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Hawaii: Tourists Saw California Man Fall Into Maui Blow Hole

Jennifer Sinco Kelleher
Associated Press
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 10:00 UTC
Image
© AP Photo/Rocco Piganelli
In this Saturday, July 9, 2011 photo provided and shot by Rocco Piganelli, Piper Piganelli, Marley Meyer, and Maddie Meyer, lower left, pose for a photo Piganelli says was taken moments before a man, in the spray at right, fell to his apparent death in a blow hole at Nakalele Point in Maui, Hawaii. Piganelli, of La Jolla, Calif., told The Associated Press that he watched the man spiral down the blowhole, pop up briefly before disappearing when the next wave hit. The 44-year-old man, identified as David Potts of San Anselmo, Calif., has not been found since Saturday afternoon.
Witnesses who watched a Northern California man get sucked into a Maui blow hole to his apparent death say that the tourist was dancing around and frolicking in the sprays of water moments before a wave knocked him down.

Rocco Piganelli, of La Jolla, Calif., said he stared in horror as he watched a large wave push the tourist into the hole off Nakalele Point on Saturday afternoon. The man popped up briefly with the next wave, then disappeared.
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Life Preserver

Russian boat disaster death toll rises


ABC News
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 19:46 UTC
Russian boat accident
© Reuters/Roman Kruchinin
Expanding search: 29 people are still unaccounted for.
Divers widened their search for 29 remaining missing boat passengers after the death toll in Russia's worst river disaster in three decades reached 100, the country's Emergencies Ministry said overnight.

Officials say 79 of 208 passengers survived the sinking of an ageing, overcrowded tourist boat in the Volga River on Sunday.

The 29 people still unaccounted for are feared dead.

The Bulgaria, a 79-metre river cruiser built in 1955, listed onto its right side during a thunderstorm and sank in minutes in a broad stretch of the Volga in the Tatarstan region, trapping many passengers inside as the vessel sank to the riverbed.

"The bodies of 100 people killed have been extracted," said regional Emergency Situations Ministry official Igor Panshin.
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Heart - Black

US: New York man accused of killing, dismembering boy is "hearing voices"

Aman Ali
Reuters
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 17:23 UTC
Murder suspect Levi Aron
© Reuters/Brendan McDermid
Murder suspect Levi Aron is escorted out of a New York Police Department precinct in Brooklyn, New York, July 14, 2011.

A Brooklyn man who confessed to smothering and dismembering an 8-year-old boy lost on his first walk home alone was ordered on Thursday to undergo a psychiatric evaluation after complaining of "hearing voices."

Levi Aron, 35, pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and kidnapping in state Supreme Court in Brooklyn.

At the request of defense lawyer Pierre Bazile, Judge William Miller place Aron on a suicide watch and ordered him to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.
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Bell

World's Greatest Ongoing Humanitarian Disaster Reaches a Crisis Point

Everett Rosenfeld
TIME
Wed, 13 Jul 2011 19:34 UTC
Somali refugees
© Associated Press/Rebecca Blackwell
Somali refugees lead their herds of goats home for the night, inside Dagahaley Camp, outside Dadaab, Kenya, Sunday, July 10, 2011
With more than 60,000 starving and thirsty Somalis camped outside of the world's largest refugee camp, what some aid agencies deem the world's worst humanitarian crisis is facing its "critical days," according to a UNICEF spokesperson.

Kenya's Dadaab refugee camp, originally constructed to hold 90,000 people - making it the biggest camp in the world - is now home to approximately 400,000 people according to Bettina Schulte, Dadaab spokeswoman of the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR. Well beyond capacity, the camp is drawing thousands upon thousands of drought-fleeing Somalis, many of whom have no choice but to live in even more tenuous circumstances in the environs around the camp. Yearly dry seasons often send inhabitants of the warn-torn country fleeing into neighboring Kenya, but the Horn of Africa's worst drought in 60 years will provoke an even more desperate crisis should the current refugees in eastern Kenya and the 1,400 new ones arriving each day not receive sufficient aid.
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Card - VISA

US: Personal Banking Info Stolen from Phoenix TSA Employees


My Fox 10
Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:09 UTC


Police are looking into the theft of personal financial information at Sky Harbor, and all it took for the information to be stolen was a swipe of their credit or debit cards.

So far FOX 10 has confirmed TSA security screeners have been the targets. Their bank accounts were broken into and drained.

Police say the culprits or culprits may have used a skimmer to take information directly off a credit or debit card. A few dozen employees have already come forward to report problems with their bank accounts.

Flight attendant Tina Coffee is on her way to Tampa. As an airline employee, she spends three to four days in the air and knows all too well the dangers of working at airports.

"We travel all the time so they know that we are the ones to target," she acknowledges.
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Handcuffs

US: Mom Jailed for Raging on TSA Agents Over Daughter's Pat Down; Didn't Want Girl's 'Crotch Grabbed'

Philip Caulfield
New York Daily News
Wed, 13 Jul 2011 10:10 UTC
Image
© handout
Andrea Fornella Abbott, 41, was arrested after she raged on TSA agents at Nashville airport for trying to give her daughter a pat down search.
An overprotective mom's trip from Nashville to Baltimore took a brief detour to the slammer.

Andrea Fornella Abbott, 41, was arrested at Nashville airport after she went wild on Transportation Security Administration agents for trying to give her daughter a pat down search.

Nashville police said Abbot, from Clarksville, Tenn., shouted and swore at TSA agents, saying she didn't want her young daughter to have her "crotch grabbed."

The trouble started on Saturday after Abbott refused to go through the airports body scanning device, The Tennessean reported.

"(Abbott) told me in a very stern voice with quite a bit of attitude that they were not going through that X-ray," security officer Sabrina Birge told police.

Birge said she told Abbott that the machine was "not an X-ray" and "10,000 times" safer than her cell phone.
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Eye 1

China Tried to Play Down Size of Bohai Bay Oil Spill


The Chosun Ilbo
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 14:27 UTC
Bohai Bay, oil spill,china
© CFP
A screen grab from China’s Central Television (CCTV) on July 6, 2011, shows the devastation caused by the oil spill at the Penglai 19-3 oil field in Bohai Bay off China's eastern coast.

The sea area polluted in an oil spill in China's Bohai Bay was five times as large as Beijing previously announced. A probe conducted by the Chinese State Oceanic Administration found that some 4,240 sq.km of water, or seven times the size of Seoul, were polluted by oil leaks from the Peng Lai 19-3 oilfield in Bohai Bay, the daily Xin Jing Bao reported Wednesday.

Beijing admitted the oil spill for the first time on July 5, a month after two oil leaks occurred at China's largest marine oilfield on June 4 and 17, saying only 840 sq.km were polluted. But the water quality of a 3,400 sq.km area nearby dropped from Grade 1 to Grade 3.

China National Offshore Oil Corp. and ConocoPhillips, the joint operators of the oilfield, said the oil spill was quickly contained and cleaned up, but earlier this week Beijing admitted that oil continues to leak out.
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Family

UK: Mother Repeatedly Stabbed Daughter, 11, As Child Cried Out "I Love You"


The Daily Mail, UK
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 12:00 UTC
Image
© Philip Ide
The Old Bailey heard how a nursery worker plunged a large knife into her 11-year-old daughter and stabbed her repeatedly as the little girl cried 'I love you'
A nursery worker plunged a large knife into her 11-year-old daughter and stabbed her repeatedly as the little girl cried 'I love you,' the Old Bailey has heard.

Mid-way through the attack she paused to hug the child who was begging her mother to stop.

But she then resumed the vicious onslaught, stabbing her daughter ten times at the side of a canal.

After the youngster collapsed in St Margaret's Field, Ealing, west London, the 48-year-old woman turned the knife on herself, causing blade wounds to her stomach.

Both survived the ordeal but the girl - who received multiple cut wounds to her hands and arms - has been left with long-lasting injuries and scarring.

She was saved by a ten-hour operation to repair wounds to her abdominal organs.

The woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to attempted murder in August last year, and was detained under the Mental Health Act without limit of time.
      Read More...
People

US: Hundreds scramble for Dallas County rental vouchers


WFAA
Thu, 14 Jul 2011 12:02 UTC
Dallas, Texas - Hundreds of people lined up Thursday morning to apply for Dallas County Section 8 housing vouchers.

The office at the Jesse Owens Memorial Complex wasn't supposed to open until 8 a.m., but some applicants started lining up at 10 o'clock Wednesday night.

Police kept people off school district property until the gates opened at 6 a.m. That resulted in a long string of cars lined up on the streets.

Doors were opened early.

Hundreds of people rushed the line, causing moments of unruliness. But authorities eventually gained control.

Seven people were treated by paramedics. None were taken to the hospital.

The federally-subsidized vouchers pay a portion of the rent, based on household income.

This is the first time in five years that the Dallas County waiting list for vouchers has been open.

Applicants who do get on the list could face a wait of up to two years before receiving assistance.
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Magnify

Many parents are only on Facebook to stalk their kids

Team Register
The Register
Wed, 13 Jul 2011 02:25 UTC
Image
© Debbie Ridpath Ohi
Try to friend offspring without speaking to them

A survey has revealed that fully 30 per cent of British parents' Facebook "friend" requests to their children get rejected, and that many then resort to using other people's login details in order to keep track of their offspring's Web-2.0 activities.

This sad commentary on the number of parents who feel able to speak to their kids as opposed to interacting with them primarily online - it would seem normal to know in advance whether a friend request to one's nipper would be rejected, for instance - came among the results of a survey of 2,000 online Brits.
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