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Comment Solar flares? (Score 3) 138

by mchummer (#65336769) Attached to: Widespread Power Outage Is Reported in Spain, France and Portugal
Given the current solar activity, I would suggest a solar flare as the likely cause of the outage. Radio propagation is currently unstable and could worsen. It's prudent to anticipate potential outages affecting long systems such as power grids, communication networks, and even undersea cables. I recall a significant solar event in the early 1960s that painted the night sky a vivid blood red, disrupted many radio and TV channels, and triggered circuit breakers in parts of the Northeastern US and Canada power grid.

Comment Flying Coffins (Score 1) 297

by mchummer (#65238141) Attached to: Elon Musk Says SpaceX's First Mission to Mars Will Launch Next Year
Elon Muskâ(TM)s starships might ultimately be nothing more than flying coffins. Humanity still lacks crucial knowledge about the long-term effects of space travel and how to safeguard larger crews on journeys to Mars. His vision, while ambitious, feels like propagandaâ"selling a dream of the future to secure investments for today. The human body wasnâ(TM)t designed for prolonged weightlessness; circulatory collapse becomes a real threat over time. Add to that the devastating effects of bone density loss, collagen deterioration, and relentless cosmic radiation. This isnâ(TM)t the plot of a science fiction movieâ"these are real, unresolved challenges. A mission to Mars isnâ(TM)t just ambitious, it may be perilous to the point of being fatal

Comment Itâ(TM)s more than greed thatâ(TM)s the (Score 1) 163

Trumps promoting Muskâ(TM)s Starlink l as a replacement the data link for the American Air Traffic Control System. The problem is that Starlink - Muskâ(TM)s satellite-based system - could be knocked out with current ground, and space-based weapon systems in a conflict. This systemâ(TM)s satellites are not hardened, secure systems and their use would be a risk to National Security. This is yet another example of how the Trump administration is set to weaken American defense systems. ðYsâsï

Submission + - How Japanese Scientists Are Monitoring Fukushima Babies For Radiation Exposure (medium.com)

Submitted by KentuckyFC
KentuckyFC writes: Parents in the Fukushima region of Japan are intensely worried that their children may be consuming food and water contaminated with radiation. But whole body scanners used to monitor the internal radiation levels of adults don't work for children who cannot stand up inside them. What's more, the machines are not sensitive enough to detect problematic radiation levels in children. That's because children metabolise substances faster than adults and have a lower mass to start with, so the levels of radiation in their bodies tend to be lower. For example, if each adult ingests 3 Becquerels of cesium-137 every day, the internal levels would reach an equilibrium of about 400 Bq/adult body. But a similar intake for a 1-year old child would result in an equilibrium level of about 60 Bq/body, well below the 250 Bq/body sensitivity of adult scanners. Now a team of engineers has built a whole body scanner that is sensitive enough for the job and that children can play inside for the 4 minutes necessary to scan them. And they say the results of the first 100 scans of Fukushima children (average age 4.2 years) are reassuring--none show any evidence of cesium-137. So far.

Submission + - WWII Bugatti 100P: Jet Fighter that Could've Won Battle of Britain for the Nazis (ibtimes.co.uk) 2

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: A team of engineers is working together to recreate the Bugatti Veyron (or Bugatti 100P), an art deco-era fighter plane designed for World War II that would have broken the air speed record in 1940 — only the plane was never flown.

Featuring forward pitched wings, a zero-drag cooling system and computer-directed flight control, plane was capable of reaching an air speed of 500mph, which would have made it the fastest and most advanced plane of its time.

Submission + - Sherlock Holmes finally in the public domain in the US 1

Submitted by ferrisoxide.com
ferrisoxide.com writes: As reported on the Australian ABC news website, film-makers in the US are finally free to work on Sherlock Holmes stories without paying a licencing free to the estate of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle after a ruling by Judge Ruben Castillo.

A quirk of US copyright law kept 10 stories out of the public domain, on the basis that these stories where continuously developed. In his ruling Judge Castillo opined that only the "story elements" in the short stories published after 1923 were protected and that everything else in the Holmes canon was "free for public use" — including the characters of Holmes and Watson.

Holmes scholar Leslie Klinger, who challenged the estate, celebrated the ruling.

"Sherlock Holmes belongs to the world," Mr Klinger said in a statement posted on his Free Sherlock website.

IANAL, but the ruling of Judge Castillo that "adopting Conan Doyle's position would be to extend impermissibly the copyright of certain character elements of Holmes and Watson beyond their statutory period," is surely going to have implications across US copyright law. Mark Twain must be twisting and writhing in his grave.
Media

1928 Time Traveler Caught On Film? 685

Posted by samzenpus from the I-hate-time-travel-stories dept.
Many of you have submitted a story about Irish filmmaker George Clarke, who claims to have found a person using a cellphone in the "unused footage" section of the DVD The Circus, a Charlie Chaplin movie filmed in 1928. To me the bigger mystery is how someone who appears to be the offspring of Ram-Man and The Penguin got into a movie in the first place, especially if they were talking to a little metal box on set. Watch the video and decide for yourself.

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