So far it’s not as bad as 2019 in Palm Beach County. But, it’s pretty bad. The Sargassum bloom is out of control again. This is in Ocean Ridge, Florida.
Sargassum is a seaweed that can accumulate along the shoreline in large amounts, making the shoreline inaccessible for swimming, boating, and other recreational activities. This beach seaweed overflow is happening again.
If you live near the coast and have experienced the beach seaweed overflow in the past, then you already know what to do! Be sure to check out our site for more information on this and other coastal issues!
See the feature story I did in 2019 when it was really bad in Florida, the Caribbean, and South and Central American coasts:
I’ve been up today since, you guessed it… 4:48 AM. Thank you Florida state government Emergency Response Team.
The governor is pissed. So am I and a lot of others throughout Florida because the alarm went out to every cellphone in the state.
But, I’ll bet the coffee companies are happy because of the millions of Floridians that couldn’t go back to sleep and just got up and got coffee. We’ll need some more between 2 and 3 PM this afternoon to stay awake beyond dinner.
Officials apologize after ‘Emergency Alert’ test sent in ‘error.’
Typically, only a few agencies have the ability to request and send out emergency notifications to cell phones, and they’re usually for imminent situations, such as severe weather warnings, an AMBER Alert for a missing child, public safety alerts, or a national emergency.
Hours later, the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM) apologized for the incident in a tweet, and said the Emergency Alert System (EAS) notification was part of a monthly test, but that it was supposed to air on TV, not cell phones.
Florida Governor DeSantis’ press secretary @BryanDGRiffin says “party responsible” for 4:45 a.m. emergency alert will be fired, “This morning’s 4:45AM SERT test alert was not appropriate and not done at our direction. The party responsible will be held accountable and appropriately.”
Twitter is Lit Up
“ICYMI: Florida‘s got its feathers ruffled today because at 4:45am the EAS decided to send a TEST to our phones. All of our phones. All of them. We are grumpy.”
“To whoever decided to do a test of Florida’s Emergency Alert System at 4:45 a.m.: I hope you step on a Lego. Jerk.”
“On the night my sister’s six-month-old was actually sleeping through the night for the first time. She’s out for blood.”
“The only thing the state of Florida achieved with this 4:43am emergency alert test was helping people find out how to turn alerts off, probably at the expense of all other alerts including AMBER alerts.”
And Then… the Cool Huge Rocket Blew Up
SpaceX Starship launches
SpaceX Starship blows up at about a minute into the launch just as it tried to separate stages.
The giant rocket started to spin weirdly and wiggle, then… BOOM!
Geek wording for an explosion of SpaceX Starship today: “Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation,” SpaceX said in a statement on Twitter.
The technology that we’ve come to rely on to connect our phones, smart speakers, cars,vibrators, andtoastersis problematic for reasons more serious than pairing issues. Bluetooth has been shown time and time again to be a security and privacy nightmare — albeit one that can be mostly solved with a simple toggling of an off switch.
Bluetooth has long been a dirty word for security professionals. So much so, in fact, that one of themost commonpiecesof advicegivento attendeesof the annualDEF CONhacker conference in Las Vegas is to make sure Bluetooth is disabled on their phones.
This is not just paranoia. In fact, at this year’s DEF CONresearchers showed offthe ability to use Bluetooth to identify vulnerable digital speakers. Once identified, hackers could take control of the devices and force them to play “dangerous” sounds that could lead to hearing loss in anyone unfortunateto be nearby.
A new tracking admission from Google, one that hasn’t yet made headlines, should be a serious warning to Chrome’s 2.6 billion users. If you’re one of them, this nasty new surprise should be a genuine reason to quit.
Officials in the Brittany region of France have reportedly arrested a fan wanted in connection with a massive crash at the Tour de France.
The fan held up a large cardboard sign while stepping out into the path of oncoming cyclists on Saturday, the first day of the multi-day race. Video of the race shows the woman was looking toward cameras and away from the pack of riders.
The sign hit one of the riders near the front of the pack. The cyclist fell, leading to more crashes as riders behind him fell.
The crash was significant, taking down or slowing down dozens of riders. The race was held up for several minutes as bicycles and people were detangled.
BrownieBytes Take: Typical idiot spectator trying to get a selfie with a sign causes a disaster crash on the first day. Arrest her! The stupid sign had something to do with her grandparents. Dox the idiot. Her actions wrecked a professional cyclist that has trained for years for this race and she stole that time and effort. As a former racer, nothing makes me more angry than a selfish spectator.
Jasha Sütterlin was forced to withdraw from the race due to an injury sustained in the crash, according to @LeTour.
Most riders were able to continue on after the sign incident, but Jasha Sutterlin had to leave the race because of the crash,according to NBC Sports.
The Tour de France tweeted later that while it is happy to have spectators on hand to take in the race, it wanted fans to “respect the safety of the riders” and not to “risk everything for a photo or to get on television.”
More containers have fallen off ships in the past four months than are typically lost in a year. Blame heavy traffic and rolling waves.
SINCE THE ENDof November, this is some of what has sunk to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean: vacuum cleaners; Kate Spade accessories; at least $150,000 of frozen shrimp; and three shipping containers full of children’s clothes. “If anybody has investments in deep-sea salvage, there’s some beautiful product down there,” Richard Westenberger, chief financial officer of the children’s clothing brand Carter’s told a conference recently.
You can blame the weather, a surge in US imports tied to the pandemic, or a phenomenon known as parametric rolling.
All told, at least 2,980 containers have fallen off cargo ships in the Pacific since November, in at least six separate incidents. That’s more than twice the number of containers lost annually between 2008 and 2019,according to the World Shipping Council.
Until COVID-19 hit, the global cruise industry was on course for a record-breaking year. But major coronavirus outbreaks on board ships cost lives, jobs, and damaged the reputation of the fastest-growing sector of the travel industry.
Italy’s famed active volcano, Etna, has been spewing lava for over three weeks. On Sunday, March 7, the fiery mountain on the eastern coast of Sicily let out its tenth big blast of the season since February 16. Only this time, it also rained down ash and small lava stones on the town nearby.
At nearly 3,324 meters above sea level, Etna is the tallest active volcano in Europe. According to Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology ( INGV), the giant exploded at approximately 2:00 am local time, pushing the column of ash and lava to a height of 10,000 metres.
Volcanic pebble size ash rains down on streets, cars, and buildings throughout the villages.
The lava down below did not change direction and continues to flow from the southeast crater — down the side of the volcano that does not house any residents.
More containers have fallen off ships in the past four months than are typically lost in a year. Blame heavy traffic and rolling waves.
Brownie Bytes 