Word: awaying
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...tall order, but the National Park Service wants to jack up the 208- ft.-tall, 2,800-ton Cape Hatteras Lighthouse and move it half a mile inland, away from encroaching surf. Only 200 ft. of sand now separates the 118-year-old tower from the churning Atlantic. Cost of the proposed move: $8.8 million. Local residents who have grown up in the shadow of the lighthouse are not yet sold on the idea. "They tell us we can't climb the tower anymore because it has cracks in it, but they can pick it up and move it without...
Some 93 million miles away, the sun was, at the very least, agitated. In early March, an area of sunspots large enough to contain 70 earth-size planets had come into view around the eastern rim* of the glowing orb. Created by intense magnetic fields and cooler than the surrounding gases, the sunspots were visible as dark blemishes on the fiery surface. Just as astronomers were turning their attention to the mottled region, a bright spot suddenly appeared in its midst. It spread like a prairie wildfire, glowing white hot on the sun's yellow face and quickly expanding...
Fortunately for earth dwellers, the March flare occurred on the easternmost edge of the sun and thus aimed its full force away from the earth. But on March 10, when the sun's stately rotation brought the turbulent group of sunspots to a position more directly facing the earth, a second, only slightly less powerful flare erupted in the region. Eight minutes later, traveling at the speed of light, a blast of X ray and ultraviolet radiation seared the earth's upper atmosphere. Within an hour, high-energy protons began to arrive, followed in three days by a massive bombardment...
Through the centuries, few natural phenomena have inspired as much fear and awe as solar eclipses. The ancient Chinese used firecrackers and gongs to drive away the spirit they thought was devouring the sun. Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee, aware that a most timely total eclipse was going to occur, escaped being burned at the stake by King Arthur's knights when he predicted that the sun would disappear. A benign form of sun worship continues to this day, not only among beachgoers but also by a group of intrepid American astronomy buffs who have traveled around the world...
...other--however, they are all quite good, and by the end of the movie several have distinguished themselves. Todd Anderson, who in the end seems to have learned the most from Mr. Keating, is remarkably good--insecure, quiet, lonely, a prep school boy whose parents must have sent him away...