Monday, November 20, 2006

Ummmmm...........

First the serious scientific story.
They're going to sink and document the ecological benefits of a whale carcass.
Yep, science at it's best.

Confronted with a rotting whale carcass on the beach in 1970, officials in Florence, Ore., hauled in 20 cases of dynamite and lit the fuse.

The resulting rain of blubber chunks smashed a car a quarter-mile away, sent onlookers fleeing for cover and yielded one of the Internet's most side-splitting video clips.

Biologists at the University of Washington's Friday Harbor Laboratories have a better idea for disposing of a 54-foot fin whale that turned up dead in the Port of Everett earlier this month.

They plan to attach 3 tons of metal railroad wheels to the corpse and sink it off the coast of San Juan Island.

But because these are scientists, that's just the beginning of the story.

The real goal is to study the whale's decomposition at a level of detail that would make most people gag.

Using an underwater drone equipped with a video camera, the researchers will document the types of fish, crabs and other creatures that feed on the carcass, and the role it plays as a food bonanza in the marine ecosystem. Divers will also visit the site for an up-close view of the putrefaction.


Now for the good part:


Including this tongue twister "The blast blasted blubber beyond all believable bounds".

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