News of the Day
Allied forces began landing at Anzio, Italy, during World War II.On this day in 1944
Maldivian Jaunt for Scottish Politician
The Maldives are the ultimate dream holiday destination; white sandy beaches and the water lapping at your veranda – however, before long the water will be overlapping into your room. If the polar ice caps continue to melt at current rates resulting in dangerous sea level rises, glorious holidays on these tiny Indian Ocean islands could become a thing of the past. With an average height above current sea level of 1.5 metres, this island nation is on borrowed time.
British papers today however are lambasting the Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond who is planning a ‘fact finding’ trip to the Maldives later this year, all at the British taxpayer’s expense. Mr Salmond met the Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed at the Copenhagen climate change conference last month and the two countries committed to work together to help combat climate change.
Notwithstanding the cost of the jaunt, a return flight from the UK to the Maldives would result in an extra 2.03 tons of carbon emissions.
Volunteering in Paris?
If you are travelling, or an expat and are planning to stay in Paris for at least a year the local SOS Help is looking for volunteers for their English language telephone listening service. Geared towards the International community, this could be a great way to get involved and help at the same time.
Recruitment sessions are held twice a year. In 2010 these will be on the following dates:
3 February, 7 pm
11 February, 7 pm
16 February, 7 pm
All volunteers will be required at attend a training session, on Saturday 20th March.
Contact www.soshelpline.org/events for further details.
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Chain Reation?
In the week following the devastating 7.0 earthquake in Haiti, there have been earthquakes, reported in Argentina, Venezuela and most recently Guatemala, Chile, Panama, and the Cayman Islands. The one in Guatemala was 6.0 on the Richter scale, and a 6.3 quake was reported in the South Atlantic, south east of Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego (close to the southern tip of Argentina) at a depth of 25 kilometres.
There was no tsunami warning, no reported damage.
Another earthquake was reported near the coastal town of Carapuno, Venezuela at the end of last week…that one measured 5.6. This a mere 900 miles from Port au Prince, Haiti. Again, no damage, just nervous people.
The US Geological Survey reports thousands of earthquakes all over the world every day, from Birmingham in England to San Francisco in the USA, but only measures those that are over 3 on the Richter Scale. New Zealand alone experiences some 14,000 earthquakes every year, most of which are never felt. It is just a question of luck as to whether we are in the right or the wrong place at the time.
