The Milky Way is probably full of dead civilizations


By Rafi Letzter - Staff Writer 6 hours ago

(Image: © European Southern Observatory)


Most of the alien civilizations that ever dotted our galaxy have probably killed themselves off already.

That's the takeaway of a new study, published Dec. 14 to the arXiv database, which used modern astronomy and statistical modeling to map the emergence and death of intelligent life in time and space across the Milky Way. Their results amount to a more precise 2020 update of a famous equation that Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence founder Frank Drake wrote in 1961. The Drake equation, popularized by physicist Carl Sagan in his "Cosmos" miniseries, relied on a number of mystery variables — like the prevalence of planets in the universe, then an open question.

This new paper, authored by three Caltech physicists and one high school student, is much more practical. It says where and when life is most likely to occur in the Milky Way, and identifies the most important factor affecting its prevalence: intelligent creatures' tendency toward self-annihilation.

Related: From Big Bang to present: snapshots of our universe through time

"Since Carl Sagan's time, there's been lots of research," said study co-author Jonathan H. Jiang, an astrophysicist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Caltech. "Especially since the Hubble Space Telescope and Kepler Space Telescope, we have lots of knowledge about the densities [of gas and stars] in the Milky Way galaxy and star formation rates and exoplanet formation ... and the occurrence rate of supernova explosions. We actually know some of the numbers [that were mysteries at the time of the famous 'Cosmos' episode]."

The authors looked at a range of factors presumed to influence the development of intelligent life, such as the prevalence of sunlike stars harboring Earth-like planets; the frequency of deadly, radiation-blasting supernovas; the probability of and time necessary for intelligent life to evolve if conditions are right; and the possible tendency of advanced civilizations to destroy themselves.

Modeling the evolution of the Milky Way over time with those factors in mind, they found that the probability of life emerging based on known factors peaked about 13,000 light-years from the galactic center and 8 billion years after the galaxy formed. Earth, by comparison, is about 25,000 light-years from the galactic center, and human civilization arose on the planet's surface about 13.5 billion years after the Milky Way formed (though simple life emerged soon after the planet formed.)

In other words, we're likely a frontier civilization in terms of galactic geography and relative latecomers to the self-aware Milky Way inhabitant scene. But, assuming life does arise reasonably often and eventually becomes intelligent, there are probably other civilizations out there — mostly clustered around that 13,000-light-year band, mostly due to the prevalence of sunlike stars there.

A figure from the paper plots the age of the Milky Way in billions of years (y axis) against distance from the galactic center (x axis), finding a hotspot for civilization 8 billion years after the galaxy formed and 13,000 light years from the galactic center. (Image credit: Cai et al.)

Most of these other civilizations that still exist in the galaxy today are likely young, due to the probability that intelligent life is fairly likely to eradicate itself over long timescales. Even if the galaxy reached its civilizational peak more than 5 billion years ago, most of the civilizations that were around then have likely self-annihilated, the researchers found .

This last bit is the most uncertain variable in the paper; how often do civilizations kill themselves? But it's also the most important in determining how widespread civilization is, the researchers found. Even an extraordinarily low chance of a given civilization wiping itself out in any given century — say, via nuclear holocaust or runaway climate change — would mean that the overwhelming majority of peak Milky Way civilizations are already gone.

The paper has been submitted to a journal for publication and is awaiting peer review.

Originally published on Live Science.

Related:

9 strange, scientific excuses for why humans haven't found aliens yet

— 11 fascinating facts about our Milky Way galaxy

—Big Bang to civilization: 10 amazing origin events

—5 reasons we may live in a multiverse 

ENVIRONMENT
DECEMBER 18, 20207:51 AMUPDATED 21 HOURS AGO
Mauritius shipping disaster caused by lack of attention to safety - owner



By Reuters Staff


2 MIN READ





FILE PHOTO: A general view shows the bulk carrier ship MV Wakashio, belonging to a Japanese company but Panamanian-flagged, that ran aground on a reef, at Riviere des Creoles, Mauritius, August 11, 2020. REUTERS/Reuben Pillay/File Photo

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan’s Nagashiki Shipping said on Friday the grounding of one of its large bulk carriers that caused an ecological disaster in Mauritius was due to a lack of safety awareness and a failure to follow rules as it pledged better training and oversight.

The findings were assumptions based on interviews with crew members, the company said.

A bulk carrier owned by Nagashiki and chartered by Mitsui OSK ran aground on a reef in Mauritius in July and began leaking oil, causing an ecological disaster in the pristine seas around the Indian Ocean island. Four people died when a tug sank during attempts to retrieve oil in the ocean.


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The crew of the MV Wakashio, a nearly 300-metre Cape Size bulker used for carrying iron ore, changed direction to sail close enough to Mauritius to get cell phone coverage after also changing a set course two days earlier, Nagashiki said in a statement.

“There was a lack of awareness of the dangers of navigating close to the coast ... and insufficient implementation of regulations that must be observed in order to safely execute voyages,” the company said, based on its interviews with crew members.

The company will ban private use of cell phones during working hours on bridges and install high-speed communications systems on all its ships, as well beef up training, it said.


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The company has also started installed monitoring cameras on the bridges of some of its ships for testing and will consider doing so on all of them.

The Wakashio ran aground on July 25 and began leaking oil on Aug. 6, eventually spilling 1,000 tonnes of fuel oil into the ocean.

The clean-up, which includes returning 30 km (18.6 miles) of mangrove coastline to its former state, will likely be mostly completed by January, Nagashiki said last month.


Reporting by Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Mark Potter


Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.







FILE PHOTO: A general view shows the bulk carrier ship MV Wakashio, belonging to a Japanese company but Panamanian-flagged, that ran aground on a reef, at Riviere des Creoles, Mauritius, August 11, 2020. REUTERS/Reuben Pillay/File Photo
Home » Shipping » Wakashio owner blames crew’s ‘Lack of Awareness’ for ship disaster

Wakashio owner blames crew’s ‘Lack of Awareness’ for ship disaster




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REUTERS, DECEMBER 18, 2020




TOKYO, Dec 18 (Reuters) – Japan’s Nagashiki Shipping said on Friday the grounding of one of its large bulk carriers that caused an ecological disaster in Mauritius was due to a lack of safety awareness and a failure to follow rules as it pledged better training and oversight.

The findings were assumptions based on interviews with crew members, the company said.

A bulk carrier owned by Nagashiki and chartered by Mitsui OSK ran aground on a reef in Mauritius in July and began leaking oil, causing an ecological disaster in the pristine seas around the Indian Ocean island. Four people died when a tug sank during attempts to retrieve oil in the ocean.

The crew of the MV Wakashio, a nearly 300-metre Cape Size bulker used for carrying iron ore, changed direction to sail close enough to Mauritius to get cell phone coverage after also changing a set course two days earlier, Nagashiki said in a statement.

“There was a lack of awareness of the dangers of navigating close to the coast … and insufficient implementation of regulations that must be observed in order to safely execute voyages,” the company said, based on its interviews with crew members.

The company will ban private use of cell phones during working hours on bridges and install high-speed communications systems on all its ships, as well beef up training, it said.

The company has also started installed monitoring cameras on the bridges of some of its ships for testing and will consider doing so on all of them.

The Wakashio ran aground on July 25 and began leaking oil on Aug. 6, eventually spilling 1,000 tonnes of fuel oil into the ocean.

The clean-up, which includes returning 30 km (18.6 miles) of mangrove coastline to its former state, will likely be mostly completed by January, Nagashiki said last month.

(Reporting by Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Mark Potter)

The world's largest iceberg has just broken in two

The new iceberg is the size of a small city.

 The main iceberg is the size of a state.

A Dec. 17 image shows A-68a after its big split, likely due to a collision with shallow seabed off the shore of South Georgia.
(Image: © ESA)

The world's largest iceberg has just broken in two, with a chunk of ice about the size of Queens and the Bronx combined splitting off from the main berg.

The mammoth A-68a berg first split from Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf in 2017, Live Science previously reported. The giant hunk of ice has been drifting ponderously northward ever since. From the water, A-68a would look a bit like a moving island, with cliffs rising up to 100 feet (30 m) above sea level. As recently as April, it measured 2,000 square miles (5,100 square kilometers), or about as big as three Houstons plus one Chicago (or 1.7 Rhode Islands).

Recently, this floating ice-land has been on a collision course with South Georgia Island, a wildlife refuge in the South Atlantic Ocean that's home to millions of penguins, seals and other wildlife.

It's not clear exactly why the iceberg fractured, but a crash into the shallow seabed several dozen miles from the South Georgia shoreline may have caused the split, according to the Europ

A contour map shows the seafloor in the region where A-68a split and turned. (Image credit: British Antarctic Survey/ESA)

Related: 10 climate myths busted


The ESA's Copernicus Sentinel-3 mission captured A-68a's drift toward South Georgia in a series of images between Nov. 29 and Dec. 17.

A series of images taken over the course of more than two weeks show A-68a approaching South Georgia, then cracking and rotating after impacting an area of shallow seabed offshore. (Image credit: ESA)


It appears that in recent days the iceberg spun clockwise, moving one of its ends into shallow water, the ESA said. In that region, the seafloor is just 650 feet (200 m) deep, close enough to the surface for the bottom of the iceberg to have scraped against. In the process, the smaller piece — expected to take the name A-68d — likely snapped off.

It remains to be seen where the iceberg will go from here.



A map shows how A-68a has moved since cracking off of Larsen C. The blue lines show the historical tracks of other icebergs. (Image credit: contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2020), processed by ESA; Antarctic Iceberg Tracking Database)

Past chunks of ice have traced similar paths north from the southernmost continent past South Georgia. But there is some concern that if A-68a remains offshore for too long, it could block the nearby waters where the penguins that live on the island feed.

RELATED:

—Images of melt: Earth's vanishing ice caps

—Photos: Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf through time

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"The actual distance [the animals] have to travel to find food (fish and krill) really matters," Geraint Tarling, an ecologist with the British Antarctic Society, said in a statement. "If they have to do a big detour, it means they're not going to get back to their young in time to prevent them starving to death in the interim."

Future images and observations will likely reveal how much of a threat A-68a will end up posing to the waddling birds.

After A-68a's spectacular breakup, another iceberg, farther south in Antarctica's Weddell Sea, is now the world's largest at 1,500 square miles (4,000 square km), according to ESA. Its name is A-23a.

Originally published on Live Science.

1st wild animal in US infected with SARS-CoV-2 found in Utah

If the virus circulates widely in wild animals, that could pose a significant danger to humans.

(Image: © Shutterstock)

By Nicoletta Lanese - Staff Writer 3 days ago

A wild mink in Utah tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, and it may be the first "free-ranging, native wild animal" with a confirmed coronavirus infection, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

There's no evidence that the virus spread further than this one infected mink, but if SARS-CoV-2 begins circulating among wild animals, that could place humanity at risk for future pandemics, Live Science previously reported. Viruses often pick up mutations as they hop between animal species, and if this virus were to mutate significantly, COVID-19 vaccines may not protect well against the new version, should it spread back to humans.

The infected critter was found near a mink farm in Utah, which has reported coronavirus infections among its animals, according to a Dec. 13 statement from the USDA National Veterinary Services Laboratories. Veterinarians collected a sample of the virus using a nasal swab and found the virus to be "indistinguishable" from samples collected from infected mink on the farm. This suggests that the wild mink picked up the infection from the farmed mink, potentially through wastewater runoff, Vox reported. Farmed mink can sometimes escape into the wild and could spread the infection in that way, Live Science previously reported.

Related: 20 of the worst epidemics and pandemics in history

The USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has screened other animal species for the virus near mink farms in Utah, Michigan and Wisconsin, but so far those tests have come back negative, according to the statement. Just the one infected wild mink has been spotted so far, but it's possible that more may be out there, Stephanie Seifert, a researcher at Washington State University's School for Global Animal Health, told Vox.

It’s "very unlikely they swabbed the only wild mink with SARS-CoV-2," Seifert said.

—11 (sometimes) deadly diseases that hopped across species

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If allowed to spread unchecked in wild animals, the coronavirus could evolve to infect a wider range of species than it currently can, Live Science previously reported. In addition, wild animals could potentially serve as a reservoir for the virus — a population in which the pathogen could continue to spread and mutate. The virus could potentially jump from this reservoir back into humans, sparking new waves of infection.

"If it does [establish a reservoir], then we've got a long-term issue here, where this virus has the potential to be with us for millennia," Sarah Olson, associate director of the health program at the Wildlife Conservation Society, told Vox.

Originally published on Live Science.

US could reach 'net-zero' carbon by 2050. Here's how.
Key steps must be taken by 2030.

By Rafi Letzter - Staff Writer 3 days ago

A fire burns in a pit near a natural gas well as methane (CH4) 

escapes into the atmosphere.
(Image: © Orjan F. Ellingvag/Corbis via Getty Images)


The U.S. can cut its carbon output to zero by the middle of the 21st century, according to a sweeping new Princeton University study. In such a "net-zero" scenario, the American carbon output would be equal to or lesser to the carbon pulled out of the atmosphere on U.S. soil.

But to get there, the country must start now.

American per-capita carbon emissions are the highest in the world, according to the World Bank, with the country emitting 17.6 tons (16 metric tons) of carbon for ever person in 2016. The U.S. is second only to China in its total contributions to climate change. President-elect Joe Biden campaigned on achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. And according to the Princeton study, that goal is achievable and would even be cheaper than remaining on the economy's current course. But urgent action is needed in the next decade to make it happen

"We find that each net-zero pathway results in a net increase in energy-sector employment and delivers significant reductions in air pollution, leading to public health benefits that begin immediately in the first decade of the transition," the authors wrote in the report, published Dec. 15 on the Princeton website. "The study also concludes that a successful net-zero transition could be accomplished with annual spending on energy that is comparable or lower as a percentage of GDP to what the nation spends annually on energy today."

Related: 10 climate myths busted

There isn't one way to achieve the goal, the authors found. In their model, they tested approaches using only renewable energy and others that relied more heavily on next-generation nuclear technologies (including ones that still produce nuclear waste), carbon capture and natural gas — landing on five possible routes the U.S. might take to a net-zero 2050. But regardless of the route taken, certain steps must be taken before 2030, the authors wrote.

RELATED:

—Images of melt: Earth's vanishing ice caps

—The science and history of oil spills

—9 real ways the world could end

Those include putting 50 million electric cars on the road and 3 million public charging ports, increasing the use of electric heating systems in homes from today's 10% to 23%, tripling the use of electric heating on commercial property, quadrupling wind and solar capacity from today's 150 gigawatts to 600 gigawatts, building high voltage transmission infrastructure to carry renewable energy over long distances and reducing non-carbon dioxide (CO2) greenhouse gas output, nitrous oxide (N20) and methane (CH4), by 10%.

The researchers also called for changing forest and agricultural management practices to increase the amount of carbon permanently removed from the atmosphere by plants each year, developing a pipeline network for moving carbon pulled out of the air to underground storage facilities, and investing in developing power technologies like hydrogen combustion power plants.

Originally published on Live Science.

World's oldest python fossil unearthed

The python fossils indicate these snakes 

evolved in Europe.


The 48 million-year-old fossil python discovered in Germany.
(Image: © Copyright Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung)


Scientists have discovered fossils of the oldest python on record, a slithery beast that lived 48 million years ago in what is now Germany.


Found near an ancient lake, the snake remains are helping researchers learn where pythons originated. Previously, it wasn't clear whether pythons came from continents in the Southern Hemisphere, where they live today, or the Northern Hemisphere, where their closest living relatives (the sunbeam snakes of Southeast Asia and the Mexican burrowing python) are found. But this newfound species — dubbed Messelopython freyi — suggests that pythons evolved in Europe.

"So far, there have been no early fossils that would help decide between a Northern and Southern Hemisphere origin," study co-researcher Krister Smith, vertebrate paleontologist at the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt, Germany, told Live Science in an email. "Our new fossils are by far the oldest records of pythons, and (being in Europe) they support an origin in the Northern Hemisphere."

Related: Image gallery: Snakes of the world

VIDEO https://www.livescience.com/oldest-python-snakes-on-record.html?jwsource=cl

The M. freyi fossils were found at Messel Fossil Pit, near Frankfurt, Germany. Formerly an oil shale mine, this site almost became a garbage dump in the 1970s. ("A big hole in the ground is a valuable commodity," Smith said.) But by then, the site was already known for its remarkable fossils dating to the Eocene epoch (between 57 million and 36 million years ago). So, in 1995 it became a UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) site. Fossils unearthed there include a pregnant mare, mating turtles and shimmering beetles.

Image 1 of 2


The first discovered fossil belonging to the newfound species Messelopython freyi. (Image credit: Copyright Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung)



A sketch (left) and photo of a skull (right) of one of the newly analyzed python fossils. (Image credit: Copyright Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung)


M. freyi would have been about the same size as today's small pythons, reaching nearly 3.2 feet (1 meter) in length and sporting about 275 vertebrae, the researchers said. The ancient python also sheds light on its relationship with boa constrictors.

In effect, the discovery shows that this early European python lived alongside boa constrictors, a startling find given that boas don't live anywhere near modern-day pythons. In general, boas live in South and Central America, Madagascar and northern Oceania, whereas pythons inhabit Africa, Southeast Asia and Australia. "This is one of the most exciting and intriguing aspects of the discovery of Messelopython," said study co-researcher Hussam Zaher, professor and curator of vertebrates at the Museum of Zoology at the University of São Paulo, in Brazil.

Researchers already knew that boas lived in Europe during the early Paleogene period, which lasted from 66 million to 23 million years ago. Now that it's clear pythons lived there too, it raises questions about how these "direct ecological competitors," which both squeeze prey to death, coexisted, Zaher told Live Science in an email.

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This question may be answered by finding more early python and boa fossils, especially those with preserved stomach contents, he said. In addition, researchers can look to southern Florida, where python (Python molurus bivittatus and P. sebae) and boa (Boa constrictor) species coexist as invasive species. It's not yet clear whether the P. molurus bivittatus and B. constrictor living in the Sunshine State "are competing over resources or may be using slightly different microhabitat and preys," Zaher said. "A similar situation may have happened in Europe during the Eocene."

The study was published online Wednesday (Dec. 16) in the journal Biology Letters.

Originally published on Live Science.

PYTHON WORSHIP WAS THE FIRST RELIGION 

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for PYTHON WORSHIP WAS THE FIRST RELIGION (plawiuk.blogspot.com)

This ‘Crazy Beast’ roamed Earth 66 million years ago
Mike Wehner 12 hrs ago
  

© Provided by BGR crazy beast

A mammal that lived 66 million years ago has been named “crazy beast” due to its extremely bizarre body makeup.

The creature is like a random assortment of body parts from other animals and has teeth like nobody has ever seen before.

The discovery and classification of the creature is the subject of a new paper published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

Oftentimes when paleontologists are studying the remains of an ancient creature they have a pretty good idea of its lineage from the moment they lay eyes on it. In fact, some new species are so similar to creatures that are already in the scientific record that researchers spend months or even years sussing out the tiniest differences in order to correctly identify a new species. In the case of an ancient mammal named Adalatherium, determining that it was a new species was fairly straightforward, but understanding its place in the massive tree of life was still quite a challenge.

You see, the animal is such a strange mix of features from other species that figuring out where they fit in the world of mammals took a long time. In fact, some of the features the animal possesses has left researchers still scratching their heads.

Adalatherium, which translates to “crazy beast,” was native to Madagascar. Madagascar is well known for its incredibly interesting and diverse wildlife, and that trend apparently stretches back some 66 million years or so. The years-long work of studying the creature has been featured in a paper in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

The animal’s odd combination of features begins with its legs. Its hind legs are “sprawling,” in a way that you might think of a lizard’s, while its front limbs were held close to its body. Its rear legs were muscular and strong, with powerful claws, while its front legs were slim and lean.

“Adalatherium is simply odd,” Dr. Simone Hoffmann, co-author of the research, said in a statement. “Trying to figure out how it moved, for instance, was challenging because its front end is telling us a completely different story than its back end.”

Things get even more bizarre when you look at its teeth. The creature’s front teeth were similar to those of a rodent in that they were constantly-growing, meant to be whittled down over time. Meanwhile, the teeth toward the back of its jaws were just plain weird and unlike anything scientists have ever seen before. In fact, the researchers said that if just the rear teeth had been discovered, nobody would ever have known what animal they were from. They’re that unique.

If nothing else, the discovery and work to identify this “crazy beast” is proof that there are still so many creatures waiting to be found, and some of them are truly unique.

New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Friday criticized Republicans over "tax cuts for the very rich" in the second stimulus proposal.

© Drew Angerer/Getty U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) speaks outside of the Democratic National Committee headquarters on November 19, 2020 in Washington, DC.

"'You can either get stimulus money or unemployment but not both,' say Republicans demanding corporate immunity for worker abuse AND tax cuts for the very rich AND subsidies for friends AND total lack of oversight or accountability for their connected pals scamming PPP AND..." Ocasio-Cortez wrote in a tweet.

AOC Rails Against GOP Over 'Tax Cuts for The Very Rich' in Second Stimulus Proposal


“You can either get stimulus money or unemployment but not both,” say Republicans demanding corporate immunity for worker abuse AND tax cuts for the very rich AND subsidies for friends AND total lack of oversight or accountability for their connected pals scamming PPP AND...— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) December 18, 2020

The New York congresswoman went on to discuss the different aspects Democrats and Republicans are fighting against in the second stimulus proposal.

She wrote that some "of the items Republicans are fighting tooth and nail against in the middle of a pandemic," include a second round of $1,200 checks to Americans, restoring unemployment benefits, money for schools, hospitals and public transit, retroactive benefits and mortgage and rent protections.

Ocasio-Cortez's comments come as lawmakers are running out of time to pass another stimulus deal before Congress closes for the holidays.

The Associated Press recently reported that lawmakers were discussing a $900 billion proposal, which would include over $300 billion in aid to businesses, expanded unemployment benefits, $600 direct payments to Americans, vaccine distribution funds, and aid for Americans in need of food.

On Monday, The Intercept reported that a revision in the bill would allow businesses that claim expenses reimbursed through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), which are tax-free, to be used as a deduction to their taxable income.

"In other words, the change would allow a corporation that claimed $1 million in PPP reimbursements to apply that money as a deduction on its tax return, reducing taxable income by $1 million," The Intercept wrote.

While speaking to The Intercept, Tax Policy Center's tax expert Steven Rosenthal, noted that the PPP deduction provision could decrease the taxes paid by the wealthy by at least $100 billion.

"Congress is showering billions on millionaires using the cover of 'small' business," Rosenthal told the digital media outlet.

Earlier this month, Michigan Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib made comments similar to Ocasio-Cortez's and wrote on Twitter that a second stimulus deal should be funded by reversing President Donald Trump's tax cuts.

"I am being told that including another stimulus check is too expensive," Tlaib wrote. "Fine. Tax the rich and pay for it. Billionaires added $931 billion to their net worth during the pandemic. They can afford it."

She added, "They got a $1.7 trillion tax cut. We can start there."

Newsweek reached out to Ocasio-Cortez's office for comment but did not receive a response in time for publication.

A brief history of ships made out of concrete

PortandTerminal.com, August 26, 2020

HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA – Archaeologists tell us that the very first boats were probably made from hollowed-out logs or perhaps bundles of rushes bound together as rafts. These days, of course, most ships are made out of steel. Less well known though is the fact that for over 150 years ships have also been made out of concrete.

This is their story.

The Violette built in 1917, is the oldest concrete ship, still (barely) afloat.


Ferrocement    

French inventor Joseph Louis Lambot (1814 –1887) and one of his first boats made out of ferrocement (PHOTO: Maison Lambot)

In 1848, Joseph-Louis Lambot, the inventor of reinforced concrete, tried and successfully made a small boat out of ferrocement.


Ferrocement, aka ferro-cement, is a system of construction using reinforced mortar or plaster (lime or cement, sand and water) applied over a frame of metal mesh, woven expanded-metal or metal-fibers and closely spaced thin steel rods such as rebar. Think of it as similar to papier-mache but using concrete and steel instead of paper, wire and glue.

The key advantage of ferrocement construction is that its material costs are dirt cheap. The key ingredients are just water, aggregate (sand, gravel) and cement poured over a metal frame.

It’s not an ideal building method though. The disadvantages are that construction labor costs are high – it’s not easy to work with, as are the operating costs once the ship is built. Ferrocement ships require thick hulls, which means extra mass to push and less space for cargo.


Beginnings

\

A photo taken at the turn of the century of one the ferro-cement dinghies built by Lambot in 1848, on the pond at Mirval.

The earliest photographic evidence we have of ‘ferro-cement boats’, are of the two dinghies built by Joseph Louis Lambot in 1848, in Miraval, Southern France.

Thanks to Lambot’s innovation, by the late 19th century, there were concrete river barges at work in Europe. Things only grew from there.

Between 1908 and 1914, larger ferrocement barges began to be made in Germany, United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Norway, and even California.

Ferrocement, aka ferro-cement, is a system of construction using reinforced mortar or plaster (lime or cement, sand and water) applied over a frame of metal mesh

Numerous small concrete boats were also built in the U.K in the 1910s. One of these ships, the Violette, was built in 1917 – the ship still exists and is currently sunk as a breakwater with floating jetties attached to it.

Excitement with the new concrete building material was such that by 1917, Nicolay Fougner of Norway launched the first self-propelled ferrocement ship intended for ocean travel. This was an 84-foot vessel of 400 tons named Namsenfjord.

The Namsenfjord

War Years

American ferrocement construction began in 1910 when a 525-ton scow was built in San Francisco along with some smaller barges for use in the Panama Canal. At Mobile, Alabama in 1914, a 90’x62’x9′ concrete barge, as well as several 500-ton barges, were built for local traffic.

In 1917 when the United State finally entered World World I steel became scarce while the demand for ships went up  

Wrecks of concrete ships exist around the world. This one is in Ireland.

Without sufficient supplies of steel to build a fleet the ships, the United States was casting a wide net as it looked for options. Wood was an obvious choice. Concrete held out promise as well.

Looking for a solution, the US government invited N.K. Fougner to head a study into the feasability of concrete ships

.

Violette | National Historic Ships

Meanwhile, businessman W. Lesie Comyn seized the initiative and formed the San Fransisco Ship Building Company (in Oakland, California) to begin constructing concrete ships. He hired Alan Macdonald and Victor Poss to design the first American concrete ship, a steamer named the S. S. Faith.

The Faith was launched March 18, 1918. She cost $750,000 to build. She was used to carry cargo for trade until 1921, when she was sold and scrapped as a breakwater in Cuba.

President Woodrow Wilson finally approved the Emergency Fleet program which oversaw the construction of 24 concrete ships for the war. However, only 12 were under construction and none of them had been completed by the time the war ended. The 12 ships were completed and sold to private companies who used them for light-trading, storage and scrap.

With the advent of World War II, steel once again was in short supply. In 1942, the US government contracted McCloskey & Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to construct a new fleet of 24 concrete ships. Construction of the fleet started in July, 1923 in Tampa, Florida. Innovations in cement mixing and composition made these ships stronger than the previous fleet.

Other companies were contracted to build barge ships. These too were large vessels, but they lacked engines to propell them. Instead, they were used for storage and towed around by other ships.  

Super-fast Concrete Freighter Designed by Hal B. Hayes in the June 1944 Issue of “Popular Science” Magazine

After the war, several of the ships were turned into a floating breakwater in Canada and ten more were sunk as a breakwater in Virginia.

Although the end of WWII marked the end of large-scale concrete ship building, to this day, smaller recreational boats are still being made from concrete. The reason is that construction methods do not require special tools, and materials are comparatively cheap. A pioneer in this movement is Hartley Boats, which has been selling plans for concrete boats since 1938. Meanwhile, since the 1960s, the American Society of Civil Engineers has sponsored the National Concrete Canoe Competition.

In Europe, especially the Netherlands, concrete is still used to build some of the barges on which houseboats are built.

EDMONTON HAS A CONCRETE RIVER BOAT

APTLY NAMED THE RIVER QUEEN

IT WAS DAMAGED BY ICE PACKS IN THE RIVER DURING ONE SPRING

 

 

Union Dues: US unions have just suffered a huge defeat. Could it happen here?

Simon Sapper looks at a new measure in California that has set the clock back for gig economy workers.

Simon Sapper

 15 December, 2020 

In this week’s edition of the UnionDues podcast, I take a deep dive into a seismic development from the US – and no, it’s not the Biden-Harris victory. 

It’s all about a thing called Proposition 22.  Our counterparts in the US fear this could leave millions of American workers with no healthcare, employment protection or union rights. 

What’s happened? And could it happen here?  

In November, US voters in unprecedented numbers voted Donald Trump out of the White House. And they secured important progressive changes in state laws in Alaska, Arizona, Mississippi, Montana, New Jersey, Ohio,  Oregon and South Dakota.

But while President-Elect Joe Biden was meeting  business leaders and telling them he wants them to know he’s  a union man, the labour movement was dealt a heavy blow indeed in California.

Proposition 22 was on the ballot paper,  and it passed by around 7m votes to 5m.  This result has been described as the sharpest legislative reverse for organised labour since the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947.

Rights on the ballot

First we have to know another piece of state legislation – California’s Assembly Bill 5 – or AB5.  This laid down mandatory minimum terms and conditions of employment and came into force on 1 January 2020.  Prop 22 was arguably the revenge of courier companies like Uber, Doordash and Lyft who wanted to be excluded from the AB5 arrangements.

But what was proposed was a mega-exemption.  People working for these companies would no longer be employees but independent contractors.  They would have no entitlement to the full range of employee benefits – including no right to form a union.  And any change would require a 7/8ths (yes, you read that right) majority vote in the state legislature.

The importance of this battle to business was underscored by some desperate acts – employees were told that if Prop 22 failed, the company would go bust. There were also reports of employees having to deliver pro-22 propaganda – even though it is illegal to require employees to undertake political activity. Spending levels topped US$200m – making Prop 22 the most expensive-ever state ballot.

On KBOO’s Labour Radio show, hosts Michael Cathcart and Elliot Gilligland were clear that money had played a big part in the vote in favour of Prop 22, together with a deliberate confusion about the consequences by those who had most to gain.

An excellent piece in The Nation by Wilfred Chan argues the employers were arguing in bad faith. While the companies asserted that Prop 22 would be good for delivery drivers, the Berkley Labor Centre estimates that it would also push the hourly pay rate down to as low as $5.64.

Alongside obvious questions like what can labour do now, sits a legal issue –

to what extent is Worker Classification  – that thing that says only employees can form unions – at the heart of this?

What’s a worker?

You can see why Prop 22 is viewed so seriously in the US.  Arguably, the labour movement seems to have been out-manoeuvred, outspent and out-fought.  US legislation says only employees can form unions, so designating potentially millions of workers as something else is a real challenge in terms of union organising.

But it is a challenge that surely must be met. Prop 22 shows how seductive the language of choice, flexibility, independence can be. The gig economy is not going collapse any time soon, and unorganised workers will always have the potential to undercut union negotiated rates.

Ok I hear you say – that’s a steep hill to climb, but on this side of the Atlantic, we’re in a different place. And yes, to a certain extent we are,  but complacency is both unwarranted and unsafe.

The big difference is in the categorisation of workers.  In the UK,  we have had a three way split for some time between employees, self-employed and workers. Employers using web-based platforms to provide their services would typically look to self-employed labour.

But as these web-based platforms and the algorithms that accompany them became more sophisticated, more popular and more profitable, using the self-employed became integral to a business model that depended on minimal costs. 

And as labour is traditionally the largest item on any corporate balance sheet, “minimal costs” means, in practice, low pay, and stripping out the overheads associated with employment such as paid holidays, sick pay and providing tools and equipment.

In the UK, three things have happened as a result.

Different model

First, we have become addicted to cheap convenience.  The whole home delivery boom which is now seeing firms like Deliveroo and Just East now competing over the delivery of exceptionally low value food items shows how far down this track we have drifted. It’s arguably a dangerous habit. I suggest that this puts petrol on the fire of low pay gig working.

Second, there is a growing appetite for unionisation amongst the workers dependent on these platforms. UK union recognition legislation is not as binary as that in the US,  but you do still have to establish a bargaining unit to win union recognition, and employers can spin the formal process out for some time.  So new organising models have developed and gained traction. 

The “only employees can join a union” restriction in US law is also incompatible with UK legislation.

Third, a variety of employers have stress-tested notions of self-employment to destruction.  Groups of workers, backed by their unions, have brough a succession of court cases and established vital precedents, securing key employment rights, by arguing that these people are not self-employed but fall into the “worker” category.

Moving too fast

But here’s the key point. Union organisation and court cases cannot keep pace with the demands of industry.  A decline in so called zero-hours contracts seems to have been somewhat reversed this year, not helped by the effects of Covid.  And what Prop 22 tells us is that employers like Uber are at best opportunistic. 

As Veena Dubal, of the University of California in Hastings said, they seek nothing more than to secure employment legislation that fits their business model.

It’s the small print of Prop 22 that is most scary.  The bit that stipulates a seven-eighths majority is required to amend or revoke it: when the rules of politics itself is stacked against working people.

Despite the apparent finality of the Prop 22 vote, it is clear from voices across the US, as this story is far from over either there or anywhere else.

More union podcasts are available at the Labor Radio Network. Get in touch with UnionDues at uniondues@makes-you-think.com or tweet us @DuesUnion. The third series will be premier in January. Watch this space.

Simon Sapper is a trade unionist and host of the UnionDues podcast.

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