Cute Animals

A friend sent these by email — a nice collection of incredibly cute animal pictures; 16 of them along the same lines as the sample you see here. You'll need a dose of insulin after viewing these!

Cheer

Reading one of James Lileks' columns, I discovered that he has a website he calls the "Institute of Official Cheer" that is, in fact, cheering to peruse. I particularly enjoyed the Gallery of Regrettable Food. From the Institute's page:

Here's where you can learn all about the Institute, its mission and its history. Not required reading to enjoy the Institute's fine products, but when you've burned through everything else, this might make a little more sense.

Don't miss it!

Rhma

A few weeks ago, Michael Yon first wrote about Rhma, a little Iraqi girl with a serious health problem. Later, he wrote about the help Rhma was receiving from many people — including a bunch of American soldiers — to get her back to the U.S. for the medical care she needed, but that their efforts were being thwarted by glitches and bureaucracy. Today he writes of some success breaking through the problems:

I wrote about it, knowing that if Americans knew that Rhma was stuck in Jordan, our good people would not let that stand. Once again, the good and generous nature of average Americans glimmered the moment they found the problem. People all over the United States took it upon themselves to call their congressmen and senators, many of whom interceded on behalf of a sick little girl who had faith that Americans would take care of her.

A nice story for a Thursday morning. And thank you, Michael Yon, for the fine job you're doing. I wish we had more like you...

Estonian Bogs

The photo at right is of a bog in Estonia, taken with a digital camera dangling below a kite. It's been entered in a contest on visualization in science:

With its intricate patterns within patterns and striking colors, the winning photograph bears a distinct resemblance to a fractal. But scale back — to about 150 meters above the ground — and the sinuous landforms of Estonia's Männikjärve bog begin to reveal themselves.

In the peat bogs of east-central and southwestern Estonia, autumn works a change in the color scheme: Cotton grass turns gold, hardwoods in surrounding forests turn orange and red, and pine trees remain silvery green. The bog water, in sharp contrast, stays an acidic brown. Geologist James Aber of Emporia State University in Kansas recognized the potential beauty of the landscape when he was collaborating with Estonian colleagues to study the glacial geomorphology and geotectonics of the region. But to capture it, he knew he'd need to get off the ground--or at least, his camera would.

The contest entry is here, and more on do-it-yourself aerial photography from kites is here. I'd like to try this myself, though I'm a little worried about how well the camera would survive!

From Boing Boing.

Well I'll Be...

"It is now commonly accepted that was not the right path. We are now trying to change the path while doing as little damage as we can."

So said NASA Administrator Michael Griffin on Tuesday, speaking about the space shuttle system in the International Space Station (ISS).

Oh, my. Over $100 billion down the rat hole, and finally someone in charge at NASA has the gumption to stand up straight and admit it.

As many of you know, this has been a soapbox topic for me for many years. I was skeptical of the space shuttle's design from its first public disclosure (anything that depends on 30,000+ hand-fitted and fragile ceramic tiles can't be reliable and cost effective!), and I got more skeptical as it became clear that the shuttle would miss every design target. The important misses: cost per kilogram to orbit, cost of development, and payload size: all of them were far off the mark, so far that the old Saturn V (Apollo's booster) would have outperformed the shuttle in every category.

But the shuttle program (and after it, the ISS) became political issues, with direction decided for reasons that had little or nothing to do with science, techonological development, or a national objective. The last time we saw those driving NASA was in the 60's; since then they've been more of an afterthought than a driver.

And I still don't know whether Michael Griffin will be able to change that, or even if he wants to. But his stated desire to get us off the shuttle/ISS treadmill and onto something more pragmatic (if I'm interpreting his words correctly) is a good start. I hope he can pull it off!

S.S. Estonia

Yesterday was the 11th anniversary of the sinking of the ferry S.S. Estonia. On September 28, 1994, it sank in the Baltic Sea. Over 800 people died that day, most of them Estonians, many of them children. Estonia is a small country; to have so many people lost is proportionally a huge disaster — roughly as if 115,000 Americans were lost in some horrible accident. The photo of the bell, at right, is from the monument on Tahkuna, Hiiumaa — the point of land within Estonia that is closest to where the ferry sank. The faces on the bell are in memory of the children who died that day. The reasons for the sinking are still very much in dispute, as you can see by this press report from yesterday:

TALLINN, September 28 (Itar-Tass) -- The relatives of those who perished in the Estonia ferry disaster of eleven years ago have urged another, independent investigation into what proved the biggest post-war loss of human life on the Baltic Sea.

The relatives voiced the demand in a resolution adopted at a conference in Tallinn on the eve of the tragedy that occurred in the Gulf of Finland on September 28, 1994.

“For the sake of restoring justice and coping with the moral duty to those dead and their relatives the investigation of the ferry disaster must be resumed under the supervision of an independent Estonian judge,” the relatives said.

The ferry disaster claimed 852 lives. There were 137 survivors.

A panel of investigators from Finland, Sweden and Estonia arrived at the conclusion that the ferry’s loss was due to faulty locks of the front gates of the ship’s car deck. Waves tore the gates away and the water that flooded the car deck caused a dangerous list. The ferry eventually capsized and sank.

Versions explaining the ferry’s loss are many – from collision with an unidentified submarine to conspiracy by smugglers of drugs and rare earth metals.

Many suspect there might have been an explosion on board. Evidence to this effect emerged after examination of fragments of the ship’s hull held at the request of Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine and the findings of expeditions that followed.

The Baltic countries have an agreement on declaring the hull of the ferry as a mass grave and on ending any further probes.

I've read a lot about the ferry sinking over the years. It happened to occur just a few days after my first visit to Estonia, and has been a frequent topic of discussion with my Estonian friends (none of whom had relatives on the ferry). Conspiracy theories swirl around the sinking, some sounding James Bond-ish, with secret agents using the ferry to bring back equipment purchased from the ex-Soviets. Encouraging the conspiracy theories are some acknowledged intelligence activities on the S. S. Estonia, including some that remain classified and therefore undisclosed. Wikipedia has a good article on the incident and its aftermath, with many links. City Paper (an Estonian publication) has a good chronology. Another interesting article that I've published on my blog is available here.

If you find yourself still curious about the sinking of the S.S. Estonia, try googling "estonia ferry sank 1994"; that got me 11,900 hits when I tried it this morning. That should cure anyone's curiousity!

Click on the photo for a larger view of the photo. More photos of the monument are available on my personal web site (scroll down toward the bottom of this page).