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Ottawa Citizen
13-07-2025
- Science
- Ottawa Citizen
Laprade and Phillips: What happened to Ottawa's first UFO research station?
Article content During the summer, we'll carry occasional excerpts from Ottawa Made, a recently published compendium of stories about curious inventions, people and places in the national capital. Today: the search for flying saucers. Article content The truth is in Ottawa. Maybe. Article content Article content Fans of the television show X-Files — where the expression 'the truth is out there' first entered popular culture and lexicon — may be surprised to learn that the world's first UFO research facility was not in the United States, nor anywhere near Area 51. Article content Article content It was on Carling Avenue. Article content The facility opened in 1952, a joint research project of the National Research Council (NRC), the Defence Research Board (DRB), and the Department of Transportation (DOT). The scientist leading the project worked for DOT: Wilbert Smith, senior radio engineer for the department's Broadcast and Measurements Section. Article content Smith had begun researching UFOs two years earlier, as the lead scientist on Project Magnet, a DOT research study trying to determine not only if alien spaceships existed, but if so, what powered them? One theory was that UFOs used the Earth's magnetic field as a source of propulsion. Article content Smith's geo-magnetic studies seemed promising and in 1952 Project Magnet moved to Shirleys Bay, approximately 15 km west of Ottawa, on what was then a seldom used stretch of Carling Avenue. Article content Smith unpacked his gamma-ray counter, magnetometer, radio receiver and recording gravimeter and set them up in a small building DOT built by the banks of the Ottawa River. This building became the world's first government sanctioned UFO research facility (that we know about. The truth is … well, you know). Article content Article content After two years of radio silence, at 3:01 p.m. on August 8, 1954, something finally happened. The gravimeter at the Shirley's Bay installation 'went wild,' to use Smith's own words. He rushed outside to see what was causing the anomaly but there was nothing in the sky. The clouds were too thick. Article content Article content Two days later, the federal government abruptly shut down the research facility. People have speculated for years about possible reasons for the sudden closure, the most popular being … you can probably guess: Smith had detected an alien aircraft and other people — senior and secretive people — would finish the research project. (Interestingly, the CIA was a partner in Project Magnet. The agency was told about the unusual gravimeter reading the day it happened.) Article content Smith continued to work at Shirley's Bay (though no longer conducting UFO research) and in 1959 claimed to have developed a breakthrough anti-gravity device. In his research notes, he said:
San Francisco Chronicle
04-07-2025
- Climate
- San Francisco Chronicle
This Bay Area park is popular with campers. Could the ocean wash it away?
For about a half-century, Denise Longacre's family has dug for clams and stoked seaside campfires on Doran Beach, a crescent swoop of sand jutting out of the Sonoma County coast at the mouth of Bodega Bay. The Pacific Ocean's relentless winds have been the only constant — apart from camaraderie. Beach sands shift dramatically season-to-season and year to year. Clam populations have plummeted. Storms seem more dramatic. 'I've seen tents blown into the water,' she said. 'One December, all the roads flooded. It was pouring rain.' County experts warn that ocean waters increasingly cover areas of Doran from sea to harbor during winter storms and King Tides — inundations that provide a grim glimpse of a future in which rising seas could overwhelm this narrow but important spit of land. Doran's two-mile peninsula shelters Bodega Harbor, the largest fishing port between San Francisco and Fort Bragg. More than one-third of Doran Regional Park could be permanently underwater by the end of the century, if worst-case scenarios for sea level rise developed by the U.S. Geological Survey and National Research Council unfold as projected. Parks officials say there are actions they can take to lessen the impact, but they involve compromise. Natural dunes like those at Doran are masterful water absorbers, but restoring them might require moving — or removing — hardscapes like roads, picnic areas or campgrounds. Steve Ehret, planning manager for Sonoma County Regional Parks, said the county is in the very early stages of studying how to prepare Doran Beach for the next 50 and 100 years. Every major flood at Doran is a chance to learn how they might preserve the beach for people and wildlife for decades to come. 'It's a shot across the bow — a warning shot,' Ehret said. Most California beaches stand square-shouldered against the Pacific Ocean's pounding surf. But Doran curves southward, creating a relatively safe boogie-boarding paradise where children are more free to splash in crashing waves. Doran's northern shoulder hosts a rich ecosystem of tidal mudflats and salt marshes with eelgrass, shorebirds and endangered salmonids. Its 139-site campground for tents and RVs was built on land built up from dredged material decades ago when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers carved the harbor out of the original lagoon. Coastal ecologist Peter Baye said Doran shares key similarities with Stinson Beach. They are relatively protected south-facing barrier beaches with lagoons. Both lie on the San Andreas Fault and are vulnerable to large earthquakes that can cause the sand to compact and settle. Baye said beach erosion occurs in big pulses triggered by storms, bursts of rising seas triggered by global changes and earthquakes. 'One hundred years of erosion usually occurs with a few big storms,' Baye said. But unlike Stinson, which is largely lined with homes, cabins and businesses on private parcels, Doran is all public land with relatively minimal infrastructure including a road, campground, picnic areas, parking lots and septic systems. Baye said that could make it easier to cede areas to dunes and other natural systems. Resilient beaches must be able to shift with ocean movement, and they can't do that if they are hemmed in by hardscape and infrastructure. 'How can we buy some time? How can we….slow the most catastrophic, disruptive changes?' Baye said. Ehret said there are no plans yet for what the county will do. Officials are studying critical habitat areas and recreational infrastructure as well as federal sea level reports to understand which areas are most vulnerable to sea level changes. The county will hold many public discussions and present scenarios for balancing recreation and natural ecosystems at Doran in the coming years. 'It's not one day Doran is gone — it's slow,' Ehret said. The county already has many dune restoration programs underway. One of the greatest successes in restoring dunes at Doran has come from a group of stalwart volunteers. Jan Lochner and a crew of native plant society members have pulled invasive ice plant out of Doran's sands almost every Wednesday for eight years. Lochner said it seemed like a Sisyphean task at the outset but has proved remarkably effective. They have cleared more than a mile of beach of invasive plant species and watched the dunes and native plants readily reclaim the space. They've seen the threatened snowy plover begin to rebound with the removal of tall European dune grasses that were hiding prime predators like skunks. 'It's so daunting, but week by week it adds up,' Lochner said.
Hamilton Spectator
06-06-2025
- General
- Hamilton Spectator
Marc Garneau was the first Canadian in space — but what he achieved on Earth is worth remembering, too
If Marc Garneau wasn't the beau ideal of Canadian character, accomplishment and aspiration, then he was surely on the short list. Canada's first astronaut in space, who died on Wednesday at 76 after a short illness, made his name travelling to the heavens. But his was a life that meant so much more, one shot through with examples of courage, adventure, service and resilience here on Earth. 'I didn't set out to be an astronaut, but that's what I became,' Garneau wrote in his 2024 memoir, A Most Extraordinary Ride. 'I also didn't set out to be a politician, but that also happened.' What he did set out to do 'was to live to the fullest of my capabilities rather than shrink from the challenges life threw at me, to stay curious, and to carry myself with dignity.' Garneau also wrote about the odd burst of youthful hell-raising. 'I was immature and lacked judgment,' he later recalled. 'Fortunately, it worked out, and I was able to learn from those experiences.' The son of a francophone infantry officer from Quebec City and an anglo-Canadian nurse from Sussex, New Brunswick, Garneau considered himself a product of both of Canada's fabled two solitudes. 'I was half Quebecer and half Maritimer,' he wrote. 'I believe I get my passion and tendency to argue from my Quebec ancestry and my pragmatism and can-do attitude from the Maritimer in my DNA.' Garneau joined the Royal Canadian Navy at 16, relishing the challenge of navigating vast spaces, relying on his wits. 'I like challenges; I like adventure,' he said last year. 'I'm willing to tolerate a certain amount of risk in my life. Failure does not throw me off, and I learned from failure.' While serving in the navy, he read a newspaper ad from the National Research Council. It was looking for astronauts. Garneau applied. In 1983, he was selected from more than 4,300 applicants to a class of six astronauts. A year later, he became the first Canadian to go to space, as a payload specialist on the NASA shuttle mission. 'I have often used the word euphoria to describe the moment I first saw Earth from space,' Garneau wrote. 'The view that greeted me left me not only breathless, but speechless. Words like incredible, amazing and extraordinary couldn't do justice to what I was seeing.' He wanted NASA to be pleased with his work. And, he said, 'I wanted Canadians to be proud of me.' That they were, and Garneau returned to Earth a national celebrity. He left the astronaut corps after two more missions and became president of the Canadian Space Agency before being recruited into politics. 'The possibility of making decisions that would shape Canada's future appealed to me,' he wrote. Although he lost his first bid for the House of Commons, in 2006, he won in 2008 and remained in office until his retirement, in 2023. He sought the Liberal leadership in 2013 but dropped out of the race that Justin Trudeau eventually won. He would go on to serve as Trudeau's minister of transport and then foreign affairs. Garneau had an edge, disagreeing with his leader on several aspects of foreign policy. He wished that the astronaut culture of honesty, openness, making no excuses and admitting promptly to error prevailed in politics. When he was left out of Trudeau's cabinet in 2021, Garneau more or less masked his sense of betrayal. 'It felt like a punch in the gut,' he wrote — but he carried on. Many of the tributes that have poured in since Garneau's wife, Pam, announced his passing have mentioned his fundamental virtues: humility, modesty, thoughtfulness, grace, courage, hopefulness, decency. Bob Rae, Canada's ambassador to the United Nations and one of Garneau's former colleagues, called him an 'old-fashioned, upfront guy, wise, incredibly hard-working, with deep humility and quiet sense of humour.' Garneau said that when he sat down to write his memoir, 'I realized, my goodness, I did pack a lot in 75 years.' Not least of all inspiring and making proud an entire country.
CTV News
27-05-2025
- Health
- CTV News
Canadian researchers develop test they say can help diagnose life-threatening sepsis
A team of Canadian researchers has created a test in a portable device called PowerBlade, shown here in an undated handout image, that they say could quickly predict if a patient is going to develop sepsis. (National Research Council of Canada)
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bird Construction secures three projects worth over $378m in Canada
Canadian construction and maintenance company Bird Construction has secured three significant domestic projects with a combined value exceeding C$525m ($378m), expanding its presence in the buildings and infrastructure sectors. The projects span across transport, housing, and mining. The first of these projects is the Transportation Safety and Technology Science (TSTS) Hub in Ottawa, Ontario. This 120,000ft² facility will centralise federal scientists and investigators dedicated to enhancing transportation safety and developing sustainable technologies for various transportation modes. The TSTS Hub will consolidate National Research Council and Transportation Safety Board laboratories, currently spread across five buildings, into one modernised, shared space for over 260 employees. In addition to the TSTS Hub, Bird has been chosen to construct the Beverly Heights Seniors Housing project in Edmonton, Alberta. This project is seen as a strategic fit for Bird's long-term care portfolio and is designed to offer a full continuum of care, including independent living and assisted living. The development is poised to meet the needs of Canada's ageing population and reflects Bird's efforts to contribute to sectors with long-term growth prospects. Bird has also been selected as part of a joint venture to upgrade mining infrastructure for an existing client. The four-year programme will involve clearing, foundation preparation, over two million cubic metres of fill placement, and the installation of high-density polyethene geomembrane and monitoring instruments. Bird president and CEO Teri McKibbon said: 'These recent awards in our buildings and infrastructure businesses reflect the sustained demand we're seeing across our key strategic markets, despite the current economic uncertainty. 'Furthermore, they reflect the confidence our clients continue to place in Bird as an established and trusted delivery partner, valuing our deep sector experience and collaborative approach to project execution.' Earlier in March 2025, Bird Construction received five contracts valued at approximately C$470m. These Canadian contracts spanned various sectors such as nuclear support buildings, civil infrastructure, industrial maintenance, and recreation centre redevelopment. "Bird Construction secures three projects worth over $378m in Canada" was originally created and published by World Construction Network, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.
