Trouble's a brewin'

Quake of 5.2 hits Istanbul, second in days

ISTANBUL, Oct 24 (Reuters) - An earthquake measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale hit northwestern Turkey on Tuesday and was felt in Istanbul, just days after another quake of the same size in the area, Turkey's earthquake monitoring centre said.

CNN Turk quoted local officials saying the earthquake had caused no deaths or damage and they had no reports of injuries.

The quake's epicentre was in the Sea of Marmara, which lies alongside Istanbul, and the shocks were briefly felt in Turkey's largest city of 12 million residents.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was of 5 magnitude and was centred 29 km (40 miles south of Istanbul.

On Friday another small quake hit the province of Balikesir, which lies across the Marmara from Istanbul, but there were no injuries.

Turkey, which lies on a major fault line, has suffered devastating earthquakes in the past and in August 1999 nearly 18,000 people were killed in a quake, also centred in the Sea of Marmara.

Istanbul residents are jumpy as scientists have predicted a major earthquake is likely to hit in the next 30 years.

Deep quake hits northern Indonesia

JAKARTA (AFP) - A 5.6-magnitude earthquake has hit Indonesia's northernmost region off Sulawesi island, a meteorology agency official said.

The quake, which hit at 8:19 am (0019 GMT), was centered 61 kilometers (38 miles) under the floor of the Sulawesi Sea, some 288 kilometers north of Sangihe island near the maritime border with the Philippines, said Yudo of the meteorology agency here.

"It was too deep to be felt on the surface," he said, adding that several aftershocks also registered but all were weaker than the initial jolt.

A 5.2-magnitude aftershock hit more than four hours later, at 12:45 pm (0445 GMT) centered 97 kilometers (60.14 miles) under the ocean floor at about the same location as the earlier temblor's center, said another meteorology official, Puji.

The Indonesian archipelago sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire where continental plates meet, causing frequent seismic and volcanic activity.

Indonesia was the nation worst hit by the earthquake-triggered Asian tsunami in December 2004, which killed some 168,000 people in Aceh province.

A 7.7-magnitude earthquake in July on the south coast of the main island of Java also killed more than 600 people.

Strong quake hits Japan, no concern over tsunamis

TOKYO (AFP) - A strong earthquake of magnitude 6.8 struck close to islands in southern Japan, but there were no concerns over tsunamis and no immediate reports of damage or casualties, officials said.

The tremor struck at 6:18 am (2118 GMT) with its epicenter 800 kilometers (496 miles) south of Tokyo, close to the Izu islands, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

"You don't have to worry about disastrous tsunamis that could lead to damages, as certain time has passed since the quake," an official at the agency told AFP about two hours after the tremor.

He added that the agency will keep monitoring the sea level and that "some sea-level changes may be observed due to this quake."

Japan lies at the junction of four tectonic plates and endures about 20 percent of the world's most powerful earthquakes, which frequently jolt Tokyo and other major cities.

On Friday two strong undersea earthquakes struck Japan but with no reports of damages of casualties.

Hurricane Paul is now a Tropical Storm


Alvin Hernandez, of Huntington Beach, Calif., walks along the beach after surfing near San Jose del Cabo, Mexico, as Hurricane Paul nears. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

SAN JOSE DEL CABO, Mexico - Hurricane Paul weakened to a tropical storm Tuesday, easing the threat to rain-sodden resorts at the tip of the Baja California peninsula.

Paul, which had been the third hurricane this season to threaten the area, had maximum sustained winds near 65 mph and was moving north at about 7 mph, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

Forecasters predicted the storm was likely to weaken further but could still dump up to 10 inches of rain in the mountains on Mexico's mainland, causing severe flooding.

Streets were already flooded with ankle-deep water in the resort of Cabo San Lucas, where authorities closed schools and opened eight shelters Tuesday. Officials were searching for the body of an American man who reportedly drowned while swimming in surging waves Monday.

Francisco Cota, civil defense director for the two resort cities of San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas, had warned that about 2,000 to 3,000 families could be evacuated from flood-risk areas to 49 shelters, mostly schools.

"October Nightmare - The Night the Trees Wept"


Photo by Bill Wippert/Buffalo News
The nightmare was only starting on Oct. 12, as motorists guided their cars under and arounf leaf-covererd tree limbs that collapsed under nearly two feet of heavy, wet snow.

They'll talk about the Great October Surprise and recall the gut-wrenching sound, like fire crackers, of huge oaks and maples breaking under the weight of wet snow.

They'll remember the homes and businesses, hundreds of thousands of them, that went days upon days without heat and electricity.

And they'll talk about the people, 13 in all, who perished, including the three senior citizens who died of carbon monoxide poisoning while trying to keep themselves warm with generators.

It was unlike anything people here had ever seen, an early season storm with tremendous internal energy, a storm fueled by that most dangerous combination of all - a warm Lake Erie and rapidly dropping air temperatures.

The perfect storm, said one meteorologist. And when it hit, it stuck around like an unwanted in-law, wreaking havoc for 16 hours and bringing Buffalo and its northern suburbs to its knees.

"The whole world turned topsy-turvy," said meteorologist Tom Niziol of the National Weather Service. "This was uncharted territory. This was an animal we've never had to deal with before."

1,680 pounds of beef recalled for E. coli

HARTFORD, Conn. - A Connecticut company is recalling about 1,680 pounds of ground beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli, state officials and the company said Monday.

Omaha Beef Co. Inc., based in Danbury, Conn., recalled its 10-pound boxes of hamburger patties and 5- and 10-pound bags of hamburger. Each package carries the establishment number "Est. 2769" and USDA inspection code "101861."

An unspecified problem was discovered through routine federal food safety inspection testing, the state Department of Consumer Protection said. The federal Food Safety Inspection Service received no reports of illnesses associated with the products, the state agency said.

Experts fear major resurgence of polio

GENEVA - More than 250,000 people could contract polio every year if Nigeria, India, Pakistan and Afghanistan fail to eradicate the crippling virus, public health experts said on Thursday.

"the bacteria are coming to take us down
that's my prediction
it's the answer to this culture
of the quick fix prescription"

AngloGold says 5 miners missing after rock fall

JOHANNESBURG, Oct 24 (Reuters) - Rescue teams battled to find five missing South African miners on Tuesday after a rock fall at a deep-level mine owned by AngloGold Ashanti Ltd , the world's third-biggest gold producer.

Almost 24 hours after the incident took place rescue workers were still searching for the men 2,600 metres (1.67 miles) below the surface at the TauTona mine near Carletonville, southwest of Johannesburg and no contact had been made with them, the company said.

Alan Fine, a spokesman for AngloGold, told Reuters the use of explosives to blast ore in the mine, which normally takes place in the late afternoons, was halted after the incident.

This meant no new ore was being removed from underground, but he said the mine was not shut as work on already-retrieved ore was continuing.

"Routine underground work is not carrying on as normal. All new blasting was halted after the incident," Fine said.

The TauTona mine produced 120,000 ounces of gold during the quarter to end June, around 8.5 percent of the group total.

"There has been no contact with the missing workers; the mine is well-ventilated, the real question is whether the rocks fell on them," he added, speaking from the mine.

MINISTER CONCERNED

At least five miners have been killed and 10 injured so far this year at the TauTona mine, one of the deepest in the world, in separate incidents in January and February due to rock falls.

A similar incident at the mine killed two workers last July.

South Africa's Minerals and Energy Minister Buyelwa Sonjica said she was concerned by the "unacceptable" number of miners dying in the country's mines.

"In view of an industry-accepted target of zero fatalities, gold mines ... are the worst performers," she said in a statement. Sonjica added she would visit the mine on Tuesday.

The damage that took place on Monday hit a production panel 2,700 metres below the surface and was caused by two seismic events about 25 minutes apart that registered a magnitude of 1.9 and 2.3 on the Richter scale, AngloGold said.

Fine said deep-level gold mines often experienced such events -- some more serious than others.

Two employees were rescued immediately after the rock fall.

One suffered minor injuries and the second had back injuries and was in a stable condition in hospital, the company said.

AngloGold, whose biggest shareholder is Anglo American Plc , said it had notified the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) about the incident and rescue operations.

Shares in AngloGold traded 1.99 percent higher at 313.51 rand by 1304 GMT as a weaker rand helped the sector resist the impact of a softer gold price.

Humans living far beyond planet's means: WWF

BEIJING (Reuters) - Humans are stripping nature at an unprecedented rate and will need two planets' worth of natural resources every year by 2050 on current trends, the WWF conservation group said on Tuesday.

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Populations of many species, from fish to mammals, had fallen by about a third from 1970 to 2003 largely because of human threats such as pollution, clearing of forests and overfishing, the group also said in a two-yearly report.

"For more than 20 years we have exceeded the earth's ability to support a consumptive lifestyle that is unsustainable and we cannot afford to continue down this path," WWF Director-General James Leape said, launching the WWF's 2006 Living Planet Report.

"If everyone around the world lived as those in America, we would need five planets to support us," Leape, an American, said in Beijing.

People in the United Arab Emirates were placing most stress per capita on the planet ahead of those in the United States, Finland and Canada, the report said.

Australia was also living well beyond its means.

The average Australian used 6.6 "global" hectares to support their developed lifestyle, ranking behind the United States and Canada, but ahead of the United Kingdom, Russia, China and Japan.

"If the rest of the world led the kind of lifestyles we do here in Australia, we would require three-and-a-half planets to provide the resources we use and to absorb the waste," said Greg Bourne, WWF-Australia chief executive officer.

Everyone would have to change lifestyles -- cutting use of fossil fuels and improving management of everything from farming to fisheries.

"As countries work to improve the well-being of their people, they risk bypassing the goal of sustainability," said Leape, speaking in an energy-efficient building at Beijing's prestigous Tsinghua University.

"It is inevitable that this disconnect will eventually limit the abilities of poor countries to develop and rich countries to maintain their prosperity," he added.

The report said humans' "ecological footprint" -- the demand people place on the natural world -- was 25 percent greater than the planet's annual ability to provide everything from food to energy and recycle all human waste in 2003.

In the previous report, the 2001 overshoot was 21 percent.

"On current projections humanity, will be using two planets' worth of natural resources by 2050 -- if those resources have not run out by then," the latest report said.

"People are turning resources into waste faster than nature can turn waste back into resources."

PAKISTAN: Eid travel brings dengue fever north

RAWALPINDI, 24 October (IRIN) - An outbreak of the deadly dengue virus in southern Pakistan has now spread to the north, partly because more people have been travelling across the country for Eid, medical officials say.

The four-day national Eid ul-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of Ramadan, started on Tuesday and has seen thousands boarding trains, buses or coaches to visit family or return home.

Microbiologist Dr Abbas Hayat, head of the pathology department at Rawalpindi Medical College, close to the capital, Islamabad, expressed apprehension that "as more and more people arrive from areas in Sindh where the disease is endemic, there is a danger the epidemic will spread".

Mosquitoes spreading the disease have ended up in buses or trains heading north; or those already infected with the virus in the south have been bitten by local mosquitoes at their destination, causing the disease to spread further.

Most often, the viral infection manifests itself as high fever, body aches and joint pains and most victims recover within a fortnight. However, in some cases, the disease takes the form of dengue haemorrahagic fever, which can cause uncontrollable bleeding, leading to death if not treated swiftly.

There have been cases in Peshawar, the capital of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), in the Islamabad and the city of Rawalpindi that lies adjacent to it.

Hundreds of patients are in hospital in the Islamabad and Rawalpindi areas and on Monday Rawalpindi saw its first confirmed death from the disease.

Mehreen Bano, 14, a patient brought to the Cantonment General Hospital (CGH) in Rawalpindi from the nearby village of Pindigheb, died within an hour of being admitted. The girl was reported to have been suffering high fever and nose bleeds for several days.

"Mehreen was brought to the hospital on Monday morning, but her condition was severe and she died within half an hour," Dr Shafiqur Rehman, the medical officer at the CGH, told IRIN. Out of 77 blood samples sent for testing from the Rawalpindi area to the National Institute of Health (NIH) in Islamabad, 14 have tested positive for the dengue virus. It is believed dozens more, currently either in hospital or discharged after initial treatment, could be suffering from the disease.

However, a severe shortage of testing kits at hospitals has made it difficult to determine the numbers infected. Hospitals across the country are currently demanding testing kits, with more and more suspected patients coming in daily.

The long Eid break has added to the problems in acquiring new kits and pharmaceutical companies involved in importing the kits say it could be two weeks or longer before more can be brought in. "It is a case of market dynamics. The demand is unusual and we were not ready for it, Peshawar-based pharmacist Fazal Afzal said.

Health experts across the country have warned that the dengue epidemic could assume still more serious proportions over the coming days, due to a continuing lack of sufficient public awareness and a failure to take measures to prevent breeding of the Aedes mosquito, which carries the virus.

The onset of colder weather, which would kill of the mosquitoes, is seen as the main hope in stopping the rapid spread of the disease.

There have so far been 432 confirmed cases of dengue in the southern port city of Karachi, the capital of the Sindh province. At least 12 people have died since the outbreak hit in mid-September, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said. While more than 160 patients are still hospitalised in Karachi, the epicentre of the mosquito-transmitted epidemic. At least another 1,500 people in the province are thought to be infected.

All hospitals in Peshawar, Rawalpindi and Islamabad have been placed on high alert, and isolation wards have been set up at them for patients showing symptoms of dengue.

Manatee finds way to Memphis

MEMPHIS, Tennessee (AP) -- An adventurous manatee strayed far from its usual coastal habitat to make an appearance on a Mississippi River tributary near downtown Memphis on Monday.

The distance on the curvy river from near its delta in Louisiana to Memphis is more than 725 miles, according to Army Corps of Engineers charts.

"I got a call about 3 p.m. about either a hippo or a manatee in the water," said Andy Tweed, an officer with the Tennessee Wildlife Resource Agency. Officers from the agency and zoologists from the Memphis Zoo confirmed the sighting and observed the animal from boats.

The endangered species generally prefers warm coastal waters ranging from Alabama to South Carolina, although there were sightings this August along the East Coast up to Rhode Island.

In winter months, they usually stay in coastal waters off Florida, often congregating near the warm-water discharges of power plants.

"If he did swim from Florida, he's doing really well," Tweed said, estimating its size between eight and 10 feet, and its weight up to 1,000 pounds.

Tennessee officials were working with experts in Florida to decide what to do next. The agency planned to track the animal again Tuesday morning by helicopter and restrict private boat traffic in the harbor of the Wolf River, a tributary that meets the Mississippi just north of downtown Memphis.