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The AIH Transcript for July 02, 2020

Hosts: Duncan McCue and Chris Howden

DUNCAN MCCUE: Hi, I'm Duncan McCue, sitting in for Carol Off.

CHRIS HOWDEN: Good evening, I’m Chris Howden. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

Prologue

DM: Right-hand woman. Ghislaine Maxwell is arrested and charged with recruiting young women who were abused by Jeffrey Epstein — and the lawyer for one of Ms. Maxwell's accusers tells us her client is relieved.

DM: The death-threat penalty. In California, some public health officials are being threatened just for giving advice about COVID-19 — so one state senator is proposing a law to protect them.

DM: Twinkle twinkle monster star. How scientists wonder where you are — considering you're more than two-million times brighter than our sun. An astrophysicist tells us his theories.

CH: As It Happens, the Thursday edition. Radio that knows the type.

[Music: Theme]

Part one: Ghislaine Maxwell arrested, California doctor law, Connecticut well rescue

Ghislaine Maxwell arrested

Guest: Lisa Bloom

CH: She was Jeffery Epstein's closest confidante. And today, Ghislaine Maxwell was accused of being something else as well: his accomplice. Ms. Maxwell was arrested today by the FBI. An indictment alleges that she groomed minors to be sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein, and organized for his victims to travel to him as underage sex partners. Ms. Maxwell is also accused of perjury. Jeffery Epstein was facing sexual abuse charges when he took his own life in prison last year. Lisa Bloom is a lawyer who represents one of Ghislaine Maxwell's accusers. We reached her in Los Angeles. And a warning, this interview contains descriptions of sexual abuse.

DM: Ms. Bloom, how is your client feeling about the news that Ghislaine Maxwell has been arrested?

LISA BLOOM: You know, her first reaction was fear. Anytime that she hears Ghislaine’s name, it just really triggers her. She's got post-traumatic stress, and she really just hates hearing anything about her. Then when we talked her through a little bit more, of course, she was pleased that at least now Ghislaine is being brought to justice on the criminal side. This is long overdue.

DM: After all of these years, and the suicide of Jeffrey Epstein, did your client start to doubt whether this day would ever come?

LB: Oh, I think we all doubted it. Law enforcement has let the victims down in this case time and time again. And, you know, more broadly, I represent many sexual abuse victims. And law enforcement often refuses to make arrests. So this is a very good day. And I'm pleased to see it.

DM: Ghislaine Maxwell wasn't hiding out or anything. I mean, she was arrested in New Hampshire. Do you think she assumed that at this point the allegations wouldn't end up resulting in charges?

LB: You know, that is very surprising to me because we had heard all of these rumors and reports that maybe she was in another country that didn't have extradition with the U.S. And here she was in the U.S., right there in New Hampshire, right? So, yes, she must have felt very confident, but she was foolish to think that. You know, the victims have never given up. We filed a lawsuit against the Epstein state on behalf of six victims less than a year ago. One of them also has the allegations against Ghislaine Maxwell. And it is the victims who had insisted, even after Jeffrey Epstein’s suicide, that everyone be brought to justice. So I give them all of the credit today.

DM: Ms. Maxwell has been accused of providing underage sex partners to Jeffrey Epstein by his accusers, including your client. The indictment contains similar accusations. How did Glenn Maxwell allegedly groom girls who would later be abused by Mr. Epstein?

LB: Well, she's alleged to have reached out to girls and groomed them, and taught them how to behave around Jeffrey Epstein in a way that, you know, the victims’ guards were lower because Ghislaine was a woman. They didn't really think that she was going to prey on them. She would gain their trust. She could at times be kind and be friendly, which also got them to trust her more. So it's a very confusing set of circumstances. And then in some cases, she's accused of not only procuring the girls for Jeffrey Epstein, but also participating in the sexual assaults herself. It's really mind-boggling. It's a story that's really hard to believe. But so many victims tell the same story that, in my view, makes it highly credible.

DM: That is perhaps one of the more serious aspects of these indictments. She's alleged to have actually been present during some of this abuse. Without going into too much graphic detail, what does your client and and some of the other women say happened?

LB: Well, they say that she was a direct participant in the sexual abuse, that she engaged in sexual acts with the girls, that she encouraged them to engage in sexual acts with Jeffrey Epstein when she was present. I mean, it's just a nightmare scenario. And it went on for a very long time.

DM: Important to say that these allegations aren't proven in court, but they are included in the indictment, which begs the question, why wasn't Ms. Maxwell specifically charged with abusing minors?

LB: That's a very good question. And I can only assume that law enforcement wanted to bring charges that they were confident that they could prove beyond a reasonable doubt. These cases are not easy. I've been doing them for over 30 years. You need to have victims who are willing to testify. You need to have corroboration. And so I'm going to assume that they brought the charges that they felt were the strongest charges that they could win at trial.

DM: Will your client have to testify against Ms. Maxwell?

LB: So my client is not one of the three victims named in the criminal case. We have brought a civil case on her behalf. But she told me this morning she wants us to reach out to the criminal authorities, offer to help, offer to be a witness, and really to assist in any way that she can. And yes, she would testify if it comes to that. She's very fearful, but she will do it.

DM: And these happened, allegedly happened, long ago. But has your client told you about how it impacts her today?

LB: Yes. Post-traumatic stress is an incurable condition. If you get therapy and treatment, you can manage it, like diabetes, but it never goes away. And today was a very hard day for my client. And she's very upset that she has to think about this and relive this. So, you know, it may seem like, gee, these things happened long ago in the 1990s, according to the indictment. But I can assure you, if you ask any victim of child sexual abuse, they will tell you that it stays with them for a lifetime, and it's worth prosecuting even many years later.

DM: Last question for you. There has been a lot of speculation about the well-connected and high-profile friends of Jeffrey Epstein. Do you expect that there will be more charges against others?

LB: I do. And I hope so because there are other women and men who are accused of recruiting a lot of victims for Jeffrey Epstein. And so I hope that they are all brought to justice. My clients are certainly crying out for justice against everyone.

DM: We'll leave it there. Thank you for your time.

LB: Thank you so much. Have a nice day.

DM: You too.

CH: Lisa Bloom is a lawyer who represents one of Ghislaine Maxwell's accusers. We reached Ms. Bloom in Los Angeles.

[Music: Ukulele strumming]

California doctor law

Guest: Richard Pan

CH: Over the last two weeks, there's been a distressing rise in cases of COVID-19 in the state of California. So public health officials are urging people to take action, to reduce the threat. Which has actually increased the number of threats — against the officials themselves. In California, the Department of Motor Vehicles is prevented from disclosing the home addresses of politicians and police officers. The idea is to keep them safe from harm, or undue influence. Now, State Senator Richard Pan has written the law to protect public health officers — by making the DMV hide their addresses as well. State Senator Richard Pan is also Doctor Richard Pan: he's a pediatrician. We reached him in Sacramento.

DM: Dr. Pan, what kind of threats are California's public health officers facing?

RICHARD PAN: They are facing threats online. They are facing threats at Board of Supervisors meetings, where people have read out their home addresses. And in one case, incited people to actually show up at the public health officer’s home with threatening messages. In fact, she resigned. We have people also organizing protests at other health officers’ homes. So basically, we're having people not arguing their case based on science and facts, but through bullying and intimidation.

DM: There have even been physical threats, death threats even. Are those threats being treated seriously?

RP: Well, certainly they have been serious enough that public health officers have received increased security or police protection.

DM: Do you worry that they maybe feel that they need to back off on orders about social distancing or PPE and businesses?

RP: Well, they are feeling pressure to back off because unfortunately, sometimes their bosses, the elected leaders who hired them, may be swayed by some of these protesters, may be swayed because of ideology or political persuasion. Because unfortunately, we have not had consistent messaging in the United States from our president, from many of our elected leaders. And that creates challenges for a public health officer. Public health officers are hired for their expertise and knowledge. They're not elected officials. They are specialists who are then given broad authority to keep us safe during a pandemic like the one we're experiencing now. So we need them to be able to make their recommendations and their decisions based on their knowledge, based on their expertise, based on the science and the facts. When we don't, more people get sick, more people will be hospitalized, more people will die. Unfortunately, if they are targets for personal threats, their families are targeted, then they're not able to do their best job in protecting all of us.

DM: You mentioned the politics at play here with some of these protests. Are the threats and the lashing out, is it happening because of the economics? Because there are livelihoods at stake here, or is there something else going on, a deeper distrust for science being expressed?

RP: Well, the evidence shows that if you want the economy to come back, you need to follow the public health guidelines. So I find it disingenuous that the people who are attacking our public health officers are just interested in restoring our economy. Because our public health officers are doing their best to control the very pandemic that's at the heart of our economic challenges. Instead, I think these extremists who are essentially trying to terrorize our public health officers and people who are advocating for the public health measures we need are people who are driven by whether it's ideology or even personal gain is something that we cannot accept. Because this is endangering our entire community.

DM: What are you hearing from health officials about how your bill will help protect them?

RP: Well, I think our health officials just want to be able to do their jobs. And my bill is to provide them some additional protection, so they can do exactly that. Because we need them to do their jobs.

DM: California, I mean, at the beginning of the pandemic certainly shut down early compared to some other states. But now the state is seeing a pretty large upswing in terms of the coronavirus cases. How willingly have people in the state followed science-based advice?

RP: The vast majority of people are following science-based advice. The challenge is that if not enough of us do it, then the disease will still spread. And when we started off, we were pretty successful in flattening the curve in California. But over time, what we didn't do is we didn't turn down the curve. And people are getting mixed messages because we have a president who doesn't want to wear a mask. The disease spreads in the margins. So with every person who isn't doing what they can to limit the spread of the disease, then that's going to increase the odds of disease spread a little farther. And when you add that up over more people, then the disease will take off. And so there is this mixed messaging. People are getting. And unfortunately, we've politicized these recommendations, and that's a major problem. Because then wearing a mask now becomes a political statement, and it shouldn't be a political statement. It's about public health. So the evidence shows wearing a mask reduces transmission. Then everyone who can should wear a mask. It's not about whether you're a Democrat or Republican, or whether you support the president, you oppose the president. This is about slowing the spread of a disease that has already killed more Americans than Americans have died in World War One.

DM: Dr. Pan, you're a pediatrician. You're a longtime advocate for science. What's it like for you to see someone facing death threats for offering medical advice?

RP: Unfortunately, we have seen this kind of terrorism before. So as I was working on proving our vaccination rates in the face of outbreaks of measles and whooping cough, I've experienced personally, but I've also witnessed other physicians, even parents, being terrorized by these extremists. And now I see these same extremists targeting public health officials, basically opposing every effort to try to slow the spread of this disease. They oppose the stay at home orders. They oppose masks. They oppose contact tracing. And they oppose a non-existent vaccine because unfortunately, we do not have a vaccine against COVID. At some point time, we need to come together as a community and say it is not tolerable that we have so many people sick and even dead because of this virus. And that we're not going to tolerate extremists who are attacking the very people who are trying to stop this disease. We need to come together. We need to stop this disease, so our economy can come back, our kids can go back to school, and that we don't have people dying from a disease that is spreading because we're not willing to control it.

DM: Dr. Pan, thank you for joining us. Stay safe.

RP: All right. Thank you so very much. I appreciate it.

DM: Bye.

RP: Bye.

CH: Dr Richard Pan is a Democratic California State Senator. We reached him in Sacramento.

CH: He was there. And then he was gone. And when Chris Town's wife called 9-1-1, she told the 9-1-1 dispatcher that he had fallen into a "black hole." The 67-year-old Connecticut man had been helping a friend move into a new place. Suddenly, the floor gave out. Mr. Town says he fell — and then, he kept falling. We reached Chris Town in Guilford, Connecticut.

DM: Mr. Town, first of all, how are you doing after everything you've been through? Have you got any injuries?

CHRIS TOWN: Bruises and minor cuts, mostly. You know if you play basketball and somebody throws the ball too hard and you jam your finger? Well, I feel like three or four of my fingers were jammed. So they're a little stiff, but everything is pretty much okay.

DM: Which is amazing given what you went through. I mean, your wife said you fell down a black hole. What were you doing? And what happened?

CT: [laughing] Well, here's the story. A friend of ours was moving into a house with her two kids. She's a single mom. So we were trying to help her. You know, we dropped off a bit of furniture. She said I had to put this bed frame together in this room for her son. She has a ten-year-old son who is autistic. So, you know, he's not real verbal. And so I said, well, I’d put the frame together. She said, no, no, no, you don't need to that. I said, no, no, trust me. I’ve put that frame together before; I can do this. She said there's a soft spot in the floor, and I want to make sure the bed frame is over that soft spot because I don't want Ben, you know, putting his foot through it or what have you. So I opened up the box and started putting together the pieces of the bed frame, and I was probably up to part three out of five. And I stood up, and apparently, when I stood up, I stood up light on top of that soft spot. And I heard a noise, and I looked down, and the floor is disappearing before me, and I'm dropping. And then I felt my feet going into water. And I went in water over my head. And then, you know, sort of sprung up to the top and looked up and took me a minute or two to realize that a well would be the only explanation I could think of for what I was seeing. You know, I'm in a circular area going straight up. Looks like it thins down as you get closer to the top. And I'm down at least twelve feet by my guess at that point. I start looking around for handholds or footholds. Because, you know, the water's not freezing cold, but it's cold. And I keep thinking I don't want to tread water forever. So I started feeling around with my feet, and I found a rock on one side and a rock on the other side that were out far enough that I could sort of get up to my I probably had everything above my waist out of the water. And I hear my wife call me because she was upstairs, you know, in the room that I was.

DM: What did your wife say?

CT: She said her first instinct was to run over and start looking down the hole. And then she thought, you know, the whole floor could collapse. She wasn't sure what had happened. So she stepped back, and she started calling me. And I probably didn’t hear her the first couple times, partly because I was under water for some of it. So at one point, I hear her voice from upstairs, and she says, Chris?! And I said, yeah, I'm okay. [bright laughter]

DM: According to the local fire department, Chris, that old well that you're in, and it's more than six meters deep, it's filled with more than two metres of water.

CT: RIght.

DM: When they finally arrived, how did they get you out?

CT: Well, it was a low ceiling room, so they drilled a hole, and then they set up an apparatus. And they had basically they sent a guy down who put a harness on me and they dragged the two of us up together. [phone rings in background] They worked very hard and very efficiently. And then so from the time they arrived, until the time they pulled me out, they said it was about 47 minutes. And, you know, when you're sitting at the bottom of a well, part of me is thinking, can't these guys go faster? But then I'm thinking, well, I have no idea what they have to do. [laughing] So I certainly didn't say anything to them about that. And they did an outstanding job. So I'm very grateful.

DM: What was your response when you got up on solid ground?

CT: Well, I was freezing, you know? And I told the firemen while I was down, I said, I'm getting a little hypothermic because, you know, I'm in water that's not freezing water, but it's cold enough. And if you stand in cold water long enough, you do become hypothermic. And so I was just chattering and shaking. And they got me on the floor, and put me on a stretcher, then took me to the ambulance and then asked me to strip off all my clothes while I was in the air while I was in the ambulance, after they closed the door, of course. And I did. And they wrapped me and towels and took me to the hospital.

DM: And what did your wife say?

CT: She was very happy to see me. You know, she called friends, she called my son, she called all sorts of people in the 45 minutes while they were trying to get me out, just to let people know what was going on. And she was very, very upset that I had disappeared down the hole, and she had no idea where I was gone. But she kept her head and called the fire department. So, again, another person responsible for saying.

DM: What have you since learned about the history of this well, how it ended up underneath the house?

CT: Well, the House has obviously been through many owners over the years, and I assume this was an original well, and I don't know how old the well was, but the rumor I've heard is it was in the early 1980s that somebody put an addition on and that covered up this well. And there was a time when wells were, in fact, in houses. But this was probably outside the house. But when they expanded, they just built an addition over top of the well. And they probably could have gotten away with that if they had, you know, topped off the well. But there was only wood over it. And, you know, the moisture from underneath that apparently rotated out the flooring that was over it over however many years it was. And so that's why it gave way. You know, my issue, well, one of my towns was of course, I had no idea that there was a well under there, and nor did the woman who was renting it, we were helping move in. And she just thought it was a soft spot in the floor that might cause a little trouble somewhere along the line. So I was a bit shocked to find myself in well, but it took me probably a minute or two, maybe three to realize that I probably wasn't capable of climbing out of it. You know, there weren't enough good handholds and footholds, and I'm not a kid anymore. [laughing] I don't go climbing walls on a regular basis. So I figured I wasn't going to be able to climb out myself. But if someone came and helped me, yeah, I was probably going to be fine. And that’s the way it worked out. My wife, when she talks about it, she gets kind of choked up, you know, talking about my falling in. And then, you know, then that the dispatcher at the fire department said, you know, he was thinking about just sending an ambulance. And he said, how's your husband doing? And Angie called down to me, and I said, well I'm trying to keep my head above water because that was, you know, within a minute or two after I'd fallen. And she didn't realize I was in water until then. So she told that dispatcher, so rather than sending just an ambulance, he sent a fire truck and rescue squad and all the other good folks that you would need to to get a rescue done.

DM: I'm glad you weren't injured seriously. Thank you for chatting with us.

CT: Thank you very much. And thanks for calling. It’s been a pleasure talking to you.

CH: Chris Town fell into a well on Sunday. We reached him in Guilford, Connecticut. In a Facebook post, the local police department said the house was built in 1843, and the well was likely outside of the house at the time. You can see images of the hole in the floor, and read more about the rescue, on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: More banjo]

Goldman Sans

CH: Matt Taibbi once described the investment giant Goldman Sachs as "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money." It's evocative, although some might argue it's unfair. To vampire squids. Nevertheless, such critical characterizations might have informed the bank's boldest — and most italicized — move yet. Goldman Sachs has released a font. Its vibe, the bank says, is "neutral, with a wink". You'll immediately notice the "slightly chamfered spurs" which "aid legibility". It's called Goldman Sans, and it's available for free. You just have to abide by the restrictions rendered highly legible in its otherwise neutral fine print. That fine print says that, by downloading Goldman Sans, users agree not to use the font to disparage the company. Which means I'm allowed to type "Goldman Sachs is nice" in Goldman Sans. But if I type anything about the bank, say, valuing profit over people — let alone blood funnels — I'd have to use Comic Sans. That probably means most people are highly ineligible for this highly legible font. And all these font rules make Goldman Sachs seem like — a large, self-serving corporate entity. Which means it's really reverting to type.

[Music: Sexy, sexy, 1920’s Parisian nightlife instrumental]

Part two: Virginia hair discrimination, moster star disapears

Virginia hair discrimination

Guest: Carmen Davis

CH: This week, the state of Virginia joined a handful of states in enacting the CROWN Act — a law banning discrimination based on racial identifiers like hair texture or type. Virginia is only the fourth state in the U.S. to pass the law, and the first Southern state to do so. Carmen Davis is a natural hair stylist in Virginia. For her and for her clients, the Act is personal. We reached her in Richmond.

DM: Ms. Davis, what does it mean to you to see this act come into effect in Virginia this week?

CARMEN DAVIS: I'm really happy about it because with all of the things that are going on right now, I'm overwhelmed just because I know it’ll help with so many of my clients in the issues that they usually have when it comes to their hair and the concerns in the workspace.

DM: For people who aren't familiar with the term, what's meant by natural hair exactly?

CD: So natural hair is hair that hasn't been chemically-processed. It's basically the hair that grows out of the scalp, and wearing it in that state. So whatever the texture is, if it's kinky, coily, curly ringlets, wearing it in that state, or even when it locks or sometimes even braids.

DM: You mentioned that some of your clients have had challenges over the years for wearing braids or afros or dreadlocks. I mean, what kinds of pushback have black women in Virginia faced for choosing natural hair?

CD: A lot of questions, concerns, people asking can they touch their hair? Asking, like questioning, how professional the look of that hair is in the workspace. So I know a lot of my clients have allowed me to know that they usually just want to stick to the script. So they say if they came to work a certain way or got hired with a certain hairstyle, they're more prone to want to wear that hair more than that, because they are afraid of possibly not getting the job promotion that they want, keeping the job, and like I said, just being uncomfortable in the workspace with their counterparts asking and prying when it comes to their hair.

DM: I know there's a lot of discussion that goes on in the hair salon. Have you heard from your clients that they've actually gone to a workplace and been discriminated against because of their hair?

CD Yeah, absolutely. They’ve went to work and someone has come up to them and let them know, like, you know, you may not go so far with your hair like that. You know, let’s tone that down. I know, for instance, when I used to wait tables, my manager said something like, I really like it better when you hair is more tamed than when it isn't. But the only difference would be either I was wearing my hair, which some call an afro, but it would be like manipulated, you know a afro, that was what he was referring to as not being tamed. So being more tame would be like when I had it in a bun or a ponytail or I was wearing it straight.

DM: What was your reaction when he said that to you?

CD: Oh, I asked him to not reference my hair in using an adjective of taming because he was like, it just seems so wild, usually. And I was like, well, my hair can't be wild and or tamed because it's not an animal. So let's just not talk about my hair going forward. So I think with the act passing, it possibly will help others feel as comfortable addressing certain situations that have been so uncomfortable.

DM: When you first decided to start wearing your hair naturally, you faced some backlash yourself in those early days. Can you tell us about that?

CD: Yeah, well I was in college, it was like 2004, so this was a little bit ahead of the newer wave of embracing your texturing, your hair and wearing it in its natural state. And my roommate didn't want me to like speak to her. She just stoped talking to me. So it was like a year or so where her and I like didn't speak because she was like, why would you do that? That's not attractive. I don't like it. You know, she just doesn't understand why I would cut all of my relaxed hair and want to then wear my natural hair.

DM: How does an experience like that, having your hair described as wild, I mean, how does it affect young Black girls?

CD: It can have a major impression on a person, especially when it comes to the hair. Any time that someone then makes another reference of wild or taming or nappy or rough, it definitely can dim you light. It definitely makes you question yourself. So it’ll definitely make you have an issue with possibly being Black and having the texture that's coming, you know, out of your hair. Because everyone's texture is going to be different, you know, and it may play on their self-esteem. I know these are a lot of the things that I've heard before in the salon.

DM: And I know that the CROWN Act is meant to make sure that there's no overt discrimination about natural hair.

CD: RIght.

DM: Will it help in terms of some of the subtle kind of discrimination that people experience or the kind of unwanted touching that you just mentioned?

CD: Yeah, I'm hoping that it will help. Because now that the act has passed, there should be a space of, okay, I was uncomfortable with addressing this before because there was nothing hard on paper for me to be like, hey, you know, this is my hair, and you said something about it and it's made me uncomfortable. Can we no longer discuss that? Or if someone does ask you a question about your hair, you know, maybe not wanting to have that deep dialog conversation of explaining the whole process. I'm hoping that this act will give people enough confidence, just because you need that backing. You need something to say, ok, I know that one paper, this will give people enough backing to truly speak on how they feel. And knowing like, hey, you probably should or shouldn't be doing these things.

DM: It sounds like you're hoping that it'll normalize Black hair.

CD: Oh yeah, for sure. Normalize Black hair. But it's so weird because it's like Black hair is normalized. It’s just not normalized fo all Black people.

DM: Well, I wonder what does it say about the United States that there needs to be anti-hair discrimination laws passed?

CD: That we are way behind, and we think that we are not advanced at all when it comes to Black people just being who they are, like no Black person culturally should feel as though they can't express themselves at work. It just shows how behind we are. Because it's accepted like, you know, if you go on vacation, white, Caucasian people, get braids. They do all of those things. And then they'll come back. They’ll show their friends. It's like it's fine. It's fine. You know, it's accepted. Kim Kardashian can get braids or a weave. Everyone wants braids next week. But then when Black girls wear braids, it's a big, thorough conversation. Why did you do that? Did your hair grow overnight? Can I touch it? And people love that hair, but they just don't truly love it on them. So we have a lot of deep-rooted issues that we collectively need to work on in our community and as a whole with everyone. So I think that's what it says, that we got a lot of work to do. But, hopefully, this is like the beginnings part of it all.

DM: Thanks for telling us about this new law.

CD: No problem. Thank you for having me.

DM: Bye.

CD: Bye.

CH: Carmen Davis is a natural hair stylist in Richmond, Virginia. That's where we reached her.

[Music: Drum-heavy jazz]

Monster star disappears

Guest: Andrew Allan

DM: Mr. Allen, first of all, you're gonna have to explain to us what a monster star like this is.

ANDREW ALLAN: It's what we call massive star, massive star means that the star’s mass is somewhere above eight solar masses, so eight times heavier than the sun. And once the stars are like this, they're able to burn carbon in their core, so they live a different life than lower mass stars.

DM: How massive and bright of a star is this compared to the sun?

AA: Yeah. So we predict using our computer models that this star is roughly two-and-a-half-million times brighter than the sun, and has a mass somewhere between 85 and 120 times the size of the sun.

DM: [sounding astounded] That's pretty bright!

AA: Yeah, it's quite an extreme case. So the star is what we call a luminous blue variable. So these are the brightest stars. And yeah, this is quite an interesting example of one.

DM: And how do you know that this star exists? Because as I understand it, it is really, really far away?

AA: Yeah, it's extremely far away. It's roughly 75-million light years away. So we there’s observations going from 2001 until 2011. And these consistently showed the signature of the star. And this is what we were expecting to see in our own observation. So we got two observations in 2019, and we really just wanted a higher resolution version of the old observations so that we could fit our models to it in order to predict the properties of the Star. But yeah, [chuckle] so when we received our first observation, we realized we couldn't find that signature was there.

DM: What was that like for you when you went up to your very big telescope, and then you couldn't find it?

AA: [chuckling] It was very exciting. So I, unfortunately, didn't get to go to Chile to go to the very large telescope, which took the observations. And so we got remote observations, and I was working from Ireland. But yeah, we were all very excited. But we also wanted to make sure. So the conditions for the first observation weren't perfect. So before we got too excited, we wanted to double check that star signature definitely wasn't there. So we requested a follow up observation, which is how we got our second observation in December. And that was, again, using the very large telescope in Chile, but this time using a different instrument called X-shooter, because one of the previous observations was already taken with the X-shooter instrument of the VLT, so we had a very good way to compare.

DM: You said you were very excited. When a massive star like this disappears, what do you expect caused it?

AA: Yeah. And so the reason why we're so excited about this case is usually when the massive stars disappear, you'd expect to see a bright supernova explosion at the same time as the colapse to a black hole. But this wasn't detected for this star. That's what really got us excited.

DM: How do you know that there wasn't a supernova explosion this time around?

AA: We don't for sure. We can't say for sure. But we would expect, given the properties of the star, that it would've been quite a bright supernova. And there's a lot of surveys looking out for these kinds of things. And none was reported.

DM: So this is a bit of a mystery then. Do you have some theories on what may have happened?

AA: Yeah. So our first theory, we have two theories, and the first one I've partially mentioned is the direct collapse through a black hole without a supernova. Another theory we have is that the star was actually going through a very large eruption during the first observation, so from 2001 until 2011, which then ended. As well as the star has a very strong wind, and it's given out a lot of particles. And these particles conformed together and they could form a dust. And this dust could kind of block the light of the star, which could also lead to the star not being observable at the minute.

DM: Stars are just big exploding balls of gas, aren't they?

AA: Yes, pretty much [laughing].

DM: Is it possible that it just used up all the fuel?

AA: Yeah. And so that's exactly it. So when the star is dying, it's burning and all of its fuel throughout its centre. And eventually, it reaches iron. At which point, there a balance of energy between the light from the star and the gravity due to its mass. But once it reaches an iron core, it's full of iron in the centre, then it's not going to gain more energy by burning the iron. So it doesn't. And it starts to collapse. And so that would be what happened if it directly collapsed through a black hole. So in the dust case, the star could still be there.

DM: So black holes, maybe. Dust, maybe. If you had to put money on a theory, what are you betting?

AA: [chuckling] I wouldn't bet at the moment. I'm really not sure. [laughing] But, hopefully, we'll find out soon because we will have another observation. And our group's going to get to observe again with the Hubble Space Telescope. So that's going to be led by Professor Nathan Smith of the University of Arizona. And we’re fortunate that there is already an archival observation taken with the Hubble Space Telescope when the star was present. So by comparing to the new image with Hubble on the old image, hopefully, we could pick out the star itself and possibly determine why it really disappeared.

DM: Andrew, you're only 23. You're working on your PhD at Trinity. What's it been like for you to lead this research so early in your career?

AA: Yeah, it's been a really great experience. I've had a lot of support from all of the team members. They've been really great in guiding me and stuff. My supervisor of Trinity College, Dublin, as well. He was very heavily involved in all of this research, and was a great help for me.

DM: Andrew, thank you very much for sharing your time.

AA: Thanks very much for having me.

DM: Bye.

AA: Bye.

CH: Andrew Allan is a PhD candidate in astrophysics at Trinity College Dublin. We reached him in Mullingar, Ireland.

CH: Okay, don't tell on me. But the gray-tailed tattler doesn't really look all that unusual. Grey body. Yellow feet. Pointy beak. Pretty standard elements of bird. But that hasn't stopped birders from flocking to the B.C. site where one was spotted. That's because last week's sighting is reportedly the first of its kind in Canada. And while he's definitely no peacock, this unassuming bird has plenty of admirers. Kitimat, B.C. birder Walter Thorne is among them. This week, he told CBC's Wil Fundal about the day the gray-tailed tattler turned up.

CH: A few hundred years ago — give or take — a clergyman happened upon a young brother and sister. Orphans, living alone in an isolated Newfoundland cove. The girl was pregnant. When the writer Michael Crummey happened upon a brief account from the time — no more than a paragraph long — he knew immediately there was a great story there. He also knew immediately that he wanted nothing to do with it. But like most great ideas, this one proved persistent. And so, years later, Mr. Crummey reluctantly gave in. Everyone — including him — is glad he did. The novel that resulted is titled "The Innocents." And this week, the book picked up a 25-thousand-dollar prize for best fiction at the Atlantic Book Awards. Last fall, Carol spoke with Michael Crummey about "The Innocents" on stage in Toronto.

[sc]

MC: I immediately dismissed it. So I didn't make a note about it. I couldn't find that little paragraph again if my life depended on it — probably. But I often thought of those children through the years, you know? And mostly thinking of them in terms of my own childhood and what that was like. That move out of childhood into adolescence, and how appallingly confusing that was. And I was you know in a situation where I had some resources, you know I had a supportive family, my mother forced all of us to read that book called “Almost 13”. [this time, CO and the crowd laugh] And then went that step further and asked if we had any questions about it? And none of us had any questions, of course. And there was a sex education class in school. And still with those resources, it was completely overwhelming to try to make sense of what was happening to me, and how I was supposed to be in the world with this it felt like almost a new creature living inside me. So I always was haunted by what it must have been like for those children to be left alone before there was an inkling of any of this. They wouldn't even have had words for what might be ahead of them.

CO: Before anyone thinks that this is a book about incest and hard scrabble, it's beautiful. These two kids — Ada and Evered — are just lovely children. And I've had to do assignments in war zones where there are refugee camps or whatever, I'm always astonished that children are still children no matter what you do to them. A girl will make a doll out of rags, or someone will do it for her. And children will make balls out of things, and they'll play, they want to have a childhood somehow, and even Ada’s little collection of things.

MC: Right. Yeah, I mean I think that was one of the other decisions I made from the beginning was that I didn't want to write a book about incest. I mean that was not the story for me. The story was who are these two children? Like, I wanted it as much as possible to be a celebration of those two children, and to be a celebration of like the unbelievable life force in them to find themselves in those circumstances. And to survive not just for themselves, but for the other.

[/sc]

CH: The writer Michael Crummey speaking with Carol about his novel "The Innocents." This week, Mr. Crummey won the top prize at the 2020 Atlantic Book Awards.

[Music: Bright piano]

Airplane!

CH: Finally tonight. Stay calm, but there is an issue.

[sc]

WOMAN: Excuse me, sir. There's been a little problem in the cockpit.

MAN: The cockpit? What is it?

WOMAN: It's a little room in the front of the plane where the pilots sir. That's not important right now.

[/sc]

CH: And to quote another moment in that movie, we need somebody who can not only fly this plane, but who didn't have fish for dinner. That line pretty much sums up the movie “Airplane!” with an exclamation mark, of course, which debuted 40 years ago today. The thing is, that absurd sentence about the fish dinner was lifted verbatim from an old thriller called “Zero Hour!”. Also with an exclamation mark, because the kind of melodramatic, self serious storytelling that “Airplane!” pokes fun at practically satirizes itself. But “Airplane!” goes farther, much, much farther, too far by current standards. The gags are so relentless, the movie should come with a fasten seat belt sign. And in 2020, some of those gags no longer land. But the sheer commitment to nonstop goofiness means “Airplane!” stays aloft — even as it threatens to crash at any moment.

[sc]

MAN: Can you fly this plane and land it?

MAN TWO: Surely you can't be serious.

MAN: I am serious. And don't call me Shirley.

WOMAN: Doctor, I've checked, Mr. Stryker's the only one.

MAN: What flying experience have you had?

MAN TWO: I flew single-engine fighters in the Air Force. But this plane has four engines. It's an entirely different kind of flying, altogether.

MAN AND WOMAN: It's an entirely different kind of flying.

MAN TWO: Besides, I haven't touched any kind of plane in six years,

MAN: Mr. Stryker. I know nothing about flying. But there's one thing I do know. You're the only one on this plane who can possibly fly it. You're the only chance we've got.

[Music: Tens instrumental]

[/sc]

CH: “Airplane!” starring Leslie Nielsen hit theaters 40 years ago today.

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July 02, 2020 Episode Transcript

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