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I flew back from a week long spring break in Seattle yesterday, and to my great delight I found 50 degree weather and most of the snow melted in North Dakota! Unfortunately, that boon is met with the backside of the monkey’s paw in the form of massive flooding. In fact, when I flew in fields were replaced by lakes, roads replaced by rivers, and we may actually beat a record in 1897 for the amount of flooding this year! We are getting pretty boxed in- The east/west interstate I-94 is closed between us and Fargo, and so is the north/south one, I-29. Volunteers are needed everywhere, and water is coming up everywhere.

Needless to say, school is closed “until further notice”- and the president of the university closed the school himself, calling for all students at NDSU to volunteer to help with the flood prevention. This has left me in a slightly tricky spot- especially since my routine has been thrown off, and my schoolwork getting farther behind. I guess there isn’t much you can do about the weather though! More pictures to follow from flooding in Lisbon!

In like a lion… March has proved to be one of the worst weather months for us here in North Dakota for this winter, and we haven’t even reached the Ides yet! On Monday, a storm began that promptly gave us a foot of snow, and Tuesday rapidly became a blizzard as snow continued and winds started blowing at around 45 MPH. If you stood outside you would probably feel like it was -40 Fahrenheit, although the real temperature was closer to -5. Needless to say the University closed on Tuesday, and was opened at 10 AM on Wednesday (closings of the university are probably the best indicator of weather severity, it rarely happens, and the University will be open, even when the interstates are closed!)

Looking back, I realized that I haven’t blogged a lot about surviving the weather here- and I do get a lot of comments on Facebook and Twitter, especially from friends on the West Coast about how to survive these extreme colds and weather conditions, so I thought I would at least get one post going on the topic. They say here that there is no such thing as bad weather- just bad gear. Welll, at least they say that to me. However, my number one survival tip is this: don’t go out! That hasn’t been necessarily easy with my commute, because often roads and interstates are closed by drifts and blowing snow, but the University still doesn’t close. On Wednesday, I couldn’t make it into school because the interstates were closed, and I was forced to stay at home. By the way, if you drive on a closed interstate and get caught- that is a $1000 fine and jail time!

On more than a few occassions I have been forced to get a room in Fargo to ensure that I make it to school, or because I simply cannot reach home because of the weather. However, for driving, my truck is packed with the following items to get me unstuck or to survive:

• Snow Shovel (for digging yourself out)
• Sand (weight for grip in the bed, but also for traction when you are stuck)
• Blanket, -30 degree sleeping bag, warm hat, boots, gloves (all extra).
• Chocolate (for energy in case I can’t get out).
• Survivor candle – a candle that burns for hours and creates both warmth and light.

Of significant importance I’m told, is that if I get stuck- don’t get out of the car, don’t try to walk anywhere. Pretty much that is a death sentance- wait to be found. In addition, I never go anywhere or begin one of the legs of my trip with less than a half a tank of gas- that gas will keep heat running and you don’t want to be limited by the amount, not to mention, gas is weight that gives you traction!

In the end, it’s cold, but I’ll survive. My wife did it for what I can only imagine were the longest 18 years of her life! Needless to say, we will certainly be planning on living somewhere warmer after I have recieved my degree!

Last week we were assigned to write a short summary about the BTK Killer case in my Computer Forensics class. I found it very interesting and I think those of you that like CSI, NCIS, or any other forensic cop shows might find my summary very interesting, so it is presented to you here in blog form:

Dennis Rader, aka the BTK (bind, torture, and kill) Killer, was convicted in August 2005 of 10 serial murders in Wichita, Kansas over the period 1974 through 1991. He was sentenced to 10 consecutive terms of life in prison without the opportunity for parole, based largely on the use of forensic evidence, especially DNA and handwriting analysis. However, it is the special use of computer forensics which led to his arrest that is of particular interest to this class.

During the timeframe of the murders, Dennis provided details of the murders through letters to the police and local news stations. After the last known murder in 1991- the trail went cold as both the murders and the letters ceased. However, in 2004, after the release of a book concerning his serial murders, he sent a copy of the book along with a 3.5 inch floppy disk containing his final letter to a Fox news station (KSAS-TV) in a padded envelope. Although neither the letter nor the book provided any clues as to the identity of the killer, the 3.5 inch disk did provided the vital link that led to the arrest.

According to Guidance Software, a digital forensic investigation was conducted on the 3.5 inch floppy disk using their premier product: EnCase Forensic. EnCase software is actually a software package, containing several applications that allow investigators to provide digital forensic evidence that can be submitted in court. EnCase starts by creating an image of the media in question, in this case an image of the 3.5 inch disk. The image is stored in a proprietary format that includes byte reads from every sector of the disk and an MD5 or SHA-1 checksum. The checksum is meant to ensure the authenticity of the disk image from the time of its creation (as it also hashes law enforcement metadata). After imaging, the EnCase software uses series of byte analysis tools that identify all the files on the disk, and common software tools such as document viewers and hex editors to classify the files. Any files of interest are then packaged and saved along with their own metadata and checksum to be submitted as evidence.

Using this method of disk analysis, an investigator can find non-operating system files, hidden files, log data, and especially deleted files. In fact, what investigators did find on the disc was a deleted Microsoft Word file. The Word file itself contained no data of interest, but it did contain metadata that led to the arrest- specifically that the author of the file had the first name Dennis, and that the software in question was licensed to Christ Lutheran Church. When law enforcement investigated further, they discovered Raders surname because he was a Deacon at the church (previously they had no named suspects). They knew the killer drove a black Jeep Cherokee, and when they went to his house they noted one in the driveway. They managed to obtain DNA from his daughter, which had a familial match to the DNA evidence from the killings. Based on this evidence they arrested Dennis Rader in May 2005, and obtained warrants that led to the collection of the convicting evidence.

Without the computer forensic tools and analysis used in this case, investigators would never have been able to determine a named suspect, nor obtain the necessary warrants that led to the collection of the convicting evidence.

It seems that every time I tell anyone outside the frigid tundra that I live in what is going on with the weather- I often get an exasperated sigh of disbelief and feigned sympathy. Well I am hoping that I can change that with today’s blog post and hopefully expiate how the weather here affects you in everyday life, and when I tell you that I don’t think I could survive another winter in North Dakota- you will literally believe that I may actually die if I spend next January in this state! Now I know you all believe its bad, and you have heard stories from me, but I just wanted to share with you how truly cold it really is:

First, lets talk temperatures. Today’s high is 5 below 0, Fahrenheit. Now -5 doesn’t really sound so bad, does it? Actually it doesn’t really sound that bad to me right now either! However, that is just the high, and a high in the sun at that! Consider this- when I got up this morning and left the house at 530 am- it was dark outside and -17 degrees, right now it is -15 degrees at 930 am. So that -5 degree high? Well that may only be for an hour or so at 1 pm! Last week we were talking about -20 degree highs, at night it was closer to -40! But how cold is -15 degrees? Surely it is livable? Consider the time you guys have spent in 20 degree weather- that was bitterly cold and you had to bundle up, now consider the temperature at 32 degrees when it is just starting to freeze. That 12 degree difference feels like a lot right? Well it is exponentially different, so -15 degrees while only 35 degrees colder than 20 degrees, is about four times colder! To put that in perspective, think about the difference between 50 degrees and 85 degrees.

But that isn’t the only problem, in fact I could handle -5 degrees, or even -20 degrees even though I am from below the Mason-Dixon Line. Far worse is the wind- the wind is literally what will kill you. The wind chill today is -40 degrees! The wind blows at roughly 20-30 MPH, and it feels like ice daggers are going through you. Worse still it blows snow (there is about 2.5 feet of snow on the ground right now) in your face, across the roads, and it looks like you are on stage with a fog machine- think about driving through it, you cant even see the road! Not only that, but there are ditches on both sides of the road, that should you go into, you’ll be buried and might not come out! The wind is evil here- it is malevolent and you see it as something horrible that you just cannot avoid. Even when I pump gas, the time out in the wind at the gas station leaves me shaking so hard that once I get back into the truck, I have to sit there for five or ten minutes to warm up!

My truck is like a parachute and I am constantly being blown across the road. I drive 75 miles one way, and it is a hard stressful drive with the wind, not being able to see the road, and the icy conditions. But it is made worse by the wind. The wind blows so hard that it literally blows through the door of my truck. If you licked my window, your tongue would probably stick to the glass! The effect is that I have to keep the heat on full blast and the left side of my body is freezing cold, and the right is sweating- not pleasant!

In the summer my truck used to get 19 MPG, now it gets less than 15- that’s how cold it is!

I probably should give a shout out to Tim and Matagi who are probably reading this and laughing right now- they have lived here all their lives- and everyone should be highly impressed with their ability to handle the elements and not go crazy.

Other things the cold does: It is so cold the inside of your nose freezes; we are at skin freezing temperatures right now. Water in the air freezes also- so those rainbows you are seeing? Those aren’t classical rainbows; the prisms aren’t water in the air- its ice! Rainbows here completely circle the sun since its so cold and are called sun dogs

Speaking of ice- the most horrible thing happened to me the other day. There is a pedestrian walkway going between buildings here, and the sun was shining on it perfectly through two buildings. That coupled with the fact that the walkway was heated meant that the snow was melting where the sun was shining. Worse still was the fact that it was -33 degrees out that day: so the melted snow was instantly freezing, and was forming long thin icicles. I had the great misfortune of walking underneath that bridge and getting hit in the head with a drop of death water- it was so cold my head felt like it was burning. I reached up to rub it out and grabbed ice! I had no idea what to do, I just stood there in horror for what felt like an eternity. I think I will never get over that!

Then there is the perennial discussion of long underwear- wear it and you are a little happier outside. But once you get inside, you are sweating in your knickers and that isn’t pleasant at all! Then when you go back outside, the sweat freezes- and frozen privates are something no one should ever experience. (I once dropped my shorts in the shower at the gym and I had to put them on wet- it was a horrible experience. I wear so many clothes it takes me 10 minutes to dress and undress at my office!

Hopefully this puts into perspective my misfortune at my placement this winter. In fact, this winter is the worst winter since 69 if you don’t include the blizzards of 96-97. I have been truly North Dakotaized- and not only that; I have a renewed respect for my wife, and a greater understanding of the way she thinks. Truly, living through a winter here builds character (even if it has only made me more of a character!)