Archive for January 15th, 2007
Various news outlets have reported the death of 28 year old mother of three Jennifer Strange, who died of water intoxication following a competition to win a games console. Californian radio station KDND 107.9 held the contest, entitled “Hold your wee for a Wii”, where participants were encouraged to drink half a pint of water every 15 minutes, with the participant who resisted their bladder longest declared the winner.
Quite how any of the event organisers thought this was safe is beyond comprehension. Nevertheless, Strange was allowed to leave whilst complaining of a severe headache (an obvious symptom of water intoxication) without being given medical attention. The excessive water consumption had overloaded her kidneys and diluted her blood enough that water was entering her body cells, causing them to swell. The swelling of her brain (cerebral edema) was the cause of the headache, and would eventually lead to her death.
The most famous case of death by water intoxication is that of Leah Betts (though invariably reported as due to Ecstasy).
January 15th, 2007
The National Post, along with most other papers this weekend, reported the case of German breeder Karl Szmolinsky, who has sold a number of his freakisly large rabbits to North Korea, believing that they will be used to solve a food shortage in the beleaguered state.
Quite frankly, how these behemoth bunnies can not be considered a dual-use technology and fall under “sanctioned goods” is beyond me. Has nobody at the UN seen Watership Down? Those rascally North Koreans are clearly intent on building an army of war-rabbits.
Oh, those South Koreans think they’re safe behind the largest minefield in the world, but what do rabbits do? Jump! And burrow! Please, won’t somebody intervene, before Kim Jong-Il appears at the Demilitarised Zone astride a 12-ft kriegkanninchen named General Woundwart?
Thanks to Jen for submitting this!
January 15th, 2007
Brazilian scientists have recreated one of the most freaking awesome of natural phenomena, ball lightning, under lab conditions. New Scientist reports that the researchers theorised:
ball lightning forms when lightning strikes soil, turning any silica in the soil into pure silicon vapor. As the vapor cools, the silicon condenses into a floating aerosol bound into a ball by charges that gather on its surface, and it glows with the heat of silicon recombining with oxygen. To test this idea, a [Brazilian] team… took wafers of silicon just 350 micrometers thick, placed them between two electrodes and zapped them with currents of up to 140 amps. Then… they moved the electrodes slightly apart, creating an electrical arc that vaporised the silicon. The arc spat out glowing fragments of silicon but also, sometimes, luminous orbs the size of ping-pong balls that persisted for up to 8 seconds.
There is a video of the phenomenon here.
January 15th, 2007
Popular Science has posted a nice little series entitled “Science Mysteries, Explained“. If you’ve ever laid awake at night pondering questions such as “Do you use up more energy when you’re thinking really hard?” or “Can men produce breastmilk?”, this is exactly the lunchtime reading you need. Personally, I’ve never really wondered what the most powerful laser in the world is, but I’m glad to discover the National Ignition Facility beamline is capable of generating thermonuclear detonations. Awesome.
January 15th, 2007