The lanky Aussie pilot stepped out of the tiny helicopter, cursorily introduced himself as Bronte then disappeared on the back of a motorbike to find fuel. Meanwhile I was stood on the airfield apron at Kisangani airport where one was allowed to smoke, use a mobile phone but not photograph, which was a pity because while waiting  three more people arrived with a large river fish which was deposited on the ground; apparently our dinner.  Almost an hour later Bronte reappeared with tanker and we were ready to go except for a short interlude when a flustered woman walked up to tell the pilot that he had paid with a dodgy 20 dollar note. It seemed an inauspicious start. 

I’ve always openly admitted that I’m afraid of flying and at this stage began to wonder whether my insurance would cover my imminent death in the Congolese jungle. I need not have feared: For all the outer roughness and somewhat bad language,  Bronte had the most delicate touch on the helicopter controls and an ultra smooth tree-hugging 90 minute flight started over the second largest rainforest in the world. Jungle  filled the horizon in all directions from the moment we set off to the moment we landed at Yindi, one of Loncor’s camps where I was to give training to their operatives in the use of our window sampling set which is used to take samples of the saprolite layer necessary in gold exploration. 

I had been at a gold exploration company camp in the Congo before and that was lovely but this was simply exquisite. In six months, they had created, in the jungle, hundreds of miles from the nearest town what I consider to be the most magnificent example of an interface between industry and ecology. The bricks for the buildings were recycled from structures left by the Belgians during their colonisation, the beds and timber for some of the buildings were fashioned, using basic tools by local craftsmen from wood felled in the jungle and the site was landscaped, keeping plenty of the original vegetation to provide shade and serenity to the location.  Mark Hannam, one of the senior geologists was key in this transformation. The strange thing to my mind was that whereas those involved in this creation clearly appreciated the beauty of the place they, and particularly Mark did not seem to be aware that this is an amazing achievement at a personal level. I’ve travelled much and have seen some impressive business locations but I will categorically say that this camp ranks, by far, as the most amazing accomplishment in creating a beautiful modern facility out of a beautiful natural resource. 

If I was in awe of the base camp I was also impressed at how local skills and local people, who have an immense desire to learn and acquire new skills, have been and are involved in this development. In my opinion, this type of activity will do more good for Africa than any UN or missionary involvement ever will. While those involved remain modest I would like to shout about it from the tallest building so that the world can hear and take note. 

My huge thanks go to Howard, Mark and their colleagues at Loncor for having given me the opportunity to experience all this first hand. 

Vincent van Walt

There is a requirement to filter samples on site for all metals analysis. This is done with a .45 micron filter. The filtration is a requirement for METALS only and other analyses must be made WITHOUT filtration as some compounds may form colloids which are too large to pass through this pore size.

A further discussion has arisen concerning analyses on soil solutions collected by ceramic or polysulfon plastics (Rhizon) which have a 0.1 micron pore size.

I attach here some (unaltered so sorry for the spelling errors!)  email correspondence and invite responses or comments which may add to these discussions:

Vincent,

Good question, simple answer. Dissolved metals are present as ions (i.e Zn2+), dissotiation of the salts. How much dissolves, depends on the solability product of the salt and the pH (also on pressure en temp. but these are pretty much constant in soils).  

Sampling with rhizons is not a problem at all. The problem is sampling with porous material on which the metal ions can adsorb (metal lattice, or ordinary ceramics)

 Regards,

 Jan Frank Mars

An interesting discussion indeed!

> Hello Vincent and Jan Frank
> 
> A straw punctured with many many holes of 0,1 (or a bit more in) microns would work like a sampler with which you could take water from the UNsaturated zone of the soil (Rhizons and fine porous ceramics work like that). If the holes are above 1 micron (by heart) applying a vacuum will cause air to pass instead of retaining it and only letting pass water. In other words; a straw punctured with “large” holes will operate like a piezometer; it will collect water only from the saturated zone (and a vacuum does not help). Sorry for the scientist.
> 
> Then the TOC and elements question:
> I am sure that (after letting establish an equilibrium, so throwing away the first samples) the mentioned elements will pass. Dissolved tritium will pass also, except if the vacuum will degass it from the sample (with limited underpressure the recovery on tritium would be higher). Other elements, even the large uranium molecules, are far smaller than the 0,1 micron of the polysulfon plastic. However when adhered to colloids (like tannine which is present in peat soils) they may not pass as the colloids surpass the diameter of the pores. Same counts for pesticides and similar hydrophobic organics like PAH. Their state of emulsion, rather than completely dissolved state, will prevent them from passing through the rhizon membranes. This in fact is, I believe, much underestimated. For  myselfI I can say that this knowledge is very  recent but should be mentioned somewhere in the manual at some time and place. I am slightly astonished that Mr. Frits Meiboom, the former producer of the Rhizons was a real scientist. I will need to discuss this with the new producer and see how we should adapt the manual.
> It is also strange that none of the scientist using the Rhizons ever mentioned (to my knowledge) this limited recovery. On the other hand, where can they compare it with ??
> 
> Hope this info helps. Curious to see if Jan Frank has something to add that could be of more help to me or you.
> 
> Gerard
>
> ________________________________
>
>> Hi Jan Frank
>
> A thought has occurred to me following a site visit on Wednesday with
> some researchers from the University of Manchester. We were discussing
> the use of Rhizon samplers for their experiments and they told me they
> had experienced a lot of problems collecting dissolved organic carbon
> (DOC) after filtration through a .45 micron filter and the Rhizons, from
> literature have .15 micron  (actually this is from the Eijkelkamp
> catalogue but their website says .1 micron as do the instructions for
> the macro rhizons?) pore size. My thoughts are that we should check with
> Rhizosphere to ask whether the radiological elements XXXX  wishes
> to sample for will pass through the membrane or do you know?
>
> I’m copying this email to Gerard in case he has some ideas (Gerard the
> elements we want to extract are Tritium (although I thought this was a
> gas?) Technicium, Strontium 90, Cesium, Uranium)
>
>

> Vincent van Walt
> 01428 661 660
> www.vanwalt.com

I would invite others to participate in this discussion and you can post comments.

Thanks

Vincent van Walt

Last night I slept at an hotel on the Welsh border. The place looked nice enough although rather deserted. I settled down in my room to watch  TV but was greeted by a message “No Signal”. I switched on my laptop to catch up on my emails but the machine told me there was no internet access and my phone apparently couldn’t find a service either.

After a moment of panic I spoke to the owner/manager who told me that internet worked fine in the corridor, he would allow me access to a neighbouring room to watch TV and only O2 gave a phone signal and then only occasionally in the bar area. Oddly, he said that they no longer had phones in the bedrooms because everyone carries a mobile these days don’t they? At this point I was manifesting severe signs of withdrawal and became increasingly frustrated at my reliance on technology and pined for the good old days when we had none of these facilities and it didn’t matter.

Some scallops, a lamb shank and some excellent local beer revived my spirits so much that I was totally satisfied by watching a re-run of Top Gear on the only channel available in the adjacent room.

Are we happier because of all this technology?  Reliant, yes but happier? I very much doubt it.

Vincent van Walt

Knowing your competition is an essential part of business. Monitoring their activity is a key part of any communication strategy. Stealing a march on their ideas – hugely satisfying, but with good competition – usually very short lived!

Whatever your field remember – it’s a small world. Images and facts from around the world reach our laptops in seconds so that, in an instant, you can find information on almost anything – thanks to Google and some of the better search engines.

Our competitors keep us on our toes but it’s our customers who exercise the power of business success over business failure. The best policy – try to know as much as possible about both because, rest assured, they will be trying to find as much as possible about you!

Tracey Daley

As much as I would have preferred it if the English football team had performed better in the World Cup – unlike the rest of the nation it seems – I don’t feel their deserved quick exit from the championship is the end of the world.

Yes, it’s disappointing and the reasons for their abysmal performance should be investigated, but life goes on and soon, even mainstream TV will return to normal, with football relegated to just two or three nights a week at the height of the season!

What’s more disappointing about the World Cup Tournament is that none of the coverage has given us a better insight into this fascinating country; we haven’t seen stadiums filled with local people enjoying the spectacle and brand new facilities; we haven’t seen the South African people benefitting from improved housing, schools or life opportunities. What we get is plenty of coverage on the in’s and out’s of each of the players private lives and why, mysteriously that hampered their performance on the pitch – silly me – I thought they were professionals!

Football mania has also obscured some of the other British sporting triumphs that have been achieved in fields where ridiculous wages and hero worship are a pipedream: The English Cricket team 3 to 1up in the one day series against Australia; Andy Murray through to the semi-finals at Wimbledon; the other Rooney – Martyn Rooney who stormed to victory in the 400m final at the European Trials and UK Championships in Birmingham or Guy Williams on Softrack Skip Two Ramiro who won the 2010 Hickstead Show Jumping Derby this year and a jackpot of £40,000.

I say roll-on the 12th July – when football world cup madness will be over and we will have a 4 week respite before the 2010/2011 season starts again!

Tracey Daley
1st July 2010

…..but mercifully they keep on coming back!

Last Saturday my daughter was married. Now all three children have their own lives; their joys, disappointments and adventurous futures.

I told my daughter that now she’s someone else’s responsibility. She just scowled and mumbled  ”I’m the baby you gotta love me!”

I’ll admit to a pang of solitude when the third fledgeling flew the nest but I know that she’ll fly back, as the others have done. I can’t wait!

Vincent van Walt

Restaurants are judged by their last meal, photographers are judged by their last photograph and companies are judged by their last equipment or service they supply.

We’ve just received the results of our last customer satisfaction survey and for 96 percent the evaluations were very good. Clearly we will need to address the last 4 percent for a perfect score and that is our aim for the next 12 months: To do more of the same but just better.

As for some of the gushing comments about the excellent service received from one of our members of staff: the person concerned is still hiding her blushes but thank you on her behalf!  More importantly thanks to you all for having taken the time to respond.

Vincent van Walt

The oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico – the worst environmental disaster the US has faced – raises important questions way beyond whose fault was it anyway?

This is a wake-up call and society needs to look again at the technology and risks we are prepared to take in order to satisfy our addiction for oil?

This reliance comes at a high cost at the best of times when measured in terms of increased pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and subsequently climate change. Add to this the need to go deeper and further into more inaccessible places in order to extract the oil, since the days of easy access are long gone, and quickly the need for us to reduce our dependency is clear.

There is no doubt that this and other well documented disasters will serve to provide better safeguards and improvements in technology in order to minimise the potential of future oil disasters and, at the very least, it will improve the way we factor cost into energy investment decisions. But will it do anything to change our oil habits?

As a result of this oil leak will we go cold turkey – probably not, but should we look for our energy fix from alternatives – definitely yes. How ironic that so much time, effort and resources is going in to cleaning up the mess rather then avoiding the need for it to happen in the first place!

Tracey Daley

This morning I managed to forget my bank login details then I bought too many dollars. I broke two computers and made all sorts of other small errors. This follows a number of nights of disturbed sleep and the correlation is hard to ignore.

I once went to a sales seminar and was told that a salesman with scuffed shoes will not sell. Perhaps I can add my 2 cents worth of advice that a tired salesman will not sell either!

Elsewhere I was told that there is an exponential decrease in IQ because of sleep deprivation. This is not a problem if one starts from a high IQ but if it is only average at the best of times then one or two bad nights can lead to interesting results.  No doubt I fall in the latter category.

Perhaps our politicians ought to bear this in mind?

Vincent van Walt

From our technical expert and training course lecturer Jan Frank Mars:

“Do dissolved metals (like mercury) absorb in PE tubing or well material?

The answer is no! All plastics are made of non-polar molecules, this implies plastics are hydrophobic. Dissolved metals are positively charged ions, which “love” to be in the aquatic phase -water is a polar molecule- and is repelled by non-polars.

For this reason salts easily dissolve in water and do not dissolve in petrol. Whereas volatiles like benzene (non-polar molecules) are easily absorbed in plastics.”

Jan Frank Mars