Emergency officials in Costa Rica say they have moved some residents away from a volcano outside the capital after it spewed toxic gas and ash, signs of a potentially imminent eruption.

The Turrialba volcano located about 40 miles (65 kilometers) outside San Jose began a series of eruptions in 2007. Several nearby villages were evacuated and a surrounding national park closed in 2010.

Costa Rica's National Emergency Commission said its volcano warning level was at green on Wednesday, the lowest of three warning levels, but that it had alerted residents about the possibility of an evacuation and already moved some villagers away from the populated areas closest to the volcano so they would not be harmed by erupting gases.

In less than 24 hours Lake Cachet II in Chile's southern Patagonia vanished, leaving behind just some large puddles and chunks of ice in the vast lake bed.

The lake's water comes from ice melting from the Colonia Glacier, located in the Northern Patagonian ice field, some 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) south of the capital, Santiago.

The glacier normally acts as a dam containing the water, but rising temperatures have weakened its wall. Twice this year, on January 27 and March 31, water from the lake bore a tunnel between the rocks and the glacier wall.

The result: Lake Cachet II's 200 million cubic liters of water gushed out into the Baker river, tripling its volume in a matter of hours, and emptying the five square kilometer (two square miles) lake bed.

Cachet II has drained 11 times since 2008 -- and with global temperatures climbing, experts believe this will increase in frequency.

"Climate models predict that as temperatures rise, this phenomenon, known as GLOFs (Glacial Lake Outburst Floods), will become more frequent," said glaciologist Gino Casassa from the Center for Scientific Studies (CES).

Hurricane Bud quickly strengthened early Thursday after forming off the southwestern coast of Mexico just hours before, the National Hurricane Center in Miami reported.

The Category 1 storm with 90 mph winds was about 350 miles (560 kilometers) southwest of Manzanillo, and was tracking to the north at 7 mph.

Some additional strengthening is expected Thursday, the hurricane center said. "Gradual weakening is expected to begin by Friday."

The forecast map shows the storm approaching the coast late Friday before slipping off to the southwest and away from land.

Bud is the second named tropical storm of the East Pacific hurricane season.

The mystery surrounding the deaths of at least 877 dolphins in Peru deepened on Wednesday as the government said human activity was not to blame but failed to pinpoint a natural cause for the massive die-off.

A final report from the Peruvian government's Ocean Institute, which manages one of the world's richest marine ecosystems, said the dolphins did not die from a lack of food, hunting by fishermen, poison from pesticides, heavy metal contamination, an infection or a virus.

It also said there was no conclusive evidence that linked seismic offshore exploration by oil companies to the deaths of the long-beaked common dolphins along the Andean country's northern coast.

But it did leave open the possibility that abnormally warm surface water temperatures and high levels of algae may have played a role, saying further analysis would be needed to determine if any red and brown plankton species in the sea were toxic.

"The dolphins were killed by natural causes and not due to any human activity - that is what you might say is the major conclusion," said Minister of Production Gladys Triveno, who oversees the government's Ocean Institute.

However, ORCA, a local NGO, says the deaths occurred after seismic events - which locals attribute to exploration by oil companies - damaged the ears of the sound-sensitive mammals and caused them to surface too rapidly.

After the active ingredient in most birth control pills has done its duty preventing pregnancy, it begins a second life as a pollutant that can harm wildlife in waterways.

Not only is ethinyl estradiol quite potent - creating "intersex" fish and amphibians - but it is very difficult to remove from wastewater, which carries it into natural waterways.

Since women around the planet take the pill, this is a global problem. The European Union is the first entity to seriously consider mandating the removal of ethinyl estradiol, also known as EE2, from wastewater. However, as researchers pointed out in Thursday's (May 24) issue of the journal Nature, the question of whether to remove the pollutant is not simple.

The dilemma

The problem is effectively removing ethinyl estradiol can be quite costly. Governmental estimates put the cost of upgrading about 1,360 wastewater treatment plants across England and Wales so they can comply with a proposed limit at between $41 billion and $47 billion (€32 billion and €37 billion), according to Richard Owen, a professor at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom.

"The big question is, 'Are we willing to pay this as a society?'" Owen told LiveScience. "Or, alternatively, 'would we prefer to live with the environmental impact?'"

In their Nature commentary, Owen and Susan Jobling, an ecotoxicologist at the University of Brunel, write that more public debate is needed on the proposed regulation.

They intended to draw attention to this environmental dilemma, not to suggest that women should not have access to birth control, Owen told LiveScience.

The earthquake that struck northern Italy will affect production and export of some of the area's most internationally famous culinary delicacies - Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano cheeses.

National farmers' group Coldiretti has estimated damage to agriculture in the area, one of Italy's most fertile and productive zones, at more than 200 million euros.

Some of the worst damage was to the production of Parmigiano Reggiano, also called Parmesan cheese, and its eternal rival, Grana Padano.

Both of the very hard seasoned cheeses are grated over pasta dishes, thinly sliced on salads or served in small, irregular pieces at fashionable parties worldwide.

Their respective passionate devotees can be compared to fans supporting different sports teams in the same town.

A four-metre square sinkhole opened up in a major downtown Montreal street just hours after a massive student protest had marched over it.

The protest, which attracted tens of thousands of people, had already passed and gone down another street when the four-metre-deep sinkhole opened up late Tuesday afternoon.

Denis Roy, an operations chief with the Montreal fire department, said there were no injuries to any passersby.

Public works officials are attempting to determine the cause of the collapse.

The sinkhole is located not far from McGill University on Sherbrooke Street, one of Montreal's key east-west arteries.

The collapse, which happened around rush hour, added to the headaches of drivers already dealing with detours because of the huge student protest over tuition fee hikes and a special law to limit demonstrations.

Source: The Canadian Press

Prince William County, Virginia - The Virginia Department of Transportation is working to repair a massive sinkhole in Prince William County.

The hole opened up in the middle of Aden Road early Tuesday morning.

VDOT says this was one of three sinkholes to open up within the last 24 hours in Prince William County.

VDOT believes heavy rain and flooding may be to blame.

An estimated 5,000 people participated on Tuesday in a "walk of unity" to Joplin, Missouri, along the path of a deadly tornado that tore through the city one year ago, killing 161 people.

The anniversary of the tragedy also was marked by President Barack Obama, who traveled to Joplin to give the commencement address for graduating high school seniors whose school building was obliterated by the EF-5 tornado, the strongest on a rating scale for twisters.

"Just as you have learned the goodness of people, so have you learned the power of community," Obama said. He also honored two classmates of the graduates who died in the May 22, 2011, storm.

The tornado killed 161 people and damaged or destroyed 7,500 homes. It was the deadliest U.S. tornado in more than six decades.

An earthquake of a magnitude of 5.7 to 5.9 struck the Bulgarian city of Pernik, 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) northwest of the capital Sofia.

The quake, the worst in the Sofia area since 1917, shook the country at 2:58 a.m. local time, causing walls and roofs to collapse in Pernik and chimneys and plaster to fall in Sofia, Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov said on the ministry's website today. There were no casualties, Prime Minister Boiko Borissov said in an interview with Nova Television station.

The capital city's airport, railways and subway are working and no damage to infrastructure in the country has been reported, Construction Minister Liliana Pavlova told reporters in Sofia. In Pernik, which was worst affected by the quake, the heating utility was shut down and schools were closed for today and tomorrow.