The orbit of asteroid 2011 ES4 is still not entirely known. Our knowledge of it might improve sometime today – or early tomorrow – if it is “recovered” by astronomers. It’s expected to pass within the moon’s orbit, possibly as close as 0.19 lunar distances. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/asteroid-2011-es4-closer-than-moon-september-1-2020…
Tag: Truck
Are We Ready for Driverless Trucks?
Two million truckers move 70% of America’s goods. But hundreds of thousands of their jobs could be disrupted away, reports Jon Wertheim on the CBS news show 60 Minutes, in “a high-stakes, high-speed race pitting the usual suspects — Google and Tesla and other global tech firms — against small start-ups smelling opportunity.” One of those startups is TuSimple, and their…
Investors Argue This Stock Market Isn’t Like the ’90s Dot-Com Boom
The stock market is setting new records, with some tech companies at “the steepest premium ever versus cheap shares,” reports Bloomberg. (Even Tesla “is trading at more than 800-times earnings while an electric-truck peer, which made just $36,000 last quarter by installing solar panels for its founder, is valued at $16 billion.”) So is it like the great dot-com bubble of…
Electric Trucks Could Make a ‘Significant Dent’ In Carbon Emissions
Electric trucks have the potential to displace enough oil to make a “significant dent” in transportation sector CO2 emissions, per a Rhodium Group analysis. Axios reports: There’s lots of buzz — and a lot of money — around electric trucks these days. It estimates the long-term effects of a recent 15-state nonbinding pact (PDF) to bolster the use of zero-emissions heavy…
Truck-sized asteroid swept within 2,000 miles on Sunday
Asteroid ZTF0DxQ – now officially labeled 2020 QG – now holds the record for the closest flyby of Earth. It swept just 2,000 miles (3,000 km) from Earth’s surface, or about a quarter of the diameter of Earth itself. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/closest-known-asteroid-flyby-ztf0dxq-2020-qg…
Speeding truck driver was ‘attacked by snake’
A man who was stopped for speeding in Australia had a rather unique excuse for why he was going so fast. When officers in Queensland intercepted a tru… Source: https://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/news/338030/speeding-truck-driver-was-attacked-by-snake…
California Set To Require Zero-Emissions Trucks
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Rebuffing strong opposition from industry, California is expected to adopt a landmark rule on Thursday that requires more than half of all trucks sold in the state to be zero-emissions by 2035, a move that is set to improve local air quality, rein in greenhouse gas emissions and sharply curtail…
Tesla Acquires $5 Million Worth of Land Outside Austin To Build ‘Cybertruck Gigafactory’
Tesla is acquiring $5 million worth of land outside of Austin, Texas to build its new factory. CEO Elon Musk refers to it as “Cybertruck Gigafactory” because it will be where Tesla produces its new electric pickup truck. Electrek reports: Last month, Electrek exclusively reported that Tesla’s next factory is going to be in Austin. After our report, Tesla leaked that…
Nikola Founder Exaggerated the Capability of His Debut Truck
An anonymous reader shares a report: After half an hour of promotional videos and big promises, Nikola’s 13-foot-tall prototype parked atop a rotating stage began to spin. The dramatic music reached a crescendo, lights flicked on and a partially translucent white sheet lifted off the Nikola One. Founder Trevor Milton walked up to applause, put his hands on his side and…
More Drone Deliveries Being Tested in America
Long-time Slashdot reader necro81 writes: For several years, Zipline has deployed autonomous, fixed-wing airplane drones for medical supply deliveries in Rwanda. Now they have received permission to test their aircraft in the U.S., ferrying COVID-19 supplies from a depot to a hospital in North Carolina. The practical benefit is small: the cargo is modest amounts of PPE that could have been…