2007 total lunar eclipse 鳶山月全蝕 in Taiwan. Photo by Scott-史考特黃 on Flickr.Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Sunrise on Taiwan
It seems like only yesterday that this was new technology . . .
In an early afternoon ceremony, the crowd looked on in silence as the black kite-like planes took off one by one, led by a jet whose undercarriage was painted with the American flag. Each fighter flew over a throng of about 100 cheering aviation buffs who had gathered at a makeshift viewing spot just outside the base. In formation, the planes then circled back and flew overhead before heading east to their final resting spot. The send-off began shortly after 1,000 former and current employees of Lockheed Martin's famed Skunk Works held a tribute to the aircraft they had developed, built and maintained, virtually all shrouded in secrecy.
"It's now time to say farewell, farewell to an old friend," said George Zielsdorff, Lockheed's vice president for the F-117A program, as employees signed their names on the bomb bay doors of the four planes parked in front of Building 601. Inside sat the next generation of stealth fighter jets, F-22 Raptors. With the introduction of the F-22, the Pentagon decided to retire the F-117As in 2006.
Beginning in 1981 and until 1990, Lockheed assembled 59 Night Hawks, most of them in total secrecy, in a hanger next to the Burbank airport. Later, Lockheed continued to upgrade the fleet at its complex in Palmdale. The Air Force did not acknowledge the program's existence until about a decade after the jets began flying.The single-seat F-117 was the first plane that could evade radar detection. It was designed to fly into heavily defended areas to knock out radar installations and anti-aircraft missile batteries, clearing the way for other fighters and bombers. It was also used to destroy military command and communication centers. During its development, the F-117 flew only at night to avoid prying eyes and Soviet spy satellites, thus its name: Night Hawk.
Reporters who attended Tuesday's retirement ceremony were kept 75 feet from the planes and were not allowed to go beyond a roped-off area.
The retired fleet will be housed at a high-security base about 140 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Somebody has a sense of humor and a tendency toward mischief
Moving Up in Monte Carlo
IRON MAN to open May 2nd in a theatre near you
IRON MAN Tony Stark, who develops an invulnerable robotic suit to fight the throes of evil. In addition to being filthy rich, billionaire industrialist Tony Stark is also a genius inventor. When Stark is kidnapped and forced to build a diabolical weapon, he instead uses his intelligence and ingenuity to construct an indestructible suit of armor and escape his captors.Sunday, April 20, 2008
The Spiral Jetty
The Spiral Jetty, considered to be the central work of American sculptor Robert Smithson, is an earthwork sculpture constructed in 1970.Built of mud, salt crystals, basalt rocks, earth, and water on the northeastern shore of the Great Salt Lake near Rozel Point in Utah, it forms a 1500-foot long and 15-foot wide counterclockwise coil jutting from the shore of the lake.
At the time of its construction, the water level of the lake was unusually low because of a drought. Within a few years, the water level returned to normal and submerged the jetty for the next three decades. Due to a recent drought, the jetty re-emerged in 1999 and is now completely exposed. The lake level rose again during the spring of 2005 due to a near record-setting snowpack in the mountains and partially submerged the Jetty again.
Originally black rock against ruddy water, it is now largely white against pink due to salt encrustation and lower water levels.
The Flying Hotel
Singapore's A380 holds 471 passengers -- 399 in economy, 60 in business and 12 in first class. When the jet made its maiden flight in October, the airline set the pace for customizing the A380 by introducing private suites in first class, with leather chairs and fully flat beds.
Passengers in business class won't have cabins, but they will have a private lounge with leather sofas, a large video monitor and a self-service bar.Two of the suites on a Singapore Airlines A380 are combined here, creating a large sleeping area.The suites, designed by French yacht designer Jean-Jacques Coste, are essentially hotel rooms operating at 30,000 feet. Each of the 12 suites aboard Singapore's A380 features a 23-inch-wide LCD TV, a 35-inch-wide leather chair (with armrest folded away) that reclines up to 130 degrees and a large table. The suites also have blinds for added privacy and a chaise longue.
Illuminating Crested Butte Mountain
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Cosmic Communist Constructions
If you're in the New York area between this coming Tuesday (April 24th) and May 26th, you might be interested in photographer Frederic Chaubin's upcoming exhibit, titled CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed, showcasing little-known Soviet architecture of the 1970s and 1980s at the Storefront for Art & Architecture. Above: the Druzhba "holiday camp" in Yalta, Ukraine, built 1985 and designed by architect Igor Vasilevsky.
We'll give a pass to the construction worker -- described in the New York Post as a "hulking mason" and a "Boston-loving boob" -- who buried a Boston Red Sox jersey in the concrete foundation of the new stadium being built for the New York Yankees. And we can almost forgive the fans on both sides of the Other Coast's fiercest sports rivalry for thinking this might somehow lay a curse on the plutocrats in pinstripes. But when somebody in the Yankees' front office ordered construction workers on Sunday to drill chunks out of the foundation -- a five-hour job that cost a reported $50,000 -- in order to remove the voodoo Fan Merchandise of Doom, it became clear that this incident was more than just a harmless sports prank. It was a reminder that for all of humanity's pretensions to modernity and reason, we are essentially just bald monkeys who wear shoes.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Jet Li wins Best Actor award
"Street Kings"
"Egypt's Sunken Treasures"
Visitors walk past an ancient Egyptian statue during the inauguration of "Egypt's Sunken Treasures" exhibition in Madrid April 15, 2008. The exhibition presents objects from underwater excavations conducted since 1992 in Alexandria and Aboukir Bay by Franck Goddio, French underwater archaeologist and director of the Institut Europeen d'Archeologie Sous-Marine (IEASM). About 500 artefacts will be on view from April 16 to September 28, 2008. REUTERS/Susana Vera(SPAIN)
Flying High
P O W . . . for Forty Years
Maqbool Hussain, a Pakistani war prisoner who spent around 40 years in an Indian jail, stands beside his picture during a premiere of a drama in Rawalpindi, April 15, 2008. A drama based on plight of Hussain, who was taken prisoner during the second of the three wars between the two neighbours in 1965, was released on Wednesday by the Inter Service Public Relation (ISPR). REUTERS/Faisal Mahmood (PAKISTAN)
"Tibetan Independence Torch relay"
Tibetan exiles shout slogans as they carry out the "Tibetan Independence Torch relay" along the route of the Olympic torch relay in New Delhi April 15, 2008. The Olympic torch, touring the World ahead of the Olympic Games in Beijing in August, has become a magnet for protests against China's policies, in particular its crackdown last month on unrest in Tibet. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi (INDIA)
When the Grunion Run
In the darkness of a new moon, a dozen black-crowned night herons landed on a San Pedro beach and stood like sentinels facing the open ocean."That's a good sign," whispered marine biology researcher Jenn Corpuz, 26. "The herons know there is something coming."
Suddenly, the surf shimmered with flashes of silver, and a few small, slender fish wriggled on shore, as if to size up the situation. Then thousands of fish began riding in on the swells and piling up on the beach in writhing clots. "Grunion!" she said. "Turn on your flashlights, everybody!"
About 400 onlookers dashed to the shore to witness the reproductive mayhem of Leuresthes tenuis, the iconic Southern California fish that leaves its briny realm to mate on the sand.
They also were watching the launch of a scientific attempt to establish the world's first sustainable captive population of grunion -- a lofty goal for California marine aquariums. A half-dozen researchers and volunteers in white lab coats and cutoffs waded into the surf with plastic buckets, collecting as many as possible, then gently coaxing eggs and sperm into specimen vials before setting them free.
For several hours, the tiny strip of intensely urbanized beach next to one of the world's busiest ports was a landing zone for wave after wave of the 6-inch night-time spawners: vibrant, vulnerable and acutely aware they had little time to complete their urgent business.
Thousands of grunion eggs collected by volunteers at the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium.
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