Hawaii Hit by Great Plastic Garbage Patch
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Queensland Facing Major Reconstruction
The Australian state of Queensland is facing an uphill struggle to recover from its recent flood. It could take years before things are back to normal. Large areas of the state are still under water. Thousands of homes have been flooded and many people are now without a roof over their heads. Many more homes are without power and people are relying on food and water handouts. State Premier Anna Bligh told reporters the flood is the worst natural disaster in Queensland’s history and that reconstruction would be of "post-war proportions". She said: "Queensland is reeling this morning from the worst natural disaster in our history and possibly in the history of our nation….We've seen three-quarters of our state having experienced the devastation of raging flood waters.”
One good piece of news to emerge from the flood is that the flood waters weren’t as high as feared. The water peaked at 4.46m, below the 5.4m of the 1974 floods. Nevertheless, around 30 Brisbane suburbs now look like giant lagoons. There is a huge amount of debris in the water, ranging from the entire walkway that lined Brisbane’s business district waterfront, to a floating restaurant smashed to pieces after crashing into a bridge. So far, the reported death toll is 15, but dozens more people are missing. Brisbane’s mayor Campbell Newman warned residents it would take a long time to return to normal. He said: “The clean-up effort, ultimately, will take many, many months…The reconstruction effort on people's homes is going to take much longer.”
Girl Back Home 7 Years After Tsunami
A teenage Indonesian girl swept away in the Indian Ocean tsunami on Boxing Day seven years ago has been reunited with her family. Fifteen-year-old Wati was eight when the devastating tsunami wiped out the village of Ujong Baroh in Sumatra’s Aceh province. Her family survived the giant tidal wave but little Wati was carried away. The last time her mother saw her was when the water carried the little girl away. She was desperately clinging to her three children in an attempt to keep them all together, but her efforts were in vain as she lost her grip on Wati. Yusniar never thought she would see her daughter alive again. Wati’s family made several attempts to find her but no one reported seeing her alive.
A miracle happened last Wednesday when her grandfather Ibrahim, who lived in another town, got a visit from an acquaintance who was with a teenage girl. Wati had visited the old man in his coffee shop. She told him she was trying to get back to her village but did not know the way. Ibrahim suspected the teenager might be his long-lost grand-daughter but she could not remember any of her parents’ of relatives’ names, except Ibrahim’s. Wati’s identity was confirmed by her parents several days later from a mole and a scar above her eyebrow that she got when she was six years old. It is still unclear what happened to Wati in her seven-year absence. The deadly tsunami killed more than 150,000 people in several Indian Ocean nations.
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Haiti in Ruins After Huge Earthquake
Television pictures are slowly beginning to show how great the damage is in Haiti following the huge earthquake on Tuesday. A magnitude 7.3 quake, just 16km from the capital, hit the Caribbean nation as people were going home after work. It was the worst earthquake to strike Haiti in more than two centuries. Much of the country has been devastated. Many major buildings in the capital Port-au-Prince have collapsed, including the Presidential Palace and the UN headquarters. Haiti's President Rene Preval described the scene in the capital as "unimaginable". The Red Cross says up to 3 million people have been affected. Mr. Preval fears "well over 100,000 people" may have died.
Haiti's ambassador to the USA, Raymond Joseph, said there was "no way of estimating" how many casualties there were. Countries around the world are acting quickly to send whatever help they can to Haiti. US President Barack Obama has promised America will do all it can to help. He vowed "unwavering support" following a “particularly cruel” disaster. Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world. More than half its people live below the poverty line on less than two dollars a day. It is one of the poorest-equipped countries on Earth to deal with such a catastrophe. The nation was still trying to recover from being hit by four deadly hurricanes in 30 days in 2008. Its economy is in ruins and it has a long history of corruption and coups.
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Hawaii Hit by Great Plastic Garbage Patch
A recent discovery shows the world now has two ocean garbage patches. These are huge areas of the ocean which have a huge floating island of trash and litter. The first garbage patch was discovered in the Pacific by ocean researcher Charles Moore in 1997. The new one was found in the Atlantic by a husband and wife team Anna Cummins and Marcus Eriksen. “We found the Great Atlantic Garbage Patch,” said Ms Cummins. “Our job now is to let people know that plastic ocean pollution is a global problem. Unfortunately, it is not confined to a single patch,” she added. Ms Cummins described her sadness at what humans are doing to the ocean: “It’s shocking to see it firsthand….We’ve managed to leave our footprint really everywhere.”
The BBC has just reported on the damage the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is doing. Tons of plastic is washing up on the beaches of Hawaii. This island chain is world famous for having some of the world’s most beautiful beaches. The very name ‘Hawaii’ conjures up images of paradise islands. No longer. The BBC’s presenter Simon Reeve says Kamilo Beach on the island of Hawaii has been described as “the world’s dirtiest beach”. The World Wildlife Foundation reported that nearly 100,000 marine mammals are killed each year by plastic trash. Plastics and other garbage can be mistaken as food that will choke, poison or make the creature think they are full when there is no nutritional value what so ever. Discarded fishing nets that are aimlessly floating continue to catch sea-creatures and enable them to get loose or to be rescued. This is called ghost fishing.
5. Japanese Return $78m Lost Tsunami Cash
Five months after the devastating earthquake and tsunami that ripped apart Japan’s northern coastline and people’s lives, cash and valuables washed away have been returned to their owners. Since the double disasters struck in March, Japanese people and search and rescue crews have handed in thousands of wallets and 5,700 safes found in the debris. A total of $48 million in cash has been turned in to police stations across northern Japan. One safe alone contained a million dollars in banknotes. This is welcome news for those reunited with their valuables who thought they had lost everything in the tsunami. It will help some rebuild their lives. It is also a fitting tribute to the honesty of the Japanese people.
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Japan’s National Police Agency says nearly all the valuables found in the three hardest hit areas have been returned to their owners. Police spokesman Koetsu Saiki from the Miyagi Prefectural Police explained the difficulty his officers had in reuniting the cash with its owners, saying: "The fact that these safes were washed away, meant the homes were washed away too. We first had to determine if the owners were alive and then find where they had been evacuated to." He said that finding out who a safe belonged to was the easy part as it usually contained bankbooks and other documents with names and addresses. One grateful resident, Torazo Chiba, 65, whose home was washed away by the tsunami said: "This has inspired me to try hard again."
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