commodorez
Santa only brings mainframes to good boys and girls!
mdrambles
boffo-novelty-and-joke-shop
petermorwood
petronellabravest
The 7ft-high Blade Angel is a sculpture of 100,000 knives that have killed people across the UK. Knives were collected from 43 police stations and a memorial dedicated to the victims.
The correct name is “The Knife Angel”, and it looks like something you’d see in a Hellraiser movie. It’s 27 feet (>8 metres) tall, which I bet adds to that effect.
Another correction: it’s not made of “100,000 knives that have killed people across the UK”. That’s a massive exaggeration. Knife crime is definitely too common in the UK (and Ireland as well), but the casualty figures are nothing like this.
Some of the knives in the statue were indeed used in crimes and were delivered in evidence packs, a few supposedly still with fluid contamination(!) Yes, every one of the 100K blades was sterilised and blunted before the sculptor started, but that bit (if true…) was careless procedure on someone’s part.
A far better description would be
“100,000 knives seized by police, surrendered in amnesties or anonymously donated to knife banks”.
*****
I’ve got a fascinating and wryly funny book by Colin Watson called “
Snobbery With Violence: English Crime Stories and Their Audience
” which notes that the use of stabby-cutty weapons used to be (or was at least popularly regarded as) a serious no-no for even the most crooked of British crooks.
Using a knife on someone, old boy, simply Isn’t Done.
Daddy’s Purdey shotgun, Uncle William’s Holland & Holland big-game rifle or even Cousin Geoffrey’s Webley service revolver are an entirely different matter.
As for the selection of interesting white powders favoured by Great-Aunt Agatha, that’s a genre in itself…
puchun
cosmictuesdays
bakasara
what Buffy The Vampire Slayer got right was that it went like (any gender person punches any gender person) (cartoon punch sound)
figdays
fuckyeahfluiddynamics
Wet Masks Block Droplets Better
As wearing face masks for long periods has become more typical, you may have wondered whether a soggy mask offers less protection. All masks – cloth, surgical, and N-95s – get moist from their wearer’s breath. A recent study indicates this isn’t a cause for alarm, though. (Image credit: top - V. Davidova, other - S. Bagchi et al.; research credit: S. Bagchi et al.; via APS Physics)
Researchers looked at how relatively high-speed droplets (like those from a cough or sneeze) impact dry and wet masks. These high-speed droplets can break into smaller droplets upon impact with a mask layer. The more layers a mask has, the fewer droplets make it through. But even for single-layer masks*, a moistened mask layer lets fewer droplets through. So you don’t have to worry if it’s a little humid in there. Your mask is still working! (Image credit: top - V. Davidova, other - S. Bagchi et al.; research credit: S. Bagchi et al.; via APS Physics)
* To be clear, you should be wearing masks that are more than a single layer thick. Personally, I’m still only going into indoor public spaces in an N-95 at this point.
Droplet penetration through a mask. Top row: dry, single layer mask. Middle row: wet, single layer mask. Bottom row: wet, triple layer mask. When wet, masks permit fewer droplets through.
Read the full article
ari-kanon
arcticflakes
