Current Events #10

Hey Baby…Argh, A Bat (not man)

http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2014/01/23/bats-frogs-predator-prey-animals-ripples/#.UvrqXM0zh2U.email

The frog’s calls have an unintended effect: They create ripples that draw the attention of predators lurking in the sky.Scientists already know that the frog-eating bat Trachops cirrhosus eavesdrops on the túngara’s love song. The frog knows this too, falling silent whenever it senses a predator nearby. However, according to new research, frog-hunting bats can also detect ripples created by the frogs with their echolocation, or built-in sonar. The bats can do this even after a frog has stopped calling, since ripples last for several seconds afterward.

Middle-Aged Man and the Sea

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/elsalvador/10628208/Castaway-leaves-Marshall-Islands-for-home-in-El-Salvador.html

Jose Salvador Alvarenga, the castaway believed to have spent over a year drifting across the Pacific Ocean from Mexico, flew out of the Marshall Islands on Monday to be reunited with his family in his homeland of El Salvador.The 37-year-old fisherman was finally given the go-ahead to travel from doctors after his departure was delayed for three days due to ill-health in the wake of his 13-month ordeal.

No Need to Shank

http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=54208

A disease known as chronic kidney disease (CKD) is killing cane workers in Central America. The disease is also prominent in Sri Lanka and India. Although CKD has always been around, it seems to be worsening in these areas, over the past 20 years.

In parts of Nicaragua and El Salvador, the disease is a way of life, and workers on the cane plantations understand that their days are numbered. One community in Nicaragua has been renamed from "La Isla" to "La Isla de las Viudas" or, the Island of the Widows because so many men from the community have died from CKD.

to Be, or Not to Be

http://www.mexiconews.net/index.php/sid/220071416/scat/968d25eaf1a5e264/ht/More-bodies-found-in-clandestine-graves-in-Mexico

"There are now 21 skeletons. There's a person with a municipal police uniform," Blanco said.Forensic experts have been brought in to determine how long the bodies had been buried prior to discovery, the victims' gender and, insofar as possible, the cause of death, he added.DNA samples also were gathered for inclusion in a victims' database.During the same press conference, Blanco hailed his office's results in combating the crime of kidnapping.Last year, 233 suspects were arrested, up 294 percent from 2012, a total of 38 kidnapping gangs were dismantled, and 139 victims were rescued alive, he said.

At Least They are Not Flying

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/08/health/canada-h5n1-avian-flu/index.html?iref=allsearch

Canadian health officials confirmed Wednesday that a resident from Alberta has died from H5N1 avian flu, the first case of the virus in North America.Canada's Health Minister, Rona Ambrose, said the infected individual had recently traveled to Beijing.The Canadian case also is the first case of H5N1 infection ever imported by a traveler into a country where the virus is not present in poultry. No such H5N1 viruses have been detected in people or in animals in the United States.

Scary and Unpronounceable

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/world/americas/virus-advances-through-east-caribbean.html?rref=world/americas&module=ArrowsNav&contentCollection=Americas&action=click&region=FixedRight&pgtype=article&_r=0

A painful mosquito-borne virus common in Africa and Asia has advanced quickly throughout the eastern Caribbean in the past two months, raising the prospect that a once-distant illness will become entrenched throughout the region, public health experts say.

Chikungunya fever, a viral disease similar to dengue, was first spotted in December on the French side of St. Martin and has now spread to seven other countries, the authorities said. About 3,700 people are confirmed or suspected of having contracted it.

Slavic Spring

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/terrorism-security/2014/0220/Ukraine-truce-shattered-by-deadly-fighting-in-Kiev

Violent clashes between protesters and riot police erupted again in central Kiev Thursday morning, breaking an hours-long truce and casting doubt on the efforts of European negotiators in Kiev today.

Gunfire broke out in Kiev’s Independence Square early Thursday morning, leaving at least 22 people dead, as smoke continued to billow from burning barricades, according to the BBC. Eyewitnesses said they saw the bodies of some two dozen protesters, and officials said a police officer was killed.

Butterflies are Beautiful

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/Latin-America-Monitor/2014/0220/A-win-for-monarch-butterflies-at-Mexico-summit

Somewhere in their discussions of trade-facilitating measures, energy integration, and border infrastructures, the three North American leaders found time in their summit Wednesday for the butterflies.Flanked by US President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Steven Harper, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto announced at the conclusion of the trilateral meeting here that the countries agreed to set up a task force to devise a plan for saving the continent’s endangered migration of monarch butterflies.“We have agreed to conserve the monarch butterfly as an emblematic species of North America which unites our three countries,” Mr. Peña Nieto said. 

Not an Eye for an Eye

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2014/0219/Border-agent-shoots-and-kills-alleged-rock-thrower.-Excessive-force-video

The fatal shooting of a man who allegedly threw rocks at a US Border Patrol agent while trying to escape capture in the San Diego mountains Tuesday has rekindled concerns over the contentious issue of how much force border agents should use when trying to apprehend suspected illegal immigrants.According to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, which is investigating the killing, the agent was struck and injured by the rock-throwing man and shouted warnings before firing his gun.

$19 Billion for an App

http://money.cnn.com/2014/02/20/technology/social/whatsapp-19-billion/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

What is WhatsApp? WhatsApp is a mobile messaging service that functions as a kind of a social network. WhatsApp users can send messages to one or many recipients at the same time, and they can even share their locations.In many ways, WhatsApp's users are just the kind of customers Facebook is looking for. They are extremely active, sending more than 600 million photos a day -- more photos than Facebook (FB, Fortune 500) users upload. A whopping 70% of WhatsApp users are active every day. By way of comparison, 62% of Facebook users are active daily.

Viva la Revolucion

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/20/world/americas/venezuela-qa/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

Venezuelans have taken to the streets in recent days, leading to gruesome clashes between protesters and police. Their demands are varied, from economic to social. So many protests worldwide. When did Venezuela's begin?Nationwide student protests started this month. On February 12, the demonstrations attracted global attention when three people were killed.Demonstrators are demanding better security, an end to goods shortages and protected freedom of speech.

That is One Angry Strigiformes

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/owl-viciously-attacks-rabbit-hunter-near-digby-n-s-1.2535224

A 55-year-old rabbit hunter from Nova Scotia's Digby County is recovering from an attack by a cranky owl on Tuesday night.

Kevin O'Neil said he was checking on his snares on shore after a day of lobster fishing when he saw an owl in a nearby tree.

"I kind of looked up at it jokingly and said to it, 'You bugger, you better not be eating my rabbits,'" he said.

A few minutes later O'Neil says he heard a swoosh coming at him in the dark.

"It swooped down and struck me right in the face. Feet first," he said

Use the Bathroom

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/19/world/asia/japan-fukushima-daiichi-water-leak/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

A large amount of radioactive water has leaked from a holding tank at Japan's troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, its operator said Thursday.The leak of an estimated 100 metric tons of highly contaminated water was discovered late Wednesday, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) said in a statement.The tainted water flowed over a barrier around the tank and is being absorbed into the ground, TEPCO said. The plant has shut off the inflow of water into the tank and the leaking has stopped, it added.The company doesn't believe that there was any leakage of the radioactive water into the nearby Pacific Ocean.

Now That’s an Edumecation

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/20/us/lawsuit-accuses-for-profit-schools-of-fraud.html?hp&_r=0

It was the electronic monitor around a student’s ankle that first gave Kelli J. Amaya serious doubts about the Harris School of Business.

The young man with the monitor was studying to be a pharmacy technician, and Ms. Amaya, who worked at Harris, a for-profit chain of trade schools, knew that the most widely recognized certification for pharmacy technicians excludes anyone convicted of a felony or even a low-level drug offense.

But the student received federal financial aid, and for the school to keep collecting it, he had to remain in the program and complete an internship. So Ms. Amaya said she was told to find him an internship, even if that meant deceiving the employer.

“I saw students who never should have been there, students with whopping gaps in learning abilities and major psychiatric problems who were just not capable of doing the work,” said Ms. Amaya, an administrator at Harris’s Linwood campus, and then at its Wilmington, Del., campus, from 2009 to 2011. “The bosses were always like, ‘Stop asking why they’re enrolled, just get them to graduation however you can.’ ”

And the Silver Goes To…

http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/20/sochi-winter-olympics-2014-check-out-this-epic-photo-finish-during-the-ski-cross-4311421/

Going into the final jump of the race, three skiers were all pushing for second place, with Russia’s Egor Korotkov, Sweden’s Victor Oehling Norberg, and Finland’s Jouni Pellinen all battling with each other.

What happened next would provide us with one of the most epic photo finishes ever, as all three crashed into each other – right on the finish line.

Korotkov, Norberg and Pellinen all tumbled over the line at the same time, with camera footage needed to decide who actually finished first.