Farmer jailed in Hong Kong for burning flag

A man has been jailed in Hong Kong for burning the national flag, in the first sentence of its kind.

S Korea suspends savings banks citing weak finances

South Korea has suspended seven local savings banks citing the weak state of their finances.

Japan urges mass evacuation ahead of Typhoon Roke

More than a million people in central and western Japan have been urged to leave their homes as a powerful typhoon approaches.

Burma begins swap scheme for cars over 40 years old

Owners of some of Burma's most antiquated cars have been queuing in Rangoon to exchange their old vehicles for permits to import newer models.

Polio strain spreads to China from Pakistan

Polio has spread to China for the first time since 1999 after being imported from Pakistan, the World Health Organization (WHO) has confirmed.

Showing posts with label worst. Show all posts
Showing posts with label worst. Show all posts

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Zuckerman: U.S. Heading Toward 'Worst Time' Without STEM Ed

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Home > Politics & Policy > STEM Education > Zuckerman: U.S. Heading Toward 'Worst Time' Without STEM Ed

October 5, 2011 Print

U.S. News & World Report editor in chief Mortimer Zuckerman told Yahoo's Daily Ticker that the United States may be "heading for the worst time in our lifetimes" if the nation does not begin graduating more students who are competent in STEM subjects.

He said that much of the job crisis in the United States can be attributed to the lack of skilled workers. Many corporations are shipping jobs overseas because they cannot fill them with U.S. citizens.

[Read Zuckerman's column Why Math and Science Education Means More Jobs.]

"We don't have the personnel to do the kind of manufacturing we need in [STEM] areas," he said. "You could employ hundreds of thousands, millions of people in these areas, but we don't have the qualified people to do it."

He said that America should fund schools that focus on STEM, and develop between 10,000 and 15,000 STEM teachers each year.

[Check out U.S. News's ranking of the best high schools for math and science.]

"Sixty percent of people who teach any kind of engineering or chemistry have no background in it," he said. "This is ridiculous. No other country would accept this."

He said the government should put money into career retraining efforts for laid-off workers. Zuckerman admitted that investing in STEM education is a "long-term solution," and that America will likely continue to suffer from a high unemployment rate in the short term.

 Have something to share? Send news and submissions to stem@usnews.com.

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Monday, October 3, 2011

Scores die in worst Mekong flooding since 2000

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Rescuers stand on a broken dyke of the Mekong river in An Giang province, Vietnam September 28, 2011. REUTERS/Van Duc/Tuoi Tre Newspaper

1 of 5. Rescuers stand on a broken dyke of the Mekong river in An Giang province, Vietnam September 28, 2011.

Credit: Reuters/Van Duc/Tuoi Tre Newspaper

By Prak Chan Thul

PHNOM PENH | Fri Sep 30, 2011 8:41am EDT

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - At least 150 people in Cambodia and southern Vietnam have died in the worst flooding along the Mekong River in 11 years after heavy rain swamped homes, washed away bridges and forced thousands of people to evacuate.

Worse could be in store if Typhoon Nesat, which killed at least 39 people in China this week and plowed into northern Vietnam on Friday, dumps rain deep enough inland to further swell the Mekong.

Flooding across the fertile Mekong Delta helped drive rice prices to a three-year high in Vietnam this week, traders said, which will add to inflation problems. The delta produces more than half of Vietnam's rice and 90 percent of its exportable grain.

In Cambodia, 141 people have died since August 13 due to Mekong flooding and flash floods, the Cambodian National Disaster Management Committee said.

"Now, more than 200,000 hectares (494,200 acres) of our rice paddies are under water but we don't yet know the full extent of the damage," said Keo Vy, deputy information director at the National Disaster Management Committee.

Cambodia is a minor rice exporter, but Vietnam is the world's second-biggest exporter behind Thailand.

In 2000, the worst flooding in decades killed more than 480 people across the Delta region. The following year, more than 300 people died when the Mekong, which flows 4,350 km (2,700 miles) from the glaciers of Tibet to the rice-rich Delta of southern Vietnam, overflowed its banks.

Some 150,000 families had been affected by the flooding in Cambodia this year and another 15,000 evacuated to higher ground, said Men Neary Sopheak, deputy secretary general of Cambodia's Red Cross.

Down river in Vietnam, at least nine people have died since seasonal floods arrived in the Delta in August, government and provincial disaster reports said. Floods had inundated nearly 3,800 houses and nearly 700 people were evacuated in An Giang province and the city of Can Tho.

Dykes and bridges were washed away in places and roads submerged by the muddy deluge. Production of shrimp and fish had been affected in parts of the Delta.

PEAK OF FLOODING NEAR?

Flooding is forecast to peak in Vietnam in early October. The waters had already peaked in Cambodia and were receding there slowly, the Vietnamese government said on Friday.

Water had reached 4.76 metres (15 ft 7 in) early on Friday at Vietnam's Tan Chau gauging station, 0.26 meter (10 in) above Alarm Level Three, the most dangerous flood condition at which inundation is widespread and dykes are in jeopardy.

It was forecast to peak at 4.9 metres (16 ft) by Sunday, the government said. Water 5 metres deep can submerge one-storey houses, which are common in the Delta in southern Vietnam.

Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai urged the provincial authorities to evacuate people from dangerous areas, speed up the rice harvest and close more schools to prevent deaths.

Around 5,000 hectares (12,355 acres) of the Delta's third rice crop have been inundated as floods broke through dyke sections in the provinces of Dong Thap and An Giang, and another 90,000 hectares (22,240 acres) were under threat.

The region has planted nearly 600,000 hectares (1.58 million acres) for the current crop, which is mainly for domestic consumption, and only 5 percent has been harvested, the agriculture ministry said.

In Thailand, the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation said 180 people had died in flooding since mid-July caused by tropical storm Nock-Ten and seasonal monsoons.

Two million people in 23 provinces have been affected, with 2.4 million acres of farmland under water. Officials say rice has been harvested early in some areas, which may cut yields.

Flooding was reported in the night bazaar in the northern town of Chiang Mai, popular with tourists, and flash floods and landslides were reported in areas around town due to the high level of the Ping river, officials said.

(Additional reporting by Ho Binh Minh in Hanoi and Jutarat Skulpichetrat in Bangkok; Writing by John Ruwitch; Editing by Alan Raybould and Sanjeev Miglani)



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Peliculas Online

Monday, September 26, 2011

10 Cities With the Best and Worst Drivers

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According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Americans got into 10.2 million motor vehicle accidents in 2008, the last year for which data are available. Although that number has been trending downward over the past several years, car accidents are the leading cause of death for young Americans. 

The average American gets into a car accident once every 10 years, but certain cities are particularly perilous, according to insurance company Allstate's newly released best drivers report, which ranks drivers in America's 200 largest cities according to car accident frequency. 

If you're looking to stay safe, avoid the beltways of the mid-Atlantic—drivers in Washington, D.C., average a car accident every 4.8 years, and drivers in Baltimore average an accident every 5.3 years, the two most frequent accident rates of any cities. Drivers in nearby Alexandria, Va., don't fare much better—their drivers are the 10th worst in America, crashing an average of once every 6.4 years.

[View a slideshow of the 10 cities with the worst drivers.] 

Other cities along the I-95 corridor also made the list: Drivers in New York suburbs Newark and Jersey City, N.J., crash 70.8 percent and 57.5 percent more often than the average American, respectively, and drivers in Philadelphia are the nation's sixth-worst, crashing once every 6.2 years. 

Instead, head west. Drivers in Fort Collins, Colo., crash just once every 14 years, and drivers in Boise, Idaho, crash every 13.4 years. With just over a quarter-million residents, Lincoln, Neb., is the most populous city in the top 10—its drivers crash only once every 12.9 years, good for third on the list.

[View a slideshow of the 10 cities with the best drivers.]



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Peliculas Online

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

New York, Pennsylvania see décrue of flood waters, while Maryland worst braces

BLOOMBSBURG, PA. -areas in the North of the Susquehanna River swollen began Friday but after days of rain from the remnants of the storm tropical Lee flooded communities from Virginia to New York, leading to evacuation orders for 100,000 people. Some evacuees were allowed to the House.

The damage was concentrated along the Susquehanna at Binghamton, New York; in the cities of up - and downstream protected lifting Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where more than 70 000 people were told to evacuate; and communities more downstream, in Maryland.

Susquehanna River crested at 42.66 feet Thursday evening at Wilkes-Barre - to beyond of design more than the record set in historic flooding caused by Hurricane Agnes in 1972 and in quality of the system of reception of the city.

"They did what was good for them, the people there," said Tom Vaxmonsky, a resident of Pittson West, just above the Wilkes-Barre. "But it's like everything else, for every action there is a reaction." And the reaction is that we had much more that we made in 72 with the Agnes flood water. »

As floodwaters that invades the city of Binghamton, including the Mayor called the worst in more than 60 years and the surrounding communities start decreasing, the first 20,000 evacuees began returning to their homes.

Robert Smith, 35, he return around noon at his home in an article struggling to Binghamton. Mud and debris covered pavement, and the water still blocked streets closest to the River. But he feels inspired to the point where that he spent in a shelter; When a woman collapsed on the floor, he said, transported foreigners to emergency to tend to him.

"Everyone was help each other out, just complete strangers," he said. "You have never seen it before in your life.".

Flooding was fed by days of heavy rains was tropical storm Lee and followed a little more than a week in watering of this hurricane Irene gave the coast is. In some parts of Pennsylvania, the total precipitation reached 9 inches or more, at the top of what was already a relatively wet summer.

The authorities closed Pennsylvania countless roads, including some interstates strong and evacuation shelters open as many displaced persons.

In Wilkes-Barre, officials have said the dikes holds that the Susquehanna was under "extreme stress", but holding.

A broken gauge flooding hindered the ability of officials to measure the height of the River, but the U.S. Geological Survey Friday estimated that the River had crested 42.66 feet, well above earlier estimates and higher than the record of 1972 of 40.9 feet.

Executive Director of alfalfa County Flood Protection Authority Jim Brozena, said the River was down Friday, but that the flood control system was in its "extreme limits".

Heavy rain is also at the closure of some parts of the Capital Beltway in Fairfax County, Virginia, but some parts have reopened. As well as 10 inches of rain fell in some places in the vicinity of Washington since Wednesday.

In Maryland, most of the 1,000 residents of the Port deposit have been advised to evacuate after the dam of massive Conowingo upstream on the Susquehanna, opened its doors in case of spill and flooded the city with 4 feet of water. Hundreds more were told to leave their home in Havre de Grace, where the river meets the Chesapeake Bay.

The River crested Friday morning under record levels but dam was not intended to repelled until, in the night. Shelters opened in Perryville and Aberdeen, with river levels expected to be higher since Agnes.

President Barack Obama declared States of emergency in Pennsylvania and New York, Friday at first, paving the way with the Federal Government. Also, Governor of Virginia Bob McDonnell said an emergency situation, allowing State agencies to help communities.

Evacuees said expect to remain at least until Sunday or Monday, and it will be some time before officials get a handle on the damage which included a partial bridge collapse in Northern Pennsylvania, vehicles and other property has swept away sewage treatment plants and failed.

"We have some damage, but you won't know until it's over, said Mayor Tom Leighton Wilkes-Barre."

People in many small towns and rural areas in the Centre of Pennsylvania sometimes scrambled to get their families and their luggage out of danger, as the waters rose with frightening speed.

West Pittston, unprotected by dikes, several hundred houses were under water - much to the second floor, said former Mayor Bill Goldsworthy. Home of the own Goldsworthy was among those flooded.

It's the same story downstream in Plymouth Township, where homes and businesses flood submerged approximately 80 water.

More on the Susquehanna in Bloomsburg, the height reached by Agnes topped flood waters and were expected to Crest just below the record set by a flood of 1904.

Harrisburg evacuated 6 000 to 10 000 people in low-lying areas, while in alfalfa County, PA., which includes Wilkes-Barre, the evacuation order covered all communities along the Susquehanna River flooded in the deluge of Hurricane Agnes of 1972.

Late Thursday, city Wilkes-Barre crews scrambled to connect system with bags of sand control of the holes in the floods developed city. Dramatic increase in the river begins to slow, giving hope that the walls and earthen mounds would hold.

Nearby place not protected by the receiving system, however, officials of emergency should flooding of the structures of 800 to 900, with likely River Ridge above the roofs.

At least 12 deaths were attributed to Lee and his suites: four in Pennsylvania; three in Virginia. one in Maryland; and four other people killed when he came ashore on the Gulf Coast last week.

There were also mandatory evacuations in a neighbourhood along the Housatonic River in Shelton, Conn., as residents were cleaning up messes that Hurricane Irene left for account.

"I still have fish swimming in my garage, this is a first," Brian Johnson said the position of Connecticut. "It y Minnow swimming there.".

Damage in parts of New Jersey that have been flooded by Irene rains were less to fear. About 300 residents waiting to return home after the remains of Lee renewal of floods. Three houses were swept off the coast of their foundations by a mudslide, but no one was injured.



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