‘As the ice thickens along the coast of Newfoundland and even the icebreakers are getting stuck in it, seal hunters and the Coast Guard are praying for the wind to change.
Relentless northeasterly gales have piled up the ice from Bonavista to St. Anthony and trapped about 100 sealing “longliners” returning from the annual hunt. Some crews have been forced to abandon their vessels. A few have been flown to safety by Coast Guard helicopters. Others are camped on the ice floes beside their boats as icebreakers fight to smash their way through. Meanwhile, food and water are running short. Fuel could be a problem when the boats are able to move. As well as rescue operations, the four choppers are ferrying supplies.’
‘A 16-year-old Russian boy found a hospital halfway around the world willing to remove his brain tumor for free. His father says there was one condition – that his treatment could be filmed for a feel-good story by a local television station about the charitable operation.
But the positive story St. Anthony Hospital and neurosurgeon Paul Francel hoped to tell became tragic when the surgery left David Kurbanov brain dead. Now his anguished father is lashing out at the hospital and hoping for a miracle recovery.
Sabit Kurbanov said he had been led to believe that his son would fully recover, and he accused St. Anthony Hospital of performing experimental surgery.’
‘A teenager was left with severe burns when he accidentally set his hair on fire after rubbing in head lice lotion.
Matthew Moore, 15, of Purbeck, Dorset, had just applied the lotion when he started playing with a cigarette lighter, which ignited his hair. [..]
In a statement, manufacturers of the lotion Thornton & Ross said: “It’s the very first incident of its kind.
“The product is not flammable. It’s been fully approved by various regulatory authorities.”‘ [..]
A spokesman for Dorset Fire and Rescue Service added: “Don’t play with lighters close to your hair and that goes generally when you have applied any type of hair product.”‘
‘A father says he wasn’t trying to shame his 14-year-old son when he made the boy wear a large sandwich-board sign saying, “I abused and sold drugs.” [..]
“I’m doing this because I love him,” he said. “We do have an extreme drug problem in America, and maybe it’s time for extreme measures that parents need to take to monitor this problem that we have.” [..]
The father said he recently learned after reading the boy’s MySpace page that his son was involved with marijuana and OxyContin. That’s when he decided to act, and the boy agreed to the punishment. [..]
By then the boy said he’d learned his lesson. “This is embarrassing. I ain’t going to be doing it again,” the boy said. “Drugs are for losers. That’s all I can say.”‘
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‘A mother makes a quick turn on a busy street and her son falls out the side door. She doesnt notice he is missing until she sees him get up and start walking around to the front of the car.’
(5.1meg Windows media)
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‘A lonely man is £16,000 poorer after sending money overseas to two women he fell in love with over the internet, in the hope they would join him in the UK. [..]
Mr Hodgkinson, who is a full-time carer for his 86-year-old mother, turned to online dating after he became fed up with being single. [..]
He first struck up a relationship with Natalia, from Russia, who he met through a dating website. [..]
He sent her more than £10,000 to pay for her travel and a visa so she could be with him.
He went to meet her at Heathrow Airport four times, but she never arrived. [..]
His mother, Constance, has been forced to take out a loan to help repay his debts.
“I did tell him off about keeping going to Heathrow,” she said.’
‘Crematoria are struggling to deal with spiralling rates of obesity.
Expanding waistlines are forcing many councils to spend thousands widening their furnaces, the Local Government Association has warned.
In some cases grieving relatives have to travel hundreds of miles to find crematoria that can accommodate over-sized coffins.
Standard coffins range from 16-20 inches, but coffins up to 40 inches are becoming increasingly common.’
‘Microsoft spent millions of dollars advertising its next generation OS ‘Windows Vista’ in China, in fact the IT juggernaut threw up the biggest Vista Ad on the 421 meter high Jin Mao tower in Shanghai China. However after 2 weeks (Jan 19 to Feb 2) from launch Microsoft managed to sell a mere 244 copies of Windows Vista. Software piracy is rampant in the middle kingdom and a pirated version of Vista sells for a mere $1 on the streets. The following numbers are quoted by Windows Vista chief distributor in Bejing.’
‘At least 32 people have died at a steel factory in China, after being showered with molten metal.
The accident happened at a plant in Tieling, in the north-eastern province of Liaoning, according to the state news agency Xinhua.
A container of steel split in two and spilled the metal onto workers who had gathered for a meeting, Xinhua said.
Rescuers were unable to get close to the scene, because of the intense heat radiated by the liquid metal.’
‘Ellen Massey always counted being struck by a baseball or a bat at Shea Stadium among the hazards of being a Mets fan, but she never thought a 300-pound man would come crashing down the stands — and onto her.
That’s what the Manhattan resident, 58, said happened on Monday, Opening Day at Shea.
Shortly after the seventh-inning stretch, she said, a man dressed in a green Army-type jacket tumbled from higher seats and onto her back, knocking the wind out of her and, ultimately, causing serious injury. [..]
“We were sitting and watching the ball game,” he said. “And in a split-second a rather large person, a man, came sort of tumbling down upon us and basically landed on my aunt’s head and neck.”‘
‘The mural destroyed by ACT Liberal MP Steve Pratt was paid for under a government program to promote legal street art and was effective in discouraging vandalism.
The artwork was funded under an urban planning scheme and commissioned by a local sporting group, said Chris Kon of the Department of Territory and Municipal Services.
Legal artworks like the one Mr Pratt painted over as part of a publicity stunt to promote his anti-vandalism policies were “very successful” at discouraging illegal graffiti, said Mr Kon. [..]
“It’ll cost some money for (the artist) to re-do it again.” [..]
State Chief Minister Jon Stanhope said the matter would be referred to the police for investigation.’
‘A Dutch police station trying to help Muslim detainees face Mecca for their prayers painted arrows in cells pointing in the wrong direction.
The Segbroek police station in The Hague borrowed the idea of putting compass marks on ceilings from an Amsterdam hotel, the Dutch daily De Telegraaf reported on Friday.
Muslims pray five times a day, facing east in the direction of Mecca. But the arrows in Segbroek pointed west.
“This is a really gigantic, stupid blunder,” a police spokesman told the De Telegraaf.
“The faulty compass marks have been immediately corrected. It is a mystery for us how this could have possibly happened.”‘
‘According to new statistics that would make Bob Vila cringe, the number of injuries from nail guns has almost doubled since 2001.
Researchers said that more and more it is do-it-yourselfers who are feeling the pain, according to a press release.
The number of weekend carpenters treated each year for nail gun injuries in emergency rooms in U.S. hospitals more than tripled between 1991 and 2005, increasing to about 14,800 per year, according to an analysis by researchers at Duke University Medical Center and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.’
‘In the middle of the night a manhole erupts gushing millions of gallons of water onto the highway.’
(5.8meg Windows media)
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‘Cannabis users who started smoking as teenagers are more likely to suffer long-term harm, including poor mental health, than drinkers who started using alcohol as adolescents, a major study has found.
Heavy users of marijuana are also more likely to graduate to other drugs such as amphetamines and ecstasy than are teenage binge drinkers.
Involving nearly 2000 Victorian high school students aged 14 or 15, the landmark study has traced their progress since 1992, and provides the first comparison of the consequences of the two substances commonly used in teenage social situations.
Researcher George Patton, who conducted the study for Melbourne University’s Centre for Adolescent Heath, said that while both alcohol and cannabis carried health risks, the overwhelming evidence was that cannabis was “the drug for life’s future losers”.’
‘A woman diner was left with horrific burns after a Portuguese sausage dish exploded in her face. The victim was eating with friends when the accident took place at the Sporting Clube de Londres in west London. [..]
Witnesses described how the flaming chorizo sausage dish burnt out of control when a waiter topped it up with rum at a table packed with people.
The woman, who spent two weeks in hospital and has since undergone two skin graft operations, said it was like being hit by a “flame-thrower”. [..]
The victim will to have to wear pressure garments on both hands for 23 hours a day for up to two years.’
‘A Taiwanese zoo vet has had his arm reattached after it was bitten off by a crocodile.
Earlier reports that the crocodile had been shot have been proven untrue after an examination of the animal.
Chang Po-yu, 38, from the southern Kaohsiung city’s Shou Shan Zoo, was injecting the sick crocodile with anaesthetic when it attacked him.
The Associated Press reported that Mr Chang was trying to retrieve a tranquiliser dart from the reptile’s hide when it attacked him.
Police shot a crocodile after it bit off the arm – but no bullet holes have been found in its skin.’
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‘Gonorrhea in the United States is now resistant to all but one class of antibiotic drugs, threatening doctors’ ability to treat the common sexually transmitted disease, officials said on Thursday. [..]
Gonorrhea is an example of the rise of “superbugs” that have evolved to beat antibiotics that once vanquished them. Many experts decry the overuse of antibiotics, which can fuel the emergence of drug-resistant bacteria.
Douglas said gonorrhea previously became resistant to other antibiotics, penicillin and tetracycline, before starting to conquer the fluoroquinolones.
“Gonorrhea has now joined the list of other superbugs for which treatment options have become dangerously few,” Dr. Henry Masur, president of the Infectious Diseases Society of America advocacy group, said in a statement.’
This is more brilliance from Bill Dance, who you may remember from: Bill Dance Fishing Illustrated
(8.1meg Windows media)
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‘A young Argentine zookeeper who worked on a giant anteater conservation project died on Thursday after she was attacked by an anteater who mauled her abdomen and legs with its sharp front claws.
“Her injuries were very serious and when she was admitted she was already in critical condition,” Jose Potito, director of the hospital, told Reuters.
Potito said Melisa Casco, 19, died after an operation to amputate one of her legs. [..]
Anteaters, which can measure up to 9.2 feet long and weigh as much as 110 pounds (50 kg), are native to Latin America and have toothless snouts.
They are usually not aggressive, but their long, knife-like claws can do serious damage to predators when they defend themselves.’
‘A teenager in Fayette County died after a very unusual accident.
Police say 18-year-old Brandon Buster was a passenger in a car Sunday.
Officials say Buster felt ill and was leaning out the car door to vomit, when he hit a mailbox.
The car was going about 15 miles per hour at the time because the driver was slowing down to let Buster out.
Buster was pronounced dead at Piedmont-Fayette hospital.
Police say their investigation will continue.
No charges have been filed.’
‘Watch as the crane hits some power lines and eventually falls over because of the weight of what it was moving.’
(12.3meg MPEG)
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‘The Big Brother nightmare of George Orwell’s 1984 has become a reality – in the shadow of the author’s former London home. [..]
According to the latest studies, Britain has a staggering 4.2million CCTV cameras – one for every 14 people in the country – and 20 per cent of cameras globally. It has been calculated that each person is caught on camera an average of 300 times daily.
Use of spy cameras in modern-day Britain is now a chilling mirror image of Orwell’s fictional world, created in the post-war Forties in a fourth-floor flat overlooking Canonbury Square in Islington, North London.
On the wall outside his former residence – flat number 27B – where Orwell lived until his death in 1950, an historical plaque commemorates the anti-authoritarian author. And within 200 yards of the flat, there are 32 CCTV cameras, scanning every move.’
‘A worker was injured this afternoon when his penis became caught in machinery at a northern suburbs saw mill.
The man, 30, was working at the Parafield Gardens Saw Mill at about 1.50pm when his crotch and penis became caught in the chain of a piece of machinery.
He was taken to the Royal Adelaide Hospital. It is believed his injuries are not life threatening but he initially suffered uncontrollable bleeding.
A company spokesman said the man’s injuries were not serious.
“He got caught in the log moving mechanism on one of the saws,” he said.’
‘A Minneapolis city worker is worried about blood in the sewer system because he said, while he was cleaning the system, blood sprayed out of a hole and got all over him.
“We could tell it was blood, I mean large amount of blood,” said Minneapolis Sewer Maintenance Worker Ron Huebner.
It happened about two weeks ago in Northeast Minneapolis near a lab that does medical testing and dumps blood into the sewer. It is allowed but the city is now making changes to help protect workers in the future.
“Blood just all over my face, in my mouth, I could taste it. It was terrible. I had it in my mouth and I kept spitting and I couldn’t get rid of it,” said Huebner. [..]
The Met Council said it was a mix of human and animal blood used in medical testing at this nearby lab.’
‘The second time I was visiting a friend at her farmhouse in rural Oklahoma and needed to grab a toothbrush and some toothpaste, as I’d forgotten mine. I rolled up to a 24-hour Walmart at about midnight and it was like stepping into the movie Jacob’s Ladder. As I walked through the doors some drunk guy stumbled into me and vomited all over the place, narrowly missing my shoes. Then I saw a woman asleep on the floor, in the middle of the cosmetics section, snoring loudly and wrapped up in a blanket like she was at home in bed. [..]
Once when perusing clocks, me and my girlfriend heard a mother screaming at her child from the next aisle: “I’m gonna tell you one more time, and then I’m gonna kick you in the head. Now put it down!” [..]
A friend of mine worked at an IGA or something a few years back. One night when he was on cash, a very guy who was in line with his caretaker announced loudly that he’s “GOTTA POOP!” before letting out a DBZ roar, dropping his pants, squatting, and spraying diarrhoea all over the floor. Yeah.’
