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In the new movie “Elysium,” Earth is beyond repair, and the rich and powerful have decided to leave it behind.

“The premise is totally believable to me. I spent 28 years working on NASA’s International Space Station and retired last summer as the director of ISS at NASA Headquarters,” Mark Uhran, former director of the International Space Station Division in NASA’s Office of Human Exploration and Operations, said. “When I took a look at the Elysium space station, I thought to myself, that’s certainly achievable in this millennium.” (via Space Station Science: Could Humans Build the ‘Elysium’? | Space.com)

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It took decades for global warming to slowly melt the surface of the Larsen B Ice Shelf on the Antarctic Peninsula, forming nearly 3,000 lakes. But at the end of the Antarctic summer of 2002, all the lakes drained away in the space of a week. And then the 2,700-square-kilometre ice shelf, which was some 220 metres thick and probably had existed for some 12,000 years, rapidly disintegrated into small icebergs, leaving glaciologists scratching their heads.

The researchers showed that if there are many lakes on an ice shelf, the disappearance of one lake could result in fractures under others — an effect that can spread rapidly throughout the ice shelf. “This chain reaction could explain why the lakes drained all together,” MacAyeal said. 

Most of the lakes were about 1,000 metres wide, according to a poster presentation at the same meeting by study co-author Alison Banwell. Once drained, each would leave behind a ring fracture about 4,000 metres wide. When lakes are tightly packed together, as they were on the Larsen B ice shelf, the chain of fracturing would result in thin icebergs calving off, Banwell said.

via Chain reaction shattered huge Antarctica ice shelf : Nature News & Comment

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A 60-foot-wide sinkhole formed under a resort in central Florida late Sunday, forcing guests out of their rooms as one three-story building collapsed and another slowly sank. Guests at the Summer Bay Resort in Clermont, about 10 minutes from Walt Disney World, called for help before the collapse, saying they heard loud noises and windows cracking. All guests inside the buildings – an estimated 35 people, authorities said – were evacuated before the first structure crumbled. (via Florida sinkhole swallows parts of resort near Disney World – CNN.com)

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idlnmclean:

priceofliberty:

A new children’s show called “Burka Avenger” premieres in Pakistan next month. It features a female superhero in a fictional northern Pakistani town, and two regular villains meant to reflect the reality in Pakistan; a corrupt government official and an evil magician styled to look and feel like a Taliban commander. The show was created by Pakistani pop star Haroon Rashid.

From AP:

Our protagonist is a mild-mannered teacher with secret martial arts skills who uses a flowing black burka to hide her identity as she fights local thugs seeking to shut down the girls’ school where she works.

Sadly, it’s a battle Pakistanis are all too familiar with in the real world.

The Taliban have blown up hundreds of schools and attacked activists in Pakistan’s northwest because they oppose girls’ education. The militants sparked worldwide condemnation last fall when they shot 15-year-old schoolgirl activist Malala Yousafzai in the head in an unsuccessful attempt to kill her.

Action in the “Burka Avenger” cartoon series, which is scheduled to start running on Geo TV in early August, is much more lighthearted. The bungling bad guys evoke more laughter than fear and are no match for the Burka Avenger, undoubtedly the first South Asian ninja who wields books and pens as weapons.

I’m so glad to see this.

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