News from around the world

Here’s another round of news that’s worth knowing about.

Main item

Greek wildfires

In the cult classic Backdraft the general public was introduced to the idea that fire is a living, sentient, being with motives behind what it does. Ok, maybe that’s not quite how the movie presented it, but a little bit of embellishment never hurt to help set the tone. In the case of the Greek wildfires it appears that intelligent fire is the least of our concerns. In this instance, as is often the case, it looks as though idiotic humans are the true culprits once again.

Here’s a quick look at some of the publicly known facts regarding the fires.

• Fires began popping up last Friday, 24 August 2007
• 63 confirmed dead
• Reward of up to 1,000,000 Euros for information leading to the capture(s) of persons involved in setting the fires
• Those found to have participated may be prosecuted under Greek terror laws
• There are literally hundreds of fires, many of them with multiple fronts
• It is an ecological disaster as nearly all of the remaining Grecian forest land has been scorched
• 32 suspected arsonists terrorists have been arrested thus far

For further information about these particular fires you can look at numerous news sources courtesy of Google news. This wikipedia page gives some good information about wildfires in general. Finally here are some safety tips from FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) regarding what to do in the event you find yourself in the path of an oncoming wildfire.

Other items

Global flooding

Ok perhaps global is a bit strong, but there certainly is a lot of it going on. To be fair this is the latter half of a monsoon season so heavy rains are to be expected. Some facts and statistics to help catch you up on these floods…

• Over 500 killed in Bihar India flooding
• At least 600 dead in North Korean flooding
• Across Africa floods have taken a toll
• The mid-western US is dealing with floods that has killed dozens

Of course we can’t forget the floods that soaked the United Kingdom either.

Dog fighting

It seems that the indictment of Michael Vick on dog fighting charges and the subsequent guilty plea we are starting to see the issue of dog fighting getting some attention by the major media. I’ll not get into to much detail about Pit Bulls at this point as I just wrote an article about Pit Bulls a few days ago.

Now with the raid on Earl Simmon’s (aka DMX) home in Phoenix Arizona turning up illegal drugs, weapons, and of course malnurished and abused Pit Bulls this whole situation will no doubt get even more media attention. Which is a good thing. Perhaps now people will start to see that it is not the breed of dog that is the problem, but the slobs who own them.

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