Antarctica

My old college roommate just arrived in Antarctica as a glaciologist.  Her blog has some great pictures.  Check it out to get yourself ready for winter, or to make yourself happy you live somewhere that isn't -40.


http://southwithkelly.blogspot.com/

Are these two related?

Warning: non-entertaining post. I was going to warn readers that this is a political viewpoint of mine, but it's not.  It is just plain sad.

I get a science news briefing e-mail every couple of weeks.  I think #21 is the result of #22.  Math and science need to be emphasized more in our schools!

21. Survey finds public more skeptical of global warming
Fewer Americans believe there is good evidence for human induced temperature increases, or that it is a serious problem, according to a Pew Research Center for the People & the Press survey.  Of the 1,500 people surveyed from September 30-October 4, only 57 percent agreed that there is solid evidence the Earth is warming.  That is down across party lines from the 71 percent who answered the question affirmatively in April 2008.  Of those who agreed, a similar decrease is seen in those who thought it was due to human activity.  In 2008, 47 percent believed it was caused by humans while the latest survey shows 36 percent.  When asked how serious they believed the problem to be, 35 percent answered very serious, down from 44 percent in 2008.

Despite the decreases, the survey shows increased support for a cap-and-trade program with 50 percent of the respondents favoring setting limits on carbon emissions.  This comes after a separate Pew Research Center poll on current events during early October found only 23 percent of the 1,002 people called could correctly identify that a "cap-and-trade" program dealt with energy and the environment, as opposed to health care, banking reform, or unemployment.


22. Math proficiency levels stagnant for American students
The latest results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the U.S.'s most significant standardized test, demonstrate a plateau in math achievement for American students.  Released after a bi-annual assessment, the scores show a slight increase in proficiency for eighth grade students, while student in fourth grade showed no improvement.

These results indicate a six year trend of slowed achievement growth since the passage of No Child Left Behind, a law that requires U.S. schools to bring 100 percent of students into reading and math proficiency by 2014.  Now five years away, these scores indicate that only 39 percent of fourth graders and 34 percent of eighth graders are making the mark.

Snake Valley fall flume installation

This post is about another routine day in the life of a hydrogeologist (me).  For the past three years I have been doing a lot of field work in Snake Valley on the Nevada-Utah state line to set up a network of ground-water monitoring wells and spring discharge gauges.  The purpose is to quantify the amount of water in the valley and document any changes to the hydrologic system.  These pictures are from five days of work during an unseasonably cold snap (high of 45 and windy) in October and a couple of pictures from this past week. This is the fun part of my job!

This (above) is Miller Spring. There is a spring in the middle of this pond, which used to flow through the dam that had been located in the foreground. The dam had eroded so I needed to repair it and insert a new culvert so that I could attach my flume to the pipe to measure the flow of the water through the pipe/flume.

Here is the new pipe going in. I had tons of help from the folks at Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge and the Utah Department of Wildlife Resources (DWR). Fish Springs people are worried the proposed pumping by Southern Nevada Water Authority in eastern Nevada and Snake Valley will impact the flow of water to Fish Springs. The DWR people are worried the spring's flow will decrease, which will reduce the habitat for threatened species. The pond here is great habitat for Columbia Spotted Frog.

The photo above shows the new dam. The flow here is only about 1/3 cubic feet per second (cfs) or around 130 gpm. It was challenging to get the pipe positioned at the correct level so that habitat was preserved. The very cold weather and rising pond didn't help either. It took 60 cubic yards of fill material to reconstruct the dam - about twice what I had estimated because the last time I saw this site in March, the dam was still mostly intact.

Next up was Foote Reservoir. I needed to install a ramp flume here to measure the flow from some significant springs upwelling in the reservoir (not pictured).  The marshland here is great habitat for Columbia Spotted Frog and Utah Least Chub, a small native fish, swim in the water.

Aaron from Division of Water Rights and two biologists from DWR helped me install a 7 cfs ramp flume in a location adjacent to the existing channel. First step was to excavate a pad location. Then we laid down railroad ties as a base. The flume is the silver thing to the left in the picture to the left.

It took almost all day, but we successfully installed the flume. Here is 30-second video of the water first flowing through the flume. The flow here is about 3 cfs.

Man, is this blog getting great or what?  Hydrogeology is action packed.

Above is the mostly finished site. Our logging equipment will go in the upright steel culvert to the right of the flume.

Next stop was Twin Springs. There are two spring pools, each having a small stream flowing from them at about 1 cfs. I wanted to install 3.5 cfs flumes in both channels.

Above are before and after pictures of one of the channels at Twin Springs. This site was particularly hard because the channel was too narrow to divert the flow around the installation site so we had to do everything underwater.

The other channel at Twin Springs had a wider channel, so we diverted the flow around the flume installation site with a coffer dam while we installed the flume. Kevin from DWR is pictured above bailing out the muck from the installation site.

We installed the flume and backfilled (above left) with a mixture of gravel and finer material. There is a fair amount of hand shovel work (above right) involved.

Last week Aaron and I went back to install a water-level monitoring device inside the upright culvert to the right of the flume (pic right), the radio equipment and battery in the metal box on the pole, and a solar panel and antenna on the top of the pole.



By knowing the level of water in the flume, we can calculate the flow using a standard formula for this shape of flume. The level data are radioed to a repeater station about 15 miles away, which in turn relays the data to Garrison, Utah, where we have it tied into the State computer network. The data are live on our website (screen shot below) and the Division of Water Rights website.

Yes, having live data means that you can check it whenever you have insomnia. You can make all kinds of exciting graphs like this one (right).

So this fall I have had two hugely successful field work sessions. One more big trip and I think we will have the Snake Valley surface flow remote monitoring network complete!

Green Tomato Pie

We had a great time at Theresa's house warming party last night. Saw lots of bike friends we don't normally see in the off season. Great food too. I brought green tomato pie. I used about 5 or 6 of the multitude of green tomatoes I picked a couple of weeks ago. I never have known what to do with green tomatoes, but don't have the heart to just compost them. It seems all that water and nutrients the tomato plant used to make the fruits shouldn't go to waste. Now I have something to do with them! The pie was a big hit at the party. It tastes sorta like an apple pie and has the same texture, but there is a little sour/spicy bite to it. Very tasty and super easy - easy as pie.

GREEN TOMATO PIE

Pastry for double crust pie
1 1/3 cups sugar
¼ cup plus 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 ¼ teaspoons ground nutmeg or ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups green tomato slices, cut into fourths
1 ¼ teaspoons grated lemon peel
¼ cup lemon juice
1tablespoon butter or margarine
1. Heat oven to 425°F.
2. In large bowl, mix sugar, flour, nutmeg and 1 teaspoon salt. Add tomatoes, lemon peel and lemon juice; toss to coat. Turn into pastry-lined pie plate. Cut butter into small pieces; sprinkle over tomatoes.
3. Roll other round of pastry. Cut slits so steam can escape. Place top pastry over filling; trim overhanging edge 1 inch from rim of plate. Fold and roll top edge under lower edge, pressing on rim to seal; flute as desired. Cover edge with 2- to 3-inch strip of foil to prevent excessive browning.
4. Bake 35 to 45 minutes or until crust is brown and juice begins to bubble through slits in crust, removing foil for last 10 minutes of baking. Serve warm.

Bobke gets uppity

This is a progress report on Bobke, the 1980 Volkswagen Westfalia camper van we bought as a "fun project we can do together" (Drew's description).

Last week on our way to Moab, we stopped by ACE, the shop where Bobke is being brought back to life. As you can see from the pictures, nothing much was happening.

He was sitting in the fenced holding yard, lonely and incomplete.

The inside especially has a long way to go.

But yesterday we stopped by again to deliver the 15-inch wheels we bought to replace the standard 14-inch wheels that were on there but about ready to disintegrate. To our extreme delight, Bobke had gotten uppity. That is to say, he was up on the lift,

with his engine out,
Here is a shot looking up from through the engine compartment to the ceiling.

He is about as torn apart as he can get. He is getting his engine rebuilt, new brake lines, new fuel lines, CV joints (axle?) rebuilt/replaced, and new wheel bearings. Shop guy says it could be as little as three weeks before Bobke is mobile under his own power.

Any suggestions for where his maiden voyage should be?

Summer... er, I mean, Fall trip to Moab

The weather did more than just cooperate for our 5-day Moab trip - it made up for all that nasty weather we had last week when I was working outside, all that nasty weather we had last spring, and pretty much all the nasty weather we have had for 5 years. Temps in the first weekend of November in Moab were in the mid 70's, sunny, and f-f-fabulous. We came to attend the annual HOA meeting and do maintenance on the condo, but we also rode and hiked.

Friday, after a long morning of trying to get a tire on Magma, we finally hit Sovereign Singletrack trail at 1 PM.

We had a great ride north from Willow Springs road on Salt Wash, then Contributors trail and a couple of the Links. We had time to go up to the newish trails in the Garden area. Pretty fun, although not as stellar as the Salt Wash and Sovereign trails. We finally completed the loop back to the car on the sandy 4WD track from Dalton Wells to Willow Springs - the one the guidebooks say to skip because it is so sandy. It is, but I wanted to do it at least once. We need to do trail research for our renters.

Saturday, HOA board officer Drew had to partake in the HOA meeting, but the weather was really just too phenomenal to sit in a meeting with a bunch of other owners debating the merits of planning ahead to have money for new roofs in 20 years vs. paying for it in a special assessment later on. I chose to ride Amasa Back out to Pothole Arch instead. Magma enjoyed the ride. Here he is sunbathing.

The view from Amasa Back.

It was fun, but I did feel a little guilty sending these photos back to Drew in the meeting via my cell phone.

When I returned to the condo, our friends Jon and Kathy from Grand Junction were there. They came over to play/ride with us, but unfortunately on their ride on Klondike Bluffs earlier in the day, Jon broke his Gary Fisher frame. No injuries to Jon, but the frame is toast. Drew broke two Gary Fisher frames a few years ago. Do you think GF has a problem making frames for the big boys? We drank imported beer with Jon and Kathy and Drew made a new friend in their dog Adi.

Sunday, after tasty breakfast in the garden (yes, outdoor seating at 11 AM in November, and Jon had shorts on to boot) at Eklecticafe, we took a short hike to Fisher Towers. The hike was pleasant and the scenery was amazing.

Then back to town for buffalo burgers at Eddie McStiff's before Jon and Kathy drove off in their Vanagon back to Junction.

Monday we spent some more time deep cleaning our place before heading out of town for a quick ride on Bartlett Wash.

The picture above is Drew on the Entrada Sandstone in the Bartlett Wash area. I don't know what I like better about Barlett Wash, the endless traction on the slickrock which allows bike surfing on the swoops and knobs of sandstone, or marveling at the intricate and beautiful cross beds and weathering patterns on the outcrop.

Even after that gift of gorgeous weather, I'm still not ready for winter.

First flight of Sticky Stuff

Posted by Drew
My father, who has been flying for years, decided several years back to build his own aircraft. There is a certain amount of pride put in to a project when building anything. After 7 years and countless hours of work and research, my father rolled his aircraft out to the flight line for the first time. With no fanfare or spectators, he took to the air. She flew true as a Hawk and was as nimble as a Sparrow. Dad named his aircraft Sticky Stuff. To be blunt, the name relates to the fact that all of his money seems to stick to the airplane. Not a detail was overlooked when he built it, and the craftsmanship is incredible. The aircraft resides in Pennsylvania where my parents still live. Sticky Stuff is an RV-8 aircraft by Vans Aircraft. She has been flying for approximately 2 years, and Dad approached me about flying her almost a year ago.

With my busy schedule and the fact that we are geographically separated by quite some distance it has been a challenge to get out to Pennsylvania and learn how to fly Sticky Stuff. Many people assume that my occupation as an airline pilot would make it easy for me to just jump in and fly this little aircraft, but nothing could be further from the truth. Everything from her control inputs to her performance characteristics demand respect and a thorough understanding before flying solo.

With the help of Dad and Mr. Ed Condon, a good friend of Dad's, I was able to get some great instruction. My dad sent all of the performance publications to me several months ago for my review. When I came out to Pennsylvania we spent a day at the airport hanger. Being able to touch the switches and work through the systems was a great benefit to me. Mr. Condon took me up in his RV-4 home built aircraft so that I could get used to the control inputs and performance characteristics of a similar aircraft.


Anyone can paint flames racing back from the front of a vehicle. Dad decided in keeping with the name of his aircraft that he would paint honey dripping back from the leading edges of her. The picture above shows a close up of the paint job on the wing.

Before soloing I went up for another flight with Mr. Condon. This time I flew Sticky Stuff with Mr. Condon riding along. The above picture shows the two of us strapping in and preparing to start the engine.

After flying in the local area for a bit and getting a feel for the aircraft we came back to the airport and I dropped Mr. Condon off. My Dad, Lucy, and Mr. Condon all watched as I taxied out for my solo takeoff.

Click on the play button above to see a short video of my takeoff.

Of course what goes up must come down. Click on the play button above to see some video of my landing.

I will never understand how my wife runs the video camera and takes a photograph at the same time. Here is a picture of my first landing roll out in Sticky Stuff.

Unfortunately, the sun was setting fast and our vacation had come to an end so we put the aircraft back in the hanger and headed back to my parents' house. That evening we celebrated in style. Dad brought home some beers from around the world and Mom made a delicious dinner with baked apples for dessert. You might wonder why the big hubbub with regards to flying Sticky Stuff? There have been a lot of sacrifices in my family to see my Dad's dream come true. During the building process, I called home one week and at 1PM my mom was making breakfast for my dad. I inquired why breakfast so late? Mom responded that my father had been out in the garage until 2 AM working on the aircraft. There was much time, attention to detail, and dedication put in to the building of Sticky Stuff, and it truly was an honor to be asked to fly her.