World Watches As Chilean Miners Rescued After 69 Days Underground

Thursday, October 14th, 2010 at 2:58 am 
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Chile – Chilean rescuers ended a marathon operation Tuesday and freed all 33 miners trapped underground for more than two months.  All of the rescued miners were sent for medical treatment and several of them are expected to undergo surgery in the coming days. Chilean officials say the rescue operation at the San Jose mine in northern Chile advanced more quickly than expected. Initially, officials said it might take 48 hours to pull the miners to the surface through a 622-meter rescue shaft. Rescue crews honed the process throughout the day, enabling them to pull each miner to the surface in about 15 Read the rest of this entry

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A New Video Of Trapped Chilean Miners Sending Greetings To Their Families

Monday, August 30th, 2010 at 8:00 am 
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Mr Bustos looked to northern Chile, where mines dot the barren lunar landscape. Two months later he found his way to the San Jose mine, one of hundreds of mid-size operations digging into the rocky, red earth in search of copper, gold and other minerals.The men were told on Wednesday it could take up to four months to rescue them. Workers are due to start drilling an escape shaft today, which could take that long to complete.

Engineers could also try to widen an existing tunnel which may get them out in two months.They were cut off from the outside world for 17 days until Sunday, when rescuers successfully sank a narrow borehole down to their shelter after seven failed attempts.Experts were also studyzing trying to reach the miners through a combination of air ducts and cleared tunnels, but warned that could be slow and dangerous.

The hole will likely end up several hundred yards (meters) from their living area in the mine’s shelter, giving the men room to maneuver and store the rocks, he added.Sougarret declined to estimate how long the work would take, saying it would depend on how each step went.But when speaking about their wives and children, many broke down.”I’m sending my greetings to Angelica.

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Wife of Chilean miner tells how she survive earthquake six months ago

Saturday, August 28th, 2010 at 9:20 pm 
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article 1254171 087EE667000005DC 252 634x467 Wife of Chilean miner tells how she survive earthquake six months ago  e2f7e9726ce24c7aa08b67783e80 grande Wife of Chilean miner tells how she survive earthquake six months ago
wenn5290547 Wife of Chilean miner tells how she survive earthquake six months ago  chilean Wife of Chilean miner tells how she survive earthquake six months ago

Like most Chileans, the couple were sound asleep when one of the most powerful
earthquakes registered in a century struck the central coast Feb. 27.

What the earthquake did not knock down, the tsunami it triggered washed away.
While the familys home survived, ships in Asmars yards were pushed into
the street and the builders operations destroyed.

Having to support his wife and two small children, Mr Bustos looked to
northern Chile, where mines dot the barren lunar landscape. Two months later
he found his way to the San Jose mine, one of hundreds of mid-size
operations digging into the rocky, red earth in search of copper, gold and
other minerals. Narvaez stayed behind with their children, 5-year-old Maria
Paz and 3-year-old Vicente.

But when word arrived of the collapse at the mine, Ms Narvaez left the
children with her parents and rushed to the mine site, where she has camped
out since.

?In the earthquake we just had to keep on living. We had our lives, she said.
?This is the same. It is producing much anguish, isolation, fear. But were
alive. My husband is alive down in that mine, and we will have another happy
ending.

Bustos and the 32 other miners, were trapped August 5 by a massive collapse of
the main access shaft, which corkscrews more than four miles into the
mountain. They were cut off from the outside world for 17 days until Sunday,
when rescuers successfully sank a narrow borehole down to their shelter
after seven failed attempts. Two additional boreholes were later drilled.

Ms Narvaez, a 36-year-old health care company administrator, said her hopes
were further bolstered after seeing her husband on a 45-minute video the
miners made with a small camera sent to them via one of the boreholes.

Also, the notes that she has passed back and forth with her husband have
helped.

Her husband wrote in one note; ?My little thing, you should know the words you
sent me made me cry.

?They have always been with me, along with my God who gave me strength to
overcome anxiety.

In the note, Mr Bustos tells his wife that he nicknamed the first drill that
finally reached the miners after the couples daughter, Maria Paz, because
it was ?the winner, who never loses, and it broke through.

She acknowledged that overcoming two disasters in six months was tough, but
expressed optimism that rescuers will be able to free the men. Nor does she
feel cursed.

?If it were bad luck, then there would be a bad ending, she said. ?Neither of
these disasters will have a bad ending.

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Plane Carrying 14 Crashes Near Nepal Capital

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010 at 2:20 pm 
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20100728pakistan300 Plane Carrying 14 Crashes Near Nepal Capital  airfrance Plane Carrying 14 Crashes Near Nepal Capital
IMG 0274 Plane Carrying 14 Crashes Near Nepal Capital  0f8e75bd398180fead29e29b7c93 thumb Plane Carrying 14 Crashes Near Nepal Capital

KATMANDU, Nepal — A small passenger plane carrying 14 people, including some foreigners, to the Mount Everest region crashed into the hills outside Nepal’s capital in heavy rain Tuesday, officials said.

A witness said there were no survivors, but there was no immediate word from officials on casualties.

The area’s police chief, Ram Bahadur Shrestha, said the plane went down near Shikharpur village, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Katmandu.

The German-built Dornier airplane was carrying 11 passengers and three crew members when bad weather forced it to try to return to Katmandu. Rescue coordinators at the police headquarters in Katmandu said six foreigners were on board but could not give details.

Initial reports said there were 15 passengers and three crew members on board.

Shrestha said rescuers have not been able to reach the crash site and villagers were trying to help out. The area has no roads and is only accessible by foot, but the route from the nearest town is blocked by a river flooded by monsoon rainfall.

Ram Bahadur Gole, a villager who witnessed the accident, told Avenues Television network that there were no survivors.

He said the crash impact broke the plane into several pieces that were scattered on a hillside, and that continuing rain and flooding had made many of the area’s foot trails unpassable.

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Worst flooding in a decade swamps China

Wednesday, August 11th, 2010 at 5:20 pm 
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175 iowa flood tout Worst flooding in a decade swamps China  china deep freeze Worst flooding in a decade swamps China
chsflood Worst flooding in a decade swamps China  080528 AU flood Worst flooding in a decade swamps China

ZHOUQU, CHINA — Rescuers lifted muddy bodies into trucks, and aid convoys choked the road into this remote Chinese town where hundreds died and more than 1,100 were missing Monday from landslides caused by heavy rain.

The death toll in China jumped to 337 late Monday after Sunday’s landslides in the northwestern province of Gansu — the deadliest incident so far in the country’s worst flooding in a decade. A debris-blocked swollen river burst, swamping entire mountain villages in the county seat of Zhouqu and ripping homes from their foundations.

“There were some, but very few, survivors. Most of them are dead, crushed into the earth,” said survivor Guo Wentao. AP Television News showed the bodies of his younger brother and sister, wrapped in quilts, being carried away on a stretcher as crying relatives followed.

The government said 1,148 were missing Monday night. About 45,000 were evacuated. It was not known how many of the missing were in danger or simply out of contact as workers rushed to restore communications in the area, where one-third of residents are ethnic Tibetan.

More rain is forecast in the region over the next three days.

“We were dumbfounded by the enormity of the flood situation when we got to the scene,” said Chen Junfeng, a disinfection specialist whose army battalion was the first on the scene Sunday.

Flooding in China has killed more than 1,100 people this year and caused tens of billions of dollars in damage across 28 provinces and regions.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

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Radio-Style System of Communication Via Magnetic Waves Demonstrated in Deep Mines [Magnets]

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 at 7:20 am 
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After 13 miners were trapped in a coal mine in Sago, West Virginia, four years ago, rescuers didn’t know where to look for survivors — they could have been anywhere between 11,000 and 13,000 feet from the entrance. Radio waves can’t penetrate very far through rock, so there was no way to communicate with the miners. More

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18 killed in mass panic at German music festival

Sunday, July 25th, 2010 at 1:40 pm 
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outsidelandsfestival 795623 18 killed in mass panic at German music festival  23218240 1208721160 a day away 18 killed in mass panic at German music festival
0 18 killed in mass panic at German music festival  l 70a2f5e9f2a54138a52997e21d8e96f5 18 killed in mass panic at German music festival

By MICHAEL SOHN and VANESSA GERA, Associated Press Writers

Saturday, July 24, 2010 at 5:13 p.m.

/ AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

In this image taken from television an ambulance at the scene where people receive first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/WIEBOLD TV via APTN)

— AP

In this image taken from television an ambulance at the scene where people receive first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/WIEBOLD TV via APTN)

— AP

In this image taken from television people receive first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/WIEBOLD TV via APTN)

— AP

In this image taken from television people walk through the tunnel after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/WIEBOLD TV via APTN)

— AP

Firefighters and rescuers take care of a collapsed person after a stampede at this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/ddp/Clemens Bilan)

— AP

An injured person is helped by rescuers after a stampede at this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/ddp/Clemens Bilan)

— AP

A shoe is left on the ground after a stampede at this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/ddp/Clemens Bilan)

— AP

A collapsed person is carried away by rescuers after a stampede at this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/ddp/Clemens Bilan)

— AP

A collapsed person is carried away by police after a stampede at this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/ddp/Clemens Bilan)

— AP

A collapsed man is carried away by police after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. A stampede inside thetunnel crowded with techno music fans crushed more than a dozen to death at Germany’s famed Love Parade festival on Saturday. Thousands of other revelers keep partying at the event in Duisburg, near Duesseldorf, unaware of the deadly stampede that started when police tried to block thousands of people from entering the already-jammed parade grounds.Police are still trying to determine exactly what happened, but the situation was “very chaotic,” police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said.(AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

People try to leave the area after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

People try to leave the area after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

A participant rests exhausted after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Map locates Duisburg, Germany where a number of participants in the â?¬Å?Love Paradeâ?¬ were injured and killed in a panic

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

Collapsed people get first aid after a panic on this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

People celebrate this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Photo/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

People celebrate this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Photo/Hermann J. Knippertz)

— AP

People celebrate this year’s techno-music festival “Loveparade 2010″ in Duisburg, Germany, on Saturday, July 24, 2010. More than a dozen people were killed and others injured when mass panic broke out in a tunnel at the Love Parade. (AP Photo/dapd/Photo/Hermann J. Knippertz)

DUISBURG, Germany ?
Crowds of people streaming into a techno music festival surged through an already jammed entry tunnel, setting off a panic that killed 18 people and injured 80 at an event meant to celebrate love and peace.

The circumstances of the stampede Saturday at the famed Love Parade festival in Duisburg in western Germany were still not clear even hours after the chaos, but it appeared that some or most of the 18 had been crushed to death.

Authorities also suggested that some of the people killed or injured might have attempted to flee the crowd by jumping over a barrier and falling several meters (yards). Witnesses described a desperate scene, as people piled up on each other or scrambled over others who had fallen in the crush.

“The young people came to celebrate and instead there are dead and injured,” said Chancellor Angela Merkel. “I am horrified by the suffering and the pain.”

Criticism quickly fell on city officials for allowing only one entrance to the grounds of a hugely popular event that drew hundreds of thousands of people to dance, watch floats and listen to DJs spin. German media said 1.4 million people attended but that figure could not be immediately confirmed.

The founder of the Love Parade, Matthias Roeingh, known by the name Dr. Motte, blasted the planning for the event, saying “one single entrance through a tunnel lends itself to disaster. I am very sad.”

City officials chose not to evacuate the site, fearing it might spark more panic, and many people continued partying, unaware of the deaths.

Emergency workers had trouble getting to the victims, hampered by the huge crowds. The area was a hectic scene, with bodies lying on the ground and people milling around or attending to them. Rescue workers carried away the injured as techno music thundered in the background.

Local media reported that the cell phone system in Duisburg broke down temporarily and frantic parents trying to reach their children instead drove to the scene to look for them.

However, most streets downtown were blocked by police and the highways leading to the city were jammed. Several media outlets also reported that rescue helicopters had problems taking away the heavily injured because there was not enough space for them to land.

Authorities believe the panic might have first been sparked outside the tunnel when some revelers tried to jump over a barrier and fell, said Wolfgang Rabe, the head of the crisis unit set up by Duisburg city authorities.

Police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said that just before the stampede occurred at about 5 p.m. (1500 GMT, 11 a.m. EDT), police closed off the area where the parade was being held because it was already overcrowded. They told revelers over loudspeakers to turn around and walk back in the other direction before the panic broke out, he said.

Eyewitness Udo Sandhoefer told n-tv television that even though no one else was being let in, people still streamed into the tunnel, causing “a real mass panic.”

“At some point the column (of people) got stuck, probably because everything was closed up front, and we saw that the first people were already lying on the ground,” he said.

“Others climbed up the walls and tried somehow to get into the grounds from the side, and the people in the crowd that moved up simply ran over those who were lying on the ground.”

Another witness, a young man who wasn’t named, told n-tv the tunnel became so crowded that people began falling. “It got tighter and tighter from minute to minute and at some point everyone just wanted out,” he said. “People were just pushed together until they fell over.”

Duisburg city officials decided at a crisis meeting to let the parade go on to prevent more panic and another stampede, said city spokesman Frank Kopatschek.

It is the worst accident of its kind since nine people were crushed to death and 43 more were injured at a rock festival in Roskilde, Denmark, in 2000. That fatal accident occurred when a huge crowd pushed forward during a Pearl Jam gig.

The Love Parade was once an institution in Berlin, but has been held in the industrial Ruhr region of western Germany since 2007.

The original Berlin Love Parade grew from a 1989 peace demonstration into a huge outdoor celebration of club culture that drew about 1.5 million people at its peak in 1999. But it suffered from financial problems and tensions with city officials in later years, and eventually moved.

The website of the Love Parade — whose motto this year was “The Art of Love — went black on Saturday night, with words in white saying:

“Our wish to arrange a happy togetherness was overshadowed by the tragic accidents today. … Our sincere condolences to all the relatives and our thoughts are with all of those who are currently being taken care of.”

—–

Gera reported from Berlin. Associated Press Writers Geir Moulson and Kirsten Grieshaber contributed to this report from Berlin.

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Three Gorges Dam People And Forced The Relocation Of 1.3 Million

Wednesday, July 21st, 2010 at 6:40 am 
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“Compared to 1998, the biggest difference is the Three Gorges Dam. Without it, thousands of soldiers and rescuers would have been needed to fight the floods,” said Yuan Jie, director of the Three Gorges Cascade Dispatching Center of China Three Gorges Cooperation.

The Three Gorges Dam traditional is a hydroelectric dam that spans the Yangtze River by the town of Sandouping, located in the Yiling District of Yichang, in Hubei province, China. It is the world’s largest electricity-generating plant of any kind.

Wang Jingquan, a drought and flood prevention official at the water-resources committee, said the Three Gorges Dam was designed to withstand up to 110,000 cubic meters of water a second. He added that reservoir levels are below the maximum capacity of 175 meters high and that the dam’s electricity turbines haven’t been operating at full capacity because the area had been suffering from drought.

Rainfall since July 1 has affected about 38 million people and forced the relocation of 1.3 million in 11 provinces, the Ministry of Civil Affairs said July 16. Rice output in China, which accounts for 35 percent of global production, may drop by 10 percent on torrential rains and outbreak of pests.

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