Social Media, More Than A Movie

A couple of months ago I attended a well-worthwhile workshop on social media. Sponsored by the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia (Western Washington State), in a hands-on approach it dealt with what social media is, how to use it, what are its benefits, and what is its power. Yes, its power. What we learned, which was lots even for someone who spends far too much time on line, now from the past few weeks and especially the last few days seems too very benign.

Take the January insurgency in Egypt. Very well prepared and organized, following a very disciplined non-violent script, it saw the overthrow of a lengthy dictatorship, albeit still remaining under military rule. What oiled the movement making it actually work was the organizer's use of social media. Information moved throughout the revolution at lighting speed to hundreds of Egyptians. The protests and protestors were well coordinated. Egypt may well be the first example of a national (international?) revolution happening in real time and supported by Facebook.


Libya, where it seems the uprising may not have been as well planned, saw the government learning from Egypt and attempting, at least to some extent, to block internet activity.

Then this past Friday afternoon, Japan time, came first the magnitude-8.9 earthquake, followed almost immediately by the horrendous tsunamis with waves 23 feet (some reports say 30 feet) high, with the speed of a jumbo jet, racing inland as far as six mile, swallowing homes, cars, trees, boats and ships, people and anything else in their path. And now the loss of life and home and land just, just starting to emerge as aftershocks, nuclear plan failures, and the inevitable risk of disease continue to grow.


Amidst all this incomprehensible horror, social media again came into its own potential. Twitter quickly became the go-to service in the emergency, and its use was immediate and intense. Less than an hour after the quake and tsunamis, with the country's phone system knocked out, the number of Tweets coming from Tokyo were topping 1,200 per minute. Here on our own West Coast Twitter users learned of the disaster late Thursday night and were quickly sharing reports, prayers, and video streams. Twitter users were also announcing the tsunami's estimated time of arrival on U.S. shores - - even before an official government tsunami warning went into effect. (The waves were expected to hit Hawaii first, at roughly 3:00 A.M. local time; Skype provided visual assurance. YouTube gave real-time footage, and even set up a dedicated page just for videos of the disaster. Now families are using Facebook and Google to contact relatives and friends in Japan.

And there are , without doubt, many more stories and example.

Throughout the world people not just witnessed, but in a very real sense, experienced the tragedy via social media. Non-governmental relief agencies, as well as churches, within hours, if not minutes, provided us with avenues to help, primarily posting ways of contributing money, and giving us a means of immediate engagement.


Immediate, real-time, is today's reality, with even national newscast bordering on obsolescence in a world where even one hour ago is history.

NDB station 46006,
 600 NM west of Eureka CA

A sidebar for we mariners. As the tsunami moved east across the Pacific you could monitor the wave via the National Data Buoy Center site, especially as it approached the shallow continental shelf off Southwestern Washington state and Crescent City, California.


Yes, social media has power well beyond the casual, oft times sophomoric chatter, that tends to clutter my screen. Like it or not, it really is a new day for many of us.


All of us living on this West Coast, atop our very own geological faults, need to remember that what has happened, and what is happening in Japan, could and probably will be our own experience.

And in this vein, I wonder how we might respond, not just to the disaster itself, but more importantly in the aftermath? Marnie Hunter in an op-ed yesterday on CNN entitled  "Orderly Disaster Reaction In Line with Deep Cultural Roots." raises some critical observations.


But for now, please keep the thousands and thousands of Japanese who are missing, who are dead, who morn, who are homeless, who suffer both in body and mind, in your thoughts and prayers. 

People for Puget Sound

A premier organization that actually cares for Puget Sound (certainly our section of the Salish Sea) celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, as well as making a change in its leadership. People for Puget Sound has been working for the Sound's protection and recovery since 1911, and boaters and non-boaters alike owe them our thanks - - lots of thanks.


Mike Sato, Director of Communications, Education and Involvement, issued a press release earlier this week announcing the hiring of Tom Bancroft as the organization's next executive director.

"Tom Bancroft, who holds a PhD in ecology, has had a distinguished career as an environmentalist and leader. Most recently he was Chief Scientist and Vice President of the National Audubon Society. Prior to that he was Vice President of The Wilderness Society. While he will be new to the Puget Sound region, he is well-acquainted with our challenges. Just last year, he headed up National Audubon’s scientific evaluations of the massive BP oil spill in the Gulf. He has worked for many years on restoration and management of the Everglades, and he is familiar with Puget Sound and its watersheds from his work with The Wilderness Society."


Dr. Bancroft will be  succeeding founder and Executive Director Kathy Fletcher who will be retiring at the end of June 2011.


Dr. Bancroft explained that he boated a lot more when he was working in the Everglades and out into the Florida Keys but not much since then. He hope to be on the water here both for pleasure and for work.


In celebrating its anniversary People for Puget Sound will be taking the S/V Adventuress and the M/Y Carmelits on voyages to communities around the Sound, "reprising the inaugural voyage that launched People for Puget Sound in 1991". For details go to www.onepugetsound.org/voyage.


Retiring leader Kathy Fletcher has been an extraordinary founder-executive director. A personal connection for me, besides supporting People for Puget Sound in this blog, our youngest daughter, while at Western Washington University's environmental science program, did an internship under Kathy. I later met Kathy aboard the classic tug "Owl" while doing some boathandling coaching on Lake Union.


Now we welcome Tom Bancroft onto our waters and into our concerns for a healthy Sound.


This is a most worthy organization, one that has well earned the respect of many in the Puget Sound area and far beyond, boaters as well as non-boaters. You can keep up with them by subscribing (free) to their news clips and weather postings email list entering "subscribe" in the subject line, subscribing (again free) to their electronic newsletter, and, hopefully, then supporting them.

Is Big Brother on the High Seas?

Let's face it, most of us value independence (we're not that far from our teenage progeny). We like being able to move freely, unrestrained, the world, or at least our little chunk of it, our oyster. We boaters certainly enjoy being able to cruise wherever, whenever, however.


But herein may lie a dilemma, so let's go back a bit.  Three years ago I posted an introductory description of the Automatic Identification System (AIS), a great system which identified and shows vessels on your navigation plotter, not by line-of-sight radar, but by radio transmission. Quite different than radar, being radio AIS can "see"  behind hills and around corners and show the vessel  on your plotter. Required of all vessels over 300 gross tons and certain high-speed yachts, AIS transmits the location, heading, speed, cargo, and destination of the vessel. While AIS transmitters are not yet required of recreation boats, many of us have AIS receivers so that we can receive these AIS transmissions (and have them appear on our navigation plotters). For a fuller description go to my January 2008 posting.


Then this past January I posted a description of an expanded world-wide fun use of the AIS showing vessels all over the world, where they were heading, at what speed, etc., a very creative project of the University of the Aegean, in Mytilene, Greece.


Quite frankly, I'm pretty long on this collision avoidance system


Now comes Ralph Naranjo, noted technical editor of Practical Sailor, around-the-world sailor, safe-boating advocate, and former Vanderstar Chair at the U.S. Naval Academy, raising the issue: Is the AIS chipping away at our freedom?


Naranjo points out in Practical Sailor that that AIS system is also the foundation of the Department of Homeland Security's vessel-tracking system run by the US Coast Guard. Dubbed the National Automatic Identification System (NAIS), security seems to be at the top of the list of objectives, according to Naranjo. He quotes a directive, "AIS data is combined with other government intelligence and surveillance information to form a holistic, over-arching view of marine traffic . . . detecting anomalies, monitoring suspicious vessels, and pinpointing the location of potential threats."


While compulsory AIS transmission by recreational vessels is at best in the distant future (remember that with deregulations of years ago no longer are recreational vessels is US waters required even to have VHF radios aboard!), the notion of AIS "surveillance" does conjure up some concerns, at least some disturbances. Of course such monitoring is de rigor for airplane pilots, commercial as well as recreational, but we're boaters. . . .


Big brother? Orwell's 1984? Privacy issues? Freedom of the Seas? Want to weigh in on this?  Simply click "comments" at the end of this posting and have at it.


You'll find Ralph Naranjo's complete article on Practical Sailor.

Illustration courtesy of Practical Sailor 

The Social Media: Facebook

While the film "The Social Network" has eight Academy Award nominations, won four Golden Globes as well as four Critics' Choice awards, plus many more prizes and nominations, Facebook (about which the film is based) continues to make changes without necessarily telling its over 350-million users, and many, many boaters are on Facebook.


[Fact: Facebook is the third largest country in the world based on population, just behind China and India.]

[Fact: Facebook played a crucial role in the January 26th uprising in Egypt, as well as protests in other Mideast countries.]


Last Friday in Washington DC's examiner.com,  Tanya Gupta wrote:

Are you wondering why you aren't getting news from Alicia?  Did Bob block you?  Did you "hide" your friends newsfeed and then just forgot?  Are you wondering why more people are not commenting on your posts?

No, you are not being paranoid.

Facebook went and did another change without telling you.  Now the default is that your FB page will only show posts from people you interact with the most or your most recent interactions.  The result is that close friends stay close, whereas the friends you hoped to get closer to through Facebook are slowly becoming invisible to you.

If you want to stay in touch with everyone then re-set your Facebook settings so that you can keep in touch with all your friends.

Go to the bottom on your newsfeed page and find the button that says "edit options". Then select "all of your friends and pages", and save.  This should do it.  But remember - this only fixes it for you so that you see everybody else's feed.  However FB users who don't know about this will still not be able to see your feed.  So let your friends know so that they can change their settings!

(And a shout out to Lesley Scher for passing this on to me)

The New Coastal Radar Is almost Here!

Almost two years ago we cited Cliff Mass' blog about the possibility of there being a new coastal weather radar for the West Coast. Cliff, professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington, now gives us a status update, and the news is exciting!

At the recent annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society, several of us had the chance to sit down with the NWS folks that are responsible for the installation of the new radar. Let me tell you what we have learned.

Bottom line: the National Weather Service is confident that the new radar will be operational by the end of September (2011).

So by the start of the next storm season, we will finally be able to see the details of incoming storms and weather systems. This is fortunate--next year will probably be a neutral El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) year...neither El Nino nor La Nina. Such years are the ones when the most powerful storms hit our region (but no guarantees storm lovers!!)

Now the details.

First, the location of the radar is now public knowledge: Langley Hill in Grays Harbor County.

A wonderful location, with clear views out to the Pacific Ocean. And the radar will able to see the heavy precipitation on the windward side of the Olympics and over the Willapa Hills. The National Weather Service is close to signing the final paperwork for leasing that site

Second, the National Weather Service now has our radar in hand. This is not a new radar, but one used for training purposes by the military (and the only one available) and identical to the radars used by the NWS over the rest of the country (known as the NEXRAD or WSR-88D radars). I was told it was "lightly used" , sort of like buying a used car from an elderly grandmother. It will be completely refurbished and updated before installation. Using a preexisting radar not only saves money, but the NWS folks know how to maintain and service it. They were nervous about getting a new radar--one different than the current network.

Third, our radar will be one of the first in the nation to be updated with dual-polarization. All the current radars are single polarization, which means the electromagnetic radiation it emits has only one orientation--horizontal.

In dual polarization, two orientations (horizontal and vertical) are emitted and received. Why is this good? Well, by getting the two orientations all kinds of magic is possible---determining the shape and type of precipitation, getting a much better handle on the intensity of precipitation (especially in terrain), and more. Eventually all the NWS radars will have it, but this will be one of the first.

Fourth, our radar will be the ONLY one in the nation using a zero degree scan angle. Weather radars scan in two ways. First, they constantly turn in azimuth (0 to 360 degrees). During the first scan the antenna is directly at an angle .5 degree above the horizon. Then it does a scan at 1.0 degrees, then 1.5 degrees, etc. Here is a figure that shows you the height of the radar beams for the various scan angles close to the radar (up to 120 nautical miles, 220 km).

Now the lowest scan is near the surface close to the radar, but get 100 km out and the beam is 1000 meters up in the air! And at 200 km out the beam is 2000 meters (over 6000 ft) above the surface. So you are missing what is happening lower down. These radars can view 300-400 km out, so you can miss a lot at low levels, particularly at a distance. And WE want to see as much as possible at low levels over the Pacific!

Several of us have pushed the NWS to do something special with this radar, allowing a zero degree angle, and they have agreed. This will allow us to see much farther out at low levels than normal and will be a boon for viewing weather out over the Pacific. Again, no other NWS radar in the country has this capability--hopefully our radar will inspire the NWS to try this elsewhere.

During the next few months, a lot of action will begin at the site. Trenching for utilities, putting down a concrete pad, erecting a building for the generator, putting up the tower, and more. The radar should be installed midsummer. By late September a local meteorological revolution will occur and for the first time one of the stormiest areas in the country will be able to see incoming storms. And folks in the coastal communities and those in the marine industries of the Washington Pacific coast will have what the rest of us have enjoyed for years...decent weather radar coverage, with all the safety and economic benefits. Finally, I should note that Senator Maria Cantwell deserves credit for getting the resources to make this happen.

With good radar coverage, incidents like the New Carissa grounding (on the Oregon Coast), will hopefully be less frequent.


Cliff Mass' blog is listed to the left of this posting.

Intriguing headline: "Arctic Ocean Getting Warm; Seals Vanish and Icebergs Melt"

From The Washington Post:
The  Arctic ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer and in some  places the seals are finding the water too hot, according to a  report to the Commerce Department yesterday from Consulafft, at  Bergen, Norway.  Reports from fishermen, seal hunters and explorers  all point to a radical change in climate conditions and hitherto  unheard-of temperatures in the Arctic zone.  Exploration expeditions  report that scarcely any ice has been met as far north as 81 degrees,  29 minutes.
Soundings to a depth of 3,100 meters showed the  gulf stream still very warm.  Great masses of ice have been replaced  by moraines of earth and stones, the report continued, while at many  points well known glaciers have entirely disappeared.
Very  few seals and no white fish are found in the eastern Arctic, while  vast shoals of herring and smelts which have never before ventured  so far north, are being encountered in the old seal fishing grounds.  
Within a few years it is predicted that due to the ice  melt the sea will rise and make most coastal cities  uninhabitable.

Oops!   Never mind.  This report was from November 2, 1922, as reported by  the Associated Press and published in the Washington Post -- 88 years ago, and currently in the Library of Congress archives with the fascinating story behind it. The reality of global warming, while critical today, was evidently apparent years ago.

(With thanks to Mike Harlick who passed this on to me.) 

Tea Time

Earlier this month, slate.com posted a piece by Christopher Hitchens on tea (actually he was commenting on Yoko Ono’s tribute to her husband, in which she recalled that they often made tea together).

“Just after World War II, during a period of acute food rationing in England, George Orwell wrote an article on the making of a decent cup of tea that insisted on the observing of 11 different "golden" rules.  Some of these (always use Indian or Ceylonese – i.e., Sri Lankan – tea; make tea only in small quantities; avoid silverware pots) may be considered optional or outmoded.  But the essential ones are easily committed to memory, and they are simple to put into practice.

“If you use a pot at all, make sure it is pre-warmed.  (I would add that you should do the same thing even if you are only using a cup or a mug.)  Stir the tea before letting it steep.  But this above all:  "[O]ne should take the teapot to the kettle, and not the other way about.  The water should be actually boiling at the moment of impact, which means that one should keep it on the flame while one pours."  This isn't hard to do, even if you are using electricity rather than gas, once you have brought all the makings to the same scene of operations right next to the kettle.

“It's not quite over yet.  If you use milk, use the least creamy type or the tea will acquire a sickly taste.  And do not put the milk in the cup first – family feuds have lasted generations over this – because you will almost certainly put in too much.  Add it later, and be very careful when you pour.  Finally, a decent cylindrical mug will preserve the needful heat and flavor for longer than will a shallow and wide-mouthed – how often those attributes seem to go together – teacup.  Orwell thought that sugar overwhelmed the taste, but brown sugar or honey are, I believe, permissible and sometimes necessary.”

This brought back warm memories of my very early years when my parents had tea umpteen times a day (Dad was English; Mum, Canadian. And we had lived in Columbo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in the late ‘30s. Dad being an early riser would bring Mum her cup first thing in the morning, in bed. As I recall tea was drunk mid-morning, for lunch, late afternoon before a pre-dinner sherry, in the evening before bed. The tea pot was always pre-warmed, loose tea used (Orange Pecoe and Pecoe, from Ceylon, naturally) - - tea-bags were never tolerated, steeped just so long with a tea-cosy keeping the pot warm, strained, just the right amount of milk and sugar added, thank you. To make a good cuppa was an art.

Many years later, in the hills of Korea while attached to a British Army unit, at a break a large can (someone in the section always had a beat up rather grubby one tied to his small pack) would appear, water brought to boiling, a handful of tea thrown in, a bit more of a boil, then off the fire and a dash of cold water thrown in to settle the leaves, and you had your tea.

Actually, I never liked tea.

January 8, 2011

Photo: Thanks to the Rev. Suzi Robertson, Vicar
Good Samaritan Episcopal Church,
Sammamish WA

Scanning the Globe

After a nice week of crystal clear skies, yet cold, a time when one could look from the Kingston-Edmonds ferry at sails tacking across this southern end of the Salish Sea (aka Puget Sound), enjoying great frost-bite sailing. But now the weather has moved in with grey skies, and rain. Though a bit warmer, snow is forecast mid-week. Time to hunker down with a warm stove and get comfy writing those Christmas thank-you notes and finishing up those cartons of eggnog.


A few posts ago, December 5th, 2008, to be exact, I wrote about the Automatic Identification System, or AIS as it is more commonly called. In a nutshell, it's a radio system, and being a radio system it can see "vessels" when you or your radar cannot. Overlaid on your plotter, it shows vessels that "are just around the corner", thus giving you time to make course corrections. You can read more on this by going to the archives to the left and clicking on 2008, December, 5th. A great safety device, as well as a fun one to monitor when at anchor. You get all sorts of information about the vessels you "see" - - you "see" the vessel's name; if it is "at anchor", "underway using engine", or "not under command"; type of ship and cargo; tonnage; dimensions; speed and course over ground; call-sign; MMSI; and destination, and when it will get there. I did notice that military vessels don't say much of anything on their icon, something akin to sailors and soldiers wearing camouflage uniforms in Starbucks (Hey, I can see you!).


AIS is becoming more popular, with some larger recreational vessels now transmitting their information while the rest of us just "read" what they're saying.


And when at evening anchor, calmly nursing a cool glass of wine, it doesn't bother me one bit when my wife and traveling companions kid me as I sit tracking vessels on my plotter. "Look, there goes the B.C. Ferry "Spirit of Vancouver Island" leaving Tsawwassen. And there's the tug "Intrepid III" with a tow, just rounding Moresby Island." Wow, just another form of mariner relaxation.


But now you can go even global, thanks to the creative work of the University of the Aegean in Mytilene, Greece.  Those lads and gals of the Department of Product and System Design Engineering have wonderfully created and host a world-wide AIS, Marine Traffic.com from which you can track vessels all over the globe. Right now, as I write this post, their page shows 20,461 vessels being tracked.


A great way to pass the time, a sort of nautical "Where's Elmo?", as you're  hunkered down and waiting for clearer skies and calmer seas.


And if you haven't yet done so, check out AIS for your own vessel. I got mine through Milltech Marine, a local Northwest company with great service and support.


Thanks to Mike Harlick and Rod Scher (author, The Annotated Sailing Around the World) who separately introduced me to the University of the Aegean site (which is also a hint asking you for your ideas for this blog . . .). 

Setting a New Course

January was named for the Roman god Janus, the protector of gates and doorways. He was pictured as two-headed, with both heads bearded; one head looked forward while the other looks aft, with a retrospective view.


A few weeks ago fellow boaters and friends came ashore for dinner with us. As the evening drew on, and being faithful readers of this blog, they asked, "So, what is this blogger's block you last mentioned all about?" As I stumbled to come up with an appropriate response, John added, "What I really like are the comments and the ideas you mention, not necessarily the 'how to' stuff" (or words to that effect). Gives one pause. Not being an editor of Chapman's Piloting I may well be burned out on the 'how to' stuff.


So a new course is set as we look forward like Janus, one which continues nautical matters, but also veers at times to touch on other interests, as the description of the blog at the top of the page suggests. A new course with a new name: "Aft Deck Musings . . . ." A new course with a new name and now more folk joining this cruise as new addressees join  greatly increasing the current 400+ viewers currently receiving (and hopefully, reading) this blog.


But, and this is very important, our well respected CruiseMasters Boating Instruction program is still very much alive and on course. Almost 600 boaters have taken this program since it started thirteen years ago; that's 1,252,100 client/hours of instruction! Click on the web site to the left to find out a lot more about CruiseMasters.


So, Happy New Year, and here's to our new heading!


I hope you enjoy it.

Photo: moored at Ganges, Salt Spring Island, B.C., 2006