#condition based monitoring

[vibrationanalystslist]

Vibration Analysts Inc. offers ISO certified vibration analysis services and support for your vibration program. We provide accurate and affordable data analysis and free access to client databases. Contact us for world-class service from start to finish.

[thirdeye-ai]

Condition Based Monitoring & Maintenance Solutions

Unlock the power of real-time insights and proactive maintenance with ThirdEye AI's Condition Based Monitoring & Maintenance Solutions. Our intelligent system utilizes cutting-edge sensors, data analytics, and AI to predict and prevent equipment failures. Empower your organization with predictive maintenance scheduling, anomaly detection, and optimization of spare part inventory. Make informed decisions and optimize efficiency with ThirdEye AI.

[rahulsinha]

MG Cooling Solutions specializes in IoT-based HVAC monitoring systems that empower businesses with real-time insights, remote control, and predictive analytics. Our smart systems collect and analyze critical data on temperature, humidity, airflow, and energy consumption, helping facilities optimize performance and reduce costs.

[likitakans]

AI and Health: New Technologies Paving the Way for Better Treatment

Artificial intelligence (AI) is expanding rapidly in the health sector, and it is revolutionizing our medical system. With the help of AI, new technologies are being developed that are not only helpful in accurately diagnosing diseases but are also playing an important role in personalized treatment and management.

Quick and accurate diagnosis of diseases AI-based tools can now analyze medical imaging data such as X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs quickly and accurately. This helps doctors to quickly detect complex conditions such as cancer, heart diseases, and neurological problems.

Personalized medicine AI can help create personalized treatment plans for every individual by analyzing genomics and biometrics. This technology ensures that the patient gets the right medicine and the right dose at the right time.

Improved health management AI-based health apps and wearables such as smart watches are now helping people monitor their health condition. These devices regularly track health indicators such as heart rate, blood pressure and sleep quality.

Accelerating medical research The role of AI has become extremely important in the development of new drugs and vaccines. Using AI, scientists can analyze complex data sets and make new medical discoveries faster.

Accessible and affordable healthcare AI technology is helping in delivering affordable and effective healthcare, even in rural and remote areas. Telemedicine and virtual health assistants are bridging the gap between patients and doctors.

Conclusion Artificial intelligence is playing an important role in making healthcare more effective, accurate, and accessible. However, there are challenges such as data security and ethics in the use of AI technology which need to be dealt with. In the coming years, with more advanced and innovative uses of AI, the healthcare landscape may change completely.

[cyberswift-story]

Road Condition Monitoring System(RCMS): Enhancing Efficiency with AI-Powered Solutions

The quality and sustainability of road infrastructure play a pivotal role in societal development, economic growth, and the safety of communities. To address the challenges of road construction and maintenance, advanced digital tools such as Road Condition Monitoring Systems (RCMS) are becoming indispensable. Leveraging technologies like AI-powered pothole detection, data analytics, and interactive visualization, RCMS ensures efficient planning, monitoring, and maintenance of road networks.

[ontonix]

Onboard, Real-time Anomaly Detection via 4-th Generation AI

Modern products such as automobiles, aircraft, ships, military equipment, etc., function thanks to a multitude of software, hardware, and sensors/actuators. The amount of data they produce is massive. Their key characteristic is their immense complexity. Because of technology advances this complexity increases and is becoming a threat of its own. This is because high complexity inevitably…

[terotam]

Explore why preventive maintenance is a game-changer for small businesses, driving operational efficiency and reducing unexpected downtime.

[reasonsforhope]

Although dam removals have been happening since 1912, the vast majority have occurred since the mid-2010s, and they have picked up steam since the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which provided funding for such projects. To date, 806 Northeastern dams have come down, with hundreds more in the pipeline. Across the country, 2023 was a watershed year, with a total of 80 dam removals. Says Andrew Fisk, Northeast regional director of the nonprofit American Rivers, “The increasing intensity and frequency of storm events, and the dramatically reduced sizes of our migratory fish populations, are accelerating our efforts.”

Dam removals in the Northeast don’t generate the same media attention as massive takedowns on West Coast rivers, like the Klamath or the Elwha. That’s because most of these structures are comparatively miniscule, built in the 19th century to form ponds and to power grist, textile, paper, saw, and other types of mills as the region developed into an industrial powerhouse.

But as mills became defunct, their dams remained. They may be small to humans, but to the fish that can’t get past them “they’re just as big as a Klamath River dam,” says Maddie Feaster, habitat restoration project manager for the environmental organization Riverkeeper, based in Ossining, New York. From Maryland and Pennsylvania up to Maine, there are 31,213 inventoried dams, more than 4,000 of which sit within the 13,400-square-mile Hudson River watershed alone. For generations they’ve degraded habitat and altered downstream hydrology and sediment flows, creating warm, stagnant, low-oxygen pools that trigger algal blooms and favor invasive species. The dams inhibit fish passage, too, which is why the biologists at the mouth of the Saw Kill transported their glass eels past the first of three Saw Kill dams after counting them...

Jeremy Dietrich, an aquatic ecologist at the New York State Water Resources Institute, monitors dam sites both pre- and post-removal. Environments upstream of an intact dam, he explains, “are dominated by midges, aquatic worms, small crustaceans, organisms you typically might find in a pond.” In 2017 and 2018 assessments of recent Hudson River dam removals, some of which also included riverbank restorations to further enhance habitat for native species, he found improved water quality and more populous communities of beetles, mayflies, and caddisflies, which are “more sensitive to environmental perturbation, and thus used as bioindicators,” he says. “You have this big polarity of ecological conditions, because the barrier has severed the natural connectivity of the system. [After removal], we generally see streams recover to a point where we didn’t even know there was a dam there.”

Pictured: Quassaick Creek flows freely after the removal of the Strooks Felt Dam, Newburgh, New York.

American Rivers estimates that 85 percent of U.S. dams are unnecessary at best and pose risks to public safety at worst, should they collapse and flood downstream communities. The nonprofit has been involved with roughly 1,000 removals across the country, 38 of them since 2018. This effort was boosted by $800 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. But states will likely need to contribute more of their own funding should the Trump administration claw back unspent money, and organizations involved in dam removal are now scrambling to assess the potential impact to their work.

Enthusiasm for such projects is on the upswing among some dam owners — whether states, municipalities, or private landholders. Pennsylvania alone has taken out more than 390 dams since 1912 — 107 of them between 2015 and 2023 — none higher than 16 feet high. “Individual property owners [say] I own a dam, and my insurance company is telling me I have a liability,” says Fisk. Dams in disrepair may release toxic sediments that potentially threaten both human health and wildlife, and low-head dams, over which water flows continuously, churn up recirculating currents that trap and drown 50 people a year in the U.S.

Numerous studies show that dam removals improve aquatic fish passage, water quality, watershed resilience, and habitat for organisms up the food chain, from insects to otters and eagles. But removals aren’t straightforward. Federal grants, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or the Fish and Wildlife Service, favor projects that benefit federally listed species and many river miles. But even the smallest, simplest projects range in cost from $100,000 to $3 million. To qualify for a grant, be it federal or state, an application “has to score well,” says Scott Cuppett, who leads the watershed team at the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation’s Hudson River Estuary Program, which collaborates with nonprofits like Riverkeeper to connect dam owners to technical assistance and money...

All this can be overwhelming for dam owners, which is why stakeholders hope additional research will help loosen up some of the requirements. In 2020, Yellen released a study in which he simulated the removal of the 1,702 dams in the lower Hudson watershed, attempting to determine how much sediment might be released if they came down. He found that “the vast majority of dams don’t really trap much sediment,” he says. That’s good news, since it means sediment released into the Hudson will neither permanently worsen water quality nor build up in places that would smother or otherwise harm underwater vegetation. And it shows that “you would not need to invest a huge amount of time or effort into a [costly] sediment management plan,” Yellen says. It’s “a day’s worth of excavator work to remove some concrete and rock, instead of months of trucking away sand and fill.” ...

On a sunny winter afternoon, Feaster, of Riverkeeper, stands in thick mud beside Quassaick Creek in Newburgh, New York. The Strooks Felt Dam, the first of seven municipally owned dams on the lower reaches of this 18-mile tributary, was demolished with state money in 2020. The second dam, called Holden, is slated to come down in late 2025. Feaster is showing a visitor the third, the Walsh Road Dam, whose removal has yet to be funded. “This was built into a floodplain,” she says, “and when it rains the dam overflows to flood a housing complex just around a bend in the creek.” ...

On the Quassaick, improvements are evident since the Strooks dam came out. American eel and juvenile blue crabs have already moved in. In fact, fish returns can sometimes be observed within minutes of opening a passageway. Says Schmidt, “We’ve had dammed rivers where you’ve been removing the project and when the last piece comes out a fish immediately storms past it.”

There is palpable impatience among environmentalists and dam owners to get even more removals going in the Northeast. To that end, collaborators are working to streamline the process. The Fish and Wildlife Service, for example, has formed an interagency fish passage task force with other federal agencies, including NOAA and FEMA, that have their own interests in dam removals. American Rivers is working with regional partners to develop priority lists of dams whose removals would provide the greatest environmental and safety benefits and open up the most river miles to the most important species. “We’re not going to remove all dams,” [Note: mostly for reasons dealing with invasive species management, etc.] says Schmidt. “But we can be really thoughtful and impactful with the ones that we do choose to remove.”

-via Yale Environment 360, February 4, 2025

[zazaiafe2]

How to make Your shifting journey fun again

(and stop being haunted by pressure, guilt or mental exhaustion)

So… you’ve been trying to shift for a while. You started out excited. You thought it would happen any day now. You felt the spark, the drive, the wonder.

But time passed, and now… it’s not so fun anymore. You feel stuck. Maybe even stressed. Intrusive thoughts? Compulsive rituals? A sinking feeling that it’s "just not working"?

Yeah. I see you. And this post is for you.

First, let’s name the enemy: Negative habitual conditioning

There’s something I call negative nabituation:

It’s what happens when your brain gets used to failing.

Each time you try to shift and "nothing happens," your brain marks that experience. Over time, these “failures” become the default neural expectation, even if consciously you want it to work.

Your subconscious starts expecting not to shift, because that’s what’s familiar.

Your excitement drops. You stop feeling newness.

The mind begins associating the act of "trying to shift" with frustration, not wonder.

-> Familiarity without success = subconscious resistance.

This is not your fault. It’s how the brain protects itself from disappointment. But the good news is, you can rewire it.

We see that the majority of people who have never shifted, have, for the most part, knew shifting for more than a year.

Why this happens

The dopaminergic system thrives on novelty and small wins.(In easier language your brain crave novelty and success)

If you always repeat the same methods without results, dopamine drops, motivation follows, and you enter a loop of expecting failure.

The prefrontal cortex, responsible for self-monitoring, becomes overactive with pressure and stress.

If you develop intrusive thoughts, impulse fears, or even OCD-like rituals, that’s your brain reacting to pressure by trying to control the uncontrollable.

This is a brain based reaction, not a character flaw.

This is also why I think many people shift by accident when they consciously stop trying it creates novelty, no pressure, no stress the level of cortisol and stress drastically descend. It also avoids self-checking since the person no longer seeks to check anything and it allows the thoughts to soften without intrusive thoughts about the fear of not shifting.

So how do we fix it?

1. Reintroduce Playfulness

Stop treating shifting like a test or a job. You're not failing school. You're exploring your own consciousness.

Do silly, creative daydreams

Make aesthetic moodboards or playlists for your DR

Write letters to your DR self

Imagine flying toast if that helps. No rules.

Joy = new neural plasticity and it will help you build new beliefs.

The more positive emotion you tie to the experience, the more likely your brain is to let you go deep at the key moment because you will break the negative loop.

Personally, I have mood boards and playlists.

2. Cut out guilt-based content

Let’s be real:

A lot of content out there is filled with toxic messages like:

> “If you didn’t shift, you didn’t want it bad enough.”

“You just didn’t believe hard enough.”

“It’s your fault. You're stuck in the victim mindset”

No. No. And no. That’s not how psychology, neuroscience or even spirituality works. Guilt is a terrible motivator for altered states. It triggers cortisol, not calm.

Unfollow what makes you feel like shit.

You don’t owe anyone a perfect journey.

3. Do shadow work to find the mental block

Ask yourself:

What does not shifting say about me?

What part of me believes I don’t deserve it?

Where did I learn to associate failure with identity?

These beliefs live in the subconscious, and until they’re seen, they’ll run the show.

Use:

Journaling

Hypnosis

Voice memos

Inner child work

You don’t need to heal everything to shift. You just need to create space

4. Relax the rituals

If you’re doing 37 affirmations, 5 meditations, a 45-minute audio loop, and re-writing your script daily… you’re probably exhausted.

Fun fact: over-ritualizing creates a false sense of control and often signals to your brain:

-> “This is hard. This is dangerous. We need to over-prepare.”

Try this instead:

Let your rituals become gentle routines

Do 10% of what you used to do

Take 1 night per week where you shift without any prep

Surprisingly, this works better for many people.

The majority of those who shift on command do not have a comprehensive or lengthy method

5. Shift your beliefs with hypnosis & Ccgnitive Work

Sometimes, it’s not your method. It’s your mental model.

Your brain may be caught in:

"I can’t shift because of X"

"It only works for other people"

"If I don't do it right, I'm stuck here forever"

These are cognitive distortions. And you can:

Use self-hypnosis or subliminals to implant new beliefs

Write counter-beliefs and repeat them with emotion

Reframe failure as data, not identity

6. Use audio That sparks curiosity, pot pressure

Instead of going for the “perfect frequency to force a shift,”

try soundscapes that make your brain go:

-> “Oooh… what’s that?”

That could be:

Low alpha or theta beats

Psychill, ambient or fantasy music

Natural sounds + suggestion layers Let it feel like exploration, not performance.

A playlist that make you think of your Dr

This frequency is super cool for that.

7. Tiny Wins Build Big Momentum

You don’t need to fully shift to celebrate:

Did you feel vibrations? Success.

Did you enter a trance? Huge.

Did you have a DR dream? You're syncing.

Did you feel excited again? That’s everything.

Each time you reward your brain for even small progress, you reprogram it to expect success. That’s where the magic begins. Start to treat your own journey like a game

You are not behind!

You are not broken!

You are not failing!

You'll get there and you'll see how it was all worth it.

You're unlearning stress, expectation, and inner noise. You're coming back to your own mind. To your playfulness. Your awe. Your joy. Start to gently trust yourself and the process again i know you can do it, don't let "not shifting" become a part of your identity because you are much more than that.

Shifting is not a punishment.

It’s not a race

[thirdeye-ai]

Condition Based Monitoring & Maintenance Solutions

Condition Based Monitoring & Maintenance is essential for modern businesses seeking to optimize their operations. With solutions like predictive insights, proactive scheduling, and reduced downtime, organizations can enjoy increased asset lifespan, minimized costs, and streamlined operations. Thirdeye AI leads the charge in revolutionizing maintenance strategies, offering innovative tools and expertise to propel businesses into a smarter, more efficient future. Experience the power of Thirdeye AI today!

[processanalytikinstruments]

How Model Based Condition Monitor Improves Industrial Equipment Reliability?

In the current competitive world of manufacturing where the highest achievable equipment reliability and lowest achievable unplanned downtime are the final targets of manufacturers and plant owners, a few of the most advanced and modern methods to achieve the same are the Model based Condition Monitor. It relies on mathematical models and real-time information to deliver accurate and informative feedback in the form of machinery health, thereby enabling industries to have maximum performance and prevent sudden failure.

When Indian industries adopt smart maintenance practices, Mumbai Model based Condition Monitor, Maharashtra Model based Condition Monitor, and across Model based Condition Monitor India are in demand day by day on a regular basis. In this blog, we will talk about how this new technology enhances the reliability of industrial machinery.

What Is a Model Based Condition Monitor?

A Model-based Condition Monitor is predictive maintenance by computer models that simulates and analyzes equipment maintenance in industry. By measuring current operating conditions against a simulated "ideal" condition, the system identifies anomalies indicative of equipment wear, misalignment, or looming failure.

Compared with conventional monitoring systems, which rely solely on sensor inputs, model-based monitoring builds a virtual duplicate of equipment. This enables operators to:

Foresee maintenance prior to it occurring

Refine maintenance schedules

Maximize machinery life

Improve production efficiency

Why Do Industries Require Equipment Reliability?

Equipment reliability in industries is needed because of the following reasons:

Avoids unplanned shutdowns

Reduces maintenance and repair costs

Provides consistent production output

Improve workplace safety

Improve overall working efficiency

As the machines are operated 24/7 all day long, even minor malfunctioning would result in huge downtime. Therefore, businesses are now opting for smart machines such as Model based Condition Monitor in Mumbai and Model based Condition Monitor in Maharashtra to maximize maintenance of their equipment.

Model Based Condition Monitor Increases Equipment Reliability

1. Early Fault Detection

Using prediction algorithms, a Model-based Condition Monitor can identify deviation from optimal operating conditions. Deviation usually refers to incipient faults like bearing wear, shaft misalignment, or lubricant failure. Fault detection ahead of time enables maintenance staff to take countermeasures before cataclysmic failure.

2. Fault-tolerant Failure Prediction

Through constant correlation of sensor readings in real-time with the virtual model, the system can accurately detect when a component would fail. This enables maintenance actions to be scheduled with ease without conducting unnecessary inspections that are not necessarily bound to lead to interventions before the time to failure.

3. Real-Time Performance Monitoring

Model-based Condition Monitor in Maharashtra and other industrialized hubs is increasingly being used for online condition monitoring. Twenty-four-hour-a-day monitoring of machine functioning enables any faults to be picked up straight away, cutting response time and avoiding downtime from having an impact on planning production.

4. Data-Driven Maintenance Scheduling

Maintenance activities based on legacy are time-fixed-driven with the risk of over-maintenance or periodic random failure. A Model Based Condition Monitor offers condition-based maintenance wherein the services are carried out only when the machine's condition requires it. This maximizes the utilization of maintenance resources and spending.

5. Enhanced Safety and Compliance

Malfunctioning equipment poses danger to employees and could result in penalty by regulatory bodies. A Model based Condition Monitor keeps equipment in a safe operating state within desired limits, lessening the likelihood of dangerous failure and enables industries to achieve compliance levels.

6. Equipment Life Extension

Planned inspection and on-time maintenance prolong the life of machine components. Firms applying Model based Condition Monitor in Mumbai reported that equipment life increased significantly, which is a reflection of increased return on investment.

Increased Demand of Model Based Condition Monitor in Mumbai and Maharashtra

Metropolitan towns such as Mumbai and industrial towns such as Maharashtra are the sites of India's biggest outsized production facilities, chemical refineries, and power facilities. Such facilities require prevention of sudden failure of equipment to sustain the production level and profitability.

In the wake of technological thrust and increasing information on predictive maintenance, organizations are using Model based Condition Monitor in Mumbai and Model based Condition Monitor in Maharashtra in order to:

Reduce downtime

Reduce maintenance expense

Obtain real-time insight into equipment health

Improve plant-wide overall efficiency

Market leaders among solution partners and distributors in these markets offer ease of deployment for industrial customers to implement such advanced monitoring systems.

Why Model Based Condition Monitor is the darling of Industries across India?

Development of Model based Condition Monitor adoption in India is accelerating at a very rapid rate in sectors such as automotive, pharma, energy, and food processing. A few of the drivers of growth are listed below:

Access to next-generation monitoring technology

Prioritize digitalization and Industry 4.0 projects at a very high level

Governance emphasis on efficient and sustainable industrialization

Growing need for cost reduction

Adoption of Model based Condition Monitor in India is compelling industries to embrace international standards of industrial performance based proactive strategy.

Conclusion

With the theme of intelligent manufacturing and digitalization, Model based Condition Monitor stands at the core place for guaranteeing equipment reliability and improved operation. With fault prognosis ahead of time, online condition monitoring of equipment, and predictive maintenance, the technology enables industries to prevent capital-ruining failures and gain optimum machinery life.

Companies in Mumbai, Maharashtra, and India are identifying the necessity of adding Model based Condition Monitor solutions to help protect their business and achieve profit in the future.

If your company relies on rotating equipment or critical assets, having a Model based Condition Monitor can be the difference in order to maximize performance and reduce costs.

[rahulsinha]

Reduce Energy Costs with IoT-Based HVAC Monitoring System

IoT-based HVAC monitoring systems enhance efficiency, reduce costs, and optimize energy use through real-time tracking, predictive maintenance, and smart automation. Industries like healthcare, hospitality, and manufacturing benefit significantly. Despite challenges like cybersecurity and integration, advancements in AI and 5G make these systems a cost-effective, sustainable solution for energy management.

[ceilidho]

fear of god

There's someone outside the spacecraft. You don't remember them being part of the crew. Part 12 masterlist

-

A false moon dictates the coming of night. 

You set up a cot in the medical unit again, going to your quarters to grab a spare set of sheets before returning, Gaz shadowing you the way there and back. His presence scratches at the back of your head, reminding you that he’s there at your back. You don’t ask him why he insists on keeping up this charade of monitoring your behaviour—his motives are as unclear to you as ever.  

“This isn’t necessary,” you finally manage to get out on the walk back to the medbay, the door within sight. 

“I know,” Gaz says simply. 

The door slides open and you enter with him still at your back. “Then why are you following me?”

“Those were Graves’ orders, weren’t they?”

“And you what? Follow his orders now?”

It’s difficult to determine who you actually feel betrayed by. Gaz owes you no debt—it wasn’t you that let him into the ship. The focus of your anger should be on Graves and the rest of the crew, but yet—

Your chest twinges when the door slides shut and Gaz leans against it, no different than a guard posted at the door. 

He shrugs, unbothered by the reproach in your voice. “He’s the commander.”

“That doesn’t mean he’s right.”

“Maybe not.”

“I had nothing to do with Hadir getting sick.”

“I know that.” Your chest deflates when you can’t detect any insincerity behind his words. “But Graves is in charge of the ship and unless you think you could get the others to agree with you, isn’t it better to toe the line for now?”

It would upset you if it were any less true. The hierarchical arrangement of personnel on board has always been clear, and it’s not lost on you that you’ve always hovered near the bottom, falling further from grace with every passing day. Who apart from Gaz and Hadir have been sympathetic towards you in recent weeks anyway? Nikolai’s friendship is an extension of his disposition, an affection easily given and easily taken away. Farah barely even regards you as trustworthy these days, convinced that you’re teetering on the edge of losing your mind.

She might not be wrong. 

Gaz watches you make the bed, settling into your office chair, a mite more comfortable than the stool by the counter. 

“Do you want me to set up a cot for you?” you ask begrudgingly. 

He shakes his head. “Don’t need one.”

“You can sleep comfortably sitting up like that?” 

His smile verges on patronizing. “I don’t need to sleep, love.”

Your skin crawls. You hate when he does that—when he lets you in on your shared secret, the knowledge that he isn’t as human as he appears. Whatever he is still eludes you. Alien or divine. There’s no point in asking though. That knowledge sits beyond your purview. 

You ignore him to the best of your abilities and finish setting up your cot, his words still ringing in your ears. 

Things take a turn for the worse when Hadir stops responding altogether. 

Though his verbal responses have become less and less frequent over the last couple days, the dropoff is significant. As your only patient though, you’ve been monitoring him closely since he was admitted, and you pick up on the change quickly. It’s like an itch under your skin, a sixth sense from working with sick patients for the better part of your adult years. 

Gaz picks up on the change in your mood, sitting up straighter. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” you respond through stiff lips. “Something changed.”

The base of your spine tingles when the vital signs monitor suddenly beeps, alerting you to a change in Hadir’s condition.

You flip a switch and press a button on the keyboard, speaking directly to the Ship’s AI. “Ship, what’s the patient’s status?” 

Patient's temperature is unusually elevated

Recommendation to increase fluids and decrease external temperature 

You lift his eyelids and find his pupils irregular, one larger than the other, and they don’t respond properly when you shine a light on them. 

“What can I do?” Gaz asks, as serious as you’ve ever seen him.

“We need to cool him down. His fever is spiking. I’ll get the cooling blanket—there are ice packs in the freezer over there—” You point to a refrigerator on the other side of the room. “—get the ice packs and start packing them around his armpits and groin. We need to get his temperature down while I figure out what the fuck is happening.”

Gaz moves quickly, retrieving the ice packs from the freezer and packing them up against Hadir’s pits and in between his legs under the medical gown. Hadir’s lips flutter reflexively at the cold but that’s as much responsiveness as you get out of him. 

You press the button to speak to the AI again. “Ship, is his temperature coming down?”

Negative

Patient temperature currently: 104°

Even his breathing has changed, his breaths similarly irregular and increasingly shallower. You put in the orders for another CT scan, moving quicker and typing faster than you ever have before. The breathing tube gets put in next to secure his airway and you don’t like the way his gag reflex doesn’t kick in when the tube is shoved down his throat. It signals something dangerous. 

The situation before you doesn’t bode well. Dread clings to the wall in the far corner of the room but you ignore its presence to focus on your work, throwing everything at the walls to see what sticks. 

His labs are all over the place. High fever, low platelets, high D-dimer, high FDPs. An hour passes in a blink with you running test after test to no avail—none of his results that come back make any sense—all while his temperature continues to rise. 

Patient temperature currently: 105°

Plastic backliners flutter to the floor when you rip them off the electrodes, pasting the small metal discs around Hadir’s scalp for the EEG, working as quickly and efficiently as possible. 

“Has his temperature come down yet?” you bark, too preoccupied with your work to chance a glance up at the monitor.

“No,” Gaz says curtly. “Still 105°.”

It’s all happening so quickly that you can’t seem to get your bearings. If it were anyone else on the table, you’d at least have Hadir to assist you; you’re on your own now though, Gaz barely any help to you without any real medical knowledge. 

Your heart pounds against your chest when you notice blood coming up Hadir’s ET tube. A few droplets at first, and then a trickle. 

A horrible, prophetic knowledge falls over you, threatening to collapse you. 

“What’s wrong with him?” Gaz asks.

“I don’t know—” Then his nose starts to bleed and your heart stops. The stain on the front of his gown and what you find underneath it when you lift it up confirms your worst suspicions. “He’s going into DIC—”

“DIC?”

“His blood—”

The AI takes that moment to interject, speaking over you: Patient body has used up all of its clotting factors and will begin to bleed out

Sepsis—a severe infection—an autoimmune response—trauma—cancer—so many different possible answers to explain why Hadir would spontaneously go into disseminated intravascular coagulation, but his labs tell you shit. Nothing makes sense. You can’t explain why he might be hemorrhaging because there isn’t anything in his scans or labs to indicate anything wrong with him.

More blood leaks from his face and nethers, staining the light blue of the bed a dark red. Logical objections halt in the face of the tangible, and blood is tangible. Blood is all you see. 

The final moments are harried, frenzied. You bark orders at Gaz, which he follows militarily, and struggle in vain to keep Hadir’s condition from further deteriorating, but it’s nearly impossible without being able to address the root cause. Transfusions of platelets, fresh frozen plasma, and cryoprecipitate only go so far. 

When his brain activity goes flat on the monitor, your mind goes blank. Static noise fills your head. You slump against the wall, staring at Hadir’s bleeding body on the exam table, still leaking blood from all of his orifices, the sound of the monitor blaring like a siren in your ears. 

“He’s dead,” Gaz says blandly, staring at the body nonplussed. 

“Yeah,” you rasp. Your voice is thick in your throat, devastated. 

There’s blood all over the bed, more in one place than you’ve seen in a long time—not since working in trauma units back on Earth. Every inch of your body aches as the adrenaline recedes, having reached its peak in the throes of Hadir’s final moments, jaw so tight you almost can’t unclench it.

“What happened?” he asks, almost quizzically. 

The curious lack of emotion in his voice doesn’t penetrate through the brain fog. “I don’t know—he just…” 

The weight of all that just happened comes over you swiftly. An hour ago, Hadir was fine for all intents and purposes. Stable. Now, blood stains his chin, the underside of his nose, the front of his gown, and the bed underneath him, the sweat caked on his forehead cooling as the life leaches out of his body. 

Your hands shake by your sides, a violent tremble rolling through you. 

“I don’t get it,” you whisper. 

You should’ve quarantined Hadir from the start, from the very second he was admitted into your care. You should’ve ignored the fact that his labs came back fine that first day and just assumed that the nature of his illness was more severe than it appeared. Shame and dread plunge like a dagger through your midsection.

Protocol should’ve dictated that you initiate a quarantine, but since you didn’t—

You stare at the body on the table, the ET tube streaked with blood.

—your duty now is to ensure that no one else gets sick too. 

You’ll need to seal off the medbay until every surface has been properly decontaminated and then quarantine yourself until you’re sure that you aren’t infected as well. Your eyes flick towards Gaz momentarily before you shoot down the thought of testing him as well. 

Mitigate the transmission. That thought sticks out amongst the rest. The body lying on the bed in the middle of the room is no longer a patient that needs tending to but rather hazardous material that needs to be disposed of lest whatever infected it is transmitted to everyone else on board the ship. 

It’s waste. Filth. And it will contaminate everything on board if you don’t remove it. 

Your body moves on autopilot. You wheel the bed to the ejection chute at the back of the medbay. It takes a series of codes in order to open the door to the chute and you key them in quickly and efficiently. When the door slides open, you raise the bed until it’s slightly higher than the chute, tipping the bed forward in order for the body to slide into it. 

Ejection chute engaged

Hadir’s body disappears into the chute, the reinforced metal and glass sliding shut when the sensors register that the chute door is empty. There’s a thunk from behind the wall as his body is shuttled through the pneumatic tubes towards the back of the ship, and it won’t be more than a minute before the body is projected from the ship entirely. 

Your heart skips a beat when the AI pings awake again.

Object ejected 

“I wouldn't have done that if I were you,” Gaz says, and you flinch at the sound of his voice, momentarily forgetting that someone else is in the room with you. 

Your eyes drift over to him, the room murky for a moment, the air hazy like water, like you’re looking through a film and only just starting to settle back down into your body after watching from overhead. He seems bigger somehow.

“We have to quarantine ourselves,” you say, frantically towards one of the cupboards and ripping it open, pulling out rolls of plastic to plaster over the door. “We didn’t put on any PPE, so we might’ve been exposed to whatever Hadir had.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that.”

His lips are turned up at the corners when you look over, frowning, but noise in the hallway keeps you from following up on his remark. 

The announcement over the intercom must have alerted the others, and you hear footsteps from down the hall seconds before they arrive, boots clanking against the metal flooring. When the door slides open and you see Farah standing there with Alex at her back, her face hauntingly vulnerable in a way you’ve never seen before, words fail you. 

“What happened?” Farah asks. 

“I don’t know. He was fine just a second ago and then—”

“Where is he?” she demands, scanning the room for him. “Where’s Hadir?”

“I—” The words get tangled up in your throat, terror and shame making it hard enough to breathe, never mind speak. 

Graves barrels in a second later, flushed and out of breath. He must have been in the cockpit when the intercom alerted him to the ejection chute being utilized. Nikolai is fast on his heels, less winded but just as concerned. 

You realize that from the direction Nikolai came, he must’ve been at the back of the spacecraft, and you morbidly wonder if he heard the sound of Hadir’s body ferrying through the pneumatic tube system.

“Doctor, what did you just throw out of the chute?” Graves asks, his tone hard and uncompromising, softened only by the breathless note in his voice from running halfway across the ship. 

You don’t answer.

His eyes lift to the space over your shoulder, where the patient bed is flush to the wall, the head level with the chute leading out of the ship. Blood still saturates the mattress. 

You watch as the knowledge of what you’ve done dawns on them, realization morphing into distress and horror. From behind Farah, Alex goes ashen, a hand clamping down on her shoulder to hold her in place before she realizes what you’ve done and the inevitable happens. You see it play out in your head like a movie. 

“Farah—” he starts, but any effort to steer her out of the room is thwarted by how quickly she comes to the same conclusion. 

“Where’s my brother?” Farah screams, and you wince, your head aching like there’s something else in there listening to her scream too. 

Alex has to hold her back from lunging at you, fighting to keep her in his arms, her body thrashing wildly. You’ve never seen her like this before. Grief and rage strip her of stoicism, and when her screams turn to tears, it rips a hole right through you. 

“You ejected Hadir from the ship?” Graves breathes, stunned. 

Nikolai just stares, at a loss for words. You’ve never seen any of them so obviously affected, so contrary to the image of them that you’ve carried with you in your mind for months. 

“I had to!” you shout, vocal cords tearing under the strain. “We couldn’t keep his body on board! What if it was some hemorrhagic fever—like ebola? Or worse?”

“You don’t even know what killed—” Graves roars before stopping abruptly, squeezing his eyes shut. He presses his fist to his mouth, the skin around his knuckles bone white. 

“We need to quarantine.” Your fingers tremble when you press them to your temples, flinching when you realize that your gloves are still covered in blood. “I was going to seal off the room to keep it from spreading, but now that you’re all here, we’re probably all been infected—”

“Infected by what?” 

“I don’t know.” 

A shade is falling over you. Everything feels raw, livid—a wound being prodded. The light hurts your eyes when you lift them from the floor to meet Graves’ gaze. Even the air feels caustic against your skin. 

Even your impulses don’t feel like your own, like there is some

insidious rot

fruiting under your skin.

“Are you going to say anything to them?” you finally snap at Gaz, desperation loosening your tongue. “You were here—you saw what happened. Why aren’t you telling them what happened?”

The others turn to look at him, orienting like sunflowers towards the sun. It’s the only comparison that comes to mind. And at the centre of them, Gaz stares back at you, an ersatz approximation of confusion. 

He gives a slow blink, eyes glinting with something unknown. “Tell them what? That you tossed Hadir out into space?” 

You should’ve expected that you’d be left hanging, but the reality of it is unbearable. Humiliating. 

You know what you look like to them: dangerous, erratic. Your paranoia on full display. Even Nikolai’s mouth is set in a grim line.

You can hear the accusations flying through their minds—that you caused this somehow. Overdosed him on anti-clotting medication and let him bleed out, then disposed of the body before a proper autopsy could be performed. That maybe you prolonged his illness, knowing it would lead to this.  

It happens swiftly and without word, as if planned ahead of time. Nikolai and Graves lunge towards you suddenly, grabbing you by the undersides of your arms and nearly lifting you off your feet when they haul you forcibly out of the room. Alex still has Farah trapped in his arms in the corner of the room when they drag you past her. 

“Farah, I’m sorry—I’m sorry—” 

You’re not strong enough to break free of Graves’ and Nikolai’s hold though, so you’re carried off before Farah can say anything. There’s only a split second for your eyes to lock and for you to see something broken beyond recognition there, and then the door cuts you off from her.

“You’re all fucking insane—let me go—” you scream, spittle flying from your mouth. The scream that tears out of you is so animalistic and loud that your throat squeezes up in protest, a cough forcing its way out. “I didn’t do anything wrong!”

Down the hall and towards the back of the ship. Boots echo against the metal floors, the two men on either side of you in sync with each other. Neither says a word nor responds to your screams. Their patience with your increasingly unhinged behaviour has finally crossed a threshold once thought impossible, your reputation alone no longer enough to save you. 

They all but throw you into the brig, the metal door clanging shut behind you when you’re dropped to your hands and knees, peering over your shoulder to find Nikolai punching in the key to lock and arm the door, a wretched, pained look on his face.

“Nikolai, please—” you beg, crawling to the door and curling your hands around the bar. “It wasn’t my fault—I didn’t kill Hadir. I’m sorry! He could’ve made everyone on board sick if we’d kept the body! Please, Nikolai, please—”

Your pleas fall on deaf ears. The last sound you hear is the brig door slamming shut and then their footsteps gradually recede into the distance.

[whenthewallfell]

Some of the supporting cast of the thg/rdr mashup! I was gonna wait until the proper portraits were done but got too impatient haha

(deets below the cut)

Haymitch Abernathy

Not much is known about who he was before coming to New Hanover - his youth, his family, and his name are all things he refuses to talk about. What is known is that he spent some time as a migrant worker, travelling the states until he eventually came into the employ of government official Coriolanus Snow as a gun-for-hire. Snow later granted him a homestead in Cumberland Forest, in what would become a precursor to the General Allotment Act.

Despite the close proximity and occasional trades with the Wapiti tribe, Haymitch rebuffs all offers of community, preferring to spend his days in solitude. Recently, however, Katniss has strongarmed her way into his life, using his house as a base of operations whether he wants her to or not.

Johanna Yau

Yau Qiuyue was born and raised in West Elizabeth to a railroad worker and his wife, until the Chinatown they lived in was burned down by locals. Qiuyue was one of the few survivors, taken to be sold to a brothel; the men were found dead a few days later with a hatchet buried so deep in one man's skull they couldn't pull it out. She reappeared travelling under the name Johanna Yau with a bounty hunter, Haymitch Abernathy, who took her under his wing and taught her how to handle firearms.

These days she's something of a local legend - a vigilante who wipes out gangs and deals brutal justice to those who target immigrant workers. Known as The Dragoness of West Elizabeth, she is sometimes accompanied by the woman journalist Cressida Mason, who chronicles (and embellishes) her deeds. They make for an odd couple, preferring each other's company to that of any hopeful suitors.

Euphemia Trinket

A somewhat naïve secretary of Snow's who was tasked with monitoring his investment in the new allotment project, Euphemia is required to make fortnightly checkups and send reports on Haymitch's progress with the homestead. The position, while offering more freedom and independence than she might find otherwise, is not without its downsides - the fashion and culture of New Hanover is severely lacking in her eyes, and she misses the hustle and bustle of Blackwater.

Originally, Effie believed that what they were doing was essential to the betterment of their native neighbours and their introduction into Civilised Society, but she is beginning to have doubts after seeing the true extent of Haymitch's depression and the living conditions on the nearby reservation.

Primrose

Sister and polar opposite to Katniss, Primrose is a sweet girl with a sunny disposition, growing into a fine healer under the tutelage of her mother. She's also an accomplished sewist who is fascinated by 'modern' fashion, and enjoys blending outside and Wapiti influences into her own clothing whenever she can. She sometimes offers to work on Effie's as well in exchange for fashion plates and fabrics from the city.

Despite her gentle manner, however, Prim is deeply stubborn and fiercely devoted to her tribe and family. She thinks Katniss' idea of shipping her off to some random faraway city is the stupidest thing she's ever heard, and isn't afraid to fight her sister every step of the way.

[animalphotorefs]

Quickly boosting the repository's Patreon! This is where the magic happens (aka where you get sneak peeks of upcoming photos, plus exclusive videos)!

The art reference project is run entirely on donations. Contributions from users like you make it so I can continue expanding the species and photosets.

Here's a quick cost breakdown of my recent day-trip to go add newborn elephant photos to the repository:

Gas - $75

Camera lens rental - $45 (needed for specific building/lighting conditions)

Zoo ticket - $26

Parking - $10

Food - none, brought it with me

Lodging - none, day-trip

Time - 6.5 hours of driving, 6 hours at the zoo

Total: 12.5 hours of time and $156 for day-of trip costs. All covered by one month of support from current Patrons!

What it contributed for site (online soon):

Newborn Asian elephant photos

At least five new species (insects!) for a whole new site category

Nesting behavior in red-billed hornbills

Two new amphibian species

Way better photos of a crocodile monitor than currently on the site

Wing references for California condors in flight!

Harbor seal banana pose, 1-800-r-u-slapping pose, and face/flipper closeups

Some stellar mountain goat shots

Right now the Patreon funds one day trip like this a month, as long as it's within a couple hours drive from my home base. My current goal is for the Patreon to reach maybe... 350 a month? $350 a month would let me travel further afield this summer - driving and car-camping a couple days at a time - to capture species not in human care in the PNW. Can we make it happen? There's a reptile place with over 80 species of snake I'm itching to return to... and baby bongos just begging to be photographed...

Thanks so much to all of my current Patrons! You're literally why I can keep doing this work and running the site.

[probablyasocialecologist]

For years now, both Democratic and Republican administrations have used a little-known section of the Guantánamo Bay Naval base to detain migrants, primarily from the Caribbean. And due to the secrecy of the facility, known as the Guantánamo Migrant Operations Center (MOC), conditions at the facility are generally unknown. In the fall, Drop Site News published previously unreported details of the treatment of migrants at the MOC, the bureaucratic process of how migrants are detained, and the private prison companies profiting from the detention center. In August 2024, the Biden administration granted a private prison company a $163.4 million contract to run the facility. "For decades, the Guantanamo migrant detention center has been the hallmark of the most inhumane, racist, and brutal U.S. policies against people seeking refuge," said Jesse Franzblau, senior policy analyst with the National Immigrant Justice Center. "The Biden administration could have shut down the facility but tragically renewed and entered into new contracts to keep it up and running." Drop Site News revealed that the MOC can detain single adults, families, and unaccompanied children. Because the MOC is inside of a military base, migrants awaiting processing are transported in black out vans “with hand restraints and black out goggles to obscure their vision,” according to the documents obtained by Drop Site. Migrants also have limited communication with the outside world, with their few phone calls monitored for “restricted information,” including information about the navy base, the documents showed.

30 January 2025