Sharks in danger...because of soup!

By Derek

Sharks are the top predators in the ocean. A predator is an animal that eats other animals. Sharks are at the top of the "food chain". The food chain is made up of different kinds of sea animals eating each other, although some sea animals eat nothing but plants. For example, some sharks eat fish such as tuna and tuna eat smaller fish such as mackerel. Sharks play a part in keeping our oceans balanced and healthy.

A food chain

There are many types of sharks, and they eat many types of food. The whale shark is the largest, growing to over 20 meters long, and weighing up to 35,000 kilograms. The whale shark feeds on small organisms, such as plankton, crustaceans, tiny fish, and occasionally larger fish and squid. They are gentle fish, and people sometimes swim next to them. The smallest shark is about the size of a man's hand. 

The largest shark - the whale shark

The smallest shark - a dwarf lantern shark

Not Monsters

The sharks that people know about the best are the ones we see on TV and in movies. These include large sharks such as the great white shark. The great white eats fish, seals and smaller sharks. We know the great white shark from movies like "Jaws", but it is important to remember that, around the world, there are only about 100 shark attacks on people each year, and most of them do not end in death. 

The 1975 movie that made many people think sharks are bad

If you go to the beach, you are much more likely to die falling down the stairs or slipping in your hotel shower than to be bitten by a shark. Sharks sometimes bite people to see what they taste like, or they might mistake people for seals.

A great white shark chasing a seal


The video below shows how a shark could mistake a human on a surfboard for a seal

Sharks in Danger

Even though many people wrongly think sharks are "bad", sharks are important for our environment because of their role in the food chain. But sharks are in danger. Every year, between about 25 to 100 million (100,000,000) sharks are killed, mostly for their fins. Shark fins are among the most expensive seafood products worldwide, commonly selling at US$400 (400,000 Korean won) per kilogram (kg). 

When a shark is "finned", the fin is cut off, and the shark is often thrown back into the ocean, bleeding, where it will die. The fins are then used in shark's fin soup, which is very popular in China and some other countries. Some people think that sharks' fins and other parts are magic, or that they can be used as medicine. This is not true -- there is no scientific evidence to show that eating shark parts can cure diseases.

In a few days, it will be soup.

Sharks lie dead after having their top fin cut off

Popular in Chinese restaurants

Many people around the world are trying to stop people eating shark's fin soup so that sharks will not become endangered or extinct. Protecting the environment is not just about recycling or walking instead of driving: protecting sharks also protects the environment. So watch what you eat!

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This video is not about finning, but is interesting. People rescuing a shark!

Meteor explodes above Russian city

  

Video from YouTube shows the explosion of the meteor from a number of cameras.

Edited from CBC News:

With a blinding flash and a booming shock wave, a meteor blazed across the western Siberian sky Friday near the Russian city of Chelyabinsk and exploded with the force of 20 atomic bombs, injuring more than 1,000 people as it blasted out windows and spread panic  (fear) in the city of 1 million.

"There was panic. People had no idea what was happening," said Sergey Hametov of Chelyabinsk, about 1,500 kilometers east of Moscow in the Ural Mountains.

Windows damaged by the meteor explosion

Meteoroids are small pieces of space debris — usually parts of comets or asteroids — that are on a collision course with the Earth. They become meteors when they enter the Earth's atmosphere. Most meteors burn up in the atmosphere, but if they survive the frictional heating and strike the surface of the Earth they are called meteorites. 

 
While NASA estimated the meteor was only about the size of a bus and weighed an estimated 7,000 tons, the fireball it produced was dramatic. Video shot by startled residents of the city of Chelyabinsk showed its streaming contrails as it arced toward the horizon just after sunrise, looking like something from a world-ending science-fiction movie.  It was the largest recorded meteor strike in more than a century.

The meteor above western Siberia entered the Earth's atmosphere about 9:20 a.m. local time at a hypersonic speed of at least 54,000 km/h and shattered into pieces about 30-50 kilometers high, the Russian Academy of Sciences said. NASA estimated its speed at about 65,000 km/h, said it exploded about 30 to 38 kilometers above the ground, released 300 to 500 kilotons of energy and left a trail 485 kilometres long.

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How much is 300 kilotons of explosive energy?

Atomic bombs (2) dropped on Japan in 1945 -  Equal to 15 kilotons of explosive force (15,000 tons).

The Chelyabinsk meteor explosion was equal to at least 20 atomic bombs. 

People walk along a road in Hiroshima 1945. All the buildings were destroyed by the atomic bomb.

For a 10 kiloton blast at the height where it would produce the most damage, severe damage to frame (wooden) houses would occur out to 1.6 km and moderate damage to 2.4 km. A 10 kiloton blast would produce a fireball of about 300 meters in diameter and would cause moderate flash burns (second degree) at a range of about 2.4 km. A second-degree burn includes blisters, a darker tone and a shiny, moist appearance.

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The shock wave broke an estimated 100,000 square metres of glass, according to city officials, who said 3,000 buildings in Chelyabinsk were damaged. At a factory, part of the roof collapsed.

The meteor's shockwave damaged around 3,000 buildings including this zinc factory, where about 600 square metres of the roof collapsed.

The Interior Ministry said about 1,100 people sought medical care after the shock wave and 48 were hospitalized. Most of the injuries were caused by flying glass, officials said. A Chelyabinsk resident, Alexander Yakovets, told CBC News he was woken in his eighth-floor apartment by a "really horrible sound" that he first thought might have been a terrorist attack or a military exercise. He said he saw a very bright light and heard multiple explosions.

 NASA said the Russian fireball was the largest reported since 1908, when a meteor hit Tunguska, Siberia, and flattened an estimated 80 million trees. Chelyabinsk is about 5,000 kilometers west of Tunguska. The Tunguska blast, attributed to a comet or asteroid fragment, is generally estimated to have been about 10 megatons. For the full story, click here

Chelyabinsk

Trees flattened by the Tunguska meteor blast in 1908

Click here for more about the even bigger Tunguska explosion and what different scientist think may have caused it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sF8HKCuA3DQ

Women in Combat

Edited from Scholastic News:

More than 200,000 women currently serve in the U.S. military. They make up about 15 percent of all service members. Until recently, women were barred from officially serving in combat units. Combat units engage directly in battle during a war.

That all changed on January 24, when the Department of Defense ended the policy that excluded women from serving in direct-combat positions.

“Women have shown great courage and sacrifice on and off the battlefield . . . and proven their ability to serve in an expanding number of roles,” Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said.

About 237,000 positions that have been closed to women could now be open to them under the new policy. Women would need to meet the same standards as men to get those jobs. Some positions may remain exceptions to the rule if the military finds that women cannot meet the requirements for those jobs.

Until now, women have only been serving in combat unofficially.

SUPPORT FOR THE CHANGE
General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that opening combat units to women will strengthen the military. President Barack Obama agrees.

“This milestone reflects . . . the indispensible role of women in today’s military,” Obama says. “Every American can be proud that our military will grow even stronger with our mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters playing a greater role in protecting this country we love.”

Public opinion polls show that Americans generally agree with allowing women into combat units. Recent polls by CBS News and the Pew Research Center, for example, showed that two thirds (66 percent) of Americans support ending the ban.

EQUAL ROLES
Dempsey and Panetta said the new policy reflects the realities of female soldiers’ changing roles over the past decade. More than 280,000 women have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, and more than 150 have died.

Many of those women have served in combat unofficially. They’ve patrolled dangerous areas as military police, served as machine gunners atop military vehicles, searched Iraqi and Afghan women for weapons, and more.

Female machine gunner on top of a vehicle

New jobs will be opened gradually to women throughout the next few years. The entire process is expected to be complete by January 1, 2016.

“Everyone, men and women alike . . . is committed to doing the job,” says Panetta. “They’re fighting and they’re dying together. And the time has come for our policies to recognize that reality.”

A World War Two poster: women could serve in the US Army but they could not go into battle

South Korea's First Satellite Blasts Off

Edited from SkyNews:

South Korea has launched a satellite into space from its own territory for the first time - just weeks after North Korea accomplished a similar feat.

Satellites can be used for communications or for tasks such as observing the weather

The rocket blasted off from a launch pad in the southwestern coastal village of Goheung. Officials told cheering spectators minutes later that the rocket delivered an observational satellite into orbit. It is unclear whether the satellite is operating as intended.

A crowd watches the launch from a Seoul railway station

The launch is the result of years of efforts by South Korea - Asia's fourth-largest economy - to advance its space programme and confirm that it is a technology leader.

North Korea's long-range rocket program has generated international fears that it is getting closer to developing nuclear missiles capable of striking enemies. It has threatened to explode its third nuclear device.


South Korea tried and failed to launch satellites in 2009 and 2010, and more recent launch attempts were aborted at the last minute. The satellite launched by Seoul is designed to analyse weather data, measure radiation in space, gauge distances on earth and test how effectively South Korean-made devices installed on the satellite operate in space. South Korean officials say it will help them develop more sophisticated satellites in the future.

The rocket left from Goheung Space Centre

The South Korean rocket launched on Wednesday was partially designed and built by Russian experts under a contract between the two governments.

The coldest village on Earth

From the Korea Times:

If you thought it was cold where you are at the moment then a visit to the Russian village of Oymyakon might just change your mind.

With the average temperature for January at -50 C, it is not surprising that the village is the coldest permanently inhabited settlement in the world (people live there all the time).

Known as the 'Pole of Cold', the coldest ever temperature recorded in Oymyakon was -71.2 C.

This is the lowest recorded temperature for any permanently inhabited location on Earth and the lowest temperature recorded in the Northern Hemisphere

The village, which is home to around 500 people, was, in the 1920s and 1930s, a stopover for reindeer herders who would water their flocks from the thermal spring (hot water that comes from under the ground).

reindeer

But the Soviet government, in its efforts to settle nomadic populations (groups of people who move from place to place), believing them to be difficult to control and technologically and culturally backward, made the site a permanent settlement.

Ironically, Oymyakon actually means 'non-freezing water' due to a nearby hot spring.

A thermal or hot spring

 Most homes in Oymyakon still burn coal and wood for heat and enjoy few modern conveniences (electric stoves, refrigerators).

Nothing grows there so people eat reindeer meat and horsemeat. A single store provides the town's bare necessities (food, clothing etc.) and the locals work as reindeer-breeders, hunters and ice-fisherman.

ice fishing

Doctors say the reason the locals don't suffer from malnutrition (bad health caused by not enough food) is that their animals' milk contains a lot of micronutrients (vitamins and minerals).

Unsurprisingly, locals are used to the weather and unlike in other countries where snow can cause problems such as the closing of schools, Oymyakon's only school only shuts if temperatures fall below -52 C.

The village is located in the far north of Russia, which means that the length of a day varies from 3 hours in December to 21 hours in the summer. And despite its terrible winters, in June, July and August there are often temperatures over 30 Celsius. 

Inventor of the World Wide Web

From FamousPeopleLessons.com

Sir Timothy Berners-Lee is a British computer scientist who invented the World Wide Web. He received a knighthood from the British Queen for his efforts (so he is called ‘Sir’). He is director of W3C, which looks after the Web’s development. A leading British newspaper ranked him as the world’s greatest living genius. Today’s world would be very different without his discovery.

Berners-Lee was born in 1955.His parents were mathematicians and computer scientists. He grew up with numbers and electronics and managed to build his own computer. He went to Oxford University and was banned from using the computers for hacking. Berners-Lee graduated with a degree in physics. His first jobs after graduating were as a computer programmer and software developer.

Berners-Lee spent the 1980s on a project based on sharing and updating information online. In 1991, he put the first website online. It explained what the World Wide Web was and how it was used. He gave his idea to the world for free. In 1994, Berners-Lee founded W3C to set standards and improve the quality of the Web.

Berners-Lee now spends his time between W3C and as a professor of computer science in England. He also writes about the future of the Web. In 2004, he was named as the first ever winner of the Millennium Technology Prize. He has other awards and is listed as one of ‘Time’ magazine’s 100 most important people of the 20^th Century.

An Ancient Palace Uncovered

From Scholastic News:

The ancient city of Xi’an (shee-an) in China holds many treasures. Last month, archaeologists working there made an important discovery—a buried palace built in the third century B.C. to honor China’s first emperor.

The entire palace measures roughly 2,260 feet (689 meters) long by 820 feet (250 meters)  wide. It includes 10 courtyard houses and one main building. Archaeologists found bricks and pieces of pottery at the site of the palace, as well as the remains of walls and roads.

THE FIRST EMPEROR
The palace is part of the massive burial complex of Emperor Qin Shihuangdi (chin shir-whong-dee). He conquered seven warring kingdoms and united ancient China in 211 B.C.

Qin Shihuangdi wanted his legacy, or accomplishments, to be remembered forever. So he hired more than 700,000 workers to build his funeral complex in Xi’an. It represents a miniature version of his vast kingdom.

The complex also includes the world-famous terra-cotta army, a collection of more than 8,000 life-size clay statues. These sculptures represent soldiers, acrobats, and horses from the Qin Dynasty (221 B.C.-206 B.C.). Scientists have not yet found all these terracotta warriors, even though they discovered more of the statues last summer.
  

A terracotta warrior from the tomb

CITY OF SECRETS

 Farmers discovered the complex by accident in 1974. Since then, scientists studying the site have learned a great deal about life in ancient China. But much of the emperor’s tomb has yet to be excavated, or unearthed. Many of the artifacts (objects from the past) are so old that scientists cannot preserve them.


“Archaeologists fully acknowledge that nobody in the world has the technology [to safely excavate Xi’an’s treasures] yet,” explains Kristin Romey, an expert on Chinese archaeology. But as technology improves, archaeologists will keep digging to uncover the rest of the wonders that still lie buried in Xi’an.

“It’s one of the most important archaeological discoveries that’s waiting to be made,” says Romey, "and we know where it is.”

There are over 8,000 life-size warriors, and each one is different

Songs from the International Space Station

The International Space Station

What did you do today? Did you record a song in space? No? Then you aren’t as cool as International Space Station mission commander Chris Hadfield.

The Canadian astronaut posted the song, “Jewel in the Night” to the music hosting service Soundcloud early on December 24, and then linked to it on the social-sharing site Reddit. The top responding comment from Reddit user jackrabbitslimz assured the commander that his song was good. Good music, check. / Recorded in space, check. / By a Canadian astronaut, check. / Rendez-vous with Reddit standards, complete.

Chris Hadfield doing "Jewel in the Night";

Here is Chris Hadfield singing his version of "Space Oddity", a song originally sung by David Bowie:

Hadfield traveled to the space station on board a Russian Soyuz capsule for a five-month visit to the giant orbiting space lab. During his stay, the 53-year-old space veteran, an avid guitar player, promised to do some strumming to help himself deal with homesickness, a promise he obviously started to fulfill today.

He will also be involved with more than 130 experiments including Micro-flow, a Canadian blood-sampling experiment which he compared to a hospital in a box.

During the second half of his mission, Hadfield will become the first Canadian to command the space station. This is Hadfield’s third space journey.


Words

Cool - informal word for "impressive" or "awesome". "He looked really cool on his motorcycle."
Preface - something written before a song or story. The preface of a book comes before the main part.
Humble-brag - humble means not showing off, not proud. "Buddhist priests are humble". Brag means to tell people you are wonderful or great. "John bragged about what a great student he was."
Capsule - the part of a rocket where the astronauts are seated when the rocket takes off from Earth
Lab - short for laboratory, a place where scientists do experiments
Veteran - somebody who has experience doing something: a veteran astronaut or a veteran soldier, for example
Stay - the length of time you spend somewhere. "Our stay in Seoul was enjoyable."
Avid - enthusiastic: An avid reader is someone who likes to read many books.
Strumming - playing the strings of a guitar
Homesickness - sadness you feel when you are away from home and you miss your home, family and friends