Approved For Release 2000/08/10
: CIA-RDP96-00792R0001 001 2001 3-0
NATURE’S HIDDEN POWER LINE
.
s
“
m
A
Everyone knows about the kind ofelee-
I
trie current provided by
utility compa-
sj
nies. Less familiar are the currents in aim.
t| Factured
by
nature's own
powerhouse.
Charged particles from the sun set offos-
:
| filiations in the Earth’s magnetic Field at
1 the edges of the atmosphere. T hese pulses
j
in
turn
induce
electric
currents on
the
j
Earth.
j
John R. Booker, a geophysicist
at the
ij University of Washington, was studying
j the structure of the
western
sea coast
:j when he came across an immense current,
j one far too strong to be caused solely by
i
local phenomena.
In early
19110, he and
j co-worker Gerard Hensel traced the enr-
;j rent along a line that runs roughly south-
j east from Tacoma,
Washington,
to
the
I Columbia River.
,j
An
electric
current
will
usually
flow'
j more easily through water than through
i
land,
but
rock
that
holds
water
in
its
pores
tends
to be highly conductive.
Booker discovered that his current flows
along a thin wedge of porous sedimentary
rock squeezed between older, denser con-
tinental crust to the east and ocean crust
being pushed in from the west.
Booker believes the current
is induced
in the Pacific and travels down between
Vancouver
Island and
the Canadian
mainland.
Then,
prevented by a milder
incoming current front following the path
of
least
resistance back
to the ocean,
it
continues south down Puget Sound,
where
it leaks into the continental mass.
I he current's path coincides with a
seis-
mic
fault, and
scientists hope that map-
ping
it will provide information about the
region’s geological structure that can help
them evaluate earthquake hazards.
Although the current flows along at a
powerful
rate,
local
residents
won’t be
able to plug their toasters into their back-
yards. The mck vein's high conductivity,
says Booker, makes
it impossible for the
I
energy to be concern rated and tapped,
WORLD SPACE
CAPITAL RISES
IN BALTIMORE
A CAMEL CAN SURVIVE in the'
desert not because
it/s hump stores
water, but because
it stores fat, As
the fat is broken down, hydrogen is
given off. This mingles with oxygen
inhaled by the animal and cre-
ates- -you guessed
it—water.
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J-U.lt ‘M")A K V
I M JMATKIJ BOUNDARY
STRAIT Ol’’
c;korc;ia
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v
/TiJAN m i? ijc.O
WASHINGTON
MONTANA
rfteMCCCnAN
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^
* ‘nltimhip Ktv> ar^
S 4
i|I
* n**un“ {y occurring' electric current flows through a wedge of porous rock
in the
ed consortium that proposed th<
fi| wetfic. -Northwest,
coincident
with a
seismic fault.
By mapping
the
current's path,
It
already
operates
three
gro
2001 3-0
.Jfctepa* Digest-October 1982
c.
Beginning
in
early
1985,
the
world's
’
i!
capital of astronomy will not be a wand-
’
swept mountain in California, a volcano
; I
;
in Hawaii or even a huge telescope in the
j
’
Soviet Union,
ft will be a five-story build-
j
.J
j
ing in downtown Baltimore.
Tf
The Space Telescope Science Institute
j:'
i
(STSI), now being built at Johns Hopkins
j
i
'
University,
will be the
final destination
I
for data transmitted from the Space Tele-
j_
scope, an orbiting observatory that
proj-
j
ect scientists say will see objects 50 times
‘
;
fainter and 7 times farther away than can
j
v
be
detected by
the
largest
Earth-based
j
telescopes.
i.
Once the Space Telescope is placed into
j
orbit by the space shuttle and begins
its
j
observations, a crew about 80 strong will
;
operate the STSI around the clock. As
j
,
one scientist’s experiment ends, another’s
f
t
;
will begin, and by the end of one year it is
\
,
estimated that the facility will have host- |
jj
,
ed more ‘than
150
visiting astronomers
.yk
l
from around tlte world.
<
Data and pictures from the Space Tele- 2lfe
scope will first be transmitted to NASA’s
|f|’|
Goddard Space Flight Center in Green-
r
'
:
.
belt, Maryland, where the craft's ground
*
systems are located, and then relayed
to |j||
the STSI’s on-line observation
area. As
:
r
the data become
public,
after about a
|||.;
year, they will also be sent to a European 4|
:
Space Agency
facility now under con- f|s$
struction in Munich.
v Ij'
“Calculations
suggest
that,
the
Space
Telescope will tie able to see any Jupiter-
size planets orbiting Sumlike stars as far
/
'
;
away as ten light-years—possibly twenty
to
thirty,”
says
project
scientist
C.
R. A
,
O'Dell.
There
are
stars
within
ten S<
light -years of the Sun, 76 more within a Sj.
radius of twenty light-years,
'
If all goes according to blueprints,
as-
tronomers at the STSI will carry out the Py-
renaissance of optical astronomy in pleas-
;
, V
ant surroundings. “The Institute is being
;
built into the side of a hill in a very w ood-
?h|
ed section.
It’s a nice rural setting within
j-
j
a
city,”
says
chief
facility manager
H.
.
James Lyall. The building will include a
library, data archives, a 200-seat lecture
pf:
hall, a skylit lobby, a terrace cafeteria and ^
office space for support staff and visiting
f
'
scientists,
'
;
The STSI is being built under the aegis
of AURA (Association of Universities for
j.
Research in Astronomy), a NASA-fund- |T
ed consortium that proposed the institute,
fe-
lt
already
operates
three
ground-based
I
e.'TAc