Supercell in Tacloban

Two weeks ago, a supercell developed 3 miles northeast of the airport. It went viral on social media because the netizens thought it was a huge funnel cloud/tornado. LOL if it really was a tornado, judging from what I saw, it could easily pass as an EF5 tornado. I'd be one of the few survivors (because... masamang damo lol) if it went straight to the airport.

Anyway, this is just a supercell, a rotating thunderstorm. This is relatively small compared to what we always see on TV in America's midwest aka the notorious tornado alley. Minutes after this photo was taken, it rained so hard but it only lasted for forty-five minutes. The wind was packing up to 35 knots, blowing to the north.

The supercell quickly dissipated.

Seeing this in real life rekindled my obsession in extreme weather. HAHAHAHA

A Very Nice Experience

I won't regret on spending lots of money over the last weekend. It's just... it was all worth it (despite some minor problems during the trip).

I was not a field trip (that is... purely acads), but it was a fun trip!
Sigh. I won't forget those cheerful memories especially from my HALER van mates. HAHAHAHA!!!


The Initao Adventure was the best trip that I've experienced so far.

H1Z1 - The New Strain of Swine Flu

The Swine Flu, also known as A(H1N1) virus has been lurking across the globe since its first outbreak in Mexico a couple of months ago. It had caused sudden alerts and travel advisories to common people and made microbiologists, virologists and medical doctors to work almost 24/7 just to monitor this new virus outbreak. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the virus had affected almost 40 countries and new cases were reported in India and Malaysia. It also claimed at least 150 lives worldwide with 8,000 cases that are positive in this virus.


Information, on the other hand, spread faster than the virus by means of television, radio, and the internet. While reading some news articles from the official pages of CNN and BBC, I clicked on a certain link and was surprised by this headline:

Swine Flu Quickly Turns Into Zombie Swine Flu, H1N1 Is Now H1Z1

This is an excerpt from an alleged viral mutation:

It is said that the swine flu zombie strain can resurrect a human after his death. After what happened in London with the zombism, WHO has raised the alert level to 6, and now it is clear that a pandemic is imminent. WHO officials reported that after two hours after the initial death of a zombie swine flu victim, the H1Z1 virus can restart the heart of a person who will quickly behave in “extremely violent ways” due to a mixture of brain damage and an unknown chemical released into the victim’s blood during his resurgence.

The satire-report says that there have been multiple cases of the zombie swine flu including one in the Netherlands where a 3-year-old child died and then returned to life in order to lunge at his mother.


Source:
http://www.softsailor.com/news/2126-swine-flu-quickly-turns-into-zombie-swine-flue-h1n1-is-now-h1z1.html

So, is this the “dawn of the dead”? Probably not.



First of all, if the mutation of H1N1 to H1Z1 really occurred in real life, then the mutation rate of H1N1 is impossibly fast. Though, the nature of some viruses is not predictable, there’s no way that a human being will be transformed into a deranged zombie by just a single virus.


Another thing, we must have listened to our high school biology teachers. These scoundrels who have made this fake news weren’t participative during the lectures in their Biology class. Apparently, viruses CAN’T live and reproduce without its host. When a host dies, the virus also dies inside the body of its host. Viruses are found wherever there is life. There are no molecular proofs that a virus is capable to revivify dead people.



The alleged new zombie strain of H1N1 is just crazy… a fictitious news.


I can’t consider this as news for crying out loud. It’s just a practical joke, trying hard to be the latest internet sensation.

Book vs. Movie: Angels and Demons

Almost five years ago, I read Dan Brown’s four books and I really loved them. But my favorites were the controversial The Da Vinci Code and its prequel, Angels and Demons. It was indeed beautifully written by Dan Brown, so beautiful that the powerful Catholic Church despise his finest works of literature. On the 17th of May 2006, The Da Vinci Code was released in cinemas worldwide but it was restricted for mature viewers only. I was only fifteen at that time and there’s no way to watch that on the movie house. I only had the chance to watch it six months later on DVD. Unfortunately, I was NOT happy with the movie version and like what all Dan Brown fanatics have claimed, the book is always better than the movie (except for Stardust).

Three years later, its prequel, Angels and Demons was released and I was waiting for it for almost a year already. Finally, the long wait has come to an end. I just watched it on the movie house this afternoon and today, I’m watching it online, again. I have even downloaded its OST!




So, what’s the fuss of this movie by the way?


First of all, people are somewhat curious of what’s really happening inside the Sistine Chapel during one of the Catholic Church’s rarest events to occur, the Conclave. The ceilings and the four corners of the historical Sistine Chapel was the only witness of this religious event for the past thousand years aside from the Cardinals who will cast their votes for the next Vicar of God, the next leader of the Catholic Church. We all have this notion that cardinals are clean, not materialistic and do not practice vices. Apparently, Cardinals smoking pipes, talking to their high-end phones and recording videos using their state-of-the-art video camera were portrayed in the movie. It’s just an eye-opener, to see that Cardinals are just human beings though they are one of the leaders of the most powerful religion, the Catholic Church.


Another thing is this. Aside from people’s curiosity on religion, they are also nosy with the antimatter. As what the novel had described, antimatter is a new generation matter which can generate great amounts of energy in just an infinitesimal amount. Antimatter is made through the gigantic particle accelerator which ran the entire complex of CERN in Zurich, Switzerland. A cataclysmic event or annihilation shall occur if antimatter is in contact with matter, the things that we see everyday. This study is primary concerned with the creation of the universe, to see whether the idea in the Holy Bible would be coherent with science.


The idea of having science as the mortal enemy of the Catholic Church stretches as early as 1000 AD. The Catholic Church before thought that scientists were heretics and those who will not follow their beliefs shall be excommunicated by the pope or worse executed by grotesque means. The novel portrays a different story, some sort of the revenge by a secret society called the Illuminati.


The novel was indeed powerful that it drew media attentions worldwide. Such upheavals of it claimed both praises and criticisms. The movie was almost called off due to the protest made by the Catholic Church. But fortunately, the production continued this project.



What I really liked in this movie were the cinematography, the original sound track and the visual effects, most especially when the antimatter exploded into the midnight sky of Vatican. All were great. The script was surprisingly simplified though and as what I had expected, scenes from the book weren’t included in the movie. Here are some:

• The movie didn’t portray the state-of-the-art Boeing X-33, the plane use to transport Robert Langdon from USA to Switzerland in just three hours (normal flight duration on this route usually takes a good 8 hours from a jumbo jet).

• Robert Langdon was asleep and he wasn’t swimming when Vatican called him.

• Robert Langdon and Vittoria Vetra didn’t meet at the Vatican. On the book, they met at CERN.

• The mischievous BBC reporter Chinita Macri (or was she a camerawoman?) wasn’t in the movie.

• In the book, Robert Langdon had caught in the helicopter and flew together with the Carmelengo and the antimatter. The Carmelengo escaped by using his parachute and Robert Langdon had a majestic dive in the Tiber River. In the movie, only the Carmlengo rode the helicopter and Robert Langdon only watched him in horror as the helicopter rose before the grandiose explosion.

• In the book, the Assassin died when he fell from his secret hiding place. In the movie, he escaped without the terrifying fight scene from the book, but eventually killed when his car exploded.

• The movie and book had different beginnings. In the former, it was just a narrative story about the demise of the pope while the latter explains the death of Vittoria’s father and that was the time when the canister went missing.

• The Carmelengo’s life story wasn’t emphasized in the movie.

• The head scientist of the CERN didn’t visit Vatican.

I think this is already enough because I might get killed by someone due to these spoilers. Haha!


But yeah, the movie was at least depicted in a straight-forward manner and likewise, this is better than The Da Vinci Code. Whether you have read the book or not, this is going to be one of the greatest movies of this year. I’m looking forward to watch this flick on DVD again.

Prey (Michael Crichton): Book Review

Prey is one of Michael Crichton’s techno-thriller novels. It tells the story about Jack Forman, a father of three, jobless and the lovely husband of Julia Forman, who embarks on a quest to solve the series of mishaps of the latest scientific innovation of nanotechnology. The novel was indeed compelling, the plot was delivered in a straightforward manner and the facts were presented evidently.


We all lived in a cynical world and reading this novel makes you realize that a small mistake would lead into a catastrophic disaster. Small things, like the programmed nanoparticles can coalesce with each other and wreak unimaginable havoc to humans. It’s an eye opener for us, and gives us an opportunity to take a peek on to the possible drawbacks of science and technology.


I think Biology, Computer Science and Biotechnology majors could relate or even love this novel. Imagine the intricate courses like Biology, Computer Science and Genetic Engineering in just one book.




A great book, kudos to the late Michael Crichton.


One of my favorite authors (I love Robert Ludlum too!). Sigh.