleeping in my car too.
Here’s a supposed online real time traffic site that might be more accurate.
http://traveler.modot.org/map/
If you are looking to see the eclipse, make sure that the weather report where you are going is for clear sky’s and no clouds…I was, in 1970 – drove 300 miles to Perry FL and it was much less than spectacular because of the cloud cover…Check the weather reports…
Just sayin…
If it is cloudy, it will not get darker than a thunder storm approaching – believe me…
Probably because of the light coming in from both sides of the total path…
As many people have realized here the air is being let out of the AGW ‘Climate Change’ balloon and this has recently led to an catastrophic decline in levels of alarm for the human race. Added to this the recalcitrant extreme weather is not doing its part in maintaining the mean levels of alarm.
Compared to the peak of human alarm during the Dark Ages the ALARM summation index (Global Ordinary National Alarm Data Summation (Gonads)) has catastrophically slipped to new lows. Normal levels alarm must be reasserted lest we are lulled into the complacent idea that the foreseeable future will be OK.
Listen people! It is your duty to stay ALARMED.
Now stay put and voice your worry and anguish. Why do you think your betters allowed you to have FarseBook, Twatter, Blogs, MSWindows, and all the other modern communications methods? Just so your betters could spy on you while YOU have fun? If nothing else think of the alarmingly huge amount of worry-debt burden YOU will be leaving for YOUR children — leaving for all future generations!
Ask yourself, did previous generations struggle through the horrors of their awful lives with most of them dying miserable painful deaths just so YOU could have fun? I think not!!
Start now and do your bit to ensure levels of personal guilt, despair, and ALARM are raised to new unprecedented highs, allowing us all to return to normal sleepless nights of anguish.
REMEMBER!!
You have been warned — there will be repercussions!
~~~~~~~~~~
Have a nice time worrying about that solar eclipse, and remember in past times an eclipse was an evil omen signaling a great catastrophe. Try to have some guilt-ridden fun.
I got a box of chicken bones, a flask of something that smells awful, and a bowl I’m supposed to light a fire in using the urine of a mermaid and half a dozen Altoids, off of Ebay for the low price of $19.99 + $24 shipping and handling. Supposed to protect me and mine from all “Eclipse Evil”. Unfortunately the dog found it and now I just have a dog with heavily dilated pupils and a bowl with drool in it. &^%$ dog.
For Sale:
One bottle of mermaid urine and an unopened box of Altoids.
You really do have to keep that stuff away from your dog Aphan… 🙂
Tell HIM that! 🙂
Ever really stop and think about who you “owe” Tom? I never did. I just went along with the idea I owed someone, but I never met the guy. Eventually, I didn’t owe anyone and the people who owed me didn’t send Christmas cards or anything.
How is this all supposed to work anyway? I figure I’ll be dead before I know who owes me stuff, and why?
As every trendy lefty knows you owe it all to humanity….what ever that is supposed to mean.
This idea is my reaction to what my relatives and their uber-left leaning friends have been saying at me for far to long. According to them I’m on the borderline of being a sociopath as I fail to subscribe to their efforts at indoctrination. What I do fear is that these people will gain more political power.
Wasn’t it Obama who (in)famously said something like “You didn’t build this”?
“added to this the recalcitrant extreme weather is not doing its part in maintaining the mean levels of alarm.”
Say, there haven’t been the usual number of hurricanes and tornadoes for this time of year. WUWT?
Shocking FACT right? Lol
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/tropical-cyclones/201706
Here’s tornado data….busier year than you’d think, but the data isn’t final:
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/tornadoes/201706
On site , camping just outside Casper WY for the eclipse. Hope many of you fellow science nerds are able to view totality as well. Cheers!
Well, you can bet Harry Ford will be there with bells on! He’s quite the accomplished pilot and he lives right down the road from Jackson…
Hope you enjoy it! I’m north of Casper at home, staying away from the zoo in town!
Good luck Charles. Tomorrow I am flying to Kansas City, where my bother lives, and he, I and my son who will join us from Chicago will try to see the eclipse on Monday.
Bon Voyage!
Hoping for a Mr. Blue Sky were you will be at!
Hey, we only get 80% occlusion in Southern Ontario but it occurs during one of the golf tournaments that I and the committee have organized. I have slipped a welding glass into my bag for the occasion. I hope the occlusion is auspicious for winning some money.
Have a good trip Charles, and make sure you pay more attention to the trip than the eclipse. Astronomical events are predictable hundreds and thousands of years in advance, but every moment of your life is unique and no one can tell you what’s going to happen next.
Cherish that.
Mazda’s New “Skyactiv-X” Gasoline-Powered Diesel Engine
On August 8, on the finance-oriented website Seeking Alpha, at https://seekingalpha.com/article/4096302-mazdas-new-invention-diesel-without-diesel?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-widget, Anton Wohlman posted an article titled “Mazda’s New Invention: Diesel, Without The Diesel.” Its summary contains the following:
Here’s an impressive 3-minute video touting the “Skyactiv” diesel technology that preceded its new “Skyactiv-X” announcement: https://www.mazda.se/filmer/technology/skyactiv-diesel/
Mazda’s August 8 press release is here: https://insidemazda.mazdausa.com/press-release/mazda-announces-long-term-vision-technology-development-sustainable-zoom-zoom-2030/ Its Item #2, about 2/3 down the page, describes the technological innovations and desirable features of the “Skyactiv-X Next-Generation Engine.” The key innovations are “maximizing the zone in which compression ignition is possible and achieving a seamless transition between compression ignition and spark ignition.”
Here is a January 13 article on Autoguide.com, at http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2017/01/mazda-s-new-engine-tech-will-cut-fuel-consumption-by-a-third.html, titled “Mazda’s New Engine Tech Will Cut Fuel Consumption By a Third.” It states:
Greater efficiency implies lower CO2 emissions. Several commenters defend the viability of EVs, partially in response to the first commenter on the Seeking Alpha thread, Yambol, who wrote:
I don’t know if this is a flash in the pan, like the sort of never-heard-of-again breakthroughs sometimes featured in Popular Mechanics-type magazines. The expanded partnership with Toyota and the new North American factory they’re building gives me hope that this has real substance.
Roger –
Thanks. I can say “wow!” too. I watch for this sort of thing and you caught me by surprise. Very good story and not one I’ve found in the MSM or even alternative news sources. The thanks are sincere.
If this technology performs as claimed, I’d guess it spells then end of EV’s for at least 20 years. If it performs as claimed.
That’s a big if, but off the wall miracles have happened in the past…
Roger,
Seems interesting, as they use the increased compression ratio of a diesel engine (= efficiency), without the extra particulates caused by direct injection of the fuel. The trick seems to be to adjust the moment of ignition with a spark for a lean mixture, as a rich mixture will start burning too soon and a lean mixture too late – or not at all – for best performance.
As that is -relative- easy to implement (diesel engines already use demand dependent timing changes for injection or even multiple injections), I suppose that will not take long before on the market…
The only drawback I see is that NOx will go up as you have most of the time a lot of excess air to reach the high compression, thus de-NOx measures will be necessary…
Alternative could be that they recycle part of the exhaust to reduce excess oxygen – and thus NOx -. As far as I remember, VW does something like that…
“I suppose that will not take long before on the market…”
My guess is that it will first be sold in Japan. it’s likely IMO that prototypes are working there now.
I can usually squeeze close to 50 mpg out of my 2014 Mazda 3 driving carefully with the current generation Skyactiv. So the next generation is looking at 65 mph, without hybrid technology add ons. Kudos to Mazda for taking their own path of innovation and not following the EV crowd.
IIRC the previous Skyactive engines from Mazda the compression ratio is more or less the same in petrol and diesel engines, about 16:1, both fitted with turbocharger. In a departure from mass production engines is that the inlet and exhaust vales and ports are “ported” for better gas flow. Also the exhaust headers/extractors are gas flowed, tuned mandrel bent steel tubes rather than a cast iron block, to improve efficiency.
Sign in Rufus, OR: No fuel for 94 miles, i.e. Madras. A zoo in Madras, with Japanese and Eiropean tourists taking over the Warm Springs Imdian Reservation.
I hope you are able to get photographs of the stars behind the shadow of the moon as it eclipses the sun as depicted in “The Science Channel” promotion of their coverage of the eclipse. That would be a WOW! moment.
Just in case the formation and strengthening of Harvey is blamed on global warming (because it will be), here’s the water temp anomaly…
http://icons-ak.wxug.com/data/images/sst_basin/at_anom_mm.gif