Buddy Holly

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I was a grubby little 18 month old Iowa farm toddler, eating dirt and tripping over cow pies when Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper augered into a frozen cornfield near Clear Lake, in northern Iowa. The date was February 3rd, 1959.

The pilot, 21 year old Roger Peterson, took off at 1 AM in light snow flying a 1947 Beechcraft Bonanza. A few minutes later, the aircraft impacted the ground at high speed a few miles from the airport, killing all aboard.  Tommy Allsup and Waylon Jennings, Holly’s backup musicians, were supposed to be on board the plane with Holly. But at the last minute they were pursuaded to give up their seats.

Last night, on the 50th anniversary of the untimely death of Buddy Holly, we went to a dinner theater production of the Buddy Holly Story. It turned out to be quite entertaining. I say “turned out” because in truth I’m not much of a 50’s music fan. Being a serial doofus in the area of music, I didn’t realize that Holly was such a prolific song writer. Wasn’t paying attention.

On a side note, a Beechcraft Bonanza has been flown underneath the Eiffel Tower. It is hard to imagine that permission was given, much less, an insurance policy.

Bye Bye JOC

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I’ve decided that I’m going to let my subscription to Journal of Organic Chemistry lapse. It’s getting too expensive and they’re accumulating in my house at an alarming rate. The spouse unit is beginning to dig in her heels. My kid thinks it’s normal to have chemistry journals and molecular models all over the house.

Instead, I’ve subscribed to Journal of Loss Prevention in the Process Industries. Much of my time is taken up with process safety and reactive hazards these days, so I may as well accept the transition. I’ll probably subscribe to OPR&D as well. It feels strange, though. I’ve had a JOC subscription since  my junior year in college in ’82/’83.  Carrying around stacks of journals is like carrying around blocks of wood. And, after a while the collection gets a little … odd.

It’s the Schist and a Lot More

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The Front Range of Colorado is roughly comprised of those mountains that can be seen from the eastern plains. There is no precise definition that I am aware of, so this will have to do. 

Superficially, these mountains run north/south and appear to be organized into ranges, which are really just a series of roughly parallel ridge structures punctuated with the occasional high points that are refered to as peaks. The origin and orientation of these ranges is defined by the orientation of faults and with the effect of eons of erosion to form river channels. Erosion has the effect of removing the weakest materials and leaving behind the most resistant rock structures.

The present epoch of the Rocky Mountains are the result of the Laramide Orogeny, the most recent period of mountain building thought to have begun 70-80 million years ago in the late Cretaceous period. The cause of this mountain building episode is attributed to a shallow angle of subduction of the Kula and Farallon plates below the western margin of the North American plate.

Geologists propose that the shallow subducting slab of ocean bottom applied a drag on the root of overlying continental lithosphere. These forces lead to the broad belt of disturbance to the overlying rock leading to the formation of the Rocky Mountains.

As mountian building proceeded, overlying sedimentary formations were bent and fractured along the margins of the upward moving rock. Today these sedimentary formations are visible in the form of ridges of protruding lamanellar sandstone, mudstone, and shales whose surface planes sit at a high angle  relative to the horizon. The uppermost sedimentary formations are exposed further east in the plains, and as one moves a few miles closer to the mountains, the deeper and correspondingly older sedimentary formations are exposed. These parallel ridges of exposed, upthrusted sedimentary formations are collectively referred to as “foothills”.

Along much of the northern Colorado front range, the westernmost sedimentary formation that abutts the metamorphic rock is called the Fountain formation. Adjacent to this upthrust of metamorphic rock is a layer of disturbed Fountain formation that has been drug upwards to a near vertical orientation. If you have been to Boulder, Colorado, and have seen the Flatirons, you have seen the Fountain formation. Red Rocks Amphitheater and the Garden of the Gods are also part of the Fountain formation.

Here is my question- Somewhere, there should be an interface (I think geologists call it an unconformity) between the metamorphic and sedimentary formations. Where can it be inspected? A road cut or riverbed?

So, it turns out that Th’ Gaussling’s brother owns a spread that is comprised of Fountan formation sandstone. He has a mountain. And down from this mountain and into his yard come elk, deer, mountain lions, bear, and rattle snakes. One of his house cats, in fact, was last seen in the jaws of a cannibalistic mountain lion trotting off to a quiet spot to munch this fresh, tender kitty morsel.

To satisfy my curiosity about this interface, Th’ Gaussling was out in the brush scrambling over snow covered rocks, cactus, and yucca looking at examples of the Fountain formation and, nearby, a formation comprised of schist and gneiss. Not surprisingly, I did not find it in a single outing. But I was close- it’s buried in deep rubble, no doubt. The hunt continues.

Year of the Ox, 2009

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According to high placed sources, 2009 is the Chinese year of the Ox. Hmmm.  If you wanted to buy an Ox, where would you go? What does one look for in an ox? If an excellent ox was standing next to a bad ox, how would you know?  Besides having tails suitable for stew, what else is tasty about the ox? Oxburgers?

An ox is a compact beast of burden- a sort of bulldozer on the hoof. Why didn’t Budweiser choose oxen to pull their famed lager wagon? If oxen were good enough for the Mormon trail and Paul Bunyan, why not for beer distribution? I’m gonna go have a beer and think about it.

Redoubt’s Rumbling Redux

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The Redoubt volcano along the Cook inlet in Alaska is showing seismic activity according to the Alaska Volcanic Observatory (AVO). Seismic activity may be a precursor to eruption. Dedicated seismic recorders show frequent bursts of activity on the volcano.  The USGS has a website with advice and information aimed at helping people cope with an ashfall. 

In the past, the prevailing winds have carried the ashfall in an easterly direction over and past Anchorage. According to AVO, Redoubt is a stratovolcano located several hundred km west of Anchorage. It has reportedly erupted explosively six times since 1778, with the most recent being in 1989-90.

Note to Wal-Mart:  You may want to stock up the anchorage stores with extra brooms and shopvacs.

The House GOP. Hear Them Squeal!

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Poor GOP. The party of values, Tom DeLay, and Karl Rove. Now that they are the loyal opposition, they seem to have forgotten their time in the sun. Remember the good old days when Majority Leader Tom “The Exterminator” Delay ran roughshod over house Dems? The tide has turned and today they are whining vociferously about the lack of input into legislation.  Should they be surprised at like treatment? Actually, they are not getting like treatment. Boehner and party have been asked to participate in problem solving and, naturally, they have reverted to their rabid, atavistic reflex for eating the liver of any democrat within reach.

Reactivity and Risk. Gaussling’s 10th Epistle to the Bohemians.

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A chemical plant performing synthesis is a place where the materials in use are purposely selected for certain attributes of instability. Chemical stability refers to the tendancy of a substance to remain unchanged when exposed to some kind of stimulus. That stimulus may be exposure to heat energy, mechanical shock, or a more precise chemical attack on particular functional groups. Unstable substances have a low threshold to change. Stable substances require more stimulus to cause a change in composition.

Substances that are extremely stable are often not very useful in near-ambient temperature chemical synthesis, i.e., saturated hydrocarbons, metal sulfates, silica, etc.  The lack of lower temperature reactivity (say, up to 200 C) can be compensated for by application of high temperatures. Petroleum refineries take full advantage of high temperature reaction chemistry to alter the composition of otherwise stable hydrocarbons.

We choose stable substances for duty as solvents, diluents, carriers, etc., precisely because of their non-changeability or stability. “Inert” solvents allow chemists to bring molecules into solution for selective transformations. Of course, we all know that most solvents have some influence on the course of a transformation, the point is that we can transform solute materials without the fuss of altering the solvent too.

Chemical synthesis requires the manipulation of reactivity (and therefore stability) to perform useful transformations. Without well placed instability on a molecule, there cannot be efficient, directed synthesis. It is the job of the synthesis chemist to apply the knowledge of reactivity.

Because of the inherent instability of reactive and flammable materials, chemical plants must require that certain behaviors, procedures, and knowledge be set into a formal structure. Actions and conditions must give predictable consequences. This structure is comprised of a set of standard- operating procedures, equipment, test methods, and safety requirements.

It seems silly to go to the trouble of detailing the merits of running a safe plant, but it is worth pointing out the layers of requirements on an operating plant. 

  1. Preservation of life, health, and the environment
  2. Compliance with federal, state, and local regulations
  3. To provide for the uninterrupted flow of goods and services in the conduct of business
  4. To qualify for affordable business insurance
  5. To be a good neighbor and stable source of gainful employment for all concerned

A company in the business of manufacture is exposed to many kinds of liability. A chemical manufacturing plant is subject to modes of failure and liability that set it apart somewhat. 

One result of chemical manufacture that sets it apart from other forms of industry is the combination of unknown risk and dread fear. For communities in the vicinity of chemical operations, fear comes from the combination of the unknown as new risks, unknown effects, or delayed effects with the dreaded possibility of catastrophic or fatal consequences, inequitable consequences, involuntary effects, and high risk to future generations (see: Perilous Progress: Managing the Hazards of Technology, Edited by Kates, Hohenemser, and Kasperson, 1985, Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado, p 108. ISBN 0-8133-7025-6).

While the neighbors of a furniture factory may be annoyed by the presence of a nearby woodworking shop, it is unlikely that the neighbors will be stirred into existential dread by its presence. The hazards of a woodworking plant are easy to imagine and therefore, easier to rank into the grand list of life’s dangers.

Chemical and nuclear risk perception score at the extreme ranges of risk perception. Both domains involve an agent of potential harm that is poorly understood by most people. Ionizing radiation is inherently destructive to tissues, but the exact relationship between quality and dose to risk is fuzzy at low level exposure. And because it cannot be sensed directly, fear of it’s presence can induce disturbing excursions of imagination and dread.

Fear of chemicals is widespread in the industrialized world. The downside to chemical operations has been immortalized by numerous well known industrial calamities like Love Canal (Hooker Chemical), Bhopal, numerous dioxin fiascos, PCB’s, or occupational exposure to asbestos or chromium (VI). There are a great many chemical items of commerce that are unavoidably hazardous to health.

Because of the risks associated with toxicity or exposure to hazardous energy from machines, chemicals, radiation, heat, noise, gravity, sharp implements, etc., the many layers of government have established agencies and a regulatory structure to diminish risk exposure to workers specifically and citizens generally.

The purpose of the chemical industry is to produce goods and services for people who want or need the value of it’s output. Like the ad says- “We don’t make the surfboard, we make it better”. Well, making the surfboard better inevitably requires that certain kinds of hazards be unleashed and managed. The expectation that hazardous materials can be eliminated in manufacturing is a fantasy. The manipulation of instability is inherent to chemical transformation. Zeroing out hazards has to come from the demand side of the market.