The Zone Rouge is an area in north-eastern France, site of the Battle of Verdun, which was totally devastated by the war and remains completely uninhabitable. The area is saturated with unexplored munitions and the soil is contaminated with dangerous heavy metals and chemicals. In two areas, 99% of all plants which sprout in the soil die. It is estimated that it will take 300 to 700 years to rehabilitate the area.
The immediate area inside the nuclear facility at Chernobyl will be uninhabitable for at least another 20,000 years. In the 18-mile exclusion zone around the site, it is estimated that it could be habitable again anywhere from 20 to several hundreds of years. However, plant life appears to have adapted to the radioactivity and is thriving throughout the area.
Both Pierre and Marie Curie experienced radium burns, and were exposed to extensive doses of radiation while conducting their research. They experienced radiation sickness and Marie Curie died of aplastic anemia in 1934. Even now, all their papers from the 1890s, even her cookbooks, are too dangerous to touch. Their laboratory books are kept in special lead boxes and people who want to see them have to wear protective clothing. Had Pierre Curie not been killed at age 45 in a traffic accident, it is likely that he would have eventually died of the effects of radiation, as did his wife, their daughter Irène, and her husband Frédéric Joliot.
As shown in the critically-acclaimed recent HBO miniseries Chernobyl, Soviet investigators of the catastrophic explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in April 1986 raced to interview the plant staff, many of whom were by then dying of massive radiation poisoning, before they died in order to learn why the accident had occurred.
A medical linear accelerator (LINAC) is the device most commonly used for external beam radiation treatments for patients with cancer. It delivers high-energy x-rays or electrons to the region of the patient’s tumor. These treatments can be designed in such a way that they destroy the cancer cells while sparing the surrounding normal tissue. The LINAC is used to treat all body sites, using conventional techniques, Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT), Volumetric Modulated Arc Therapy (VMAT), Image Guided Radiation Therapy (IGRT), Stereotactic Radiosurgery (SRS) and Stereotactic Body Radio Therapy (SBRT).
Comment: My work is with SRS to treat brain tumors non-invasivey. Here is our machine at Zap Surgical.
Tom Clancy’s military novel Red Storm Rising (1986) is about a conventional war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, begun by Moscow as a means to seize Mideast oil fields after a terrorist attack severely curtails Soviet oil production.
The Mark Gordon Company is planning to produce a feature film adaptation of the musical Come From Away, which is set in the week following the September 11 terror attacks and tells the true story of what transpired when 38 planes were ordered to land unexpectedly in the small town of Gande. Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, as part of Operation Yellow Ribbon.
Gander Airport was taken over by the RCAF during the war, and became a major staging base for RAF Ferry Command, who transported new airplanes from North America to Britain. Other stops on the route eventually included Narsarssuaq, Greenland (code named Bluie West One); Keflavik, Iceland (a field the British built after their non-hostile but insistent takeover of Iceland); and Prestwick, Scotland. Although Ferry Command pilots were not military personnel, they were given military uniforms to protect them if somehow captured - they joked that the “FC” on their hats stood for “Frightened Civilian”.
Gander Crater, with a diameter of about 25 miles, is located at 31.5° south latitude, 265.9° west longitude, on Mars.
A male goose is a gander; a female peacock is a peahen.
In January 2018, a female United Airlines passenger was denied boarding at Newark for a flight to LAX with what she claimed to be her “emotional support peacock”, even though she had bought it its own ticket. The peacock, reportedly called Dexter, belongs to Brooklyn-based artist Ventiko (real name unknown), who documents its life on social media.
Emotional support animals differ from trained service animals, who have been trained to do work or perform a task for the benefit of a person with a disability. Most emotional support animals are not officially trained to offer support, but their owners consider them a comfort nonetheless.
Oscar Munoz, CEO of United Airlines, told a business group that his airline was expected to fly a support animal for an emotional support animal.
A group of emotional supprt peacocks is called a bevy, or ostentation, or muster, or party.
The Irish Rovers, recording under the name The Rovers, had an international hit with their cover of Tom Paxton’s Wasn’t That A Party?. The recording even crossed over to success in the country rock genre.
Rover has been a common name for hunting dogs since at least the mid-18th century. The first movie to feature a dog was made in 1905 and called “Rescued by Rover.”
Michael Brooke, a British movie critic, said that when Rescued by Rover was released, it was “possibly the only point in film history when British cinema unquestionably led the world.”
And I just now realized why Tom Paxton worked “Irish rover” into the last song of his Annie trilogy When Annie Took Me Home
here was I wondering why
Annie’d choose to ask me over
But she did, sure she did
She called me her Irish rover
“The Wild Rover” is a well-known folk song; its origins are disputed, some claiming it is Irish, others saying it is from Northern Scotland. Supposedly it originated as a temperance song, but now it is commonly sung in pubs as a drinking song. At matches of the Celtic Football club, its chorus is performed by fans, and by other clubs throughout England, usually with the words adapted to suit the team in question.:
And it’s no, nay, never
No, nay, never no more
Will I play the wild rover
No, never no more
Four robotic vehicles, generically called “Rovers,” have been successfully deployed to Mars. The USSR tried to send two of its own back in the 1970s but both missions failed. “Curiosity” is stil loeprational on Mars, having been there since 2011. Its power source of just eleven pounds of plutonium dioxide can power it for at least 14 years.
The first extraterrestrial rover was the USSR’s Lunokhod series, designed to support the Soviet manned moon missions during the Moon race. They were transported to the lunar surface by Luna spacecraft, which were launched by Proton-K rockets. The moon lander part of the Luna spacecraft for Lunokhods was similar to the one for sample-return missions. There were no other rovers until the US Pathfinder mission in 1997.