Published on
March 25, 2009 in
News.
- The name “Colbert” has beat out NASA’s four suggested options in the space agency’s effort to have the public help name the new addition to the International Space station launching later this year. Colbert urged viewers to write in his name. And with 230,539 votes that clobbered Serenity, one of the NASA choices, by more than 40,000 votes. Nearly 1.2 million votes were cast by the time the contest ended Friday. NASA reserves the right to choose an appropriate name. Agency spokesman John Yembrick said NASA will decide in April, but will give top vote-getters “the most consideration.”
- Mythbusters exploded 500 pounds of ammonium nitrate for an upcoming episode half a mile north of Woodland Avenue in Esparto, California, Friday afternoon. The explosion, caused by a quarter of the same material used in the Oklahoma City bombing, was large enough to be picked up as a “small event” ground tremor by National Geographical Survey sensors, said scientist David Oppenheimer. Most Esparto residents didn’t know the MythBusters were in the area let alone going to create such an explosion.
- On a cool spring eve, March 15th, 2009, a bat, crippled and wistful, clung to the Space Shuttle Discovery as it was thrust toward the great beyond. Bereft of his ability to fly and with nowhere to go, a courageous bat climbed aboard our Discovery with stars in his weak little eyes. The launch commenced, and Spacebat trembled as his frail mammalian body was gently pushed skyward. For the last time, he felt the primal joy of flight; for the first, the indescribable feeling of ascending toward his dream—a place far away from piercing screeches and crowded caves, stretching forever into fathomless blackness. Whether he was consumed in the exhaust flames or frozen solid in the stratosphere is of no concern. We know that Spacebat died, but his dream will live on in all of us.
- A Finnish computer programmer who lost one of his fingers in a motorcycle accident has made himself a prosthetic replacement with a 2 gig USB drive attached. The finger is not permanently attached to his hand, so it can be easily left plugged into a computer when in use. Mr Jalava says he is already thinking about upgrading the finger to include more storage and wireless technology.
- Kiefer Sutherland will be back to play Jack Bauer for an eighth season of the hit counter-terrorism drama “24,” but the show’s longevity will depend on its writers, the actor said Tuesday.
- A playwright is on the hunt for a Preston family who invited Doctor Who star Tom Baker into their home to watch an episode of the cult sci-fi series. The star arrived at their front door on November 13, 1976, as he was travelling back from a fan convention in Blackpool. He could not wait until his return to London to see the latest episode and so found himself sitting alongside a stunned family as they watched him on screen. Now, Scottish writer Simon Farquhar is researching the incident for a new production he is penning for the BBC, titled Teatime with Tom Baker, and is asking for the help of Evening Post readers.
- Cameron’s Avatar, due in December, could be the thing that forces theaters to convert to digital. Spielberg predicts it will be the biggest 3-D live-action film ever. More than a thousand people have worked on it, at a cost in excess of $200 million, and it represents digital filmmaking’s bleeding edge. Avatar is filmed in the old “Spruce Goose” hangar, the 16,000-sq.-ft. space where Howard Hughes built his wooden airplane. The film is set in the future, and most of the action takes place on a mythical planet, Pandora. The actors work in an empty studio; Pandora’s lush jungle-aquatic environment is computer-generated in New Zealand by Jackson’s special-effects company, Weta Digital, and added later.
- A Thai fireman turned superhero when he dressed up as comic-book character Spider-Man to coax a frightened special needs eight-year-old from a school balcony. The firefighter said he keeps the Spider-Man costume and an outfit of Japanese television character Ultraman at the station in order to liven up school fire drills.
- A mission by the town of Vulcan, southeast of Calgary, to beam in the new Star Trek movie on opening day May 8 appeared to have failed this week when Paramount Pictures said it couldn’t work out details. But now Spock himself, Leonard Nimoy has stepped in. “The people of my home planet of Vulcan are not happy about this. I won’t say they’re sad or upset because that would express emotion but they think it’s illogical that somehow Paramount could not arrange to get a screening of the movie up there in Vulcan,” he said, laughing.
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