In Denmark the two largest water suppliers in the country, Hofor and Novafos, are transforming parts of their water distribution networks with noise loggers, noise recorders that “listen” to the pipes to understand where there are leaks and to avoid flooding.
But how do they work? The noise loggers are compact devices composed of an accelerometer sensitive to the sound frequencies that propagate in a water pipe, from a data acquisition and recording unit, from a radio transceiver system for data exchange with a separate central unit, from the electronic part that manages the automatic operation, and from a battery for the power supply.
The water escaping from a pressurized pipeline generates a noise that propagates along the water network: the noise loggers can record these noises and analyze them, distinguishing them from other background noises that propagate in the pipes. In this way it is possible to establish whether there is a loss in the vicinity, based on an evaluation carried out automatically by the internal software.
The noise loggers are used to analyze the networks on which it intends to control water losses, occasionally for a control or even permanent if you intend to keep the network under constant monitoring. Operationally the noise loggers are connected a few hundred meters from each other along the water network to be analyzed, using a magnet that makes them adhere to the pipeline; the device records the sound frequencies present in the network for a predefined time, preferably at night, defining through the internal algorithm the presence or absence of nearby leaks. Through an external data acquisition unit, the results of the listening of each unit are downloaded, the results thus acquired allow to intervene in a timely manner where there are losses and to avoid flooding.

They are called Exitenter, Ache77, Nian, they are just some of the many street artists – more or less good and more or less famous – that adorn the walls of cities with their drawings, in the wake of a myth like Bansky. Usually choosing desolate and decadent corners, often the tubes fall into their works: on a tube a fox clings, from a tube a flower is born, a tube frames a portrait …

The chronicle reports two cases of arrests due to the production and possession of clandestine weapons “homemade” with tubes.
The Carabinieri of Gela, in Sicily, have arrested two people for having found, hidden in their property, some tubes that individually appear to be simple metal pieces, but which, once assembled, are firearms of rapid use and easy concealment. At the end of the operations a complete caliber 36 weapon was placed under seizure with other adaptable tubes of different caliber, numerous metal tubes of the same features for the manufacture of further weapons, as well as sixty cartridges of various caliber.
An operation by the Avola State Police has instead led to the arrest of a man, intercepted on a stolen car, in possession of a craft gun, composed of several disassembled parts: a castle consisting of a cylindrical pipe half an inch with a striker, with a threaded part on which a piece of iron of 25 cm or another of more than half a meter could be screwed for use as a rod. At the home of the arrested person, in addition to various ammunition, there was a small artisan workshop for assembling DIY weapons. Dulcis in fundo, the police also seized an umbrella to make it look like a gun barrel.

A broken pipe risked blowing up the match between Lorenzo Sonego (67th Atp) and Russian Karen Khachanov (13th Atp) of the Internazionali at Foro Italico. The sudden break of a pipe used to water the field flooded, within a few minutes, a small part of the field of the Grand Stand Arena. Fortunately, the timely intervention of the employees interrupted the flow of water and dried the mud by spreading a little red soil. The match was smooth and Khachanov eventually won.