- How about that massive meteor that missed us or the one that hit Russia? This page has a few videos on the one in Russia. A thousand people were injured from shattering glass. Of course I thought about the Tunguska event of 1908, the last time something like this happened where it is believed a meteor of enormous size must have crashed into Siberia.
- I got to hear the international cheer of scientists as the big one, 2012 DA14 missed the earth near 2:25 EST on Friday, February 15, 2013. Nearly five million people were watching NASA's feed before it happened. Science Friday was there briefly.
- Why it's bad to be 'dead in the water' even these days. Carnival cruise ship 'Triumph' finally pulls into port in Mobile, AL last night after four days of deprivation out in the Caribbean. Deprived of motive force, the ship apparently lost power as well to sewage displacement pumps. As a result, bilges filled up and leaked all over, etc... NPR has a collection of anecdotes and articles. The cruise-ship had a fire in its engine room Sunday night while drifting off the Mexican Yucatan peninsula. The company promises some forms of compensation for the hardship.
- And on Sunday night, hours after Pope Benedict XVI said he would resign, St Peter's Basilica was struck by lightning. That's right. Here's a weather.com article with a bbc posted video. Pretty weird.
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Columbus' son Hernando Colon continues the tale of the first return from 'the Indies', in his 38th chapter of his Life of the Admiral by his son:
"As they sailed on in such great danger from the storm, at dawn on Friday, 15 February, one Ruy Garcia of Santona saw from the main mast land to the east-north-east. The pilots and sailors thought that it was Cintra in Portugal. But the Admiral insisted that they were at the Azores, and this was one of the islands, and although they were not far offshore they were unable to reach land that day on account of the storm. Being compelled to beat about [that is, to row] since the wind was in the east, they lost sight of the first island and saw another, under the lee of which they ran to shelter from a strong crosswind and bad weather."
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Also Weird to me how I start reading Aztec omens about fires in the sky from 500 years ago and then, this very week it happens, in Russia, in Rome. Just weird. A coincidence like they say between the Russian meteor and the big one 2012 DA14. But here we are. As I said before these were collected by one Bernardino de Sahagún a missionary-ethnographer c. 1555 who put these into Book 12 of what is now called the Florentine Codex. * These were then selected and printed in a twentieth-century collection of inhabitant re-tellings called The Broken Spears.
"The third bad omen: A temple was damaged by a lightning-bolt. This was the temple of Xiuhtecuhtli, which was built of straw, in the place known as Tzonmolco. It was raining that day, but it was only a light rain or a drizzle, and no thunder was heard. Therefore the lightning-bolt was taken as an omen. The people said: "The temple was struck by a blow from the sun."
The fourth bad omen: Fire streamed through the sky while the sun was still shining. It was divided into three parts. It flashed out from where the sun sets and raced straight to where the sun rises, giving off a shower of sparks like a red-hot coal. When the people saw its long train streaming through the heavens, there was a great outcry and confusion, as if they were shaking a thousand little bells."
from The Broken Spears: the Aztec account of the conquest of Mexico, translated, edited with an introduction by Miguel León-Portilla, expanded and with a postscript, Beacon Press, 2006.* Bernardino de Sahagún, Florentine Codex , Introductory Volume, trans. and ed. A.J.O. Anderson and C. E. Dibble, no 14, pt 1 (Santa Fe and Salt Lake City: School of American Research and University of Utah Press, 1982)
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