On admission into the Order of Merit, members can use the post-nominal letters "OM", and have the badge of the order, consisting of a golden crown from which is suspended a red enamelled cross, itself centred by a disk of blue enamel, surrounded by a gold laurel wreath, and bearing in gold lettering the words "FOR MERIT"; the insignia for the military grouping has a pair of crossed swords behind the central disk. The ribbon of the Order of Merit is divided into two stripes of red and blue; men wear their badges on a neck ribbon, while women carry theirs on a ribbon bow pinned to the left shoulder, and aides-de-camp may wear the insignia on their aiguillettes. Since 1991, the insignia is to be given back upon the recipient's death.
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As the Order of Merit is open to the citizens of sixteen different countries, each with their own system of orders, decorations, and medals, the order's place of precedence varies from country to country. While in the United Kingdom, members rank below Knights and Dames Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, it has been claimed by Stanley Martin, in his book "The Order of Merit 1902-2002: One Hundred Years of Matchless Honour", that the Order of Merit is actually the pinnacle of the British honours system. Similarly, though it was not listed in the Canadian order of precedence for honours, decorations, and medals until December 2010, except relating to those who were appointed to the order prior to 1 June 1972, both Christopher McCreery, an expert on Canadian honours and secretary to the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia, and Rafal Heydel-Mankoo, an editor of "Burke's Peerage", stated that the Order of Merit was the highest civilian award for merit a Canadian could receive.
Some orders of precedence are as follows:
Ellsworth Street Bridge
The Ellsworth Street Bridge is a highway bridge that crosses the Willamette River in Albany, Oregon, United States. Built in 1925, the two-lane structure carries U.S. Route 20 eastbound traffic, with the adjacent Lyon Street Bridge carrying westbound traffic. The -long steel-truss bridge was designed by Conde McCullough and opened in 1926.
In 1887, a bridge was built across the Willamette River at Albany for the Corvallis and Eastern railway followed by the Steel Bridge built in 1893 just down river. The state of Oregon began building a new bridge across the river at the city in 1925 to carry vehicular traffic. Designed by state highway department bridge designer Conde McCullough, it was constructed by the Union Bridge Company based in Portland, Oregon. The steel truss structure was completed in 1926.
When the bridge opened, the Albany-Corvallis Highway was completed. At the time the structure was named the Albany Bridge. In 1973, the neighboring Lyon Street Bridge was completed to the east to expand capacity to a total of four lanes between the two bridges. Ellsworth Street Bridge was refurbished in 1971 and 2002. As of 2004, the bridge handled an average of 9,850 cars per day.
East Caribbean dollar
The East Caribbean dollar (sign: $; code: XCD) is the currency of eight of the nine members of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (the exception is the British Virgin Islands).
It has existed since 1965, when it replaced the British West Indies dollar, and it is normally abbreviated with the dollar sign "$" or, alternatively, "EC$" to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies.
The EC$ is subdivided into 100 cents. It has been pegged to the United States dollar since 1976 and the exchange rate is currently at US$1 = EC$2.70.
Six of the eight countries which use the EC$ are independent (Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines). The other two are British overseas territories: Anguilla and Montserrat.
All of the countries except Dominica are Commonwealth realms.
Hurdle race
Hurdle race is a type of track and field race.
There are "sprint" hurdle races and "long hurdle" races. The standard sprint hurdle race is 110 meters for men and 100 meters for women. Men and women run 400 meters in the standard long hurdle race. Each of these races is run over ten hurdles and they are all Olympic events.
Other distances are sometimes run, particularly indoors. The sprint hurdle race indoors is usually 60 meters for both men and women, although races 55 meters or 50 meters long are sometimes run.
Hammer throw
Hammer throw is an athletic throwing event. The goal of it is to throw a heavy metal ball attached to a wire and handle. The name "hammer throw" is derived from the older Scottish sport competitions.
Like in other throwing events, competitors gain maximum distance by swinging the hammer above their head to set up the circular motion. Then, they apply force and pick up speed by completing one to four turns in the circle. In competition, most throwers turn three or four times to gradually increase the velocity with each turn. The thrower releases the ball from the front of the circle. The most important factors for a long throw are the angle of release and the speed of the ball. The hammer throw was one of the first Olympic games played. Any gender can take part in the event.
Ocean thermal energy conversion
Ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) is a way of getting useful energy from the world's oceans. The sun shines on the oceans of the world and in the hot parts near the water at the sea's surface can be quite warm, sometimes as high as 30°C.
Many oceans are very deep and the water at depths of 1,000 meters can be around 5 °C.
If a pipe is put down into the ocean we can bring the cold water to the surface where we also have warm water available.
The difference in temperature between the warm surface water and the cold deep water may only be around 15 °C. But we can build a machine called a heat engine, which can use this harry difference to generate power that can be used by people that live in that place. A machine which can do this is called an OTEC machine which stands for "ocean thermal energy conversion".
Because the difference in temperature is small we will need to get large quantities of warm and cold water to go through the machine to get a useful amount of work, but large quantities are available in the ocean.
It has been estimated that OTEC could give amounts of energy that are 10 to 100 times greater than the other ocean energy source, wave power.
The first OTEC machine was built in Cuba in 1930 and made 22 kW of electricity. The largest machine built so far generated 250 kW in 1999 and was made by the US. Plans to build even bigger machines of around 10 MW have been made.
OTEC can also supply quantities of cold water as a by-product. This can be used for refrigeration and can help crops and fish grow. OTEC can also produce large amounts of salt-free water, which can be useful on mid-ocean islands as drinking water.
Middle distance race
Middle distance race event is longer than sprints, up to 3000 metres. The standard middle distances are the 800 metres, 1500 metres and the mile run, while the 3000 metres may also be classified as a "middle distance event". The 880 yard run, or half mile, was the forebear to the 800 m distance and it has its roots in competitions in the United Kingdom in the 1830s. The 1500 m came about as a result of running three laps of a 500 m track, which was commonplace in continental Europe in the 20th century.
Powerslave
Powerslave is a studio album by Iron Maiden. It went on sale on 3 September 1984. It was the second most popular album in England when it started being sold.
The album got good reviews; one person said it was "classic and essential."
One of the songs, "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," was adapted from a poem of the same name by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It is Iron Maiden's longest song (almost 14 minutes).
New World vulture