In the case of the train, Newton's first law worked as well.

ouch.

Gravity wasn't to blame here. Inertia and Momentum are what caused the crash. Gravity was keeping the train on the track until gravity was overcome by other forces. Gravity can be blame to a partial degree that the building did not move upon impact. Gravity has been getting a bad rap for a lot of things. When someone falls to their death it isn't gravity that kills them, it's the Normal force. The normal force is what causes the sudden stop.

http://www.fnn-news.com/realvideo/bs200504251901_300.ram
I prefer the Japanese coverage of this tragedy over AP. (Paste into Realplayer or your web browser - which will launch Realplayer anyway. Realplayer required. Duh.)　Of course, NHK and all the other stations had comparable coverage too. Just thought I'd throw my two cents in. Sorry, I don't know HTML, so I can't make an aesthetically pleasing link. :-(
Cheers from Tokyo

I'll try to help:

http://www.fnn-news.com/realvideo/bs200504251901_300.ram

It IS a terrible tragedy.
~:-(

However, I don't use RealPlayer, just trying to include the linkage necessary to help "Cheers from Tokyo."

"Some people are thinking there's absolutely no reason that all vehicles shouldn't be hybrid. The technology is there," Miller said.

These people are not very smart! You can't pull a 6000 lb. trailer with a hybrid. The Ford Escape can only pull 1000 lbs, which is 2500 lbs less than the gas Escape. Also Ford has a prolem with the Escape at high alt. So they can't sell them in Colorado.

Couldn't agree more about the hybrids... The prius may be selling, but its doing so for reasons other than it's "rated" fuel economy.

Your average prius owner is going to be dismayed to learn that average MPG is somewhere in the 75% neighborhood of the sticker on the window (source).. If fuel economy were the reason behind the success, the VW TDI's would be selling better.

I look at the hybrids like iPods, people are buying them because they want to be a part of a collective, and nothing says "green" more than the word hybrid on the rear liftgate. They're not buying them because they've done their homework and found it to be superior to the alternatives. (Accord hybrid being the exception to this rule).

I'd love to hear a Prius owner tell me about their fuel economy and pump savings in 6 years or so after that first $3000+ battery replacement job... As for me, I'm sticking to my diesels, in '07 the selection is only going to get better.

and don't overlook those buying hybrids, not because of the green factor, because they get access to HOV lanes..

So hybrids cost a little extra - it's a small price to pay for getting home 20 minutes earlier each day.

I've said this before on other blogs, but I will reiterate:
Hybrid cars WASTE MORE ENERGY THAN THEY SAVE IN GAS FUEL ECONOMY!!!

Sorry to shout, but this is the unfortunate consequence of poor thermodynamic design of these vehicles. They acutually get considerably lower net energy efficiency when compared to a conventionally powered internal combustion car. This is due to the extremely large amounts of electricity needed to produce the lithium ion batteries in the hybrid drive system. Don't take my word for it, call up Toyota or Honda and ask for the selling price of a replacement lithium ion battery pack. You will find that the Toyota batteries retail for over $5000. The vast majority of that cost is the electricity used to produce the batteries. By the way, those batteries are produced in Japan and China, using FOSSIL FUELS to make over 90% of their energy. You are trading gasoline burned in the US for Coal burned in Japan and China.

Idiots!!!

Geez, is it too easy to just drive less often and with less testosterone? Go J Pickens, pick those peckerwoods apart!

I must confess that I'm not particularly worried about coal being burned in China and Japan, I don't have to beathe over there and we've lots of coal.
I will say that of the several people I know who drive hybrids almost all are somewhat to very disappointed with the milage. The ones that are happy all do very little open-road driving. The folks who use their cars for in town driving seem quite happy, it's people with long commutes that seem to be the unhappy ones.
I would submit that if the lion's share of one's driving is below forty MPH or so, a hybrid might well make sense and there are quite a few folks like that.
As for big cost after six years, how many folks keep a car six years, anyway? That's about as rare as people who write a check for the full amount buying the cars new.

Peter said:

"As for big cost after six years, how many folks keep a car six years, anyway? That's about as rare as people who write a check for the full amount buying the cars new."

the problem with that reasoning is that the closer you get to battery replacement day, the less you'll be able to get on trade or resale. You won't be able to give away a six-year-old Prius with factory batteries.

"the problem with that reasoning is that the closer you get to battery replacement day, the less you'll be able to get on trade or resale. You won't be able to give away a six-year-old Prius with factory batteries."

Combine that with the fact that if you do pay for the replacement batteries, you will be consuming the equivalent of 1500 gallons of gasoline in energy used to manufacture them. You are NOT saving energy, you are WASTING it!