Scribbles on the margins of science.
On the Record
“Clearly, having a working toilet is a priority for us.”
Shuttle payload manager Scott Higginbotham, on the failure of the toilet system on the International Space Station. The three astronauts aboard used the one on the moored Soyuz capsule instead.
Scorecard
Skydiving balloon
A $200,000 helium balloon, supposed to take French daredevil Michel Fournier 40 kilometres up for a record-setting sky-dive, launched successfully last week — but without Fournier. A technical problem led to its premature release. It was Fournier's third failed attempt at the jump, but he says that he'll try again in August.
Party balloons
The California Senate has voted to ban helium-filled metallic balloons because they, too, frequently escape, and can get tangled in electrical lines. They have apparently caused hundreds of power outages in recent years.
Number Crunch
830 years ago the Tower of Pisa first began to lean. It has now officially stopped moving.
28 years ago, the latest attempts to un-tilt the tower began.
70 tonnes of earth were shifted to prop up it up.
300 years is how long it is expected to remain stable at its new lean, which is about the same tilt it had in 1700.
Sources: NASA, Globe and Mail, Mercury News, Reuters
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Sidelines. Nature 453, 705 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/453705b
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/453705b