Tiny creature killing lake swimmers

RV enthusiasts who plan to head south for the winter and swim in a lake while there might want to bring along some nose plugs.

”Just when you thought it was safe to go into the water” went the slogan for the movie Jaws, when a great white shark threatened swimmers at the ocean shore.

Now, comes another creature, even more sinister -- a microscopic amoeba called Naegleria fowleri that attacks the body through the nasal cavity and quickly eats its way to the brain. Six people have been killed this year by the nasty bug, the most recent a 14-year-old boy who got it while swimming in Arizona’s Lake Havasu.

According to the Center for Disease Control, Naegleria infected 23 people from 1995 to 2004. This year health officials say they've noticed a spike in cases, with six so far, all fatal.

Though infections tend to be found in the South, Naegleria has been found almost everywhere in lakes, hot springs, even some swimming pools. Still, the CDC knows of only several hundred cases worldwide since its discovery in the 1960s.

The amoeba typically live in lake bottoms, grazing off algae and bacteria in the sediment. People become infected when they wade through shallow water and stir up the bottom. If someone allows water to shoot up his or her nose, the bug can latch onto the person's olfactory nerve, destroying tissue on its way to the brain. Death usually occurs within two weeks.

Symptoms of infection include a stiff neck, headaches and fevers. In the later stages, victims show signs of brain damage such as hallucinations and behavioral changes.

In addition to the Arizona case, health officials reported two cases in Texas and three more in central Florida this year, prompting authorities in those states to advise people to avoid warm, standing water, or any areas with obvious algae blooms.

The easiest way to prevent infection is to simply plug your nose when swimming or diving in fresh water. Or don’t swim at all.

Hollywood stars compete to build biggest RVs

Hollywood stars are vying for more than Oscars these days. Some are duking it out to see who can build the biggest, baddest motorhome. Sylvester Stallone, Will Smith and Robert De Niro are among the big names that are building behemoth RVs.

So far, De Niro is winning, with a three-story coach that's 1,192 feet of living space, complete with a super climate control system that can cool the inside to its optimal temperature within 15 minutes. Just about everything in the coach can operate by remote control including its 12 high definition TVs. When the star wants to screen a new film, he can invite his friends to the 30-seat home theatre.


Other celebs with super comfy coaches include Mariah Carey, Vin Diesel, Nicole Richie, Ice Cube . . . to name a few.

The interiors of each are plush, modeled after luxury yachts -- designed with each of their owners in mind. Smith's includes cowhide pillows, African masks and chessboards. And for when he wants to "make some music," there's a studio where he can do it while the kids stay occupied in their own playroom. Oh, yes, there's a dance floor, too.

Don't look for any of these rigs in your local National Forest campground.

Photos: Robert De Niro at the wheel of an RV, and the inside of his luxury rig.

Arizona or California BLM Boondocker? A Warning

RVers by the thousands flock to Quartzsite, Arizona each year and camp out on public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management. But the BLM has done something you may find a bit dirty. Check out "Death, Taxes, and LTVAs" on our Quartzsite News Blog.

RV Breakdown? Get Away from that Highway

A nasty--and fatal--crash involving a motorhome in Iowa once again raise issues of safety for the RV set. Back on September 15, four folks were sitting in their Class C motorhome on the shoulder of Interstate 35 near Des Moines. Unknown to them, trouble was on the way in the form of an alcohol-affected driver and his Mitsubishi Galant.

The Galant was traveling at about 85 miles per hour when it slammed the Tioga motorhome. The force was so strong it turned the motorhome on its side and pushed across the freeway. Happily the four occupants of the motorhome were only injured; the car driver and two of his three passengers were killed.

The motorhome was parked off on the shoulder because of mechanical problems. It's not clear if the driver had engaged his hazard lights, and how much of a role alcohol played in the car driver's error--he was tested at a .08 rating, below Iowa's legally drunk-driving level.

Nevertheless, it does raise the old story: If you break down on the freeway (or anywhere else) try and get as far off to the side of the road as you can. Be sure to turn on your hazard flashers, and if you have them (and it's safe to put them out) do put out road flares. If you can limp to an exit, get off the road. You're a lot better off getting hit at exit ramp speeds than at full-tilt highway speeds.

We broke down on California's Interstate 10 one dark night when we lost all oil pressure. We limped off the shoulder as far as we could, put on hazards, and seeing that we were within inches of the fog line, got out of the rig and got as far away from the traffic as we could, clear to the interstate chain link perimeter fence. Happily, nobody clobbered us, but it was a scary night indeed.

For more details, catch the news story on line.

Photo courtesy KCCI News.

Free Public Lands Access Septepmber 29

Load up your RV with the family, the friends, the dog and the cat, because your US public lands free for the visit September 29. Across all lands managed by the US Department of Interior, which includes National Parks, US Forest Service Lands, BLM lands, and the rest will waive any entry fees this Saturday.

In some areas this can amount to a pretty substantial rate reduction; it doesn't permit free camping in fee campgrounds, but getting into some of those "national jewels," for free is something to consider. Many agencies will also have special programs to celebrate the nation's landholdings. Additionally, all who volunteer at a National Park Service site on Saturday will receive a free pass for a visit to any National Park Service site later on.

For more information on National Public Lands Day, visit this web site.

Next Moon explorers may drive mini RVs

NASA's next generation of Moon explorers may live in mobile habitats that can be driven around for a week or more at a time like mini-RVs. The rovers would be about the same size as the dune buggies driven during the last three Apollo moon landings in the early '70s. But the new vehicles would be enclosed and pressurized so that astronauts would be better protected from radiation, extreme temperatures and other hazards.

The astronauts would also be able to dress normally inside in regular clothes, not bulky spacesuits like the Apollo astronauts had to wear when driving their rovers. For off-vehicle excursions, the new vehicles would have spacesuits fully assembled and attached to the rover so that astronauts could slip into them by opening a hatch and climbing inside. The target date for missions that might use such vehicles would by before 2020. Illustration courtesy NASA.

Car crash videos now available online

Consumers now have free access to more than 200 crash test videos as part of a collaboration between Consumer Reports and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). These online videos bring a new level of research detail to shoppers looking for a new or used car, minivan, truck, or SUV. Footage of some 200 vehicles tested at IIHS' state-of-the-art Vehicle Research Center (VRC) in Ruckersville, Virginia, can be found at ConsumerReports.org/crashtest. Visitors to the Web site can search by make, model, and year to witness how well the new or used vehicle they are considering -- or even their current vehicle -- protects occupants in frontal offset and side-impact collisions. Details of crash results, such as overall performance and potential injuries, are explained by CR's Jeff Bartlett. Consumer Reports will add more crash-test videos as the IIHS continues its testing.

Big tax break (again) for California RVers

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Sept. 4, 2007) -- California RV buyers who keep their vehicles out of the state for at least 90 days after purchase will no longer have to pay state sales tax. That’s the way it was until 2004, when the state changed the length of the out-of-state-stay to one year. Now, a new budget passed by the Legislature last Tuesday changes the time requirement back to only 90 days.

The rule also applies to buyers of yachts, and is not being well received by many people. "Everybody recognized this as a scam," Lenny Goldberg, executive director of the nonprofit California Tax Reform Association, told the L.A. Times. "People had even made a business out of this scam. And now the state is going to permit it again."

A book for yacht owners, "The 90 Day Yacht Club Guide to Ensenada," schools Californians on the art of avoiding sales tax by temporarily docking in Mexico.

Since 2004 under the one year rule, the state had added $45 million annually to its coffers. That will now be gone under the new 90-day rule.

A provision intended to keep the one-year requirement in place was removed from the budget last month at the insistence of Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman of Irvine who owns a yacht. Other legislators weren’t happy. "Hopefully they will make him president of the yacht club or something," said Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, who opposed the change back to the shorter requirement.

So, for now at least, if you live in California, when you buy a new RV and keep it out of state for a minimum of 90 days, you'll pay no state sales tax.

NASA developing $3 million “pop up camper” for the Moon

If all goes well, NASA will send a group of explorers to the Moon as early as 2020, but they won't just touch and go. They'll stay awhile, and eventually others will follow to populate a moon base to serve as a staging area for flights to Mars.

But there's a little glitch: There are no Holiday Inns on the Moon. So NASA is developing something a bit more modest. A 20-foot-high, 12-foot-wide inflatable capsule that project manager Judith Watson describes as a "pop-up camper."

The capsule is made of layered nylon and designed to provide four people with 1,872 cubic feet of living and storage space.

On the moon, the habitat and an attached air-lock unit is connected by an airtight door would be pressurized to about the same as atop Colorado's Pikes Peak, 14,110 feet above sea level.

A prototype of the habitat is already in place at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Virginia, where it is being tested and tweaked.

Is your RV dealer just average? Find out

RV dealers are not all created equal, according to a report being marketed to industry by a company called ResearchandMarkets.com. Here is a brief overview the company provides about the state of RV dealerships in the USA.

More than 3,000 RV dealers operate in the U.S. with combined annual revenue of more than $15 billion. Most RV dealers are privately held; larger dealers include Freedom Roads, Lazydays RV Supercenter, and LaMesa RV Center. The industry is fragmented: the top 50 dealers account for about a third of industry revenue. Most dealerships have about 10 employees, but large dealerships can have more than 150.

Competitive landscape
Demand is driven by consumer income and U.S. population demographics. The profitability of individual companies depends on effective marketing and inventory management. Large dealerships have advantages in breadth of product line, repair center capability, and marketing efficiencies. Small dealers compete by providing superior customer service. Average annual revenue per employee is under $300,000 for small dealerships and more than $600,000 for large ones.

Products, operations and technology
Major products include new motor homes (about 35 percent of sales); used RVs (25 percent); and new travel trailers (20 percent). Other dealership services include repair and maintenance, sales of RV parts, and extended warranty service contracts. Some dealers, especially in northern climates, also sell snowmobiles or other products during the winter.

Most dealers have non-exclusive sales contracts with multiple RV manufacturers, although some carry just one brand. Individual dealerships can carry more than 20 different RV brands.