The low-lying Pacific nation of Kiribati is running out of time on climate change as seas rise, and is drafting plans including mass relocation of its people while the world procrastinates on the issue, the country’s leader says.
President Anote Tong said areas of Kiribati — consisting of more than 30 coral atolls, most only a few metres (feet) above sea level — had already been swamped by the rising ocean.
“We’ve had communities that have had to relocate because their previous village is submerged, it’s no longer there,” he told AFP in a telephone interview from the capital Tarawa.
“We had a very high tide at the beginning of this month and communities were washed out. It’s becoming more frequent, time is running out.”
Kiribati is among a number of island states — including Tuvalu, Tokelau and the Maldives — the UN Human Rights Commission is concerned could become “stateless” due to climate change.
With erosion gnawing at the coast and crops dying as sea water infiltrates fresh water sources, Tong said plans to relocate people from Kiribati to Fiji and East Timor had been put forward.
He was pessimistic UN climate talks underway in Doha would offer a solution, saying they assumed global warming would occur in the future, allowing countries to stall over emissions targets.
“That’s not relevant to us,” he said. “The reality is that we’re already facing problems.
“Are the negotiations addressing this? I don’t believe so. They’re regarded as a game by many of the negotiators, they’re not focusing on what’s already happening in the most vulnerable countries.
“We (in Kiribati) are not talking about economic growth, we’re not talking about standards of living — we’re talking about our very survival.”
– “Some of our people will have to be relocated” –
Rather than wait for global action, Tong said Kiribati was examining options for the climate-threatened nation, including relocating parts of its 103,000-strong population.
An aerial view over the Tongariro National Park. Photo / Greg Bowker
A “sudden rise” in volcanic activity at Mt Tongariro has prompted scientists to lift its volcanic alert status for the first time.
But local businesses and conservation authorities remain unconcerned as they seek to reassure visitors it is “business as usual” at National Park.
GNS Science this afternoon lifted Mt Tongariro’s volcanic alert status from level zero to level one, and increased the aviation status from green to yellow.
It said a series of more than 20 “small” volcanic earthquakes had been recorded at Tongariro since July 13 – more than the average of two per year according to historic seismic data.
The quakes, below a magnitude of 2.5 and between 2-7km deep, were recorded in a cluster zone between Emerald Crater and Te Maari craters.
The sequence of earthquakes soon declined but restarted on Wednesday and increased in number yesterday and today.
GNS volcanologist Brad Scott said it was the first time the alert level had been lifted at Tongariro since the alert system was introduced.
“It’s displaying some form of unrest. We don’t know exactly what’s driving it, if we did we’d be saying.”
To get a clearer picture, GNS would deploy portable seismic recorders around the epicentres of the earthquakes and conduct sampling of selected hot springs, crater lakes and fumaroles in the area.
“We’ve got our permanent networks out giving us data in real time… (and) we want to compliment that with some more data, just to add to our knowledge.”
Mt Tongariro is a volcanic complex that lies to the north of Ngauruhoe and consists of numerous craters and vents.
There are six alert levels of volcanic action, increasing in seriousness from zero to five. Alert level one indicates “signs of volcano unrest”.
For the alert level to be lifted to two – “minor eruptive activity” – there would need to be an eruption and there was no indication that would happen.
The aviation status yellow also acts as a warning of increased unrest.
Department of Conservation local conservation analyst Harry Keys said GNS Science was dealing with the matter and the department did not need to take any action at this stage.
The popular Tongariro Alpine Crossing passed close to Te Maari craters, where the most recent ash eruptions took place from 1855 to 1897.
But there was no hazard at the moment and the crossing would remain open to the public.
“There are public safety matters if the volcano starts getting active, but at the moment the volcano is not getting active and it may not ever get active,” he said.
“We’ve got everything ready if we have to do anything. We will then go to the next stage, but at the moment we’re not doing anything.”
Dr Keys said he would not expect more or fewer visitors at the moment.
“It’s definitely business as usual. People might make their own decisions, but there’s no reason at the moment they should make any decisions about what they’ve planned.”
National Park Business Association chairman Murray Wilson said the only problem with volcanic activity was when it interrupted visitor flows.
He had been at a regional tourism meeting today but the issue was not even raised.
“It’s just a fact of life around here and I don’t think anyone around the place will be to excited about that – it’s probably more of a technical response than a physical response.”
Mr Wilson said “media hype” had been the biggest issue the last time neighbouring Ruapehu had erupted in the 1990s.
“The people around here depend on uninterrupted visitor flows. Last year we had interrupted visitor flows because of the Rugby World Cup – as soon as the rugby started, people tended to stay at home and go to the rugby matches.”
He did not think there would be much impact unless it was “over-reported and people get worried”.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — A strong earthquake has struck off the east coast of New Zealand, but there were no immediate reports of any injuries or damage.
The U.S. Geological Survey says the magnitude-5.8 temblor struck Saturday off the east coast of the North Island at a depth of 20 kilometers (12 miles).
New Zealand is prone to earthquakes. In February 2011, a strong quake in Christchurch killed 185 people and destroyed much of the city’s downtown area.
This is an illustration showing how the mantle plumes can be emitted from the core-mantle boundary region to reach the Earth’s crust. Due to the lateral displacement of the tectonic plates at the surface, the mantle plumes can create a series of aligned hot spot volcanoes. A mid ocean ridge and a subducted plate are also shown. Credit: ESRF/Denis Andrault/Henri Samuel. For a larger version of this image please go here.
Scientists have recreated the extreme conditions at the boundary between Earth’s core and its mantle, 2,900 km beneath the surface. Using the world’s most brilliant beam of X-rays, they probed speck-sized samples of rock at very high temperature and pressure to show for the first time that partially molten rock under these conditions is buoyant and should segregate towards the Earth’s surface.
This observation is a strong evidence for the theory that volcanic hotspots like the Hawaiian Islands originate from mantle plumes generated at the Earth’s core-mantle boundary. The results are published in Nature dated 19 July 2012.
The group of scientists was led by Denis Andrault from the Laboratoire Magmas et Volcans of University Blaise Pascal in Clermont, and included scientists from the CNRS in Clermont and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France.
Most volcanoes are situated where continental plates are pushed or pulled against each other. Here, the continental crust is weakened, and the magma can break through to the surface. The Pacific “Ring of Fire”, for example, exhibits such plate movements, resulting in powerful Earthquakes and numerous active volcanoes.
Volcanic hotspots are of a completely different nature because most of them are far away from plate boundaries. The Hawaiian Islands, for example, are a chain of volcanoes thought to have their origin in a mysterious hot spot beneath the Pacific ocean floor. Every island in the chain starts as an active volcano fed by the hot spot that eventually rises above the ocean surface. As plate tectonics move the volcano away from the hotspot, it becomes extinct.
The hot spot will in the meantime create another volcano: the next island in the chain. The Hawaiian Islands are one of many examples of this process, like the Canary Islands, La Reunion or the Azores.
The nature of the hot-spot source and its location in the mantle have remained elusive to the present day. One explanation is narrow streams of magma conveyed to the Earth’s surface from the boundary between the Earth’s core of liquid iron and the solid mantle of silicate rock. Whether the lowermost mantle expels such streams of magma called mantle plumes is one of today’s major controversies among geologists.
What material can be stored at the core-mantle boundary and become sufficiently light to rise through 2900 km of thick solid mantle? This was the question Denis Andrault and his colleagues addressed when they set out to recreate in a laboratory the conditions found at the core-mantle boundary.
They compressed tiny pieces of rock, the size of a speck of dust and ten times thinner than a human hair, between the tips of two conical diamonds to a pressure of more than one million bar. A laser beam then heated these samples to temperatures between 3000 and 4000 degrees Celsius, which scientists believe is representative of the 200km-thick core-mantle boundary. The samples are extremely small compared to the natural processes occurring in the Earth.
However, the melting processes are very well reproduced experimentally. Therefore, the observations can be confidently transferred from micron scale in the experiments to kilometre scale in the deep mantle.
Beams of X-rays at the ESRF, focused to a diameter of one 1000th of a millimetre, were used to map these samples and identify where the solid rock had melted. “Obviously, these tiny samples produce weak interaction signals, and this is why it is important to have the most brilliant X-ray beams for this type of experiments, says Mohammed Mezouar, the scientist responsible for the high-pressure beamline ID27 at the ESRF.
Once regions with molten rock had been identified, another X-ray technique was used at the ESRF to compare the chemical compositions of previously molten and solid parts. “It is the iron content which is decisive for the density of molten rock at the core-mantle boundary. Its accurate knowledge allowed us to determine that molten rock under these conditions is actually lighter than solid,” says Denis Andrault.
Gravity makes the light liquid rock from a hotspot move slowly upwards like a bubble in water until it reaches the surface where the magma plume will form a volcano. The hotspots of liquid occur in the relatively thin boundary region between the solid lower mantle and the liquid outer core of the Earth where the temperature rises over a distance of just 200 kilometres from 3000 to 4000 degrees. This steep rise is caused by the vicinity of the much hotter core and induces a partial melting of the rocks.
The results of the experiment are also of great significance for the understanding of the early history of the Earth, as they provide an explanation why many chemical elements playing a key role in our daily life gradually accumulated from the Earth’s inside to its thin crust, close to the surface.
“We know less about the Earth’s mantle than about the surface of Mars. It is impossible to drill a hole of even 100 kilometres into the Earth, so we have to recreate it in the laboratory. This is important knowledge, because active hot spot volcanoes like those in Iceland can be dangerous and disruptive for the daily lives of people far away”, concludes Denis Andrault.
FORT WORTH TX
OMAHA/VALLEY NE
HASTINGS NE
MEMPHIS TN
SPRINGFIELD MO
NORMAN OK
TULSA OK
GOODLAND KS
SIOUX FALLS SD
NORTH PLATTE NE
WICHITA KS
ST LOUIS MO
At least 12 people died during torrential rainstorms which battered much of northern and southwestern China from Friday night to Saturday, state media reported. In Beijing, strong winds blew off rooftops killing two people and injuring six others, the Beijing Emergency Medical Center reported. Heavy rain flooded roads and caused 223 flights to be cancelled in the capital, as the Beijing Meteorological Bureau issued its second-highest rainstorm alert for the first time since 2005. The report said Beijing received 95 mm of precipitation on average as of 7:00 pm (1100 GMT), and heavy rainfall is expected to last until Sunday morning.
The Interior Ministry sent a military transport plane with 83 firefighters to Madeira, where the flames briefly threatened the outskirts of the region’s capital and popular tourist destination Funchal on Wednesday night. Interior Minister Miguel Macedo also flew to Madeira to coordinate the efforts.
Firefighters from several departments started fighting a fast-spreading brush fire east of Ash Grove near U.S. 160 at Farm Road 43. Firefighters were dispatched at about 9 a.m. to fight a brush fire that was originally reported to be two acres in size. Crews from Everton, Bois D’Arc, Willard, Ash Grove and Walnut Grove worked to prevent the fire from spreading to a field with a machine shed in it. The fire spread to the outer edge of U.S. 160 close to at least one home. It wasn’t the peace and quiet for sleeping Stan Pyle planned on. “I work night shift at French’s, and I actually got home and got to bed. My wife just woke me up and said there’s a fire across the street, and my son and I hook up all the garden hoses we had,” Pyle says. Ash Grove and Walnut Grove firefighters were the first on the scene. “We had approximately two acres when we first got here, but the winds pushed it pretty fast on us,” says Ash Grove Fire Chief Anthony Monnig.
Firefighters contained a brush fire that threatened homes south of Horseshoe Bend Thursday afternoon. Officials tell us that about 10 to 20 homes on Horseshoe Bend Hill were evacuated. A spokesperson for the Bureau of Land Management said a lot of resources were put on the Summit Fire to keep it from spreading and destroying homes. Fire departments from Horseshoe Bend, Eagle and the BLM responded. Six fire engines, five structure protection units, two water tenders, one bulldozer, two helicopters and one plane were called to the scene. Windy conditions and dry brush fueled the fire, which burned around 100 acres. One outbuilding was lost in the fire. The fire was reported around 2:20 p.m. “When you do get a grass fire that burns hot and fast, those homes are usually in the direct path of that,” said Nevil Humphreys of the Eagle Fire Department. The fire burned to within about a quarter-mile of Highway 55, but the road remained open to traffic. Boise County Sheriff’s deputies went door-to-door urging residents near the fire to evacuate their homes.
The Kreitzer family lives in one of the homes that was evacuated. They were all out of the house when the fire started. Ingrid Kreitzer said their neighbor alerted them to the fire. “He called and he said, ‘You know, I think you probably should come up. It looks like it might be coming closer. You might just want to come down and hose anything in case it jumps over,’” Kreitzer said. She said with all the recent fires, her family had been creating a fire plan in case of the wildfire. Crews on the scene told us homes they saw had good defensible space, helping to keep them safe. “We were able to get in there, limb up some brush and what not,” said Paul Story, a firefighter who came in with his crew from Salt Lake to help with recent fires. “It was very minimal effort on our part, and so the homeowner did a good job in that regard.” Humphreys said the fire is human-caused and remains under investigation. No homes were destroyed in the fire.
Weather forecasters see no end in sight to the worst US drought in five decades, a blistering heatwave that has wilted crops across America’s crucial breadbasket and sent grain prices soaring.
Farmers are mulling cutting down crops and thinning livestock herds as meteorologists said the country’s central breadbasket, the world’s largest source of both soybeans and corn, faces another month of stifling, rainless heat.
Top US agriculture official Tom Vilsack announced Wednesday he was designating 39 more counties in eight states as “natural disaster areas,” making farmers there eligible for low-cost emergency loans. Nearly 1,300 counties across 29 states have been designated natural disaster areas this year.
Vilsack also met with President Barack Obama Wednesday to review options to deal with the drought.
Meanwhile, a World Bank official said they were watching to see how the drought could impact global food supplies, after sharp surges in food prices in 2008 and 2010 dealt harsh blows to poor, food-importing nations.
“While it’s too early to be overly concerned, the Bank is monitoring the situation closely for potential impacts on our clients,” said Marc Sadler, team leader for the World Bank’s Agricultural Finance and Risk Management Unit.
“Global stocks in most of the tradable grains are lower now than they have been historically… we don’t have as much in the larder as we used to.”
More than 60 percent of the continental United States has been under drought and extreme heat conditions since June, according to Mark Svoboda of the National Drought Mitigation Center in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Temperatures have topped 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) for days in a row in many places, with the central plains running three to four degrees Fahrenheit above normal this month.
Svoboda said the drought was as tough as the worst in the 1930s and 1950s, although those benchmarks were multi-season, multi-year disasters while the current situation only dates to May.
But, he pointed out, the timing of the lack of rain and the heat has been particularly devastating, coming just at the peak of the growing season with the epicenter the central US farm belt east of the Rocky Mountains all the way to the Atlantic coast.
It has hit corn, soybeans, and crops like hay needed to feed cattle especially hard.
Farmers are now looking at cutting their losses — chopping down fields of half-mature, ear-less corn to feed the stalks to cattle.
“The jury is still a little bit out on it. We are in that process right now, making that decision,” said Steve Foglesong, who raises cattle and farms corn in Astoria, Illinois.
“From the road the corn looks green, but there are no ears on it.”
Foglesong said the next two weeks will be crucial, but weather forecasters were not encouraging.
“The worst of the drought is right in the middle of the nation, the corn belt. It’s just been bone dry,” said Carl Erickson, a meteorologist at Accuweather.
“Unfortunately across the central plains, the Mississippi valley, it looks like the overall pattern will remain in place for the rest of the month and into August,” he said.
“Once you get into a pattern like this, it almost feeds on itself.”
Joseph Glauber, chief economist for the Department of Agriculture, said their surveys show that 38 percent of the corn crop, and 30 percent of the soybean crop, are considered in “poor” or “extremely poor” condition.
That compares to 9 percent and 8 percent respectively this time last year.
In the last big drought, in 1988, corn yields fell by more than 20 percent, Glauber noted. Although the department will wait until early August before reaching a conclusion about the crops, he said: “It’s evolving as we speak. Every week these crop conditions have gotten worse.”
Corn prices have soared by 50 percent since May, while the rate for soybeans, which develop later than corn and might be able to bear up under another few weeks of rainless conditions, has surged 26 percent.
Ironically, in a way, beef and other meat prices have fallen. Glauber said some ranchers facing higher feed prices appear to be reducing their herds, pushing livestock into the market.
Foglesong said that in addition, from what he can tell the heat wave has been so intense around so much of the country that consumers have curtailed their summer barbecues, also hitting demand for steaks, ribs and other products.
Over the longer term, Glauber said, the herd reductions will mean tighter supplies and higher prices for meat on top of the grains.
Svoboda said that the crops aren’t the only problem. The drought has already fed devastating wildfires in the west, and if it keeps on, he predicts cities will start running into limits on their water supplies, which could lead to water use controls.
Tropical storm Khanun destroyed scores of houses, buildings and transportation infrastructure in southern parts of North Korea this week, killing at least seven people in the reclusive state, state-run media reported on Friday. It weakened quickly over North Korea before Khanun’s remnants dissipated over China. The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Friday that flooding triggered by Khanun caused significant damage and casualties in the southern regions of North Korea. It said at least seven people were killed in Kangwon Province, but few other details about casualties were released. “Many hectares of farmland were inundated in Kangwon province and some dwelling houses, public buildings, railways, roads, bridges, breakwaters, electric supply and communication networks were destroyed,” KCNA said in its report, adding that some areas saw up to 200 millimeters (7.8 inches) of rain. “The water supply system was paralyzed in Wonsan and Munchon cities, suspending the provision of drinking water to citizens.” In South Hwanghae province, several houses were destroyed in Haeju City and Jaeryong County while large areas of cropland were submerged in Unchon County. The report did not say whether there were casualties in South Hwanghae province, or in any other regions of North Korea. In South Korea, Khanun also caused flooding, power outages, and affected major transportation systems. One fatality was reported in North Gyeongsang province when the wall of a home collapsed, officials said.
A North Carolina mall was evacuated Friday when a thunderstorm that produced heavy rain caused the ceiling to collapse, officials said. The ceiling at SouthPark collapsed around 5 p.m., said Charlotte Fire Department Capt. Rob Brisley. He said by the time firefighters were dispatched to the mall, an evacuation was already under way. Brisley said firefighters also pulled the alarm systems in the mall to help with the evacuation, which he described as orderly. No injuries were reported. Brisley said firefighters were focusing on making sure the building was safe, and that the water damage could be addressed by mall workers. Mall personnel couldn’t be reached for additional comment Friday afternoon. It’s estimated that up to 3 inches of rain fell on south Charlotte in approximately 45 minutes, said Rodney Hinson, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Greer, S.C. Hinson said additional rain was likely to pass over Charlotte Friday night.
Mudslides unleashed by torrential rains killed one man, wrecked houses and cut off villages in the Austrian province of Styria, authorities said on Saturday. Police in the southeastern province said they had found the body of a 47-year-old local man swept away by a mudslide on Friday night in the town of Thoerl. Several small communities near Liezen were stranded by blocked roads. Austrian broadcaster ORF said helicopters evacuated around 20 people from the area after mudslides up to 10 meters (30 feet) high made travel by road impossible. A further 360 people had to leave their homes in the town of Sankt Lorenzen for fear of more slides given unrelenting rainfall, authorities said.
Director of Disease Prevention and Control at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Dr. Amara Jambai, has yesterday disclosed that the outbreak of Lassa fever in Kenema district. Lassa fever is a viral disease which is carried by rats. It is spread from infected rodents to humans through direct contact with urine and droppings of an infected rat. Speaking to journalists at the weekly press briefing at the Ministry of Information and Communications, Dr. Jambai said the outbreak, which started in three districts but has extended to other parts of the country, should be a serious concern to the government and people of Sierra Leone.
Biohazard name:
Lassa Fever Outbreak
Biohazard level:
4/4 Hazardous
Biohazard desc.:
Viruses and bacteria that cause severe to fatal disease in humans, and for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such as Bolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, H5N1(bird flu), Dengue hemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, hantaviruses, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and other hemorrhagic or unidentified diseases. When dealing with biological hazards at this level the use of a Hazmat suit and a self-contained oxygen supply is mandatory. The entrance and exit of a Level Four biolab will contain multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet light room, autonomous detection system, and other safety precautions designed to destroy all traces of the biohazard. Multiple airlocks are employed and are electronically secured to prevent both doors opening at the same time. All air and water service going to and coming from a Biosafety Level 4 (P4) lab will undergo similar decontamination procedures to eliminate the possibility of an accidental release.
Symptoms:
Status:
confirmed
21.07.2012
Epidemic
Sierra Leone
Northern Province, [Port Loko, Kambia, Pujehun and Kailahun districts]
Director of Disease Prevention and Control at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Dr. Amara Jambai, has yesterday disclosed that the outbreak of cholera in Port Loko, Kambia, Pujehun and Kailahun districts and the Western Area has claimed 62 lives so far. Speaking to journalists at the weekly press briefing at the Ministry of Information and Communications, Dr. Jambai said the outbreak, which started in three districts but has extended to other parts of the country, should be a serious concern to the government and people of Sierra Leone. Dr. Jambai explained adding that 26 cholera deaths have been reported in Kambia, 22 in Port Loko, nine in Pujehun and another nine in the Western Area which sum up to 62 cholera cases reported since January to date. “We have set up cholera treatment units at Macaulay Street and Connaught hospital with three more to follow. Also, we have provided technical assistance, drugs and rapid diagnostic test kits at various locations across the country,” he added to highlight measures his department has put in place to curtail the situation. He however warned that despite efforts by the health ministry to cub the outburst, people should be more careful about their food and water sources and should endeavour to always keep their environment clean.
Biohazard name:
Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
A one-year-old boy from Davao City has been found positive for the Enterovirus-71 (EV-71), the mysterious illness that killed dozens of children in Cambodia. Health Secretary Enrique Ona said the screening and confirmatory tests done at the Research Institute of Tropical Medicine (RITM) revealed that of the eight suspected Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease (HFMD) patients, one was tested positive of the virus similar to the ones in Cambodia. Ona clarified, however, that the boy has no history of travel outside the country. “The virus is similar to Cambodia but this case is the mild one,” Ona told reporters in a press conference Friday. EV-71 causes diarrhea; rashes; and hand, foot and mouth disease; and is sometimes associated with severe central neurological disease. The virus, which was earlier tagged as a “mystery disease” in Cambodia, caused the deaths of 52 children there. Based on the details of the case, the official said the boy had developed fever and rashes on his hands, soles of feet, mouth and buttocks last July 6. He was brought for consultation at a local health facility but was subsequently sent home and has since recovered very well, Ona said. Although the victim’s family members have no sickness, they are still being closely monitored for possible manifestation of symptoms such as high fever, chest and muscle pain, sore throat and headache, Ona said.
Meantime, two HFMD patients were found negative of human Enterovirus while the five others will be further tested for Coxsackie A16, which is also associated with HFMD, the health official said. The health official said there is no vaccine on EV-71 yet, so the “approach is to monitor the cases.” Ona, however, reiterated that the incident should not come as a surprise to the public since EV-71 is not new to the Philippines. “This virus could have been here all along… Maybe, this specific strain has not been examined before, therefore, it has not been identified in the past,” Ona said. The DOH had already related in the past that there have been cases of human Enterovirus in the country but that they are not the fatal ones like those found in Cambodia. Meanwhile, the health department strongly urged the public to always maintain personal hygiene and cleanliness as this would be the best way against the virus. “Prevention relies on individual personal hygiene and hand washing; shared toys or teaching tools in daycare should be cleaned, washed and disinfected as they easily become contaminated,” said Ona.
Biohazard name:
Enterovirus-71 (EV-71)
Biohazard level:
3/4 Hight
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.
Building on previous work with the botanical abscisic acida, researchers in the Nutritional Immunology and Molecular Medicine Laboratory (NIMML) have discovered that abscisic acid has anti-inflammatory effects in the lungs as well as in the gut. The results will be published in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry.
“While the immune effects of abscisic acid are well understood in the gut, less was known about its effects in the respiratory tract. We’ve shown definitively that not only does abscisic acid ameliorate disease activity and lung inflammatory pathology, it also aids recovery and survival in influenza-infected mice,” said Raquel Hontecillas, Ph.D., study leader, assistant professor of immunology at Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, and co-director of NIMML.
Influenza accounts for anywhere from 3,000 to 49,000 deaths per year in the United States alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control. It is difficult to treat if not caught immediately; antivirals usually become ineffective after the virus incubation period has passed and resistance to antiviral drugs poses a serious public health problem in the face of outbreaks.
Abscisic acid, however, has been shown to be most effective at about seven to ten days into the infection, targeting the immune response rather than the virus itself, which many researchers feel is a safer way to reduce flu-associated fatalities.
“Most drugs for respiratory infections target the virus itself, rather than the inflammatory responses caused by the virus. Abscisic acid activates peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma, a receptor that aids in reducing inflammation, through a newly identified pathwaya but it does so without the side effects of other agonists like thiazolidinediones, which are known to have strong adverse side effects.
The development of complementary and alternative Medicine approaches that modulate the host response has great promise in decreasing respiratory damage caused by influenza or other respiratory pathogens,” said Josep Bassaganya-Riera, Ph.D., director of NIMML and professor of nutritional immunology at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute.
From this and previous research, it’s clear that abscisic acid could yield a novel new way to combat inflammatory disease, both in the gut and the respiratory tract. By using host-targeted strategies to mediate disease, alternate pathways can be established to activate immune responses without the deadly side effects of many drugs currently on the market.
MessageToEagle.com – Mathematicians have discovered a new way to crinkle up the fabric of space-time, at least in theory.
“We show that space-time cannot be locally flat at a point where two shock waves collide,” said Blake Temple, professor of mathematics at UC Davis.
“This is a new kind of singularity in general relativity.”
The results are reported in two papers by Temple with graduate students Moritz Reintjes and Zeke Vogler, respectively, both published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A.
Einstein’s theory of general relativity explains gravity as a curvature in space-time. But the theory starts from the assumption that any local patch of space-time looks flat, Temple said.
A singularity is a patch of space-time that cannot be made to look flat in any coordinate system, Temple said. One example of a singularity is inside a black hole, where the curvature of space becomes extreme.
Temple and his collaborators study the mathematics of how shockwaves in a perfect fluid can affect the curvature of space-time in general relativity.
In earlier work, Temple and collaborator Joel Smoller, the Lamberto Cesari professor of mathematics at the University of Michigan, produced a model for the biggest shockwave of all, created from the Big Bang when the universe burst into existence.
A shockwave creates an abrupt change, or discontinuity, in the pressure and density of a fluid, and this creates a jump in the curvature.But it has been known since the 1960s that the jump in curvature created by a single shock wave is not enough to rule out the locally flat nature of space-time.
Vogler’s doctoral work used mathematics to simulate two shockwaves colliding, while Reintjes followed up with an analysis of the equations that describe what happens when shockwaves cross.
He found this created a new type of singularity, which he dubbed a “regularity singularity.”
What is surprising is that something as mild as interacting waves could create something as extreme as a space-time singularity, Temple said.
Illustration of twisted space-time around Earth. Image credit: NASA
Temple and his colleagues are investigating whether the steep gradients in the space-time fabric at a regularity singularity could create any effects that are measurable in the real world.
For example, they wonder whether they might produce gravity waves, Temple said. General relativity predicts that these are produced, for example, by the collision of massive objects like black holes, but they have not yet been observed in nature. Regularity singularities could also be formed within stars as shockwaves pass within them, the researchers theorize.
The algal bloom identified off the west coast is continuing to kill fish and shellfish in significant concentrations from north Galway to north Donegal. Up to 80 per cent of stock has been affected on some oyster farms in Donegal, and it is also having a negative impact on sea angling tourism, the Marine Institute has confirmed. The bloom is caused by Karenia mikimotoi, a phytoplankton of the dinoflagellate group which caused a red tide in 2005 that killed wild fish and shellfish. Samples of this new bloom, first detected in May, are being collected for Marine Institute monitoring by the Irish Coast Guard search and rescue helicopters. Marine Institute phytoplankton expert Joe Silke said the bloom was naturally occurring. It was not associated with pollution but contained a “toxic irritant” that damaged gills of shellfish, fish and invertebrates. Irish Farmers’ Association fish farm section chief executive Richie Flynn said if there was a “properly functioning” licensing system in place, farmers could take measures to move stock when such blooms occurred.
Biohazard name:
Red Tide
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
MessageToEagle.com – Some years ago, back in, 2005, over the slopes of Mount Gongga, China all rocks suddenly turned red.
In time, the entire region became known the “Red-Stone-Valley” and today it is a spectacular local tourist attraction.
For many years, scientists have wondered what caused the stones to unexpectedly change color?
Today, scientists can finally offer an explanation what is behind this strange phenomenon.
According to Guoxiang Liu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, Hubei, China, and his colleagues, the rocks became red as a result of a newly discovered variety of the algae Trentepohlia jolithus that suddenly expanded.
The stones suddenly changed color. Image credit: Guoxiang Liu
In their research paper, Liu and his colleagues write that ” Trentepohlia is a genus of subaerial green algae which is widespread in tropical, subtropical, and also temperate regions with humid climates”.The scientists state that the reason the algae Trentepohlia jolithus started to expand is due to global warming as well as various human activities.
“This new variety only grows on the native rock, both global warming and human activity have provided massive areas of suitable substrata: the rocks surfaces of the Yajiageng river valley floodplain were re-exposed because of heavy debris flows in the summer of 2005; plus human activities such as tourism and road-building have also created a lot of exposed rock!” Liu and his team write.
Red-Stone-Valley and the stones covered with Trentepohlia-carpets.
2A-2B: Red-stone Valley and the Yajiageng River; 2C: Red Trentepohlia-carpet in a cold winter; 2D: Trentepohlia growing on stone walls near the road; 2E: Red-Stone-Valley and Yajiageng River; 2F-2G: Red-Stone-Valley in foggy conditions; 2H: Tibetan Ni-ma stack with Trentepohlia growing on it. 2I: Red-Stone-Valley in winter. Image credit: PLoS One
Microscopic view of Trentepohlia jolithus. Image credit: PLoS One
Today, most of the rocks are covered with deep red colored algal carpets in the Yajiageng river valley.
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The death toll from a powerful earthquake in northern Italy has risen to six, as strong aftershocks forced the evacuation of thousands of people.
The epicentre of the 6.0-magnitude quake was in the province of Modena, but it was felt from Venice to Milan.
It has left thousands homeless and reduced historic buildings in cities including Bologna and Verona to rubble.
The quake hit in the early hours of Sunday (local time) as people were sleeping, sending terrified residents running into the street.
“I am 83 and I have never felt anything like this,” Lina Gardenghi said in the town of Bondeno, near Ferrara.
The quake was followed by a series of jolting aftershocks, sparking the evacuation of 3,000 people.
At least two of the tremors reached magnitude-5.1, sowing fresh panic, further damaging already weakened buildings and causing more structures to collapse.
The tremors were more deadly than any since 2009, when the central city of L’Aquila was devastated.
When we were got on the street, it was like we were at sea, the ground was shaking.
Ferrara resident Angelo
Two of the dead suffered heart attacks, while one woman was crushed under a building that collapsed.
The other four victims were night-shift workers in factories which collapsed, including two who were crushed when the roof of a ceramics factory caved in in the town of Sant’Agostino.
“He wasn’t supposed to be there,” the mother of one of the victims said.
“He changed shifts with a friend who wanted to go to the beach.”
SOFIA (Reuters) – A 5.6 magnitude earthquake shook Bulgaria’s capital Sofia early on Tuesday, causing residents to rush into the streets, the civil defence office said.
The quake, which occurred at 3 a.m. local time, shook apartment buildings and rattled windows but caused no casualties or damage, Nikolay Nikolov, an official from the office was quoted as saying by the national radio, citing initial reports.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the temblor was centered about 14 miles (24 km) west of Sofia and occurred at a relatively shallow depth of 5.8 miles (9.4 km).
USGS initially reported the magnitude as 5.8.
The civil defence office said the quake’s epicentre was near the western town of Pernik.
Many people in the Bulgarian capital fled their homes and gathered in the streets.
“I’ve never experienced anything like this,” Ivanka Georgieva, who lives on the eighth floor in a residential block, told Reuters. “It was very strong and it was frightening.”
The quake was felt across the south-western part of Bulgaria.
The small Black Sea country of fewer than 8 million people lies in Europe’s earthquake-prone Balkan region.
(Additional reporting by Eric Walsh in Washington; Editing by Bill Trott and Eric Beech)
Sunday’s quake in northeastern Italy destroyed more than 300,000 wheels of Parmesan and Grana Padano, a similar cheese, with an estimated value of more than NZ$421m, an industry official said.
“The earthquake was very strong and heavily damaged the structures of many warehouses as well as thousands of tonnes” of the two cheeses, said Stefano Berni, head of a consortium that protects the Grana Padano designation.
“It’s a very heavy loss, but there have been no casualties, which is a great relief at this worrying time,” he told the ANSA news agency.
An initial estimate of 250 million euros is “very conservative,” Berni said, adding that he hoped no further tremors would “further aggravate the state of the already highly damaged and fragile structures.”
A wheel of the cheese can weigh up to 40 kilograms.
JOPLIN, Mo. — Joplin can add earthquake damage to its history of natural disasters.
City officials believe that a Nov. 6 shaker that was centered in Shawnee, Okla., rattled hard enough here to cause some big cracks in Memorial Hall.
The City Council will be asked on Wednesday to authorize a contract for engineering services to identify the extent of the damage and recommendations for repair.
Jack Schaller, the city’s assistant public works director, said that the building’s caretaker who does regular inspections of the building, along with maintenance duties, reported the cracks right after the earthquake, which was felt as a slight tremor here. If the engineering investigation bears out the city’s contention, it will be used for an insurance claim on the damage.
“That building is 90 or 100 years old, so there are always some cracks from age and settlement,” Schaller acknowledges. “But after that earthquake, the guy who works at the hall noticed some huge cracks, so it’s obvious there had been some significant settlement due to the earthquake.”
Added Schaller, “If slight cracks appeared, you’d know it had settled over time, but when it happens overnight, you know something caused it.” He said normal settlement or wear and tear has not produced cracks that size during the building’s existence.
If the council approves, a contract for $38,630 will be awarded to Allgeier, Martin and Associates to conduct tests and an evaluation. Those tests will include geotechnical probes, a seismic hazard analysis and an evaluation of soil conditions.
Geotechnical testing will be done to find out what the soil strength is at Memorial Hall to determine if there is a hazard for the building to settle excessively, Schaller said. The engineers also will asked to look at methods of stabilizing the damage and options for repair.
The hall is currently being leased by the Joplin School District as space for band classes and practices, and physical fitness activities. The damage does not put students at risk, he said.
“We have had several engineers look at it and structurally it’s in good shape,” Schaller said. “There’s no safety concerns. We just have to figure out how to remediate it and get those cracks closed up and see if we can keep it around another 100 years.”
The city will coordinate with the school district on any schedule to make repairs, Schaller said.
As for having an earthquake that followed a late winter blizzard that piled up nearly two feet of snow, an EF-5 tornado and a summer of excessive heat and drought, 2011 “will be a year that people won’t ever forget,” Schaller said.
Shake, rattle and roll
Other damage was observed in the area believed to connected to the earthquake. The city of Neosho attributes damage to its sewer and water lines to that cause.
A magnitude-6.0 earthquake shook northern Italy early Sunday, killing at least three people and toppling some buildings, emergency services and news reports said.The quake struck at 4:04 a.m. Sunday between Modena and Mantova, about 22 miles north-northwest of Bologna at a relatively shallow depth of 6 miles, the U.S. Geological Survey said.It was one of the strongest quakes to shake the region, seismologists said, and initial television footage indicated that older buildings had suffered damage: roofs collapsed, church towers showed cracks and the bricks of some stone walls tumbled into the street. As dawn broke over the region, residents milled about the streets inspecting the damage.Italian news agency ANSA, citing emergency services, said two people were killed in Sant’Agostino di Ferrara when a ceramics factory collapsed. Another person was killed in Ponte Rodoni do Bondeno, ANSA said.The epicenter was between the towns of Finale Emilia, San Felice sul Panaro and Sermide but was felt as far away as Tuscany and northern Alto Adige.The initial quake was followed about an hour later by a 5.1-magnitude temblor, USGS said.IItaly’s Sky TG24 showed images of the collapsed ceramics factory where the two workers were reportedly killed; the structure, which appeared to be a hangar of sorts, had twisted metal supports jutting out at odd angles amid the mangled collapsed roof.In late January, a 5.4-magnitude quake shook northern Italy. Some office buildings in Milan were evacuated as a precaution and there were scattered reports of falling masonry and cracks in buildings.In 2009, a devastating temblor killed more than 300 people in the central city of L’Aquila.
Kupang. Various ailments, including coughs and other respiratory conditions, have affected hundreds of people seeking safety in temporary shelters after the eruption of Mount Sirung on Pantar island in the Eastern Nusa Tenggara District of Alor, an official said on Monday.
Mount Sirung, a 862-meter-high volcano, erupted on May 13, forcing some 250 people from the Mauta village on its slope to seek safety elsewhere in the district.
The volcano was put on the third level of alert after it began to show increased activity on May 8.
“Residents are beginning to be affected by ailments such as coughs, sneezing, and other respiratory conditions,” Viktor Tanghana, the head of the Alor district Disaster Mitigation Office said.
Viktor said children were the most vulnerable among the displaced.
He said the district had already deployed a medical team to the temporary shelters to provide some help, and the authorities had also sent food aid such as rice, corn and instant noodles and cans of sardines.
The evacuation of Mauta, approximately 300 meters from the crater, was conducted by the local authorities at the request of the Vulcanology and Geology Disaster Mitigation Center in Bandung (PVMBG), Viktor said.
He said although the people of the village had been evacuated to the temporary shelters, they continued to return to their fields to work.
Viktor also berated the shortage of face masks at the district level, and called on the disaster mitigation office in Kupang, the provincial capital to send at least 500 such masks to the district for distribution.
Antara
Professor Emeritus, Kimura from Ryukyu university warns eruption of Mt. Fuji in 3 years is the bigger risk than possible earthquake caused by the active fault.
He points out these 2 facts below
1. From North east to South west of the crater, water eruption is observed. This is the water version of eruption instead of magma,but the mechanism is almost the same as normal eruption. In Fujinomiya city beside Mt. Fuji, water has been springing every few months since 2 years ago. Water level became higher all of a sudden at Fujigoko lake located at North to Mt. Fuji.
2. Huge holes appear in the Fuji maneuvering ground of Japanese Self Defense Force. Natural gas is coming up from the holes. The temperature is 40℃ ~ 50℃. It is not the volcanic gas directly coming up from magma but considering water eruption as well, it is highly likely to be the omen of major eruption.
According to the simulation of Cabinet Government, volcanic ash will be accumulated 2~10cm even in Tokyo, where is 100km away from Mt. Fuji. In the worst case, 14,600km of road will be closed. 515 flights will be cancelled a day. 1,080,000 houses will be out of power. The estimated economical damage will be 2 trillion and 500 billion yen.
More than 300 people have been evacuated and a state of emergency has been declared due to a forest fire near Kirkland Lake.Fire crews and water bombers from the Ministry of Natural Resources, along with firefighters from the Town of Kirkland Lake, were tackling the blaze that was discovered Sunday morning and had grown to 2,757 hectares by noon Monday.Kirkland Lake is located about 600 km north of Toronto.Residential and cottage areas on Goodfish and Nettie Lake and one street in Chaput Hughes were evacuated Sunday afternoon and residents were still unable to return home Monday.An emergency post was set up at the local Royal Canadian Legion for those displaced.Two local gold mines, KL Gold and AuRico Gold, have suspended operations due to fire damage to power lines.Town officials said Monday morning there was concern winds could switch the direction of the fire, which was heading north of Kirkland Lake. Residents were told to be prepared in the event the fire turns back towards town.Another forest fire near Timmins was spreading rapidly Monday and had closed two highways.Officials closed Hwys. 144 and 101 to allow vacationers and residents to evacuate from The Cache, Little Star Lake, Star Lake, the Old Mill Campground, Keefer Lake, Bob Lake, Opishing Lake and Aquesquaw Lake.Timmins residents were being urged to keep their windows shut due to the heavy smoke.
SALT LAKE CITY UT
RIVERTON WY
FAIRBANKS AK
RENO NV
CHEYENNE WY
ELKO NV
FLAGSTAFF AZ
ALBUQUERQUE NM
GRAND JUNCTION CO
EL PASO TX/SANTA TERESA NM
PUEBLO CO
Seven NATO officials staying at the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place hotel were being treated Monday after being stricken with flu-like symptoms, law enforcement sources said.Officials were looking into whether the incident was due to food poisoning, the Sun-Times is reporting.A U.S. Secret Service spokesman said he believed that seven people were stricken and were being treated but referred other questions to the NATO delegation.A spokeswoman for the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place said the hotel was alerted Monday that “several” hotel guests complained of feeling ill.“We have provided them with access to medical attention and are taking appropriate steps to ensure their comfort and safety,” Lori Alexander said. “The cause of their illness is not yet determined and is being investigated.”
Biohazard name:
flu-like symptoms
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
This is a time lapse video of the eclipse on May 20th, 2012 in San Antonio, Texas at 8:32PM (ECT) and the Full Moon that we experienced a week prior.
ALL VIDEO IS PROPERTY OF MB PRODUCTIONS. MUSIC USED IN THE VIDEO IS NOT OWNED BY MB PRODUCTIONS. ALL CREDITS GO TO THE WRITERS OF THE TWO MUSICAL SCORES IN THIS YOUTUBE VIDEO.
MessageToEagle.com – The Sun and its system of planets formed about five billion years ago and the Universe itself was born about 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang.
A key question, which is still waiting for an answer is: what happened, then, during that long, intervening stretch of nearly nine billion years?
Astronomers think that the very first stars and galaxies appeared only a few hundreds of millions of years after the big bang, and have been evolving ever since.
They must have been quite different from the stars and galaxies of today, however, in part because the young universe lacked most of the chemical elements present today – those elements were made gradually in the nuclear furnaces of those stars.
Modern telescopes and infrared and submillimeter techniques have recently enabled astronomers to spot significant numbers of very distant galaxies and begin to piece together a picture of cosmic evolution.
Galaxies often undergo bursts of star formation that make their dust glow in the infrared. In fact, recent results suggest that at some cosmic epochs star formation was as much as ten times more active than it is today.
The power of infrared is twofold: It can measure the luminous dust, and, because cosmic expansion shifts starlight into the infrared, it can also see spectral features in that starlight that allow an estimate of the cosmic distance.
Spitzer sees a galaxy sitting more 13 billion light-years away as a red smudge above a bright nearby galaxy. Photo credits: Spitzer Telescope
Sensitive infrared cameras staring over large fields of view are the best way to find large numbers of very distant objects for analyses SAO astronomers Jia-Sheng Huang, Giovanni Fazio, and Matt Ashby, together with a team of colleagues, used the infrared camera on the Spitzer Space Telescope to undertake a very deep and sensitive search for distant infrared galaxies in an area of the sky one twentieth the size of the full moon.
They coordinated their study with infrared images from Hubble.
The scientists discovered twenty five peculiar infrared objects in their field. Follow-up analyses revealed that between eleven and nineteen of them date to cosmic epochs from 1.5 to 3 billion years after the big bang.
Now you don’t see it; now you do – the image of a galaxy from a time when the universe was only a billion years old. The left image, from Hubble, sees nothing in the sky, but the longer wavelength infrared image from Spitzer (right) sees a bright source. The intense star formation activity in the galaxy, its distance, and the expansion of the universe combine to make it appear in the infrared. Credit: K. Caputi
These galaxies seem to be very massive and to contain significant amounts of warm dust. Two other sources just as massive seem to be even older, dating from a period only one billion years after the big bang.
The latter present a serious challenge to current theories about galaxy evolution, which predict very few such objects should exist at such an early time.
The new survey is significant not only because it has discovered such distant galaxies, but also because it points to a previously unrecognized galaxy population whose properties are significantly different from those of known galaxies at similar epochs. @ MessageToEagle.com
AN investigation has been launched into the cause of a mysterious boom which shook buildings across the Island on Saturday afternoon.
Hundreds of Islanders reported hearing a loud bang – similar to a sonic boom – at 1.04 pm.
The boom was so loud it rattled doors and windows from Gorey to St Ouen and even measured on the Island’s seismograph in St Aubin.
But despite speculation that the noise was caused by a military jet travelling faster than the speed of sound, Jersey Airport has confirmed that no aircraft capable of causing such a noise was in the Island’s airspace at the time.
And Jersey Met Office has confirmed that it is unlikely that any meteorological phenomenon could have caused the noise.
Farmers in Rangwe Division of Homa Bay District have lost 12 cattle following acute outbreak of Black quarter disease.
The farmers expressed concern saying curing the disease among their cattle has become a nightmare.
They said the death of the cattle has caused an enormous loss in their economy owing to the fact that cattle keeping is regarded as a major investment among the area residents. The farmers are worried that the situation may aggravate if precautionary measures are not taken early enough.
They appealed to the government to intervene promptly and carry out preventive measures for curbing further deaths of cattle.
Area District Veterinary Officer Alexander Baboon confirmed the outbreak saying that Black quarter is one the dangerous diseases that can claim lives of many livestock within a short duration.
Baboon assured area residents that the government would undertake massive vaccination of animals to combat further spread of the disease in the affected areas.
He called upon farmers to co-operate with Veterinary Officers in a vaccination exercise scheduled for Tuesday May 22. The Officer said the exercise is expected to continue for a period of seven days in Rangwe and Asego Divisions where trace of the disease has been experienced.
He called upon farmers to present their animals for vaccination in the designated places adding that it would be offered free of charge.
Baboon attributed the bacterial disease to prevalent dirty water that has resulted from heavy rains experienced in the region. He told the farmers to be calm as he is making all possible efforts to arrest the situation.
ALONG THE GUNFLINT TRAIL, Minn. — If moose disappear from the boreal forest of northern Minnesota, as some biologists predict, they will not exit with a thunderous crash. Climate extinctions come quietly, even when they involve 1,000-pound herbivores.
Experts who have studied the Northwestern moose — Alces alces andersoni — believe they are witnessing one of the most precipitous nonhunting declines of a major species in the modern era, yet few outside Minnesota fully appreciate the loss.
The moose is an iconic species whose existence is woven into the social, economic and cultural fabric of this region. Its elongated head and wide antlers are emblazoned on everything from T-shirts to tire flaps. The 1960s cartoon character Bullwinkle J. Moose and his flying squirrel friend Rocky were residents of the fictionalized town of Frostbite Falls, Minn.
But the animals that inspired Bullwinkle are not what they were. Here, even healthy bulls — whose size, strength and rutting prowess make them the undisputed kings of the North Woods — are dying from what appear to be a combination of exhaustion, exposure, wasting disease triggered by parasites and other maladies.
The biologists are baffled and also helpless.
Mark Lenarz, who retired in March from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), where he led moose research efforts, said it’s not like the TV show “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.”
“Unlike ‘CSI,’ it’s very hard to identify in the field exactly what an animal is dying from,” he said. “We know something about the symptoms” of distressed moose, he added, “but we don’t necessarily know the exact causes of mortality.”
What Lenarz and other experts do know is that a variety of climate stressors — including higher average annual temperatures, a long string of very mild winters, and increasingly favorable conditions for ticks, parasites and other invasive species — are conspiring to make northern Minnesota a moose graveyard.
Since 2002, Minnesota DNR specialists have put radio collars on 150 healthy adult moose; 119 subsequently died, most of them from unknown causes, according to wildlife officials. Car and train collisions accounted for 12 mortalities, while wolves were culpable in just 11 deaths.
Sudden collapse of herds
Meanwhile, annual surveys taken from helicopter overflights show that the state’s primary moose population, in the state’s northeastern Arrowhead region, has been halved in just six years, dropping from 8,840 animals in 2006 to just 4,230 this year. The decline mirrors a similar collapse a decade ago in the state’s northwest corner, where moose plummeted from an estimated 4,000 animals in the mid-1980s to less than 100 by the mid-2000s.
While some monitoring of moose had occurred in the 1990s, most of the animals were gone before scientists could examine cause-and-effect relationships. In the Arrowhead, however, experts are watching mass mortality, discovering multiple moose carcasses in the same area, including animals that appeared relatively healthy only a few years before.
Under attack by ticks, parasites and wolves, the moose’s status as an icon of Minnesota’s North Woods is rapidly ending. Photo by J. Gelineau, courtesy of University of Minnesota, Duluth.
Over 20,000 years ago, humans won the evolutionary battle against Neanderthals. They may have had some assistance in that from their best friends.
One of the most compelling — and enduring — mysteries in archaeology concerns the rise of early humans and the decline of Neanderthals. For about 250,000 years, Neanderthals lived and evolved, quite successfully, in the area that is now Europe. Somewhere between 45,000 and 35,000 years ago, early humans came along.
They proliferated in their new environment, their population increasing tenfold in the 10,000 years after they arrived; Neanderthals declined and finally died away.
What happened? What went so wrong for the Neanderthals — and what went so right for us humans?
The cause, some theories go, may have been environmental, with Neanderthals’ decline a byproduct of — yikes — climate change. It may have been social as humans developed the ability to cooperate and avail themselves of the evolutionary benefits of social cohesion. It may have been technological, with humans simply developing more advanced tools and hunting weapons that allowed them to snare food while their less-skilled counterparts starved away.
The Cambridge researchers Paul Mellars and Jennifer French have another theory, though. In a paper in the journal Science, they concluded that “numerical supremacy alone may have been a critical factor” in human dominance — with humans simply crowding out the Neanderthals. Now, with an analysis in American Scientist, the anthropologist Pat Shipman is building on their work. After analyzing the Mellars and French paper and comparing it with the extant literature, Shipman has come to an intriguing conclusion: that humans’ comparative evolutionary fitness owes itself to the domestication of dogs.
Yep. Man’s best friend, Shipman suggests, might also be humanity’s best friend. Dogs might have been the technology that allowed early humans to flourish.
Shipman analyzed the results of excavations of fossilized canid bones — from Europe, during the time when humans and Neanderthals overlapped. Put together, they furnish some compelling evidence that early humans, first of all, engaged in ritualistic dog worship. Canid skeletons found at a 27,000-year-old site in Předmostí, of the Czech Republic, displayed the poses of early ritual burial. Drill marks in canid teeth found at the same site suggest that early humans used those teeth as jewelry — and Paleolithic people, Shipman notes, rarely made adornments out of animals they simply used for food. There’s also the more outlying fact that, like humans, dogs are rarely depicted in cave art — a suggestion that cave painters might have regarded dogs not as the game animals they tended to depict, but as fellow-travelers.
Shipman speculates that the affinity between humans and dogs manifested itself mainly in the way that it would go on to do for many more thousands of years: in the hunt. Dogs would help humans to identify their prey; but they would also work, the theory goes, as beasts of burden — playing the same role for early humans as they played for the Blackfeet and Hidatsa of the American West, who bred large, strong dogs specifically for hauling strapped-on packs. (Paleolithic dogs were big to begin with: They had, their skeletons suggest, a body mass of at least 70 pounds and a shoulder height of at least 2 feet — which would make them, at minimum, the size of a modern-day German Shepherd.) Since transporting animal carcasses is an energy-intensive task, getting dogs to do that work would mean that humans could concentrate their energy on more productive endeavors: hunting, gathering, reproducing.
The possible result, Shipman argues, was a virtuous circle of cooperation — one in which humans and their canine friends got stronger, together, over time.
There’s another intriguing — if conjecture-filled — theory here, too. It could be, Shipman suggests, that dogs represented even more than companionate technologies to Paleolithic man. It could be that their cooperative proximity brought about its own effects on human evolution — in the same way that the domestication of cattle led to humans developing the ability to digest milk. Shipman points to the “cooperative eye hypothesis,” which builds on the observation that, compared to other primates, humans have highly visible sclerae (whites of the eyes). For purposes of lone hunting, sclerae represent a clear disadvantage: not only will your pesky eye-whites tend to stand out against a dark backdrop of a forest or rock, giving away your location, but they also reveal the direction of your gaze. It’s hard to be a stealthy hunter when your eyes are constantly taking away your stealth.
Expressive eyes, however, for all their competitive disadvantage, have one big thing going for them: They’re great at communicating. With early humans hunting in groups, “cooperative eyes” may have allowed them to “talk” with each other, silently and therefore effectively: windows to the soul that are also evolutionarily advantageous. And that, in turn, might have led to a more ingrained impulse toward cooperation. Human babies, studies have shown, will automatically follow a gaze once a connection is made. Eye contact is second nature to us; but it’s a trait that makes us unique among our fellow primates.
Dogs, however, also recognize the power of the gaze. In a study conducted at Central European University, Shipman notes, “dogs performed as well as human infants at following the gaze of a speaker in tests in which the speaker’s head is held still.” Humans and their best friends share an affinity for eye contact — and we are fairly unique in that affinity. There’s a chance, Shipman says — though there’s much more work to be done before that chance can be converted even into a hypothesis — that we evolved that affinity together.
“No genetic study has yet confirmed the prevalence or absence of white sclerae in Paleolithic modern humans or in Neanderthals,” Shipman notes. “But if the white sclera mutation occurred more often among the former — perhaps by chance — this feature could have enhanced human-dog communication and promoted domestication.”
Which is another way of saying that, to the extent dogs were an evolutionary technology, they may have been a technology that changed us for the better. The old truism — we shape our tools, and afterward our tools shape us — may be as old, and as true, as humanity itself.
Conflagration at biblical Armageddon preserved gold and silver trove
Archaeologists digging at Tel Megiddo in northern Israel have unearthed what turns out to be one of the largest troves of Canaanite treasures ever found, buried in rubble from destruction 3,100 years ago. The treasure was hidden inside a clay vessel that had been unearthed in the summer of 2010. The pot had been filled with dirt and sent for testing. It was only recently that the dirt was examined in a restoration laboratory and the treasure revealed to their great surprise.
The hoard includes a collection of gold and silver jewelry, beads, a ring and a pair of unique gold earrings with molded ibexes and wild goats that was likely made in Egypt. “We find about 10 [whole] vessels every year. The only thing that was unusual was that the jug was found inside a bowl. It was put inside a bowl 3,000 years ago and was covered by another bowl and it was put in the corner of a court yard,” archaeologist Eran Arie told The Media Line.
The hoard is one of the largest and most intriguing ever found in Israel. The treasure likely belonged to a wealthy, perhaps royal, family and was found in the layer of settlement dating to 1,100 B.C., about 150 years prior to the Israelite conquest of Canaan, Arie says.
Israel Finkelstein, a professor Tel Aviv University’s Department of Archaeology and Near Eastern Cultures, who has been digging at Megiddo for nearly two decades, says the jug was discovered in the remains of a private home in the northern part of the site. It was dated to a period called Iron I.
The ancient city of Megiddo lies on the western border of the Jezreel Valley and had dozens of layers of civilization. It is mentioned repeatedly in Egyptian chronicles and was a major city during the era of the biblical Jewish kings. Christian prophecy holds that it is Armageddon, the site of the final battle between good and evil.
It’s another fascinating find from a unique archaeological site. Tel Megiddo was an important Canaanite city-state until the early 10th century B.C.E. and a pivotal center of the Northern Kingdom of Israel in the following centuries. It is a multi-layered site comprising clearly differentiated time periods.
In this time period there are 10 or 11 strata well-dated through radiocarbon analysis. “Such a sequence of radiocarbon dates doesn’t exist anywhere else in the region,” says Finkelstein.
The hoard contained nine pairs of lunette [moon-shaped] earrings of common Canaanite origin made out of gold and a gold ring with a seal. There were also over one thousand beads made from semi-precious carnelian, which was frequently used in the making of Egyptian jewellery in the same period. It also contained a number of silver jewellery pieces.
Arie was supervising the area where the jug was found. He says the layer his team was excavating had gone through a conflagration, or destruction, perhaps connected to the treasure.
“Maybe somebody knew that the family had this kind of hoard and they were looking for it and when they didn’t find it they set it all on fire,” Arie speculates. “It was not hidden under the floor, but on the floor. So the people didn’t know that they were going to perish. It was probably hidden by some kind of organic material, sacks, textile, leaves something that we didn’t find.”
He says an examination of the jewelry showed that some of it had originated from a different period. “Probably part of it was stolen or robbed from an earlier strata. Or some of it may have been heirloom,” he says.
“What was unique in this hoard is that it contained gold and silver jewelry together. This is exactly the period that the Egyptians are not here anymore,” he adds.
At the time this was going on Israelites began to appear in the central mountains and Philistines in the coastal plane. But Megiddo remained a strong Canaanite city well into the Israelite period.
Arie says the source of the silver was to the north, while the gold came from Egypt in the south. The mixture of the silver and gold jewelry can be seen as evidence of the waning Egyptian influence on the area.
“The hoard itself showed that they knew of and still appreciated the Egyptian style,” he says.
A suicide bomber dressed in a military uniform killed at least 47 soldiers Monday at the central security headquarters in Yemen, two intelligence officials said.The soldiers were preparing for Tuesday’s National Day of Unification ceremonies when they were attacked in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. The blast wounded 36 other soldiers, the officials said.The day celebrates the union of South Yemen and North Yemen on May 22, 1990, to form Yemen.
The attack took place about 200 meters (218 yards) away from the presidential palace.”We heard a massive explosion. Minutes later, there were so many emergency vehicles, it seems as if hundreds were injured,” said resident Ali al-Husseini, who was near the attack.The defense ministry said the defense minister was at the scene of the attack but escaped unharmed. The country’s chief of staff, Ahmed al-Ashwal, was also present.No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.Last week, al-Qaeda’s leader called for the Yemeni people to rise up against the country’s new president, portraying him as the stooge of the unpopular former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, and the United States.”So, Ali Abdallah Saleh is gone, and his successor Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi has taken over,” al Qaeda’s chief commander Ayman al-Zawahiri said in a video posted on jihadist forums.Saleh, who led Yemen for 30 years, relinquished power last year after an extended popular uprising in a transition agreement that was supported by the United States. But because Hadi was Saleh’s vice president, al-Qaeda has exploited the connection to stir resentment against the new government.Last year, Ansaar al-Sharia, an offshoot of al Qaeda, took over the majority of districts in the southern Abyan province, benefiting from the political turmoil in the country. Numerous military bases were evacuated, making it easier for the militants groups to grow in power and territory.On Sunday, fierce clashes between government troops and al Qaeda fighters left 21 people dead, two local security officials said.The officials said the violence erupted when hundreds of troops attempted to sweep through areas around the district of Jaar, the main stronghold for al Qaeda in Abyan province.Al Qaeda fighters fought back, kicking off clashes that continued for nine hours, the officials said. Fourteen militants and seven troops were killed in the fighting, they said.
[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit, for research and/or educational purposes. This constitutes 'FAIR USE' of any such copyrighted material.]
Strong Italy quake kills at least six
by Staff Writers
Ferrara, Italy (AFP) May 20, 2012
Dazed and angry residents count losses of Italy quake San Carlo, Italy (AFP) May 20, 2012 – Thousands of residents in towns around the northeast Italian city of Ferrara wandered in a daze Sunday amid the stench of gas leaks as aftershocks hit the region after a deadly quake.”I felt the house dancing around. It was chaos. We ran in all directions,” said Claudio Bignami, 68, a retired electrician in the town of San Carlo.”The furniture all fell over. There was broken glass everywhere,” said Bignami, as he stared out of his store at a collapsing restaurant in front.”We’re all trying to help each other out now,” he said.Small aftershocks continued to sow panic in the sparsely populated farmlands, industrial parks and small towns around the historic city of Ferrara even after the main 6.0-magnitude shock in the early hours of the morning that left at least six dead.
Cracks were visible in the roads and chimneys and roof tiles littered the streets. At a nearby ceramic factory where two employees died, the crashing sounds of falling crates of tiles could still be heard long after the quake.
Alda Bregoli, 73, was still in her nightshirt with a woollen jumper thrown on top standing under an umbrella in the rain.
“I had to run out as quickly as possible. I didn’t have time to put anything on. The firemen told me I can’t go back in. I’m scared,” she said.
Out of habit, many residents crowded around shuttered bars where they would usually go on a Sunday and looked for emergency workers, asking them to inspect the damage in their homes and worried about where they could stay the night.
Local business owners began calculating the extent of the damage.
One angry man in a baseball cap living in an isolated home in the countryside, still under shock, shouted: “Why are there no emergency workers here helping me? The roof of my house has fallen in! Why are they ignoring me?”
The earthquake left many of the region’s modern two-storey homes intact but older buildings, ancient churches and belltowers which dot the flatlands were badly hit — some collapsed, others had gaping cracks.
The centre of Ferrara is classified as a UNESCO World Heritage site.
A local chapel in San Carlo, the 16th-century Ghisilieri Oratorium, which had just been re-opened after an eight-year restoration, lay in ruins.
“We’ll never be able to rebuild it,” sighed Claudio Fabbri, 37, an architect from Modena who has been working on the project and who rushed to the scene in the early hours after a local resident told him what had happened.
Statues of angels in the chapel’s apse stared into the open sky after the roof and most of the walls caved in. Fabbri said his only hope was to save a precious painting above the altar now exposed to the elements.
“We even had an Internet campaign to raise funds to restore the terracotta flooring. A lot of local residents contributed,” said Fabbri, shaking his head.
“It was a very rich church. During the restoration we uncovered a 16th-century fresco in the ceiling. It even has the relics of a pope.”
A powerful earthquake shook Italy’s densely populated industrial northeast early Sunday, killing at least six people and reducing homes, factories and historic buildings to rubble.
Emergency services said dozens had been injured in the magnitude 6.0 quake, which struck in the middle of the night, sending thousands of people running into the streets in towns and cities across the Emilia Romagna region.
Prime Minister Mario Monti was to return early from the United States, where he was attending a NATO summit, as Italy reeled from the double shock of the quake and a deadly school attack that took place on Saturday.
Emergency workers were sifting through the rubble of collapsed buildings for victims hours after the quake and several aftershocks struck at 0200 GMT.
European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso expressed his “profound sadness” and said Brussels was “ready to provide swiftly any assistance that may be requested.”
Four of the dead were night-shift workers in factories which collapsed, including two who were crushed when the roof of a ceramics factory caved in in the town of Sant’Agostino.
A 37-year-old German woman and another woman aged over 100 reportedly died from shock.
The quake caused “significant” damage to historic buildings as it rattled the cities of Bologna, Ferrara, Verona and Mantua, Italy’s culture ministry said.
“According to first reports, damage to the cultural heritage is significant,” the ministry said, adding that it was carrying out “more detailed verifications with firemen and the civil defence service.”
Italian television showed many historic buildings, including churches, reduced to rubble. Cars were crushed under falling masonry, and the Civil Protection Agency evacuated hundreds of elderly and vulnerable people to makeshift communal shelters in Finale Emilia and towns near the epicentre.
Hospitals were evacuated as a precautionary measure and about 3,000 people have been evacuated from their homes.
Warehouses storing more than 300,000 wheels of Parmesan and Grana Padano, a similar cheese, with an estimated value of more than 250 million euros ($320 million), also collapsed, an industry official said.
The roof of a recently renovated sixth-century chapel in San Carlo, near Ferrara, caved in, exposing statues of angels to the elements.
Claudio Fabbri, a 37-year-old architect, told AFP the restoration had taken eight years. “Now there’s nothing left to do,” he said despondently.
People were out in the street, fearful of going indoors, as the odour of gas hung in the air.
Retired electrician Claudio Bignami, 68, said: “I went out because I felt the house moving. Furniture was falling over. It was chaos. Everyone was running in every direction.”
Aldra Bregoli, 73, who had pulled on a sweater over her nightgown, said: “I had to get out quickly. I can’t go back home. I’m afraid.”
Authorities said the quake’s epicentre was the commune of Finale Emilia, 36 kilometres (22 miles) north of Bologna, at a depth of only 5.1 kilometres.
One of the men killed in the ceramics factory collapse, Nicola Cavicchi, 35, “wanted to go to the seaside but because of the bad weather forecast he decided to go to work to replace a colleague who was sick,” a family member told local media.
A 29-year-old Moroccan man was killed by a falling girder when a factory building collapsed in the small town of Ponte Rodoni di Bondeno.
The body of a fourth night-shift worker was found in the early afternoon under fallen masonry at a factory in a nearby village.
In Finale Emilia, firefighters rescued a five-year-old girl who was trapped in the rubble of her house after a rapid series of phone calls between a local woman, a family friend who was in New York and emergency services.
The region shaken by the quake is Italy’s industrial heartland but also home to priceless architectural and art treasures. The historic centre of Ferrara is classified as a UNESCO World Heritage site.
A 5.1 magnitude aftershock struck Sunday afternoon, forcing the collapse of several structures already weakened, with a firefighter left seriously injured after falling from a wall.
Yet in a show of calm nerves, officials opened polls as planned for the second round of local elections in the cities of Piacenza, Parma, Budrio and Comacchio.
“Italy is a very quake-prone country,” said seismologist Enzo Boschi.
In March 2009, a 6.3 magnitude quake devastated the central city of l’Aquila, killing some 300 people and leaving tens of thousands homeless.
A strong earthquake shook northern Italy early on Sunday, killing at least four people, toppling buildings and sending residents running into the streets, emergency services and news reports said. The magnitude-6.0 temblor struck at 4:04 a.m. (2:04 GMT) on Sunday between Modena and Mantova, about 35 kilometers (22 miles) north-northwest of Bologna at a relatively shallow depth of 5 kilometers (3.2 miles), the US Geological Survey said. It was one of the strongest quakes to shake the region.
A magnitude-6.0 earthquake shook northern Italy early Sunday, killing at least three people and toppling some buildings, emergency services and news reports said.The quake struck at 4:04 a.m. Sunday between Modena and Mantova, about 22 miles north-northwest of Bologna at a relatively shallow depth of 6 miles, the U.S. Geological Survey said.It was one of the strongest quakes to shake the region, seismologists said, and initial television footage indicated that older buildings had suffered damage: roofs collapsed, church towers showed cracks and the bricks of some stone walls tumbled into the street. As dawn broke over the region, residents milled about the streets inspecting the damage.Italian news agency ANSA, citing emergency services, said two people were killed in Sant’Agostino di Ferrara when a ceramics factory collapsed. Another person was killed in Ponte Rodoni do Bondeno, ANSA said.The epicenter was between the towns of Finale Emilia, San Felice sul Panaro and Sermide but was felt as far away as Tuscany and northern Alto Adige.The initial quake was followed about an hour later by a 5.1-magnitude temblor, USGS said.IItaly’s Sky TG24 showed images of the collapsed ceramics factory where the two workers were reportedly killed; the structure, which appeared to be a hangar of sorts, had twisted metal supports jutting out at odd angles amid the mangled collapsed roof.In late January, a 5.4-magnitude quake shook northern Italy. Some office buildings in Milan were evacuated as a precaution and there were scattered reports of falling masonry and cracks in buildings.In 2009, a devastating temblor killed more than 300 people in the central city of L’Aquila.
Japan was hit by two shallow earthquakes in the space of just eight minutes on Sunday, one of them measuring a strong 6.2-magnitude, but there were no reports of damage and no tsunami alert.
The 6.2-magnitude quake struck at 4:20pm (0720 GMT) off Japan’s northeast Pacific coast, the national meteorological agency said, followed by a tremor with a reading of 5.7 at 4:28pm.
The US Geological Survey estimated the magnitude of the first quake at 6.0.
The depth of both quakes was about 10 kilometres, the agency said.
“Sea levels may change slightly due to the (first) earthquake but there is no fear of damage resulting from it,” the agency said in a statement.
A 9.0-magnitude undersea earthquake off the same coast triggered a monster tsunami on March 11 last year, leaving about 19,000 people dead or missing and crippling the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
Christchurch has been rocked by a 4.8 magnitude earthquake on Sunday evening.
It follows a 4.1 magnitude quake four point one quake at 9.35am on Sunday.
The 4.8 quake was centred 20 kilometres east of Christchurch at a depth of eight kilometres and struck at 5.06pm.
The shaking lasted several seconds but so far there have been no reports of damage or injuries.
The chief executive of the electricity lines company, Orion, says there have been no reports of power outages.
Sunday morning’s quake measured 4.1 and was centred 20 kilometres west of Christchurch at a depth of 10km.
The regularity and strength of earthquakes has continued to subside since the quakes felt just before Christmas which produced power outages and fresh liquefaction.
A small glacial burst occurred in the volcano Katla, which lies underneath the Mýrdalsjökull icecap in south Iceland, on April 28 and lasted a few days. The activity was registered by seismic monitors and increased conduction was measured in the river Múlakvísl until May 7.
Mýrdalsjökull. Photo by Páll Stefánsson.
Last summer a large glacial burst, probably caused by a minor eruption in Katla, caused the river to swell and tear a hole in the Ring Road, right at the height of the tourism season in early July.
Oddur Sigurðsson, a geologist at the Icelandic Meteorological Office, told visir.is that the glacial burst in late April was so insignificant that it couldn’t be detected by the naked eye.
Oddur explained that it was caused by geothermal activity in one of Katla’s craters.
Volcano enthusiast and blogger Jón Frímann Jónsson reported on two events in Katla, on April 28 and May 6 or 7, and considers them to be warning signals: something is happening in the volcano, he predicts.
He also commented on the recent series of earthquakes which hit Herðubreið in the northeastern highlands early this week.
Significant activity at the volcano east of San José has caught the attention of local volcanologists.
National Seismological Network volcanologists are keeping an eye on Turruialba Volcano, which they say could erupt soon. Courtesy of RSN
Costa Rica’s National Seismological Network has upgraded the color threat level to yellow of Turrialba Volcano, in the province of Cartago east of the capital.
A statement issued by Raúl Mora-Amador, coordinator of Seismology, Volcanology and Geophysical Exploration at the University of Costa Rica, indicates a threat level of yellow means that the National Seismological Network believes an eruption is “probable” in a matter of days, weeks or a few months.
The upgrade in the threat level is due to “important changes in seismic activity of Volcano Turrialba associated with the movement of fluids, gas and magma beneath the surface, different from that observed in past years,” Mora-Amador’s statement says.
Temperatures around some fumaroles on the volcano have risen to as much as 800° Celsius, accompanied by eruptions of ash. High-temperature emissions of volcanic gases including sulfur dioxide have increased, causing incandescence in some of the fumaroles, Mora-Amador said, adding that the internal wall of the active crater is very weak due to hydrothermal changes in the volcano. Mora-Amador indicated this could mean a major eruption could jettison material into the atmosphere.
Turrialba is the only volcano in the country currently with a yellow threat-level indicator. An upgrade to red would mean an eruptions is imminent.
Flood waters ravaged a provincial capital in northern Afghanistan, killing at least 19 people and destroying hundreds of homes, officials said Sunday.About 60 other people were missing and rescuers were looking for them across Sar-e-Pul, the capital of a province with the same name, said Sayed Faizullah Sadat, the national disaster director in the area.Northern Afghanistan gets hit nearly every spring by flash flooding from heavy rains and snow melting off the mountains.
Sadat said 1,000 houses were destroyed and 10,000 people were forced to find shelter in mosques, schools and a teacher-training center.”Most of these families have lost their houses — all their property, their livelihoods,” he said.
According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance, the water rose to 1.5 meters on Saturday during the peak of the flooding.The office said four humanitarian assessment teams tried to get to the city on Saturday, but could not access the area.”Most of the roads are blocked by the flooding,” said Sayed Jahangir, deputy provincial police chief. “Hundreds of houses have been destroyed. We were able to move people to different places that we think will be safe.”The Afghanistan National Disaster Management Authority reported that several hundred people were rescued from rooftops.Flash flooding also has been reported in northern Takhar province.Mustafa Rasouli, a spokesman for the province, said heavy rains continued Sunday in the area where flash flooding killed two people. He said 3,000 animals, including sheep and cows also were killed, and about 1,000 hectares of farm land had been destroyed in the provincial capital of Taloqan and six other districts.”Two thousand houses have been partially or completely destroyed,” he said.
Black substance five times more radioactive than Chernobyl-Belarus mandatory exculsion zone
[Photo-Image: Radioactive mystery black substance discovered in different locations in Tokyo, photo source, Fukushima Diary]
A mysterious black substance five times more radioactive than the Chernobyl-Belarus mandatory evacuation zone was discovered 4 kilometers from the center of Tokyo, the Hirai Station. The mystery radioactive black substance discovered close to Tokyo on the heels of the discovery of Cesium in Fukushima Prefecture 122 times higher than in Belarus evacuation zone.
[Image: Google Earth map location of Japan's Hirai Station]
The Belarus exclusion zone, a 30-mile now wilderness area around the Chernobyl plant. Tokyo is located more than 241 kilometers from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant with four nuclear reactors in “dire” condition according to physicist Dr. Michio Kaku.
Flashpoint interview with Dr. Kaku:
………“People don’t realize that the Fukushima reactor is on a knife’s edge; it’s near the tipping point. A small earthquake, another pipe break, another explosion could tip it over and we could have a disaster much worse, many times worse than Chernobyl. It’s like a sleeping dragon………
According to a new article posted by the Asia-Pacific Journal, Japan Focus, After The Media Has Gone: Fukushima, Suicide and the Legacy of 3.11, there has been a continuous leakage of radioactive waste water into the Pacific Ocean, radioactive waste water that includes strontium-90, and, the dire claim Fukushima’s radioactive waste water “contamination will spread all over the world, reaching to Kamchatka, Hawaii and the U.S. soon”.
Possibly angry at this situation, on April 21st a 62-year-old nuclear worker broke the silence on the continued leakage of contaminated water from Fukushima Daiichi. Speaking to me, he requested anonymity for fear of losing his job. He supervises a construction site aimed at building a new facility to extract radioactive materials such as cesium and strontium from the contaminated water used to cool the plant’s crippled reactors. He revealed that the current facility removes only cesium and that other radioactive materials such as strontium cannot be cleaned up.
He expressed astonishment at the scale of the cleanup operation. “You know how much contaminated water is stored at the Fukushima Daiichi site? It is 200,000 tons. It is an enormous amount!” “In reality,” he said, raising his voice, “it is impossible to store that much water on site. So, it is obvious that some of the contaminated water has been leaked into the ocean.”
TEPCO announced on March 26th, 2012 that approximately 120 tons of water had leaked from a treatment pipe, forcing them to halt operating the treatment facility. Thi was the second time in two weeks that contaminated water leaked from the nuclear power plant.3
Concern mounts over Fukushima nuclear reactor number four
[Photo-Image: Water vapor containing radiation swirls around damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors, May 2, 2012. Photo image source: Fukushima live stream web cam video]
“Nearly all of the 10,893 spent fuel assemblies at the Fukushima Daiichi plant sit in pools vulnerable to future earthquakes, with roughly 85 times more long-lived radioactivity than released at Chernobyl.”
-April 30, 2012, Urgent letter to UN General Secretary
In post-March 11, 2011 (311) Japan a small, makeshift wall constructed of ‘bags of rock’ is the sole protection from a future tsunami at the Fuksuhima Nuclear Power Plant Number One; bags of rock to protect four severely damaged nuclear reactors including reactor number four still in disrepair after the 311 magnitude 9.0 earthquake and devastating tsunami. Located in nuclear reactor number four, spent nuclear fuel–Cesium-137 (Cs-137)–equivalent to 10 times the amount that was released at the time of the Chernobyl nuclear accident.
Post 311, a surreal world of mysterious black ‘dust’ discovered in different locations in Japan and fog-like clouds swirling around the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Number One. Detected in the mysterious black dust, plutonium. The fog-like clouds, radioactive water vapor. Hidden from eyesight in the radioactive water vapor fog, mixed Plutonium Uranium fuel scattered around Fukushima nuclear reactor number three.
The report on the radioactive water vapor from the Japan website Fukushima Diary:
Oshidori Mako talked at Osaka Bar Association when she asked Tepco , “We see gas coming out from Fukushima plants at night. It looks like smoke. What is that ? ” Tepco replied it’s water vapor. She asked them again, if it’s radioactive. They answered it is radioactive, and it comes out in day time and night time.
2012.05.02 01:00-02:00 (Live Fukushima Nuclear Plant Cam) Video
A Special Report On the Fukushima Nuclear Catastrophe
Radioactive Seawater Impact Map (March 2012), US Dept of State Geographer Image
The upshot of each of the preceding articles is that the Pacific Ocean is extremely vulnerable to the radioactive waste being dumped into her waters at Fukushima. Should another catastrophic earthquake occur, it could create a new and more complicated nuclear disaster scenario that is truly irreparable. Even without any seismic activity affecting the nuclear sites, the current state of affairs has taken for granted that the Pacific Ocean will become a nuclear dumping ground for decades to come. It has not been lost on us that such an inevitability appears to be the only practical expedient available.
We are truly saddened by the great loss of marine life and harm to myriad aquatic and shoreline ecosystems. As the nuclear radiation is exported around the Asian Ring of Fire, genetic mutation will begin to affect every form of life — from phytoplankton to whales, from seabirds to mangroves, from dolphins to krill. Everything that lives near the Pacific will be at risk to some degree. Anyone who lives, works or plays in or around the Pacific will be compelled to evaluate their relationship to this great ocean.
What have we done to Mother Earth by siting nuclear power plants in the most seismically active region of the world?!
What in God’s Creation can possibly be done to fix it?
Never in the history of humankind has the planet been confronted with such a grave set of circumstances. Fukushima represents all that can go wrong when scientific applications and technological advancement within a crude industrial context have gone awry. Unfortunately, given the many trajectories that numerous fields of technological innovation are currently on, Fukushima and the BP Gulf oil spill of 2012 may only be the beginning of a period of accelerating technospheric breakdown which will sweep across the planet. Read Full Article Here
An as yet undiscovered planet might be orbiting at the dark fringes of the solar system, according to new research.
Too far out to be easily spotted by telescopes, the potential unseen planet appears to be making its presence felt by disturbing the orbits of so-called Kuiper belt objects, said Rodney Gomes, an astronomer at the National Observatory of Brazil in Rio de Janeiro.
Kuiper belt objects are small icy bodies—including some dwarf planets—that lie beyond the orbit of Neptune.
Once considered the ninth planet in our system, the dwarf planet Pluto, for example, is one of the largest Kuiper belt objects, at about 1,400 miles (2,300 kilometers) wide. Dozens of the other objects are hundreds of miles across, and more are being discovered every year.
What’s intriguing, Gomes said, is that, according to his new calculations, about a half dozen Kuiper belt objects—including the remote body known as Sedna—are in strange orbits compared to where they should be, based on existing solar system models. (Related: “Pluto Neighbor Gets Downsized.”)
The objects’ unexpected orbits have a few possible explanations, said Gomes, who presented his findings Tuesday at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Timberline Lodge, Oregon.
“But I think the easiest one is a planetary-mass solar companion”—a planet that orbits very far out from the sun but that’s massive enough to be having gravitational effects on Kuiper belt objects.
[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit, for research and/or educational purposes. This constitutes 'FAIR USE' of any such copyrighted material.]
MessageToEagle.com – Mathematicians have discovered a new way to crinkle up the fabric of space-time, at least in theory.
MessageToEagle.com – Some years ago, back in, 2005, over the slopes of Mount Gongga, China all rocks suddenly turned red.
Microscopic view of Trentepohlia jolithus. Image credit: PLoS One
MessageToEagle.com – The Sun and its system of planets formed about five billion years ago and the Universe itself was born about 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang.
Now you don’t see it; now you do – the image of a galaxy from a time when the universe was only a billion years old. The left image, from Hubble, sees nothing in the sky, but the longer wavelength infrared image from Spitzer (right) sees a bright source. The intense star formation activity in the galaxy, its distance, and the expansion of the universe combine to make it appear in the infrared. Credit: K. Caputi
Under attack by ticks, parasites and wolves, the moose’s status as an icon of Minnesota’s North Woods is rapidly ending. Photo by J. Gelineau, courtesy of University of Minnesota, Duluth.
