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North Carolina, US: Police Officer Trapped in Car by 50,000 Bees

Nick Allen
The Telegraph
Wed, 18 Aug 2010 02:19 UTC
Image
© AP PhotoDeputy Brandon Jenkins sits inside the police cruiser while the bees are collected.
A police officer was trapped in his patrol car for three hours after 50,000 angry honeybees descended on his vehicle.

Sheriff's Deputy Brandon Jenkins, 31, had been called to the scene of a broken down lorry in North Carolina. The lorry was pulling a trailer loaded with 60 boxes of bees and the insects had escaped.

Officer Jenkins arrived at day break just as the bees were waking up and they swarmed him, forcing him to retreat to his car and radio for assistance.

"It was mind boggling how many bees were out there. At some point, it was hard to see out of the windows," he said.

The officer admitted using deadly force on some of the insects who got in.
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Magnify

Flashback British Scientists Study Hawaiian Happy Face Spider


The Telegraph
Wed, 22 Apr 2009 05:58 UTC
Image
© CatersScientists think the spider, which has the scientific name Theridion grallator and is harmless to humans, has evolved the patterns to confuse predators.
Scientists have found themselves raising a smile when studying this creature - the happy face spider.

The spider, which measures just a few millimetres across, has developed bizarre markings giving the appearance of a smiling face.

Scientists think the spider, which has the scientific name Theridion grallator and is harmless to humans, has evolved the patterns to confuse predators.

It is under-threat of extinction in the rainforests of the Hawaiian island chain in the Pacific.

Dr Geoff Oxford, a spider expert from the University of York, said: "I must admit when I turned over the first leaf and saw one it certainly brought a smile to my face.
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Bizarro Earth

Mariana Islands: Earthquake Magnitude 6.1


USGS
Wed, 18 Aug 2010 14:05 UTC
Marianna Quake_180810
© USGSEarthquake Location
Date-Time:
Wednesday, August 18, 2010 at 16:28:20 UTC

Thursday, August 19, 2010 at 02:28:20 AM at epicenter

Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones

Location:
12.210°N, 141.456°E

Depth:
43.1 km (26.8 miles)

Region:
MARIANA ISLANDS REGION

Distances:
385 km (240 miles) WSW of HAGATNA, Guam

460 km (285 miles) WSW of Rota, Northern Mariana Islands

470 km (290 miles) NE of Yap, Micronesia

565 km (350 miles) SW of SAIPAN, Northern Mariana Islands
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Bizarro Earth

Scientists: Rare Double Quake Caused Deadly Samoa Tsunami


Agence France-Presse
Tue, 17 Aug 2010 18:56 UTC
Tonga Quake
© AFPStunned survivors search for bodies amongst the debris left by the tsanami on Lalomanu Beach in September 2009.
Wellington - The devastating tsunami which killed nearly 200 people in Samoa and Tonga last September was the result of a rare double earthquake and not one as previously believed, scientists said Wednesday.

Simultaneous earthquakes, with one hiding the other, are unusual "and almost certainly increased the size of the tsunami and its destructiveness on some Tongan islands," New Zealand's GNS Science said in a statement.

Global earthquake readings initially indicated a single large "normal faulting" quake of magnitude 8.0 had occurred, producing an extensional motion while the tsunami waves indicated a "thrust" event with compressional movement.

The scientists said they were unable to reconcile the conflicting data until six weeks after the event when measurements from a small Tongan island showed there must have been two large earthquakes.

Their findings appear this week as the cover story in the prestigious science publication Nature.

"This is a rare phenomenon," lead author John Beavan, a geophysicist at GNS Science, said Wednesday.
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Arrow Down

Mass Hippo Deaths Caused by Unlikely Culprit: Anthrax

Kathryn Yao
AOL News
Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:51 UTC
Image
© Getty ImagesA hippopotamus is seen at Queen Elizabeth National Park in Uganda, where 83 hippos have died since June from anthrax poisoning.
Another hippopotamus at a Ugandan safari park has died, bringing the death toll to 83 since June. Stranger still is the cause of the massive pachyderm massacre: anthrax poisoning, the London Daily Telegraph reports.

Besides being a powdery biological weapon that grabbed headlines in the perilous week following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks (when some was mailed to Sens. Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy, among others), anthrax is also a soil-dwelling bacteria -- bacillus anthracis bacterium -- that is clearly harmful to both humans and animals alike. Symptoms of infection can include high fever and bleeding.
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Cloud Lightning

Severe hurricane hits Russia after deadly heatwave hell


Russia Today
Tue, 17 Aug 2010 17:38 UTC
Strong winds and heavy rains are taking the place of the record heat which has been baking Central Russia since the middle of June. On Sunday, a hurricane hit north-western regions of the country, up-rooting trees and causing streets to flood. The storm swept through residential areas over-turning cars, damaging railways and electricity wires. Forecasters say the hurricane level winds will hit Moscow within the next few days. There's little respite from the extreme weather which has already endangered lives in Russia this year. Ambulance crews have been in a tough battle to get to people with the number of emergency calls at record levels.

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Phoenix

Spain, Portugal fight wildfires


News24.com
Tue, 17 Aug 2010 17:30 UTC
Image
© Francisco Seco, APPeople fight a fire on the Peneda-Geres mountain near Pardela, northern Portugal.
Madrid - Officials say emergency services in Spain and Portugal are combating 19 sizable wildfires as cooler weather is now easing firefighting.

The regional government of Galicia, in the northwestern corner of Spain, says firefighters are working to control outbreaks in four areas of the province, including one "very large forest fire" in Negreira.

A fire in Barjas, in the neighbouring province of Leon, is being brought under control, mayor Alfredo de Arriba says.

Portugal's Civil Protection authority said on Sunday its forces had fought fires in 14 different areas and cooler conditions presented "a much more favourable scenario".

Comment: Footage of the fires in Portugal from Russia Today:



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Cloud Lightning

Russia lashed by storm after heatwave


BBC
Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:10 UTC
Image
© UnknownThe storm battered St Petersburg on Sunday before moving towards Moscow
Russia's record-breaking heatwave looks set to come to a dramatic end, with a severe storm now heading for Moscow after battering St Petersburg.

Nearly 100,000 people around St Petersburg were left without power, rail services were halted and trees felled amid high winds and heavy rains.

Moscow is expected to be hit later. Temperatures there dropped to 25C on Monday after nearing 40C for weeks.

Fires that have raged across western Russia are being brought under control.

The emergencies ministry said the area affected by peat and forest fires was down to 45,800 hectares, compared to a peak of almost 200,000 hectares.
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Arrow Down

Russian wheat export ban threatens higher inflation and food riots

Sean O'Grady
UK Independent
Tue, 17 Aug 2010 16:42 UTC
Image
© AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel
The world faces an inflationary time bomb as shortages of food threaten to push prices to fresh all-time highs.

A variety of freakish weather conditions across the world has sent the price of staples including wheat, pork, rice, orange juice, coffee, cocoa and tea to fresh highs in recent weeks. Yesterday's decision by the Russian government to ban the export of wheat to protect home consumers saw grain prices jump 8 per cent on the day, on what was already a two-year high. Meanwhile, the burgeoning demand for foodstuffs and raw material growth in the resurgent economies of China and India has also driven oil, copper and other industrial commodities higher.
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Bizarro Earth

Tornado hits North Hungary


Caboodle.hu
Tue, 17 Aug 2010 10:14 UTC

Comment: From RSOE: Two tornadoes touched down last evening in two hungarian counties. First tornado landed in the Diósjenő, Nógrád County and tornado-like storm hit the Mezőkövesd, Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén County. A violent storm caused heavy damage but no personal injury. A tornado-like storms are becoming more common lately.


A tornado swept through Diósjenő, Nógrád county on Monday, uprooting trees and tossing them onto electricity poles and cars.

Gale-force winds lashed Mezőkövest, Borsod county early Monday evening, pelting residents with hailstones as large as walnuts.

It was not immediately known whether the hail caused significant damage, but the downpour of water on the streets halted vehicle traffic.

Sunday evening's storm affected about 40 villages in Szabolcs county, causing damage to houses in 15 villages. Some houses were so damaged that residents had to stay with neighbours and relatives.

tornado hungary
© Idokep
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