Idiot of the Week: Woman accidentally breaks $42,000 Jeff Koons sculpture at Art Wynwood in Miami

 This week's idiot is a klutz who destroyed an expensive piece of artwork in a Miami museum. Here's the story.

(Photo: Before and after the accident:  Jeff Koons sculpture at Art Wynwood in Miami. Credit; Miami Herald) 

Woman accidentally breaks $42,000 Jeff Koons sculpture at Art Wynwood in Miami

A woman accidentally broke a sculpture valued at $42,000 on display at Miami's Art Wynwood museum exhibit.

The sculpture by artist Jeff Koons was called “Balloon Dog (Blue).” It was a blue porcelain piece on a rectangular display stand. The 2021 piece was made of porcelain and measured 40 x 48 x 16 cm. A total of 799 editions of the sculpture were made. A massive, orange version of his “Balloon Dog” series was sold for $58.4 million in 2013.

One of the visitors said, “I saw this woman was there, and she was tapping it, and then the thing fell over and shattered into thousands of pieces."

Koons’ balloon animal figures are some of the most iconic sculptures in the contemporary art world. His pieces have sold for several million dollars at auctions: “Rabbit” (1986) sold for $91 million at Christie’s New York in 2019, and “Balloon Dog (Orange)” (1994-2000) sold for $58.4 million six years earlier.

VIDEO: https://youtu.be/qoaEFldPvgA

According to the museum's website, Art Wynwood was established in February 2012 over President’s Day Weekend by the same team that produces Art Miami during Miami Art Week. The website noted "Art Wynwood’s curatorial focus is on emerging contemporary talent, mid-career artists and blue chip post-war modern masters. The fair routinely draws more than 25,000 patrons during the long weekend and showcases the works of over 180 artists from 50 international galleries from countries including Germany, Chile, Russia, France and the United Kingdom."

Heroes of the Week: Students pull off impressive upside down stunt to rescue dog from canal

This week's heroes are students from the United Kingdom, who rescued a dog from drowning in a canal, but had to be creative in their rescue. Here's the story;

(Photo: Ben dangling off the wall, into the canal with a group holding onto his ankles. Jack Spencer Furmston and Ben Camphor spotted the dog while walking home (Pictures: Dabhidh MhicEamailinn/Twitter/Deadline News))

Students pull off impressive upside-down stunt to rescue dog from canal

METRO UK, Feb 24, 2023

A pair of students have got top marks after helping to rescue a dog who had fallen into a canal.

Jack Spencer Furmston and Ben Camphor, both 20, were walking home from a coffee shop in Manchester when they spotted a pet owner in need of help.

Batu Akyol was grasping the lead belonging to his dog that had unfortunately just fallen into the Ancoats Canal.

A ‘crowd had begun to build’ and Ben decided to ‘spring into action’ as the tallest one among them. ‘Everyone was panicking. I couldn’t let that dog down and not help,’ Ben told MailOnline. Jack and five others held on tight to Ben’s legs while he dangled head-first over the wall bordering the canal.

Dabhidh MchicEamailinn, who was walking on the other side of the water, spotted what was happening, filmed it and posted it on Tuesday. The footage caught the moments Ben grabbed the dog’s collar to help it reach the wall. He then reaches out and reaches the animal’s front legs. The rest of the group then give a massive heave to bring Ben and the dog to safety.

Several spectators can be heard cheering in the clip as the rescue reaches its happening.

The Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, reacted to the video on Twitter with clapping hands emojis.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

English Lesson: Using Contractions and Possessives

Yesterday's blog was about grammar. Today's blog continues that with a lesson about use of contractions and possessive pronouns. I've noticed that many people will make words possessive (by including an apostrophe and letter "S" ('s) when the subject doesn't need it. Today's blog will examine both things.

USING CONTRACTIONS- Is it grammatically correct to use contractions?  Contractions are considered informal language—they're most common in speech and casual written conversations. That makes them out of place in formal writing like academic papers or research reports

POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS - Another potentially confusing area is possessive pronouns, which can sound the same as some contractions. In these cases, just remember that possessive Pronouns do not use an apostrophe, so if you see what looks like a possessive pronoun with an apostrophe, it’s actually a contraction.

it’s -> it is

its -> possessive of it

they’re -> they are

their -> possessive of they

who’s -> who is

whose -> possessive of who

she’s -> she is

her -> possessive of she

What Is a Possessive Noun? A possessive noun shows that a noun owns or possesses another noun. You can spot one in a sentence because it has an apostrophe before or after the letter "s." For example:

the boy's coat (the coat of the boy)

Jaime's feet (the feet of Jaime)

the Smiths’ cat (the cat of the Smiths)

Singular Possessive Nouns: Add Apostrophe Plus S

For most singular nouns, you can make them possessive by adding an apostrophe + "s" to the end of them.

The puppy's collar is red.

Joe's car looks like mine.

We designed the company's logo.

If a singular noun ends in "s," you can either add an apostrophe + "s" to the end or just an apostrophe. Both are correct, as long as the noun is not the same in singular or plural forms (such as pants or scissors).

Mr. Roberts' house is down the street. (Correct)

Mr. Roberts’s house is down the street (Also correct)

This species’ prey is dying out. (Correct)

This species’s prey is dying out. (Incorrect — species is the same in singular and plural forms)

Pet Peeve: Bad Grammar & Public Figures / A Grammar Fix for writing

Speaking clearly and grammatically correctly gives the appearance of an educated person.  Recently, an admired public figure gave an interview where he sounded uneducated. It's troublesome, because younger people look up to them, and emulate them, even in incorrect speech. Today's blog contains the example, and a LINK to a free Grammar check to help you in your emails...

This famous director/actor said the following when asked about his current project:

"Who said that? Who said that? You said that! I ain't say that! I don't even know no rumors about that one."  

Corrected: 1) I didn't say that. I don't even know any rumors... 

1 WORD  PET PEEVE:   One word that makes me crazy, is when people mis-use "ax" for "ask."  

"Ax" or "Axe" is a tool.      "Ask" means to request.    To say "Ax" makes people sound uneducated. It only takes a little thought to pronounce "ask."  And it makes you sound much more intelligent. 

GRAMMARLY- I have the Free Grammarly App on my computer to catch mistakes, as I do a lot of writing. Why? Because you can't be an effective self-editor (I even go back and re-read things before finalizing). About Grammarly- Compose bold, clear, mistake-free writing with Grammarly’s new AI-powered desktop app.

  To get it: https://www.grammarly.com/signup?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=1711727224&utm_content=394631897168&utm_term=proper+grammar&matchtype=b&placement=&network=g&gclid=CjwKCAiA3pugBhAwEiwAWFzwddPmSsMlHHs5vEwZFW6lmcyCrwm6IWM1pVrV46x0zeR3morHHMcbtBoCp54QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds&afterSurvey=recommend

Comics News: The First Woman To Draw Wonder Woman Wants You To Know She’s Alive and Well in SF

Here's some background comic book and superhero news that I didn't know. It's about one of the artists who drew Wonder Woman, and she's still at it and she did much more, like making clothes for celebrities. This is a great and well-written article on a fascinating woman. 

Photo: Trina Robbins, the first woman to draw Wonder Woman. | Photo By Liz Hafalia/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

The First Woman To Draw Wonder Woman Wants You To Know She’s Alive and Well in SF 

San Francisco Standard, Julie Zigoris, Published Mar. 01, 2023

Cartoonist and author Trina Robbins—the first woman to draw Wonder Woman—began reading at the age of 4. But she began drawing even earlier.

“It was as soon as I could hold a crayon in my chubby hands,” Robbins told The Standard.

Today, at age 84, she’s hard at work on a pro-choice benefit anthology.

Robbins grew up poor and Jewish in Queens, where she longed for a Christmas tree and worshiped her older sister. Her parents showered her with love and never questioned her passion.

“It was never said, ‘Trina wants to be an artist,’ Robbins said of her family. “It was always ‘Trina is an artist.’”

That early support and those early drawings laid the foundation for what would be the structure of her life. Robbins thrived as an underground comics artist in late 1960s San Francisco, before going mainstream with DC Comics in the 1980s. She continues to write and draw to this day, with subjects that range from the Golden Era of Chinatown nightclubs to the history of women cartoonists.

She’s had some incredible adventures along the way.

Robbins left home at 18 and moved to Los Angeles, where she took art classes—and posed nude for men’s magazines after an agent promised he could make her the next Marilyn Monroe. Eventually, she met the man who would become her first and only husband.

“He saved me,” she said of that relationship.

She quit the girlie mags and got into girlie dressing instead. An artist of many stripes, Robbins has creativity infused in her marrow. When her husband, rock critic Paul J. Robbins, gifted her a sewing machine, she began making clothes for herself—and celebrities.

Robbins stitched a dress for Cass Elliot of The Mamas & The Papas and a shirt for David Crosby. And she almost made clothes for Sonny and Cher.

“But I couldn’t do zippers,” Robbins said. “And they wanted zippers.”

Robbins eventually left her husband—”I outgrew him” she said—and moved to New York, where she opened a clothing boutique on the Lower East Side and began drawing in earnest. The boutique, named Broccoli, sold very simple clothes and became a sort of social center, where artists would gather and discuss ideas.

In 1969, Robbins discovered women’s liberation. “My art got much better and more realistic,” she said. But it was a chance encounter with Robert Crumb’s work at SFO that changed her life forever.

“Someone handed me issue one of Zap,” Robbins said, referring to the famed 1960s underground “comix” series. “And I had this epiphany—you can do these things in a comic book, not just a newspaper.”

Entranced, she closed up her shop and headed west. She received a cold reception in a scene that included only one other woman.

“It was a real boys club,” she said. “It was all anthologies in those days, and they’d never ask me to participate.”

(Caption: Artist Trina Robbins especially loved drawing for It Ain’t Me Babe, the first feminist newspaper in the U.S., which inspired her to craft an entire feminist comic book.)

1970 It Ain’t Me Babe was the first all-woman comic book. Asked what it felt like to participate in such a milestone, Robbins demurred.

“I don’t think it hit me at the time,” she said.

Robbins hopscotched across the city, living first in Ingleside, then Noe Valley, then the Mission. In 1975, she bought a house for $60,000 between the Castro and Mission, which she laughingly called the “Mastro.” It’s where she still lives today.

It was 1986 when the fateful call came—DC Comics asked Robbins to draw Wonder Woman, her first foray into mainstream comics. She drew, but didn’t write, four issues. She later regretted not asking to tell the story, too.

“I would have written it differently,” she said. “Wonder Woman doesn’t do that. She’s an Amazon.”

Wonder Woman’s cultural impact has only grown over the years. Once derided as an anti-male lesbian, the character now embodies empowerment, gracing everything from the silver screen to cereal boxes to Lynda Carter’s Twitter account.

Asked how she thinks the situation is for women today, the staunch feminist had a clear opinion.

“It’s so much better—you can’t imagine how much better it is,” she said. ““There are so many guys who aren’t sexist jerks.”

But that doesn’t mean Robbins doesn’t still see challenges for women in today’s landscape. That’s part of why she chose to work on a pro-choice anthology as her current project, with all the proceeds going to benefit Planned Parenthood.

“We all fight in the ways we can,” she said. “And this is what I can do—I can march and draw comics.”

(Image: DCinthe80s:  The Legend of Wonder Woman This mini-series, written by Kurt Busiek and illustrated by Trina Robbins (both Busiek and Robbins collaborated on the plot), 

At 84, Robbins estimates she still has a good 16 years ahead of her, and she wants people to remember that she’s still around, she’s still drawing and writing.

“I want to keep working until I drop dead at the computer,” Robbins said.

Julie Zigoris can be reached at jzigoris@sfstandard.com

DISCOVERED: Lost World War II–Era Submarine Identified Off Japan Coast

Using a remote, undersea probe, scientists discovered the resting place of a U.S. Submarine off the coast of Japan, that sunk during World War 2. Here's the story.

(Photo:  USS albacore submarine. Credit: National Archives)

Lost World War II–Era Submarine Identified 

Archaeology.Org Feb 2023

TOKYO, JAPAN—The Maritime Executive reports that a wrecked submarine off the coast of Hokkaido, Japan, has been identified as the USS Albacore by the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) with the assistance of Tamaki Ura of the University of Tokyo.

Japanese war records show that an American submarine hit a naval mine near the coast of the island of Hokkaido on November 7, 1944.

Ura and his colleagues found the site and were able to examine key structural elements in the murky underwater conditions with a remotely operated vehicle. Those elements include modifications made to the Albacore at Pearl Harbor, such as the addition of a radar dish and mast, a row of vent holes, and the lack of steel plates along the upper edge of the fairwater, or tower-like structure on the topside of the submarine.

Japan’s NHK News reports the submarine was found approximately 4.3 miles off the city of Hakodate. This corresponds to the Tsugaru Strait, a narrow waterway between Hokkaido and the main island of Honshu. Albacore was likely positioned to ambush any shipping transiting the strait, or traveling between the two islands. She was reportedly instructed to stay out of the strait itself, which the U.S. Navy believed might be mined.

The wreck is protected by the NHHC as a war grave. 

 To read in-depth about similar research done at Pearl Harbor, go to "December 7, 1941."

Climate Change: A Dry Lakebed on Easter Island Reveals More Moi (Giant Carved Heads)

Eastern Island is known worldwide for its enormous carved heads known as moai. They were created by the Polynesian civilization that settled Rapa Nui (Easter Island) around A.D. 1000. Now, more have been found as climate change has dried up a lakebed. Here's the story from artnet. 

(Photo: Evidence of charring on two moai statues following a serious fire on Easter Island started on October 3, 2022. Photo courtesy of the Rapa Nui Municipality.) 

Archaeologists on Easter Island Have Discovered a Previously Unknown Moai Statue Buried in a Dried-Out Lake Bed 

More of the iconic head statues could turn up, researchers say.

Jo Lawson-Tancred, ArtNet February 27, 2023

A new moai statue has been found on Rapa Nui, a Chilean territory also known as Easter Island, prompting excitement among researchers that there may yet be others waiting to be discovered.

The sacred monument, which is smaller than most others on the island, was found buried in a dry lake bed. This area is not usually accessible to humans but had dried out most likely due to climate-related weather conditions, allowing archaeologists to attempt an excavation.

“For the Rapa Nui people, it’s [a] very, very important discovery,” Salvador Atan Hito, vice president of the Indigenous organization Ma’u Henua, which oversees the site, told Good Morning America. “Because it’s here in the lake and nobody knows this exists — even the ancestors, our grandparents, don’t know [about] that one.”

Terry Hunt, a professor of archaeology at the University of Arizona who specializes in the Rapa Nui, added, “we think we know all the moai, but then a new one turns up. There have been no moai found in the dry bed or in what was previously a lake, so this is a first.”

The archaeologists are currently on a mission to see what else they can unearth at the site, looking out for evidence of moai as well as the tools that might have been used to make them.

There are approximately 1,000 moai on Easter Island. These monolithic human figures were carved out of volcanic rock some 500 years ago by the Polynesian tribe Rapa Nui. They are believed to embody ancestral spirits and were placed in a ring around the island, facing inwards.

“The moai are important because they really represent the history of the Rapa Nui people. They were the islander’s deified ancestors,” said Hunt. “They’re iconic worldwide and they really represent the fantastic archeological heritage of this island.” 

Tragic Idiots of the Week: Family of 3 Murder-Suicide Because Trump Lost Election

 This week's idiots are now dead. They were so brainwashed by Donald Trump, that they thought a murder-suicide pact was best because Trump wasn't re-elected. They were right-wing, conservative Christians, who lost their minds, and took their own lives. This is what happens when people are brainwashed and can't think on their own. It's tragic and idiotic.  Here's the story from Business Insider:

The Daub family's home in York, Pennsylvania.Google Maps

Family of 3 found dead in apparent suicide pact were 'hell-bent' on Trump winning, thought it could be 'the end' if he lost: reports

Joshua Zitser, Business Insider

Mon, February 6, 2023 at 6:52 AM EST·

A family of three from Pennsylvania was found shot dead in their backyard last week in what police are calling a suicide pact, according to NBC News.

Police discovered the bodies of Morgan Daub, 26, and her parents James Daub, 62, and Deborah Daub, 59, in York County, Pennsylvania, after neighbors requested a welfare check, NBC News reported.

The West Manchester Township Police Department said it appeared to be a "joint decision" to end their lives, citing notes found inside the family home, the news outlet said.

The police department added that it believes that Deborah Daub killed her husband, and was then killed by their daughter, who died by suicide, adding that there is no evidence that anybody else was involved, according to NBC News.

The lead detective in the case, Timothy Fink, told local media outlet York Dispatch that the department reached this conclusion from handwritten notes left behind by the family members, but added: "We may never know with certainty exactly who fired each shot."

An investigation into the deaths has concluded for now, Fink said, per York Dispatch.

According to those who knew the family, and who spoke to NBC News, they were Christian conservatives who were outspoken in their political beliefs.

Deborah Daub and her daughter were "huge" supporters of former President Donald Trump, said Bret Stabley, who knew the family as they frequented his store, per NBC News.

The family "was never shy about letting anybody know what their beliefs were," Stabley said, according to NBC News.

A neighbor, who asked to remain anonymous, told the media outlet that the family's front yard was "littered" with pro-Trump banners and, later, anti-abortion signs.

Stabley told NBC News that Deborah Daub and her daughter were "hell-bent on Trump winning" the 2020 election, adding: "Like this could be the end if he doesn't."

He said he stopped seeing them after Trump's election loss.

Stabley also said that Morgan, the daughter, was "very meek," had been homeschooled, and often had her mother speak on her behalf, according to NBC News.

In an interview with The Christian Post, a childhood friend described Morgan as having grown up in a "very uptight Christian household," adding that she wasn't allowed to use social media, have a boyfriend, or go out with her friends.

The lead detective, Fink, also said that documents left behind at the family's home showed that Morgan had told her mother that she was having "auditory hallucinations" that weren't improving, per York Dispatch.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Heroes of the Week: Isle of Man Community's All-Out Search for a Missing Puppy

 It's a wonderful thing when a community comes together to find a lost puppy and that's exactly what happened on the Isle of Man. The Isle of Man is a self-governing British Crown dependency in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland. It’s known for its rugged coastline, medieval castles and rural landscape, rising to a mountainous center. Here's the story from the BBC News.

(Photo: Lucy the puppy IMAGE SOURCE,RACHELLE VARNEY)

Isle of Man puppy lost for five days now 'grounded', says owner

By Ashlea TraceyBBC News, Feb 22, 2023

A lost puppy that captured the island's hearts after being found five days later is "perfectly fine" but "grounded", her owner has said.

Jemma Ryan's five-month-old collie Lucy bolted after being spooked by other dogs in Conrhenny plantation on Saturday.

A dog walker found the pup after hundreds of people helped - with some even using drones and a heat camera.

Ms Ryan, from Braddan, said "everyone was crying" when they were reunited.

"The Manx public pulled together and we found her," she said.

Lucy went missing while being walked off the lead by a family member and a search soon began of the trails and bushes in the area.

The family "barely slept" as they looked for her "day and night," Ms Ryan said. They were also joined by dozens of others including strangers who had seen an appeal for help on social media. "It's been such a worry," Lucy's owner said, but added the support has been "amazing".

(Photo:  A photo of Lucy and owner Jemma. Lucy was missing for 5 days. IMAGE SOURCE,RACHELLE VARNEY) 

Ms Ryan received the phone call she had been hoping for earlier, as another dog owner said "I've found your puppy".

They were reunited in the car park of the plantation shortly afterwards.

Lucy has since been taken to the vet, is eating well at home and has been in the family garden, Ms Ryan says.

She is "perfectly fine" but "grounded for the next few days" apart from a "quiet walk around the block," she added.

FOUND: A 'hidden' 30-foot-long corridor in Egypt's Great Pyramid

 Technology has helped find another hidden chamber in Egypt's Great Pyramid! Archaeologists can't get to it, but they can see it using cosmic rays and an endoscope!  Here's the story and images from LiveScience. 

(Image: An endoscope inserted into the hidden corridor reveals that no artifacts are visible within the hidden void. (Image credit: Copyright ScanPyramidsMission, 2023)

Cosmic rays reveal 'hidden' 30-foot-long corridor in Egypt's Great Pyramid 

By Owen Jarus LIVE SCIENCE , March 2, 2023

For years, scientists have known there was something hidden above the entrance to the Great Pyramid. Now, they've finally revealed it.

Cosmic rays and photos from an endoscope have revealed a "hidden" corridor inside the Great Pyramid of Giza's north face, above the pyramid's ancient entrance, new research finds.

The Great Pyramid was built on orders of the pharaoh Khufu (ruled circa 2551 B.C. to 2528 B.C.) on the Giza plateau and today is about 456 feet (139 meters) high. It is the only surviving wonder of the ancient world and was the tallest building on Earth until 1311, when England's Lincoln Cathedral's 525-foot-tall (160 m) central tower was completed.

A new study reveals that, just above the ancient entrance to the pyramid, there is likely a horizontal chamber that runs for 30 feet (9 m) in length and is 6.6 feet by 6.6 feet (2 by 2 m) in width and height. It is located behind a chevron-shaped structure that is visible outside the pyramid, according to the study, published Thursday (March 2) in the journal Nature Communications.

To learn more about the void, the scientists inserted an endoscope into the corridor to peer inside on Feb. 24, they announced in a statement. But so far, the team has not found any artifacts inside the corridor, they told Live Science.

"The first pictures taken with the endoscope seem to show there is nothing, but we cannot see all the room precisely yet," study first author Sébastien Procureur, a physicist with the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), told Live Science in an email.

Procureur also refuted media reports that the team was close to a hidden burial chamber of Khufu, saying that the team hasn't found any evidence of a secret tomb.

Scientists discovered this corridor while analyzing so-called muon scans of the 4,500-year-old Great Pyramid. Muons are negatively charged elementary particles that form when cosmic rays collide with atoms in Earth's atmosphere. These high-energy particles constantly rain down on Earth but interact differently with stone than with air. For the past decade, scientists have been using muon detectors to search for hidden chambers in the Great Pyramid.

"To our knowledge, this study is the first characterization of the position and dimensions of a void detected by cosmic-ray muons with a sensitivity of a few centimeters only," the researchers wrote in the study.

In their statement, the scientists added that ground-penetrating radar was also used to gather information on the corridor.

(Image: Using dedicated laser surveys and photogrammetry data, researchers were able to create a 3D model of the Great Pyramid. This is an east-west cut view of the Great Pyramid and also the front view of the North face Chevron Area. Labels are as follows: a) Subterranean chamber, b) queen's chamber, c) grand gallery, d) king's chamber, e) descending corridor, f) ascending corridor, g) al-Ma'mun corridor, h) north face chevron area, i) ScanPyramids Big Void with horizontal hypothesis (red hatching) and inclined hypothesis (green hatching). (Image credit: Procureur, S. et al. Nature Communication (2023))) 

For several years, scientists have known that there was something hidden behind the north face of the pyramid. They announced the discovery of a "void" behind the north face of the Great Pyramid in 2016, but it wasn't until now that they were able to reveal this 30-foot-long corridor.

In 2017, scientists announced the discovery of a larger void, about 98 feet (30 m) long, located above the pyramid's "grand gallery," but a more precise analysis of this void has not yet been completed.

Zahi Hawass(opens in new tab), Egypt's former antiquities minister, said during a news conference Thursday (March 2) that the 30-foot-long corridor was likely created to help relieve stress from the weight of the building material on the Great Pyramid. He noted that it is located behind a chevron-shaped structure that distributes weight, the Egyptian newspaper Ahram Online reported(opens in new tab).

Procureur agreed that the corridor may be related to the construction of the chevron. "If I had to make a guess, I'd say it could have been a first test of the chevron structure" that was later used higher up in the pyramid, Procureur said.

Fact check: Did 2018 rail rule repeal make transportation less safe?

In the last couple of weeks, I've read about three train derailments and wondered why there's suddenly a spate of them. It turns out that the Federal Government DID have rules to help prevent these, but the previous President repealed them. Today's blog is a FACT CHECK about the train industry and safety regulations that were put in place by the Obama Administration and were indeed repealed under the Trump Administration. 

   NOTE:  The  Obama requirement wouldn't have affected the 1st Ohio incident last month, because the cargo wasn't classified as "hazardous" - THAT is a different issue that needs addressing. But, it would have helped prevent the other 2 incidents that happened in the last month. 

WRAL-TV did a Fact Check and confirmed this is TRUE. Here's the story 

Fact check: Did Trump rail rule repeal make transportation less safe?

WRAL-TV (Click for story) Feb 24, 2023

In 2015, during the Obama administration, a new safety rule was adopted requiring electronically controlled pneumatic brakes to be installed on all high-hazard flammable unit trains by 2023, allowing them to brake faster. Trump rescinded that requirement three years later.

The rise and fall of an Obama-era train safety rule

In 2014, following several high-profile train derailments, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and the Federal Railroad Administration (which both operate under the Department of Transportation) proposed rules to bolster safety standards for trains carrying hazardous materials.

A year later, these two agencies finalized the rule for trains carrying high-hazard, flammable materials. New trains were required to have the electronic brakes and older trains were required to be retrofitted with them by 2023.

A high-hazard flammable unit train was defined as a train going faster than 30 miles per hour with at least 70 loaded tank cars containing certain highly flammable liquids, such as crude oil and ethanol.

Bottom Line #1: This Really is Needed: Electronically controlled pneumatic brakes

Electronically controlled pneumatic brakes work on all train cars simultaneously. This allows the train to brake faster than when equipped with conventional air brakes, which are applied sequentially along the length of the train.

After this rule was enacted, lobbyists for railway and oil companies pushed to repeal it, questioning the effectiveness of electronic brakes and arguing that the cost of installing them was too high.

Then in 2018, under the Trump administration, the Department of Transportation repealed the rule based on government reports that determined equipping high-hazard cargo trains with electronic brakes was not economically justified. However, the Associated Press reported that these government reports omitted up to $117 million in estimated future damages from train derailments that could be avoided by using electronic brakes.

Bottom Line #2: The Definition of Hazardous Chemicals Needs to be Changed for Trains

However, even if this safety rule had still been in effect, it would not have applied to the Norfolk Southern train that derailed in East Palestine, because it was not categorized as a high-hazard cargo train.

Although the Norfolk Southern train contained hazardous materials, including vinyl chloride, it did not meet the Department of Transportation’s narrow definition of a high-hazard flammable unit train in that it didn’t have at least 70 cars containing flammable materials, such as crude oil or ethanol. The chemicals it was carrying fall into a different classification not included in this definition.

The National Transportation Safety Board told PolitiFact that the Norfolk Southern train was categorized as a "general merchandise train"  and it used "pneumatic brakes," or conventional air brakes.

Mummified Bear Found entombed in the Siberian Permafrost

 As permafrost and glaciers melt around the world from a warming climate, ancient secrets continue to be unveiled around the world. Here's one of them - a bear who was found entirely intact, including its skin, fur and internal organs!

(Image: A close-up of the mummified bear's head. (Image credit: Press service of the North-Eastern Federal University) 

'Prehistoric' mummified bear discovered in Siberian permafrost isn't what we thought

By Harry Baker LIVE SCIENCE

The bear, unearthed in 2020, was originally assumed to be an extinct cave bear that dated back at least 22,000 years. But a new necropsy reveals it is actually a brown bear that lived 3,500 years ago.

A perfectly preserved, mummified bear found entombed in the Siberian permafrost in 2020 isn't what scientists thought it was, a new analysis reveals. It turns out that the eerily intact carcass is much younger than first assumed and belongs to an entirely different species.

Reindeer herders unearthed the remains, which include the bear's intact skin, fur, teeth, nose, claws, body fat and internal organs, on Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island, a remote Russian island located in the East Siberian Sea. Researchers named it the Etherican bear, after the nearby Bolshoy Etherican River.

When the Etherican bear was first uncovered, researchers at the Lazarev Mammoth Museum Laboratory at North-Eastern Federal University (NEFU) in Yakutsk, who have led the analysis of the remains, thought that the mummy was an extinct cave bear (Ursus spelaeus). 

(Image: Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island where the bear was found in 2020. Credit:  dailymail.co.uk/) 

Fossils of this long-lost species suggest that the enormous ancient bears, which are closely related to brown bears (Ursus arctos) and polar bears (Ursus maritimus), grew to around 11.5 feet (3.5 meters) tall and weighed a whopping 3,300 pounds (1,500 kilograms). U. spelaeus went extinct around 22,000 years ago, toward the end of the Last Glacial Maximum, the coldest part of the last ice age, so the researchers believed that the mummy was at least this old.

However, subsequent analysis revealed that their assumptions about the Etherican bear were way off: In reality, the beast was a brown bear that dated to around 3,460 years ago, the NEFU team said in a statement in December 2022.