Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Musings
Newfie Guinea pigs
While I was visiting my Newfoundland/Labrador recently I heard a radio announcement/commercial asking for volunteers to sign up for a study on cold sores. It got me thinking this is because of NL pure genes they are using NL'ians as guinea pigs to try and find a cure or identify the responsible gene for this particular ailment and the people responsible for these studies don't have the decency to establish a centre of excellence at Memorial University for the study of genetics while they use our people as Guinea pigs.
Geneology centre/ Family trees
Newfoundland/Labrador would make an ideal location for a federally funded centre on geneology.
Actually family trees would make for an interesting Blog. Could you imagine the possibilities for finding missing branches in your family tree.
Ballast free cargo ship
I heard on the CBC world radio service a while back a story about an experimental new cargo ship hull design being developed and tested in Holland I beliee it was. I've searched high and low and haven't been able to find any diagrams or pictures of this new hull design so I will try and describe it as best I can.
The idea is to develop a hull design that won't require sea water as ballast and hence either eliminate or mitigate the tranfer of foreign species into sensitive ecosytems.
The hull design proposed would resemble an inverted banana design. That is to say the bow and stern would protrude further into the ocean than the centre keel. They even talked about filling the hollow created by the concave hull with an air bubble to reduce any drag because of any loss in streamlineness.
The air bubble is also expected to work like lubrication but is being studied as a separate benefit with air lubrication.
Some links I've found.
http://www.imo.org/About/mainframe.asp?topic_id=848&doc_id=3475
http://www.tc.gc.ca/acts-regulations/GENERAL/C/csa/regulations/400/csa448/csa448.html
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1155851411212&call_pageid=968332188774&col=968350116467
http://www.kinectrics.com/en/TechProfiles/EverClearBallast.html
http://www.uni-duisburg-essen.de/IST/thill.shtml
Intercontinental ferry
Same day Intercontinental ferry system from Ireland to Newfoundland. It would seem to me from my research into high speed ferries that this is a possibility. The Cat or a similar design ferry is capable of traversing the 1500 mile distance in a 24 hour period according to previous trials.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_of_Ontario_I
http://www.solarnavigator.net/history/scandlines_cat_link_v.htm
Why Buy Canadian?
You know I used to be an ardent supporter of buying Canadian, when I was less informed and living in a world of ignorance is bliss with respect to Canada's treatment of Newfoundland/Labrador, no more. If anything I will now go out of my way to buy anything but Canadian products especially canadian made cars.
How can I in good conscience buy Canadian when Canada is giving away the livelihood of my home province by not protecting the continental shelf in it's entirety and not just the 60% which lies inside the 200 mile limit.
I know until Canada protects my provinces livelihood I will never again buy a Canadian made car. I accepted the shortcomings of Canadian made cars in lieu of imports mainly in support of Canada but no more. My next car will be an import either a toyota, Honda, Hyundai anything that isn't either assembled or built in Canada.
While I was visiting my Newfoundland/Labrador recently I heard a radio announcement/commercial asking for volunteers to sign up for a study on cold sores. It got me thinking this is because of NL pure genes they are using NL'ians as guinea pigs to try and find a cure or identify the responsible gene for this particular ailment and the people responsible for these studies don't have the decency to establish a centre of excellence at Memorial University for the study of genetics while they use our people as Guinea pigs.
Geneology centre/ Family trees
Newfoundland/Labrador would make an ideal location for a federally funded centre on geneology.
Actually family trees would make for an interesting Blog. Could you imagine the possibilities for finding missing branches in your family tree.
Ballast free cargo ship
I heard on the CBC world radio service a while back a story about an experimental new cargo ship hull design being developed and tested in Holland I beliee it was. I've searched high and low and haven't been able to find any diagrams or pictures of this new hull design so I will try and describe it as best I can.
The idea is to develop a hull design that won't require sea water as ballast and hence either eliminate or mitigate the tranfer of foreign species into sensitive ecosytems.
The hull design proposed would resemble an inverted banana design. That is to say the bow and stern would protrude further into the ocean than the centre keel. They even talked about filling the hollow created by the concave hull with an air bubble to reduce any drag because of any loss in streamlineness.
The air bubble is also expected to work like lubrication but is being studied as a separate benefit with air lubrication.
Some links I've found.
http://www.imo.org/About/mainframe.asp?topic_id=848&doc_id=3475
http://www.tc.gc.ca/acts-regulations/GENERAL/C/csa/regulations/400/csa448/csa448.html
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1155851411212&call_pageid=968332188774&col=968350116467
http://www.kinectrics.com/en/TechProfiles/EverClearBallast.html
http://www.uni-duisburg-essen.de/IST/thill.shtml
Intercontinental ferry
Same day Intercontinental ferry system from Ireland to Newfoundland. It would seem to me from my research into high speed ferries that this is a possibility. The Cat or a similar design ferry is capable of traversing the 1500 mile distance in a 24 hour period according to previous trials.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_of_Ontario_I
http://www.solarnavigator.net/history/scandlines_cat_link_v.htm
Why Buy Canadian?
You know I used to be an ardent supporter of buying Canadian, when I was less informed and living in a world of ignorance is bliss with respect to Canada's treatment of Newfoundland/Labrador, no more. If anything I will now go out of my way to buy anything but Canadian products especially canadian made cars.
How can I in good conscience buy Canadian when Canada is giving away the livelihood of my home province by not protecting the continental shelf in it's entirety and not just the 60% which lies inside the 200 mile limit.
I know until Canada protects my provinces livelihood I will never again buy a Canadian made car. I accepted the shortcomings of Canadian made cars in lieu of imports mainly in support of Canada but no more. My next car will be an import either a toyota, Honda, Hyundai anything that isn't either assembled or built in Canada.
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