Earth ChangesS


Attention

Zimbabwean hunter trampled to death by elephant


news24.com
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 16:46 UTC
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Hey, that's one less hunter to contend with
A Zimbabwean professional hunter was killed by a bull elephant in the north of the country, his company said on Thursday.

Ian Gibson was killed on Wednesday by the elephant he was tracking with a client in the lower Zambezi Valley, Chifuti Safaris said in a statement posted to the africahunting.com website.

The bull charged Gibson from a distance of less than 100m, the statement said.

"Feeling he was quite close to the elephant, Ian and his tracker Robert continued to follow the tracks in the hopes of getting a look at the ivory," Chifuti Safaris said.

"They eventually caught up to the bull, spotting him at about 50m-100m. The bull instantly turned and began a full charge.
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Cloud Precipitation

At least 4 passengers dead after bus is swept away by floods near Mandera, Kenya

Lucas Barasa
Daily Nation (Kenya)
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 14:46 UTC
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Passengers atop a bus that was swept away by flash floods as it tried to cross a seasonal river at Gadudia in Mandera County on April 16, 2015.
At least four passengers were killed while more than 20 remained unaccounted for after floods swept away a bus in Mandera on Thursday.

County Commissioner Alex ole Nkoyo, who confirmed the four deaths, said rescuers were still searching for more bodies along the river where the incident occurred.

The bus, Mr Nkoyo said, had 59 passengers with an unknown number of children when it was rummaged by the fierce waters. Only 42 passengers had been rescued by around 5pm, Mr Nkoyo said.

There were fears that the number of those killed following the floods could rise as signs of more passengers being rescued faded as darkness neared.
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Bizarro Earth

Billions of barrel jellyfish appear in coastal waters off Cornwall, UK

Ben Spencer
Daily Mail
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 07:55 UTC
jellyfish devon, jellyfish cornwall
Making waves: Billions of barrel jellyfish have been spotted in water off the coast of Devon and Cornwall
This week's warm weather may have tempted you to take a dip in the UK's usually chilly waters.

And if you had, you wouldn't have been the only one swimming around the coastline.

Billions of jellyfish have appeared in our waters, apparently attracted by the higher sea temperatures.

Hundreds of the barrel jellyfish - each the size of a dustbin lid - have been hauled in by fishermen on the Devon and Cornish coast, with dozens of sightings reported to the authorities.

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Question

Huge power outage strikes Macau


Macau Business Daily
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 14:34 UTC
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© XinhuaA sign at a Macau bank notifying business interruption due the power failure.
A massive power outage, triggered by malfunctioning electrical substations, hit Macau yesterday, paralysing fixed-line telephones, traffic lights and elevator services, said the government. Banking services in the affected areas were also briefly suspended before electricity supplies were restored at noon. Some shops were temporarily closed due to the incident as well.

The city's sole electricity supplier CEM - Companhia de Electricidade de Macau - said at 10:56am yesterday morning that a malfunction of the 110kV high-voltage equipment in the Canal dos Patos substation subsequently affected four primary substations including S. Paulo, D. Maria, Porto Exterior and Ariea Preta substations.

Extensive areas in Macau Peninsula were affected, with 100,000 customers on the Macau Peninsula and some customers in Taipa, Coloane and the University of Macau encountering voltage dips caused by the incident. The power supply was fully restored at 12:20pm according to CEM.
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Pistol

Unofficially it's 365 rhino killed already in South Africa this year

Kevin Heath
wildlifenews.co.uk
Fri, 17 Apr 2015 13:50 UTC
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Rhino drinking
With officials figures hard to come by and a change from regular monthly reports to 'quarterly or so' reports its difficult to find out the current situation on rhino poaching in South Africa. Even with reports and statistics now being published on a quarterly basis the South African government is still finding excuses not to publish the figures.

This is so with the first set of rhino poaching statistics due to be published for 2015. The press conference and publication due today has been postponed because the departments that were to be involved in the press conference had 'timetable clashes'.

With a current investigation going on that will probably lead to South Africa asking for a legal rhino horn trade market at next years CITES meeting it is obviously beneficial to cloud the waters where the scale of the poaching epidemic is concerned.

With official figures hard to come by then unofficial reports need to be used as an indication about the effectiveness of anti-poaching activities.

One of the unofficial statistics compiled on rhino poaching in South Africa is put together by OSCAP (Outraged Citizen Against Rhino Poaching) who have their own system in place to monitor rhino deaths and court cases.
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Arrow Down

No big surprise: Bird populations around Fukushima plummet after nuclear disaster

Catherine Griffiin
scienceworldreport.com
Thu, 16 Apr 2015 13:39 UTC
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© Flickr.com/Jun TaramotoScientists have taken a closer look at bird populations and have found that since the March 11 earthquake, which caused the nuclear catastrophe, bird populations have plummeted.
Bird populations may have declined to a large extent in Japan's Fukushima province due to the disaster that occurred there in 2011. Scientists have taken a closer look at bird populations and have found that since the March 11 earthquake, which caused the nuclear catastrophe, bird populations have plummeted.

"We were working with a relatively small range of background exposures in this study because we weren't able to get into the 'hottest' areas that first summer after the disaster, and we were only able to get to some 'meium-hot' areas the following summer," said Tim Mousseau, one of the researchers, in a news release. "So we had relatively little statistical power to detect those kinds of relationships, especially when you combine that with the fact that there are so few barn swallows left. We know that there were hundreds in a given area before the disaster, and just a couple of years later we're only able to find a few dozen left. The declines have been really dramatic."

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© Alpsdake/Wikimedia CommonsBarn Swallow (Hirundo rustica gutturalis) in Japan
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Phoenix

Haunting video: Ash rains down on cars fleeing wildfire inferno in Russia


RT
Wed, 15 Apr 2015 08:03 UTC
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A haunting video emerged online of a wildfire trapping residents in eastern Siberia as they try to flee in their cars. The blaze surrounds the vehicles and what looks like volcanic ash rains down on them.


The grassland fire in Zabaykalskiy region, Russia, bordering Mongolia, has been raging since March 19, displacing people from over 1,200 dwellings in 20 separate towns and villages. Fifteen people have been killed and over 480 people injured.

A total of 22 districts in the Zabaykalskiy region have been affected, with some 93 fires there alone affecting natural reserves, according to local authorities.

All emergency situation procedures are still in place.

Comment:
Russian President Vladimir Putin had personally coordinated emergency services operations in Khakassia:


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Fish

Fish kills reported due to bitterly cold winter in Pennsylvania

Alicia Nieves
wnep.com
Tue, 14 Apr 2015 09:32 UTC
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Dead fish
Evidence of how brutal this winter was is showing up at ponds in Pennsylvania, including one in Luzerne County.

Pennsylvania's Fish and Boat Commission says the bitterly cold winter killed off nearly the entire fish population at Harris Pond in Sweet Valley. Harris Pond is a popular fishing spot for those who live in and around the Sweet Valley area of Luzerne County.

"That's bad. That's terrible. A lot of people fish in there. The public fishes there a lot," said John Kobal of Sweet Valley.

Hundreds of dead fish have already been cleared from the pond, but if you walk along the water's edge more are still surfacing.

Harris Pond isn't the only place dealing with dead fish.
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Black Cat

Man fights off cougar to save girlfriend's large dog in Priddis, Canada

Clara Ho
National Post
Wed, 15 Apr 2015 09:19 UTC
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Elvis Xerri and Boomer
Elvis Xerri is nursing a few bruises after fighting off a cougar that attacked his girlfriend's dog on his acreage southwest of Calgary early Monday — but acknowledges his injuries could have been a lot worse.

"It scared the crap out of me. I can't believe I did that," Xerri said. "Would I do it again? For sure, because I wouldn't want to be a bystander. Was it smart? Probably not the smartest thing I've ever done."

Xerri said he and his girlfriend Jacqui were asleep at his property in Priddis. Boomer, Jacqui's nine-year-old Bernese mountain dog, was dozing outside below their open bedroom window with the exterior lights on.

All of a sudden, at around 3 a.m., Xerri awoke to Boomer's yelps and jumped to action wearing only his underwear.

"I was thinking it was a coyote attacking him. But it was the largest cougar I've ever seen, on top of the dog," he said, estimating the animal to be about five feet long.

Adrenalin kicked in and Xerri found himself jumping on top of the big cat, startling it and grabbing its scruff.
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Attention

Two earthquakes (4.8 and 3.8 mag) rock Assam, India within 2 hours

Samudra Gupta Kashyap
Indian Express
Fri, 17 Apr 2015 10:23 UTC
earthquakes in Assam
The Met department put the epicenter at Morigaon and Sonitpur.
Two earthquakes, one measuring 4.8 on the Richter scale and the other 3.8, rocked Assam in a span of about two hours in the early hours of Friday, forcing people to jump out of bed and run outdoors.

While the first tremor, which lasted about seven seconds, was felt at 3:35 AM, it was followed by smaller one at 5:50 AM.

The Met department website put the epicenter of the first earthquake at a place in Sonitpur district at 26.8 N Latitude and 92.7 E Longitude, and that of the second tremor in Morigaon district at 26.3 N Latitude and 92.4 E Longitude. The depth of both the tremors has been put at 10 km.

Geomorphologically located in earthquake zone V of the Indian subcontinent, the Northeastern region is marked as a highly seismic area.

With these, the Northeastern region along with adjoining Bangladesh, Myanmar and Andaman & Nicobar Islands have recorded as many as nine earthquakes in the current month.

Comment: There has been a surge in earthquakes very recently, as Earth continues to 'open up'.

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