The appearance of a "sprite" (about 30 miles high by 30 miles wide), flashing above a distant thunderstorm. The "sprite" is about 175-250 miles away from the camera. Credit: ILAN Science Team

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: The appearance of a "sprite" (about 30 miles high by 30 miles wide), flashing above a distant thunderstorm. The "sprite" is about 175-250 miles away from the camera. Credit: ILAN Science Team

Mysterious UFO sightings may go hand in hand with a puzzling natural phenomenon known as sprites — flashes high in the atmosphere triggered by thunderstorms.

The dancing lights have appeared above most thunderstorms throughout history, but researchers did not start studying them until one accidentally recorded a sighting on camera in 1989.

"Lightning from the thunderstorm excites the electric field above, producing a flash of light called a sprite," said Colin Price, a geophysicist at Tel Aviv University in Israel. "We now understand that only a specific type of lightning is the trigger that initiates sprites aloft."

Researchers have detected the flashes between 35 and 80 miles (56-129 km) from the ground, far above the 7 to 10 miles (11-16 km) where usual lightning occurs. Sprites can take the form of fast-paced balls of electricity, although previous footage has suggested streaks or tendrils.

The cause or function of the flashes remains murky, but Price suggested that they could explain some of the UFO reports which have cropped up over the years. That might provide some solace for UFO enthusiasts disappointed by human-caused hoaxes in the past.

Both jetliner pilots and astronauts have previously reported sightings of sprites, along with a different but equally mysterious phenomenon known as blue jets.

Price and his colleagues have focused on "winter sprites" which appear only in the northern hemisphere's winter months. Their remote-controlled roof-mounted cameras can spot thunderstorms producing sprites far out over the Mediterranean Sea.

Triangulation techniques have also allowed the researchers to calculate the dimensions of the sprites.

"The candles in the sprites are up to 15 miles high, with the cluster of candles 45 miles wide — it looks like a huge birthday celebration!" Price said.

Sprites may have some effect on the Earth's ozone layer, but researchers suspect that the global impact is small.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 05:35 | link | comments

Flying Colors

To the naked eye, Comet Lulin may have a vaguely pale green look when it passes about 38 million miles from Earth on Tuesday. We're told it's already been visible where the sky is clear and city lights don't interfere, high in the northern sky after midnight in the U.S.

Click on the picture to enlarge; it's one of those that is best enjoyed big. The colors are not just for our pleasure; the blue and green come from the probe's UltraViolet and Optical Telescope (UVOT for short), while the red is what Swift observes in the X-ray range. The stars were added from earthly observations; that's the constellation Libra in the background.

"In the Swift images," says NASA, "the comet's tail extends off to the right. Solar radiation pushes icy grains away from the comet. As the grains gradually evaporate, they create a thin hydroxyl tail. Further from the comet, even the hydroxyl molecule succumbs to solar ultraviolet radiation. It breaks into its constituent oxygen and hydrogen atoms."

NASA quotes Dennis Bodewits, a member of the Swift team at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md: "The UVOT data show that Lulin was shedding nearly 800 gallons of water each second." That's enough, they say, to fill an Olympic-size swimming pool every 15 minutes.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab has an interactive diagram that allows you to follow the comet's path from different angles; take a look HERE. Sky & Telescope is providing a regularly-updated page of comet observations, with pictures and information on where to find the comet; click HERE.

Most of us will miss the show. That's the price we pay for city lights and urban haze. In the meantime, enjoy the pictures.

Image Credit: NASA/Swift/Univ. of Leicester/DSS (STScI, AURUA)/Bodewits et al.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 09:17 | link | comments (1)

Golf ball found embedded in tree trunk

LYNDSEY HEWISON

20 February 2009 08:24

Golf's strangest stories

The golf ball embedded in the tree

A long-forgotten hook and an astonishing slice of luck have combined to create a unique trophy for members of one of Norfolk's top golf clubs.

The story begins years ago when an anonymous golfer stood on the first tee and hooked his ball into a high hedge of conifers, planted between the hole and the ninth green. The ball was lost without trace - until now, when the winter programme at Eaton included cutting down the trees.

As greenkeeper Richard Mitchell sawed the felled trees into lengths he realised he was looking at a cross-section of trunk - with a golf ball embedded in it.

“It's an incredible find,” said the Norwich club manager's Peter Johns. “It was pure luck that it was discovered. If Richard had cut the trunk an inch or two either way we'd never have known the ball was there.

“We think the ball came off the first tee, went into the trees and was lost. It must have lodged in a fork or embedded itself in the trunk and the tree just grew round it.”

The cross-section - inevitably known as a tree wood - was entrusted for preservation to Jim Cook, a past captain and skilled woodworker. It's thought it will become a trophy and one idea is to use it as an honour board to record all holes-in-one at the short ninth hole.

The trees were felled during the winter maintenance programme after they were found to be dying and also draining moisture from the ninth green.

Eaton golf club member Jim Cook with the slice of tree with the golf ball embedded in it

Their removal is the first phase of a programme to reshape the area behind the green by extending a bunker, new tree planting and the creation of some mounds.

Woodland management has also been carried out elsewhere on the course, continuing the work that helped Eaton win an English Golf Environment Award in 2005.

“We are keen to expose the really mature oaks which we have on the course,” said Johns. “We have some magnificent oaks which have been 'lost' in the middle of wooded areas. By thinning out we have been able to make a feature of them.

Notable clearing has been carried out on the right of the third hole while the removal of two pines has created an avenue of oaks leading to the elevated sixth green.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 00:20 | link | comments

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 09:56 | link | comments

Galaxy has 'billions of Earths'

Fomalhaut star and exoplanet (AFP/Getty)

The number of stars points to there being many rocky planets

There could be one hundred billion Earth-like planets in our galaxy, a US conference has heard.

Dr Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Science said many of these worlds could be inhabited by simple lifeforms.

He was speaking at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago.

So far, telescopes have been able to detect just over 300 planets outside our Solar System.

Very few of these would be capable of supporting life, however. Most are gas giants like our Jupiter; and many orbit so close to their parent stars that any microbes would have to survive roasting temperatures.

But, based on the limited numbers of planets found so far, Dr Boss has estimated that each Sun-like star has on average one "Earth-like" planet.

This simple calculation means there would be huge numbers capable of supporting life.

"Not only are they probably habitable but they probably are also going to be inhabited," Dr Boss told BBC News. "But I think that most likely the nearby 'Earths' are going to be inhabited with things which are perhaps more common to what Earth was like three or four billion years ago." That means bacterial lifeforms.

Dr Boss estimates that Nasa's Kepler mission, due for launch in March, should begin finding some of these Earth-like planets within the next few years.

Recent work at Edinburgh University tried to quantify how many intelligent civilisations might be out there. The research suggested there could be thousands of them.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 06:25 | link | comments (6)

A US woman with the world's longest fingernails has lost them - in a car accident.

Lee Redmond, 67, of Salt Lake City, Utah, had been growing her fingernails since 1979, reports the Salt Lake Tribune.

They were the longest in the world according to Guinness World Records and were last measured at 33 inches long.

But Salt Lake County sheriff's spokesman Don Hutson confirmed they were broken off in a four-car pileup in Holladay.

Ms Redmond was a passenger in one of the cars and was taken to a hospital. Her injuries were not life threatening, Hutson said.

In a 1995 article, she revealed that she once turned down $10,000 to trim her nails on Japanese TV.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 09:55 | link | comments (3)

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 10:41 | link | comments

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 10:33 | link | comments (2)

5 Things You Never Knew Your Cell Phone Could Do
>
>For all the folks with cell phones. (This should be printed and kept in your car, purse, and wallet. Good information to have with you.)
>
>
>There are a few things that can be done in times of grave emergencies.
>
>Your mobile phone can actually be a life saver or an emergency tool for survival.
> Check out the things that you can do with it:
>
>
>FIRST
>Emergency
>
>The Emergency Number worldwide for Mobile is 112. If you find
>Yourself out of the coverage area of your mobile network and there is an
>Emergency, dial 112 and the mobile will search any existing network to
>Establish the emergency number for you, and interestingly, this number 112
>can be dialed even if the keypad is locked. Try it out.
>
>SECOND
>Have you locked your keys in the car?
>
>Does your car have remote keyless entry? This may come in handy someday. Good reason to own a cell phone:
> If you lock your keys In the car and the spare keys are at home, call someone at home on their cell phone from your cell phone. Hold your cell phone about a foot from your car door and have the person at your home press the unlock button, holding it near the mobile phone on their end. Your car will unlock. Saves someone from having to drive your keys to you. Distance is no object. You could be hundreds of miles away, and if you can reach someone who has the other 'remote' for your car, you can unlock the doors (or the trunk).
>
>Editor's Note: It works fine! We tried it out and it unlocked
>Our car over a cell phone!'
>
>THIRD
>Hidden Battery Power
>
>Imagine your cell battery is very low. To activate, press the keys *3370#. Your cell phone will restart with this reserve and the instrument will show a 50% increase in battery. This reserve will get charged when you charge your cell phone next time.
>
>FOURTH
>How to disable a STOLEN mobile phone?
>
>To check your Mobile phone's serial number, key in the following Digits on your phone: *#06#. A 15-digit code will appear on the screen. This number is unique to your handset. Write it down and keep it somewhere safe.
>
>When your phone gets stolen, you can phone your service provider and give them this code. They will then be able to block your handset so even if the thief changes the SIM card, your phone will be totally useless. You probably won't get your phone back, but at least you know that whoever stole it can't use/sell it either. If everybody does this, there would be no point in people stealing mobile phones.
>
>
>And Finally....
>
>FIFTH
>Free Directory Service for Cells
>
>Cel l phone companies are charging us $1.00 to $1.75 or more for 411 information calls when they don't have to. Most of us do not carry a telephone directory in our vehicle, which makes this situation even more of a problem. When you need to use the 411 information option, simply dial: (800)FREE411, or (800) 373-3411 without incurring any charge at all. Program this into your cell phone now. This is sponsered by MacDonalds.
>
>This is the kind of information people don't mind receiving, so Pass it on to your family and friends.

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 11:24 | link | comments (4)

Zen Sarcasm
> Words to live by...
>
>
> THESE ARE GREAT Sayings
>
>
> 1. Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead. Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow. Do not walk beside me either. Just pretty much leave me the hell alone.
>
> 2. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and leaky tire.
>
> 3. It's always darkest before dawn. So if you're going to steal your neighbor's newspaper, that's the time to do it.
>
> 4. Don't be irreplaceable. If you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted.
>
> 5. Always remember that you're unique. Just like everyone else.
>
> 6. Never test the depth of the water with both feet.
>
> 7. If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of car payments.
>
> 8. Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.
>
> 9. If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.
>
> 10. Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.
>
> 11. If you lend someone $20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.
>
> 12. If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.
>
> 13. Some days you're the bug; some days you're the windshield.
>
> 14. Everyone seems normal until you get to know them.
>
> 15. The quickest way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.
>
> 16. A closed mouth gathers no foot.
>
> 17. Duct tape is like 'The Force'. It has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
>
> 18. There are two theories to arguing with women. Neither one works.
>
> 19. Generally speaking, you aren't learning much when your lips are moving.
>
> 20. Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.
>
> 21. Never miss a good chance to shut up.
>
> 22. Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night
>
>

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 01:15 | link | comments (5)

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 10:43 | link | comments (2)

Sometime this year, taxpayers will receive an Economic Stimulus Payment. This is a very exciting new program that I will explain using the Q and A format:

"Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment?
"A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.

"Q. So the government is giving me back my own money?
"A. No, they are borrowing it from China . Your children are expected to repay the Chinese.

"Q. What is the purpose of this payment?
"A. The plan is that you will use the money to purchase a high-definition TV set, thus stimulating the

Below is some helpful advice on how to best help the US economy by spending your stimulus check wisely:

If you purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico , Honduras , and Guatemala (unless you buy organic).

Posted by: NeutronNorman at 10:41 | link | comments (2)

If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.
(Hardly seems worth it.)

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