Continuing mystery of Flight 370

Signals from commercial aircraft to Inmarsat satellites always include a code confirming the identity of the plane. You'll find more on this here - It's simply fascinating...

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/17/world/asia/satellite-signals-plane-identity-flight-370/index.html?hpt=hp_mid

Experts piecing together the mystery of Flight 370, are using this information to try and track the path that the plane may have taken...

In a talk with Becky Anderson, Professor David Stupples explains what a satellite handshake is, and how a plane can hide radar detection.

A satellite handshake - 'Think of it like a mobile telephone,' he says. Even though the telephone is not being used to make a call, it is registering continuously with its space station to say 'I am here.' This is what the aircraft is doing with the geostationary satellite which is 23000 miles up in outer space....

Professor Stupples breaks this down at - http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/world/2014/03/17/ctw-malaysia-flight-370-radar-expert-stupples-intv.cnn.html

What courage!

You'll find this heartbreaking story of 'Two women trapped in Damascus', here:

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26474982

What is war doing?

Having been a teacher for most of my life...

this article caught me...

A Point of View: The case for not leaving education to the teachers. You can find it here: 

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26480053

The turmoil regarding education is happening in some way or the other in all countries. The old system is not working, nor is the new. Everyone connected with education knows a constant revamp has to be done to keep pace with the constantly changing world - children have to be taught new skills, new ways of thinking, new ways of problem solving...new ways of coping, even....In many countries, children have yet to be made literate...

Here's a thought that caught me:

Our country is full of people who know things, and of children who want to learn things. A successful education system is one that brings the two together, so that knowledge can pass between them. In every village there are people with knowledge that would be useful to the young - retired accountants and lawyers, musicians and singers, those who speak a foreign language, writers, plumbers, farmers, engineers and amateur historians. And many of those would welcome the opportunity to teach what they know. Somehow we have failed to harness this capital, letting it go to waste while our children drift in search of it. Gradually our governments have begun to wake up to this fact. We are seeing a revival in government circles of the old idea of education as a charitable gift from one generation to the next, rather than a form of state-controlled social engineering.

I've changed my blog...

Cal Kaleidoscope to Weft and Warp

I'd like to share stories and happenings that catch my attention. Would love for you to give me your opinions...

A terribly busy crossing...

the Gariahat-Rashbehari junction...

People reading the paper and discussing the days news, events, political moves.....immersed in their discussions and debates, regardless of honking cars/buses/autos, people shouting greetings across to each other, hawkers hawking their wares....and the whole human drama that happens at any crossing....

Some days you'll even see people balancing a chess board on the rail tracks that make up the barrier, totally focused on their chessmen.

You may also, a little later in the day, be lucky to catch a little boy weaving his way with cha...

The only Cal sky...

that I love is this one...dark, cloudy, with the promise of rain...

Cal skies...

                                A tangle of wires, palm fronds, and a bit of the Calcutta sky...