Blackberry REACT May 2008 NewsletterQuick ClicksIBM uses stochastic modeling to manage natural disastersAn interesting idea if it works. Deployment of resources in natural disasters has been, well, a disaster in the US lately. IBM has developed a computer model (excuse me, "a set of intellectual properties and software assets") to help get supplies and people where they are needed as quickly as possible. VoidsWe've all learned to use the side of a bed or other large object as a shelter if the house collapses in an earthquake. The link to the photo shows a house after a propane explosion. A 9-month-old baby was found fifteen hours after the explosion next to some cinder blocks that prevented rubble from falling on her: "'She was just in a little void space that was perfectly sized for her,' [Fire Chief Kenny] Holbrook said. 'She was just very fortunate.'" Dashcam video of rescue from burning carNotice that it takes several strikes to break the car window and that it takes a long time to get the person out of the burning car. Breaking a window is hard, thanks to modern protective glass. It's also life-threatening to lean into a burning car to try to release the safety belt. Having a seatbelt cutter lets you stay outside and still get unconscious people out of the car. Lego 3D zoetrope
Gary Aden of SCARES has a 3D zoetrope which he'll be showing at Maker Faire, May 3 and 4 in San Mateo. This link shows a photo of it plus a flash animation. Follow the link for animated GIF. Make your own vacuum tubes for your boatanchor radio17-minute video; background music: The Man I Love by the incomparable George Gershwin. It's an incredible video. (The text is in French, but the video shows all you need to know.) Then use them to make your own MRIA couple of crazy guys have built their own MRI. 
High tech Post-It noteYou can set an alarm on this paper by touching it with your finger and the strip where you wrote your note flashes at the appropriate time. There's even thermo-chromic ink - and you know what that's for, so I don't have to type it out. :-> Charles Babbage Difference Machine in Mt. ViewCharles Babbage originated the concept of a programmable computer, back when computer just meant someone or something that does math computations. He never got to build one during his life (his design has 25,000 parts and weighed 15 tons using materials available to him in the mid-nineteenth century). A full-scale model has been installed at the Computer History Museum in Mt. View, where it will be on view for six months starting on May 10. The machine is entirely mechanical, using no electricity. Because it is hand-cranked, gears had to be hand fitted so that friction did not exceed our human limitations. It took several years to make and assemble. The story in the link above describes some of the problems and has photos of the beautiful machine. Making a fire without matches - easy!Use a 9V battery and a packet of steel wool. This looks remarkably easy, so I think I'll try it myself and make sure it works. I have friends who light steel wool and spin it on rope, so I know steel wool burns very fast and hot - I'm thinking this video is real. More lunches to go
Photos and recipes from a woman called Biggie*. Tons of tips on storing food, freezing food, preparing food, and preparing lunch boxes with tons of illustrative photos. Lunch boxes raised to art. Alarm clocksSo you agreed to work at this event and you've set the alarm for 4:40 AM in the MORNING, and you're wondering if you'll regret it; then the alarm goes off and you KNOW you regret it, use this AA powered alarm to get the cobwebs out of your sleep-deprived brain. Check the site to see the other alarming options. Dry boxesFrom MTM Case-Gard. They think the boxes are for hunters who need to keep their powder dry out in the field. We know we can use them for our electronics and radio gear. HVOB
Highly Versatile Orange Box - this photo and the one in the previous link are from May's QST. This is Steve and Kim's page on their gear box, with tons of links and photos to their box and to the boxes of others (although not all are orange). Please go look at this page and follow the links that interest you. There are lots of things to learn from the photos and instructions. The dumbest 911 calls everMore Steampunk
People may think Apple had the original all-in-one PC, but this beautiful work of art demonstrates that it was all done in Queen Victoria's England. (If you've never seen a 24-inch LCD cut down to size on a table saw, this might be a video for your entertainment.) Wildfires alreadyYikes! Fires in the hills already. Red Cross evacuation centers and the whole thing. Of course, we have our Bail- Out Bags all ready, right? Although the weather doesn't show it, we're apparently out of our rainy season and into summer. We still need warm clothes for the night, but we can consider having heat as an issue during the day - time to think about changing our gear to warm weather stuff. Include more water? Everyday CarryOne guy posted somewhere online that he was on his way to the men's room when an underground steampipe in Manhattan ruptured. No one knew what happened -- terrorist attack, plane crash -- and the building squawk box said to evacuate immediately. His bail out bag was in his office. Did he go back and get it or did he leave without it? He left without it. He had only what was on him at the time. What's your everyday carry that you have on you all the time? When the Big One hits, what are you going to have on you when you evacuate? Survival GearI have doubts about some of the gear - a cocoon-shaped shelter that you hang from a tree? Another shelter is dropped in on a parachute that becomes a roof; a solar oven; a custom survival trailer. Some interesting things that look plausible, some that don't. Red Flare KitsThis is a local emergency kit company I stumbled across. They are in San Mateo, so you can shop locally, although the stuff they sell comes from all over. They have full emergency kits, put-it- together- yourself kits, first aid kits, multi-tools, knives, whistles, glow sticks, and on and on - all the stuff we need in our go-bags and cars. Shelf-lifeI don't like freeze-dried foods. They taste bad, they need a lot of water, and they taste bad. Louise and I were out buying canned goods a month or two ago, and she was watching for the expiration date on the cans - generally a year or two out from now. After I stumbled on to Red Flare Kits, I stumbled on to Mountainhouse, which makes freeze-dried food. I've eaten some of their stuff, and I don't like it. However, their pouches have a 7-year shelf-life, and their cans have a 25-year shelf- life. Yikes. The reason for these long times is that the stuff is freeze-dried. One of the issues with living after an earthquake for weeks without rescue is that you can get awfully bored with your food. This is a particular problem with children and the elderly, who will die rather than eat enough when the food is the same day after day. See Living on Survival Food. Since I can't stand freeze-dried food, I wont' make it my entire food stash, but I'll use some of it to save the hassle of watching dates on cans and rotating them out of stock after I remember they've expired. Events
*events for which we sometimes receive a donation UpdatesLouise Johnson (Unit 79 of Blackberry REACT C-57 in Menlo Park,CA; KG6IMA) and Phil Stripling (Unit 77; KG6ILU) promoted REACT and amateur radio at the Third Annual Maker Faire (http://www.makerfaire.com) on May 3 and 4, 2008, with Special Event Station K6M, Amateur Radio: Getting on the Air (http://makerfaire.com/pub/e/1310). They were assisted by fellow Blackberry REACTer Howard Zolty (Unit 74; KG6JRG) and other local amateur radio operators. K6M was run on a Kenwood TS-480SAT from batteries, using a Tarheel Model 100 antenna. The operators also used their own HTs for local co-ordination of their activities. Because of considerable electrical interference from Tesla coils, Jacob's Ladders, electric motorcycles and cupcakes, other home-made electronic devices, the noise level at the station was about S-6, making for interesting communications. We had hundreds of visitors, and we handed out REACT and ARRL brochures, pamphlets, and flyers with information on getting an amateur license and on operating as volunteers at events such as Maker Faire and after disasters. Since we are in the San Francisco Bay Area, people are very much aware of the potention for earthquakes, wildfires, and mudslides. Attendance at Maker Faire was projected at 60,000, and thousands walked by our station and saw our banners and information. We used QR-Codes on our signs and materials to provide URLs for our Blackberry REACT Web site, the ARRL's site, and local clubs, and many people took photographs so they could check the coded URLs later; thus, although they did not stop to talk, they have our contact information. More information on QR-Code is at http://www.denso-wave.com/qrcode/index-e.html, and there is a demonstration of its use with a cellphone on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crPg_eyXPTs. Everyone has a digital camera nowadays, either in their phone or around their neck; by providing a way to photograph URLs, we saved the costs of duplication and probably some waste when people throw away many of the brochures they collected during the day. Some people who declined our offer of brochures because they had too much stuff to carry already did accept our invitation to photograph our URLs and QR-Codes. See photos and videos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/civex/ and yes, there really were electric cupcakes. [NOTE: this was submitted to the REACTer, hence the somewhat formal nature of the writing.] |
