Tag: science

Scientists: Major measles outbreaks likely because of COVID-19 lockdowns

10:38 pm

According to a paper published in the peer review journal Lancet, there is a very high likelihood of major measles outbreaks among children worldwide in 2021 — resulting in many unnecessary deaths — due to the shut downs imposed because of the panic over COVID-19.

Lead author Professor Kim Mulholland, from the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and Chair of the World Health Organization’s SAGE Working Group on measles and rubella vaccines, said that many children have missed out on measles vaccination this year, making future measles outbreaks inevitable. …”The coming months are likely to see increasing numbers of unimmunised children who are susceptible to measles. Many live in poor, remote communities where health systems are less resilient, and malnutrition and vitamin A deficiency are already increasing.”

Professor Mulholland said the COVID-19 pandemic had also had a profound effect on the control of vaccine preventable diseases, with vaccination campaigns paused in the early months of 2020 and routine immunisation services greatly disrupted in many countries.

The WHO estimates that by the end of October, 2020, delayed vaccination campaigns in 26 countries have led to 94 million children missing scheduled measles vaccine doses. [emphasis mine]

Think about it. Because we and our governments panicked and shut down society to protect children from a virus that is not only not contagious among children, it also is practically harmless to them, many children will now die from diseases we know are highly contagious and we know can kill them.

And people accuse me of being heartless because I say the lock downs are senseless, irrational, and a bad idea.

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Buried mountain on Mars

2:17 pm

Isolated buried mountain on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on August 8, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). Labeled merely as a “terrain sample,” it is an example of an image taken more for engineering than scientific reasons. No research scientist specifically requested it. Instead, the scientists operating the camera took it because they need to use MRO regularly to maintain the camera’s proper temperature. To do this they periodically take almost random images, but never without trying to pick a location that might have some scientific value.

In this case we get what appears to be an isolated sloping hill. Located at about 15 degrees north latitude, this is not a place where one would expect visible evidence of water, though the gullies on the slopes are intriguing. They almost look like the kind of hillside erosion you see in places where rain falls on desert mountainsides.

Rain can’t be the cause, but nonetheless monitoring these gullies for changes over time would be worthwhile science research. Since it appears no one is presently focused on doing it, anyone interested out there?

This mountain is actually far more isolated than this high resolution image suggests.
» Read more

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The Apollo 12 crew’s excursions on the Moon, 51 years ago

8:25 am

In celebration of the anniversary this week of the Apollo 12 mission to the Moon in November 1969, the science team for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) have created a wonderful animation showing step-by-step where and when Pete Conrad and Alan Bean walked during their two EVAs on the lunar surface.

That video is below. It highlights strongly the need of any future short-term mission to any planetary landing to have a vehicle on board. Conrad and Bean accomplished a lot during their two four-hour walks, but nowhere near as much as they could have accomplished if they could have driven about on their EVAs. In fact, in the 1960s NASA had already recognized this, and was to put a rover on the last three Apollo lunar landings.

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Arecibo’s status appears to be worsening

8:47 am

According to a new engineering report, the condition and status of the Arecibo Observatory’s main antenna, suspended by cables above its giant radio dish, appears very uncertain and to be worsening.

Preliminary analysis indicates the main cable, which failed on Nov. 6, should have easily handled the extra load based on design capacity. Engineers suspect it is likely that the second cable failed because it has degraded over time and has been carrying extra load since August. A final determination could not be made without retrieving and analyzing the second cable.

The engineering firms cannot verify the integrity of the other cables at this time supporting the 900-ton platform. Each of the structure’s remaining cables is now supporting more weight than before, increasing the likelihood of another cable failure, which would likely result in the collapse of the entire structure.

Other wire breaks on two of the remaining main cables have also been observed. [emphasis mine]

If the 900 ton antenna structure that the cables hold up should fall, it will do significant damage to the disk, and will also likely make the cost of repairing the radio telescope prohibitive.

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A majestic terraced butte on Mars

1:35 pm

Majestic butte on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on September 8, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows an outstanding terraced butte that would rival any of the similar buttes scattered throughout the Grand Canyon, and is reminiscent especially of Wotans Throne.

What makes this butte intriguing are its terraces, the obvious result of the repeated deposition of new layers across the surface over time, and now exposed by erosion. What caused them?

As always, location provides the clues. First, this butte is found at about 15 degrees north latitude in the vast Arabia Terra transition region between the Martian northern lowland plains and the southern cratered highlands. At that latitude, we are not looking at any recent glacial features. While there might have been ice here once, it hasn’t likely been present, either on the surface or underground, for a very long time.

This conclusion becomes important once we look at the wider photo below, taken by the high resolution camera on the European orbiter Mars Express. This image gives us the immediate context.
» Read more

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MAVEN finds water loss on Mars faster than expected

12:58 pm

New data from the Mars orbiter MAVEN has found that the water on Mars moves into the upper atmosphere where it is lost to space much faster than expected.

It had previously been believed that Mars’ water loss only occurred in the lower atmosphere, which is a much slower process. Scientists had also believed that water on Mars would behave as it does on Earth, where temperatures and the atmosphere act to block it from reaching the upper atmosphere where it can easily and quickly be lost to space. Instead, MAVEN found a lot of water in the upper atmosphere.

When the team extrapolated their findings back 1 billion years, they found that this process can account for the loss of a global ocean about 17 inches deep. “If we took water and spread it evenly over the entire surface of Mars, that ocean of water lost to space due to the new process we describe would be over 17 inches deep,” Stone said. “An additional 6.7 inches would be lost due solely to the effects of global dust storms.”

During global dust storms, 20 times more water can be transported to the upper atmosphere. For example, one global dust storm lasting 45 days releases the same amount of water to space as Mars would lose during a calm Martian year, or 687 Earth days.

This data reinforces the theories that Mars once had liquid water on its surface, either as intermittent oceans or as lakes and rivers. Or it suggests that Mars once had a lot more glaciers than it does now, reinforcing a competing theory that glaciers formed the Martian features we on Earth routinely associate with flowing water.

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Hubble sees too much infrared energy from gamma ray burst

9:09 am

The uncertainty of science: During a short gamma ray burst (GRB) that was observed in a distant galaxy on May, astronomers were baffled when measurements from the Hubble Space Telescope detected ten times more near infrared energy that they predict from this type of GRB.

GRBs fall into two classes. First there are the long bursts, which are thought to form from the collapse of a massive star into a black hole, resulting in a powerful supernova and GRB. Second there are the short bursts, which scientists think occur when two neutron stars merge.

The problem with this GRB is that though it was short and somewhat similar to other short GRBs across most wavelengths, in the near infrared Hubble detected far too much energy.

“These observations do not fit traditional explanations for short gamma-ray bursts,” said study leader Wen-fai Fong of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

…Fong and her team have discussed several possibilities to explain the unusual brightness that Hubble saw. While most short gamma-ray bursts probably result in a black hole, the two neutron stars that merged in this case may have combined to form a magnetar, a supermassive neutron star with a very powerful magnetic field. “You basically have these magnetic field lines that are anchored to the star that are whipping around at about a thousand times a second, and this produces a magnetized wind,” explained Laskar. “These spinning field lines extract the rotational energy of the neutron star formed in the merger, and deposit that energy into the ejecta from the blast, causing the material to glow even brighter.”

What is intriguing about their theory is that this merger of two neutron stars simply resulted in a larger neutron star, not a black hole. This new neutron star was also a magnetar and pulsar, but unlike a black hole, it was a still-visible physical object. And yet its creation in this GRB produced more energy.

When GRBs were first discovered, I was always puzzled why so many astronomers seemed to insist there must be a single explanation for them. With time, when two classes of GRBs were discovered, this assumption was then replaced with the equally puzzling insistence that only two types of events explained them.

It seemed to me that that such explosions had too many potential variables, and could easily have a wide range of causes, though all related to the destruction or merger of massive stars. As the data continues to accumulate this now appears increasingly the case.

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A field of Martian knobs

12:30 pm

Knob field on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on August 9, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). Uncaptioned, the image is merely dubbed a “knob field.”

I won’t spend much time trying to explain this geology. It might be related to pedestal craters, but these ridges and mesas don’t really look like those features, since they don’t really stand above the surrounding terrain.

Maybe they are a very ancient field of craters long buried, now partly exposed due to erosion, but also partly buried by wind-blown Martian sand and dust. Once again, that many of their shapes don’t resemble craters discounts this explanation.

The location of this photo is in the southern cratered highlands, as shown by the black cross in the overview map below.
» Read more

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Lock down madness prevents approval of cancer drug

9:47 pm

Because the FDA’s irrational fear of COVID-19, it has refused to do inspections required to approve a new drug (effective against non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma). The result: The drug company’s application will expire on November 16, meaning that they will have to start all over, a process that could take years, while tens of thousands die annually unnecessarily.

Liso-cel, manufactured by Bristol-Myers Squibb, originally had its Food and Drug Administration (FDA) application accepted in February, but has yet to have one of its contracted manufacturing sites undergo FDA inspection due to the coronavirus pandemic. Not only is the drug’s approval contingent on the facility inspections from the FDA, according to multiple company executives, but its application expires on Nov. 16, meaning that if the plant is not inspected in the coming days Bristol-Myers may have to completely resubmit the drug’s application as a result.

While the first of two facility inspections occurred, the planned inspection of Bristol-Myers’ contracted Houston facility has not “due to COVID travel restrictions and health risks,” according to a Sept. 8 conference call with Citi biopharma analysts and the company’s chief medical officer.

…The drug, which in clinical trials triggered a positive response in 73% of patients and remission in 53% of patients, according to Bristol-Myers, must receive FDA approval by Nov. 16. If it fails to be approved, it must resubmit its application, further delaying its approval by months, if not years, potentially costing thousands of lives as a result.

Each year, approximately 77,000 Americans are diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and about 20,000 Americans die, according to the American Cancer Society.

I promise you, this story is one of many. A cold rational look at the unnecessary deaths caused by the thoughtless fear of COVID-19 would find without doubt that the cure was much worse than the disease. We are killing many more people from other far more serious illnesses because of our unreasonable terror at something quite comparable to the ordinary flu.

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Rover update: Curiosity on the move again

1:51 pm

After spending more than three months at a single site, drilling three different holes in the same rock, Curiosity is finally on the move again, heading east and uphill toward Mt. Sharp. Yutu-2 meanwhile continues its very slow journey on the far side of the Moon. And the new rovers are halfway to Mars.

Drill holes at Mary Anning site in Gale Crater
Click for full image.

Curiosity

The image to the right, cropped and annotated to post here, shows the three drill holes that scientists had Curiosity drill in this one pavement rock, dubbed Mary Anning and located in the clay unit within Gale Crater on Mars. As I noted in my last update on July 22, 2020, the rover’s science team had made a specific detour in their planned route up Mt. Sharp in order to find this one last place to drill in this geological unit.

Though they have been very quiet about their results, apparently what they found in this one pavement rock was important enough that it required three drill holes. In addition, samples from the second hole were subjected to two of Curiosity’s limited supply of wet chemistry experiments. From the science team’s August 28, 2020 update:
» Read more

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Giant iceberg heading to possible collision with South Georgia Island

10:45 am

Track of iceberg in the past three years

Close-up comparing iceberg with South Georgia Island.

The largest section of a huge iceberg that broke off from Antarctica’s Larson ice shelf in 2017 is now headed directly for a collision with remote South Georgia Island.

The first image to the right shows the iceberg’s movement since 2017. The second zooms in to show that the iceberg and island are almost the exact same size, 100 miles long.

South Georgia Island, 1,000 miles east of South America, has no permanent human inhabitants, though explorers, scientists, and mountain climbers do go there periodically. Instead, it is a wildlife preserve:

Around five million seals call the islands home, as well as 65 million birds of 30 different species. Migrating whales and various fish species populate the surrounding waters and there is a large penguin population.

The first link above, from the European Space Agency (ESA), typically shivers with the modern mindless fear that seems to permeate everything our culture considers:

About the same size as the South Atlantic island, it could ground in the shallow waters offshore and cause real problems for the island wildlife and seafloor-dwelling life. Penguins and seals need access to the sea to feed so the iceberg could easily block their foraging routes and life on the seafloor could be crushed if the berg grounds. The fear is that if the berg does anchor against the South Georgia coast, it could remain there for up to 10 years. When the A38 grounded here in 2004, many dead penguin chicks and seal pups were found along the shoreline.

All maybe true, but then, the arrival of icebergs this large to South Georgia Island while likely rare is also quite normal. The sea life there has had to adapt to these events, or else it would not have survived to today.

Also, note the blue lines. Those are the tracks of past icebergs as recorded from orbit. Not only is it common for icebergs to be aimed at South Georgia Island, the currents appear to guide them around the island once they get close. While this new berg is so huge it might plow into the island anyway, the data here suggests it will not.

Regardless, this somewhat rare event provides scientists a opportunity to learn something about the survival of species in hostile environments. We can’t prevent such things, but we can learn their consequences as well as how life adapts under such conditions.

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Meteorite stolen five years ago from Australian museum recovered

8:45 am

A meteorite that was stolen five years ago from a small Australian museum, only two weeks after it was donated to that museum, was recovered by police two days ago.

While the police have returned the meteorite, they have not yet revealed much else.

On Saturday, Queensland Police executed a search warrant at a Cairns address and recovered the space rock, valued at more than $16,000.

Investigations are underway into the incident, and no charges have been laid, but the sisters are pleased the meteorite is back in their possession.

…Police investigating the incident said they were looking into a number of leads relating to the theft. “I believe it definitely has a story to tell,” Senior Constable Heidi Marek said. “I’ll leave it up to detectives to uncover that story but hopefully we’re able to reveal a bit of information down the track.”

That no charges were file is most puzzling. I hope the full story is soon revealed.

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Apophis: the asteroid that may someday hit the Earth

8:40 am

Apophis' path past the Earth in 2029
From the conference’s logo.

Last week planetary scientists held a three-day virtual conference focused on the asteroid Apophis, whose orbit regularly places it close to the Earth with a real possibility that it might someday hit the Earth.

When Apophis was originally discovered early in 2004, it wasn’t at first seen as an out-of-the-ordinary asteroid. Not much was known about it other than its albedo and that it was not trivial in size, probably around 1,000 feet in diameter. All this changed in December 2004, when further observations suggested that it had a 2.7% chance of impacting the Earth in 2029, making it the most dangerous asteroid ever discovered.

Fortunately, all subsequent observations of the asteroid have since eliminated any possibility of an impact, at least through the year 2068. Depending on what happens during the 2029 and 2036 fly-bys of Earth, there is a very small chance that it could hit the Earth in 2068, though the data says the chances of that happening are quite small (1 in 150,000).

On April 13, 2029 however Apophis will still zip past the Earth less than 20,000 miles above its surface, well within the orbit of all geosynchronous satellites. For viewers in Europe and Africa it will be a naked eye object, with a magnitude of -3.

Because the date of that close fly-by is so well known, and because this asteroid still poses a threat to the Earth, the planetary science community is very much interested in taking advantage of that close approach. From the conference’s webpage:

Knowledge is the first line of planetary defense, and the 2029 Apophis encounter is a once-per-thousand-year opportunity for investigating an asteroid as large as 350 meters passing within 6 Earth-radii. Time is of the essence as we have less than a decade to plan Earth-based and possible in-situ missions whose measurements can deliver unprecedented detailed knowledge on the physical nature of Apophis as the prototype example (poster child) of potentially hazardous asteroids.

I attended that conference, and am here now to give a summary.
» Read more

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Second cable failure further disables Arecibo radio telescope

8:28 am

A second cable at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico has broken, further disabling the radio telescope from operation.

A main cable that supports the Arecibo Observatory broke Friday at 7:39 p.m. Puerto Rico time.

Unlike the auxiliary cable that failed at the same facility on Aug. 10, this main cable did not slip out of its socket. It broke and fell onto the reflector dish below, causing additional damage to the dish and other nearby cables. Both cables were connected to the same support tower. No one was hurt, and engineers are already working to determine the best way to stabilize the structure.

The telescope has been badly crippled since the first cable failure in August.

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Jupiter’s stormy southern polar regions

2:46 pm

Jupiter's polar regions
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right shows the southern polar regions of Jupiter. The image, taken by Juno during its 29th close-fly of Jupiter, was enhanced by a citizen scientist who only goes by the nickname Flury-21. This in fact was this person’s first try at enhancing a Juno image. He or she did a nice job, but provided no additional information other than saying that he “used lightroom to enhance the image and mostly used the dehaze effect.”

Works nicely nonetheless to illustrate how the bands that dominate Jupiter’s equatorial and mid-latitude regions disappear at the pole. Instead, the pole is a region of chaotic independent hurricanes, many bigger than North America. Other images from Juno suggest that they change relatively quickly. For example, compare this image of the south pole with an earlier one taken during the 28th fly-by. While we might not be looking at the same hemisphere, it is hard to believe there is no overlap between both images. Yet I can find no corresponding features.

The two images of course were taken months apart, and thus it is not surprising the storms have changed completely. However, I also suspect, given their size, that even over this time span some storms have survived, but changed so much it is hard to link them together. The only way to do this would be to have an orbiter close enough all the time to make movies. Unfortunately, Juno cannot do this, and I don’t expect any orbiter like this to reach Jupiter for many decades.

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United Arab Emirates announce plans for lunar rover mission

7:59 am

The new colonial movement: The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has announced plans to launch its first unmanned probe to the Moon, a small rover dubbed Rashid with a target launch date in 2024.

The Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) in Dubai says its in-house teams will develop, build and operate the 10-kilogram rover, which is named after the late Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, who ruled Dubai at the UAE’s creation in 1971.

The team will hire an as-yet unannounced space agency or commercial partner to carry out the launch and landing, the riskiest part of the mission. If successful Rashid would be one of several rovers made by private firms and space agencies that are set to populate the Moon by 2024.

This project is a great opportunity for the various new private aerospace companies in the U.S. developing interplanetary capabilities for sale to others.

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China launches ten satellites for Argentinian company

7:52 am

China today used its Long March 6 rocket to successfully launch ten satellites for the Argentinian company Satellogic S.A.

The satellites form the beginning of a 25-satellite constellation designed to do Earth resource observations. The Chinese rocket in turn is designed to capture the emerging smallsat market.

The leaders in the 2020 launch race:

28 China
19 SpaceX
12 Russia
4 ULA
4 Europe (Arianespace)
4 Rocket Lab

The U.S. remains ahead of China 30 to 28 in the national rankings.

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Terraced mesa inside Martian depression

1:14 pm

Terraced mesa inside depression
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on July 1, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a very puzzling terraced mesa inside an enclosed depression or sinkhole (the western half of which can be seen in the full image).

What caused that mesa? A first scan of the image and the data suggests we are looking at sinkage related to the melting of an underground ice table. The latitude here is 34 degrees south, just far enough away from the equator for glacial activity to be possible. Moreover, the small circular depression in the upper right of the image strongly suggests an impact crater into slushy material. The implication is that this depression is the result of the melting or sublimation of underground ice, leaving behind a mesa that is made of solider stuff.

Another possibility is that the terraced mesa is actually the remains of glacial material. In the full image features inside other nearby depressions are terraced also, but are also much more reminiscent of glacial features found in many craters in the mid-latitudes. The depression is also close to the headwaters of Reull Valles, a meandering canyon where many images have shown glacial features (see for example here, here, and here).

These features however could also have nothing to do with water ice.
» Read more

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Overview of China’s lunar sample return mission

8:29 am

Chang'e-5 landing site on Moon

Link here. The Chinese mission, the first to bring back lunar samples since the 1970s, is now set for launch on November 24, 2020.

Chang’e-5 includes a lander, ascender, orbiter and returner. After the spacecraft enters the Moon’s orbit, the lander-and-ascender pair will split off and descend close to Mons Rümker, a 1,300-metre-high volcanic complex in the northern region of Oceanus Procellarum — the vast, dark lava plains visible from Earth. Once the craft has touched down, it will drill up to 2 metres into the ground and extend a robotic arm to scoop up about 2 kilograms of surface material. The material will be stored in the ascender for lift-off.

The descent and ascent will take place over one lunar day, which is equivalent to around 14 Earth days, to avoid the extreme overnight temperatures that could damage electronics, says Clive Neal, a geoscientist at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.

…Once the ascender is back in lunar orbit, the samples will be transferred to the returner. This in-flight rendezvous will be complex and “a good rehearsal for future human exploration”, says James Carpenter, a research coordinator for human and robotic exploration at the European Space Agency in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. China plans to send people to the Moon from around 2030.

The Chang’e-5 spacecraft will then journey back to Earth, with the lander parachuting toward Siziwang Banner in Inner Mongolia, northern China, probably sometime in early December.

The location, as shown in the image above, is in the northern mid-latitudes of the Moon’s nearside, and is a place where some relatively recent volcanic activity might have occurred, though still in the far past.

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Why Martian mountains are different than on Earth

3:08 pm

A mountain peak on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on August 12, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what to any Earthling’s eye appears to be a somewhat ordinary flat-topped mountain peak with two major flanking ridgelines descending downward to the north and the south, and two minor ridgelines descending to the northwest and southwest.

This peak and its landscape would surely be quite a spectacularly place to visit, should humans ever settle Mars and begin doing sightseeing hikes across its more interesting terrain. I can definitely imagine hiking trails coming up the two minor ridges, with a crest trail traversing the main north-south ridge across the peak.

This is not however a mountain on Earth. It is on Mars, which makes its formation and evolution over time fundamentally different than anything we find on Earth, despite its familiar look.

First, what formed it? Unlike most of Earth’s major mountain chains, the mountains of Mars were not formed by the collision of tectonic plates, squeezing the crust upward. Mars does not have plate tectonics. Most of its mountains formed either from the rise of volcanoes at single hot spots, or from the wearing away of the surrounding terrain to leave behind a peak or mesa.
» Read more

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