Canal
Canals, or navigations, are human-made channels, or artificial waterways, for water conveyance, or to service water transport vehicles. In most cases, the engineered works will have a series of dams and locks that create reservoirs of low speed current flow; these reservoirs are referred to as slack water levels just called levels. A canal is known as a navigation when it parallels a river and shares part of its waters and drainage basin, leverages its resources by building dams and locks to increase and lengthen its stretches of slack water levels while staying in its valley. In contrast, a canal cuts across a drainage divide atop a ridge requiring an external water source above the highest elevation. Many canals have been built at elevations towering over valleys and other water ways crossing far below. Canals with sources of water at a higher level can deliver water to a destination such as a city where water is needed; the Roman Empire's aqueducts were such water supply canals. A navigation is a series of channels that run parallel to the valley and stream bed of an unimproved river.
A navigation always shares the drainage basin of the river. A vessel uses the calm parts of the river itself as well as improvements, traversing the same changes in height. A true canal is a channel that cuts across a drainage divide, making a navigable channel connecting two different drainage basins. Most commercially important canals of the first half of the 19th century were a little of each, using rivers in long stretches, divide crossing canals in others; this is true for many canals still in use. Both navigations and canals use engineered structures to improve navigation: weirs and dams to raise river water levels to usable depths. Since they cut across drainage divides, canals are more difficult to construct and need additional improvements, like viaducts and aqueducts to bridge waters over streams and roads, ways to keep water in the channel. There are two broad types of canal: Waterways: canals and navigations used for carrying vessels transporting goods and people; these can be subdivided into two kinds:Those connecting existing lakes, other canals or seas and oceans.
Those connected in a city network: such as the Canal Grande and others of Venice Italy. Aqueducts: water supply canals that are used for the conveyance and delivery of potable water for human consumption, municipal uses, hydro power canals and agriculture irrigation. Canals were of immense importance to commerce and the development and vitality of a civilization. In 1855 the Lehigh Canal carried over 1.2 million tons of anthracite coal. The few canals still in operation in our modern age are a fraction of the numbers that once fueled and enabled economic growth, indeed were a prerequisite to further urbanization and industrialization – for the movement of bulk raw materials such as coal and ores are difficult and marginally affordable without water transport; such raw materials fueled the industrial developments and new metallurgy resulting of the spiral of increasing mechanization during 17th–20th century, leading to new research disciplines, new industries and economies of scale, raising the standard of living for any industrialized society.
The surviving canals, including most ship canals, today service bulk cargo and large ship transportation industries, whereas the once critical smaller inland waterways conceived and engineered as boat and barge canals have been supplanted and filled in, abandoned and left to deteriorate, or kept in service and staffed by state employees, where dams and locks are maintained for flood control or pleasure boating. Their replacement was gradual, beginning first in the United States in the mid-1850s where canal shipping was first augmented by began being replaced by using much faster, less geographically constrained & limited, cheaper to maintain railways. By the early 1880s, canals which had little ability to economically compete with rail transport, were off the map. In the next couple of decades, coal was diminished as the heating fuel of choice by oil, growth of coal shipments leveled off. After World War I when motor-trucks came into their own, the last small U. S. barge canals saw a steady decline in cargo ton-miles alongside many railways, the flexibility and steep slope climbing capability of lorries taking over cargo hauling as road networks were improved, which had the freedom to make deliveries well away from rail lined road beds or ditches in the dirt which couldn't operate in the winter.
Canals are built in one of three ways, or a combination of the three, depending on available water and available path: Human made streamsA canal can be created where no stream presently exists. Either the body of the canal is dug or the sides of the canal are created by making dykes or levees by piling dirt, concrete or other building materials; the finished shape of the canal as seen in cross section is known as the canal prism. The water for the canal must be provided like streams or reservoirs. Where the new waterway must change elevation engineering works like locks, lifts or elevators are constructed to raise and lower vessels. Examples include canals that connect valleys over a higher body of land, like Canal du Midi, Canal de Briare and the Panama Canal. A canal can be constructed by dredging a channel in the bottom of an existing lake; when the channel is complete, the lake is drained and the channel becom
Carson Sink UFO incident
The Carson Sink Case is a UFO incident alleged by John L. McGinn and John R. Barton, two United States Air Force Colonels, to have taken place near Carson Sink in western Nevada in the United States while they were en route from California to Colorado in a B-25 on July 24, 1952. Both colonels worked at the Pentagon at the time with assignments that would have made them familiar with military aircraft of the era, both domestic and foreign; the aircraft were reported as being seen by hundreds of residents. On July 24, 1952, two Air Force colonels requisitioned a twin-engine B-25 bomber at Hamilton Field north of San Francisco for a flight to Colorado Springs, Colorado. At 3:40 P. M. Mountain Time, while flying at 11,000 feet with a speed of 180 knots over Carson Sink, the two pilots saw three unknown aircraft ahead of them and to their right. At first, the two thought the aircraft were F-86 jets but determined that the aircraft were flying too high for that to be the case. On top of this, the pilots reported the aircraft to be flying in a V-formation, abnormal for military aircraft at the time.
Within seconds, the aircraft had come close enough to the B-25 that the pilots could determine the unidentified aircraft to be bright silver, delta wing aircraft that were lacking tails and pilot's canopies. The colonels reported that the aircraft had a ridge that ran from nose to tail; the aircraft made a sharp left turn, passing within 800 yards of the B-25 before flying off in what the pilots estimated to be a speed, three-times the speed of an F-86, placing them out of sight within four seconds. Upon landing in Colorado Springs, the pilots reported the incident to Air Defense Command headquarters, who told them that no civilian or military aircraft had been anywhere near Carson Sink at the time they were passing over the area; the closest known delta wing aircraft were on the West Coast at the time. On top of this, the Navy aircraft were painted to be dark blue. Air Defense Command reported the incident to Project Blue Book. In his subsequent book, The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects, Edward Ruppelt characterized it as a "good UFO report with an unknown conclusion".
Both pilots continued to dismiss the idea. The investigation looked into balloons, both weather balloons and research balloons that can be up to 100 feet wide, but there were no known balloons in the area, either. Both of the pilots had friends. McGinn and Barton expressed skepticism of these reports previous to the incident, but upon being interviewed in Colorado Springs they reported they had changed their opinions. Northrop_YB-35 Carson Sink List of UFO sightings UFO
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Colorado Springs is a home rule municipality, the largest city by area in Colorado as well as the county seat and the most populous municipality of El Paso County, United States. Colorado Springs is located in the east central portion of the state, it is situated on Fountain Creek and is located 60 miles south of the Colorado State Capitol in Denver. At 6,035 feet the city stands over 1 mile above sea level, though some areas of the city are higher and lower. Colorado Springs is situated near the base of Pikes Peak, which rises 14,115 feet above sea level on the eastern edge of the Southern Rocky Mountains; the city is home to 24 national governing bodies of sport, including the United States Olympic Committee, the United States Olympic Training Center, USA Hockey. The city had an estimated population of 465,101 in 2016, a metro population of 712,000, ranking as the second most populous city in the state of Colorado, behind Denver, the 42nd most populous city in the United States; the Colorado Springs, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area had an estimated population of 712,327 in 2016.
The city is included in the Front Range Urban Corridor, an oblong region of urban population along the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado and Wyoming following the path of Interstate 25 in both states. The city covers 194.9 square miles. In 2018, Colorado Springs received several accolades: U. S. News named Colorado Springs the number one most desirable place to live in the United States, number two on their list of the 125 Best Places to Live in the USA; the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings found that Colorado Springs was the fastest growing city for Millennials. Thumbtack's annual Small Business Friendliness Survey found Colorado Springs to be the number four most business friendly city in the country; the Ute and Cheyenne peoples were the first recorded inhabiting the area which would become Colorado Springs. Part of the territory included in the United States' 1803 Louisiana Purchase, the current city area was designated part of the 1854 Kansas Territory. In 1859, after the first local settlement was established, it became part of the Jefferson Territory on October 24 and of El Paso County on November 28.
Colorado City at the Front Range confluence of Fountain and Camp creeks was "formally organized on August 13, 1859" during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush. It served as the capital of the Colorado Territory from November 5, 1861, until August 14, 1862, when the capital was moved to Denver. In 1871 the Colorado Springs Company laid out the towns of La Font and Fountain Colony and downstream of Colorado City. Within a year, Fountain Colony would be renamed "Colorado Springs", was incorporated; the El Paso County seat shifted from Colorado City in 1873 to the Town of Colorado Springs. On December 1, 1880, Colorado Springs expanded northward with two annexations; the second period of annexations was during 1889–90, included Seavey's Addition, West Colorado Springs, East End, another North End addition. In 1891 the Broadmoor Land Company built the Broadmoor suburb, which included the Broadmoor Casino, by December 12, 1895, the city had "four Mining Exchanges and 275 mining brokers." By 1898, the city was designated into quadrants by the north-south Cascade Avenue and the east-west Washington/Pike's Peak avenues.
From 1899 to 1901 Tesla Experimental Station operated on Knob Hill, aircraft flights to the Broadmoor's neighboring fields began in 1919. Alexander Airport north of the city opened in 1925, in 1927 the original Colorado Springs Municipal Airport land was purchased east of the city. In World War II the United States Army Air Forces leased land adjacent to the municipal airfield, naming it "Peterson Field" in December 1942; this was only one of several military presences around Colorado Springs during the war. In November 1950, Ent Air Force Base was selected as the Cold War headquarters for Air Defense Command; the former WWII Army Air Base, Peterson Field, inactivated at the end of the war, was re-opened in 1951 as a U. S. Air Force base; the 1950s through 1970s saw a continued expansion of the military presence in the area, with the establishment of NORAD's headquarters in the city, as well as the ADCOM headquarters. Between 1965 and 1968, the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, Pikes Peak Community College and Colorado Technical University were established in or near the city.
In 1977 most of the former Ent AFB became a US Olympic training center. The Libertarian Party was founded within the city in the 1970s. On October 1, 1981, the Broadmoor Addition, Cheyenne Canon, Ivywild and Stratton Meadows were annexed after the Colorado Supreme Court "overturned a district court decision that voided the annexation". Further annexations expanding the city include the Nielson Addition and Vineyard Commerce Park Annexation in September 2008; the city lies in a high desert with the Southern Rocky Mountains to the west, the Palmer Divide to the north, high plains further east, high desert lands to the south when leaving Fountain and approaching Pueblo. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 194.6 square miles, of which 194.6 square miles is land and 0.35 square miles, or 0.19%, is water. Colorado Springs has many features of a modern urban area, such as parks, bike trails, urban open-area spaces. However, it is not exempt from problems that plague cities that experience tremendous growth, such as overcrowded roads and highways, crime and government budget issues.
Many of the problems are indirec
Pony Express
The Pony Express was a mail service delivering messages and mail using relays of horse mounted riders that operated from April 3, 1860 to October 1861 between Missouri and California in the United States of America. Operated by Central Overland California and Pike's Peak Express Company, the Pony Express was a great financial investment to the U. S. During its 18 months of operation, it reduced the time for messages to travel between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to about 10 days, it became the West's most direct means of east–west communication before the transcontinental telegraph was established, was vital for tying the new U. S. state of California with the rest of the United States. The Pony Express demonstrated that a unified transcontinental system of communications could be established and operated year-round; when replaced by the telegraph, the Pony Express became romanticized and became part of the lore of the American West. Its reliance on the ability and endurance of individual young, hardy riders and fast horses was seen as evidence of rugged American individualism of the Frontier times.
The idea of a fast mail route to the Pacific coast was prompted by California's newfound prominence and its growing population. After gold was discovered there in 1848, thousands of prospectors and businessmen made their way to California, at that time a new territory of the U. S. By 1850, California entered the Union as a free state. By 1860, the population had grown to 380,000; the demand for a faster way to get mail and other communications to and from this westernmost state became greater as the American Civil War approached. In the late 1850s, William Russell, Alexander Majors, William Waddell were the three founders of the Pony Express, they were in the freighting and drayage business. At the peak of the operations, they employed 6,000 men, owned 75,000 oxen, thousands of wagons, warehouses plus a sawmill, a meatpacking plant, a bank and an insurance company. Russell was a prominent businessman, well respected among the community. Waddell was co-owner of the firm Waddell & Co.. After Morehead was bought out and retired, Waddell merged his company with Russell's, changing the name to Waddell & Russell.
In 1855 they took on a new partner, Alexander Majors, founded the company of Russell, Majors & Waddell. They held government contracts for delivering army supplies to the western frontier, Russell had a similar idea for contracts with the U. S. Government for fast mail delivery. By utilizing a short route and using mounted riders rather than traditional stagecoaches, they proposed to establish a fast mail service between St. Joseph and Sacramento, with letters delivered in 10 days, a duration many said was impossible; the initial price was set at $5 per 1⁄2 ounce $2.50, by July 1861 to $1. The founders of the Pony Express hoped to win an exclusive government mail contract, but that did not come about. Russell and Waddell organized and put together the Pony Express in two months in the winter of 1860; the undertaking assembled 120 riders, 184 stations, 400 horses, several hundred personnel during January and February 1861. Majors was a religious man and resolved "by the help of God" to overcome all difficulties.
He presented each rider with a special edition Bible and required this oath, which they were required to sign. I... do hereby swear, before the Great and Living God, that during my engagement, while I am an employee of Russell and Waddell, I will, under no circumstances, use profane language, that I will drink no intoxicating liquors, that I will not quarrel or fight with any other employee of the firm, that in every respect I will conduct myself be faithful to my duties, so direct all my acts as to win the confidence of my employers, so help me God." In 1860, there were about 186 Pony Express stations that were about 10 miles apart along the Pony Express route. At each station stop the express rider would change to a fresh horse, taking only the mail pouch called a mochila with him; the employers stressed the importance of the pouch. They said that, if it came to be, the horse and rider should perish before the mochila did; the mochila was held in place by the weight of the rider sitting on it.
Each corner had pocket. Bundles of mail were placed in these cantinas; the mochila could hold 20 pounds of mail along with the 20 pounds of material carried on the horse. Everything except one revolver and a water sack was removed, allowing for a total of 165 pounds on the horse's back. Riders, who could not weigh over 125 pounds, changed about every 75–100 miles, rode day and night. In emergencies, a given rider might ride two stages back to back, over 20 hours on a moving horse, it is unknown if riders tried crossing the Sierra Nevada in winter, but they crossed central Nevada. By 1860 there was a telegraph station in Nevada Territory; the riders received $100 a month as pay. A comparable wage for unskilled labor at the time was about $0.43–$1 per day. Alexander Majors, one of the founders of the Pony Express, had acquired more than 400 horses for the project, he selected horses from around the west, paying an average of $200. These averaged 900 pounds each; the 1,900-mile-long route followed the Oregon and California Trails to Fort Bridger in Wyoming, the Mormon Trail (known as the
Naval Air Station Fallon
Naval Air Station Fallon or NAS Fallon is the United States Navy's premier air-to-air and air-to-ground training facility. It is located southeast of the city of Fallon in western Nevada. Since 1996, it has been home to the Naval Fighter Weapons School taking over from the former NAS Miramar and the surrounding area contains 240,000 acres of bombing and electronic warfare ranges, it is home to the Naval Aviation Warfighting Development Center, which includes TOPGUN, the Carrier Airborne Early Warning Weapons School and the Navy Rotary Wing Weapons School. Navy SEAL Combat Search and Rescue training takes place there; the airfield is named Van Voorhis Field in honor of Commander Bruce Van Voorhis, awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor. The airfield at NAS Fallon was built in 1942 as part of a defensive network to repel a feared Japanese invasion of the west coast, it was soon taken over by the Navy for training use and has been used as such since with the exception of the period of 1946 to 1951, during which it was used by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
During the years prior to 1972, the base was known as Naval Auxiliary Air Station and was used during the Vietnam War by various squadrons that rotated through the base before deploying to carriers headed for Vietnam. During these same years prior to 1972, many ground troops were temporarily assigned to NAAS Fallon for their hot weather training and cold weather training. On 1 January 1972, the Navy recognized NAS Fallon's importance to naval aviation by upgrading the base from auxiliary air station status to a major aviation command as a full-fledged naval air station. While NAS Fallon provides training for visiting Carrier Air Wings, Strike Fighter Squadron 127, the "Desert Bogeys", was the air station's only permanently based squadron from October 1987 until it was disestablished on 23 March 1996; the Navy relocated its Navy Fighter Weapons School, or TOPGUN, from NAS Miramar to NAS Fallon in 1996, following the transfer of NAS Miramar to the Marine Corps and its redesignation as MCAS Miramar.
This move resulted in the construction of a new ramp and academic buildings. The new command, the Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center, was established on 11 July 1996 and was a unification of TOPGUN, Strike University, the Naval Strike Warfare Center, TOPDOME, the Carrier Airborne Early Warning Weapons School. In addition to transferring the NSAWC squadron, a Navy Reserve adversary squadron, Fighter Squadron Composite THIRTEEN, the "Saints," was permanently relocated from its former base at NAS Miramar to NAS Fallon; as a result, VFC-13 replaced the disestablished VFA-127 in the fighter adversary role. Associated bombing ranges checker the surrounding Lahontan Valley and Dixie Valley, the next valley to the east. Dixie Valley contains a simulated air defense network, including 20 operational radar installations. Many demilitarized armored vehicles, including some exotics, have been scattered throughout the area for ambiance. Most of this area is publicly accessible, with the exception of areas surrounding the radar installations.
The entire training area surrounding NAS Fallon is known as the Fallon Range Training Complex. Between 1956 and 1975, the United States Air Force Air Defense Command operated a General Surveillance Radar station at NAS Fallon; the Air Force area was named Fallon Air Force Station and designated ADC site SM-156. The 858th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron moved to Fallon AFS from Hamilton Air Force Base, California in the south central section of NAS Fallon in 1956, it activated AN/MPS-7 search and AN/MPS-14 height-finder radar sets, the station functioned as a Ground Control Intercept and warning station. As a GCI station, the squadron's role was to guide interceptor aircraft toward unidentified intruders picked up on the unit's radar scopes. An AN/FPS-3 search set saw service in 1959. During 1962 Fallon AFS joined the Semi Automatic Ground Environment system feeding data to DC-16 at Stead AFB, Nevada. After joining, the squadron was redesignated as the 858th Radar Squadron on 1 December 1962.
The radar squadron provided information 24/7 the SAGE Direction Center where it was analyzed to determine range, direction altitude speed and whether or not aircraft were friendly or hostile. In this time frame, the radar site was relocated from the original location in the south central part of the Naval Air Station grounds to the far southwest corner. At the new SAGE radar site, the squadron used an AN/FPS-35 search radar that replaced the AN/MPS-7 set in 1963. In 1964 an AN/FPS-6 height-finder radar was added. In addition to the main facility at NAS Fallon, the squadron operated a remote AN/FPS-14 Gap Filler site: Gabbs, NV: 38°46′28″N 118°01′17″WAround 1965, Fallon became an FAA/ADC joint-use facility; the AN/MPS-14 radar was retired in 1969. In the early 1970s, the AN/FPS-35 was replaced with an AN/FPS-66A. Over the years, the equipment at the station was upgraded or modified to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the information gathered by the radars; the 858th Radar Sq was inactivated and replaced by the 858th Air Defense Group in March 1970.
The upgrade to group status was done because of Fallon AFS' status as a Backup Interceptor Control master control center site. BUIC sites were alternate control sites in the event that SAGE Direction Centers became disabled and unable to control interceptor aircraft; the group was inactivated and replaced by the 85
Topog Peak
Topog Peak is a mountain in the West Humboldt Range of Churchill County, in Nevada, United States
Nevada Department of Transportation
The Nevada Department of Transportation is a government agency in the U. S. state of Nevada. NDOT is responsible for maintaining and improving Nevada's highway system, which includes U. S. highways and Interstate highways within the state's boundaries. The department is notable for its aggressively proactive approach to highway maintenance. Nevada state roads and bridges have been named some of the nation's best; the state of Nevada is facing a multibillion-dollar transportation funding deficit, NDOT is developing potential transportation funding sources through the Pioneer Program and Vehicle Miles Traveled Fee Study. For those driving in Nevada, NDOT offers updated road conditions and construction reports through the 511 Nevada Travel Info system. NDOT headquarters is located on Stewart Street in Nevada. List of Nevada state highways Official website Nevada Department of Transportation - Road Conditions
