Natural Disasters61
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Maybe Ben Franklin Was Wrong
A new study says that for all of its ill effects, the Laki volcanic eruption of 1783-84 probably was not the main culprit behind one of the coldest winters in hundreds of years, as many scientists — and contemporary observer Benjamin Franklin — have speculated.
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Lessons from the Japan Earthquake
The jolt in Japan stunned even scientists who’ve studied earthquakes all their lives.
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Done in Khulna, back to Dhaka and then home
On Saturday, we finished up work at the site. Even at the last minute, it threw some challenges at us. We began the day with out reduced group eating breakfast down the street. We could no longer take the mediocre food at the hotel. Dhiman and Babu had been eating there for days. Besides paratha,…
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Learning From Japan’s Catastrophe
The images and stories of the devastation caused by Japan’s massive earthquake is heart wrenching. We see countless examples of extraordinary acts of human courage and generosity as the local, national and world communities struggle to respond to this catastrophe. Japan, a nation that has long ensured that its buildings were built to withstand earthquakes…
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Finishing up in Khulna
The last two days have been a little different as I spent much of them in Khulna rather than at the site. Since the Islam family does not have electricity, Hafizul would have to carry the expensive EDM (Electronic Distance Meter) and laptop back and forth to Khulna University to charge. However, we have an…
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Finally getting it right
We are driving back to Khulna at 10:30 after our third excellent day in a row. However, there were still a lot of hiccups along the way. Yesterday, we were set to install the deep well, but when we arrived they were just starting to pull the pipe from the deep well. We had hoped…
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Frustration and Progress, again
Days here seem to be coming in pairs. In the morning, we redid the 40m well, remeasuring, doing a dry run with no cement, mixing and putting in cement, lowering the fiber and everything went as planned. Then came the 60m well. It already had a history. It caved in twice when they pulled the…
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At Bhandarkote, Khulna, the second site
Today we started working on the new site. Bhandarkote is a small village outside of Khulna, the third largest city in Bangladesh. The site is on a dirt road at the family home of a student from Khulna University. It a pretty remote rural place about 25 minutes off the main road through small country…
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Disaster and moving on
It looks like we lost the deep well. The morning started off as planned. We would finish the calibration of the strainmeters, installing the GPS and training Shaheen for the weekly measurements. Should be out by noon for the 8-hour drive to Dhaka followed b the 5 hour ride to Khulna the next day. Then…
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