6/30/2018

How We Got To Mars Video




Click to view the video of the Mission To Mars
https://www.youtube.com/embed/XRCIzZHpFtY?rel=0

















  1. Mars Exploration Rover Mission: Home

    mars.nasa.gov/mer
    New Day for Longest-Working Mars Rover NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity recorded the dawn of the rover's 4,999th Martian ... two-year extended mission ...

  2. List of missions to Mars - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars
    List of missions to Mars ... Mars One, rover & ComSat mission: 2026: Orbiter ... Missions sent to the Martian system have returned data on Phobos and Deimos and ...

  3. Mission To Mars Martian Rover - Video Results

    • Mars Rover - NASA animation of mission to Mars
      youtube.com
    • NASA Begins Building Next Mars Rover Mission
      3:14
      NASA Begins Building Next Mars Rover Mission
      youtube.com
    • Mission to Mars: Anticipating NASA Rover Touchdown
      10:41
      Mission to Mars: Anticipating NASA Rover Touchdown
      pbs.org
    • Mission to Mars | Red Planet Rover
      0:58
      Mission to Mars | Red Planet Rover
      youtube.com

  4. Mars Science Laboratory - NASA Mars rover + mission info

    mars.nasa.gov/msl
    Mars Science Laboratory rover Curiosity exploring the planet mars - facts, information, videos and pictures

  5. Mission To Mars Martian Rover - News

  6. The Next Mission to Mars: Mars 2020 - YouTube

    www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZCRFRgSgas
    In 2020, NASA will send a new rover to the Martian surface with one of its objectives to search for evidence of ancient life on the planet. I made this clip ...

  7. Mission To Mars Martian Rover - Image Results

    • Mars Exploration Rover
    • Mars rover - Wikipedia
    • International Space Station Shuttle NASA Missions Google ...
    • What is a "Mars Rovers"? - MARS ROVERS

  8. Mars Curiosity: Facts about the Mars Science Laboratory & Rover

    www.space.com/17963-mars-curiosity.html
    The Mars Science Laboratory and its rover centerpiece, Curiosity, is the most ambitious Marsmission yet flown by NASA. The rover's primary mission is to find out if Mars is, or was, suitable for life.

  9. NASA’s Next Mars Rover Is Going to Be Seriously Badass

    gizmodo.com/nasa-s-next-mars-rover-is-going-to...
    Should all go according to plan, NASA will launch its next Martian rover in July 2020. The robotic probe is still under construction, but early signs are that the next-gen rover will be equipped with an impressive assortment of high-tech gadgets. The rover is currently under construction at NASA’s ...

  10. Mars Exploration Rover - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Exploration_Rover_Mission
    NASA's Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission is an ongoing robotic space mission involving two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, exploring the planet Mars.It began in 2003 with the launch of the two rovers: MER-A Spirit and MER-B Opportunity—to explore the Martian surface and geology; both landed on Mars at separate locations in January 2004.

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6/29/2018

THE PRAIRIE FIRE


Illustration by Ida Liffengren Jansen, Sister of Louise Hullinger


THE PRAIRIE FIRE
Excerpted From “Next Year Country” 
by Louise Liffengren Hullinger

Folks around Draper, South Dakota, still refer to the summer of l930 as a Scorcher. (Folklore has it that you could fry eggs on the rooftops during August of that year!)

The searing sun turned the treeless plains into a tinderbox; the grasses, curled and brown, lay wilting alongside the road; the drouth-stunted weeds crunched underfoot. An idle flick from a cigarette, a careless spark from a running motor, even the hot sun beating down on a chip of broken glass could ignite the vast prairie turning it into a blazing holocaust.

Morning dawned bright and clear. There was an air of tranquility on the day the prairie fire struck. It was barely past noon when the farmer noted the first faint smell of smoke and, could see, in the distance, along the horizon, the shadowy tracings of a fire.

In the moments it took to reach his tractor he exulted in how much easier it was to plow safety furrows with his new tractor than it had been in the past with a team of horses. With a tractor he could maneuver the dried coulees, could easily cross the rough, untamed prairie.

Round and round the scattered farm buildings the farmer plowed, leaving protective furrows of freshly turned earth. Satisfied that his buildings were safe from fire he thought next to protect his winter's supply of cattle food. The furrows were purple-black and deep, so wide an errant fire could not cross.

As he finished fireproofing his own place, he noticed the wind had switched slightly. Shouting to his wife that he was going to plow around the neighbor's buildings, too, he hurried off, in high gear, cutting through the pasture, heading towards the little cottage where an old couple lived.

They were a little old couple, in their late 70's, stone deaf. They wouldn't have heard about the fire, but by this time they would have smelled it, and seen it, and would have had no way to get out of its path.

The wind, which had increased sharply, began whipping the fire along. Scientists can explain how hot air rises and causes movement which is wind; in the course of a prairie fire, fire begets wind, and when the fire gets a good strong toehold, there's very little that can hold it back.

The farmer could see it coming closer, could see the red tongues of fire consuming the brittle, toast-colored grass.

It was about that time that a neighbor lady from the west came to help. She and her young children, ages four through eight, brought two large cream cans full of water. They were prepared to help beat back the fire.

At almost the same time two rigs of men arrived with barrels of water, and heaps of gunnysacks. Leaping out of the trucks they grabbed the sacks, soaked them in water, and frantically began beating at the fire as it raged in front of them.

The neighbor lady, who hadn't waited to search for gunny sacks, grabbed what she could that wouldn't burn readily. She snatched the heavy denim jeans her eight year old was wearing, doused them in water, and began lashing furiously at the fire which by now was frighteningly near.

Moments later several more rigs of men arrived, all with barrels of water. One of the men, an old timer, looked at the highway, a natural barrier to the fire, and reckoned, gravely, that they would have to start a backfire if they were to break this one's force. He'd experienced many fires, and this one was one of the fiercest.

The wind was flogging the fire into a frenzy. The crackling heat provided a backdrop of sound effects for the treacherous wind. Without a backfire, there could be no stopping this fire.

A backfire was built to consume the combustible materials in the path of a fire, so that it would have no place to go, and would be forced to die. There is a trick to it, a technique, and the old man knew it. He and several others huddled together to protect the flame from the onslaught of the wind, nursing their flame along until it was ready.

With the highway as a safety zone behind them, the men worked, coaxing, channeling, directing their fire towards the big one, until there was nothing left between the two fires to devour.

Taming the rampant fire required all the strength the men had, and even after the wind had died down, and dusk had come, they did not dare to leave.

Wiping sweaty arms across their foreheads, sipping what water was left, they sprawled on the charred earth, wishing it might rain. They were exhausted, but so was the fire.

It wasn't until then that they heard the news about the farmer who had gone to plow the furrows around the neighbor's home. When the capricious fire had turned, it had trapped the farmer. He had jumped from his tractor, and ran back through the fire, protected by leather leggings, remnants of his World War I uniform, and his arms, which he used to shield his face.

When he was found he was dazed and incoherent. The neighbors who found him took him immediately to the nearest doctor, thirty miles away. The tractor, in the perverse way of things, was turning circles, as though performing a slow ballet movement. Treatment for burns in those days was vaseline to be slathered on, and gauze bandages. The neighbors transported him, covered him with an apron, and gave him sips of water from a thermos made from a mason jar wrapped in burlap. When they brought him home he was beginning to be lucid.

All that fall neighbors came to help him with the chores, and to haul him to the doctor. The gauze stuck to his burned flesh and tore at the wounds when it was peeled; the odor of rotting flesh left a stench that had to be borne; the days were filled with unceasing pain.

Without the neighbors the work could not have been done. One of them came nightly to do the chores, and to tell tall tales and jokes to make him laugh. He couldn't smile because that caused the blisters on his face to crack and ache, but his big shoulders shook with laughter, and his eyes gleamed.

Winter came, and with the spring, the earth had healed and so had the farmer. The winter snows had blanketed the earth and the melting rains had carried away all traces of the fire that had ravaged it. When the grasses poked through they formed a soft carpet of green. The plowed furrows looked oddly out of place, a vestige, a reminder of things past.

When the gauze and bandages were removed, the fingers were no longer thick from swelling; no longer was there a fear of infection.

When the first green shoots of grain peeked through the ground, the farmer headed into the fields again. His arms were scarred and brown, in stark contrast to the pink-white of his arms above the elbow, where he had always rolled his blue denim shirt sleeves, but his steps were youthful, and plans for the new season began to take form.

It must have been a year later when a magazine salesman found his way to the farmer's home. "Wasn't it somewhere around here," the salesman asked, "where a man got burned trying to plow around an old couple's place?" But the salesman was anxious to sell magazines and didn't wait for a reply. "They say the old couple never realized he was plowing to try to save their place, and I've heard he never told them."

The farmer traded two old batteries for a subscription to a magazine, and shook the salesman's hand when he left.

"Good luck," the farmer said, and added, "Don't bother to stop at the little farm to the east; the old couple who lived there passed on last winter."
....................

The farmer in the story was my father, Helmer Liffengren, of Draper, South Dakota. We had only recently moved to that farm when the prairie fire broke out, and we did not know any of our neighbors well. But, in Dakota, neighbors were a precious commodity, something that one cherished and greatly appreciated.

I have written this story not only to pay homage to my father, but to cite the Rankins, the Dowlings, and the others who helped in our time of great need. I would like to go even farther than that: I should like this story to honor good neighbors wherever they may be. @

This true story was first published in the May/June, 1993 issue of South Dakota magazine under "Remembering."


Louise Liffengren Hullinger


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6/27/2018

Books Go Figure







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6/26/2018

Is Chicago Union Station Redevelopment Soldier Field 2.0?

Interesting article from Aaron Renn. Read more from Renn at http://www.urbanophile.com



Aaron M. Renn via aweber.com 




Is Chicago Union Station Redevelopment Soldier Field 2.0?

The company redeveloping the headhouse of Chicago Union Station just unveiled renderings of the project that are not exactly earning rave reviews from the critics. The proposal involves plopping a modernist box addition top of the existing station. Here’s the rendering.


To give you a sense of this, here’s a photo of the existing station.



Photo Credit: Thshriver, CC BY-SA 3.0

This sort of combination is reminiscent of the much-maligned renovation of Soldier Field, in which a contemporary “space saucer” bowl of seating was added on top of the neoclassical colonnades.



Photo Credit: Ken Lund, CC BY-SA 2.0

 Click to read the article and to view on web site to post comments at: 

http://www.urbanophile.com/2018/06/26/is-chicago-union-station-redevelopment-soldier-field-2-0/



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6/20/2018

All Men May Not Be Brothers, But We Are Cousins

'Most recent common ancestor' of all living humans surprisingly recent

New Haven, Conn. -- In this week's issue of Nature, a Yale mathematician presents models showing that the most recent person who was a direct ancestor of all humans currently alive may have lived just a few thousand years ago.

"While we may not all be 'brothers,' the models suggest we are all hundredth cousins or so," said Joseph T. Chang, professor in the Department of Statistics at Yale University and senior author on the paper.

Chang established the basis of this research in a previous publication with an intentionally simplified model that ignored such complexities as geography and migration. Those precise mathematical results showed that in a world obeying the simplified assumptions, the most recent common ancestor would have lived less than 1,000 years ago. He also introduced the "identical ancestors point," the most recent time -- less than 2,000 years ago in the simplified model -- when each person was an ancestor to all or ancestor to none of the people alive today.

The current paper presents more realistic mathematical and computer models. It incorporates factors such as socially driven mating, physical barriers of geography and migration, and recorded historical events. Although such complexities make pure mathematical analysis difficult, it was possible to integrate them into an elaborate computer simulation model. The computer repeatedly simulated history under varying assumptions, tracking the lives, movements, and reproduction of all people who lived within the last 20,000 years.

These more realistic models estimate that the most recent common ancestor of mankind lived as recently as about 3,000 years ago, and the identical ancestors point was as recent as several thousand years ago. The paper suggests, "No matter the languages we speak or the color of our skin, we share ancestors who planted rice on the banks of the Yangtze, who first domesticated horses on the steppes of the Ukraine, who hunted giant sloths in the forests of North and South America, and who labored to build the Great Pyramid of Khufu."

The results can also work backwards, into the future. According to Chang, "Within two thousand years, it is likely that everyone on earth will be descended from most of us."
###

Other authors are Douglas L.T. Rhode of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Steve Olson of Bethesda, MD. The National Institutes of Health supported this research.

Citation: Nature 431: (September 30, 2004). For solicited commentary on this paper, see News & Views and supplementary material in the same issue.










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6/18/2018

Sabbatical Around the World 2003

From a Previous Trip. 
The Chinese enjoyed the Blue Eyed Empress
Scoop at:
http://sabbaticalruhu.blogspot.com/





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Angkor Wat Sunrise


Angkor Wat, Cambodia


Around the World in 40 Days and 40 Nights


We made this trip up as we went along. Why Plan, When you can react?  We left Sarasota, Florida to visit our daughter in Washington State - Seattle and the western mountains. Very nice visit there. We then had options to fly space available on military planes - I am retired military - Space A to Europe, Hawaii, Alaska and Korea. We chose Korea and had a nice time there.  

Beth and I have always loved Hong Kong and since it was not to far from Korea we thought we would go. Hong Kong was the first international trip that Beth and I made 30 years ago. We have visited there 5 more times. Fun to see this dynamic city again.

Then we were close to Angkor Wat, Cambodia so we flew there. And then we were close to Bangkok, another city we love, so we went there. We were then about 1/2 way around the world. 

Rapperswil-Jona, Switzerland and Sarasota, Florida are considering becoming Sister Cities. Beth is President and I am a Vice President of Sarasota Sister Cities.  Rapperswil wanted us to visit, so we flew there via Helsinki, Finland.  Met some very nice people there.  Then on to Ramstein Air Force Base, Germany for a Space A flight to McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey. We drove home from there.

Cities we visited.

     Sarasota, FL
     Seattle, WA
     Misawa, Japan
     Osan, Korea
     Dragon Hill, Korea
     Hong Kong, China
     Angkor Wat (Seam Riep)
     Bangkok, Thailand
     Helsinki, Finland     
     Zurich, Switzerland
     Rapperswil, Switzerland
     Ramstein Air Force Base, Germany
     McGuire Air  Force Base, New Jersey
     Philadelphia, PA
     Tampa, FL
     Sarasota, FL








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6/15/2018

Cute Little Gator Tonight Jun 15, 2018






Run for it, little guy


Splash!!

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