Russian Winters Not

This was what I got listening to a program on the BBC radio today: The Russians are trying to do away with their snowy winter weather for good by cloud seeding. They, along with a few other places, have been using cloud seeding for a while to make sure sunny days were in the forecast for whenever they planned large events/parades and such. But now they want to use it to get rid of their snow!
This is amazing to me, and I listen and understand how they do the process now, but really? Taking the snow out of Moscow? How sad. If anyone could find the actual report given (it was today, not that long ago), I would really appriciate it. All I'm finding is general information on cloud seeding, and I want to know how and why they plan on getting rid of their wonderful winter weather.

Soviet icon surprises polar scientists

By MICHAEL FIELD - Fairfax Media | Friday, 04 January 2008

Scientists trekking across a little visited part of Antarctica have discovered a bizarre relic of the Soviet Union is dominating the South Pole of Inaccessibility.

In the middle of no-where – literally the point on Antarctica furthest from the sea – an imposing bust of revolutionary Bolshevik Vladimir Lenin peers out onto the polar emptiness.

A Norwegian-US Scientific Traverse met Lenin this week while nearly a thousand kilometres to the south another group were "moving" the South Pole – literally.

A barber's pole marks the actual spot but the US Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station sits on top of a moving ice-sheet - so the Pole moves.

The Inaccessibility Pole marks the point on Antarctica that is furthest from the ocean. At 3718 metres above sea-level it is in the Australian zone and seldom visited.

The Scientific Traverse this week made it to the Inaccessibility Pole for New Year's Day and found a one time Soviet Union base buried under the ice.

The group's website says Soviet scientists first visited the Pole in December 1958 and built a small cabin there.

After several weeks they left, putting the bust of Lenin on top of the chimney facing Moscow.

"Today the bust is clearly visible from many kilometres away, and remains as they left it on the chimney, although the cabin itself is buried under the snow," the explorers say.

The current expedition plans to leave something more substantial in the form of an automatic weather station. They will also drill a 90 metre ice core.

One of the drillers, Lou Albershardt, told an US website that they took six weeks to reach the pole, noticing Lenin from a long way out.

They all speculated on what the bust might have been made out of; marble or concrete.
“You wouldn’t believe it. He’s plastic,” he said.

Lenin died in 1924 and his corpse was embalmed and placed in a mausoleum on Moscow's Red Square.

The old Soviet base sits at 82 degrees six minute south, 54 degrees 58 minutes east. The pole's actual position is disputed around how to define the coast to the north.

The Inaccessibility Pole is around 878 kilometres from the South Pole.

At the South Pole a ceremony was held this week to move the Pole and put in a marker on the spot that the pole had been.

The US Antarctic Program said in a statement the new marker was designed by base machinist Derek Aboltins. His design has 54 grooves around the edge, one for each of the 2007 winter-over staff.

The diamond shaped emblem on top replicates an old sign that used to be displayed on the old gymnasium before it was torn down. The resulting marker resembles a gear, similar to those that turn the new South Pole Telescope.

The station sits on a glacier which moves about 10 metres per year, so every January 1 a brass marker designating exactly 90 degrees South is placed in the new location.

Unsure Kisses

How many kisses to plant on the cheeks? It is a conundrum shared by the socially timid and extrovert alike: whether to plump for a brusque one-cheek brush or to dive in for multiples and risk appearing embarrassingly overenthusiastic.

Nowhere is the puzzle more complex than in France, the country most famed for the practice. Now, far from settling the matter, a survey aimed at determining the correct etiquette of kissing has only illustrated a fracture at the heart of the country.

This may be welcome news to the British, many of whom still regard the looming approach of a proffered cheek as a social minefield. Having adopted the French habit of kissing far beyond the family circle, the British often find themselves at sea when it comes to knowing where and when to kiss, how many times, and which cheek to peck first.

In France, not only does the number of kisses vary from one to four depending on the region, but it also varies within regions. City centres and their peripheries, urban and rural communities and different social classes are all divided over how many kisses to give.

“It is very complex,” said Constance Rietzler, director of La Belle École in Paris, which provides lessons on French art de vivre. “There is a lot of confusion over this.”

Gilles Debunne, a computer expert, hoped to resolve the conundrum when he launched a website, Combien de Bises (How Many Kisses), this year. “I was curious to find out what the reality was,” he said.He had hoped to end the embarrassment that arises when trying to give three or four kisses to someone who turns their head away after just two. (While the British opt for fewer kisses, many is the one-cheek kisser who has been left gawping as a double-cheeker lunges at them a second time.)

Mr Debunne invited internet users to vote on what they considered to be the appropriate number of kisses for a greeting in their département. More than 18,000 votes have been registered and the picture of a divided nation is emerging.

In Paris and central France, most people give two kisses – one on each cheek. But a swath of northern France, from Normandy to the Belgian border, opted in general for four. And southeastern France, from Marseilles to the Alps, preferred three.

Two départements – Finistère in Brittany and DeuxSèvres in the centre – give a meagre one. But within each region, there were deep divisions. About half the voters in and around Calais, for example, said that they gave “deux bises” while the other half said that they gave “quatre”.

In the Vienne département in central France, the confusion was even greater, with voters plumping in almost equal numbers for two, three and four kisses.

“It’s a lot more subtle than I ever imagined,” said Mr Debunne. “Sometimes the number of kisses changes depending on whether you’re seeing friends or family or what generation you belong to.”

Class distinctions also came into play. Mrs Rietzler said that the French upper classes preferred two kisses. Anyone planting three or more smackers on the cheeks of their host at a refined dinner would be committing a faux pas, she said.

But to whom should you faire la bise and in what circumstances? Mrs Rietzler said: “In general, the French kiss friends who are the same generation as them and family members.” She said that women could kiss each other and could kiss men as well. But men kissed each other only if they were very close friends or relations.

“If you are invited to a dinner party with people you don’t know, you’ll shake their hands when you arrive. At the end of the evening, you might kiss them but it’s probably better to hold out your hand and see what happens.”

Safe enough advice for those on both sides of the Channel.

Kissing cousins: how they do it across Europe

The Netherlands begin and end on the same cheek. Three kisses are expected, but if greeting an elderly or close family member add a few more. Right cheek first

Italy kissing is restricted to very close friends or family. The number is optional and as there are no rules on which cheek to kiss first, there are frequent clashes

Belgium If the same age as the other person, one kiss is the rule. For someone ten years older, three is a mark of respect. This is hazardous if you are bad at judging ages

Spain, Austria and Scandinavia All are content with the two kisses ritual. In Spain the rule is strictly right cheek first

Germany tends to restrict kissing to family and very close friends. Handshakes predominate and all meetings begin and end with this formality

Hunters kill one of last Amur Leopards

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Hunters in Russia's Far East have shot and killed one of the last seven surviving female Amur leopards living in the wild, WWF said on Monday, driving the species even closer to extinction.

Last week environmentalists said there were only between 25 and 34 Amur leopards -- described as one of the most graceful cats in the world -- still living in the wild.

At least 100 are needed to guarantee the species' survival which depends upon female leopards breeding. There are more male leopards in the wild than female because cats tend to breed males when under stress, WWF said.

"Leopard murder can only be provoked by cowardice or stupidity, in this case most likely by both," Pavel Fomenko, WWF's biodiversity coordinator in Russia's Far East said in a statement.

A hunter shot the leopard through the tail bone. It tumbled over and was then beaten over the head with a heavy object, WWF said. Amur leopards have not been know to attack humans.

Environmentalists have urged the Russian government to introduce tighter controls on its national parks in the Far East to crack down on leopard hunting.

They also want more done to protect the animal's natural environment and food supply, which they say is being destroyed by human development.

A local wildlife watchdog received an anonymous tip-off that a leopard had been killed. State wildlife officers found the dead animal after a day of searching. The leopard died on either April 15 or April 16, WWF said.

Buttcrack of the Earth in Atlantic

Scientists have discovered a large area thousands of square kilometers in extent in the middle of the Atlantic where the Earth’s crust appears to be missing. Instead, the mantle - the deep interior of the Earth, normally covered by crust many kilometers thick - is exposed on the seafloor, 3000m below the surface. Marine geologist Dr Chris MacLeod, School of Earth, Ocean and Planetary Sciences said, “This discovery is like an open wound on the surface of the Earth. Was the crust never there? Was it once there but then torn away on huge geological faults? If so, then how and why?”

To answer some of these questions Dr MacLeod with a team of scientists, led by marine geophysicist Professor Roger Searle, Durham University, will travel to the area which lies mid-way between the Cape Verde Islands and the Caribbean.

The expedition will be the inaugural research cruise of a new UK research ship RRS James Cook. The team intends to use sonar to image the seafloor and then take rock cores using a robotic seabed drill. The samples will provide a rare opportunity to gain insights into the workings of the mantle deep below the surface of the Earth.

Cardiff University scientists will shortly set sail next week (March 5th) to investigate a startling discovery in the depths of the Atlantic.