The reaction that occurred brought as much as four-tenths of an inch of rain, the heaviest rainfall this year, helping to "alleviate drought, add soil moisture and remove dust from the air for better air quality," Xinhua said.

Though unusual in many parts of the world, China has been tinkering with artificial rainmaking for decades, using it frequently in the drought-plagued north. Last month, another artificial rainfall was generated to clear Beijing after the city suffered some of the fiercest dust storms this decade.

Whether cloud-seeding actually works has been the subject of debate in the scientific community. In 2003, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences questioned the science behind it as "too weak."

"At this point, it is too early in the investigation to say whether a particular product or solution may be responsible for the outbreak," the Atlanta-based agency said in a statement.

The agency has received a total of 195 reports of eye infections caused by Fusarium keratitis _ of which 12 are "possible cases" and 81 were still under investigation. On Tuesday, the CDC said it had received 191 reports, including 86 confirmed cases.

Fifty-six of the confirmed cases involved contact-lens wearers, with 32 of them saying they used MoistureLoc, 15 saying they used ReNu MultiPlus and seven an unspecified ReNu product. In some cases, patients reporting using more than one type of lens cleaner.

A federal inspection of a Bausch & Lomb factory in Greenville, S.C., where MoistureLoc is made has not turned up evidence of contamination, but extensive microbiological tests could take weeks to analyze.

Without eye-drop treatment, the infection can scar the cornea and blind its victims. At least eight patients have required cornea transplants. Because it's not a disease that doctors must report, it is unclear how many cases occur annually.

Of the more than 30 million Americans who wear contact lenses, about 2.3 million of them use MoistureLoc and nearly 11 million use MultiPlus.

MoistureLoc first hit store shelves in late 2004 and contains new- generation moisturizing and conditioning agents. It generated $45 million in U.S. sales last year.

Bausch & Lomb's shares rose $1.48, or 3.6 percent, in afternoon trading Friday on the New York Stock Exchange, at the low end of their 52-week range of $40.75 to $87.89. They had slumped 15.3 percent over the two previous days as concerns grew that the fungus may be linked to more of the company's lens cleaners.

The men were standing on the frame, working on the building's 26th floor, when the frame gave way, fire Chief Richard Martin said.

The men fell into a thick layer of concrete that was drying on the floor below them, and they became trapped, Martin said.

Search teams were using dogs to look for the missing worker.

The building being constructed will be a combination hotel and condominium, police Capt. Jay Smith said.

Bal Harbour is just north of Miami Beach.

Arinze's appeal came some 10 days after another Vatican cardinal called for a boycott of the film. Both cardinals asserted that other religions would never stand for offences against their beliefs and that Christians should get tough.

"Christians must not just sit back and say it is enough for us to forgive and to forget," Arinze said in the documentary made by Rome film maker Mario Biasetti for Rome Reports, a Catholic film agency specializing in religious affairs.

"Sometimes it is our duty to do something practical. So it is not I who will tell all Christians what to do but some know legal means which can be taken in order to get the other person to respect the rights of others," Arinze said.

"This is one of the fundamental human rights: that we should be respected, our religious beliefs respected, and our founder Jesus Christ respected," he said, without elaborating on what legal means he had in mind.

A transcript of the documentary, due to be screened in Rome later this month just before the release of the film version of the best-selling book at the Cannes Film Festival, was made available to Reuters.

The book, written by Dan Brown, has sold more than 40 million copies.

The novel is an international murder mystery centered on attempts to uncover a secret about the life of Christ that a clandestine society has tried to protect for centuries.

The central tenet of the book is that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had children.

BLASPHEMY

"Those who blaspheme Christ and get away with it are exploiting the Christian readiness to forgive and to love even those who insult us. There are some other religions which if you insult their founder they will not be just talking. They will make it painfully clear to you," Arinze said.

This appeared to be a reference to protests by Muslims around the world over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad.

Last month, another broadside against "The Da Vinci Code" was launched by Archbishop Angelo Amato, the number two official in the Vatican doctrinal office which was headed by Pope Benedict until his election last year.

Amato urged a boycott of the film and Arinze, like his fellow cardinal, also blasted the credibility of the book.

"'The Da Vinci Code' presents (Christianity) wrongly ... any film produced on the basis of that book is already in error from the word go, no matter how interesting it might appear," Arinze said.

Catholic group Opus Dei has told Sony Pictures that putting a disclaimer on the movie stressing it is a work of fiction would be a welcome show of respect toward the Church.

In the novel and film, Opus Dei is characterized as the latest in a series of secretive groups that worked over the centuries to obscure truths about Jesus Christ.

Opus Dei is a controversial conservative Church group whose members are mostly non-clerics and are urged to seek holiness in their everyday professional jobs and lives. It has rejected criticisms that it is secretive and elitist.

The movie, which is being released by Sony Pictures division Columbia Pictures, stars Tom Hanks. Sony Pictures is the media wing of Japanese electronics giant Sony Corp.

"Evidence suggests that meteors and their well-known effects, and possibly some other less-known effects, are responsible for some unidentified aerial phenomena.

"Considerable evidence exists to support the thesis that the events are almost certainly attributable to physical, electrical and magnetic phenomena in the atmosphere, mesosphere and ionosphere," it said.

A Ministry of Defense (MOD) spokesman said the full report, "Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in the UK Air Defense Region," would be published on its Web site on May 15.

The ministry publishes annual lists of UFO sightings on its Web site, which rank among its most viewed -- and bizarre -- pages.

In 2005 the ministry was asked under freedom of information laws for details of its plans for "dealing with the arrival of extra-terrestrials."

An unnamed defense official replied: "While we remain open-minded, to date the MOD knows of no evidence which substantiates the existence of these alleged phenomena and therefore has no plans for dealing with such a situation."

The city of Penglai had been soaked by two days of rain before the rare weather phenomenon occurred.

The mirage took place during the week-long Labor Day holiday. The small city received over 30,000 tourists on Sunday.

Experts said that many mirages have been recorded in Penglai, on the tip of Shandong Peninsula, throughout history, which made it known as a dwelling place of the gods.

They explained that a mirage is formed when moisture in the air becomes warmer than the temperature of sea water, which refracts rays of sunlight to create reflections of the landscape in the sky.