Louisiana's giant sinkhole showed up in radar data before imploding onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Louisiana's giant sinkhole showed up in radar data before imploding

Since 2012, a monstrous sinkhole in Bayou Corn Louisiana has been swallowing up land in giant, tree-sized gulps, growing to a whopping 25-acres. Now, analyses of NASA radar data indicate the land showed signs of collapsing before the sinkhole opened. This raises a pressing question: Could sinkholes like Bayou Corne's be predicted before they happen?

Above: The now 25-acre sinkhole, as seen from above. Image credit: On Wings of Care, New Orleans, La.

Theoretically? Yes. In practice, though, probably not. "You could spend a lot of time flying and processing data without capturing a sinkhole," said JPL researcher Ron Blom. Blom, along with researcher Cathleen Jones, analyzed radar data of Southern Louisiana collected by NASA's Uninhabited Airborne Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar (UAVSAR) and found that the ground surface layer in Bayou Corne had, according to NASA, "deformed significantly at least a month before the collapse, moving mostly horizontally up to 10.2 inches (260 millimeters) toward where the sinkhole would later form."

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This interferogram was formed with images acquired on June 23, 2011 and July 2, 2012. Colors represent surface movement, with one full color wrap corresponding to 4.7 inches (120 millimeters) of displacement. Image & Caption Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

"While horizontal surface deformations had not previously been considered a signature of sinkholes, the new study shows they can precede sinkhole formation well in advance," added Jones. "This kind of movement may be more common than previously thought, particularly in areas with loose soil near the surface."

Even if there are no immediate plans to fly NASA's UAVSAR over sinkhole-prone areas, it's encouraging to know that predicting sinkholes is something we could conceivably do moving forward. Though we suspect that's small comfort to the people that make up the community of Bayou Corne, many of whom were evacuated so as to keep them from being swallowed up by the sinkhole. The sinkhole, which continues to threaten the community, along with nearby Highway 70, is still growing – perhaps UAVSAR could at least be used to provide locals with some sense of where, and how quickly, it will continue to expand.

Read more over at NASA.

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Louisiana's giant sinkhole showed up in radar data before imploding

An infographic that keeps track of all of Shakespeare's deaths for you onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com An infographic that keeps track of all of Shakespeare's deaths for you

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My god, Titus Andronicus. Points for volume and creativity.

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Cam Magee and Caitlin S. Griffin created a infographic that crosses Shakespeare with the people from bathroom signs. It shows every death from the tragedies, plus one of the most famous stage directions ever, from The Winter's Tale: "Exit, pursued by a bear."

Flavorwire

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com An infographic that keeps track of all of Shakespeare's deaths for you

Brand New Art from Calvin and Hobbes Creator Bill Watterson! onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Brand New Art from Calvin and Hobbes Creator Bill Watterson!

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Well here's an unexpected surprise: Bill Watterson, long-retired creator of Calvin of Hobbes, was so impressed with Stripped – a new feature documentary that invites some of the biggest names in comics "to talk about the art form they love, and what happens to it as newspapers die" – that he agreed to provide the art for the film's poster.

Stripped – the preview for which appears above – is a "love-letter" to the art form of cartooning, the brainchild of co-directors Dave Kellett (of Sheldon and Drive) and Fred Schroeder. The duo conducted over 90 interviews with some of the industry's biggest names to understand the once, current, and future landscape of comics, and how that landscape stands to transform as more people turn to the web for content. The list of interviewees includes more than 70 big-name print- and web-based cartoonists, including Zach Weiner (SMBC), Bill Amend (Foxtrot), Jim Davis (Garfield), Kate Beaton (Hark! A Vagrant) and, in his first-ever audio interview, Bill Waterson (check out the entire list of interviewees here). The full version of Watterson's poster art appears below:

"In the right hands," Watterson says, in a sound byte that Kellett and Schroeder use to open the documentary's newly released trailer, "a comic strip attains a beauty and an elegance that really I would put against any other art."

That Watterson would lend his voice to the movie had us pretty excited for its release. That he was so taken with the end product that he leant it his pen has us pretty much out of our minds with anticipation. Stripped will be available for advance ordering on iTunes at midnight tonight. DVD goes on sale April 2nd.

[Stripped via The New York Times]

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Brand New Art from Calvin and Hobbes Creator Bill Watterson!

Is Almost Human set in the retro future? onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Is Almost Human set in the retro future?

Every time period has its own vision of the future, whether that future consists of unlimited plenty and moon colonies or zombies and ruthless ape overlords. But do retro visions of the future sometimes cycle back into our current movies and TV?

In response to this week's recap of Almost Human, commenter Briareosdx advances an intriguing theory: Almost Human is set not in our own future, but in the future as imagined in the 1980s.

I came to a realization about this show, and ever since it has helped me to understand it perfectly as one of the most meta-science-fictional shows ever created. The realization is this:

Almost Human is a work of period fiction. It is set not in the near future, but in the the 1980's vision of the near future. Specifically, the cinematic vision of the near future as seen in other 80's sci-fi films such as Robocop, Runaway, Blade Runner, and so on.

Let that sink in. Almost Human does not take place in the future as we now think it will be, but in a modern interpretation of the near future we went to see in the movies in the 1980s.

Once you understand this, all the odd things about the show become clear.That's why I think this is a deliberate choice on the part of the creative team. The show plays with some of the tropes from the films of this era, as it brushes with technophobia, xenophobia, and even some of the questionable aspects of the show's female characters. However, as it is still a period piece made by modern people, it only plays with these thigs instead of embracing them. There are some very uncomfortable moments in a lot of 1980s films, particularly when it comes to women and foreigners. But just as a Masterpiece Theater murder mystery doesn't usually delve into the casual racism of the turn of the century, these elements act more as a signifier of the setting than a thematic point.

It is an odd thing to do in a show, but go back through the sci-fi of the 80's and the intention becomes almost overwhelming. Hell, even Kennex himself is clearly an 80's movie hero. Tough guy exterior, rough around the edges, a bit technophobic and old fashioned, a heart of gold underneath he denies he has, all wrapped up in a silly "tough guy" name.

And in the 80's, or at least the sci-fi of the 80s as we remember it, you had to have a silly tough guy name.

Do you have any other TV shows or movies that you think are set in the retro future? Tell us about it now.

onlinecollegedegreee.blogspot.com Is Almost Human set in the retro future?