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The article here describes a phenomenon that can occur to hurricanes: their wind-speed grows rapidly.

Hurricane Melissa underwent what meteorologists call “rapid intensification,” exploding from a 70-mph tropical storm Saturday morning Oct. 25 to a Category 4 hurricane with 140 mph winds by 5 a.m. Sunday, Oct. 26. It has since reached Category 5 strength, with winds of 175 mph.

Rapid intensification is a process in which a storm undergoes accelerated growth: The phenomenon is typically defined to be a tropical cyclone (whether a tropical storm or hurricane) intensifying by at least 35 mph in a 24-hour period.

Questions (that our kids should be able to answer from their science classes):

#1 How is this intensification powered?  Faster winds have more energy than slower winds, so where does this energy come from?

Answer: It’s by unusually warm sea water — in this case, in the Caribbean Sea.

#2:  OK, but what provides the energy that warms the water?

Answer: The sun.  What we’re experiencing right now on Earth is called “global warming,” meaning that our planet’s atmosphere is trapping more of the sun’s radiant energy, which is heating up our atmosphere, as well as our oceans.

My wife and I have a friend in Kingston, Jamaica’s largest city, which is in Melissa’s crosshairs.  We’re rooting for you, Richard.

How Hurricane Melissa Underwent ‘Rapid Intensification’

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Renewable Energy

Bravery Meets Tragedy: An Unending Story

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Here’s a story:

He had 3 days left until graduation.

STEM School Highlands Ranch. May 7, 2019.

Kendrick Castillo was 18. A robotics student. College bound. Accepted into an engineering program. The final week of school felt like countdown, not crisis.

Then a weapon appeared inside a classroom.

Students froze.

Kendrick did not.

Witnesses say he moved instantly. He lunged toward the attacker. No hesitation. No calculation.

Two other students followed his lead.

Gunfire erupted.

Kendrick was fatally sh*t.

But his movement changed the room.

Classmates were able to tackle and restrain the attacker until authorities arrived. Investigators later stated that the confrontation disrupted the attack and likely prevented additional casualties.

In seconds, an 18-year-old made a decision most adults pray they never face.

Afterward, the silence was heavier than the noise.

At graduation, his name was called.

His diploma was awarded posthumously. The arena stood in collective applause. An empty seat. A cap and gown without the student inside it.

His robotics teammates remembered him as curious. Competitive. Kind. Someone who solved problems instead of avoiding them.

He had planned to build machines.

Instead, he built a moment.

A moment that classmates say gave them time.

Time to escape.

Two points:

If you can read this without tears welling up in your eyes, you’re a far more stoic person than I.

Since Big Money has made it impossible for the United States to implement the same common-sense gun laws that exist in the rest of the planet, this story will reduplicate itself into perpetuity.

Bravery Meets Tragedy: An Unending Story

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Forced Transgendering of America’s Little Kids

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How often does this happen? How about never?

Trump loves to say that little boys go to school and come back home little girls.

He’s the most powerful person in the world for exactly one reason: We’re a nation of morons.

Forced Transgendering of America’s Little Kids

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Renewable Energy

Illegal Aliens and U.S. Veterans

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Two comments:

That the United States has homeless veterans is a national (and international) disgrace.

By definition, no one has the legal right to enter the U.S. illegally, but according to our constitution, everyone in America is entitled to due process.

Illegal Aliens and U.S. Veterans

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