Warmer Weather = Sooner Jobs

This past March has been one of the warmest on record all across the United States. Not only are students and children enjoying it but so are the construction workers.

Because the temperature is so warm, employees in the construction field are able to start earlier. This has caused unemployment to shrink earlier than it usually would for these seasonal jobs.

In fact, this entire winter we have received very mild weather making temperatures warmer than usual at the very starting of this year. January brought an increase of about 7,000 jobs, and the Connecticut Department of Labor announced on March 29 that approximately 5,500 additional private sector jobs were added in the month of February. In New Haven, unemployment fell from 12.5 percent in January to 11.7 percent in February. Seven months in a row now the economy has been obviously growing and unemployment shrinking.

Because of this weather, private construction jobs are more likely to occur rather than jobs on the highway which will take place later this year. But for now, businesses, universities, and hospitals can receive construction earlier than last year.

New Warning Sirens

We all know the sound of a tornado warming siren. That siren that seems to get strong and pull back and do it over and over. But how often do we really listen to it? What’s the real ratio of tornado siren warnings to actual tornados? Well, the sirens probably win.

Because we often hear the warnings more than we see the actual tornado it’s not uncommon for us to not take action when we hear the siren. I know I’m guilty of that. I’ll hear a siren go off and I’ll go ahead and step outside and look around at the storm because I don’t feel the danger in doing so. Our sirens went off so often last year it seemed like our weather service was in a completely different area considering our storms weren’t that damaging. In fact, a lot of people don’t react much to tornado sirens because they aren’t one hundred percent sure that it’s coming. They will wait and look for additional information to really confirm that a tornado is heading towards them.

Now that people are used to the sirens it doesn’t seem like a big deal when they go off. But recently the tornadoes have been horrific. The National Weather Service is actually planning to change the sirens to give more of a scare to people so that they listen and take shelter.

The new sirens aren’t set to release in every state yet; it will mostly be in the states that have recently been hit by the sweep of tornadoes. They are planning to say something about how the damage will be so catastrophic the land will be unrecognizable after the storm is over. The goals of this new warning system are as follows:

- Provide a non-routine warning mechanism that prompts people to take immediate life-saving action in extreme events like strong and violent tornadoes.

- Be impact-based more than phenomenon-based for clarity on risk assessment.

- Be compatible with NWS technological, scientific and operational capabilities.

- Be compatible with external local warning systems and emerging mobile communications technology.

- Be easily understood and calibrated by the public to facilitate decision making.

- Maintain existing "probability of detection" for severe weather events.

- Diminish the perception of false alarms and their impacts on credibility

-These are the kind of warnings that will go out:

Standard Tornado Warning: These warnings are the basic warnings issued by the National Weather Service. These are generally the sirens that are used all across the United States.

Potentially Dangerous Situation (PDS) Tornado Warning: If a PDS Tornado Warning is issued, then it means that the storm has a tornado on the ground that was spotted by a storm chaser or the public. This is the second highest warning that could be issued by the National Weather Service.

Tornado Emergency: In a tornado emergency, a large tornado is on the ground producing a lot of damage and is headed towards a populated city. This is the highest possible warning used to alert people. It has already been used in some cities as of last year when super cell storms were occurring.

These warnings are going to be launched in St. Louis, Kansas City, Topeka, Wichita, and Springfield, Missouri. If they prove to be more effective than the previous warning system then it will be expanded to the entire nation within the following years.

A Drill to Help Students Realize That They Won't be Protected

With the recent outbreak of tornados, our school decided to practice our tornado drill. I know I can’t be the only one, but our procedure is incredibly stupid.

My class had to stand in a hallway for our protection. Classes had to walk out of their safe rooms to a different hallway so different classrooms could be protected in that room. Many classes have to walk down a hallway that has glass windows covering an entire side of the hallway in order to stand in a hallway that has doors on each side, pretty much making it a wind tunnel.

I remember in middle school when the whole school just went down to the locker rooms. I understand that our locker rooms in high school aren’t big enough for everyone, but we need that underground and strongly supported area rather than a hallway. I just find it really annoying that the administration didn’t find a safer way for us to find protection during a tornado.

March 4th Solar Flare

The starting of this month had begun with an intense solar flare from the sun. An active region on the sun unleashed a flare on March 4^th labeled as an X1.1-class solar flare. Solar flares are rated by letter with M being a medium eruption and C-class being a weak eruption.

This eruption ejected a fast moving cloud of plasma (otherwise known as a coronal mass ejection, or CME) into space. It wasn’t expected to hit Earth but it was expected to create minor geomagnetic storms. Some of these minor issues could include delaying of flights due to interference of radio waves, GPS systems not being able to connect to towers because of the interference, and satellite dishes also failing. I personally experienced Direct TV going down. The show had turned into a black screen and the next screen to follow was Direct TV apologizing because sometimes the sun interferes with its broadcasting.

The X-ray flux of X class flares increases the ionization of the upper atmosphere, which can interfere with short-wave radio communication and can heat the outer atmosphere. This can cause increased drag on low orbiting satellites, leading to orbital decay.

But solar flares also cause the aurora borealis (or Northern Lights) be able to be seen stronger and brighter and even further south than usual.

Although there were only minor issues from this solar flare, it is possible that Earth will see more of those and even stronger ones to come.

A lead researcher as NASA says that the region where the flare came from (AR1429) has been highly active recently. The region is at least 5 times larger than Earth and is actually expected to continue growing. If the flares continue to get stronger, they could be strong enough to knock out power grids and be hazardous to astronauts on the International Space Station. The astronauts could receive dangerous amount of radiation from the X and UV rays coming from the solar flare.

Considering the sun is rotating the active region towards Earth, the flares will have a more direct path to hit us. That being said, it could potentially cause much more damage.

These sun spots are created by intense magnetic activity. The spots can sometimes erupt into storms and send streams of plasma and charged particles into space. Every 11 years the sun’s activity hits a peak. The next solar maximum is expected to build up in 2013.

TSA Goes Extreme or TSA is Being Cautionary?

With new restrictions, and a few old removed, there is still plenty of uproar about the screening for security at airports. One of the biggest problems being brought up is the question on whether pat downs are really needed for kids and the elderly or not.

Recently, a young boy with his parents, two siblings and his grandparents were ready to get on the plane for a Disney vacation. When passing through security the young boy (3 years old) was pulled aside for more direct screening. The boy, in a wheelchair and leg cast, had to be patted down and have his cast swabbed. The family was told they couldn’t intervene so they weren’t allowed to touch him. During the pat down, the little boy reached out to his father wanting his dad to hold his hand and give him a hug because he was trembling with fear. All his parent could do was act like it was all okay so the boy wouldn’t feel the need to panic. The TSA even swabbed the boy’s hands twice to look for traces of explosives.

In this same situation, an elderly person also gets pulled aside for screening; an elderly person with a cane. The video of this recent incident is below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YNO-AzPxS4U#!

Other incidents that relate to this include a baby that got pat down in May 2011. One man took a picture of a woman being held aside by the TSA officers while her son, an infant, gets a pat down. He then posted the picture on Twitter exclaiming that this was too extreme. This picture wound up getting over 310,000 views.

Another incident includes a 6 year old girl receiving a pat down. In the video it shows a TSA agent explaining the procedure to the girl’s mother and then pulling the girl aside. She makes the girl spread out her arms and legs and tells her they will have to pat down “sensitive areas”. The young girl complains to her mom and asks if she could just be re-scanned. Her father said that she began to cry after the pat down.

The TSA has been pressured to change the rules now because of criticism of these incidents. Soon they will no longer require children under the age of 12 to remove their shoes for screening. They will also have modified pat downs as well as reduce the number of pat downs given to children. This means that the TSA will have the children walk through metal detectors and imaging machines multiple times to capture a clear picture and they will be using hand swabs more often to detect traces of explosives.

I understand the concern of having to watch your kids be scared of being pat down, but at the same time, it needs to be done. If it’s such a problem then just drive to your destination because it’s actually cheaper than flying these days. A terrorist would be smart to tell a kid to hide an explosive or to somehow attach it to an elderly person because they aren’t the normal suspects. The TSA is doing their job of keeping this country safe.

I never flew on a plane until 8^th grade. Up until then, my parents always drove us on vacation because we didn’t have the money for flights when we were really young. I think that’s a safer route to go. Wait until your kids can understand the TSA’s motives before you make them go on a plane. I understand if the TSA pulled me aside that all they are trying to do is make sure all the passengers will be safe on the flight. Because I understand that, I wouldn’t be afraid or have some huge issue with being pat down. I get that it’s invasive but really, I’d rather have that than be killed by someone’s hidden bomb.

Indiana Tornado

This is a video of a tornado that hit Indiana. The video becomes less interesting as they're running away and not focusing on the tornado. But this just shows how quickly one can form. Within a matter of minutes the sky darkened and the funnel formed and produced a tornado.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5fLJAk98pE&feature=related

The Problems With Christian Religion

Currently I am reading a book called Washed and Waiting by Wesley Hill. This book is about the author telling his struggles of being a homosexual and trying to still be a Christian. I saw this book and was interested because I know that I have Christian beliefs and also am homosexual.

This book is a really good read. It seems like a fast read but it’s very dense, for me anyway. A lot of things weighed heavy on my mind just entering the first chapter.

One thing that continues to annoy me is when people say that homosexuals are going to hell because “God hates fags” and all that other crap. First of all, my God is perfect. Therefore, that means he is incapable of hate and he can only love everyone equally. If there are people who think that their God can actually hate people, then they obviously see their God as imperfect which seems to be demeaning of the authority God should have.

People say that God hates gays because in the Bible and in the Gospel it is said that if a man lay down with another man like he would with a woman then that is an abomination. I’m not saying that the Gospel or Bible doesn’t say that, and I’m not even saying that’s incorrect. My point of view is that God (or Jesus) did not write the Gospel or Bible. My perfect God did not write either of those. An imperfect man wrote those from his own ideals of what God is to him. Why should I follow what a mere imperfect man has to say about God? I just don’t see how that makes any sense at all.

Another thing that bothers me is the fact that some churches will allow for you to be gay but homosexual sex is not allowed. This is because you are not to have sex before marriage in the Christian religion and since gays can’t get married in the church (the only place a Christian is expect to be married) then they can never have sex.

Now the whole idea of that is because Jesus never had sex. He never gave into his temptations and his followers should be just the same and deny sex. However, there actually have been many stories saying that Jesus indeed did have sex. He had sex (and potentially married) Mary Magdalene. There are stories that say they also had kids together. Literally half of the people believed this when the Bible and Gospel were written. But the people that were chosen were from the other half that believed that this wasn’t true. So technically, the Bible and Gospel are both bias sources.

There have been facts all across Jerusalem that gives evidence to the fact that Jesus did have children. However, the people who decided to depict the life of Jesus Christ for every follower turned up their noses to that evidence and wrote what they believed.

I personally do think that Jesus and Mary had kids. I think what makes a loyal man is one who can be faithful to a woman and his children. Just because he was perfect and he’s the savior in the Christian religion, doesn’t mean he has to be celibate. I really don’t think that has anything to do with it.

I think that the Christian religion tries way too hard to shun gays. Honestly, if you are a true Christian, you’ll accept everyone and love everyone no matter what. That’s what Jesus did; he loved every single person. If you’re Christian then you should be striving to act in a holy way as Jesus did so you should love everyone no matter what.