dr6u drht by helenadinasel

SUMMARY

TECH COMPANIES PLEDGE BILLIONS IN CYBERSECURITY INVESTMENTS

WITH SALES STILL SURGING, BEST BUY RAISES PROSPECTS FOR 2021

DILEMMA FOR FED CHIEF: HIGH INFLATION AND A SURGING VIRUS

COVID-19 RESURGENCE CRIMPS SPENDING, TRAVEL RECOVERY

WHAT IS A COVID-19 VACCINE PASSPORT, AND DO I NEED ONE?

SPAIN JUDGE NIXES BACKUP SITE FOR DISPUTED HAWAII TELESCOPE

WALMART TO LAUNCH DELIVERY SERVICE FOR OTHER BUSINESSES

WAYMO EXPANDING AUTONOMOUS RIDE SERVICE TO SAN FRANCISCO

TESLA ROBOT: THE NEXT BREAKTHROUGH FOR AI HAS BECOME REAL

US AUTHORITIES WARN AGAINST FLYING DRONES OVER NATIONAL LAB

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GIG APPS FOR A PANDEMIC ECONOMY: PART TIME, NO COMMITMENT

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TIKTOK TO LET USERS SHOP THROUGH APP WITH SHOPIFY DEAL

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YOUTUBER HUNTS VIEWS AND VOTES IN CALIFORNIA RECALL BID

126

SENATORS QUESTION DOJ FUNDING FOR AI-POWERED POLICING TECH

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VEGAS-AREA COUNTY JOINS ROOM TAX FIGHT AGAINST ONLINE FIRMS

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WHITMER PROPOSES SPENDING $1.5B TO BOOST BUSINESS CLIMATE

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REBECCA HALL SHINES IN EERIE ‘THE NIGHT HOUSE’

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A PAST-OBSESSED, UNDERWATER WORLD IN ‘REMINISCENCE’

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DATA BREACH EXPOSES STUDENT REQUESTS FOR VACCINE EXEMPTIONS

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US OUTBREAKS FORCE EARLY REVERSALS ON IN-PERSON LEARNING

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CHINA’S MARS ROVER SOLDIERS ON AFTER COMPLETING PROGRAM

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FOSSIL LEAVES MAY REVEAL CLIMATE IN LAST ERA OF DINOSAURS

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FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR WATER TO BE RELEASED VIA UNDERSEA TUNNEL

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SCIENTISTS LAUNCH EFFORT TO COLLECT WATER DATA IN US WEST

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WHY IT TAKES MONTHS TO SUBDUE SOME WILDFIRES

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TECH COMPANIES PLEDGE BILLIONS IN CYBERSECURITY INVESTMENTS

Some of the country’s leading technology companies have committed to investing billions of dollars to strengthen cybersecurity defenses and to train skilled workers, the White House announced Wednesday following President Joe Biden’s private meeting with top executives. The Washington gathering was held during a relentless stretch of ransomware attacks that have targeted critical infrastructure and major corporations, as well as other illicit cyber operations that U.S. authorities have linked to foreign hackers. The Biden administration has been urging the private sector to do its part to protect against those increasingly sophisticated attacks. In public remarks before the meeting, Biden referred to cybersecurity as a “core national security challenge” for the U.S. “The reality is most of our critical infrastructure is owned and operated by the private sector, 08

and the federal government can’t meet this challenge alone,” Biden said. “I’ve invited you all here today because you have the power, the capacity and the responsibility, I believe, to raise the bar on cybersecurity.” After the meeting, the White House announced that Google had committed to invest $10 billion in cybersecurity over the next five years, money aimed at helping secure the software supply chain and expand zero-trust programs. The Biden administration has looked for ways to safeguard the government’s supply chain following a massive Russian government cyberespionage campaign that exploited vulnerabilities and gave hackers access to the networks of U.S. government agencies and private companies. Microsoft, meanwhile, said it would invest $20 billion in cybersecurity over the next five years and make available $150 million in technical services to help local governments upgrade their defenses. IBM plans to train 150,000 people in cybersecurity over three years, Apple said it would develop a new program to help strengthen the technology supply chain, and Amazon said it would offer to the public the same security awareness training it gives to employees. Top executives of each of those companies were invited to Wednesday’s meeting, as were financial industry executives and representatives from the energy, education and insurance sectors. A government initiative that at first supported the cybersecurity defenses of electric utilities has now been expanded to focus on natural gas pipelines, the White House said Wednesday. Though ransomware was intended as one aspect of Wednesday’s gathering, a senior administration 10

official who briefed reporters in advance said the purpose was much broader, centered on identifying the “root causes of any kind of malicious cyber activity” and also ways in which the private sector can help bolster cybersecurity. The official briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity. The meeting took place as Biden’s national security team has been consumed by the troop withdrawal in Afghanistan and the chaotic evacuation of Americans and Afghan citizens. That it remained on the calendar indicates the administration regards cybersecurity as a major agenda item, with the administration official describing Wednesday’s meeting as a “call to action.” The broad cross-section of participants underscores how cyberattacks have cut across virtually all sectors of commerce. In May, for instance, hackers associated with a Russia-based cyber gang launched a ransomware attack on a major fuel pipeline in the U.S., causing the pipeline to temporarily halt operations. Weeks later, the world’s largest meat processor, JBS, was hit with an attack by a different hacking group. In both instances, the companies made multimillion-dollar ransom payments in an effort to get back online. Biden on Wednesday pointed to a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in June when he said he made clear his expectation that Russia take steps to rein in ransomware gangs because “they know where (the hackers) are and who they are.”

WITH SALES STILL SURGING, BEST BUY RAISES PROSPECTS FOR 2021

Best Buy raised its sales outlook for the year after breezing past Wall Street expectations in the second quarter. The nation’s largest consumer electronics chain joined other major retailers including Walmart, Target and Macy’s in putting up banner numbers, suggesting that Americans have continued to be spend even as the delta variant spreads. Department store chain Nordstrom also upgraded its annual revenue outlook Tuesday after reporting fiscal second-quarter results that beat expectations. But shares of Seattle-based Nordstrom fell nearly 8%, or $2.86, to $34.95 in extended trading after it issued its quarterly report. Investors appeared disappointed with Nordstrom saying that its quarterly sales were still below the prepandemic 2019 period. There have been concerns that consumer spending, which drives 70% of U.S. economic activity, would begin to slow again as it did early 16

like cars and furniture, which over time reduces inflation pressures. That’s in contrast to the late 1970s, the last time the United States faced rapid inflation, when rising prices encouraged a “buy it while you can” mentality, Gaske said. Ongoing spending at that time drove costs even higher. As a result, any pullback in the Fed’s low-rate policies could help pull inflation below its 2% annual target in a year or two. It’s also getting harder for the Fed to define its other policy goal of “maximum employment.” Initially Powell and other officials, including Vice Chair Richard Clarida, defined it as a “broad and inclusive” goal that included sharply reducing unemployment for Black Americans and Latinos and restoring the job market to its prepandemic health. Yet the number of older Americans who are retiring has accelerated since the pandemic struck, and it’s far from clear that low interest rates would induce many of them to return to work. A smaller workforce could make it harder to restore the job market to pre-pandemic levels. Many economists were surprised by remarks from Clarida this month suggesting that a return to an unemployment rate of 3.8% would meet the Fed’s goal of maximum employment and justify a rate hike by the end of 2022, earlier than Fed officials had projected in June. Even if the jobless rate falls that low — it is now 5.4% — millions of Americans could remain on the sidelines, no longer looking for work and therefore not counted as unemployed. Black and Latino Americans would likely have much 32

DILEMMA FOR FED CHIEF: HIGH INFLATION AND A SURGING VIRUS

Not long ago, anticipation was high that Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell might begin to sketch out a plan this week for the Fed to start pulling back on its support for an economy that has been steadily strengthening. That was before COVID-19 cases began accelerating across the country. Now, the decision of how and when the Fed should begin dialing back its help for the economy has become a more complicated one. Yet in outlining his view of the economy and the threats it faces in a high-profile speech Friday, Powell may provide important clues to the timing of changes in the Fed’s ultra-low-interest rate policies. The big question has been when the Fed will begin to slow its purchases of Treasury and mortgage bonds. The Fed has been buying 24

$120 billion in bonds each month since the pandemic erupted in March 2020 to try to keep longer-term rates low and encourage borrowing and spending. It has also pegged its short-term benchmark interest rate at nearly zero since then. Powell will be speaking Friday at an annual conference of academics and central bankers. The conference, sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City and normally held in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, will instead be a virtual-only event for a second straight year. A surge of COVID-19 cases near the Wyoming resort delivered a direct impact on the Fed itself by forcing a last-minute cancellation of its inperson plans. The hasty shift to an online event reflects the rapid rebound of the pandemic, led by the delta variant, particularly in the South and Northwest. It follows a sharp decline in confirmed cases earlier in the summer that had raised hopes that the coronavirus and its economic impact might be fading. Just a few weeks ago, many Fed officials were signaling that the economy was making solid progress toward the central bank’s twin goals of maximum employment and annual inflation at just above 2% for a sustained period. Several presidents of regional Federal Reserve Banks said they wanted to announce a reduction, or taper, of the bond purchases at the Fed’s next meeting in September. Yet some economists have been slashing their forecasts for economic growth in the current July-September quarter. Restaurant traffic has declined slightly. Last week, Powell said it wasn’t yet clear what the delta strain’s impact on the 27

Most places that require vaccination proof also accept simpler options, such as the paper card noting the dates of your shots from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In the U.S., showing a photo of that card on your phone will usually suffice. Denmark, Greece, France, Italy, some Canadian provinces and the U.S. cities of New Orleans, New York and San Francisco are among the places that have vaccination requirements to get into places like indoor restaurants or theaters. Enforcement varies and many places also accept a recent negative test for the virus, a partial vaccination or proof that you previously recovered from the disease. Even without government mandates, more businesses in countries where vaccines are readily available are starting to ask for proof that you got the shots, so long as their local governments haven’t blocked them from doing so. Officials around the world were initially reluctant to mandate vaccines, but some now hope doing so will persuade more people to get the shots. Businesses requiring proof of vaccination say they are trying to make customers and employees feel safe. Protesters in France and elsewhere have criticized vaccine mandates as invasive and restricting freedom of movement. Privacy advocates have raised concerns about getting people in the habit of having their phones scanned wherever they go, and generally favor options that won’t be tracked, such as a paper record or a digital copy in your phone that can be shown at the door. 48

economy would be. But he emphasized that the pandemic was far from over and was still “casting a shadow on economic activity.” With the economic picture hazier now, economists will be listening carefully for clues Powell may provide about the Fed’s intentions. “I’ll be watching how he characterizes current conditions and the outlook he has for the economy,” said Ellen Gaske, an economist at PGIM Fixed Income. “That will give us a sense of how soon the tapering will occur.” The uncertainties raised by the delta variant make it likelier that the Fed will announce a tapering in November or later, economists said, rather than in September. That would allow Fed officials to consider two additional months of data on inflation and jobs to gauge the delta variant’s impact.

The resurgence of the virus is hardly the only complicating factor facing the Fed. Inflation has surged to a three-decade high as a sharp rebound in consumer spending and shortages in many commodities and parts, such as semiconductors, have sent prices rising for airline tickets, hotel rooms, new and used cars and restaurant meals. The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge jumped 3.5% in June compared with a year earlier, the biggest such rise since 1991. Higher inflation has, in turn, intensified pressure on Powell and the Fed to rein in their stimulus policies. Powell, though, has consistently expressed confidence that higher inflation will prove temporary, even if it persists for several more months. Many economists and Wall Street investors agree. Some, in fact, are more concerned about the opposite problem: That inflation will decline too far from its current level. At the same time, growth could slow. Government stimulus is set to fade next year. No more stimulus checks are in the pipeline, and a $300-a-week federal unemployment supplement is set to expire in two weeks. Gaske noted that the price jumps have caused consumers to reduce their spending on things 31

“The whole idea of offering the island as a backup was nothing else but as a strategy to put pressure on the Hawaii plans,” Batista said. In a statement, the group also said that “the five years that the TIO consortium has lost on La Palma should make it reflect on the arrogant and disrespectful strategy that they have carried out both in Hawaii and in the Canary Islands, emboldened by institutional support and despising the arguments of the opposition to the TMT.” The group’s concerns echo some of the concerns expressed by those fighting the telescope in Hawaii, said Kealoha Pisciotta, one of the leaders seeking to keep the project off Mauna Kea. “I’m glad that they challenged it, because like here, the challenge helps bring awareness to TMT’s not only lack of following the process, but caring for the environment and Hawaiians’ sacred site,” she said.

WALMART TO LAUNCH DELIVERY SERVICE FOR OTHER BUSINESSES

Walmart said it will start farming out its delivery service, using contract workers, autonomous vehicles and other means to transport rival retailers’ products directly to their customers’ homes as fast as just a few hours. The nation’s largest retailer said it will dispatch contract workers from its Spark delivery network, which was launched in 2018, to merchants’ stores to pick up items and then bring them to shoppers. Over the past year, Walmart has doubled Spark’s coverage to more than 500 cities nationwide, providing access to more than 20 million households. 63

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COVID-19 RESURGENCE CRIMPS SPENDING, TRAVEL RECOVERY

A COVID-19 resurgence this summer has caused consumers to turn cautious, while investors trim their investments in a travel sector still struggling to recover. Retail sales dipped a surprising 1.1% in July as consumers spent less on clothing, furniture and sporting goods. At the same time investors have been retreating from cruise lines, airlines and other travelrelated stocks as those companies face another potential stall in activity as cases of COVID-19 surged because of the highly contagious delta variant. The pullback in spending and investments in the travel sector mark an unwelcome reversal 39

company said. It would not say how many vehicles are involved or when it plans to pull the human backups. The approach is similar to what Waymo did in Phoenix when it started a limited ride-hailing service in 2017. The company says it has given thousands of fully autonomous rides in metro Phoenix since October of 2020. People who want to join the program can do so by downloading the Waymo One app.

manual human labor. Indeed, the new Tesla bot is capable of attaching bolts to its cars using a wrench or heading to the local grocery store to pick up ingredients for tonight’s meal. There’s no doubt that actual use cases like these are a while off yet, but they spark a debate that needs to be had about how far we let technology infiltrate our lives, and indeed the impact it could have on the overall jobs market. Indeed, answering a question from a journalist at the event, Elon Musk said that he could “safely say that it will be much longer than 10 years before a humanoid bot from any company on the planet can go to the store and get groceries for you,” so it’s a while off yet. Keen to squash criticism and complaints from journalists, charities, and governments, Musk acknowledged the potential impact the robot could have on the global economy right there at its keynote. He admitted the Tesla Bot could have “profound implications for the economy,” but drew reference to the current labor

shortage that’s been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. He said that he thought it was important that the machine

WHAT IS A COVID-19 VACCINE PASSPORT, AND DO I NEED ONE?

What is a COVID-19 vaccine passport, and do I need one? “Vaccine passports” are digital or paper documents that show you were vaccinated against COVID-19, and could help you get into a growing number of places. What they look like and why you might want one depend on where you live, but more private venues, workplaces and governments are requiring proof of vaccination in public settings. Europe and U.S. states like California and New York created official digital credentials that let you verify your COVID-19 immunization record and convert it into a scannable QR code you can pull up on your cellphone. 47

In the years and decades ahead, robotics - and the Tesla Bot - will become the norm.

But an administrative court in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the capital of the Spanish archipelago, ruled last month that the 2017 concession by local authorities of public land for the tentative project was invalid. The ruling was dated on July 29, but only became public this week after local media reported about the decision. In the ruling, Judge Roi López Encinas wrote that the telescope land allocation was subject to an agreement between the Canary Astrophysics Institute, or IAC, and the telescope’s promoter, the TMT International Observatory (TIO) consortium. But the judge ruled that the agreement was not valid because TIO had not expressed an intention to build on the La Palma site instead of at the Hawaii site. The judge also sided with the plaintiff, the environmental group Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Acción, in rejecting arguments by TIO’s legal team and the island’s government that the land concession was covered by an international treaty on scientific research. An official for the Canary Islands High Court said questions about the ruling could not be answered because other court officials in a position to answer the questions were on vacation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to be named in media reports. The island’s local elected government chief, Mariano Zapata, said it was “sad” that advocacy groups “are so occupied by administrative matters instead of environmental issues.” “I wish we were all in the same boat with the intent of creating jobs in the La Palma island so it can keep being an international reference on 55

scientific research,” Zapata said. His government estimated last year that the telescope would generate 500 permanent jobs and at least 400 million euros ($470 million) in investment. Scott Ishikawa, a spokesperson for the consortium hoping to build the telescope, said that the consortium plans to appeal the ruling. “While we respect the court’s ruling in La Palma, we will pursue the legal process to retain La Palma as our alternative site. Hawaii remains our preferred location for TMT, and we have renewed our efforts to better connect with the Hawaii community in a meaningful and appropriate way,” he said in an email. Pablo Batista, a spokesman of the Ben MagecEcologistas en Acción group, hailed the decision as a big setback for what he called a “fraudulent” project that he said made “fake promises” of new jobs for the island.

For months, Gabrielle Walker had been looking for a part-time job. She applied to restaurant chains and retailers like Nando’s and Primark, and she scoured the job search site Indeed. Nothing. Then one day, Walker, a 19-year-old student at University College London, was scrolling through TikTok and stumbled on a video about an app called Stint. A face on the screen explained that Stint could help students earn money by working brief temporary stints at places like restaurants and bars that require little training or experience. Walker downloaded the app, took a 15-minute intro course and days later snagged a job polishing cutlery at a Michelin-star restaurant in London — for one day. Between May and June, she took on several other gigs, squeezing them into her class schedule where she could. “Everyone could do it,” Walker said. Stint, in use across the U.K., has grown in popularity, alongside similar apps in the United States like Instaworks and Gigpro, as one response to the peculiar ways in which economies have been rebounding from the pandemic recession. Uncertainty about the durability of the recoveries and the tentative re-openings of businesses still threatened by the coronavirus have made flexibility a top priority — for workers and employees alike. As the hospitality industry, in particular, confronts worker shortages, these apps are helping form an ultra-short-term worker-employee relationship, something that hasn’t widely existed in recent decades. Walker noted that even students with no relevant experience could sign up with one of these apps and likely find paid work — as brief as 113

WALMART TO LAUNCH DELIVERY SERVICE FOR OTHER BUSINESSES

“The biggest change we see is this desire for flexible staffing on both sides,”said Sumir Meghani, CEO and co-founder of Instaworks, which connects businesses with temporary or short-term hourly workers. During the pandemic, Meghani said, businesses discovered that the rise and fall of viral cases — and the resulting disruptions to their operations — sometimes require them to scale up or down at any given notice. Greater flexibility in the worker-employer relationship during the pandemic period is also what Gigpro’s founder, Ben Ellsworth, has observed. His app, which operates in three Southern U.S. states, is expanding, to try to address staffing shortages exacerbated by the pandemic. Ellsworth, who spent years in the restaurant industry, said that with eateries in particular, workers have been“plagued with low wages, lack of incentive, no real focus on flexibility or quality of life.”Stuck at home after being laid off, many of these workers either turned to other industries, Ellsworth suggested, or came to recognize gig work as an opportunity to tailor their work hours to their own needs. That realization arrived just as businesses, too, sought workers to fill part-time hourly slots — at least temporarily — as business restrictions eased. “Now that restrictions have been lifted and businesses are starting to boom again,”Ellsworth said, “they’re getting stretched.” While the flexibility provided by these apps serves a need now, some critics foresee a threat to workers over the long run. If gig workers replace jobs formerly filled by permanent restaurant or retail employees, they could diminish job security, along with sick pay and other benefits.

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Shoppers ordering anything from cupcakes to gadgets at their local stores won’t know that Walmart is involved. They buy the goods on their local store website and then the store activates the Walmart GoLocal delivery. Walmart said it will be a white-label service, so deliveries will not be made by Walmart-branded vehicles. “This is a smart tactic that has more upside than downside,” said Jason Goldberg, chief commerce strategy officer at Publicis Communications, part of Publicis Groupe SA. 69

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Goldberg noted that the more deliveries Walmart can make, the lower the costs and the more profitable each delivery becomes. By working with different businesses with different needs, it can also manage peaks in ordering. Walmart will have an advantage in the competition for gig workers because it can offer more shifts to those looking for flexibility. The only downside is that Walmart is potentially giving up business to some of the local players, Goldberg said. For example, a customer may prefer buying a birthday cake from the local bakery and having it delivered in the next few hours, rather than picking one up at Walmart, he said. But Goldberg said he believes the benefits from having a broader deliver network outweighs those small competitive disadvantages. Goldberg said that it’s possible Walmart could use the sales data from all the third-party deliveries to inform its own future plans. But he doubts they would do that, given the antitrust scrutiny Amazon is facing. During a call with reporters, Tom Ward, a senior vice president at Walmart’s U.S. division, said that fees for the service will be negotiated on a case-by-case basis. The delivery time could be as fast as a few hours or up to two days. Walmart said it could eventually use drones for delivery. “In an era where customers have come to expect speed and reliability, it’s more important than ever for businesses to work with a service provider that understands a merchant’s needs,” said John Furner, president and CEO of Walmart’s U.S. division.

SENATORS QUESTION DOJ FUNDING FOR AI-POWERED POLICING TECH

A Democratic senator said the U.S. Justice Department needs to look into whether the algorithm-powered police technologies it funds contribute to racial bias in law enforcement and lead to wrongful arrests. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, was responding to an investigation published about the possibility of bias in courtroom evidence produced by an algorithm-powered gunshot detection technology called ShotSpotter. The system, which can be funded by Justice Department grants, is used by law enforcement in more than 110 U.S. communities to detect gunfire and respond to crime scenes faster. “While there continues to be a national debate on policing in America, it’s become increasingly clear that algorithms and technologies used during investigations, like ShotSpotter, can further racial biases and increase the potential for sending innocent people to prison,” Wyden said. Image: Chris Maddaloni

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Chicago prosecutors relied on audio evidence picked up by ShotSpotter sensors to charge 65-year-old Michael Williams with murder last year for allegedly shooting a man inside his car. ShotSpotter has said their system has trouble identifying gunshots in enclosed spaces. Williams spent nearly a year in jail, until late last month a judge dismissed the case against him at the request of prosecutors, who said they had insufficient evidence. “Fundamentally, these tools are outsourcing critical policing decisions, leaving the fate of people like Michael Williams to a computer,” Wyden said. In Chicago, where Williams was jailed, community members rallied in front of a police station, demanding the city end its contract with ShotSpotter, a system they said “creates a dangerous situation where police treat everyone in the alert area as an armed threat.” The Chicago Police Department defended the technology in response to calls to end the city’s ShotSpotter contract. Chicago is ShotSpotter’s largest customer. “ShotSpotter has detected hundreds of shootings that would have otherwise gone unreported,” it said in a statement emailed to press, adding that the technology is just one of many tools the department relies on “to keep the public safe and ultimately save lives.” It said real-time ShotSpotter alerts about gunshots mean officers respond faster and more consistently than when depending on someone to call 911 to report gunfire.

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WAYMO EXPANDING AUTONOMOUS RIDE SERVICE TO SAN FRANCISCO

Waymo, the Google self-driving vehicle spinoff, is expanding its autonomous ride-hailing service to San Francisco. Selected “trusted tester” customers in the city by the bay will be able to hail a ride in self-driving Jaguar I-Pace electric vehicles, the company said. For now the vehicles will have human backup drivers on board. But at some point the company plans to run the vehicles without them like it now does in the Phoenix area. Waymo began the program last week with a few testers and is now expanding it, the 77

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At its August AI Day event, Tesla founder Elon Musk made the next leap forward for mankind, announcing the firm was working on a prototype humanoid robot that could revolutionize the way we live. Designed to replace manual workers in dangerous, repetitive, and boring roles, the bot sets a new standard for 21st-century living. The future is coming.

INTRODUCING THE TESLA BOT Although many were expecting Tesla’s AI Day event to focus on the artificial intelligence element of its self-driving cars, the company took a slightly different approach. Of course, there was news on upgrades to the Tesla operating system that would make driving your Model X even better, the star of the show was undoubtedly the announcement that the firm was working on a humanoid robot that could change the way we all live, work, and interact forever. Like something out of an episode of Black Mirror, Tesla confirmed that its new fivefoot-eight-inch-tall robot could be deployed across organizations around the world to help improve efficiency and reduce the need for

shortage that’s been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. He said that he thought it was important that the machine

Tesla AI Day

A PASTOBSESSED, UNDERWATER WORLD IN ‘REMINISCENCE’ Just as surely as climate change is scarring the land and warming the seas, it is also flooding our movies. The planet’s imperiled future has been in the DNA of disaster movies like “The Day After Tomorrow” for years, of course. But lately, climate has taken a more leading role in films proliferating as quickly as ice caps are melting. This summer has seen the parched, Australian thriller “The Dry” (good movie, by the way) and “The Tomorrow War,” a time-traveling war movie that leads to an apocalyptic threat unlocked by thawing permafrost. In Lisa Joy’s “Reminiscence,” which debuts in theaters and on HBO Max on Friday, the first thing we see is water. The movie is set in a mostly submerged Miami in the near future, with canals flowing through high-rises in some sections. In other areas braced by an ocean wall, there are perpetual puddles. To escape the daytime heat, the city has also turned nocturnal. Or, at least, more so. 162

What would it be like living in such a world? It’s reasonable, maybe even responsible to consider it. Joy, who wrote and directed the movie, has sensibly concluded we would probably spend a lot of time remembering better days. In “Reminiscence,” she has fashioned a shadowy, future-set film noir, with all the genre trappings of a hardboiled narrator, a slinky femme fatale, Venetian blinds and, most relevantly, a sense of the past’s irrevocable hold over our lives — and our planet’s. That makes “Reminiscence” both kind of terrifyingly ominous to watch and a little comforting. Who knew that environmental disaster could be so stylish? The seas may be encroaching, but at least you can still get a stiff drink at a seedy nightclub and tersely muse on the past like private eyes of earlier times. In “Reminiscence,” everyone is hooked on nostalgia, which makes Nick Bannister’s memoryweaving machine, in which people lie down in a shallow tank and are transported to any time from their past, something more like a drug den. “Nothing is more addictive than the past,” narrates Bannister (Hugh Jackman). With soothing direction, he guides customers to cherished memories — a tryst with a lost love, playing fetch with a beloved dog — which are illuminated on a round stage draped in translucent strings. (The production design by Howard Cummings is consistently terrific throughout.) It’s a fallen world, rampant in lawlessness, corruption and ennui. Bannister is a veteran of the wars that came when the waters rose. But Jackman, whose range extends from song-anddance musicals (“The Greatest Showman”) to suburban scandal (“Bad Education”), exudes 166

a large compute plane, with extremely high bandwidth, and low latencies. During the event, Tesla revealed it adopted a top to bottom approach to help scale performance, with the smallest entity being the training node to help address latency and bandwidth issues. The high-performance training node is capable of 1024 GFLOPS and 512 GB/s in each cardinal direction – truly incredible figures. A computer that the company showed off offered 354 training nodes capable of 362 TFLOPs, whilst the firm’s D1 Chip is a machine learning machine capable that’s 362 TFLOPs and is designed completely in-house. Tesla’s unique integration process was designed to preserve bandwidth, resulting in training tiles with 9 PFLOP. Dojo will be the fastest AI training computer in the world with four times the performance, 1.3X better performance/W, and 5X smaller footprint compared to what exists, and the company is recruiting “heavily” to help speed up its artificial intelligence journey – with the talent to be deployed across the entire fleet. Tesla says that the latest iteration of Dojo will be operational next year, but admits that there are problems with scalability and distribution which need to be ironed out first. The firm says that the difficulty is how to keep the localities and that its primary ambition is to train vast avoids of video, reducing training time, and improving safety and performance, but by the time the Tesla bot is introduced in more than a decade’s time - perhaps in 2035, or maybe even 2040, that technology will be even further advanced and could unlock even greater powers and abilities for the company. In short, the Tesla Bot would serve as a 93

self-driving Tesla car in humanoid form, with “human-level” hands and a variety of electromechanical actuators for smoother movement. The Tesla Bot would come with a screen with a human face, which could provide ‘useful information’ to users and would navigate using eight cameras, built-in to the robot. The FSD computer will be housed in the ‘chest’ of the humanoid, and multi-cam video neural networks will make it easy for the robot to walk and move around. Neural net planning allows the bot to map locations and act in the same way as humans, with auto-labeling functions. With 40 electromechanical hands 12 in the hands, 2 in the torso, 12 in the legs, 2 in the neck, and 12 in the arms - the robot should be able to move in the same way as a human, with human feet for balancing and force feedback sensing for safety - all in all, it’s designed in a similar manner to a car, and though it looks visually stunning, it will no doubt be offputting to some.

THE ROBOTS ARE COMING Whilst there’s no denying the sheer brilliance of the innovations at Tesla HQ, it’s also worth noting that the move into humanoid robots starts a new chapter for the world. We’ve already seen AI-powered robots taking over warehouses, both in manufacturing and distribution, and both the rise in eCommerce and the changing attitudes brought about as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has resulted in a number of labor shortages around the world, companies now want to invest in reliable machinery over people. Add in growing competition and challenges 96

from dominant players like Amazon, and it’s clear to see why the Tesla Bot could be an attractive investment for companies of all shapes and sizes. No downtime, no absenteeism, no need for staff perks, and, once the initial investment has been made, no salaries. Back in 2012, Amazon acquired Kiva Systems, a Massachusetts-based robotics company that produces autonomous mobile robots, to move shelves of goods. Six years later, FedEx began deploying its own AMRs, designed by a different Massachusetts-based startup called Vecna Robotics, whilst British online supermarket Ocado made headlines with its highly automated fulfillment center in Andover, England, featuring a giant grid of robots whizzing along metallic scaffolding to deliver groceries to consumers. Automation on this level is not particularly complex, but as fulfillment centers are overhauled and redesigned to prioritize machinery over humans, we’ll only see more robotics and automation in the future. Take a look at Flippy, a robot hamburger flipper and the world’s first autonomous robotic kitchen assistant. The robot, designed by Miso Robotics, flips burgers and has never taken a vacation day. Flippy grabs unwrapped burger patties, moves them into position on a hot grill, keeps track of each burger’s cooktime and temperature, then alerts human cooks when it’s time to apply cheese or other toppings. Again, this is entry-level automation, and certainly not advanced enough to replace chefs in Michelin star restaurants, but it’s the beginning of our new world.

In the years and decades ahead, robotics - and the Tesla Bot - will become the norm.

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CHINA’S MARS ROVER SOLDIERS ON AFTER COMPLETING PROGRAM

China’s Zhurong Mars rover is soldiering on after completing its initial program to explore the red planet and search for frozen water that could provide clues as to whether it once supported life. China’s National Space Administration said on its website that Zhurong completed its 90-day program on Aug. 15 and was in excellent technical condition and fully charged. It said it would continue to explore the area known as Utopia Planitia where it landed on May 14. Zhurong has been consistently sending back photos and data via the Tianwen-1 orbiter that crosses over it once a day.

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We’ll find a balance that works for the greater good of humanity and boosts bottom lines. We might be a while away from Skynet, but are closer to reality than ever before.

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US AUTHORITIES WARN AGAINST FLYING DRONES OVER NATIONAL LAB

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Drone pilots beware. Authorities at one of the nation’s top nuclear weapons laboratories issued a warning that airspace over Los Alamos National Laboratory is off limits. The birthplace of the atomic bomb, Los Alamos lab reported that recent unauthorized drone flights have been detected in restricted airspace in the area. Officials said if you fly a drone over the lab, you likely will lose it. “We can detect and track a UAS (unmanned aircraft system), and if it poses a threat, we have the ability to disrupt control of the system, seize or exercise control, confiscate or use reasonable force to disable, damage or destroy the UAS,” said Unica Viramontes, senior director of lab security. The lab would not release any specifics about how the system works, citing security protocols. They also would not say how many unauthorized flights have occurred in recent months. Lab officials also warned of the potential for “collateral interceptions” of normal commercial or hobbyist drone flights, saying pilots should stay well outside the lab’s restricted airspace and the additional no-drone zone designated by the Federal Aviation Administration. According to the FAA, drones are prohibited from flying over sites designated as national security sensitive facilities. Aside from military bases and other Department of Defense sites, restrictions are in place for national landmarks and certain critical infrastructure such as nuclear power plants.

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GIG APPS FOR A PANDEMIC ECONOMY: PART TIME, NO COMMITMENT

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Japan has obtained the International Atomic Energy Agency’s agreement to cooperate in the

The government adopted an interim plan that includes a fund to cushion the impact of

water sampling and monitoring.

any negative reports about the discharge and compensate fisheries and other local businesses

The controlled release, with an annual cap on radioactive materials, will continue for about 30 years, or until the plant’s decommissioning ends, Matsumoto said. TEPCO said it plans to apply to the Nuclear Regulation Authority for a safety review of the tunnel plan after gaining support from local fishermen and other residents. It hopes to start construction so the discharge can start in spring 2023.

for any damage. Japanese officials have said the ocean release is the most realistic option for disposing the water, which they say is required for the decommissioning of the plant. Government and TEPCO officials say tritium, which is not harmful in small amounts, cannot be removed from the water, but all other isotopes selected for treatment can be reduced to safe levels before release.

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reopens and vaccine rollouts continue, “one question mark that remains for the UK,” he said, “is whether firms will have to permanently adapt to a new post-Brexit status quo.” Not everyone is celebrating the trend. UKHospitality, the leading trade association for Britain’s hospitality sector, suggested that while businesses are used to innovating, the economic forces that have created staff shortages in the industry could pose enduring problems. The association, along with the British Beer and Pub Association and the British Institute of Innkeeping, asserted that the road to recovery requires that the government “put in place the right trading environment,” including an expansion of business tax cuts. UKHospitality has also urged an overhaul of post-Brexit visa rules to make it easier for foreigners to work in the industry. Sol Schlagman, who co-founded Stint along with his brother, Sam, drew from his own experience as a college student in creating it. “It’s the student that needs to have money to pay their rent,” he said, “but it’s also the student that wants to buy a pair of shoes they wouldn’t necessarily buy otherwise.” The restaurant chain Chipotle uses Stint to recruit workers “at short notice to cover peak times in our restaurants,” said Jacob Sumner, its director of European operations. Chilango, another food chain, said its stores use the app when they need “extra pairs of hands during busy times.” The use of apps to connect businesses and workers for short-term gig work appears to be a growing trend in the United States as well. 116

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“The flexibility of the gig economy may be welcome when crises take out regular staff, but this comes at a potential cost to society,” said Ann Light, a professor of design and creative technology at the University of Sussex. Still, Greig acknowledged that the apps can lower barriers to entry for people who need cash quickly, a category that includes many young workers with limited work experience. The role of gig workers, for employment purposes, can vary widely with these apps. Student users of Stint are employed as workers, guaranteed a set wage and accrued holiday pay. On the other hand, those who use Instaworks are considered independent workers who can choose to be either contractors or employees. Gigpro users are independent contractors. Platforms also take their cue from an international perspective, Light suggested, even as they battle local jurisdictions. This year, Uber drivers in Britain won rights as workers. Similarly, last week, a judge struck down a California measure that exempted app-based ride and delivery services like Uber from a state law requiring that drivers be classified as employees eligible for benefits. In the meantime, the worker apps appear to be filling a niche. For Monty Jackson, a student at the University of Plymouth in England, the work gigs he’s obtained through Stint have helped fund his swimming hobby. He had been working part time at restaurants and bars. But the work shifts he received had interfered with his studies. Now, he plugs in only the hours when he’s available and picks up a work slot sometimes the same day he looks for one. “The flexibility attracted me,” Jackson said. 120

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TIKTOK TO LET USERS SHOP THROUGH APP WITH SHOPIFY DEAL

TikTok users will soon be able to buy stuff directly through the short videos on the app — something they had only been able to do through ads until now. Canadian e-commerce company Shopify said this week that businesses will be able to add a shopping tab to their TikTok profiles to create a “mini-storefront” that links directly to their online store for checkout. The shopping tool, which is still being tested, is available to merchants in the U.S., the U.K. and Canada, and will roll out to more regions in the coming months. Shopify already had a deal with TikTok that let merchants create “shoppable” video ads that drive customers to online stores. 123

ByteDance, the Beijing-based company that owns TikTok, already runs a thriving social media marketplace on Douyin, its twin video app for the Chinese market. Buying products through social media websites isn’t yet as common in the U.S., though Pinterest and Facebook-owned Instagram have made some inroads. Reality star Kylie Jenner is among the first merchants to participate in the program by selling her skincare and cosmetics line through TikTok.

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YOUTUBER HUNTS VIEWS AND VOTES IN CALIFORNIA RECALL BID

The only time Californians voted to recall a governor, they replaced him with a Hollywood megastar. This time, could it be a 29-year-old YouTube star who ends up leading the nation’s most populous state? It’s a very long shot, but Kevin Paffrath could conceivably win simply because he has some name recognition by virtue of the nearly 1.7 million followers of his video channel, where he dispenses financial advice. The other eight Democrats running are essentially unknowns. The Democratic field is filled with anonymous political neophytes because of Gov. Gavin 126

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Newsom’s successful strategy of discouraging any prominent Democrats from running in the Sept. 14 election. His goal was to make it an all-ornothing proposition for voters — keep Newsom, or live with the consequences of picking a replacement with a far different policy agenda. “Social media stardom translates to name recognition, and that’s really what’s going to make a big difference in an election like this with 46 names on the ballot,” said Kim Nalder, a professor of political science at the California State University, Sacramento. Voters already have received mail-in ballots with two questions: Should Newsom be recalled and, if so, who should replace him? If a majority want Newsom gone, the candidate with the highest vote total becomes governor even if they fall short of a majority, which is almost a certainty with so many candidates. People who vote against recalling Newsom can still choose a replacement option in case he’s recalled. Paffrath’s climb is a steep one made more difficult by his failure to submit a statement describing his political beliefs for the voter guide that goes to all households with registered voters. For people loosely following the race, that could be the primary place to learn about replacement options. He’d also have to overcome the message from Newsom and California Democratic Party officials that recall opponents should skip the second question altogether and focus only on keeping Newsom in office. Paffrath thinks that’s a mistake. He’s been traveling the state — even showing up at some of Newsom’s events — and making the case to

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reporters and his followers that a vote for him gives California a chance at progress on issues like homelessness should Newsom be recalled. If Democrats forfeit their right to choose a replacement, he argues it could leave the state in the hands of a Republican likely to be in a stalemate with the overwhelmingly Democratic Legislature. “We want folks in California to know there is a backup option, that if you are against the recall, do not leave the second part of the ballot blank — it’s stupid,” Paffrath told. Paffrath, who is listed on the ballot as a “financial educator/analyst,” posts multiple videos a day on subjects like the stock market and cryptocurrency. And about his campaign. Many have attention-grabbing headlines such as “It’s Official: California is Shutting me Down,” which featured Paffrath sharing that California’s secretary of state wouldn’t allow him to use his nickname “Meet Kevin” on the ballot. In another video titled “PLEASE HELP or I’m Screwed in 48 hours,” he asked his followers to assist him in texting voters. Paffrath’s campaign is getting a boost. For the first time, he’s being included in a debate. He appeared with three Republican candidates — former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, Assemblyman Kevin Kiley and businessman John Cox, who lost to Newsom in a 2018 landslide. Newsom and Republican front-runner and talk show host Larry Elder have skipped all debates. The recall campaign is Paffrath’s first foray into politics. He didn’t even vote in 2018, something he now says was a mistake.

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Paffrath lives in Ventura with his wife, Lauren, and two sons, ages 3 and 5. The couple met on a high school trip to Paris, but their relationship quickly hit a snag: Lauren lived in Southern California, and Paffrath in Florida. He eventually moved to California for his senior year and lived with her family, then stayed and got into real estate with the help of his wife’s father. Paffrath says he and his wife have a net worth of at least $15 million. Father-in-law Bill Stewart said Paffrath learned the ropes of the real estate business then quickly became one of Ventura County’s top agents. “He combines intelligence with an incredible work ethic,” Stewart said. “He learns things incredibly quickly, and he’s always doing research to get the best results.” Paffrath now owns many properties in Ventura County. When he started his YouTube channel, he made videos critiquing other people’s real estate advice and quickly started garnering attention. He’s now hoping to capitalize on that following his bid for governor. If elected, he’d focus on homelessness, something Newsom identified as his No. 1 priority before the pandemic hit but has only worsened. Paffrath said he’d use his emergency powers to build 80 shelters that would provide substance abuse help, mental health treatment and educational support on site, as well as meals and showers. While they’re under construction, he’d dispatch the National Guard to help homeless people on the streets by passing out supplies and building temporary bathrooms.

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Once the shelters are up and running — he says within 60 days — no one would be allowed to sleep on the streets. He envisions ambulances picking up people on the streets at night and bringing them to shelters or helping them get medical care, but said people would not be arrested. California has roughly 160,000 homeless people, and politicians and community groups have for years struggled to find policy solutions. Shelters have proven an insufficient support system. But Paffrath believes his approach will build goodwill with lawmakers to move forward on other priorities, like a wide-ranging infrastructure plan that would include constructing a pipeline to the Mississippi River for a new source of water and building underground tunnels to alleviate traffic, an idea championed by billionaire Elon Musk. He’s also proposing giving interested adults $2,000 per month to attend “future schools” where they can learn skills such as computer programming or electrical engineering to find high-paying jobs. Paffrath feels he’s been unfairly blocked by the Democratic Party and its message to only vote no on the recall and not pick a replacement candidate. He said that could result in a conservative Republican governor. Paffrath believes Newsom’s campaign should tout his candidacy as a viable backup. “Maybe they’ll be too arrogant to do it,” he said. “But it would be very smart for them to do that.”

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SENATORS QUESTION DOJ FUNDING FOR AI-POWERED POLICING TECH

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“The system gives police the opportunity to reassure communities that law enforcement is there to serve and protect them and helps to build bridges with residents who wish to remain anonymous,” the department said. ShotSpotter uses a secret algorithm to analyze noises detected by sensors mounted on light poles and buildings. Employees at the company’s Incident Review Centers in Washington, D.C., and Newark, California, look at the wavelengths and listen to sounds that the computer deems possible gunshots to make a final determination before alerting police. “The point is anything that ultimately gets produced as a gunshot has to have eyes and ears on it,” said CEO Ralph Clark in an interview. “Human eyes and ears, OK?” Civil rights advocates say the human reviews can introduce bias. 141

Wyden said he and seven other Democratic lawmakers are still waiting for a Justice Department response to their April letter raising concerns about federal funds going to local law enforcement agencies to buy a variety of artificial intelligence technologies, including some that integrate gunshot detection data. In addition to Wyden, the letter was signed by Sens. Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Alex Padilla of California, Raphael Warnock of Georgia, and Jeff Merkley of Oregon, and U.S. Reps. Yvette Clarke of New York and Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas. “These algorithms, which automate policing decisions, not only suffer from a lack of meaningful oversight regarding whether they actually improve public safety, but it is also likely they amplify biases against historically marginalized groups,” they wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland. The Justice Department did not respond requests for comment.

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VEGAS-AREA COUNTY JOINS ROOM TAX FIGHT AGAINST ONLINE FIRMS

The county with jurisdiction over the Las Vegas Strip has joined a legal fight to try to collect what attorneys maintain could be be hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid hotel room taxes owed by more than 20 online travel companies. A lawsuit by Clark County echoes claims raised last year by two Las Vegas communications executives against online hotel booking services including Orbitz, Hotwire, Expedia, Travelocity, Priceline and Hotels.com. At stake are “hundreds of millions of dollars in room tax revenue that have been avoided by online travel companies for years and years,” Michael Cristalli, an attorney handling both cases, said. “The county made the determination that it’s in their best interest and the interest of the taxpayers of Nevada to pursue the deficient and continuing tax liability,” he said. Officials with most of the 13 named defendants did not immediately respond to email messages about the case. A spokesperson for Hotel 145

Tonight Inc. declined to comment. Cristalli and attorney Dominic Gentile also represent communications executives Mark Fierro and Sig Rogich in a case they filed last year making similar consumer fraud and unjust enrichment claims. The lawsuits accuse online booking companies of chronically underpaying taxes ranging from 10.5% to 13.38%, calculated as a percentage of gross rental receipts. Both court filings used an example of an online travel company obtaining a room from a hotel for $150 and selling it online to a customer for $200, then paying the state tax based on the lower wholesale price of $150. “This business model deprives Nevada taxing authorities including Clark County of taxes due them on the full value of the transaction,” the county lawsuit said. The amount in dispute includes more than $100 million in unpaid taxes, plus perhaps another $100 million in damages and penalties, Cristalli said. The revenue would benefit tourism, school, transportation and local government general

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fund accounts, according to the county lawsuit filed May 14 in Clark County District Court. Attorneys representing at least 16 named defendants moved the case in July from state to federal court, where a judge now is being asked whether to send it back to state court. A hearing is scheduled Sept. 2 before a judge in Las Vegas who decided in May not to throw out the unusual “qui tam” civil lawsuit filed in April 2020 by Fierro and Rogich. The filing lets private citizen whistleblowers be rewarded for successful outcomes where they act and the government recovers money lost to false claims or other kinds of fraud. Fierro and Rogich, namesakes of Fierro Communications and The Rogich Communications Group, would get up to 30% of money won in their case, according to their court filing. Tax cases aimed at similar practices in other states involving online travel companies, or OTCs, have had mixed success. The independent nonprofit Tax Foundation surveyed similar lawsuits in 34 states and the District of Columbia for a 2016 report. It found courts in 23 states, including three federal courts of appeal, concluded that online travel services weren’t subject to hotel occupancy taxes. Courts in six states ruled they were. 148

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WHITMER PROPOSES SPENDING $1.5B TO BOOST BUSINESS CLIMATE

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer proposed spending more than $1.5 billion in federal pandemic rescue funding to help boost the business climate, redevelop polluted sites and take steps such as accelerating the development of electric vehicle charging infrastructure. The proposals are the latest offered by the Democratic governor since Congress and President Joe Biden approved an unprecedented $6.5 billion in discretionary aid for the state, half of which can be allocated now. She and the Republican-led Legislature have not allotted any of the funds. Some could be negotiated as they work to finalize the next state budget before October, though much of it may not be approved until later. 151

Under Whitmer’s plan, about $700 million would be used to redevelop brownfield properties, rehabilitate vacant buildings, prepare sites for business development, create more energyefficient homes and bolster regional economic resiliency plans. Roughly $350 million would go toward fostering a business environment that the governor said would be more conducive to high-tech, high-growth startups, preparing manufacturers for opportunities in emergency industries, speeding up charging infrastructure for electric cars and expanding an internship program for science, technology, engineering and math students. An additional $456 million would boost the Going PRO program — which gives employers money to help train current and newly hired workers — help people who are almost finished with school or whose classes were affected by the coronavirus outbreak, expand apprenticeships and assist released inmates transition to jobs. Whitmer said she is proud of the state’s economic turnaround and fiscal picture more than a year into the pandemic but pointed to challenges including not enough people to fill jobs, a lack of necessary skills, a lagging entrepreneurial sector and a shortage of affordable housing. The unemployment rate is lower than the national average, but the labor force participation rate is low. “We are in a strong position to emerge from this once-in-in-a-lifetime pandemic and usher in a truly new era of prosperity and opportunity here in Michigan,” said said during a news conference at Lansing’s Rotary Park. 152

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“But that prosperity is only possible if we meet the moment and address the big, preexisting challenges exacerbated by COVID and we do it together.” Whitmer said she will further detail her economic proposal in coming weeks. Altogether, it would total $2.1 billion when factoring in previously announced or updated facets such as expanding tuition-free programs for adults ages 25 and older and frontline workers, providing grants and loans to small businesses and temporarily helping businesses pay $15 an hour. Among those joining the governor was Jared Fleischer, vice president of government affairs for the Rock Family of Companies, which includes Detroit-based Rocket Mortgage. He said COVID-19 has changed the economy — accelerating automation and artificial intelligence, reshaping downtowns that have smaller tax bases and fewer workers due to remote or hybrid work, and positioning Michigan to make advances in shipping and logistics. “We could not stand in stronger support. We could not believe that the investments that are being announced are more critical to our state, our future prosperity,” Fleischer said.

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REBECCA HALL SHINES IN EERIE ‘THE NIGHT HOUSE’

Rebecca Hall occupies nearly every fame of the elegant psychological thriller “ The Night House ” and you still leave wanting more of her and her character, Beth. It’s quite a feat even for someone as inherently compelling as Hall. For one, Beth not exactly likable. At least not in the traditional Hollywood sense of what constitutes a “likable” human woman. She is deeply skeptical, sarcastic and occasionally even hostile, telling uncomfortable truths and drinking herself into oblivion every night with brandy, which she says she doesn’t even really like. Whether or not she has these tendencies normally is moot, however, since this is not a normal moment for this protagonist. The week before we meet Beth, her husband of almost 156

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15 years, Owen (Evan Jonigkeit), a handsome and muscled architect, died by suicide with a handgun she didn’t even know he had. Now she is untethered and alone in the lakeside house that he built for them — a dream existence has turned into a nightmare. For the most part, Beth gets a pass for her lack of social graces from those around her, including a grade-grabbing mother whom she eviscerates with indifference. And she has some friends and acquaintances who seem to genuinely care, like a fellow teacher, Claire (“Barry’s” Sarah Goldberg), and her neighbor Mel (Vondie Curtis Hall), who are both concerned about her mental state. No one expects her to be OK, but Beth seems to be spiraling. Confidently directed by David Bruckner from a clever script written by Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski, “The Night House” excels in THE NIGHT HOUSE | Official Trailer | Searchlight Pictures

tension building —it is both unpredictable and unnervingly restrained. In other words, you’re rarely at ease for 110 minutes. The film does lull you into submission at first, however, as we join Beth on what is likely her first night alone in the house. She drinks, she plays music, she watches their wedding video and passes out. It is rather affecting for someone we’ve just met. But she, and we, are jolted awake with a knock at the door downstairs. Then there’s another few knocks that are even more aggressive. Windows are everywhere in this picturesque home and anxiety increases as Beth strains to see through them into the dark night. She is scared but not paralyzed and bold enough to walk around unarmed, flip on lights and open 159

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doors to the outside. Has she never seen a horror film, or does she just not yet know she’s in one? Whatever the reason, it’s effective. The filmmakers and the script carefully toss out little breadcrumbs along the way as we and Beth try to figure out what is going on: A cryptic suicide note, a disturbing set of blueprints, a photo of a woman who looks almost exactly like Beth. The scares are creepy, but not exactly threatening at first and there’s even a little glimmer of hope in the haunting: Having your dead husband’s presence around might not be the worst thing in the world in this solitary mourning period, right? There’s also a fair amount of doubt and skepticism that builds as well: Beth is so often drunk when things start getting weird, you wonder if she’s even a reliable lens.

THE NIGHT HOUSE | Official Trailer | Searchlight Pictures

The film’s third act doesn’t quite live up to the tantalizing promises of its first two. There are still pleasures to be had, but the impact of the scares is not exactly enhanced by an explanation (or at least by this explanation, which is far too crowded for a film that started so studiously stripped down). But, like Beth, by that point you’re in it ’till the end. “The Night House,” a Searchlight Pictures release in theaters Friday, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for “language, some violence, disturbing image, some sexual references.” Running time: 110 minutes. Three stars out of four.

MPAA Definition of R: Restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

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little of the trauma of anyone who’s been through war. Jackman is a more reassuring presence. He doesn’t slide into noir with the weariness of, say, Harrison Ford, or the disillusionment of Humphrey Bogart. But, then again, “Reminiscence” gradually grows more in the direction of melodrama than its dark premise might suggest. “Reminiscence” properly starts with an oldfashioned kind of encounter: an alluring lady looking for her keys. Just after closing time, in walks Mae (Rebecca Ferguson), in a handsome red dress. There’s immediately chemistry between her and Bannister, which his colleague, Watts (a typically very good Thandiwe Newton) eyes skeptically. She’s a singer at a club in a dark, neon-lit offshore district. Their first night out ends with Bannister taking her home, in a dingy by daylight. As you might imagine, “Reminiscence” begins to play with what’s real and what’s memory, blurring the lines in between. When Mae disappears, Bannister begins pouring over their time together, searching for clues — some of which begin cropping up in other cases, including one involving a New Orleans drug kingpin (Daniel Wu). To a remarkable degree — complete with a mysterious, disfigured bad guy (Cliff Curtis) — Joy’s film is peopled by the dependable types of the genre. The story is never quite as impactful as the rising-seas set-up. “Reminiscence” is Joy’s feature-film debut, but as the creator of the HBO series “Westworld,” she has already proven her considerable talent in fashioning vivid, intelligent sci-fi worlds out of contemporary anxieties. “Reminiscence” may turn too sentimental and mutter a bit too much 169

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about “the past.” Like its characters, it’s drunk on what came before, relying too heavily on noir tropes. But its smart, thought-provoking concept isn’t so easy to shake off. The images of a half-submerged Miami are too eerily realistic. As Bannister sloshes around in shallows and dives deeper into the depths, “Reminiscence” will leave you soaked with unease.

“Reminiscence,” a Warner Bros. release, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association of America for strong violence, drug material throughout, sexual content and some strong language. Running time: 116 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.

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DATA BREACH EXPOSES STUDENT REQUESTS FOR VACCINE EXEMPTIONS

Personal information from students at a California college who requested a religious exemption from the COVID-19 vaccine has been posted online after an apparent data breach. The records from about 130 students at California State University, Chico were dumped on an anonymous internet message board, the Sacramento Bee reported. A commenter on the site linked to a spreadsheet with detailed explanations from students who had asked to be exempted from receiving the vaccine in order to attend the college. Student names and phone numbers were included in many of the entries. The original post provided tips on how to file a religious exemption to a COVID-19 vaccine mandate, according to the Bee. “State purely religious reasons only,” the anonymous tip read. “Do not mention anything else.” 174

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The CSU system requires its 56,000 faculty and staff and nearly 500,000 students on campus to be vaccinated against the coronavirus. The policy allows for medical and religious exemptions. The spreadsheet shows that roughly half of the requests in the leaked document were approved. Many of the denied requests were resubmitted for another chance at approval. “We are aware of the documents posted online and circulated among the media. We are investigating this incident, while also taking a number of proactive steps to protect students’ confidential information,” Andrew Staples, CSU Chico’s public relations manager, said in a statement. Most of the exemption requests were filed by students citing their Christian beliefs — some of them quoting Biblical scripture. Another student who was approved called the vaccine “unclean” and analogous to what non-kosher food is to Orthodox Jews. Students who asked for a religious exemption included several NCAA athletes, incoming students, and residents of university dorms, the newspaper said. Students who stated they believed in healing through prayer were approved for exemption, and many referred to their bodies as a temple. “My religious beliefs follow natural healing through God’s divine power and faith healing,” read one NCAA athlete’s exemption request that was approved. “My beliefs question the necessity of modern medicine including vaccinations.”

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US OUTBREAKS FORCE EARLY REVERSALS ON IN-PERSON LEARNING

A few weeks into the new school year, growing numbers of U.S. districts have halted in-person learning or switched to hybrid models because of rapidly mounting coronavirus infections. More than 80 school districts or charter networks have closed or delayed in-person classes for at least one entire school in more than a dozen states. Others have sent home whole grade levels or asked half their students to stay home on hybrid schedules. The setbacks in mostly small, rural districts that were among the first to return dampen hopes for a sustained, widespread return to classrooms after two years of schooling disrupted by the pandemic. In Georgia, where in-person classes are on hold in more than 20 districts that started the school year without mask requirements, some Image: Stephen B. Morton

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superintendents say the virus appeared to be spreading in schools before they sent students home. “We just couldn’t manage it with that much staff out, having to cover classes and the spread so rapid,” said Eddie Morris, superintendent of the 1,050-student Johnson County district in Georgia. With 40% of students in quarantine or isolation, the district shifted last week to online instruction until Sept. 13. More than 1 of every 100 school-aged children has tested positive for COVID-19 in the past two weeks in Georgia, according to state health data published last weekend. Children age 5 to 17 are currently more likely to test positive for COVID-19 than adults. Around the country, some schools are starting the year later than planned. One district in Western Oregon pushed back the start of classes by a week after several employees were exposed to a positive teacher during training. Before the latest virus resurgence, hopes were high that schools nationwide could approach normalcy, moving beyond the stops and starts of remote learning that interfered with some parents’ jobs and impaired many students’ academic performance. Most epidemiologists say they still believe that in-person school can be conducted safely, and that it’s important considering the academic, social and emotional damage to students since the pandemic slammed into American schools in March 2020. In some cases, experts say, the reversals reflect a careless approach among districts that acted as if the pandemic were basically over. 181

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“People should realize it’s not over. It’s a real problem, a real public health issue,” said Dr. Tina Tan, a Northwestern University medical professor who chairs the American Academy of Pediatrics Section on Infectious Diseases. “You have to do everything to prevent the spread of COVID in the school.” Tan and others say that means not just masks in schools but a push for vaccination, social distancing, ventilation and other precautions, providing multiple layers of protection. Dairean Dowling-Aguirre’s 8-year-old son was less than two weeks into the school year when he and other third graders were sent home last week in Cottonwood, Arizona. The boy took classes online last year and was overjoyed when his parents said he could attend school in-person. But Dowling-Aguirre said she grew more anxious as infections climbed. Masks were optional in her son’s class, and she said fewer than 20% of students were wearing them. Then she got a call from the principal saying her son had been exposed and had to stay home at least a week. Of particular concern was that her parents watch her son after school and her mother has multiple sclerosis. “It’s definitely a big worry about how it’s going to go from here on in and how the school’s going to handle it,” she said. In Georgia, more than 68,000 students — over 4% of the state’s 1.7 million in public schools — are affected by shutdowns so far. Many superintendents said they have already recorded more cases and quarantines than during all of last year, when most rural districts held in-person classes for most students. 183

“This year, you saw it very quickly,” said Jim Thompson, superintendent in Screven County, Georgia. “Kids in the same classroom, you’d have two or three in that classroom.” Thompson said the county’s 25-bed hospital warned it was being overloaded by infections but what led him to send the district’s 2,150 students home was concern that he wouldn’t be able to staff classes. “You don’t want to start the school day and find you don’t have enough teachers,” Thompson said. The onslaught is driving changes in mask policies. Weeks before school started, only a handful of large districts covering fewer than a quarter of students across Georgia were requiring face coverings. Now, mask mandates cover more than half of students. Part of the mask policy change is driven by a shift in U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance. The CDC now advises that when everyone is wearing masks, exposed students 3 feet (1 meter) or more apart don’t have to be sent home if they’re not showing symptoms. Angela Williams, the superintendent in Burke County, Georgia, said she believes masks and that rule will allow her 4,200-student district near Augusta to avoid further disruptions after its current two-week shutdown. “That is going to cut down on the number of students we’re having to quarantine,” Williams said. Georgia told districts in early August that they could choose their own quarantine policy, and some loosened rules.

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Thompson, though, said Screven is likely to retighten its policy when it returns and require everyone who is exposed to quarantine for at least a week because of delta’s high contagion level. “We started with utilizing that latitude to its fullest,” Thompson said. “That did not work for us locally.” Some districts are also looking to boost vaccination rates among staff and eligible students, but most Southern schools appear unlikely to mandate teacher vaccination or testing, unlike states on the West Coast and in the Northeast. Thompson said he sought to schedule a vaccine clinic in Screven County last week but got so few takers it was canceled.

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Despite disruptions, there’s still strong resistance to masks. In the 28,000-student Columbia County in suburban Augusta, officials said they were putting plexiglass dividers back up in school cafeterias, as well as limiting field trips, school assemblies and classroom group work. But the district continues to only “strongly recommend” masks. Even some districts that have sent all their students home don’t expect to require masks when they return, facing opposition from parents and the school board. “They wanted that that should be the parents’ decision,” Morris said of school board members.

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CHINA’S MARS ROVER SOLDIERS ON AFTER COMPLETING PROGRAM

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After the United States, China is the second country to land and sustainably operate a spacecraft on Mars, where days are 40 minutes longer than on Earth. At 1.85 meters (6 feet) in height, Zhurong is significantly smaller than the American Perseverance rover, which is exploring the planet with a tiny helicopter. NASA expects its rover to collect its first sample in July for return to Earth as early as 2031. Concurrently, China is assembling its permanent space station, with three astronauts now aboard the Tianhe, or Heavenly Harmony, core that was put into orbit on April 29. Two of the astronauts completed their second space walk. All three are due to return to Earth in September and be replaced by a new crew. China earlier launched two smaller experimental space stations. It has been excluded from the International Space Station largely at the insistence of the United States, which is wary of the Chinese space program’s secrecy and close military links. Congressional approval is also required for any cooperation between NASA and the CNSA. China also recently brought back lunar samples, the first by any country’s space program since the 1970s, and has landed a probe and rover on the moon’s less explored far side. China first put an astronaut into orbit in 2003, becoming just the third country to do so.

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FOSSIL LEAVES MAY REVEAL CLIMATE IN LAST ERA OF DINOSAURS

Richard Barclay opens a metal drawer in archives of the Smithsonian Natural History Museum containing fossils that are nearly 100 million years old. Despite their age, these rocks aren’t fragile. The geologist and botanist handles them with casual ease, placing one in his palm for closer examination. Embedded in the ancient rock is a triangular leaf with rounded upper lobes. This leaf fell off a tree around the time that T-rex and triceratops roamed prehistoric forests, but the plant is instantly recognizable. “You can tell this is ginkgo, it’s a unique shape,” said Barclay. “It hasn’t changed much in many millions of years.” What’s also special about ginkgo trees is that their fossils often preserve actual plant material, not simply a leaf’s impression. And that thin sheet of organic matter may be key to understanding the ancient climate system — and the possible future of our warming planet. Image: Carolyn Kaster

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But Barclay and his team first need to crack the plant’s code to read information contained in the ancient leaf. “Ginkgo is a pretty unique time capsule,” said Peter Crane, a Yale University paleobotanist. As he wrote in “Ginkgo,” his book on the plant, “It is hard to imagine that these trees, now towering above cars and commuters, grew up with the dinosaurs and have come down to us almost unchanged for 200 million years.” If a tree fell in an ancient forest, what can it tell scientists today? “The reason scientists look back in the past is to understand what’s coming in the future,” said Kevin Anchukaitis, a climate researcher at the University of Arizona. “We want to understand how the planet has responded in the past to large-scale changes in climate — how ecosystems changed, how ocean chemistry and sea levels changed, how forests worked.” Of particular interest to scientists are “ hothouse ” periods when they believe carbon levels and temperatures were significantly higher than today. One such time occurred during the late Cretaceous period (66 million to 100 million years ago), the last era of the dinosaurs before a meteor slammed into Earth and most species went extinct. Learning more about hothouse climates also gives scientists valuable data to test the accuracy of climate models for projecting the future, says Kim Cobb, a climate scientist at Georgia Institute of Technology. But climate information about the distant past is limited. Air bubbles trapped in ancient ice cores allow scientists to study ancient carbon 196

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dioxide levels, but those only go back about 800,000 years. That’s where the Smithsonian’s collection of ginkgo leaves come in. Down a warren of corridors, Barclay hops across millennia – as is only possible in a museum – to the 19th century, when the Industrial Revolution had started changing the climate. From a cabinet, he withdraws sheets of paper where Victorian-era scientists taped and tied ginkgo leaves plucked from botanical gardens of their time. Many specimens have labels written in beautiful cursive, including one dated Aug. 22, 1896. The leaf shape is virtually identical to the fossil from around 100 million years ago, and to a modern leaf Barclay holds in his hand. But one key difference can be viewed with a microscope — how the leaf has responded to changing carbon in the air. Tiny pores on a leaf’s underside are arranged to take in carbon dioxide and respire water, allowing the plant to transform sunlight into energy. When there’s a lot of carbon in the air, the plant needs fewer pores to absorb the carbon it needs. When carbon levels drop, the leaves produce more pores to compensate. Today, scientists know the global average level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is about 410 parts per million – and Barclay knows what that makes the leaf look like. Thanks to the Victorian botanical sheets, he knows what ginkgo leaves looked like before humans had significantly transformed the planet’s atmosphere.

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Now he wants to know what pores in the fossilized ginkgo leaves can tell him about the atmosphere 100 million years ago. But first he needs a codebreaker, a translation sheet — sort of a Rosetta stone to decipher the handwriting of the ancient atmosphere. That’s why he’s running an experiment in a forest clearing in Maryland. One morning earlier this year, Barclay and project assistant Ben Lloyd tended rows of ginkgo trees within open-topped enclosures of plastic sheeting that expose them to rain, sunlight and changing seasons. “We are growing them this way so the plants experience natural cycles,” Barclay said.

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The researchers adjust the carbon dioxide pumped into each chamber, and an electronic monitor outside flashes the levels every five seconds. Some trees are growing at current carbon dioxide levels. Others are growing at significantly elevated levels, approximating levels in the distant past, or perhaps the future. “We’re looking for analogues — we need something to compare with,” said Barclay. If there’s a match between what the leaves in the experiment look like and what the fossil leaves look like, that will give researchers a rough guide to the ancient atmosphere. They also are studying what happens when trees grow in super-charged environments, and they found that more carbon dioxide makes them grow faster. But adds Barclay, “If plants grow very quickly, they are more likely to make mistakes and be more susceptible to damage. ... It’s like a race car driver that’s more likely to go off the rails at high speeds.”

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FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR WATER TO BE RELEASED VIA UNDERSEA TUNNEL

The operator of the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant said this week it plans to build an undersea tunnel so that massive amounts of treated but still radioactive water can be released into the ocean about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) away from the plant to avoid interference with local fishing. The operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, said it hopes to start releasing the water in spring 2023. TEPCO says hundreds of storage tanks at the plant need to be removed to make room for facilities necessary for the plant’s decommissioning. An official in charge of the water discharge project, Junichi Matsumoto, said TEPCO will construct the undersea tunnel by drilling through bedrock in the seabed near its No. 5 reactor, which survived the meltdowns at the plant, to minimize possible underground contamination or leakage of radioactive ground water into the tunnel. Image: Tomohiro Ohsumi

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Increasing amounts of radioactive water have been stored in about 1,000 tanks at the Fukushima Daiichi plant since 2011, when a massive earthquake and tsunami damaged three reactors and their cooling water became contaminated and began leaking. The plant says the tanks will reach their capacity late next year. The government decided in April to start discharging the water, after further treatment and dilution, into the Pacific Ocean in spring 2023 under safety standards set by regulators. The idea has been fiercely opposed by fishermen, residents and neighboring countries including China and South Korea. The offshore discharge using a pipeline enclosed inside a concrete tunnel is an attempt to minimize the “reputational damage” that would occur if the contaminated water is released close to marine life off the Fukushima coast. Under the plan released this week, the water will be released at a depth of about 12 meters (40 feet) below the ocean’s surface, said Matsumoto, who works for Fukushima Daiichi Decontamination & Decommissioning Engineering Co., a company created by TEPCO. A pipeline enclosed in undersea tunnel is safer than simply laying a pipe under the seafloor in the event of a major earthquake or tsunami, he said at a news conference. TEPCO plans to dilute the contaminate water with large amounts of seawater to reduce the concentration of radioactive materials below allowable limits. Plant workers are to sample the water ahead of its release and examine samples of seawater from multiple locations daily. 206

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Japan has obtained the International Atomic Energy Agency’s agreement to cooperate in the

The government adopted an interim plan that includes a fund to cushion the impact of

water sampling and monitoring.

any negative reports about the discharge and compensate fisheries and other local businesses

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SCIENTISTS LAUNCH EFFORT TO COLLECT WATER DATA IN US WEST The U.S. Department of Energy announced a new kind of climate observatory near the headwaters of the Colorado River that will help scientists better predict rain and snowfall in the U.S. West and determine how much of it will flow through the region. The multimillion-dollar effort led by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory launches next week. The team has set up radar systems, balloons, cameras and other equipment in an area of Colorado where much of the water in the river originates as snow. More than 40 million people depend on the Colorado River. Alejandro Flores, an associate professor of hydrology at Boise State University, said the weather in mountainous areas is notoriously difficult to model and the observatory will be a “game changer.” “We have to think about the land and the atmosphere as a linked system that interact with each other,” he said in a call with reporters. “Up until now, there have been a lack of observations that help us understand this critical interface.” 211

The West is in the midst of a more than 20-year megadrought that studies link to human-caused climate change. That, along with increased demand on the Colorado River led to the firstever shortage declaration in August, and there’s an increasing threat of deeper, more widespread water cuts. Arizona, Nevada and Mexico won’t get their full allocations of river water next year. Scientists will use the observatory to gather data on precipitation, wind, clouds, tiny particles, humidity, soil moisture and other things. Along with a better understanding of the hydrology, they hope to learn more about how wildfires, forest management, drought and tree-killing bugs, for example, play a part in water availability. A big issue in predicting water supply in the West centers on soil moisture and content, said Ken Williams, the lead on-site researcher and Berkeley Lab scientist. The monsoon season largely was a dud across the Southwest for the 212

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past two years, which means more melting snow soaks into the ground before reaching streams and rivers when it does rain, he said. Climate experts said during a separate briefing that southern Arizona and parts of New Mexico have seen impressive rainfall totals so far this monsoon season, with Tucson marking its wettest July on record. Mike Crimmins, a professor at the University of Arizona, called it an “amazing reversal” for the desert city. Some parts of the Southwest have seen as much as four times their normal precipitation levels. But Crimmins noted other spots like Albuquerque, New Mexico, are either at average levels or still lagging. “We have both really wet conditions for the short term, but we also have longer-term drought still hanging out there because we have these longer-term deficits that we cannot solve with just one or two or even three months of precipitation,” he said. To reverse the longer-term trends, the region would need to see back-to-back wet winters and summers that are hard to come by, Crimmins said. The new climate observatory, called the Surface Atmosphere Integrated Field Laboratory, brings together federal scientists, university researchers and others to build on a previous effort to study part of the upper Gunnison River basin in Colorado that shares characteristics with the Rocky Mountains. For the Rio Grande basin, the data could help water managers as they juggle longstanding water sharing agreements among Colorado, New Mexico, Texas and Mexico, Williams said. 214

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It also could help improve weather forecasting and experiments to modify the weather, such as cloud seeding to produce more precipitation. The data will be available to other researchers and provide a benchmark for any collection beyond the two-year project, scientists said. 216

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WHY IT TAKES MONTHS TO SUBDUE SOME WILDFIRES

At nearly every community meeting on firefighting efforts in the U.S. West, residents want to know why crews don’t simply put out the flames to save their homes and the valuable forests surrounding them. It’s not that simple, wildfire managers say, and the reasons are many, some of them decades in the making and tied to climate change. The cumulative result has been an increase in gigantic wildfires with extreme and unpredictable behavior threatening communities that in some instances didn’t exist a few decades ago. “How do we balance that risk to allow firefighters to be successful without transferring too much of that risk to the public?” said Evans Kuo, a “Type 1” incident commander assigned to the nation’s biggest and most dangerous wildfires. “I wish it wasn’t the case, but it’s a zero-sum game.” 219

More than 20,000 wildland firefighters are battling some 100 large wildfires in the U.S West. Their goal is “containment,” meaning a fuel break has been built around the entire fire using natural barriers or manmade lines, often created with bulldozers or ground crews with hand tools. Estimated containment dates for some wildfires now burning aren’t until October or November.

WHY SO LONG? A big concern is safety. Kuo said residents sometimes plead with him to send firefighters into areas where he knows they could get killed. “That’s a deal-breaker,” he said on a day off after 18 straight days of 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. shifts on a wildfire in Washington state. “I’m not putting people at risk.” Actually putting out these large fires, or labeling them “controlled,” will require cold weather combined with rain or snow, weeks away for many states. “I’d say pray for rain because that’s the only thing that’s going to get us out of this fire season,” Idaho’s state forester, Craig Foss, told Republican Gov. Brad Little and other state officials this week during a discussion of the wildfire season.

HAVE WILDFIRES CHANGED? Kuo has been fighting wildfires for 30 years with the U.S. Forest Service, spending the first part of his career as a frontline firefighter with groundcrews, the backbone of any effort to stop a wildfire. At the time, wildfires of 150 square miles (390 square kilometers) were uncommon. Now blazes reach fives times that size and more,

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getting large enough to create their own weather. “That’s kind of redefining what the new normal is,” said Kuo. “We get these megafires.”

IS WILDFIRE SUPPRESSION IN THE PAST PLAYING A ROLE NOW? For much of the last century, firefighters had been mostly successful at suppressing wildfires in ecosystems that evolved to rely on wildfire. Early on, firefighters benefitted from forests that had already been periodically cleared of brush and debris by wildfires that could move through every couple decades. But with fire suppression, experts say, that brush and debris accumulated to where now, wildfires can ladder up into the branches and into the crowns of large trees, creating the giant wildfires that kill entire swatches of a forest.

HOW HAS DROUGHT IMPACTED WILDFIRE SUPPRESSION? On top of fire suppression have been several decades of drought that studies link to humancaused climate change. That’s exacerbated by this year’s hot and dry weather, leading to historically low moisture contents in forests that have become tinder-dry. “Our protection districts are seeing far warmer and dryer than normal conditions creating historically dry fuels,” said Dustin Miller, director of the Idaho Department of Lands. Those dry fuels allow wildfires to spread more quickly. On big fires, embers can shoot out to start spot fires on the other sides of natural barriers such as rivers. Sometimes spot fires can 222

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put firefighters at risk of being trapped by flames in front and behind them. Miller said the state is likely facing $100 million in costs to fight fires this year on land the state is responsible for protecting, which is mostly state forests but also includes some federal and private forests.

WHAT ABOUT DISEASE AND INSECT INFESTATION? Disease and bug infestations in trees whose defenses have been weakened by drought have led to forest-wide epidemics that have killed millions of trees in the U.S. West. Those dead trees, called snags, become fuel for wildfires while at the same time posing increased danger to firefighters who can be hit by falling branches or the unstable trees themselves.

ARE MORE HOMES IN WILD AREAS AN ISSUE? Homes built in what firefighters call the wildlandurban interface pose special problems for firefighters, typically tying up many firefighters on structure protection rather than have them actively engaging a wildfire. “We base our strategy and tactics on protecting values at risk,” Kuo said. “Homes, subdivisions, communications towers, gas pipelines, railways and roadways, transmission lines.” He said homes built with defensible space helps. More people in forested areas, as well as people recreating, has led to more human-caused wildfires. The National Interagency Fire Center in Boise says humans cause about 87% of all wildfires each year. 224

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ARE THERE ENOUGH FIREFIGHTERS? The nation has just more than 20 Type 1 response teams to handle the nation’s biggest wildfires fires, and Kuo and his colleagues on those teams, like just about every other firefighting position this year, are in short supply. He and his crew agreed to work longer than their 14-day shift on the Washington fire to make sure another Type 1 crew would be available. Another problem is lengthening wildfire seasons mean many seasonal firefighters leave for school well before wildfire season ends. Josh Harvey, fire management bureau chief for the Lands Department, said about 30% of the state’s firefighters head back to school. Overall, Harvey said there have been widespread shortages of firefighters, fire engines and logistical support, and the state can no longer rely on help from neighboring states or federal partners. There have even been occasional shortages of jet fuel for retardant bombers in some states. “We’ve never seen anything like it before,” Harvey said. “We are living and making fire history right now.”

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