Latest news with #Wein
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
New Arctic search and rescue watch adds durable features
A company that's been constructing military-grade watches for the U.S., Canada and other nations since World War II has added an arctic version of a premier search and rescue watch to its inventory. Company owner Mitchell Wein's grandfather had the good fortune of housing his watchmaking business in the same building as the Canadian Army's procurement office as the nation entered the WWII. It had only been a few years since the Marathon Watch founder had broken off from the family watch business to design his own product. Those first watches went on the wrists of soldiers headed to fight in Italy. The company eventually delivered an estimated 160,000 watches during WWII, Wein said, and has remained in the military watch game nearly ever since. 'Combining military-grade durability with precise engineering, the Original Search and Rescue with Date, or OSAR-D, builds on Marathon Watch's legacy of the original 41mm SAR, which set the standard for Search and Rescue timepieces in the early 2000s,' according to a company release. The expanded OSAR-D family of watches maintains the enhanced features introduced last year with the launch of the 41mm OSAR-D with black dial. Those include the improved MaraGlo illumination, larger indices and increased clarity on the cyclops date window. The company also added the Arctic white dial, which is designed to improve legibility in bright conditions, offering unparalleled readability in extreme environments. All the company's timepieces are powered by Marathon x Sellita automatic movements. The SW-200 movement drives 36mm and 41mm sizes. The 46mm jumbo edition is equipped with the new SW600 movement, which includes a 62-hour power reserve, now the largest power reserve Marathon has to date. Each OSAR-D model is also fitted with an Incabloc shock absorber to reinforce its durability. The 41mm size watches are available for preorder, with shipments slated for mid-May, company officials said. Prices start at $1,500 with the 3-piece rubber strap kit. The stainless steel bracelet option costs $1,800. The 36mm and 46mm sizes will be available in late 2025, with prices ranging from $1,000 to $2,500. The company built its general-purpose mechanical watch in 1976 for the U.S. military and started building chronometers for ships in the early 1980s, Wein said. 'We didn't really make money on the government watches,' Wein said, adding that they would get orders of 7,000 or 11,000 watches and make between $3.50 and $5 per watch. One of the reasons mechanical watches remain part of military inventory in an age of their smart counterparts is that mechanical timekeeping remains impervious to electromagnetic pulse tactics that could blow out any electronics in range. They also do not emit a signal that can be detected by electromagnetic warfare tools. And then there's the battery, or lack thereof, which adds to their long-lasting durability. The watch can operate for 30 years, as compared to a traditional quartz watch that usually requires a new battery every six years. Special, synthetic oil blends keep the watch going. Those only need replacement every 15 years or so, Wein said. Tritium gas tubes that provide glow in the dark features stay bright for 12 to 25 years.
CBS News
27-03-2025
- General
- CBS News
Report highlights how wildlife corridors protect wildlife and more are needed in Pennsylvania
An environmental group is calling on state leaders to protect Pennsylvania's native species by supporting the creation of more wildlife corridors and crossings. Pennsylvania is among the top five states for vehicle collisions with animals every year, and it's not just a deer issue. PA is home to elk, bobcats, black bears, and a variety of turtles, too, and many birds like the Songbird migrate through the state. "We have incredible wildlife. But each year, more and more, our state's wildlife habitat is crisscrossed by roads, by energy infrastructure, by sprawl. That's called fragmentation. Habitat fragmentation has a real impact. That combined with habitat loss is the number one threat to wildlife in the Commonwealth," said Stephanie Wein, Clean Water & Conservation Advocate of the PennEnvironment Research & Policy Center. A new PennEnvironment report highlighted ten wildlife corridors in the state that are successfully connecting habitats, helping wildlife move and migrate, and decreasing vehicle-wildlife collisions and the amount of roadkill. "If they're not crossing roads, they face a different problem, which is the population being split apart and then you have inbreeding and less healthy populations," Wein said. Corridors can look like many different things, including engineered crossings, culverts, stepping stones, barriers, and dam removals. Wein said it just depends on what species you're trying to keep moving. The report's successful examples include the woodland dam removal on the Little Sewickley Creek in Allegheny County that helps fish swim upstream, and some of the 35 wildlife crossings that PennDOT has constructed, like underpasses under I-99 in Centre County that families of bears and deer love to use, and culverts and fencing on State Route 381 in Fayette County that accommodates threatened species of turtles and amphibians. "We want to keep them off the roadways for us, but we also want to make sure that they have safe ways to cross the roadways so they can continue to function as a healthy and intact population," Wein said. Wein said there's a lot of work being done by state agencies and conservation groups to reconnect habitats, but to take these efforts a step further, PennEnvironment is calling on Governor Josh Shapiro and the executive branch to form an interagency working group to protect more critters. "What we can learn from other states is that by having an interagency working group partnered with conservation experts, we can come up with a plan with priority areas we need to conserve, and we need to reconnect in Pennsylvania. So we need a statewide wildlife corridor plan for the Commonwealth," Wein said. She said they're also suggesting some steps the legislature can take. "Like making sure that we track where animal vehicle collisions are happening. So, we can best cite those crossings, making sure we're getting that then also raising the spending limit that the Pennsylvania Game Commission, which is a self-funding commission, has the money, but they're only allowed to spend $400 per acre to acquire land for conservation. The legislature could raise that cap to make sure that we are getting the most critical parcels for conservation, both for the wildlife but also for our sportsmen," Wein said. The full PennEnvironment report can be found here .
