NASA took the unusual step of issuing a press release to discount the prediction by a student astronomer of a catastrophic asteroid collision with Earth.
The Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, maintains its current estimates for the very low probability (1 in 45,000) of an Earth impact by the asteroid Apophis in 2036. Apophis is estimated to be about 1,000 feet (320 meters) in diameter. If it were to strike Earth, Apophis would not be a planet-killer, but it could certainly generate significant regional damage and depending on where it struck, it has the potential to kill millions of people, experts say.
A young German student claims the Apophis impact probability is far higher because of the possibility of a collision with an artificial satellite during the asteroid’s close approach in April 2029. However, NASA believes the asteroid will not pass near the main belt of geosynchronous satellites in 2029, and the chance of a collision with a satellite is exceedingly remote.
NASA Press Release
A city worker is dead after a horrible accident in Tustin, California. The man was trimming trees last Wednesday when he fell into a wood chipper.
The Los Angeles Times identified the victim as Gabriel Gonzales-Ferrer, 24. The man was “was standing at the back end of the chipper, throwing branches into it with his co-workers nearby,” Tustin police Sgt. Pat Welch told the newspaper. “One of them looked over, and he was gone.”
Safety inspectors are investigating the incident as an industrial accident. Thirty-one people have been killed in wood chipper accidents between 1992 and 2002, according to a 2005 Journal of the American Medical Association report.
MyFox Los Angeles Video
Scientists predict there is a 99.7% chance that California will be struck by a magnitude 6.7 quake or larger in the next 30 years. The last time a quake this size rattled California was the 1994 Northridge disaster, which measured 6.7 on the Richter scale, killed 72 people, injured more than 9,000 and caused $25 billion in damage.
“It basically guarantees it’s going to happen,” said Ned Field, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Pasadena and lead author of the report.
California sits in one of the most seismically active regions in the world. More than 300 faults crisscross the state, and about 10,000 quakes each year rattle Southern California alone, although most of them are too small to be felt.
More at FoxNews
Forecasters predict a “very active” Atlantic hurricane season in 2008. Colorado State University’s Tropical Meteorology Project, led by hurricane expert William Gray, predicts 15 named storms and 8 hurricanes, 4 of which will be “major.”
A typical season has 10 named storms, 6 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes. The Atlantic hurricane season starts June 1 and lasts until Nov. 30. The most active time is typically in late August and early September.
The forecasters believe above-normal sea surface temperatures in the eastern subtropical Atlantic during February and March will significantly increase hurricane activity. The team devised a new computer statistical model after overestimating the last two hurricane seasons.
The 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was the most active in recorded history with 28 storms, 7 major hurricanes including the infamous Hurricane Katrina, at least 2,280 deaths and $128 billion in damages.
More at USAToday
The U.S. government plans to move its research on one of the most contagious animal diseases from an isolated island laboratory to the U.S. mainland near herds of livestock, raising concerns about a catastrophic outbreak. Skeptical members of Congress are demanding to see internal documents they believe highlight the risks and consequences of the decision.
An epidemic of the "foot-and-mouth" disease, which only affects animals, could devastate the livestock industry. A computer-simulated outbreak of the disease ended with food shortages and fictional riots in the streets after the simulation’s National Guardsmen were ordered to kill tens of millions of farm animals, so many that troops ran out of bullets.
The foot-and-mouth virus can be carried on a worker’s breath or clothes, or vehicles leaving a lab, and is so contagious it has been confined to remote Plum Island, N.Y., for more than a half-century. The lab is currently 100 miles northeast of New York City and far from commercial livestock, accessible only by ferry or helicopter. Researchers there who work with the live virus are not permitted to own animals at home and must wait at least a week before attending events where animals might perform, such as a circus. The government plans to move the virus lab to Manhattan, Kansas, in the heart of the nation’s breadbasket and in close proximity to over a half million livestock.
More on FoxNews
A British wildlife student died after being bitten by a deadly black mamba snake. Nathan Layton, 27, was attacked by the snake as he walked in long grass with a group of teachers and fellow students during a trip to South Africa. His girlfriend, Laura Woolley, was with him and watched in horror as Layton fell into a coma, from which he never recovered.
The black mamba is the world’s second largest venomous snake, capable of reaching 14 feet in length. It’s also one of the deadliest, carrying up to 20 drops of venom in its fangs, but requiring only two drops of venom to kill an adult human.
Sky News
A Florida teen was beaten in an “animalistic attack” filmed for YouTube. Victoria Lindsay, 16, of Mulberry, Fla., is still having trouble with her hearing and vision since the March 30 attack. She will be taught at home until she finishes high school and will miss the upcoming prom. Her parents say Lindsay is still scared for her life.
Seven juveniles and one adult are in police custody and charged with felonious battery, false imprisonment and kidnapping. One of the girls struck Lindsay on her head several times and then slammed Lindsay’s head into a wall, knocking her unconscious, according to the arrest report. Later the teens can be seen blocking the door and hitting Lindsay repeatedly. Two males allegedly acted as lookouts, police said.
Update:Â Prosecutors are charging all seven juveniles as adults, and charging three of them with witness tampering.
A shark attacked and killed a 16-year-old boy Tuesday while he and a friend were bodyboarding off Australia’s east coast. Peter Edmonds was about 50 yards from shore when the shark attacked. Edmonds suffered two large bites, one to his leg and one to his chest. He died from extreme blood loss while lifeguards and paramedics frantically tried to save him.
It was the first fatal shark attack in Australia in two years. In spite of all the media attention, shark attacks are extremely rare. You are three times more likely to be struck by lightning than to be bitten by a shark, and thousands of times more likely to be killed while driving to the beach. There are an average of 32 shark attacks per year in U.S. waters, with only 11 fatalities between 1990 and 2004.
Shark FAQs
Relative Risk of Shark Attacks to Humans
In the 1991 movie Body Parts, when a man loses his arm in a car accident, surgeons transplant the arm of an executed death row inmate onto the injured man. Unfortunately, an evil force possesses the new arm, and murder ensues. Now fiction may have become reality as a transplanted heart recipient follows in the dark footsteps of his donor.
In South Carolina, a man who received a heart transplant 12 years ago later married the donor’s widow! Then on Tuesday, the man died the same way his heart donor did: of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. (cue eerie music)
More at FoxNews
“To err is human, but to really foul things up you need a computer.” –Paul Ehrlich
Software errors cost the U.S. economy $60 billion annually in rework, lost productivity and actual damages. We all know software bugs can be annoying, but faulty software can also be expensive, embarrassing, destructive and deadly.
In this case, just hours after thousands of fans left the Hartford Coliseum, its steel-latticed roof collapsed under the weight of wet snow. The cost of this disaster was $70 million, plus another $20 million damage to the local economy. The roof collapsed due to a bug in the CAD software used to design the coliseum.
See 20 Famous Software Disasters
In spite of all our differences, the one thing that binds all living creatures is that we each have an expiration date. This finality to our existence is what makes life special, something to be cherished and protected. But occasionally things can go terribly wrong…
