DAILY LOBO new mexico
Science in art
thursday
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The Independent Voice of UNM since 1895
December 10, 2009
Carlsbad threatened by potential sinkhole by Kallie Red-Horse Daily Lobo
Pre-historic caverns in Carlsbad may have put the small city on the map, but locals are concerned a man-made cavern might take the city off it. Salt mining has left a cavity beneath a main intersection on the south side of town that threatens to collapse any day, said George Veni, member of a city committee working on the issue. “What we have right now is a cavity down below. Once it collapses, it will be a sinkhole,” he said. “Any building within this sinkhole will be
destroyed, but in terms of the larger impact this will have, we’re looking at potential disruption of one or two of the highways within town, potential disruption of the railroad tracks and potential disruption of an irrigation canal that provides the water for agriculture.” The existence of the salt brine well was not unknown to residents, but the recent collapse of two similar mines outside of town has raised concern, Veni said. “We realized that the brine well in Carlsbad was very similar in very many ways to the two that collapsed,” he said. “Their age, depth and geology were alike and we
realized that there may be a problem here.” The salt mining technique injects water into underground rocks in order to dissolve the salt layer, trapping the oil and reaching the brine held within the rocks, UNM Geology Professor Wolfgang Elston said. “A sinkhole occurs when the ground subsides because something is gone from underneath it,” Elston said. “Unless some fluid moves in to take its place, something has to give.” UNM student Janae Owen is from Carlsbad and said she is concerned for her hometown’s well-being. “It’s a complete shock,” she said.
“Carlsbad is a small town so any damage, even small, will affect the whole town.” Owen said her best friend lives within the range of the possible sinkhole and in event of a collapse her house would be damaged. “It will be really weird going back if it collapses,” she said. “I’m always at her house and it will be ridiculous for it to just not be there anymore.” Veni said the potential sinkhole is a serious situation, but it has been blown out of proportion by the media. Stories about the sinkhole have appeared in the LA Times, Detroit Times and the Chicago Tribune. “People seem to have this idea
that the whole city is going to collapse, and it will be a giant hole in the ground, which is not going to happen,” he said. “The affected area is relatively small. You have the area where it occurs and the area around it where the ground will sort of slump towards the sinkhole and some damage to the road, infrastructures and buildings.” Precautionary measures have been taken to ensure the affected residents’ safety and convenience, Veni said. “The county is doing everything we can to ensure public safety,” he
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Growers rally for medical cannabis
Lights on the river
Staff Report Daily Lobo
Daniel Hulsbos / Daily Lobo Hundreds of thousands of Christmas lights reflect on the ABQ Biopark Lake on Wednesday during The River of Lights display. Tickets for the display are $7 for adults; $3 for children ages 3 to 12. Gates open at 6:00 p.m. and close at 9:00 p.m., and the display closes Dec. 30.
Student-designed campus courtyard in the works by Nicole Raz Daily Lobo
Thanks to a design by students for students, the dirt field outside the Centennial Engineering Building will no longer be an eyesore next semester. Tapy Hall housed the civil engineering department until Aug. 2008 while the Centennial Engineering building was under construction. When Tapy Hall was torn down in fall 2008, a 30,000 square foot dirt
Inside the
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lot was left in its place. The space is in the middle of the Centennial Engineering, the Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Farris Engineering buildings, shaping an isolated courtyard, said Alfred Simon, the associate dean for the School of Architecture and Planning and director of the Landscape Architecture Program. “Because of where that site is located, it’s very much a commons for what is a small engineering campus within the large campus,”
Simon said. “It really becomes an engineering commons and, as such, it becomes a site where faculty, staff and students of engineering can enjoy it in various ways.” Former dean of the mechanical engineering department, Joe Cecchi, and Roger Schluntz, dean of the School of Architecture and Planning, decided to have students design a landscape for the field. About 12 engineering students participated in the first meeting on Sept. 18 to discuss possible
Courtyard design display Stamm Room, Centennial Engineering Center 10 - 11 a.m. Friday landscape ideas. During the final stages of planning, three teams with two graduate students each, one from architecture and one from landscape architecture, came up with an independent design,
Caught reading
Feed your neighbor
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The pot pioneers of New Mexico are meeting in Santa Fe on Friday to show support for the Department of Health’s Medical Cannabis Program. The DOH is holding the meeting to consider approving new medical conditions, including Hepatitis C, that could warrant patients having a cannabis I.D. card. As of now, patients with one of 15 medical conditions can be prescribed medical marijuana. Larry S. Love is the organizer for the unofficial group of New Mexicans who are interested in growing medical cannabis for the more than 800 New Mexico patients who have cannabis I.D. cards. Love has organized a patient rally to start after the 10 a.m. DOH’s meeting in the Runnels Building in Santa Fe. “I understand that Albuquerque in general doesn’t have a lot of doctors that are willing to write a recommendation for their patients,” Love said. “So, it’s early on in the program here, and we’re all sort of pioneers. Some physicians are just a little reluctant because they have DEA licenses to write prescriptions for regular prescriptions, and medical cannabis should be considered a regular type of treatment.” Love said he wants to help potential patients fill out their paperwork and find willing doctors. “One of the things that I’m hoping to do in the near future is to have a clinic where people can come and get the proper paperwork if they don’t have a computer, and we’ll help them fill out their applications for the DOH,” he said. “I would like to do that at least once a week up here in Santa Fe, and if we can find a place down in
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