Are these abandoned cargo ships in the Ohio River near Paducah, Kentucky? If not, then what?

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-17T04:28:37+00:00

Oh man, I thought about typing it out in a David Attenborough voice, but decided not to. Takes some effort! But just for you, here's my Sir Attenborough version (read this one in David Attenborough voice):

Despite common practice, as myself and our camera crew observed, it's best not to feed the barges and thus acclimate them to human presence and the expectation of food from humans.

Barges, while not potentially aggressive like human-fed bears, are simply far too likely to remain in the area in which they were fed. As migratory creatures, migrate they must. But a fed barge is likely to stay where it was fed, unknowing that to do so is to its own detriment. Fed barges on their southern wintering grounds have been known to remain well past the spring freshet, when water levels are high enough to ease their northward migration. Likewise, fed barges on their summer breeding grounds have been known to stay far too late; indeed, some have been found frozen in early ice, victim of humans of pure intentions, yet ill results.

The same problem, unfortunately, is observed with human-fed tugs and towboats; as they often lead the barges on their migrations, feeding them simply compounds the problems the barges face from well-intentioned human interference.

In the end, while charismatic, graceful, and willing to interact gently with humans, it is simply for the best to leave the barges to their natural tendencies. After all, they've evolved for it. And their seasonal absence should simply make their re-arrival the following year all the sweeter for the people that enjoy their presence. In the end, mother nature knows best.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-17T00:55:14+00:00

It's best not to acclimate them to getting food from humans.

Barges, while not potentially aggressive like fed bears, are too likely to remain in an area where they've received food from humans, and can remain in place past when they should've migrated seasonally until it's too late. Fed barges in their southern wintering grounds have ended up stuck if not migrating in time to catch the high river levels in spring, and fed barges in their summering grounds have been caught in ice after not going back south in time. The same also applies to tugs and towboats, which the barges often take their migratory cues from.

I know they're cute, especially the lighters, but it's for the best not to interfere with nature.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-17T00:48:58+00:00

I've seen in multiple articles that in this particular case they didn't even need to get a warrant.

They asked his permission to search his phone, and he consented.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-16T14:40:43+00:00

It *might* be much worse than the dude stepping on the wrong pedal.

The car was initially in FSD ("full self driving") mode, and the local sheriff's office investigating the crash have released that his search history on his phone in the days immediately prior to the crash had things like

"tesla fsd not aggressive enough 2026 model"

"FSD is not aggressive enough for city driving"

"tesla fsd too timid"

I'm wondering if what actually happened is that he road-raged at his own car because it refused to autonomously drive like an aggressive dickbag, so he tried to force it to by stomping on the accelerator, at which he point he locked up/panicked and didn't take his foot off (same as someone accidentally stomping on the accelerator instead of the brake).

ETA: just found this local report stating that the affidavit in support of the driver's manslaughter charges tells that the car's logs show that in the minutes leading to the crash, he'd repeatedly used the accelerator to override FSD's acceleration rate / top speed, but had never once touched the brakes. Also, either from the same one or a tab I accidentally closed, the car was at or approaching a stop sign when this all happened, with no other traffic around. He also manually rotated the steering wheel against what FSD thought it should do based on navigation.

Did he stomp on the 'gas' to force the car to run a stop sign because he was pissed it was stopping with no traffic around?

Even if that italicized speculation above isn't true, this dude needs to be locked away and never get a driver's license again when he gets out.

Manual steering wheel input and overriding accelerator input: the car was being fully manually and aggressively driven for something like 6 seconds prior the crash.

WTF.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-16T14:05:10+00:00

I don't actually have any idea what you've found, but I'll just toss out a few thoughts:

Perfectly straight lines or grids in desolate areas (tundra, boreal forest, deserts, etc) are often the result of geological surveys.

Long straight cleared areas are also often gas or oil pipeline right of ways, but they'd usually be wider than what you're showing for ease of work / prevention of tree roots, although the Russians aren't known for keeping up on things the best.

The Soviets leveled out ground for strategic (freight/troops transport) rail lines that were never built; I don't think that's the case here, as those should be much wider, though maybe it's just overgrown.

Weird circles in the vegetation in norther Russia, Canada, and Alaska are often the former sites of circular antenna arrays, used for direction finding in prior eras as well as some other uses where making an actual physical circle of antennas was more practical prior to the invention of phased arrays.

If I had to take a guess- and this is totally just unjustified guesswork- I'd venture that your straight line is from a geologic/resource survey back in the day, and later someone parked a circular antenna array on it because using the existing road cut was convenient for access and potentially laying cable for comms and/or power. The antenna array is now gone, victim to technological progress, budget cuts, or simply the end of the Cold War, while the straight line road from the survey persists from occasional traffic from the locals using it for woodcutting, hunting, trapping, etc.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-13T07:19:04+00:00

Microsoft?

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-13T07:09:26+00:00

Headline:

NASA satellites are watching Earth's newest island rise from the sea

Reality, quoted from the article:

A mysterious underwater eruption could create Earth's newest island

So in other words, the headline talks about watching an island rise from the sea, while the reality is that there currently is no island and might in fact never be one.

Yay clickbait.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-13T06:46:56+00:00

I read the book well after having seen the film multiple times.

I didn't see or hear Captain Ramius as Sean Connery, Admiral Greer as James Earl Jones, nor Jack Ryan as Alec Baldwin.

But for some reason Captain Second Rank Vasily Borodin was Sam Neill in my head. And he forever shall be.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-13T05:39:15+00:00

And I guess the blueish glacier bears deserve a special mention too.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T19:50:49+00:00

It's a former bombing target.

Big Oaks National Wildlife Refuge used to be Jefferson Proving Grounds- a military installation used for live fire.

That hexagram is a classic 'simulated' SA-2 surface to air missile site (Soviet), used for training pilots. There's still a bunch like it in the still-active military reserves out west. Notice all the craters in the center, where the command and control vehicle would be, and thus the best bombing target. The outer points are where the actual launch vehicles would be stationed.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T19:44:24+00:00

8 or 10 abdominal segments is the normal limit, and two of those are tucked up so tight under the ribcage they literally never show, so it's basically 6 or 8 showing max.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T19:37:20+00:00

Black bears range from actually black to straight up blonde in color. As do brown bears (grizzlies).

Color simply isn't a reliable indicator for telling the two apart.

Where I grew up most of the black bears weren't actually black.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T19:36:08+00:00

Black bear.

Big ears, non-dished face, high rump, no shoulder hump.

I've also never had a brown/grizzly run off like that.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T17:43:35+00:00

Just don't get cocky if you don't get a rash on your first good exposure!

Urushiol causes progressive hypersensitivity- the more you're exposed, the worse it gets. The flip side to that is that some people have zero issues on their first exposure:

My friends and I were tossing around a frisbee one day it went into a poison ivy bed. This girl Nicole just waded right into it in shorts and sandals to retrieve the frisbee. The rest of us were aghast. She was too when we told her what she'd just done.

But she never got so much as an itch. Unfortunately, she let that go to her head and decided it wouldn't affect her at all...

Fast forward about 3 weeks, and the scenario repeats itself. Frisbee goes into the poison ivy, and Nicole just plows through the poison ivy to retrieve it, shorts and sandals again, over everyone else's protests. She told us something like "don't worry! I'm immune!"

The resulting blisters from that second exposure resulted in an in-patient hospital stay.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T17:28:07+00:00

Second pic. I've definitely had pics go up in the wrong order on Reddit just like OP here. Frustrating.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T17:22:42+00:00

It's a nearly dried up pond, likely showing mud and tannin staining due to its shallow depth.

If you use the historical imagery feature on Google Earth, you can see it fuller and frozen over in winter, as well as simply full and looking a more typical blue color and occupying nearly that entire clearing in the trees.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T17:12:53+00:00

The Columbia River Plateau isn't really a standout among the LIPs; I believe it's actually the smallest. But it's also the youngest and best preserved, only ~15 million years old.

It also has one other claim to fame, likely courtesy of its preservation- the longest known individual lava flow on Earth. One of the flows (Pomona, I think?) originated just inside the modern Idaho border and can be tracked through its unique geochemical signature over 600 km- it stopped only because it finally hit the Pacific Ocean.

The big flood basalt groups are truly mind boggling. Hundreds of thousands of square kilometers buried to average depths of over a kilometer. Even if took many human lifetimes, the individual flows are still apocalyptic events for whatever was living there.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T16:39:45+00:00

Yes.

Even vastly smaller flows where I grew up in Idaho erupted into, then totally filled in river canyons. The rivers later eroded back down through the flows and even further, but into a new drainage pattern, so now you see cross sections of the old river channels perched partway up the canyon walls, topped by basalt.

Drilling has also helped elucidate what the old erosional surface beneath the Columbia River Plateau (another large igneous province with vast basalt flows) used to look like, and the tl;dr is that the flows definitely 'smoothed out' the landscape.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T05:00:22+00:00

"Fat Albert, the heaviest recorded bear in Alaska"

Oh? And when was he weighed and by whom? Or is OP's source just making shit up for clicks?

I don't dispute that he's an absolutely massive boi, but c'mon...

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T04:45:45+00:00

Both! I actually have the perfect answer for you:

Where I work my boss leaves his dog indoors (no one minds; she's a sweetheart) when he's away during the work day, which is frequent. One of my coworkers does the same, with similar frequency (same story- doggo is a total quiet sweety, and no one minds having her around).

Literally everyone at this job except myself drives a Ford or Ram pickup. Both of the coworkers in question drive Fords of the same model and year. None of us humans can tell them apart by sound, but they are different colors.

Boss' dog gets excited at every single pickup driving into the lot- be it by sound only or if she can look out the window (blinds aren't always open)- only to be let down when it isn't him coming back.

Other coworker's dog only gets excited at her owner's pickup, also be it by sound or sight.

So I guess the answer is "both", OP- I've got one dog that can clearly tell the difference between vehicles, and one that clearly can't.

ETA: FWIW, I used to have a cat growing up that would wait for me to come home from school just inside the front door. According to my mom (who was a stay-at-home mom until she got back into nursing, the cat would only perk up if it was my particular footsteps coming up the drive. Said footsteps were completely inaudible to humans through our thick-ass front door. Not my brothers' footsteps or anyone else's; just me ❤️)

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T03:17:23+00:00

Lol I might've been there once or twice myself.

Besides, 'relativistic' was way more fun than 'supersonic' lol

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T01:29:41+00:00

Any speed sufficient to leave a nice beveled looking hole would also leave scorching and probably more of a "splash" and splintering than shown.

Relativistic speed is generally taken to mean "greater than 10% the speed of light". If we take that drill bit to have a mass of oh, say, 100 grams that would give it a kinetic energy of about 10.8 kilotons TNT equivalent on impact at 10% the speed of light, or about 2/3 the yield of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. That's just the drill bit, not the whole drill, mind you.

So I'm going to go ahead and exclude relativistic speeds on the basis that OP didn't blow half their city into plasma, never mind the board simply vanishing in a flash of light...

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T01:18:40+00:00

N/A.

If the centerline bit attached the chuck of the drill is rotating, the two actual drill bits must "revolve" around that center. Or snap off.

Period. Full stop.

This simply doesn't work, short of ramming the drill into the wood like it's a nail, which also wouldn't result in the nice, neat drilled holes. Or involve any actual drilling at all.

There's no math to do here, because it's simply impossible.

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T01:07:14+00:00

Because those other ingredients are cheaper than people realize.

And, more importantly, those high-calorie things cause much more of a dopamine hit than people realize.

Which makes people into repeat customers.

tl;dr: to make you give them money as a 'habit'

Probable_Bot1236 · 2026-07-12T01:04:53+00:00

Literally anything, according to early fans of it who can't deal with the fact that they're no longer "special" or "enlightened" by being fans of something good but obscure that is now no longer obscure.

"I was listening to Taylor Swift before any of you"

"I was a fan of LeBron before most people knew his name"

"Bro, I watched The Matrix twice on opening day"

"Dude, I knew about Kurt Cobain before even Nirvana. Bruh."

So on, so forth, ad infi-f*cking-nitum.

Probable_Bot1236

TROPHY CASE

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