An anonymous insider described the gas-guzzling behemoth as "too goddamned big to conscientiously produce any longer."

[Auto.com] After the 2004 model year, Ford will be discontinuing its 19 foot long, 7,200lb. Expedition SUV despite the fact that a Ford spokeswoman described it as "extremely well-liked by consumers." The gas-guzzler got about 12 miles per gallon, which some speculate didn't sit well with Ford chairman William Clay Ford, Jr., who is known as being environmentally conscious.

Link via MetaFilter

[BBC] : A jet that flies 7 times the speed of sound is currently being tested in the Australian desert. A flight from London to Sydney in the jet takes about 2 hours at Mach 7.6 according to the article. "Scramjets," as planes like these are called, have engines that are far lighter than conventional engines, and have no moving parts. This one collects oxygen as it flies and burns it with small amounts of hydrogen.

There's a nice accompanying graphic that explains how the jet was tested here.

And here's another fantastic Q & A section the BBC has set up for its readers regarding the scramjet. One point made in this section suggests that it will be decades before the scramjet will receive commercial use due to lack of funding. In addition, the scramjet technology can only be used to make a moving jet go faster; it cannot propel a jet that isn't already moving-- another hindrance.

[BBC] : The BBC is reporting that Nissan may put their hydrogen fuel cell car on limited sale by next year. Oddly, this means that the car is far ahead of schedule. Read all about it here.

[CNN] : Norwegian Cruise Lines has been slapped with a $1 million penalty for illegally dumping waste to avoid having to pay for proper waste disposal procedures. The authorities were tipped off after a whistleblower went to the Environmental Protection Agency. "We took responsibility and fixed the problem, at a very substantial cost," Norwegian President and CEO Colin Veitch said. "Instead of stalling or stonewalling, we cooperated fully with the government throughout this period."

What a great guy-- you know, for not trying to evade criminal charges and all...

[New York Times] : Here's an interesting article on the explosion in popularity of airline clubs. These formerly mysterious, tucked-away rooms in airport cul-de-sacs are now thriving hang-outs for the entire family. I liked them when they were underground, man.

Some Englishmen are grinding their teeth over the solution to the congestion problem

[CNN] : London is taking an innovative approach to countering congestion : charging a lot of money to get into the city center (er, "centre"). Starting next year, the city will make motorists pay a £5 ($7.9) toll to drive around in the heart of London. The decision comes after a court decided in favor of London mayor Ken Livingstone, who was a proponent of the measure. The toll is expected to raise £130 million pounds ($204 million) a year for public transport funds. The Freight Transport Association vows to fight the measure.

Vanguard Airlines has filed for bankrupcy. Because the company is going out on a classy note, employees can visit the company's website to see their pink slip.

[San Francisco Chronicle] : In Bay Area news, the long-awaited BART train to SFO (San Francisco International Airport) is 97 percent complete. A test train rolled into the airport yesterday for the first time, after 4 1/2 years of construction. BART officials hope that the route will be open to the public by January 2003. Here is a 3 picture slideshow that supplements the story, showing a map of the route and two pictures of the trains.

[Washinton Post] : The Washington Post has a nice retrospective on the massive Chesapeake Bay Bridge, which connects Southeastern Virginia and the Delmarva Peninsula in Eastern Maryland. The 4.35 mile bridge cost $45 million to build, and last year carried 23.9 million vehicles. The article speaks for itself, but there's a funny little tidbit I picked up: The Great Depression thwarted initial plans to build the bridge in 1927, but by 1947 the project was back on track, much to the amusement of one bystander. "If they wait another forty years . . . people will have flymobiles and won't need bridges to cross the bay."

[CNN : Reuters] : On Monday, United Airlines announced that it would be charging a $20 fee for passengers who wanted paper tickets. The move is a step in eventually phasing out paper tickets in favor of electronic tickets, which the company hopes to do by January 2004. Last month, American Airlines made a similar announcement.

[NY Times] : The big question on the mind of epicureans around the world is: Are airlines passengers going to continue getting meals? Or are they going to be cut back in favor of, well, nothing? The Times tells you what's going on in the world of airline food, and lets you know how you can help your chances of getting that tepid, bacteria-filled chicken and rice plate you've been craving since you got in the terminal.

NEWS FLASH

[Washington Post] : An Amtrak train has derailed in Maryland, causing injuries to 60 passengers, 6 of them serious.

[Slate] : Okay, this isn't exactly transportation per se, but it's somewhat related: a Western journalist goes to Thailand and finds a large Buddist cult worshipping near a giant, mysterious spacecraft.

[BBC] : According to the BBC, Boeing engineers are trying to build a device that defies gravity. The company is looking into the research of one Yevgeny Podkletnov, a Finnish scientist who claims that he has developed an instrument that can keep objects from affected by the Earth's pull. The scientist says that he noticed that objects sitting above a superconducting ceramic disc rotating over powerful electromagnets lost weight. Other scientists are suspicious of Podkletnov's claims because as of now, his results have not been reproduced (at least by independent scientists). Despite this, a Boeing engineer reportedly told the trade journal Jane's Defence Weekly that the research appeared "valid and plausible," an interesting contrast to NASA's research reports, which indicate that Podkletnov's anti-gravity phenomenon did not show itself in their tests.

The BBC has also set up a supplementary Q&A page that answers questions readers might have about this anti-gravity device.

Thanks to Kyle Dellamano for the link

Reader Kyle Dellamano has sent in an interesting article that suggests that the Hindenburg disaster mentioned in yesterday's post on hydrogen fuel-cell cars wasn't due to the hydrogen. Former NASA researcher Addison Bain, who was a Hindenburg obsessive, noticed that the famous picture shows a very visible explosion. Hydrogen explosions, he noted, are not fiery bursts. They are very near invisible and do not create massive amounts of heat. Then Bain discovered the following regarding the doomed blimp:

The Hindenburg was covered with a cotton fabric that had been swabbed with a doping compound to protect and strengthen it. Unfortunately, the doping compound contained a cellulose acetate or nitrate (used in gunpowder). This compound was followed by a coating of aluminum powder (which is used in rocket fuel). Additionally, the structure was held together using wood spacers and ramie cord; the furnishings were make of silk and other fabrics; and the skeleton itself was duralumin coated with lacquer. Added together, all of these made the craft itself highly flammable... Bain was quoted as saying that perhaps "... the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." - ESD Journal

The article has many other interesting pieces of evidence regarding the disaster, so I won't mention them here. Regardless of these facts, there are many who still contend that it was the abundance of free hydrogen that doomed the plane. The mystery has not yet been conclusively solved.

[Straight Dope] : Cecil Adams has a good column today about Howard Hughes's Spruce Goose! In case you're unfamiliar with it, the Spruce Goose was by far the largest airplane ever made (Adams comments that the wing span was 20 feet longer than a football field!), and if that weren't enough, it was made out of wood. The plane has only flown one time, for less than a minute. Adams explains the reasons for that, and gives a lot of interesting background information regarding this most ridiculous of planes-- although Adams himself denies that the plane is "completely off the wall."

[Seattle Post-Intelligencer : AP] : From the "It's because you weren't there" department:One hundred and sixty three passengers and crew members, or 13% of the total population aboard a Holland America cruiseliner in Alaska got sick with flu-like symptoms this week. The ship's crew has now disinfected all the rooms and common areas on the ship. Cruise companies are required to report such incidents when more than 3% of the onboard population becomes ill.

"These outbreaks are very common," said Jamal Harb of Health Canada. "Norwalk-like virus is on the increase here in B.C. and in Alberta. We're investigating but the reasons for that, I don't know."

Wait, so he's not sure why he's investigating? Maybe because it's his JOB?!

[San Francisco Chronicle] : Honda's hydrogen fuel cell car got approval yesterday from the Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board as a low-emissions vehicle. Honda is still waiting for approval for passenger safety certification, but the company is optimistic that at least one of the cars will be on California's highways by the year's end. Some of the downsides of the vehicle include a lack of fueling stations, expensive platinum metal is required for the fuel cell to operate, and the fact that producing hydrogen will cause a considerable amount of pollution. A nice visual explanation of how the hydrogen fuel cell works is included here. The text-only version can be found at the bottom of the article.

Two thoughts:
1) The article does not mention the potential hazards of the hydrogen in the event of an accident. As we all know from the 1937 Hindenberg disaster, using hydrogen in transportation can be a very risky proposition. I am curious as to what the chances are of a car exploding after an accident.

2) I'm very hopeful that this technology will prove practical in the everyday world. U.S. dependence on oil is the cause of many political problems.

Thanks to Huan-Hua Chye for the link

Comedian Denis Leary once commented that New York was the most exciting place in the world because "there are so many ways to die in New York City." If you are curious as to your chances of dying in transportation related mishaps, the National Safety Council has analyzed the statistics, and have cranked out some numbers that may satiate your morbid curiousity.

Your odds of dying in:


Transport Accidents: 1 in 77
Railway: 1 in 6,842
Motor Vehicle: 1 in 81
Other road vehicle 14,993
Water transport: 1 in 5,092
Other water transport (not sure of the distinction between this and previous): 1 in 14,094
Air and space transport: 1 in 5,092
Vehicle accidents not elsewhere classifiable: 1 in 25,349


If you're interested in other methods of death such as falling earth, inhalation of food, or plastic bag, I recommend you check out the figures for yourself.

Link via MetaFilter

[CNN : AP] : Guess what, everyone? Air pollution-- like the kind that comes from trucks billowing out plumes of thick, black smoke-- makes you feel worse when you have a cold. This conclusion comes from the July issue of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, which states that cold viruses and pollutants both cause cells to release inflammatory agents-- adding that when the two are in combination, the results are more than twice as bad.

[CNN : AP] : A Senate committee is now debating whether to arm pilots with guns. Sen. Ernest Hollings, head of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, had an interesting proposal that I had never heard before. He suggested that the doors that lead into airplane cockpits should be impenetrable, and never opened during flight. "Once that's fixed, we've solved the problem of an airliner flying into the Empire State Building. We've solved the problem of guns in the cockpit."

[Washington Post] : If airlines can only sell tickets at a loss, then does it make sense for them to cut prices even further? Yes, says Stephen M. Usery, US Airway's vice president of marketing and revenue management, who said that US Airways wasn't the one who started the recent fare war, but slashed prices in order to compete. Keith Alexander, Washington Post writer, wonders why an airline would race to lose money, and speculates that this behavior is part of a cycle that will drag airlines lower and lower.

[BBC] : Think pirates went the way of the Dodo? The International Maritime Bureau is reporting that instances of sea piracy are on the rise. The rate of attacks have gone up 3.1% since last year. One-hundred-seventy-one attacks worldwide have been made on shipping vessels in the first half of 2002.

I saw a quote today that I found quite interesting:

"There has grown in the minds of certain groups in this country the idea that just because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is supported by neither statue or common law. Neither corporations or individuals have the right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back."

-Robert Heinlein, Life Line, 1939


In the context of $15 billion airline bailouts, among other pieces of law and legislation not limited to transportation (file-sharing, intellectual property, the list goes on), it's something worth thinking about.

If you are interested in airport security, make sure to check out an extremely interesting paper written by Samidh Chakrabarti and Aaron Strauss on the effectiveness of the CAPS system. CAPS, or Computer Assisted Passenger Screening system, was put in place in American airports in 1999. The system utilizes profiling to determine the risk factor for a passenger. However, the authors of the paper find serious holes in the functionality of the system, which they claim would be extremely easy for a terrorist cell to overcome. They go so far as to say that the system would be far less effective than random searches. Although this fascinating paper goes into much more detail regarding the reasons why this is so, the short version is that if you are a person who is considered high-risk on the CAPS system, you will know about it. Your screening in airport will be tedious, your bags will be completely unpacked and repacked, you will be thoroughly searched-- every time you enter an airport. Terrorist groups could easily send unarmed henchmen through the system to find ones who are considered low risk on the CAPS system, and subsequently use them for mass destruction. In fact, a terrorist organization could simply recruit a random person with a low ranking on the CAPS system. Put simply, the problem is that the CAPS system is simply too easy to subvert. Random searches, meanwhile, are unpredictable and therefore unavoidable. In addition to these assessments, also included in the article are many probabilistic analyses and calculations regarding the searches that likewise suggest that random searches would be far more effective.

Also important to note when considering these issues is that a random search, unlike the CAPS method, does not violate court interpretations of the 4th Amendment (unreasonable search and seizure).

Link from MetaFilter, via Boing Boing

[BBC] : The much-hyped Segway scooter made its British debut yesterday at a prominent air show. Currently, a plant in Japan is producing enough to meet the world's, uh, demand, but the article suggests that if the device catches on as hoped, the Segway company may open a plant in England.

Here's something old, but maybe useful: a list of the 25 busiest U.S. airports by passenger traffic.

[CNN : AP] : Congress is investigating the TSA's (Transportation Security Administration) progress in securing U.S. airports. They will be examining whether the TSA will be able to have federal airport screeners by the Nov. 19 deadline, and a December 31 deadline for inspecting all checked baggage for explosives. Also in question are current practices employed in airport security.
"You have 535 members of Congress who are frequent flyers," commented Rep. John Mica, chairman of the House Transportation Committee's aviation panel. "People are not happy when there aren't some commonsense approaches to security. Shaking down 80-year-old ladies, Medal of Honor winners and five-year-old kids makes no sense."

Five-year-old Congressmen? Talk about putting kids under pressure.

[NY Times] : If you're travelling long distances with children... oh, do I even need to finish that sentence? The New York Times has an article on how you can keep your children occupied.

[READER COMMENTS]

Hydrogen or Hot Air?

[In regards to the posting regarding GM's efforts at a hydrogen powered car, a reader writes:]

GM has a nasty habit of taking great ideas and turning them into garbage (witness Saturn and the EV-1).

[Also,] two things about the efficiency. . . I think Wagoner's comment was taken out of context in the article when he's quoted as saying, "The internal combustion engine is an incredibly efficient source of power, but we've wrung the towel." He might mean that the oil is running out, but it's more likely that he means that ICE [Internal Combustion Engine] technology has now reached the point of diminishing returns and it's just not worth it to improve it anymore. It's not likely that we will run out of oil very soon. That's something that's been predicted for over a hundred years, but we keep learning to get more out of the ground. However, oil consumption is increasing exponentially, and carbon emissions and global warming is a real concern. . . We are likely to reach disastrous consequences long before the oil runs out.

As you pointed out, the ICE isn't very efficient, but then, nothing really is. Automotive fuel cells have theoretical energy efficiencies of about 40-45%, and practical efficiencies of about 30-35%. This isn't that much better than the ICE, really. (By energy efficiency, I mean actual work done divided by theoretical energy content of the fuel. Nothing can have 100% efficiency; that would violate the second law of thermodynamics.)

-- Haresh Kamath, chemical engineer, Knoxville, TN

[CNN] : Every major airline company reported huge losses this quarter-- except the notoriously bare-bones Southwest Airlines. Here are some quick statistics for your consideration:


US Air : minus $250 million
American Airlines : minus $500 million
Delta Air: minus $185 million
Southwest Airlines: plus $102 million


Good thing these guys got a $15 billion bailout, huh?

[from the "It's funny when it's not you" department] : Watch this plane get struck by lightning! Creepy, huh?

Incidentally, lightning strikes like this occur all the time. The charge is dissipated, so don't worry about the passengers.

[CNN] : Here's an interesting article about "space freeways." It's a somewhat obvious method of travel when it comes to space, but I'd never thought of it. Essentially, you map out gravitational fields caused by planets and other astral bodies in space, and then use them to gain speed and propel yourself around. Cool, huh?

I think a potential snag might be that there's nothing around for millions of miles and then you end up trapped in the far reaches of space... forever! Whoa.

[Yahoo : AP, Reuters] : Here's a good 21-frame slideshow of the experimental Japanese plane crash. There are also informative captions in case you didn't hear about this before.

Click the "NEXT" bar at the top of the screens to forward through the slideshow.