Month: January 2021

A federal judge has lifted most restrictions on non-crewed commercial photography in National Parks. YouTubers and other people who make a few dollars from photography are now able to film without filing permits or paying outrageous fees. About time.

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uggligr commented on your video
Carnotite Musings

uggligr

Dear Mr. Farley; notice that carnotite does not dissolve in water. Uranium 238 decays into thorium 234, whose compounds do dissolve in water. In many deposits, especially carnotite sand, this thorium leaches out of the carnotite. Thorium 234 decays in 24.1 days in a four step process into uranium 234. This uranium, once away from the vanadate complex, will stay dissolved in water as long as there is oxygen in the water. If the water goes into an anoxic condition such as a marsh or a bog, the uranium condenses out into uraninite, a refractory substance that resists mechanical or chemical attack, thus forming a deposit. Uranium 234 is a nuclear explosive. If you know where any of this material is located, call the sheriff of the county it’s in and have him lock it down. Have him contact the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Tell them that “Project Zeus”, named after the Nike missile interceptor, sent you. I have already contacted the NRC, the FBI, sheriffs and park rangers, and anybody who I think can help. You will not get in trouble. I will. Thank you for your cooperation. I have not been jailed and don’t expect to be. Do not let terrorists blow up a city with this. I regret to report that all the information I have gathered is on the open internet for anybody to find.

BLM has introduced their new new mining management system for public lands, replacing the command line interface of the old LR2000 with a zoomable map. Yay!

This is what they say:

“The Bureau of Land Management has been working to modernize and transform the land and minerals management experience for its customers. As a result, the BLM is excited to introduce the Mineral and Land Records System, or MLRS. This free, secure, and user-friendly online platform will enhance tracking of land and mineral resource decisions, records, and cases involving these resources on BLM-managed public lands. MLRS will improve data quality, increase transparency, and create a better experience for BLM’s customers.”

And this is what I say:

Thanks. I particularly like how the MLRS shows yearly claims in what looks like their approximate positions in each section. When LR2000 came out I was hoping that it would show me the documents inside present and past mining claim folders, saving me a trip to BLM Headquarters on Cottage Way in Sacramento. Alas, no. Twenty years on, it still looks like I can’t do that online. No look at annual assessment work, no look at a miner’s maps, no clue as to what, for example, the mineral a miner was staking for. This map actually looks like a refinement of what the shoe-string and non-profit MyLandMatters.org has been doing for years. As well as the Diggings. Here’s hoping that with your budget and resources you can, in less than twenty more years, provde us miners with all the public record information you have. Thanks.

Mineral and Land Records System from Bureau of Land Management on Vimeo.

A very nice person named Brian left me a voice mail saying he had sent me an email with photos. Unfortunately, I cannot find any email from him in any of my three mail accounts. And I checked their spam folders.

So, if you are out there Brian, send me an email at [email protected]. That’s the best way to get hold of me. Right now I am on the road toward Quartzsite so communication of all kind will be difficult or delayed. Thanks, Thomas

I’m learning a great deal from Nick Zentner.

Using only four chalkboards and a handheld white board, Zentner conveys the basics of geology in a warm and easy to understand manner.

No Death by Powerpoint here.

His method would be a great approach to live streaming.

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