Tuesday, July 12, 2005Bobby Abreu, welcome to the spotlight.

The Philadelphia Phillies star, now 31 and a two-time All-Star, has produced well for the Phillies over the last half a decade without the glamour of other top players. However, last night there was no denying that he was the star of the show.

And what a show it was. The first batter in the 2005 Home Run Derby, Abreu proceeded to shatter the previous record of 15 home runs in a round, belting 24, including a 517-foot moonshot that exited the stadium in right field, going through two bats in the process. This rampage came immediately after ESPN announcers Chris Berman and Joe Morgan described Comerica Park, the site of the Derby, as a difficult park to hit home runs in.

In the second round, Abreu edged past Boston’s David Ortiz (who himself hit an astounding 17 homeruns in the first round) and Milwaukee’s Carlos Lee to earn a spot in the finals alongside Detroit star Ivan Rodriguez. Rodriguez, who snuck into the second round with 7 dingers, swatted the most in the second round, but his home-field advantage deserted him in the finals as Abreu smashed 11 over the fences to win the Derby for his native Venezuela.

Abreu’s three-round total of 41 homers broke Miguel Tejada‘s record of 27, set last year in Houston’s Minute Maid Park.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

A memorial dedicated to Oklahomans killed in the war on terrorism is planned for just north of the Oklahoma Capitol. The memorial would be built next to the proposed Veterans Affairs Department building on the side of Lincoln Boulevard between NW 30 and NE 32.

The plans would also have statues and memorials honoring veterans south of the capital moved to the Veterans Affairs building.

The Veterans Affairs building is part of a $196 million bond issue that will also pay for six other projects. If Oklahoma legislators could take up the measure as early as a special session this month and include it in the state’s 2007 fiscal year. The measure is expected to be raised next year if the bond issue is not acted on this year.

War On Terror Memorial Design Committee will oversee the task of seeking designs for the memorial. Because no state money has been set aside for the memorial, the committee would also raise money for its construction. Similar memorials around the country range in price of $1 million to $2.2 million.

Friday, May 28, 2010

A man accused of being a serial killer has appeared in Bradford magistrates court in West Yorkshire today charged with three counts of murder. 40-year-old Stephen Griffiths is accused of killing Suzanne Blamires, 36, Susan Rushworth, 43, and Shelley Armitage, 31, all prostitutes.

Griffiths, a former van driver with a degree in psychology and studying for a PhD in criminology, gave his name as “Crossbow Cannibal” when asked. He has been in police custody since Monday when police were alerted to a CCTV recording that appeared to show a murder.

A caretaker had been reviewing footage from the flats where Griffiths lives when he saw footage of a woman and a man enter a flat early on Saturday morning. Two minutes later, she ran out and was followed by the man, who beat her to the ground and shot her in the head with a crossbow. Over the course of the weekend, the man was seen several times with bin bags and a rucksack.

On Tuesday, the day after the arrest of Griffiths, Blamires’ remains were found in the River Aire in nearby Shipley. She had been cut into several pieces and her head was located in a rucksack. Police continue to search for the other two alleged victims; Rushworth has been missing since June last year and Armitage vanished in April.

Police have searched much of Bradford’s red-light district, where Griffiths’ third-floor flat is located. Forensic investigations at the flat are expected to last around three weeks. There are plans to search landfill sites for bodies, and police may yet expand the inquiry to cover three more cold cases, although at present they have not been linked to the current inquiry.

Sniffer dogs have been used throughout the city, and police have been taking away plastic evidence bags. Some alleyways remain closed off. Police charged their suspect yesterday.

Griffiths was known as “the lizard man” in his block of flats owing to his habit of walking his two pet monitor lizards in the area. One neighbour is reported to have quoted him as saying he was studying for “a PhD in murder and Jack the Ripper,” and he has spent time in a high-security psychiatric hospital. During his five-minute court appearance he did not enter a plea, kept his head bowed and fidgeted with his cuffed hands. He said “Here, I guess,” when asked for his address.

As he stood in the glass-fronted dock, guarded by three security officers, he was watched by the families of Rushworth and Armitage, who were accompanied by police family liaison officers. Blamires’ family chose not to be present, but the victim’s mother Nicky Blamires, 54, has told the press that Suzanne was a “much-loved” family member even though she “went down the wrong path and did not have the life she was meant to have.” “Nobody deserves this,” she said. “All these girls were human beings and people’s daughters.”

Griffiths’ morning court appearance was followed by a second one this afternoon, at Bradford Crown Court. This time, he confirmed his name without incident. He was remanded into custody until next month, when he will appear in court again.

British media has been quick to compare the case to Peter Sutcliffe, dubbed the “Yorkshire Ripper”. Sutcliffe was a Bradford killer responsible for thirteen murders and seven attempted murders, including several prostitutes. Since his 1981 conviction he has spent most of the last three decades in Broadmoor high-security psychiatric hospital near London.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005A team of Australian surgeons yesterday reattached both hands and one foot to 10-year-old Perth boy, Terry Vo, after a brick wall which collapsed during a game of basketball fell on him, severing the limbs. The wall gave way while Terry performed a slam-dunk, during a game at a friend’s birthday party.

The boy was today awake and smiling, still in some pain but in good spirits and expected to make a full recovery, according to plastic surgeon, Mr Robert Love.

“What we have is parts that are very much alive so the reattached limbs are certainly pink, well perfused and are indeed moving,” Mr Love told reporters today.

“The fact that he is moving his fingers, and of course when he wakes up he will move both fingers and toes, is not a surprise,” Mr Love had said yesterday.

“The question is more the sensory return that he will get in the hand itself and the fine movements he will have in the fingers and the toes, and that will come with time, hopefully. We will assess that over the next 18 months to two years.

“I’m sure that he’ll enjoy a game of basketball in the future.”

The weight and force of the collapse, and the sharp brick edges, resulted in the three limbs being cut through about 7cm above the wrists and ankle.

Terry’s father Tan said of his only child, the injuries were terrible, “I was scared to look at him, a horrible thing.”

The hands and foot were placed in an ice-filled Esky and rushed to hospital with the boy, where three teams of medical experts were assembled, and he was given a blood transfusion after experiencing massive blood loss. Eight hours of complex micro-surgery on Saturday night were followed by a further two hours of skin grafts yesterday.

“What he will lose because it was such a large zone of traumatised skin and muscle and so on, he will lose some of the skin so he’ll certainly require lots of further surgery regardless of whether the skin survives,” said Mr Love said today.

The boy was kept unconscious under anaesthetic between the two procedures. In an interview yesterday, Mr Love explained why:

“He could have actually been woken up the next day. Because we were intending to take him back to theatre for a second look, to look at the traumatised skin flaps, to close more of his wounds and to do split skin grafting, it was felt the best thing to do would be to keep him stable and to keep him anaesthetised.”

Professor Wayne Morrison, director of the respected Bernard O’Brien Institute of Microsurgery and head of plastic and hand surgery at Melbourne’s St Vincent’s Hospital, said he believed the operation to be a world first.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a vault containing millions of seeds from all over the world, saw its first deposits on Tuesday. Located 800 kilometers from the North Pole on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, the vault has been referred to by European Commission president José Manuel Barroso as a “frozen Garden of Eden“. It is intended to preserve crop supplies and secure biological diversity in the event of a worldwide disaster.

“The opening of the seed vault marks a historic turning point in safeguarding the world’s crop diversity,” said Cary Fowler, executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust which is in charge of collecting the seed samples. The Norwegian government, who owns the bank, built it at a cost of $9.1 million.

At the opening ceremony, 100 million seeds from 268,000 samples were placed inside the vault, where there is room for over 2 billion seeds. Each of the samples originated from a different farm or field, in order to best ensure biological diversity. These crop seeds included such staples as rice, potatoes, barley, lettuce, maize, sorghum, and wheat. No genetically modified crops were included. (Beyond politics they are generally sterile so of no use.)

Constructed deep inside a mountain and protected by concrete walls, the “doomsday vault” is designed to withstand earthquakes, nuclear warfare, and floods resulting from global warming. Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg called it an “insurance policy” against such threats.

With air-conditioned temperatures of -18 degrees Celsius, experts say the seeds could last for an entire millennium. Some crops will be able to last longer, like sorghum, which the Global Crop Diversity Trust says can last almost 20 millenniums. Even if the refrigeration system fails, the vaults are expected to stay frozen for 200 years.

The Prime Minister said, “With climate change and other forces threatening the diversity of life that sustains our planet, Norway is proud to be playing a central role in creating a facility capable of protecting what are not just seeds, but the fundamental building blocks of human civilization.” Stoltenberg, along with Kenyan Nobel Peace Prize laureate Wangari Maathai, made the first deposit of rice to the vault.

“It is very important for Africa to store seeds here because anything can happen to our national seed banks,” Maathai said. The vault will operate as a bank, allowing countries to use their deposited seeds free of charge. It will also serve as a backup to the thousands of other seed banks around the world.

“Crop diversity will soon prove to be our most potent and indispensable resource for addressing climate change, water and energy supply constraints and for meeting the food needs of a growing population,” Cary Fowler said.

Friday, February 19, 2021

A series of winter blasts have struck the US state of Texas in recent days, leaving at least ten people dead in the aftermath. On Wednesday, the second wave of the storms impacted utilities and water systems, with cities asking citizens to conserve water usage. Reports early Wednesday indicated more than two and a half million homes and businesses were without power. Texas is the only one of the 48 contiguous US states with its own separate power grid.

One media source indicated carbon monoxide poisoning killed a mother and her child in the city of Houston. A house fire killed a woman and three children in the city of Sugar Land. The storm has impacted shipments of COVID-19 vaccine, according to at least one report. Citizens were asked to conserve usage of electricity where possible. Reports from the city of Tyler indicate roads were nearly impassible on Monday and Tuesday due to ice and snow.

Earlier in the month, winter conditions contributed to a massive vehicle pile up in the city of Fort Worth, taking the lives of at least five people. Some victims were trapped in their vehicles for hours, awaiting rescue. During a press briefing, an emergency services official said this was a once-in-a-lifetime event.

Sunday, March 8, 2009

28 people were killed in an suicide bombing attack outside a police recruitment building at 10am local time (UTC+3) in Baghdad, Iraq. The attack occurred in the centre of a crowd outside the police recruitment building. Most of the dead were police recruits, yet civilians and other serving officers were also injured or killed. At least 57 people were injured in the attack. The death toll is the highest reported incident in Iraq for nearly one month.

Insurgents often choose police recruitment centres to attack and this centre, located on Palestine Street, has been previously attacked. In an attempt to prevent such attacks concrete blocks were previously constructed and checkpoints established.

According to a nearby police lieutenant there was a demonstration of about 100 oil employees at an intersection between the police recruitment building and the oil ministry. The bomb went off one hour after the demonstration had started and according to some sources the bomber mingled within the crowd. The police believe that there was an accomplice who remotely detonated the bomber. There may have been a second bomb. Some reports suggest that the suicide bomber crashed into the crowds on a motorcycle and detonated a belt or vest of explosives. An eye-witness said that the police started firing weapons “randomly” after the explosion. Pick-up trucks were used to transport the casualties to hospital afterwards.