Toyota’s fix for the accelerator pedal problem is a shim inserted inside the gas pedal. If you’re handy, and don’t want to stand in line at the dealer, just do it yourself. Probably a good idea to make sure you have a suspect CTS pedal and review some of the pedal diagrams and videos on the internet before you break out the tools.

First, unplug the wires from the top of the pedal. There are two nuts/bolts holding the pedal assembly in the car. Remove the two nuts with a 10mm wrench and take the pedal assembly out of the car. Carefully remove the metal cover on the back of the pedal assembly. Use a small flathead screwdriver to pry up the pedal tensioner just a bit. Slide a dime in there and let the pedal tensioner back down against the dime, holding it in place. Replace the metal cover. Reinstall. Done!

A 38-year-old kite surfer was attacked and killed by sharks off Stuart Wednesday afternoon in Martin County’s first fatal shark attack. The lifeguard who made the rescue spotted several sharks surrounding the victim.

There is some speculation that the extreme cold weather this year has allowed juvenile Great Whites to travel farther south than usual. One of the Great Whites tagged off Cape Cod last year was tracked to Jacksonville where the satellite tag popped off. Bite marks will eventually identify the species.

At this time of year, sharks make their annual southern migration, following huge schools of baitfish along Florida’s east coast beaches. The Palm Beach TV stations have the usual helicopter photos of these big shark schools today. Most of the schooling sharks are hammerhead, lemon and spinners. Bull and tiger sharks generally seek warmer water and are not usually here in winter. However, there were tiger shark reports and a hammerhead was caught off Singer Island just last week.

A 20-year-old report analyzing 100,000 sharks caught off Florida’s east coast over a ten-year period in the early 1900s shows only 27 GW sharks in the bunch. There just are not many of them coming down here. The water is just too warm.

FRIDAY: Newspaper reports Burgess says it was bull or tiger.

Chalk up at least one dead Burmese Python to the cold… it’s 12 feet long and albino. Check out this story from the Tampa Bay side of the state. Interesting to note, FWC officers buried the snake in nearby woods, letting Mother Nature have her way with the carcass. So, they may be exotic, but they do become part of the ecosystem in the end.

University of Miami geologist Harold Wanless, gave a presentation about rising sea level to an audience of  100 Keys residents at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park last week. The basic points are that Since 1930, sea level in South Florida has risen nine inches. That’s eight times more than the previous 2,000 years. Wanless said not to think of your investment in coastal real estate as something you will be able to hand down to your grandchildren.

Used to be, when I pushed the gas pedal, the movement of my foot was mechanically transferred by cable to the throttle of my engine. There were two springs on the gas pedal (in case one broke) and another spring on the carb end of the cable. My foot was directly connected to the engine. My brain is attached to my foot. I was really in control.

The problem Toyota accelerator is nothing more than an electrical switch, like the dimmer switch you use to adjust lights inside your home. There are wires from this foot-operated switch to the car’s computer. Then more wires out of the computer and to an electric solenoid that is attached to the car’s fuel injection unit. Push the gas pedal and you send a signal to the computer. The computer then sends a signal to the solenoid, the solenoid then opens or closes the throttle. Car goes faster or slows down. There are additional feedback sensors from the engine to the computer.

Now because there is no actual cable, Toyota had to create “fake” friction so the pedal would feel “realistic.” The friction device inside the pedal sometimes sticks and causes “unintended acceleration.” Your car becomes a flaming high-speed steel coffin when you unintentionally decelerate by smashing into an unmovable object while listening to “Flirting with Disaster” by Molly Hatchet.

So, we’ve got fake friction causing a fiery death scenario all because we replaced cheap, simple cable with expensive computer controls. This is a textbook example of “over-engineered.” The computer does not care if you live or die, so replace the computer. Occam was right.

I can handle a bit of “unintended acceleration” every now and then… However, I have a real problem with the unintended (and very rapid) deceleration when I hit a car, tree or other immovable object.

Florida wildlife can endure a cold night. Florida exotics can endure a cold night. But when that cold lasts for two weeks, the exotics and many of the cold-sensitive natives perish.

Across south Florida, the first two weeks of the year were very cold. 77 manatees died. Millions of fish died. The FWC rescued 3,000 cold-stunned sea turtles. Nobody knows for certain, but it’s likely that all the small pythons are history… heat loss is a function of surface area/volume. The smaller organism loses heat and dies first, bigger animals can endure longer.

Miami Herald fish kill story. Exotic chiclids and armored catfish were pretty much wiped out. Peacock bass survived in the deep lakes and rockpits where the Biscayne Aquifer moderates the water temperature.

It’s been two months since Richard Alicea and Edwin Pritchard left Haulover Marina and headed for Bimini, 50 miles east of Miami, in a 17-foot boat. There was an unconfirmed sighting a few days after they disappeared. Then nothing.

Remember the Great White sharks tagged off Cape Cod last year? One of those satellite tags popped off about 50 miles east of Jacksonville… Meanwhile, the FWC has closed a two-year-old case of White Shark poaching in the Gulf of Mexico with about $45,000 in fines.