Celtics

Jayson Tatum was among the many elite when he surpassed 13,000 profession points on Saturday night.

Only seven players in NBA history have reached this milestone before he turns 27. LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Wilt Chamberlain, Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, Tracy McGrady and now Tatum.

The Celtics superstar continues to construct on his already impressive resume at a young age and doesn't turn 27 until March.

Tatum reached the milestone with a three-pointer within the second quarter of Boston's win over the Dallas Mavericks. He finished the sport with a team-high 24 points together with six rebounds and three assists.

Slightly over a yr ago, Tatum became the 15. Player to achieve 10,000 points before he turned 26. This implies that not only did he rating 3,000 points in only over 14 months, but he also stood out from another names along the way in which.

At 26 years old, Tatum has already built a near Hall of Fame-worthy resume. He is a world champion, two-time Olympic gold medalist, six-time All-Star and four-time All-NBA selection.

And with Tatum's current pace and entering the league at a young age, it's possible for the Celtic to complete his profession as a top-10 scorer in NBA history. Of the sport current top 10 scorersFive are names that also reached 13,000 points before the age of 27. McGrady is the one player who did not compete to complete in the highest 10 in scoring.

At Tatum's current pace, he could overtake Anthony (28,289 points) in eight seasons or less. At this point in his profession, he would only be 34 years old and 35 years old, and there would still be loads of room for improvement on the all-time list.

For all the eye Tatum receives on social media, each positive and negative, he’s well on his technique to becoming certainly one of the NBA's all-time greats.

Hurricane Milton struck hardly hurricane strength to a dangerous category 5 storm in lower than 24 hours across the Gulf of Mexico towards Florida.

As wind speeds increased, Milton became one in all the fastest intensifying storms ever. And with 180 mph sustained wind On October 7, 2024, it also became one in all the strongest storms of the yr with very low pressure.

Less than two weeks later The devastating effects of Hurricane HeleneThe final thing Florida desired to see was a storm like that. Hurricane Milton was expected to make landfall as a serious hurricane late on October ninth or early October tenth, and has already done so triggered widespread evacuations.

So what exactly is rapid intensification and what does global climate change must do with it? We Research into hurricane behavior And Teach meteorology. Here's what you have to know:

What is rapid intensification?

The National Weather Service defines rapid intensification as a rise in a tropical cyclone's maximum sustained wind speed no less than 30 knots – about 35 miles per hour inside 24 hours. This increase could also be enough to escalate a storm from Category 1 to Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale.

Milton's wind speed went from 80 miles per hour To 175 miles per hour from 1 p.m. Sunday to 1 p.m. Monday, and the pressure dropped from 988 millibars to 911.

The National Hurricane Center had warned that Milton was prone to become a serious hurricane, but such rapid intensification can take people by surprise, especially if it occurs near landfall.

Hurricane Michael did Damage within the billions in 2018, when it quickly strengthened right into a Category 5 storm just before it hit near Tyndall Air Force Base within the Florida Panhandle. In 2023 Hurricane Otis' Maximum wind speeds increased by 100 miles per hour in lower than 24 hours before hitting Acapulco, Mexico. Hurricane Ian The storm continued to strengthen rapidly in 2022 before arriving just south of where Milton is anticipated to cross Florida.

What causes hurricanes to accentuate quickly?

Rapid intensification is difficult to predict, but there are some driving forces.

• Ocean heat: Warm sea surface temperaturesespecially as they penetrate deeper layers of warm water, provide the energy needed for hurricanes to accentuate. The deeper the nice and cozy water, the more energy a storm can harness and the stronger it’s.

• Low wind shear: Strong vertical wind shear—a rapid change in wind speed or direction with altitude—can disrupt a storm's organization, while low wind shear causes hurricanes to grow more quickly. In the case of Milton, atmospheric conditions were particularly conducive to rapid intensification.

• Moisture: Higher sea surface temperatures and lower salinity increase the quantity of moisture available to storms, resulting in rapid intensification. Warmer water provides the warmth needed for moisture to evaporate, while lower salinity helps retain that heat near the surface. This allows for more sustained transfer of warmth and moisture to the storm. faster driving and greater intensification.

• Thunderstorm activity: Internal dynamics, similar to B. Outbreaks of intense thunderstorms throughout the rotation of a cyclone Reorganize the circulation of a cyclone and result in rapid strength gains, even when other conditions aren’t ideal.

Research has shown that almost all hurricanes worldwide are Category 3 and above are likely to experience rapid intensification over the course of their lives.

How does global warming affect the strength of hurricanes?

If it looks like you've been hearing about rapid intensification lots more lately, that's partly why it happens more often.

A 2023 study examined Relationships between rapid intensification and climate change found a rise within the variety of tropical cyclones with rapid intensification over the past 4 a long time. This includes a big increase within the variety of hurricanes, which rapidly intensify several times as they develop. Another evaluation comparing trends from 1982 to 2017 with climate model simulations found this Natural variability alone can’t be explained This increase in rapidly intensifying storms suggests a probable role of human-caused climate change.

How future climate change will affect hurricanes is an energetic area of ​​research. However, as global temperatures and oceans proceed to warm, The frequency of severe hurricanes is anticipated to extend. The extreme hurricanes of recent years, including Beryl in June 2024 and Helene, are already raising concerns in regards to the increasing impact of warming on the behavior of tropical cyclones.

How it works

Over the counter

To protect themselves from stepping into a deal that would harm them, home buyers are advised to incorporate contingencies in a suggestion in order that they can back out of a deal or renegotiate the value if recent problems emerge during an inspection or appraisal.

But what if a buyer can’t find insurance?

This summer, the California Association of Realtors began adding recent language to its standard purchase agreement forms, utilized in most home sales across the state, to permit a buyer to back out of a deal in the event that they can't find a reasonable insurance policy.

This recent standard case reflects the cruel reality for many homebuyers: Insurance is becoming increasingly difficult in California as major insurers leave the state. Both Allstate and State Farm stopped writing recent insurance policies in California this yr, citing rising construction costs and what they are saying are overly burdensome regulations from the California Department of Insurance.

Realtors say that even before the California Association of Realtors adopted the insurance contingency standard, they were advising their buyers to incorporate it of their listings or to research the policies upfront.

“This is the first year I have advised my buyers to think about purchasing insurance before they even write an offer,” said Cara Gamble, an agent with The Agency in Danville. “They need to make sure they’re happy with that payment.”

Gamble has worked with buyers who decided not to put in writing a suggestion on a house they were enthusiastic about after realizing how expensive their annual insurance payments can be.

In the affluent town of Woodside, up within the hills above Silicon Valley, agent Scott Hayes said he has noticed less traffic to homes within the last yr as buyers realize the one insurance plan they will get is California's FAIR plan – the state's insurer of last resort.

“If you want to buy here, there’s just no other option,” Hayes said. As insurance firms refuse to renew hundreds of policies for Californians living near wildfire hotspots, the variety of policyholders within the FAIR plan has increased from 126,709 to over 350,000 today.

“Insurance is actually impacting people’s interest because it’s such a big, unknown cost right now,” Hayes said. “People may think there’s no way to get insurance, so they don’t want to look for a home.”

Hayes hasn't yet worked with buyers who’ve backed out of a contract as a result of insurance, but normally that's because he's prepared them with expectations in regards to the FAIR plan price: For a $2 million home in Woodside, Hayes estimates annual payments will probably be between $15,000 and $20,000.

According to the insurance conditions contained within the CAR forms, a buyer who doesn’t find “acceptable” insurance inside 17 days can cancel the contract without forfeiting any money they’ve earned – typically a deposit of around 2% of the entire purchase price.

In the Bay Area, buyers are sometimes pressured to waive most contingencies with the intention to make their offer more competitive. But some agents say they haven't seen the identical thing with insurance accidents.

“I really don’t see anyone giving it up,” said Melody Johnson, an agent at The Agency in Danville.

To prevent a sale from being held up in escrow, brokers advise buyers to start out researching insurance options as early as possible.

In Johnson's office, agents keep a running list of insurance firms still willing to put in writing recent home insurance policies.

“They’re not the big insurance companies anymore,” Johnson said. “There are a few smaller ones with funny-sounding names.”

Originally published: October 4, 2024 at 3:43 p.m

A two-week standoff between Columbia University administration and student protesters who advocated for the varsity to divest from firms that work in or support Israel culminated on April 30, 2024, One day after a bunch of scholars occupied a campus constructing, Hamilton Hall.

New York police arrested 109 protesters in Columbia and 173 other demonstrators City College, in uptown Manhattan, on April 30.

US politics and society editor Amy Lieberman spoke to The Conversation John J. Sloan IIIan authority on crime and policing on college campuses on the University of Alabama at Birmingham to raised understand different roles of police on college and college campuses.

How do universities differ of their cooperation with the police?

The first documented appearance of a sworn police officer Patrolling a university campus took place at Yale University in 1894.

In general, there are two approaches to policing on college or university campuses. University leaders initially asked local police to answer problems with anti-war demonstrators in the course of the Vietnam War and girls's rights protests within the Nineteen Sixties. If a lot of these encounters didn't go particularly well for anyone, campus police departments were created. Today, about two-thirds of universities and colleges – mainly public, corresponding to the University of California, Los Angeles – are have their very own campus police departments. There isn’t any difference between these campus law enforcement officials and their city counterparts by way of training or legal authority.

Another third of faculties and universities ultimately decided to rent their very own private security guards as a substitute – not law enforcement officials. Columbia and other Ivy League schools, in addition to other private institutions corresponding to Johns Hopkins University, are on this group. More and more of it Guards are armed.

One reason why different options were chosen was that The legal features of creating a police department at a personal school are more complex than those for establishing police departments at public universities. Aside from these logistics, there have been also image concerns about whether schools really wanted armed, uniformed law enforcement officials on their campuses.

Does this difference between police and personal security have any practical significance?

Colleges and universities which have their very own police departments often have a memorandum of understanding or mutual aid agreement that formalizes the connection between campus and city police. Both groups often train together to raised coordinate their response to, for instance, a mass shooting on campus. It is probably going that within the post-George Floyd era, mutual training included responding to campus protests.

At schools without campus police, security staff may lack comprehensive training in coping with demonstrations. This can result in a spiral in a short time. I could imagine this because the president of Colombia has recently called for the NYPD to be called in This is because of a mix of things – including that non-public security personnel may not have been fully trained and equipped to cope with the situation, in addition to the perceived urgency of the situation of scholars taking up a university constructing.

What else is notable about how different schools have responded to those protests?

The reactions of universities and the police to the protests look like very different. On the one hand is the situation in Columbia, where there have been literally NYPD officers Use of drones and other forms of military tactics to retake the constructing that the scholars first occupied on April 29.

At the University of Wisconsin, Madison – which has its own campus police force – it was also the university president decided to get the Madison police involved, perhaps for other reasons. This raises the query of how the university management desires to cope with these protests. Do you need to wait out the demonstrators? And in the event that they don't wish to wait, how quickly do they need the campus cleared?

I fully understand the necessity to ensure campus safety. But once you invite local or state law enforcement officials onto campus to answer protests, you might be handing them control of the situation and counting on them to have the training and preparation needed to intervene and never create further problems. What I even have seen up to now, not less than, is that those that have brought in outside law enforcement agencies are having to reply questions on the usage of force against protesters.

What to know in regards to the police's tactical response to the protests?

New York Mayor Eric Adams spoke at a press conference and explained this NYPD procedure for entry and the evacuation of the Columbia campus jogged my memory of military tactics. He talked about how the NYPD flew drones to search out higher access points to the constructing and where students were staying. He discussed encrypting police radio frequencies so nobody could intercept them. The clothes the police wore and the photographs of so many officers marching down the road jogged my memory of a military.

Adams said nobody was injured at Columbia, but there are reports that three students were injured We are hurtand possibly some law enforcement officials. There were those too Reports from law enforcement officials was injured on the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

In other places, like UCLA, There was also a heavy outside police presence on campus Reports from law enforcement officials Use of pepper spray and tear gas against demonstrators there and elsewhere Places like Florida. And on the University of Texas at Austin this week, officials called in state troopers to arrest protesters. Police use pepper spray Other aggressive tactics were also reported there.

Part of this phenomenon has to do with the extent to which police nationwide have gotten increasingly militarized as standard operating procedure. The Ohio State University bought a surplus military armored personnel carrier for instance for his police team in 2013.

In the post-9/11 era, law enforcement concerns were initially focused on terrorism; Now it's about mass shooters. In response, many police departments, including colleges and universities, are routinely deploying military-grade surveillance, communications, equipment, and training to the extent possible It looks like you might have the military in your campus.

U.S. health officials are closely monitoring the recent surge in avian influenza from birds to cattle — and earlier this month to a dairy farmer in Texas.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Stresses that the present public health risk is low – the virus isn’t known to spread amongst humans or through the food supply, is never transmitted through contact with infected animals and where human infections have occurred, they are sometimes mild and manageable.

But the jump to cattle by the H5N1 strain of influenza, which is widespread amongst wild birds and an everyday threat to domestic poultry, was unexpected and a worrying development since the more the virus spreads, the greater the possibility it is going to mutate. The COVID-19 pandemic was a transparent example of the danger of “spillover” when pathogens pass from animals to humans.

Humans have frequent contact with cattle, creating the chance for more contact. Experts suspect that transmission is feasible amongst animals in a herd or through contaminated milking equipment.

California, the country's top milk producer, is working on the main points of a testing program that each one arriving animals must comply with a brand new federal requirementbased on the California Department of Food and Agriculture.

Concerned dairy farmers are taking biosecurity measures to assist protect their herds, at the same time as testing of the state's animals stays voluntary.

Some farmers are covering their water supplies with tarps to discourage migratory birds and are requiring hygiene measures equivalent to disinfecting tools and boots for people traveling from ranch to ranch, equivalent to hoof trimmers. based on Anja RaudabaughCEO of Western United Dairies in Turlock.

However, there isn’t a state or federal requirement to frequently test cows or milk. Clinical signs of flu occur in just a fraction of cases, leading some experts to fret that the virus could also be hiding in untested animals.

Bird flu was once only a bird problem. But it has now been detected in 33 dairy herds in eight states. It doesn't kill the cows, but it surely causes a dramatic drop in milk production.

While California stays off the list of infected states, “it's a very dynamic situation that can change from day to day,” he said Dr. Terry W. LehenbauerDirector of the Veterinary Medicine Teaching and Research Center on the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine in Tulare.

“Wild birds have introduced avian influenza into cattle in the Midwest; it could also happen in California,” According to Dr. Michael Payne, Director of the California Dairy Quality Assurance Program.

There are two key clues that the outbreak is larger and commenced sooner than experts thought.

A clue was present in the milk supply. This week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration discovered fragments of the inactivated H5N1 bird flu virus in milk purchased in stores across the country. Because milk is pasteurized, it’s protected – but that is evidence that infected cows aren’t being counted.

The other was detected within the genome. A brand new genetic evaluation shows that the virus jumped from birds to dairy cows in mid-December – probably as an isolated case. This is going on sooner than previously thought and suggests it has turn into more widespread. According to evolutionary biologist Michael Worobey of the University of Arizona.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, that is the worst bird flu outbreak in U.S. history. The virus has also been detected in other mammals, equivalent to elephant seals and sea lions in South America, where it is rather deadly.

Pigs routinely tested for flu are still negative. This is reassuring because pigs have each bird and human cell receptors that act as “mixing vessels” for flu viruses.

The latest federal regulation requiring all lactating cows to be tested before moving to other states will aid disease investigation. Labs and veterinarians that find the virus or antibodies to it must report it to the USDA.

California ships numerous dairy cows out and in of the state, Lehenbauer said. Most cows coming to California are heifers that don't yet produce milk. The cattle leaving the state are typically steers headed to feedlots for beef production.

To prevent infection of the state's 1.72 million animals, California requires that cattle coming from a state where there are infected herds be inspected and given a clean bill of health. Cattle aren’t allowed entry in the event that they come from a suspicious herd.

“Our heightened approach at our border crossings and quarantining cattle from affected areas have really helped prevent further spread of this virus.” Raudabaugh said.

And regulations which are too restrictive could disrupt the critical supply chain that supplies the country's milk, Lehenbauer said.

“Given our current situation, I think the procedures and policies we have in place are appropriate and appropriate. … We don’t want to unduly restrict our animal production systems,” Lehenbauer said. “I am very confident that our milk and dairy product supply is very safe and healthy.”

However, this approach has drawn criticism from some experts who consider the shortage of testing on healthy animals is short-sighted.

“This is not good, guys,” said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institution in San Diego. on twitter. “I am not (yet) concerned about transmission of H5N1 to humans, but … the lack of testing of asymptomatic cattle” and other issues “impacts confidence.”

An important NASA mission within the search for all times beyond Earth. Mars sample return, is in trouble. It is The budget exploded from $5 billion to over $11 billion, and the sample return date could shift from the top of this decade to 2040.

The mission could be the primary to try and bring rock samples from Mars back to Earth in order that scientists can examine them for signs of past life.

said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson during a press conference on April 15, 2024, that the mission in its current form was too expensive and too slow. NASA gave private firms a month to submit proposals for a faster, less expensive option to return the samples.

As astronomer who studies cosmology and wrote a book about it early missions to MarsI checked out the sample return saga. Mars is the closest and best place to look for all times beyond Earth, and if this ambitious NASA mission fails, scientists would lose their likelihood to learn rather more in regards to the Red Planet.

The habitability of Mars

The first NASA missions When he reached the surface of Mars in 1976, it was revealed that the planet was an ice-cold desert, uninhabitable and not using a thick atmosphere to guard life from the sun's ultraviolet radiation. But studies conducted during the last decade suggest the planet can have been it much warmer and wetter several billion years ago.

The curiosity And Endurance Rovers have each shown that the planet's early environment was suitable for microbial life.

They found the chemical constructing blocks of life and signs of surface water within the distant past. Curiosity, which landed on Mars in 2012, remains to be energetic; Its twin Perseverance, which landed on Mars in 2021, will play a vital role within the sample return mission.

Why Astronomers Want Mars Samples

NASA looked for life in a Martian rock for the primary time in 1996. Scientists claimed they found microscopic fossils of bacteria inside Martian meteorite ALH84001. This meteorite is a bit of Mars that landed in Antarctica 13,000 years ago and was recovered in 1984. Scientists disagreed about whether the meteorite had ever actually harbored biology, and Today most scientists agree that there isn’t enough evidence that the rock accommodates fossils.

Several hundred Martian meteorites have been found on Earth within the last 40 years. These are free samples that fell to Earth. Although it could appear intuitive to review them, scientists cannot say where on Mars these meteorites formed. They were also thrown off the planet's surface by impacts, and these violent events could easily have destroyed or altered subtle evidence of life within the rocks.

There is not any substitute for it Bring samples back from a region that was previously considered livable. As a result, the agency faces a price tag of $700 million per ounce, making these samples the most costly material ever collected.

A charming and complicated mission

Bringing Martian rocks back to Earth is probably the most ambitious mission NASA has ever undertaken, and the primary phase has already begun.

Endurance has accrued over two dozen rock and soil samplesand deposited them on the ground of Jezero Crater, a region that was likely once flooded with water and will have harbored life. The rover puts the samples into containers the dimensions of test tubes. Once the rover has filled all of the sample tubes, it can collect them and convey them to the situation where NASA is situated Sample return landing device will land. The Sample Retrieval Lander features a rocket to deliver the samples into orbit around Mars.

The European Space Agency has developed one Earth return orbiter, which can rendezvous with the rocket in orbit and capture the basketball-sized sample container. The samples are then robotically sealed in a biocontainment system and transferred to an Earth entry capsule that is a component of the Earth Return Orbiter. After the long journey home, the entry capsule will parachute to the Earth's surface.

The complex choreography of this mission, involving a rover, a lander, a rocket, an orbiter and the coordination of two space agencies, is unprecedented. It is the explanation for the exploding budget and the long schedule.

The sample return breaks the bank

Mars Sample Return has burned a hole in NASA's budget, threatening other missions that need funding.

The NASA center behind the mission, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, just laid off over 500 employees. It is probably going that Mars Sample Return's budget was partly accountable for the layoffs, but they were also resulting from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory having an overloaded roster of planetary missions and suffering Budget cuts.

Within the past 12 months a… independent review board report and a report from the NASA Office of Inspector General behaved deep worries in regards to the feasibility of the sample return mission. These reports described the mission's design as overly complex and pointed to problems comparable to inflation, supply chain problems, and unrealistic cost and schedule estimates.

So is NASA I feel the warmth of Congress. For fiscal 12 months 2024, the Senate Budget Committee has cut NASA's planetary science budget by over half a billion dollars. If NASA can't keep costs under control, the mission could even be canceled.

Think outside the box

Given these challenges NASA has issued an appeal for revolutionary designs from the private sector, with the aim of reducing the fee and complexity of the mission. Proposals have to be submitted by May 17, an especially tight timeline for such an ambitious design effort. And it can be difficult for personal firms to enhance on the plan that experts on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory spent greater than a decade developing.

An vital potential actor in this case is the commercial space company SpaceX. NASA is already working with SpaceX on America's return to the moon. For the Artemis III missionSpaceX will try and land humans on the moon for the primary time in greater than 50 years.

However, the enormous Starship rocket that SpaceX will use for Artemis had few three test flights and rather more development is required before NASA can entrust it with a human cargo.

Basically a Spaceship rocket could bring back a big load of Martian rocks in a single two-year mission and at a much lower cost. But Starship comes with great things Risks and uncertainties. It's not clear whether this rocket could bring back the samples that Perseverance has already collected.

Starship uses a Launchpad, and it will need to be refueled for the return journey. But there is no such thing as a launch pad or gas station at Jezero Crater. Starship is designed to move people, but when astronauts are going to Mars to gather samples, SpaceX will need a Starship rocket even larger than those it has tested to this point.

Sending astronauts also carries additional risks and costs, and a technique to deploy humans could find yourself being more complicated than NASA's current plan.

Given all of those pressures and limitations, NASA decided to see if the private sector could discover a successful solution. We'll discover the reply next month.