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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (March 25, 2016)
THE DAILY ASTORIAN FRIDAY, MARCH 25, 2016 COMMUNITY 1B SHAKE IT UP CLEAN ’EM UP IN THE NEWS ... AGAIN aturday is SOLVE’s Spring Oregon Beach Cleanup day, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. up and down the Oregon Coast. Want to help out? Click on a beach location on the map at http://tinyurl. com/solveclean and register to volunteer, or call 03--1, ext. 332. Be sure to wear raingear and sturdy shoes, and never turn your back on the ocean. Be sure to bring: a bucket or reusable bag (preferably not plastic); an old colander to sift for harmful, bite- sized bits of plastic; gardening gloves (preferably not vinyl); and a reusable water bottle and/or coffee mug. There’s lots to be done. “I picked this up in 15 minutes at the South jetty area,” a local beachcomber wrote, describing his photo, which is shown. “Seeing March 26 is beach cleanup day, (I thought) this photo would be a good incentive to get volunteers out.” And so it is. S A LATE ARRIVAL he ongoing battle between the Port of Astoria and the East Mooring Basin sea lions once again made a hit in the news with the port’s latest efforts to get the pesky pinnipeds off the docks: Scaring them off with “air dancers,” which are usually seen attracting attention around car dealerships. The air dancer/sea lion confrontation garnered headlines from publications including the +uf¿ngton Post, the Weather Channel, Smithsonian Magazine, Global News in Canada, and the UK’s Daily Mail, not to mention several TV stations around the country. Once again, it’s the laugh heard round the world. The contretemps even became a question on a Comedy Central game show Tuesday night on @Midnight with Chris Hardwick (http://tinyurl.com/ccDancers). The seg- ment is about 6 minutes in; a screen shot of the show is pic- tured. The three contestants were asked what the Port of Asto- ria was doing to get rid of the sea lions, and the choice of answers was: a gun, the air dancers or loud music from Kid Rock. “Listen, you and I both know it’s Kid Rock,” panelist Cameron Esposito said. “But I want it to be inÀatable tube men, so I will take the loss by saying it’s inÀatable tube men.” “You’re absolutely right It’s inÀatable tube men,” +ard- wick said. “This, my friends, is why you will never see a sea lion at Toyotathon.” T ebris from the 2011 Japanese tsunami apparently is the gift that keeps on giving — even ¿ve years later. On March 16, a Coast Guard helicopter spotted the derelict bow of a boat out on the ocean and Àoating towards the Oregon Coast. A tracking buoy was attached, and its progress monitored, a Oregon Parks and Recreation Department press release reported. The photo shown is courtesy of OPRD. On Tuesday the Àotsam, which was 16 feet long and feet wide, made landfall just north of Coos Bay. Biologists arrived to check for invasive species, and removed algae, a live Planes crab (known for living on Àoating debris) and mollusks to study and identify before the bow was removed and taken to a land¿ll. That’s not the end of the story, though. A registration number was found on the vessel, and of¿cials in the U.S. and Japan are researching to see if they can identify its home port. In the meantime, one can’t help but wonder how much more is Àoating around out there. D TIP YOUR HAT n Tuesday, Feb. 23, the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus (www.lennonbus.org), a mobile recording studio that is touring high schools, rolled into town and stopped at Astoria High School to give seven lucky students a chance to make a professional recording. How did the Lennon bus wind up in our fair city? The school district’s technology director, Scott Holmstedt, contacted the Paci¿c Northwest tour, and Astoria was chosen as a stop. Port City Jazz Choir Director Matt Pierce picked the students who would participate. The school’s newest group was formed that day, Top Hat (pic- tured), consisting of Beth Mathre and Sarah Miller (vocals); Jared Rivera, Nate Hawkins and Evan Lemmy (guitar); and Emmanuel Goicochea and Jasmin Mabry. After creating the lyrics and tune of their new song, “Springtime Rain,” Top Hat spent the entire day being shown how to cut, mix and record it; then a full production 3-minute video of the ¿nished product was ¿lmed around the school grounds. A partial screen shot from the video is shown. Finally, almost a month later, you can see the results at http:// tinyurl.com/TopHatRain. It was worth the wait. O ant to help the University of California at Berkeley do some earthquake research? Check out their free Android app, MyShake, which “has the ability to recognize earthquake shaking using the sensors in every smartphone,” the app’s web- site says (http://myshake.berkeley.edu). “The app runs ‘silently’ in the background on your phone using very little power ± just like the step-tracking ¿tness apps. When the shaking ¿ts the vibrational pro¿le of an earthquake, the app sends the anonymous information to our central system that con¿rms the location and magnitude of the quake. “Our goal is to build a worldwide seismic network and use the data to reduce the effects of earthquakes on us as individuals, and our society as a whole. MyShake also provides users with infor- mation about recent earthquakes around the world and signi¿cant global historical earthquakes.” Why not check it out? W few snippets of this and that: Yardage: You can add this to your list of useless sta- tistics to inspire awe and stun your listeners: “The state of Oregon ranks No. 1 in terms of number of yard sales with 3.02 per capita,” a press release from Treasure Listings pro- claims (http://tinyurl.com/ORyard). “... Overall, the Paci¿c Northwest corner of the U.S. States ranks highest in number of yard sales per capita, while the Atlantic East Coast has the lowest number of sales.” Treasure Listings says it is the largest online network of garage, yard and estate sale listing websites. “Rankings were determined by analyzing 12 months worth of yard sale data from the Treasure Listings Network. Over 4,000,000 yard sales listings were compiled and analyzed.” That’s a lot of yard sales. Viva Warrenton: Even though it’s referred to as “Asto- ria’s lesser-known neighbor,” AAA’s Via Magazine still shows the town lots of love in the Spring 2016 issue with the article, “Warrenton, Ore.: 5 Things We Love” (http:// tinyurl.com/via5spots). Wondering what those ¿ve things are? Guided zip line tours at High Life Adventures, the food and margaritas at Tacos El Catrin, the 8.5 miles of paths in the Warrenton Water- front Trail system, razor clamming and the Fort Stevens State Park historic area and museum. Since they’re technically into Hammond on that last one, how could they forget the Peter Iredale shipwreck? Heavy sigh. Main drag: Think your town has the best main street ever? Nominate it for the America’s Main Street Contest in 300 words or less at www.mainstreetcontest.com, and don’t forget to include a photo. The winning street wins a grand prize of $25,000 in cash and related prizes to help revitalize it. No, the words “Main Street” do not need to be a part of the name — for example, Commercial Street works just ¿ne. “The goal of the America’s Main Streets contest is to help promote the importance and strong economic bene¿ts of these Main Streets and the small businesses that help them thrive,” the website says. “Please help us by nominating and telling us about a deserving Main Street.” Have at it. A TURN IT DOWN he ocean seems to hold no end of fascination for many of us liv- ing on the North Coast, and recently one of its deepest secrets has been revealed: It’s noisy down there. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) researchers sent an underwater microphone nearly miles down into the Challenger Deep trough in the Mariana Trench, Live- Science reports, and were surprised at just how much sound there actually is at those depths (http://tinyurl.com/trenchnoise). There is a link to some of the sounds on the website, including that of a ship’s propeller heard loud and clear from miles away. The Mari- ana Trench is pictured courtesy of the University of New Hampshire. The researchers did the recording off the coast of Guam last sum- mer for 23 days, until the Àash drive gathering the data was full. “The pressure at that depth is incredible,” Haru Matsumoto, an Oregon State University ocean engineer, said. “We had to drop the hydrophone mooring down through the water column at no more than 16 feet per second to be sure the hydrophone, which is made of ceramic, would survive the rapid pressure change.” The effort was part of a research project to establish a baseline to see if the ocean is getting noisier, and if the increase in sound is affecting the lives and migration of sonar-dependent sea life such as dolphins and whales. The team expects to go back and measure noise levels again in 201 for comparison. “You would think that the deepest part of the ocean would be one of the quietest places on Earth,” Robert Dziak, a research ocean- ographer and chief project scientist with NOAA, said. “Yet there is almost constant noise. The ambient sound ¿eld is dominated by the sound of earthquakes, both near and far, as well as distinct moans of baleen whales and the clamor of a category 4 typhoon that just hap- pened to pass overhead.” T ALL TIED UP ike, whose world head- quarters are in Beaverton, is striking a blow for those who hate to tie their shoelaces — or who don’t want to learn how — by recently announcing its new self-lacing shoe, the Nike HyperAdapt 1.0 (http://news. nike.com). The shoe is pic- tured, courtesy of Nike. “When you step in, your heel will hit a sensor and the system will automatically tighten,” Tiffany Beers, senior Inno- vator at Nike and the project’s technical lead, explained. “Then there are two buttons on the side to tighten and loosen. You can adjust it until it’s perfect.” The shoe will be available only to members of Nike+ (http:// tinyurl.com/registernike, if you’re interested) beginning later this year, in three colors. “Wouldn’t it be great if a shoe, in the future, could sense when you needed to have it tighter or looser?” Nike shoe designer Tin- NHU+DW¿HOG mused. “... That’s where we’re headed. In the future, product will come alive.” Which is downright scary. N He is Risen INDEED!
