Like the 20,000 school children who died in Sichuan province when many of the schools in the region collapsed during an earthquake due to shoddy construction? Nothing better than seeing those "tofu construction" buildings completed.

That makes it even worse.

>Snow blanketed California the last weekend of February, only weeks after it was pummeled by torrential rains. But these historic storms barely made a dent in a daily reality for most Californians — a years-long, expansive drought. According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, 99.39% of the state is still abnormally dry or in drought...

Despite the rains and snow in February, the state was still mostly in a state of drought in January?!?

I don't doubt what you're saying, but why say 99.7% and link to a source that says 55.34%?

The US drought monitor site they linked doesn’t seem to agree with their assertion that 99.3% of the state is abnormally dry or in drought.

Open Skies required notification, certification and pre flight inspection.

Edit: and China was never a signatory.

The capability of the Chinese balloon and the U-2 aren't well known. The intent of flying a U-2 over a foreign country is pretty obvious. The U-2 observing the Chinese balloon was able to determine the balloon was doing intelligence gathering as well, so the intent is also obvious.

It is also an incontrovertible fact that doing either in foreign airspace without permission is a violation of international law assuming the payload of the balloon weighs more than 5kg (approximately 40 bananas.)

The attention is because it isn't any different than the US flying a U-2 over China.

I don't doubt it, but if you exclude accidents, I suspect the fatality rates would look different for other occupations as well. Looking at the BLS data, one quarter of all logging deaths in 2021 were also vehicular accidents.

The FBI statistics seem to indicate that more officers died from felonious assault with a firearm in 2021 (61) than from vehicular accidents (32 in crashes and 20 struck by a vehicle as a pedestrian.)

They're not even on the list as BLS rate data lumps cops into either Federal, State, or Local government workers.

www.bls.gov/iif/fatal-injuries-tables.htm#rates

Upper Colorado headwaters are currently at 126% of normal snow water equivalent, but that won't really put a dent in Mead and Powell levels.

https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/wcc/home/quicklinks/states/colorado

I can see why Quincy Jones heard this demo, and thought the song was perfect for Michael (with a rewrite of the verses of course.)

NPS generally doesn't allow grazing other than probably Capitol Reef which was made from existing BLM land with existing leases. Organ Pipe isn't a good example as the Sonoran Desert probably isn't a good candidate to reverse desertification and that ecoregion is important in itself.

When trying to reverse desertification, herd animals aren't the most important thing, stopping soil erosion is. Grazing animals can also be a negative, but if managed properly they can be a great positive. Ruminant animals are an important part of the ecosystem, whether they be bovine (including bison), ovine, caprine or deer. I strongly suggest you watch this Ted talk. It's certainly not settled science, as some will argue that the benefit is offset by the methane created by ruminant animals. I would argue that the methane production from the great bison herds of North America, which were also ruminant, didn't seem to be a problem, or we wouldn't call climate change man-made.

Overgrazing can be a huge problem. That is why the Taylor Grazing Act was passed, to avoid the issues seen in the Dust Bowl. If grazing herds aren't allowed to move once they have mowed over an area it can have a severely negative affect. That's why the Federal Government hires scientists to monitor and plan these leases. There is plenty of area for herds to move as we're talking about a combined area (630,000 square km) larger than Ukraine.

It seems as though they have classified BLM land as dedicated to livestock, even though they are actually multi-use, and open to the public for recreation along with other uses. Much of it isn't fit for grazing, and others are actual conservation areas. Usually in the areas where they issue grazing permits under the Taylor Grazing Act, the cattle are there three months out of the year with plenty of room to graze. Large herds of grazing animals are actually better for the land than not having them. They eat, trample, and fertilize the grass then move on rather than letting it grow and then die creating a thatch and taking several years to decompose. Grazing herds can actually be a valuable tool in stopping and even reversing desertification.