The rest of the family members miraculously were virtually unscathed — a couple of scratches, but nothing to them. What they have is the horror of what happened to the two boys.New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection spokesperson Larry Ragonese • On the death of two young cousins, aged 2 and 7, at that state’s Parvin State Park very early Saturday morning. A tree fell on top of the family, which was huddled together in a single tent amidst the storm. It’s just one of the tragedies of the extreme weather seen along the East Coast this weekend, a mixture of incredibly strong storms and record heat. In Atlanta, for example, it hit 106 degrees yesterday, an all-time record for the city. Power grids remained severely damaged throughout the region, and many were suffering from heat exhaustion, which led to the deaths of two young boys in Tennessee. Just a tip to everyone: Find AC and stay inside, but don’t be jerks to each other.
Hot dense matter, indeed: Scientists at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have successfully super-heated a small piece of aluminum foil, as thin as spider silk, to a temperature of 3.6 million degrees Fahrenheit. They did this by hitting it with a rapidly pulsing, high-powered X-ray laser, which caused the foil to become what scientists refers to as “hot dense matter,” commonly found only in places like the center of stars. This is the first time a sample has been able to be reproduced in a lab setting, and could lead to greater understanding of nuclear fusion, among other things — the 3.6 million degree matter was, in fact, hotter than the corona of our Sun. (Photo from University of Oxford/Sam Vinko) source
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