Latest news with #SonoranDesert
Forbes
08-07-2025
- Forbes
Explore Celestial Wonders Of The Night Sky At These Locations
The practice of stargazing dates back to the Babylonians and Egyptians. getty The roots of stargazing date back centuries to ancient civilizations like the Babylonians and Egyptians who practiced stargazing for navigation, agriculture and religious purposes. However, the invention of telescopes in the 17th century significantly advanced the scientific study of astronomy and further fueled public interest in the cosmos. Today, many stargazers explore the celestial wonders of the night sky as a form of meditation and relaxation. An excellent way to unwind from daily stressors, stargazing can serve as a peaceful, mindfulness practice. Other benefits of stargazing include its ability to help you sleep better. Studies have shown that exposure to natural light patterns and being closer to nature can lead to increased melatonin production, which promotes better sleep. Stargazing can have many positive physical effects. getty Similar to spending time in nature during the day, stargazing can have many positive physical effects, such as lowering blood pressure and cortisol (stress hormone) levels. Also, the sheer scale and beauty of the cosmos can evoke feelings of awe, wonder and a sense of belonging to something larger than yourself. Research suggests that awe can enhance feelings of happiness, gratitude and even improve decision-making. Adero provides an excellent vantage point for stargazing. JOHN WOODCOCK for ADERO Scottsdale Resort. Perched high above the Sonoran Desert in the certified International Dark Sky Community of Fountain Hills, ADERO Scottsdale Resort provides an excellent vantage point for stargazing unlike any other luxury resort in the area. Its signature 'Find Your Way' Dark Sky experience includes weekly guided night sky tours led by the Star Dudes local experts (based on seasonality), high-definition telescopes available for guests to borrow and complimentary access to the Star Walk 2 mobile app for an enhanced look at the stars, planets and constellations. All 177 rooms and suites have either private balconies or patios, including 16 suites with expansive terraces, for taking in the breathtaking mountain views by day and chasing stars under clear desert skies by night. Stargazers can view the splendor of the Milky Way Galaxy. Carl Christensen Monterey County, California Monterey County on California's Central Coast offers a stellar lineup of stargazing spots, including: Pinnacles National Park – A premier destination for stargazers. For an immersion into the velvet night sky's celestial wonders with unobstructed views, head to the Peaks View parking area, Bacon Ranch or Chaparral parking area. For a guided experience, Inn at the Pinnacles in the Gabilan Mountains hosts Sky Tours in April and July, led by local astrophotographer Carl Christiansen. Big Sur – The dark skies of Big Sur are a stargazer's dream, with breathtaking views of constellations framed by majestic cliffs at popular spots like Pfeiffer Beach (where you can see the Milky Way) at Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. Check out Alila Ventana Big Sur for rustic luxury where the lush forest meets the coastal cliffs – The dark skies of Big Sur are a stargazer's dream, with breathtaking views of constellations framed by majestic cliffs at popular spots like Pfeiffer Beach (where you can see the Milky Way) at Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. Check out Alila Ventana Big Sur for rustic luxury where the lush forest meets the coastal cliffs Garland Ranch Regional Park – In Carmel Valley, Garland Ranch Regional Park offers a scenic setting for gazing at the twinkling constellations in the serenity of the surrounding Santa Lucia Mountains. The Monterey Institute for Research in Astronomy (MIRA) regularly hosts public star parties here. Carmel Valley Ranch offers a sophisticated escape in the foothills of the Santa Lucia Mountains with plenty of room to roam, explore and discover. The astronomy field offers an excellent view of the night sky. getty Cherry Springs State Park, Pennsylvania A combination of attributes makes Cherry Springs State Park ideal for stargazing and astronomy: The field is at the top of a 2,300-foot high mountain — the surrounding state forest is relatively undeveloped and nearby communities are in valleys, shielding any light that might affect the park. The location of the park, 41 degrees north, 77 degrees west, offers a great view of the nucleus of the Milky Way Galaxy. The astronomy field offers an excellent 360 degree view of the night sky. All lighting in the park is shielded and all white light has been converted to red. Three areas of the park are available for stargazing: Night Sky Public Viewing Area — Best short-term stargazing for a few hours. Although white light is permitted, a red filter or cover for your flashlight is recommended to preserve your night vision. Rustic Campground — Suggested for overnight stargazing for casual stargazers. Not recommended for serious stargazers. There are no lighting restrictions in the Rustic Campground. However, to aid in creating a more enjoyable experience for all visitors, it is recommended to use red filters on all light. Campfires should be kept as small as possible. Suggested for overnight stargazing for casual stargazers. Not recommended for serious stargazers. There are no lighting restrictions in the Rustic Campground. However, to aid in creating a more enjoyable experience for all visitors, it is recommended to use red filters on all light. Campfires should be kept as small as possible. Overnight Astronomy Observation Field — Excellent overnight viewing for serious stargazers with equipment. All lights must have red filter or need to be fully shielded. White light is prohibited. Explore the night sky from many different locations. getty Acadia National Park, Maine Acadia National Park offers several locations for outstanding stargazing. Explore the night sky from the west side of Mount Desert Island while enjoying the ocean soundscape. Seawall Picnic Area offers northeastern and southern views over the Atlantic Ocean and the mouth of Somes Sound from a quintessential cobblestone beach. Views of the night sky are unobstructed and convenient for those staying near Southwest Harbor or Bass Harbor. Ocean Path offers many locations for viewing the nights sky. Most locations offer views to the east and large portions of the north and south skies as well. A camp chair or cushions are recommended for comfort on the granite rocks of the coast. Enjoy gazing up into the cosmos nestled comfortably on a blanket on Acadia's largest and very popular sandy beach. Visitors may explore Sand Beach at night, but camping or parking overnight are not allowed. Sand Beach offers a comfortable night sky viewing experience with plenty of room to spread out and peacefully enjoy your stargazing. MORE FROM FORBES Forbes How To Best Experience The Great American Road Trip By Roger Sands Forbes The Uber-Rich Are Flocking To This Small Mountain Town By Roger Sands
Yahoo
04-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Ryman Hospitality (RHP) Concludes Acquisition of JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Resort & Spa
Ryman Hospitality Properties, Inc. (NYSE:RHP) is one of the most undervalued stocks. On June 10, the company confirmed the completion of its acquisition of the JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Resort & Spa in Phoenix, Arizona, for nearly $865 million, following its earlier disclosure of the transaction. Mark Fioravanti, President and Chief Executive Officer of Ryman Hospitality Properties, commented: 'I want to thank the Ryman team and the sellers, Trinity Investments, for their collaboration in executing an efficient and successful closing. We are excited to begin integrating this premier resort into our differentiated, group-focused portfolio, and we look forward to pursuing compelling value creation opportunities at this beautiful property and across our one-of-a-kind portfolio.' An interior shot of the Grand Ole Opry House, showing the iconic country music brand and its architechtural grandeur. The JW Marriott Desert Ridge sits on about 402 acres in Arizona's Sonoran Desert and is one of the largest resorts in the Phoenix/Scottsdale area. It includes 950 guest rooms, with 81 suites, and around 243,000 square feet of space for meetings and events. The resort features a 28,000 square foot spa (REVIVE Spa), seven restaurants and bars, a large water area with slides and a lazy river, and two golf courses designed by Nick Faldo and Arnold Palmer. Recently, the property underwent nearly $100 million in upgrades, including renovated rooms and suites, an improved lobby, better water attractions, and updated dining areas. Ryman Hospitality Properties, Inc. (NYSE:RHP) is a hospitality-focused REIT specializing in upscale convention center resorts, including five of the seven largest non-gaming convention hotels in the United States. While we acknowledge the potential of RHP as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you're looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: and . Disclosure. None. Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
04-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Astrophotographer snaps 'once-in-a-lifetime' shot of solar flare photobombing the ISS
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. An astrophotographer has captured a stunning shot of a powerful solar flare photobombing the International Space Station (ISS) as the human-inhabited spacecraft appeared to zoom across the surface of our home star. Andrew McCarthy (aka Cosmic Background) snapped the incredible image on June 15 from a spot in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. He was initially planning to photograph a standard "transit" photo of the ISS passing directly between Earth and the sun. However, as McCarthy was setting up his camera, he noticed that one sunspot — dubbed AR4114 — had begun to "flare to life," he told Live Science. Through a mix of skill and luck, McCarthy snapped the space station as it whizzed almost directly past the flaring sunspot, revealing superhot loops of glowing plasma, or solar prominences, moments before they were flung into space by a powerful explosion. Capturing both objects in a single frame makes this a "once-in-a-lifetime" photo, McCarthy wrote on the social platform X. "Ever since I started chasing ISS [solar] transits, I've dreamed of catching one with an active flare," McCarthy told Live Science in an email. "When I saw the silhouette of the ISS flash through the frame, I knew it was something special." Being separated from the sun by 93 million miles (150 million kilometers) shielded ISS astronauts from any potentially harmful radiation from the flare. This also makes the space station loom large in the photo. But in reality, the prominences were much larger, stretching up to five times wider than Earth's diameter. "Something about the small human elements against the scale and power of the sun feels like an inspiring scene," McCarthy added. Related: 'Never been seen before': First images from new ISS solar telescope reveal subtle 'fluctuations' in sun's outer atmosphere Solar flares are currently exploding from the sun more frequently than usual as the sun nears the end of the most active phase in its roughly 11-year sunspot cycle, known as solar maximum. During this period, magnetic instabilities make it much easier for chunks of plasma to break away from the solar surface. The flare in the new photo is believed to be a powerful M8.46-magnitude blast that triggered a radio blackout across parts of North America as solar radiation temporarily disrupted the sea of plasma within Earth's ionosphere — the region of the atmosphere more than 30 miles (50 kilometers) above our planet's surface, according to Live Science's sister site Some of the plasma within the prominences also broke away from the sun entirely, forming a magnetized cloud of fast-moving particles known as a coronal mass ejection (CME), which glanced off Earth's magnetic field three days later. McCarthy named the new photo "Kardashev Dreams" in honor of Nikolai Kardashev, a Soviet astronomer who famously proposed the Kardashev scale, which measures the technological advancement of a planetary civilization based on the amount of energy it can harness. Photos like these are "a symbol of our first steps into a much larger universe," McCarthy said. Capturing the striking new photo was "much more difficult than I imagined," McCarthy said; to capture the best view of an ISS solar transit, you need to take the photo around midday, when the sun is directly overhead. And when you are taking the photo in the middle of a desert, as McCarthy did, this becomes very challenging, he added. "Large telescopes, like the kind I need to use for these [photos], do NOT handle heat very well," McCarthy said. "Components flex and swell in the heat and currents of air of different temperatures swirl in the tube, making it nigh impossible to focus." Electrical components also start to overheat and shut down, he added. RELATED STORIES —Powerful solar telescope unveils ultra-fine magnetic 'curtains' on the sun's surface —Behold! 1st images of artificial solar eclipse captured by ESA's Proba-3 mission —Bottom of the sun becomes visible to humans for the first time in history (photos) To beat the heat, McCarthy strapped ice packs to the critical components of the camera to stop them from overheating and covered as much of the equipment in reflective foil as possible. "This kept the equipment barely working," he said. Luckily, all the hard work paid off. "This was the type of shot I've been chasing for so long, and I'm thrilled to add it to my portfolio," McCarthy said.
The Guardian
01-07-2025
- General
- The Guardian
How Indigenous people find themselves on the frontline of the green transition
Located in Wikieup, Arizona, at the meeting point of the Mojave and Sonoran deserts, H'a'Kamwe' has for centuries had sacred significance for the Hualapai tribe. They regard the hot spring, fed by water naturally stored underground in volcanic rocks, as a place for healing that symbolises their connection to the land. So when an Australian mining company announced plans to begin exploratory drilling for lithium at 100 locations on Hualapai land, including as close as just 700 metres from H'a'Kamwe', they regarded it as a potential desecration. In August last year, the Hualapai filed a lawsuit before the Arizona district court against the US Bureau of Land Management, alleging it violated the National Historic Preservation Act and the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to properly assess the impact. Their case is just one of an accelerating wave of legal actions against renewable energy and critical minerals projects that is raising concerns that the green transition is leading to human rights and environmental abuses. Renewable electricity generation must triple by 2030, with 85% of that increase coming from critical mineral-hungry wind and solar power projects, if the world is to avoid catastrophic climate breakdown. But a scheme that tracks lawsuits against projects to build renewable energy plants or mine for the minerals they rely on has tracked 95 challenges since 2008, with more than three-quarters filed – like the Hualapai's – in the past seven years alone. The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre's (BHRRC) just transition litigation tracking tool found 71% of lawsuits in its dataset were linked to the mining of bauxite, cobalt, copper, lithium, manganese, nickel, zinc and iron ore – minerals BHRRC says are key to the green energy transition. The remainder targeted the renewable energy sector, 14% relating to wind, 12% linked to hydro, and 4% regarding solar. According to a report in AZCentral, the Hualapai claim included concerns that noise, vibrations and industrial machinery would ruin a site used for prayer. But their bigger concerns were environmental, including fears that drilling could puncture the aquifer that feeds H'a'Kamwe'. In that, their case was not unusual, according to BHRRC, which found that 70% of legal cases in its tracker related to the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment, and 56% relating to water pollution or access to water. Almost half the claims were filed by Indigenous people. Of these, 49% were linked to violations of Indigenous peoples' rights, including violation of the right to free, prior and informed consent in 33% of cases. Elodie Aba, a senior legal researcher at BHRRC who carried out the analysis, warned that the essential transition to cleaner energy resources could not come at the expense of people on the frontlines of resource extraction. She said: 'Lawsuits, which are often a last resort, have become a powerful tool for those left out of the decision-making process. These lawsuits are not a rejection of climate action; they are a demand for a just transition.' For the Hualapai, the law has worked – for now. Last November, a federal judge extended a temporary pause on drilling on their lands, at least for the duration of their case. The outcome has yet to be determined.
Yahoo
28-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Residents issue urgent PSA after nightmare species rapidly invades community: 'It's expanding as we speak'
Residents in Southern Arizona have sounded an alarm to raise awareness about an invasive grass taking over their area, KGUN reported. The highly invasive buffelgrass has pushed out iconic local species like mesquite trees and saguaros, while sapping the soil of vital nutrients and leaving the desert susceptible to wildfire, per KGUN. "We're on a relatively sharp slope downward to having this area of Southwest Arizona turn into grasslands," Bruce Grieshaber, a local homeowners association president, told KGUN. Originally introduced to Arizona in the 1930s for cattle grazing and erosion control, the highly invasive buffelgrass is native to Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, according to the National Park Service. The same characteristics that led people to plant buffelgrass in the first place — its drought tolerance and abundant seed production — have allowed buffelgrass to spread out of control. It now poses a threat to the natural balance of the entire region. "Buffelgrass … is the archenemy of the Sonoran Desert — the invasive grass most likely to cause significant damage to the native ecosystem," the National Park Service warned on its website. Buffelgrass is well-suited for its native habitat of savannah grasslands, where wildfires are part of the local ecosystem cycle and other vegetation has evolved to survive the heat of the flames, per the NPS. However, in the deserts of Southern Arizona, the native vegetation is not similarly adapted, leaving it vulnerable to being wiped out in a fire. Local residents lack the resources necessary to get the buffelgrass under control, let alone eradicate it. Should we be actively working to kill invasive species? Absolutely It depends on the species I don't know No — leave nature alone Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. Grieshaber told KGUN that his community has a 26-acre nature park that has been taken over by buffelgrass. "It's expanding as we speak," Grieshaber said. Despite the efforts of local volunteers, to remove all of that buffelgrass would simply require too much work, and the cost of paying to have the grass removed professionally is cost-prohibitive. The HOA even looked into bringing in sheep to graze on the buffelgrass. "We priced it out, and to do probably a couple acres, it would be thousands of dollars," Grieshaber told KGUN. Southern Arizona's struggles against invasive buffelgrass are a prime example of the impact invasive species are having around the globe. Similar stories are playing out elsewhere, with invasive species spreading deadly diseases, hurting crop production, upsetting trade, and crowding out native species. As average global temperatures climb, it aids the spread of invasive species, opening up new regions that previously were too cold for certain species to survive. Unfortunately, when it comes to invasive buffelgrass in Arizona and many similar situations, the only options available involve containment and not total eradication. However, putting even containment plans into effect requires dedicated resources. In 2014, Green Valley, Arizona, and the Pima County Flood Control District received a $70,000 grant to combat the spread of buffelgrass. Using those funds, locals were able to get the buffelgrass situation temporarily under control, per KGUN. However, when the funds ran out in 2017, the buffelgrass returned. Since that time, local HOAs have largely been left to manage the situation on their own. "We need a buffelgrass/wildfire mitigation grant so we can give relief to some of these homeowners associations that are spending thousands of dollars to keep this effort going," said Debbie Valley, president of the Green Valley Council, per KGUN. You can help combat the spread of invasive species in your own backyard or community garden by planting native species, switching to a natural lawn, or rewilding your yard. These steps save money on your water bill and landscaping costs while helping native wildlife like pollinators, birds, and small mammals. Join our free newsletter for easy tips to save more and waste less, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
