STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

Found Frozen And Almost Perfectly Preserved In Permafrost, This 18,000-Year-Old Puppy Could Be A Huge Deal

The DNA of an exquisitely preserved puppy found in Siberia doesn’t appear to fit the profile of a dog or a wolf, which means the specimen might be something in between.

The frozen puppy, found near Yakutsk in eastern Siberia, was just two months old when it died, reports CNN. Scientists from the Centre for Palaeogenetics—a joint project between Stockholm University and the Swedish Museum of Natural History—used radiocarbon dating on its rib bone to place its brief time on Earth to 18,000 years ago, during the tail end of the last Ice Age.

The level of preservation is unreal, with the puppy still exhibiting intact teeth, nose, and fur. Scientists were able to extract DNA from the specimen, allowing them to confirm the pup’s sex as male. It has since been named “Dogor,” which means “friend” in Yakutian.

The body of the 18,000-year-old puppy, named “Dogor.”

As to which species this animal belonged is now an intriguing question, as the DNA analysis was inconclusive. The little critter doesn’t seem to fit the genetic profile of a dog or a wolf, and it quite possibly represents an intermediary stage during the domestication of dogs.

“We have a lot of data from it already, and with that amount of data, you’d expect to tell if it was one or the other,” David Stanton, a researcher at the Centre for Palaeogenetics, told CNN. “The fact that we can’t might suggest that it’s from a population that was ancestral to both—to dogs and wolves.”

It’s a fascinating possibility, but it’s important that we not jump to conclusions. The specimen could very well be an ancestral wolf. If it is a dog, however, it would likely represent the oldest in the archaeological record. The current record holder is the Bonn-Oberkassel dog, dated to around 14,223 years old. The incomplete remains of this ancient domesticated dog were uncovered in a basalt quarry near Bonn, Germany in 1910.

The origin of dogs is still not completely clear, hence the importance of the new discovery. The first domesticated dogs emerged in Asia around 14,000 to 16,000 years ago, but genetic evidence suggests the divergence date between dogs and ancient wolves happened at some point between 20,000 to 40,000 years ago. To complicate matters, dogs may have been domesticated twice, once in Asia and once in Europe.

That the newly discovered puppy is some kind of evolutionary missing link is wholly plausible, as the timing appears to be right. But more evidence is needed. To that end, the researchers at the Centre for Palaeogenetics are planning to perform more tests on the specimen to fully elucidate its genetic constitution and get a better handle on the species to which it belonged.

[MIKA27]

That time a monkey flew to the edge of space and then smashed into a destroyer

Sam the rhesus monkey had already experienced one hell of a ride to the edge of space when he splashed down into the Atlantic Ocean—but his adventure didn’t end there. Although the dry, original accounts of Sam's 1959 flight offer scant detail about the journey, mainly confirming that NASA’s new Mercury capsule kept him alive, Bob Thompson tells a more colorful story.

Now in his early 90s, Thompson can still dominate a room with his commanding voice. And on a recent January morning, standing in his kitchen, Thompson did just that as he recounted the landing of Sam nearly six decades ago. In doing so, he offered a parable for NASA as it considers rescue operations for its Orion spacecraft at sea.

Back in December 1959, NASA was 18 months away from Alan Shepard’s flight into space. The agency still had rockets and spacecraft to test. And scientists knew almost nothing about the effect of weightlessness on humans or how to keep them alive. More immediately, they wondered about the safety of a new launch-abort system, needed to get the crew capsule quickly away from the rocket in case of an accident. Rockets blew up a lot back then.

So when NASA's young engineers at Langley Research Center in Virginia began testing their new Mercury capsule in flight, they wanted to see whether the accelerations experienced during the abort of a Mercury flight shortly after launch were survivable. Enter Sam, an eight-pound rhesus monkey.

It was up to Thompson to recover Sam, or what remained of him, after the test flight. An original member of NASA’s Space Task Group, Thompson had been brought in a year earlier to head up landing and recovery operations for NASA and coordinate with the US Navy. Rough seas had scuttled attempts to launch Sam earlier in the week. But finally, by December 4, the seas had calmed—a little.

“I was out there on a destroyer, and there were 20-foot seas,” Thompson recalled. “The destroyer captain was an ex-submarine guy. I stayed on the bridge, and I set him on a course with the wind and the seas that favored recovery. And I said, 'Stay steady as you go and don’t stop.' Then I left the bridge and went down to the deck to help them get the capsule out of the water."

The flight

By then Sam had already had quite a ride. Housed inside a 36-inch by 18-inch container within the capsule, Sam had been launched atop a Little Joe rocket. At one minute into the flight, traveling at 3,685mph, the Mercury capsule’s abort system fired. In his contour couch, Sam experienced 10 to 12Gs before a little more than three minutes of weightlessness, reaching a peak altitude of about 53 miles. The capsule’s pressure fell from 1 atmosphere to about half of that during the flight.

And then the Mercury capsule fell into the turbulent seas off the Virginia coast, bouncing around and waiting for Thompson and the Navy to come and pick him up. Eventually, the ship tracked Sam's capsule down.

As Thompson watched, deckhands worked with a long aluminum rod that had a hook on the end. With the ship and capsule swaying back and forth, the goal was to hook the rod into an improvised latch on top of the Mercury capsule, which looked something like the handle of an Easter basket. But then, just as the capsule was hooked, the captain stopped the ship.

A wrecking ball

“So the ship is really rolling, and the capsule is out there like a wrecking ball,” Thompson recalled.

"And then, all of a sudden, BAM!

"It's thrown up against the side of the ship.

"It goes back out and BAM! Up against the side of the ship again.

"I’m down there on the deck and after the second BAM! I told the coxswain to loose the line. Then the thing hit again and got hung up on the deck. We threw a lasso around it and washed a sailor overboard in the process.” (He was later recovered).

Langley Research Center technicians construct boilerplate Mercury capsules for Little Joe launches in-house in Langley's shops.

Surprisingly, the capsule wasn’t damaged much. But what of Sam, who had flown to the edge of space and then been tossed and crashed around back on Earth?

“The monkey was inside in a large aluminum can, which was bolted down. We took the top off, and I crooked my finger and put it down in there. He took a hold of it. So we got some [diagonal wire cutters] to cut him out of his contour couch. I set him down and told the chief petty officer to go get some apples and oranges. The monkey was hungry. He ate up most of the oranges.”

After the flight, an analysis of electrocardiogram, respiration, body temperature, eye movements, and other measurements showed no abnormal results from Sam's physiological and psychological reactions. He'd survived the ordeal, appetite intact. Sam, who had come from the US Air Force School of Aviation Medicine at Brooks Air Force Base in Texas, returned home. He lived a long life, dying in 1982, when his remains were cremated.

[MIKA27]

Pablo Escobar's Brother Has Apple In His Crosshairs With... An 'Unbreakable' Foldable Phone?

If the Samsung Galaxy Fold, the Huawei Mate X, or that new Razr phone are too rich for your blood, consider the $513 Pablo Escobar Fold 1. Yes, you read correctly.

The Fold 1 is the brainchild of Roberto Escobar, brother to famed Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar whose death also happened to disastrously unleash a horde of wild hippos into the country’s rivers. As for the gadget itself, the Fold 1 is an Android 9 phone with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Series CPU. It features two 16-megapixel and 20-megapixel cameras, as well as two 7.8-inch AMOLED screens. Plus you know, a fingerprint print sensor. The Escobar Inc website also says the phone is unlocked, and “works on all networks in USA and worldwide.” The $US350 ($513) phone features 128GBs of storage, and there’s a $US500 ($733) version with 512GB.

The fact this phone exists is pure chaos energy. But there’s more. Commenting to Digital Trends, Escobar said he wasn’t gunning for Samsung. Oh no. The tech company in his crosshairs is Apple. “I have told many people that I would beat Apple and I will,” Escobar told Digital Trends.

“I cut the networks and retailers, to sell to customers phones that can fold for only $US349 ($512), phones which in stores cost thousands of dollars by Samsung and others. This is my goal, to beat Apple, and by doing it myself like I always have.” Escobar then goes on to say he plans on slapping Apple with a class-action lawsuit on January 6, 2020, for $US30 ($44) billion and that he spent $US1 ($1.5) million of his own moolah just to begin the legal process.

As for the phone itself, Escobar says his phone is harder to break than the Samsung Galaxy Fold on account of the phone’s screen being “made of a special type of plastic” that is “very difficult to break.” Ah yes, you see Samsung, you blithering fools, PLASTIC. Special Plastic was the key all along to unbreakable, foldable glory.

The Fold 1, according to Escobar, was also built with security in mind. As in, it features “special security” that makes it hard to scan via Bluetooth or for the government to access. The phone cover will also feature a “thin layer of metal” that blocks RFID and “other communications.”

O-kay. A peep at the Fold 1's website is illuminating on other levels. For instance, one of the marketing photos is just the phone with a Pablo Escobar wallpaper—very on-brand. There’s also a video where buxom, scantily clad women in outrageous heels walk around with the phone. Also on brand. There’s another video that begins with the narrator stating “Apple Boy Steve once looked into space. He saw Pablo Escobar with a phone beyond anybody’s imagination,”—super on brand.

But perhaps the most on-brand thing is the Fold 1 is clearly a rebranded Royole FlexPai, right down to the marketing graphics and specs.

 

[MIKA27]

A Radio Telescope Is Now Scanning Deep Space From The Moon's Far Side

For the first time in astronomical history, a space-based radio telescope is gathering data from the Moon’s far side, in a location free from Earth’s interference. This collaboration between China and the Netherlands could provide new insights into the conditions of the early universe.

The instrument, called the Netherlands-China Low Frequency Explorer (NCLE), is located on Queqiao, a Chinese communications satellite that was launched in support of the Chang’e 4 mission, the first soft-landing and robotic mission to the lunar far side. NCLE was developed in the Netherlands by Radboud University, ASTRON, and ISISpace, along with support from Netherland’s Space Office.

Queqiao is currently located around 450,000 kilometres from Earth, and it’s positioned in a halo orbit that keeps the satellite in the Earth-Moon L2 Lagrange point (so the satellite stays behind the Moon from our perspective, never coming between Earth and Moon).

Until now, Queqiao provided telecommunications service for the Chang’e 4 mission, acting as a relay station between the Yutu 2 lander and China’s project control centre on Earth. The Dutch-Chinese telescope radio telescope has been dormant since it was launched in May 2018.

The NCLE device was supposed to have been deployed a few months ago, but it was delayed owing to the tremendous success of the Chang’e 4 mission, which wasn’t expected to last beyond March 2019.

The China National Space Administration (CNSA) has now decided to move on to the next stage of the mission and convert Queqiao into an observatory for radio astronomy, according to a Radboud University press release. Three antennas have now been partially unfurled, allowing for radio scans of space—without pesky interference from Earth’s atmosphere.

The unfolding of one of the NCLE’s three antennas.

“We are finally in business and have a radio-astronomy instrument of Dutch origin in space,” said Heino Falcke of Radboud University in the press release. “The team has worked incredibly hard, and the first data will reveal how well the instrument truly performs.”

The NCLE should be able to detect super-faint radio signals, which it will do with its three 5-metre-long antennas, which work in the 80 kHz to 80 MHz radio frequency range, according to ISISpace, a dutch satellite manufacturer involved in the mission.

Scientists are hoping to capture radio signals associated with the universe’s Dark Age—the period immediately following the Big Bang, before the birth of stars. Radio signals from this embryonic era are “considered to be the holy grail of cosmology,” according to ISISpace. These ancient signals are largely undetectable from Earth, as they’re blocked by our planet’s atmosphere. Radio data from the Dark Age could reveal new insights into the first stars and galaxies, as well as dark matter and dark energy, which are still poorly understood cosmological phenomena.

Quote

 

The unfurling of the three antennas, which were packed inside Queqiao, was not a smooth process, according to the press release:

The longer stay behind the moon most probably did have an effect on the antennas. At first, the antennas unfolded smoothly, but as the process progressed, it became increasingly difficult.

The team therefore decided to collect data first and perhaps unfold the antennas further at a later point in time. With these shorter antennas, the instrument is sensitive to signals from around 800 million years after the Big Bang. Once unfolded to their full length, they will be able to capture signals from just after the Big Bang.

 

Further details weren’t given about the anomaly, but video of the NCLE antenna deployment in a laboratory setting can be seen here.

Hopefully this won’t be an ongoing problem, and the team will be able to extend the antennas to their full position without further issue. The Chang’e 4 mission has presented a really neat opportunity for scientists to collect data that would otherwise remain invisible to us. We eagerly await the results of this exciting next phase in the mission.

[MIKA27]

Mission To Study Asteroid-Spacecraft Collision Gets Official Go-Ahead In Europe

The European Space Agency has approved the budget of Hera, the European component of a mission to slam a spacecraft into an asteroid.

Growing concern for planetary defence is motivating new missions to both study asteroids and potentially deflect them from a collision course with Earth. One such project, the Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment (AIDA), consists of NASA’s DART mission (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) plus the ESA’s Hera. Together, they will study the effectiveness of an impact to ward off an impending asteroid threat.

There are perhaps 25,000 near-Earth objects (NEOs), things that orbit the Sun on a trajectory that comes close to the Earth’s orbit. Scientists designate a subset of those as “potentially hazardous,” meaning they span 140 or more metres across and come within 0.05 AU to Earth, where 1 AU is approximately the distance between Earth and the Sun. In 2005, Congress mandated that NASA scientists should catalogue 90 per cent of these potentially hazardous asteroids by 2020, a goal that American scientists today are far from completing.

Meanwhile, scientists are working on other planetary protection initiatives, including OSIRIS-REx’s visit to the potentially hazardous asteroid Bennu. But perhaps the most drastic measure so far is AIDA.

NASA announced last year that its researchers had stared construction on their component of the mission, DART. DART will travel to double-asteroid system Didymos, which consists of an 800-metre-wide rock and a 160-metre-wide rock. The spacecraft will slam into the smaller asteroid at around 6 kilometres per second. DART’s launch is scheduled for 2021, aiming for a 2022 collision.

The ESA was then to construct a complementary mission, the Asteroid Impact Mission, or AIM, that would have launched this year and included advanced observational capabilities to study Didymos prior to DART’s arrival and monitor the asteroid during and after impact.

Unfortunately, AIM didn’t work out; Germany withdrew its portion of the mission’s funding back in 2016, so the ESA director general Jan Woerner cancelled the mission. NASA moved forward with DART, with plans to monitor the collision from the ground. The ESA proposed an alternative mission in 2018 to replace AIM, called Hera.

Hera is scheduled to launch in 2024 and arrive at the Didymos system in 2027. It will measure the impact crater produced by the DART collision and the change in the asteroid’s orbital trajectory. Its payload tentatively includes two small satellites called cubesats that will study the smaller asteroid up close and potentially land on it.

The ESA’s governing body gathered in Spain last week to decide on which proposals they’d move forward with and fund. Its member states agreed to earmark 12.5 billion euros over the next three years, nearly all of the money requested, for missions. This included approval for Hera, which the ESA announced in a cringe-y press video (yes, it features Brian May, the guitarist from Queen who is also an astrophysicist).

Other missions to receive funding include space transportation and telecomm programs, as well as initiatives related to Mars sample return ant Lunar Gateway.

[MIKA27]

Bugatti’s Carbon Fiber ‘Chiron Noire’ Is A 1,500HP Hypercar Inspired By The Past

The world of classic automobiles is full of awe-inspiring stories, long-lost legends, and one-of-a-kind chassis that have influenced the genre as a whole. Among these iconic platforms, Bugatti’s “La Voiture Noire” stands alone — a bespoke Type 57 SC Atlantic crafted by Jean Bugatti, himself, and an artifact of the Second World War that many thought they’d never see again.

In 1936, the shadowy La Voiture Noire made its debut — resulting in only four examples in its two-year manufacturing run and fostering its reputation as the “most famous, and most beautiful car in the world.” Following its disappearance, enthusiast’s collectively agreed that, if found, the Noire would undoubtedly be the medium’s most valuable variant, even by today’s standards. As such, Bugatti’s Design Director, Achim Anscheidt, has decided to pay homage to the classic with a modern-day reinterpretation, the Chiron Noire. The car arrives in both a performance-oriented “Chiron Noire Sportive” and luxury-focused “Chiron Noire Élégance” iteration and boasts an extensive range of lavish inductions, including exposed carbon fiber covers, Bugatti’s famous sports grille, and a Bugatti “Macaron” emblem constructed from solid silver and black enamel. Beneath the hood, the hypercar’s iconic 16-cylinder engine produces a monstrous 1,500 horsepower and 1,180 lb-ft of torque, calling upon the Chiron’s lauded performance characteristics to bring the Noire into contemporary standing. Only 20 examples are slated for production, with deliveries starting in the second quarter of 2020 for an estimated $3,326,000.

 

[MIKA27]

MONKEY 47 DISTILLER'S CUT GIN

Each year, Monkey 47 creates a one-of-a-kind, limited-edition Distiller's Cut gin.

The special release represents their ongoing effort to test the limits of distilling botanical ingredients. This year, the added botanical is nutmeg mace, which makes 48 in total and provides a welcome flavor that blends perfectly with the holiday season. This unique gin is best enjoyed neat, but is just as comfortable in gin cocktails — holiday-centric or otherwise. It's also the first time Distiller's Cut is being released in the United States, with just 2,000 bottles in total making their way stateside.

[MIKA27]

PAPPY VAN WINKLE BARREL FERMENTED CIGAR BOX SET

If you've ever owned a bottle of Pappy Van Winkle bourbon, you know that patriarch Julian Van Winkle was also a big fan of cigars.

This line of barrel-fermented cigars helps marry those two passions, and this box set is the perfect way to experience them all. Each set includes 3 10-count boxes of cigars, all of which are made by hand in small batches at Drew Estate in Nicaragua.

The medium-plus cigars are great for new smokers as well as aficionados and arrive in three-lined, custom wooden boxes. The set includes ten Churchill size, ten Toro, and ten Robusto cigars. And right now, the set also includes the Pappy Van Winkle Limitada: a commemorative trio of cigars that are not for sale and are an exclusive gift to be enjoyed during special moments or saved as a collection piece.

[MIKA27]

First ‘Black Widow’ Trailer Reveals Scarlett Johansson’s Super-Spy Spinoff

Black Widow hits theaters on May 1, 2020

 

[Fuzz]

51 minutes ago, MIKA27 said:

First ‘Black Widow’ Trailer Reveals Scarlett Johansson’s Super-Spy Spinoff

 

 

Red Guardian and possibly Yelena Belova as the 2nd Black Widow?

[MIKA27]

15 minutes ago, Fuzz said:

Red Guardian and possibly Yelena Belova as the 2nd Black Widow?

Her sister in the trailer looks as if she could be Yelena Belova?

[Derboesekoenig]

On 12/3/2019 at 9:27 AM, MIKA27 said:

PAPPY VAN WINKLE BARREL FERMENTED CIGAR BOX SET

If you've ever owned a bottle of Pappy Van Winkle bourbon, you know that patriarch Julian Van Winkle was also a big fan of cigars.

This line of barrel-fermented cigars helps marry those two passions, and this box set is the perfect way to experience them all. Each set includes 3 10-count boxes of cigars, all of which are made by hand in small batches at Drew Estate in Nicaragua.

The medium-plus cigars are great for new smokers as well as aficionados and arrive in three-lined, custom wooden boxes. The set includes ten Churchill size, ten Toro, and ten Robusto cigars. And right now, the set also includes the Pappy Van Winkle Limitada: a commemorative trio of cigars that are not for sale and are an exclusive gift to be enjoyed during special moments or saved as a collection piece.

I like how Lot B is in the picture, considering it isn't "real Pappy"

[MIKA27]

No Time To Die's First Trailer Introduces A New 00 Agent And A Masked Bond Villain

Daniel Craig’s James Bond has been just as ready for a change of scenery as the Bond fandom has been ready to meet some freshly-minted 00 Agents, and in the first No Time to Die trailer, it seems as if almost everyone’s about to get what they want.

Though it was Bond’s intention to leave the super spy game behind, No Time to Die finds him pulled right back into the thick of it when CIA operative Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) contacts him with yet another mission of the utmost importance. Somewhere in the world, a key scientific mind’s gone missing and Bond’s reputation makes him the one of the few MI6 agents well-equipped to take on the job. But as Bond gets deeper into the field, he crosses paths with Nomi (Lashana Lynch), an up and coming agent relatively new to the organisation who’s quickly making a name for herself as being one of the deadliest, slickest women in the world.

Bond might not exactly be jazzed about his new colleague’s presence in the larger world-spanning mission, but with both SPECTRE head Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Christoph Waltz) and Safin (Rami Malek) taunting the agents with their sadistic mind games, teaming up is likely going to be their best bet at saving the day.

No Time to Die is directed by Cary Fukunaga, and also stars Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Ana de Armas, Ralph Fiennes, and Léa Seydoux.

The film hits UK theatres on April 2, 2020, ahead of an Australian release on April 8.  

[MIKA27]

Nuclear Radiation Hot Spots Found At Starting Point Of Japan's 2020 Olympic Torch Relay

High levels of radiation have been detected near Japan’s J-Village, a sports facility and the starting point of the upcoming Olympic torch relay, according to Greenpeace. The discovery was made by surveyors with Greenpeace Japan, which warns that monitoring and decontamination efforts in Fukushima are inadequate.

Radiation levels as high as 71 microsieverts per hour were found on the surface near J-Village in northeastern Japan, according to a Greenpeace press release issued Wednesday. This level of radiation is hundreds of times greater than what’s stipulated in Japan’s decontamination guidelines, prompting Greenpeace Japan to demand that the Japanese government conduct regular radiation monitoring and decontamination of regions affected by the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.

J-Village National Training Centre is in Fukushima prefecture, which is located 20 kilometres from the damaged nuclear power plant. This sports facility will be the starting point of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Torch Relay, which is scheduled to begin on March 26, 2020. That J-Village was chosen as the starting point for the relay is by design, as the Japanese government is promoting the games as the “reconstruction Olympics.” The Olympics will begin on July 24, 2020 in Tokyo, some 239 kilometres from the damaged reactors.

J-Village recently underwent renovations, and the facility was used to host the Argentina team during the Rugby World Cup held just a few weeks ago, according to Reuters. And as the Guardian reports, the facility served as a “logistics hub” for crews working to manage and decommission the damaged reactors.

The readings were made over a two-hour period on October 26 by Greenpeace’s Nuclear Monitoring & Radiation Protection Advisors. High levels of radiation were detected along the boundary of the parking lot and a forest next to J-Village, reports Sankei Shimbun. Readings at ground level were as high as 71 microsieverts, which is 308.7 times more than the nationally accepted 0.23 microsieverts per hour—the standard for decontamination—and 1,775 times the level prior to the Fukushima disaster, according to Greenpeace.

Sieverts describe the amount of ionising radiation that can be absorbed by human tissue. Natural radiation exposure amounts to between 2,000 to 3,000 microsieverts each year, so people hanging out near these hot spots would exceed their annual dose in around two to three days, according to Reuters. While upsetting, it’s not excessively dangerous or life-threatening. It’s not until people are exposed to levels between 1,000 to 3,500 millisieverts (1 millisievert is 1,000 microsieverts) that radiation sickness and life-threatening symptoms set in. By comparison, a single chest x-ray yields about 100 microsieverts (0.1 millisieverts) of radiation exposure.

Still, Greenpeace is concerned that heavy rains might spread the contaminated soil elsewhere, such as onto public roads, from which it could spread farther still.

“This could partially undo earlier efforts to decontaminate the public areas in J-Village. From our observations, it is unlikely that radiation hot spots of such high levels re-emerged from re-contamination after the previous decontamination,” Shaun Burnie, a senior nuclear specialist at Greenpeace Germany and the team leader of the survey, said in the press release. “It is more logical that the decontamination was not sufficiently and thoroughly conducted in the first place.”

In a separate Greenpeace Japan statement, Kazue Suzuki, who is in charge of energy at Greenpeace Japan, said the radiation hot spots were found in areas which were previously decontaminated, which he found troubling.

“It is a place where the general public is coming and going, and there are concerns about its health effects, and this area is also the starting point for the torch relay at the Tokyo Olympics next year,” said Suzuki. “This raises questions about the effectiveness of previous decontamination activities, and Greenpeace sent a letter to the Minister of the Environment on November 18 to recommend regular radiation monitoring and decontamination.”

Greenpeace said the Japanese government has not replied to its letter, but state officials have responded to the discovery of radiation at J-Village. According to Greenpeace, and as reported today in Sankei Shimbun, clean-up crews from Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) cleaned the hot spots yesterday—so it’s clear the warning letter had an impact. Speaking to Reuters, an unnamed official said Japan’s Ministry of Environment “cooperated with related groups to decrease radiation levels in that area.”

Greenpeace is now asking the Japanese government to conduct “immediate and extensive radiological and hot spot surveys in public areas around J-Village and in the surrounding Olympic/Paralympic venues,” among other recommendations.

The discovery of these hot spots represents an uncomfortable truth for the Japanese government. The consequences of the Fukushima nuclear meltdown will persist for many decades to come.

[MIKA27]

Why Star Wars' Past Is So Important To The Future In The Rise Of Skywalker

When a little boy force-pulled a broom to him at the end of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, he looked to the sky and, we thought, the future. And while its sequel, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker will deal with the implications of that scene and what it means for the future, it’s all heavily informed by the past.

“The idea of how the legacy of the Jedi is carried on and how the Force and its uses extend to the next generation [is] a thing that we for sure are taking up,” Chris Terrio, the co-writer of The Rise of Skywalker, told Gizmodo.

Terrio explained though that the film’s complexities lie not in figuring out what the future holds for Broom Boy and his crew, but in balancing looking ahead with ideas of the past and, most importantly, the idea of Emperor Palpatine.

“This saga is really the story of the Skywalkers, but also the story of Palpatine,” Terrio said. “The way that these two philosophies and ways of being in the world would clash. And so we felt—and I know J.J. [Abrams, co-writer and director] said this but it’s quite genuine—that to close out this trilogy and the nine movies, that it would almost be strange not to in some way have the presence of the old shadow of Palpatine.”

Understandably, that might be confusing some fans. Palpatine has been gone for decades, both in Star Wars canon, and their minds. And while that’s not exactly true (several Expanded Universe stories, canon and non-canon, have hinted as ways his essence still remains) bringing him back could, potentially, undercut the joyous victory at the end of Return of the Jedi. Terrio admitted he and Abrams were worried about that and very conscious to make sure it didn’t happen.

“The end of Return of the Jedi is a beautiful ending to that part of the war,” Terrio said. “The sacrifice of Vader, The redemption of Vader. The saving of his son. It’s so deep in my consciousness and in my soul, Return of the Jedi being the first movie that I ever saw, that the last thing that we would ever want to do is suggest that that sacrifice didn’t have the gravity and the meaning that it did. And so I think we’ve found a way in which all that remains intact. But the story wasn’t over.”

No, it wasn’t. Not just in the sequel films either. In most of the stories that take place after Return of the Jedi (including The Mandalorian) remnants of the Emperor’s Empire remain. Remnants that will, eventually, create the First Order.

“There are certain threads that are hanging in the mythology that give it sort of a natural entry place for the continuation of the story,” Terrio said. “And so the fact that the war didn’t really end is already in the story of the sequels. The First Order, even in the Expanded Universe, comes about through remnants of the Empire...And so we wanted to explore that in the context of a family saga.”

Terrio was also quick to remind us too that, though we may not think of it in this way, Rey herself is an important part of that connection between past and present.

“We first meet Rey, literally, in the wreck of the old war. The old war is so present in her life in every possible way,” he said. “So we wanted to explore the first order a little bit further and the origins of the First Order and how the past affects the present...And by exploring the story in the ways that we did, we could keep the sense of the past, even in the present war.”

Yes, it sounds like The Rise of Skywalker is going to be a lot. But when you look at it in the overall context of not just Star Wars, but life for these characters, Terrio thinks it had to be.

“Another guiding principle we had was there are no final victories,” he said. “Every generation have to sort of take up the struggle again. Fight old evil in new forms. [So] for the epic scope of the saga, we needed to kind of expand the canvas and the palette a bit.”

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker opens December 19. We’ll have more soon.

[MIKA27]

“Ip Man 4: The Finale” Trailer Teases The End of the Donnie Yen Martial Arts Saga

WellGo USA has released the official US trailer for Ip Man 4: The Finale starring Donnie Yen. The movie series is a highly idealized and fictionalized telling of the story of the man who taught Bruce Lee martial arts. Ip Man has become a Chinese folk legend on his own because of this and other movies about him.

The martial arts form Wing Chun might have died out if Ip Man hadn’t moved to Hong Kong and started a dojo in the 1950s. Bruce Lee used Wing Chun as one of the bases for Jeet Kun Do, the martial arts form he developed on his own.

Donnie Yen and the filmmakers say this will be the final movie in this series. In real life, Ip Man would have been old and frail by the the late 1960s and early 1970s that The Finale seems to be set in. This is a “print the legend” approach where the ageless and still dynamic Donnie Yen plays the grandmaster.

This is a Chinese Superhero Saga

And Bruce Lee finally appears in the story. This was the unspoken promise the series made before it became a franchise. British martial artist and action star Scott Adkins also appears in the movie as a racist fighter. The series continues its ongoing theme of Chinese pride fighting back against white racist, which Bruce Lee’s own movies often pursued as well. Martial arts master and director Yuen Wo Ping choreographs the action.

It’s remarkable that the series managed to have three sequels with the same star, producers and directors over 11 years. The first movie came out in 2008 and nobody thought it would get to a fourth.

WellGo USA also released an official synopsis for the movie:

“Ip Man’s life remains unchanged after his wife’s death, but he and his son are slowly drifting apart. To seek a better future for his son, Ip Man decides to travel to the U.S. only to find the stable, peaceful life abroad is only skin deep. Underneath lies a deep rooted racial discrimination that is far worse than he has expected. Ip Man re-examines his position and ponders on the reason he took up martial arts in the beginning.”

Ip Man 4: The Finale opens in select theatres in the US on December 25th.

[MIKA27]

Wonder Woman 1984's First Trailer Is Here To Bring Justice To The Reagan Era

Diana’s back, this time in the glitz, glamor, and the glut of corruption of the 1980s. Greed is good, baby, though I imagine Wonder Woman might not agree.

Finally, after a far-too-long wait, the first trailer for Wonder Woman 1984, the sequel to Patty Jenkins’s Wonder Woman, is here, with Gal Gadot and Chris Pine back in tow as Wonder Woman and her best dude pal, Steve Trevor.

They’re also joined by Kristen Wiig, who will be playing the classic Wonder Woman villain Cheetah, and Pedro Pascal as businessman Maxwell Lord.

In this trailer, we get to see more about what Wonder Woman’s 1980s journey, at the late height of the Cold War, is going to look like. And it looks thrilling: beginning with Diana sharing her history, tentatively, with a friend, we’re introduced to the lush, flashy future of the 1980s, full of elegance and power and Wonder Woman kicking arse.

Until, somehow, Steve Trevor returns, a revelation which seems to be related to Pascal’s sinister Maxwell Lord. Also, Diana uses her rope to... swing on the sky?! Like, literally on thunder? The period soundtrack is great, too if you're into 80's music.

Premiered during Comic Con Experience Sao Paolo, the trailer was shown at a panel featuring director Patty Jenkins and the rest of the cast. During the panel, Jenkins emphasised the big ‘80s aesthetics of the film, and proudly talked up the film’s stunt work, which relied on non-digital effects to replicate the imagery and vibe of film’s from the time period.

Now that we know what to expect, the wait will be even more agonizing. Fortunately, it’s not that much longer: Wonder Woman 1984 comes out June 4, 2020.

MIKA: 

1984: "This is the future"

2019: Still Waiting.... 

[MIKA27]

Turns Out A Wild Geoengineering Plan To Refreeze Arctic Sea Ice Isn't The Best Idea

As the world spins closer to climate catastrophe, fringe ideas are inching toward the mainstream. Geoengineering is among the topics that were once verboten but are now finding traction. And that includes some pretty out-there ideas, including ones focused on saving polar ice by pumping massive amounts of seawater onto the surface of ice, where it will refreeze quicker and strengthen all icepack against melting.

The refreezing idea has been proposed for both poles and would be massively expensive. But a new study shows that, in the Arctic, saving sea ice would do little to slow the climate crisis elsewhere. And it would unleash shocking and unintended consequences in the Arctic itself.

The paper, published in Earth’s Futures on Thursday, takes its inspiration from a previous study that first raised the prospect of an Arctic geoengineering project. That study outlined a proposal to install wind turbines across the Arctic that would power pumps to draw water to the surface of the remaining sea ice, where it would refreeze more quickly than from the bottom-up.

Sounds a little bit (OK, a lot) radical to be sure, but the rapidly warming Arctic needs all the help it can get. Old sea ice that used to hold the icepack together is all but gone, and we could see an ice-free Arctic as early as the next decade if carbon pollution isn’t slowed soon.

But while the previous research showed it was technologically feasible to do the wind turbine thing, it didn’t look too hard at what the climate ramifications would be. The new paper picks up at that point because, as Lorenzo Zampieri, the new study’s lead author and PhD student at Germany’s Alfred Wegener Institute, told Earther, “this geoengineering idea had never been tested with a climate model and, in our opinion, this was a necessary step to contextualise this approach.”

The scientists used an advanced climate model to explore what the scheme would actually do to the Arctic. They modelled a number of scenarios, including one idealised scenario in which seawater was pumped over the entirety of the sea ice. That model found that ice would grow up to 65 metres thick over the rest of the century, a huge change from the average historical thickness of 1.8 metres.

They dialled things back to a bit more “realistic” scenario that aimed for an average thickness of around 2 metres and moderately spaced out wind mills and pumps. The good news: It would indeed help refreeze.

But the less good news is that the process would radically alter the climate in the Arctic while doing very little to fix the global climate overall. Healthy, reflective ice that lasts through the summer would restore the late summer Arctic climate to some semblance of its former self.

Pumping throughout the winter, however, would result in an unintended warming for parts of the Arctic in the latter half of the century. That’s because as the ice freezes, it releases energy in the form of heat. Layer that on top of the warmth from global warming, and you have a recipe for a very confusing Arctic winter.

Oh, and speaking of that global warming: While saving Arctic sea ice is great for polar bears and the people who live there, it does just about jack shit for the climate globally. The mid-latitudes, where most humans live, would see just a few hundredths of a degree of cooling as a result. That’s nice and all, but it ain’t gonna do much to save the coral, stop wildfires from burning out of control, or keep people from dying.

This type of modelling will be crucial in the coming decade to understand the options we have on the table. Other forms of geoengineering, like blocking sunlight or undertaking massive reforestation projects to suck carbon out of the air, are also gaining steam as the climate we so rely on keeps unravelling.

There’s a seductiveness to thinking we can just implement a few techno fixes to buy time while the world gets its act together drawing down emissions, but the reality is they will almost surely come with tradeoffs and gnarly surprises of their own.

“I would like to point out that, according to our findings, this approach could only buy some decades to the Arctic sea ice, while a permanent solution can only be achieved by reducing the excess of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere and cooling the climate,” Zampieri said.

That’s right. The best thing we could do for the climate and future generations is the one the world has so far failed at. It might not be as sexy as building huge wind turbines in the Arctic, but it damn well gives us a better chance at survival.

[MIKA27]

Australia's Terrifying Bushfires Are Turning New Zealand Glaciers Pink

For weeks now, Australia has been dealing with severe bushfires. They’ve engulfed the country’s largest city in smoke, threatening air quality throughout New South Wales and destroying key koala habitat. In New South Wales alone, more than 100 bush and grassfires were burning as of Friday.

Nearly 1.6 million hectares have burned across the country so far, unleashing massive plumes of smoke that have travelled across the ocean. The smoke has been clearly visible from space, but it’s also left a mark on the ground, painting New Zealand glaciers a shade of dusty pink.

Travel blogger and photographer Liz Carlson captured the beautiful but ominous sight during a helicopter ride in late November through Mount Aspiring National Park in New Zealand’s South Island. The park is more than 1,850 kilometres from where the fiercest fires are burning. Up close, the particles of ash look a lot more brown than pink, but these fire remnants look quite beautiful from a distance.

“As a frequent visitor to Mt. Aspiring, and flying as often as I can around these big mountains I call home, it was unusual and exciting to see something rare and different,” Carlson wrote on her blog about the glaciers. “How crazy is it that we can see the impact of fires in Australia here in New Zealand?!”

Wind-driven dust and soot created odd patterns before. Storm winds have transported southwestern desert dust onto midwestern lawns. Orange snow has graced parts of eastern Europe after winds picked up sand from the Sahara. Weather can be pretty cool, I guess.

What’s not cool, however, is the potential impact of ash falling on glaciers. Climate change is already melting these giant stores of ice around the world. Research has shown that dust particles from Amazon forest fires falling on glaciers in the Andes may glaciers there to melt because darkened snow absorbs more sunlight. The Greenland ice sheet has also seen widespread melting due to soot and ash from fires in North America and across the Arctic.

At the same time, climate change has increased the odds of fire weather in Australia that can lead to destructive fires like the ones we’re seeing this year. The fact that ash from the fires is ending up on glaciers adds another weird way in which climate change impacts build on each other in terrible ways.

“Our glaciers don’t need any more battles as they are already truly endangered,” Carlson wrote on her blog. “It puts the impact of climate change into even more stark reality we can’t ignore.”

Wildfires will continue to burn in Australia for the foreseeable future with a “mega fire” currently ablaze north of Sydney, and the country’s Bureau of Meteorology is forecasting a warmer, drier summer than usual.

That means an increased risk of bushfires and heatwaves. Australia’s last summer became its hottest ever recorded. That’s what climate change looks like. And so, too, do these weirdly coloured glaciers.

[MIKA27]

The East African Safari Classic Rally Looks Fun As Hell

This week Porsche 911s, Ford Escorts and even a Rover SD1 ripped through Kenya and Tanzania as part of the Safari Classic Rally. While part of the course had to be abandoned, the rally went on and it looks like it was a pretty damned good time.

Austrian Kris Rosenberger and his co-driver Niki Bleicher took home the big prize on Friday with their Porsche after nine days on the road. Their Martini-liveried car might look like the kind of 911 build you’d have seen at Luftgekühlt a few years ago when this style was all over the place, but this one’s the real deal. This one wins races.

The classic rally is designed to celebrate the legacy of the original Safari Rally that once ran through East Africa. The rally started in 1953 in honour of Queen Elizabeth’s coronation and continued up through 2003, by which time it was already a WRC event.

Back in the ‘70s, the original rally was where cars like the 911 and the Peugeot 504 Coupe dueled against one another in a test of wits, endurance and, above all else, durability over rough terrain.

Today, teams are still out there racing 2-wheel drive, FIA-homologated cars through Kenya and Tanzania. The cars can’t be built after 1985 and strictly no forced induction is allowed to keep things simple but interesting. The mix has ended up Porsche-heavy, but there are some cool Datsuns and a Ford or two mixed in as well.

If all of this excites you, know that there are ways to get some more. For starters, a documentary was filmed as the 2019 race was run and you should look for it on television soon. If that’s not enough, WRC is back in East Africa next year after a 17-year hiatus too.

Of course, I know watching cars on TV isn’t going to cut it for at least one of you, but that’s totally fine. You can join the party yourself next year if you like with this car that’s for sale on the event’s website. It’s a safari-ized Ford Capri with the underbody guards and suspension travel to cope with the terrain and it’s fully homologated for racing too.

If all that is too much but you’re still looking for your East African Rally fix, check out the rest of the superb photo gallery from this week’s race right here below. It’s worth it.

[MIKA27]

In Free Guy's First Trailer, Ryan Reynolds Is The Only Dude For The Job

What if you were able to break the boundaries of the role society placed you in? And what if you were, also, literally, a video game character? And what if you were also played by Ryan Reynolds in a new motion picture? Wait. Hang on. This metaphor has fallen apart.

Let me try again: In Free Guy, Ryan Reynolds plays Guy, just a dude living a monotonous, not-at-all meaningful life as a bank teller. Until he finds out that the reason his life isn’t meaningful is because he’s in an open-world video game, and he’s not a player character. Reclaiming his agency and some snazzy new player-character gear, he becomes the freest guy around, rubbing shoulders with the players, fighting the bad guys, and becoming a bonafide hero.

In the movie’s first trailer, we see Reynolds, alongside co-stars Jodie Comer (Killing Eve), Lil Rey Howery, and Taika Waititi, having a blast as the simulated reality of Guy’s video game starts to fall apart. It looks silly but in a charming, incredibly Ryan Reynolds sort of way, and it seems like it could be a lot of fun.

Directed by Shawn Levy, Free Guy will open in theatres July 2, 2020. 

[MIKA27]

James May Is In A New Show All About Touring Around Japan

James May has always been my favourite of the Three Amigos. Even before they all went to The Grand Tour, watching James May travelling abroad during the Top Gear specials was a treat. Now, it seems like there’s a new show of just May doing that: travelling. I’m tentatively excited.

It’s called James May: Our Man in Japan, where he takes a trip from the north to south end of the country and exploring everything in between. “He’ll see the sights, meet the locals, and eat the noodles in a bid to truly understand the Land of the Rising Sun,” touts the trailer’s YouTube caption.

Judging from the trailer, it doesn’t look like a car-centric show, either. Which is a good thing! Car shows are great and all, but May has displayed a wealth of knowledge and interests outside the automotive world which will hopefully get highlighted here.

My favourite Top Gear episodes were always the ones where they travelled somewhere cool. I know what England looks like, so when the three got to go to places such as India, China, Botswana, Bolivia, Patagonia and Vietnam, it was a real treat.

What wasn’t so cool was how ignorant and racist the hosts could be sometimes. I have distinct memories of Richard Hammond refusing to try the local food out of fear and Jeremy Clarkson just being a general racist arse. May largely stayed silent during stuff like that and typically seemed more open-minded and pleasant about their surroundings.

Travel shows always run of the risk of exoticizing a culture. Sometimes we can’t help but to project our pre-conceived notions onto a foreign place or group of people, because it’s what we think we know. But that can falsely portray an entire culture, which becomes problematic when you broadcast your show to thousands or millions of people who also don’t know any better. As a hopefully unnecessary reminder, just because something seems weird and different to you doesn’t mean it isn’t perfectly normal to all the people who live in that country.

So I’m tentative in my excitement. But considering May seems to be good-natured guy, it’s probably going to be a lot of fun.

James May: Our Man in Japan airs on Amazon Prime Video UK on Jan. 3, 2020.

[MIKA27]

Polar Bears Have Invaded A Russian Town... Again

Over the past few days, 56 hungry polar bears have wandered into Ryrkaypiy, a village in far north Russia, forcing locals to cancel their New Year’s celebrations.

It’s not unusual for a few bears to visit the village, but an invasion of this size is unheard of, according to the World Wildlife Federation. The group says the climate crisis is to blame as melting sea ice screw up the bears’ usual habitat, forcing them to search for food elsewhere.

“If there is enough ice, the bears would go further north to hunt the seals,” Mikhail Stishov, the Arctic biodiversity projects coordinator for WWF Russia, said in a statement. “Until the ice is not thick enough, they will stay ashore and can visit the village due to curiosity and hunger.”

If you think you’ve heard this story before, you’re right. In February, Russian officials declared a state of emergency dozens of polar bears got into peoples’ homes near the settlement of Belushya Guba. Ryrkaypiy was also the site of polar bears herding hundreds of walruses off a cliff in late 2017 before laying siege to the village.

“Gathering of polar bears are becoming more frequent, and we have to adapt and find ways to avoid conflicts between people and animals,” said Stishov.

With their normal food sources depleted, the polar bears have been seen eating walrus carcasses that have been on the shore since last month. Tatyana Minenko, Ryrkapiy’s head of village’s polar bear patrol, described the bears as “thin,” which is never a good sign for this time of year.

Polar bears depend on sea ice—which has been melting rapidly over the past decade—to catch their prey. This year saw sea ice bottom out at its second-lowest extent in 40 years this September. The situation around Ryrkapiy hasn’t improved much in the intervening months.

The Chukchi Sea that borders the village has seen sea ice fail to regrow in recent weeks and November levels were more akin to mid-summer. In addition to climate change increasing the likelihood of polar bear-human interactions, their diets are also at-risk. As they’ve been forced to scavenge on land more often, scientists recently estimated that plastic and other garbage makes up a quarter of polar bears’ diets in Russia.

Under the Endangered Species Act, polar bears’ official designation is “vulnerable” (as in, at risk of becoming endangered) but experts say that by all scientific measures, they’re actually at risk of extinction.

Two-thirds of the world’s polar bears could be gone gone by 2050 if their Arctic sea ice habitat continues to melt. Essentially, their continued existence depends on climate action. And those that are still around could end up in contact with humans more often.

[MIKA27]

Lost In Space's New Trailer Has Robot Feels And Spaceship Ships

And yes, there’s still danger—although it’s not just Will Robinson that needs warning about it.

Netflix just dropped the full trailer for Lost in Space’s sophomore season, and while the Robinsons are just about still standing after the wild events of season one, it seems like they’re in for a bunch of new problems. Mainly problems like “Where the hell is our robot?” and, more immediately worrisome, “Can we turn our space-ship into a ship-ship before it plummets off of the edge of a waterfall?”

They might succeed in the latter, judging by this trailer, but as for the former, it seems like the hunt for Robot after it got separated from Will and the gang last season will be a major drive for season two, as the Robinsons and the rest of the remaining colonists attempt to get back to their fellow humans on the Resolute and continue their mission.

Too bad it seems like said mission is going to be impeded by some decidedly less-pleasant robots than, well, Robot! Poor guys can’t catch a break. At least Parker Posey still seems like she’s having a great old time on this show.

Lost in Space returns for round two on Netflix December 24.

[MIKA27]

Bond’s ‘No Time To Die’ Titanium Omega Dive Watch Has Been Revealed

Just as super-spy James Bond has driven cars other than an Aston Martin, he’s also worn watches other than those made by Omega. However, like the aforementioned British carmaker, there’s no timepiece brand more closely associated with 007 than Omega. And the relationship between Bond and the Swiss watchmaker has just been solidified even further with the unveiling of the No Time To Die Omega Seamaster watch.

Officially called the Omega Seamaster Diver 300M Co-Axial Master Chronometer 007 Edition, this is the exact timepiece donned by Daniel Craig in his last on-screen performance as James Bond. That includes its lightweight titanium case and matching band, aluminum dive timer bezel, Sapphire crystal, and the ultra-precise automatic movement powering it all. It even features a specially-engraved caseback with genuine military-issue watch serial numbers, all including the number 62 — a reference to the very first Bond film, Dr. No. Along with a handsome watch roll, this Omega diver can be yours today for $9,200.