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Remembering Titanic: A century later, effort continues to unravel doomed ocean liner's mystery
April 15, 2012, marks the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, and a century later the world remains fascinated by the ill-fated ocean liner.
The ship, carrying more than 2,200 passengers and crew, set sail on April 10, 1912, on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City.
At the time the Titanic, built in Belfast, Ireland, was the largest passenger ship on the ocean, and the White Star Line billed the ship “unsinkable.”
Shortly after 11:30 p.m. April 14 Titanic struck an iceberg, and early the next morning the ship split and sank.
More than 1,500 people died. The RMS Carpathia picked up the the survivors in the lifeboats hours later.
The ship's sinking had worldwide repercussions, and for decades the wreck went undiscovered.
In 1985 the ship was discovered in 12,400 feet in the North Atlantic. The following year, the U.S. Congress passed the RMS Titanic Memorial Act to recognize the wreck site's discovery and its historical and cultural significance.
Answering the lingering questions
One hundred years after the sinking of the Titanic, a mystery still surrounds the cause of the events on that tragic night in April 1912.
On a clear night, under a sky of bright stars, how could two expertly trained lookouts miss an enormous iceberg lying directly in the ship's path? Furthermore, why did it take so long for help to arrive?
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) may finally have given researchers the information needed to conclusively answer these questions.
Researchers used NCDC's data archive, which contains hundreds of millions of records stretching back as far as the mid-1700s, as their most significant source to uncover the real reason the Titanic sank.
NCDC archivists provided researchers with 75 Greenwich Mean Noon (GMN) ship observation forms from April 1912 containing air and sea surface temperatures in the vicinity of the wreck site.
These documents also contained observer comments and sketches of sea ice that proved to be just as valuable as the data. Some of these comments included ominous phrases such as “much refraction on the horizon.”
These comments and data would establish the framework for British Titanic historian Tim Matlin's new theory that a mirage actually played a major role in causing the Titanic to sink.
Observations recorded in the logbooks provided evidence of the recent arrival of the cold water Labrador Current in the area.
This current cooled the warm air above the Gulf Stream from the bottom up resulting in a strong thermal inversion, which causes light to bend.
This refraction would have made the horizon appear higher than normal, camouflaging the iceberg from view until it was too late.
The temperature inversion, with the warmer air aloft, would also have scrambled the Titanic's Morse code signal and caused the distress rockets to appear lower in the sky to nearby ships, making the rescue effort exceedingly difficult.
These data records, never before used in such a capacity, also assisted Matlin and his team in the production of “Titanic: Case Closed,” a 96-minute documentary that explains his theory in detail with vivid effects and dramatic first-hand accounts.
However, these records might not have even been available without the preservation work of the Climate Database Modernization Program (CDMP) at NCDC.
The CDMP team imaged the century-old forms to permanently preserve them and make them digitally available to others.
A critical telegram
Historians also have discovered that a telegram from another ship could have saved Titanic.
On April 14, 1912, the German-flagged S.S. Amerika also was steaming for the United States, just ahead of Titanic.
When the Amerika encountered several large icebergs near 41°27'N, 50°8'W – in the middle of the Atlantic – she passed the message on to the hydrographic office – a precursor to the Defense Mapping Agency Hydrographic Center – in Washington, D.C., via the Titanic's radio relay.
The Amerika's radio antennae were not large enough to get messages to the ground relay station at Cape Race, Newfoundland, Canada from her distance, and it was common practice for other larger ships to relay messages.
As a result of this radio relay, the Titanic actually had the location of the icebergs that they struck one day later.
The resultant fallout from this maritime disaster put into motion the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) Convention in 1914, which, after subsequent meetings, includes a global requirement for baseline weather forecasts to ensure safer ocean voyages worldwide. The United States was one of the original signatories of this convention.
Today, the National Weather Service, through the Ocean Prediction Center, National Hurricane Center, and Honolulu, Hawaii Weather Forecast Office, assumed the obligation to issue warnings and forecasts for the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans.
For more visit www.noaa.gov/titanic .
Space News: NASA's Swift monitors departing Comet Garradd
An outbound comet that provided a nice show for skywatchers late last year is the target of an ongoing investigation by NASA's Swift satellite.
Formally designated C/2009 P1 (Garradd), the unusually dust-rich comet provides a novel opportunity to characterize how cometary activity changes at ever greater distance from the sun.
A comet is a clump of frozen gases mixed with dust. These "dirty snowballs" cast off gas and dust whenever they venture near the sun. What powers this activity is frozen water transforming from solid ice to gas, a process called sublimation. Jets powered by ice sublimation release dust, which reflects sunlight and brightens the comet.
Typically, a comet's water content remains frozen until it comes within about three times Earth's distance to the sun, or 3 astronomical units (AU), so astronomers regard this as the solar system's "snow line."
"Comet Garradd was producing lots of dust and gas well before it reached the snow line, which tells us that the activity was powered by something other than water ice," said Dennis Bodewits, an assistant research scientist at the University of Maryland, College Park, and the study's lead investigator. "We plan to use Swift's unique capabilities to monitor Garradd as it moves beyond the snow line, where few comets are studied."
Comets are known to contain other frozen gases, such as carbon monoxide and dioxide (CO and CO2), which sublimate at colder temperatures and much farther from the sun.
These are two of the leading candidates for driving cometary activity beyond the snow line, but phase transitions between different forms of water ice also may come into play.
C/2009 P1 was discovered by Gordon J. Garradd at Siding Spring Observatory, Australia, in August 2009. Astronomers say that the comet is "dynamically new," meaning that this is likely its first trip through the inner solar system since it arrived in the Oort cloud, the cometary cold-storage zone located thousands of AU beyond the sun.
Comet Garradd was closest to the sun on Dec. 23, 2011, and passed within 118 million miles (1.27 AU) of Earth on March 5, 2012. The comet remains observable in small telescopes this month as it moves south though the constellations Ursa Major and Lynx.
Although Swift's prime task is to detect and rapidly locate gamma-ray bursts in the distant universe, novel targets of opportunity allow the mission to show off its versatility. One of Swift's instruments, the Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope (UVOT) is ideally suited for studying comets.
The instrument includes a prism-like device called a grism, which separates incoming light by its wavelength.
While Swift's UVOT cannot detect water directly, the molecule quickly breaks up into hydrogen atoms and hydroxyl (OH) molecules when exposed to ultraviolet sunlight.
The UVOT detects light emitted by hydroxyl and other important molecular fragments – such as cyanide (CN), carbon monosulfide (CS) and diatomic and triatomic carbon (C2 and C3, respectively) – as well as the sunlight reflected off of cometary dust.
"Tracking the comet's water and dust production and watching its chemistry change as it moves deeper into the solar system will help us better understand how comets work and where they formed," said Stefan Immler, a researcher and Swift team member at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
Swift last observed the comet on April 1, when it was 1.53 AU away and just past the orbit of Mars. Although detailed results are not yet available, Bodewits estimates that Comet Garradd was shedding about 400 gallons of water each second -- enough to fill an Olympic-size swimming pool in under 30 minutes.
But the water given off by the comet was only about half of the dust mass it produced. Bodewits estimates that each second, Garradd was losing about 7,500 pounds (3.5 metric tons, or about twice the typical mass of a small car) in the form of dust and icy grains.
Thanks to Garradd's brightness and the UVOT's sensitivity and resolution, researchers can monitor the comet when it is beyond the grasp of most ground-based observatories. Plans call for observations at eight different distances from the sun out to about 5.5 AU, which the comet will reach in April 2013.
Adoption Minute: Three little kitties
LAKEPORT, Calif. – Kitten season is arriving early in Lake County this year, and these three little kittens are among the first of the season to be put up for adoption at Lake County Animal Care and Control.
They're about 6 weeks old and come in a variety of colors – calico, orange tabby and black.
Lake County Animal Care and Control is located at 4949 Helbush in Lakeport, next to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.
Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday. The shelter is open from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and on Saturday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
Visit the shelter online at http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control.htm .
To fill out an adoption application online visit http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/Animal_Care_And_Control/Adopt/Dog___Cat_Adoption_Application.htm .
For more information call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278.
CHP honors its communications operators
In the midst of an emergency, a member of the public may have to call 911.
It is the calm voice and gentle demeanor at the other end of the phone that can help soothe rattled nerves and calm a stressful situation.
The U.S. Congress has designated the second full week of April of each year as National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week.
The California Highway Patrol (CHP) this week is taking the opportunity to thank communication workers who are on the front line of emergency response.
“The dedicated public safety dispatchers you speak with at our communications centers throughout the state are highly trained professionals. In an emergency, they may be the first person within our agency that you may come in contact with,” said CHP Commissioner Joe Farrow. “We are proud of the vital and often life-saving services they provide on a daily basis.”
CHP dispatchers often have challenging and stressful jobs since they take the majority of California’s wireless 911 emergency and non-emergency calls.
Dispatchers ensure the appropriate assistance is provided, whether it is sending an officer to respond to a call, or contacting fire, ambulance, or other emergency services.
In addition, they are in constant radio communication with the patrol officers, often assisting them by looking up vehicle identification, license plate and driver license numbers, or by running checks for wanted subjects.
The CHP has 25 communications/dispatch centers statewide that employ nearly 900 public safety dispatchers.
Last year, these individuals were responsible for handling approximately 9.3 million calls for service (911 and other calls).
Calling 911 during a stressful incident can be intimidating.
The following tips are designed to help callers through an emergency:
- No matter what happens – stay calm.
- Be prepared to provide your name, phone number, address or location, and a detailed description of the incident being reported.
- Let the dispatcher guide the conversation.
- Wait for the dispatcher to ask questions, then answer clearly and calmly.
- Listen carefully and follow all directions provided by the dispatcher.
- Be prepared to provide a physical description if an emergency involves a criminal suspect.
- Cellular telephones may not tell the call-taker where you are. Use a landline to report an emergency whenever possible.
- Remember, 911 is for life-threatening emergencies. Misuse of the emergency 911 system will result in a delay for callers with real emergencies and is punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000.
“We commend the employees who provide radio, telephone, and computer services to the public and CHP officers in the field, and we appreciate their continued dedication and professionalism,” Farrow added.
