Author: Robert Zimmerman

Infrasonic detection of a near-Earth object impact over Indonesia on 8 October 2009

10:38 pm

From a paper published on Saturday in Geophysical Research Letters, scientists describe the after the fact detection of the impact of a near-Earth object about 6 to 10 yards in diameter over Indonesia in 2009. From the abstract:

We present analysis of infrasonic signals produced by a large Earth-impacting fireball, believed to be among the most energetic instrumentally recorded during the last century that occurred on 8 October, 2009 over Indonesia. This extraordinary event, detected by 17 infrasonic stations of the global International Monitoring Network, generated stratospherically ducted infrasound returns at distances up to 17 500 km, the greatest range at which infrasound from a fireball has been detected since the 1908 Tunguska explosion. From these infrasonic records, we find the total source energy for this bolide as 8–67 kilotons of TNT equivalent explosive yield, with the favored best estimate near ∼50 kt. Global impact events of such energy are expected only once per decade and study of their impact effects can provide insight into the impactor threshold levels for ground damage and climate perturbations.

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Mary Black – A song for Ireland

8:01 pm

An evening pause:

Dreaming in the night
I saw a land where no man had to fight.
Waking in your dawn
I saw you crying in the morning light
Lying where falcons fly
And twist and turn in your fair blue sky.
Living on your western shore,
Saw some sunsets, asked for more.
I stood by your Atlantic sea
And I sang a song for Ireland.

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At House hearing head of NOAA challenged on ignoring Congressional law

12:54 pm

At House hearings this week the head of NOAA was attacked for ignoring Congressional law in setting up a National Climate Service.

One big sticking point for legislators is language in this spring’s final 2011 spending bill that averted a government shutdown, which states that “none of the funds made available by this division may be used to implement, establish, or create a NOAA Climate Service.” Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) said the appointment of Karl and the hiring of six regional directors appear to have ignored those instructions. He quipped that NOAA was “living in climate sin,” a reference to Karl’s statement during an interview in December 2010 with ClimateWire that “we’ve moved in, … we’re waiting for the marriage certificate, but we’re acting like we have a climate service.”

Lubchenco defended her actions, saying that her appointments were “smart” and merely “good planning.” She said their salaries are drawn from “existing funds” and that legislation dating back to the National Climate Program Act of 1978 describes providing climate services as part of NOAA’s mission. She responded to Hall’s concerns that the climate service would take away from NOAA’s other activities by saying, “It’s good government to reorganize periodically.” She also referred to its economic potential, citing the $1 billion industry that has emerged around the National Weather Service.

Speaking with ScienceInsider after the hearing, she made it clear that NOAA intends to push ahead. “This is an idea whose time has come.” [emphasis mine]

In other words, so what the law forbids NOAA from doing this. We know best, Congress can go to hell.

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“Unable to pass its immigration agenda through legislation, the Administration is now implementing it through agency policy.”

7:11 pm

From the head of union representing agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE): “Unable to pass its immigration agenda through legislation, the Administration is now implementing it through agency policy.” And if you still have doubts about the unwillingness of the Obama administration to enforce the law, there’s also this quote:

Our officers are already under orders not to make arrests or even talk to foreign nationals in most cases unless another agency has already arrested them; you won’t find that written in any public ICE policy.

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Fermilab confirms Japanese particle physics results that could explain lack of antimatter in the universe

6:36 pm

Fermilab has confirmed the Japanese particle physics experiment from two weeks ago suggesting that muon neutrinos can morph into electron neutrinos.

The results of these two experiments could have implications for our understanding of the role that neutrinos may have played in the evolution of the universe. If muon neutrinos transform into electron neutrinos, neutrinos could be the reason that the big bang produced more matter than antimatter, leading to the universe as it exists today

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Global Bankruptcy Months Away?

10:42 am

The day of reckoning beckons: Global bankruptcy months away? Key quote:

“Based upon world liquidity, the amount of money available to fund sovereign debt in 2011 is between $6-9 trillion,” Marc Nuttle told Townhall Finance. Nuttle runs the site DebtWall.org. “The world’s government projections for deficit financing in 2011 is $8-10 trillion. We are bumping into the ceiling of the world’s ability to fund ongoing sovereign deficits and debt on an annual basis.”

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NASA faces subpoena on heavy-lift rocket work

10:16 am

The space war continues: Several senators are threatening to subpoena NASA over what they perceive as the agency’s foot-dragging in building a heavy-lift rocket.

Idiots. They give NASA less money and less time to build the program-formerly-called-Constellation, and then are surprised when things don’t go well. Of course, it doesn’t help that the Obama administration is trying to sabotage the project anyway.

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Senate Republicans pull out of Biden debt limit negotiations

2:12 pm

The Senate Republicans have pulled out of Biden’s debt limit negotiations.

This article strongly suggests to me that the Democrats, who hold a majority in this negotiating group, have refused to take seriously the Republicans’ demand to cut spending, instead focusing on tax increases as a solution. The problem is that you could raise our taxes to 100 percent and you wouldn’t solve the debt problem. The government has got to reduce its spending.

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