Revelations
15:3 "Great and marvelous are your works, Lord God, the Almighty; Righteous and true are your ways, you King of the nations.

15:4 Who wouldn't fear you, Lord, And glorify your name? For you only are holy. For all the nations will come and worship before you. For your righteous acts have been revealed."


8.1 Quake near Kurile Islands, Tsunami Warning

TOKYO, Nov 15 (Reuters) - A small tsunami wave hit Japan's northernmost island late on Wednesday after a major quake in the Kurile islands triggered a full-scale tsunami warning for areas of northern Japan and Russia's Pacific coast.

Japanese media reported that a wave measuring about 40 cm (16 inches) had come ashore at Nemuro, on the east coast of Japan's Hokkaido island.

NHK public television in Japan said local authorities in Hokkaido had been bracing for a tsunami predicted at between 1 to 2 metres in height.

A lesser warning was issued for a wide swathe of the eastern coast of northern and central Honshu, Japan's main island, but for waves expected to be some 50 cm (20 inches) at highest.

A tsunami warning was also issued to all coastal areas in the Kuriles, NHK public television quoted Itar-Tass news agency as saying.

Both the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii and Japan's Meteorological Agency put the quake's intensity at 8.1. Its epicentre was deep under the Pacific Ocean roughly 1,700 km (1,000 miles) northeast of Tokyo.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake occurred at 8:14 p.m. (1114 GMT) with the focus was 27.7 km below the seabed.

Hokkaido residents reported feeling little to no shaking from the earthquake, but authorities stopped trains in the eastern part of the island and warned people to move to higher ground.

"We have been repeatedly urging people to evacuate. We did not feel an earthquake," said Yasukatsu Imai, an official in the Nemuro local government, told NHK.

Authorities in Russia's Sakhalin region said the earthquake had struck near uninhabited islands at the centre of the Kuriles chain. The Russian Emergencies Ministry said a tsunami had yet to be spotted.

Russia's Shell-led Sakhalin-2 oil and gas exploration project said that there had been no immediate impact on their activities from the earthquake and tsunami.

The Kuriles are known as the Chishima islands in Japan. Japan claims the four islands closest to Hokkaido, calling them the Northern Territories. The Soviet Union seized the islands, which it knows as the Southern Kuriles, at the end of World War Two and Tokyo and Moscow continue to wrangle about their future.

Hurricane Sergio gains power off Mexican coast

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Hurricane Sergio, a rare mid-November cyclone, quickly strengthened off Mexico on Wednesday, and was due to brush Pacific coastal towns over the weekend as the official end to hurricane season approached.

The storm was some 410 miles southwest of the town of Zihuatanejo, Mexican meteorologists said.

Sergio packed howling winds of 109 mph (175 kph) and was almost a strong Category 3 hurricane, capable of causing structural damage and dangerous storm surges. The U.S. National Hurricane Center predicted higher wind speeds in the next 24 hours.

"We are anticipating it will continue to intensify and become a major hurricane possibly later tonight or during the day tomorrow," said Michelle Mainelli of the Miami-based center.

Mainelli said it was likely Sergio would be upgraded to a Category 3 storm. She said it was still early to say whether it would make land.

"The atmosphere is very light and the water is very warm, combining the two we could get a very strong hurricane," she said.

Fire department personnel survey storm damage at The Fun Zone, a skating rink and entertainment complex for children in Montgomery, Ala., Wednesday, Nov. 15, 2006. The roof collapsed at the facility due to high winds.

One dead as severe storms pelt the South

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Lines of powerful thunderstorms pelted the South with heavy wind, rain and hail Wednesday, turning a skating rink into a hulk of twisted metal soon after the 31 preschoolers and four adults inside had fled to the only part of the building that turned out to be safe.
One child suffered a broken bone and another a cut to the head, but everyone else emerged unharmed from the crumpled wreck of the Fun Zone Skate Center, which doubled as a day-care facility.

"I'm amazed that anyone got out of there," said Montgomery Mayor Bobby Bright.

Several states were battered by the storms, which unleashed tornadoes and straight-line winds that overturned mobile homes and tractor-trailers, uprooted trees and knocked down power lines. At least one person was killed and several injured.

Authorities were unsure whether it was a tornado that hit the skate center about 10:15 a.m.

Jon Slaughter, who owns two nearby businesses, arrived at the skating center with two employees about five minutes after the building was ripped apart.

"What I saw was just utter destruction," said Slaughter. "The children were scared, they were cold and dirty. They were crying and upset, but really they were calmer than I thought they would be."

The manager of the day-care center operating inside the building had made everyone get into the section of the building that survived the high winds.

"She may have saved many of these children's lives," the mayor said.

The damage was so severe some witnesses were in disbelief that everyone inside could have walked out. Two people crawled under the beams and wreckage looking for kids, but everyone was already out.

"I wasn't panicked until I saw the building," said Russell Grant, who showed up to take home his 5-year-old son, Justin, after hearing what had happened.

Building falls as winds batter Canada's west coast

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Nov 15 (Reuters) - A storm packing heavy rain and high winds slammed into Canada's already soggy Pacific coast on Wednesday, uprooting trees, disrupting travel and possibly causing a building to collapse.

The steel frame of a four-storey building under construction in Vancouver collapsed during the storm, but fire officials said all the construction workers escaped injury because they were on a coffee break at the time of the incident.

The metal girders crushed cars in a parking lot next to the construction site and narrowly missed a truck driver.

The cause of the collapse was not immediately known, but a fire department spokesman told local media that the weather was likely a factor.

Winds gusting at more than 100 km/h (62 mph) smashed trees into houses in West Vancouver, forcing officials to evacuate about 30 homes in a subdivision in the wealthy suburb.

The storm forced BC Ferries to cancel most of its sailings. The ships serve as an extension of the provincial highway system, connecting the mainland with Vancouver Island and other smaller islands off the coast.

The Port of Vancouver, Canada's largest, was also forced to idle its container and coal loading operations at its Deltaport facility on Wednesday. The port's other facilities remained in operation, a spokeswoman said.

BC Hydro said as many as 180,000 customers lost power because of the weather. The utility said all of its repair crews and contractors had been called out.

The storm also brought heavy rain to the region, which was still drying out from storms that had caused flooding in southwest British Columbia and western Washington state last week.

Flood warnings were issued for several rivers on eastern Vancouver Island where rain fell at a rate of 10 mm an hour for more than six hours at midday.

Coastal residents on the Island had also been under a tsunami watch for a brief time on Wednesday morning because of an 8.1 magnitude earthquake across the Pacific near Japan.

Kenya floods kill 23, displace 80,000 -Red Cross

NAIROBI, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Floods in Kenya's northeastern and coastal areas have killed 23 people and displaced more than 80,000, the Red Cross said on Wednesday.

It also warned that heavy rains would take a toll on the flood-prone western region.

"From our countrywide assessment, we know of 23 people dead at the coast, the refugee camps and other areas of north eastern province," Linet Atieno, an information officer with the Kenyan Red Cross Society, told Reuters.

Government officials in the coastal province said thousands were fleeing the rising water for shelter in the hills of Kwale district.

Roads have been blocked and many students sitting national high school exams have been cut off from schools and examinations centres.

"The number of people displaced (are) 80,000 and thousands more are affected and at high risk countrywide," the Kenya Red Cross Society said in a statement.

"Flooding is also expected to occur in the traditional flood-prone areas of western Kenya, with rivers threatening to break their banks."

The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said the flash floods have destroyed hundreds of homes and killed a pregnant woman and a child in the Dadaab refugee camps in northeastern Kenya. Thousands of Somali refugees fleeing tension in their country have been pouring into the Dadaab camps in recent months.

Heavy rains have also been pounding the Horn of Africa beyond Kenya, bringing misery to parts of Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Eritrea. Thousands have been driven from their homes in southern Somalia.

"We are asking the international community to help the affected people," said Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, one of the Somali Islamist leaders in control of much of the country's south.

Strong earthquake hits near Indonesia

WASHINGTON, Nov 14 (Reuters) - A strong earthquake measuring 6.0 shook the Banda Sea near Indonesia on Tuesday, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The quake hit 185 miles (300 km) off the Moluccas, in Indonesia at 11:20 p.m. local time at the epicenter (9:20 a.m. EST/1420 GMT). The epicenter was also 225 miles (360 km) from Dili, in East Timor.

British, Swedish climbers missing in Nepal avalanche

KATHMANDU, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Three foreign climbers and their sherpa guides are missing after being hit by an avalanche while trying to scale a Himalayan peak in eastern Nepal, an official said on Wednesday.

The men were sleeping at a camp on the 6,812 metre (22,349 feet) Ama Dablam mountain -- 130 km (80 miles) east of the capital, Kathmandu -- on Monday at the time, Lok Bahadur Khatri, a tourism ministry official, told Reuters.

"The avalanche hit the camp around midnight," Khatri said, adding that a helicopter had been sent to the area near Mount Everest to look for the climbers.

"The pilots said they could only see something like shoes or clothes from the air but found no trace of the climbers."

He identified the climbers as Briton Duncan Williams, 32, and Swedes Daniel Carlsson, 27, and Mikael Forsberg, 41.

Three Nepali sherpas were also missing.

British officials in Kathmandu confirmed Williams was among those missing. The Swedish Consulate General in Nepal was unavailable for comment.

The incident comes a day after four French mountaineers trying to scale a peak in central Nepal were reported missing.

Every year, thousands of foreign climbers visit Nepal, home to eight of the world's 14 highest peaks.

Scarlet fever nearing pandemic in N.Korea

SEOUL, Nov 15 (Reuters) - North Korea could be facing a scarlet fever pandemic after the disease broke out last month in its Ryanggang province which borders China, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported on Wednesday.

It quoted a source close to North Korea, who declined to be named, as saying the disease had been spreading fast to other parts of the country and risked turning into a full-blown pandemic.

The Daily NK www.dailynk.com, a Web site run by anti-North Korean government activists, last month quoted a number of sources as saying that the disease had spread to several places along the border and the area had been closed and quarantined.

Tornado injures six in Mississippi; high winds batter Arkansas

SUMRALL, Miss. (AP) — At least six people were hurt early Wednesday when a tornado touched down in a residential area of Sumrall in Lamar County, Miss.
The tornado hit about 2:50 a.m. in a subdivision southwest of the city, said James Smith, director of the county's emergency operations center.

"We had no report of fatalities. We had six people transported to local hospitals. There may have been others who were hurt but didn't need to go to hospitals," Smith said.

Smith said more than 10 homes were damaged by the storm.

He said damage reports were being delayed by a second storm system that was moving into the area early Wednesday.

"The National Weather Service tells us this second storm may be as bad or worse than the first one, so we're going to wait that out," Smith said.

Thunderstorms also boomed across Arkansas overnight and into Wednesday morning, bringing flooding and wind damage to parts of the state.

Several people were injured in accidents along Interstate 40 in St. Francis County when winds blow at least five tractor trailers over. A possible tornado was reported in the area Wednesday morning.

Officials say at least four people were hospitalized for injuries from the crashes.

Authorities asked motorists in east Arkansas to avoid the area on I-40 between mile markers 229 and 231.

In the Wheatley area, officials say a hotel along I-40 sustained structural damage.

A number of places in central Arkansas experienced flash flooding overnight, including the Little Rock area, as storms dropped rain and hail and brought high winds.

Police in North Little Rock reported flooded conditions in the Percy Machion and Pershing areas. And police in Little Rock said they rescued two people who were stranded in trees in the Asher and University area.

The weather service said strong and gusty winds from the north would bring much cooler air into Arkansas on Wednesday. Lows Thursday morning were forecast to be in the lower 30s in the northwest to near 40°F in southeast Arkansas.

Storm brings up to a foot of snow, 66-mph wind gusts to Colorado

DENVER (AP) — A winter storm dropped a foot of snow on parts of Colorado on Tuesday, bringing high winds and closing highways, with more accumulation possible in some areas.
A foot of snow fell at the Eisenhower Tunnel, about 50 miles west of Denver, which takes Interstate 70 through the mountains. The storm had been expected to drop up to 20 inches in the high mountains before moving east.

Winds gusted to 66 mph in Longmont, about 25 miles north of Denver, National Weather Service meteorologist Scott Entrekin said.

Vail ski resort, which is set to open Friday, reported 6 inches of new snow. Arapahoe Basin reported 10 inches of snow and Loveland resort, 11 inches.

Officials closed 60 miles of I-70 in the mountains west of Denver for much of the day, and other highways also closed.

ETHIOPIA: Stagnant water hampering aid efforts in flood-hit areas

NAIROBI, 15 November (IRIN) - Water levels are receding in southeast Ethiopia but humanitarian efforts to help thousands of people displaced by floods are being hindered by stagnant water, amid fears of increased risk of water-borne diseases.

About 68 people died and thousands fled their homes in the Somali region after the Wabe Shebelle river burst its banks in early November, washing away livestock and damaging infrastructure, including bridges and roads. The towns of Mustahil and Kelafo, south of Gode, the regional capital, have been worst hit by the floods.

"Inaccessibility to flood-affected areas, particularly Mustahil and Kelafo woredas, is still a challenge; this coupled with a shortage of fuel is hampering the emergency response," the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a situation report on Monday.

A total of 145,000 people have been affected in the two woredas, according to OCHA. Approximately 11,000 people were reported displaced in Mustahil. "These areas are still inaccessible by road," the report noted. "Transportation has been partly hampered because of poor road conditions following heavy rains in the region … and several trucks loaded with emergency relief items are stranded due to the floods and heavy rains. Transportation, including helicopters and boats, is among the pressing needs."

So far, 89 percent of the food items sent to the area have been delivered by road from Dire Dawa. A total of 1,980 tonnes of relief food items have been allocated to Mustahil, Gode and Kelafo areas by the government Disaster Prevention and Preparedness Agency.

The stagnant water and limited access to medicine or healthcare have increased the fear that water-borne diseases might increase in the flooded areas. "High incidences of endemic water diseases, including acute watery diarrhoea, malaria and intestinal parasites are also reported," OCHA says in its humanitarian bulletin, adding that unconfirmed reports of diarrhoea had killed people in the Somali region.

Cases of acute watery diarrhoea had reached 36,342, with 416 deaths in 99 woredas across the country.

Various other agencies are trying to deliver aid. "Right now, there are several operational constraints in trying to mount a humanitarian response to the floods," the UN Children's Fund [Unicef] said on Wednesday, noting that many bridges and roads had been washed away. "Unicef is working with its partners to deliver non-food items, specifically, water and sanitation supplies, and ready-to-eat food such as fortified biscuits for children."

On Friday, a C-130 Hercules aircraft from the United States Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa flew nearly 48 tonnes of relief supplies from Dire Dawa and Addis Ababa, the capital, to the affected areas. "We're delivering these supplies at the request of the Ethiopian government," said Marine Maj Phillip Frietze, mission commander for the operation.

In mid-August, at least 639 people were killed when unusually heavy rains triggered massive flooding in the eastern, northern and southern regions of the country. A total of 357,000 people have been affected by the floods, which aid agencies say are the worst in decades. Somalia and neighbouring Kenya have also been hit by flash floods over the past two weeks.

Living with Australia's drought

Goulburn in New South Wales is Australia's oldest inland city.

But when it comes to dealing with chronic water shortages it offers an alarming glimpse of the future.

A town of some 22,000 people, situated about two-and-half hours south of Sydney, it has been coping with severe water restrictions for the past five years.

With the town in the grip of Australia's worst drought in a century - there has been no significant rainfall in Goulburn since January and not a single drop in October - residents are confronted with all manner of water-related prohibitions.

All use of town water outside is banned, which includes hosing the garden, washing the car, and filling or topping up swimming pools or spas.

Households are only allowed to consume 150 litres per person per day.

If they exceed that target, they are faced with hefty fines. Bills are already soaring. Wardens patrol the streets on the look-out for "water louts" (residents who illegally use their hoses).

The town's streets, avenues and cul-de-sacs have become a sun-dried suburbia, a scorched landscape of parched lawns and dying plants and flowers.

Dusty cars sit unwashed on the driveways.

Rugby teams have to cut back on their training because the ground is so hard.

There are even fears that the cricket season will have to be cancelled by the New Year unless there is a break in the drought.

So no wonder Joanne Godbar is standing in her bathroom posed with a stopwatch, looking like the starter in an Olympics 100 metres final rather than a mother-of-two.

Her daughter is just about to take a shower, and Joanne is making sure that she does not spend more than five minutes under the water.

"Obviously with the showering, we have to time the shower," says Joanne. "You have to be really careful with the washing machine. Clothes that aren't too dirty just go back in the drawer. And then there's a garden. Well, we haven't got a garden any more. We've just accepted the fact that we will never again have a nice green lush lawn."

The scale of the problem facing Goulburn is clear at Pejar Dam, one of the town's main reservoirs.

It is an empty bowl, with just 2% of its capacity. Even the small amount of water that is resting on the bottom is impractical to use. You would lose too much through evaporation by transporting it into town.

A sign by the side of the reservoir says that boating is banned - a glaring statement of the obvious.

"We'd be a good 10 metres under water where we standing now," explained Greg Finlayson, Manager of Water Services at the local council.

"For the past two years we've been under the most severe water restrictions in Australia, and possibly the western world."

"During the winter, the water consumption has been cut in half. During the summer, the residents and business are using just a quarter of what they used to consume."

Falling income

Travel further down the road, and you come to Gundowringa farm. The Prell family has been farming this land for four generations, but fears it might have to leave if the rain does not come soon.

At this time of the year, the farm should be a dreamy picture of lush rolling hills. But it has been starved of water, and the bleached landscape is dying.

The family has kept an accurate measure of monthly rainfall since 1895. In October, for the first time ever, there was not a single drop of rain.

Charlie Prell took me for a tour of the farm, driving through dried-out river beds and showing me his bedraggled sheep and cattle.

The farm's income stream has dropped by 50%, and the family has had to sell-off a third of its land to make ends meet.

Last year, sheep commanded a price of A$40-50 a head. Now it has plummeted to A$10-15 a head.

The price has fallen because of a glut in the market. Farmers are selling off their sheep at bargain basement prices because they cannot afford to feed them through the summer.

"Every four days a farmer in Australia is committing suicide," he says. "I haven't contemplated that myself, but it destroys my soul."

Contingency plans

Many businesses have been forced to totally reinvent the way they operate to deal with the water shortage.

Dad's Car Wash is a case in point. With cars lined up bumper to bumper, it is doing a roaring trade - which comes as no surprise, since it is the only place in Goulburn right now where you can get your car washed.



Had it not invested A$100,000 in a recycling plant which allows it to re-use grey water, the business would have faced ruin.

"The place would probably have lasted six months," according to owner Jeff Hayward. "So it really was a case of do or die. A$100,000 is a lot of money, but we employ 10 people so it was not just me that was going to be affected but the staff as well. So we really thought we must do it."

Painful though the process has been, Goulburn is learning to cope with its severe water restrictions, and people seem to deal with them with a combination of resilience and resignation.

The local council claims the town may be in better shape than other Australian cities, for the simple reason that over the course of five rain-starved years it has become adept at tackling the problem.

Still, if the drought continues, the water crunch will only get worse.

A contingency plan is already in place to transport water into the town by the truckload - a task that would require 40 trucks a day, at a cost of A$1m a week.

The worrying question for Goulburn - and indeed, communities all over the world: Is this the new normal?