https://newatlas.com/space/2014-un271-comet-solar-system-close-pass/

By Michael IrvingJune 20, 2021https://newatlas.gystaudio.com/embedded/newatlas.com/space/2014-un271-comet-solar-system-close-pass/

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A diagram of the orbit path of 2014 UN271, which will make its closest pass in 2031JPL Solar System DynamicsVIEW 1 IMAGES

The outskirts of our solar system is teeming with mysterious objects – and now one of them is heading our way. Astronomers have discovered a minor planet that’s about to make its closest pass to the Sun on its 600,000-year orbit.

The object in question is designated 2014 UN271, and it was only recently identified in data from the Dark Energy Survey captured between 2014 and 2018. Size estimates place it anywhere between 100 and 370 km (62 and 230 miles) wide. If it’s a comet, it’s quite a big one, especially for one coming from the outer solar system.

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“[That] puts it on a similar scale, if not larger than, Sarabat’s huge comet C/1729 P1, and almost undoubtedly the largest Oort Cloud object ever discovered – almost in dwarf planet territory!” says Sam Deen, a citizen astronomer, in a post on the Minor Planet Mailing List (MPML) forum.

But by far the most intriguing thing about 2014 UN271 is its orbit around the Sun. This thing is extremely eccentric, journeying between the inner solar system and the Oort cloud that marks the boundary of interstellar space over a period of 612,190 years.

And it turns out, astronomers are about to witness the closest pass of this incredible round trip. Currently, 2014 UN271 is about 22 Astronomical Units (AU) from the Sun (for reference, Earth is 1 AU from the Sun). That means it’s already closer than Neptune, at 29.7 AU. And it’s not stopping there – it’s already traveled 7 AU in the last seven years, and at its closest in 2031, it’s expected to pass within 10.9 AU of the Sun, almost reaching the orbit of Saturn.

Before then, it’s expected to develop the characteristic coma and tail of a comet, as icy material on its surface vaporizes from the heat of the Sun. This close pass would give astronomers an unprecedented close look at Oort cloud objects.

Unfortunately for us amateurs on the ground, don’t expect to see a show on the scale of Halley’s comet. While it’s too early to tell for sure, Deen calculates that 2014 UN271 would, at best, become about as bright as Pluto in the night sky, but more likely it’ll reach the brightness of Pluto’s moon Charon. Still, we’ll probably get some amazing shots from telescopes and observatories of the time.https://e012bf0bfa4469e1ffb3df15c1c26204.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

After its close pass, 2014 UN271 will then hurtle back out into the inky blackness, on a several-hundred millennia return trip to the Oort cloud, and an incredible peak distance of almost 60,000 AU.

WEATHER

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/weather/wildfires-erupt-after-hottest-week-history-across-parts-west-ignited-n1271603

Meteorologists are worried another heat wave could be coming next week for the West, leading to an even higher wildfire risk on the horizon.

June 21, 2021, 8:27 AM PDTBy Kathryn Prociv

Last week featured one of the worst June heat waves in decades across the West, shattering hundreds of daily records, as well as several all-time hottest temperatures recorded for the month.

Death Valley soared to a blistering 128 degrees, and Denver saw a rare hat trick of three 100-degree days in a row.

Tucson saw eight straight days of temperatures 110 degrees or higher, breaking the record for the number of consecutive days above that barrier and making it the city’s hottest week. Phoenix endured a record-setting six straight days of temperatures 115 or higher.

All of this heat contributed to a high fire danger which came to fruition over the weekend when multiple blazes broke out in several Western states including California, Colorado, Arizona and Oregon.

Death Valley’s soaring temperatures create hot spot for tourists

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The Willow Fire in Monterey County, which forced evacuations Friday, continued to burn over the weekend sending smoke billowing into the Bay Area.

The Cow Fire in Shasta County also prompted evacuation orders, and at one point Sunday required a large air tanker to be diverted off the Willow Fire for increased firefighting efforts.

On Monday, 7 million people were under red flag warnings across six Western states where the combination of hot temperatures, wing gusts to 40 mph and bone-dry humidity lead to a critical fire threat.

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Las Vegas was included in the risk zone for the fire danger.

The most recent heat wave was focused over portions of the Four Corners, desert Southwest and Southern and Central California. Next week, however, the area of most exceptional heat could park over northern California and the Pacific Northwest.

This will lead to another week with a high risk of wildfires due to the already desiccated landscape void of much precipitation whether falling from the sky or locked in the mostly-melted snowpack.

With ground fuels already sitting at highly flammable and record-dry levels, all experts can do is warn people of the impending danger and hope for the best in what has already proven to be an early and destructive start to the Western wildfire season.

With climate change making heat waves three times more likely compared to 100 years ago and contributing to the current 22-year megadrought, wildfire seasons are starting earlier and lasting longer into the year. As the gap closes, experts say there isn’t so much a defined wildfire season in the West anymore, but instead it lasts year round.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jun/20/far-right-activist-ammon-bundy-announces-run-idaho-governor

Sign of rightward trend of politics in the rural and Republican-dominated state

Edward Helmore and agenciesSun 20 Jun 2021 09.15 EDT

Far-right anti-government activist and militia figure Ammon Bundy has announced a bid to be governor of Idaho governor in a further sign of the rightward trend of politics in the rural and Republican-dominated state.

The Stetson-wearing activist said he wants to defend Idaho from President “Joe Biden and those in the Deep State that control him” because they “are going to try to take away our gun rights, freedom of religion, parental rights, and more and further violate the Constitution in unimaginable ways even more than they’ve already done.”

There is little evidence to back up Bundy’s sentiments which reflect paranoid ideas common on the US far right. Idaho, which has long had a tradition of anti-government and pro-militia sentiment, is seen as being one of the most rightwing Republican states in the US, especially in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic which has seen rightwing groups fight health measures like wearing masks.Advertisement

Bundy and his family gained fame in 2014, when they engaged in an armed standoff with Bureau of Land Management agents at their Bunkerville, Nevada, ranch amid a dispute over his father Cliven Bundy’s refusal to pay grazing fees.

Ammon, brother Ryan and Cliven Bundy were indicted and served jail time, but they later acquitted.

He gained further recognition in 2016 over a protest at the the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge – part of a campaign to force the federal government to turn public land of over to states.

Bundy was arrested twice last year at Idaho’s state capitol after leading a march to protest Idaho’s stay-at-home order and later charged with criminal trespass for disrupting a meeting of the state legislature. In April this year he was arrested again over a similar encounter. He has pleaded not guilty in one case and has not yet entered a plea in the second.

Bundy filed documents last month indicating plans to run. He will likely face competition. The current Idaho governor, Brad Little, Lt Governor Janice McGeachin and four other Republicans Jeff Cotton, Edward Humphreys, Lisa Marie and Cody Usabel have also filed papers.

But Idaho Republican party chairman Tom Luna said this month that Bundy is not welcome among GOP ranks, KTVB reported, pointing to Bundy’s failure to register as a Republican before at the time he filed initial campaign paperwork.

“Furthermore, we do not support his antics or his chaotic political theater,” Luna said. “That is not the Idaho Republican Party, and we will not turn a blind eye to his behaviors.”

In his campaign launch video, Bundy drew attention to his long battle with the federal government over the use of government land, which make up about two-thirds of the state. His platform is to eliminate property and income taxes, federal control over land and public health mandates.

In the campaign-launch video, Bundy also referred to his repeated conflicts with the government.

“We cannot afford to have state leadership that lets the federal government bully us, or walk all over us. And it’s an unfair fight, when the federal government unlawfully attacks the people believe me, I know as my family and I experienced this first hand, when we were unlawfully attacked by federal officials at our family ranch in Nevada in 2014,” Bundy said.

“But we did not back down, and thankfully, likeminded patriots across the country stood with us, as we fought back against federal tyranny to protect our land and our rights.”

https://news.yahoo.com/father-8-set-2nd-vaccine-140641747.html

EMILY SHAPIROSat, June 19, 2021, 7:06 AM·6 min read

This Father’s Day will be an especially difficult one for many of the more than 600,000 American families mourning the death of a loved one to COVID-19.

Among those is the Ballard family in North Carolina, grappling with the loss of their patriarch.

Gordon Ballard, a devoted husband and father of eight who pushed through a lifelong illness to provide for his family, died of COVID-19 on May 17, 2021, his daughter said.

The 65-year-old tested positive two weeks earlier, on May 3 — the same day he was set to get his second vaccine dose.

Dedicated dad

As a child in upstate New York, Ballard had a unique career in mind: funeral director, one of his daughters, Sharena Ballard-Hart, told ABC News.

He attended the Simmons Institute of Funeral Service in Syracuse before interning at a funeral home in Rochester. He was there working a funeral when he fell for the decedent’s daughter, Sandra.

Gordon and Sandra married and would have celebrated their 40th anniversary this July, Ballard-Hart said of her parents.

The Ballards’ road to parenthood began quickly. When Sandra’s mother died, the young couple took in Sandra’s 4-year-old brother, Quinton, and raised him as their own son.

“I just remember them picking me up with my suitcase, taking me home. At the time we lived above a funeral home,” the Ballards’ eldest child, Quinton Wilburn, told ABC News.

After welcoming Sharena and her brother Marcus, the Ballards decided to become foster parents and adopted five children.

As a father of eight, Gordon Ballard was a hard worker and “very generous,” Wilburn said.

“He watched ‘Jeopardy’ faithfully every single day” and wanted his family to think “he knew everything,” Ballard-Hart added.

He was also protective of his wife. Whenever Ballard had a health battle, he was always more concerned about Sandra, Ballard-Hart said.

Gordon Ballard was born with sickle cell anemia — a disorder in which there aren’t enough healthy red blood cells to move oxygen through the body — and suffered one or two crises per year, his daughter said.

Story continues: https://news.yahoo.com/father-8-set-2nd-vaccine-140641747.html