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If you’d like a snapshot of how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the motorcycle industry, this year’s EICMA trade show is it. It’s clear that budgets have shrunk over the past two years, and it’s even clearer that major OEMs have found more cost-effective ways to release motorcycles to the public, than to splash out on floor space at a trade show.

Notable players like BMW and Triumph opted to reveal their 2023 updates in the weeks leading up to EICMA, rather than waiting for the show itself. And many of the brands that did pitch up, did so with mildly updated versions of current bikes.

Major revelations were few and far between, but we did manage to pick out a handful of highlights (and lowlights) for your reading pleasure. If we missed anything, feel free to holler at us in the comments.

Royal Enfield Super Meteor Royal Enfield’s modern 650 twins are lauded for how easy they are to ride, how delightfully minimalistic they are, and how their classic design lends itself to customization. But despite the platform’s versatility, it only comes in two flavors: the Interceptor roadster, and the Continental GT café racer. Until now, that is.

The new Royal Enfield Super Meteor cruiser adds a third style to the mix. It’s powered by the same 648 cc engine as its siblings, but it’s closer to the smaller Royal Enfield Meteor, design-wise (hence the name).

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By: Wesley Reyneke
Title: Speed Read: The biggest hits (and misses) from EICMA 2022
Sourced From: www.bikeexif.com/motorcycle-news-eicma-2022
Published Date: Sun, 13 Nov 2022 17:01:14 +0000

Did you miss our previous article…
https://mansbrand.com/neon-adv-north-east-customs-honda-nx650-dominator/

Frontier Adventure

Should We Send Humans to Venus?

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NASA is preparing to send humans back to the Moon with the Artemis missions in the next few years as part of the agency’s Moon to Mars Architecture with the long-term goal of landing humans on the Red Planet sometime in the 2030s or 2040s. But what about sending humans to other worlds of the Solar System? And, why not Venus? It’s closer to Earth than Mars by several tens of millions of kilometers, and despite its extremely harsh surface conditions, previous studies have suggested that life could exist in its clouds. In contrast, we have yet to find any signs of life anywhere on the Red Planet or in its thin atmosphere. So, should we send humans to Venus?

“Yes, we should send humans to Venus,” Dr. Paul Byrne, who is an Associate Professor of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, tells Universe Today. “But first, let’s talk about what ‘sending humans to Venus’ actually means. The surface of Venus is hellish, so nobody would last long there nor volunteer to go. Above the clouds, the temperature and pressure are almost like a nice spring day here on Earth, so aside from tiny sulphuric acid cloud droplets you’d be okay (with a breathing apparatus).”

These “hellish” conditions that Dr. Byrne alludes to are the extreme conditions across the surface of Venus, including surface pressures 92 times that of Earth’s surface and average surface temperatures of approximately 464 degrees Celsius (867 degrees Fahrenheit). In contrast, Earth’s average surface temperatures are a calm 15 degrees Celsius (59 degrees Fahrenheit). These extreme pressures and temperatures have made landing on the surface of Venus even more difficult, as the former Soviet Union continues to be the only nation to have successfully landed on Venus’ surface, having accomplished this feat with several of their Venera and Vega missions. However, the longest mission duration for the lander was only 127 minutes (Venera 13), which also conducted the first sound recording on another planet.

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Color images taken by the Soviet Union’s Venera 13 lander on the surface of Venus on March 1, 1982, with the lander surviving only 127 minutes due to Venus’s extreme surface conditions. (Credit: NASA)

“If we were to send humans to Venus, they’d be going in a spacecraft that would fly by the planet en route somewhere else,” Dr. Byrne tells Universe Today. “If we were to one day send humans actually to Venus itself for science and engineering purposes, then a cloud-based habitat is the way to go. Getting humans onto the Venus surface is going to require so much technology and expense that, for the foreseeable future, I don’t think anyone will think it worth doing.”

A 2015 study presented at the AIAA Space and Astronautics Forum and Exposition outlined a NASA study for the High Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) mission that would involve a 30-day crewed mission using an airship equipped with solar panels within the upper atmosphere of Venus. This is because Venus’ upper atmosphere at approximately 50 kilometers (30 miles) above the surface exhibits much more hospitable conditions, including temperatures between 30 to 70 degrees Celsius (86 to 158 degrees Fahrenheit) and pressures very close to that of Earth. However, Dr. Byrne refers to HAVOC as an “unbelievably expensive concept”.

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Artist rendition of proposed habitable airships traversing Venus’ atmosphere, which has been proposed as the High Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) mission. (Credit: NASA)

As for using Venus while en route to another location in the Solar System, Venus has been used on several occasions to slingshot spacecraft to the outer Solar System as well as for exploration of the inner Solar System, such as Mercury and the Sun. For example, NASA’s Galileo and Cassini spacecraft used gravity assists

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Baller Awards

Oscars 2024: What to Make of the Gothams and Other Critics Awards to Come

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The Gotham Awards were held the other night, and the results were very Film Twitter-friendly. By that, I mean, no straight white men were awarded. In a lineup of names for Lead Performance, they have stuffed them all into a category together, almost as a dare. They’re daring voters to pick the straight white guy […]

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By: Sasha Stone
Title: Oscars 2024: What to Make of the Gothams and Other Critics Awards to Come
Sourced From: www.awardsdaily.com/2023/11/29/oscars-2024-what-to-make-of-the-gothams-and-other-critics-awards-to-come/
Published Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2023 16:07:44 +0000

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Did you miss our previous article…
https://mansbrand.com/how-bill-pullman-became-alex-murdaugh-under-the-gun-of-a-streamlined-schedule-limited-budget-looming-actors-strike/

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Baller Awards

How Bill Pullman Became Alex Murdaugh Under the Gun of a Streamlined Schedule, Limited Budget, & Looming Actor’s Strike

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Awards Daily talks to Bill Pullman about becoming Alex Murdaugh in Lifetime’s Murdaugh Murders: The Movie and how he balanced all the lies against his character’s most honest moment. Even though his character committed one of the most notorious crimes in recent memory, Bill Pullman isn’t what you would call a true crime fan. “I was […]

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By: Megan McLachlan
Title: How Bill Pullman Became Alex Murdaugh Under the Gun of a Streamlined Schedule, Limited Budget, & Looming Actor’s Strike
Sourced From: www.awardsdaily.com/2023/11/29/how-bill-pullman-became-alex-murdaugh-under-the-gun-of-a-streamlined-schedule-limited-budget-looming-actors-strike/
Published Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2023 15:04:48 +0000

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