WHAT IS DARK ENERGY? PHYSICISTS AREN'T EVEN SURE

15-Minute Listen Download Transcript

MADDIE SOFIA, HOST:

Hey, Maddie Sofia here with a quick note ahead of today's show. We know that there are a lot of things people need right now, and information is one of them. Today is Giving Tuesday Now, which makes it a great day to support public radio's mission to keep you informed. And when you donate to a local NPR station, you're making all the news and information that you rely on from this podcast available to everyone free of charge. To help us do that, visit donate.npr.org/short. Thanks.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: You're listening to SHORT WAVE...

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: ...From NPR.

Going out into nature - hiking, paddling, looking up at the stars - has always helped me center myself. It reminds me that I'm just Madeline Kelly (ph) Sofia, one human among millions of critters and trees and galaxies that don't care about me or acknowledge me at all. I'm just a group of random atoms - matter taking up space. And it turns out that matter as we normally think of it is a tiny, tiny portion of the universe, meaning your genes, the ocean, trees, computers, all the stars and planets - all of that is only 5% of the universe.

SARAFINA NANCE: And the rest of the stuff is dark matter and dark energy.

SOFIA: Right, which is wild. That's so much. (Laughter) That's so much of it. That's too much of it. Honestly, it's too much.

NANCE: (Laughter) Yeah. It's like a very uncomfortable place to be in when you think about - oh, you know, we study the universe, and theoretically we understand, you know, on some scale, how the universe works. And then all of a sudden, you're like - oh, wait; we actually do not understand, like, over 95% of our universe. What?

SOFIA: The large majority of our universe is made up of this mysterious thing called - I kid you not - dark energy.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: And get this - it's how we know that our universe is expanding. I learned about dark energy, honestly, like, three weeks ago. And it blew my mind.

NANCE: Dark energy is intrinsic to the fabric of space-time that is somehow pushing galaxies apart.

SOFIA: This is Sarafina Nance's day job.

NANCE: I am a Ph.D. student at UC Berkeley studying supernova and cosmology.

SOFIA: Supernova, meaning an exploding star that can help us understand how our universe is changing. You know, no big deal.

NANCE: It's a really phenomenal thing in sort of the scale of the universe to see something change. And that's this class of astronomy called transience, where things change in the night sky and you can learn about them through their changes.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: So today we explore one of the universe's biggest mysteries - dark energy - from the days of Einstein to the exploding stars that help us understand the very fabric of our universe.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: So. OK, Sarafina, to really understand dark energy, we have to go back to Einstein. Right?

NANCE: Yeah. So Einstein came up with this theory of general relativity, which is basically his version of gravity, in the early 1900s. And the only way to make his equations work and satisfy what he thought was a static universe, he introduced this fudge factor - in his words - called the cosmological constant.

SOFIA: So Einstein actually thought that the universe was static, not that it was expanding.

NANCE: That's right. And over the next 10 years, people sort of manipulated these equations and tried to find solutions and started hinting at perhaps the universe wasn't static.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: Well, it's nice to see that, you know, Einstein can get things wrong. That's cool.

NANCE: (Laughter) So the funny thing is this cosmological constant, he called it his biggest blunder.

SOFIA: Honestly, it's just nice to hear Einstein say I messed up, you know what I mean?

NANCE: I know. Well, the fun fact...

SOFIA: We can all mess up.

NANCE: The fun fact is that he ended up actually being right.

SOFIA: Right (laughter). Dang it.

NANCE: So it turns out that that cosmological constant is exactly what we think dark energy is...

SOFIA: (Laughter).

NANCE: ...And is necessary to actually describe our universe.

SOFIA: I feel like that's classic Einstein. Him being wrong...

NANCE: Yep.

SOFIA: ...Is being more right than I've ever been in my entire life.

NANCE: Exactly. Yes (laughter).

SOFIA: OK. So after Einstein introduces this idea that the universe is static, we figure out, actually, that the universe is expanding. Right?

NANCE: Yeah. So in 1929, Edwin Hubble showed that the universe is not static; it's actually expanding. So what he did is he measured, basically, galaxies and how far away they are. And he found that galaxies are actually moving away from us. So that means that the universe is not static. It's, in fact, expanding.

SOFIA: And at this point, we think that the universe is expanding but that that expansion is slowing down. Is that correct?

NANCE: Exactly. So we think that the expansion comes from the Big Bang and it comes from inflation, which was right after the Big Bang, which is this rapid expansion of space. But because there's gravity in the universe and there's mass in the universe, we would think that gravity starts to take over and the expansion decelerates because gravity starts to pull things back in.

SOFIA: And then in the late '90s, we get turned on our head again, right? There's another big discovery. And we're like - oh, wait, wait wait...

NANCE: (Laughter).

SOFIA: ...Maybe she's not slowing down.

NANCE: That's right. So in 1998 and in 1999, there were two teams that were studying a specific type of supernova. And they found that these supernova that were super far away from us were fainter than what we would have expected if the universe was in fact expanding but decelerating that expansion. And the only way to explain away that faintness is if the universe was instead accelerating its expansion.

SOFIA: Wild. So we went from, the universe is static - OK, it's not static; it's expanding, but it's slowing down that expansion to - wait, wait, wait - not only is it expanding but it's expanding faster than we thought it was and it's speeding up. And what...

NANCE: That's right.

SOFIA: And the explanation for that is dark energy?

NANCE: You killed it. That's right.

SOFIA: I nailed it. OK. So yes, we have finally gotten to the point where I can ask you - Sarafina, what is dark energy? (Laughter).

NANCE: So I think the only answer to that question is we don't know.

SOFIA: Oh, come on, Sarafina. You brought me all the way here. You told me Einstein's story, and we don't know.

NANCE: I know. It's really uncomfortable to sit with.

(LAUGHTER)

NANCE: We can see dark energy through its effects on the expansion of the universe, but we don't actually know what it is.

SOFIA: Wow. I don't even know - I don't even know what to say about that. That's - so - 'cause it's wild. We don't know what dark energy is, but we know it exists.

NANCE: Yes.

SOFIA: And - so what are you doing over there, astronomers?

NANCE: (Laughter).

SOFIA: This is what we've got - 4% to 5%? No, I'm just teasing you. So that - I mean, that's wild. And the amount of dark energy is staying the same, right?

NANCE: So that's an interesting question. So I like to kind of describe dark energy and the expansion of the universe in - the way that I think about it is sort of picture a loaf of bread and picture a bunch of raisins in the bread. And the raisins are like our universe's galaxies. And the bread itself is like space-time.

SOFIA: OK.

NANCE: And so as you bake the bread, the bread rises and the raisins get farther and farther apart. They're sort of carried along the fabric of space-time, which means that the distance between galaxies increases with time.

SOFIA: OK. I'm with you. I'm with you.

NANCE: And the introduction of dark energy is like - imagine you have this special type of yeast that you can put into a bread and the bread starts to rise with yeast. And then all of a sudden, it starts to rise a lot, and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger over time. And that's dark energy.

SOFIA: So dark energy is the weird yeast that causes...

NANCE: Exactly.

SOFIA: ...Our universe to grow and push our galaxies farther and farther apart from each other.

NANCE: Exactly. And it causes it to grow exponentially.

SOFIA: Well, I totally get it now.

NANCE: (Laughter) Great. We'll...

SOFIA: Now that we put...

NANCE: We'll publish a paper.

SOFIA: Now that we started talking about carbs, I'm starting to understand.

NANCE: (Laughter).

SOFIA: OK. OK. So we actually figured a lot of this out by studying a particular type of exploding star - a supernova.

NANCE: Right.

SOFIA: Tell me about that.

NANCE: So when dark energy was first basically discovered, it was discovered through a specific type of supernova that forms when you have a binary system of a really big star or a really small star and another small star, which is called a white dwarf. And basically, the white dwarf accretes matter from the companion star - the binary star - and ignites an explosion. And the really interesting thing about this particular type of supernova is that all of them blow up with the same brightness.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

NANCE: And that makes them what we call standard candles. So if you can imagine a lightbulb and you have a lightbulb right next to you and you have a lightbulb a hundred feet away from you, the one that's right next to you seems to be way brighter. And the one that's farther away from you is way fainter. And so by using the intrinsic brightness of the sort of lightbulb or, in the universe, of the supernova and comparing it to what is observed, we can determine the distance to the supernova and determine how fast that galaxy that hosts the supernova is expanding away from us.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: Wild. That's wild. That's your job.

NANCE: Yes, it's really cool.

SOFIA: I mean, it's very cool. That is very cool. OK. So basically studying these supernovae help us understand how fast the universe is expanding because we can kind of try to calculate how far those explode-y stars are away from us. Is that fair?

NANCE: Yeah, that's exactly right.

SOFIA: OK. And tell me if I'm overselling this, but all of this potentially gives us clues into how the universe could end.

NANCE: That's exactly right.

SOFIA: So what is our best guess as far as, like, how the universe could end?

NANCE: So right now, we think that dark energy stays constant with time, which means that the universe is going to continue to accelerate its expansion. Distances between galaxies are going to get further and further apart with time. And so it's going to accelerate forever, and it's going to be a cold, dark universe.

SOFIA: I mean, that sounds about right to me, you know?

NANCE: (Laughter) You know, it's kind of where we're at right now.

(LAUGHTER)

SOFIA: So what's the coolest thing about all of this to you, Sarafina? Because this is objectively very cool.

NANCE: Well, thanks. I love it. I think it kind of goes back to what drew me to astronomy in the first place, which is we are trying to understand some of the most fundamental aspects of our universe and human existence. And we can derive some sort of meaning about, you know - how did we get here? what is the fate of the universe? how does that change with time? - and learn some really profound things about what it means to exist here.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SOFIA: Sarafina Nance studies supernova and cosmology at UC Berkeley.

This episode was produced by Rebecca Ramirez, edited by Geoff Brumfiel and was fact-checked by Emily Vaughn I'm Maddie Sofia, and we are all in awe of our universe. Thanks for listening to SHORT WAVE from NPR. See you tomorrow.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

Copyright © 2020 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

SEE 
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=DARK+ENERGY
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=ETHER
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=DARK+MATTER

The supernova that keeps on giving

Illustration by Sandbox Studio, Chicago
04/28/20
By Shannon Hall

Supernova 1987A, the closest supernova observed with modern technology, excited the world more than 30 years ago—and it remains an intriguing subject of study even today.

Astronomer Robert Kirshner didn’t believe the news. It was early one morning in February 1987 and a colleague was recounting an unthinkable rumor: A star had exploded in a galaxy next door.

If it were a prank, it wouldn’t be the first time, so Kirshner wasn’t alone in his skepticism. “It was so unexpected and outrageous that I think for a few hours, we discounted it,” says Stan Woosley, an astronomer at UC Santa Cruz. “But then the messages kept pouring in from all over the world. It was clear that it was real and our lives were all going to change.”

Although astronomers now spot thousands of supernovae every year, an explosion close enough to be seen with the unaided eye is still a rare event. In fact, the cosmic explosion—dubbed SN1987A or just 87A for short—remains the closest supernova that has been seen in nearly four centuries. Its proximity, plus the use of modern technology, allowed astronomers across the globe to catch an incredible show—one that continues today.

Supernovae change the fate of entire galaxies, altering the chemical make-up of the interstellar medium and prompting the formation of new stars. They have even had quite an effect on you; the calcium in your bones, the oxygen you breathe and the iron in your hemoglobin were all elements originally unleashed in these massive stellar explosions.

We know this now. Before 1987, however, much of our understanding of supernovae was based solely on theory. So astronomers around the world scrambled to observe the live event.

The Russian space station literally rocked back and forth to catch gamma-rays from the explosion. NASA looked for gamma-rays as well, launching high-altitude balloons from Australia to observe them. The Japanese satellite GINGA successfully detected X-rays. Observatories in South Africa, Chile and Australia kept track of the supernova’s light curve. And huge underground detectors in Japan, the United States and Russia detected subatomic particles known as neutrinos.

“It was a big party, a worldwide party, and stayed that way all year long,” Woosley says.

But it didn’t end there. Nearly any time a new observatory has come online over the last 33 years, it has swiveled toward the dying explosion. “All the instruments of modern astronomy have been used, by and large,” says Adam Burrows from Princeton University. “There isn't any class of instrumentation that hasn't been employed to study 87A.”
Early insights

A type II supernova erupts when a heavyweight star runs out of fuel and can no longer support itself against gravity. The bulk of the star comes crashing down toward its core, forcing it to collapse into one of the densest astrophysical objects known, a neutron star. A neutron star squeezes a few solar masses’ worth of star into an orb the size of a city. Meanwhile, the onrush of gas from the rest of the star rebounds against that core, sending a shock wave back toward the surface, which ultimately tears the star apart.

At least that was the theory. If true, the action would release a huge stream of particles called neutrinos. And because they would pass through the bulk of the star unimpeded, they would arrive at Earth even before the explosion could be seen as a blast of light. (In fact scientists now think that it’s not the bounce that blows up the star, but the neutrinos.)


Illustration by Sandbox Studio, Chicago

To check, scientists began poring over data from the Kamiokande II neutrino detector in Japan as soon as they heard about the eruption. It was painstaking work, but after a few days they spotted nearly a dozen neutrinos that had arrived a few hours before the flash of light—a Nobel Prize-winning discovery that confirmed a neutron star had formed within the blast. “It was the best time so far in my life,” says Masayuki Nakahata, who as a graduate student helped make the detection.

In total, the Kamiokande II detector in Japan counted 11 neutrinos, the IMB facility in Ohio reported eight and the Baksan Neutrino Observatory in Russia reported five more. Neutrino detectors haven’t seen so many particles at once since.

But while the observation of neutrinos confirmed theories, the observation of the type of star that went supernova went against them. Before SN1987A, textbooks asserted that only puffy red stars known as red supergiants could end their lives in such an explosion. But when scientists peered through past images of the location of the supernova, they found that 87A’s progenitor was a hotter and more compact blue supergiant.

Astronomers were baffled until the Hubble Space Telescope was launched in 1990. Its early images revealed what other telescopes had only hinted at: a thin ring of glowing gas that encircled the dying ember that 87A left behind, with two fainter rings above and below. These were clues that the star had dumped a lot of gas into space tens of thousands of years before it exploded. A previous outburst, likely from a red supergiant, could have whittled the star down to expose its hotter, bluer innards. Or perhaps two stars had collided together; this would have shed a lot of gas and left behind a hot mess.
An ongoing event

To this day, astronomers continue to pivot the Hubble Space Telescope toward SN1987A nearly every year—and for good reason. As the ejecta from the explosion continue to expand outward, they slam into the surrounding medium, lighting up previously unseen material that was emitted in winds before the supernova eruption. “We see something new every time we take an image,” says Josefin Larsson from the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden.

They’re not the only ones. The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile recently claimed to have spotted telltale evidence of the “missing” neutron star.

Although the detection of neutrinos indicated that a neutron star had formed within the embers, there was one major snag: Scientists have yet to actually spot the star itself. That’s a problem, given that the neutron star should finally be visible—unless of course there is too much dust surrounding the explosion. “It’s like trying to observe something through a Sahara Desert storm,” Woosley says.

Finally, there is a hint that the neutron star is there. Using ALMA, Phil Cigan, an astronomer from Cardiff University in the United Kingdom, and his colleagues spotted a small bright patch—affectionally dubbed “the blob”—within the dust of 87A consistent with where scientists predicted the neutron star should be.

They’re not calling the case closed, though; without being able to see the star directly, no one can prove that the supernova had the predicted effect. “It’s only tantalizing,” Burrows says. “We have to watch for a much longer time to see what’s left emerge.”

One hypothesis suggests that perhaps a neutron star formed but that it was only short-lived. If more material rained down in the aftermath of the explosion, the star could have gained so much weight that it collapsed further to form a black hole. “Suppose that happened, let’s say, in five days after the explosion,” says Kirshner, who is still at Harvard University and also works full-time as head of science philanthropy for the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. “I don’t think we would have any way to know whether that was true or not.”

Mikako Matsuura, an astronomer who worked on the ALMA observations at Cardiff, agrees that we cannot exclude this hypothesis. But Woosley says he doubts it, arguing that the most natural time to make a black hole would have been within seconds—a hypothesis that’s discounted by the length of the neutrino arrival.

Whether or not the supernova created a neutron star is “the biggest remaining question in 1987A right now,” Burrows says. And that means that observations won’t stop anytime soon, he says. “It has been a moveable feast—and continues to be.”

Astronomers hope it’s just a taste of what’s to come. Supernovae likely erupt every 50 years in a galaxy like ours, yet one hasn’t been seen since 1604 (SN1987A was not actually in our galaxy; it was nearby). “We feel as if we’re due for one,” Kirshner says.

It’s an exciting prospect, given the number of new observatories that have come online in recent years or are scheduled to begin operation soon. The James Webb Space Telescope would be able to image a supernova in the infrared. Radio telescopes like the upcoming Square Kilometer Array in South Africa and ALMA would collect radio waves. The Athena X-ray observatory, which is scheduled to be launched by the European Space Agency in the early 2030s, would image the energetic emission from the supernova. Gravitational wave facilities such as LIGO in North America, Virgo in Europe and KAGRA in Asia would detect ripples in space-time from such a supernova. Neutrino facilities such as IceCube at the South Pole, the NOvA detector (and an even larger upcoming project, the DUNE detector) in the United States, and the Super-Kamiokande detector (and an even larger upcoming project, the Hyper-Kamiokande detector) in Japan would be much more sensitive to the influx of neutrinos.

Nakahata, who owes his career to 87A and today works as a neutrino physicist, notes that the Hyper-Kamiokande detector alone would be able to witness tens of thousands of the particles in such an instance, a major upgrade from Kamiokande II’s previous record of 11. That would allow scientists to pin down further details behind the neutron star, like how much energy it might emit and the mass of the star itself. While the Hyper-Kamiokande detector would primarily be sensitive to antimatter particles—antineutrinos—the DUNE detector is complementary in that it would primarily be sensitive to matter particles—neutrinos. And additional observations from other detectors across the spectrum would provide even further insights.

“We should be treated to an incredible show,” Burrows says. “It would dwarf 87A in importance.”

UPDATED

12 Los Angeles firefighters recovering after explosion


AT ILLEGAL HASH OIL FACTORY


By STEFANIE DAZIO and FRANK BAKER

1 of 28

https://apnews.com/48a29168caab09da237d3cc56e6c2aa4/gallery/dd859627a6f94605b7fb89adb414311e

Los Angeles Police Department officers work the scene of a structure fire that injured multiple firefighters, according to a fire department spokesman, Saturday, May 16, 2020, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)


LOS ANGELES (AP) — Eight firefighters remained hospitalized Sunday after being hurt in an explosion at a hash oil manufacturer in downtown Los Angeles that sent crews running for their lives when a ball of flames shot out of the building and scorched a fire truck across the street.

The blast Saturday evening injured a dozen firefighters including some who ran out onto sidewalks, where they tore off their burning protective equipment including melted helmets, officials said.

“The was one of the worst scenes I’ve seen,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Capt. Erik Scott.


He said “one significant explosion” shook the neighborhood around 6:30 p.m. Firefighters inside had to run through a wall of flames he estimated as 30 feet (9 meters) high and wide, and those on the roof scrambled down a ladder that was engulfed in fire.

Three firefighters were released after spending the night in the hospital, fire department spokesman Nicholas Prange said Sunday. Of the eight that remained hospitalized, two were in critical but stable condition, he said. Officials initially announced that 11 firefighters were injured but Prange said a 12th was treated and released for a minor injury.

All were expected to survive.

“The good news is everybody’s going to make it,” Mayor Eric Garcetti said at a late Saturday news conference outside the Los Angeles County-University of Southern California Medical Center where all the injured were treated.

“Things could have been so much worse,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Medical Director Dr. Marc Eckstein, who works at the hospital and helped treat the injured.

Scott said people at the scene described the explosion as sounding like a freight train or jet engine.

Firefighters were called to 327 East Boyd St. in the city’s Toy District for a report of a fire at a one-story commercial building. There was light to moderate smoke when firefighters entered the building and went on the roof — normal procedures to try to quickly knock down any flames.

Los Angeles Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas said one of the firefighters inside the building thought things didn’t seem right — the pressure from the smoke and heat coming from the rear of the building were increasing. He directed everyone to get out, and they quickly started exiting the building as it was rocked by the explosion.

Firefighters on the roof scrambled down ladders with their protective coats on fire. The wall of flames shot out the building and burned seats inside a fire truck across the street.

More than 200 firefighters rushed to the scene, and dozens of engines, trucks and rescue vehicles clogged the streets. The fire spread to several nearby buildings, but firefighters were able to douse it in about an hour.

The injured firefighters were rushed to the hospital. Those who remained at the scene, unaware of the seriousness of their colleagues’ injuries, were traumatized by what had transpired, Terrazas said.

“You can imagine the amount of emotional stress,” he said.

Scott said the building was a warehouse for SmokeTokes, which he described as a maker of “butane honey oil.” Butane is an odorless gas that easily ignites, and it’s used in the process to extract the high-inducing chemical THC from cannabis to create a highly potent concentrate also known as hash oil. The oil is used in vape pens, edibles, waxes and other products.

On its website, SmokeTokes advertises a variety of products including “puff bars,” pipes, “dab” tools, vaporizers, “torches and butane,” and cartridges. The company says it is “an international distributor and wholesaler of smoking and vaping products, and related accessories.” Founded in 2009, it offers “discounts to loyal customers, fast shipping, a huge catalog of products and customer service that is untouched.”

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

___
Associated Press writer Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Investigators open criminal probe into LA explosion that injured a dozen firefighters

by STEFANIE DAZIO and FRANK BAKER ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sunday, May 17th 2020A



VIEW ALL PHOTOS

Los Angeles Fire Department firefighters work the scene of a structure fire that injured multiple firefighters, according to a fire department spokesman, Saturday, May 16, 2020, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Police and fire investigators launched a criminal probe Sunday into the cause of an explosion at a hash oil manufacturer in downtown Los Angeles that sent firefighters running for their lives.

Detectives from the Los Angeles Police Department's major crimes division were working with the city Fire Department's arson investigators to determine what might have sparked the blast that shot a ball of flames out of the building Saturday night and scorched a fire truck across the street, police spokesman Josh Rubenstein said.
“We're in the very early stages of the investigation ... to understand what happened and figure out how to move forward,” he said.

The Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was assisting local fire investigators, an agency spokeswoman said.

The blast injured a dozen firefighters including some who ran out onto sidewalks, where they tore off their burning protective equipment including melted helmets, officials said.


“The was one of the worst scenes I’ve seen,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Capt. Erik Scott.

Firefighters first thought they were battling a routine structure fire, Scott told KNX Radio, but as they got a little farther in the building they started to hear “a loud hissing sound and a significant rumbling that you could feel vibrating throughout the area.”



Los Angeles Fire Department firefighters work the scene of a structure fire that injured multiple firefighters, according to a fire department spokesman, Saturday, May 16, 2020, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

He said “one significant explosion” shook the neighborhood around 6:30 p.m. Firefighters inside had to run through a wall of flames he estimated as 30 feet (9 meters) high and wide, and those on the roof scrambled down a ladder that was engulfed in flames.

Three firefighters were released after spending the night in the hospital, fire department spokesman Nicholas Prange said Sunday. Of the eight that remained hospitalized, two were in critical but stable condition, he said. Officials initially announced that 11 firefighters were injured but Prange said a 12th was treated and released for a minor injury.

All were expected to survive.

“The good news is everybody’s going to make it,” Mayor Eric Garcetti said at a late Saturday news conference outside the Los Angeles County-University of Southern California Medical Center where all the injured were treated.

“Things could have been so much worse,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Medical Director Dr. Marc Eckstein, who works at the hospital and helped treat the injured.

There was light to moderate smoke when firefighters entered the one-story building in the city's Toy District and went on the roof — normal procedures to try to quickly knock down any flames.

Los Angeles Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas said one of the firefighters inside the building thought things didn’t seem right — the pressure from the smoke and heat coming from the rear of the building were increasing. He directed everyone to get out, and they quickly started exiting the building as it was rocked by the explosion.

Firefighters on the roof scrambled down ladders with their protective coats on fire. The wall of flames shot out the building and burned seats inside a fire truck across the street.

More than 200 firefighters rushed to the scene, and dozens of engines, trucks and rescue vehicles clogged the streets. The fire spread to several nearby buildings, but firefighters were able to douse it in about an hour.

The injured firefighters were rushed to the hospital. Those who remained at the scene, unaware of the seriousness of their colleagues’ injuries, were traumatized by what had transpired, Terrazas said.

“You can imagine the amount of emotional stress,” he said.

Scott said the building was a warehouse for SmokeTokes, which he described as a supplier for makers of “butane honey oil.” Butane is an odorless gas that easily ignites, and it’s used in the process to extract the high-inducing chemical THC from cannabis to create a highly potent concentrate also known as hash oil. The oil is used in vape pens, edibles, waxes and other products.

A call to SmokeTokes went unanswered on Sunday and the company's voicemail was full.

On its website, SmokeTokes advertises a variety of products including “puff bars,” pipes, “dab” tools, vaporizers, “torches and butane,” and cartridges. The company says it is “an international distributor and wholesaler of smoking and vaping products, and related accessories.”



A local resident holds her dog as she watches Los Angeles Fire Department firefighters working the scene of a structure fire that injured multiple firefighters, according to a fire department spokesman, Saturday, May 16, 2020, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Prange, the LAFD spokesman, said carbon dioxide and butane canisters were found inside the building but that it was still not clear what caused the blast.

Adam Spiker, executive director of the cannabis industry group Southern California Coalition, said he didn't know what activities were taking place inside the building. However, if the business was using butane in cannabis extraction it would be illegal, since the city has never issued a license for that type of operation.

Because of safety concerns, such businesses are typically restricted to industrial areas and kept away from urban centers.

“If they were doing volatile extraction with butane ... they couldn’t be legal in the city of LA to do those types of activities,” Spiker said.

He said the coalition was unaware of the business having any type of license and “something about this doesn’t pass the smell test.”

Information so far “puts up a lot of alarm bells,” Spiker said.

In 2016, there was another major fire at a business called Smoke Tokes at a nearby address. The Los Angeles Times reported at the time that it took more than 160 firefighters to put out the blaze and that they encountered pressurized gas cylinders that exploded in the fire.

No one was injured in the fire and it was unclear whether that business and the one that burned Saturday were connected.

Hash oil factory blast injures 11 

blast at a hash oil factory in Los Angeles has injured 11 firefighters who were caught by a ball of flame as they worked to put out a blaze.

The fireball shot out of the building and scorched a fire engine across the street when the explosion happened at 18:30 on Saturday (02:30 GMT Sunday).

Some of the firefighters had to run through a wall of flames 30ft (9m) high and wide to escape, an official said.

Three are in a critical condition but all are expected to survive.

All 11 firefighters suffered burns ranging from minor to serious, and two have been placed on ventilators.

Some of them were on fire as they ran out of the building and they ripped off their protective equipment, leaving it on pavement along with melted helmets, Los Angeles Fire Department Captain Erik Scott was quoted as saying by the Associated Press news agency.

It appears that butane gas was being used in the process to extract a chemical from cannabis to create hash oil, a powerful concentrate.

Los Angeles explosion: 11 firefighters hurt as 'hash oil factory' burns

Sam Levin Los Angeles correspondent and agencies

Sun 17 May 2020



Los Angeles explosion: 11 firefighters injured in 'major emergency' – video

An explosion in downtown Los Angeles has injured 11 firefighters, with scores more sent to put out the blaze in what was described as a factory making cannabis oil.

Captain Erik Scott of the Los Angeles fire department said “one significant explosion” shook the neighborhood around 6.30pm on Saturday and as first responders arrived they saw firefighters emerge from the building with burns and other injuries. Some of their uniforms were on fire.

Four firefighters were taken to a burns intensive care unit, two were put on ventilators due to signs of swelling airways and the other five who were hospitalized suffering a range of burns. The two firefighters on ventilators appeared to have inhaled superheated gases but as of around 10pm local time it seemed none of the injuries were life-threatening, said the fire department’s medical director, Marc Eckstein.

Firefighters were initially called to 327 East Boyd Street in the city’s Toy District for a report of a fire at a one-storey commercial building.

The LA fire department issued a “mayday” call, which means a firefighter is missing, down or trapped, and characterised the blaze as a “major emergency” with more than 230 firefighters responding. The fire spread to several nearby buildings but by 7.15pm appeared largely under control.

When the firefighters first entered the building before the explosion they saw “light to moderate smoke”, but also noticed that the pressure and heat was increasing inside, said fire chief Ralph M Terrazas: “Things didn’t seem right.” The firefighters moved to evacuate at this point and as they were starting to exit, the “explosion or flash” occurred, prompting the mayday call, he said. Some of their coats caught fire.

Scott described the business as a maker of “butane honey oil.” Butane is a flammable gas. Making the oil involves extracting the high-inducing chemical THC from cannabis plants to create a highly potent concentrate also known as hash oil. The oil is used in vape pens, edibles, waxes and other products.

Small butane canisters were later found on the street, officials said. The business where the explosion erupted may have been a wholesale distributor but the nature of the operation and the cause of the fire were still under investigation late Saturday evening.

“We have every expectation the firefighters will pull through,” Eckstein told reporters, noting that all firefighters were awake and alert upon arrival to the hospital. “It could’ve been much, much worse.”

Eckstein said there were no Covid-19 patients in the unit where the firefighters were being treated but the hospital was taking precautions to protect them.

Terrazas said the department was providing mental health services for the impacted first responders: “A lot of our firefighters were traumatized. You can imagine the amount of emotional stress.”

Jeralyn Cleveland told the Los Angeles Times she was on a roof of an apartment building a few blocks away when she saw the explosion: “Everyone in my building thought there was a bomb that went off. It was like a mushroom.”

The site of the fire was not far from Skid Row, a downtown LA neighborhood that is the epicenter of the city’s homelessness crisis.

Eleven firefighters injured in structure fire in downtown Los Angeles

May 17 (UPI) -- Eleven firefighters were injured, including three critically, in explosion at a commercial smoke shop in downtown Los Angeles, officials said.

During a news conference, Saturday night, officials said several firefighters were in the intensive care unit for burns at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, including at least two on ventilators. One injured firefighters will likely need skin grafts.

The incident was first reported at 6:26 p.m. in the city's Toy District in a one-story building.

The department posted on Twitter: "An explosion on scene has caused a MAYDAY with approx 10 firefighters down and multiple buildings on fire. This has been upgraded."

"A Mayday to us means a firefighter is missing, down or trapped," Fire Chief Ralph M. Terrazas said at the news conference.

Eyewitnesses said they saw firefighters coming out with their turnout coats on fire.

Within minutes, hundreds of firefighters responded to help. More than 230 firefighters responded to the blaze and the fire was put out just after 8 p.m.

Initially, the fire occurred at butane honey oil supplier.

Upon arrival, the blaze was described as having moderate smoke, Terrazas said, and smoke pressure was escalating when firefighters entered the building. They were directed to get out of the building as the explosion or flash occurred.

"Our hearts go out to their loved ones and fellow first responders," Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti posted on Twitter. "We are keeping them in our prayers.

Garcetti was on the scene.

'Coronatoon': A selection of COVID-19 caricatures

For weeks, there's been nothing but news about all things coronavirus. Cartoonists need no more than a few lines to trigger emotions like fear and sadness, but also hope for the day when this crisis is finally over.

FROM DW GERMANY

4 OF 12

https://www.dw.com/en/coronatoon-a-selection-of-covid-19-caricatures/g-53425632

Mass for Nazi-allied 'victims' sparks protest in Sarajevo

 Antifascist protesters marched in Sarajevo as the local Catholic cardinal served a mass for "Bleiburg victims" executed by Yugoslav partisans at the end of World War II. Most of those killed were pro-Nazi militants.    

Bosnian Cardinal Vinko Puljic held a mass to honor "Bleiburg victims" who died when the Yugoslavian communist regime executed thousands of mostly pro-Nazi militants in the immediate aftermath of WWII. The group also included a large number of civilians.

Leading the Saturday ceremony in Sarajevo, the Catholic cardinal said that "the victims cannot be forgotten" and that the prayer was aimed to "cleanse all bitter feelings and negative tensions that come up when the victims are remembered."

Only 20 people attended the service in the Sarajevo cathedral due to the coronavirus restrictions.

Read more: Neo-fascism on the rise in Croatia, Council of Europe finds

'It is not normal'

Meanwhile, thousands of protesters marched through the city in opposition of the event. The protesters slammed the mass as a thinly disguised attempt to rehabilitate Nazi collaborators, most notably Croatia's Ustasha militia that served the wartime fascist regime in Zagreb. With the support of the Axis forces, Ustasha held sway in Croatia and large parts of Bosnia, where they predominantly targeted Serbs and Jews during WWII.

In the closing months of the war, the Ustasha militia implemented a brutal terror campaign in Sarajevo, which included a public hanging of 55 of the city's residents. Over 10,000 residents of Sarajevo are believed to have lost their lives during the occupation.

On Saturday, anti-fascist protesters posted pictures of the hanged residents and displayed a banner reading "I am anti-fascist too" across Sarajevo's main street.

"My two grandfathers, their brothers and my grandmother were all killed by these fascists who have been honored today," 63-year-old retired electro-technician Cedomir Jasksic told the Reuters news agency.

"It is not normal that a city such as Sarajevo... allows something like this to happen," he added.

Catholic Zvonimir Nikolic described the mass as a "disaster for Sarajevo," while Bosniak Sead Sahovic, who was born in the Ustasha concentration camp Stara Gradiska, slammed the commemoration as a "horrifying farce."'

Read more: Croatian bishops push for mass at Ustasha-linked Bleiburg memorial

Puljic unmoved by protests

The decision to hold the mass prompted a storm of criticism in Bosnia & Herzegovina, including a condemnation from the Israeli and the US embassies. However, the Croatian parliament endorsed the event, and the country's ambassador to Sarajevo attended the Saturday mass.

In the days leading up to the commemoration, Cardinal Puljic seemed to shrug off the accusations of praising Nazi collaborators.

Talking to Croatian Catholic Radio, Puljic said that "the Church has always respected innocent victims" and was the mass was not intended to celebrate anyone.

He added that a "crime cannot be defended by (another) crime."

Read more: My Europe: Stop glorifying fascists!

Canceled due to coronavirus

With the breakdown of Nazi Germany in April and May of 1945, members of pro-Nazi militias from various parts of Yugoslavia fled towards Austria with their family members. Their goal was to surrender to British forces at Bleiburg, but the British army rejected their surrender and extradited them to Communist forces, which also included a large percentage of ethnic Croatians. Many of the prisoners were executed without trial during the return march through Slovenia.

The executions remained a taboo topic until the breakup of socialist Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. A large event to commemorate the victims is now held annually in Bleiburg, with many of the visitors displaying Ustasha and Nazi symbols. Last year, the Austrian diocese denied permission to hold a mass at the site, prompting criticism from their Croatian counterparts. It also prompted a reaction from Croatia's then-president, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, who said that she "deeply regrets" the ban as a "Croatian and a woman of faith." The Bleiburg rally of 2020 has been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

dj/mm
 (Reuters, AP, Beta, AFP. dpa)

DW RECOMMENDS

Opinion: Catholic cardinal to rally fascists in Sarajevo

A cardinal intends to commemorate fascists executed in 1945 after being sent back to Yugoslavia from Austria. The EU and Catholic Church must take a stand, the German politician Christian Schwarz-Schilling writes. (16.05.2020)  

Serbia protests EU's 'fake' description of Nikola Tesla as Croatian

The Serbian foreign minister has sent an outraged note to Brussels after one of the EU's online resources referred to inventor Nikola Tesla as a "famous Croatian." Serbia called the claim "fake news." (09.05.2020)  

Croatian President Milanovic protests WWII Ustasha slogan

Croatian President Zoran Milanovic has walked out of a war of independence memorial event when some of the participants displayed a slogan used by the pro-Nazi Ustasha militia. PM Andrej Plenkovic criticized the exit. (01.05.2020)  

• Date 16.05.2020
• Related Subjects Bosnia, Croatia, Sarajevo
• Keywords Bleiburg, Vinko Puljic, Ustasha, Sarajevo, Croatia, mass, anti-fascist
• Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3cLD8

Germany: Radiation leak detected at research reactor

A research reactor near Munich has emitted excess C-14 radiation, says the Bavarian city's technical university. The "slight" leak late March had shown up Thursday when monthly readings were collated.


Munich's technical university (TUM) said Saturday a neutron reactor located at Garchingjust north of the metropole was found to have leaked nuclides into the atmosphere "slightly" above the level permitted annually in its license.

Neither human beings nor the surrounding environment had been endangered, said the TUM and Bavaria's environmental ministry — responsible for oversight.

Monthly figures collated on Thursday had shown an excess in C-14 particles 15% above the permitted yearly level, with the potential to cause "theoretically" a load for the public of 3 Mikrosieverts at the maximum.

That was less than the level a patient undergoing an x-ray at the dentists' would endure, said Anke Görg spokesperson for the TUM's operating institute, known as FRMII.

"An individual error during the installation of the mobile drying unit used for this purpose caused the discharge of the C-14 over a short period of time," Görg added, referring to a method used to extract C-14 in resin from water in the reactor's tank.

The Munich-based Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper said the notifiable incident was ranked "0," very low on the international scale.

Read more: Germany's anti-nuclear movement: Still going strong after four decades of activism

Garching's divisive 'Egg'

Garching's special campus, where an "egg"-shaped dome covers an older reactor — used between 1957 and 2000 — draws annually about 1,000 international researchers who experiment with its newer neutron reactor, the so-called FRMII.

The facility was put on hold on March 17 because of the current pandemic, leaving many scientists unable to glean results for industry and medicine, said Görg.

The FRMII reactor, inaugurated in 2005, remains controversial among organizations like Germany's branch of Friends of the Earth (BUND) and opposition Greens in Bavaria's state assembly.

Detection of the isotope C-14 is a key method in so-called carbon-dating to determine the age of ancient objects containing organic material.

Read more: Winds of change push German power grid to brink

Decades of turmoil

Bavaria, which in the 1970s went through political turmoil over the siting of six nuclear reactors, now has only two of them in operation — Isar 2 east of Munich, and Gundremmingen C, west of Augsburg.

As a whole, Germany currently has six reactors running as a whole, according to the federal environment ministry, as it continues its nuclear-power phase-out, spurred by Japan's 2011 Fukushima disaster, as it pushes for renewables.

Read more: Nuclear reactor to shut down amid Germany's atomic phase-out

Europe still has 108 reactors running

Positioned just outside Germany's borders are further nuclear plants, for example, Cattenom, a four-reactor French power station.

It lies alongside the Moselle river in France's Lothringia region, adjacent to Germany's states of Saarland and Rhineland Palatinate, and EU hub Luxembourg.

Downwind in terms of prevailing weather are German cities such as Frankfurt, Mainz and Heidelberg.

Western Europe currently has 108 operational reactors, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEO) based in Paris.

ipj/mm (dpa, SZ)


DW RECOMMENDS

German wind energy stalls amid public resistance and regulatory hurdles

The German Economy Ministry has held a summit to discuss a dramatic slowdown in the wind energy sector that's threatening agreed climate goals. The problems are due to policy mistakes and growing public resistance. (04.09.2019)

Date 16.05.2020

Keywords nuclear reactors, Garching, neutron research, Munich Technical University, nuclear phase-out

Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3cLII