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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 04/06/2009 : 22:18:10 [Permalink]
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Well, since HalfMooner is giving me competition in the "what's this weird geological feature?" line of trivia questions, it seems I've gotta start again.
Here is an odd little place. The questions are: what is its ZIP code, and why?
Using Wikipedia is forbidden. Prize is the same as always: a cookie. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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Machi4velli
SFN Regular
USA
854 Posts |
Posted - 04/06/2009 : 23:06:42 [Permalink]
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| Is it the place with the uncontrollable mine fire? I think the government paid for the people to move away because it was unsafe. I don't imagine towns with no people have zip codes? |
"Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people."
-Giordano Bruno
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge."
-Stephen Hawking
"Seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable"
-Albert Camus |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
 Posted - 04/06/2009 : 23:08:29 [Permalink]
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Is that Love Canal? Bit before my time, but I think it's in upstate NY somewhere. No idea on a zip code, so that means I'm probably wrong.
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 04/06/2009 : 23:17:19 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Machi4velli
Is it the place with the uncontrollable mine fire? I think the government paid for the people to move away because it was unsafe. I don't imagine towns with no people have zip codes? |
Close enough. It is Centralia, PA, which has had burning coal underneath it for decades. The Post Office revoked its ZIP code after the State used eminent domain to evict the residents who couldn't be bought out with Federal emergency money.
I just read about the town this past week in Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods, a nice book about hiking the Appalachian Trail. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 04/06/2009 : 23:52:12 [Permalink]
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Good one, Dave! I was still scratching my head.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Machi4velli
SFN Regular
USA
854 Posts |
Posted - 04/06/2009 : 23:59:33 [Permalink]
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| It's amazing how long they can burn, the coal just does not need much oxygen at all. There are, or have been, quite a few of them in PA, WV, and OH. |
"Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people."
-Giordano Bruno
"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge."
-Stephen Hawking
"Seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable"
-Albert Camus |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 01:05:17 [Permalink]
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Originally placed under foreign administration by an accident caused by an American land company, the small rural village below was later formally given through treaty by the United States to a foreign nation.
It is the last portion of the United States proper to be simply given away to a foreign land.
1. What is its name?
2.What country now owns it?
Click for extra-large version
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 04/07/2009 01:09:53 |
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Simon
SFN Regular
USA
1992 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 08:12:08 [Permalink]
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I have no clue... even after a bit of Google-cheat... But that seems like a fascinating story...
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Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
Carl Sagan - 1996 |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 08:22:28 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dave W.
Originally posted by Machi4velli
Is it the place with the uncontrollable mine fire? I think the government paid for the people to move away because it was unsafe. I don't imagine towns with no people have zip codes? |
Close enough. It is Centralia, PA, which has had burning coal underneath it for decades. The Post Office revoked its ZIP code after the State used eminent domain to evict the residents who couldn't be bought out with Federal emergency money.
I just read about the town this past week in Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods, a nice book about hiking the Appalachian Trail.
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How the hell does it burn without oxygen? There has to be some oxidizer source for the fire to continue. |
-Chaloobi
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 08:43:17 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by chaloobi
How the hell does it burn without oxygen? There has to be some oxidizer source for the fire to continue. |
According to Wikipedia:The pocket of ignited coal is fed oxygen by vent paths that have not yet been discovered. These smolder year in, year out. Exhaust vents in populated areas are soon sensed and are sealed. Vents in uninhabited areas remain undiscovered. Occasionally, vents are discovered via fumes sensed by passers-by, often in forested areas. But it's unreferenced. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 09:30:04 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dave W.
Originally posted by chaloobi
How the hell does it burn without oxygen? There has to be some oxidizer source for the fire to continue. |
According to Wikipedia:The pocket of ignited coal is fed oxygen by vent paths that have not yet been discovered. These smolder year in, year out. Exhaust vents in populated areas are soon sensed and are sealed. Vents in uninhabited areas remain undiscovered. Occasionally, vents are discovered via fumes sensed by passers-by, often in forested areas. But it's unreferenced.
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It seems to me that vent detection and sealing ought to be a major priority for anyone who is concerned about global warming.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13477 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 09:41:21 [Permalink]
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| Well, I tried and failed, Mooner. I must be in a slump... |
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 11:24:47 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by HalfMooner
Originally posted by Dave W.
Originally posted by chaloobi
How the hell does it burn without oxygen? There has to be some oxidizer source for the fire to continue. |
According to Wikipedia:The pocket of ignited coal is fed oxygen by vent paths that have not yet been discovered. These smolder year in, year out. Exhaust vents in populated areas are soon sensed and are sealed. Vents in uninhabited areas remain undiscovered. Occasionally, vents are discovered via fumes sensed by passers-by, often in forested areas. But it's unreferenced.
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It seems to me that vent detection and sealing ought to be a major priority for anyone who is concerned about global warming.
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I wonder how much CO2 it actually puts out and how much coal's under there. I'd guess that eventually enough of the underlying coal's going to burn away that the mine will collapse, sealing the vents, and putting the fire out. That or that damn thing's going to smolder for a millenia. That'd actually be pretty cool.
EDIT:
Ok, I read the article about the town itself and it sheds more light on my wonderings...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania
The mine was already abandoned when it caught fire. Apparently some careless garbage disposal mixed with coal burner ash set the town dump on fire which somehow migrated to the underlying abandoned mine. They didn't apparently regard it as a big problem until there a kid fell into a 4 foot wide, 150 foot deep hole that opened under him in a back yard. It doesn't say if he survived. Oh, and a local gas station found it's underground storage tank was heated to 172 F. What's the flash point of gasoline, anyway? Yikes. |
-Chaloobi
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| Edited by - chaloobi on 04/07/2009 11:35:27 |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 20:41:41 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
Well, I tried and failed, Mooner. I must be in a slump...
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It turns out I'm a very poor predictor of the difficulty of these things. I'd thought this one would be too easy.
Hint #1: The treaty giving the above bit of America to a foreign government was signed in 1970, and the hand-over itself took place in 1977.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 04/07/2009 20:44:23 |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 04/07/2009 : 22:55:12 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by HalfMooner
Originally placed under foreign administration by an accident caused by an American land company, the small rural village below was later formally given through treaty by the United States to a foreign nation.
It is the last portion of the United States proper to be simply given away to a foreign land.
1. What is its name?
2.What country now owns it? |
After scouring four-and-a-half states' borders with foreign countries, I decided to go a-Googling. Google, of course, wound up sending me to Wikipedia, and at the bottom of that list was a link to this entry.
However, the treaty was not a give-away, it was more like a trade to settle border disputes which resulted in the U.S. becoming more than 600 acres larger (net).
It appears, after reading more, that just about all of the border treaties and land lost from the U.S. follows a similar pattern, where the U.S. gives up some land in return for a lot of other land or other compensation. I have a hard time calling any of it "give-aways," unless we go all the way back to the War of 1812, during which Tristan da Cunha was used as a military base by the U.S., and after the war it was simply abandoned (and then annexed by the British in 1816). |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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The water cooler, part 3
