EVERYDAY MYSTERIES solved at the Library of Congress
Q. Does water go down the drain counterclockwise in
the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern hemisphere? A. It all depends upon how the water
was introduced and the geometric structure of the drain. One can find both counterclockwise and
clockwise flowing drains in both hemispheres.
Some people would like you to believe that the Coriolis force affects
the flow of water down the drain in sinks, bathtubs, or toilet bowls. Don’t believe them! The Coriolis force is simply too weak to
affect such small bodies of water. In
his work “Sur les equations du movements relative des systems des corps” (1835)
the French engineer Gaspard Gustav de Coriolis (1792-1843) first described this
force. The Coriolis force is caused by
the earth’s rotation. It responsible for
air being pulled to the right (counterclockwise) in the Northern Hemisphere and
to the left (clockwise) in the Southern Hemisphere. The Coriolis Effect is the observed curved
path of moving objects relative to the surface of the Earth. Hurricanes are good visual examples. Hurricane air flow (winds) moves
counter-clockwise in the northern hemisphere and clockwise in the southern
hemisphere. This is due to the rotation
of the Earth. The Coriolis force assists
in setting the circulation of a hurricane into motion by producing a rightward
(clockwise) deflection that sets up a cyclonic (counterclockwise) circulation
around the hurricane low pressure. (For
a more in depth discussion on hurricanes see NASA’s
Hurricanes: Greatest Storm on Earth.)
What happens at the equator? The
Coriolis force is too weak to operate on the moving air at the equator. This means that weather phenomena such as
hurricanes are not observed at the equator, although they have been observed at
5 degrees above the equator. In fact,
the Coriolis force pulls hurricanes away from the equator. https://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/coriolis.html
Egyptian cotton--extra
long staple cotton--comes from a native North American cotton plant; the plant
did not originate in Egypt. But Egypt's
climate produces the right conditions to grow the ELS cotton used in luxury
products around the world. Percale represents the weave used to
produce sheets, towels and other bedding products. Each warp thread goes over one weft thread,
then under the next warp thread, then over the next weft thread, continuing
across the fabric. This one-over-one
under weave produces a strong fabric. Sateen sheets consist of a weave where
several warp threads go over one weft thread at a time. In the next row, the four threads are offset
by one weft thread, creating a weave with a soft finish . Loose threads lay
across the surface and create a distinct diagonal pattern when viewed
closely. Because several threads lie on
the surface, the fabric appears shinier than fabrics with the threads woven in
the typical one-over-one-under weave.
Manufacturers also mix cotton with man-made fibers such as polyester,
and weave it into bedding with either the percale or sateen weave. For example, sheets can be 100 percent
Egyptian cotton percale, 100 percent Egyptian cotton sateen, blended cotton
percale or sateen, or poly-cotton percale or sateen. Read more at
Follow-up to the Michael Bornstein
story: Michael
Bornstein was indeed a fortunate lad to survive Auschwitz, but it appears he
was rescued by the Soviet Army rather than escaping. God forbid that I
step on my tongue as did Sean Spicer and in any way be considered to diminish
the horror of the Nazi concentration camps, but four of us did escape from
Dachau in 2003. We were in Munich on a
Monday in late December and decided to visit Dachau. We parked around the
corner and walked to the gate. Unfortunately, the sign said it was closed
on Mondays; however, I noted that the gate was ajar, and there were a couple of
cars at the administration building, so we went in. There was about a
foot of snow, and a light snow was falling, blanking out all of the city
noises. It was a very moving experience to see the outline of the
foundations of rows and rows of barracks that were long ago destroyed and to
walk through the gas chambers, all in perfect silence and without anyone else
around. I took a picture of the snowy grounds through the gate with the
legend, “Arbeit Macht Frei”, which was at the far end of the compound from
where we came in. About that time, I noticed that the cars were gone and
the gate was closed. None of us had a cell phone. We were
discussing which of us would be boosted up to try to scale the wall and clear
the concertina wire, when we heard the sound of a diesel-engined front-end
loader chugging around from behind the administration building. We
hurried up to the operator, and he leaned down and angrily shouted, “Wir sind
geschlosst. (We are closed.)” Somehow, I was able to call up just
what I needed from my college German from about 35 years earlier and responded,
“Ja, bestimmt. (Yes, indeed.) Wir brauchen eine Schlussel!
(We need a key!)” The look of disgust on his face was priceless as he
realized he was being jollied by an American in his own language. He
growled, “Kommen Sie mit, (Come with me.)” and set off for the gate with
a goodly turn of speed. We followed at a trot, as I would not be
surprised to see him go through the gate and lock it behind him if we were not
there. So that was our escape from Dachau. Thank you, Muse reader!
The Arbeit Macht Frei slogan was first used at the the Sachsenhausen
concentration camp near Berlin, which was a camp for political prisoners, not a
camp for Jews. According to Rudolf Höss,
who was an adjutant at Sachsenhausen before he became the first Commandant of
Auschwitz, the slogan “Arbeit Macht Frei” means that works liberates one in the
spiritual sense. Sachsenhausen was a
Class 1 camp, where prisoners who worked had a good chance of being released. After World War II, the Sachsenhausen camp
was turned into a Communist prison for German citizens. The Arbeit Macht Frei sign was removed and the
prisoners did not work. https://furtherglory.wordpress.com/2014/04/01/rabbi-explains-the-meaning-of-the-arbeit-macht-frei-slogan/
Airlines are allowed to sell more tickets than seats on the plane, and they routinely overbook flights
because some people do not show up. It's
not unusual for airlines to offer travel vouchers to encourage people to give
up their seats, and there are no rules for the process. When an airline demands that a passenger give
up a seat, the airline is required to pay double the passenger's one-way fare,
up to $675 provided the passenger is put on a flight that arrives within one to
two hours of the original. The
compensation rises to four times the ticket price, up to $1,350, for longer
delays. When they bump passengers,
airlines are required to give those passengers a written description of their
compensation rights. Last year, United
forced 3,765 people off oversold flights and another 62,895 United passengers
volunteered to give up their seats, probably in exchange for travel vouchers. That's out of more than 86 million people who
boarded a United flight in 2016, according to government figures. United ranks in the middle of U.S. carriers
when it comes to bumping passengers. ExpressJet,
which operates flights under the United Express, American Eagle and Delta
Connection names, had the highest rate of bumping passengers last year. Among the largest carriers, Southwest Airlines
had the highest rate, followed by JetBlue Airways. https://www.dallasnews.com/business/airlines/2017/04/11/twitter-slogans-late-night-talk-shows-mock-united-overpassenger-dragging-video
United
Airlines
has released four official statements in response to the backlash against the
company since a customer was dragged from an oversold flight April 9, 2017 at
Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. The
first three were from the parent company's CEO, Oscar Munoz. The fourth was posted on the company's website
Thursday after a news conference by the passenger's attorneys. Find the text of these messages at http://www.kansascity.com/news/business/national-international/article144564399.html
New United Airlines faux
slogans
proposed in April
2017 "We overbooked but you
pay the price," "We Put The Hospital In Hospitality," "We’ll
drag you all over the world," "We can re-accommodate you the easy way... or
the hard way," "Volunteer, or we'll make you
volunteer."
http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com Issue 1692
April 14, 2017 On this date in
1912, the British passenger liner RMS Titanic hit
an iceberg in the North Atlantic at 23:40 (sank morning of April 15th). On this date in 1935, a severe dust storm occurred in the Plains States. It is estimated to have displaced 300 million
tons of topsoil from the area. On this
date in 1939, The Grapes of Wrath,
by American author John Steinbeck was
first published by the Viking Press.
Thought
for Today Many people consider the things
government does for them to be social progress but they regard the things
government does for others as socialism. - Earl Warren, jurist (1891-1974)
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