Earth ChangesS


Attention

Student gored by bison in Yellowstone Park


news.yahoo.com
Sun, 17 May 2015 11:46 UTC
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© Salvatore WugangeCharging bison
A 16-year-old girl has been gored by a bison in Yellowstone National Park while posing for a picture near the animal.

The National Park Service says the unidentified girl's injuries were serious but not life-threatening.

The agency described her as an exchange student from Taiwan who was visiting the park with her host family.

The incident occurred shortly after noon Friday in the Old Faithful area.

The Park Service says she and others were between 3 and 6 feet from the bison when she turned her back to the bison to have her picture taken. The bison took a couple steps and gored her.

The girl was airlifted to an area hospital.

The Park Service advises visitors to stay at least 25 yards away from bison in the park.
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Fire

Lightning sparks new wildfires in British Columbia as massive blaze continues


CTV News
Sat, 16 May 2015 15:26 UTC
wildfire in Canada
© BCFS photoEfforts are underway to battle the wildfires in B.C., which has claimed roughly 17,000 hectares, west of Prince George.

Crews are responding to five new wildfires in British Columbia's Central Interior, as a massive blaze continues to burn about 70 kilometres southwest of Prince George.

B.C.'s Wildfire Management Branch says all of the new fires were sparked by Friday's lightning activity in the Cariboo region.

The largest fire is raging four hectares west of Anahim Lake, where a three-person attack crew, airtankers and a helicopter are on site with 16 additional firefighters on the way.

The branch says crews are also working on three small fires in the Big Bar area and one small fire southwest of Quesnel.

Meanwhile, the aggressive Little Bobtail Lake blaze has destroyed about 17,000 hectares since it was first discovered last Saturday.

Some 240 firefighters, 11 helicopters, eight air tankers and 23 pieces of heavy machinery have been brought in and 20 per cent of the fire has been contained.

Jill Kelsh with the Prince George Fire Centre says crews have been working around the clock since last Sunday.
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Cloud Lightning

Thousands on Guam without water, power after Typhoon Dolphin strikes island, destroys homes

Manny Cruz
Pacific Sunday News
Sun, 17 May 2015 09:32 UTC
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© AAPTyphoon Dolphin batters Guam.
Many Guam residents were left without power or water yesterday while hundreds remained in island storm shelters.

More than 3,300 Guam Waterworks Authority subscribers experienced water outages and 40 percent of Guam Power Authority customers experienced power outages that lasted through yesterday, according to GPA and GWA spokeswoman Heidi Ballendorf.

Ballendorf said more than five of the emergency generators used to power water wells experienced malfunctions, which left about 8.2 percent of the agency's 41,000 customers without water.

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Wolf

5 people treated for wolf bites in Israel

Justin Jalil
Times of Israel
Sat, 09 May 2015 08:47 UTC
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© Carlos Delgado/Wikimedia CommonsAn illustrative photo of a gray wolf.
Five people were lightly wounded on Saturday when a wolf suspected of carrying rabies attacked three groups of hikers in separate incidents in northern Israel.

The five who were bitten by the canine were given rabies shots, as were another two people as a precautionary measure, according to Ynet.

The she-wolf first attacked a group of hikers in the Golan Heights. Although bystanders were eventually successful in chasing the wolf away with rocks, three individuals were bitten, including a father and his nine-year-old son.

The victims were transferred to the nearby Ziv Medical Center and were listed in good condition.

"The father is suffering from cuts and scratches on his hands and arms," said Majid Abu Janev, a nurse who treated the victims.

Three more people later arrived at the medical center; a man suffering from scratches and a fractured ankle he sustained while trying to escape the wolf and a woman suffering from a bite and deep scratches. The woman's husband was also given a rabies vaccine after coming into contact with her open wounds.

"We thoroughly washed, disinfected and bandaged the wounds and administered rabies vaccines," Janev said.
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Attention

Swedish man's roar scares off charging bear


thelocal.se
Fri, 15 May 2015 08:13 UTC
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© Håkan Vargas S/imagebank.sweden.seA Scandinavian brown bear.
Ralph Persson, a hunter in Jämtland, northern Sweden, scared off a charging bear by roaring at the animal as it attacked him, it has emerged.

While out training a new hunting dog, Persson sensed a change in the animal's bark. Seconds later a brown bear came charging at him from the woods. "I screamed as much as I could and made myself very big," Persson told Sundsvall Tidning newspaper, in an interview which has gone viral over the past week.

The bear quickly veered off back into the trees, utterly surprised by Persson's ferocity. Both Ralph and his wife Lena filmed the encounter which can be seen on the newspaper's website.


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Arrow Down

Giant sinkhole appears in a field in southern Turkey


Euronews
Sat, 16 May 2015 03:42 UTC
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Giant sinkhole appears in Turkey
Residents of Konya Province in southern Turkey have spoken of their terror when a giant sinkhole suddenly appeared in a local field.

"We are very afraid (for) our lives. It is luck that no one fell into it," said one local farmer.

Measuring 10 metres wide and 90 metres deep, the crater is thought to have formed in the space of 24 hours.

No one was injured as a result of the ground caving in.

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Ice Cube

Hailstorm with golf ball sized hail causes injuries in Germany


BBC
Thu, 14 May 2015 19:48 UTC
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Residents described seeing large hailstones
At least nine people have been injured and dozens of homes damaged in a hailstorm in southern Germany.

There were reports of hailstones the size of golf balls in the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg.

Winds of up to 120 km/h (75mph) were reported on Wednesday night and residents near the Bavarian city of Augsburg spoke of seeing a tornado.

Roofs were badly damaged, blocks of flats had to be evacuated and a local school had to be closed on Thursday.

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Question

Odd animal behaviour: A beaver walks into a hardware store in Fairbanks, Alaska

Weston Morrow
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Sat, 16 May 2015 18:54 UTC
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© Angelesa WardA beaver pauses in the middle of an aisle at the Lowe's store in Fairbanks, Alaska, Friday, May 15, 2015.
Sometimes driftwood just isn't enough, one beaver decided when it took an impromptu trip to Lowe's early Friday morning.

The beaver wandered into the parking lot of the Lowe's construction and home improvement store on the Johansen Expressway at about 7 a.m., triggering the automatic doors and strolling inside.

Once inside the store, the beaver made its way to the plumbing department, where store employees attempted to provide assistance to the wild animal.

A cellphone video of the incident shows employees asking the beaver if there is anything they can help it find in the store. However, the beaver — like many construction store shoppers — seemed to prefer to wander aimlessly through the store instead of asking for help.

One witness in the video observed that the beaver appeared to be injured.
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Cloud Lightning

Lightning strikes kill 7 in three districts of Bangladesh


bdnews24.com
Sat, 16 May 2015 19:11 UTC
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At least seven people, including two siblings, have been killed after being struck by lightning across Bangladesh, doctors and family members say.

Five of them were killed on Friday when parts of the country recorded rain accompanied by gusty winds and thunder.

Mobarak Hossain, 10, and his sister Jannatul Bakia, 8, were hit by lightning on Saturday morning in Chittagong's Banshkhali.

They died before they could be taken to Banshkhali Upazila Health Complex, doctors said.

In Magura, three people were killed by lightning on Friday evening, Sadar Hospital's emergency ward doctor Nasimul Hasan said.

The victims are 'Molin', 18, of Laxmipur village, 'Sindbad', 35, from Andolbarhia and 'Iadul', 80, from Gopalpur village.
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Snowflake

8 inches of snow falls in May in Flagstaff, Arizona


Arizona Daily Sun
Sat, 16 May 2015 18:25 UTC
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© National Weather ServiceThe National Weather Service office in Bellemont just west of Flagstaff had received 8.4 inches of snow from the storm through late Friday afternoon.
May is looking like March in Flagstaff -- and the National Weather Service in Bellemont is right in the middle of it.

The most recent storm to roll through the Flagstaff stalled over the Weather Service office early Friday, dumping more than 8 inches of snow into its gauge through 5 p.m.

"It's always good to see rain and snow this late in the season," said Brian Klimowski of the National Weather Service. "Every storm we get like this helps push back the onset of our fire season."

Meanwhile, just to the east, Flagstaff's Pulliam Airport recorded just 0.3 inches of snow along with a half-inch of rain.

The snow was coming down so fast early Friday morning that snowplows were dispatched to the I-40 and I-17 corridors.

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