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MSNBC-Some evacuated with water, power, bridges, roads out across city of 350,000. About 1,000 residents of a suburb were told to evacuate their homes Saturday after a major earthquake caused extensive damage in Christchurch, New Zealand’s second-largest city, authorities said. Two men were seriously injured and scores of other people suffered less serious injuries in the aftermath of the quake, which registered 7.0 on the Richter scale at 4:35 a.m -Read Article
ABC-The New South Wales Government says the first plague locust nymphs have hatched in the north and central-west, signalling the start to what is predicted to be the state’s worst outbreak in 30 years. Primary Industries Minister Steve Whan says warmer weather over the weekend triggered the insect eggs to hatch -Read Article
Live Science-Mass extinctions have served as huge reset buttons that dramatically changed the diversity of species found in oceans all over the world, according to a comprehensive study of fossil records. The findings suggest humans will live in a very different future if they drive animals to extinction, because the loss of each species can alter entire ecosystems -Read Article
AOL News-A Boston lab hired by the United Commercial Fishermen’s Association to analyze coastal fishing waters says findings suggest the government’s claim that Gulf of Mexico seafood is safe to eat may be premature. The lab, Boston Chemical Data Corp., said it found dispersant in a sample taken near Biloxi, Miss., almost a month after BP said it had stopped using the toxic chemical to break up the record amounts of crude spewed by the Gulf oil spill. The leak was finally capped on July 15 -Read Article
AP-Another oil rig exploded and caught fire Thursday off the Louisiana coast, spreading a mile-long oil sheen in the Gulf of Mexico west of the site of BP’s massive spill. All 13 crew members were rescued. Coast Guard Petty Officer Bill Coklough said the sheen, about 100 feet wide, was spotted near the platform. Firefighting vessels were battling the flames -Read Article
Daily Mail – Under the specter of an autism epidemic sweeping America, Senator Barbara Boxer (CA) convened hearings last week on the “State of Research on Potential Environmental Health Factors with Autism.” (3) The result? Experts agree that the primary explanation for the dramatic increase in autism is toxic environmental exposure and gene-environment interactions. New research shows that even low-dose, multiple toxic and infectious exposures may be a key factor to the onset of autism. Read article
Related article: Autism explosion half explained, half still a mystery
The Telegraph-The argument over whether the universe has a creator, and who that might be, is among the oldest in human history. But amid the raging arguments between believers and sceptics, one possibility has been almost ignored – the idea that the universe around us was created by people very much like ourselves, using devices not too dissimilar to those available to scientists today -Read Article
ABC _ Canberra has experienced its coldest winter daytime temperatures in 10 years. Daytime temperatures averaged 12.6 degrees while overnight minimums averaged 2 degrees. Meteorologist Brett Dutschke says excessive cloud cover over the past three months did not allow many nights to become cold or days to warm up. Winter has also been wetter than average for the first time in five years, with a total of 130 millimetres recorded. Read Article
Sydney Morning Herald – Adelaide has shivered thought the chilliest winter in 13 years. The South Australian city experienced the coldest winter since 1997, the longest run of cold nights since 1982 and the wettest winter in five years, The Weather Channel says. Read Article
ScienceDaily – The ozone layer, which protects humans, plants, and animals from potentially damaging ultraviolet (UV) light from the Sun, develops a hole above Antarctica in September that typically lasts until early December. However, in November 2009, that hole shifted its position, leaving the southern tip of South America exposed to UV light at levels much greater than normal -Read Article
Daily Telegraph – Last month was the coldest August for 17 years, recording the chilliest average temperatures since 1993 without a single “hot day”, figures show. Read Article
Herald Sun – NSW shivered through its coldest winter in 12 years, while daytime temperatures in August hit their lowest since 1990. NSW experienced average daytime temperatures of 15.9C, making it the coldest winter since 1998 and the 16th nippiest winter on record. Climatologist at the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM), Shannon Symons says widespread rainfall also resulted in the wettest winter since 2005. Read Article
AFP-Wildfires have cost Russia 300 billion dollars in forest loss, environmentalists said on Thursday, explaining the scale of the disaster by Vladimir Putin’s “absurd” changes to forestry law. The economic damage amounts to 25,000 dollars per hectare (2.4 acres), or at least 300 billion dollars, according to estimates based on the market value of timber and the cost of reforestation, said Alexei Zimenko, general director of the Biodiversity Conservation Centre. “The figures are completely astronomical,” Zimenko told a news conference, adding that they did not include several factors, such as the loss of wildlife like insects and rare birds and animals -Read Article
AllAfrica .Com – A meeting held yesterday in Mendefera town highlighted the need for exerting coordinated endeavors on the part of all government institutions in raising public awareness in introducing renewable energy, as it has vital role to play in preventing deforestation. In the meeting in which the ministers of land, water and environment, as well as agriculture and justice took part, briefings were given regarding the condition of forests and the alarming irresponsible cutting down of trees in the Southern region -Read Article
BBC-The UN’s climate science body needs stricter checks to prevent damage to the organisation’s credibility, an independent review has concluded. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has faced mounting pressure over errors in its last major assessment of climate science in 2007. The review said guidelines were needed to ensure IPCC leaders were not seen as advocating specific climate policies -Read Article
UPI- Canadian scientists say they are puzzled why dolphins, which normally stay in offshore waters, are showing up close to shore and in inlets on Vancouver Island. Dolphins started moving closer to land in the mid-1980s but the reason is still unknown, researchers said. It could have been a result of a food shortage or changing water temperatures -Read Article
Tehran Times-Malaysia is considering releasing genetically modified mosquitoes designed to combat dengue fever, in a landmark field trial that has come in for criticism from environmentalists. In the first experiment of its kind in Asia, 2,000-3,000 male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes would be released in two Malaysian states in October or November. The insects in the study have been engineered so that their offspring quickly die, curbing the growth of the population -Read Article
NY Times-In a remote reach of the Gulf of Mexico, nearly 200 miles from shore, a floating oil platform thrusts its tentacles deep into the ocean like a giant steel octopus. The $3 billion rig, called Perdido, can pump oil from dozens of wells nearly two miles under the sea while simultaneously drilling new ones. It is part of a wave of ultra-deep platforms -Read Article
DailyFinance-The BP (BP) oil spill may be over, but controversy over the company’s use of toxic oil dispersants in the Gulf of Mexico is still going strong. Although BP allegedly stopped using the chemicals more than a month ago, area residents claim it is still spraying Corexit, a chemical dispersant, from airplanes and boats -Read Article
USA Today-Where has all the plastic gone? For the first time, oceanographers have quantified the floating plastic debris in the Atlantic Ocean and have come to a surprising conclusion. The amount of plastic hasn’t changed in two decades despite a sharp increase in plastic production and trash, according to a recent report published in Science -Read Article
Reuters – Thousands of Indonesians were evacuated from the slopes of a volcano on Sunday after it erupted for the first time in more than 400 years, spewing out lava and sending smoke and dust 1,500 meters (5,000 feet) into the air -Read Article
The Guardian-For the second time in less than a year, genetically modified vines being tested by the French National Institute of Agricultural Research (INRA) in its Colmar centre in eastern France have been uprooted and destroyed. Now that France no longer grows or tests GM corn, which used to be a regular summer target of the Faucheurs Volontaires (voluntary reapers) movement, attention has turned to the vines -Read Article
Irish Times-THE GOVERNMENT must immediately implement its pledge to declare Ireland a GM-free zone outlined in its programme for government, the Irish Organic Farmers and Growers Association has said. It said the recent two-pronged decision by the European Commission granting states and regions more autonomy in banning but also in allowing GM cultivation, made this a matter of urgency -Read Article
Reuters- The Canadian government has voiced concerns about a European Union proposal to allow member states to decide whether to ban genetically modified (GM) crops. The bloc’s executive — the European Commission — submitted the proposal in July in a bid to break a deadlock in EU GM approvals, with just two products authorized for cultivation since 1998 -Read Article
Physorg-Fertilizer chemicals may pose a bigger hazard to the environment – specifically to creatures that live in water – than originally foreseen, according to new research from North Carolina State University toxicologists -Read Article
