No. 196 May 1999
LESS-THAN-ALERT/SLEEPY DRIVER TO GET MEASURED Have you ever become tired and sleepy while driving? Often? Had an accident yet? Do you know anyone who has been tired or sleepy while driving and would not admit to that fact? The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Office of Vehicle Safety Research is researching the development of an ocular-based measurement device for the alertness of drivers. Fatigue detection and measurement technology can measure the eyelids' closure, PERCLOS which is "the percent of time eyelids are closed 80% or more" is a measure found significantly correlated with driver fatigue. Other psychophyisological measures include two eye-blink measures, two electroencephalograph (EEG) measures, and a head movement detector. Preliminary research at NHTSA has shown PERCLOS to be the most promising effective measurement technique and best indicator of driver alertness and fatigue. Research studies at the University of Pennsylvania and Carnegie Mellon Research Institute include driver-vehicle interface devises that will detect and measure the driver's lack of alertness and provide warnings or alarms. Evaluation of Techniques for Ocular Measurement, DOT-HS-808 762 is a NHTSA document available from the National Technical Information Service (703) 605-6000 or (800) 553-6847. This NHTSA report, which provides information about the fatigue measurement techniques and the Carnegie Mellon Research Institute study to be done in the spring 1999, should be interesting. The Federal Register v. 64, no. 18, January 28, 1999 pages 4487-4490 is where the hunt begins for information about how to prove to a stubborn driver that he/she is getting sleepy.
LASERS "Light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation" are the words behind the acronym LASER. LASERS, which come in various shapes and sizes, emit visible (or invisible light). Some operate from batteries and some do not. Some are found in surgical operating rooms and some are found mounted on guns and rifles. Some LASERS are used to cut materials, vaporize steel, and some cauterize blood vessels or tissue. Then there are some LASERS which are about the size of pencils, operate on batteries, neither injure nor harm the human body but can temporarily disrupt one's visual ability. This type of LASER in the hands of mischievous children or person committing a crime is the concern of law enforcement officers. There have been reports of juveniles temporarily blinding subway drivers, British sports fans aiming laser pointers at soccer players, and American spectators shining LASERS into the eyes of basketball players at the free throw line. Law enforcement officers don't want to worry about LASERS blinding them temporarily and having their judgement impaired. Since many states do not have a reporting category for lasers used in the commission of a crime, Texas A & M University and Walter Reed Army Institute have developed a website to collect this type of laser use information. The U.S. Army Medical Research Detachments Automated LASER Accident/Incident Reporting Website at http://hoxie.brooks.af.mil/ . This is an online database where all law enforcement officers can submit laser incident data. This database is also a source of statistics about laser accident incident occurrence. Douglas Johnson at dougjohnson@tamu.edu is the contact person as well as the author of "Laser Threats to Law Enforcement" FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin v. 68, no 5, May 1999 pages 7-9. (J 1.14/8:68/5). Does this shine any light on the LASER topic?
BLACK BOXES IN VEHICLES We all know about the "black boxes" which are in airplanes and that it is an analysis of the information in these black boxes that can help determine why an airplane has crashed. Have you ever thought of having a comparable black box in a car or truck? I have not but there are (at least) two people who have. Marie E. Birnbaum and Price T. Bingham. Ms. Birnbaum asked the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to initiate rulemaking to require passenger cars and light trucks to be equipped with "black boxes" (data recorders) analogous to those found on commercial airliners. Mr. Bingham wanted rulemaking to require air bag sensors to be designed so that similar information is recorded during a crash and can be read by crash investigators. Mr. Bingham's petition was denied per the NHTSA notice in the Federal Register v. 63, No. 216 November 9, 1998 pages 60270-60271 and Ms. Birnbaum's petition was denied for the same reasons in the "National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 49 CFR Part 571, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, Denial of petition for rulemaking," Federal Register v. 64, no. 105, June 2, 1999 pages 29616-29617. Part of the reason for the petition denial is that there is a NHTSA Event Data Recorder Working Group which includes car manufactures representatives who are working on the issue of black boxes for vehicles and if you go to the NHTSA website http://dms.dot.gov , search for Docket No. 5218, on the results page http://dms.dot.gov/search/hitlist.asp click on "NHTSA-1999-5218-1" and you will find the 80 page written minutes (in Multi-pageTIFF and Adobe PDF files) of the Group's Meeting. This should be good start for information about "black boxes" for vehicles.
HMDA/CRA DATABASE - A FASTRACK TO CENSUS TRACT DATA Those banks which qualify under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) and the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) have to report on every HDMA Loan/Application Register the Census Tract or BNA (Block Number Area) Number for every loan applicant. The geographic code for the MSA (Metropolitan Statistical Area), the State, and County must also be put on the person(s)'s loan application. To find the Census Tract/BNA and the geographic code numbers, the bank officer need only type http://www.ffiec.gov/geocode into his Internet browser and the FFIEC Geocoding System will appear on the computer screen. The bank officer then fills in the FFIEC's electronic form with the appropriate address and zip code and hits the search button. The search result is the "Geocode Search Result for 1999 HDMA/CRA Reporting" screen which contains the "street address, the zip code, and the MSA, State, County, and Tract/BNA codes." Next a click of the mouse on "Get Demographic Data" will uncover 10 data items in a "Summary Census Demographic Information" about the Census Tract or BNA. Also, on the screen are (three) more links at: "More on Income Data", "More on Population Data", and "More on Housing Data" that will lead to 1990 and 1999 data (estimates) for family, household, race, ethnicity, poverty, and income. In short, "one address," "one zip code," and a "few clicks of the mouse" and you get Tract/BNA numbers, geographic codes, and lots of Census Data about your Tract/BNA, address, and zip code area. What's easier???….I know: have someone else do it for you!!! A Guide to HMDA Reporting, Getting It Right in a pdf and MSWord 97files at http://www.ffiec.gov/hmda/howtfile.htm is where our information begins.
HUMANITY IS A FINGERPRINT, DNA, & BAR CODE Everyone was first identifiable by his/her unique fingerprints. Then the DNA analysis of body fluids was found to identify the person via his DNA profile. Now in 1999, each person can have the set of antibodies found within him or her analyzed and the result is a display of a "bar code" of antibodies unique for each person. "Vicki Thompson, Chemical Engineer at the Dept of Energy's (INEEL) Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Laboratory and Miragen, a biotechnology company have developed a new technique called the Antibody Profile Assay (AbPTM) that can identify an individual by a subset of normally occurring antibodies present in his body. These antibodies, called Individual Specific Autoantibodies (ISA's), are not affected by medicines or illnesses, and with very few exceptions are stable across a person's lifetime--just like a fingerprint." The AbPTM assay test to develop the "bar code" for the individual takes only about two hours and costs about twenty dollars. This is much faster and cheaper than DNA testing which cost from $200 to $1200 and takes from 24 hours to three weeks. This is a very new, fast, and cheap identification technology for law enforcement and security and whoever else wants to identify individuals. You will find the initial INEEL February 11, 1999 News Press Release "Human Identity Reduced to A Bar Code" at http://www.inel.gov/cgi-bin/newsdesk.cgi?a=30&t=template.html
EXTREME WEATHER COSTS Weather occurs and it costs money. Sometimes a little (money) and sometimes a lot. The lack of rain will cause some people to water their garden and grass and they pay for the water. Sometimes, there is too much rain and we have a flood with physical damage to one's house and land. Extreme weather conditions conducive to tornadoes and hurricanes can result in partial or total housing and property loss and loss of life, all of which are costly. The National Center for Atmospheric Research has issued on February 8, 1999 a news release: NCAR Web Site Reports Economic Costs of Extreme Weather by State http://www.ucar.edu/publications/newsreleases/1999/sourcebk.html . This site presents the Extreme Weather Sourcebook, Economic Losses Related to Floods, Tornadoes and Hurricanes in the United States. This online volume http://www.dir.ucar.edu/esig/HP_roger/sourcebook/ ranks the 50 States and Territories in order of economic losses due to each type of hazard. Data for tornadoes covers 1960-1996, data for hurricane impacts covers 1925-1995, and floods data ranges from 1983-1996. The site presents separate information and economic loss data on each type of hazard as well as combined data for all three. There are also links to detailed graphs, and more details about the cost per year in 1997 dollars for each state and each hazard. "This site also allows comparisons of where a region or state stands in the national picture". Now you can find out what the weather has cost the American people.
DISASTER BY DESIGN "Disaster is by design." "It's not God." "It's not nature." These are quotes from the May 20, 1999 Knight-Ridder News Service article by Seth Borenstein. Seth's article is entitled "Report says population patterns court disasters." Borenstein got his information from Dennis Mileti's new book: Disasters by Design: A Reassessment of Natural Hazards in the United States. Mileti is the lead author of this 376 paged federally funded study of natural hazards in the United States. The National Academy Press web site publication number 5782 at http://www.nap.edu/catalog/5782.html allows you to review the circa 120 word "description" of the content and purpose of the study and its "table of contents". The book can be ordered from the National Academy Press or the full text viewed online. Many people go to Florida to retire or to the sunny California shores to escape the cold winters of Nebraska, New York, and other similar places. It is usually Florida that is hit by hurricanes and California is the state which comes to mind if one thinks about earthquake disasters, mud slides and Santa Anna wind supported fires. "As more people move to more hazard-prone areas, catastrophes, the really big ones, are getting larger." Deaths from hurricanes and other disasters are down in recent years because of better warning systems, yet 24,000 people died from disasters between 1970and 1994. As the study's "description" presents, "this volume provides an overview of what is known about natural hazards, disasters, recovery, and mitigation, how research findings have been translated into policies and programs; and a sustainable hazard research agenda. Also provided is an examination of past disaster losses and hazards management over the past 20 years, including factors--demographic, climate, social--that influence loss." Isn't it true that if an earthquake, mudslide, tornado, snowstorm, or other climate related or geophysical event occurs in the middle of the ocean or high in the uninhabited mountains, that event is not a (natural) disaster? Yet if the same earthquake or natural event takes place where people live we call that same climatological or geophysical event a natural disaster because human life and possessions and/or property are damaged or lost. Right?
August 12, 1999
http://www.nku.edu/~yannarella/news9905.html