When I was in Youngtown, kids were playing in a deep dry riverbed. They had been warned to get out fast if they see clouds. That riverbed could fill up fast.
That was in about 1974. Today, parents might not allow kids to go into that riverbed, calling it too dangerous.
[snip]
At the time I wrote about the "NOT dry" heat here, it was abnormally cool and pleasant because of the rain.
[snip]
One thing I'd like to see sometime is the aurora. It must look a lot better than what you see on TV.
Until one of them stops taking a charge.
I have several cordless drills (B&D, Makita, Bosch, etc.) that folks have given me, over the years -- when they decided they didn't want to keep buying a "replacement" every time a battery died.
[I use the drills to make hand-crank generators so I don't need the battery pack!]
The area is crisscrossed by "washes" (dry river/stream/creek beds). You can walk across them (some being a sizeable fraction of a mile to cross!). Or *drive* across them! (some of our roads have omitted the cost of bridges -- at the expense of being unpassable when it rains!)
~20 years ago, one of the largest washes was flooded -- as if a LARGE RIVER! Took a sizeable piece of property away with it (eroding the "bank").
It is a relatively common occurrence for someone to get swept away in these "water events" (don't always qualify as "flash floods"). And, motorists often need to be rescued for attempting to cross these areas ("It's only a few inches deep! What's the problem??").
[If you need to be rescued for failing to heed the warning signs for such a place, you are fined as a "stupid motorist"]
The aurora has been on our bucket list for many years. So, this April my wife and I made a trip to Fairbanks to see the northern lights.
The aurora occurs year round, but your odds of seeing it go down at certain times of the year. During the winter you have to contend with clouds and very frigid temperatures. During the summer it doesn't get dark enough to see the lights anymore.
March seemed like a good compromise, but I planned late so April was the best we could do. Even in early April it was staying light out till well past 10pm.
We were in Fairbanks for five nights, but the weather and the aurora only cooperated one night during our stay.
We drove up to the top of Murphy Dome after midnight to get away from the city lights and have a clear view of the night sky. The aurora wasn't particularly strong that night (a four rating I believe) but it was still an amazing sight. I tried to get pictures of it, but despite long exposures and clear photographs, it just doesn't capture the scale of the real thing. The lights extend almost from horizon to horizon, dancing slowly in the sky all around you. Even though they are far above, it felt like we could reach out and touch them. Beautiful and mesmerizing.
We tried to condition ourselves to staying up late, but at 3am it was getting very cold and windy on the top of that mountain. We reluctantly decided to pack it in and make the long drive down the snow covered mountain roads.
It was truly an amazing sight. I wish we had been able to see it more than just the one night, but I'm thankful we were able to see it at least once in our lives.
Anthony Watson
While serving in the USCG, I spent a year on the end of a finger spit known as Port Clarence, AK. It should be roughly in the center of this link.
https://www.google.com/maps/@65.4334836,-166.683659,8.44z
(Little Diomede Island in the upper left is in AK, Big Diomede, just 2.25 miles away from Little Diomede, is in Russia.)
Many a night was spent lying on the beaches of either Port Clarence Bay or the Bering Strait (on either side of the spit) watching the northern lights dance in the sky. Trust me, "city lights" weren't an issue. Here is a picture of 5 buildings that made up the entire 40 man station.
All we had to do was walk away from the drift wood bonfire, crack a beer, lie back and watch the show. The downside was that if you were away from the fire and you didn't drink your beer fast enough, it would freeze.
Lucky... That must have been an awesome experience.
I hope we can see the aurora again someday, though it would be nice to view them from a different location. There's not a lot do see in Fairbanks.
Well, "city" is a relative term in Alaska. :)
Fairbanks didn't produce much light polution to start with. It was just so light out in early April that we were grasping for anything that would be even slightly darker.
We were also staying in a rental that was in the forest, so we drove to the mountain top to get out of the trees for a clear view of the sky.
It was -20 the week before we arrived, but we had daytime temps in the 50's during our visit. It was actually warmer in Fairbanks than it was back home. :)
Spring break-up meant lots of muddy rutted roads. Sure glad we rented a 4 wheel drive SUV.
Anthony Watson
So, how expensive were AAA alkalines there?
I don't know because the USCG supplied all of the batteries we needed.
My guess is they were probably in the hundreds of dollars *each* due to the typically favorable terms of most government contracts as well as the mil-spec requirements.
Here is the 1988 Military Standard entitled:
Batteries, Non-Rechargable, Selection and Use Of"
They list D, C, AA, and 9volt. No listing for AAA on that document. Non standard, you see.
AAA not be in the standard but their use is covered in 4.1(a) and 4.2.1. The very fact that the spec allows for approval of non-standard batteries by the "contracting agency" just about guarantees that the price will outside the range that most people would consider reasonable.
I guess there is civillian logic, and military logic.
Reminds me of a readers digest story. The military had a flight training simulator. Which stopped working at some point. The one intelligent future flyer noticed on the back of the simulator was a fuse holder. Look, and find a fuse had gone bad. On the home, the recruit stopped by electronics store, and bought a pack of fuses. Put in a fuse the next day, and the machine came back to life. The Sargeant in charge spent the usual generous ammount of time hollering at the recurit for not using Milspec fuse. But the recruit notes that the fuse stayed in, and the flight training resuemed while using the non MILSPEC fuse.
That is all. All units are ordered to carry on.
In case you ever need some milspec duct tape:
...and you won't find that at Harbor Fright ;-)
A few years ago, I was visiting some people in west Texas and nowhere near a big city. I was surprised at how many stars I could see in the sky. It looked like hundreds or thousands, rather than the half dozen or so I can see in town.
Exactly. I took my "evening constitutional" around 11P last night (had to wait for it to drop down below 90F). Waxing crescent so the sky was pretty black. Walking in the middle of the road (no risk of tripping over any portion of the sidewalk that may have "buckled" from the day's heat) eliminates any buildings or foliage that would otherwise be alongside me while walking (i.e., on the sidewalk).
So, clear view of the sky from horizon to horizon ahead of me. "Inky black" instead of that "grey soup" that's common in many other places.
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