July 11, 2018

As soccer’s FIFA World Cup winds up this weekend in Russia, Florida’s Pérez Art Museum of Miami (PAMM) is featuring an exhibition on the art of soccer, or, as it is called in many places, football (fútbol in Spanish). “The World’s Game: Fútbol and Contemporary Art,” which runs through Sept. 2, 2018, features works by more than 40 artists who have revealed their love and unique views of the sport through painting, photography, sculpture, and video art. The PAMM exhibition, timed to coincide with the World Cup, is free to youth soccer clubs and teams in the Miami area.

“The World’s Game: Fútbol and Contemporary Art” at the Pérez Art Museum of Miami celebrates the art of soccer. Credit: © Oriol Tarridas, Pérez Art Museum Miami

“The World’s Game” features works by such famous artists as Andy Warhol and Kehinde Wiley, and includes soccer balls (naturally), cleats, player portraits, videos of raucous fans, and miniature figurines dashing about on artistically imagined pitches (playing fields). Warhol and Wiley excepted (they are both connected to New York City), most artists in the exhibition come from the Miami area and nearby regions of Latin America. The exhibition is a celebration of the sport, of course, but it also explores how soccer influences nationalism while also promoting globalism through such uniting events as the World Cup.

“The World’s Game” also reflects Miami’s diverse population through the international appeal of the sport. Over two-thirds of Miami’s population is of Hispanic origin. Cubans make up about half of that group, and they give the city a strong Latin culture. The city also has a large Haitian population. Other population groups include those of German, Irish, and Italian descent. About a fifth of the people in Miami are African Americans.

PAMM focuses on international art of the 1900′s and 2000′s. It is one of the main attractions of Miami’s Museum Park (formerly known as Bicentennial Park) on Biscayne Bay. The museum’s roots go back to the opening of the city’s Center for the Fine Arts in 1984. It was renamed the Miami Art Museum in 1994, and was later renamed again in honor of Miami real estate mogul, art collector, and philanthropist Jorge M. Pérez, whose donations helped fund an expansion and a new building that opened in 2013. The three-story, 200,000-square-foot (18,580-square-meter) museum was designed by the Pritzker Prize-winning Swiss architects Herzog and de Meuron.

September 13, 2017

Last week, on September 6, the massive storm known as Hurricane Irma began ravaging the Leeward Islands of the eastern Caribbean Sea. The storm then roared over Puerto Rico and Cuba before reaching southern Florida on September 10. The storm has since weakened to a tropical depression and dissipated over land, but it continues to bring torrential rains as it passes up the southeastern coast of the United States. Irma’s week of havoc has killed 70 people, leaving a shattered landscape and record flooding in its wake.

The eye of Hurricane Irma centers on the island of Anguilla on Sept. 6, 2017. Emergency precautions on Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic (at left) prepared residents for the approaching storm. Credit: CIRA/NOAA

Hurricanes are measured using the Saffir-Simpson scale of intensity. The scale is based on wind speed and the height of the resulting storm surge—that is, how much the sea level rises above normal high tide. The scale ranges from Category 1 (weak) to Category 5 (devastating). Irma formed as a low pressure and thunderstorm system over the Atlantic Ocean before consolidating into a massive storm in the eastern Caribbean Sea. As a Category 5 hurricane, Irma devastated parts of Antigua and Barbuda, the islands of Anguilla, St.-Barthélemy, and St.-Martin, and the British and U.S. Virgin Islands. Irma’s strength fluctuated as it roared over Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, the Turcs and Caicos Islands, and the Bahamas, alternating between categories 3 and 4 before reaching the Florida Keys. The storm weakened to a tropical storm over Florida, but still caused massive wind and water damage. Among the Caribbean Islands, Irma killed 43 people. Twenty-seven more people have died in the southeastern U.S. states of Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina. Those numbers will very likely rise.

On Sept. 11, 2017, the flattened devastation of Jost Van Dyke island in the British Virgin Islands reveals the destructive force of Hurricane Irma. Credit: UK Department for International Development (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

In the southeastern United States and the Caribbean, hundreds of roads are still blocked by high water, and many airports, schools, and office buildings remain closed. Millions of people have been displaced, and many areas are without electric power or drinking water. Humanitarian and military aid is arriving in the areas hit by Irma, providing shelter, medicine, and food and water, and helping with the beginning of a colossal cleanup. Damage from Irma is expected to top $200 billion, and repairs and reconstruction after the storm could take years. Irma is the strongest storm to hit the region since Hurricane Wilma in 2005.

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Hurricane Irma roared from east to west through the Caribbean Islands. Credit: WORLD BOOK map

Irma followed closely on the heels of Hurricane Harvey, which flooded the Texas coast, and preceded the formation of Hurricane Katia, which hit southern Mexico last weekend. An astounding fourth hurricane, Jose, chased Irma into the Caribbean before spinning off into the western Atlantic Ocean. Water temperatures in the Atlantic and Caribbean Sea are well above average, and massive storms feed off those warm waters. The expansion of high pressure areas—as well as a superabundance of moisture in the air—are ripe conditions for hurricane creation. They are also consistent with the effects of anthropogenic (human-caused) climate change.

February 22, 2017

Last weekend, Major League Baseball (MLB) teams began full workouts at spring training camps in Arizona and Florida. After an off-season of savoring success (for the few) or ruing defeat (for everyone else), ballplayers returned to the field to stretch, run, catch, throw, and hit in preparation for the grind of the long MLB season. As the winter chill is shaken off, the heat of competition slowly returns, and players and fans alike turn a hopeful eye toward the possibility of an October crowned by a World Series championship.

Houston Astros pitchers loosen up at their spring training facility in Kissimmee, Florida, in March 2010. The Astros opened a new spring training complex in West Palm Beach, Florida, in 2017. Credit: © John Kershner, Shutterstock

Pitchers and catchers—always the first to report—arrived at camps early last week. Pitchers need time to get their arms in shape and, well, catchers have to catch them. The Cleveland Indians, who lost the 2016 World Series by a hair’s breadth to the Chicago Cubs, were the first to arrive. On Feb. 12, 2017, the sun rose over Goodyear, Arizona, to warm bullpens suddenly blooming with the red, white, and blue of Indians’ uniforms. Within two days, pitchers and catchers from all 30 MLB teams were in their spring training homes. A few days later, position players arrived with their bats and gloves, and the full show got underway.

Baseball spring training dates back to the late 1800’s. Back then, all teams were clustered in the Midwest and northern East Coast of the United States—areas notorious for unbaseball-like weather well into spring. The Cincinnati Red Stockings (now the Reds), the first professional baseball club, first took an extended spring southern tour in 1870, spending most of their time in New Orleans, Louisiana. Over the next 30 years, many teams took advantage of southern spring warmth to prepare for the season—particularly in Arkansas and Florida—but spring training didn’t become a baseball institution until the early 1900’s.

By 1910, enough teams were training in Florida to create a competitive spring training league that became known as the Grapefruit League. Teams trained in other locations, too, such as Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico—often simply as MLB marketing tours. The Cubs went out west to southern California, where they trained for years in Santa Monica and even out on Santa Catalina Island. Chewing gum magnate William Wrigley, who bought the Cubs in 1921, also owned Catalina Island. During World War II (1939-1945), fuel rationing forced teams to train close to home. During that time, for example, the New York Yankees held spring training in Asbury Park, New Jersey, and the Boston Red Sox trained at Tufts College in nearby Medford, Massachusetts.

In the desert sun of Arizona, where teams had trained from time-to-time, the spring training Cactus League firmly took root in 1947. That year, the Indians and New York (now San Francisco) Giants opened spring training facilities in Tucson and Phoenix, respectively. Other teams soon joined the Giants and Indians in the Southwest, particularly as baseball integrated and black players often met with racial discrimination in Florida.

Today, MLB teams are evenly divided between the Cactus and Grapefruit Leagues. Baseball fans flock to the warm spring training sites to take in the sun and watch their favorite teams play in the intimate settings of small ballparks and practice fields, where interaction with players is common. Well-known stars begin the games, tuning their skills at a less-than-frantic pace. The later innings provide a stage for fringe and minor league players hoping to prove themselves worthy of “heading north” with the big club for the start of the MLB regular season in April.

January 23, 2017

Tornadoes swept through parts of the southeastern United States over the weekend, killing 20 people and injuring and displacing many others. Most of the deaths—15 of them—occurred in the state of Georgia. Four others were killed in Mississippi and one person died in northern Florida. The tornadoes erupted from a violent storm front that also hit the states of Louisiana, Alabama, and South Carolina.

This satellite image shows the strong storm front over the southeastern United States on Jan. 22, 2017. The storm killed 20 people in 3 different states. Credit: NASA/NOAA/GOES

The storm hit first in Louisiana early on Saturday, January 21, as severe weather damaged homes and caused injuries around the north-central city of Natchitoches. The storm then roared into southern Mississippi, where predawn tornadoes killed four people in the city of Hattiesburg.

Tornadoes touched down as the storm passed through Alabama, but the full wrath of the storm hit southern Georgia on Sunday, January 22. Tornadoes ripped in a northeasterly direction through southern Brooks, Cook, and Berrien counties, killing 11 people and devastating parts of several communities. Four other people died in tornadoes near the city of Albany in southwestern Dougherty County, and one person was killed in northern Florida’s Columbia County. Tornadoes also touched down as the storm front crossed South Carolina.

The powerful southern storm prompted the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Storm Prediction Center to issue a rare “high risk” severe weather outlook early Sunday—the first such “high risk” day since June 2014 when storms raked through Nebraska, Iowa, and Missouri.

March 20, 2014

Everglades National Park, in the Florida Everglades, has a major problem with invasive species, including the giant Burmese python (National Park Service).

Giant Burmese pythons have a magnetic sense that directs them “home” over vast distances, scientists announced yesterday in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters. To study how these invasive predators migrate and spread, scientists captured and relocated 12 pythons in Florida’s Everglades National Park. The huge snakes were fitted with GPS radio transmitters. Half were released where they were captured; the other half was transported to other areas in the park—13 to 23 miles (21 to 36 kilometers) from where they were captured. Using aircraft to track their movements, the scientists were amazed to discover that 5 of the 6 pythons quickly returned to within 3 miles (5 kilometers) of the place where they had been captured. “We were very surprised,” noted the study’s lead author Shannon Pittman of Davidson College in North Carolina. “We anticipated the pythons would develop new home ranges where they were released. We didn’t expect them to orient back to their capture locations.” Pittman stated that the experiment provided the first evidence that snakes may share a similar magnetic sense as other reptiles, such as sea turtles. Dr. Pittman suggested that staying in familiar territory may help snakes find prey and mates, and this homing sense may allow them to return to their territory after exploratory forays. “We know that snakes tend to come back to some of the same sites throughout their lives such as overwintering locations or refuges.”

The Burmese python, a native of Southeast Asia, has become established in the Everglades as a result of people dumping unwanted pet pythons. One of the largest snakes in the world, the python has been measured at more than 15 feet (4.5 meters) and weighing in excess of 160 pounds (72.5 kilograms). The snakes coil around a prey animal and suffocate it. Pythons have been known to kill and swallow adult alligators and have been blamed for a staggering decline in the numbers of native mammals in the Everglades. Conservation surveys conducted between 2003 and 2011 documented a 9.3-percent decrease in the frequency of raccoon observations and decreases of 98.9 percent and 87.5 percent in opossum and bobcat observations, respectively. No native marsh rabbits were detected during the entire length of the survey. Understanding how invasive pythons migrate could help control their spread in Florida, Pittman told BBC news.

Additional World Book articles:

• Invasive Species (a special report)
• New Top Predator? Pythons in the Everglades

November 15, 2013

A sinkhole in Dunedin, Florida, has swallowed a 14-foot (4.3-meter) boat and a backyard swimming pool, and parts of two houses are collapsing into it. One house lost the boat and a screened-in porch. The neighboring house lost the in-ground swimming pool and the master bedroom. The garage is also giving way. The sinkhole is currently 70 feet (21 meters) wide and 53 feet (16 meters) deep. Police evacuated six houses in Dunedin, a city on central Florida’s west coast, and electric power and natural gas lines are cut off.

A sinkhole is a bowl-shaped depression created when the ground collapses into an opening in the underground rock. (© James A Hyatt)

Sinkholes are relative common in Florida where sandy soil sits on top of layers of clay and limestone. Over time, an acid created from oxygen in water causes the limestone to dissolve, undermining the ground, which eventually gives way. In February, a man in Seffner, Florida, near Tampa, died when a sinkhole opened under his bedroom. His body was never recovered. In August, sections of a hotel at a resort near Orlando collapsed into a sinkhole. The guests escaped without injury.

August 12, 2013

A 15-foot- (4.5-meter-) deep crater opened last night beneath a resort villa near Clermont, Florida, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) west of Disney World. Dozens of people staying at the 3-story, 24-unit villa managed to escape unhurt before it collapsed into the 60-foot- (18-meter-) wide sinkhole. Guests at the resort called for help before the collapse, reporting that they were hearing cracking noises and had windows blowing out.

A sinkhole is a bowl-shaped depression created when the ground collapses into an opening in the underground rock. This sinkhole formed during a flood, damaging homes and allowing contaminated floodwater to drain into groundwater supplies. (© James A Hyatt)

Sinkholes are common in Florida, which lies atop a system of limestone caverns that are subject to water erosion. Over time, the underground water dissolves the limestone, but the surface of the ground stays intact. Eventually, the void collapses, creating a sinkhole.

In February, a man asleep in bed was swallowed live when a sinkhole opened beneath his house in a Tampa suburb. His body was never recovered.

A solution cave, such as the one shown here, is formed in limestone when water dissolves sections of the rock. Many of the cave's features develop from minerals deposited by the water. (World Book diagram by Bruce Kerr)

Additional World Book article:

• Guatemala 2010 (a Back in Time article)

April 15

It may sound like a science-fiction movie, but southern Florida truly is being attacked by giant snails—giant African land snails (Achatina fulica), to be precise. The shell of these snails are commonly as large as 7 inches (18 centimeters) in length and more than twice that size in diameter. The snails are an invasive species in Florida. They are voracious plant eaters that can be harmful to agricultural crops and natural ecosystems.

Some species of land snail can become an invasive pest. (c Shutterstock)

The snails were first spotted in Florida in September 2011. Since that time, 117,000 of them have been trapped by scientists from Florida’s Department of Agriculture and Human Services. The invasion is worrisome because the snails have no natural predators to reduce their population and an individual snail is capable of laying around 1,200 eggs at a time. The giant snail also harbors a parasite that can cause meningitis in humans. Humans can contract it by eating undercooked snails or by simply handling a snail.

Florida has had a previous run-in with this snail. In 1966, a child brought in three from Hawaii. His grandmother released them  into her garden. Seven years later, the snail population had grown to 17,000. It took the state of Florida 10 years to eradicate the snails, at a cost of $1 million. Scientists have not determined how the current infestation came about.

Experts gathered in Gainesville, Florida, last week for a Giant African Land Snail Science Symposium to share information on the best methods of eradicating the pest. Florida is battling a number of other invasive species in addition to the snail, including the Burmese python and the Asian swamp eel (which is actually a fish and is not a true eel).

Additional World Book articles:

• Ecology
• Invasive species (Special report)

March 8, 2013

Beaches on the coast of southern Florida were closed to swimmers this week as thousands of sharks were spotted in the waters near shore. The sharks are migrating north for summer, heading from Florida to North Carolina. This migration  takes them past the shores of many beaches frequented by tourists, including Palm Beach. Scientists estimate that there are approximately 15,000 sharks migrating–mostly blacktips (which grow to be about 5 feet, or 1.5 meters, long) and spinners (which grow to be about 10 feet, or 3 meters, long). The sharks swim about 200 yards (180 meters) out from the beach, but lifeguards closed the beaches for swimming as a safety precaution. Florida had 25 unprovoked shark attacks in 2012, although none were fatal.

The body of a shark. Sharks rarely threaten humans, but authorities will often close down beaches where sharks are sited as a precaution. (World Book illustration by Marion Pahl)

The shark migration is normal and happens every year, but it is usually earlier and does not affect beach season in Florida.  In 2013, the migration is happening during spring break for many schools. Spring break is one of Florida’s heaviest tourist seasons. Scientists are not certain why the migration is happening so late in 2013.

Additional World Book articles:

• Migration

• Shark

February 22

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission announced this week that 68 Burmese pythons had been captured in the Florida Everglades in its 2013 Python Challenge. The Burmese python, the target of the hunt, is an invasive species–that is, it is not native to Florida. Most of the pythons in the wild in Florida are either snakes that escaped from captivity or pets that were deliberately released into the wild when owners could no longer care for them. Because the Burmese python is not native, it has no predators itself. Thus, the python has spread quickly throughout the Everglades, causing harm to the ecosystem and to native species in the region. According to a 2012 study, sightings of bobcats, opossums, rabbits, raccoons, and other mammals in the Everglades are down as much as 99% in areas where pythons live.

The Burmese python, a subspecies of the Indian python shown, has spread quickly through the Florida Everglades, threatening the ecosystem and the animals native to the area. (J. H. Robinson, Animals Animals)

Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Commission held its first python hunt from January 12 to February 10 in 2013. Any adult who wanted to try to harvest the nonvenomous snake was encouraged to do so, and nearly 1,000 people, mostly amateurs, signed on. Given how well camouflaged the snake is in the Everglades environment, experts were surprised that the hunt had found 68 pythons in the wild by the end date.

Most of the captured snakes were humanely euthanized. However, several snakes–including the longest, at 11 feet (3.3 meters)–were fitted with transmitters and released back into the wild. Scientists planned to track these snakes, hoping that they would lead to nests of breeding females, who could also then be captured before their young went into the wild.

Additional World Book articles:

• ecology
• environment
• Everglades
• python