Eric Dollard Aaron Murakami and others Building Telluric Amplifier

All right. Well, we're up here on the
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hill um where the shack is. You can see
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these lines going down straight towards
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town. Um there's about a mile and a half
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that we of land that we have for this.
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So, the lines come up.
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It's a culmination of 10 years of work
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uh fixing, repairing, replacing holes,
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replacing mass, running wire, and
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eventually a fully completed 1,400T long
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antenna bridge. And it's not even
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finished yet.
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So these lines terminate here coming in
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and
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okay. So what what's our setup here?
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So the feed the original feed line comes
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in from a a cell link that's mounted up
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high outside. It leads into this uh
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Wi-Fi access point which is essentially
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uh it's a 3D enclosure 3D printed
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enclosure for one of those little cell
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phone data only MiFi plans. Uh that data
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runs through to this uh data logger
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which is essentially a Raspberry Pi
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modified to run on 12 to 20 volt solar
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uh which makes it appropriate for our
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stuff. Uh it also has to have separate
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power supplies to power some of the
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other equipment we have. For example,
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the uh the uh cell phone Wi-Fi requires
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uh I believe 12 volts to operate. And uh
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in order to get that feed, I had to have
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a second supply that uh power or
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Ethernet that supplies the Wi-Fi.
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In addition to that, there's a third
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power supply in here that is a 12 to
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24vt converter that provides the uh
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voltage that's necessary to run the 37
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bra, which is the actual audio, the
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actual line recording equipment. Uh that
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1400 ft antenna field comes all the way
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across those towers and eventually comes
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through some filtering systems uh and
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leads in right here which leads into the
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input of the 37 Bravo. This is an audio
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audio line test equipment
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and uh what it's normally made for doing
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it's normally made for testing noise and
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minimizing interference on the original
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POTS telephone network. In this case,
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we're actually looking for the noise.
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So, it makes the perfect system for
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amplifying that type of thing. Uh, so
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this takes the raw signals that are on
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that line, amplifies them to a to a
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region that we can pick them up. Goes
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through what is essentially audio output
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down the feed and re leads into the
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audio input junction on the data log.
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The audio input is it's essentially a
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sound card that's mounted onto the
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Raspberry Pi. And uh essentially all the
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a lot of the work in development is not
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so much in the uh hardware itself. It's
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relatively simple Raspberry Pi people
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put together besides the power. Uh but
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the much larger issue is this is a this
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is a Linux based PC that's sitting in a
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shack in the middle of nowhere in the
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Nevada desert. So you have to make sure
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that uh everything is very battle
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hardened, resilient, uh uh handles
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reboots, can allow to be maintained
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remotely uh and continually streams
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external over to the internet to our
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servers where you can actually listen to
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them yourself.
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Uh this whole system at the moment is
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running on battery power on a 12volt
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battery pack. eventually want to hook
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this up to one of the solar panels on
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the roof. So essentially this entire
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feed, the data logger, the cell phone,
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Wi-Fi, the 37 Bravo can all operate
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independently as one powered unit and
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they could conceivably run this system
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uh 24/7 without uh without stopping. And
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uh that would fit some of our longer
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goals which is once we start getting the
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signals recorded and analyzed and start
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picking apart the signals from the noise
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we'll get a better understanding of what
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we're dealing with and we might be able
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to start making forecasts.
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Uh in addition to that uh a lot of the
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work in development is just getting the
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physical design and infrastructure in
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place. So the really good news is that
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now that we have a functioning system,
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it's exceptionally easy to uh make
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copies of it and start putting up
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multiple stations in other locations
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across the planet or across the country
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at first. Uh I just happen to have the
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37 Bravo is the ideal for this. The
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sound that you hear, which you hear
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there's a a low frequency buzz, which is
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essentially the power line noise from
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the nearby town. And then you hear this
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little crackling sound. It's like that
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popcorn crackling. Uh that crackling
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sound that you're hearing is uh all of
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the lightning activity on the planet at
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the moment. So this is actually a global
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receiving device which makes it really
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interesting. And uh for the research and
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development purposes, this uh it's
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essentially listening to the ionosphere
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and whenever there's issues that happen
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both in the in the sky for solar
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activity as well as within the earth
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causes changes to to the way these
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signals interact and operate. So I can
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see for for example what might happen
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before a large seismic event is these
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crackles might get more uh more densely
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packed and louder and and closer
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together. So instead of hearing these
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little pops and cracks here and there,
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that meter might be pegged all the way
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top and you hear a continuous rush or
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roar of
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constant high power activity going on.
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But uh I haven't seen that yet. So
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that'll I believe that was Eric's
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observations for his previous stations
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in the '9s. It
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was and anybody can go to ericp
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dollar.com just search uh keyword
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landers for the blog posts
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pictures whatever it's all it's all in
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there along with the the charts.
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Yeah. And Eric's research originally was
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he had chart reporters and things that
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were taking these types of measurements.
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And uh he had correlated some changes in
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ionospheric activity with uh seismic
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events that were occurring both locally
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in California and across the world. So
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now that we have a more modern system
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set up, we can record much higher
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quality audio. We can record the live
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feed directly from the source, have it
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stored and analyzed at our leisure. So
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when something does happen, uh, we're
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prepared. We can go back in time. We can
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listen to the recordings. We can see how
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the signals changed and, uh, a couple
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good seismic events might allow us to
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calibrate this equipment. And, uh, in
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the relatively near future, as in maybe
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within a few years from now, we could
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start making uh, reliable and accurate
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forecasts.
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So sky is the limit.