The Miller/Urey Experiment
They said it couldn't be done !!
By the 1950s, scientists were in hot pursuit of the origin of life. Around the world, the scientific community was examining what kind of environment would be needed to allow life to begin. In 1953, Stanley L. Miller and Harold C. Urey, working at the University of Chicago, conducted an experiment which would change the approach of scientific investigation into the origin of life.
Miller took molecules which were believed to represent the major components of the early Earth's atmosphere and put them into a closed system
The gases they used were methane (CH4), ammonia (NH3), hydrogen (H2), and water (H2O). Next, he ran a continuous electric current through the system, to simulate lightning storms believed to be common on the early earth. Analysis of the experiment was done by chromotography. At the end of one week, Miller observed that as much as 10-15% of the carbon was now in the form of organic compounds. Two percent of the carbon had formed some of the amino acids which are used to make proteins. Perhaps most importantly, Miller's experiment showed that organic compounds such as amino acids, which are essential to cellular life, could be made easily under the conditions that scientists believed to be present on the early earth. This enormous finding inspired a multitude of further experiments.
In 1961, Juan Oro found that amino acids could be made from hydrogen cyanide (HCN) and ammonia in an aqueous solution. He also found that his experiment produced an amazing amount of the nucleotide base, adenine. Adenine is of tremendous biological significance as an organic compound because it is one of the four bases in RNA and DNA. It is also a component of adenosine triphosphate, or ATP, which is a major energy releasing molecule in cells. Experiments conducted later showed that the other RNA and DNA bases could be obtained through simulated prebiotic chemistry with a reducing atmosphere.
These discoveries created a stir within the science community. Scientists became very optimistic that the questions about the origin of life would be solved within a few decades. This has not been the case, however. Instead, the investigation into life's origins seems only to have just begun.
There has been a recent wave of skepticism concerning Miller's experiment because it is now believed that the early earth's atmosphere did not contain predominantly reductant molecules. Another objection is that this experiment required a tremendous amount of energy. While it is believed lightning storms were extremely common on the primitive Earth, they were not continuous as the Miller/Urey experiment portrayed. Thus it has been argued that while amino acids and other organic compounds may have been formed, they would not have been formed in the amounts which this experiment produced.
Many of the compounds made in the Miller/Urey experiment are known to exist in outer space. On September 28, 1969, a meteorite fell over Murchison, Australia. While only 100 kilograms were recovered, analysis of the meteorite has shown that it is rich with amino acids. Over 90 amino acids have been identified by researchers to date. Nineteen of these amino acids are found on Earth. (table showing comparison of Murchison meteorite to Miller/Urey experiment) The early Earth is believed to be similar to many of the asteroids and comets still roaming the galaxy. If amino acids are able to survive in outer space under extreme conditions, then this might suggest that amino acids were present when the Earth was formed. More importantly, the Murchison meteorite has demonstrated that the Earth may have acquired some of its amino acids and other organic compounds by planetary infall.
If these compounds were not created in a reducing atmosphere here on Earth as Miller suggested, then where did they come from?
Monday, September 26, 2005
Morning Papers - continued ...
The Times Picayune
Nagin reopens New Orleans' Algiers section
9/26/2005, 2:51 p.m. CT
By MICHELLE ROBERTS
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Residents of one New Orleans neighborhood were invited to come home Monday and "help us rebuild the city."
The mayor's office announced that residents of Algiers, which largely escaped the flooding brought by the twin onslaughts of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, would be able to return starting at 10 a.m. Algiers has electricity, water and sewer service.
In addition, business owners in the Central Business District, the French Quarter and the Uptown section would be allowed in to inspect property and clean up.
http://www.nola.com/newsflash/weather/index.ssf?/base/national-52/112773894593250.xml&storylist=hurricane
Catholic Church to cut jobs in New Orleans
9/26/2005, 9:16 a.m. CT
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The Archdiocese of New Orleans, which was hit by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, said Monday that it will lay off a yet-to-be determined number of workers over the coming weeks.
In a news release, the Catholic Church's archdiocese said it is trying to determine how to best utilize diminished resources.
http://www.nola.com/newsflash/weather/index.ssf?/base/news-19/1127744640223500.xml&storylist=hurricane
Cameron Parish deluged by waters from Gulf
Homes, businesses get a historic pounding
By Jan Moller
and Leslie Williams
Staff writers
CAMERON - From several hundred feet above the devastation in Cameron Parish, the rubble from homes and businesses looks like Canal Street at the end of a long and rainy Carnival.
Bits and pieces of homes peek above the murky floodwaters, parts of walls roost in trees.
Hundreds of homes and businesses deconstructed by storm surge and brutal winds mark a trail of misery near the part of the parish not far from the Gulf of Mexio. Homes have been shoved off their foundations, others crushed with only slabs remaining in a brown soup of floodwaters just north of a now relatively calm Gulf.
http://www.nola.com/newslogs/tporleans/index.ssf?/mtlogs/nola_tporleans/archives/2005_09_26.html
New Zealand Herald
Ice Age infants discovered in Austria
26.09.05 8.20am
The 27,000-year-old skeletons of two Ice Age infants have been found near Krems in northern Austria, the first discovery of its kind in Europe.
The perfectly preserved skeletons, measuring 40cm, had been protected by a mammoth's shoulder-blade bone, under which they had been buried on a sheltered hillside on the banks of the River Danube.
The grave, discovered 5.5m below ground, also contained a necklace of 31 pearls made from mammoth ivory and was located next to an area inhabited by ancient "homo sapiens fossilis," newspapers reported.
"It is the first discovery of a child's grave dating from this period," the excavation manager, Christine Neugebauer-Maresch, confirmed to the daily newspaper Kurier. "They may have been twins, but we have not yet been able to establish that," she told Die Presse.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347244
Tsunami could catch Auckland off its guard
27.09.05
By Wayne Thompson
Auckland could be hit with little or no warning by a southbound tsunami from the Pacific Ocean near Fiji, a scientist has warned.
Dr James Goff, of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, told a meeting of Civil Defence managers yesterday that Aucklanders needed to be more aware of the dangers of tidal waves in view of the Boxing Day tsunami in South-east Asia.
Devastated Sri Lanka was similar to many places in New Zealand in having a long, narrow stretch of exposed coast, which was open to wave after wave.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10347456
Fears over bird flu mean drug sells out
27.09.05
By Rebecca Walsh
Demand for the anti-bird flu drug Tamiflu is growing so fast the company that supplies it has not been able to keep up with orders.
New Zealanders, particularly travellers and those going on business to Southeast Asia, are seeking their own supplies as public fears of a global flu pandemic increase.
Bird flu has infected about 112 people and killed 57 in Asia since the end of 2003. Health experts have warned that as long as bird flu exists there is a risk it could mutate, become highly infectious and transfer from human to human.
Tamiflu is seen as the best way of preventing a pandemic - in conjunction with measures such as vigilant personal hygiene and avoiding public places.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10347462
Closing arguments ahead in Lynndie England abuse case
27.09.05
By Adam Tanner
FORT HOOD, Texas - Defense lawyers had a last chance yesterday to argue that U.S. soldier Lynndie England was not responsible for her actions when she posed for notorious photos of abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
England, 22, faces up to 11 years in prison if convicted on all seven counts connected with the abuse, which included posing with Iraqis who were forced to masturbate and famously holding a leash tethered to the neck of a naked prisoner.
Final arguments are scheduled for Monday and a five-member military jury could begin deliberations and issue a verdict as early as later the same day. If they find the reservist guilty, sentencing would follow later in week.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347424
Court to rule on school board's attempt to put creationism in class
27.09.05
By Leonard Doyle
HARRISBURG - In what is being described as the most important "creationist" legal battle in 18 years, a Pennsylvania court is due to hear opening arguments in a school board's attempt to include "intelligent design" in the curriculum.
Last October, the small, rural school district of Dover became the first public school district in the US to include the "alternative" to Darwin's theory of evolution in its biology curriculum.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347421
Major quake rocks northern Peru, one dead
26.09.05 4.30pm
LIMA, Peru - A major 7.5 magnitude earthquake rocked Peru's northern jungle on Sunday and police said at least one person had died.
The US Geological Survey's website said the quake hit at 8:55pm (1.55pm NZT Monday) and the epicentre was 75km northeast of the town of Moyobamba.
"We have one dead and three injured. The victim is a man whose house fell on top of him," Ramiro Pozzi, a police spokesman in the town of Lamas, some 25km from Tarapoto, the biggest town in the area, told Reuters.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347366
Left-handed women's risk of breast cancer higher
26.09.05 4.20pm
LONDON - Left-handed women are more than twice as likely as right-handers to suffer from breast cancer before reaching menopause, Dutch scientists said on Monday.
More than a million women are diagnosed with breast cancer worldwide each year. Three-quarters of cases occur after menopause, which usually begins around the age of 50.
Researchers at the University Medical Centre in Utrecht in the Netherlands speculate that there is a shared origin early in life for both left handedness and developing breast cancer, possibly exposure to hormones in the womb. "Left handedness is associated with breast cancer, most specifically pre-menopausal breast cancer," said Cuno Uiterwaal, an assistant professor of clinical epidemiology at the university, in an interview.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347350
American troops fire 250,000 bullets for every local they kill
26.09.05
By Andrew Buncombe
WASHINGTON - United States forces have fired so many bullets in Iraq and Afghanistan - an estimated 250,000 for every insurgent killed - that American ammunition-makers cannot keep up with demand.
As a result the US is having to import supplies from Israel.
A US Government report says that US forces are using 1.8 billion rounds of small-arms ammunition a year. The total has more than doubled in five years, largely as a result of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as changes in military doctrine and increased training.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347310
Police Hunt for Outback camel killer
27.09.05
DARWIN - Up to 30 camels have been slaughtered in a "thrill kill" in Outback Australia, police said.
The camels and several kangaroos were found dead at Henbury Station, about 140km south of Alice Springs in Central Australia.
They had been shot in the head in what police described as a "deliberate and calculated attack".
"The camels were partly domesticated and were in fenced paddocks, so it would have been easy for the offender to pick them off," Kulgera police sergeant Alistair Taylor said.
"What concerns us is the deliberate approach of the offender.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347422
US offers Iraqi prisoner amnesty
27.09.05 6.20am
The US military began yesterday to release 1000 Iraqi detainees from Abu Ghraib Prison at the request of the Iraqi Government in honour of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Arab Governments often pardon non-violent offenders during Ramadan, but the action in Iraq is widely seen as an effort to persuade Iraqis to vote in the October 15 national referendum on Iraq's draft constitution.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347420
Houston Chronicles
Beaumont Enterprise newsroom in "shambles"
Ron Franscell, a managing editor at the Beaumont Enterprise, checked in Sunday. He hadn't updated his blog since Friday afternoon, so I had become a little concerned.
He's back, and apparently the storm caused a fair amount of damage at the newspaper's building:
Not much time here. Power is still out and everything crucial piece of equipment is on priceless battery power.
We survived, battered and a little dazed. Our third-floor newsroom is a shambles. The ceiling caved in as Rita ramped up and, at about 3 a.m., we quickly removed everything that could help sustain us in the next few hours and days. The greater fear was that the rushing water would naturally migrate into the second floor, where most of us were bivouacked. By 5 a.m., it started to cascade throught the elevator shaft and from several spots in the second-floor ceiling. We were faced with a decision: Move people through the storm to the emergency command center across the street, or hope that the storm would pass over us before the situation became truly desperate.
http://blogs.chron.com/sciguy/
5 found dead in Beaumont apartment
By ZEKE MINAYA and DALE LEZON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
BEAUMONT - Five people were found dead today in an apartment, apparently overcome by fumes from a generator they were using for power following Hurricane Rita, authorities said.
The bodies of a woman, man and three children were found after the children's aunt went to the apartment near the Neches River to check on the group, said Carmen Apple, a spokeswoman for the Beaumont Police Department.
Power was knocked out to Beaumont and Port Arthur after Rita roared into Texas Saturday morning. Authorities suspect carbon monoxide poisoning as the cause of death. Autopsies will be conducted for an official ruling.
The aunt told authorities that the 25-year-old woman was the mother of the children — a 9-year-old boy, a 7-year-old girl and a 12-year-old girl — and the 47-year-old man was her companion. No names were released.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369454
5 found dead in Beaumont apartment
By ZEKE MINAYA and DALE LEZON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
BEAUMONT - Five people were found dead today in an apartment, apparently overcome by fumes from a generator they were using for power following Hurricane Rita, authorities said.
The bodies of a woman, man and three children were found after the children's aunt went to the apartment near the Neches River to check on the group, said Carmen Apple, a spokeswoman for the Beaumont Police Department.
Power was knocked out to Beaumont and Port Arthur after Rita roared into Texas Saturday morning. Authorities suspect carbon monoxide poisoning as the cause of death. Autopsies will be conducted for an official ruling.
The aunt told authorities that the 25-year-old woman was the mother of the children — a 9-year-old boy, a 7-year-old girl and a 12-year-old girl — and the 47-year-old man was her companion. No names were released.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369454
SOUTHEAST TEXAS
516,000 still without power in Texas
Thousands of workers labor in 16-hour shifts to restore service
By ERIC HANSON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
About 493,000 customers in Southeast Texas still have no electricity today, as thousands of workers labor to restore power knocked out by Hurricane Rita.
Of the 700,000 CenterPoint Energy customers who lost electricity, mostly in the Houston area, all but 180,000 had power restored by midday, said Leticia Lowe, company spokeswoman. She said all are expected to be back on line by Friday.
Entergy, which serves the parts of East Texas that bore the brunt of the hurricane, had about 262,000 customers without power in Texas this morning, compared with 270, 000 right after the storm hit, company spokesman Morgan Stewart said
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369262
LAKE LIVINGSTON
Dam damage called 'serious situation'
The drawdown continues, flooding the Trinity, so that experts can assess the storm damage
By CINDY HORSWELL and ARMANDO VILLAFRANCA
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
Engineers are slowing down the unprecedented release of water from the Lake Lake Livingston dam, which suffered "serious" damage from Hurricane Rita.
The water is expected to cause flooding along the Trinity River below the lake, with the worst coming Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. The river is expected to crest 3 feet above the flood stage at Liberty, sending water over roads but not into houses on stilts.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369376
Port of Houston opens to limited traffic
By BILL HENSEL Jr.
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
The Houston Ship Channel was reopened today to vessels with a draft of less than 35 feet, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
ADVERTISEMENT
That's only for daylight traffic and probably would not include oil tankers, since those vessels, at least when they are fully loaded, need a deeper channel. The channel, however, is open to tug and barge traffic, Coast Guard officials said.
The Port said it will offer a midday update on the results of inspections of the Ship Channel, and at that time they may to provide an update on when the deeper draft ships can travel up the channel.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/3370141
Sydney Morning Herald
Judges ask for extension on Corby appeal
September 26, 2005 - 10:45PM
Convicted drug smuggler Schapelle Corby may have to wait another month to learn if she can go free from a Bali jail after judges wrote to Indonesia's highest court to ask for more time to make up their minds.
The appellant court, which could theoretically increase Corby's 20-year sentence, had been due to rule by Thursday whether it would agree to quash or cut Corby's sentence.
But lead lawyer Hotman Paris Hutapea told AAP that the judges wrote to the Supreme Court this afternoon to request another 30 days.
The request is extraordinary because a time extension is usually granted only once and the High Court has already pushed out the detention period by a month.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/judges-ask-for-extension-on-corby-appeal/2005/09/26/1127586795181.html
Bird flu drug aid boosted
By Cynthia Banham
September 27, 2005
Australia is giving Indonesia thousands more doses of the antiviral drug Tamiflu as it struggles to deal with the latest outbreak of bird flu.
As a 27-year-old Indonesian woman died in a Jakarta hospital yesterday from suspected bird flu, the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, announced Australia would fund 40,000 more courses of the antiviral drug, on top of the 10,000 it agreed to pay for last week.
Mr Downer said Indonesian authorities had been "caught a bit short" by the bird flu outbreak - which they have described as an epidemic - and were "finding it difficult to handle".
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/bird-flu-drug-aid-boosted/2005/09/26/1127586800447.html
Access forbidden: China's sweeping measures to police internet
By Hamish McDonald Herald Correspondent in Beijing
September 27, 2005
The Chinese Government has announced sweeping new controls on the fast-growing internet industry to put its content under the supervision of Communist Party propaganda officials, as is the case with print and broadcast media.
"We need to better regulate the online news services with the emergence of so many unhealthy news stories that will easily mislead the public," a State Council (cabinet) spokesman was quoted as saying.
Although there was a brief mention of pornography, gambling, violence and criminal use of the internet, it was made clear that the authorities were out to screen China's 100 million-plus internet users from political news and scandals challenging the party's rule. Eleven forbidden areas have been listed, including news that would endanger state security, state secrets not yet unclassified, reports inciting ethnic violence, challenges to the state's religious policies, banned cults, and news that promotes civil unrest or calls for public protests and assemblies.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/access-forbidden-chinas-sweeping-measures-to-police-internet/2005/09/26/1127586800456.html
continued …
Nagin reopens New Orleans' Algiers section
9/26/2005, 2:51 p.m. CT
By MICHELLE ROBERTS
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Residents of one New Orleans neighborhood were invited to come home Monday and "help us rebuild the city."
The mayor's office announced that residents of Algiers, which largely escaped the flooding brought by the twin onslaughts of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, would be able to return starting at 10 a.m. Algiers has electricity, water and sewer service.
In addition, business owners in the Central Business District, the French Quarter and the Uptown section would be allowed in to inspect property and clean up.
http://www.nola.com/newsflash/weather/index.ssf?/base/national-52/112773894593250.xml&storylist=hurricane
Catholic Church to cut jobs in New Orleans
9/26/2005, 9:16 a.m. CT
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The Archdiocese of New Orleans, which was hit by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, said Monday that it will lay off a yet-to-be determined number of workers over the coming weeks.
In a news release, the Catholic Church's archdiocese said it is trying to determine how to best utilize diminished resources.
http://www.nola.com/newsflash/weather/index.ssf?/base/news-19/1127744640223500.xml&storylist=hurricane
Cameron Parish deluged by waters from Gulf
Homes, businesses get a historic pounding
By Jan Moller
and Leslie Williams
Staff writers
CAMERON - From several hundred feet above the devastation in Cameron Parish, the rubble from homes and businesses looks like Canal Street at the end of a long and rainy Carnival.
Bits and pieces of homes peek above the murky floodwaters, parts of walls roost in trees.
Hundreds of homes and businesses deconstructed by storm surge and brutal winds mark a trail of misery near the part of the parish not far from the Gulf of Mexio. Homes have been shoved off their foundations, others crushed with only slabs remaining in a brown soup of floodwaters just north of a now relatively calm Gulf.
http://www.nola.com/newslogs/tporleans/index.ssf?/mtlogs/nola_tporleans/archives/2005_09_26.html
New Zealand Herald
Ice Age infants discovered in Austria
26.09.05 8.20am
The 27,000-year-old skeletons of two Ice Age infants have been found near Krems in northern Austria, the first discovery of its kind in Europe.
The perfectly preserved skeletons, measuring 40cm, had been protected by a mammoth's shoulder-blade bone, under which they had been buried on a sheltered hillside on the banks of the River Danube.
The grave, discovered 5.5m below ground, also contained a necklace of 31 pearls made from mammoth ivory and was located next to an area inhabited by ancient "homo sapiens fossilis," newspapers reported.
"It is the first discovery of a child's grave dating from this period," the excavation manager, Christine Neugebauer-Maresch, confirmed to the daily newspaper Kurier. "They may have been twins, but we have not yet been able to establish that," she told Die Presse.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347244
Tsunami could catch Auckland off its guard
27.09.05
By Wayne Thompson
Auckland could be hit with little or no warning by a southbound tsunami from the Pacific Ocean near Fiji, a scientist has warned.
Dr James Goff, of the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, told a meeting of Civil Defence managers yesterday that Aucklanders needed to be more aware of the dangers of tidal waves in view of the Boxing Day tsunami in South-east Asia.
Devastated Sri Lanka was similar to many places in New Zealand in having a long, narrow stretch of exposed coast, which was open to wave after wave.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10347456
Fears over bird flu mean drug sells out
27.09.05
By Rebecca Walsh
Demand for the anti-bird flu drug Tamiflu is growing so fast the company that supplies it has not been able to keep up with orders.
New Zealanders, particularly travellers and those going on business to Southeast Asia, are seeking their own supplies as public fears of a global flu pandemic increase.
Bird flu has infected about 112 people and killed 57 in Asia since the end of 2003. Health experts have warned that as long as bird flu exists there is a risk it could mutate, become highly infectious and transfer from human to human.
Tamiflu is seen as the best way of preventing a pandemic - in conjunction with measures such as vigilant personal hygiene and avoiding public places.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10347462
Closing arguments ahead in Lynndie England abuse case
27.09.05
By Adam Tanner
FORT HOOD, Texas - Defense lawyers had a last chance yesterday to argue that U.S. soldier Lynndie England was not responsible for her actions when she posed for notorious photos of abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.
England, 22, faces up to 11 years in prison if convicted on all seven counts connected with the abuse, which included posing with Iraqis who were forced to masturbate and famously holding a leash tethered to the neck of a naked prisoner.
Final arguments are scheduled for Monday and a five-member military jury could begin deliberations and issue a verdict as early as later the same day. If they find the reservist guilty, sentencing would follow later in week.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347424
Court to rule on school board's attempt to put creationism in class
27.09.05
By Leonard Doyle
HARRISBURG - In what is being described as the most important "creationist" legal battle in 18 years, a Pennsylvania court is due to hear opening arguments in a school board's attempt to include "intelligent design" in the curriculum.
Last October, the small, rural school district of Dover became the first public school district in the US to include the "alternative" to Darwin's theory of evolution in its biology curriculum.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347421
Major quake rocks northern Peru, one dead
26.09.05 4.30pm
LIMA, Peru - A major 7.5 magnitude earthquake rocked Peru's northern jungle on Sunday and police said at least one person had died.
The US Geological Survey's website said the quake hit at 8:55pm (1.55pm NZT Monday) and the epicentre was 75km northeast of the town of Moyobamba.
"We have one dead and three injured. The victim is a man whose house fell on top of him," Ramiro Pozzi, a police spokesman in the town of Lamas, some 25km from Tarapoto, the biggest town in the area, told Reuters.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347366
Left-handed women's risk of breast cancer higher
26.09.05 4.20pm
LONDON - Left-handed women are more than twice as likely as right-handers to suffer from breast cancer before reaching menopause, Dutch scientists said on Monday.
More than a million women are diagnosed with breast cancer worldwide each year. Three-quarters of cases occur after menopause, which usually begins around the age of 50.
Researchers at the University Medical Centre in Utrecht in the Netherlands speculate that there is a shared origin early in life for both left handedness and developing breast cancer, possibly exposure to hormones in the womb. "Left handedness is associated with breast cancer, most specifically pre-menopausal breast cancer," said Cuno Uiterwaal, an assistant professor of clinical epidemiology at the university, in an interview.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347350
American troops fire 250,000 bullets for every local they kill
26.09.05
By Andrew Buncombe
WASHINGTON - United States forces have fired so many bullets in Iraq and Afghanistan - an estimated 250,000 for every insurgent killed - that American ammunition-makers cannot keep up with demand.
As a result the US is having to import supplies from Israel.
A US Government report says that US forces are using 1.8 billion rounds of small-arms ammunition a year. The total has more than doubled in five years, largely as a result of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as changes in military doctrine and increased training.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347310
Police Hunt for Outback camel killer
27.09.05
DARWIN - Up to 30 camels have been slaughtered in a "thrill kill" in Outback Australia, police said.
The camels and several kangaroos were found dead at Henbury Station, about 140km south of Alice Springs in Central Australia.
They had been shot in the head in what police described as a "deliberate and calculated attack".
"The camels were partly domesticated and were in fenced paddocks, so it would have been easy for the offender to pick them off," Kulgera police sergeant Alistair Taylor said.
"What concerns us is the deliberate approach of the offender.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347422
US offers Iraqi prisoner amnesty
27.09.05 6.20am
The US military began yesterday to release 1000 Iraqi detainees from Abu Ghraib Prison at the request of the Iraqi Government in honour of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Arab Governments often pardon non-violent offenders during Ramadan, but the action in Iraq is widely seen as an effort to persuade Iraqis to vote in the October 15 national referendum on Iraq's draft constitution.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10347420
Houston Chronicles
Beaumont Enterprise newsroom in "shambles"
Ron Franscell, a managing editor at the Beaumont Enterprise, checked in Sunday. He hadn't updated his blog since Friday afternoon, so I had become a little concerned.
He's back, and apparently the storm caused a fair amount of damage at the newspaper's building:
Not much time here. Power is still out and everything crucial piece of equipment is on priceless battery power.
We survived, battered and a little dazed. Our third-floor newsroom is a shambles. The ceiling caved in as Rita ramped up and, at about 3 a.m., we quickly removed everything that could help sustain us in the next few hours and days. The greater fear was that the rushing water would naturally migrate into the second floor, where most of us were bivouacked. By 5 a.m., it started to cascade throught the elevator shaft and from several spots in the second-floor ceiling. We were faced with a decision: Move people through the storm to the emergency command center across the street, or hope that the storm would pass over us before the situation became truly desperate.
http://blogs.chron.com/sciguy/
5 found dead in Beaumont apartment
By ZEKE MINAYA and DALE LEZON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
BEAUMONT - Five people were found dead today in an apartment, apparently overcome by fumes from a generator they were using for power following Hurricane Rita, authorities said.
The bodies of a woman, man and three children were found after the children's aunt went to the apartment near the Neches River to check on the group, said Carmen Apple, a spokeswoman for the Beaumont Police Department.
Power was knocked out to Beaumont and Port Arthur after Rita roared into Texas Saturday morning. Authorities suspect carbon monoxide poisoning as the cause of death. Autopsies will be conducted for an official ruling.
The aunt told authorities that the 25-year-old woman was the mother of the children — a 9-year-old boy, a 7-year-old girl and a 12-year-old girl — and the 47-year-old man was her companion. No names were released.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369454
5 found dead in Beaumont apartment
By ZEKE MINAYA and DALE LEZON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
BEAUMONT - Five people were found dead today in an apartment, apparently overcome by fumes from a generator they were using for power following Hurricane Rita, authorities said.
The bodies of a woman, man and three children were found after the children's aunt went to the apartment near the Neches River to check on the group, said Carmen Apple, a spokeswoman for the Beaumont Police Department.
Power was knocked out to Beaumont and Port Arthur after Rita roared into Texas Saturday morning. Authorities suspect carbon monoxide poisoning as the cause of death. Autopsies will be conducted for an official ruling.
The aunt told authorities that the 25-year-old woman was the mother of the children — a 9-year-old boy, a 7-year-old girl and a 12-year-old girl — and the 47-year-old man was her companion. No names were released.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369454
SOUTHEAST TEXAS
516,000 still without power in Texas
Thousands of workers labor in 16-hour shifts to restore service
By ERIC HANSON
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
About 493,000 customers in Southeast Texas still have no electricity today, as thousands of workers labor to restore power knocked out by Hurricane Rita.
Of the 700,000 CenterPoint Energy customers who lost electricity, mostly in the Houston area, all but 180,000 had power restored by midday, said Leticia Lowe, company spokeswoman. She said all are expected to be back on line by Friday.
Entergy, which serves the parts of East Texas that bore the brunt of the hurricane, had about 262,000 customers without power in Texas this morning, compared with 270, 000 right after the storm hit, company spokesman Morgan Stewart said
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369262
LAKE LIVINGSTON
Dam damage called 'serious situation'
The drawdown continues, flooding the Trinity, so that experts can assess the storm damage
By CINDY HORSWELL and ARMANDO VILLAFRANCA
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Video, graphics courtesy Associated Press and KHOU; free Real Player, Flash plug-in and Acrobat Reader may be required.)
Engineers are slowing down the unprecedented release of water from the Lake Lake Livingston dam, which suffered "serious" damage from Hurricane Rita.
The water is expected to cause flooding along the Trinity River below the lake, with the worst coming Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. The river is expected to crest 3 feet above the flood stage at Liberty, sending water over roads but not into houses on stilts.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/topfront/3369376
Port of Houston opens to limited traffic
By BILL HENSEL Jr.
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
The Houston Ship Channel was reopened today to vessels with a draft of less than 35 feet, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
ADVERTISEMENT
That's only for daylight traffic and probably would not include oil tankers, since those vessels, at least when they are fully loaded, need a deeper channel. The channel, however, is open to tug and barge traffic, Coast Guard officials said.
The Port said it will offer a midday update on the results of inspections of the Ship Channel, and at that time they may to provide an update on when the deeper draft ships can travel up the channel.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/3370141
Sydney Morning Herald
Judges ask for extension on Corby appeal
September 26, 2005 - 10:45PM
Convicted drug smuggler Schapelle Corby may have to wait another month to learn if she can go free from a Bali jail after judges wrote to Indonesia's highest court to ask for more time to make up their minds.
The appellant court, which could theoretically increase Corby's 20-year sentence, had been due to rule by Thursday whether it would agree to quash or cut Corby's sentence.
But lead lawyer Hotman Paris Hutapea told AAP that the judges wrote to the Supreme Court this afternoon to request another 30 days.
The request is extraordinary because a time extension is usually granted only once and the High Court has already pushed out the detention period by a month.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/judges-ask-for-extension-on-corby-appeal/2005/09/26/1127586795181.html
Bird flu drug aid boosted
By Cynthia Banham
September 27, 2005
Australia is giving Indonesia thousands more doses of the antiviral drug Tamiflu as it struggles to deal with the latest outbreak of bird flu.
As a 27-year-old Indonesian woman died in a Jakarta hospital yesterday from suspected bird flu, the Foreign Affairs Minister, Alexander Downer, announced Australia would fund 40,000 more courses of the antiviral drug, on top of the 10,000 it agreed to pay for last week.
Mr Downer said Indonesian authorities had been "caught a bit short" by the bird flu outbreak - which they have described as an epidemic - and were "finding it difficult to handle".
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/bird-flu-drug-aid-boosted/2005/09/26/1127586800447.html
Access forbidden: China's sweeping measures to police internet
By Hamish McDonald Herald Correspondent in Beijing
September 27, 2005
The Chinese Government has announced sweeping new controls on the fast-growing internet industry to put its content under the supervision of Communist Party propaganda officials, as is the case with print and broadcast media.
"We need to better regulate the online news services with the emergence of so many unhealthy news stories that will easily mislead the public," a State Council (cabinet) spokesman was quoted as saying.
Although there was a brief mention of pornography, gambling, violence and criminal use of the internet, it was made clear that the authorities were out to screen China's 100 million-plus internet users from political news and scandals challenging the party's rule. Eleven forbidden areas have been listed, including news that would endanger state security, state secrets not yet unclassified, reports inciting ethnic violence, challenges to the state's religious policies, banned cults, and news that promotes civil unrest or calls for public protests and assemblies.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/access-forbidden-chinas-sweeping-measures-to-police-internet/2005/09/26/1127586800456.html
continued …
UNISYS Infrared Satellite 12 hour loop - click here
September 26,2005. The North Pacific Vortex is south of Alaska and spinning toward it with a mini-vortex over California. The North Atlantic Vortex is over Iceland reaching to the Mid-Atlantic and onto the equator spawning several reverse rotations; east of NC and south of Haiti. The primarily southern border of the Arctic Vortex falls at the Canadian border. There is a clear delineation between it and the ascending heat off the equator. NOTED the straight edge of the aire masse extending past the Great Lakes.
UNISYS Water Vapor Satellite 12 hour loop - click here
September 26, 2005. This Global Heat is unrelenting. The turbulence in the Gulf, in particular south of Haiti is again a concern.
Morning Papers - concluded
The weather in Antarctica (Crystal Ice Chime) is"
Scott Base
Clear
-33.0°
Updated Tuesday 27 Sep 2:59AM
The weather at Glacial Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
39 °F / 4 °C
Scattered Clouds
Humidity:
87%
Dew Point:
36 °F / 2 °C
Wind:
Calm
Pressure:
30.10 in / 1019 hPa
Visibility:
2.0 miles / 3.2 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Scattered Clouds 1500 ft / 457 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
Scott Base
Clear
-33.0°
Updated Tuesday 27 Sep 2:59AM
The weather at Glacial Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
39 °F / 4 °C
Scattered Clouds
Humidity:
87%
Dew Point:
36 °F / 2 °C
Wind:
Calm
Pressure:
30.10 in / 1019 hPa
Visibility:
2.0 miles / 3.2 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Scattered Clouds 1500 ft / 457 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
Rita spawned more than 17 tornadoes with more than 100 homes damaged
Tornado rips through Miss. State U.; 4 hurt
Rita spawns 17 twisters; more than 100 homes damaged
Russ Houston / AP
Chuck Cariker, a Mississippi State University alumnus from Tunica, Miss., looks through his motor home after a tornado tore through the Starkville campus and swept his vehicle off the ground on ...
Follow two MSNBC.com journalists as they blog from the less publicized areas of Katrina's wrath.
Updated: 11:21 a.m. ET Sept. 26, 2005
STARKVILLE, Miss. - A tornado spawned by the remnants of Hurricane Rita ripped through Mississippi State University’s campus, injuring four people and forcing cancellation of Monday’s classes.
The tornado was one of at least 14 twisters that touched down Sunday in Mississippi, meteorologists said. More than 100 homes were damaged, the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency said. At least three tornadoes struck in Arkansas on Saturday.
By dawn Monday, the fading remnants of Rita were centered 80 miles north-northwest of Indianapolis and moving to the north-northeast at 30 mph.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9491254/
GreenShift Appoints Lt. Commander John Davis to Head Tornado Trash Corporation
09.26.05, 8:06 AM ET
GreenShift Corporation (OTC Bulletin Board: GSHF) today announced the appointment of Lt. Commander John "Whit" Davis as its chief executive officer to head GreenShift's new wholly-owned portfolio company, Tornado Trash Corporation,.
Lt. Commander Davis has a broad base of diversified management, engineering, operational and business development experience. Most recently, Lt. Commander Davis was the technical director for special projects at Vortex Dehydration Technology, LLC, where he led product design, development and implementation for many applications of the technologies underlying GreenShift's Tornado Generator(TM).
http://www.forbes.com/businesswire/feeds/businesswire/2005/09/26/businesswire20050926005557r1.html
Tornado rips through MSU, trailer park
The Associated Press
Watch for Top Jobs coming to this space soon.
STARKVILLE - A tornado ripped across the Mississippi State University campus on Sunday, injuring four people, damaging buildings, and plucking trees, telephone and power lines from their rightful places.
The storm also caused damage to the nearby University Hills trailer park, rolling an RV onto its side, officials said. At least five trailers suffered major damage and some minor injuries were reported.
"They sounded the sirens, but it was pretty much too late," said Glenn Palmer, weekend manager at University Hills. "I looked outside and saw the funnel cloud coming and knew we were in trouble."
http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050926/NEWS01/509260306/1002/NEWS01
Tornado victims assess damage
By Leesha Faulkner, Managing Editor
09/26/2005
Marlon Nichols repairs the roof of his parents’ house Sunday afternoon in Quito. A twister touched down Saturday in the south Leflore County community, ripping up trees, roofs and damaging a cotton gin
QUITO - Carolyn and Wayne Nichols hooked up a generator to their house Sunday, hoping to clear away debris left behind by a tornado the day before.
Carolyn Nichols drew attention to the car and truck that rested beneath the lumber and roofing, which they once had called a garage.
"The roof ripped off the living room and dining room," she said as she surveyed the damage.
By early Sunday afternoon a few friends and their son, Marlon, had come over to offer helping hands as much as condolences for the couple's property losses.
The Nicholses fared worse than some and better than others from the tornadoes spawned by Hurricane Rita as she tracked inland Saturday through Louisiana. At least one death was reported in Humphreys County, according to a spokeswoman at the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency in Jackson.
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=15279720&BRD=1838&PAG=461&dept_id=104621&rfi=6
Storm's remnants bring wind, rain, tornado warnings
More showers expected today, but cooler, drier weather ahead
Monday, September 26, 2005
By BUDD McLAUGHLIN
Times Staff Writer buddm@htimes.com
Though Hurricane Rita was a few hundred miles away, her remnants paid a visit to the area Sunday bringing high winds and tornado warnings, including one for Madison County.
The bad weather also caused the final day of Big Spring Jam to be canceled.
"We've got a pretty dynamic situation," said Andy Kula, senior forecaster at the National Weather Service's Huntsville office. "Tornadoes were sighted in Mississippi and western Alabama," and there were warnings for Colbert, Cullman, Franklin, Lawrence, Limestone and Morgan counties, as well as Madison County.
http://www.al.com/news/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/news/112772620473440.xml&coll=1
Rita spawns 17 twisters; more than 100 homes damaged
Russ Houston / AP
Chuck Cariker, a Mississippi State University alumnus from Tunica, Miss., looks through his motor home after a tornado tore through the Starkville campus and swept his vehicle off the ground on ...
Follow two MSNBC.com journalists as they blog from the less publicized areas of Katrina's wrath.
Updated: 11:21 a.m. ET Sept. 26, 2005
STARKVILLE, Miss. - A tornado spawned by the remnants of Hurricane Rita ripped through Mississippi State University’s campus, injuring four people and forcing cancellation of Monday’s classes.
The tornado was one of at least 14 twisters that touched down Sunday in Mississippi, meteorologists said. More than 100 homes were damaged, the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency said. At least three tornadoes struck in Arkansas on Saturday.
By dawn Monday, the fading remnants of Rita were centered 80 miles north-northwest of Indianapolis and moving to the north-northeast at 30 mph.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9491254/
GreenShift Appoints Lt. Commander John Davis to Head Tornado Trash Corporation
09.26.05, 8:06 AM ET
GreenShift Corporation (OTC Bulletin Board: GSHF) today announced the appointment of Lt. Commander John "Whit" Davis as its chief executive officer to head GreenShift's new wholly-owned portfolio company, Tornado Trash Corporation,.
Lt. Commander Davis has a broad base of diversified management, engineering, operational and business development experience. Most recently, Lt. Commander Davis was the technical director for special projects at Vortex Dehydration Technology, LLC, where he led product design, development and implementation for many applications of the technologies underlying GreenShift's Tornado Generator(TM).
http://www.forbes.com/businesswire/feeds/businesswire/2005/09/26/businesswire20050926005557r1.html
Tornado rips through MSU, trailer park
The Associated Press
Watch for Top Jobs coming to this space soon.
STARKVILLE - A tornado ripped across the Mississippi State University campus on Sunday, injuring four people, damaging buildings, and plucking trees, telephone and power lines from their rightful places.
The storm also caused damage to the nearby University Hills trailer park, rolling an RV onto its side, officials said. At least five trailers suffered major damage and some minor injuries were reported.
"They sounded the sirens, but it was pretty much too late," said Glenn Palmer, weekend manager at University Hills. "I looked outside and saw the funnel cloud coming and knew we were in trouble."
http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050926/NEWS01/509260306/1002/NEWS01
Tornado victims assess damage
By Leesha Faulkner, Managing Editor
09/26/2005
Marlon Nichols repairs the roof of his parents’ house Sunday afternoon in Quito. A twister touched down Saturday in the south Leflore County community, ripping up trees, roofs and damaging a cotton gin
QUITO - Carolyn and Wayne Nichols hooked up a generator to their house Sunday, hoping to clear away debris left behind by a tornado the day before.
Carolyn Nichols drew attention to the car and truck that rested beneath the lumber and roofing, which they once had called a garage.
"The roof ripped off the living room and dining room," she said as she surveyed the damage.
By early Sunday afternoon a few friends and their son, Marlon, had come over to offer helping hands as much as condolences for the couple's property losses.
The Nicholses fared worse than some and better than others from the tornadoes spawned by Hurricane Rita as she tracked inland Saturday through Louisiana. At least one death was reported in Humphreys County, according to a spokeswoman at the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency in Jackson.
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=15279720&BRD=1838&PAG=461&dept_id=104621&rfi=6
Storm's remnants bring wind, rain, tornado warnings
More showers expected today, but cooler, drier weather ahead
Monday, September 26, 2005
By BUDD McLAUGHLIN
Times Staff Writer buddm@htimes.com
Though Hurricane Rita was a few hundred miles away, her remnants paid a visit to the area Sunday bringing high winds and tornado warnings, including one for Madison County.
The bad weather also caused the final day of Big Spring Jam to be canceled.
"We've got a pretty dynamic situation," said Andy Kula, senior forecaster at the National Weather Service's Huntsville office. "Tornadoes were sighted in Mississippi and western Alabama," and there were warnings for Colbert, Cullman, Franklin, Lawrence, Limestone and Morgan counties, as well as Madison County.
http://www.al.com/news/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/news/112772620473440.xml&coll=1
It's a matter of morality not just survival and profits.
The World According to Wal-Mart
Under Paid. Under insured. UNION BUSTING. Global reach. Global experience with weather. Sexual Harassing. Wal-Mart should render their experience to a hearing of FEMA by an Independent Investigator/Prosecutor. But, I don't see them taking over the national emergency management authority in this country.
Wal-Mart puts FEMA to shame
9/25/2005
By MURRAY LIGHT
Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the nation, has become the favorite target of those who say it gives its thousands of employees poor pay and benefits. It also is facing a sex-discrimination lawsuit.
I don't have the information I need to evaluate these charges, which Wal-Mart top management vigorously denies. Before going any further, let me state for the record that I know no Wal-Mart executives, mid-managers or sales associates. In fact, I've never even been in a Wal-Mart store. Nor do I own any Wal-Mart stock.
My friends and colleagues, mostly of liberal persuasion who have been highly critical of Wal-Mart's policies, will undoubtedly challenge much of what I have to say in this column and charge that I've sold out to corporate interests. But the facts are what they are, and without going into the corporation's personnel practices and policies, I have to salute Wal-Mart for its role in responding to the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina on the nation's Gulf Coast.
http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20050925/2066732.asp
THIS IS BECAUSE THEY HAD THE CORNER ON DEVASTED AREAS IN THE USA. THEY WERE LATER THWARTED BY THE RED CROSS.
Wal-Mart's September Sales Are Rising Within Forecast on Food
Sept. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, said September sales at its U.S. stores open at least a year are rising within its forecast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, led by grocery sales.
The company has forecast a sales gain of 2 percent to 4 percent from a year earlier in the five-week period that began Aug. 27. An increase of less than 2.5 percent would be the smallest since April, when Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart reported a 0.9 percent gain. Wal-Mart updated results through yesterday in a recorded call today.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=atPXEM3YZuYI&refer=top_world_news
Area faces Wal-Mart 'superblitz'
By CHRIS G. DENINA/Times-Herald staff writer
Vallejo's Wal-Mart store. (J.L. Sousa/Times-Herald)
In a few years, it may be tough to drive through Solano County without seeing a Wal-Mart Supercenter.
The retail giant aims to dot Solano and Napa counties with super-sized stores in Vallejo, American Canyon, Suisun City, Fairfield and Dixon.
At present, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. only has five Supercenters statewide - the first opened just last year in California - but the company plans to quickly add more throughout the region.
http://timesheraldonline.com/ci_3061504
After Lowe's will be Wal-Mart, Home Depot
Hickory residents, save your neighborhoods. The giant neighborhood-busters are moving in. With the vast Lowe's campus come not only friendly customers from all over the Unifour, but also the lumbering semis, the lurching 18-wheelers creeping up the slow streets, slowing with each traffic light, forcing the rest of us to dart in and out of your neighborhood and mine finding a fast way to get to our destinations.If Lowes is allowed to build beside churches and schools, Wal-Mart and Home Depot will be right behind.
Peace soon will be a relic of the past. Noise, smog, wrecks, traffic jams, strangers whizzing by in a hurry, screeching tires as they barely miss you inching out of your driveway -- these will be the new sights and sounds if Lowe's builds on N.C. 127.
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/local/states/north_carolina/counties/catawba/12736350.htm
IT IS SO GOOD TO KNOW 'WINNEBAGO' OWNERS CAN AFFORD THEIR TRAVELS. I hadn't realized Camp Grounds with sewer hook ups were so expensive.
Travelers like my husband and me rely on Wal-Mart stopovers
Meeting Per and Leif reminded me of the time my husband and I spent the night in an Arkansas Wal-Mart parking lot.
I have always loved to travel. A lot of that probably comes from my family. My parents made sure we visited the "mainland" at least once every other year while we were growing up in Hawaii. So it came as no surprise that I married someone who loves to travel as much as I do.
http://www.jacksonsun.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050925/NEWS01/509250306/1002
Wal-Mart sale sets land record
By CHUCK STINNETT, Business Editor
September 25, 2005
A fleet of earth-moving equipment is transforming the landscape on U.S. 60-East from which a Wal-Mart Supercenter, Lowe's home improvement store and associated businesses will rise.
But it didn't get started until a lot of legal wrangling had taken place and a lot of money had changed hands. In fact, it appears Wal-Mart's purchase of its tract has set a local record.
Advertisement
Deeds at the courthouse show that Henderson Development Association (the entity created by developer GBT Realty Corp. of Brentwood, Tenn.) paid $3,978,720 to Clark and Cynthia Merrill and Frances M. O'Sullivan for about 58.5 acres.
Then, Henderson Development resold 25.2 acres to Wal-Mart Real Estate Business Trust for $6,030,635 -- an average of $239,580 per acre.
http://www.courierpress.com/ecp/gleaner_business/article/0,1626,ECP_4481_4102170,00.html
Wal-Mart closes 72 stores as Rita approaches
23 Sep 2005 13:49:15 GMT
Source: Reuters
CHICAGO, Sept 23 (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc. closed 72 stores in the path of Hurricane Rita as of Friday morning, the company said on its Web site.
The world's biggest retailer had closed 64 stores and distribution centers by Thursday evening, and said more than 100 facilities were within a 120-mile radius of where the storm is expected to make landfall overnight on Friday.
The Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer, which has more than 3,500 U.S. stores, had closed 126 locations when Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast. Nine of its stores were severely damaged in that storm.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N23629372.htm
Wal-Mart shuts 108 facilities before Rita
By Jennifer Waters, MarketWatch
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has closed down 108 facilities in the path of Hurricane Rita, while loading up more than 200 trucks with emergency supplies to staging areas in Texas.
Edit My Portfolio Edit Alerts
The world's largest retailer, which gained much praised for its quick response to Hurricane Katrina, said on its Web site Friday that it has more than 100 facilities within a 120-mile radius of the hurricane's expected landfall.
Shares of Wal-Mart (WMT: news, chart, profile) bounced around the flat line, last trading lower by 2 cents to $43.15.
Of the stores closed, 52 are Wal-Mart supercenters, 22 are Sam's Clubs and three are distribution centers.
The trucks have been dispatched to a number of outlying communities in Texas. The fleet has already delivered a truckload of water to Camp Gruber in Oklahoma, which is expected to house more than 3,000 evacuees from the Houston Astrodome, the company said.
On the trucks are about 621,000 gallons of water and 24 generators, as well as other merchandise. Forty-two facilities are scheduled to receive dry ice.
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?guid={5676c655-ea8f-4400-b6c9-06f7c139bae9}&siteid=google&dist=SignInArchive&archive=true¶m=archive&garden=&minisite=
Wal-Mart may buy Sonae Brazil by mid-Oct-report
Fri Sep 23, 2005 11:51 AM ET
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, Sept 23 (Reuters) - U.S. retailer Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) may take over the Brazilian operations of Portuguese conglomerate Sonae SGPS (SON.LS: Quote, Profile, Research) by mid-October, a Brazilian newspaper reported on Friday.
Valor quoted unnamed retail sector sources as saying an auditing process preceding the potential purchase was concluded on Sept. 14, with a deal possibly sealed as soon as in the first two weeks of October or earlier.
However, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman in Sao Paulo, Monica Moreira, said "The company does not comment on speculations."
http://today.reuters.com/investing/financeArticle.aspx?type=mergersNews&storyID=2005-09-23T155156Z_01_N23474514_RTRIDST_0_RETAIL-SONAE.XML
A long silence from Wal-Mart
Now and then there's an item in the paper about Wal-Mart elsewhere in Oregon. (Yesterday's was from Milwaukie, where the city government is trying to keep Wal-Mart out.) Every one of these stories reminds us of the company's strange silence on its Albany project or plans.
In May 2004, Wal-Mart representatives submitted an application for changes in the comprehensive plan and zoning so the company could build a big store on Pacific Boulevard Southwest. City officials said it was the most complete application they had ever seen, or words to that effect.
Because the store would attract an estimated 4,000 cars a day, the company had to show what it would do to keep congestion from worsening at several nearby intersections. That's where the project ran into a brick wall — or a railroad crossing, in this case. Evidently there's no way that issue can be solved.
http://www.dhonline.com/articles/2005/09/23/news/opinion/edit01.txt
Jefferson to hold its first recall election over Wal-Mart
Associated Press
JEFFERSON, Wis. - The 7,500 residents of this city will hold the first recall election in their history Tuesday because residents are upset with an alderman who twice rejected a proposed Wal-Mart supercenter.
David Olsen, 46, who is also a funeral home operator, will face off against Chris Havill, a 33-year-old general manager of a local auto dealership.
It started in April when the city council voted 5-3 against the annexation of a 22-acre site on which Wal-Mart wanted to build its store.
http://www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/politics/12733034.htm
Wal-Mart looks to add grocery to Wasilla store
WASILLA: Local food sellers would face stiff competition from a Supercenter.
By KYLE HOPKINS
Anchorage Daily News
Published: September 24, 2005
Last Modified: September 24, 2005 at 06:45 AM
WASILLA -- Wal-Mart wants to supersize its Wasilla store, making it the first of many Supercenters planned in Alaska.
The move could also start a food fight with other Valley grocers.
Wal-Mart's discount stores sell a few staples such as cereal and snacks, but Supercenters offer full-blown grocery sections with delis and baked goods. Wal-Mart already hopes to build two of the expanded stores in Anchorage, but the company's Wasilla plans could come first.
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/7007773p-6909336c.html
Wal-Mart targets upscale consumers
Posted September 24, 2005
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, is offering more varieties of digital music players and items such as a $2,632 Panasonic LCD television to attract more upscale shoppers. Wal-Mart is "not as well represented at mid- and high price points," Chief Financial Officer Tom Schoewe said Thursday at an investment conference in San Francisco. In a test, Wal-Mart will offer a mobiBLU cube-shaped digital audio player on its Web site for just under $100, he said. The retailer also is seeking to lure more affluent shoppers by adding products such as organic foods and 400-thread count sheets as sales growth slows compared with Target Corp., the second-largest U.S. discount retailer. Wal-Mart's strategy with electronics may challenge retailers such as Circuit City Stores Inc. and Best Buy Co.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/orl-bizbriefcase2405sep24,0,2651490.story?coll=orl-business-headlines
Tate & Lyle- Wal-Mart drops own-brand sucralose
Wed Sep 21, 2005 6:05 PM BST
LONDON (Reuters) - Tate & Lyle (TATE.L: Quote, Profile, Research) says retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) has removed its own cut-price brand of sucralose sweetener from stores, closing a potential risk to Tate's highly profitable product.
The London-based sugar and sweeteners producer said on Wednesday it had identified the Wal-Mart sucralose as its own patented product, Splenda, which it had supplied to a manufacturing customer who had then sold the sucralose on to Wal-Mart.
Tate said it had enforced its contract requirement that the customer could not sell the product on to a third party, such as Wal-Mart, closing off the retailer's supply.
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=businessNews&storyID=2005-09-21T170535Z_01_MCC161470_RTRUKOC_0_UK-FOOD-TATELYLE-SUCRALOSE.xml
NOT ONLY THAT BUT I HEAR WAL-MART IS A FAVORITE OF MILITARY RECRUITERS.
Some suburban Detroit residents oppose Wal-Mart for racial reasons
September 21, 2005, 2:47 PM
LIVONIA, Mich. (AP) -- Some residents are angry about a planned 24-hour Wal-Mart Supercenter, making racially-charged comments about the people they say the store would attract to their suburban Detroit community.
The Livonia City Council will review the issue at an Oct. 17 meeting before voting on it Oct. 26, Marge Watson, a planning commission official, said Wednesday. Both meetings are open to the public.
On Tuesday night, the planning commission voted 6-1 to recommend the project to the city council after a six-hour-plus meeting in which more than 500 residents showed up.
http://www.freep.com/news/statewire/sw121599_20050921.htm
Eating Wal-Mart's Lunch
By Alyce Lomax (TMF Lomax)
September 21, 2005
Some headlines that many might find unsavory plagued retail giant Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) earlier this week. According to allegations waged in court in California, Wal-Mart bilked its employees out of the unpaid lunch breaks they were entitled to under that state's laws -- paltry half hour that those required breaks may have been. But wait a minute, you say. Shareholders (gulp) require that companies save money and make profits, and sometimes that stands squarely in opposition of some employee benefits.
Should investors throw up their hands and dismiss a story like this because of what could be called the natural antithesis between the concepts of happy employees and happy shareholders, particularly in the retail universe?
http://www.fool.com/News/mft/2005/mft05092111.htm
Wal-Mart in court over right to stop for lunch
By David Usborne in New York
Published: 21 September 2005
Wal-Mart, the world's largest discount retailer and owner of Asda supermarkets in Britain, faced new legal difficulties yesterday as jurors in a California court heard claims that the company denied employees lunch breaks and forced them to work overtime without compensation.
The case being heard in an Oakland court has been brought on behalf of 115,919 current and former Wal-Mart employees. Fred Furth, the lawyer for the plaintiffs, said that for years most employees dared not ask management about missed meal breaks. "Some of the braver ones did ask, and I'm going to prove Wal-Mart ignored their pleas to hire more help," he said.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article314018.ece
Bennington Wal-Mart hearing focuses on traffic issues
September 21, 2005
BENNINGTON, Vt. --Traffic issues are emerging as a major point of debate as a developer seeks town permission to more than double the size of the local Wal-Mart store.
Opponents and some regional planners worry that the 112,000-square-foot store would worsen traffic conditions on Northside Drive near the new Bennington Bypass highway.
Consultants for the developer told the town Development Review Board that traffic likely would increase 6 percent over 10 years, but critics said that estimate was based on the existing size of the store. They also argued that the estimate did not take into account the possibility of greater traffic on the Bennington Bypass, which is only partially complete.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont/articles/2005/09/21/bennington_wal_mart_hearing_focuses_on_traffic_issues/
Wal-Mart plan moves ahead to Livonia council
Residents worry about possible crime, noise; earlier racial comments spur scornful reaction.
By Catherine Jun / The Detroit News
LIVONIA -- The Planning Commission early today recommended a plan to bring a Wal-Mart Superstore to a defunct mall, a proposal opposed by most of the 500 residents who attended the meeting.
The City Council will hold a public hearing on the measure on Oct. 17.
The proposal triggered a racial controversy following published comments Tuesday reportedly made by a few residents at meetings with the developer. Those comments indicated some people feared the development would bring more African-Americans into the predominantly white suburb.
In response to residents' concerns, the commission recommended that the store, ordinarily a 24-hour operation, limit its hours from 6 a.m. to midnight.
After Tuesday's six-hour meeting, Victoria Kowaleski, who lives behind the property on Middle Belt and Plymouth, left City Hall crying. She said lights from the all-night Wal-Mart would shine through her bedroom window and noise from the stores would be a nuisance.
http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/0509/21/B01-322457.htm
Livonia board approves plans for new Wal-Mart
September 21, 2005
BY ZLATI MEYER and CECIL ANGEL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS
Photos by RICHARD LEE/DFP
Residents of Livonia and interested parties attend a hearing of the City of Livonia Planning Commission, Tuesday night. The hearing lasted 6 1/2 hours.
City officials voted early this morning to recommend the development of a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Livonia after more than 500 residents thronged to a city meeting Tuesday night, fueling an ongoing battle against the proposal, which has drawn some racially charged complaints.
At a 6 1/2-hour meeting, the planning commission voted 6-1 to recommend the project which will include a neighboring Target and approximately 40 specialty shops and restaurants. The City Council will consider the recommendation, but a council vote on the issue has not been scheduled yet. The tension at previous meetings caused the chairman of the Planning Commission, John Walsh, to warn Tuesday night's audience against racial outbursts. "The issue of race will not have an impact on the meeting tonight," he said. "I recommend that people who harbor racist fears keep them to themselves."
http://www.freep.com/news/locway/walmart21e_20050921.htm
Jeremy Warner's Outlook: Wal-Mart has gone crying to the regulator, yet Tesco has simply out-traded the retail goliath
Published: 21 September 2005
Complaining to regulators about supposedly unfair competition is what business losers do best. What better place to hide, when the going gets tough, than behind Europe's dizzying cacophony of competition law, which in the name of diversity and consumer choice can usually be relied upon for protection from better managed, more innovative rivals.
This is a point of view that Wal-Mart would wholeheartedly endorse back on its own home turf in the United States, where it has swept all before it to become the most powerful retailing force in the world. In little ol' Britain, however, this bully boy of the global retailing industry has chosen to complain to the Office of Fair Trading about the growing power of our very own Tesco.
http://news.independent.co.uk/business/comment/article314088.ece
Wal-Mart Gets Even Bigger
April showers and Southern winds are in Wal-Mart's weather forecast.
By Rick Aristotle Munarriz
Updated: 10:21 a.m. ET Sept. 20, 2005
In a pair of moves that will further widen Wal-Mart's (NYSE: WMT) retail reach into the world's wallets, the discount giant acquired a minority stake in a Latin American grocer and signed a pact with H&R Block(NYSE: HRB) to open tax-preparation centers inside some of its stores.
First, the supermarket deal. Wal-Mart announced this morning that it would be buying a 33% stake from Dutch giant Ahold(NYSE: AHO) in Central American Retail Holding Company, an operator of 363 grocery stores in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9408469/
U.S. Stock Futures Fall on Energy Prices; EBay, Wal-Mart Drop
Sept. 19 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stock-index futures declined as oil and gasoline prices increased, sparking concern higher fuel costs will hinder profit growth. Shares of EBay Inc. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. dropped.
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=a4TWNb9eMbKs&refer=news_index
Wal-Mart still suffering growing pains in Japan
By Mariko Sanchanta
Published: September 18 2005 20:47 Last updated: September 18 2005 20:47
When Wal-Mart first dipped its toe in the Japanese retailing market in 2002 by purchasing a small stake in Seiyu, it was seen as a shrewd way of slowly expanding its share in Japan without taking on too much risk.
But three years later, Wal-Mart and Seiyu are still in the red and stuck in fourth place, unable to have captured a lead on Japan's top three players.
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/eaa8a1a0-287b-11da-97c7-00000e2511c8.html
Suspects sought in Wal-Mart shooting
11:40 AM CDT on Monday, September 19, 2005
From 11 News Reports
Baytown Police still have no answers as to why a customer was shot Saturday night in a Wal-Mart parking lot.
The store is located in the 4900 block of Garth Road.
Investigators said Libby Farabee was putting groceries into the trunk of her vehicle.
Two men in another car pulled up near her, and the passenger said something to Farabee.
The victim said she heard a gunshot, and the other car sped off.
It was then that Farabee realized she had been shot in the arm.
She was taken to the hospital, but we haven’t heard her condition.
The search continues for the two suspects.
http://www.khou.com/news/local/stories/khou050918_ac_walmart.6edbe091.html
Wal-Mart Sets Off Bad Vibes
Sex boutiques upset that giant getting into intimate toy market
By ELIZA BARLOW, EDMONTON SUN
Wal-Mart should stick to selling bikes and Barbies instead of butting into the adult toy market, says the owner of a city sex shop.
"I think it sucks," said Love Stop manager Sally Hotar, reacting to word that Wal-Mart Canada and Shoppers Drug Mart are bringing in a line of sex toys.
"They have lots of things they sell that they make money on already. They should leave us alone."
Wal-Mart Canada and Shoppers will carry a line of sex products called Elexa, developed by Trojan.
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Edmonton/2005/09/18/1222299-sun.html
Law limits council options on Wal-Mart Lawyer: Wonderland's zoning helps retailer's case
By Dan West
Staff Writer
In Independence Township this summer, a strong community protest helped elected officials persuade a developer to drop plans for a Wal-Mart store near Clarkston in lieu of mixed-use development as part of a rezoning proposal.
Livonia also has strong community opposition to a Wal-Mart Supercenter at the old Wonderland Mall, but legal experts say the Livonia situation is different - no zoning changes are needed for the proposed Wonderland Village development.
Since the property already is zoned commercial, a Wal-Mart must be approved if the site plan meets the city's laws and established standards.
http://hometownlife.com/Livonia/News.asp?pageType=Story&StoryID=127798&Section=Main%20News&OnlineSection=Main%20news&SectionPubDate=Sunday,%20September%2018,%202005&RefDate=9/18/2005
BOYCOTT WAL-MART THEY ARE PROMOTING EMACIATION OF EMPLOYEES TO ENHANCE PROFITS !!!
Boycott of Wal-Mart Makes No Economic Sense
By GARY SUTTON
Voice Guest Columnist
Monday, Sept. 19, 2005
Right now, the American Federation of Teachers is urging its 1.3 million members to boycott Wal-Mart.
"Buy back-to-school supplies somewhere other than Wal-Mart," their petition urges.
Last weekend, Sept. 11, 2005, my closest FedEx/Kinko's displayed pencils. Kinko's offered a box of No. 2 pencils for $1.55, or, just over 12 cents per pencil. On the next block, Sav-On Drugs displayed No. 2 pencils boxed in groups of 10 for $1.19. Again, that's 12 cents for a single pencil. Next door, Staples was selling a dozen No. 2 pencils for 99 cents, or, slightly above 8 cents a pencil. Wal-Mart, however, boxed the No. 2 pencils in sets of 10 that were priced at 48 cents. That's less than a nickel each. Wal-Mart pencils looked the same, including the erasers on the end.
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=euLTJbMUKvH&b=486835&ct=1427965
Wal-Mart marches on amidst rising tensions
City council and citizens clash; controversy ensues
Roar: The nine-feet tall Walmrat using drastic measures to convince students they should sign the Living Wage petition.
By Emma Dumain and Maxine Kaplan
One of the first things both new and returning students wondered when they arrived at Oberlin this fall was, “What’s a big inflatable rat doing in front of Stevenson?”
Some feared it was the start of another union conflict, recalling how the last academic year opened with the threat of a major strike. But soon it became evident that this rat, far from its usual symbolic role as a warning to picket-jumpers, was no ordinary rat. This was the Walmrat.
Oberlin students, faculty members and residents should be familiar with the ongoing controversy over the impending construction of the Wal-Mart superstore in town. It is a complicated issue fraught with anxieties; even city council members are ambivalent about the effects it will have on Downtown Oberlin.
http://www.oberlin.edu/stupub/ocreview/2005/9/16/news/article1.html
Ex-Wal-Mart workers win battle
By RHÉAL SÉGUIN
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Saturday, September 17, 2005
Quebec — The Quebec Labour Board has ruled that the closing of a Wal-Mart store this year amounted to a reprisal against unionized workers and has ordered the company to compensate former employees.
The labour board concluded that Wal-Mart Canada, Inc., failed to prove that the closing of its store in Jonquière in April was "real, genuine and definitive" as required under the Quebec Labour Code.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/Page/document/v4/sub/MarketingPage?user_URL=http://www.theglobeandmail.com%2Fservlet%2Fstory%2FRTGAM.20050917.wwalmart0917%2FBNStory%2FNational%2F&ord=1127727782746&brand=theglobeandmail&force_login=true
Wal-Mart deal off council agenda
Details need to be ironed out, mayor says
BY SCOTT WUERZ
News-Democrat
BELLEVILLE -- A vote on the deal to bring a new Wal-Mart Supercenter has been taken off the agenda of the City Council's Monday meeting.
Mayor Mark Eckert said the decision was made to allow the city and the shopping center's developer time to iron out the fine details of an incentive deal for the retail giant. The deal includes the formation of a new tax increment finance district. Eckert insisted the deal is not in jeopardy.
"There are a few things that the staff and the developer are trying to fine tune before this gets to council," Eckert said. "We think this is definitely something that can be taken care of in 30 days or less. The deal is still very solid."
http://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/news/local/12670642.htm
Under Paid. Under insured. UNION BUSTING. Global reach. Global experience with weather. Sexual Harassing. Wal-Mart should render their experience to a hearing of FEMA by an Independent Investigator/Prosecutor. But, I don't see them taking over the national emergency management authority in this country.
Wal-Mart puts FEMA to shame
9/25/2005
By MURRAY LIGHT
Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the nation, has become the favorite target of those who say it gives its thousands of employees poor pay and benefits. It also is facing a sex-discrimination lawsuit.
I don't have the information I need to evaluate these charges, which Wal-Mart top management vigorously denies. Before going any further, let me state for the record that I know no Wal-Mart executives, mid-managers or sales associates. In fact, I've never even been in a Wal-Mart store. Nor do I own any Wal-Mart stock.
My friends and colleagues, mostly of liberal persuasion who have been highly critical of Wal-Mart's policies, will undoubtedly challenge much of what I have to say in this column and charge that I've sold out to corporate interests. But the facts are what they are, and without going into the corporation's personnel practices and policies, I have to salute Wal-Mart for its role in responding to the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina on the nation's Gulf Coast.
http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20050925/2066732.asp
THIS IS BECAUSE THEY HAD THE CORNER ON DEVASTED AREAS IN THE USA. THEY WERE LATER THWARTED BY THE RED CROSS.
Wal-Mart's September Sales Are Rising Within Forecast on Food
Sept. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, said September sales at its U.S. stores open at least a year are rising within its forecast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, led by grocery sales.
The company has forecast a sales gain of 2 percent to 4 percent from a year earlier in the five-week period that began Aug. 27. An increase of less than 2.5 percent would be the smallest since April, when Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart reported a 0.9 percent gain. Wal-Mart updated results through yesterday in a recorded call today.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=atPXEM3YZuYI&refer=top_world_news
Area faces Wal-Mart 'superblitz'
By CHRIS G. DENINA/Times-Herald staff writer
Vallejo's Wal-Mart store. (J.L. Sousa/Times-Herald)
In a few years, it may be tough to drive through Solano County without seeing a Wal-Mart Supercenter.
The retail giant aims to dot Solano and Napa counties with super-sized stores in Vallejo, American Canyon, Suisun City, Fairfield and Dixon.
At present, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. only has five Supercenters statewide - the first opened just last year in California - but the company plans to quickly add more throughout the region.
http://timesheraldonline.com/ci_3061504
After Lowe's will be Wal-Mart, Home Depot
Hickory residents, save your neighborhoods. The giant neighborhood-busters are moving in. With the vast Lowe's campus come not only friendly customers from all over the Unifour, but also the lumbering semis, the lurching 18-wheelers creeping up the slow streets, slowing with each traffic light, forcing the rest of us to dart in and out of your neighborhood and mine finding a fast way to get to our destinations.If Lowes is allowed to build beside churches and schools, Wal-Mart and Home Depot will be right behind.
Peace soon will be a relic of the past. Noise, smog, wrecks, traffic jams, strangers whizzing by in a hurry, screeching tires as they barely miss you inching out of your driveway -- these will be the new sights and sounds if Lowe's builds on N.C. 127.
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/local/states/north_carolina/counties/catawba/12736350.htm
IT IS SO GOOD TO KNOW 'WINNEBAGO' OWNERS CAN AFFORD THEIR TRAVELS. I hadn't realized Camp Grounds with sewer hook ups were so expensive.
Travelers like my husband and me rely on Wal-Mart stopovers
Meeting Per and Leif reminded me of the time my husband and I spent the night in an Arkansas Wal-Mart parking lot.
I have always loved to travel. A lot of that probably comes from my family. My parents made sure we visited the "mainland" at least once every other year while we were growing up in Hawaii. So it came as no surprise that I married someone who loves to travel as much as I do.
http://www.jacksonsun.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050925/NEWS01/509250306/1002
Wal-Mart sale sets land record
By CHUCK STINNETT, Business Editor
September 25, 2005
A fleet of earth-moving equipment is transforming the landscape on U.S. 60-East from which a Wal-Mart Supercenter, Lowe's home improvement store and associated businesses will rise.
But it didn't get started until a lot of legal wrangling had taken place and a lot of money had changed hands. In fact, it appears Wal-Mart's purchase of its tract has set a local record.
Advertisement
Deeds at the courthouse show that Henderson Development Association (the entity created by developer GBT Realty Corp. of Brentwood, Tenn.) paid $3,978,720 to Clark and Cynthia Merrill and Frances M. O'Sullivan for about 58.5 acres.
Then, Henderson Development resold 25.2 acres to Wal-Mart Real Estate Business Trust for $6,030,635 -- an average of $239,580 per acre.
http://www.courierpress.com/ecp/gleaner_business/article/0,1626,ECP_4481_4102170,00.html
Wal-Mart closes 72 stores as Rita approaches
23 Sep 2005 13:49:15 GMT
Source: Reuters
CHICAGO, Sept 23 (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
The world's biggest retailer had closed 64 stores and distribution centers by Thursday evening, and said more than 100 facilities were within a 120-mile radius of where the storm is expected to make landfall overnight on Friday.
The Bentonville, Arkansas-based retailer, which has more than 3,500 U.S. stores, had closed 126 locations when Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast. Nine of its stores were severely damaged in that storm.
Wal-Mart shuts 108 facilities before Rita
By Jennifer Waters, MarketWatch
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has closed down 108 facilities in the path of Hurricane Rita, while loading up more than 200 trucks with emergency supplies to staging areas in Texas.
Edit My Portfolio Edit Alerts
The world's largest retailer, which gained much praised for its quick response to Hurricane Katrina, said on its Web site Friday that it has more than 100 facilities within a 120-mile radius of the hurricane's expected landfall.
Shares of Wal-Mart (WMT: news, chart, profile) bounced around the flat line, last trading lower by 2 cents to $43.15.
Of the stores closed, 52 are Wal-Mart supercenters, 22 are Sam's Clubs and three are distribution centers.
The trucks have been dispatched to a number of outlying communities in Texas. The fleet has already delivered a truckload of water to Camp Gruber in Oklahoma, which is expected to house more than 3,000 evacuees from the Houston Astrodome, the company said.
On the trucks are about 621,000 gallons of water and 24 generators, as well as other merchandise. Forty-two facilities are scheduled to receive dry ice.
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?guid={5676c655-ea8f-4400-b6c9-06f7c139bae9}&siteid=google&dist=SignInArchive&archive=true¶m=archive&garden=&minisite=
Wal-Mart may buy Sonae Brazil by mid-Oct-report
Fri Sep 23, 2005 11:51 AM ET
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, Sept 23 (Reuters) - U.S. retailer Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) may take over the Brazilian operations of Portuguese conglomerate Sonae SGPS (SON.LS: Quote, Profile, Research) by mid-October, a Brazilian newspaper reported on Friday.
Valor quoted unnamed retail sector sources as saying an auditing process preceding the potential purchase was concluded on Sept. 14, with a deal possibly sealed as soon as in the first two weeks of October or earlier.
However, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman in Sao Paulo, Monica Moreira, said "The company does not comment on speculations."
http://today.reuters.com/investing/financeArticle.aspx?type=mergersNews&storyID=2005-09-23T155156Z_01_N23474514_RTRIDST_0_RETAIL-SONAE.XML
A long silence from Wal-Mart
Now and then there's an item in the paper about Wal-Mart elsewhere in Oregon. (Yesterday's was from Milwaukie, where the city government is trying to keep Wal-Mart out.) Every one of these stories reminds us of the company's strange silence on its Albany project or plans.
In May 2004, Wal-Mart representatives submitted an application for changes in the comprehensive plan and zoning so the company could build a big store on Pacific Boulevard Southwest. City officials said it was the most complete application they had ever seen, or words to that effect.
Because the store would attract an estimated 4,000 cars a day, the company had to show what it would do to keep congestion from worsening at several nearby intersections. That's where the project ran into a brick wall — or a railroad crossing, in this case. Evidently there's no way that issue can be solved.
http://www.dhonline.com/articles/2005/09/23/news/opinion/edit01.txt
Jefferson to hold its first recall election over Wal-Mart
Associated Press
JEFFERSON, Wis. - The 7,500 residents of this city will hold the first recall election in their history Tuesday because residents are upset with an alderman who twice rejected a proposed Wal-Mart supercenter.
David Olsen, 46, who is also a funeral home operator, will face off against Chris Havill, a 33-year-old general manager of a local auto dealership.
It started in April when the city council voted 5-3 against the annexation of a 22-acre site on which Wal-Mart wanted to build its store.
http://www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/politics/12733034.htm
Wal-Mart looks to add grocery to Wasilla store
WASILLA: Local food sellers would face stiff competition from a Supercenter.
By KYLE HOPKINS
Anchorage Daily News
Published: September 24, 2005
Last Modified: September 24, 2005 at 06:45 AM
WASILLA -- Wal-Mart wants to supersize its Wasilla store, making it the first of many Supercenters planned in Alaska.
The move could also start a food fight with other Valley grocers.
Wal-Mart's discount stores sell a few staples such as cereal and snacks, but Supercenters offer full-blown grocery sections with delis and baked goods. Wal-Mart already hopes to build two of the expanded stores in Anchorage, but the company's Wasilla plans could come first.
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/7007773p-6909336c.html
Wal-Mart targets upscale consumers
Posted September 24, 2005
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, is offering more varieties of digital music players and items such as a $2,632 Panasonic LCD television to attract more upscale shoppers. Wal-Mart is "not as well represented at mid- and high price points," Chief Financial Officer Tom Schoewe said Thursday at an investment conference in San Francisco. In a test, Wal-Mart will offer a mobiBLU cube-shaped digital audio player on its Web site for just under $100, he said. The retailer also is seeking to lure more affluent shoppers by adding products such as organic foods and 400-thread count sheets as sales growth slows compared with Target Corp., the second-largest U.S. discount retailer. Wal-Mart's strategy with electronics may challenge retailers such as Circuit City Stores Inc. and Best Buy Co.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/orl-bizbriefcase2405sep24,0,2651490.story?coll=orl-business-headlines
Tate & Lyle- Wal-Mart drops own-brand sucralose
Wed Sep 21, 2005 6:05 PM BST
LONDON (Reuters) - Tate & Lyle (TATE.L: Quote, Profile, Research) says retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT.N: Quote, Profile, Research) has removed its own cut-price brand of sucralose sweetener from stores, closing a potential risk to Tate's highly profitable product.
The London-based sugar and sweeteners producer said on Wednesday it had identified the Wal-Mart sucralose as its own patented product, Splenda, which it had supplied to a manufacturing customer who had then sold the sucralose on to Wal-Mart.
Tate said it had enforced its contract requirement that the customer could not sell the product on to a third party, such as Wal-Mart, closing off the retailer's supply.
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=businessNews&storyID=2005-09-21T170535Z_01_MCC161470_RTRUKOC_0_UK-FOOD-TATELYLE-SUCRALOSE.xml
NOT ONLY THAT BUT I HEAR WAL-MART IS A FAVORITE OF MILITARY RECRUITERS.
Some suburban Detroit residents oppose Wal-Mart for racial reasons
September 21, 2005, 2:47 PM
LIVONIA, Mich. (AP) -- Some residents are angry about a planned 24-hour Wal-Mart Supercenter, making racially-charged comments about the people they say the store would attract to their suburban Detroit community.
The Livonia City Council will review the issue at an Oct. 17 meeting before voting on it Oct. 26, Marge Watson, a planning commission official, said Wednesday. Both meetings are open to the public.
On Tuesday night, the planning commission voted 6-1 to recommend the project to the city council after a six-hour-plus meeting in which more than 500 residents showed up.
http://www.freep.com/news/statewire/sw121599_20050921.htm
Eating Wal-Mart's Lunch
By Alyce Lomax (TMF Lomax)
September 21, 2005
Some headlines that many might find unsavory plagued retail giant Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) earlier this week. According to allegations waged in court in California, Wal-Mart bilked its employees out of the unpaid lunch breaks they were entitled to under that state's laws -- paltry half hour that those required breaks may have been. But wait a minute, you say. Shareholders (gulp) require that companies save money and make profits, and sometimes that stands squarely in opposition of some employee benefits.
Should investors throw up their hands and dismiss a story like this because of what could be called the natural antithesis between the concepts of happy employees and happy shareholders, particularly in the retail universe?
http://www.fool.com/News/mft/2005/mft05092111.htm
Wal-Mart in court over right to stop for lunch
By David Usborne in New York
Published: 21 September 2005
Wal-Mart, the world's largest discount retailer and owner of Asda supermarkets in Britain, faced new legal difficulties yesterday as jurors in a California court heard claims that the company denied employees lunch breaks and forced them to work overtime without compensation.
The case being heard in an Oakland court has been brought on behalf of 115,919 current and former Wal-Mart employees. Fred Furth, the lawyer for the plaintiffs, said that for years most employees dared not ask management about missed meal breaks. "Some of the braver ones did ask, and I'm going to prove Wal-Mart ignored their pleas to hire more help," he said.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article314018.ece
Bennington Wal-Mart hearing focuses on traffic issues
September 21, 2005
BENNINGTON, Vt. --Traffic issues are emerging as a major point of debate as a developer seeks town permission to more than double the size of the local Wal-Mart store.
Opponents and some regional planners worry that the 112,000-square-foot store would worsen traffic conditions on Northside Drive near the new Bennington Bypass highway.
Consultants for the developer told the town Development Review Board that traffic likely would increase 6 percent over 10 years, but critics said that estimate was based on the existing size of the store. They also argued that the estimate did not take into account the possibility of greater traffic on the Bennington Bypass, which is only partially complete.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont/articles/2005/09/21/bennington_wal_mart_hearing_focuses_on_traffic_issues/
Wal-Mart plan moves ahead to Livonia council
Residents worry about possible crime, noise; earlier racial comments spur scornful reaction.
By Catherine Jun / The Detroit News
LIVONIA -- The Planning Commission early today recommended a plan to bring a Wal-Mart Superstore to a defunct mall, a proposal opposed by most of the 500 residents who attended the meeting.
The City Council will hold a public hearing on the measure on Oct. 17.
The proposal triggered a racial controversy following published comments Tuesday reportedly made by a few residents at meetings with the developer. Those comments indicated some people feared the development would bring more African-Americans into the predominantly white suburb.
In response to residents' concerns, the commission recommended that the store, ordinarily a 24-hour operation, limit its hours from 6 a.m. to midnight.
After Tuesday's six-hour meeting, Victoria Kowaleski, who lives behind the property on Middle Belt and Plymouth, left City Hall crying. She said lights from the all-night Wal-Mart would shine through her bedroom window and noise from the stores would be a nuisance.
http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/0509/21/B01-322457.htm
Livonia board approves plans for new Wal-Mart
September 21, 2005
BY ZLATI MEYER and CECIL ANGEL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS
Photos by RICHARD LEE/DFP
Residents of Livonia and interested parties attend a hearing of the City of Livonia Planning Commission, Tuesday night. The hearing lasted 6 1/2 hours.
City officials voted early this morning to recommend the development of a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Livonia after more than 500 residents thronged to a city meeting Tuesday night, fueling an ongoing battle against the proposal, which has drawn some racially charged complaints.
At a 6 1/2-hour meeting, the planning commission voted 6-1 to recommend the project which will include a neighboring Target and approximately 40 specialty shops and restaurants. The City Council will consider the recommendation, but a council vote on the issue has not been scheduled yet. The tension at previous meetings caused the chairman of the Planning Commission, John Walsh, to warn Tuesday night's audience against racial outbursts. "The issue of race will not have an impact on the meeting tonight," he said. "I recommend that people who harbor racist fears keep them to themselves."
http://www.freep.com/news/locway/walmart21e_20050921.htm
Jeremy Warner's Outlook: Wal-Mart has gone crying to the regulator, yet Tesco has simply out-traded the retail goliath
Published: 21 September 2005
Complaining to regulators about supposedly unfair competition is what business losers do best. What better place to hide, when the going gets tough, than behind Europe's dizzying cacophony of competition law, which in the name of diversity and consumer choice can usually be relied upon for protection from better managed, more innovative rivals.
This is a point of view that Wal-Mart would wholeheartedly endorse back on its own home turf in the United States, where it has swept all before it to become the most powerful retailing force in the world. In little ol' Britain, however, this bully boy of the global retailing industry has chosen to complain to the Office of Fair Trading about the growing power of our very own Tesco.
http://news.independent.co.uk/business/comment/article314088.ece
Wal-Mart Gets Even Bigger
April showers and Southern winds are in Wal-Mart's weather forecast.
By Rick Aristotle Munarriz
Updated: 10:21 a.m. ET Sept. 20, 2005
In a pair of moves that will further widen Wal-Mart's (NYSE: WMT) retail reach into the world's wallets, the discount giant acquired a minority stake in a Latin American grocer and signed a pact with H&R Block(NYSE: HRB) to open tax-preparation centers inside some of its stores.
First, the supermarket deal. Wal-Mart announced this morning that it would be buying a 33% stake from Dutch giant Ahold(NYSE: AHO) in Central American Retail Holding Company, an operator of 363 grocery stores in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9408469/
U.S. Stock Futures Fall on Energy Prices; EBay, Wal-Mart Drop
Sept. 19 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stock-index futures declined as oil and gasoline prices increased, sparking concern higher fuel costs will hinder profit growth. Shares of EBay Inc. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. dropped.
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=a4TWNb9eMbKs&refer=news_index
Wal-Mart still suffering growing pains in Japan
By Mariko Sanchanta
Published: September 18 2005 20:47 Last updated: September 18 2005 20:47
When Wal-Mart first dipped its toe in the Japanese retailing market in 2002 by purchasing a small stake in Seiyu, it was seen as a shrewd way of slowly expanding its share in Japan without taking on too much risk.
But three years later, Wal-Mart and Seiyu are still in the red and stuck in fourth place, unable to have captured a lead on Japan's top three players.
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/eaa8a1a0-287b-11da-97c7-00000e2511c8.html
Suspects sought in Wal-Mart shooting
11:40 AM CDT on Monday, September 19, 2005
From 11 News Reports
Baytown Police still have no answers as to why a customer was shot Saturday night in a Wal-Mart parking lot.
The store is located in the 4900 block of Garth Road.
Investigators said Libby Farabee was putting groceries into the trunk of her vehicle.
Two men in another car pulled up near her, and the passenger said something to Farabee.
The victim said she heard a gunshot, and the other car sped off.
It was then that Farabee realized she had been shot in the arm.
She was taken to the hospital, but we haven’t heard her condition.
The search continues for the two suspects.
http://www.khou.com/news/local/stories/khou050918_ac_walmart.6edbe091.html
Wal-Mart Sets Off Bad Vibes
Sex boutiques upset that giant getting into intimate toy market
By ELIZA BARLOW, EDMONTON SUN
Wal-Mart should stick to selling bikes and Barbies instead of butting into the adult toy market, says the owner of a city sex shop.
"I think it sucks," said Love Stop manager Sally Hotar, reacting to word that Wal-Mart Canada and Shoppers Drug Mart are bringing in a line of sex toys.
"They have lots of things they sell that they make money on already. They should leave us alone."
Wal-Mart Canada and Shoppers will carry a line of sex products called Elexa, developed by Trojan.
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Edmonton/2005/09/18/1222299-sun.html
Law limits council options on Wal-Mart Lawyer: Wonderland's zoning helps retailer's case
By Dan West
Staff Writer
In Independence Township this summer, a strong community protest helped elected officials persuade a developer to drop plans for a Wal-Mart store near Clarkston in lieu of mixed-use development as part of a rezoning proposal.
Livonia also has strong community opposition to a Wal-Mart Supercenter at the old Wonderland Mall, but legal experts say the Livonia situation is different - no zoning changes are needed for the proposed Wonderland Village development.
Since the property already is zoned commercial, a Wal-Mart must be approved if the site plan meets the city's laws and established standards.
http://hometownlife.com/Livonia/News.asp?pageType=Story&StoryID=127798&Section=Main%20News&OnlineSection=Main%20news&SectionPubDate=Sunday,%20September%2018,%202005&RefDate=9/18/2005
BOYCOTT WAL-MART THEY ARE PROMOTING EMACIATION OF EMPLOYEES TO ENHANCE PROFITS !!!
Boycott of Wal-Mart Makes No Economic Sense
By GARY SUTTON
Voice Guest Columnist
Monday, Sept. 19, 2005
Right now, the American Federation of Teachers is urging its 1.3 million members to boycott Wal-Mart.
"Buy back-to-school supplies somewhere other than Wal-Mart," their petition urges.
Last weekend, Sept. 11, 2005, my closest FedEx/Kinko's displayed pencils. Kinko's offered a box of No. 2 pencils for $1.55, or, just over 12 cents per pencil. On the next block, Sav-On Drugs displayed No. 2 pencils boxed in groups of 10 for $1.19. Again, that's 12 cents for a single pencil. Next door, Staples was selling a dozen No. 2 pencils for 99 cents, or, slightly above 8 cents a pencil. Wal-Mart, however, boxed the No. 2 pencils in sets of 10 that were priced at 48 cents. That's less than a nickel each. Wal-Mart pencils looked the same, including the erasers on the end.
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=euLTJbMUKvH&b=486835&ct=1427965
Wal-Mart marches on amidst rising tensions
City council and citizens clash; controversy ensues
Roar: The nine-feet tall Walmrat using drastic measures to convince students they should sign the Living Wage petition.
By Emma Dumain and Maxine Kaplan
One of the first things both new and returning students wondered when they arrived at Oberlin this fall was, “What’s a big inflatable rat doing in front of Stevenson?”
Some feared it was the start of another union conflict, recalling how the last academic year opened with the threat of a major strike. But soon it became evident that this rat, far from its usual symbolic role as a warning to picket-jumpers, was no ordinary rat. This was the Walmrat.
Oberlin students, faculty members and residents should be familiar with the ongoing controversy over the impending construction of the Wal-Mart superstore in town. It is a complicated issue fraught with anxieties; even city council members are ambivalent about the effects it will have on Downtown Oberlin.
http://www.oberlin.edu/stupub/ocreview/2005/9/16/news/article1.html
Ex-Wal-Mart workers win battle
By RHÉAL SÉGUIN
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Saturday, September 17, 2005
Quebec — The Quebec Labour Board has ruled that the closing of a Wal-Mart store this year amounted to a reprisal against unionized workers and has ordered the company to compensate former employees.
The labour board concluded that Wal-Mart Canada, Inc., failed to prove that the closing of its store in Jonquière in April was "real, genuine and definitive" as required under the Quebec Labour Code.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/Page/document/v4/sub/MarketingPage?user_URL=http://www.theglobeandmail.com%2Fservlet%2Fstory%2FRTGAM.20050917.wwalmart0917%2FBNStory%2FNational%2F&ord=1127727782746&brand=theglobeandmail&force_login=true
Wal-Mart deal off council agenda
Details need to be ironed out, mayor says
BY SCOTT WUERZ
News-Democrat
BELLEVILLE -- A vote on the deal to bring a new Wal-Mart Supercenter has been taken off the agenda of the City Council's Monday meeting.
Mayor Mark Eckert said the decision was made to allow the city and the shopping center's developer time to iron out the fine details of an incentive deal for the retail giant. The deal includes the formation of a new tax increment finance district. Eckert insisted the deal is not in jeopardy.
"There are a few things that the staff and the developer are trying to fine tune before this gets to council," Eckert said. "We think this is definitely something that can be taken care of in 30 days or less. The deal is still very solid."
http://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/news/local/12670642.htm
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Weather Propaganda Strikes Again. Pathetic.
The USA National Weather Service is grossly in error. They limit their focus on the Atlantic and National Accounting of the cost of 'hurricane' and other weather issues to report to congress. Unfortunately the USA National Weather Service never reaches beyond that limit to realize the devastating effects of Global Warming spawned by high carbon dioxide levels generated by this country.
It isn't politically correct for Max Mayfield to make a president 'feel bad' about his priorities. After all looked what happened to a Civil Rights Directors with decades of service.
The USA is not an authority in ANYTHING. The National Weather Service 'strings' the public along costing millions if not billions of dollars with inaccurate landfall predictions because it does not see, nor wants to see 'The Big Picture.'
"Heck, Max, I haven't got three quarters of the computer resources you have nor one 15th the resources CNN had and I got it 'DEAD ON' in prediction before Rita made landfall. On Tuesday past I predicted it would fall on the Texas/Louisiana border while Chad Myers relying on the National Weather Service to hold his hand predicted "Rita" would make landfall far south of Corpus Christi and perhaps even Mexico due to a 'high pressure' system that was actually part of "Rita's" vortex system.
It's like dejavu with CNN and the National Weather Service. The same 'stupidity' regarding the dynamics of these issues existed when I first gave testimony to the EPA in 2003. There were no such things as vortexes in 1995 and the jet stream was still dominating Global Climate patterns. The National Weather Service is ineffective due to their limited view of the world. CNN limits itself and hence compromises the safety of all that they seek to attract in weather/climate prediction.
It isn't politically correct for Max Mayfield to make a president 'feel bad' about his priorities. After all looked what happened to a Civil Rights Directors with decades of service.
The USA is not an authority in ANYTHING. The National Weather Service 'strings' the public along costing millions if not billions of dollars with inaccurate landfall predictions because it does not see, nor wants to see 'The Big Picture.'
"Heck, Max, I haven't got three quarters of the computer resources you have nor one 15th the resources CNN had and I got it 'DEAD ON' in prediction before Rita made landfall. On Tuesday past I predicted it would fall on the Texas/Louisiana border while Chad Myers relying on the National Weather Service to hold his hand predicted "Rita" would make landfall far south of Corpus Christi and perhaps even Mexico due to a 'high pressure' system that was actually part of "Rita's" vortex system.
It's like dejavu with CNN and the National Weather Service. The same 'stupidity' regarding the dynamics of these issues existed when I first gave testimony to the EPA in 2003. There were no such things as vortexes in 1995 and the jet stream was still dominating Global Climate patterns. The National Weather Service is ineffective due to their limited view of the world. CNN limits itself and hence compromises the safety of all that they seek to attract in weather/climate prediction.
I refuse to stand by while nothing but lies are leveled at the people of this nation whom are the real victims to the lack of expertise of their own weather experts. These patterns are not casual, they are deadly and devastating. They are not temporary EXCEPT to realize that once the biotic troposhere no longer supports life due to excessive heating under a carbon dioxide blanket, it will eventually resolve itself when the carbon dioxide emission stops as society no longer contributes. To THAT end and only to that end these vortices are temporary but this is no natural pattern. The National Weather service under different leadership said the same thing back in 2002 - 2003. They are stuck in the Bush rut of designing the news including weather rather than reporting with expertise.
The USA needs to be a responsible country and cut back drastically on it's carbon dioxide emissions as they are human induced.
It's a 'new era' of hurricanes
Experts: String of intense storms is part of normal cycle
By Ann O'NeillCNN
Friday, September 23, 2005; Posted: 3:52 p.m. EDT (19:52 GMT)
(CNN) -- Hurricanes aren't behaving like many of us are used to them behaving. They're bigger and meaner, and more numerous than many people have seen.
Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne tore up parts of Florida last year. After tweaking Florida, Katrina and Rita are wreaking havoc this year along the Gulf Coast from Alabama to Texas.
But don't rush to blame it on global warming, experts warn.
Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, told a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday that we're in a period of heightened hurricane activity that could last another decade or two.( See scientists collect data -- 1:33)
"The increased activity since 1995 is due to natural fluctuations (and) cycles of hurricane activity driven by the Atlantic Ocean itself along with the atmosphere above it and not enhanced substantially by global warming," he testified.
Sea level air pressure is determined by the column of air above one's head. Air has weight.
Here is a Mr. Wizard or a Phil Nye the Science Guy moment for you. DON'T LET CHILDREN DO THIS.
INFLATE A BALLOON.
Put it in the freezer. The air contracts while water vapor freezes. The air is denser (takes up less space) and less saturated with water vapor.
Now heat it up again and use a hair dryer at a reasonable distance to prevent integrity issues with the balloon's plastics while avoiding getting hit with flying debris. Stand back because the air will expand.
Now, when the balloon breaks as the air expands is that increased air pressure per square foot? No. It's just increased volume that exerts pressure on the THINNING plastic of the balloon.
A lower sea surface air pressure facilitates storms such as Rita and Katrina. Rita's lowest air pressure was 897 millibars at Cat 5 status. Katrina's lowest pressure was 902 at Cat 5 status.
GLOBAL WARMING. Hello, Max Mayfield !!!
Impact Of Global Warming On Weather Patterns Underestimated
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/09/050922015634.htm
The impact of global warming on European weather patterns has been underestimated, according to a new report published in Nature this week.
Dr Gillett, of the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit, compared Northern Hemisphere air pressure changes at sea level over the past 50 years with predicted changes from nine state-of-the-art climate models.
The Northern Hemisphere Circulation study found that present climate change models – computer representations of the atmosphere, ocean and land surface - have underestimated the changes in air pressure, leading to an underestimate of the impact of global warming on weather patterns.
While observations reveal that air pressure has dropped 4 millibars over Iceland in the past 50 years and risen by up to 3 millibars in the sub tropics, climate model trends were less than 1 millibar.
Previous research has shown that over the past thirty years air pressure trends have contributed about 1°C to warming over the UK in winter and up to 3°C in Siberia, as well as 60% of the rainfall increase seen in Scotland. Over Southern England, the air pressure trends have likely made the winters milder and windier. Dr Gillett's findings indicate that these changes are not well-captured by climate models.
Dr Gillett, said: "Climate models are very good at simulating temperature changes, but this study shows that their simulations of pressure trends in the northern Hemisphere are not realistic. If we could understand and correct this bias, predictions of future regional climate change would be improved."
.........................................................................
Katrina shows effect of climate change, says Gore
Hurricane Katrina offered "a taste" of the disasters, and the response to them, that the US could expect as a consequence of climate change, former vice president Al Gore said on Saturday.
He cited recent research that found warmer sea surface temperatures - a result of global warming - had strengthened hurricanes and major storms around the world. Speaking at the Clinton Global Initiative in New York, where climate change was one of the key issues under discussion, he also criticised those politicians he said wanted to trim government too far, as weak government was incapable of responding adequately to emergencies.
http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/provider/providerarticle.asp?feed=FT&Date=20050917&ID=5120636
An iceberg melts in mid-August in Kulusuk, Greenland, near the Arctic Circle. Arctic sea ice has decreased by about 8 percent, or more than 380,000 square miles, over the past 30 years. The average ocean temperature off Greenland's west coast has risen from 38.3 degrees Fahrenheit to 40.6 in recent years.
Arctic region bellwether of warming
RISING TEMPERATURES: Northern communities, wildlife feel changes.
By JAN M. OLSEN
The Associated Press
Published: September 17, 2005
Last Modified: September 17, 2005 at 03:18 AM
ILULISSAT, Greenland -- The gargantuan chunks of ice breaking off the Sermeq Kujalleq glacier and thundering into an Arctic fjord make a spectacular sight. But to Greenlanders it is also deeply worrisome.
The frequency and size of the icefalls are a powerful reminder that the frozen sheet covering the world's largest island is thinning -- a glaring sign of global warming, scientists say.
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/6979974p-6880202c.html
Strong Hurricanes increasing as Global Warming worsens
(17.09.2005)
During the last 35 years, the number of Category 4 or 5 Hurricanes have doubled, which researchers have linked to global warming.
You would think that with the overwhelming evidence of increased temperatures affecting our planet, there would be no longer any doubts that this is being caused by global warming.
Yet there are still a large number of people (and scientists) who either rule this out completely, or reluctantly admit that maybe there is some connection or link, but usually insist on telling us that there is nothing to worry about.
We sometimes imagine the same people repeating these words when the sea levels have risen by about 8 feet and all the ice on our planet has melted!
Although there have been twice as many of the most powerful hurricanes in the last 15 years (category 4 and 5), compared to a similar period prior to this, the overall number of hurricanes have decreased during the last 10 years.
To some it would seem that the number of Hurricanes, and not their power, has more significance and you almost get the impression that some people are looking harder to find excuses to support their theory that there is no connection to global warming. Yet the facts show that sea temperatures have risen (and are continuing to do so), and this is causing the increase in stronger hurricanes. Global warming is melting our ice caps and the planet is in serious trouble!
The trend to see more hurricanes like Katrina is almost certain and there can be no question that global warming is to blame for this. But is global warming caused entirely by polluting gases produced by man?
We think not. Recent reports have shown that "Global Warming" is not just affecting our planet, but the entire solar system. Increased temperatures have been recorded on Pluto, even though its orbit is taking it further away from the Sun. Even our Sun is showing signs of being affected by this change in our solar system. In the last week we have witnessed some of the largest solar flares in history, at a time when solar activity should be at its lowest!
In a recent article on the effects of global warming in our solar system, we took a closer look at this problem. We believe that this effect has not gone unnoticed by some governments and attempts at reducing the problem have been in place for almost 7 years (in secret). However, keeping such a project of this scale from the public can not remain a secret for long and we expect "official" news of this to be announced in the next 6 months.
http://www.profindsearch.com/news/2005/09/17/PFS1194.htm
Thousands without power after thunderstorms
(Hartford, Mass.-AP, Sept. 17, 2005 7:20 PM) _ A violent thunderstorm knocked out power to more than 28,500 residents of central Connecticut.
The storm, which produced lightning and hail, primarily affected residents of Burlington, East Hartford, Farmington, Hartford, Simsbury and Windsor.
Connecticut Light & Power reported the outages as of 7 o'clock this evening. The utility serves more than one million customers in Connecticut.
A spokesman at Connecticut Light and Power did not return a phone call seeking more information.
http://www.wtnh.com/Global/story.asp?S=3863770&nav=3YeX
FEMA distributes $168.5 million after Detroit thunderstorms
BY JON BURSTEIN
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
DETROIT - (KRT) - A band of thunderstorms in 2000 flooded thousands of homes in the suburbs but caused no reported problems in the Motor City.
State emergency managers kept asking their counterparts in Detroit if "they were sure that no damage had occurred in the city," said Anthony Katarsky, assistant commander of the state police Emergency Management Division. "Their response was that they had received no calls about damage as a result of the storm from city residents."
But once the Federal Emergency Management Agency included Detroit in the disaster declaration for the Sept. 10-11 storms, claims began pouring in from residents reporting basement flooding.
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/news/nation/12673655.htm
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