Miscellaneous
The Hurricanes Down South
Jamie Marshaleck
By the end of August, we all basically thought that it was the end of hurricane season. We all celebrated inwardly -- we had made it through the worst of the year with no hiccups, one might say. No one was expecting such a horrid turn of events to ravage our home turf like it did.
Hurricane Harvey was just a category three hurricane, but the worst happened when it stalled; instead of moving inland and breaking apart to end up just a storm, it stopped. The storm stopped moving, over the Houston area. Over 13 feet of water flooded through the area, filling people’s homes. If you were unable to evacuate the area, you were stranded in an Atlantis of sorts.
Hurricane Irma, completely covered Puerto Rico and some of the surrounding islands. It then completely covered Florida as well. However, what hit Florida didn’t cause nearly as bad damage as Hurricane Harvey did to Florida. Hurricane Irma, unlike Harvey, was a category five hurricane. This entails that it had wind speeds over 150 miles per hour.
What’s worse is the Red Cross didn’t give all of the donations earned to Houston and areas affected by Hurricane Harvey. In fact, a portion (there were reports of about one third of donations) went to internal spending. This entails paying workers, furnishing offices, and taking care of employees. Not people directly affected by Harvey. This might actually be one of the most scandalous events, as the Red Cross has been doing this for years. Not only did NPR state this, but so did snopes.com, slate.com, time.com, vibe.com, and nytimes.com. The Red Cross has not released a breakdown of how it is spending the donations.
These hurricanes are doing some pretty awful damage to our country. However, people are helping others that they have absolutely no relation to. One person completely different from someone else is somehow working perfectly together to help an elderly woman.
“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”
- Fred Rogers
Bethlehem's K-9 Unit
By Brianna LaPadula
Bethlehem has a wonderful canine unit. The dogs are so smart and are really cool! At school, many students got a presentation from them. Everyone always thinks that they are just cool, but it's amazing how much training they go through. It normally takes about six to twelve months for basic training, and other training can take three to six weeks each. They are taught detection of bombs, weapons, and illegal substances. They can track people and find missing people. They are fast, swift, and agile, so they can help catch people and protect their owners. They have a very strong bite, and can rip through flesh so far it can be close to the bone. Every week, the officers and dogs go through training so they are sure they are ready for anything. These dogs are used in situations when police can not finish the job. Police can not always catch the person or catch a violent move before it happens. The dogs usually can. Also, as I mentioned before, they have a great sense of smell. They can smell forty feet underground, smell an average of forty thousand feet away, track scents for miles, and each smell is separated into between one and two trillion parts. Because of this, they are great for finding people and things. If you are ever offered a chance to see the dogs in action, take the opportunity. They are so cool, and you’ll never forget!!
My Summer Creation:
By: Matthew Davis
When you think of the word “lego” you usually think of lego houses, ships, and cars but over the years people have taken this toy one step farther and that is exactly what I did over the summer. All my life I loved legos and I finally wanted to make my best creation yet, so after some planning and thinking I came up with the idea to make a lego gumball machine. It was the perfect idea and I got right to work starting at the base and making my way up to build a smooth sloped opening where the gumballs would come out. That first day, there was no doubt about it that I was dedicated because I worked 7 hours straight, but little did I know that I would have to build many more hours in order to succeed in this challenging project.
Soon, 4 days passed by like the clock was not even running and after continuing to build up the machine still keeping in mind of the tunnel running through the center, I tackled the real challenge. This challenge was building the mechanical function which would be put into play when someone turns the knob to receive a gumball. The plan was to have a connecting pouch to the knob at the other side so when the knob turns upside down, the gumball in the pouch would fall down by the force of gravity. Of course, there was one problem and this was that I was running out of legos and I realized I had to sacrifice a creation for the sake of the build. Just when I thought all the obstacles were over there came another setback which nearly took a week to complete, and so I needed to fix the top the pouch where more gumballs would enter. The problem I found was that the gumballs were colliding with each other causing the mechanism to get stuck and I was forced to do many minor fixes but overall, it was worth it.
Finally, I came to the last challenge yet, building and designing the storage mechanism for the gumballs. I started with a base that expanded two more pegs wide than the connecting part and began to build up so that it could hold lots of delicious “sugar balls”. As soon as it was time to make the inside suitable to hold the gumballs, I then crafted an idea in my head to make slopes so the gumballs could slide down the surface easily. This idea sure was a good one because it worked with ease and it was time to wrap it up. I stuck on a huge roof tile and then made a refill compartment for some connivance and now I’m happy to say it was complete. All my hard work and all the struggles I had to go through were now in the past and the only thing to say is follow your dreams and goals because you never know where it will take you.
Steelstacks - History of the Steel
Zachary Schafer
On Wednesday, October 18th, 2017, 8th Grade’s Team Tide took a field trip to Bethlehem Steel/Arts Quest to explore the history of steel stacks. The trip included a walkway of which you could walk above the railroad of steelstacks. Also, a movie was shown in the Frank Banko Alehouse Cinema about the history of Bethlehem, AKA “The Christmas City” and the home to Bethlehem Steel and steelstacks.