My Science School

Most people don't realize that ruby and sapphire are both gems of the mineral corundum. Both of these gemstones have the same chemical composition and the same mineral structure. Trace amounts of impurities determine if gem corundum will be a brilliant red ruby or a beautiful blue sapphire. 

Ruby and sapphire both serve as modern birthstones. Ruby is the birthstone for the month of July. Sapphire is the birthstone for the month of September. Synthetic gems are often used in birthstone jewelry to save on costs.

Rubies are gem corundums with a dominant red color. The color can range from orangy red to purplish red or brownish red. The most desirable color range is a pure vibrant red to a slightly purplish red.

Trace amounts of iron and titanium can produce a blue color in corundum. Blue corundums are known as "sapphires." The name "sapphire" is used for corundums that range from a very light blue to a very dark blue color. The blue can range from a greenish blue to violetish blue. Gems with a rich blue to violetish blue color are the most desirable.

 

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One of the challenges of international flying is handling different units of measure in different countries. In aviation, the battle between imperial and metric units continues. Feet, meters, statute miles, nautical miles, inches of mercury, millibars, hectopascal, knots, meters/second – it can get a little confusing! Read on and I’ll scramble your brain with international aviation units!

World-wide, the nautical mile (nm) is the standard for measuring the distance an aircraft travels across the ground. 

Other lateral measurements are a mess. Most of the world measures runway length in meters while North America uses feet. Most of the world measures airport visibility in meters. North America? Not nautical miles, not meters, but statute miles! Huh?? Not to worry, North America changes back to feet when measuring Runway Visual Range (runway visibility measured with a laser), while the rest of the world sticks with meters. Confused? I sure am, and I do this for a living!

 

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Lord Hanuman, son of Vayu (wind God) and Anjana, was very powerful. There are different versions of how he was born. One is that on Ramanavami, when Rishyashringa performed yagna, divine nectar which contained the seed of Lord Shiva was given to the three wives of King Dasharatha, the King of Ayodhya.

After consuming it, Ram, Lakshman, Bharat, and Shatrughna were born to them. But one portion of the nectar was carried away by a large bird into the sky. However, Vayu took that portion away from the bird

and brought it to Anjana. She drank it and Lord Hanuman was born.

 

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Singapore is an island nation affected by global warming. The Singapore government is trying to protect this low-lying country from being submerged. But this world cost the nation S$ 100 billion ($72 billion) or more over 100 years. According to its PM, Singapore’s future options include building areas of land reclaimed from a body of water, or reclaiming a series of islands offshore and connecting them with barrages.

Singapore has also introduced a carbon tax to reduce CO2 let out in the atmosphere. Its new airport terminal and port will be built on higher ground. The government will also spend S$400 million to upgrade and maintain the country’s drains and strengthen its flood outlets. But for climate change, all this money could be used for sports facilities, schools and hospitals!

 

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According to a report in The Guardian, the melting of Himalayan glaciers had doubled since 2000. In the last four decades, a quarter of all ice has melted. The accelerating losses indicate a “devastating” future for the region. A billion people depend on the Himalayan snow for regular water. Scientists say that 8bn tonnes of ice are being lost every year and not replaced by snow. The glaciers at the lower levels of the Himalayas are shrinking in height by 5 metres annually. This heavy melting is entirely due to human activity. Prof. Joerg Schaefer, climatologist said, “It is really the doubling of the speed of glacier melt that is most concerning.”

On average, the glacier surfaces shrank by 22cm (8.6 inches) a year from 1975 to 2000. But the melting has accelerated with an average loss of 43cm a year from 2000 to 2016. We know this shrinking is caused by us because it happens at similar rates all along the mountain chain.

Temperature data from the region shows an average rise of 1C from 2000-16 compared with 1975-2000. “Even glaciers in the highest mountains of the world are responding to global air temperature increases driven by the combustion of fossil fuels,” said Joseph Shea, at the University of Northern British Columbia in Canada. “To stop the temperature rise, we have to cool the planet,” he said. “We have to not only slow down greenhouse gas emissions, we have to reverse them. That is the challenging for the next 20 years.”

 

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In 2019, the Arctic region experienced “unprecedented” Wildfires, which scientists say have been facilitated by high temperatures. The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service has tracked more than 100 intense wildfires in the Arctic Circle since June, 2019.

Temperatures in the Arctic are rising at a faster rate than the global average, providing the right conditions for wildfires to spread.

Wildfires also release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, contributing to global warming. For instance, the 2014 megafires in Canada scorched more than 7 million acres of forest, releasing more than 103 million tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere – half as much as all the plants and trees in Canada typically absorb in an entire year, according to a study by NASA.

The pristine Arctic environment is particularly sensitive/fragile and warming faster than most other regions. Particles of smoke can land on snow and ice, causing the ice to absorb sunlight that it would otherwise reflect, and thereby accelerating the warming in the Arctic. Fires in the Arctic also increase the risk of further permafrost thawing that releases methane, which is also a greenhouse gas.

 

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Scientists say Greenland ice sheet experienced its biggest melt of the summer in 2019. More than 10 billion tons of surface ice melted into the ocean. Greenland’s ice sheet usually melts during the summer, but melting begins at the end of May. This year it came very early. Melting went on continuously for four months. The temperature recorded was on all-time high. There was a heat wave throughout Europe and it reached the Arctic, and this triggered one of Greenland’s biggest ice-melts since 1950. Meteorologists have reported that globally, 2019 July has been as hot as any month in recorded history.

Greenland’s ice sheet is the second biggest in the world and this season’s ice melt has already contributed around half a millimetre to global sea levels.

 

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In the Santa Cruz province of Argentina too, glaciers are under attack. In the last 50 years, the majority of the 50 large glaciers in Los Glaciers National Park have been retreating due to the rise in temperatures. The U.S. Geological Survey reported that over 68% of the world’s freshwater supplies are in the ice caps and the glaciers. When glaciers freeze or dry up, the world will be without fresh water.

Meltwater from the Patagonian icefield contributes to sea level rise. The contribution is less than what will come from Greenland and Antarctica, but scientists plan to keep studying the region from space, from the air, and from the ground. According to Rignot: “Understanding the evolution of these glaciers helps us understand what glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica may look like in the future in a much warmer climate.”

 

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In Iceland, about 11 billion tonnes of ice melts away every year. Scientists fear all of the island country’s 400-plus glaciers will be gone by 2200. In 1890, the Okjokull glacier ice covered 16 sq km, but by 2012, it measured just 0.7 sq. Km, according to a report from the University of Iceland from 2017.

In 2014 glaciologists decided this was no longer a living glacier, it was only dead ice since it was not moving. To be called a glacier, the mass of ice and snow must be thick enough to move by its own weight. For that to happen the mass must be approximately 40 to 50 metres (130 to 165 feet) thick. “Even if we could stop introducing greenhouse gases into atmosphere right now, it will keep on warming for a century and a half or two centuries before it reaches equilibrium.”

 

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We can no longer ignore it. Climate change is happening. Experts say that the devastating wildfires in Australia and the flash floods and hail that followed are clear indications that the climate is changing fast. For those who still doubt this is happening, here is proof.

Last year, Iceland built a monument for its first glacier and wrote its epitaph. The glacier, named Okjokull (“Ok Glacier”) had disappeared. They placed a bronze plaque in the western part of Iceland, in memory of the lost glacier. Iceland’s Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir, Environment Minister Gudmuundur Ingi Gudbrandsson, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson were present at the event.

It is the first monument to a glacier lost to climate change anywhere in the world. The plaque has the words “A letter to the Future” written on it. It has a label “41 5 ppm CO2” that shows the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere recorded in May, 2019. The plaque also reads, “In the next 200 years all our glaciers are expected to follow the same path. This monument is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done.” The monument is meant to spread the message that our glaciers are disappearing fast and it is due to climate change.

 

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