Category Archives: Physics

Nuclear Reactor Assplosion: the drive to Oregon will never be the same

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Nuclear Cooling Tower, Trojan plantThe Trojan nuclear reactor is being dismantled. Assploded, actually. And road trips will never be the same.

How well I remember the first time I laid shocked, awed eyes on this behemoth of nuclear arrogance; it had been raining steadily in Vancouver for three uninterrupted weeks, and my friends Christi and Ken and I had decided to take a wee road trip south for shopping and general recreating purposes.

I don't know what the rain in Spain was like, but the rain in Seattle was exactly the same as the rain in Vancouver, so we just kept driving. At a certain point about halfway to Depoe Bay, Oregon, Christi, gripping the wheel a little too hard and her teeth also, hissed out the side of her mouth, "I hope you two don't mind, but I'm just going to drive south until I see the sun."

We did not think it an opportune moment to wrest control of the steering wheel away from her, nor did we think hers a bad idea in the first place, so we just nodded and continued to passenge passively.

Somewhere south of Seattle and north of the Oregon state line, I saw something looming out of the mists. I know it's a cliche, but some things just loom; this did. At first I thought it was a low-flying plane, because I could see a blinking red light, but as we got closer I realized there were only other red lights, at vast distances from one another, and that they were attached to a structure. A tower. A huge, Orwellian example of nuclearchitecture that did, indeed, loom out of the lead-coloured mists like the solidification of a Greenpeacer's worst nightmare. We just kept driving.

Trojan Nuclear Power Plant

It's not every day that I'm cowed by a building, but it was that day.

And never more:

In less than two weeks, history will be made when the cooling tower at the old Trojan power plant along the Columbia River is brought down.

I imagine there will be cheers. Unless they're a little sloppy, in which case there will be trouble.

Trojan Assplosion plans

The tower will come almost straight down, 150 feet off center, and far away from the radioactive spent fuel rods that are still stored at the site…

If you want to see the demolition, the best way to do that is from your own livingroom because there will be no public viewing spot. KATU News will be airing live coverage of the event on Sunday, May 21 starting at 6 a.m. The demolition is scheduled to take place at 7 a.m.

Mars Pathfinder NIN Animation/Music Video

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Yes, I know we've had a ton of videos today, but you MUST see this.

Awesome Daniel Maas NASA Mars Pathfinder Animation set to "Sunspots" by Nine Inch Nails (Trent Reznor) via Fark.

Vatican to Creationists: Suck it!

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Cardinal and GalileoVia BoingBoing.

The Vatican never actually abandoned the practice of keeping pet scientists, a fact which I welcome with equal parts relief and shock, for they have been very quiet lo these last four centuries. I didn't think they'd ever recovered from the Galileo PR disaster.

But there are scientists at the Vatican, and one, Brother Consolmagno, is in fact an astronomer, and not only is he over that Galileo thing, he's also over that Copernicus thing, and he's right out there giving interviews to The Scotsman in which he says…

Copernican View

"Religion needs science to keep it away from superstition and keep it close to reality, to protect it from creationism, which at the end of the day is a kind of paganism – it's turning God into a nature god. And science needs religion in order to have a conscience, to know that, just because something is possible, it may not be a good thing to do."

He also had a few pithy points to make about Papal PR as well.

Brother Consolmagno, who was due to give a Pope checks out the eclipsespeech at the Glasgow Science Centre last night, entitled "Why the Pope has an Astronomer", said the idea of papal infallibility had been a "PR disaster". What it actually meant was that, on matters of faith, followers should accept "somebody has got to be the boss, the final authority".

"It's not like he has a magic power, that God whispers the truth in his ear," he said.

Some Jokes Just Never Get Old

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Particularly if you can't make head or tail of them. If you get this, please comment for the benefit of those of us who only got A's on our algebra exams. I mean, I get the arc, I get the punchline, it's the syntax that sort of throws me. Like when you're travelling and your only words in the language are "restaurant" "washroom" and "police" and yet you still end up safe and sound and fed and where you meant to go in the first place. Yeah, like that.

Giving it an Allegory tag anyway, what the hell and for the sake of Operation Global Media Domination (I believe this is the only blog on WordPress with an Allegory tag; they're sure to jump on the bandwagon once Narnia goes to DVD though).

                a = b
              a^2 = ab
          a^2-b^2 = ab-b^2
       (a+b)(a-b) = b(a-b)
              a+b = b
               2b = b
                2 = 1

                x = (Pi+3)/2
               2x = Pi+3
         2x(Pi-3) = (Pi+3)(Pi-3)
          2Pix-6x = Pi^2-9
             9-6x = Pi^2-2Pix
         9-6x+x^2 = Pi^2-2Pix+x^2
          (3-x)^2 = (Pi-x)^2
              3-x = Pi-x
               Pi = 3   

               -1 = -1
             -1/1 = -1/1
             -1/1 = 1/-1
       sqrt(-1/1) = sqrt(1/-1)
              i/1 = 1/i
                i = 1/i
            i * i = 1
               -1 = 1

don’t pay the ferryman

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Especially if he takes you out in weather like this. From the awesomely cool wave gallery at LiveScience.

Don't pay the ferryman

Hurricane New England