Three shark attacks in Australia in two days this week sparked a global media frenzy of "Jaws" proportions, but sharks are more at risk in the ocean than humans with man killing millions of sharks each year.
Sharks are the top of the marine food chain, a powerful predator which has no match in its watery realm, until man enters the ocean.
Commercial fishing and a desire for Asian shark fin soup sees up to 100 million sharks, even protected endangered species of sharks, slaughtered around the world each year, says the Shark Research Institute (Australia).
Yet in contrast, sharks, apparently, do not like the taste of humans. Very few shark attacks involve the shark actually eating the human, unlike a land-based predator like a lion or tiger.
Earth Changes
Drought conditions in Texas are so bad cattle are keeling over in parched pastures and dying.
Drought conditions worsened significantly in the past week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor map released Thursday. Seventy-one percent of the state is now in some stage of drought, up from 58.3 percent last week.
A week ago the two worst drought designations - extreme and exceptional - covered 9.1 percent of the state. This week the two categories cover 15.1 percent of the state, with a circle near San Antonio and Austin widening in all directions. Only the eastern and southeastern parts of Texas are without any drought status.
Drought conditions worsened significantly in the past week, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor map released Thursday. Seventy-one percent of the state is now in some stage of drought, up from 58.3 percent last week.
A week ago the two worst drought designations - extreme and exceptional - covered 9.1 percent of the state. This week the two categories cover 15.1 percent of the state, with a circle near San Antonio and Austin widening in all directions. Only the eastern and southeastern parts of Texas are without any drought status.
An endangered species of penguin is mysteriously disappearing from a remote British island in the South Atlantic at a rate of 100 birds every day. About two million northern rockhopper penguins have vanished from Tristan da Cunha and Gough Island, part of the British overseas territory of St Helena, in half a century.
The once huge penguin populations on the islands have dwindled so dramatically that they are now threatened with extinction, and the British Government was accused yesterday of contributing to the decline.
The once huge penguin populations on the islands have dwindled so dramatically that they are now threatened with extinction, and the British Government was accused yesterday of contributing to the decline.
© Michael Kooren/Reuters
Canals in the Netherlands no longer freeze every winter, so the chance to ice-skate outdoors created a frenzy in Kinderdijk and elsewhere in the south. “Everybody took days off,” said one mayor.
Canals in the Netherlands no longer freeze every winter, so the chance to ice-skate outdoors created a frenzy in Kinderdijk and elsewhere in the south. “Everybody took days off,” said one mayor.
Nieuwerkerk Aan Den Ijssel, the Netherlands - For the first time in 12 years, the Netherlands' canals froze this month, bringing the Dutch, who like their tulips in neat rows, a heady mix of pandemonium and euphoria.
Hundreds of thousands of skaters, their cheeks as red as apples in the subzero temperatures, took to the ice, and hospital wards were filled with dozens of people with fractured arms, sprained ankles and broken legs.
Train engineers were ordered to go slowly to avoid hitting skaters who clambered over railway tracks to get from one frozen canal to another. Even the minister of defense, an avid skater, fell and broke his wrist. His ministry announced that the national defense remained in safe hands, even if one of them was in a cast.
An earthquake measuring 5.1 on the Richter scale on Thursday hit China's Wenchuan County, which was the epicentre of the May 12 earthquake last year that left more than 87,000 people dead or missing, an official said.
According to the National Earthquake Network Center, the earthquake took place in Wenchuan County in southwest China's Sichuan Province at 2.23 am on Thursday. No casualties or geological disasters have been reported, said Liao Min, head of Wenchuan County.
The epicentre was located at 31.3 degrees north latitude and 103.3 degrees east longitude. The quake took place about 22 km underground.
According to the National Earthquake Network Center, the earthquake took place in Wenchuan County in southwest China's Sichuan Province at 2.23 am on Thursday. No casualties or geological disasters have been reported, said Liao Min, head of Wenchuan County.
The epicentre was located at 31.3 degrees north latitude and 103.3 degrees east longitude. The quake took place about 22 km underground.
An earthquake measuring 5.0 degree on the Richter scale jolted Sorong in Indonesia's West Papua Province in the wee hour of Thursday, the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG) was quoted by the national Antara News Agency as saying.
The quake's epicenter was at 0.34 degrees southern latitude and 132.28 degrees eastern longitude, some 123 km northwest of Sorong, at a depth of 46 km below sea level.
The quake's epicenter was at 0.34 degrees southern latitude and 132.28 degrees eastern longitude, some 123 km northwest of Sorong, at a depth of 46 km below sea level.
© USGS
Date-Time Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 17:49:39 UTC
Friday, January 16, 2009 at 03:49:39 AM at epicenter
Location 46.859°N, 155.173°E
Depth 36 km (22.4 miles) set by location program
Distances 430 km (270 miles) S of Severo-Kuril'sk, Kuril Islands, Russia
595 km (370 miles) ENE of Kuril'sk, Kuril Islands
1785 km (1110 miles) NE of TOKYO, Japan
7245 km (4500 miles) NE of MOSCOW, Russia
Research published today reveals the major influence of fish on maintaining the delicate pH balance of our oceans, vital for the health of coral reefs and other marine life.
The discovery, made by a team of scientists from the UK, US and Canada, could help solve a mystery that has puzzled marine chemists for decades. Published today (16 January 2009) in Science, the study provides new insights into the marine carbon cycle, which is undergoing rapid change as a result of global CO2 emissions.
Until now, scientists have believed that the oceans' calcium carbonate, which dissolves to make seawater alkaline, came from the external 'skeletons' of microscopic marine plankton. This study estimates that three to 15 per cent of marine calcium carbonate is in fact produced by fish in their intestines and then excreted. This is a conservative estimate and the team believes it has the potential to be three times higher.
The discovery, made by a team of scientists from the UK, US and Canada, could help solve a mystery that has puzzled marine chemists for decades. Published today (16 January 2009) in Science, the study provides new insights into the marine carbon cycle, which is undergoing rapid change as a result of global CO2 emissions.
Until now, scientists have believed that the oceans' calcium carbonate, which dissolves to make seawater alkaline, came from the external 'skeletons' of microscopic marine plankton. This study estimates that three to 15 per cent of marine calcium carbonate is in fact produced by fish in their intestines and then excreted. This is a conservative estimate and the team believes it has the potential to be three times higher.
© USGS
Date-Time
* Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 07:27:21 UTC
* Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 06:27:21 PM at epicenter
Location 22.379°S, 170.624°E
Depth 40.4 km (25.1 miles)
Region SOUTHEAST OF THE LOYALTY ISLANDS
Distances 145 km (90 miles) W of Ile Hunter, Loyalty Isl., New Caledonia
300 km (185 miles) ESE of Tadine, Loyalty Islands, New Caledonia
430 km (265 miles) E of NOUMEA, New Caledonia
1650 km (1030 miles) NNW of Auckland, New Zealand
Anchorage - Five months after suing to keep polar bears off the U.S. threatened species list, Alaska's government said Wednesday it plans to issue a similar challenge to block federal protections for a struggling population of beluga whales in Cook Inlet, a mature oil-producing basin.
Former vice presidential hopeful Gov. Sarah Palin said the energy-rich state believes the Endangered Species Act protections for belugas announced in October by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are unwarranted.
"The State of Alaska has worked cooperatively with the federal government to protect and conserve beluga whales in Cook Inlet," the Republican governor said in a news release announcing that a 60-day notice of intent to sue had been sent to NOAA. "This listing decision didn't take those efforts into account as required by law."
Beluga whales swimming in Cook Inlet, a glacier-fed saltwater channel running from Anchorage to the Gulf of Alaska, numbered as high as 1,300 three decades ago, but has dropped to about 375 since then, according to NOAA.
Former vice presidential hopeful Gov. Sarah Palin said the energy-rich state believes the Endangered Species Act protections for belugas announced in October by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are unwarranted.
"The State of Alaska has worked cooperatively with the federal government to protect and conserve beluga whales in Cook Inlet," the Republican governor said in a news release announcing that a 60-day notice of intent to sue had been sent to NOAA. "This listing decision didn't take those efforts into account as required by law."
Beluga whales swimming in Cook Inlet, a glacier-fed saltwater channel running from Anchorage to the Gulf of Alaska, numbered as high as 1,300 three decades ago, but has dropped to about 375 since then, according to NOAA.
