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Mission artist animates green utility boxes with a flock of birds
Read Mission Local often?Help grow our newsroom during end-of-year fundraising, joining the hundreds of San Franciscans who support us by donating below. Chestnut-backed chickadees, yellow warblers and other feathered birds have landed this winter on the unassuming green utility boxes along South Van Ness Avenue and Bryant Street in the Mission.The 20 feathered friends are the creation of Claudio Talavera-Ballón, a Mission-based Peruvian painter sponsored by the nonprofit Paint the Void sponsored to paint 10 Mission utility boxes, part of a project to remake 250 utility boxes across San Francisco.It’s an effort to color the utility boxes that store infrastructure for nearby traffic lights across the city. Elsewhere, dozens of artists have covered the “municipal green” boxes with pandas, a girl on the swing, and a naughty astronaut. Talavera-Ballón’s flock, all Bay Area species, can be seen at almost every intersection […]
Karl The Fog December 25, 2024
Undersea power cable linking Finland and Estonia hit by outage, prompting investigation
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — A power cable linking Finland and Estonia under the Baltic Sea suffered an outage, prompting an investigation, Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said Wednesday.Writing on X, Orpo said that power transmission through the Estlink-2 cable stopped Wednesday and that authorities were “investigating the matter.” He said the interruption would not affect electricity supplies in Finland.Estonian network operator Elering said there was enough spare capacity to meet power needs on the Estonian side, public broadcaster ERR said on its website.Trusted news and daily delights, right in your inboxSee for yourself — The Yodel is the go-to source for daily news, entertainment and feel-good stories.Authorities have been on edge about undersea infrastructure in the Baltic. Two data cables, one running between Finland and Germany, the other between Lithuania and Sweden, were severed in November.Germany's defense minister said officials […]
Karl The Fog December 25, 2024
The ‘Godfather of EVs’ explains why China is winning the race to go electric — and why hybrids are a ‘fool’s errand’
Former Nissan and Aston Martin executive Andy Palmer is known as the "godfather of EVs" thanks to his work on the Nissan Leaf.Courtesy of Andy Palmer Andy Palmer, the "Godfather of EVs," explains how China took the lead in the electric car race. Ex-Nissan COO Palmer got the moniker after developing the Leaf, the world's first mass-market EV. He says Chinese EVs offer "remarkable" value for money and have better battery tech than their Western rivals. The man often known as the "Godfather of EVs" has a warning for automakers thinking of ditching electric vehicles for hybrids. Former Aston Martin CEO and Nissan exec Andy Palmer told Business Insider that delaying transitioning to EVs in favor of selling hybrids was a "fool's errand" and warned automakers doing so risk falling even further behind Chinese EV companies. Palmer's moniker comes from his […]
Karl The Fog December 25, 2024
S.F. police shooting victim idolized cops, law enforcement
The Central Valley man who police killed last week — purportedly attempting to arrest him for an alleged hit-and-run in San Francisco — thought very highly of law enforcement, his social media presence shows. Hodge, whose identity has been reported widely in the media but remains unconfirmed by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, ran his own private security firm called Covert Guardian Solutions based in Lodi, in San Joaquin County. Hodge and his company are licensed with the state Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. His company website advertises protection for high-profile individuals as well as security and surveillance for businesses. On his social media page, Hodge posted photos of a vehicle, labeled with Covert Guardian Solutions branding, outside both the Dior store and the nearby Louis Vuitton store. Police believe that Hodge was working as a security guard outside the […]
Karl The Fog December 24, 2024
Scientists Destroy 99% of Cancer Cells in Lab Using Vibrating Molecules
Scientists have discovered a remarkable way to destroy cancer cells. A study published last year found stimulating aminocyanine molecules with near-infrared light caused them to vibrate in sync, enough to break apart the membranes of cancer cells.Aminocyanine molecules are already used in bioimaging as synthetic dyes. Commonly used in low doses to detect cancer, they stay stable in water and are very good at attaching themselves to the outside of cells.The research team from Rice University, Texas A&M University, and the University of Texas, said their approach is a marked improvement over another kind of cancer-killing molecular machine previously developed, called Feringa-type motors, which could also break the structures of problematic cells."It is a whole new generation of molecular machines that we call molecular jackhammers," said chemist James Tour from Rice University, when the results were published in December 2023."They […]
Karl The Fog December 24, 2024
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Mission artist animates green utility boxes with a flock of birds
Read Mission Local often?Help grow our newsroom during end-of-year fundraising, joining the hundreds of San Franciscans who support us by donating below. Chestnut-backed chickadees, yellow warblers and other feathered birds have landed this winter on the unassuming green utility boxes along South Van Ness Avenue and Bryant Street in the Mission.The 20 feathered friends are the creation of Claudio Talavera-Ballón, a Mission-based Peruvian painter sponsored by the nonprofit Paint the Void sponsored to paint 10 Mission utility boxes, part of a project to remake 250 utility boxes across San Francisco.It’s an effort to color the utility boxes that store infrastructure for nearby traffic lights across the city. Elsewhere, dozens of artists have covered the “municipal green” boxes with pandas, a girl on the swing, and a naughty astronaut. Talavera-Ballón’s flock, all Bay Area species, can be seen at almost every intersection […]
Karl The Fog December 25, 2024
S.F. police shooting victim idolized cops, law enforcement
The Central Valley man who police killed last week — purportedly attempting to arrest him for an alleged hit-and-run in San Francisco — thought very highly of law enforcement, his social media presence shows. Hodge, whose identity has been reported widely in the media but remains unconfirmed by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, ran his own private security firm called Covert Guardian Solutions based in Lodi, in San Joaquin County. Hodge and his company are licensed with the state Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. His company website advertises protection for high-profile individuals as well as security and surveillance for businesses. On his social media page, Hodge posted photos of a vehicle, labeled with Covert Guardian Solutions branding, outside both the Dior store and the nearby Louis Vuitton store. Police believe that Hodge was working as a security guard outside the […]
Karl The Fog December 24, 2024
Clancy’s 41-year-old Christmas tree lot is a tradition on a clock
The undeveloped lot at the corner of Seventh Avenue and Lawton Street is quiet and lifeless most of the year. But, at year’s end, pumpkins and Christmas trees line a dirt path, giant candy canes stand illuminated by strings of lights, and the whir of saws fills the air. Opened in 1949, Clancy’s Pumpkins and Christmas Trees has been at this corner of the Inner Sunset for 41 years. But perhaps not for much longer. Earlier this year, the Board of Education approved using the undeveloped land at 1620 Seventh Ave., owned by the SFUSD, as a potential site for teacher housing, which would move the school district closer to its goal of developing 550 educator housing units across San Francisco by 2030. It is unclear how long it will take for the project to break ground. But for Clancy’s, the clock […]
Karl The Fog December 24, 2024
Seeing a show – Mission Local
Mission Local produces enterprise reporting on San Francisco's most critical issues: police reform, corruption, public health, housing and homelessness. Learn more about us, and donate below keep us reporting.Subscribe to Mission Local's daily newsletter Source: missionlocal.org
Karl The Fog December 23, 2024
Waymo rolls toward San Francisco Airport — showdown brewing
On Friday morning, a driverless Waymo vehicle, for reasons unknown, rolled into a patch of wet cement on the grounds of Laguna Honda Hospital — and sank in. It was, for onlookers, a source of much mirth and cellphone picture-taking. A witness tells your humble narrator that the wet cement ought to have been better demarcated with barricades — but, also, that a human driver would never, ever have made this mistake. Two weeks prior, an official with San Francisco International Airport wrote to the Planning Department. “The City and County of San Francisco, by and through the San Francisco Airport Commission proposes to approve a permit allowing autonomous vehicle companies to map the roads at San Francisco International Airport, ” it read.“Under the Proposed Project, autonomous vehicle companies would be allowed to deploy up to two autonomous vehicles operated by human drivers to […]
Karl The Fog December 23, 2024