Welcome to the last Sunday of 2006

Monster winter storm moves into Plains

DENVER - Denver was spared another round of heavy snow but an expansive winter storm that rolled out of the Rockies trapped drivers farther east in 10-foot drifts.

Denver had expected a foot or more of additional snow through Sunday, but the storm trudged northeast from New Mexico into the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles. Parts of eastern Colorado still expected up to 2 feet, along with high winds.

The storm stretched nearly from Canada to Mexico.

"It's still a very powerful storm," said meteorologist Jim Kalina of the National Weather Service. Winds exceeding 50 mph produced whiteout conditions.

National Guard troops in tracked vehicles crawled through the blizzard to rescue hundreds of motorists who became stranded in the region's second blizzard during the busy holiday travel season.

"They're telling me it's zero visibility," said Maj. Gen. Mason Whitney, the state adjutant general. "They'll kind of bump into something and it'll turn out to be a car with people in it."

The Guard and Civil Air Patrol planned to do searches by helicopter early Sunday, weather permitting.

The storm, which hampered air travel through Denver on Thursday and Friday, spread snow from New Mexico to the Dakotas and generated strong thunderstorms in the lower Mississippi Valley.

Conditions were so bad that some snowplows had to stay off the roads.

In Denver, the sun emerged Saturday for the first time in several days, helping street crews clearing snow and ice left from the pre-Christmas blizzard. Major carriers at Denver International Airport resumed flying regular schedules after canceling 20 percent of flights during the storm.

The weather service on Saturday reported 30 inches in the foothills west of Denver, with more than 9 inches in the city.

Parts of Interstate 70 from the Rockies to Kansas remained closed Saturday, along with several other major east-west highways. In New Mexico, Interstate 25 from Pueblo to Santa Fe was also closed.

A Kansas Highway Patrol dispatcher said most major roads from Kansas into Colorado would remain closed until Colorado officials reopen their routes.

Ice and strong winds knocked out power to at least 14,000 people in Kansas, where up to 18 inches of snow had fallen by Saturday in some areas. The snow later turned to rain in many areas. Up to a foot fell in southwestern and central Nebraska.

One traffic death was blamed on the storm in Colorado and a tornado killed one person Friday in Texas. The storm also created severe thunderstorms in the South. A possible tornado was reported Saturday in southern Louisiana.

On Friday, tornadoes generated by the storm in Texas destroyed as many as 50 homes and forced President Bush and his wife into an armored vehicle on his Crawford ranch.

Residents of an assisted living center for military veterans in Texas had little time to react Friday before a tornado struck, killing one person.

More than 15 inches of snow fell at Albuquerque's airport by noon Saturday, setting records.

In North Dakota, transportation officials pulled snowplows off many roads late Saturday because of reduced visibility.

The National Weather Service said snowfall amounts in the central part of the state late Saturday night ranged from 8 inches in Bismarck to 16 inches in Ashley, with up to 3 more inches expected overnight.

Malaysian floods death toll rises to 12, another missing

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) - The death toll from Malaysia's disastrous floods has risen to 12, with another youth missing, but authorities said fears of another round of flooding had been averted.

The latest confirmed victim is a five-year-old girl whose body was found late Friday, the official Bernama news agency said.

She was swept away when the car her family was travelling in was caught by strong currents. Her father survived, but her mother and three-year-old sister also died.

However, an 18-year-old youth is missing after he was lost in floodwaters late Friday, Bernama said.

Malaysia's opposition has called for an inquiry into the floods, the worst in decades, which have forced nearly 59,0000 people in southern Johor state to flee their homes and take shelter in relief centres.

However, Johor chief minister Abdul Ghani Othman said he was confident the situation in the state would be back to normal within the next few days.

Abdul Ghani said the second wave of rains predicted by forecasters would not take place as the rain-bearing clouds had been blown towards Singapore and Sabah state on Borneo island.

Minor quake shakes northern Japan, no injuries

TOKYO, Dec 31 (Reuters) - An earthquake with a magnitude of 5.1 jolted Japan's main northern island of Hokkaido early on Sunday, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage from the quake, which occurred at 7:34 a.m. (2234 GMT Saturday), according to Japan's Kyodo news agency.

Tremors of similar intensity usually cause hanging objects to swing and can be felt by people walking on the street. The meteorological agency said there was no risk of a tsunami.

The focus of the tremor was 50 km (31.07 miles) below the surface of the earth, off the east coast of Hokkaido, it said.

President takes cover during tornado scare

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) -- President Bush and first lady Laura Bush were moved to an armored vehicle on their ranch Friday when a tornado warning was issued in central Texas, the White House said.

The vehicle was driven to a tornado shelter on the ranch at 1:30 p.m. CT, and the president, the first lady and their two Scottish terriers, Barney and Miss Beazley, sat inside until the weather cleared, deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel said. They were never moved into the shelter, he said. The shelter is a few hundred yards away from the president's house on the ranch.

"He was in the vehicle for about 10 minutes and then he went back to the house," Stanzel said, adding that other members of the staff at the ranch were sheltered as well.

About an hour later in Groesbeck, roughly 60 miles east of Crawford, a man was killed when a tornado struck an assisted living facility for veterans, emergency management officials said.

Earthquake in Gulf of Aden, little damage reported

ADEN, Yemen, Dec 30 (Reuters) - An earthquake with a magnitude of 6.3 struck the Gulf of Aden between Yemen and Somalia on Saturday, but initial reports from Yemen said it appeared to have caused little damage.

The quake was at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles), the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said on its Web site, but residents of Yemen's port city of Aden said they did not feel it.

There did not appear to be any serious damage or injuries in Aden and the sea looked calm, one resident said.

It was not clear whether the earthquake had a more serious impact on nearby Somalia.

The quake struck at 11:30 a.m local time (0830 GMT), the USGS said. It located the quake some 240 km to the west of the Yemeni island of Socotra and 325 km north of Xaafuun on the Somali coast.

Indonesian flood-displaced return, new Malaysia fear

SUKAJADI, Indonesia, Dec 29 (Reuters) - Thousands of villagers forced from their homes by floods on Indonesia's Sumatra island returned on Friday to begin cleaning up as neighbouring Malaysia braced for another deluge.

In Indonesia's Aceh and North Sumatra provinces, where floods and landslides killed as many as 141, the number of displaced fell from 400,000 to nearer 200,000 as people returned from shelters on high ground and temporary government camps.

Aid was getting through to many of those in need of food and other basics, but rain was still heavy enough in some isolated areas to block relief shipments, officials said.

"There are still five villages and two districts that we cannot reach because of the rain," health ministry crisis chief Rustam Pakaya told Reuters.

He put the death toll in the two provinces at 104, although domestic affairs minister Muhammad Maaruf later gave reporters figures totalling 141.

It is not unusual for such numbers to vary in Indonesia, where communications can lag and more than one department might have responsibility for collecting data.

Maaruf said there were 211,530 people displaced and 179 missing in the two provinces.

Many survivors who had gone home were cleaning up mud and debris on Friday, but others had found the task overwhelming and returned to the camps.

"It seems impossible to return to our home. It's full of mud," Tamilah, a villager using a truck as a shelter, told Reuters Television in Sukajadi village in Tamiang district, Aceh's worst-affected area.

"The problems are lack of food and drinking water," said Rosmini, another villager.

Pakaya said medicines, biscuits and water purifiers would be distributed and scores of clinics were being opened in affected areas to treat and prevent medical problems.

Catur Haryani, a doctor helping coordinate the aid effort in Aceh, told Reuters Television: "The health cases that we found are injuries, breathing problems and small numbers of diarrhoea."

WORST SINCE 1969

Parts of peninsular Malaysia, across the Strait of Malacca from Sumatra, were also hard hit by floods, the country's worst since 1969.

The Bernama news agency said at least 11 had been killed and 63,000 displaced, while the state Meteorological Department expected rains in Johor and southern Pahang to continue until Sunday.

"Of course, we hope there will not be a second round of the heavy rains that caused the current floods," the New Straits Times newspaper on Friday quoted Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak as saying. "But we will be ready for it if it happens."

Officials said three states including Johor, the hardest hit, would remain on red alert.

"Other states have been put on standby," Che Moin Omar, director of the government's crisis and disaster management directorate, told the newspaper.

The opposition took the government to task over its handling of the crisis.

"One woman died because no rescue boat came despite promises of help by government agencies during the past 24 hours," said Lim Guan Eng, leader of the Democratic Action Party.

Malaysian palm oil prices rocketed to 8-year highs on Thursday on fears that floods could severely cut supplies. Johor is one of Malaysia's top palm oil producers.

The floods also raised concerns in Indonesia about flows of palm oil, rubber and coffee to factories and ports. Traders said damaged roads and bridges had hampered delivery.

But in Aceh, home to major offshore natural gas fields and onshore processing plants, output and movement of natural gas were unaffected, industry officials said.

Authorities blamed heavy rains and deforestation for the latest destruction. Lack of adequate cover leaves ground less able to absorb excess water or hold soil in place.

Colorado digging out after latest storm

DENVER - National Guard troops in tracked vehicles crawled through 10-foot snowdrifts and whiteout conditions Saturday in eastern Colorado, rescuing motorists trapped by the region’s second holiday season blizzard.

The storm, which brought Denver to a standstill and hampered holiday air travel Thursday and Friday, was slowly moving east, spreading snow from New Mexico to the Dakotas and generating strong thunderstorms in the lower Mississippi Valley. Blizzard warnings were posted for eastern Colorado and western Kansas and into parts of New Mexico, Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle.

The Guard pulled about 20 people out of cars stranded on rural highways from Friday night into Saturday and took them to emergency shelters, said Maj. Gen. Mason Whitney, the state adjutant general.

“They’re telling me it’s zero visibility,” Whitney said. “They’ll kind of bump into something and it’ll turn out to be a car with people in it.”

No injuries were reported.

Interstate 70 and several other major east-west highways were closed Saturday from the Rockies east across Colorado into western Kansas. Interstate 25 heading south into New Mexico was closed near the state line.

Major interstate closed
All major roads from Kansas into Colorado were closed Saturday, including Interstate 70. A Kansas Highway Patrol dispatcher said the roads would remain closed until Colorado officials decide to reopen their routes.

One traffic death was blamed on the storm in Colorado and a tornado killed one person in Texas on Friday.

A possible tornado struck a rural part of south Louisiana early Saturday, damaging homes and ripping down power lines, but there were no immediate reports of injuries, Acadia Parish Sheriff Wayne Melancon said.

About 500 travelers spent the night at Denver International Airport, not stranded but hoping to get an early start on ticket lines, said airport spokesman Chuck Cannon.

The nation’s fifth-busiest airport was closed for two days by the storm that struck just before Christmas, but it was only slowed by the latest storm, with the major carriers canceling about 20 percent of their scheduled flights.

Airlines planned to fly full or nearly full schedules Saturday, Cannon said.

In southeastern Colorado, about 50 Guard troops operated four SUSVs, or “snow utility sustainment vehicles” — a military version of the sno-cat. The vehicles travel on tracks and can carry 12 people or supplies, Whitney said.

The troops were working around the clock through snowdrifts standing 7 to 10 feet deep, Whitney said.

Almost two feet of snow in foothills
Nearly two feet of snow fell in the foothills west of Denver, where many streets were still packed with ice from last week’s blizzard.

Up to 18 inches of snow had fallen by Saturday in western Kansas, but the snow had started turning to rain in many areas Saturday. Up to a foot fell in southwestern and central Nebraska.

Colorado Gov. Bill Owens had declared a statewide disaster emergency. Many government agencies and businesses were closed Friday. Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper said the economic impact on the city could easily total several million dollars.

Compared to last week’s blizzard, this storm produced its snow over a longer period, making it easier for armies of snowplows at the Denver airport and in most major cities across the state to keep up.

The tornadoes generated by the storm system in Texas on Friday destroyed as many as 50 homes, sent at least a dozen people to hospitals and forced President Bush and his wife into an armored vehicle on his Crawford ranch. The Bushes, and their two Scottish terriers, were driven to a tornado shelter on the ranch. They sat inside the armored vehicle until the weather cleared, deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel said.

Residents of an assisted living center for military veterans in Texas had little time to react Friday before a tornado struck.

“That convalescence center received word, from our understanding, about 30 seconds before the tornado hit them,” said Matt Groveton, the emergency management coordinator for Limestone County, about 60 miles east of Crawford near Waco. “Everybody dove to the ground.”

An Acehnese woman looks at a house destroyed at a vilage hit by flood and landslide in Aceh Tamiang district, Indonesia, Thursday, Dec. 28, 2006. Authorities deployed boats and helicopters on Thursday to shift aid to survivors of floods and landslides in northwestern Indonesia that have killed at least 109 and displaced more than 400,000. (AP Photo/Binsar Bakkara)

Death toll in Indonesian floods rises

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia - Rescuers reached remote villages, delivering food and medicine Friday to thousands of people displaced by floods and rain-induced landslides that have claimed at least 126 lives on Indonesia's Sumatra island.

In neighboring Malaysia, which is experiencing its most severe weather in a century, authorities found the body of a 14-year-old boy floating in a flood-swollen canal, bringing the death total there to 11.

Days of torrential rain have forced more than 400,000 people from their homes in Indonesia and displaced nearly 90,000 in Malaysia.

Heavy rain continued to fall over the hardest-hit areas of Sumatra, complicating relief efforts and adding to the misery of survivors, said local government spokesman Nadir Musa.

Most affected was the northernmost province of Aceh, where helicopters dropped food, tents and medicines while volunteers in dinghies distributed aid, Musa said.

At least 76 people were killed in Aceh, said Jabad, an official in the area who goes by only one name. That was 70 less than he had reported earlier in the day. Jabad said he mistakenly added some of then 150 people listed as missing to his count of the dead.

At least 50 others have died in neighboring North Sumatra province, said Edy Sofyan, the provincial spokesman.

Seasonal downpours cause of dozens of landslides and flash floods each year in the sprawling archipelagic nation where millions of people live in mountainous areas or in fertile flood plains.

Aceh was the hardest hit province in the 2004 tsunami, losing an estimated 167,000 people, but the floods and landslides have affected inland regions that were untouched by that disaster.

Malaysian flood toll rises to 11

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) - The death toll from Malaysia's worst floods in decades has risen to 11, officials have said, and the government has warned of further flooding with more heavy rain forecast.

The latest victim was a 14-year-old boy whose body was found floating in a canal, the official Bernama news agency said.

A five-year-old girl is also missing, after the car her family was travelling in was swept away by strong currents. Her father survived but the bodies of her mother and three-year-old sister have been retrieved.

The number of people forced to flee their homes and shelter in relief centres in southern Johor state, which has been hardest-hit, rose to 61,352 on Friday from 55,212 the day before, Bernama said.

The government has urged rescuers to brace themselves for another round of the disaster after forecasters perdicted more bad weather for Johor and central Pahang state until Sunday.

"If it doesn't occur, then thank God, but if it does, we must be in a state of readiness so that the necessary operations can be carried out efficiently," deputy premier Najib Razak said Thursday.

Hailstorm damages National Museum

A freak hailstorm in Canberra caused a ceiling to collapse at the National Museum of Australia late on Friday.

The museum would remain closed on Saturday while the damage was assessed, a spokesman said.

He said an administration block at the popular tourist attraction was damaged when intense storms swept through the national capital shortly after 4pm (AEDT) on Friday.

There was no damage to the museum's valuable collection of Australian materials and artefacts.

"What appears to have happened is that there's been some blockage in the drainage on the roof, in the guttering. There's been a build-up of hail and water and that's crashed through," the museum's director of public affairs Dennis Grant said.

"The damage has been confined to the administration block, so the collection is safe and secure."

Mr Grant could not put a figure on the damage, which he said was "all repairable".

There was no one in the administration area when the ceiling came down.

Strong winds, lightning and heavy rain lashed the capital for about half an hour on Friday, and the lawns of Parliament House were coated in hailstones up to one centimetre in diameter.

By 6pm (AEDT) on Friday the sun was shining again after the short downpour that delivered only 11mm of rain to Canberra, which is experiencing drought.

The ACT Emergency Services Agency said its volunteers received 22 calls for help following the storms, with Canberra's southern suburbs the worst affected.

Most requests for assistance were for minor flooding damage and fallen trees, a spokesman said.

A severe thunderstorm warning remains in force for the ACT and surrounding regions.

A spokesman for the Bureau of Meteorology said showers and thunderstorms were likely during the next few days.

The National Museum, opened in 2001, is considered one of Australia's most iconic buildings, known for its distinctive architecture and prominent location on Lake Burley Griffin.

Ancient ice shelf snaps, breaks free from Canadian Arctic

TORONTO, Ontario (AP) -- A giant ice shelf the size of 11,000 football fields has snapped free from Canada's Arctic, scientists said.

The mass of ice broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 800 kilometers (497 miles) south of the North Pole, but no one was present to see it in Canada's remote north.

Scientists using satellite images later noticed that it became a newly formed ice island in just an hour and left a trail of icy boulders floating in its wake. (Watch the satellite images that clued in ice watchers)

Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who studies Arctic conditions, traveled to the newly formed ice island and could not believe what he saw.

"This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years. We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead," Vincent said Thursday.

In 10 years of working in the region he has never seen such a dramatic loss of sea ice, he said.

The collapse was so powerful that earthquake monitors 250 kilometers (155 miles) away picked up tremors from it.

The Ayles Ice Shelf, roughly 66 square kilometers (41 square miles) in area, was one of six major ice shelves remaining in Canada's Arctic.

Scientists say it is the largest event of its kind in Canada in 30 years and point their fingers at climate change as a major contributing factor.

"It is consistent with climate change," Vincent said, adding that the remaining ice shelves are 90 percent smaller than when they were first discovered in 1906.

"We aren't able to connect all of the dots ... but unusually warm temperatures definitely played a major role."

Laurie Weir, who monitors ice conditions for the Canadian Ice Service, was poring over satellite images in 2005 when she noticed that the shelf had split and separated.

Weir notified Luke Copland, head of the new global ice lab at the University of Ottawa, who initiated an effort to find out what happened.

Using U.S. and Canadian satellite images, as well as data from seismic monitors, Copland discovered that the ice shelf collapsed in the early afternoon of August 13, 2005.

"What surprised us was how quickly it happened," Copland said. "It's pretty alarming.

"Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly, but the big surprise is that for one they are going, but secondly that when they do go, they just go suddenly, it's all at once, in a span of an hour."

Within days, the floating ice shelf had drifted a few miles (kilometers) offshore. It traveled west for 50 kilometers (31 miles) until it finally froze into the sea ice in the early winter.

The Canadian ice shelves are packed with ancient ice that dates back over 3,000 years. They float on the sea but are connected to land.

Derek Mueller, a polar researcher with Vincent's team, said the ice shelves get weaker and weaker as the temperature rises. He visited Ellesmere's Ward Hunt Ice Shelf in 2002 and noticed it had cracked in half.

"We're losing our ice shelves, and this a feature of the landscape that is in danger of disappearing altogether from Canada," Mueller said. "In the global perspective Antarctica has many ice shelves bigger than this one, but then there is the idea that these are indicators of climate change."

The spring thaw may bring another concern as the warming temperatures could release the ice shelf from its Arctic grip. Prevailing winds could then send the ice island southwards, deep into the Beaufort Sea.

"Over the next few years this ice island could drift into populated shipping routes," Weir said. "There's significant oil and gas development in this region as well, so we'll have to keep monitoring its location over the next few years."

Denver areas smacked with 28 inches of snow

DENVER, Colorado (AP) -- The second major snow storm in a week pounded Colorado on Friday, burying the foothills under another 2 feet of snow, shutting down highways and forcing the cancellation of hundreds of flights at the Denver airport.

The storm stretched across the Rocky Mountains into the western Plains, where the National Weather Service warned that the gusting wind could whip up blinding whiteouts.

Colorado Gov. Bill Owens again declared a statewide disaster, putting the National Guard on standby as areas west of Denver got 28 inches of snow Thursday and early Friday. In the city, about 16 inches had fallen by morning. Interstate 25, the main north-south highway through the state, was closed about 60 miles north of Denver.

While last week's blizzard dumped nearly 2 feet of snow in about 24 hours, making it impossible for airport and highway plows to keep up, snow from the new storm was expected to stretch over about three days.

United Airlines and Frontier Airlines, the largest carriers at Denver International Airport, both canceled 513 flights Thursday through Friday morning, trimming their schedules to ease congestion from weather delays.

"Right now, we're planning to operate a full schedule starting at noon," United spokeswoman Robin Urbanski said early Friday.

Interstate 70, the main east-west highway through the state, was closed early Friday between Denver and the Kansas line. Greyhound canceled all trips out of Denver on Friday and more cancelations could follow this weekend.

The metro area's light rail trains, buses and public transit planned to run on their regular schedules, though. Maintenance crews covered Denver streets with deicer, but offices still closed early Thursday and residents stocked up on groceries.

With memories fresh of the 4,700 stranded holiday travelers and backed up flights around the country last week, New Year's travelers jammed the airport Thursday trying to get out of Colorado while they still could.

Managers at the nation's fifth-busiest airport drew up snowplowing plans, and airlines urged ticket-holders to get early flights or wait until after the storm.

Traveler: 'It's been crazy'

Chris Malmay of San Diego, California, hoped to spend a long holiday with family in Colorado, but because of the first storm, he couldn't reach Denver until Christmas Eve. On Thursday, his flight back to California was canceled because of the second storm.

"It's been crazy," Malmay said as he waited to board a plane Friday. "I'm saying, 'Please let me go back where it's sunny. You won't get snowed in, I promise."'

Ann and Mill Younkers arrived hours early to check in for an evening flight back to Naples, Florida. The couple's trip to see their daughter in Denver was delayed three days by the first storm, and they didn't get in until Christmas morning.

This time, they had backup reservations for Sunday and were ready to reclaim their rental car if necessary.

"You just have to have a good sense of humor and keep your patience," Mill Younkers said. "Try to always have a plan B."

The airport and airlines called in extra workers, and security lines moved relatively quickly. But long lines formed at ticket counters as travelers tried to adjust their plans.

The Frontier line snaked across the cavernous terminal, weaving behind the lines of ticket counters on the other side of the building.

Frontier waived its usual change fee to encourage passengers to catch earlier flights. "Let's try and get as many people out ahead of the storm as we can," Frontier spokesman Joe Hodas said.

After running out of bedding for stranded passengers during the first storm, airport managers lined up cots and blankets and urged food vendors to ensure they had plenty of supplies on hand.

Nasty storm in New Mexico

In New Mexico, Interstate 40 remained closed Friday morning from Albuquerque to Santa Rosa, with numerous crashes were reported after a storm swept through.

Residents of Cheyenne, Wyoming, also braced for another snowstorm. Heavy snow began falling around dusk, and forecasters said up to a foot was expected.

In California, a powerful winter storm left tens of thousands of people without power as winds gusted to near-hurricane force. Forecasters warned of dangerous winds, with gusts over 70 mph, through Friday morning in the valleys and mountain passes.

Aid moves to thousands displaced by Indonesia floods

BUKIT RATA, Indonesia, Dec 28 (Reuters) - Government and aid agencies were moving food, water and medical supplies on Thursday to hundreds of thousands forced into temporary shelters by floods and landslides on Indonesia's Sumatra island.

But in Bukit Rata village in Aceh province's hard-hit Tamiyang regency, where 64 families have pitched tents on the roadside and higher ground, not everyone was satisfied.

"We have just complained to the district office about the lack of assistance. We know our hamlet is supposed to receive 25 sacks of rice but only 20 sacks arrived," said displaced resident Suroso Kasimin.

Water has receded but houses were still covered by thick mud. Some residents were trying to cleaning up their homes.

The government has been using helicopters to get aid to the most isolated points in Aceh province on the northern tip of Sumatra, while military planes and lorries shuttle relief supplies to other areas.

The confirmed death toll in Aceh and neighbouring North Sumatra province has remained around 100 in recent days, but figures for the displaced have climbed to above 400,000.

"Displaced people in Aceh are at 365,335, while in North Sumatra (they are) at 44,189," said Laksmita Novira, a U.N. aid spokeswoman in Aceh.

More than 200 people were missing in Aceh alone, she said.

Medication and doctors had been sent to help the displaced, according to Rustam Pakaya, the health ministry's crisis centre chief. "So far, there is no serious health problem," he said.

Lina Sofiani, a UNICEF officer in Jakarta, told Reuters: "Today, a child protection team from UNICEF's Banda Aceh base will go to east Aceh. Three diarrhoea cases were reported".

The government was sending additional food to flood-affected areas, and polluted wells were being treated with chlorine and temporary camps fogged with insecticide, the health ministry's Pakaya told Reuters.

TWO YEARS AFTER TSUNAMI

The flooding came two years after a giant tsunami left about 170,000 dead or missing in Aceh, a remote but resource-rich province whose capital, Banda Aceh, is 1,700 km (1,060 miles) northwest of Jakarta.

Aceh and North Sumatra produce palm oil, coffee and rubber, while Aceh has major offshore natural gas fields and onshore processing plants.

Traders say washed out bridges and damaged roads have hampered delivery of raw materials to factories and pushed up prices.

Some coffee shipments from plantations to ports have also been affected but not enough to hit prices, an industry official said.

Effects from the flooding have been minimal on output and processing of palm oil and and natural gas.

Authorities blame heavy rains and the effects of deforestation for the latest destruction. Lack of adequate forest cover leaves the ground less able to absorb excess water.

Flooding has also hit parts of peninsular Malaysia, across the Strait of Malacca from Sumatra, killing nine people in the worst-hit state of Johor. Four others are missing.

The floods, which the Malaysian government described as the worst since 1969, have displaced more than 60,000 people in the states of Johor, Pahang and Malacca. Malaysia's Meteorological Department said rains in Johor and southern Pahang were expected to continue until Sunday. (With additional reporting by Mita Valina Liem and Muara Makarim in Jakarta and Syed Azman in Kuala Lumpur)

Colorado braces for more snow as Northern Calif. begins cleanup after heavy storm

DENVER (AP) — Still recovering from last week's blizzard, Colorado cities braced Wednesday for another storm that could bring more than a foot of snow and high winds to the state and cause planes to be grounded at Denver International Airport again.

The National Weather Service said a storm, expected Thursday, could pack gusts up to 45 mph, whipping the heavy snow into blinding whiteouts. Denver could get 18 inches of snow by Friday morning, and up to 2½ feet were forecast for the foothills, the weather service said.

Weather Service forecasters said flights from Denver's airport could be delayed or even canceled but cautioned the storm's path and intensity were difficult to predict.

Crews were still trying to clear away ice and hard-packed snow from last week's storm. "Believe it or not, the first storm is not over for us," said Saleem Khattak, streets manager for Colorado Springs' Public Works Department.

Last week's storm dumped up to 3½ feet of snow on some parts of the state, shutting down highways, schools, businesses and mail delivery in some towns and cities. Denver's airport was closed to all flights for 45 hours, stranding about 4,700 people at the airport one night.

Meanwhile, utility crews in San Francisco scrambled Wednesday to fix power lines knocked over during a winter storm that snarled traffic, killed one woman and left tens of thousands of people without electricity across Northern California.

The post-Christmas storm had passed through the San Francisco Bay Area by Wednesday morning.

Downed power lines caused by heavy rains and winds left more than 107,000 customers without power Wednesday afternoon, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. spokesman Brian Swanson said.

One woman was killed when the storm's powerful gusts pushed an oak tree into a home, Marin County Fire Department spokeswoman Sarah Gibson said.

The storm had forced some flight delays Tuesday at San Francisco International Airport. But by Wednesday, flight arrivals were on time while some departures were slightly delayed, airport officials said.

In Southern California, powerful winds knocked out power to tens of thousands of customers as dangerous surf pounded the coast.

Southern California Edison said about 115,000 customers had outages ranging from momentary to several hours, and about 5,000 remained without electricity Wednesday afternoon. About 10,000 Los Angeles Department of Water and Power customers were without power Wednesday evening, spokeswoman Carol Tucker said.

At least one death is being blamed on the storm. A man drowned in Ventura Tuesday while rescuing his 4-year-old grandniece, who was knocked off a jetty while watching the large waves that preceded the storm.

Breakers as high as 10 feet pounded the coast Wednesday in Ventura and Los Angeles counties.

Asia gets back online after quake

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) -- Telecom companies quickly cobbled together new telephone and Internet networks on Thursday as Asia began recovering from a Taiwanese earthquake that snapped undersea cables, snarling service across the tech-savvy region.

Less than 48 hours after the powerful quake ruptured the two crucial cables off Taiwan's southern tip, companies from South Korea to Singapore said they managed to partially restore most of their service to millions of customers.

They did it by rerouting traffic through satellites and cables that weren't damaged by the 6.7-magnitude tremor that killed two people.

Four repair ships were sailing to the quake zone, but they weren't expected to arrive until Tuesday, said Lin Jen-hung, vice-general manager of Chunghwa Telecom Co., Taiwan's biggest phone company.

The crews would need to find the fault, survey the conditions and pull up the cables for repair -- a job Chunghwa said could take two weeks.

Most international Internet data and voice calls travel as pulses of light through hundreds of undersea fiber optic cables crisscrossing the globe. The cables -- clusters of glass fibers enclosed in protective material -- are often owned by groups of telecom companies, who share costs and capacity.

"Cables break all over the place, from sharks nibbling, anchors dragged across," said Markus Buchhorn, an information technology expert at Australia National University.

But Buchhorn added the broken cables become a problem if -- like in the Taiwanese case -- several snap at the same time and there are not immediate backup lines to keep the traffic flowing.

Chunghwa estimated its revenue loss from the earthquake damage at about $3 million. Repairing the cables would cost about $1.53 million, the company said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.

The outage reminded stock traders, travelers and online video gamers how addicted they've become to the Internet.

"Many lost the opportunity to make fast money," said Francis Lun, general manager at Fulbright Securities in Hong Kong.

"I haven't experienced anything like this before," Lun added. "We've become too dependent on these optic fibers -- a few of them get damaged, and everything collapses."

Online gamer Daniel Lee, 28, said he was suffering in Hong Kong because he couldn't spend his usual eight to 10 hours a day playing games on the Internet.

"Most online games are routed through Taiwan, and now I can't play any of them. I can't contact a lot of people because my e-mail is down. It's a hassle and it's depressing, but I can't do anything about it," said Lee, who's unemployed.

Long lines formed at Hong Kong's airport because the computer system at the check-in counters for Taiwan's China Airlines weren't working.

A woman at the airline's hot line said the computer system had been down since Wednesday afternoon.

"We had to switch to manual services because the system in Taipei was affected by the quake," said the woman, who only gave her surname, Sze. "But all our computers are running normally now."

South Korea's biggest carrier, KT, said more than half of its 92 damaged lines should be fixed by the end of Thursday. One of the company's customers was the Foreign Ministry, which recovered its service.

In Japan, major carriers KDDI Corp. and NTT Communications said most fixed-line telephone services were up and running.

NTT spokeswoman Akiko Suzaki said that a full recovery would require a relaying of undersea cables and could take weeks.

Tim Dillon, senior research director with U.S.-based Current Analysis, which studies the telecom industry, said customers in Asia will have to get used to sluggish service in the next few weeks.

"We have a lot of traffic all going to alternate routings at the same time," Dillon said. "It's obviously going to result in slower speeds and congestion as everyone piles onto the same cable."

Quakes disrupt Asia communications

SINGAPORE (Reuters) -- Telecommunications around Asia were severely disrupted on Wednesday after earthquakes off Taiwan damaged undersea cables, slowing Internet services and hindering financial transactions, particularly in the currency market.

Banks and businesses across the region reported problems with communications, with some telephone lines cut and Internet access slowing to a crawl.

South Korea's top fixed-line and broadband service provider, KT Corp, said in a statement that six submarine cables were knocked out by Tuesday night's earthquakes.

"Twenty-seven of our customers were hit, including banks and churches," a KT spokesman said. "It is not known yet when we can fully restore the services."

Banks in Seoul said foreign exchange trading had been affected.

"Trading of the Korean won has mostly halted due to the communication problem," said a dealer at one domestic bank.

Some disruption was also reported in the important Tokyo currency market but the EBS system that handles much dollar/yen trading appeared to be working.

Global information company Reuters Group Plc said all users of its services in Japan and South Korea had been affected.

One Tokyo foreign exchange trader said: "There are many currencies in which market-making is being conducted via Reuters and such currencies such as the Australian dollar and the British pound are in a very tenuous situation now."

State secret
In China, trading in currencies and copper appeared to be normal and both the Shanghai stock market and money market were working.

But China Telecommunications Group, the country's biggest fixed-line telephone operator and parent of China Telecom Corp., said the earthquakes had affected lines "from the Chinese mainland to places including the Taiwan area, the United States and Europe, and many have been cut".

"Internet connections have been seriously affected, and phone links and dedicated business lines have also been affected to some degree," it said.

Officials declined to give further details. "Undersea communications cables fall in the area of state secrets," said a ministry of communications official in Beijing.

The main quake, measured by Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau at magnitude 6.7 and at magnitude 7.1 by the U.S. Geological Survey, struck off Taiwan's southern coast at 1226 GMT on Tuesday. Two people were killed.

Taiwan's Chunghwa Telecom said two of four major undersea cables out of Taiwan had been affected. Voice circuits had been reduced to 40 per cent of capacity to the United States and just 2 per cent to most parts of Southeast Asia.

KDDI Corp., Japan's second-largest telecoms company, said communications along submarine cables out of Japan went through Taiwan before reaching Southeast Asian countries, which was leading to disruption.

But it said communications were unlikely to break down completely since there were alternative lines.

PCCW, Hong Kong's main fixed-line telecoms provider, said several undersea cables it part-owned had been damaged. "Data transfer is down by half," a spokeswoman said.

Both Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel), Southeast Asia's top phone company, and local rival StarHub Ltd., said customers were suffering slow access to Internet pages.

But SingTel said traffic was being diverted and repair work was in progress, adding: "Our submarine cables linking to Europe and the U.S. are not affected."

Indonesia air drops aid, sends in teams after flooding

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (Dec 27) Reuters - Authorities in north-western Indonesia struggled on Wednesday to feed and shelter more than 200,000 people forced from their homes by floods and subsequent landslides that killed around 100.

Officials used military helicopters to reach remote areas in Aceh province, while more than two dozen lorries shuttled relief supplies. Health authorities began treating well water with chlorine to stem the outbreak of disease.

"Aid is being distributed but there are some areas that are still isolated, so we have air dropped the aid to those areas. We are going to do it again today if the weather permits," said a spokesman for the Aceh disaster coordination agency.

He said at least 69 people had died in Aceh, with around 170 people listed as missing. Estimates of those displaced ranged from 200,000 to a high of 360,000.

In the province's Gayo Luwes district around 5,000 people remained cut off by landslides, Nurdin F. Jos, spokesman for the Ace governor's office, told Reuters.

In neighbouring North Sumatra province, authorities said at least 39 people had been killed by flooding and by a landslide triggered by the heavy rains.

Edy Sofyan, a provincial spokesman, said that number of dead could go higher. "We keep on searching for victims."

He said medical teams had visited the worst-hit areas and that residents were beginning to return to their villages as the floodwaters receded. But he said the fear of fresh landslide had meant some areas remained unsafe.

The flooding comes two years after a giant tsunami left about 170,000 dead or missing in Aceh, an impoverished province on the northern tip of Sumatra island.

Authorities have blamed heavy rains and the effects of deforestation for the latest destruction. Lack of adequate forest cover leaves the ground less able to absorb excess water.

Fears of tsunami ease after Taiwan quake

TAIPEI, Taiwan - A powerful earthquake struck off southwestern Taiwan on Tuesday, briefly prompting fears of a tsunami on the second anniversary of the quake and deadly waves that killed thousands in south Asia.

Taiwanese media reported one person died and three were injured when their home collapsed in the southern city of Pintung. Other reports said city streets had cracked and a major bridge was damaged. They said fires were burning out in the area, apparently caused by downed power cables.

The quake was felt throughout Taiwan. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated its magnitude at 7.1, while Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau measured it at 6.7. It was followed eight minutes later by 7.0 magnitude aftershock, the USGS said.

Two hours later, an official at Japan's Meteorological Agency said there was no longer any danger of a destructive tsunami headed for the Philippines, as had been predicted.

"The danger has passed," said Hiroshi Koide of the agency's earthquake section. "We predicted tsunami based on the depth and magnitude of the earthquake. But ultimately, it appears no large tsunami were triggered."

Phone lines were cut in the southern cities of Kaohsiung and Pingtung, possibly hindering reports of damage by residents, the CTI Cable News reported. Several high-rise hotels swayed violently in Kaohsiung, it said.

Liao Ching-ling, a 30-year-old manager at Kaohsiung's Ambassador Hotel, said she had never before felt such a strong quake: "The building swayed so badly that many panicky guests ran out of their rooms and into the streets."

The initial tremor was centered at sea about 13 miles southwest of Hengchun on the southern tip of Taiwan, the bureau said. Hengchun is about 260 miles south of Taipei.

Quakes frequently shake Taiwan, which is part of the Pacific's "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin. Most are minor and cause little or no damage, but a 7.6-magnitude earthquake in central Taiwan in September 1999 killed more than 2,300 people.

A 9.1-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Indonesia on Dec. 26, 2004 caused a tsunami that killed at least 230,000 people in 11 countries. Those waves reached as high as 33 feet.

Revelation 11:17
"We give you thanks, Lord God, the Almighty, the one who is and who was; because you have taken your great power, and reigned.

Revelation 11:18
The nations were angry, and your wrath came, as did the time for the dead to be judged, and to give your bondservants the prophets, their reward, as well as to the saints, and those who fear your name, to the small and the great; and to destroy those who destroy the earth."



This handout photo released by the Aceh and Nias Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Agency (BRR) on December 24, shows an aerial view of flooded houses in Aceh Tamiang. Two years after the devastating tsunami, Indonesia's Aceh province was grappling with more tragedy after floods and landslides killed at least 90 people and left thousands waiting to be rescued.(AFP/HO)

New woes for Aceh as floods kill 90, force 300,000 to flee

BIREUEN, Indonesia (AFP) - Two years after the devastating tsunami, Indonesia's Aceh province was grappling with more tragedy after floods and landslides killed at least 90 people and left thousands waiting to be rescued.

Troops and volunteer rescue workers were attempting to reach thousands of people trapped by the floods, which have forced around 300,000 to flee their homes on the island of Sumatra.

Aceh was the worst hit, with 60 dead in one district alone as the region prepared to mark the second anniversary of the December 26, 2004 Indian Ocean catastrophe.

Whole villages have been swallowed by flood waters following a week of torrential rains.

Aceh governor Mustafa Abubakar said six helicopters were transporting supplies to people stranded by the floods. A navy warship was already in the area with another on the way, said Abubakar, who is coordinating relief and rescue efforts.

"Relief efforts are starting to be more coordinated. We've started dropping relief supplies from the air in isolated areas," he told AFP.

Only house roofs and the minarets of mosques showed above the muddy brown waters in the worst-hit district of Aceh Tamiyang in aerial photographs taken by the Aceh and Nias Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Agency.

Villagers were shown sheltering on higher ground surrounded by flood waters, with some people floating precariously on logs.

Some 150,000 people in Aceh Tamiyang have taken refuge on higher ground but water levels remained high, local police chief Agus Santoso told ElShinta news radio.

"Water levels in the upstream areas in Aceh Tamiyang remain about two metres (more than six feet) in some areas. The area is surrounded by rivers and the water level has not receded," he said.

Villagers said they were running short of food.

"We have not received any food, we have not eaten rice for five days. We're surviving on sweet potatoes and bananas," Anto, a resident of Tenggulun village in Aech Tamiyang, told ElShinta.

"Many children are getting sick with fever and diarrhoea," he said.

In North Aceh, two people were killed and more than 140,000 people fled their homes, deputy district head Nasrullah told AFP.

"We need food, clothes and tents for the displaced people," he said.

"Water has receded in some places, but it's flowed to lower areas and flooded more villages," he said.

In the neighbouring province of North Sumatra, at least 19 people were killed in a landslide which buried dozens of houses while nine others died in the floods.

Television pictures showed villagers perched under makeshift shelters along railway tracks built on banks which remained above the waters.

"We are now concentrating on evacuating people who are trapped in their homes in the town of Kuala Simpang in Aceh Tamiyang district," Ghufran Zainal Abidin, the local chairman of the Prosperous Justice Party, told AFP from the worst-affected area.

"We have not received any more reports of dead victims as we are concentrating on saving the ones that are trapped in flooded spots," said Abidin, who reported 60 dead in Aceh Tamiyang district Sunday.

Around 1,000 troops have been dispatched to Aceh and North Sumatra along with heavy equipment and helicopters, Commodore Mohammad Sunarto Sjoekronoputro said, according to the official Antara news agency.

Two Hercules transport aircraft loaded with tents, field kitchens and inflatable boats were being sent to the affected region.

Floods also hit neighbouring Malaysia, where seven people were killed in the worst affected southern state of Johor. Some 74,000 were still sheltering at relief centres.

Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla has pointed the finger at illegal logging as one of the causes of the deadly floods, and pledged that the government would intensify its efforts to replant the forests.

Last June, floods and landslides triggered by heavy rains killed more than 200 people in South Sulawesi province. Separate floods killed more than 20 people and forced 40,000 people from their homes in Borneo in the same month.

Severe Storms Exit SE, New Wet Storm West

A storm complex churning through the South this Christmas Night will continue to foster conditions favorable for strong to severe thunderstorms in southern Florida tonight before quickly exiting into the Atlantic overnight. An apparent Christmas tornado this morning destroyed five homes in northern Florida near Lake City. Other possible tornadoes or straight-line thunderstorm complexes with high winds severely damaged homes in Leesburg and San Antonio at the Tampa Bay Golf and Country Club Community. Reports of severe damage to 15 to 25 homes with 10 destroyed in the Tampa Bay Golf and Country Club Community with 2 injuries has been devastating for the Holiday. In the West, heavy rain is likely in extreme northwestern California and southwest Oregon. Local totals of 4 or 7 inches are possible by Tuesday Night along the northern California coast with possible flash flooding. Heavy rain will also spread down into the Bay Area with potential flooding rain on Tuesday. Along the coasts of Oregon and northern California, high surf advisories and warnings are out for surf of 20-25 feet. Use extreme caution around any of the seaside coastal areas. Also, heavy snow and winter storm warnings remain posted for the mountains and highlands of Idaho and west-central Montana. Snowfalls of up to a foot (or slightly more) are possible. On Wednesday, The powerful storm will move inland bringing widespread rain and snow to the Great Basin and northern and central Rockies.

Typhoon Muifa creating battering waves

What started Tuesday innocently enough as a moderate tropical storm has become a small, but potent, typhoon east of the Philippines. Typhoon Muifa (Moy-fa) became worthy of its prefix today when winds were estimated at near 105 mph. Muifa is at best meandering to the north while churning in the Philippine Sea just east of Manila. In fact, for all intents and purposes, the typhoon has stalled. Though forecast to move west over the islands, forward progression will be slow. Bad news for the island chain as flooding and mudslides will result from the copious amounts of rain expected to fall over the next 48 hours. There is no doubt that the large and powerful waves have been battering the eastern coast of the northern Philippines. The system is forecasted to weaken gradually over the next 5 days as it heads towards southern Vietnam.

This is an aerial view of a flooded area in eastern Aceh, Indonesia taken on Friday, Dec. 24, 2006. Raging flood waters Sunday submerged houses and roads on Indonesia's Sumatra island, killing more than 70 people and forcing tens of thousands from their homes, officials and reports said. (AP Photo/Binsar Bakkara)

Floods kill 94 in Indonesia, Malaysia

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia - At least 94 people were killed and dozens left missing by floods in Indonesia and Malaysia, officials said. Looting broke out in areas of Malaysia abandoned because of rising waters.

An aerial view from an aid flight over the worst-hit region on Indonesia's Sumatra island showed many houses submerged, while only the roofs of others were visible. Some families were trapped on the roofs of their homes.

The death toll from more than three days of rain-triggered flooding on Sumatra was at least 87, with dozens others reported missing, while seven people have been killed in neighboring Malaysia, officials said.

More than 150,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in both countries.

The worst hit region was in Tamiyang district in Aceh province in Northern Sumatra, where rescuers found 60 bodies on Sunday, said Nurdin Jos, an Aceh government spokesman.

Aceh was the region worst hit by the 2004 Asian tsunami, but this week's flooding was in areas unaffected by that disaster.

Another official said 13 more people, mostly children, were killed elsewhere, adding to 14 confirmed dead on Saturday. State news agency Antara reported 114 people killed, but gave no attribution.

In Malaysia, nearly 70,000 evacuees were in public shelters in Johor state, about 10,000 in Malacca and 5,760 in Pahang, the Bernama news agency said.

Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi called on people to help prevent looting in the flooded areas by making citizen's arrests, the report said.

"There are looting incidents but not that rampant," Abdullah was quoted as saying. "We cannot wait for the police to act. The public and the volunteers must help."

Officials were not immediately available to confirm the report.

The flooding, which followed unusually heavy rainfall, is reportedly the worst in living memory in some areas.

The weather was expected to improve this week, the department said.

Seasonal downpours cause dozens of landslides and flash floods each year in Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago of 17,000 islands, where millions of people live in mountainous areas or near fertile flood plains.

In June, severe flooding and landslides killed more than 210 people on Sulawesi island.

Indonesia fears another massive tsunami

PADANG, Indonesia - Two years after an earthquake off western Indonesia unleashed a monster tsunami, scientists expect the same fault to rupture again within the next few decades — and this town stands to take the full force of the waves.

They predict a large swath of Sumatra island's densely populated coast just south of the tsunami-hit area will be pounded by a giant wall of water.

"All this area in red will disappear," Padang Mayor Fauzi Bahar said, pointing at a satellite map on his office wall showing the likely reach of the waves into the town.

The low-lying town of 900,000 people has started mapping out evacuation routes and educating the public, but all the same, authorities fear up to 60,000 will die, unable to outrun the waves even if they get a speedy warning and flee.

"The people will be washed away," Bahar said.

On the morning of Dec. 26, 2004, the most powerful earthquake in four decades lifted the seabed west of Sumatra by several yards, propelling waves up to two stories high at jetliner speeds across the Indian Ocean to smash into coastal communities, beach resorts and towns in 12 nations.

In hardest-hit Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka and India, the waves surged miles inland, tossing ships, swallowing entire villages and leaving behind a blasted landscape of concrete foundations and rubble littered with tens of thousands of bodies.

On Sumatra island — home to more than half the tsunami's nearly 230,000 dead and missing — volunteers and emergency workers took three months to recover all the corpses and bury them in mass graves.

Warnings of another tsunami-spawning quake are adding urgency to efforts to establish a warning system covering the Indian Ocean rim like the network of high-tech buoys in the Pacific that alerts Japan, the United States and other nations of sudden tidal changes.

The worst-affected countries have begun installing sirens on threatened coasts and three buoys with sensors capable of detecting waves generated by seismic activity are in the water, but the network is several years from completion, officials say.

Making sure the system works from end-to-end is a "daunting task," said Curt Barrett at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is helping set it up.

"Once the warning goes out, people have to know what to do," he said. "All of this information is useless if it doesn't get to the person down on the beach."

The warnings of another tsunami are based on more than a decade of research by respected U.S. geologist Kerry Sieh and a team of scientists on a section of the fault just south of the part that ruptured in 2004.

His conclusions are shared by scientists at other universities and government research institutions.

The fault, which runs the length of the west coast of Sumatra about 125 miles offshore, is the meeting point of the Eurasian and Pacific tectonic plates that have been pushing against each other for millions of years, causing huge stresses to build up.

Using historical accounts of earlier quakes, measurements of coral uplift and data from a network of Global Positioning System transmitters on nearby islands, Sieh, from the California Institute of Technology, has found a pattern of large earthquakes about every 230 years, with the last major ones in 1797 and in 1833.

The 2004 jolt, as well as another strong quake on the same fault three months later that killed 1,000 people on nearby Nias island, has loaded even more stress, Sieh said.

"We are not saying the quake is going to happen tomorrow or next week, but on the other hand we don't want people to forget about it and be lax," he said. "I'd be surprised if it were delayed much beyond 30 years."

A small non-governmental agency funded by foreign donors is spreading the message in Padang and surrounding districts. The group has met with hundreds of village heads and religious leaders and sends volunteers to schools along the threatened coast with a simple warning:

"If the quake lasts longer than a minute, knocks you to your feet or collapses buildings, run to the nearest hills," volunteer Riska told a class recently.

"If you can't make it, then climb a tree. Start learning now," she said, her voice hoarse from trying to hold the giggling children's attention.

The group says residents and local government officials are receptive to its message, especially since a second tsunami on Indonesia's main island of Java last July killed 600 people.

Coastal residents say land prices have fallen, a sign that people are moving inland.

But simply raising awareness isn't enough, experts say.

The tsunami will likely crash into the shore within 20 minutes because the fault line is so close, meaning the town must make expensive infrastructure changes to enable people to flee.

Evacuation roads need widening and bridges crossing the town's many rivers need reinforcement. Some experts say tsunami-proof towers should be built in coastal areas and emergency services and government agencies moved inland.

Sieh says Indonesia would be better off spending more money on those projects and educating people than on installing and maintaining an expensive warning system of buoys.

"You have an earthquake and it lasts for five minutes. It is shaking so heavily you can't walk. Why do you need a warning? Haven't you got one already?" he asks. "It is not just a waste of money, it is a distraction: It gives people a false sense of security."

Australian Chris Scurrah and his wife manage a small hotel in Padang's seaside colonial quarter and run a thriving business organizing surfing trips. After five good years, they have no plans to leave.

"It's an awesome place to be, but it's just scary it's going to get smashed," Scurrah said before setting out with a boatload of surfers. "That's just the way it works here."

San Francisco area feels 3rd small quake in 4 days

BERKELEY, California (AP) -- A third small earthquake in four days rattled the San Francisco Bay Area on Saturday, but there were no reports of injuries or damage.

The temblor that struck at 9:21 a.m. had a preliminary magnitude of 3.5 and a depth of about 6.1 miles, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The epicenter was about 2 miles from Berkeley and 3 miles from Emeryville, across the bay from San Francisco.

Residents throughout the Bay Area reported feeling the jolt, but police said there were no reports of injuries.

The latest earthquake was similar in magnitude and location to those that struck Wednesday and Friday.

They erupted along the Hayward Fault, which geologists believe is due for a quake in the potentially lethal 6.7 to 7.0 range.

But the minor earthquakes should not be interpreted as omens of a more destructive one to come, said Jessica Sigala, a geophysicist with the National Earthquake Information Center.

"It could mean there's something coming, it could mean there's nothing coming," Sigala said. "It just means the area is active, more active than it's been."

Also Saturday, a small earthquake rattled the desert in Southern California, but there were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.

The magnitude-4.1 temblor struck at 7:43 p.m. and was centered 8 miles east of Coachella, which is about 20 miles east of Palm Springs, according to a preliminary report for the U.S. Geological Survey. Two aftershocks also were reported, the agency said.

A dispatcher for the Riverside County Sheriff's Department said there were no calls about damage or injuries.

Wisconsin snowstorm knocks out power

MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin (AP) -- A winter storm dumped 7 inches of wet, heavy snow on central Wisconsin, leaving thousands of people without electricity and disrupting holiday preparations.

Wisconsin Public Service Corp. reported fewer than 15,600 customers without electricity Saturday night. About half of the outages were in the towns of Wausau and Stevens Point.

"For the little ones that are making snowmen it is awesome," said Kelly Zagrzebski, a spokeswoman for the utility. "For us, no."

The snow began falling Friday night and did not let up until Saturday morning. The weight of the snow snapped power lines and tree limbs, causing the outages, she said. Nearly 30,000 customers initially had service interrupted.

More than 100 crews were working to restore power, a job that would likely continue through Sunday, Zagrzebski said.

"People are expecting family ... and want to know if their power is going to be restored," Zagrzebski said. "It's just a hard question right now."

Temperatures in the region were expected to drop to the teens and 20s overnight and partly cloudy skies were forecast for Sunday.

Bob Warnke, 61, of Stevens Point, said he is giving up plans to visit relatives 30 miles away in Wausau to stay at his bar.

"It kind of aborted my Christmas holiday because I'm not going up to see them, he said.

He chose instead to watch over his building and customers at the Trackside Bar, some of whom are elderly, he said.

"They're out of power, also, and they're quite uncomfortable," Warnke said.

Australia ponders climate future

Parts of Australia are in the grip of the worst drought in memory.

Rainfall in many eastern and southern regions has been at near record lows. On top of that, the weather has been exceptionally warm.

The parched conditions have sparked an emotional debate about global warming.

Conservationists insist the "big dry" is almost certainly the result of climate change and warn that Australia is on the brink of environmental disaster.

Other experts believe such hysteria is wildly misplaced and that the country shouldn't panic.

'A war-like scenario'

The drought in Australia has lasted for more than five years.

The worry for some is that this could be the start of a protracted period of low rainfall that could go on for decades.

"The really scary thing is last time we had a drought of this intensity that lasted about five years - it lasted for about 50 years," cautioned Professor Andy Pitman from Macquarie University in Sydney.

"The politicians truly believe this is a five-year or six-year drought that will break sometime in 2007 or 2008. But it might not break until 2050 and we aren't thinking in those terms at this stage," Professor Pitman told the BBC.

Global warming, the drought and the future of dwindling water supplies will undoubtedly dominate talk at barbeques and dinner parties this festive season in Australia.

"We're in a state of emergency," said Cate Faehrmann from the Nature Conservation Council of New South Wales. "We need to treat this as a war-like scenario. The people are really worried that we are going to run out of water."

She added: "I can imagine Australia being a desert in a few decades' time in some of these agricultural areas. The soil is blowing away, the rivers are drying up.

"I think there will be plots of land abandoned and perhaps whole agricultural practices abandoned."

Massive losses

The drought has affected farmers worse than anyone else.

Jock Lawrie, president of the New South Wales Farmers' Association, paints a dismal picture.

"There are people out in some parts of our state that have gone to work for four or five years and haven't even earned an income.

"With the winter crop failing to the extent it did, there have been some massive losses. It is really hard on the emotions of people, there's no doubt about that."

Australia has some of the world's most erratic rainfall-patterns.

This vast continent has experienced very dry periods before: the "Federation Drought" of the late 1800s was a disaster for many communities.

However, some climate experts believe this drought will also pass and Australians shouldn't be too alarmed.

Veteran meteorologist Bill Kinimonth insists the gradual warming of the earth is part of a natural cycle: "The climate follows patterns which we can read back from our instrument records for about 150 years, and from a lot of the proxy records they go back thousands of years.


"The ice cores show the fluctuations of the climate over 100,000-year cycles."

He told the BBC News website: "We're presently in what we might call the optimum period, where the Earth is warmer than it has been for the last 20,000 years, and I think we should be making the most of it.

"The alternative is not very good - a cold, dry Australia."

The Australian Prime Minister John Howard, who refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol insisting it would damage the economy, now believes, however, that serious environmental trouble is brewing.

Professor Andy Pitman says the drought has forced politicians to look at the bigger picture.

"The Australian government has absolutely jumped on greenhouse bandwagon in the last three or four months," he said.

"Although it won't sign Kyoto, it's now saying it wants to lead the drive for greenhouse gas emissions globally in a very aggressive leadership way.

"That's largely due to the drought and the Stern report."

Strong quake hits India's Andamans archipelago

PORT BLAIR, India (AFP) - A 6.1-magnitude earthquake struck India's Andaman islands on Saturday, prompting residents fearful of a repeat of the deadly 2004 tsunami to flee their homes, geologists and witnesses said.

The earthquake occurred at 1:20 am (1950 GMT Friday), some 115 kilometres (71 miles) south-southwest of the local capital Port Blair, according to the US Geological Survey.

There were no reports of damage or casualties following the quake, which occurred at a depth of 45 kilometres.

But residents of the archipelago wrecked by the December 26, 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami raced from their homes and sought higher ground.

"The memories of 2004 are still vivid on their minds so when the quake struck, the level of panic was much greater," said C. Palaniswamy, council chief of tsunami-shattered Hut Bay island.

Official both in the Andamans and at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii said Saturday's quake had not sparked a tsunami alert.

"Nevertheless, people were in great panic," said Poritosh Haldar, a college teacher in Port Blair.

The Andaman and Nicobar chain of more than 500 islands, 58 of them inhabited, was hit hard by the earthquake-triggered tsunami two years ago.

Initially, officials here said 3,000 people had been killed in the disaster and 5,500 others left missing, but authorities recently drastically revised the death toll down to 454, with 3,073 others listed as missing.

Floods in southeast Asia force thousands to flee

KOTA TINGGI, Malaysia, Dec 23 (Reuters) - Malaysia's worst floods in 37 years have displaced nearly 100,000 people amid food shortages, looting and criticism on Saturday of the government's handling of the crisis.

Heavy rain in neighbouring Indonesia -- exacerbated by deforestation -- also killed at least six people and drove tens of thousands from their homes.

Malaysian weathermen warned the floods, which hit the southern states, could spread to the central and northeastern parts of the country if the unusually heavy monsoon rains persisted.

The rains over the Malaysian states of Johor, Negeri Sembilan, Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang are expected to continue until Sunday, the weather bureau said in a report.

Six people, all in the worst-hit state of Johor, have now died in the floods, which the government described as the worst since 1969.

Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, enroute to Australia for his holiday after an official visit to Venezuela, made a surprise detour to Johor on Saturday to visit flood victims.

"We want to ensure that everyone gets to return home safely," the national Bernama news agency quoted him as saying after visiting a shelter in Johor.

The floods, which followed this week's heaviest rainfall in a century, submerged buildings and cut off roads in Kota Tinggi and several other towns in Johor, which borders Singapore.

Newspapers reported looting in the towns of Kota Tinggi and Segamat. There were also cases of rescuers demanding money from flood victims before rescuing them, the Star newspaper said.

DESPERATE VICTIMS

"I was desperate and did not know what to do," the Star quoted Abdul Rashid Maidin, one of several people whom it said paid the money, as saying.

The going rate was between 50 and 100 ringgit ($14 and $28), it said.

Flood victims also complained of lack of food, clothing, blankets and running water at many of the relief shelters.

Opposition leaders criticised the government's handling of the crisis, saying relief operations were in complete disarray.

"A full and independent inquiry into the monster floods in southern peninsula Malaysia and the horror stories of inhumanity, greed and incompetence is clearly warranted," parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang said.

In Indonesia, authorities said at least five people were killed and 70,000 others driven from their homes by surging flash floods triggered by two days of incessant rain in Aceh's eastern coastal areas.

Local officials said the region's rice paddies were damaged and cattle killed by the rising waters.

In North Sumatra province, one person died and twelve were missing, possibly dead, after floodwaters up to two metres high racing through 12 districts.

"One died and 12 people are missing, but we can not confirm yet whether the missing have died or not," Syam Sumarno, spokesman of Langkat regency in North Sumatra, said by telephone.

Sumarno blamed heavy rains that began on Friday, as well as the heavy deforestation of the region for the flood's destruction. "About 17,000 people are being evacuated," he said.

Six die in south Malaysia floods, 75,000 homeless

MUAR, Malaysia, Dec 22 (Reuters) - Relentless floods in southern Malaysia have now killed six people and forced around 75,000 from their homes, national media said on Friday.

The southern state of Johor bordering Singapore was the worst affected, with some 65,000 victims taking shelter in schools and community halls, Bernama news agency said.

The floods, which followed this week's heaviest rainfall in a century, submerged buildings and washed out roads in Muar and several other big towns in Johor.

"The floods in Johor and other states in the Malaysian peninsula have shown no signs of subsiding soon," Bernama said.

It said police had recovered the body of an elderly woman in Johor on Friday, bringing the death toll so far to six.

Military and police deployed helicopters to airlift emergency food supplies and take patients to hospital.

One flood victim in Muar said he had lost everything.

"The flood water rose so fast at about 2 a.m. when my family and I were asleep," Shahril Yusof told Reuters. "I could not salvage any of my belongings."

Rains flood New Orleans streets

NEW ORLEANS - Heavy rain swamped New Orleans' streets Thursday, forcing some schools to close early and backing up traffic as pumping stations struggled to keep up.

"Unbelievable," said Pamela Borne, who waded in knee-high water with her daughter on her back to get to her house. "It's very disappointing, that just with an overnight rain of this magnitude, that the city is so ill-prepared."

Most of her home was above the water level, but the ground-level floor, where she had stashed Christmas presents, had 4 inches of water in it before noon, Borne said.

Pumping stations, closely watched since the catastrophic flooding after Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, were working, officials said. But the rain lasted so long, they couldn't keep up, said public works director Jose Gonzalez of Jefferson Parish.

"The rest of the day, we will continue to pump," Gonzalez said. "Hopefully, it's not going to rain as much as it did this morning. ... The amount of rain, that's what hurt us."

Some schools in New Orleans closed early because of street flooding and traffic problems, officials said.

The same storm that dumped snow across the West brought more than 6 inches of rain to the New Orleans area through midday Thursday. The

National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch until noon Friday for parts of east-central and southeastern Louisiana.

The community of Larose, about 60 miles south of New Orleans, got an estimated 10 to 12 inches of rain, meteorologist Fred Zeigler said. Parts of southeastern Louisiana, leading up to New Orleans, had 6 to 8 inches, he said.

Bad weather grounds flights, strands thousands

Bad weather in Denver, London and other busy hubs created pre-Christmas headaches for tens of thousands of customers, some who may very well end up spending the holiday not with loved ones, but in an airport.

Even before dawn, hundreds of people in Denver were in line at the ticket counters, hoping to rebook a flight out by Christmas.

Outside, an army of snow plows worked to clear the runways so the airport could resume at least limited operations around noon.

“I just want to get home to see my family,” said Atlanta businessman Scott Carr, standing in the Frontier Airlines line that wrapped around to the opposite side of the terminal.

He booked four flights on three different airlines to increase his chances of making it home for Christmas and was considering driving to Kansas City to catch a flight.

“If I have to drive, at least I’ll be getting closer,” he said.

As flight after flight was canceled, the situation grew into a logistical horror for fliers, whose vacations were disrupted if not spoiled, and for airlines, who may lose much-needed revenue.

Frontier spokesman Joe Hodas said the airline has 65,000 bumped passengers to move system-wide and the airline is already 90 percent booked for the holidays.

“Do the math,” he said.

Industry officials said it could take two days to untangle the knot, which is tightest in Denver, where more than two feet of snow kept the airport closed for a third day. Home to one of United Airlines biggest hub operations, it’s not expected to reopen until midday. In London, the weekend forecast is for more fog — and more travel delays.

“The weather across much of the U.K. is regrettably showing little sign of improvement,” said Geoff Want, director of ground operations for British Airways which has canceled all domestic flights.

Cardboard shelter
A makeshift shelter of cardboard boxes sprang up near a United Airlines ticket counter in Denver as hundreds of stranded travelers found ways to cope.

More than 2,000 flights have been canceled at the nation’s fifth busiest airport, according to airline officials.

Two of the airport’s six runways were set to open first, followed by a third runway Friday night.

Flu virus 'could kill 81 million'

LONDON, England (AP) -- If a flu virus as deadly as the one that caused 1918 Spanish flu struck today, it could kill as many as 81 million worldwide, a new study estimates.

By applying historical death rates to modern population data, the researchers calculated a death toll of 51 million to 81 million, with a median estimate of 62 million.

That's surprisingly high, said lead researcher Chris Murray of Harvard University. He'd done the analysis in part because he thought prior claims of 50 million deaths were wildly inflated.

"We expected to end up with a number between 15 and 20 million," said Murray. "It turns out we were wrong."

The new work is published in Saturday's issue of the journal The Lancet.

The 1918 outbreak killed at least 40 million people worldwide. But flu pandemics have varied widely in their severity. The last two, in 1957 and 1968, were relatively mild, killing two million and one million people worldwide respectively.

Many numbers have been tossed out in speculating how many people might die in the next flu pandemic, ranging from several million to several hundreds of millions, but the guessing game will continue until the actual pandemic strain emerges.

To get their estimates, Murray and colleagues examined all available death registration data from 1914 to 1923. There was sufficient information from 27 countries, including numbers from 24 U.S. states and nine provinces in India.

The researchers then compared death rates during the pandemic to average death rates beforehand and afterward. That revealed how much the pandemic flu contributed to death rates, a figure called excess mortality. They then applied the excess mortality data to worldwide population data from 2004.

If their median estimate of 62 million flu deaths occurred in a single year, the total number of deaths from all causes around the world would more than double, jumping by 114 percent.

One surprise in the new study was the huge variation in how different countries would be affected by a pandemic. The study estimates that 96 percent of the deaths would occur in the developing world. Murray and colleagues noted there was a 30-fold or more variation in mortality.

"That tells us it's not just the genetic make-up of the virus that will cause deaths, but that there are a lot of other things that intervene," he said.

Determining what some of these mitigating factors are might help to avert a similar catastrophe in the future. "If we can answer that question, we may unlock the mysteries behind which non-pharmaceutical strategies could significantly decrease mortality," said Murray. Issues such as population density, nutritional or immune status could all play a role, he suggests.

Some experts warn that planning based on the Spanish flu -- the deadliest infectious disease event ever recorded -- is skewed. The World Health Organization estimates that in a moderate pandemic, based on the 1957 and 1968 pandemics, up to 7.4 million people might die.

"We know that even if we have much lower numbers of deaths worldwide than in 1918, the world will be severely stressed," said Dr. Keiji Fukuda, coordinator of WHO's Global Influenza Programme. "Speculating about the possible numbers is an interesting exercise, but the really important thing is, what do we do about it?"

Since the pandemic threat first arose, with the circulation of the H5N1 bird flu virus on a large scale in late 2003, the global community has greatly bolstered its pandemic preparedness plans.

Medical systems today are far stronger than they were last century, and the availability of antivirals and antibiotics -- which did not exist in 1918 -- should help greatly.

Still, many of these advantages remain out of reach for poor countries. A big question mark also looms over the impact a flu pandemic would have on the approximately 35 million people infected with HIV. Seasonal influenza exacts a heavy toll on people with weak immune systems, thus, in the case of a new pandemic flu, Murray's estimate might even be optimistic.

And while the Spanish flu has often been regarded as a worst-case scenario, there is no guarantee that the next pandemic will not be even more deadly. Despite the tens of millions of deaths the 1918 flu caused, the death rate among those infected was approximately two percent.

In comparison, the fatality rate for the H5N1 virus, currently thought to be the most likely candidate to spark a flu pandemic hovers around 60 percent.

But experts think that if H5N1 were to evolve into a strain easily transmissible between people, it would have to trade some of its lethality for transmissibility.

"It's not in a virus' interest to kill its hosts so readily, otherwise it can't reproduce itself," said Dr. Ian Gust, a flu expert at the University of Melbourne, Australia.

There is no guarantee, however, that H5N1 will make such a concession if it does ultimately ignite the next pandemic.

"If that happens, we would be in for a devastating impact," said Gust. "All bets would be off."

An aerial view of flooded area in Malaysia's southern state of Johor, December 20, 2006. (Stringer/Reuters)

Floods worsen in southern Malaysia, 50,000 homeless

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Around 50,000 people have been forced to evacuate their flooded homes in southern Malaysia as the region suffered its heaviest rainfall in a century, news reports said on Thursday.

The rains, blamed on Typhoon Utor, triggered large-scale flooding, cut off several towns in the southern state of Johor, shut down power and water supplies and disrupted train services.

One passenger bus fell into a ravine early on Thursday in the southern town of Kota Tinggi but none of the six people on board were injured, the online edition of the Star newspaper said.

Official news agency Bernama put the total number of evacuees in Johor and three neighboring states at 50,000, up sharply from 30,000 a day earlier.

The Meteorological Services Department said more rains were forecast in Johor and the northeastern states of Kelantan and Terengganu over the next 24 hours.

Science Minister Jamaluddin Jarjis blamed the downpours on strong winds from the western Pacific Ocean.

"The phenomenon is due to the effects of Typhoon Utor near the Philippines," he said. The typhoon killed 27 people in the Philippines last week.

Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak was in Johor on Thursday to visit flood victims, many of them taking shelter in schools and community halls.

Johor is one of Malaysia's biggest producers of rubber and palm oil. There was no immediate word on the impact on crops in the state, but palm oil prices have risen on fears of supply disruption.

Colorado blizzard strands thousands

DENVER - The Denver area was motionless for a second day Thursday. City streets were empty, nothing moved at the airport but the thousands of stranded travelers, long stretches of highway were impassable, even the mail couldn't get through after a powerful blizzard dumped 2 feet of snow on the region.

"It feels like I'm a refugee," said Lisa Maurer, a University of Wyoming student who was stuck at the Denver airport as she tried to make her way home to Germany.

Some 4,700 people hunkered down with her overnight at Denver International Airport after all flights there were canceled. The runways weren't likely to reopen until Thursday night, airport spokesman Steve Snyder said.

More than 30 inches of snow fell in the mountains, and up to 2 feet fell in the Denver metro area Wednesday and early Thursday.

A snowstorm also dumped up to 18 inches on parts of New Mexico, glazing roads with ice and forcing some schools to close Wednesday, and the National Weather Service warned that another storm was taking aim at the state Friday night and Saturday.

Denver, Colorado Springs and other cities along the Rocky Mountain Front Range remained virtual ghost towns Thursday morning after workers slipped and slid their way home on Wednesday and stayed there.

The wind-whipped snow was finally expected to taper off in Colorado on Thursday afternoon. Parts of Nebraska and Kansas were also getting snow and ice, but farther east, warmer temperatures meant even Chicago was only forecast to get heavy rain as the storm moved through.

In Colorado's socked-in eastern half, though, few travelers were going anywhere. The Colorado Springs airport reopened and some airlines were flying, but getting there was nearly impossible.

Bus and light rail service in a six-county region around Denver was suspended. The State Patrol reported a rash of collisions but no fatalities.

Gov. Bill Owens declared a state of emergency and activated the National Guard, which assisted dozens of motorists on the highways around Denver and delivered diapers, formula and bottled water to the airport.

Long stretches of Interstates 70 and 25, the main east-west and north-south routes through the Mountain West, were closed. Interstate 76 was closed from Denver to Nebraska.

"They pulled everyone off the highway," said Leon Medina, manager of a truck stop on Interstate 25 in Walsenburg, about 130 miles south of Denver. "Cars are all around the building. Trucks are all over, trucks and cars pulled into ditches."

At least 270 people took refuge at seven American Red Cross shelters in the Denver area and the number was expected to rise as motorists arrived by the busload early Thursday, said Robert Thompson, spokesman for the Mile High chapter.

"It's just amazing how many people are still out there," Thompson said.

Shelters also opened in Fort Collins and Colorado Springs, and the Red Cross provided 140 cots for nearly 350 people stranded at a Greyhound bus station in downtown Denver, Thompson said.

Weather Service program manager Byron Louis said it was the most powerful storm to hit Colorado since March 2003, when a massive blizzard dumped up to 11 feet of snow in the mountains over several days and was blamed for at least six deaths in Colorado and Wyoming.

Major malls closed early Wednesday. One, Flatirons Crossing Mall in Broomfield, northwest of Denver, offered warmth for motorists stranded along U.S. 36, the major link between Denver and Boulder.

Mail service was canceled in the eastern half of the state because mail carriers and trucks delivering mail four days before Christmas couldn't get through.

"We don't want to take the risk of clogging up the system just by being out there," said Al DeSarro, a U.S. Postal Service spokesman in Denver. "We're considering delivering on Sunday to make up for what's sure to be a backlog of mail."

At Denver International Airport, more than 1,000 flights were canceled from Wednesday afternoon through Thursday. United Airlines canceled more than 670 flights into Denver, plus 160 that had been scheduled leave before noon Thursday. Frontier Airlines canceled up to 190 flights.

"I'm just happy to be alive. It was a terrifying drive," Sara Kelton said of the two-hour crawl over slick, snow-clogged roads to reach the airport.

Thirteen hours after Alan Barr left his Denver office for a bus ride home to Boulder, he was stuck at a Red Cross shelter in Denver, not much closer to home than when he left.

His bus had set out from Denver hours late, then had to turn back. Barr trudged into the shelter shortly after midnight with other discouraged riders but said he had not given up on the bus system.

"Days like today are an exception," he said. "I believe in public transportation."

Commuters on several buses had similar experiences, said Scott Reed, spokesman for the Regional Transportation District. "There was just no traffic moving," Reed said. "It was absolute gridlock."

Public transit service was not expected to resume until late Thursday at the earliest.

"It was comical for a while," said bus rider Matt Notter of Boulder. "Then we realized, this is an all-night thing."

Christmas cheer blooms in Philippine typhoon path

LEGAZPI CITY, Philippines (Reuters) - Anne Hermosura swapped Christmas shopping and parties for back-breaking construction work this week to help thousands left destitute by typhoons in the central Philippines.

The 19-year old student nurse was one of hundreds of volunteers, from soldiers to businessmen, who passed buckets of water and building materials at a site for 600 new homes in Albay province, around 200 miles south of Manila.

"It's really very difficult because I am not used to doing these things only men do," Hermosura told Reuters, wiping sweat from her face as she took a short break from carrying cement blocks in the baking heat.

"It's a rewarding and humbling experience. I couldn't believe it myself that I was capable of doing this. Of course, all of us were exhausted and tired after a day's work, but I can't explain the happiness of helping people I never even knew or met."

The Philippine government wants to build around 10,000 new homes for nearly 440,000 people displaced after a succession of typhoons crashed into the Philippines since September.

Hermosura and her friends were toiling on what will become Taysan village, a hilly area free of geological hazards that will be a new home for families displaced after Typhoon Durian destroyed their communities last month.

Durian killed more than 1,000 people when its high winds and rains sent tonnes of mud and water crashing from Mount Mayon, the country's most active volcano, onto nearby villages.

Around 120,000 people were still sheltering in evacuation centers in Albay after Durian's wrath.

TYPHOON-PROOF

"Twenty-one days after the last powerful typhoon to hit our country, we now begin the massive reconstruction efforts to get the affected communities back on their feet," said Glenn Rabonza, executive director of the National Disaster Coordinating Council.

Earlier this month, the United Nations appealed for $46 million to help feed, clothe and rebuild the lives of hundreds of thousands of Filipinos in the central region of Bicol, known as the country's welcome mat for typhoons.

The government has said it would need 50 billion pesos ($1 billion) to rebuild farms and communities, which have seen fruit crops and irrigation systems destroyed, fishing boats smashed and bridges and roads obliterated.

Around 20 typhoons buffet the Philippines every year and Luis Oquinera, national coordinator of non-government group Gawad Kalinga, said his organization was building homes to deal with the meteorological challenge.

"Our engineers have made modifications to make these homes withstand 250 kph winds during typhoons," he said, adding that it would take about two weeks to complete one home depending on the number of volunteers helping to build it.

"Some of the displaced residents could probably move in one day before Christmas in about 20 homes nearing completion."

Hermosura said she had not thought twice when she got a mobile phone text message from school friends to spend their Christmas break rebuilding communities in the Bicol region.

"I can shop and party any time in Manila but I wouldn't pass on this rare chance of spending Christmas with our less fortunate countrymen."

South Korea says fourth bird flu case confirmed

SEOUL, Dec 21 (Reuters) - A fourth case of bird flu has been discovered in South Korea after culling of poultry from earlier cases, a government official said on Thursday, raising concerns that quarantine measures had failed to control the outbreak.

South Korea confirmed in November its first case of the H5N1 strain in about three years.

The three initial cases were found in farms in the North Cholla province, around 170 km (100 miles) south of Seoul. The latest case emerged at a duck farm in Asan, South Chungcheong province, about 100 km further north.

"We confirmed that a case at a duck farm in Asan was highly pathogenic," an official at the agriculture ministry said.

There were no reports suggesting human infection, the official added.

Quarantine authorities would cull 23,000 poultry within a 3-km radius of the latest infected farm.

Between December 2003 and March 2004, about 400,000 poultry at South Korean farms were infected by bird flu. During that outbreak, the country destroyed 5.3 million birds.

Bird flu remains essentially an animal disease, but it has infected nearly 260 people worldwide since late 2003, killing more than 150, according to the World Health Organisation.

Since 2003, outbreaks have been confirmed in about 50 countries and territories.

Bird flu outbreak spreads in Vietnam's Mekong Delta

HANOI, Dec 21 (Reuters) - Vietnam's first outbreak of bird flu since August has spread to four more areas in the Mekong Delta, where nearly 8,300 birds have been killed by the virus or slaughtered to hold it back, the Agriculture Ministry said.

Three outbreaks spotted between Dec. 11 and Dec. 20 in Ca Mau province killed over 2,500 chickens and ducks, while one in neighbouring Bac Lieu province killed dozens of ducks, the ministry's Animal Health Department said in a report on Thursday.

The outbreaks of the H5N1 virus were the first in Vietnam since August. The initial eruptions killed around 6,000 newly hatched chickens and ducklings that were not vaccinated against bird flu.

Farmers have since thrown dead birds into water channels or let ducks roam on rice fields, helping spread the virus that first arrived in the Delta in late 2003 and has since killed 42 of the 93 people infected in Vietnam.

Vietnam, which has had no human bird flu cases since late 2005, has a human death toll second only to Indonesia's 57, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

WHO says bird flu has killed 154 people out of 258 infected globally since late 2003.

Vietnamese animal health officials said on Wednesday that temperatures were falling in the southern region incorporating the delta, which would help the spread of a virus that thrives best in cooler temperatures.

Experts fear the virus could mutate into a form that is easily transmissible among humans and spark an influenza pandemic that would kill millions.

The Mekong Delta outbreaks caused health officials in nearby Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam's largest city, to tighten inspection of poultry and step up monitoring of breeding farms, state media reported on Thursday.

Thousands stuck at foggy Heathrow

LONDON, England (Reuters) -- Tens of thousands of passengers were stranded Thursday after a thick blanket of freezing fog forced hundreds of flights to be canceled at Heathrow, Europe's busiest airport.

Heated tents, sleeping mats and catering stalls were set up to accommodate irate travelers, many of whom were affected after British Airways canceled 180 flights, including all domestic and some European services.

"It's bedlam. The whole terminal is so packed you can barely walk," said Nicholas Velez, 23, one of about 500 passengers left stranded Wednesday night while trying to return home to Washington, D.C., for the holidays.

About 350 flights have been canceled since Tuesday, when a thick blanket of freezing fog moved in to the city.

"When we flew in last night, you couldn't see the ground," said Velez, who had been transferring through Heathrow. "I've never seen anything like it before."

Velez said he saw fights breaking out as people scrambled for places in line and criticized British Airways for its management of the crowds.

Outside Heathrow, visibility reached a low of 115 meters (377 feet), making runways nearly invisible to approaching aircraft, said Keith Fenwick, a spokesman for Britain's Meteorological office. Visibility lower than 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) is generally considered disruptive for flights.

The fog was expected to continue through Friday -- one of the busiest travel days before the holidays -- raising the possibility that thousands more passengers could be stranded. Eurostar reported a 15 percent spike in traffic as frustrated airline passengers boarded trains to get to Paris and Brussels.

At Heathrow's Terminal Four, the British Airways terminal, lines snaked out of the door as passengers struggled to reach the ticket counter.

Mark Bullock, managing director of BAA Heathrow, said the airport's capacity had been reduced by about 40 percent.

"The cancellations will need to continue as long as the weather conditions prevail," he told the British Broadcasting Corp. Flights at other London airports were relatively unaffected, with nine cancellations reported at Stansted and none at Gatwick.

Flu 'could wipe out 62 million'

A global flu pandemic could kill 62 million people, experts have warned.

The 1918 pandemic claimed 50 million lives, and experts in The Lancet predict the toll today would be higher than this, despite medical advances.

The world's poorest nations would be hardest hit, fuelled by factors such as HIV and malaria infections, the Harvard University researchers believe.

Yet developing countries can least afford to prepare for a pandemic, which needs to be addressed, they say.

Killer strain

Lethal global flu epidemics tend to occur three or four times a century.

Some scientists believe a new one may be imminent and could be triggered by bird flu.

So far there have been only 258 cases of the latest strain of avian flu, H5N1, recorded in humans.

But the fear is that this strain could mutate and spread quickly and easily between people, triggering a deadly pandemic.

It is estimated between 50,000 and 700,000 people could die in the UK if such an event occurred.

To forecast how big the global death toll might be, Professor Christopher Murray and his team looked back at the events of the 1918-20 Spanish flu pandemic.

When they extrapolated the mortality rates then to the global population of 2004, they estimated 51-81 million people could die from a similarly severe outbreak and gave a median estimate of 62 million.

And 96% of these deaths would occur in the poorest countries, where there is overcrowding and access to medical care is limited, they predict.

Professor Murray warned: "The burden of the next influenza pandemic will be overwhelmingly focused in the developing world.

"Focusing on practical and affordable strategies for low-income countries where the pandemic will have the biggest effect is clearly prudent."

Dr Neil Ferguson, a UK flu expert at Imperial College London, St Mary's, said: "Access to vaccines, antivirals, and antibiotics for the most vulnerable populations is clearly part of the solution."

But he said it might be more pragmatic to focus on public health measures such as school closure, household quarantine and mask-wearing, although more evidence is needed to show if these can delay or reduce the effect of a pandemic.

"The evidence for non-medical interventions will be eagerly awaited," he added.