Forest fires in Siberia is an annual thing, and I don't think there is much support for attributing them to climate change. I have a memory from my first flight over Siberia, between Helsinki and Tokyo in 1999, of forest fires. For hours and hours plumes of smoke could be seen rising from the land a...

33976  Interestingly though, there aren't much historical records of observations of these clouds before 1885, after the Krakatau eruption. I don't think this is very conclusive.  There are hardly any clear descriptions of the aurora borealis either going back more than a few centuries.  Greek and ...

How I read the articles is that the scientists say that it's currently impossible to do the calculations, but if it were possible, the most likely number would be 36.  I hope that is a kind of reasoning that doesn't make it through peer review.

33850 Yes, I see statues of slave traders are being torn down.  In the UK also.  That is a symbolic gesture as you can't change history, but I believe people are sick and tired of honoring those who did so much harm. It's nothing new that extremists seek to erase history that they don't like or get...

33838 I meant more along the lines of painting graffiti on walls Still vandalism (I guess "vandalism" must count as a racist term, but until someone claims to be a descendant of the Vandals and speaks up, I'll stick to that term).  There have been protests over here as well (I remain some...

33831  Looks like wearing a mask lowers transmission rate by a large amount- even more than distancing does. Probably not.  Masks protect if used properly, but if you don't wear it properly, touch it unnecessarily or incorrectly, take it on and off, etc, the mask will increase the risk of transmiss...

33819 I found a small clip from the HBO piece. It doesn't seem to be available in Europe.  There is no reason to doubt that there are spots where 30 minutes is enough, but it's surely not descriptive of the wider region (i.e. kilometres away from the plant). Radiation is not relevant for the Olympi...

33815 Also, I have been reading that it's a good thing that the Olympics have been canceled, not just because of the virus, but because of the dangerous levels of exposure still present in the area around the plant, where the torch was supposed to pass through. It's not cancelled, but rescheduled f...

A large landslide caught on camera in Norway yesterday.  All occupants of the houses escaped in time (minutes to save).

33747 what about something like x-rays? we have regulations that need to be followed for exposure to x-rays. X-rays will not make you radioactive.  They affect the electrons and powerful or long exposures are harmful, but they don't affect the nucleus of atoms and wont make you any more radioactive...

The season for noctilucent clouds has begun in Oslo.  Last night:

Send your pictures to Les Cowley, I'm sure he'll find the inner circle interesting.  I was also thinking that the inner circle was a bit colourless.  I've never seen a circle like that. How uncommon really depends on your location.  I would say that the 46° is pretty common in Scandinavia during win...

Nice.  I think you identify correctly.  I haven't seen a complex display here at this time of year, but in winter when the ice crystals are at "ground level", the halos and arc can become very bright, even the rarer ones. As for the smaller, inner ring, I am not sure.  My immediate thought...

33689  It's not like nuclear radiation which may make things radioactive. Yes, but usually, what makes people or things radioactive is the contamination by radioactive dust or material, not the radiation itself.  For that, the radiation needs to change the nucleus of atoms to form new isotopes.  Ne...

The app that was launched in Norway a month ago does pretty much exactly the opposite: gathering GPS data, storing everything centrally, closed source, and if the app is activated, the battery drains in no time.  Thanks for the effort, but no thanks.  The approach explained in the video isn't waterp...