A retired sailor from Barnstable purchased a computer and began to learn all about computing. Being a sailor, he was used to addressing his ships as "She" or "Her" but was unsure what was proper for computers. To solve his dilemma, he setp a barnstable Group and Yarmouth group of computer experts: one group was male, and the other group was female. The group of women reported that computers should be refereed to as "HE" because:
1. In order to get their attention you have to turn them on.
2. They have a lot of data but are still clueless.
3. They are supposed to help you solve problems but half the time they are the problem.
4. As soon as you commit to one, you realise that if you had waited a little longer, you could have had a newer and better model.
The group of men reported that computers should be refered to as "SHE" because:
1. No one but the creator understands their logic.
2. The native language they use to talk to other computers is incomprehensible to anyone else.
3. Even your smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for later retrieval.
4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.
A retired sailor from Barnstable purchased a computer and began to learn all about computing. Being a sailor, he was used to addressing his ships as "She" or "Her" but was unsure what was proper for computers. To solve his dilemma, he setp a barnstable Group and Yarmouth group of computer experts: one group was male, and the other group was female. The group of women reported that computers should be refereed to as "HE" because:
1. In order to get their attention you have to turn them on.
2. They have a lot of data but are still clueless.
3. They are supposed to help you solve problems but half the time they are the problem.
4. As soon as you commit to one, you realise that if you had waited a little longer, you could have had a newer and better model.
The group of men reported that computers should be refered to as "SHE" because:
1. No one but the creator understands their logic.
2. The native language they use to talk to other computers is incomprehensible to anyone else.
3. Even your smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for later retrieval.
4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.
If you don’t speak Spanish It says
Neither delinquents nor illegals, we are international workers”
6 ways the border wall could disrupt the environment
Trump's plan to build a wall from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific could come with unintended consequences for wildlife and people.
People who live and work along the southern border of the U.S. will tell you that the farther away the political debate occurs from the border, the more detached it becomes from the reality of life in the borderlands. That long-held view has been confirmed yet again as the wrangling in Washington over President Donald Trump’s demand for $5.7 billion to build a wall along the border devolves into an argument over whether such a wall should be concrete slab or steel slats.
The reason to build a wall is to keep people out. Yet history is replete with examples of walls all over the globe that rarely deterred determined people from getting in. Janet Napolitano, who served as governor of Arizona and President Barack Obama’s secretary of Homeland Security, was famous for her oft-repeated declaration: “Show me a 50-foot wall, and I’ll show you a 51-foot ladder.” The wisdom of building a wall across the length of the U.S.-Mexico border at a time when the number of arrests of illegal border crossers is at a 45-year low is an issue for the debate over immigration law.
What follows here instead is a look at the implications of wall construction itself—beyond talk over concrete-or-slats—and the unintended consequences that erecting such a barrier could pose. (See what existing parts of the wall look like.)
“Whatever they build, it’s going to be destructive to natural habitat,” says Bob Dreher, an attorney who heads Defenders of Wildlife conservation programs. “It’s about the physical reality of what a permanent barrier will do in one of the most sensitive landscapes in North America.”
Here’s a look at some of these potential impacts.
1. Threatening diverse landscapes
The border stretches for 1,954 miles from the Gulf of Mexico in Texas to the Pacific Ocean in California over one of the nation’s most diverse landscapes. It includes six separate eco-regions, ranging from desert scrub to forest woodlands to wetland marshes, both freshwater and salt.
Construction of a border wall will bisect the geographic range of 1,506 native animals and plants, including 62 species that are listed as critically endangered. A team of conservation experts, including Edward O. Wilson, famed biologist and naturalist, argued in a paper published last July in Bioscience that a border wall puts these habitats at risk. A wall increases soil erosion. It will alter natural water flows and the patterns of wildfire, exacerbating the risks of both to people and animals by trapping their escape.
2. Exacerbating flooding
Flooding disasters occurred in Arizona after 700 miles of fencing was constructed during the George W. Bush administration. The barriers acted as dams during rainy season flash floods. In 2008, at the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in southwest Arizona, a five-mile-long segment of 15-foot-high wire mesh fence trapped debris flowing through a natural wash during a 90-minute summer thunderstorm, causing water to pool two-to-seven feet high.
The same storm sent torrents into the city of Nogales, Arizona, a border town 66 miles south of Tucson, causing millions of dollars in property damage in Nogales, Sonora on the Mexican side. In 2011, another deluge at Organ Pipe knocked over a segment of fence, and in 2014, the twin cities of Nogales flooded again after border barriers clogged with debris during a rainstorm.
3. Perils to wildlife and plants
The border wall could disconnect a third of 346 native wildlife species from 50 percent or more of their range that lies south of the border, the Bioscience paper concluded. That raises the risk to their survival by shrinking and isolating animal populations and limiting their ability to roam for food, water, and mates. Fencing also traps wildlife from escaping fires, floods, or heat waves. Even the pygmy owl is at risk, because when flying, it’s range is less than five feet off the ground.
Border fencing disrupts seasonal migration, affecting access to water and birthing sites for Peninsular bighorn sheep that roam between California and Mexico. The inability to cross the border has fragmented populations of Sonoran pronghorn, and diminished the chances of re-establishing colonies of the Mexican gray wolf, jaguars, and ocelots in their range in the United States. Jaguars once roamed the banks of the Rio Grande, but have virtually disappeared from Texas.
Limits on migration, in turn, affects plants. The seeds of mesquite trees germinate best after they have passed through the digestive systems of javelinas and coyotes, according to a report by Defenders of Wildlife.
4. Dividing a river
The meandering Rio Grande, the official border between the United States and Mexico, was long believed to be a geologic obstacle to construction of a border fence. The river channel shifts course from time to time and floods in the spring. To build a wall north of the river would, in effect, cede control of those lands to Mexico and isolate property and homes owned by U.S. citizens on the Mexican side of the wall.
That thinking has changed. Last spring, Congress approved $1.6 billion to build more wall, mostly in Texas. Plans by Homeland Security call for construction of 25 miles of wall on flood control levees in Hildalgo County, sometimes more than a mile from the border. Another eight miles is planned to go up in neighboring Starr County.
5. Disrupting wildlife refuges and parks
Proposals under consideration would locate the wall through seven Texas wildlife conservation areas, including the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge and Big Bend National Park, prized among national parks as a place so remote it is considered to be one of the best place in the Lower 48 to view the night sky.
In Mission, Texas, the National Butterfly Center, where more than 200 butterfly species live near the banks of the Rio Grande, has been notified that the wall will divide the 100-acre sanctuary, placing almost 70 percent of it on the Mexican side. Plans also call for bisecting a wildlife refuge and state park, placing most of the land on the Mexican side.
After ferocious objections, Homeland Security shelved plans to build the wall through the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge in Alamo, Texas, where more than 400 species of birds, banded armadillos, and endangered wildcats live.
6. Exemption from environmental oversight laws
Construction of the border wall does not have to meet the requirements of more than 30 of the most sweeping and effective federal environmental laws, such as the Endangered Species Act, National Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act, and the Clean Water Act. That’s due to the REAL ID Act, passed by Congress in 2005 in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It authorizes Homeland Security to waive any laws in the name of national security.
Multiple lawsuits challenging the REAL ID law date to 2006. So far, none have survived court appeals that would place the constitutional question concerning expansive executive branch authority before the Supreme Court. The challenges continue.
Ocean Cleanup Project’s System 001 during sea trials off the coast of California with the Maersk Launcher. Photo: Ocean Cleanup Project
The u-shaped cleanup system that was deployed to the Pacific Garbage patch last fall is headed back to port for repairs due to a “structural malfunctioning” of the system, the company behind the project has announced.
In a blog post published this week, Founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup Project, Boyan Slat, said crews had discovered that an 18-meter end-section of System 001 had detached, requiring the entire system to be towed back to port for repairs and upgrades earlier than initially planned.
Both the 580-meter main section and the 18-meter end section are both reported to be completely stable. System 001 has now been safely opened and reconnected to the Maersk Transporter, which has commenced the tow back to the United States.
System 001, dubbed “Wilson”, departed from San Francisco for the Great Pacific Garbage Patch back in September as the world’s first large-scale system that would attempt to remove some of the nearly 2 trillion pieces of plastic that is estimated to be floating on or near the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
Despite early performance issues, which Slat openly detailed in a blog post published in November, plus these new developments, Slat admits that although disappointing, the system is returning to port with terabytes of data that will be used to make upgrades so that the system can return to the Garbage Patch again in 2019.
The Maersk Transporter is also carrying around 2000 kg of plastic that was recovered over the past few weeks through a combination of the cleanup system and ghost net fishing. For comparison, Slat notes, System 001 is expected to harvest 1000 kg per week
“Although we would have liked to end the year on a more positive note, we believe these teething troubles are solvable, and the cleanup of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch will be operational in 2019. The fact that the cleanup system orients itself in the wind, is able to follow the waves well and is able to catch and concentrate plastic gives us confidence in the technology,” Slat writes.
Down the road, the Ocean Cleanup Project envisions System 001 to be the first of around 60 systems focused on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch over the next two years. According to the group, the fleet could be enough to remove half of the plastic in the Garbage Patch within just five years’ time
( WOMEN:: Women are honest, loyal, and forgiving. They are smart, knowing that knowledge is power. But they still know how to use their softer side to make a point. Women want to be the best for their family, their friends, and themselves. Their hearts break when a friend dies. They have sorrow at the loss of a family member, yet they are strong when they think there is no strength left. A woman can make a romantic evening unforgettable. Women come in all sizes, in all colors and shapes. They live in homes, apartments and cabins. They drive, fly, walk, run or e-mail you to show how much they care about you. The heart of a woman is what makes the world spin! Women do more than just give birth. They bring joy and hope. They give compassion and ideals. They give moral support to their family and friends. And all they want back is a hug, a smile and for you to do the same to people you come in contact with.
MEN:: Men are good at lifting heavy stuff, killing spiders, and sometimes taking out the garbage
Cape Hinchinbrook, Alaska, Lightstation pictured in 1948. U.S. National Archives Photo
Alaska’s Hinchinbrook Island Light sits on a high cliff 235 feet above the ocean, at the SW corner of Hinchinbrook Island at the entrance to Prince William Sound. At this height, the horizon is 18 miles away and on a clear night, the light’s 15s flashing white beacon can be seen far out into the Gulf of Alaska.
When you stand at the light you hear the ocean surf far below, winds rustling through the stands of trees, scrub, and bushes, and sounds of seagulls and wildlife. It is an amazingly peaceful place. If you close your eyes and let the sunshine on your face you find yourself transported to a faraway different world.
“Sir, we are going up to the light now” shouts the BM3, who is busy unlocking the lighthouse door.
“Roger that, I am right behind you” replies the Ensign.
He and a group of Coasties from the USCGC Sweetbrier, a 180-foot ocean-going buoy tender homeported in Cordova AK, have hiked up to the light for its semiannual servicing.
There is a helo-pad adjacent to the light, and when helos are available and the weather allows, Coasties come out by air to service the light. But most often this lighthouse, and most other lighthouses and aids to navigation in Prince William Sound, are serviced by the Sweetbrier’s crew.
Reaching Hinchinbrook Light is an adventure, involving hiking up several miles of rough trails through the Island’s woods and rocky terrain. Hinchinbrook Island, like most of Alaska and Prince William Sound, is uninhabited. It is pristine, untouched and raw.
Before the Alaska oil pipeline was built to Valdez, and the Exxon Valdez then grounded on Bligh Reef, few people knew Prince William Sound existed. Only Coasties servicing aids to navigation and fishermen were privileged to sail these magical waters.
On this day the Sweetbrier has anchored in 40 fathoms in Port Etches, a secure bay on the north side of Cape Hinchinbrook. The clear cold waters of Prince William are brilliant blue-green. You can see the ship’s anchor chain reaching far below the surface. If this were the Caribbean you would want to jump in and swim down the chain to the ocean floor.
Once anchored the Sweetbrier’s 30-foot motor lifeboat (MLB) is filled with tools, gear, and the shore party.
“Lower Away!” shouts the MLB coxswain, and slowly the rope falls payout and lowers the heavy surfboat to the bay’s calm waters. The wondrous silence in the anchorage is broken as the surfboat’s diesel engine comes to life. Human presence in this environment is rare.
“Cast off the sea-painter” shouts the coxswain and the surfboat heads toward the protected beach inside English Bay. At low tide, there is sufficient beach to ground out the MLB and offload the gear and maintenance team. Once ashore the Coasties begin the slow but steady climb up to the light, following a narrow, single file trail.
There is no rush, no need to move quickly. They have allotted all day to accomplish this maintenance, and the hike up to the light, though arduous and not something most mariners are trained to do, is a welcomed task. A day of hiking in the woods of Alaska, up to a site where you can see far out into the Gulf of Alaska & Pacific Ocean, is a rare privilege.
They stop along the way to gaze at waterfalls, flowing creeks, massive trees, and huge rock outcroppings, and then, after several hours, they emerge from the woods to a breathtaking sight, the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. If you were to sail due south from this spot, the first land is Hawaii, 2,800 miles away. Everyone stops and stares out, the clear air and wind makes your eyes water. Even for those who have previously climbed to this light, it is an awe-inspiring, breathtaking experience.
“Ok, we probably need to get to work”, someone finally says, breaking the silence.
Hinchinbrook Light, like all lighthouses, shines its light day and night. Every 15 seconds it sends a beam of light out into the ocean to aid mariners. Lighthouses are constant, dependable, reassuring and unfailing. When mariners return from the sea it is that re-assuring beacon of light provided by lighthouses that provide comfort and peace. Electronics do not provide the same feeling of security and stability that a visual beacon of light offers.
Maintaining a lighthouse is more than just keeping a piece of machinery working properly. It is so much more than keeping a light bulb illuminated. Maintaining a lighthouse fulfills a solemn duty to other mariners, providing an assurance, a reassurance that others are looking out for you, caring for your safe return to port.
After a few hours of lubricating gears, replacing bulbs, testing voltages, and changing out emergency batteries the team secures the lighthouse, takes a final look over the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean, and head back down the trail toward their ship.
This team have done their work, ensured that mariners, most unknown to them, will have a light to guide them home, through rain, fog, storms, and snow. It is a basic and simple task, maintaining lights, but one which requires a sense of duty, attention to detail, assumption of responsibility, and pride in execution.
Few will know they were here today, but for this team of Coastguardsman, they have preserved the trust between mariners, to care and look out for each other. They are a “Band of Brothers” and so they smile and banter happily on the way back to their ship.
