Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico

There was recently a oil spill on an off shore oil rig that has made headlines recently. There has been a huge effort to stop the oil from reaching the shore and hurting the local ecosystem.

Some of the ways they have use to stop oil are burning it, using floating dams to stop the oil, and others. The floating dams, or booms, suck up the oil off the surface of the ocean but there is a problem with this method, there are not enough booms. Burning presents obvious environmental problems but is effective in getting rid of the slick. underwater domes that catch the oil coming from the pipes then bring the oil to waiting ships work well but they take time to construct and they have never been used as deep at needed for this spill. Detergents could be dispersed into the water but there might be too much oil for this too work. All of this could have been prevented with a blowoff-preventer, this rig had one but it malfunctioned.

Crazy pictures from space.

The picture above was taken by NASA's new Solar Dynamics Observatory. It is the most detailed image of the sun ever. There is also a video, for more information go to http://gizmodo.com/5521608/the-deadliest-place-in-the-solar-system-is-beautiful.




This picture was taken by the Mars rover "spirit" from the surface of mars. It is actually a mixture of multiple images.

The Masters

The Masters is one of the oldest golf tournaments in the United States. It first started in 1934, Bobby Jones and Clifford Roberts decided to hold an annual golf tournament. For the first five years it was called "The Augusta National Invitation Tournament", because "The Masters" was thought to be too presumptuous. The traditional green jacket that is given to the winner started in 1949, when it first started the green jackets were worn by all the golfers so that the fans could easily spot them while they were playing. The jacket then became a symbol of the winner becoming a member of the prestigious club.



This year was the 74th Masters tournament, the winner was Phil Mickelson with a score of sixteen under. Lee Westwood came in second at thirteen under followed by Anthony Kim at twelve under. Tiger Woods made an appearance but came in at fourth tied with K.J. Choi at eleven under.

What is the iPad?

Apple's new tablet, called the iPad, was expected to be a big new product and was going to revolutionize the industry. The iPad is a "tablet computer" which means that it is a computer that is only a touch screen. It has a 10 inch touch screen, wifi, bluetooth, speakers, a microphone, and an iPod connector. It also can connect to the Internet through a data package with a cell phone carrier. It is not being sold yet but there are a few iPads that have been put on display for people to use temporarily. There have been a couple of tablets that have come out recently but this one has had the most publicity because it is from Apple.

NBA All Star Game

The All Star game was held in Arlington, Texas at the Cowboys stadium. There was a record number of spectators at the game with 108,713 people attending. LeBron James, David Lee, Dwyane Wade, Kevin Garnett and Dwight Howard started for the east and Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, Carmelo Anthony, Tim Duncan and Amar’e Stoudemire started for the west. Chris Paul, Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, and Brandon Roy were supposed to play but couldn't because of injuries and personal reasons. The Eastern All-Stars won the game 141-139 and Dwyane Wade was the MVP. Dwyane Wade had 28 points, 11 assists, and 5 steals. Some of the bigger highlights were Dwight Howard's 3 pointer, there was plenty of dunks and ally oops, but there wasn't any really great plays. Lebron had a reverse two handed ally-oop from Dwyane Wade and Dwyane Wade ally-ooped Dwight Howard for a huge slam dunk. On All-Star Saturday Nate Robinson won the slam dunk contest, Paul Pierce won the three point shootout, Steve Nash won the skills challenge, and Kevin Durant won the horse competition.

St. Anthony vs. Beecher City

The JV had a good game and won by 38 points. Scott Deters hit lots of threes, Ryan Ragland had 26 points and a lot of steals, and everyone was making their shots and wouldn't give Beecher city any easy shots.

The varsity game was closer than most people expected but they still won. Sophomore Reed Willenborg started alongside Taylor Worman, Derek Rolfing, Alex Lustig, and Ryan Schmit. We had a lead for most of the game but in the second half Beecher City started to come back but couldn't overtake out lead.