Bertha (drag boat)

Bertha is a steam powered boat built in 1844 to remove silt from the Port of Bridgwater in Somerset, England. It is the oldest operational steam vessel in Britain, and possibly in the world. It is part of the National Historic Fleet.

The boat was built, of riveted iron, in Bristol by Lunnel, G & Co copying a design, by John McLean, developed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel to deal with silt in the Floating Harbour. It is a Bed leveler or plough dredger, with a large metal blade, which could be lowered at the stern of the boat, below the water similar to a bulldozer on land.

Bertha is 50 feet (15 m) long and 15.5 feet (4.7 m) wide, with a tonnage of 60 tons. The power is from a coal fired single cylinder steam engine providing steam at 40 pounds per square inch (280 kPa). A large flywheel and drive shaft drove a single-reduction spur wheel drive. It moved by being pulled along chains anchored on the quay.

Bertha worked in Bridgwater Docks, after the connection of the Bridgwater and Taunton Canal to the River Parrett, from 1844 until 1969. The vessel was initially owned by the Great Western Railway and then British Railways. She was then taken to the Exeter Maritime Museum. In 1997 it moved to the World of Boats at Eyemouth where it is being restored.

Bertha (tunnel boring machine)

Bertha, also known as Big Bertha, is a 57-foot-diameter (17.4 m) tunnel boring machine built specifically for the Washington State Department of Transportation's (WSDOT) Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement tunnel project in Seattle. It was made by Hitachi Zosen Sakai Works in Osaka, Japan, and the machine's assembly was completed in Seattle in June 2013. Tunnel boring began on July 30, 2013, with the machine scheduled to complete the tunnel in December 2015.

On December 6, 2013, work was halted approximately 1,083 feet (330 m) into the planned 9,270-foot-long (2,830 m) route because of an unexpected impediment. Investigations a month later revealed that the machine had damaged several of its cutting blades after encountering a steel pipe that was used to measure groundwater in 2002 around the Alaskan Way Viaduct. Over the next two years, a recovery pit was dug from the surface in order to access and lift the machine's cutterhead for repair and partial replacement in 2015.

Bertha (disambiguation)

Bertha is a female given name.

It can also refer to:

Places

Entertainment

Other uses

Russell

Russell may refer to:

People

Places

Australia

Canada

New Zealand

Solomon Islands

United States of America

Happy Tree Friends

Happy Tree Friends (HTF) is an American flash cartoon created and developed by Aubrey Ankrum, Rhode Montijo, Kenn Navarro and Warren Graff for Mondo Media. The show is cited as an early example of a popular Internet phenomenon achieving a cult following.

The action and adventure comedy is composed of simple drawings and juxtaposes cute forest animals with extreme graphic violence. Each episode revolves around the characters enduring accidental events of bloodshed, pain, dismemberment, and/or death. At one point, the warning "Cartoon Violence: Not recommended for small children, or big babies" was given on the official website.

The episodes last from 1 to 7 minutes. In 2006, a television series featuring longer episodes aired. A spin-off called Ka-Pow! premiered on September 2, 2008.

Characters

Happy Tree Friends features a variety of characters, each with varying appearances and personalities. However, almost all share identical Pac-Man eyes, buckteeth, and pink heart-shaped noses. Lumpy makes up one of the four primary characters along with Cuddles, Giggles and Toothy.

Russell (Martian crater)

Russell Crater is a crater found in the Noachis quadrangle of Mars located at 54.9° south latitude and 347.6° west longitude. It is about 139.7 km in diameter and was named after Henry Norris Russell, an American astronomer (1877-1957). Debris flows have been observed on some of the dunes in this crater. Some researchers believe that they may be caused by liquid water. Liquid water could be stable for short periods of time in the summer in the southern hemisphere of Mars. These gully-like debris flows may be due to small amounts of ice melting. Another idea is that chunks of dry ice form on the dunes during the cold winter, then slide down in the spring when it is warmer. Experiments have demonstrated that carbon dioxide from the thawing dry ice forms a lubricating layer under pieces of dry ice, making it easy for the process to take place.

Why are Craters important?

The density of impact craters is used to determine the surface ages of Mars and other solar system bodies. The older the surface, the more craters present. Crater shapes can reveal the presence of ground ice.