Volcanic Ash’s Health Effects, Future of Mars Exploration
This week: I’m back from Berkeley, CA and podcasting from The World studios. You’ll hear about potential health impacts of ash from the Icelandic volcano with the difficult-to-pronounce name. Also, news about the future of U.S. space exploration and the puzzling health problems cropping up among the survivors of the Haiti earthquake. Then, a glaciologist tells us what he listens to while working in Antarctica.
Going to Mars: It was almost 50 years ago that President Kennedy declared the U.S. would send astronauts to the moon in a space race with the Soviet Union. Much has changed on earth since then. Last week President Obama outlined his vision for America’s future in space. Speaking at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the President said he’s committed to human exploration beyond the moon. But few envision a space race to Mars.
Report by: Alex Gallafent.
Read a transcript of Obama’s speech.
NASA’s Mars Exploration Program.
Haiti’s Traumatized Earthquake Survivors: It’s been three months since the quake hit Haiti and hundreds of thousands of Haitians are still living in tents. Medically, the emergency has passed. The crush of survivors being treated at hospitals has eased, but doctors in Haiti say their case loads remain high and the cases are getting more puzzling.
Report By: Amy Bracken.
Reporter’s Notebook: Amy Bracken’s journal from Haiti.
Read a transcript of this story.
More about conversion disorders from the Mayo Clinic.
Volcanic Ash Health Concerns: The skies over much of northern Europe are just starting to open up to air traffic. A vast cloud of ash from a volcano in Iceland had made flying dangerous. Thousands of people were stranded. And the World Health Organization urged people in the affected areas to stay indoors if the ash starts to settle because inhaling particles of microscopic ash could cause respiratory problems. But how concerned should people be?
Guest: Stephen Spiro, British Lung Foundation.
BBC coverage of Iceland’s volcano.
Click here for the pronunciation (and mispronunciation) of Eyjafjallajokull.
Information about the eruption from the UK Met Office.
World Health Organization statement.
Photos from the eruption.
Watch a time-lapse video of the volcano below.
Music in Science: Working in Antarctica can be awe-inspiring, but also grueling and isolating. Glaciologist Andrew Fountain describes the aggressive music that keeps him motivated while he makes his long daily trek over the glacier. He’s studying how weather patterns predict glacial melting–which, in turn, feeds Antarctica’s lowly ecosystem of mosses, microbes and worms.
Fountain’s Web page.
Song: The Distance, by Cake
Album: Fashion Nugget
Very interesting information re the volcano. I would be very interested in hearing about any investigation on any weather effects observed in Europe that could be related to the flight shut-down. If I remember correctly, following the four day shut-down of air traffic in the U.S. on Sept 11-15, 2001, a rise in the high/low daily temperature differential was observed. It was shown to be due to the lack of con-trails and added a significant new variable to the study of global climate change.
***
Also – following Rhitu’s request for feed-back on the musical interludes: I like them well enough, but I suspect they take up resources that could be used elsewhere. I’m more interested in the science news and so wouldn’t mind if they were eliminated.
Thanks for writing, Saffi. I’ll try to post any information I can find about the volcano’s weather effects in Europe.
And thanks for your feedback about music. Yes, using music requires more production time. Some podcasts just call out for music, others I have to spend more time to fit music into. Its good to know you could do without it.
Cheers,
Rhitu
Rhitu, I like the music segue between the stories–the music before the start of the podcast I can take or leave but I always like to think the producer of the podcast is paying attention when the music fits–to my way of thinking anyway.
Music? ABSOLUTELY!!! Music can punctuate, abbreviate and elevate a science story and make it 23-68% more awesome. Even a little music to underscore a story does wonders. Naturally, one must use good taste when selecting music. It is a delicate art. Like microscopic dissection, or titration.
Plus I agree with Julia, the music should fit the story.
Climate Change is really scary, now we have super typhoons and a lot of flooding going on some countries..;;~