How does a Fire Chief get ice to fight a fire?

This picture came from this IPCC report.

Here is the critical (click here) information and projections on climate change as outlined by ‘The Physical Science Basis’ of the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment on climate change.....

I am fairly confident 'ice fires' have to be more difficult to fight because so much of the water is taken out of the effort by the temperature.

I can't imagine the hoses being easy to handle. I would think fire hydrants might be issues as well. 

Ice is considered a rock in scientific circles. Fighting rocks to put out a fire won't really work, will it? 

Perhaps the fire fighting science of 'ice fires' needs evaluation to find a safety margin for the responders and an effective way to USE ice to smother the fire.
Rocks don't breath.

Evidently, the USA has heroes on both coasts.

We have Americans risking their lives to save others. All are facing Earth's challenges. This article by the New York Times is rather incredible. They did great work on this reporting.

Search and rescue is extremely dangerous work. I don't care the type disaster, it is incredibly dangerous work. In the case of the landslide there are times when it seems thankless. I appreciate their dedication and efforts to resolve the final moments of so many. Their work is very important to understand the profound tragedy and the people we loss. I thank them for being careful with their own lives while being willing to perform the work necessary. I am sure the hill is still being evaluated for any more instability.

Aerial image that shows the massive area the hillside has covered.

By KIRK JOHNSON

MARCH 26, 2014

 

ARLINGTON, Wash. — Pam Sanford (click here) was waiting for news about her brother, Joseph Miller, among the missing since Saturday in the Oso landslide, when a police detective called asking for his dental records. 

Had he been found? The detective would not say.

And so she waited some more — along with scores of other relatives and friends of the people missing in what is turning into one of the worst landslides in the nation’s history. They wait for the telephone call. Or for the possessions found by volunteers. Or just to know the scale of this catastrophe — whether the final death toll will be closer to the 16 bodies recovered by Wednesday evening, or the more than 100 people still unaccounted for... 

Boston was having hurricane strength gusts and it was nearly impossible to fight the fire.

Wind Map today (click here)

By Maria Cramer, Kevin Cullen, Akilah Johnson, Evan Allen, John R. Ellement, Travis Andersen, Martin Finucane, Jacqueline Tempera and Catalina Gaitan 
Globe Staff and GlobeCorrespondents
March 26, 2014

Two Boston firefighters died (click here) today while battling a wind-whipped nine-alarm blaze that raced through a brownstone in the city’s fashionable Back Bay neighborhood, city officials said.

Lt. Edward J. Walsh, 43, of West Roxbury, and Firefighter Michael R. Kennedy, 33, of Hyde Park were killed in the ferocious blaze, officials said this evening at a news conference....

Does the storm system look a little familiar?

UNISYS Water Vapor GOES East Satellite (click here for 12 hour loop - thank you)
March 27, 2014
0030.19z 

Frigid air mixed with Equatorial water vapor.

UNYSIS Water Vapor North and West Hemisphere Satellite (click here for 12 hour loop - thank you)
March 27, 2014
0030.19z

This country can't operate without people that accept danger into their lives to benefit others. It is rather amazing to realize the country we are and how we care. My deepest sympathies to the families and friends that have lost dear people in their lives.

This was the rather incredible reporting by The Boston Globe. I have only one thought about the deaths in Boston. I am not an expert to firefighting. But, I know how completely terrible the winds are when a very violent fire exists. Firefighters in wildfires know the incredible dangers trying to fight fire fueled by wind. 

The Firefighter Managers and Supervisors need to be sure they are not fighting these fires on old standards. I do not blame anyone for the deaths in Boston. They were tragic. But, I do believe if this was one building and contained to be one building with a inferno inside; perhaps the fire responders should accept the fate of that building rather than risking the fate of their responders. That is my only thought. 

The fire happened, the response happened, the wind was not part of the normal response pattern. It was not a 'normal storm' from the references of the past. Perhaps consulting with wildfire fighters can provide some insight to wind and how best to protect from such infernos. 

Even in the city and perhaps especially in the city, high rises and the streets within them become wind tunnels. I know everyone in Boston worked very hard to contain this fire and I know why. I am only stating perhaps this response should be evaluated. The firefighters not only had normal wind found in the city, but, also the added wind from the storm. There is no wind map to measure that I can show you.

Just how big is the storm? (click here)
When we evaluate storms, one of the ways we note the strength of a low pressure center is by its pressure. Storms exist to balance the atmosphere.
Their purpose is to mix cold and warm air and try to achieve equilibrium. When a large difference in temperature exists and energy from the jet stream rides over this contrast storms often develop....

Historical Art of the USA

Burial of DeSoto (click here)

Spanish explorer Hernando DeSoto died of a fever while searching for gold in Florida and the territory north of the Gulf of Mexico. To protect his body from enemies, his men buried him at night in the Mississippi River, which he had been the first European to discover. (1542)

A favorite argument the right wing frequently points to as a reason to believe God was speaking through the Founding Fathers is the expression of art throughout the Capital Building. I guess they believe if God was speaking through the Founding Fathers (whom were not ordained by any religious organization) then God is speaking through them. That is called Self-Righteous. But, that isn't the point here.

There is no doubt a large population of Christians living in the USA. The US Constitution states every citizen has Freedom of Religion. It doesn't mandate anyone to belong to a religious organization or adhere to any particular religious beliefs because the Founding Fathers left all that behind in England. 

However, a frequent rant out of the USA southern members of Congress, be they US House or US Senate, is that God has control of the USA. They believe that. No one says they can't. However, more frequent than not these members seek to invoke the Bible as their guiding documents. They better not be. That is called, "The Laws of Man." (excuse the gender bias - thank you) 

Where do we see the Laws of Men in other regions of the Earth? Many, right? Tribal elders and an Ayatollah in Iran, but, there is only one place where the USA Constitution exists and that is within the USA borders. 

The art that exists throughout the US Capital and other areas of government is our history is to honor and remember the history of this country. Our history is dense with Christian people, but, we are not a Christian nation. 

It is completely wrong for any legislator, be they Muslim, Baptist, Mormon, Catholic, Methodist, Jewish or non-religious to place a far different book as the basis of our democracy. We as a country separate ourselves from religion with our Constitution. If legislation is passed to enact religious precepts before that of the "Rule of Law" it is unconstitutional. 

God can be spoken anywhere in the USA, except, in sanctuaries where it is not spoken. God can be stated in reverence when speaking appropriately of those lost and soldiers in battle. God is an expression of benevolence that should not be outlawed from speech. 

Here is proof by the way. Real world proof.

On August 28th (click here) through 31st of the year 2000, two thousand of the world's preeminent religious and spiritual leaders representing the many faith traditions, gathered at the United Nations for a Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders.

Summit Information 1 | Who Attented?

One thousand of the world's leading religious and spiritual figures. Apart from His Holiness Pope John Paul II and The Most Reverend Dr. George Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury, religious leaders who have been approached include Sheikh Ahmed Keftaro, the Grand Mufti of Syria, the Grand Sheikh of Al-Alazar from Cairo, the imans of the mosques of Mecca and Medina, Dr. Abdullah Salehal-Obaid, the secretary of the World Muslim League, the Israel's Chief Rabbi, Israel Meir Lau, the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Orthodox Church, the Most Rev Bartholomew, the Russian Patriarch, His Holiness Alexii II, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Bishop Carlos Belo, the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize winner from East Timor. 

The majority of religious leaders speak about God and peace in the same breath. I believe all religious leaders care about their people.

The point here though is our governing bodies are not religious figures as others are in other nations. That doesn't say they can't be if their religious organization allow them to call their career to be service in goverment, ie: Mike Huckabee. But, the USA Constitution prohibits even those members of Congress to act within constitutional rules of law.

The motto of the USA printed on money, "In God We Trust," is a respectful form of art. It can even be living art in honoring the past and the words of the past. But, it is art and nothing more. There are no holy men or women ordained in the US Capital or any other places in our government. Elected officials and not those 'called by God' are sworn in by taking an oath. There is very little preparation required by the USA Constitution for the election of citizens to office. Religions usually have a preparation period before a person can state they are ready to serve God. 

The Southern Folks run their elections on the basis of 'The Bible" (of one version or another) because their funding sources demand it. Their funding sources demand them to make this a Christian nation or as the Southern Baptist Conventions would state, "Judeo-Christian." Good luck to everyone else. 

The US House floor and US Senate floor is not a soap box for Evangelicals and/or a place for stump speeches. It is unethical to carry out political ambitions from the legislative floor of any house. 

It is time to call this what it is. When a legislator places the Bible ahead of the USA Constitution as a reason for oppression and victimization it is treason. No document is legislated ahead of the USA Constitution. Treason is treason and diverting authority to God is unconstitutional and treason. Evangelizing religion to pandering to political chronies or carrying on with a political directive that is to enhance elections is unethical. It is time the US Senate and the US House file ethics violations for speeches as that made about personal beliefs related to religious content intended to victimize Americans while advocating a legislative agenda to that end.

I am sure there is a Chapel in the Capital building and quite possibly other buildings within our government, however, that is for the convenience of those that practice religion to find solace while working within their legal capacity under the USA Constitution. A Chapel does not turn a hospital into a church or Mosque and it doesn't turn the USA Capital building into a religiously sacred place.

Representative Scalise wasn't there when the Bible was written. Obviously.

The Bible nowhere forbids birth control, either explicitly or implicitly, and we should not add universal rules that are not in Scripture (cf. Psalm 119:1, 9 on the sufficiency of Scripture).

Aleph

1 Blessed are they whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the LORD.  

2 Blessed are they who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart.  

3 They do nothing wrong; they walk in his ways.  

4 You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed.  

5 Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying your decrees!  

6 Then I would not be put to shame when I consider all your commands. 

7 I will praise you with an upright heart as I learn your righteous laws.  

8 I will obey your decrees; do not utterly forsake me.

Beth  

9 How can a young man keep his way pure? By living according to your word.

I find it unfortunate that even after professing himself a penitent man before God and while standing on the Bible as his US Constitution (which is treason by the way) he still makes up his own rules. Isn't it like a Republican to make up their own rules.

Footnotes:

1. Psalm 119:1 This psalm is an acrostic poem, the stanzas of which begin with successive letters of the Hebrew alphabet; moreover, the verses of each stanza begin with the same letter of the Hebrew alphabet. 

Is birth control consistent with the truth that children are a gift from the Lord? (click here)

It is very important to delight in the reality that "children are a gift of the Lord." But some people go further and argue from this that since children are gifts from God, it is wrong to take steps to regulate the timing and number of children one has.
In response, it can be pointed out that the Scriptures also say that a wife is a gift from the Lord (Proverbs 18:22), but that doesn't mean that it is wrong to stay single (1 Corinthians 7:8). Just because something is a gift from the Lord does not mean that it is wrong to be a steward of when or whether you will come into possession of it. It is wrong to reason that since A is good and a gift from the Lord, then we must pursue as much of A as possible. God has made this a world in which tradeoffs have to be made and we cannot do everything to the fullest extent. For kingdom purposes, it might be wise not to get married. And for kingdom purposes, it might be wise to regulate the size of one's family and to regulate when the new additions to the family will likely arrive. As Wayne Grudem (click here) has said, "it is okay to place less emphasis on some good activities in order to focus on other good activities." 

The arguments of Representative Scalise are rhetorical, not based in Biblical context and of his own political preference.

The Southern Baptist Conventions RULES the south. 

Questions? 

The 2010 U.S. Religion Census: (click here) Religious Congregations & Membership Study (RCMS) is a county-by-county enumeration of religious bodies in the US.
 

I think it was very smart to set an enrollment date of March 31 to be sure Americans were paying attention.

I already enrolled, so this doesn't effect me, but, it isn't easy to move a nation to pay attention to important issues that effect their lives. Heck, there can be hurricane warning to evacuate and there is always that percentage that think they can beat the danger.

...Under the move (click here) planned by the administration, some people will be given a special enrollment period, beyond the deadline, if they can show they were not able to enroll because of an error by the federal exchange or by the Department of Health and Human Services. Federal officials allowed a special enrollment period, on a case-by-case basis, for some people who were unable to meet the Dec. 24, 2013, enrollment deadline for coverage starting Jan. 1 of this year....

This is a big decision. Sometimes it is a difficult decision to make. People put it off to the last minute. By making the final enrollment date at March 31, it allowed the administration to extend it in time for April 15th. I think it was very smart to allow the extension to bring on as many Americans as possible to health care. 

...Taxpayers are more willing and able to sign up as they receive tax refunds, Mr. Haile said. Indeed, he said, “our projections indicate that Health and Human Services can meet its target of six million enrollees on the marketplaces only if it allows individuals to continue to sign up through April 15.”...

Malaysian government publishes MH370 details from UK AAIB (click here)

Malaysia’s Ministry of Transport has published an article detailing how Inmarsat helped to pinpoint the southern corridor flight path taken by MH370.

It reports that Inmarsat informed them on 13 March that routine automatic communications between the Inmarsat satellite and MH370 could be used to determine several possible flight paths.

The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) then presented Inmarsat’s most recent findings on 24 March, indicating the southern corridor.

Refined analysis from Inmarsat (click here)
 
In recent days Inmarsat developed a second innovative technique which considers the velocity of the aircraft relative to the satellite. Depending on this relative movement, the frequency received and transmitted will differ from its normal value, in much the same way that the sound of passing car changes as it approaches and psses by. This is called the Doppler effect. The Inmarsat technique analyses the difference between the frequency that the ground station expects to receive and that actually measured. This difference is the result of the Doppler effect and is known as the Burst Frequency Offset....

The Pellitier Family needs to take their daughter home.

The Boston Globe reports.

Here we go again. I cannot let this go unnoticed

Ms. Pelletier Before.

The advocates and attorneys for the Pelletier family are missing the mark. When it comes to children and psychiatric medicine the State of Massachusetts does not have a good record.

Ms. Pelletier needs a her family. Her quality of life has diminished since being a ward of the state.

June 30, 2010
By KATIE HINMAN and KIMBERLY BROWN

Kimberly Brown More from Kimberly »

It may look like (click here) any leafy New England campus, but inside one Massachusetts school for special needs children, the method of teaching at work is anything but ordinary. 

The Boston-area's Judge Rotenberg Center educates and treats enrollees ages 3 to adult, all of whom are struggling with severe emotional, behavior, and psychiatric problems, including autism-like disorders. And for about half of the 250 students here, undesirable behavior means getting hooked up to a special machine and administered an electric shock. 

The skin shock treatment, used only after both a court and the student's parents have approved, has drawn criticism for years. But after the release of a recent study by Mental Disability Rights International, Rotenberg has come under the scrutiny of no less than the United Nations, which is calling the school's practices "torture."...


Genocopies of Mitochondrial Disease (click here)

Because mitochondria perform so many different functions in different tissues, there are literally hundreds of different mitochondrial diseases.  Each disorder produces a spectrum of abnormalities that can be confusing to both patients and physicians in early stages of diagnosis.  Because of the complex interplay between the hundreds of genes and cells that must cooperate to keep our metabolic machinery running smoothly, it is a hallmark of mitochondrial diseases that identical mtDNA mutations may not produce identical diseases.  Genocopies are diseases that are caused by the same mutation but which may not look the same clinically.

Mitochondrial Disease became very controversial itself during the Bush Administration. There is significant evidence in Great Britain that a genetic treatment is effective in REVERSING the disease. Of course, under the Bush White House there was absolutely no genetic treatments allowed in the USA. I have to wonder if this is a continuation of that school of thought. However, the State of Massachusetts has a history of placing young people into institutions and then forgetting about them which allows bizarre treatment of them of which the United Nations has defined as torture.

By Doug Saffir
Boston.com
Staff / March 25, 2014

A judge ruled today that Justina Pelletier, (click here) a Connecticut teen who is the subject of a heated custody dispute, will be placed in the “permanent” custody of the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families.

A report from the Boston Globe said Massachusetts Juvenile Court Judge Joseph Johnston awarded custody of Pelletier to the state. This means the agency will get to “decide whether or when Pelletier should be returned to her West Hartford, Conn., home.” The report also indicated that Pelletier’s parents will not be allowed to appeal the decision until summer.

Johnston’s ruling is in line with a previous ruling that had kept Pelletier in the state’s temporary custody after a dispute over the 15-year-old’s health and how it was being handled....

Ms. Pellitier After.

A cornerstone to pediatric medicine is that the physician is treating the family as well as the child. It is why pediatric rooms in hospitals are frequently furnished with recliner chairs and a place to sleep. There is absolutely nothing preventing a court from ordering family therapy for a child that was doing relatively well at home. It is not uncommon for families to gather around a child that is challenged and seek help at highly regarded hospitals when they feel helpless and frustrated. Adding to the child's psychiatric disintegration by removing those they love and love them is not what I call effective. 

Ms. Pellitier needs to be returned to the environment where she has done best and then with the family in tow attend counseling sessions where life planning can be engaged to bring her adulthood into focus.

World's Greatest Leader

Dr. James Hansen

Top climate scientist James Hansen (click here) tells the story of his involvement in the science of and debate over global climate change. In doing so he outlines the overwhelming evidence that change is happening and why that makes him deeply worried about the future. 

The Department of the Interior celebrates Women's History Month.

From "Silent Spring": (click here)

The rapidity of change and the speed with which new situations are created follow the

impetuous and heedless pace of man rather than the deliberate pace of nature. Radiation is no longer merely the background radiation of rocks, the bombardment of cosmic rays, the ultraviolet of the sun that have existed before there was any life on earth; radiation is now the unnatural creation of man's tampering with the atom. The chemicals to which life is asked to make its adjustment are no longer merely the calcium and silica and copper and all the rest of the minerals washed out of the rocks and carried in rivers to the sea; they are the synthetic creations of man's inventive mind, brewed in his laboratories, and having no counterparts in nature.

To adjust to these chemicals would require time on the scale that is nature's; it would

require not merely the years of a man's life but the life of generations. And even this, were it by some miracle possible, would be futile, for the new chemicals come from our laboratories in an endless stream, almost five hundred annually find their way into actual use in the United States  alone. The figure is staggering and its implications are not easily grasped—500 new chemicals to which the bodies of men and animals are required somehow to adapt each year, chemicals totally outside the limits of biologic experience.

Among them are many that are used in man's war against nature. Since the mid-1940's over 200 basic chemicals have been created for use in killing insects, weeds, rodents, and other organisms described in the modern vernacular as "pests"; and they are sold under several thousand different brand names.

These sprays, dusts, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes—nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the "good" and the "bad," to still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams, to coat the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on in the soil—all this though the intended target may be only a few weeds or insects. Can anyone believe it is possible to lay down such a barrage of poisons on the surface of the earth without making it unfit for all life? They should not be called "insecticides," but "biocides."

They are doing it again. When aren't lions important lions? When they are old or too young to propagate the zoo's ambitions.

Lions eating the remains of Marius the giraffe at Copenhagen zoo last month. Photograph: Gonzales Photo/Demotix/Corbis

Agence France-Presse in Copenhagen 
theguardian.com 
Tuesday 25 March 2014 11.13 EDT

A Danish zoo (click here) that prompted international outrage by putting down a healthy giraffe and dissecting it in public has killed two lions and their two cubs to make way for a new male.
"Because of the pride of lions' natural structure and behaviour, the zoo has had to euthanise the two old lions and two young lions who were not old enough to fend for themselves," Copenhagen zoo said.
The 10-month-old lions would have been killed by the new male lion "as soon as he got the chance", it said.
The four lions were put down on Monday after the zoo failed to find a new home for them, a spokesman said. All four were from the same family.
He said there would be no public dissection of the animals since "not all our animals are dissected in front of an audience"....