#21 kilometers

[molagboop]

So I put the power of friendship and impractical outfits into Metroid Dread. No suits, no shields: we die in a giant laser hand cannon fight like true warriors.

[kroonik]

hey i think my relationship just ended

[nasa]

A Tour of Cosmic Temperatures

We often think of space as “cold,” but its temperature can vary enormously depending on where you visit. If the difference between summer and winter on Earth feels extreme, imagine the range of temperatures between the coldest and hottest places in the universe — it’s trillions of degrees! So let’s take a tour of cosmic temperatures … from the coldest spots to the hottest temperatures yet achieved.

First, a little vocabulary: Astronomers use the Kelvin temperature scale, which is represented by the symbol K. Going up by 1 K is the same as going up 1°C, but the scale begins at 0 K, or -273°C, which is also called absolute zero. This is the temperature where the atoms in stuff stop moving. We’ll measure our temperatures in this tour in kelvins, but also convert them to make them more familiar!

We’ll start on the chilly end of the scale with our CAL (Cold Atom Lab) on the International Space Station, which can chill atoms to within one ten billionth of a degree above 0 K, just a fraction above absolute zero.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Just slightly warmer is the Resolve sensor inside XRISM, pronounced “crism,” short for the X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission. This is an international collaboration led by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) with NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). Resolve operates at one twentieth of a degree above 0 K. Why? To measure the heat from individual X-rays striking its 36 pixels!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Resolve and CAL are both colder than the Boomerang Nebula, the coldest known region in the cosmos at just 1 K! This cloud of dust and gas left over from a Sun-like star is about 5,000 light-years from Earth. Scientists are studying why it’s colder than the natural background temperature of deep space.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Let’s talk about some temperatures closer to home. Icy gas giant Neptune is the coldest major planet. It has an average temperature of 72 K at the height in its atmosphere where the pressure is equivalent to sea level on Earth. Explore how that compares to other objects in our solar system!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

How about Earth? According to NOAA, Death Valley set the world’s surface air temperature record on July 10, 1913. This record of 330 K has yet to be broken — but recent heat waves have come close. (If you’re curious about the coldest temperature measured on Earth, that’d be 183.95 K (-128.6°F or -89.2°C) at Vostok Station, Antarctica, on July 21, 1983.)

We monitor Earth's global average temperature to understand how our planet is changing due to human activities. Last year, 2023, was the warmest year on our record, which stretches back to 1880.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

The inside of our planet is even hotter. Earth’s inner core is a solid sphere made of iron and nickel that’s about 759 miles (1,221 kilometers) in radius. It reaches temperatures up to 5,600 K.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We might assume stars would be much hotter than our planet, but the surface of Rigel is only about twice the temperature of Earth’s core at 11,000 K. Rigel is a young, blue star in the constellation Orion, and one of the brightest stars in our night sky.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger 

We study temperatures on large and small scales. The electrons in hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, can be stripped away from their atoms in a process called ionization at a temperature around 158,000 K. When these electrons join back up with ionized atoms, light is produced. Ionization is what makes some clouds of gas and dust, like the Orion Nebula, glow.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We already talked about the temperature on a star’s surface, but the material surrounding a star gets much, much hotter! Our Sun’s surface is about 5,800 K (10,000°F or 5,500°C), but the outermost layer of the solar atmosphere, called the corona, can reach millions of kelvins.

Our Parker Solar Probe became the first spacecraft to fly through the corona in 2021, helping us answer questions like why it is so much hotter than the Sun's surface. This is one of the mysteries of the Sun that solar scientists have been trying to figure out for years.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Looking for a hotter spot? Located about 240 million light-years away, the Perseus galaxy cluster contains thousands of galaxies. It’s surrounded by a vast cloud of gas heated up to tens of millions of kelvins that glows in X-ray light. Our telescopes found a giant wave rolling through this cluster’s hot gas, likely due to a smaller cluster grazing it billions of years ago.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Now things are really starting to heat up! When massive stars — ones with eight times the mass of our Sun or more — run out of fuel, they put on a show. On their way to becoming black holes or neutron stars, these stars will shed their outer layers in a supernova explosion. These layers can reach temperatures of 300 million K!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Jeremy Schnittman

We couldn’t explore cosmic temperatures without talking about black holes. When stuff gets too close to a black hole, it can become part of a hot, orbiting debris disk with a conical corona swirling above it. As the material churns, it heats up and emits light, making it glow. This hot environment, which can reach temperatures of a billion kelvins, helps us find and study black holes even though they don’t emit light themselves.

JAXA’s XRISM telescope, which we mentioned at the start of our tour, uses its supercool Resolve detector to explore the scorching conditions around these intriguing, extreme objects.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/CI Lab

Our universe’s origins are even hotter. Just one second after the big bang, our tiny, baby universe consisted of an extremely hot — around 10 billion K — “soup” of light and particles. It had to cool for a few minutes before the first elements could form. The oldest light we can see, the cosmic microwave background, is from about 380,000 years after the big bang, and shows us the heat left over from these earlier moments.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We’ve ventured far in distance and time … but the final spot on our temperature adventure is back on Earth! Scientists use the Large Hadron Collider at CERN to smash teensy particles together at superspeeds to simulate the conditions of the early universe. In 2012, they generated a plasma that was over 5 trillion K, setting a world record for the highest human-made temperature.

Want this tour as a poster? You can download it here in a vertical or horizontal version!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Explore the wonderful and weird cosmos with NASA Universe on X, Facebook, and Instagram. And make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[wonders-of-the-cosmos]

A view of Mars made from pictures captured with the EXI camera aboard UAE's Hope Mars Mission spacecraft on August 21, 2023 from an orbital distance of 20,132 kilometers.

Credit: Jason Major

[disneyprincemuke]

passing the phone (rookie edition) * fem!driver

(series masterlist) | (📂 a day in the life)

“i’m passing the phone to somebody who texts like he’s writing a professional email.”

oscar scoffs, staring off camera as he takes the phone into his hands. “excuse me for writing the way i was taught.” he lifts up the phone. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who didn’t know what a kilometer was until he was 15.”

“because i grew up miami, the fuck,” logan mutters. he sighs. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who has a million problems with drs, which, seems to only be his issue.”

“whatever.” oscar scrunches his nose. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who tripped when she was stepping up to the podium and then cried about it for a half hour on the way home.”

“wow,” she mutters, eyebrows furrowed as her cheeks slowly turn red. “passing the phone to somebody who barely remembers our trip to barcelona because he partied too hard.”

“passing the phone to somebody who’s a 21-year-old virgin but gives advice like she’s a licensed therapist,” oscar says quickly, putting the phone down to smirk at her smugly.

“passing the phone to somebody who got suspended from school for a week because he told the teacher that he didn’t care about school and had to miss a karting race that weekend as punishment.”

“i’m passing the phone to somebody who had a crush on our literal best friend,” oscar says, leaning into the mic and whispering as he looks around cautiously.

logan stares into the camera wide-eyed, slowly turning to oscar who’s giggling in the corner. “what the f-“

he reappears at the camera, calmer this time. “passing the phone to somebody who talked to the quiet girl making top 30’s during karting because he thought she was kinda cute.”

oscar sighs. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who cried outside the club in singapore because the food we ordered for dinner was too spicy for her to handle eating.”

she rolls her eyes. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who got catfished in secondary school by a guy pretending to be a girl.”

logan smiles, cheeks red as he held the phone up. “i’m passing the phone to somebody who got broken up with over a 13-second phone call.”

“low blow,” she frowns. “passing the phone to somebody who pulled up to the club with fake eyelashes because he lost a bet to me.”

“passing the phone to the girl that picked up and adopted three kittens she found in a box at the corner of the street in austin at 5am after a night out,” logan scowls.

“i’m passing the phone to somebody who made being american his entire personality.”

“and i’m passing the phone to somebody who almost made us miss our flight because he left his passport on the toilet sink at the airport,” logan scowls.

oscar’s lips are pressed together in a thin line. “i don’t wanna play this game anymore.”

taglist: @wcnorris @treehouse-mouse @laura-naruto-fan1998 @mindless-rock @inejismywife @vellicora @leilanixx @meadhgbcavanagh @2bormaybenot @ironmaiden1313 @angsthology @cherry-piee @christianpulisic10 @elliegrey2803 @cashtons-wife @love4lando @sadg3 @bborra @a10vely-yutazen @mellowarcadefun @glitterf1

[vestaignis]

Сахалин — крупнейший остров России — расположен на Дальнем Востоке, у побережья Евразии. По площади он сравним с Чехией или Сербией и лишь немного уступает Ирландии. Омывается сразу двумя морями — холодным Охотским и более тёплым Японским.От южной точки острова до японского острова Хоккайдо всего 44 километра.

Первые люди поселились здесь ещё в доисторические времена. Самой древней стоянке человека, обнаруженной археологами на Сахалине, около 230 тысяч лет. Местное коренное население — их осталось около трёх тысяч человек — племена оленеводов уйльта и эвенков и рыболовов нивхов до сих пор живут согласно древним традициям.

Большинство путешественников едет на Сахалин ради природных красот. Здесь есть действующие вулканы, горячие термальные источники, и изумрудно-зелёные скалы. Растительность на острове довольно необычная. На севере можно прог��ляться по тайге, а на юге и западе — увидеть несколько видов лиан и курильский бамбук. А ещё на Сахалине есть «ботаническое чудо света»: папоротники, крапива, гречиха и другие травянистые растения в некоторых местах вырастают на высоту до 3-5 метров. При этом на материке из их семян появляются растения обычной высоты. 

На Сахалине умеренный муссонный климат с высоким уровнем влажности, дождливым летом и холодной, снежной зимой. Летом часто появляются туманы, создающие таинственную атмосферу. В конце лета и начале осени бывают тайфуны. Осень мягкая, яркая и тёплая, почти без дождей. Погода на Сахалине непредсказуемая, поэтому лучше быть готовым к любым капризам природы.

На озере Тунайча гнездятся разные виды птиц, а на Тюленьем острове близ Сахалина находится крупное лежбище тюленей и огромные птичьи базары. В окрестностях самой высокой точки острова — горы Вайды — расположены карстовые пещеры. С вершины горного хребта Жданко открывается вид на живописные окрестности. На мысе Великан можно увидеть природные арки, гроты и столбы, которые возникли под воздействием ветра и соленой морской воды.

Подходящее для туризма время на Сахалине — с мая по сентябрь. К маю почти везде сходит снег и уже можно отправляться в путешествие по острову.А самое популярное для путешествий по Сахалину время — тёплый и солнечный август. В этом месяце лучше всего исследовать дальние уголки острова, купаться в море (вода в этом месяце иногда прогревается до +21 °C) и пробовать лесную голубику и чернику.

Sakhalin, Russia's largest island, is located in the Far East, off the coast of Eurasia. In terms of area, it is comparable to the Czech Republic or Serbia and is only slightly inferior to Ireland. It is washed by two seas at once — the cold Sea of Okhotsk and the warmer sea of Japan.It is only 44 kilometers from the southern point of the island to the Japanese island of Hokkaido.

The first people settled here in prehistoric times. The oldest human site discovered by archaeologists on Sakhalin is about 230 thousand years old. The local indigenous population — there are about three thousand people left — the tribes of reindeer herders Uilta and Evenks and fishermen Nivkh still live according to ancient traditions.

Most travelers go to Sakhalin for the sake of natural beauty. There are active volcanoes, hot thermal springs, and emerald green rocks. The vegetation on the island is quite unusual. In the north you can walk through the taiga, and in the south and west you can see several types of lianas and Kuril bamboo. And also on Sakhalin has a "botanical wonder of the world": ferns, nettles, buckwheat and other herbaceous plants in some places grow to a height of 3-5 meters. At the same time, plants of normal height appear from their seeds on the mainland.

Sakhalin has a temperate monsoon climate with high humidity, rainy summers and cold, snowy winters. In summer, fogs often appear, creating a mysterious atmosphere. There are typhoons in late summer and early autumn. Autumn is mild, bright and warm, with almost no rain. Weather on Sakhalin is unpredictable, so it's better to be prepared for any whims of nature.

Different species of birds nest on Lake Tunaicha, and on Seal Island near Sakhalin is home to a large seal rookery and huge bird markets. Karst caves are located in the vicinity of the highest point of the island — Mount Vida. From the top of the Zhdanko mountain range, you can enjoy a view of the picturesque surroundings. At Cape Giant, you can see natural arches, grottoes and pillars that arose under the influence of wind and salty sea water.

A suitable time for tourism on Sakhalin — from May to September. By May, snow is falling almost everywhere and you can already go on a trip around the island.And the most popular time for traveling around Sakhalin is warm and sunny August. This month, it is best to explore the far corners of the island, swim in the sea (the water sometimes warms up to +21 °C this month) and try wild blueberries.

Источник://bolshayastrana.com/blog/top-dostoprimechatelnostej-sahalina-229,//experience.tripster.ru/articles/sahalin/, /sakhtravel .com/tury-po-sahalinu/tury/tvoya_yarkaya_zima_na_sakhalin, ://wikiway.com/russia/sakhalin/photo/, https://www.tripadvisor .ru/LocationPhotos-g4355184-Sakhalin_Sakhalin_ Oblast_Far _Eastern _District.html,//www.culture.ru/institutes/34988/ostrov-sakhalin, ://tonkosti.ru/%D0%A4%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%BE_%D0%A1%D0%B0%D1%85%D0%B0%D0%BB%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%B0?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F.

[todaysdocument]

"Cher Ami"- Taken From 1919 Signal Corps Report

Record Group 111: Records of the Office of the Chief Signal OfficerSeries: Photographs of American Military Activities

PHOTOGRAPHIC MOUNTING CARD

NUMBER 93245 SYMBOL

PHOTOGRAPHER

REC'D TAKEN

DESCRIPTION:

Cher Ami" - Taken form 1919 S.C. Report.

"Pre-eminent was the work performed by a pigeon on the afternoon of October 21. Liberated at Grand Pre at 2:35 p.m., with an important message, during intense machine gun and artillery action, the bird delivered its message to the loft at Ramport, a distance of 40 kilometers, in 25 minutes. Upon examination, it was found that one leg had been amputated and that the breast had been pierced by a machine gun bullet. The message tube, intact, was hanging by a ligament of the torn leg".

"Cher Ami died shortly after being returned to this county and is in the National Museum."

[manessha545]

Fernando de la Mora, Paraguay: Fernando de la Mora is a city located in the Central Department, and is part of the metropolitan area of Asunción, in Paraguay. The city is divided in two areas: the South area and the North area, with a total surface of 21 square kilometers. It is crossed from North to South by many paved streets and avenues, such as Zavala Cue, Pitiantuta, 10 de Julio, Las Residentas, among others. Wikipedia

[physics-of-one-piece]

Doflamingo's Day Trip to Punk Hazard

Clear the way. The King of Dressrosa is leaving the royal palace in a flair of absolute style for urgent business on Punk Hazard.

Better hold onto his coat for dear life, because this man is FAST. I recommend wrapping your arms around his neck, I would not trust that coat regardless of how it sticks to him. His arms aren’t in his sleeves, that is a death game I do not want to play. So, arms around his neck. Take a nice little inhale of his royal cologne probably worth more than your civilian life if you’re feeling brave. Maybe nuzzle into him, get comfy, you know. It’s gonna be a trip. You won't have the time to breathe. At least the view will be nice, both at the sea and the... Pilot.

Okay. Ready? (Dear God, look at the size of his shadow, holy hell)

Go!

AND HE’S OFF!

Welcome to Doffy's Physics Lab. Let’s calculate how fast Doflamingo flew from Dressrosa to Punk Hazard.

Things to note:

1) The One Piece world is much bigger than Earth. It’s not possible to calculate how big it is. 100 times big is too big, two times big is too small, but Oda put the bottom of the sea at 10km, which is the same as the depth of the Earth’s sea. See the confusion?

2) Law slowed him down by giving him the ultimatum and taking Buffalo & Baby 5 hostage and no clouds.

First, we need the distance.

We can calculate the distance from Punk Hazard to Dressrosa using the SAD tanker. It’s mentioned in the manga it takes a day to reach Dressrosa by ship from Punk Hazard, so that’s 24 hours. A cargo ship goes 25 knots per hour. 

nautical miles = 25 knots • 24 hours

= 600 nautical miles

We need to turn them into kilometers. 

1 nautical mile = 1.852 kilometers

kilometers = 600 • 1.852 kilometers = 1111,2 km ~ 1111 km

Keep in mind, the One Piece world is bigger than ours. This can be considered a short distance for them, but long distance for us. For real life example, London and Berlin are 1,100 km away from each other. The flight takes 1 hour 40 minutes by plane.

Next, we need time. Some people will hate that I use anime time, but for Punk Hazard, it isn't that big of a stretch to use it as a guide. Also, the fact the Straw Hats had a party and ate makes me think there was no way they were at the coast for a full hour before setting sail. Nuh-uh. They'd be sliced if they had stayed that long. But I'm also aware real-time probably happened faster such as a fight, so we're gonna cut the time of the ep where Nami & Usopp beat Baby 5 & Buffalo in half.

Doflamingo set off to Dressrosa at Ep 620, landed on PH in Ep 624. If we go and calculate when he made it to Punk Hazard by making it 18 minutes for each ep (counting 11 mins of 624, half-cutting 621, and counting only last minute of 620), it would be under an hour. That’s already awesome. He’s one of the fastest fliers in the series.

Let’s first focus on those 2 last minutes of Episode 620. 

At 21:25, he leaves the royal palace. At 22:23, he is already over the sea. That’s 58 seconds it takes him to cross over Dressrosa. Thankfully, the fandom did the size of Dressrosa already. 

The diameter of Dressrosa is 50 kilometers. The area is 1,960km². 

That is not even the size of Madrid (Madrid is smaller). So, he’d fly across Madrid like NOTHING.

To put Dressrosa as a comparison with the real world, it is the size of Kuiu, an island in Alaska in United States.

Here it is. It’s a shame Kuiu is so thin, but the length isn’t a bad thing to have. That’s what we need. Length.

Okay, the royal palace is at the center of Dressrosa. That means we go 50÷2 to get the radius.

That’s 25 km. Not meters. Kilometers. 

Okay, so, I mentioned Madrid. Do you all want to know the  area and diameter of Madrid, the capital of Spain, the biggest city in Spain? 

😁😁

It’s 606 km². The diameter is 27 km. The radius is 13.5 km. He’d cross all over Madrid within 30 seconds maybe.

🙂🙂

(Screams)

Haha. Ha. 

If anyone wants to know, Dressrosa is, thankfully, NOT bigger than Spain. Spain is 500 times bigger than Dressrosa. 

All right, let’s calculate how fast Doflamingo is moving to get from Dressrosa and already be out at sea within 58 seconds. We’ll add about a kilometer so the sea is the only thing beneath him as shown in the anime.

We’re using the simplest formula here.

speed = distance/time

We’ll put distance into meters because we have seconds here, not hours.

26 km = 26,000 m

speed = 26,000 m/58 seconds

speed = 448,27 m/s (1470 feet/s)

Let’s convert it to km/h

448,27 m/s • 3.6 = 1614 km/h (1002 mph)

Hahaha, holy FUCKING SHIT. That's jet speed.

I TOLD YOU, HANG ONTO THAT COAT FOR DEAR LIFE, I TOLD YOU.

Dressrosa to Sea = 1614 km/h (1002 mph)

Okay, he broke the sound barrier. If anyone wants to know, you break the sound barrier after your speed passes 1239 km/h (770 mph).

He covers 26 km within 58 seconds at 1614 km/h speed. He covers 448 meters per second. He is moving at jet speed here.

Okay, now comes the Sea to Punk Hazard. Doflamingo has cleared 26 km of the 1111 km so that leaves him with 1085 km to cross.

Here are the minutes. We now won’t count the 2 minutes from 620 because he passed that area.

9(split in half bcs of the fight)+18+18+11= 56 minutes

speed = distance/time = d/t

Speed = 1085 km/0.933 h

Doflamingo’s Speed = 1162 km/h (722 mph)

And there we go, he was flying at 1162 km/h.

Not breaking the sound barrier but it makes sense by what the anime showed.

One thing to note is this includes him saving Buffalo & Baby 5 at a point where Law made sure behind where they came from there are no clouds for Doflamingo to use. He loses about 4 minutes with Law blackmailing him and then he has to take a detour which takes him 11 minutes. We can’t know whether the Straw Hats talking at the Sunny was happening at the same time as Doflamingo landing at Punk Hazard, so we’ll give him those 11 minutes because there are no clouds.

That’s 15 minutes he loses, which makes it 41 minutes. Without Law interfering and the clouds not being there, he would have arrived at Punk Hazard within 41 minutes.

So let’s calculate that.

41 minutes= 0.683 hours

1085 km/0.683h

His full speed without being slowed down by his adopted nephew blackmailing him and kidnapping his scientist to destroy his entire business would then be:

Full Speed (without being slowed down) = 1588 km/h (987 mph)

That's 441 meters per second. That’s four soccer fields he crosses within a second.

Damn. And that’s his casual speed. Broke the sound barrier again.

He is faster than a plane, planes go 600-800 km/h. 

To put into perspective just how fast he is even at that speed, a car takes 10 hrs at the distance (From Berlin to Slovenia) of 1,090km. He literally crosses the length of entire Europe within 56 minutes based on anime time. And that’s him slowed down, according to anime time. The fastest flight from Berlin to Slovenia (1,091km distance) takes 3 hours by plane.

When he found Buffalo & Baby 5, they were away from Punk Hazard. This is important cus he got angry then. That means he SPED up.

So, now we have his descent speed to cover. You know, when he lands like a boss. Yeah, that.

Doflamingo’s Descent Speed

Okay, Doflamingo wears bright colours (white, pink, vermillion) the dominant colours are white and pink. From the front, you’d see about 40% of white and 60% of pink bcs of the way his coat hangs on his shoulders, it makes him look even bigger when he is big enough already like dear God, this man gave me heart attacks 90% of the time.

Why are his clothes important? Because of the sunlight reflecting off his clothes, therefore creating the reflection that causes the marines to see him as a spark, like a star in the daylight. The brighter the clothes, the more reflection which has a possibility of creating the spark in the sky (again, the sparks in the sky are caused by the object shining or you know, being ON FIRE bcs it’s falling down the atmosphere)

We’ll put his magnitude to +10. Humans can see the faintest star when its magnitude is +6. The more negative the magnitude, the brighter sth is. The Sun has the magnitude of -26. Magnitude isn’t important, though, except…

This means we can only see him coming when it’s too late. The anime showed this as a star gleam which I understand, to show just how FAST he is coming. They showed it in daylight, daylight has apparent magnitude of -26. This is a known thing, but when you see something like that, where there is that bright of a spark in the sky and next second it lands in front of you… its speed is 360,000 km/h. He is the only warlord you can see coming at you BECAUSE he wears bright clothes. Is that good or bad? Who knows. 

Doflamingo seems to first be flying at 20ish degrees downward toward the shore, but in the last moment (ten meter from the ground or less) he makes his approach a full horizontal one, because he whooshes past the marines in a full horizontal, linear direction and then does that epic landing.

For now we’ll focus on the descent speed, which includes his linear speed when he whooshes past the marines (in the anime when he whooshes past them he is not visible to them, he leaves blurs). 

I don’t want to fuck with curves. There’ll be tangents and there’s no need for them. I don’t think his strings even let him make a curved downward descent? He can do curves turns, but I don’t think he can do descents? It’s up for debate.

Okay, so let’s say Doflamingo is about 100 meters high in the sky. He reaches the ground within 0.05 seconds in the anime. Not even 1 full second, oh boy, fluffy man is FAST, GODDAMN. My eyes just bulged out of my head. Okay. Props to the anime team, that is a great show of his speed right there by making it last such a short time. 

Also, they never see him completely until he lands. We, the viewer see him, which means he is at maximum 4.8 km away (this is how far the human eye can see).

That means Doflamingo passes 4.8 km within 0.05 seconds.

I’m scared to calculate this, to be honest. This will be… this will be fast.

Let’s convert kilometers into meters to make our life easier. We get m/s and then we’ll convert them to km/h.

Buckle up. Keep a death grip on those feathers. Doflamingo hasn’t landed yet.

4.8 • 1000 = 4800 meters

descent speed = 4800 m/ 0.05 s

Descent speed (m/s)= 96 000 m/s (314 960 feet/s)

And into kilometers

Descent speed = 356,600 km/h (221 580 mph)

O.O

Holy fuck.

Yeah, crazy fast. You know, it makes sense now why G2 Luffy (who we’ll put moves at 2,400 km/h based on jet speed) was nothing in terms of speed. Damn.

Okay, so… this speed has not been achieved by any atmospheric or orbital aircraft, so I genuinely have nothing to compare it to. This is the velocity of objects in deep space like gravitational slingshots.

Okay, let’s put it into Machs. Fastest Mach we know of is Mach 30. Okay.

Formula is:

Mach number = speed of the object/speed of sound

Speed of sound is 343 m/s.

Mach number = 96 000/342

Mach number= 279.3 Mach

Doflamingo’s descent speed is Mach 279.3

No wonder he’s a blur. No wonder they only see him as a fckn spark in the sky. 

He didn't simply break the sound barrier here, he left the sound barrier at the bottom of the sea.

And he’s landed.

I don’t know about you guys, but I’m getting off this 3 meter ride. Yep. Hopping down. It was fun. The coat is really soft.

Thank you for the ride, Doffy. Please go 50 km/h next time.

Taglist: @fanaticsnail

(Let me know if you want me to tag you in my posts and if you want to be tagged only for particular characters, let me know that, too. Thank you all for the love and support, it's really taken me off guard. You're all so wonderful. Love you all ❤️)

[carionto]

The recoil makes it fun

Most everyone in the known Universe agree that a stable and noise-free space ship is preferable to anything not that. You know, due to space being so bad for your health. Stability means safety, noise-free means things are not breaking, which is always great!

Pure silence, however, can be deceptive, so you do want controlled noises in there, such as small beeps at regular intervals indicating that everything is fine. Soft green and blue lights are good.

By that logic, Johann Utsushima then must hate green and blue. His ship, Kitaiyohdzha, is always blaring orange and red lights and barking annoying warnings at him.

Things like: "Low pressure" "High pressure" "Not enough power" "Overload detected" "Insufficient oxygen" "Dangerous oxygen levels"

Like, make up your mind! One or the other, stop it with the extreme ends. Johann has resorted to do the time-honored tradition of ignoring the check engine light and instead stays in his suit all the time. It's his rickety mess and he knows exactly where everything is and how it should be, don't go telling him how to run HIS ship. Especially you, ship, don't tell me you know better.

An astute observer may notice the fact that Kitaiyohdzha is a giant rail gun with a cockpit, engine, thrusters, and basic life support systems attached. Or what's left of them anyway.

Mr Utsushima loves guns. And I mean LOVES them. This one in particular. He can't get enough of it. Literally. He couldn't, so he kept ordering bigger and bigger ones. Kitaiyohdzha is the biggest one (21 meters long) he can legally get without being part of or associated with the military in some way, or registering as a "redistributer". He would not pass the background check to do either.

This, however, does not stop him from modifying his guns. It's a lot of effort, very expensive, and quite complicated. Well, for him. Because he does not document anything and not even God knows how many iterations and past modifications he has made to Kitaiyohdzha to make it what it is today.

None of the matters though. The only time the world makes sense, when everything is exactly as it should be, is when he pulls the trigger.

Space. Quivers.

You can't hear the discharge, but you can feel it from a great distance.

Johann is not at a great distance. Everyone would say he is dangerously close, and be factually correct. Not even a meter from the power generator that enables the rail gun to fire a piece of tungsten at relativistic speeds in order to completely obliterate a poor and unsuspecting little asteroid just gently floating through space. Or is it a meteor? Comet? Doesn't matter, they all explode more or less the same.

Johann likes to watch the recordings of him firing the gun. It lets him know what happened, because the moment he fires Kitaiyohdzha, every time without fail, he loses consciousness from the sudden g-forces hurtling him and the "ship" backwards for thousands of kilometers before the barely functional automatic stabilizers return him to rest.

But that moment right before his mind goes blank. THAT is something you cannot explain to others. You FEEL it. The power. The force. The raw... just, THAT.

It's the only thing that keeps him going. Where to? He doesn't care. Simply forward through life.

[pearlywritings]

A nickname's origin

synopsis: after meeting your lover's family and having a great start of your trip to Morepesok, Childe wakes you early in the morning, because he has something to show you...

prompt: 21

requested by: a lovely anon

pairing: Childe x fem!reader

tw: fluff, established relationship, usage of Childe's real name

word count: 1.5k+ words

a/n: part of my Token of appreciation writing event! Closed now, still have 3 more requests to write.

“Isn’t the scenery marvelous?”

It absolutely is. Snowy planes sparkle in the rising sun as if the ground is covered by richest furs and most precious gems - it’s almost blinding. The giant pine trees look enormous even kilometers away from you, creating a thick forestland; you remember how your lover told you that it is home for many species you can’t find anywhere but Snezhnaya. Looking back, you release a puff of warm air, adoring the sight of wooden cottages - or how the locals call those izba’s - lining perfectly, each with a fence, which is carved with intricate patterns and charms to protect from evil spirits. Smoke curls from the chimneys and it immediately reminds you where you are.

Outside. In the early hours of the morning.

“Wish we were watching it from the inside of your family’s house,” yawning, you reach to adjust the scarf - along with the hat it was knitted by his mom and gifted to you with the warmest of smiles. It’s been just a couple of minutes since you two exited the village and the cold is already biting the few uncovered areas of your face.

Ajax laughs. Heartily, with his hands resting on his hips and head thrown back. Of course, he is laughing, of course he’s going to suffer less - he was born and lived all his life in such an environment.

“It’s not funny!” Your huff is ignored and a punch that was aimed to his shoulder is easily caught by his palm. 

“Sorry, sorry. I just imagined how my siblings would’ve been glued to your sides and mama and papa continued their yesterday’s quest to ask you hundreds of questions. Don’t be mad, I thought you’d like to have a little break, at least for half a day, my fierce ounce.”

Ounce. That’s what he’s been calling you for the longest time now, yet never, never, telling you what that means (but he did assure you it’s a good thing, he loves you after all). However, he promised to show you once you come with him to Snezhnaya to visit his family.

To make it short - here you are, in Morepesok, at dawn, with your gingerhead of a fiance, motivated to stay in this harsh weather only to finally find out what or who was your lover’s inspiration behind his nickname for you.

“You have a point,” you sigh. You are happy his relatives were excited to meet and accept you, so much joy filled your heart yesterday, when you arrived. But dealing with so many people drained you - just a second of your head touching the pillow was enough to send you right to the gates of the dreamland. “I need some energy-refill before being ready to maintain a proper conversation with them again…”

“Don’t forget that the whole village wants to meet a lovely bride I brought with me,” it makes your groan.

“Is that really necessary..?”

“It’s a tradition. But it’s going to be fine, I promise,” the snow crunches under his heavy felt boots as he steps closer, arms circling your waist, and lips touching the bridge of your nose, making you close your eyes. Oh, the frost is already brimming your eyelashes. “Mama and papa are going to organize a feast - to celebrate you, to show you are a part of the family now, and our neighbors are going to come to congratulate us and bring some presents.”

“Well, I like presents,” his words and embrace soothe you, and you bury your face into the fur of his sheepskin coat. “And I like people acknowledging our relationship.”

“See? It’s a win-win,” he grins widely, boyishly, and it’s enough to reassure you. After all, you won’t be alone - he will be by your side.

“Alright, alright. Now, can we move? it’s getting cold, even with all these extra layers of clothes…”

“Sorry, baby. See that forest? There are mountains on the other side, that’s where we are heading to.”

“Wait, we’ll have to climb?” You look at him incredulously, perfectly aware that neither your clothes, nor your abilities are suitable for such an activity. Childe pats your back reassuringly.

“Nope, simply observe from a good spot. Come on, to that house to the left my dear, I made an agreement with Uncle Vladislav to give us a ride. Don't let go of my hand, alright? The path can be a bit slippery.”

The first experience of riding in the sleigh drawn by horses was magical. Though it was open, you had a very warm fur blanket covering your legs, snuggling into Childe’s side, taking in the vast snow fields surrounding you. Uncle Vladislav appeared to be a nice old man, with a long beard and bushy white eyebrows that almost covered his gray eyes. Before the ride he let you offer some carrots to the three beautiful white horses and gently pat their big noses. And during the ride he managed to entertain you with all kinds of stories of local folklore - his words perfectly flying behind his back and to you, and then he even started singing. Something about three white horses named December, January and February taking him somewhere into the ringing snowy far far away. You even managed to doze off a little - your lover had to shake you out of it when you finally arrived.

“Wow, we’ve ridden right into the forest?” You can’t help but ask in astonishment - from the distance the forest looked absolutely dense, but now you can clearly see a road wide enough to get through the way you did.

“Cool, right?” The smiling gingerhead offers you his hand, before turning to the old man. “Uncle, it can take some time, sure you want to wait for us?”

“Haha, that’s a funny thing you ask, chap. If I make you walk back your mother will have my head. Not that I was going to do so in the first place. Don’t worry about the cold - for the worst case scenario I have a bottle of fire-water with me. Might offer you and your girl to take a sip when you return.”

“Hope, it won’t be necessary!” Clasping his gloved fingers around yours, clad in mittens, the young man leads you away with a giddy look in his eyes.

“Sooo, are you ready to see a real ounce?” That wide boyish smile is back on his face and excitement exhilarates in your system. Ready? You were born ready. At your enthusiastic nods Childe presses his nose to your temple, gently rubbing in affection. “Great, because we are almost here. But please, be careful. Even with all that snow you can easily trip. And above all, do not let go…” his hold on your hand tightens. “For any reason, understood?”

“Ajax, if you tell me this one more time, I will let go. You've been telling me this since yesterday as if there is danger looming over me. Then again, how are you gonna protect me with one hand occupied? Or- Oh. Ooooh~” a smug smile appears on your lips. “Is my darling clingy~?”

He whines something about being worried and protecting you with no hands at all, to which you just laugh, promising that you are just teasing. And it's not like you can resist his adorable devoted clinginess - thus the lock of hands stays unbroken.

Not a couple of minutes later you are standing in a clear spot among the rows of trees which is enough to see the side of the mountain above the coniferous tops. Your lover is squinting, sharp eyes searching the expanse of the rocky surface. You patiently wait, quickly realizing that it’s pointless to stare there not knowing what you are looking for. Besides, admiring Ajax doing such a concentrated face is a treat.

Finally his eyes widen and a toothy grin tugs his mouth wide.

“Well, my dear, we are lucky. Look at that cliff.”

Trying your best to follow the direction of his unoccupied hand pointing you to lift your gaze. A thin ribbon of steam is momentarily broken when your breath hitches - and there is a solid reason for it.

A majestically looking large cat is getting ready to make a jump to the next protruding ledge. Fur is whitish to grey with black spots on the head and neck, with larger rosettes on the back, flanks and bushy tail. Oh, the tail. It’s so long and thick, like a whole other body. And then the animal jumps, flawlessly landing on all paws and getting a nice stretch, as if showing off specifically for the two of you.

“It’s a snow leopard,” your partner explains. “But here we call them ‘ounces’.”

“It’s… It’s so pretty…” You can’t take your eyes from the creature, so perfect among the snowy mountains.

“Part of the reason I gave you this nickname,” he embraces you from behind, putting his chin on top of your head and gently rocking your body in place. “Another part is because you are fierce and strong and also I really loved these animals when I was a kid. Always begged dad to take me hunting birds just to see the cats.”

“Aww, it’s so sweet,” despite the freezing cold your heart melts and you put your palms on top of his locked on your stomach. “But why being a tease and calling me a word I don’t know? Why not ‘my snow leopard’ instead?”

“About that… Let’s just say I wanted to keep the intrigue and increase my chances when convincing you to visit my homeland.”

A sheepish chuckle that follows makes you want to give him a little punch, but you quickly decide against it. Admittedly, Ajax did everything perfectly - this whole trip to Morepesok has been excellent so far, and he did not disappoint with the inspiration behind this unique term of endearment.

“Can we watch it a little bit more?” 

“As long as you want, my pretty ounce."

[morbidology]

Kris Kremers, 21, and Lisanne Froon, 22, were two close friends from Amersfoort, Netherlands. Both were bright and enthusiastic young women who shared a passion for travel and exploration. In March 2014, they set off for Panama, planning to spend several weeks volunteering and exploring the country's culture and natural beauty.

After spending some time in the bustling city of Boquete, they decided to hike the El Pianista trail on April 1, 2014. The trail, known for its scenic views of the Panamanian jungle, was supposed to be a straightforward hike, but it would be the last time Kris and Lisanne were seen alive.

When Kris and Lisanne failed to return from their hike, concern quickly grew. The women had planned to meet a local guide the following day for a tour, but they never showed up. After several days of no contact, their families in the Netherlands raised the alarm, and a large-scale search and rescue operation was launched.

The search, which involved local authorities, indigenous tribes, and Dutch rescue teams, initially yielded no clues. The dense jungle, with its treacherous terrain and unpredictable weather, made the search incredibly challenging. Weeks passed with no sign of the young women, and hope began to fade.

Two months after their disappearance, a local woman found a backpack belonging to Lisanne Froon near a riverbank several kilometers from the El Pianista trail. The backpack, remarkably undamaged despite being exposed to the elements, contained crucial items, including Lisanne's passport, a water bottle, sunglasses, two pairs of bras, and $83 in cash.

Most notably, the backpack also held both women's cell phones and a camera.

The discovery of the cell phones provided a chilling glimpse into the ordeal Kris and Lisanne had faced. Investigators found that the women had attempted to call emergency services multiple times, starting just a few hours after they began their hike. However, due to the poor cell reception in the jungle, none of the calls went through except for one that lasted just a second before dropping. The phone records also showed that the devices were turned on and off multiple times over the following days, with the last activity recorded on April 11, ten days after their disappearance.

The digital camera found in the backpack contained over 100 photographs, some taken during the early stages of their hike, showing the women smiling and enjoying their adventure. However, the camera also contained a series of strange and disturbing images taken during the night on April 8, seven days after they were last seen. These photos showed the dark jungle, with unclear and seemingly random shots of rocks, a bridge, and a possible trail marker. One of the final images showed the back of Kris Kremers' head.

The discovery of the backpack led searchers to further explore the area, and soon after, human remains began to surface. Over the next few weeks, investigators found scattered bones, including a pelvic bone and a boot containing a foot, later identified through DNA testing as belonging to Lisanne Froon. More bones, including a fragmented rib bone from Kris Kremers, were also found in the vicinity.

The condition of the remains added another layer of mystery to the case. While Lisanne's bones appeared to be naturally decomposed, some of Kris's bones were found bleached, leading to speculation about what might have happened to the women in their final days.

The deaths of Kris Kremers and Lisanne Froon have fueled a multitude of theories, ranging from tragic accidents to foul play. Some believe that the women became lost in the jungle and succumbed to the harsh conditions, including dehydration, starvation, or injury. The nighttime photos and desperate attempts to call for help suggest they may have been trying to find their way out or signal rescuers.

However, the case has also sparked darker theories, including the possibility of foul play. The condition of the remains, the unexplained photos, and the discovery of the backpack in a relatively undamaged state have led some to speculate that the women may have encountered someone with ill intentions or that their deaths were not purely accidental.

[beautifulmars]

There’s No Place Like Terby!

Terby is a crater that is 174 kilometers across and is located on the northern margin of the enormous Hellas impact basin. The diversity of landforms that formed inside of Terby Crater over time, including massive layered mesas, a moat-like smooth depression, fan-shaped deposits, sinuous channels, and evidence of glacial ice, indicate that Terby has a fascinating geologic past.

This HiRISE image captures the side of an approximately 2-km thick mesa within Terby. This mesa consists of thick sequences of layered rocks that are peeking through a smooth, dark deposit that was once more expansive. These layered rocks may have formed in a very deep and expansive lake that filled the greater Hellas basin, possibly preserving a valuable record of environmental conditions on early Mars.

ID: ESP_083921_1525 date: 21 June 2024 altitude: 258 km

NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

[dude-why-3]

Who painted the sky?

Chapter 21: Stolen Goods

When she opens the front door fifteen minutes later, Annie finds Armin leaning by the camp van, trailer attached. He’s wearing his green hoodie, hands buried in its pockets, a smile plastered on his face. She suddenly feels extremely underdressed, the pair of shorts and white shirt she’s hurriedly thrown on doing nothing to keep her warm against the chill of the night. Annie narrows her eyes and Armin’s smile grows.

2.45am

Armin: u up?

Annie: no

Armin: lovely

Armin: do you trust me?

Annie: depends on the day

Armin: meet me outside in 15

Annie: what for?

Armin: just trust me!!

“What’s that?” She gestures towards the van and crosses her arms against her chest in an attempt to keep herself warm.

“A surprise,” Armin beams. He steps aside and opens the passenger door, holding it open for her. “Do you still trust me?”

Annie presses her lips together for a second, considering her possibilities. Then she sighs loudly. “My trust is thinning by the second,” she finally says.

Armin’s laugh pierces through her ears as she gets on the passenger seat and secures her seatbelt. Armin wastes no time in getting behind the wheel and starting the car.

“Did you even ask Hannah before taking her van?” Annie asks as they back out of the parking lot and onto the street.

Armin slowly stops and checks both left and right before continuing, though Annie’s pretty sure that’s a one way street anyway.

“I’ll bring it back by the morning, she won’t even notice it’s gone.”

Annie studies his features very closely. He keeps his eyes focused on the road, his brows slightly furrowed, his hands maneuvering the wheel with ease. And he drives so slowly, Annie can’t decide if he’s just being mindful of her or actually doesn’t usually go over thirty-five kilometers per hour.

“Will you tell me where we’re going?”

“If you ask nicely,” he teases, turning the radio on.

Instead of music, they’re met with the morning news read in such a monotone voice it could put them both to sleep. Armin turns it off again. Annie stares at him, her eyes narrowed, lips pressed together. She crosses her arms over her chest, not saying a word. She can see him tense up under her stare, he steals a tiny glance at her and she raises an eyebrow, demanding an explanation.

He looks back at the road, a smile slightly pulling on his lips. As if he were proud of this whole ordeal.

“We kind of stole the canoes,” he finally says, in such a casual tone that you’d think he does it on a daily basis.

Annie’s blood boils. “What?!”

“We’ll bring them back!” he defends.

“Armin, why would you steal the canoes? And at this hour!”

“I thought it’d be fun!”

“You thought stealing someone else’s property would be fun?!”

Armin laughs nervously. “Believe it or not, I actually have a plan.”

Annie raises an eyebrow at him. “Let’s hear your plan then.”

“It wouldn’t be a surprise if I told you–”

“Armin, I will kick you out and drive this car back to camp myself if you don’t tell me what we’re doing on the road, at three in the morning, with someone else’s canoes,” Annie threatens, in the most imposing voice she can master.

Armin sighs heavily. “I thought it’d be quite romantic to go canoeing at night and stargaze and, I don’t know, just spend time together.” He steals another glance at her., shrugging helplessly, his complexion pinking up. “And you seemed sad that you couldn’t come canoeing this week and missed out on all the fun, so I thought this might cheer you up.”

“And you thought involving theft would make it more fun?”

“Kinda?”

“I–” She finds nothing to say, her mouth agape as she stares at him in astonishment, yet her face is getting warmer by the second.

She covers her mouth with her palm, staring at him with big eyes, her chest growing warmer. Her lips arch up then, and she snorts at the idea of it all. Her giggles turn into a laugh, and she finds herself bending over and holding her stomach, not able to stop her laughing fit.

Armin steals a glance at her as she keeps laughing and nervously chuckles. “I’m not sure if I should be scared or laugh with you,” he admits.

Annie takes a deep breath in, trying to calm down her laughter. “Gosh, Armin, you’re so stupid, I love you.” Her voice sounds breathless, then she breaks into giggles again.

Armin‘s eyes widen. He remains quiet, his cheeks growing pink. He swallows the lump in his throat, allowing himself to sit with her words for a few seconds as she keeps chuckling. His lips unknowingly curve up at the sound, the oh so adorable sound.

“I love you, too,” he quietly says, eyes focused on the road.

He smoothly takes a turn to the left and enters a portion of the road that’s more lit, for he can see the trees on either side of the road more clearly now.

Annie’s laughter soon ceases. She wipes a tear from her eye, then turns to him with a big smile. “What was that?”

He’s almost disappointed that she didn’t hear– but maybe it’s for the better. He shakes his head as if to chase the thought away, pushing a little smile on. He clears his throat.

“I’ll put on some music.”

He fishes his phone out of his pocket, opens the music app and clicks on a song, then hands the phone to Annie. She connects it to the aux.

Low piano tunes start playing as he starts the car again, followed by a little harmonica solo, then Piano Man fills the car.

The two are quiet as the song follows its course, the car rolling down the empty road. Annie steals a glance at Armin, trying to read his mind, hoping he’d return her glance and find her eyes and smile at her, that sweet smile of his that always calms her nerves– but he doesn’t. He did so the whole ride as she was fishing for answers out of him, and now he’s so focused on the road he won’t spare her another look.

"The aux is all yours if you want to put anything on," Armin says.

Annie considers it for a moment.

"Sure," she mutters. "But my phone's almost dead."

"You can use mine."

"Is that okay?"

"Of course."

Annie smiles shortly and picks his phone up, already having a song in mind.

"The password is ema-eight-six-four."

Annie hums as she types it in. She's already on the music app when the phone unlocks.

"Who's Ema?" she asks, typing the song's name in the search bar.

Armin visibly tenses, his eyes growing wider, his jaw clenching. "It's not a name."

Annie raises a curious brow. She finds the song and clicks on it, soft guitar tunes echoing through the car, followed shortly by equally soft words, and First Day of my Life makes itself at home.

"What is it then?"

He doesn't say anything for a long second. Annie blinks once, twice, tilting her head at his profile, trying to read his mind.

"It's an acronym."

"Oh." Annie's silent for a while, letting the song play on. "What does it stand for?"

Armin steals a glance at her. His fingers grip the wheel tighter. "A is for my name. Armin. M stands for Mikasa."

He goes quiet again, as if considering his next words. Annie nods along, her curiosity growing bigger. E must stand for their other friend he keeps mentioning. She doesn't remember Armin ever mentioning his name before, despite talking about the two all the time. She wonders why. Armin always pictured him as such a good friend, yet he's never mentioned his name. Yet he seems to get sadder whenever he mentions him.

"And E stands for Eren," Armin finally says, his voice barely above a whisper. “He…” Armin trails back, then takes a deep breath and blinks rapidly, as if chasing tears away. “He was– He is my best friend.”

Pressing her lips together, Annie looks over at him– his frown, his clenched jaw, his fingers turning white on the steering wheel. His eyes focused ahead and only ahead, as if not seeing anything beyond that.

Annie tilts her head. “Was? Did you two have a fight or something?”

Armin opens his mouth but then closes it again. “Oh, no, I could never fight him.” A sad smile makes its way onto his lips. He loosens his grip on the steering wheel. “He always did whatever he wanted, fighting him would have been futile.”

Annie furrows her brows. It was always the past tense with Eren, as if– oh.

Oh, no.

Annie’s eyes widen in realization, the puzzle pieces finally fitting together.

Armin takes a deep breath in, as if to calm himself. “He is my best friend,” he says again, this time more content. He brings the car to a stop, and only now does Annie realize they’ve reached the canoeing spot. “He went missing a few months ago. The police searched for him, we searched for him, but then his birthday came around, he became a legal adult, and they stopped looking. Now he’s just… missing.”

Annie bites her lips, her eyes wide. “I… don’t know what to say.”

The boy nods slightly. After a moment of silence, Armin takes a deep breath in, letting it out through his mouth slowly, then takes his seat belt off and flashes her a smile. “Let’s go canoeing, shall we?”

Annie hesitates for a second, uncertain of whether this is the right thing to do or she should say something. She’s not sure what– sorries would do nothing to make it all better, she knows that much. The blonde eventually nods, and they get out of the car. She comes around the car and, standing on her tippy toes, wraps her arms around his neck.

"I'd tell you that I'm sorry, but I doubt that would help," Annie says, tightening her embrace.

Armin lets out a huff. He puts his arms around her and rests his chin on her shoulder. "It's fine," he whispers.

Silence falls over them for a moment, the water’s constant running and the owls’ occasional booing the only sounds in the valley. Armin’s arms soften around her, his eyes fluttering close as he buries his face in the crook of her neck. His heart beats against her chest, and hers against his, and for a second she thinks that this is the closest they’ve ever been.

Then, "I'm sorry," Annie says.

Armin huffs a short laugh, tickling her skin. "You're right, that doesn't do shit."

Annie scoffs a little herself. "I know!"

He takes her hand and helps her into the canoe, and she settles on one of the benches.

Armin allows himself to enjoy Annie's warmth for a second more before he parts from her.

The two open the trailer and take one of the many canoes out. Once they settle it on the shore, they decide to leave their shoes in the car, since they'll have to get in the water to push the canoe anyway.

Just as he’s about to join her, Armin’s eyes widen as if he had just remembered something, and he asks her to wait just a moment before he dashes to the car. Annie tilts her head to the side, brows furrowed– this is getting weirder by the second.

He’s back in no time, a backpack swung over his shoulder. He tosses it into the canoe and it lands with a boof, sounding rather heavy; it even looks stuffed, round on the sides, as if it were bearing heavy luggage. Annie’s frown deepens at the sight of the mysterious bag, wondering what he might have brought in it, but the boy seems not to notice her confusion. He pushes the canoe into the water and jumps in and settles on the bench in front of her.

“What’s in the backpack?” she questions, taking the paddle he’s holding out for her.

“Oh, just some snacks,” he smiles, slapping his paddle in the water.

Annie does the same, not ceasing her questionnaire. The paddles rhythmically hit the water, one in, one out, one in, one out, creating a splashing sound, the calm water only disturbed by them and the occasional fish jumping around.

“Snacks? What for?”

Armin scoffs. “You’re really not into surprises, are you?”

Annie sighs, her shoulders slumping. “I’m not fond of them,” she admits.

Armin hums. “Okay,” he says, his voice soft. “We never got to have our picnic,” he says.

Annie hums in understanding– they didn’t, the consoulers were tasked to clean the children’s dorm on the weekend the two of them had planned it, and they never got around to rescheduling it.

“So, I thought we could have it now. We could stop on that little island and stargaze and eat snacks.”

Annie takes a moment to consider the idea, a smile involuntarily raising to her lips, her face warming. He really thought this through, huh? She wouldn’t have ever thought she was worthy of so much thought and consideration, yet here he is, having planned an entire night adventure for her just because she seemed sad to have missed the canoeing.

“Ok, we can do that,” she finally says. “I’d love that.”

“Good.”

The moon shines high above them, reflecting in the water, only allowing Annie to briefly see Armin's face– but even then, she can tell apart the red on his face, the sheepish smile on his lips, and the somehow determined look in his eyes. His eyes, searching hers so intensely, she can feel her own cheeks warm up, the tips of her ears catching fire, and she's sure he can see it too, for his smile boardens.

He puts his paddle on the floor of the canoe with a click, causing the canoe to slow down. Annie does the same, following his movements, squinting her eyes to get a better look at what he’s doing. Armin brings the backpack closer to himself, unzips it, and starts rummaging through its contents. He eventually retrieves a bag of chips, a victorious expression on his face.

He opens it and thrusts it towards her. "Chips?"

“I thought we were supposed to have the picnic on the island.”

“We can have some snacks now too,” he shrugs, popping a chip in his mouth.

Annie leans forward, careful not to dip the canoe at any end, and grabs a handful of chips, popping them in her mouth one by one. He’s chosen the cheese flavoured ones– her favourite. He insists on sharing them, yet he lets her have the most.

Once the chips are no more, Annie wipes her hands on her shorts. As Armin puts the empty bag away, she picks up her paddle.

But Armin doesn’t do the same. Instead, he just stares at her, a dumb smile on his lips, his eyes sparkling with a kind of softness she finds foreign. Way too foreign.

Annie frowns. "What?"

Armin opens his mouth but then bites his lip. Then he smiles again. "You're beautiful," he says, his voice barely above a whisper as if not to disturb her beauty. He says it like a secret needing to be kept, as if the world could not handle it had he spoken any louder. As if her beauty were something to be protected.

Annie’s eyes widen briefly. She freezes in her tracks, hand frozen midair. If her face wasn’t pink before, she’s sure it’s bright red now, for even her ears have caught fire. She falters, her hands growing weak, and almost drops the paddle in the water, but thankfully manages to catch it in time, bending over the edge of the canoe, dipping her hand in the water in the process.

Annie’s lips press together as she watches him try to catch his breath. He seems to calm down at some point, then starts laughing even harder.

Armin presses his lips together as if trying not to laugh, a soft snicker still escaping his lips.

Then he bursts into laughter.

"I paid you a compliment and you just– you dropped the paddle, An!" he manages to say between laughs and hiccups, clutching his stomach.

Biting her lips, Annie looks away, her face so hot it feels like it’s going to explode. She listens as Armin tries to calm down, taking a deep breath in, her eyes focused on the moon’s reflection on the water. It’s a full moon, so shiny and beautiful that not even its own reflection in the water seems to do it justice.

Suddenly, an idea morphs into her mind, and she forgets all about her embarrassment. She turns towards Armin, who ceased his laughter and picked up his paddle. Seeing the look on her face, his expression morphes into one of curiosity, his eyebrow arched.

“Let's go for a swim,” Annie says, taking even herself by surprise.

Armin's eyes widen. “Now?”

“Yes.”

“Right now?” he asks again, a smile blossoming on his lips.

Annie rolls her eyes, smirking to herself. “Yes, Armin, right now. Or do you not know how to swim?”

“Of course I know how to swim,” he says, his voice sounding almost offended.

Annie laughs again and sets her paddle on the floor of the canoe once more. She grabs the hem of her shirt and pulls it up and over her head, remaining in only her black sports bra. Her skin shivers at the sudden contact with the night cold.

“What are you waiting for then?” she teases even further.

She folds her shirt and her shorts and places them safely on the bench, then tentatively stands up, scanning the water with her eyes, trying to decide whether she should actually do it or not. She closes her eyes, swallows hard, and jumps in without another thought.

The water is so cold when she touches it, it makes her skin shiver. As she emerges from the water and moves her now wet hair out of her face, Annie wishes she wouldn’t have been so reckless. She looks up at Armin, who's staring at her with an unreadable expression on his face, something like surprise mixed with delight, his smile growing wider. Annie finds herself mirroring it.

“Armin, come in!”

His hands go to the hem of his shirt, his eyes never leaving her. He pulls it over his head, and Annie turns around, feeling her face warm up at the mere thought of seeing Armin naked.

Shortly after, she hears a splash as he jumps into the river, followed closely by a small shriek.

“You didn’t tell me it’d be this cold!”

Annie laughs shortly, finally looking up at him. Before she gets the chance to take a good look at him, arms wrap around her waist, and she’s being pushed under the cold, cold water, letting out a shrill of surprise.

The two sink under the surface. Annie’s eyes widen in surprise, a bubble of air escaping her lips; her hands instinctively go to his arms and clutch his flesh, holding on for dear life. She only catches a glimpse of Armin’s shit eating grin before she’s pushed out of the water, his grip tighter around her waist. The cold hits her in the face, the hairs on her arms raising at the sudden change of temperature. She wraps her arms tightly around his shoulders, both in an attempt to ground herself to something and get warmer, his skin against hers extremely hot. He buries his head in the crook of her neck, his shoulders shaking with laughter, but his arms are wrapped securely around her waist– although Annie’s not sure if she is clinging to him or the other way around.

“Why did you do that?” she asks, but her voice is breaking into laughter too.

Armin tries to answer, but just as he’s about to open his mouth, he’s splashed with water right in the face, making him recoil. Annie giggles shortly at the look on his face, her head feeling suddenly very light, her chest warm– and once again, she wonders what kind of spells he’s put on her to make her feel like this so suddenly, so unexpectedly.

She moves his wet hair out of his forehead, wanting to see his face better, and his eyes pierce through hers as soon as she does, shining in the dim moonlight. It illuminates them so beautifully, makes their blue even brighter, more intense, and she finds herself drowning into them, so, so deep, as if he were inviting her into his soul, laying it bare for her to discover. His touch is gentle on her skin, his warmth and heat sheltering her from the cold of the night.

Annie parts her lips slightly, then presses them together, afraid that the wrong words would come out. A hint of confusion passes Armin’s eyes as he searches her face. Annie looks away, denying the thought, overly aware that she could not hold back if she looked at him any longer, that she shouldn’t, for the summer is almost over, and if she hasn’t until now, why would she allow herself to fall now–

“Annie,” he says her name in a whisper, like a sacred relic that should be preserved and protected from the rest of the world.

She closes her eyes, furrows her brows. She shouldn’t, she knows she shouldn’t, but the dam is slowly, slowly breaking, the water overflowing, threatening to spill over.

A warm hand touches her cheek. Her eyes flutter open, and widen even more when she finds Armin staring back at her, his eyes so comforting, the smile on his lips reassuring, letting her know that if she falls he will be right next to her and hold her hand through it all, making the crash softer.

His lips part.

But before he gets the chance to say anything, she makes up her mind. She gathers every ounce of courage she has left in her, and she grabs his face in her hands, and she wants to tell him that she does love him, and she wished their time together would never end but it will end, and they will part ways, and she’d be damned if she let the time pass without doing something about this fire he’s ignited in her, and–

Before she knows it, her lips brush against his. Her lashes flutter against his cheek, his eyes equally as surprised, and she closes her eyes, tentatively places a hand on his jaw, and-

Armin pulls her closer to him, placing his hand firmly on the small of her back, bringing the other to her face, moving a strand of hair behind her ear before tangling his fingers in her hair. A sigh escapes Annie’s lips as she slowly moves her lips against his, sending a shudder down Armin’s spine– and he’s not sure what takes over him, but he’s suddenly kissing her so hungrily, moving his lips against hers with such need, bringing her closer, closer, as close as he physically can. Annie slightly parts her lips, and Armin wastes no time in taking the invitation, sneaking his tongue past her lips– and she allows it, and she tilts her head back a little, and he takes her all in, his kiss sending shivers through every particle of her body. The cold slowly disperses, the moon shining brighter even, and as their lips dance together and Armin's hand moves slightly up on her back, making her skin burn, she wonders why she hasn’t allowed herself the luxury of kissing him this freely before.

Something cold and slick suddenly touches her leg, moving along it. Annie yelps, breaking away from her lover, and dips in the water, her eyes widening in panic when she realizes she's going down, Armin’s support suddenly gone.

It takes the boy a solid second to come to his senses, grab her arms, and pull her up. Annie takes a deep breath of air when she finds herself not drowning anymore, clinging to his arms for dear life.

“What happened?” he asks, his voice alert.

He squeezes her forearms in his hands, which feels weirdly grounding, and her body slightly relaxes. But the nagging feeling that something has touched her sends shivers down her spine.

“Something touched my leg!”

“What?”

Annie runs a hand down her face, moves her hair out of her eyes, and wipes her head around, squinting her eyes at the water, trying to see what it was, but the dark won’t allow her to.

“I swear something touched my leg,” she says, eyes still squinted.

Armin blinks at her once, twice, looks down in the water as if searching it too. “Maybe it was a fish,” he offers, “there are fish in the river.”

He looks up at her, a smile starting to pull at his lips, his eyes slightly squinted as if trying to see her better. His hands still holding her by the arms burn through her skin, her face warms up, she feels it in her ears even.

“Probably,” she mutters, lowering her gaze.

Armin smiles softly. His hands leave her elbows then, yet her skin continues to burn, and the boy swims away. Annie narrows her eyes before diving right in and swimming after him. But he’s faster than her, five feet ahead, and he doesn’t look like he'd slow down. He turns around only briefly, to catch a glimpse of her, his smile widening when he does so, then he turns away and disappears under the water. Annie takes a good look at the spot where he previously was, takes a deep breath of air in, and dives into the water.

When she opens her eyes, Annie finds Armin already looking at her, a big smile plastered on his lips. He extends his hand forward, showing her his palm, and she puts her own palm out, paralleling his, extending her fingers so she can touch each of his fingers, and lays her palm flat on his. A bubble of air leaves her lips when she smiles. A similar one leaves Armin’s when he mirrors her. He interlocks his fingers with hers, holding her hand delicately, his smile widening. In the dim light of the moon and the stars shining above them, with his hair floating around his head and the kindest look on his face, Armin looks absolutely beautiful, taking her breath away.

Without letting go of her hand, Armin swims up and breaks the water’s surface, pulling her with him.

There’s a big smile on his face when Annie faces him again, and she finds herself mirroring it. He’s looking at her with sparkling eyes, and she’s thankful for the dark, for it provides some sort of shelter from the intensity of his gaze– she’s pretty sure she would have melted right away had he looked at her that way in broad daylight.

“This is so fun!” he says, his voice filled with excitement.

Annie lets out a chuckle. “It really is!”

“I love you!”

“What?

“I said I love you!”

Annie’s eyes widen, she feels her face burn. Her heart skips a beat, beating so fast that it threatens to burst out of her chest. Yet her muscles relax, a big smile pulling on her lips.

“No, I heard you, I was just giving you an out!”

Armin laughs, throwing his head back, the crystalline sound echoing beautifully through the valley.

“I don’t need an out, I love you! I have loved you for so long it hurts, Annie.”

The girl takes in a deep breath, trying to calm down her nerves, trying to calm down her racing heart, trying to cool down her burning skin– but she can’t. The effect his words have on her entire being is impossible to undo.

Before she knows it, the words that have been itching on the tip of her tongue for so many weeks finally set free. “I love you, too.”

Armin’s eyes widen then, and his lips part slightly. He gazes at her with a look she doesn’t quite understand. Annie bites her bottom lip, suddenly very aware of herself and her surroundings and the cold of the night, and his eyes on her, bubbling with questions he doesn’t seem to want to ask, the water splashing against their bodies softly. But she doesn’t regret saying it– she’s been wanting to say it for so long, she’s been wanting him to hear her say it for so long.

His face flashes pink, so bright it’s visible through the dark of the night. “You do?”

Annie giggles, floating closer to him and cupping his face in her palm, holding it so gingerly. “Of course I do,” she whispers, resting her forehead against his.

She grazes his cheek with her thumb, searching his eyes curiously. He slowly raises his arms around her, resting his hands on the small of her back, and tugs her closer, until there’s no room between them even for the water. Very slowly, Armin brings his lips to hers and kisses her, much softer and much shorter than he did earlier, as if to seal their newfound love.

Then he parts away, a soft smile resting on his lips, and buries his face in the crook of her neck, eliciting a little giggle from Annie.

“We should get going,” she mutters, threading her fingers through his hair.

He shakes his head, tickling the skin on her neck. “Not yet.”

Annie hums, resting her cheek against the side of his head. “It’s getting colder,” she warns. “Your lips will turn purple.”

But he says nothing, only tightening his hold on her. Annie sighs.

“I can’t kiss you if your lips fall off.”

Armin scoffs lightly. He looks up at her, meeting her eyes with such a serene look on his face. “Alright,” he mutters.

He kisses her cheek, then takes her hand in his and tugs her away. They help each other back in the canoe and take their assigned seats on the benches, facing each other. Armin rummages through his backpack and produces a yellow towel out of it.

Annie snorts. “You really thought of it all, didn’t you?”

Armin leans forward and places the towel on her head, gathering her hair and squeezing it gently. “I like planning my surprises thoroughly,” he smiles, massaging her scalp.

Annie’s face warms up. “Is that so?”

“Yeah.”

He drops the towel on her shoulders. Annie hastily dabs the water away from her body and returns it to him with a thankful smile. She hastily puts her shirt back on, then watches Armin do the same. He puts the towel aside. They soon start paddling again, the canoe drifting through the night slowly and surely.

Once they make it to their usual stoppage spot for their picnic, and pull the canoe up to the shore, Annie is not surprised to see Armin pull out a blanket either. He did say he likes planning his surprises to the smallest detail. They spread it out and seal the corners with pebbles to make sure it’s secure.

As Armin takes out everything he’s prepared for the picnic, Annie rubs her hands together in an attempt to chase the cold away. Her eyes follow his every move, watching patiently and he unpacks cookies and casseroles of fruit, and paper cups. Once it’s all laid out, Armin stands up with a proud smile to admire his work. His eyes meet hers, and his smile momentarily falters.

“Are you alright?”

Annie nods thoroughly. “Yeah, just a bit cold. Don’t worry about it,” she hurries to add, still rubbing her hands together.

Armin shrugs his hoodie off and holds it out for her. “Here,” he says.

Annie presses her lips together. She can’t possibly take it, and leave him in only a t-shirt.

Armin sighs. He takes a few steps towards her, closing the distance between them, and drapes it around her shoulders, rubbing her arms up and down as if to prompt her to put it on properly. “I can’t have you get sick again.”

Annie eventually does as she’s told, slipping her arms through the sleeves. She already feels better, the warmth of his hoodie engulfing her. She rests her forehead against his shoulder then, hiding her burning face from his gaze. Armin laughs softly, bringing a hand to her head and gently running his fingers through her damp locks.

His skin is warm, and his heart is beating so loudly she can hear it, and soon their heartbeats and their breathing sync.

He retrieves his hand from her hair, nudging her shoulder slightly.

“Annie, look up,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper, as if he were holding his breath.

Annie complies, looking up at him with a small frown. But he’s not looking at her, his head tilted up towards the sky. A whimsical smile is resting on his lips, his eyes sparkling with wonder.

Curiosity takes the best of her. She straightens up, his arm falls from around her, yet his hand bruises against hers, and she finds it in herself to take a hold of it, wrapping her fingers around his much bigger and much warmer ones. She follows his gaze, and looks up.

The view Annie’s met with is mesmerizing: thousands of little, sparky stars light up the night sky, blinding her, reminding her of a life she’s never lived, in which the stars belong to her and the sky is her canvas. It is so beautiful, she has to pinch her skin to make sure it's even real. A billion stars shine above them, the full moon throning in the middle of them, illuminating the river and the valley.

A shooting star falls so fast, she almost thinks she dreamed it up, were it not for Armin marveling at the sight and pointing up to show it to her. A smile pulls on her lips, and she feels at peace, standing there with his hoodie around her shoulders, with his hand holding hers, admiring the world around them.

“What do you think?”

“It’s beautiful,” she mutters, somehow afraid she might disturb the serenity of the stars. "Who painted it?"

His eyes lock on hers, a smile playing on his lips. "Hmm?"

"The sky. It looks like a painting." Annie's lips curl up as she leans her head against Armin’s shoulder again. "Who painted the sky?"

He takes a moment to consider, his eyes going up once more. He watches the sparkling dots patiently, trying to make out the shapes of constellations, his hold on Annie's hand tightening only slightly.

"I don't know," he finally says. "But I'm sure they painted it for you."

She hums lightly, a cue of red spreading in her cheeks, looking up once more. Her eyes hover over the sky a little longer before settling on one star, and a little idea pops up in her mind.

She points up. “See that one blue-ish star that shines a little brighter than the rest?”

Armin’s gaze follows her finger and he nods slightly.

“I’ll name it after you,” she whispers.

His eyes light up, he wraps both of his arms around her and buries his face in the crook of her neck. A light giggle escapes Annie’s lips as she pats his hair.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” A thought forms then, and, however cheesy it might sound, she voices it out. “That’s Armin, the star that lights my way.”

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

Hamas has released 3 different vids of the same three hostages over the course of just 24 hours, in the first it claims they're all alive, in the second it questions that, and by the third, it's claiming 2 of these Israelis hostages are dead. The IDF is reminding everyone that Hamas is waging a psychological war against Israeli civilians, and intentionally tormenting the families of the hostages. Nevertheless, it also says there is real concern for the lives of these 2 hostages, Itay Svirsky (on the right) and Yossi Sharaby (on the left). Itay's parents were both murdered on Oct 7. Noa Argamani (in the center) was forced to read the statement about the death of the men. Her mother, Liora Argamani, has stage 4 cancer, and has repeatedly expressed her wish to see Noa one last time before she passes away.

In an interview with Piers Morgan, Thomas Hand, who is the father of Emily (a hostage of Hamas released after 50 days in captivity), said he's daughter is doing quite well, that more than 50 days after her release, her speech volume is almost back to normal, and she's only suffering from the occasional nightmare.

Mira and Barak Ayalon, the civilian mother and son who were killed by Hezbollah the other day, were buried last night in their community, Kfar Yuval. Because of the threat to everyone in northern Israel, the double funeral had to be held at night, in the dark, with a limited number of participants. Not that long ago, when Gal Hershko, an Israeli soldier killed in Gaza, was buried in a similar manner, Hezbollah aired the images, and then showed how in contrast, they bury their own killed terrorists in broad daylight, with lots of participants present. We can't even bury our dead in peace, and then we get mocked for it, and that's the reality that people want Israel to continue to accept on our northers and southern borders.

I don't write daily about the Israeli soldiers killed in the war in Gaza, but we learned about at least one more death every single day. Today, we learned that 37 years old reservist Noam Ashram, who was injured on Dec 29, has succumbed to his wounds, and 21 years old Nitzan Schessler was killed in southern Gaza, bringing the death toll of Israeli soldiers in the ground operation to 190.

The IDF estimates that the terror tunnel network spreads over up to 720 kilometers (roughly 447 miles) in Gaza, with more than 5,700 shafts that allows Hamas terrorists to carry out surprise attacks.

It only took over 100 days (disregarding everything that happened before Oct 7), but the European Union has finally designated the leader of Hamas in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, as a terrorist, allowing for the freezing of his assets. Looking forward to that being done to every Hamas terrorist senior.

This is 79 years old Edna Bluestein.

She's the woman murdered in the Palestinian terrorist attack yesterday in Ra'anana. The final number of additional casualties in that attack is 19 people, 4 of them severely wounded. Just a small reminder, the 2 terrorists intentionally targeted the elderly Edna, and another casualty, a 66 years old man, and kids, as 7 were wounded.

This is 22 years old Amit Man.

She was a paramedic with Magen David Adom (Red Star of David), and on Oct 7, as the attack on Israeli civilians began, she left her home, where she could have stayed in the safety of her apartment's bomb shelter, and rushed to her community's dental clinic, where the wounded of kibbutz Be'eri were being brought. For several hours she took care of them, and corresponded with her family members. During that entire time, Amit expressed her fear over how close to them the terrorists were, fear over how she could best take care of her patients, and repeatedly asked for the IDF to be directed to the clinic. The last voice messages she left for her family make it clear that she understood that she's not gonna make it out alive. Her apartment was found intact. She would have survived, had she not gone to the clinic, to help others. You can hear Amit's voice message to her sisters, her fear and the relentless gunshots, at this time stamp, and her very last voice message ever here, where she's just begging for it to stop.

Amit's mom recounted that after a difficult shift, when she had lost a patient, after they would talk, Amit would go into her room and record herself singing. The family mentioned that Amit chose to become a paramedic as a teenager, after she saw the dedicated medical treatment her dad got, before he passed away from cancer. If she hadn't made that choice, I think she would probably have been a singer, she had a beautiful voice, and it's clear this was an important way for her to express herself.

A Torah scroll had been dedicated in her honor at the Be'eri synagogue, and a rock band that she loved, Knesiat Ha'Sechel (Church of the Mind) used one of her recordings to create a postmortem duet. The song is called Nothing Is Going to Hurt Me, the original lyrics written by an Israeli soldier, 21 years old Erze Shtark, who died in a military helicopter accident in 1997. Knesiat Ha'Sechel, led by a band member who lost his brother in the Second Lebanon War (2006) turned Erez Shtark's written words in 2008 into a song, as part of a national project, called Soon We'll Become A Song, where many Israeli musicians have been doing the same for fallen Israeli soldiers along the years. The Song has two voices, that of the soldier swearing that nothing would hurt them, because that's what they promised their family, and the voice of the family, saying if anything happened to the soldier, there is no point to their life. "If you're standing here above me," the song goes, "I must have failed my promise. I'm sorry, I swear on my life." In the new version, Amit sings the part of the soldier, and the band sings the part of the family. Here's the duet, and in the vid you can also see the band performing it for Amit's family:

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[mbari-blog]

In the Friday Flow #literally 🌊

Remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) are often used to manipulate instruments like this current meter. The ROV is holding the current meter in front of large deep-sea corals growing in Sur Ridge, an underwater mountain range located 35 kilometers (21 miles) off the Big Sur coast.⁠ ⁠ This species, Paragorgia arborea, is also called bubblegum coral. These corals create complex, three-dimensional structures that provide habitat for many other animals. Deep-sea coral communities like this at Sur Ridge don’t receive as much attention as their shallow-water counterparts, but their roles in marine ecosystems are equally important. MBARI researchers are studying how these vulnerable communities are affected by human activities.

Learn more about life on Sur Ridge on our website.