Amusing Planet

RP FLIP, the Strangest Ship in the World

2012-05-19T03:06:00.001-07:00

The U.S. Office of Naval Research owns a very strange piece of oceanographic equipment. It’s called the FLoating Instrument Platform (FLIP), conceived and developed by the Marine Physical Laboratory (MPL) at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California. FLIP isn't a ship, even though researchers live and work on it for weeks at a time while they conduct scientific studies in the open ocean. It is actually a huge specialized buoy. The most unusual thing about this ship is it really flips.

FLIP is 355 feet (108 meters) long with small quarters at the front and a long hollow ballast at the end. When the tanks are filled with air, FLIP floats in its horizontal position. But when they are filled with seawater the lower 300 feet of FLIP sinks under the water and the lighter end rises. When flipped, most of the buoyancy for the platform is provided by water at depths below the influence of surface waves, hence FLIP is a stable platform mostly immune to wave action. At the end of a mission, compressed air is pumped into the ballast tanks in the flooded section and the vessel returns to its horizontal position so it can be towed to a new location.

During the flip, everyone stands on the outside decks. As FLIP flips, the decks slowly become bulkheads and the bulkhead becomes the deck. Most rooms on FLIP have two doors; one to use when horizontal, the other when FLIP is vertical. Some of FLIP's furnishings are built so they can rotate to a new position as FLIP flips. Other equipment must be unbolted and moved. Some things, like tables in the galley (kitchen) and sinks in the washroom, are built twice so one is always in the correct position. The entire flip operation takes twenty-eight minutes. When FLIP stands vertically, it rises more than five stories into the air.

Colorful Indian Street Art

2012-05-18T08:43:00.001-07:00

Modern graffiti art is rare in India, but traditional hand painted street art is ubiquitous. From tea stall signs to election messages on walls, from mud flaps on rickshaws to whimsical messages behind trucks, from brashly painted deities to giant larger than life paintings of Bollywood heroes, everything in India is hand painted. Though very few India’s street artists are formally trained they have collectively evolved styles that are very unique and typical to Indian visual culture.

Today, I present a very talented photographer and designer Meena Kadri who has been following the Indian street art scene.

An undergrad in anthropology and Masters in design, New Zealand–born Meena Kadri has taught at institutes in China, New Zealand and at the National Institute of Design in India. Her photography and artwork have been exhibited in Glasgow, Delhi, Rome, Barcelona and New Zealand. She currently works as a Community Manager on OpenIDEO.

Huge Swarms of Mosquitoes Invade Russian Village of Mikoltsy

2012-05-17T10:11:00.001-07:00

No, these are not Starling Murmuration. They are mosquitoes, millions of them that descended upon the Russian village of Mikoltsy near Myadel, Belarus, in the Minsk region on May 14. The mosquitoes were so loud that even cars could not be heard. Photographer Dennis Sour who managed to capture this unusual phenomenon said that although the swarm looked threatening, they didn’t bite. Such activity of mosquitoes is probably caused by the weather.

According to Tatiana Zhukova, director of the Naroch Biological Station, this is a natural process. The lake is home to mosquito larvae. When the larvae grow into adult they leave the water and come to land, where they mate and lay eggs. Large clouds of mosquitoes gather every year but they are usually not noticed because the windy weather blows away the mosquitoes. But on quiet and sunny days, like that on Monday, they become more than apparent.

Weather is known to cause weird behavior among animals and insects. Last year in Pakistan, rising flood waters drove millions of spiders up into the trees where they wove webs completely cocooning the trees.

Grass Portraits by Ackroyd & Harvey

2012-05-16T11:05:00.001-07:00

Grass is like photographic paper which becomes pigmented upon exposure to light. The more intense the light exposure, the more intensely pigmented the grass becomes. By exposing plots of seedling grass to light through a custom-made negative, Surrey, England-based Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey makes the grass grow in different shades, from yellow to green creating unique portraits out of them. After a couple of weeks, when the growing process is complete faces or landscapes starts appearing in the grass.

Grass photography wasn’t invented by this duo. This technique was pioneer by photographer William Henry Fox Talbot and his photographs published in a book in 1844. Ackroyd and Harvey admit that their photography is greatly inspired by his work and ethos towards nature.

In a small room Ackroyd and Harvey experimented for the first time with imprinting an image onto a growing wall of grass. Projecting a negative image of the storeroom containing all the large neon letters for Le Fresnoy, onto a growing wall of grass, the results were astonishing. The grass revealed an extraordinary sensitivity to light and the ability to print a living photograph was first realized. Ackroyd and Harvey spent over a decade fine-tuning this process.

Unfortunately, just as miraculously as these images emerge, so do they degrade over a short period of time. Lately, the couple has been working actively with scientists at the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research in Wales to create 'stay green,' a form of grass that lasts longer than the regular material and is grown from a genetically modified seed.

Fighting Protesters With Colored Water

2012-05-16T04:20:00.001-07:00

You must have seen photos of protesters being doused with colored-water cannons by the police. Using water canon is understood as it’s an easy non-hazardous way to disperse mob, but why would police spray protesters with purple and pink water? Simple: to identify and arrest them later. Many water cannons on the market today come with a tank specially designed to store a semi-permanent colored dye. If police decide they want to "tag" protesters with the dye, they can press a button to inject it into the main water stream. Once the water cannon is trained on a crowd, anyone hit by the spray will be easily recognizable by police.

The most famous use of colored-water cannons took place in South Africa in 1989, when police soaked anti-apartheid activists with purple water. But in the ensuing chaos, one of the protester turned a water cannon back at police and towards the local headquarters of the ruling National Party. The headquarters, along with the historic and white-painted Old Town House, were doused with purple. The next day, a graffiti artist tagged the Old Town House with the phrase "The Purple Shall Govern," which soon became an anti-apartheid slogan.

Police spray Ugandan opposition party leaders with colored water during demonstrations in the capital Kampala, May 10, 2011. President Yoweri Museveni has vowed to crush the protests and blamed rising food and fuel costs on drought and global increases in oil prices. (James Akena / Reuters)

During the last 15 years, protesters in Hungary, Indonesia, Argentina, Malaysia, India and Israel have all been showered with colored water. In Uganda last year pink dye was employed to humiliate protesters. In Israel, Palestinian rioters were sprayed deep blue, the colour of the Israeli flag. The Hungarian police use green, the Koreans orange. Indian police is particularly fond of purple.

10 Most Incredible Flower Festivals Around the World

2012-05-15T22:39:00.002-07:00

Flower festivals are celebrated all over the world and almost around the year. Even as I write this one such festival is taking place in India, the Malabar Flower Festival, and another scheduled to start later this month. The Kegworth Flower Festival is underway in Derby, England, and a dozen other places are preparing for theirs in the coming weeks. Here we present 10 most fascinating display of flowers in different parts of the world.

Bloemencorso

The Bloemencorso, a Dutch word which means "flower parade", are held in many towns in the Netherlands and Belgium. In a parade of this kind the floats, cars and in some cases boats are magnificently decorated or covered in flowers. Each parade has its own character, charm and theme. Zundert holds the largest flower parade in the world.

The parade takes place on the first Sunday of September. The floats are large artworks made of steel wire, cardboard, papier-mâché and flowers. In the Bloemencorso Zundert, only dahlias are used to decorate the objects and it takes thousands of them just to cover one float.

The huge floats are made by twenty different hamlets and each of them consists of hundreds of builders, aged 1 to 100, who are all equally crazy about the bloemencorso. The older members of the hamlet are often responsible for planting and growing the dahlias, while the younger ones build the float in large temporary tents that are built exclusively for the event.

Celebrity Pin Art Portraits by Philip Karlberg

2012-05-14T11:03:00.001-07:00

Photographer Philip Karlberg has just created a unique shoot for Plaza Magazine, sculpting famous faces by simply using clever lighting and carefully arranged wooden pins. The wooden pin are sparingly used yet the faces he created are instantly recognizable.

A couple of months ago I came up with an idea I have had in mind for years. I just did not know what I could use it for. But then I did a test with sunglasses, and it really turned out great. So I sent an image with the test to Plaza Magazine, and a week later I started shooting. It was a real challenge to ‘sculpt’ the faces of some classic wearers of sunglasses. It took me 6 days to shoot the 6 faces, and around 1200 sticks were used.

Poo Machine by Wim Delvoye

2012-05-14T08:57:00.001-07:00

Wim Delvoye is a Belgian artist known for his inventive and often shocking and repulsive projects.

Cloaca, also known as the "poo-machine", is probably Wim Delvoye's most famous art installation. In 2000, he put together a complex machinery at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Antwerp, Belgium, that mimics the action of the human digestive system and converts food in feces. Real food is dropped down a funnel into a meat grinder (simulating the teeth) twice a day. Then, viewers can follow the food as it makes its way through a series of glass containers containing human digestive juices and enzymes, which represent the various stages of digestion. At the end of the tract, the machine produces feces which are then vacuum-packed and sold in translucent boxes. It is told that the smell is so powerful that not many visitors can take it.

It took Wim Delvoye eight years of consultation with experts in fields ranging from plumbing to gastroenterology to construct the poo machine. When asked about his inspiration, Delvoye stated that everything in modern life is pointless. The most useless object he could create was a machine that serves no purpose at all, besides the reduction of food to waste.

Amazingly Realistic Cakes by Debbie Goard

2012-05-14T08:54:00.001-07:00

Debbie Goard is a cake designer who runs “Debbie Does Cakes”, a single-woman cake company based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Debbie has been crafting incredibly realistic looking cakes over the last two decades. Debbie enjoyed her work but didn’t initially believe that cake design was her calling, viewing it as a job versus a career. But after countless instances where her cakes were mistaken for real objects – most notably a life-sized chihuahua cake that compelled restaurant patrons to exclaim “Why is there a dog on a table?!” – she began to realize that maybe she had been denying her fate.

Debbie says: "The best part of my job is being challenged by unusual requests. This year I had a gallery show of cakes based on scenes from Horror movies including the rat on a platter from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane......and food from the kitchen in Poltergeist, the most outrageous of which was maggot-covered chicken."

Bryce Canyon National Park

2012-05-11T04:38:00.001-07:00

Bryce Canyon National Park is located in southwestern Utah in the United States. Bryce Canyon which, despite its name, is not a canyon but a giant natural amphitheater created by erosion along the eastern side of the Paunsaugunt Plateau. Bryce is distinctive due to geological structures called hoodoos, formed by wind, water, and ice erosion of the river and lake bed sedimentary rocks. Some of these hoodoos are up to 200 feet high. The red, orange, and white colors of the rocks provide spectacular views for park visitors.

For millions of years water has carved Bryce's rugged landscape. Water drips into the cracks in the rocks, freezes and expands thereby splitting the rocks - a cyclic process that occurs some 200 times a year. In summer, rainwater etches into the softer limestones and sluices through the deep runnels. In about 50 years the present rim will be cut back another foot.

Bryce lies at a much higher elevation than nearby Zion National Park and the Grand Canyon, varying from 8,000 to 9,000 feet (2,440 to 2,740 m), whereas the south rim of the Grand Canyon sits at 7,000 feet (2130 m) above Sea Level. Bryce Canyon National Park therefore has a substantially different ecology and climate, offering a contrast for visitors to the south west.

The Bryce area was settled by Mormon pioneers in the 1850s and was named after Ebenezer Bryce, who homesteaded in the area in 1874. The area around Bryce Canyon became a U.S. National Monument in 1923 and was designated as a national park in 1928. The park covers 35,835 acres and receives relatively few visitors compared to Zion National Park and the Grand Canyon, largely due to its remote location.

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Amazing Sculpture of Burning Tires by Gal Weinstein

2012-05-11T02:34:00.001-07:00

Tel Aviv based artist Gal Weinstein (born in Ramat Gan in 1970) is one of the internationally renowned artists of his generation. Gal Weinstein is best-known for his project “Huleh Valley”, where he created a large-format installation covering the floor at Helena Rubinstein Pavillion for Contemporary Art in Tel Aviv and wall paintings which address the famous swamp draining and land reclamation project in Huleh Valley. The government had commissioned the drainage of the 1.5 square km lake in 1951, to convert it into arable land for future generations of farmers.

In his exhibition in Kunsthaus Baselland organized last year, Gal Weinstein presented his latest series of works, “Fire Tires”. The motif of burning tires is a universal code which we associate with socio-political unrest, revolution, and also with various, mostly pagan customs. “Car tires are cheap fuel,” says the artist and thus also explains why this material is used worldwide, when a fire is started for fun or – as we increasingly experience it – fire kindled as a symbol of (political and social) upheavals. The tires are moulded from wax, the construction material consists of polystyrene foam and the surface of the smoke clouds consists of artificial pillow filling, complemented by multi-coloured graphite dust. Distributed in the exhibition space, the sculptures become almost pop-art-like icons that are able to enter into an immediate relation with the recipient due to their quick legibility.

Hyper-Realistic Sculptures by Jamie Salmon

2012-05-10T22:50:00.001-07:00

Jamie Salmon is a British born, self taught contemporary sculptor, living and working in Vancouver, Canada. He started his career working as a commercial artist and sculptor for the movie effects industry. He specializes in hyper-realist sculpture, both figurative and portrait, utilizing such materials as silicone rubber, resin, hair and fabric.

Jamie says of his working process: “I want to make something that tells a story or moves people in some sort of way, not something that just looks very real. Of course, I need my works to have a certain degree of reality about them, but it`s more of a heightened reality. This is also why I like to play with scale in a lot of my works as well. I think it is something that catches people off guard and forces them to confront their ideas about reality, and to also think about the idea behind the work more deeply. Maybe more so than they would do if the piece were just life size.”

Manhattan of the Desert: Shibam, Yemen

2012-05-10T08:55:00.001-07:00

The city of Shibam, located in the central-western area of Hadhramaut Governorate, in the Ramlat al-Sab`atayn desert, is best known for its towering mudbrick skyscrapers. This small town of 7000 is packed with around 500 mud houses standing between 5 and 11 stories tall and reaching 100 feet high, all constructed entirely of mud bricks. The bizarre skyline that the high rise buildings bestow upon the city has earned Shibam the moniker "Manhattan of the Desert."

Shibam is often called "the oldest skyscraper city in the world" and is one of the oldest and best examples of urban planning based on the principle of vertical construction. Its plan is trapezoidal, almost rectangular; and it is enclosed by earthen walls within which a block of dwellings, also built from earth, have been laid out on an orthogonal grid. Shibam was founded in the 3rd century AD, but most of the houses you see here dates only to the 16th century, following a devastating flood of which Shibam was the victim in 1532-33. However, some older houses and large buildings still remain from the first centuries of Islam, such as the Friday Mosque, built in 904, and the castle, built in 1220.

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In general the windowless lower floors are used for grain storage, with areas for domestic use above and those for family and leisure above that. The main room on the second floor is used by men for socializing. It often has wonderful carved plasterwork and freestanding decorated wooden columns supporting the ceiling, while women's areas are found higher, usually on the third or fourth floor. The highest rooms are for communal use by the whole family, and on the upper levels there are often bridges and doors connecting the houses. These are a defensive feature, but also a practical one – especially for old people who find it difficult to walk up and down the interminable staircases.

Oymyakon, the Coldest Inhabited Place on Earth

2012-05-09T10:10:00.001-07:00

Oymyakon is a small village located in the north-eastern Russian Republic of Sakha (Yakutia). It is commonly considered the coldest populated place on Earth. Situated in the heart of Siberia an area nicknamed "Stalin's Death Ring" (a former destination for political exiles), Oymyakon boasts an average winter temperature of -45C, with a one-time world record low of -71.2C. Ironically, Oymyakon means "non-freezing water", situated as it is to a nearby hot spring.

Before the 1920s and 30s, Oymyakon was a seasonal stop for reindeer herders. But the Soviet government, in its efforts to settle nomadic populations, claiming they were difficult to control and technologically and culturally backward, made the site a permanent settlement. Today, the village is home to some 500 people, and until recently had a single hotel with no hot water and outside toilet. While a flurry of snow in Western Europe can cause schools there to close for days, Oymyakon's solitary school shuts only when temperatures fall below –52C.

Most homes in Oymyakon still burn coal and wood for heat and enjoy few modern conveniences. There is no mobile coverage in Oymyakon and even if did, it would be unusable as most electronics stop working in freezing temperatures.

Fur is considered a luxury in the West but it is the only thing that keeps you warm. Nothing grows here so all people eat is reindeer and horsemeat. There is a short summer season during which people can grow things, but for the most part people don't eat fruit or vegetables. Medics say the reason they don't suffer from malnutrition is that there must be lots of micronutrients in their animals' milk. A single shop provides the town's provisions and with jobs in short supply most locals resort to reindeer-breeding, hunting and ice-fishing for their livelihoods.

Lord of Rings Movie Set Now Houses Sheep

2012-05-07T11:32:00.001-07:00

When Peter Jackson spotted the Alexander Farm during an aerial search of the North Island in Matamata in New Zealand for the best possible locations to film The Lord of The Rings film trilogy, he immediately thought it was perfect for Hobbiton, the village where the Hobbits live. He began preparing the site in March 1999 for filming that was to commence at the end of the year.

The New Zealand Army was brought in to build 1.5 km of road into the site. They brought diggers, bulldozers, loaders, trucks, rollers, graders and other heavy machinery to the site. Thirty-seven hobbit holes were created on the hillside with untreated timber, ply and polystyrene. Barberry hedges and trees were brought in and gardens were nurtured throughout winter. Thatch on the pub and mill roofs was cut from rushes around the Alexander farm, and oak tree overlooking Bag End was cut down and brought in from near Matamata. Each branch was numbered and chopped, then transported and bolted together on top of Bag End. Artificial leaves were imported from Taiwan and individually wired onto the dead tree. For nine months, 400 people toiled each day to convert this hitherto unknown place into Middle Earth.

Today, only 17 of those hobbit houses remain and they have been taken over by sheep. In 2011, the set was completely rebuilt for the feature films "The Hobbit" and now remain as permanent exhibit and tourist attraction for fans.

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Liu Bolin Disappears Again

2012-05-05T21:50:00.001-07:00

Liu Bolin (previously on Amusing Planet), also known as “The Invisible Man” is currently exhibiting his camouflaging prowess at the Eli Klein Fine Art in New York. New works by the artist including his most recent collaboration with Harper’s Bazaar and fashion powerhouses Gaultier, Lanvin, Missoni, and Valentino, will be on display. Titled “Lost in Art,” this is Liu Bolin’s fourth solo exhibition at the gallery.

In recent years, Liu Bolin has garnered a particularly high level of international acclaim. Both his most recent and his upcoming series have centered on a concept of "hiding in the city,” wherein the artist paints himself into the background of various notable locations in China, France, Italy and New York, in order to investigate the often contentious relationship between the individual and society and between man and nature.

In collaboration with Harper’s Bazaar, Liu Bolin met with Jean Paul Gaultier, Elber Albaz of Lanvin, Angela Missoni, and Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli from Valentino, as they became the latest subjects of his camouflaging performance. The designers underwent the process of becoming nearly invisible within a background of their most celebrated signature designs. Creating four fantastic photographs, this collaboration stands as a true and marvelous beacon of the merging of fashion and art.

Liu Bolin was born in China’s Shandong province in 1973, and earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Shandong College of Arts and his Master of Fine Arts from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. His work has been exhibited in museum shows around the world including recent solo exhibitions “The Invisible Man,” Fotografiska Museet, Stockholm (2011) and “The Invisible Man,” Ekaterina Cultural Foundation, Moscow (2012).

The exhibition will be on view at Eli Klein Fine Art from March 20th through May 11th, 2012.

Wendy Tsao Turns Children’s Doodles Into Real Toys

2012-05-05T02:38:00.001-07:00

Wendy Tsao made her first toy based on a drawing by her 4-year-old son Dani. The school had asked the children to bring a toy from home. The idea was to use it as an emergency measure if the child were to throw tantrum or had a crying fit. Wendy didn’t want to send Dani’s favorite toy with him to school fearing he may lose it. Instead, she decided to make him a new toy. Using a drawing made by her child, one which he often repeated, as a guide, Wendy Tsao improvised a toy snowman.

Five years later, Wendy Tsao has her own business, the Child's Own Studio in which she transforms drawings of children into plush and cloth dolls. Wendy Tsao receives requests from parents all over the world, and she made several hundreds soft toys based on children’s drawings, each one as unique as the child who drew it. Details and color choices are reproduced as closely as possible so that the stuffed toy that arrives in the mail is immediately recognizable to the child who designed it.

“It’s a fun, rewarding process, and kids love seeing their drawings come alive”, she says.

Wendy is so overwhelmed with requests that she has made a list of artists around the world who are doing similar work, and published it on her blog. She recommends some 20 craftsmen, 14 of them in the United States, two in Australia, two in Canada and two in Europe. If you want your kid’s doodles to be turned into toys, send her a request. Be aware, the list has 500 people waiting.

If you liked Wendy Tsao’s work you will also love The Monster Engine: Children’s Drawings Painted Realistically

Heavy Lift Ships and their Impossibly Massive Cargoes

2012-05-04T23:29:00.001-07:00

When you need to transport large cargo, goods, and materials from one place to another, ship is the ideal choice even though they are extremely slow. Thousands of cargo carriers ply the world's seas and oceans each year, and they handle the bulk of international trade. Then there are heavy lift ships that are designed to carry excessively large loads that even cargo ships cannot bear, such as other ships, drilling rigs or anything else too large or heavy to be easily transported on a conventional ship.

Heavy lift ships are of two types: semi-submerging capable of lifting another ship out of the water and transporting it; and vessels that augment unloading facilities at inadequately equipped ports. Semi-submerging are more commonly known as a "flo/flo" for float-on/float-off. These vessels have a long and low well deck that can go down under water allowing oil platforms, other vessels, or other floating cargo to be moved into position for loading. The tanks are then pumped out, and the well deck rises higher in the water, lifting its cargo, and is ready to sail wherever in the world the cargo needs to be transported.

The world's first heavy lift vessel was MV Lichtenfels (118 long tons; 132 short tons) constructed in the 1920s by the Bremen based shipping company DDG Hansa. After World War II, DDG Hansa became the world's largest heavy lift shipping company. Today that title is owned by Dockwise which currently operates 19 heavy lift ships – the world’s largest fleet of semi-submersible vessels of various sizes and types.

Pied Piper Duck Show in Australia

2012-05-02T08:28:00.001-07:00

Easter parades occur all over the world, but in Sydney, Australia, a very special parade takes place. Behatted ducks in pink, green and yellow outfits waddle down the catwalk in the Pied Piper Duck Show at one of Australia's most famous annual country festivals. The show is a part of the 14-day Sydney Royal Easter Show which is the largest annual event staged in Australia, attracting an average of 900,000 visitors.

Brian Harrington, who runs the duck show, believes his feathered models are just as talented as their human counterparts, and completely under-appreciated. The 60-year old Harrington has run the show for some 30 years and dresses his ducks according to the latest fashion trends for each event. A farmer from New South Wales, Brian Harrington also trains pigs which, this year, reportedly played a chaotic version of musical chairs.

Aside from fashion parades, the Pied Piper Duck Show also showcase Racing Ducks, which have the crowds roaring in laughter as they cheer on their favorite duck. And of course, there are food stalls that offer everything from steak sandwiches, souvlakis, baked potatoes, strawberries, ice-cream, milkshakes, and duck roast too.

Rebuilt World Trade Center Becomes New York's Tallest Skyscraper

2012-05-02T07:08:00.001-07:00

Eleven years after the shocking terrorist attack on the World Trade Center (WTC) building in New York, the U.S., reconstruction at the World Trade Center site is now well underway but not after years of delay and controversy. The new complex will include One World Trade Center formerly known as the Freedom Tower, 7 World Trade Center, three other high-rise office buildings, a museum and memorial, and a transportation hub similar in size to Grand Central Terminal.

As construction continues, the rebuilt One World Trade Center has quickly become a prominent fixture in the New York City skyline, overtaking the Empire State Building to become New York's tallest skyscraper this week at 1,271 feet. The milestone is a preliminary one. Workers are still adding floors to the Freedom Tower, and it isn’t expected to reach its full height for at least another year, at which point will be the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere and the third-tallest building in the world by pinnacle height, with its spire reaching a symbolic 1,776 feet.

However, its overall roof height, at 1,368 feet will still be 82 feet shorter than the roof of Chicago's 108-story Willis Tower. The building's structure is expected to top out sometime in late spring or early summer of 2012, whereupon its 408-foot radio antenna will be installed. At an estimated cost of $3.8 billion, the tower is also the most expensive single building in the world at the moment.

The 104-story tall skyscraper is being constructed in the northwest corner of the 16-acre World Trade Center site, occupying the location where the original 8-story 6 World Trade Center once stood.

Solvay Hut: A Precarious Mountain Hut at Matterhorn, Switzerland

2012-05-02T04:26:00.001-07:00

The Solvay Hut is located on the north-eastern ridge of the Matterhorn, near Zermatt in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. At 4,003 meters (13,133 feet) it is the highest mountain hut owned by the Swiss Alpine Club, the largest mountaineering club in Switzerland. Mountain huts are intended to provide food and shelter to mountaineers, climbers and hikers. But Solvay Hut can be used only in case of emergency. About two thirds up the mountain, 743 m above the Hörnli Hut and 475 m below the summit, many Matterhorn climbers have rested on the small ledge outside the hut admiring the spectacular view of all the Monte Rosa summits.

The hut was built in August 1915. All the building material was brought up to the Hörnli Hut at 3260 meter by help of animals. From there a small temporary cable car was used to transport the material up to the building site at 4000 meter. The hut was erected within only five days. In 1966 the hut was rebuilt and in 1976 an emergency telephone was installed.

The hut is named after Belgium Ernest Solvay (1838-1922) who donated the well-known hut on the Hörnli Ridge on the Matterhorn as a gratitude for the unforgettable hours he spent in the mountains, and from the realization that occasionally sudden thunder storms lead to tragedies. Before his alpine career began after retirement, Ernest Solvay was an inventor and businessman who invented the industrial process for sodium carbonate production, from which a world-wide undertaking resulted.

Conflict Kitchen: Restaurant That Serves Cuisine From Countries the US Has Conflict With

2012-05-02T04:23:00.001-07:00

Located in Pittsburgh, the Conflict Kitchen is a take-out restaurant that only serves cuisine from countries with which the United States is in conflict. The food is served out of a take-out-style storefront that rotates identities every six months to highlight another country and the idea is to spark dialogue and engage the community. Each iteration of the project is augmented by events, performances, and discussions that seek to expand the engagement the public has with the culture, politics, and issues at stake within the focus country. Often live international Skype dinner parties between citizens of Pittsburgh and professionals, documentary filmmakers and activists from the conflicting nations are organized.

Conflict Kitchen is the brainchild of three artists, John Peña, Jon Rubin, and Dawn Weleski who started the project in 2010.

The project works with communities in Pittsburgh that representative of the different conflict countries, and they come up with a menu of the street food you would find in the major cities of each country. They have included vegetarian and sometimes vegan options on every menu, and have so far covered food from Afghanistan, Iran, and Venezuela, with Cuba and North Korea planned for the future. With each iteration, the store front is redesigned and the restaurant name is spelled in the language of the country the project is highlighting. The food comes packaged in custom-designed wrappers that include interviews with Iranians both in Iran and the United States on subjects ranging from street food and popular culture to the current political turmoil.

The Adams River Salmon Run

2012-05-02T04:14:00.002-07:00

The Adams River is a tributary of the Fraser River in British Columbia, Canada. During mid-October millions of sockeye salmon run through this river and concentrate near the river mouth for breeding, an event that occurs once every four years. As many as 10 to 15 million salmons battle the Fraser River and the Thompson River to reach the 12 kilometer Adams River - the final stop to their 4,000 kilometer journey - where they spawn and die. While the sockeye return every year, the migration that occurs every fourth year (2010, 2014, 2018...) dwarfs the others.

Adams River sockeye travel from their spawning grounds to the South Thompson River, then into the Fraser River, and enter the Pacific. From the Strait of Georgia, they spend three years in the open ocean following Arctic currents to Alaska and the Aleutian islands. They then retrace their route to the Adams, completing a round trip of over 4,000 kilometers. At this point their numbers are reduced to about 2 million. They complete the arduous trip upstream, including navigating the swift waters and rapids of the Fraser Canyon, in just seventeen days. Unbelievably, the salmons do not eat during this period, instead relying on fat reserves stored up from heavy feeding in the Strait of Georgia in the late summer. It is at this point that the salmon take on their distinctive red hue, with the male fish also developing large humped backs and aggressive hooked mouths.

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When a suitable location is found, the female digs a nest from 10 to 40 cm deep while the male hovers nearby, fending off all intruders. The female deposits approximately 3,500 pinkish eggs to which the male adds a whitish milt to fertilize them. The sockeye pair then cover the eggs with loose gravel as protection against marauding fish and birds.

Within the next 10 days, the crimson pair will turn a chalky gray as their tired and battered bodies slowly give up life, passing on the task of the continuation of the species to the tiny pink eggs that lay beneath the gravel.

10 Famous Balancing Rocks Around the World

2012-04-28T00:29:00.001-07:00

A balancing rock is a naturally occurring geological formation featuring a large rock or boulder, sometimes of substantial size, resting on other rocks that often look precariously balanced. In reality, these rocks only appear to be balancing but are in fact firmly connected to a base rock by a pedestal or stem.

Here are some famous balancing rocks of the world.

Balanced Rock, Utah

Balanced Rock is one of the most popular features of Arches National Park, situated in Utah, United States. It is located next to the park's main road, at about 9 miles from the park entrance.

The total height of Balanced Rock is about 39 m, with the balancing rock rising 16.75 m above the base. The big rock on top is the size of three school buses. Until recently, Balanced Rock had a companion - a similar, but much smaller balanced rock named "Chip Off The Old Block", which fell during the winter of 1975/1976.

The Burning Town of Centralia, Pennsylvania

2012-04-27T09:09:00.001-07:00

Centralia is a small town located in Columbia County, Pennsylvania, in the very heart of Anthracite country. In May 1962, a fire started in a carelessly disposed trash incineration in an open pit mine near the town. The fire crawled along the coal-rich deposits far from the miner's pick to ignite a large coal vein running under the town.

The flames on the surface were successfully extinguished, but unbeknownst to the fire fighters, the coal continued to burn underground. Over the following weeks it rapidly migrated into the surrounding coal mines and beneath the town, venting hot and poisonous gases up into town, through the basements of homes and businesses. For the next two decades, workers battled the fire, flushing the mines with water and fly ash, excavated the burning material and dug trenches, backfilled, drilling again and again in an attempt to find the boundaries of the fire and plan to put the fire out or at least contain it.

All efforts failed to contain the fire. By the early 1980s the fire had affected approximately 200 acres and homes had to be abandoned as carbon monoxide levels reached life threatening levels.

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The fire, smoke, fumes and toxic gases that came up through the back yards, basements and streets of Centralia literally ripped the town apart. The town had an original population of 1100 residents, which dwindled to a dozen in 2005. Most of the homes were abandoned and residents were relocated over the years with grants from the federal government although some refused to be bought out and some still remain in the town.