Gary Pettis

Gary Pettis
Texas Rangers – No. 24
Center fielder
Born: April 3, 1958 (age 54) Oakland, California
Batted: Switch	Threw: Right
MLB debut
September 13, 1982 for the California Angels
Last MLB appearance
September 10, 1992 for the Detroit Tigers
Career statistics
Batting average	.236
Hits	855
Runs batted in	259
Stolen bases	354
Teams
California Angels (1982–1987) Detroit Tigers (1988–1989) Texas Rangers (1990–1991) San Diego Padres (1992) Detroit Tigers (1992)
Career highlights and awards
5× Gold Glove Award winner (1985, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1990)

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="266"] The Gold Glove Award given to Eric Chavez for his performance during the 2005 season (Photo credit: Wikipedia)[/caption]

Gary George Pettis (born April 3, 1958, in Oakland, California) is the current first base coach of the Texas Rangers. Prior to coaching, he spent eleven seasons as a center fielder in Major League Baseball.

Pettis was selected in the 6th round of the 1979 draft by the Angels, and played minor league baseball for the Salinas Spurs of the class "A" California League in 1980, then the Holyoke Millers of the double "A" Eastern League in 1981. In 1982, Pettis was promoted to theCalifornia Angels, where he played the first six seasons of his career.

After the 1987 season, Pettis went on to play two seasons with the Detroit Tigers, 1988 through the following season of 1989. After two years with Detroit, Pettis joined the Texas Rangers for two seasons 1990-91. Pettis finished his career in the major leagues in 1992. The 1992 season saw Pettis play for two different teams. After leaving the Texas Rangers, Pettis joined the San Diego Padres for the 1992 season but ended that season back in Detroit with the Tigers.

During his career, Pettis consistently hit for low averages and was known for striking out often, but he performed extremely well on defense, earning five Gold Glove Awards. He was noted for making many spectacular leaping or diving catches, depriving hitters of home runs or base hits, and was known in baseball circles as "The man who made center field look easy". Additionally, he was a prolific base runner and had five seasons where he stole over 40 bases. Pettis held the Angels' club record for stolen bases for nearly 20 years, until it was broken byChone Figgins on July 15, 2007. Pettis was tagged as "Pac Man" Pettis by a local radio station listener call-in contest in 1986, referring to his unusual speed in the outfield and ability to chase down opponents' hits.

On his 1985 Topps baseball card, the person posing in the picture is not Pettis, and is in fact a picture of his younger brother.

 

Source

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Permanente Quarry

The Permanente Quarry is a limestone quarry in Cupertino, California. The quarry is a limestone and aggregate mining operation and cement plant, owned by Lehigh Southwest Cement, a subsidiary of HeidelbergCement. Located in the foothills above Cupertino on the northeast slopes of Black Mountain, the quarry runs east-west parallel to the upper watershed of Permanente Creek to the south and to Permanente Ridge and Rancho San Antonio Open Space Preserve to the north.

The limestone rock found in the Permanente Creek valley and on the summit of Black Mountain is relatively unique in the Bay Area. Microfossils in the limestone deposits suggest that the mountain originated as a seamount at 22 degrees north in the tropical Pacific about 100 million years ago and was transported to Los Altos by the Pacific Plate.^[2][3][4] These rocks occur as jagged gray boulders and outcrops just southwest of the radio towers on the summit of Black Mountain, as well as in the Permanente Quarry. Calera is the Spanish word for 'limekiln', reflecting how limestone was burned historically to produce lime, an key ingredient for mortar

The quarry was originally founded by Henry J. Kaiser as the Kaiser Permanente Cement Plant in 1939, taking the name of the business from the Permanente Creek in whose valley it lies. Kaiser intended to use the quarry to provide the majority of the cement used in the construction of the Shasta Dam, supplying the 6 million barrels (950,000 m³) of cement . The cement plant is the sole reason for the lone railroad line that runs through the city.

On October 5, 2011, the Lehigh Southwest Cement plant was the site of a shooting in which a disgruntled employee shot and killed three people, and wounded seven

Mercury Emissions

The cement plant at the quarry has been fueled by petroleum coke since 2007, the latter (along with the limestone itself) is a major source of mercury emissions. The cement plant is responsible for 29% of total Bay Area airborne mercury emissions and was shown to impact a rural site, Calero Reservoir, 20 miles (32 km) away.^[8] Mercury, a neurotoxin and pollutant which is concentrated in the aquatic food web, was found to be 5.8 to 6.7 times higher in precipitation near the cement plant than at a control location 2.0 miles (3.2 km) away.^[9] A 2011 study showed a significant geographic association between the occurrence of autism in local school districts and higher levels of ambient mercury generated by coal-fired power plants in Bexar County, Texas and the Permanente Quarry cement plant in Santa Clara County, California

A view of Lehigh Southwest Cement's Permanente Quarry looking north from the summit of Black Mountainacross the quarry and over Silicon Valley

Selenium Discharges into Permanente Creek

Groundwater fills the current quarry and is pumped into Permanente Creek. Selenium pollution in the creek downstream from the quarry ranged from 13 to 81 micrograms/liter (μg/L). A North Quarry water sample in January 2010 had a dissolved selenium concentration of 82 μg/L, indicating that the quarry is the source of the selenium pollution. Selenium is bioaccumulated in the aquatic food web.^[11] Safety standards for selenium concentrations in fresh water are 5 μg/L under the California Toxics Rule (same as the National Toxics Rule set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) in 2000 and 2012.^[12]

[edit]Sediment Discharges into Permanente Creek

Anthropomorphic activities related to quarry operations and the cement plant have resulted in sediment discharges into Permanente Creek that are 3.5 times what would be expected under normal conditions.^[13] Sediment loads in the upper Permanente Creek mainstem are 15 times those in the West Fork Permanente Creek, which drains mostly parkland. These sediment loads could threaten the resident rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) population in the creek.