Tag: information

How Black Ice Works

drafts-to-post:

It’s the most ironic of morning weather forecasts: “Watch out for black ice on your morning commute.” You can’t watch out for black ice, Mr. Meteorologist. It’s nearly impossible to see. It often disguises itself as an innocent puddle of water on the road, luring innocent drivers into complacency. Then they drive across it at speed, lose all traction and spin straight off the side off a cliff. The car tumbles end over end to the bottom of a deep ravine, where it explodes into a ball of flame at least six stories high. But wait! The driver is hanging on to the side of the cliff by his fingertips!

What were we talking about? Oh yeah, black ice. The truth is, it’s dangerous; although, it probably won’t spin you into a clichĂ©d action movie scene. It most often forms overnight, making cold, sunless winter mornings the most likely time for drivers to find patches of the stuff. There are lots of helpful guides for driving on black ice should you ever discover yourself sliding along on some — like this guide right here — but it basically boils down to removing your foot from the gas, resisting the urge to mash the brake pedal and just riding it out for a few more feet until you can get some traction again. This is all way easier said than done, of course. It also helps to make the decision not use cruise control if you suspect black ice might be lurking out there in the cold — that way you’ll have more control over the car in case of a slip.

Knowing how to react (or not react, as the case may be) when you drive across a patch of black ice is practical; but if you’ve ever wondered what this stuff is, how it forms, and what makes it so dangerous, we’re here to help.

Knowing how to react (or not react, as the case may be) when you drive across a patch of black ice is practical; but if you’ve ever wondered what this stuff is, how it forms, and what makes it so dangerous, we’re here to help.

How Black Ice Works

Man Discovers ‘Mutant Daisies’ Growing At Fukushima Nuclear Plant

andyjwells:

A discovery of ‘mutant daisies’ has been made near the site of the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan.

Twitter user San Kaido posted the pictures of the flowers, that appear to show stems and flowers connected to each other.

Others appear slightly deformed, and have prompted fears that radiation is affecting the area.

San Kaido wrote alongside the picture: “The right one grew up, split into 2 stems to have 2 flowers connected to each other, having 4 stems of flower tied belt-like.

“The left one has 4 stems grew up to be tied to each other and it had the ring-shaped flower.

“The atmospheric dose is 0.5 ÎŒSv/h at 1m above the ground.”

However, while the flowers may well be from Fukushima, their strange look may not necessarily be the result of radiation.

Plants and flowers can produce longer looking heads as a result of a natural condition known as fasciation.

Hormonal imbalances in the plant are usually to blame, altho bacterial and viral infections can also produce the mutations.

Three of the Fukushima’s six nuclear reactors went into meltdown in 2011 when the plant was hit by a tsunami – the result of a huge earthquake.

Pics: Twitter/Wikipedia

akatheheater:

On the evening of March 31st, 2009, Tim Tevebaugh was driving home from work east of Craigmont in the southern Idaho Panhandle (see map below). Across the rolling hay fields, Tim saw a very unusual phenomenon. The snow rollers that he took pictures of are extremely rare because of the unique combination of snow, wind, temperature and moisture needed to create them. They form with light but sticky snow and strong (but not too strong) winds. Some snow rollers are formed by gravity (i.e. rolling down a hill), but in this case, the snow rollers were generated by the wind. These snow rollers formed during the day as they weren’t present in the morning on Tim’s drive to work.

Based on estimations from Tim as well as the blades of grass in the picture, most of the snow rollers were about 18" in height, while the largest rollers were about 2 feet tall.

inpastelribbons:

donovanthewizard:

sixpenceee:

This river is known as the Enchanted River in the Philippines and was only discovered recent years. None knows where the water comes from. This remains a mystery. The river has crystal-clear waters, such that you can see the riverbed even at the deepest part.

One of the most unique features of the enchanted river is its unfathomable depth. No one has ever reached the bottom. This is why many tourist swim in the shallow part of the enchanted river area with water’s shade range from aquamarine to blue. The dark blue color in the river simply means the water is very deep. At exactly 12 noon the caretaker rings the bell requesting everyone to get out from the water as is “feeding time”. The “hymn of Hinatuan” is played and a massive school of fish pops out from nowhere. The fishes gather near the mouth of the river as the caretaker feeds them some leftovers of shrimp, rice, and other food scraps. (Source)

Oh that’s so pretty

Fun fact: the fish don’t hunt/feed themselves anymore because of the feeding time. They just wait to get fed

Also you can’t swim in the dark blue part because someone tried to see how far down they could swim and ended up getting stuck and drowning

Source: sixpenceee

grim-reaping:

flowersforone:

ayalaatreides:

did-you-kno:

If your nearest Waffle House is closed,
you should probably run. Because the
24-hour chains only shut down during
absolute devastation, FEMA unofficially
determines the severity of natural
disasters by whether local Waffle
Houses remain open or not. They
call this “The Waffle House Index.” Source

I didn’t believe this, even with a source, so I Googled it. I’M SORRY I DOUBTED YOU, DID-YOU-KNO.  Oh my god, FEMA really does have a Waffle House Index. I don’t know what to do with this information.

What if there are no Waffle Houses where you live? 

Source: didyouknowblog.com

geekandmisandry:

simonalkenmayer:

memor-somnis:

weavemama:

fuggles:

weavemama:

she should have been rewarded.

Y’all got sources?

yeah so more information about this woman who leaked important information pertaining russia’s involvement in the election: 

Her name is “Reality Leigh Winner” and she was a NSA Contractor. She passed a top secret NSA document to a news source (an article from The Intercept) that contains information about a Russian cyber-attack with one voting machine DAYS before the 2016 presidential election. This is considered the most detailed piece of proof regarding Russia’s interference with the elections to date. 

Here’s how the NSA document described how the Russians did the hacking: 

“As described by the classified NSA report, the Russian plan was simple: pose as an e-voting vendor and trick local government employees into opening Microsoft Word documents invisibly tainted with potent malware that could give hackers full control over the infected computers.

But in order to dupe the local officials, the hackers needed access to an election software vendor’s internal systems to put together a convincing disguise. So on August 24, 2016, the Russian hackers sent spoofed emails purporting to be from Google to employees of an unnamed U.S. election software company, according to the NSA report. Although the document does not directly identify the company in question, it contains references to a product made by VR Systems, a Florida-based vendor of electronic voting services and equipment whose products are used in eight states.

The spear-phishing email contained a link directing the employees to a malicious, faux-Google website that would request their login credentials and then hand them over to the hackers. The NSA identified seven “potential victims” at the company. While malicious emails targeting three of the potential victims were rejected by an email server, at least one of the employee accounts was likely compromised, the agency concluded. The NSA notes in its report that it is “unknown whether the aforementioned spear-phishing deployment successfully compromised all the intended victims, and what potential data from the victim could have been exfiltrated.”

So instead of having Trump and his entire party removed, they gon throw home girl in jail and try to act like none of this happened.

Her name, Reality Winner, is ironic in this context.

Why do millennials keep leaking government secrets? Because they are brave and information matters.

Source: weavemama

sixpenceee:

Tucked into a wooden box in the Boston Athenaeum library is a curious book. The book has “a slightly bumpy texture, like soft sandpaper” and bears the title “Hic Liber Waltonis Cute Compactus Est.” The book is the 1837 memoirs of a highwayman, bank robber, and “sneak thief” James Allen. The notorious highwayman once declared himself to be the “‘master of his own skin.” He requested his skin be used to make this memoir of his crimes upon his execution. (Source)

Source: sixpenceee