Suspect Device appears to be the website of a brilliant comic artist, Greg Peters. Acid humor – but then again, he lives in Louisiana. He’s got good reason.
A reminder that while we have get things in order wherever we live, the people in NOLA and thereabouts still need our help. Our impression – based largely on friends that have been going down to help rebuild – is that they’re not getting what they need from the federal government – which, in theory – represents the national community.
 generates maps of gas and “hazardous liquid” pipelines.
We’ve yet to sort out the definitions (precisely what “gas” and “hazardous liquid” mean), the map viewer (you see we haven’t provided a sample map), and what’s in the restricted access database (the main page provides for government and contractor login – it may just be for submissions).
Check back for more on this. Anyone who knows their way around .asp applications – and how we can export images – we’d be happy to have some assistance.
On Feb. 15, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) unveiled its new design of the international symbol for radiation. Dozens of accidental exposures to radiation motivated this change. In 1987, for example, four people in Brazil died when they dismantled an abandoned cancer treatment machine, and in 2001, four men fell ill after they disassembled generators at a Russian nuclear-powered lighthouse.
“Too many people are injured each year by finding large sources of radiation and not understanding what the trefoil — the international symbol for radiation — means,†says Carolyn Mac Kenzie, a radiation source specialist with IAEA. “Many people are either injured or killed in these events.â€
Initiated in 2001, the project was intended to supplement the familiar radiation symbol, the yellow-on-black three-cornered trefoil, which was designed to be simple and conspicuous to prevent it from getting lost among the plethora of easily ignored warnings. But IAEA discovered that simplicity presented problems. Children all over the world consistently identified the radiation hazard symbol as a propeller.
The new triangular sign features the trefoil with radiating waves, a skull and crossbones, and a running man against a bright red background. Graphic designers and radiation experts spent five years refining the symbol to give a clear warning to anyone who might stumble across a radioactive device. The Gallup Institute tested the new design on 1,650 people in 11 countries to confirm that all population groups, regardless of age, sex or level of education, knew immediately that the symbol conveyed danger. The symbol is intended to be universal, and to especially protect individuals whose cultural backgrounds have not prepared them to fear the trefoil, or even radioactivity, Mac Kenzie says.
IAEA intends to place the symbol on all new small radioactive sources, such as food irradiators and cancer treatment machines. The sign will not be plainly visible on the outside of these machines to avoid alarming people in everyday settings; instead, it will be apparent inside the machines if dismantled.
The new radioactive symbol is not slated for use on nuclear waste drums or nuclear waste storage sites, such as the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage facility in Nevada and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico that houses military radioactive waste. For these long-term storage facilities, researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy have been working with archaeologists, linguists and astronomers, among other varied experts, on a symbol that might suggest danger 10,000 years from now — not an easy task. Like the new IAEA symbol, the overarching goal is to come up with a symbol that would convey danger to people who could not read nor understand common languages. “It is probable that [the new radiation symbol] would be incorporated†into that design, says Roger Nelson, chief scientist at WIPP.
Diesel fuel, delivered to United States troops on the field in Iraq. In this post At Defense Tech, Haninah Levine discussed the friction created by the cost of delivering fuel in the field – and the alternatives – including portable solar and wind generators.
No reference of the Navy’s Solar Eagle proposal – to use networked solar panels – on the roof of every building in Iraq – to make the Iraqi power grid more robust and resistant to insurgent attack. You can find a link to the proposal at FAS (the Federation of American Scientists).
And a thoughtful discussion of the Solar Eagle proposal here on the Kaedrin weblog.
Ann Coulter’s function may be to be so unreasonable that anyone not quite as unreasonable seems reasonable by comparison. So points out Rebecca Blood in a post explaining the “Overton Window” – something you might have suspected existed – but didn’t know the name for.
the Overton Window is related to my usual argument in favor of certain radical groups: they open up an avenue for discussion and consideration. People may reject PETA’s premise, for example, that animals should never be used in testing of any kind. But in doing so, those same people may decide that—while medical testing on animals is acceptable—certain forms of testing on animals in the manufacture of cosmetics should be eliminated. Come to think of it, I suppose this is the purpose Ann Coulter serves for the far right. She’s so very extreme that almost anyone else appears to be reasonable by comparison. See? I told you this was an idea that kept on giving.
I believe I recall Dave Foreman of Earth First making this point in an article published in Whole Earth Review – but haven’t been able to locate it.
Link to Rebecca Blood’s post here.
The Overton Window explained at the Mackinac Institute, where he worked.
Shaila Dewan has a good piece in this morning’s Times, describing difficulties less-affluent communities are having upgrading the 911 systems – and the attendant consequences.
The piece includes an excellent description of the various flavors and vintages of 911 systems. One particularly useful feature in the newer systems
At the next level is Enhanced 911 Phase I, as it is called, which provides the call-back number of wireless callers and the location of the cellular tower their signal has reached. Phase II provides a more precise location, accurate within 50 to 300 meters depending on the technology the carrier has chosen.
[Kevin J. Martin, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, said in Washington this week that he would propose new rules to improve accuracy.] [in orig.]
Experts are laying the groundwork for what they call Next Generation 911, which will better handle Internet-based calls, text messages, cellphone photos and other forms of communication already in common use.
“Deaf people are using text messaging,†Rick Jones, the operations director for the national association, said by way of example. “They can’t talk to 911.â€
For now, though, many counties are focused on Phase II, which shows a caller’s location on a computer map, allowing emergency responders to find people who either do not know where they are or cannot say. Beyond saving lives, it promises to put a stop to chronic prank callers or tell dispatchers when many calls are coming from the same area, which happens when multiple cellphone users try to report the same car accident or heart attack, threatening to overload the system.
For those not familiar with the New York City area, “Indian Point” is not
a rhetorical conclusion of Native Americans, but the name of a nuclear power plant.
Another week, another set of challenges for Indian Point – first, problems with a siren test Monday and then an unplanned reactor shutdown yesterday.
The nuclear plants ran into what Indian Point officials hope was a glitch when 123 of the new 150 emergency sirens failed to successfully complete an operational test.
The sirens are required to be ready to go by a week from Sunday, and county emergency officials said they hadn’t expected to see a step backward so close to the deadline.
“This test was clearly disappointing,” Anthony Sutton, Westchester County commissioner of emergency services, said of the Monday morning test. “We expected it to go in a positive direction, and it went in a negative direction.”
Then about 4:15 a.m. yesterday, Indian Point 3 workers shut down that nuclear reactor as it was going back to full power from a 24-day refueling outage.
There were low water levels in the plant’s steam generators, where steam is used to help produce electricity.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission and local emergency officials commended nuclear workers for their quick action, noting that unplanned shutdowns occur more frequently when plants go back online than during routine operation.
Jim Steets, a spokesman for Entergy Nuclear Northeast, which has owned and operated Indian Point since 2001, said the shutdown went smoothly and the appropriate notifications were made to the NRC and county officials, but that there were no safety concerns.
– snip –
“We don’t think this is a matter of the sirens not activating,” said Steets. “We think that it was largely about polling.”
The sirens must communicate with a central point to let county officials know they’ve sounded. Without that polling from the 150 locations, police and fire officials can’t be sure if the sirens alerted residents about an emergency at the nuclear plant.
“If it comes up red on the computer screen, that means it didn’t sound as far as we’re concerned,” said Sutton, the commissioner. “That was the biggest trouble we had with the old system. We don’t want to be in that same place with the new system.”
The nuclear plant operator seems to be arguing that – it’s not that the siren’s didn’t work – it’s that in polls, people didn’t admit to hearing them. It’s a polling problem. If that’s true -is the implication that there’s no accurate way to tell whether or not the sirens work?
Nuclear power plant operator does poorly on NRC drill – complains to NRC, wants grade revised upwards. There are a number of interesting issues here. For the moment, we’ll focus on one:
Matthew Wald of the Times reports that David Lochbaum, of the Union of Concerned Scientists
, points out that since the reactor has a water sensor nine inches off the floor, a leak of 150 gallons per minute would take 90 minutes to be detected by the sensor.
Lochbaum has been with UCS since 1996 – but spent 17 years working in nuclear power plants.
We read BoingBoing every day, and we’revery disappointed that they – that Cory Doctorow fellow – has given away one of the major secrets of the international Jewish Conspiracy: the bagel is actual an information storage device. It’s how Jews have always done so well in school, and in business. Why Stanley Kaplan always told people to bring something to eat (“bring a bagel”) to the SAT. Now our secret is out.
Via BoingBoing.
Neither for medieval reenactments, nor for the recreational depravities so common in New York. these chain mail gloves seem well suited to rescue and recovery work, although their intended or normal use is for carpenters and butchers. Here’s the review from CoolTools.
And they’re apparently dishwasher-safe. From Lee Valley, which we’ve found to be a reliable and competitively-priced vendor.
Beautiful images from Stanza  – generated by an array of sensors placed around a city. Stanza – we’re not sure yet if that’s he, she, orthey – appears to be using a variety of sensors – gathering data about noise, light, radiation, and other things.
Here at Popular Logistics, we don’t know much about art, but we do know what we like. And these images are beautiful. But since we’re not here to talk about art (or qualified), we point out the following. The late Jack Maple demonstrated that it was possible to radically reduce crime with good data, paper maps, and colored push-pins. And available resources. Stanza’s data maps
could be used to similar effect to address all manner of problems.
UK’s SolarLab has developed a solar boat which is
[a]ble to run itself in all daylight conditions, the SolarShuttle has reserve power for night-time running and even generates surplus energy that can be fed back into the national grid. The Serpentine SolarShuttle’s maiden voyage triggered an unprecedented response among politicians, the media and the UK public, all of whom have been inspired by the future potential of solar transport.
(This is a Flash-heavy site – so the link’s to the main URL – then navigate via “Projects”)
More demonstrative photograph coming shortly.
Why aren’t we using this technology to shuttle tourists to and from Liberty Island and Battery Park?
Apparently the British sailors captured by the Iranians don’t speak their native English too good. At perhaps there’s something about being captured by the Iranians and induced to “confess” and “apologize” that’s limiting their language skills.
Professor Mark Liberman of Penn makes a strong, detailed case that the that the statements were dictated by the Iranians. [And quotes Niall Ferguson, writing in The Telegraph, referring to the statements as being written in “Borat-ese,” a construction we’ll try to work into conversation.] As the child of non-native English speakers, we’re fond of English mildly mangled.
It’s the abuse of prisoners – by Iran and by coalition forces – which gives us pause. Let’s hope that during a week in which at least two religions celebrate holidays which consider the plight of prisoners – things improve for all of them.
Statpacks has made some of its packs and waistpacks with reflective material, and added the option of LED/fiber optic illumination. Here’s one of their models, the Manager.   We’ve seen other trauma bags with one or two strips of Scotchlite – but these are the first we’ve seen where virtually the entire outer surface is reflective.
They’re careful not to suggest that this would comply with ANSI Class III requirements – because a back or pack isn’t generally going to be visible 360 degrees around the person carrying it. We also don’t know whether they’re using prismatic, higher-visibility reflective materials – like Reflexite – or not-as-reflective material like Scotchlite.
But this is an excellent design innovation. Anyone who’s watched news footage of EU member country emergency workers has seen pant legs and sleeves ringed with reflective material, on every hem and up, down, and around each garment component. Last night in Brooklyn, we saw a near-miss – a uniformed NYPD officer, trying to keep an intersection clear for ambulances and fire apparatus – nearly get hit by a marked NYPD car. Both cops – the one in the street and the driver – were doing their jobs right – but better “conspicuity” features on uniforms would reduce this risk. We would like to take credit for coining the term “conspicuity.” We wish we had.
