Sunday, December 29, 2013

Ship Cook Rescued After Spending 60 Hours Inside Sunk Capsized Tugboat

Story from Reuters:

"After two days trapped in freezing cold water and breathing from an air bubble in an upturned tugboat under the ocean, Harrison Okene was sure he was going to die. Then a torch light pierced the darkness.

Ship's cook Okene, 29, was on board the Jascon-4 tugboat when it capsized on May 26 due to heavy Atlantic ocean swells around 30 km (20 miles) off the coast of Nigeria, while stabilising an oil tanker filling up at a Chevron platform. Of the 12 people on board, divers recovered 10 dead bodies while a remaining crew member has not been found.

Somehow Okene survived, breathing inside a four foot high bubble of air as it shrunk in the waters slowly rising from the ceiling of the tiny toilet and adjoining bedroom where he sought refuge, until two South African divers eventually rescued him."


The actual depth at which the upside down tugboat settled was only 30m, but still that would have been enough to cause him decompression sickness if he came right up.

It's an amazing story. The ordeal this guy went through. For more than two days, he was in total darkness, partially immersed in cold ocean water, without food or water, inside an air pocket he had no idea how long would last, not knowing if anyone was looking for him. The things that must have gone through his mind...

Here is the amazing video of his discovery and rescue. It's worth watching from the beginning. Apparently, the diver's squeaky voice is due to the fact that they breath a mix of oxygen and helium.




(source)

Saturday, December 28, 2013

Amazing Beatboxing Baby

Wow!
If she can do that now that she's only one-year-old, imagine what she'll be able to do in the future.





(source)

2013 News Bloopers Compilation

It's that time of the year again.

Enjoy.





Well, since we're on the subject, might as well remind ourselves of 2012...






...and 2011 (although some of the clips are definitely a few years decades older).




Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Helicopter-Assisted Christmas Tree Harvest In Oregon

I had no idea.

From the "about" section of the video:

"Christmas Tree harvesting at Noble Mountain Christmas Tree Farm in Oregon. Pilot Dan Clark flying a Northwest Helicopters, LLC 206B3 Jetranger November of 2008. 

Oregon is the nation's biggest producer and exporter of Christmas trees, selling about 7.3 million trees a year, more than twice that of No. 2 North Carolina. The holiday trees represent a $101 million industry in Oregon."


As many commenters on Youtube mention, he's probably paid by the quantity of trees he transports and not by the hour.





Also, many mention that it's not as grueling (inertia-wise) as it looks.

Here's another video (probably not of the same pilot, obviously) from a... more sunny day, showing the cockpit view.





Still pretty impressive.


(source and source)

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Cars of San Diego

We've seen the work by Cy Kuckenbaker before on this blog.

Back then, he had put together all the landings and departures from San Diego airport in two short videos.

His newest piece of work involved taking 4 minutes of raw footage from a San Diego highway (California State Route 163) and organizing the cars that passed by based on colour.

From the creator:

"The source footage for this video is a 4-minute shot from the Washington Street bridge above State Route 163 in San Diego captured at 2:39pm Oct 1, 2013. My aim is to reveal the color palette and color preferences of contemporary San Diego drivers in addition to traffic patterns and volumes. There are no CG elements, these are all real cars that have been removed from one sample and reorganized."

First, here's the raw footage:



Raw Footage San Diego Study #3 from Cy Kuckenbaker on Vimeo.



And here's what he did with it:



Midday Traffic Time Collapsed and Reorganized by Color: San Diego Study #3 from Cy Kuckenbaker on Vimeo.

 
Very impressive.


(source, source)

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Dogs Too Scared of Cats To Pass By Them

Here at KappaD, we know what the internet wants.

Cats.
And dogs.

So we provide.





Cats are evil.


(source)

A Unique Truck Ad

The following commercial by Volvo, featuring Jean-Claude Van Damme, was posted on Youtube about a month ago and it soon went viral.




From the "about" section of the video:

"This live test was set up to demonstrate the precision and directional stability of Volvo Dynamic Steering -- a world first technology that makes the new Volvo FM easier to drive.

Filmed in Spain on a closed-off landing field at sunrise in one take."


In one take... IN ONE TAKE? Are you kidding me?
And surely there must have been some safety equipment. A net? A rope?
I can't believe the 53-year old (although he looks older in this in my opinion) Jean-Claude Van Damme would do this type of split without making sure that all necessary safety precautions had been taken. Even at these speeds, a fall would have been nasty.

In any case, never one to be outdone, Chuck Norris (or maybe "Chuck Norris") chose to use his annual Christmas message to respond to Jean-Claude Van Damme's provocation.




I wonder how long it will take the real Chuck Norris to claim copyright infringement...

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

What Does the Fox Say?

I know this is old for many out there (it came out early September), but I discovered it just yesterday. 288 million views and still going (Gangnam Style, by the way, has reached 1.85 billion).

I kinda like it actually. Catchy tune.





Thankfully, it doesn't take itself seriously.
It is by Ylvis, a Norwegian comedic duo (they are in fact brothers) and is intended as a critique/parody of contemporary club/pop music. 

Agreed. Change the lyrics and this could have easily been a hit by Pitbull or Katy Perry.

Sunday, December 15, 2013

New Orleans (tilt-shift)

New Orleans is the most populous city in the US state of Louisiana (but not the capital, as is so often the case).

As always, make sure to watch in HD.





I was there for a couple of days recently. It was nice. Very touristy and pretty safe. The French Quarter was interesting, but not as large as I had expected. It is cool how that area's Franco-Spanish past (the architecture at least) has been largely preserved. I tried to imagine how it would have been in the city during hurricane Katrina. In general, I think you can see it all in 2-3 days. If you're a jazz music fan (which I am not) you might appreciate it more.

Saturday, December 14, 2013

Street Basketball Stereotypes

Anyone whose played street basketball can definitely relate to this video.

And I'm not only talking about recognizing these characters in your friends, but in yourself too.
I'm looking at you KappaD "My Bad" guy.




1994 Was A Good Year

In terms of pop culture at least.
And it was... aaaargh! 20 years ago...
Sniff.

It's time to reminisce with this recap by Slacktory.

All the songs and videos can be found here.

Enjoy.


Saturday, December 7, 2013

Cat Overestimates Its Abilities




Music is "Sail" by AWOLNATION.

This looks like Japan (and indeed, the original cat video appears to be Japanese, where, by the way, it says in the video info that the cat was unhurt following its... predicament).

It would have been even funnier if it had said "Fail" at the right moment.

Monday, December 2, 2013

Go Ahead. Knock yourself out...!

An anaesthesiologist lets the patient (prepped for knee surgery)... anaesthetize himself.



Oh shiiii... Yap, my thoughts exactly.

Although I know this is absolutely necessary and controlled, I still can't help not feeling a bit unnerved by it.

(source)

Sunday, December 1, 2013

All Nuclear Weapons Detonations Ever Conducted

Today I learned that since 1998 the only country to have conducted nuclear tests (3 to be exact) is North Korea.

Between 1945 and 1998, however, there had been a total of 2053 nuclear explosions/tests (of different yields, different types of bombs, underwater, underground, on the surface, in the atmosphere, etc., if there is etc.). The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT, of which North Korea is not a signatory, as well as Pakistan and India) is mainly responsible for the halt in nuclear tests.

Below is a video made by Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto showing where each nuclear test was conducted and by whom between 1945 and 1998. Apart from the two in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, which were used during war, all the rest are nuclear weapons tests.





This video made me interested in finding videos of some nuclear explosions.
I found quite a few on user's atomcentral's account on Youtube.

First off, here is the Trinity test, the first ever detonation of a nuclear device in July 1945.





Here's one from 1951 in Nevada, as seen from above.





In 1953, they even made an atomic cannon. But, it was soon made obsolete by advances in rocketry. Here you can also see the effects on nearby houses and vehicles. It appears as if the paint on vehicles evaporates.



Of course, as we know from that movie where they rape Indiana Jones (I'm looking at you "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull"), all you need to do to survive a nuclear blast is go inside a fridge (a sturdy one, like the ones made in the 50s).

In 1954, the Castle Bravo test involved the most powerful nuclear weapon ever detonated by the United States, a hydrogen bomb with a yield of 15 megatons of TNT. It happened at Bikini atoll in the Pacific ocean. 





Here we see five guys in 1957 enjoying themselves far too much as they stand at ground zero, while a nuclear weapon (in the form of an air-to-air missile) is detonated 10.000ft above their heads.





Finally, in 1958 an underwater detonation at Enewatak atoll in the Pacific ocean.




For no particular reason, I only used detonations by the United States here.
You can easily find ones from other countries on Youtube too.
Let's hope we never witness one first-hand.