ABSTRACT
In Greek mythology, Icarus attempted to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from feathers and wax. Icarus ignored instructions not to fly too close to the sun, and the melting wax caused him to fall into the sea where he drowned. At the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert, near the California/Nevada border, amid miles of rock and scrub, in a windy stretch once roamed by tortoises and coyotes, is a vast array of 7-by 10-foot solar mirrors. From above, these mirrors create the image of an ethereal lake shimmering atop the desert floor. A modern Icarus-like horror is played out at this site whenever birds fly over and end up with scorched wings and bodies, or even worse for those who dive into this faux lake and are literally fried by the 1000°F degree heat flux radiated by the mirrors. Unfortunately, for many of these feathered victims there is no Phoenix complex. The victims are cooked alive without hope of regeneration.
