Devil’s Pool

The Victoria Falls in the Zambia is home to the most Dangerous pool in the world. The naturally formed Devil’s Pool, near the edge of the falls on Livingstone Island on the Zambian side. When the river flow is at a certain level, usually between September and December, a rock barrier forms an eddy with minimal current, allowing adventurous swimmers to splash around in relative safety a few feet from the point where the water cascades over the falls.

Be warned.. occasional deaths have been reported when people have slipped over the rock barrier.

Livingstone Island is a 5-8 minutes boat ride from the Royal Livingstone Hotel and is located in the middle of the Zambezi River right on the edge of the Victoria Falls just before the water thunders down a 103 metre drop. To protect the sensitive environment, only 16 guests may visit at any one time during five daily departures. Access is restricted to a maximum of 80 visitors per day so it is highly recommended to book a Livingstone Island Tour in advance.Access to this unique Island is seasonal and depends entirely on the water level in the Zambezi River.

In low water season, approximately end of August to December, guests have the opportunity to swim in Devil’s Pool which is a rock pool right on the lip of the falls accompanied by a guide.The Devils Pool itself is a deep natural pool that has been created by thousands of years of erosion, but what is unique about it is that there is a rock ledge on the lip of the Falls, where the water is only a few centimetres deep. This natural barrier is what allows you to jump into the deep pool but not get swept over the edge. Swim slightly upstream in a very slow current, being a strong swimmer is not a prerequisite. A safety rope is also in place as an added precaution. You then climb out on another rocky outcrop close to the edge of the Falls and the Devils Pool.

Dr David Livingstone

As the name suggests this is the island from which Dr David Livingstone first witnessed the Falls in November 1855. From here he lowered a length of calico with a bullet attached as a weight to measure the depth of the Falls.The Devils swimming Pool is available for an even shorter period as the water level has to be really low to allow for safe swimming. Although variable every year this is normally from late August to early January.

Five trips are offered

Throughout the day each trip lasting about 1.5 to 2 hrs. There a five minute boat ride speeds you through the current of the Zambezi river, twisting and turning as the captain navigates his way through the rocky channels, this in itself is an exhilarating experience towards the rising column of spray from the Victoria Falls.

 sandy and rock island and are then led to the very edge of the Falls on the east of the island overlooking Horseshoe and Rainbow Falls. The est of the island overlooking Main Falls. magnificent view, as the main torrent of water gushes over the basalt precipice. It's like no other view of the Falls and gives a completely different perspective to the views one gets from the path through the Rainforest on the other side of the canyon.

The Devils Pool itself is a deep natural pool that has been created by thousands of years of erosion. we can  lie this rock lip and look right into the 103m chasm of the Falls, with huge torrents of water flowing just meters away. It's a real adrenaline high and people who have experienced it Love it!. 

BBS

Drones are `Becoming Birds` in the sky. Absolutely..Commercial drones are going to become as ubiquitous as aeroplanes in the sky are right now. The civil aviation authority in Australia was one of the first in the world to legalise commercial flights by unmanned aerial vehicles, adding that the USA isn't due to follow until 2015. This gives the startup the opportunity to hone the technology over the next few years, ready to export worldwide. Flirtey is the world's first unmanned aerial vehicle delivery technology. Currently in Australia same-day delivery by post cost eight to 20 [Australian] dollars.Flirtey it will cost a fraction of that and the consumer won't have to cover it because it will be included in the marketing budget of the companies that we partner with.

`World's first` drone delivery service

 A Sydney company has launched a book delivery service that employs flying robots instead of postmen, and declared that `commercial drones are going to become as ubiquitous as aeroplanes`.

Flying drones to deliver text books:Sydney startup Flirtey has teamed up with text book rental service Zookal to use hexacopters - robots with six rotors - to deliver study materials. The service aims to reduce postal costs and avoid the problem of missed deliveries by tracking the location of the recipient's mobile phone. Flirtey co-founder Matthew Sweeney says  `We're taking technology that was previously only available to the military and universities, democratising it and commercialising it so that anybody can order any goods or services and have them flown straight to their smartphone.`Books are ordered using a smartphone app, then Zookal packages them before they're flown to the customer's phone rather than their address.Six battery-powered rotors control flight, which can continue even when one isn't working. `We've built the Flirtey as a hexacopter, so it can lose any one rotor and still fly, and can lose any one battery and still fly,` said Sweeney.

 Zookal CEO Ahmed Haider mentions another safety feature: `When the Flirtey arrives to its location it levitates above the location and lowers the parcel to the consumer. If there is anyone that pulls it a little too hard the parcel comes off, keeping the Flirtey safe and ready to go.` Amazon also tests drones that could deliver parcels too.

Nixie -Drone

Sure, Apple's new smart watch brings smartphone features to users' wrists, but can it fly free and take video in the air? The Nixie, which has none of the features of a watch other than wrist-wearability, is a drone for people who like robots as fashion statements, as well as aerial photography.

Nixie is a quadcopter with flexible arms, letting it cling to a pilot's wrist like a scared mechanical flying squirrel. Created by Christoph Kohstall and a team of designers and engineers, Project Nixie is a finalist in Intel’s `Make It Wearable` competition. Here's how Kohstall wants Nixie to work:

You should be able with a gesture to tell the quadcopter to unfold. Then it's going to take off from your wrist. It knows where you are, turns around, takes a picture of you, comes back. You can catch it from the air, and put it back on your wrist.

Gravity

If the planet's gravity turned off, and suddenly there was no force of gravity on planet Earth. This would turn out to be a pretty bad day. We depend on gravity to hold so many things down -- cars, people, furniture, pencils and papers on your desk, and so on. Everything not stuck in place would suddenly have no reason to stay down, it would start floating. But it's not just furniture and the like that would start to float. Two of the more important things held on the ground by gravity are the atmosphere and the water in the oceans, lakes and rivers. Without gravity, the air in the atmosphere has no reason to hang around, and it would immediately leap into space. This is the problem the moon has -- the moon doesn't have enough gravity to keep an atmosphere around it, so it's in a near vacuum. Without an atmosphere, any living thing would die immediately and anything liquid would boil away into space.

In other words, no one would last long if the planet didn't have gravity.

The surface gravity of the Moon is only about one fifth of that of the Earth. No wonder Apollo astronauts were able to jump so far on the Moon's surface! Prospective Mars colonists should note that they will only weigh about a third of their terrestrial weight on Mars. 

According to James Overduin, a physicist at Towson University in Maryland who specializes in gravitation, a universe without gravity would be "completely flat and featureless." Overduin explained that gravity is just another term for the curvature of space-time — how steep or shallow the fabric of the universe is in a given place (and thus how likely objects are to fall toward the source of curvature). Just as a bowling ball placed on a trampoline curves its surface, it is the presence of matter and energy that cause space-time to curve. So, if the universe can't curve (because gravity doesn't exist), then there can be no matter or energy within it. 

Earth's gravitational pull is responsible for the moon's orbit. Similarly, all planets, asteroids, and comets in our solar system orbit the sun due to this gravitational pull. The fact that celestial bodies millions of light years away orbit the sun debunks the myth of no gravity in space.

Gravity on Other Planets

Gravity differs depending on what planet we are on. This is because the planets vary in size and mass.

Mercury is the smallest planet with the least mass and the least density. The gravity on Mercury is only 38% of the gravity on earth. Considering Mercury only has a radius of 4,879 km, which is barely any larger than the Moon, the gravity is high. The high gravity is due to the high density of the planet.

Venus is similar in size to the Earth, which is why it is often called Earth’s twin. Its mass, density, and volume are all slightly less than Earth’s. This means that the gravity on Venus is slightly over 90% of the Earth’s gravity. Although you would weigh less on Earth’s twin than you would on Earth, you would not want to visit Venus because of its toxic, burning atmosphere.

Jupiter is the most massive planet in our Solar System, meaning it also has the highest gravity. If you stood on Jupiter – you cannot because it does not have a solid surface – than you would weigh two and a half times what you would on Earth.

A gas giant, Saturn is more massive than Earth, but it also has the lowest density of all the planets in the Solar System. If you were able to stand on Saturn’s surface, you would experience about 91% of the gravity you would on Earth.

Like Saturn, Uranus is massive, but has a very low density. Because of this combination, Uranus has a low gravity about 89% of the gravity that you would feel on Earth. This is very close to Venus’ gravity although Uranus is more than 14 times larger than Venus is.

Neptune is much more massive than Earth – 17 times Earth’s mass – but it is also much larger than Earth, so it has a lower density. This means that Neptune’s gravity is only slightly more than Earth’s gravity – 14% more. It would not be too uncomfortable walking on Neptune if you could walk on it, which is impossible because it does not have a solid surface.

The promise of life on Mars has intrigued people for centuries, but what would living on Mars really be like. Well, Mars has a smaller density and mass than our planet, which means that it has lower gravity. In fact, you would weigh less on Mars than you would on any other planet in our Solar System. The gravity of Mars is 38% the gravity of Earth.

Nobel Peace Prize laureates

Similar Heart

The animals are sometimes called `horizontal humans`. Although they are more distantly related to us than, for example, the great apes - pigs are about the right size, and so are their organs. A 75kg pig has the same-sized heart as a 75kg human, with the same pumping capacity. In theory it should be possible to farm pigs for their organs, much as we now farm them for bacon. But there are problems. Our immune system is designed to attack any foreign material that enters the body. Many human to human transplants are only possible with powerful drugs that suppress the immune system and prevent it from treating the new organ or tissue as a huge infection and rejecting it. Doctors try to match donors to recipients to keep rejection to a minimum, but the problems are greater with pigs. If an unmodified pig heart were given to a human, the reaction would be so violent that the heart would turn black in 15 minutes and be virtually destroyed in 30.They are an important step towards `knock-out` pigs, meaning animals where the specific gene that causes the human immune system to reject pig organs is made inactive - or knocked out. The all-female litter of five lacks one of its two alpha gal genes (which put a sugar on pig cells to which the human immune system reacts aggressively). When an all-male litter is born next month (also lacking one of its two alpha gal genes) it will be possible to mate the two animals. A new breed of pig will be created where every fourth offspring will have no alpha gal gene at all, making it a true `knock out` and an ideal source of spare parts for humans.

Ultimate pig.. 

David Ayares, vice president of research for PPL Therapeutics (the company that helped clone Dolly the Sheep), says it is only the first step and speaks of a need for further modifications before the company can create the `ultimate pig`. How to deal with adverse immune reactions and conduct trials with primates before human clinical trials can begin. There will also be a need to ensure that pig diseases do not cross to humans, and to establish whether a heart that will serve a pig for its 30-year life span will last longer in humans. 

Cloned Piglets..

The five cloned piglets - Noel, Angel, Star, Joy and Mary - have been genetically modified so humans will not reject their internal organs. This opens up the possibility of pig to human transplants, which may save the lives of many seriously ill people.

Are pig to human transplants necessary?

There are currently thousands of people in around world waiting for a transplant of a kidney, pancreas, heart, lungs, liver, or a combination of these organs. On average, adults have to wait more than one year for a new kidney. There is a clear demand. Efforts are being made to increase the donation of human organs - the supply is still not high enough, though some argue that pig to human transplants would be unnecessary if the taking of healthy organs from the dead was mandatory.

Would people accept pig organs?

There may be a degree of revulsion at killing an animal to save a human, but some could feel happier carrying the organ of a dead pig than a dead human. Pigs are already bred and killed for food, but some vegetarians and vegans might feel uneasy about making such use of an animal. People who follow Jewish and Muslim eating codes forbidding the consumption of pork may also have objections.

TTT

Tiger Temple, or Wat Pha Luang Ta Bua, is a Theravada Buddhist temple in Saiyok District, Kanchanaburi western Thailand. It was founded in 1994 as a forest temple and sanctuary for wild animals, among them several tigers, the majority of which are Indochinese tigers except Mek, who is a Bengal Tiger. It is possible that some may be the newly discovered Malayan Tigers, as well as cross breeds or hybrids.In 1999 the temple received the first tiger cub, one that had been found by villagers; it died soon after. Later, several tiger cubs were given to the temple. As of July 2014, the total number of tigers living at the temple has risen to 135. Tiger feeding times 1.30pm/ 2.15pm/ 3pm For 45 min. We will have a chance to play and exercise with Tiger cubs. From the ages 6 to 8 months.The monks give us toys for the cubs to chase and jump after.When we have tied them out we will get a chance to hand wash our Tiger.

The temple sanctuary is also home to several herds of deer as well as peacocks, hornbills, water buffalo, cows, goats, horses and boars.      

                                   

Thor Heyerdahl

During World War II, Heyerdahl served in the Free Norwegian military group as a parachutist. He served to cultural anthropology after the war, seeking to prove that people of Polynesia had ancestral ties to the ancient Peruvians. This theory went against all prevailing scientific thought at the time, which held that the islands were populated by people from South Asia.To prove his theory, Heyerdahl enlisted five friends to join him on an amazing journey. He built Kon-Tiki, a roughly 40-foot log raft out of balsa wood, similar to those used in ancient times. On April 28, 1947, Heyerdahl and his crew departed Callao, Peru. They spent 101 days at sea, eventually crashing onto the shore of an uninhabited atoll near Tahiti. During their dangerous voyage, Heyerdahl and his crew faced rough seas, sharks and even curious whales while covering approximately 4,300 miles.A skilled storyteller, Heyerdahl wrote about his experiences in the best-selling book Kon-Tiki. The work was a global hit and was translated into 65 languages. A documentary about the voyage also won an Academy Award in 1951. While hugely popular with the public, Heyerdahl found himself under fire from the scientific community for his journey. It was widely felt that Heyerdahl's aquatic adventure did little to substantiate his claims regarding the cultural ancestry of Polynesia.
Later Expeditions
In 1953, Heyerdahl led an archaeological expedition to the Galapagos Islands. There, he found pottery that linked the islands to early Ecuadorian and Peruvian Indian cultures. Two years later, Heyerdahl led one of the first scientific explorations of Easter Island, where he would discover evidence of possible South American ties. This trip became the basis for the 1958 bookThe Secret of Easter Island.
Returning to the sea, Heyerdahl tried to prove that the ancient Egyptians could have sailed to the Americas. He built the boat Ra—named after the Egyptian sun god—out of papyrus reed for his first attempt in 1969. While that effort failed, he managed to make it from Morocco to the Bahamas in Ra IIthe following year.
In the late 1980s, Heyerdahl focused his attention on the Tucume pyramid complex. He again tackled pyramid excavation in the 1990s on the Spanish island of Tenerife, in the Canary Islands. The step pyramids he uncovered now make up the Chacona Pyramid Ethnological Park there.

Long-nosed Chimaera

Rarely ever seen, the long-nosed chimaera is an oddity among oddities. All chimaeras are poorly understood, but the long-nose, with its whip-like tail and long snout, is especially so. The group branched off from sharks, its closest relative, around 400 million years ago and have remained a distinct, and distinctly odd, lineage ever since and have been basically unchanged since they shared the Earth with dinosaurs. Like sharks and rays, chimaeras have a skeleton made of cartilage. An extremely weird looking fish was snagged recently in the frigid artic waters off northern Canada and after some confused speculation about what it even is, researchers have identified it as the super rare long-nosed chimaera.The spooky, deep sea fish has a long nose, menacing mouth, and a venomous spine atop its gelatinous grey body and was caught near the northernmost province of Nunavut in Davis Straight.Researchers, who at first believed the odd fish was the similarly freakish goblin shark, say the long-nosed chimaera likely makes its home at depths not often visited by humans.‘Potentially, if we fish deeper, maybe between 1,000 and 2,000 metres (3,000 to 6,000 feet), we could find that's there's actually quite a lot of them there,’ University of Windsor researcher Nigel Hussey told CBC. ‘We just don’t know.’ 

‘Only one of these fish has previously been documented from the

Hudson Strait,’ Hussey said. Like all chimaeras, the long-nosed species is a distant relative of sharks and rays.The long-nosed chimaera has a whip-like tail and can grow to around three feet long.The chimaera is one of the world's oldest species of fish.It goes by various names including ratfish, rabbitfish, and ghostsharks.But they aren't sharks. Most species of chimaera live their lives in the dark, deep sea abyss. The enigmatic fish has its closest cousin in the shark, but the chimaera is much less common and for less studied.Most species of chimaera have a mildly venomous spine on their back. The long-nosed chimaera is no exception.Some species of chimaera are even eaten as food in some parts of the world.But the enigmatic fish is largely restricted to deep ocean waters, putting it out of reach to most fishermen and scientists.For these reasons, the strange creatures are poorly studied and understood.