Reuse/Recycling

  From a Howard Hughes' Plane

  to a motor-yacht 

This is an interesting little story of how to truly reuse and recycle instead of sending something as big as an airplane to a landfill. From a plane to a boat...the story of the Cosmic Muffin.

Last week I went to Fort Lauderdale, Florida for a family reunion and found out that our neighbor is the owner of the famous Cosmic Muffin plane-boat and has it docked two houses away from my family's home. At the reunion my uncle asked who wanted to go see the neighbor's plane-boat. At first I had NO interest, and then he said the plane was originally owned by Howard Hughes. Since The Aviator is my all-time favorite Leonardo DiCaprio film then I said, "Okay, I'm So In!"

The plane-boat started its improbable journey as a Boeing 307 Stratoliner originally owned by industrialist and aviation pioneer Howard Hughes who acquired the plane in 1939 as part of his purchase of TWA. The 307 was the world’s first commercial pressurized aircraft that was a variant of the B-17 Flying Fortress. Only ten were built in the late 1930s as production was discontinued by government order at the outbreak of World War II in September 1939. One 307 has survived fully intact and has undergone a complete restoration by Boeing in Seattle for its owner, the National Air & Space Museum.

Destined for the scrap heap, the 307 was rescued by Fort Lauderdale Realtor and pilot Kenneth W. London in 1969. Unable to make the plane airworthy again, he cut the wings and tail off, trucked the remaining fuselage to a nearby marina and spent the next four years converting the four-engined airliner into a sleek and uniquely sensational motor yacht. Launched in July 1974, the Londonaire was seen throughout south Florida to the delight of spectators and the media. The “plane-boat” featured twin V-8 inboards incorporating the original aircraft cockpit controls that were used to fly the plane, propelling the vessel over 20 mph. Electrical, plumbing, sanitation and air conditioning systems were installed along with a new interior that included restored chairs and bar.

The boat was bought by Dave Drimmer in 1981 as a live aboard and extensively remodeled and rebuilt after he discovered the original hull was barely keeping the plane fuselage afloat. He later named it the Cosmic Muffin after publication of Jimmy Buffett’s novel "Where is Joe Merchant?"

While many boats over the years have pridefully claimed to be distinctive and unique, the Cosmic Muffin can truly be considered an historic one-of-a-kind amalgam of a rare aircraft and novel vessel. No other watercraft, before or since, has ever been constructed from a land-based airplane, especially one with such a rich legacy as an historic aircraft owned by a true legend, Howard Hughes.

If interested, you can read the complete history, view pictures and a video at PlaneBoats.com.

 

               Howard Hughes                                                       Dave Drimmer

According to a recent study by the marketing consulting firm Frank About Women, one-quarter of all products in a woman’s shopping cart are environmentally friendly. (Note: this is data from the USA, unfortunately our shopping carts here in Australia have no current way of achieving such lofty green levels.)

 

The study also shows, according to an article in Ad Week, that “women are less likely than men to scoff at ecological concerns.” Most importantly, “if they feel they are getting a comparable product with green benefits, 69% are game to buy it.”

 

Another study, being released this week at the Good and Green Marketing Conference, will reportedly show that 80% of adult women in the USA believe very strongly that individuals can affect the environment, but that almost 60% believe that they are personally not doing enough to protect it.

Continue Reading Is Green the “New Black” for Women Shoppers?

So the beginnings of the global environmentalist movement chose to tell us to recycle paper. In the light of fields of rainforest being burnt on our television news screens, it was decreed that this had to stop. We had to keep these forests, and we had to make an attempt to protect our home planet.

But wait, was that *burning* rainforests? Were all the loggers we see taking the freshly cut trees off to paper mills? Were they burning the trees and reconstituting the ashes?

Of course not. The simple fact is, if you have a sheet of paper, if may have come from a tree, but it's not come from prime Brazilian hardwood. That land is primarily cleared for farming. But that doesn't make a nice simple association that people can be expected to grasp, and didn't get nearly as much publicity as it should have done.

I am Richard ROBINSON an independent eco activist from Erode district a small town in the state of Tamil Nadu INDIA, since my infancy I found myself attached deeply towards nature and species this further led me to learn while I walked, without knowing those scientific facts and terminologies, I started from mimicking to the black bird’s ringing, which I lately studied as Asian Koel (Eudynamys Scolopacea) and the imitation I did was bird Ringing and birding, And along with my friends we started to plant trees, further after years in 2004 and likeminded naturalists we formed a non profit organization named JEEVAKARUNYA TRUST, with a motto to Train and implement youth In Sustainable Development work promoting environmental, ecological and humanitarian values and importance,

 

And now, still learning educating and training the younger generation’s to involve individually and collectively in all eco-development activities and decision makings  I have individually conducted hundreds of seminars and converted them to eco-actions,

24 hour x 7 days Snake Rescues along with a trained team,

Free seminars, slid shows and movie for the all local and surrounded educational institutions,

Conservation based weed removal action for Tribal livelihood development trainings

Clean renewable energy solar lamp implementation to rural and tribal those not accessed with power,

And many innovative initiatives like craft from the plant lantana camera which is considered as a weed destroying native forest and farm lands, GREEN CROSS eco action clubs, and more to bring a change in the un-mind full living of the most populace   even though we find very tuff and hard to move every step without any support, I believe that we can make it, I also swear that what ever happens I am not going to quit my duty towards nature, of conserving the only home at least in this 11 hour... 

 

 

Greenbuild 2009 International Conference and Expo is being held in Phoenix, Arizona from November 11th - 13th.

Former Vice President Al Gore will be the opening Keynote speaker tonight, November 11th at the Greenbuild conference. You can watch his speech and other keynote speakers live or as archived video later here at GreenbuildExpo.org.

Hi everyone i'm Michaela a nature lover that wants to do something for our planet. For plastic users we know that it is not biodegradable. We must learn how to recycle it...in that simple way we can contribute on saving the Earth. Well for me being a swimming pool solar heating contractor I make sure that some of my old equipment that can be use in the future is secured, with that there would be no need for me to buy another new equipment.

I'm not really into blogging. I mean who really reads these things.  I guess why I feel it is safe to say: 

"My name is Erica and I'm eco-obsessive compulsive."

It has been my secret shame for quite some time (except for my roommates who were repeatedly harassed in to recycling everything)

I'm ashamed to admit that it took me a few months to get around to watching the 11th hour. I was impressed when I bought it because it actually came in recyclable packaging.  I avoided the movie because I was afraid of feeling depressed and helpless as I watched the images and absorbed the harsh reality (the inconvenient truth, as it were) and as a single parent working in the automotive field I was mostly concerned with feeding my children and caring for those around me.  I didn't think I could make a change on a global scale.  So I put watching this on my to do list and tryed to save the world as best I could, tightening faucets and turning off lights. I hate to admit to the garbage picking that went on...  I still can't put ANYTHING in the garbage. I will donate any useless thing to charity rather than add to the landfills,  I just can't.

As I said I am, for the time being, an auto worker.  When I first started my job people were talking about how Kyoto was just being ratified in Canada.  I was happy but I knew right then that it was going to cost me my job one day. I knew at that point I would be getting ready to do something else and that the big 3 would still be producing these shiny cancer causing dinosaurs.

So the day is here and I'm still not sure what to do. I was already frightened about the future so why not get right into it and face it all at once.  The thing is that I wasn't afraid after I watched it.  I'm hopeful!  I think it is possible that I can make a change, even if I still don't know how.  I don't even know how much longer I will be working, but I know that I will be leaving my polluted little town and going out west and from there I will meet like minded people...

My biggest passion at the moment is solar energy, maybe electric vehicles.  I bit my tongue at a child's birthday party last weekend when handed a bottle of water... there is a time and a place. Wind turbines get me all warm and gooey inside. :)

I was also thinking that there should be a movie that shows the possibility for the future. Like what a big city like LA would be with cleaner cars and solar panels (they also have waves that could power much of the city and surrounding areas)

With all the disaster movies out there people will feel helpless and keep these negative images in there heads. (the media is NO HELP in that area) we need a movie that shows possibility (Hopefully we can slip it past the oil companies and their lap dog politicians)  I know that http://www.thevenusproject.com/introResearch.php are working on a movie kind of like I have in mind.  The ideas expressed there are great for the most part but I don't know how soon something like that would be possible AND I don't think we should just give up on the old cities that we already have. We do need to start making what we have work more efficiently a.s.a.p., then we can switch over from there and preserve some of the more stunning pieces of architecture and historic sites as we go.

these are just some of my thoughts.  I don't know what good I've done expressing them but I intend to keep doing it until I figure out what to do next :) ec

 

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reciclaje