Geography 321, Chapter 14 - MexAmerica, the Borderlands in reality.

(The right lies Tijuana, Baja California, and on the left is San Diego, California. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico%E2%80%93United_States_border)

The image of Mexican-American is shaped by boarder since Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. The border lands covering the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. The boarder today is continuous challenged by illegal immigration and drug smugger.  

U.S. Customs and Border Protection holds a key position. Mexican-American boarder is in middle of criminal traffic: drugs made by drug cartels in Mexican have to export into market in the U.S., and than the revenue from selling drug (mostly in cash) also have to transfer into Mexico, or buy weapons from gun shops in the U.S. have to transport into Mexico for drug cartels.

Although drug cartels tried to break the security for smuggling their drugs into the U.S., Customs and Border Protection intercepted most of the traffic by advanced sensors to detect the drugs hidden in varies of method of transportation.

Illegal immigration is different. Because the boarder lands in MexAmerica is hot, dry weather. Many of illegal immigrates risk their live to cross the boarder into the U.S.. They usually lacks water, food, and clothes to cross desert's hot daylight and cold night time so missing and death are very common for illegal crossing.


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/21/us/immigrant-death-rate-rises-on-illegal-crossings.html?_r=0

Geography 321, Chapter 17 - Telescope in top of Hawai'i and the Pacific Islands

(https://www.flickr.com/photos/chanc/9104146473)

Mauna Kea Observatories is a famous astronomy observatory located on the summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawai'i. The summit of 11,500 feet (3500 meters) is dry due strong temperature inversion keeps clouds  from climbing 4000 feet to 8000 feet (1200 to 2450 meters). In addition, there is no city on the Big Island make light pollution that can interfere the night sky observation.

(http://imgkid.com/mauna-kea-observatory.shtml)

One of the observatory is W. M. Keck Observatory, one of the largest astronomical telescopes in operation.

The Mauna Kea controversy starts recently due the Thirty Meter Telescope build proposal caused native Hawaiian protest. So far the telescope is temporary halted. It seems politics will become considering for Mauna Kea Observatories in future.

http://www.welivemana.com/articles/sacredness-mauna-kea-explained

Geography 321, Chapter 16 - Arcata at The Pacific Northwest

The California Geography Conference holds its annual conference at Humboldt State University in Arcata, California this May. It takes 12 hours drives from Northridge to Arcata by car. This is the highest latitude I have went for. The place is described as textbook: at north of California, cold ocean water body with mid latitude cyclones make Arcata as mild Summer, cold winter.

Nearly all year around foggy conditions is favorite for coastal redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens). This coastal redwoods can living 1,200–1,800 years or more. The The oldest known specimen is about 2,200 years old. 

(Chandelier Tree (Drive thru tree) v.s. modern truck)

Much of the counties at north of San Francisco is rural. More northern part of the California coast counties like Humboldt often referred to as the being located "behind the Redwood Curtain." The only way to breaching the Redwood Curtain is 101 highway. 

Arcata may looks like a small town, but the microbrewery produces some unique beers that we southern Californians never heard. Microbrewery in Arcata uses water from Mad river and takes the river name as their company brands. Surely Arcata is very remote, but I see a bottle of beer (or ale) is worth for 12 hours road drive.


http://www.conifers.org/cu/Sequoia.php
http://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/Behind-the-REDWOOD-CURTAIN-Humboldt-a-separate-2649310.php

Geography 321, Chapter 15 - California and the aqueduct.

(Terminus of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, November, 1913.)

If the man from Madison changed his mind, move to Los Angeles instead of San Francisco, he might catch up the construction of  Los Angeles Aqueduct which will complete in 1913.

If the man can get a job on aqueduct, working with dirt may sounds easy. But he have to faces the dryness and coldness of Owens Valley, and over timing works with steel pipes and dynamites. 

This hard finally ends on November 5, 1913. The man attended the opening day ceremonies of the Los Angeles Aqueduct with  30,000 people at Cascades.

The man hears his boss William Mulholland says "There it is. Take it." to him and 30,000 peoples. Then the man can looks for easy jobs like being a farmer at San Fernando Valley to raise citrus. He might plants some orange trees so the students of CSU Northridge can enjoy to pick them on decades later. 

(November 9, 2014. 101 years anniversary of L.A. aqueduct.)

Even so, the man later will feels he deserve to get a cup of water from aqueduct and condemns the saboteurs from Owens valley farms to destroy the aqueduct he was worked for.


http://waterandpower.org/museum/Construction_of_the_LA_Aqueduct.html
http://waterandpower.org/museum/Opening_of_LA_Aqueduct.html

Geography 321, Chapter 12 and 13 - The railroad that crossed the Rocky Mountain Region and the Intermontane West

(The Central Pacific's engine Jupiter and the Union Pacific's engine No. 119 meet on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Summit, Utah. http://railroad.lindahall.org/essays/brief-history.html)

If a man who lives in Madison city make up his mind to seek his own manifest destiny to the west after the Wright Brothers made their first flying machine into air, he has better chance to success than early American pioneers who took their wagon into the unknown Rocky mountains and the wild west.

After preparation done, the man go to railroad station to take a train to Milwaukee, Chicago, and then transfer into a Union Pacific's train that depart from Omaha to San Francisco. 

He may tired the flatness of the great Plains before train drives into Utah. The man could amazed from the train crosses the Great Salt Lake by Lucin Cutoff. Roughness mountains in Nevada might cause the man feels sick. He will be feel comfortable when train drives flat route in Sacramento. He can finally arrives San Francisco after the last hilly route.

(http://www.trestlewood.com/page/1020/)

The man's journal may ends on San Francisco, but his experience from The Transcontinental Railroad will pass down into his descendants. His descendants will amaze peoples at the beginning of the Century of Flight could crossing the Rocky Mountain and the Intermontane West.

Geography 321, Chapter 11 - Tornado alley in “Great Plains” and Madison.

(http://www.koco.com/weather/the-many-faces-of-tornado-alley/25726746)

As I typing this sentences, the tornado outbreak sequence is occurring in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas since 5th May. Tornado alley in the Great Plains is very famous in every Geography textbooks. Even today's tornadoes have developed more strike zone eastward by climate change, the classic Tornado alley in the Great Plains stills stands high occurrence rate for continental United States.

Tornado usually formed by several thunderstorm, or super cell. Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas located in border of differential air masses and the path of strong jet stream from Rocky mountains. In general, tornado comes from strong thunderstorm, so other region outside than the Great Plains can have tornado. The places like Los Angeles in southern California and Madison in Wisconsin could have Tornado strike, but the latter city has higher chances. According my mother's memory, my family had two Tornado warnings and went to shelter during my live in Madison city. Since I lives in Los Angeles in 2004, I heard a few Tornado warnings from SoCal beach cities and small damages in local residential buildings. For Madison city, its quit normal have Tornado strikes, but for Los Angeles it is still rare for all Angelenos! So the imagines from Hollywood's mind, "2012" is totally B rated fancy movie but "San Andreas" might have better fit for Angelenos' theater.

(The best vortical action can be seen at 3:04 and 7:04.) 

(The most recent Tornado strike in L.A.)

Geography 321, Chapter 10 Coastal South

(http://dahrjamail.net/gulf-coast-fishermen-challenge-us-government-over-dispersants)

In the coastal south there have many primary economic activities. The leading producing of large volumes of citrus fruit and sugar cane from Florida are famous in American's supermarket. However, commercial fishing is a part of Coastal South's important industry.

In 2012, commercial fishers in Louisiana  landed 1.2 billion pounds and garnered $331 million in revenue and Mississippi landed 263.6 million pounds. The economic report said commercial and recreational fishing nationally supported about 1.7 million jobs in 2012.  

However, this Coastal South's industry impacted by man-made disaster.

On 20 April 2010, an offshore oil drilling rig Deepwater Horizon got explosion and sank. The rig's drilling site caused over 210 million gallons of crude oil leaked into the Gulf of Mexico.

Coastal of west Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, east Louisiana and fishing areas in the Gulf were closed for one year due crude oil spill. furthermore, crude oil can divided into smaller droplets and enter the gulf's food chain through zooplankton. The toxins from oil spills can cause fish hearts into cardiac arrest.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/more-than-three-years-later-oil-from-the-deepwater-horizon-persists-in-the-gulf-180948063/?no-ist

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-tuna-hearts-oil-spill-toxins-20140213-story.html