Ford Ready To Produce Hydrogen Vehicles?

Ford Motors is testing out a small fleet of hydrogen powered shuttle buses which use a modified gasoline engine rather than anything exotic like a fuel cell. There are about 30 of these in various places around the country. The drawback - other than a lack of fueling infrastructure - is the very high cost. Almost four times the price of a standard shuttle bus.

DEARBORN, Mich. - The relatively quick-and-easy answer to foreign oil dependence and automotive greenhouse gas emissions is circling the grounds every day at Orlando International Airport in Florida, according to a top Ford Motor Co. official. It's a utilitarian 12-passenger parking lot shuttle bus powered by a 6.8-liter internal combustion hydrogen engine, which Ford officials said is their hydrogen technology that's closest to mass production.

"We really believe this technology is ready to be evaluated at the consumer level," John Lapetz, the company's program manager for the buses, told reporters on Tuesday at an event staged to tout Ford's future vehicles.

About 30 E-450 Hydrogen shuttle buses are working across the U.S. and Canada, and Ford engineers are monitoring them electronically in real time, Lapetz said. The vehicles, powered by a modified gasoline engine, have near zero emissions and get up to 13 percent better fuel economy than their gasoline counterparts, he said.

Nearly every automaker is testing hydrogen-powered vehicles across the world, touting them as a renewable alternative to gasoline.

Lapetz said Ford has the ability to bring internal combustion hydrogen technology to market in cars within five years. But that's only if fuel storage limitations can be solved, public fear of hydrogen can be allayed, filling stations set up, and gas prices stay high.

"The technology is there at a sufficient level, in the three-to-five year window, if all things were perfect, we could reasonably think this is a solution we could draw on," Lapetz said. "We're not really talking about invention, that's the thing. We know how to manufacture this kind of technology in high volumes."

This may indeed be a viable technology, but there are a lot of problems with infrastructure that will have to be figured out. But the cost factor is going to be the biggest problem. People will not pay four times the already rather high cost of automobiles. The story does not give the cost of hydrogen, either, but that will likely be a factor as well.

The Drumsticks Of Doom

No maybe some of those doubters out there will begin to believe us about the menace of the Animal Uprising™. Because the animal overlords have figure out a way to cause the maximum amount of damage with the minimum amount of resource expenditure. Flaming crows cause a lot of damage.

ASPEN, Colo. - A bird that caught fire after being electrocuted at a substation is suspected of igniting a 2 acre wildfire Monday, officials said. Fire personnel weren't able to identify whether the bird was raven or a crow that flew into exposed elements hanging from a high crossbeam on poles.

There were no witnesses, so officials stopped short of saying the flaming bird was at fault.

The bird "got zapped when it hit one of those things they call a terminator," Pitkin County Deputy Joe Bauer said. "Then it fell, probably on fire, right at the base of one of these poles."

Absolutely the most aptly named piece of electrical equipment in the world. But consider the implications. After all, if one combustible Kamikaze crow can burn two acres, what could a flock of sizzling suicidal seagulls do?

The Flight Of The Lawn Chair

Oh,no. Someone has done it yet again. Emulating Larry Walters and the flight of the lawn chair.

BEND, Ore. - Last weekend, Kent Couch settled down in his lawn chair with some snacks — and a parachute. Attached to his lawn chair were 105 large helium balloons.

Destination: Idaho.

With instruments to measure his altitude and speed, a global positioning system device in his pocket, and about four plastic bags holding five gallons of water each to act as ballast — he could turn a spigot, release water and rise — Couch headed into the Oregon sky.

Nearly nine hours later, the 47-year-old gas station owner came back to earth in a farmer's field near Union, short of Idaho but about 193 miles from home.

"When you're a little kid and you're holding a helium balloon, it has to cross your mind," Couch told the Bend Bulletin.

"When you're laying in the grass on a summer day, and you see the clouds, you wish you could jump on them," he said. "This is as close as you can come to jumping on them. It's just like that."

Couch is the latest American to emulate Larry Walters — who in 1982 rose three miles above Los Angeles in a lawn chair lifted by balloons. Walters had surprised an airline pilot, who radioed the control tower that he had just passed a guy in a lawn chair. Walters paid a $1,500 penalty for violating air traffic rules.

It was Couch's second flight.

In September, he got off the ground for six hours. Like Walters, he used a BB gun to pop the balloons, but he went into a rapid descent and eventually parachuted to safety.

This time, he was better prepared. The balloons had a new configuration, so it was easier to reach up and release a bit of helium instead of simply cutting off a balloon.

Ah, rapid advances in technology. Mr. Couch should be getting a call from the Federal Aviation Administration any time now, however. They frown on aerial lawn furniture. If you're not familiar with Larry Walters' story, or only know the highly embellished Darwin Award version that went around years ago, Snopes has the real details of the flight and the tragic end of Larry Walters eleven years later.

Wedding Bell Blues

Somehow, one just gets the feeling that this marriage is not exactly made in Heaven. A woman spent her wedding weekend in a jail cell after beating her newly-minted groom. Over the head. With a stiletto-heeled shoe.

LONDON - Scottish bride Teresa Brown's dream of a perfect wedding day probably did not include attacking the groom with her stiletto shoe and spending the weekend in a cell.

Police arrested the 33-year-old in the couple's hotel room in April while her wedding reception continued downstairs, prosecutor Alan Townsend said Tuesday at Aberdeen Sheriff Court. She spent the rest of her wedding weekend in a cell.

The distraught groom, Mark Allerton, 40, staggered to the front desk, clutching a bloody towel to his head, Townsend said.

"He indicated that his wife had struck him over the head with a stiletto heel," the prosecutor said.

Police found Brown, a real estate agent's assistant, sitting on the hotel room bed, surrounded by broken glass.

Brown told police she and her husband had "been accusing each other of different things," the prosecutor said, without going into details. Brown said she hit him on the head because he had taken a hold of her, he added.

The couple is in counseling. We should, however, look on the bright side. Being as the bride was from Scotland, this could have been a lot worse. There could have been a claymore involved…..

Kanalkampf

British historians generally accept July 10, 1940 as the start of the Battle of Britain. German historians don't have it starting until after the initial phase the British call the start. The Germans called the initial phase the Kanalkampf, the Channel battles. A series of running air battles erupted over convoys and shipping in the English Channel, lasting through August 11, 1940 when the  Luftwaffe switched from shipping to attacking airfields.

The British, despite using obsolete tactics and having a severely limited supply of qualified fighter pilots managed to hang on and defeat the Germans in the skies over Britain. When it was all said and done, Winston Churchill summed it up with one of the most famous lines he ever spoke:

"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

(More excerpts from that speech can be found here. The British Battle of Britain historical website features the actual command diaries that Fighter Command kept throughout the battles. There is also an official historical society with a number of resources.)

The Possibilities Are Endless

An architect hired by the city of San Diego to review development plans has made the news over the reported characterization of one proposed project. It kind of gives a whole new meaning to the phrase 'erecting a building'.

"With its rounded forms and swelling of the uppermost floors…this building structure is very phallic," wrote Gwynne Pugh, a Santa Monica architect hired by the downtown redevelopment agency to review building designs.

San Diego-based Sandor Shapery's proposal for a 160-unit hotel and condominium tower was expected to go before the redevelopment agency for initial feedback this month. Instead Shapery has asked for more time to "revisit" and perhaps "tone down" the design because he does not want to offend anyone.

"If it looks like a phallic symbol, someone has a strange perception," said Shapery, who was trying to create an "organic form." "You can find sex anywhere if you want to…There's just some sick people out there."

Well, we could riff off the "organic form" bit, but you can judge for yourself whether this is a condom-inium project or not by checking out the conceptual drawing from the website. Let's just say that there are some serious potential product placement opportunities.

Expedience

The Dallas Morning News is extremely unhappy with President Bush and the war in Iraq. That does not, however, make them supporters of a precipitous withdrawal that will only make matters even worse. And they are calling on Congress to stop trying the expedient and face up to the facts.

Momentum is building on Capitol Hill for a showdown with President Bush on an Iraq troop withdrawal, now that 18 benchmarks for progress will not be met by a mid-September deadline. Before the momentum becomes unstoppable, we'd like to ask all sides to consider the cliff up ahead.

The growing chorus of dissent in Congress makes clear that fear – specifically the fear of a voter backlash in 2008 – is driving legislators to choose the most expedient route over one that accounts for America's, as well as Iraq's, best long-term interests.

Nobody, except our enemies, is happy with the 3,600-plus U.S. death toll. Nobody can tolerate Iraqi leaders' ongoing failure to get their house in order. But just because key Republicans, including Sens. Pete Domenici and Richard Lugar, are ending support for the administration's troop-surge strategy does not mean that the Democratic plan for a pullout is the best or only solution.

We think it's a bad idea that risks repeating the same mistakes that the Bush administration made when it launched the Iraq war.

No supporters of the war, they are also honest enough to admit that the alternative will be a disaster for America and for the Middle East. The Democrats leading the charge here better realize that one of their own will, at some point, have to deal with the wreckage in the Middle East that will be created if they continue to pander to the left.

No supporters of the war, they are also honest enough to admit that the alternative will be a disaster for America and for the Middle East. The Democrats leading the charge here better realize that one of their own will, at some point, have to deal with the wreckage in the Middle East that will be created if they continue to pander to the left.

The Enemy Who Must Not Be Named

Melanie Phillips is enormously unhappy with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and the government response to the recent failed terror attacks by a bunch of homicidal (but thankfully technically inept) jihadi doctors. The response thus far has been to ban the word 'Muslim' from discussions of terrorists who happen to be from the religion that may no longer be named.

Britain is now fighting a war it dares not name. The recent failed car bomb attacks on a London nightclub and Glasgow airport demonstrated once again that Britain is a principal target for al-Qaeda. But even now, the British response is dangerously confused.

After eight people in the medical profession were arrested over these attacks, there was widespread shock that those who cure should also want to kill. This naive and ahistorical reaction demonstrated yet again the extraordinary state of denial about the Islamist jihad. After all, Osama bin Laden's sidekick, Ayman al-Zawahri, is a doctor. So are other Islamist terrorists, including Mahmoud Zahar, the Hamas strongman in Gaza.

But because the deeply empirical British do not understand how religious fanaticism twists the human mind, they tell themselves that Islamic terrorism must be driven by rational grievances such as deprivation, "Islamophobia" or British foreign policy.

Many continue to believe that Britain is a target because of its involvement in Iraq. While the war is undoubtedly used to whip up hysteria in the Muslim world, the irrationality of believing that it is the cause of Islamic terror is clearly demonstrated by the fact that British Muslims who have been jailed for terrorist offenses were recruited even before 9/11. Al-Qaeda is also heavily engaged in places such as Indonesia or Africa, which have no connection to Iraq or the Middle East.

In Britain, all these grievance excuses are wearing very thin, thanks to the recent emergence of former jihadists who have renounced their extremism.

Ed Husain, in his book The Islamist, and another former radical, Hassan Butt, have made the case that the doctrines to which they once subscribed are rooted in nothing other than a fanatical desire to Islamize the world.

But while these courageous people are telling Britain that, far from being motivated by despair, Islamist terrorists kill as an act of religious exultation, the new prime minister, Gordon Brown, has banned his ministers from using the word "Muslim" — and presumably "Islamic" or "Islamist" — in connection with the terrorist crisis. He has also put an end to the phrase "war on terror."

While I try to separate islamists from Islam when writing about the subject, it is difficult when the jihadis themselves continue to trumpet their religious trappings and their public calls for the conquest of the West. Refusing to face that reality is, as Phillips points out, a dangerous sign of weakness.

Snow And Freezing Weather

Buenos Aires, Argentina has not seen snowfall since 1918. Well, until yesterday, that is. An hours long snowfall left a coating of snow all over the area. This follows close on the heels of a record-shattering cold snap that has left a number of people dead from exposure.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - Thousands of Argentines cheered and threw snowballs in the streets of Buenos Aires on Monday as the capital's first major snowfall since 1918 spread a thin white mantle across the region.

Wet snow fell for hours in the Argentine capital, accumulating in a mushy but thin white layer late Monday, after freezing air from Antarctica collided with a moisture-laden low pressure system that blanketed higher elevations in western and central Argentina with snow.

"Despite all my years, this is the first time I've ever seen in snow in Buenos Aires," said Juana Benitez, an 82-year-old who joined children celebrating in the streets.

Argentina's National Weather Service said it was the first major snow in Buenos Aires since June 22, 1918, though sleet or freezing rain have been periodically reported in decades since……..

……The snow followed a bitter cold snap in late May that saw subfreezing temperatures, the coldest in 40 years in Buenos Aires. That cold wave contributed to an energy crisis and 23 deaths from exposure.

Two more exposure deaths were reported on Monday.

Argentina should immediately issue a plea for Al Gore to not visit Buenos Aires. Otherwise they might have to buy snowplows.

Pakistan Seizes Red Mosque

Pakistani forces assaulted the Red Mosque in Islamabad today - the battle cost at least 58 lives so far according to the reports. Most of those were people inside the mosque. There is no word yet on how many hostages died as a result of the actions of the "brave" jihadis. The battle is still not over - some armed thugs are still holding hostages more than ten hours after the fighting began.

The troops stormed the mosque compound before dawn. More than 10 hours later, they were still trying to root out the well-armed defenders said to be holding a number of hostages. Officials said at least 50 women were allowed to go free from the complex. Some 26 children had earlier escaped.

Clashes this month between security forces and supporters of the mosque's hardline clerics prompted the siege. The religious extremists had been trying to impose Taliban-style morality in the capital through a six-month campaign of kidnappings and threats. At least 80 people have been killed since July 3.

Amid the sounds of rolling explosions, commandos attacked from three directions about 4 a.m. and quickly cleared the ground floor of the mosque, army spokesman Gen. Waheed Arshad said.

Arshad said hostages were still being held and that fighting continued to be intense.

"We are taking a step-by-step approach so there is no collateral damage," he told reporters. "We are fighting room by room." He added that stun grenades were being used to avoid casualties among the hostages.

In addition to the women, Arshad said about 50 suspected militants, some of them youngsters, have been captured or emerged from the mosque since the fighting erupted Tuesday.

The "brave" cleric that helped touch this whole thing off is hiding in the basement of the school bravely holding children in font of himself as human shields and vowing to fight to the last drop of their blood.

An officer who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media said troops had cornered the mosque's chief cleric, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, in the basement of the school but held back from an all-out assault because a number of children were being held there as hostages.

Troops demanded four times that he surrender but his followers responded with gunfire and Ghazi said he was ready to die rather than give up, the officer said.

One assumes that this brave cleric could not obtain a burqa to try and sneak out in like Auntie Aziz did.