Italian Stallion - All charged up, nowhere to run

In the sparkling city of diamonds, will Sachin's Ferrari (as it will always be known as) be just an American diamond - all shine and low self worth?

Like most other towns in the country, the best of the roads in Surat are dug up mercilessly and perennially. Even as concrete gives way to mud mounds for broadband, telephone, sewage, drinking water and plumbing lines, the new owner of the Ferrari Modena 360, will find it difficult to maneuver his prancing horse on very few select roads in Surat.

Metallurgist and Plasma technologist Max Babi from Pune had presented a lecture at Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology (SVNIT) on advanced surface modification technologies. He points out, "It may not be the wisest of decisions to drive around in an aluminum-alloy-bodied lightweight, power-packed race horse like the Ferrari. The Modena 360 has a wide body, low slung design feature which would make it impossible to avoid pot-holes, projection bumps and dug-up roads which are the hallmark of all municipal corporations around India."

The 400-HP 12-cylinder Italian stallion has a huge engine and reaches speeds of up to 185 miles per hour (MPH) or nearly 300 kilometres per hour (KMPH) in just four seconds. To drive a rocket in car form would need a race track. In an overpopulated city, where sudden appearances of people, auto-rickshaws and animals is a common sight, the driver would be lucky to move past the fourth gear, leave alone the six gears that Ferrari has.

"The slightest pressure on the accelerator is likely to make the car propel forward dangerously, even expressways in India are not the right choice to race and enjoy a 350 KMPH ride because of erratic drivers and unpredictable happenings," adds Babi.

While parking a fancy car has its perks in five star ambiance, city sidewalks are too risky. Hangers-on too, tend to get in the way because they are curious to take a closer look. "If you like a pricey car, you have to be ready to pay the price. Even a cracked rear view side mirror costs a neat 1 lakh to be replaced," say Tejjus Kapadia, a Surat yarn dealer who was the first to own Jaguar in Gujarat.

Flaws in routes for Ferrari-

Piplod-Dumas road: While the 12-odd km stretch is a continuous four-lane drive, it is regularly used by truckers and chakadas on weekdays and a nightmare to ride on during weekends, when almost the entire town chooses to see the Arabian Sea.

Magdalla-Sachin-Palsana belt: It is too serpentine to take risks as truckers and trailers crawl all day and night. The industrial area and Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) waste management plant raise a stink turning the joy ride into a suffocating, stench-filled drive.

Nowhere to run « TexasVox: The Voice of Public Citizen in Texas

In a series of investigative stories, the Associated Press (AP) has been reporting on the state of the US nuclear industry in the wake of the Fukushima disaster in Japan.  In this recent report, the AP found that as America’s nuclear power plants have aged, the once-rural areas around them have become far more crowded and much more difficult to evacuate.

Even as nuclear plants run at higher power, posing more danger in the event of an accident, populations around the facilities have swelled as much as 4½ times since 1980.  At the same time estimates of evacuation times have not been updated in decades.  Emergency plans would direct residents to flee on antiquated, two-lane roads that clog hopelessly at rush hour. And evacuation zones have remained frozen at a 10-mile radius from each plant since they were set in 1978.

With about 120 million people, almost 40 percent of all Americans, living within 50 miles of a nuclear plant (using 2010 Census data) this scenario smacks of human tragedy, for any nuclear accident in this country.

Click here to read this segment of AP’s investigative study of Nuclear Power in America.

Nowhere to Run

Nowhere to Run

Nowhere to Run

Nowhere to Run, Not Without Risk\A Man to Die For

Nowhere to Run