Fourth Update: The Horizontal Auger In The Himalayas Is Eighty-Sixed. Cannot Be Repaired (Now Hand Drilling Underway); But Vertical Shaft Drilling Continues…

November 25, 2023November 25, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

While there is only about 40 linear-foot of horizontal drift yet to drill out, the continuing slippage of bad rock there makes it “two ahead; one back”. And now, the horizontal auger — a huge, hulking piece of black soot belching diesel machinery, has completely broken down — it must be replaced. and so, a new one is wending its way overland from the south by eighteen wheeled truck. [Prior post here.]

The only good news it that the vertical shaft work is progressing, with a new overhead driller. At this point it looks like the team needs to drill out almost 360 feet, to get to the miners. So — as I said, we are perhaps a month away from the miners’ emergence from the dark. Here’s a Saturday-datelined ABC report:

…The [horizontaal] drilling machine broke down late Friday while making its way through the rubble, stones and metal, forcing the rescuers to work by hand to remove debris in hopes of reaching the stranded workers, but the whole operation has currently ground to a halt.

Arnold Dix, an international expert assisting the rescue team at the accident site in the mountainous Uttarakhand state, said it is unclear when the drilling will start again.

“The machine is busted. It is irreparable,” he told reporters. “The mountain has once again resisted the auger (machine).”

Dix said the rescuers would need to pull out the entire drilling machine and replace it to restart the digging. He didn’t specify how much time it would take….

We are mindful that hot food, water and fresh air are all being delivered, on the regular — but getting them all out is still a fair piece off. Do keep them in your meditations — they need more good ju ju.

नमस्ते

[U: Hinderaker pops off!] What Will Scott Johnson / John Hinderaker Say? Chauvin Shanked In Prison In Arizona Tonight..

November 24, 2023November 25, 2023 ~ condor ~ 2 Comments

Here is the AP, on it:

… Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd, was stabbed by another inmate and seriously injured Friday at a federal prison in Arizona, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press….

A person with knowledge of the incident said that Mr. Chauvin survived the attack….

Updated — Hinderaker saw the news first, from across the pond in Paris while Scott was sleeping (since it was morning coffee time, in France). John thinks Chauvin was innocent, and railroaded. What a putz.

Now — on Sat. Morning, in MN, Scott believes Mr. Chauvin, who killed George Floyd, should go free. Though he has quite justifiably criticized Candace Owens of late, he believes much of the same false narrative she spews about Mr. Floyd [in a supposed “documentary” that was never aired, not even on Shapiro’s media properties.]

In any event, it goes without saying that the former officer shouldn’t have been shanked in gen pop in Arizona, likely at FCI Tucson, a federal medium security unit (he’s been transferred there, from Minnesota).

But… he should still do all his bid, after leaving the hospital.

That’s… justice. He will live on, after prison. He took every version of Mr. Floyd’s future, that there ever could have been.

In 20 years, Mr. Chauvin will still likely have around 30 good years left… while Mr. Floyd’s now almost ten year old daughter will never see him again.

So — Chauvin should stay in jail; 20 years is justice. That’s my take.

Out.

Just Like Bill Otis (Last Night), Hinderaker Thinks MORE Terrorism Is The Answer In Gaza. Yawn.

November 24, 2023November 24, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

He writes tonight that “our president… should have told Hamas long ago that if all Americans were not freed within 12 hours, Gaza would be reduced to rubble….”

Spoken like a doddering embittered old man, with no skin in the game left — sitting on the opposite side of the globe.

Being the second or third terrorist power into a skirmish like this… won’t solve Hamas terrorism, ever, you senile old coot. This is obvious — this, based on the 2,300 years of history in that sand. And he well knows it.

Damn. [It is also wrong, for all the reasons we mentioned last night re Bill Otis.]

Out.

A Look Ahead: Year End 2023 Results, At Merck… May Be Guiding Too Low(?)

November 24, 2023November 24, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

As we finish the annual “day after” dim sum feast on Cermak… I’ll take this moment to note that by December 31, 2023, Rahway will undoubtedly be able to truthfully say it sells the world’s most lucrative single therapeutic agent, vastly eclipsing Humira — at over $23 billion a year. [We should note, of course, that since the below projections come from a company known to Wall Street as a public company for nearly as long as there have been US public companies — the executives likely shade the guidance to be a little conservative… understanding that “missing” by being overly optimistic will be harshly punishing to the stock price, while missing on the low side simply causes a bump up on the NYSE. In sum, Merck’s management is unlikely to be too far out over its skis — all as Elon Musk so often is, as a mere baby in public company land. A big baby, but still… a baby.] So, Rahway’s year end might be slightly better than the below, when the dust settles.

True, it will have expensed the $5.5 billion, previously disclosed, on the Daiichi Sankyo deal — and about $100 million on the Caraway M&A deal in the quarter, but no one will even notice, given the hoards of cash being trucked in on pembrolizumab, thus (from the Q3 2023 guidance):

…Merck now expects its full-year non-GAAP EPS to be between $1.33 and $1.38, including a negative impact of foreign exchange of approximately 6 percentage points, at mid-October 2023 exchange rates. This revised non-GAAP EPS range reflects the following, which were not previously included in the outlook:

Additional strength in the business of approximately $0.15 per share.

A pretax charge of $5.5 billion, or $1.70 per share, for the collaboration agreement with Daiichi Sankyo.

Estimated expense in the fourth quarter of 2023 of approximately $0.04 per share to advance the ADC assets and finance the transaction with Daiichi Sankyo.

A 1%, or approximately $0.05 per share, incremental negative impact of foreign exchange.

The non-GAAP EPS range excludes acquisition- and divestiture-related costs, costs related to restructuring programs, income and losses from investments in equity securities, and a previously disclosed charge related to settlements with certain plaintiffs in the Zetia antitrust litigation….

Now you know — do go enjoy the piping hot green tea by the kettle, and the flat noodles, with steamed barbequed pork buns and curry chicken stuffed turnover pastries!

नमस्ते

Bill Otis Thinks… BECOMING A Terrorist Is The Answer… To Terrorism. Charming.

November 23, 2023 ~ condor ~ 1 Comment

As we let our sweet potato pie and lemon squares settle (the former with whipped cream and the latter with some hot coffee)… we note that Bill Otis (a former prosecutor, no less)… thinks that becoming terrorists, to combat terror… somehow will ennoble a nation — and achieve peace.

Damn. That’s just sad. Here it is — in context:

…Mindful that there are American as well as Israeli hostages, Biden and Netanyahu would deliver the following message to the mullahs in Iran, who are certainly behind this, and to the leadership of Hamas: For every day starting tomorrow that the hostages are not released, every single one of them, one of you is going to be killed. There will be no warning. Whether by bombing, poisoning by one of your staff we’ve compromised, by drone, by sniper — that’s for us to know….

I need not say much else — when a former prosecutor advocates for a return to the law of the wild.

Indeed, no Rhodes Scholar, he.

Out.

I Guess The “Spilled Toothpicks” Of Ionized Hydrogen… Are The Oddest Things, In This Image.

November 23, 2023November 23, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Just closing this out now. Welp. Exactly… why would ionized hydrogen (illustrated by dotted pink lines, here) — at the center of our Milky Way, at least, be aligned in randomly oriented long “needles“, something like toothpicks spilled from a box, onto the floor — where each toothpick is perhaps dozens of light years long?! That’s a mystery cosmologists will ponder in the next decades.

I’ll also… marvel that this bit of space science has an UNDERGRAD, at the University of Virginia, as its principal investigator. Well done, Samuel Crowe! [He is being advised and supervised by a full professor, to be fair.] But that’s one whale of a resume builder, for a 20 year old:

“➢ Discovered an entirely new form of ionized hydrogen structures — many light years across — at the center of the Milky Way, in Sag C…”

Wow.

नमस्ते

Me? I’m Still Waiting For A “St. Elmo’s Fire” Generating Flight On Mars… Heh.

November 22, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

NASA is learning lots of new low pressure atmosphere / chopper flying tricks, out 41 million miles into the night sky.

Below is the latest, but simple physics in that low pressure environment would suggest that if the copter is flown at high RPMs, at sunset — we ought to see a very noticeable blue green glow — St. Elmo’s Fire.

That image is at right, with my old story on that possibility here, from February 2022.

But here is NASA’s latest on chopper flying — off world, on Barsoom:

…Over the past nine months, we have doubled our max airspeed and altitude, increased our rate of vertical and horizontal acceleration, and even learned to land slower,” said Travis Brown, Ingenuity’s chief engineer at JPL. “The envelope expansion provides invaluable data that can be used by mission designers for future Mars helicopters.”

Limited by available energy and motor-temperature considerations, Ingenuity flights usually last around two to three minutes. Although the helicopter can cover more ground in a single flight by flying faster, flying too fast can confuse the onboard navigation system. The system uses a camera that recognizes rocks and other surface features as they move through its field of view. If those features whiz by too fast, the system can lose its way.

So, to achieve a higher maximum ground speed, the team sends commands for Ingenuity to fly at higher altitudes (instructions are sent to the helicopter before each flight), which keeps features in view longer. Flight 61 established a new altitude record of 78.7 feet (24 meters) as it checked out Martian wind patterns. With Flight 62 Ingenuity set a speed record of 22.3 mph (10 meters per second) — and scouted a location for the Perseverance rover’s science team.

The team has also been experimenting with Ingenuity’s landing speed. The helicopter was designed to contact the surface at a relatively brisk 2.2 mph (1 mps) so its onboard sensors could easily confirm touchdown and shut down the rotors before it could bounce back into the air. A helicopter that lands more slowly could be designed with lighter landing gear. So, on Flights 57, 58, and 59 they gave it a whirl, demonstrating Ingenuity could land at speeds 25% slower than the helicopter was originally designed to land at.

All this Martian Chuck Yeager-ing is not over. [Ed. Note: Glad to hear it! We have some… suggestions (see first paragraph)!] In December, after solar conjunction, Ingenuity is expected to perform two high-speed flights during which it will execute a special set of pitch-and-roll angles designed to measure its performance.

“The data will be extremely useful in fine-tuning our aero-mechanical models of how rotorcraft behave on Mars,” said Brown….

The footage would be… amazing!

Okay — likely falling silent now, until Friday — with so many pots boilin’ all at once here through late afternoon tomorrow… smile.

नमस्ते

With Any Luck — She Will Fade Away Now, Like A Skid Mark… On Old, Broken Pavement…

November 22, 2023November 22, 2023 ~ condor ~ Leave a comment

Tapson is right: Candace Owen’s is… a fraud.

She’s a fake.

Not an intellectual at all, on the hard right frontier.

I don’t care for Ben Shapiro either — on viewpoints.

But no one ever threaten Ms. Owens’ right to quote scripture. She used it as a… hat trick, to distract from the fact that she was losing an argument with her boss.

Hilarious. They can have at it:

“…for every garbage can, there is always a lid… out there.”

Onward. Go have your third baby, Candace. Maybe we will hear less of, and from — you, from now on. That would be… wonderful.

Out.