See the Moment a Shark Appears to Pose for a Selfie With a Diver, and Crack the Same Huge Smile

By Good News Network
-Aug 11, 2021

SWNS

This is the moment a shark appears to pose for a selfie with a diver—and crack the same giant smile.

36-year-old William Drumm recently clicked the perfectly timed shot 20 miles off the coast of Isla Mujeres in Mexico.

Whale sharks often swim with their mouths open and William thought it would make a good shot to imitate them.


After a few tries, he managed to get the perfect image. The Coloradan explained said that whale sharks are “so amazing.” The largest sharks on the planet, they “are often swimming with their mouths open as they filter tiny plankton from the water.”

On Instagram he explained that there were “millions of fish eggs in the water, which is likely what attracts all of these sharks every year.

“A whale shark can consume 30,000 calories or more per day, feeding on some of the smallest prey imaginable!”

“They swim pretty fast, so it took me a few tries, but I think I got a few images that worked.

“I felt so excited and honored to share the water with so many of these beautiful behemoths.

The ocean is about to flip a switch that could permanently disrupt life on Earth: study

Matthew Rozsa, Salon
August 10, 2021

Earth (AFP Photo/NASA)

A massive Atlantic Ocean current system, which affects climate, sea levels and weather systems around the world, may be about to be fatally disrupted.

A new report in the journal Nature Climate Change describes how a series of Atlantic Ocean currents have reached "an almost complete loss of stability over the last century" as the planet continues to warm. The report, authored by Dr. Niklas Boers, specifically analyzes data on ocean temperature and salinity to demonstrate that their circulation has weakened over the past few decades. If current trends continue unabated, they may slow to a dangerous level or even shut down entirely.

The series of currents in question is known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC for short. The current system is sometimes likened to a series of conveyer belts: one "belt" flows north with warm water that, upon reaching the northern Atlantic, cools and evaporates, in the process increasing the salinity of water in that region. The saltier water becomes colder and heavier, sinking and flowing south to create a second "belt." Those two currents are in turn connected by other oceanic features in the Southern Ocean, the Labrador Sea and the Nordic Sea.

The study reinforces earlier scientific studies which found the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation system to be at its weakest in 1,600 years.

This so-called conveyer belt system has been in place for thousands of years or more, and ocean life is adapted to its rhythms. Indeed, AMOC, which scientists believe can slow down or turn off abruptly when temperatures increase, is also vital to maintaining humanity's way of life. If it shuts down, temperature will plummet in Europe while the number of storms increases; changing weather conditions will lead to food shortages in South America, India and Western Africa; and rising sea levels along the North American eastern seaboard will force millions to flee their homes. Considering that AMOC is already starting to decline, this is a serious threat that could radically alter our planet in a matter of mere decades.

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"This decline may be associated with an almost complete loss of stability over the course of the last century, and the AMOC could be close to a critical transition to its weak circulation mode," the analysis explains.

This is not the first troubling news which has emerged about AMOC. In February another study disclosed that AMOC could be weakened by 34% to 45% by the end of the century as Arctic ice and the Greenland Ice Sheet continue to melt. The new report, however, increases the growing sense of scientific alarm about AMOC's integrity.

"This work provides additional support for our earlier work in the same journal Nature Climate Change suggesting that a climate change-induced slowdown of the ocean 'conveyer belt' circulation already underway, decades ahead of schedule, yet another reminder that uncertainty is not our friend," Dr. Michael E. Mann, a distinguished professor of atmospheric science at Penn State University, wrote to Salon. "There are surprises in store, and they are likely to be unpleasant ones, when it comes to the climate crisis."

Cristian Proistosescu, an assistant professor at the University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign who studies climate dynamics and global warming consequences, was more measured in his assessment.

"If the worst-case scenario comes to pass — and that's a big if — we can certainly expect to see dramatic changes in climate in the far north of Europe," Proistosescu told Salon by email. He described a world in which Scandinavian winters are no longer mild, where precipitation patterns shift as far south as central Africa and in which other meteorological patterns alter radically. The worst case scenarios may be "somewhat unlikely," he added, noting that the majority of updated climate models predict a gradual deterioration over the 21st century rather than an abrupt showdown.

"The data we have is too short to say with any real confidence whether the collapse of the North Atlantic Overturning Circulation is truly imminent," Proistosescu concluded. "The question for me is how risk-averse should we be in the face of uncertainty, and how much do we want to avoid a high cost–low probability worst-case scenario? Given how high the costs would be, we should be fairly risk averse."

Not every climate expert is impressed with the new study's conclusions. Kevin Trenberth, who is part of the Climate Analysis Section at the US National Center for Atmospheric Research, told Salon by email that the new report is "a bunch of total BS. They do not refer to any of our publications about the Atlantic and what is going on there and they get it all wrong." He added that based on "the best and longe[st] record than they have, the N[orth] Atlantic is dominated by natural variability and they can not say anything about the longer term changes."

American atmospheric scientist Ken Caldeira also warned against overstating the situation with AMOC. He wrote to Salon that "it should also be noted that paleo-climate data indicates that a shut-down of the North Atlantic circulation may have more widespread consequences than is predicted by the climate models." The problem is that even our most sophisticated climate models do not contain enough details to be able to anticipate with certainty what is going to happen in our climate system.

Like Proistosescu, Caldeira urged erring on the side of being safe. "In this case, uncertainty means risk, and, because effects of our CO2 emissions are effectively irreversible, this risk should motivate a high degree of caution," he concluded.

How to bring justice for Palestinians
This paper explores the current state of affairs and potentially effective ways of bringing justice for Palestinians.

Dr Abdul Bari
August 11, 2021 

The current conflict in the ancient land of Palestine, with Jerusalem as the revered crown jewel of the three Abrahamic faiths, goes back to the dark years of World War 1 when Britain and France, two colonial powers of Europe, sowed the seeds of injustice in Palestine and the wider Arabian Peninsula.

Since then, and with the unconditional moral and material support for Israel from America, the Palestinians have been subjected to incomparable dispossession and ethnic cleansing in their own lands. But there are signs that the winds of change are blowing in the land and across the world in support of a just solution to this conflict.

This paper explores the current state of affairs and potentially effective ways of bringing justice for Palestinians.

Download the report here.

Wages rise in US as companies scramble for staff

Agence France-Presse
August 11, 2021

Help Wanted Sign (AFP)

An acute labor crunch amid the coronavirus pandemic is boosting US wages, with many large chains now paying $15 an hour, a minimum level long sought by Democrats and labor activists.

The disruption of Covid-19 has led to record job openings, but also millions of unemployed workers, some of whom dropped out of the labor force to stay home to take care of children.

But some workers have used the pandemic to retire or try to change careers.

Economists say that so far, the wage bump has not resulted in troubling inflation.

"For the first time since the late 1990s, low-wage workers have a little more leverage to demand higher pay," said David Cooper, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a progressive Washington think tank.

Facing a sudden jump in business as the US economy reopened, restaurants, retailers and other employers have struggled to fill open positions, and have boosted pay, and even offered signing bonuses or other perks to new workers.

Last week, pharmacy chain CVS became the latest big chain to announce plans to lift its minimum wage to $15 an hour, joining a group that already includes Target, Chipotle and Amazon, among others. The new policy will take effect at CVS in July 2022.

Walmart, the biggest private US employer, in late July announced it was dropping the $1-a-day fee for its employee education program. The initiative supplements wages at the giant retailer, which pays less than its much smaller rival Costco.
Inaction in Congress

The announcements comes as President Joe Biden's effort to win a significant boost to the federal minimum wage remains stalled in Congress.

Upon taking office, Biden sought to more than double the wage to $15 an hour from $7.25 where it has been for the last 12 years.

"What the Democrats could not accomplish, businesses are delivering to them because of pandemic effects," Rubeela Farooqi, chief US economist at High Frequency Economics, told AFP.

"There was so much opposition to a $15 minimum wage but companies have no choice right now but to pay up to attract/retain workers."

The competition for workers means average pay for supermarket and restaurant workers has now topped $15, according to an article in The Washington Post.

"Overall nearly 80 percent of US workers now earn at least $15 an hour, up from 60 percent in 2014," the newspaper said, while adding that a $15 average wage is different from a minimum wage and many workers still earn less.

The trend of rising wage pressure is expected to continue for some time. Companies surveyed by Willis Towers Watson expect to lift wages three percent in 2022, up from 2.7 percent this year.

Permanent change?

But experts do not believe the trend to necessarily endure beyond the pandemic.

"The structures of the US economy that have suppressed wage growth ... for decades haven't changed," Cooper said. "We should be careful not to conclude that this will be a long-term permanent change."
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Gregory Daco, chief US economist at Oxford Economics, said many of the companies boosting wages should also see a benefit.

"It's the people with the lowest salaries who are getting a raise and that usually means more of it goes to consumption," Daco said. "Whatever more the companies are giving to workers, they're likely to make up in higher sales."

Farooqi also expects the current period of wage hikes to end, noting the large number of unemployed workers.

"We do not expect a wage spiral that will feed into inflation," Farooqi said. "Wages are not likely to keep accelerating if businesses can find workers easily."

The next major update on inflation will come Wednesday with the consumer price index for July, which is expected to rise 0.5 percent after surging 0.9 percent in June.

Hourly wages rose 0.4 percent in July compared with June and 4.7 percent over the year-ago period, according to the Labor Department.

Jefferson coffee shop flooded with applications after raising wage to $15 an hour

By Andrew McGinn, Jefferson Herald

So, people don’t want to work, eh? Rich Osborne, owner of Greene Bean Coffee in Jefferson, has been inundated with applications after raising his starting wage to $15 an hour. “I’ve never seen a turnout like this to a job posting,” he said.By Andrew McGinn


JEFFERSON: Bold. Refreshing. Ethically sourced.


And that’s just the coffee shop owner.

Rich Osborne, who owns Greene Bean Coffee in downtown Jefferson with wife Reagan, said they “knew it was the right thing to do, the right direction to go” when they recently instituted a new starting wage for all employees: $15 an hour.

What they couldn’t foresee was how the move would upend the narrative that an ongoing labor shortage — one that has caused some businesses to limit hours — is the fault of people who “don’t want to work.”

The Osbornes in early July advertised their first opening for a full-time barista at the new wage of $15 an hour. On Monday, they received their 47th application.

No, that’s not a typo.

The applications, in fact, just keep pouring in. From all over. From Perry. Fort Dodge. Lake City.

“My jaw drops with every new one,” Rich Osborne, 45, confessed. “I can’t believe how many valid applications we’re getting.”

Sydney Roberts prepares a drink at Greene Bean Coffee. By raising its starting wages to $15 an hour, the local coffee shop has thrust itself into the debate about the cost of living and about whether the federal minimum wage should be much higher than the current $7.25 an hour.By Andrew McGinn

Before, Osborne explained, they might get between four and six applications for an opening.

“Two or three would be so poor quality,” he said, “they’d go to the trash.”

In the past, he’s even resorted to headhunting new employees.

With Iowa’s minimum wage still set at $7.25 an hour — a rate that went into effect on Jan. 1, 2008 — Osborne suspects he’s unlocked the secret to finding a wealth of quality applicants. So is it time for other businesses to wake up and smell the, well, you know?

“That’s why people don’t want to work,” Osborne said, pausing.

“For you.”

You know, there’s nothing quite like being roasted by a guy who roasts his own beans.

Customers are unlikely to notice the pricing change that enabled Osborne to bump his six existing employees (four of whom are full-time) up to $15 an hour. Coffee drinks such as lattes and mochas now cost a quarter more.

“We’re still one of the cheapest coffee shops out there,” he said.

The recent move thrusts the Osbornes and Greene Bean squarely into the center of an intense, often politicized debate about the cost of living and about whether the federal minimum wage should be much higher than the current $7.25 per hour.

“The (Facebook) posts we’ve made about wages are the only ones the Chamber hasn’t reshared,” Osborne observed. “There’s a lot to be said in silence.”

The federal minimum wage hasn’t been adjusted since July of 2009 — 12 years ago — when it was increased to $7.25 from $6.55. It’s the longest period in history without an increase, according to the UC Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education.

Only Congress can raise the federal minimum wage, which the president must then sign into law.

A majority of states — 30 to date, plus the District of Columbia — have a minimum wage higher than the federal minimum wage, according to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), and 45 localities have adopted minimum wages above even what their states mandate.

Iowa isn’t one of them.

In fact, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, of the six states bordering Iowa, only Wisconsin’s minimum wage is also set at the federal level of $7.25.

The next lowest is Nebraska, at $9. Illinois is highest, at $11.

Three neighboring states — Minnesota ($10.08), Missouri ($10.30) and South Dakota ($9.45) — have their minimum wage indexed for inflation, according to EPI, meaning they’re automatically adjusted annually for increases in prices.

In Iowa, on the other hand, outgoing Republican Gov. Terry Branstad in 2017 signed legislation into law that nullified local minimum wage ordinances in Johnson, Linn, Polk and Wapello counties, and preempts local governments from establishing a minimum wage higher than the state minimum wage.

To address the “severe workforce shortage” that has gripped the state’s employers this spring and summer, Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds instead took aim at pandemic-related unemployment benefits.

In her May announcement ending Iowa’s participation in federal unemployment benefit programs, effective June 12, Reynolds said extra pandemic-related payments to jobless individuals were “discouraging people from returning to work.”

Osborne, however, believes the pandemic did something to workers — it gave them leverage.

“We may be loyal to our jobs, but our jobs aren’t loyal to us,” he said, recalling how many employers nationally dumped their workers just days into the COVID-19 pandemic. “People maybe have discovered their worth.”

The Osbornes opened Greene Bean Coffee eight years ago, in part as a hedge against the unpredictable nature of modern work.

The Osbornes may have been in the vanguard of remote-workers when they decided to relocate to Jefferson from “overpriced” Colorado following RAGBRAI one year, but Rich Osborne is acutely aware that his other job as a senior support engineer for the tech giant Oracle isn’t guaranteed for life.

He’s already endured a couple of acquisitions in his tech career.

“They stopped giving away watches at 15 years,” he said. “I got a $20 gift certificate to Amazon.”

Osborne said raising starting wages at Greene Bean Coffee to $15 an hour has “been on our radar for a long time.” It was in 2012 that striking New York fast-food workers started the movement known as Fight for $15.

President Joe Biden campaigned last year on raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Opponents, though, are equally as vocal, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has warned that raising the federal minimum wage to $15 could result in as many as 3.7 million workers losing their jobs. The U.S. Chamber says it’s not opposed to raising the minimum wage — just not to $15.

The Economic Policy Institute counters that a single adult in any part of the U.S. needs an income of at least $31,200 — a job making $15 an hour — to achieve an adequate standard of living.

“I hope people realize that $15 an hour is only 30 grand a year,” Osborne said. “For what you’re asking them to do, even that doesn’t seem enough.”

He said he recently put the question to friends in Des Moines.

“If I offered you a job for $30,000 a year and not too many great benefits, would you take it?” he asked.

There were no takers, he said.

For what it’s worth, EPI points out that had the minimum wage been raised at the same pace as productivity growth since the late 1960s, the minimum wage would now be more than $20 an hour.

EPI also notes the public cost to a low federal minimum wage, citing data that nearly half (47 percent) of families in states without laws to raise the minimum wage to $15 rely on at least one public support program because they don’t earn enough — a cost to federal and state taxpayers of $107 billion a year.


Keygan Barber, a Greene Bean barista and the assistant manager, suspects that the state’s ongoing “labor shortage” is more of a wage shortage. “People have realized they don’t have to work for peanuts,” she said.By Andrew McGinn

Keygan Barber, the assistant manager at Greene Bean, said the “cost of living is way higher than $7.25.”

“Rent in town is higher than it should be,” she said. “It does not make sense for a town of 5,000.”

According to the Living Wage Calculator developed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), an adult in Greene County with no children needs to earn at least $13.55 an hour to make ends meet.

An adult in Greene County with one child, however, needs $29.05 an hour, according to the calculator, which is based on typical expenses in a given area.

As part of the application process, Osborne asks applicants to list their current wage.

“The amount of $7s I’m seeing,” he said, “is still pretty high.”

CRIMINAL CRYPTO CAPITALI$M

$600 million gone: The biggest crypto theft in history

A vulnerability in Poly Network allowed the thief to make off with the funds, the platform said Tuesday, begging the attacker to return the money.

By Brian Fung, CNN Business
Wed August 11, 2021



Washington (CNN Business)Hackers have stolen some $600 million in cryptocurrency from the decentralized finance platform Poly Network, in what it says is the largest theft in the industry's history.

A vulnerability in Poly Network allowed the thief to make off with the funds, the platform said Tuesday, begging the attacker to return the money.

"The amount of money you hacked is the biggest one in the defi history," Poly Network wrote in a letter to the attacker it posted to Twitter. "The money you stole are from tens of thousands of crypto community members... you should talk to us to work out a solution."

Poly Network urged other members of the cryptocurrency ecosystem to "blacklist" the assets coming from addresses used by the attacker to siphon away the funds — which included a mix of various coins including $33 million of Tether, according to Tether's CTO. The cryptocurrency exchange Binance said it was "coordinating with all our security partners to actively help." Poly Network links together the blockchains of multiple virtual currencies to create interoperability among them.

Following the hack, Poly Network established several addresses to which it said the attacker could return the money. And it appears the hacker is cooperating: As of 7:47 a.m. ET Wednesday, Poly Network said, it had received about $4.7 million back. It was not immediately clear who was behind the hack or why the money is being returned.

Regulators have increased their scrutiny of crypto platforms as investors pour billions of dollars into digital currencies. Senator Elizabeth Warren recently asked SEC Chair Gary Gensler to investigate the SEC's ability to oversee trading on crypto platforms.

In response, last week, Gensler said: "Right now, I believe investors using these platforms are not adequately protected."

Hackers return portion of record crypto heist haul

Agence France-Presse
August 11, 2021

Hacker over a screen with binary code. (Shutterstock)

A firm specializing in transferring cryptocurrency said Wednesday that hackers have sent back a portion of the digital loot from a record haul.

Poly Network fired off a tweet saying it had received about $4.8 million worth of the stolen assets back, hoping for more from the online heist potentially valued at more than $600 million.

Poly Network had put out a plea for the stolen Ethereum, BinanceChain and OxPolygon tokens to be shunned by traders running "wallets" for storing cryptocurrency.

"The amount of money you hacked is the biggest one in the defi history," Poly Network said Tuesday in a tweeted message to the thieves, using a reference to decentralized finance involving cryptocurrency.

"The money you stole are from tens of thousands of crypto community members."

The return of some of the digital loot came as cyber "white hat" security experts scrutinize the theft and track the thieves.

Blockchain system defense firm SlowMist valued the Poly Network heist at more than $610 million and put out word it is on the hacker's trail.

"The SlowMist security team has grasped the attacker's mailbox, IP, and device fingerprints through on-chain and off-chain tracking, and is tracking possible identity clues related to the Poly Network attacker," the company said in a blog post.

Poly Network threatened police involvement, but also offered the hackers the chance to "work out a solution."

The US Department of Justice and FBI did not respond to requests for comment.

"We are sorry to announce that #PolyNetwork was attacked" and assets transferred to hacker-controlled accounts, the company said in a series of tweets.

Poly Network posted online addresses used by the hackers, and called on "miners of affected blockchain and crypto exchanges to blacklist tokens" coming from them.

Poly Network did not reply to an AFP request for comment, but Twitter users echoed calculations valuing the hackers' haul at some $600 million.


As of the end of April, cryptocurrency thefts, hacks and fraud so far this year totaled $432 million, according to an analysis by CipherTrace.

"While this number may appear to be small when compared to previous years, a deeper look reveals an alarming new trend -- DeFi-related hacks now make up more than 60 percent of the total hack and theft volume," CipherTrace said in a posted report.

That compares to 2019, when defi hacks were virtually non-existent, according to CipherTrace.

Facebook bans dozens of accounts for engaging in an anti-vaccine campaign


The company found out that a Russian firm used hundreds of social media influencers to run a coordinated smear campaign against Western Covid-19 vaccines.

Facebook removed hundreds of anti-vaccine accounts after finding them linked to a Russian advertising agency.

“We removed 65 Facebook accounts and 243 Instagram accounts from Russia that we linked to Fazze, a subsidiary of a UK-registered marketing firm, whose operations were primarily conducted from Russia,” the social media platform said in a report on Tuesday.

“Fazze is now banned from our platform. This cross-platform operation targeted audiences primarily in India, Latin America, and to a much lesser extent the United States. We found this network after reviewing public reporting about an off-platform portion of this activity.”

Labelling the operation a “disinformation laundromat,” the social media network said the fake accounts have spread misinformation about Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines.

The move came after last month's BBC report revealed that influencers were offered money to spread false information about vaccines.

In May 2021, when a number of countries, including India, the United States, and others in Latin America, were reportedly discussing the emergency authorization of Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines, an anti-vaccine campaign targeting the two vaccines suddenly popped up, even sharing a fake AstraZeneca document to sully the company's reputation.

One influencer with more than 1.5 million subscribers on YouTube, Mirko Drotschmann, said he was asked to say that the death rate among people who had the Pfizer vaccine was almost three times more than the AstraZeneca jab.

Facebook stated this was the second wave of a collective disinformation campaign on Western vaccines, saying that the network carried out another campaign in November last year. One of the bizarre claims that came out of such campaigns was that the AstraZeneca vaccine can turn humans into chimpanzees.

Lower post text: “The vaccine was based on a chimpanzee gene from the company AstraZeneca.” (Facebook)

A Change.org online campaign targeting these vaccines followed, generating a debate amongst those who were concerned about the Covid-19

vaccine safety. The unfounded claims also appeared on Reddit and Medium. But despite hashtags and multiplatform efforts, the campaign failed to gain major traction.

“Some questions remain about aspects of this campaign — including who commissioned Fazze to run it — that would benefit from further research by the defender community,” the Facebook report said.

“Another question relates to how the 'hacked and leaked' document came into Fazze’s hands. As with any influence operation, understanding the motive behind leaks like these is key to putting the operation in context."

Weeding out manipulation from the public debate

It's not the first time Facebook banned accounts and pages collectively. The tech giant said it also removed 79 Facebook accounts, 13 Pages, eight groups, and 19 Instagram accounts in Myanmar that targeted domestic audiences and were linked to individuals associated with the Myanmar military in July this year.

Over the four years, the social network has been publishing its findings of what it calls a Coordinated Inauthentic Behaviour (CIB).

The social network also aims to eliminate Foreign Government Interference (FGI) and monitor if dodgy accounts and pages reappear on the website.

Although Facebook’s role in removing accounts spreading disinformation about vaccines was praised by health officials, the tech giant has often come under criticism for being selective in censoring or promoting the content.

The social media platform announced plans to hold politicians accountable for hate speech, as much as anyone else, in a decision originally aimed at “preventing outside interference” in the US elections.

In one incident, Facebook refused to take down a widely viewed ad that attacked US Representative Ilhan Omar with claims that she had links with Hamas, even though her office said it could lead to harassment and death threats. The claim offered no proof and is being denied by Omar.

The social media giant was also widely criticised for taking down millions of posts of Palestinians days after Israel attacked Gaza, killing 248 people, including 66 children. Users saw warnings that said their posts had violated hate speech rules but offered no further explanation. Facebook later came up with an easy excuse, saying the mass removal of posts was caused by a technical glitch.

Greek wildfires: Multinational force works to tame flare-ups


BY PETROS KARADJIAS AND NICHOLAS PAPHITIS ASSOCIATED PRESS
AUGUST 11, 2021 

An helicopter drops water over a fire in Galatsonas village on Evia island, about 184 kilometers (115 miles) north of Athens, Greece, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021. Hundreds of firefighters from across Europe and the Middle East worked alongside Greek colleagues in rugged terrain Wednesday to contain flareups of the huge wildfires that ravaged Greece's forests for a week, destroying homes and forcing evacuations. 

(AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis) LEFTERIS PITARAKIS AP

PEFKI, GREECE

Hundreds of firefighters from across Europe and the Mideast worked alongside their Greek colleagues in rugged terrain Wednesday, trying to contain flareups of the huge wildfires that have ravaged Greece's forests for a week, destroying homes and forcing thousands to evacuate.

The spread of the blazes has been largely halted, officials said, but fronts still burned on the large island of Evia and in Greece's southern Peloponnese region, where several homes were on fire, according to state ERT TV.

The fires broke out last week after Greece had just experienced its most protracted heatwave since 1987, leaving its forests tinder-dry. Other nearby nations such as Turkey and Italy faced similar searing temperatures and quickly spreading fires, while Spain and Portugal were on alert Wednesday for wildfires amid a heat wave forecast to last through Monday.



At the southern side of the Mediterranean Sea, wildfires in Algeria's mountains have killed 65 people, including 28 soldiers sent in to help, and three days of national mourning begin Thursday.

Worsening drought and heat – both linked to climate change – have also fueled wildfires this summer in the Western U.S. and in Russia's northern Siberia region. Scientists say there is little doubt that climate change from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas is driving more extreme events.

Greece's fire service said 900 firefighters, including teams from Poland, Romania, Cyprus, Ukraine, Serbia, Slovakia and Moldova, and 27 aircraft were working on Evia, Greece's second-largest island which is linked to the mainland by a bridge.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis spoke on the phone Wednesday with top officials from Ukraine, Qatar and Romania to “warmly thank them” for their contributions. The three countries sent 340 firefighters and 24 vehicles in response to Greece's appeal for help.

Evia's northern part, which has forests entwined with villages and small seaside resorts, has suffered the greatest damage, with an estimated 50,000 hectares (123,000 acres) lost and dozens of homes burned.

Retiree Maria Roga said although her house in Pefki, a village on Evia, was saved from the flames that burned a neighboring home, she still worries about flare-ups.

“I’m still afraid. I’m afraid,” she told The Associated Press on Wednesday. “(But) I can’t complain. I am very grateful, I am one of the lucky ones.”

Although most of Pefki's homes are intact, the village — whose name means pine tree — is now surrounded by ranks of blackened trees.

Some 600 firefighters from Greece, the Czech Republic, Britain, France and Germany were also deployed Wednesday near ancient Olympia and in Arcadia in the Peloponnese, assisted by 33 water-dropping aircraft — including two Russian Ilyushin Il-76s that can drop more than 40 tons at one go.

A massive fire that broke out last week north of Athens has been limited to a section of a national park on Mount Parnitha. Firefighters from France, Qatar, Kuwait and Israel were deployed there.

That fire only caused minimal damage to the former royal summer palace of Tatoi under Mount Parnitha, although the surrounding forest was largely destroyed, Greek culture officials said. A tiny number of the estate's 100,000 artifacts in storage was destroyed — which the culture ministry said had been “of small value and in poor condition.”

Despite the widescale destruction to forests, wildlife and livestock — and homes, although official estimates are not yet available — Greek authorities' policy of evacuating villages to protect lives has paid off. No residents or tourists were killed in the wildfires. One volunteer firefighter died last week and two have been hospitalized in serious condition with burns.

In contrast, a wildfire in 2018 killed 102 people near Athens.

The health ministry said Wednesday another three firefighters required treatment for respiratory problems and light burns suffered in the Arcadia fire.

Nevertheless, some locals criticized the evacuation policy, saying while it saved lives it sent away villagers who could have helped firefighters battle the flames. Others have complained that water-dropping planes and even ground forces were absent at crucial times.

On the outskirts of Kamatriades on Evia, residents cutting firebreaks through the forest said they had received no help in protecting their village.

“We need some help here, we need some help! We are fighting alone (for) seven days now,” said Dimitris Stefanidakis.

Greek officials say they did everything they could against the fire service's biggest-ever challenge. In eight days, authorities had to deal with 586 fires across the country, while heavy smoke from the fires often reduced visibility so much that water-dropping aircraft could not be deployed safely.

The causes of the blazes are under investigation, and authorities say that in at least one major blaze arson seems likely. Several people have been arrested.

The government has pledged a large compensation and reforestation program.

Big wildfires were also burning in Italy, which claimed two more lives Wednesday — bringing the overall toll this month to four. Authorities said a 77-year-old shepherd was found dead in the southern Calabria region. Reports said he was in a farmhouse where he had apparently sought refuge with his flock.

And a 30-year-old farmer died near Catania when he was crushed by his tractor while fighting a blaze. Last week in Italy, a woman and her nephew died of smoke inhalation as they tried to save the family olive grove.

In Turkey, firefighters worked Wednesday to extinguish a wildfire in the southwest Mugla province. At least eight people and countless animals have died in Turkey in more than 200 wildfires since July 28.

___

Paphitis reported from Kontias, Greece. Lefteris Pittarakis in Kamatriades, Greece, Frances D'Emilio in Rome and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed.


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A cross is seen atop of a Greek Orthodox chapel at a burnt forest after a wildfire in Pefki village on Evia island, about 189 kilometers (118 miles) north of Athens, Greece, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021. As the worst of Greece's massive wildfires were being tamed Tuesday, the country's civil protection chief defended the firefighting efforts, saying every resource was thrown into the battle against what he described as the fire service's biggest-ever challenge. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias) PETROS KARADJIAS AP

New species of “killer tobacco” found at Australian truck stop
by Liz Kimbrough on 11 August 2021

Found at truck stop in Australia, Nicotiana insecticida is the first wild tobacco species reported to kill insects.

The new tobacco does not appear to be carnivorous, but rather uses its sticky hairs to trap insects and protect itself from being eaten.

This sticky killer is one of seven newly named species of Nicotiana (wild tobacco) from Australia’s harsh, arid regions.

“The fact that we have only now found it,” said one of the researchers,“means that there are probably a lot more similarly interesting species out there to be found.”

At a truck stop along a Western Australian highway, researchers noticed an unfamiliar wild tobacco plant. Covered in sticky hairs, the plant appeared to be a mass grave for small insects — flies, gnats, and aphids, which met an untimely death in the tobacco’s fetid liquid armor.

After shepherding its seeds from the truck stop to the greenhouses of Kew Gardens in London for cultivation, scientists found that the second generation continued its murderous ways on foreign soil, making it the first wild tobacco species reported to kill insects.

The tobacco, previously unknown to science, has been named Nicotiana insecticida. Its description was published today in the journal Curtis’s Botanical Magazine.

Nicotiana insecticida, a wild tobacco newly named by science. Photo by Maarten Christenhusz

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Insects caught in the glandular hairs of Nicotiana insecticida. Photo by Maarten Christenhusz.

“Nicotiana insecticida demonstrates well the adage that ‘tobacco kills,’” Mark Chase, a scientist at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, said in a press release, “although in this case it is insects that become ensnared on its sundew-like glandular hairs and die.”

Because N. insecticida does not appear to be “eating” the insects like the sundew plant (Drosera spp.), which captures insects with sticky hairs and dissolves them for food, it is not considered carnivorous. The tobacco’s gooey glands, researchers believe, are simply there to protect the plant from being munched on, and are quite effective.

“Many plants have sticky glands, but generally they do not kill insects in such numbers,” Chase told Mongabay in an email. “Tomatoes (a relative of the tobaccos) have glands that trap and kill some insects, but not in these numbers and not so regularly.”

Nicotiana insecticida captures insects to protect itself from being eaten. Photo by Maarten Christenhusz.

The sticky killer tobacco is one of seven species of Nicotiana (wild tobacco) newly named by scientists from the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, Australia’s Curtin University, and the University of Vienna. These new plants were described following eight years of fieldwork in the Australian outback by Chase and Maarten Christenhusz, senior researcher at Plant Gateway Ltd., with offices in the U.K. and the Netherlands. Their research explores the way plants adapt to the harsh, arid conditions of Australia’s dry regions.

“The arid parts of Australia, which is most of the continent, have been thought of as almost barren with limited plant diversity, but in recent years these poorly studied areas have yielded many new and unusual species,” Chase said in a press release.

Along the salt lakes between the Western Australian wheat belt and the dry central region, scientists found Nicotiana salina (salty tobacco), and in the Northern Territory, Nicotiana walpa, named from the local Aboriginal word for wind (in Pitjantjatjara, the language of the Anangu people). The wind plant only grows after storms dampen the desert; otherwise, the seeds lay dormant in the soil.

“The fact that we have only now found [these species],” Chase told Mongabay, “means that there are probably a lot more similarly interesting species out there to be found.”

Nicotiana insecticida flower. Photo by Maarten Christenhusz.

Citation:

Chase, M. W., & Christenhusz, M. J. M. (2021). Nicotiana insecticida: Solanaceae. Curtis’s Botanical Magazine. doi:10.1111/curt.12402

Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay. Find her on Twitter: @lizkimbrough_

#FREEASSANGE

US government wins first appeal battle in fight to extradite Julian Assange


By Latika Bourke
August 12, 2021 — 

London: The US government has won the right to appeal key evidence that had successfully claimed Julian Assange should not be extradited to the US because he was a “very high” suicide risk.

The written evidence was given by Professor Michael Kopelman, who appeared for Assange during an extradition hearing last year which the WikiLeaks founder won.

A sketch of Julian Assange, left, as he appeared via video link at the High Court in London.

CREDIT:ELIZABETH COOK/PA

A judge ruled in January that Assange should not be extradited to the US to face criminal charges including breaking a spying law, accepting testimony that his mental health combined with Asperger’s Syndrome made him a suicide risk.

The US had already been given permission to appeal the January ruling on three grounds, but on Wednesday asked that the scope of it be expanded to include a reassessment of Kopelman’s expert evidence used to evaluate Assange’s risk of suicide.

In an appeal hearing before the High Court on Wednesday, the US government singled out the fact that Kopelman, despite giving his opinion on the risk of Assange dying by suicide, had omitted the fact that Assange had secretly fathered two children with his fiancee Stella Moris, with whom he formed a relationship while holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy.

“It is in my view arguable that Professor Kopelman did not act in accordance with his declaration and that the DJ [District Judge] erred in not taking that into account,” Lord Justice Timothy Holroyde, the judge in Wednesday’s ruling, said.

He said more “detailed and critical consideration” should have been given to the serving of a report which contained “misleading information” and “significant omissions”.

“To my mind, this goes more to the weight given to the evidence than to its admissibility,” he said.

Julian Assange’s partner Stella Moris outside the High Court on Wednesday.

CREDIT:AP
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The US government is arguing that Assange is capable of resisting suicide and in the High Court repeated its offer for the Australian to serve out any sentence in his home country rather than the US.

The full appeal will be heard on October 27 and 28.

Edward Fitzgerald QC, representing Assange, sought to comfort the Australian, whom he spoke to from the courtroom via a video link, after the decision.

“It’s only a preliminary ruling, it’s not the end of the line at all, just saying it’s arguable and we’ve at least got a clear idea of the case we’ve got to meet for the full hearing,” Fitzgerald told Assange.

Supporters gathered outside as the High Court heard a US appeal in the extradition case of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

CREDIT:GETTY IMAGES

The conversation was streamed to journalists reporting remotely and was supposed to have been private, but Fitzgerald repeatedly warned Assange that it was likely their discussion was being broadcast.

“I won’t say any more Julian or invite you to say too much because people might be listening in,” he said.

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Julian Assange will not be extradited to the US on espionage charges

But Assange said he could not comprehend the reasoning behind the decision. “I just don’t understand how ... an expert has a legal obligation to protect people from harm, my children in particular,” he said, an apparent reference to Kopelman’s decision to omit referring to Moris and their two children.

The 50-year-old had been expected to appear in person at the Royal Courts of Justice but instead appeared via a video link, seated on a sofa in a room at Belmarsh Prison where he has been imprisoned for almost two years.

He appeared dishevelled, his white hair straggly and grown out to the base of his neck. He wore a white shirt with the collar unbuttoned and a burgundy tie undone and hanging around his neck. His facemask covered only his mouth, leaving his nose exposed.

The US government is pursuing Assange for espionage, arguing he conspired with Chelsea Manning, then an army intelligence officer, to hack into government systems to steal three-quarters of a million secret and classified cables which his organisation WikiLeaks dumped, unredacted, online.

Assange says he is a whistleblower and journalist, but this was rejected by the judge overseeing his extradition hearing who said his actions went beyond that of a whistleblower.

US lawyers appeal UK decision to block Julian Assange extradition

By AP • Updated: 11/08/2021 -
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Supporters of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange hold up a banner as they protest, during the first hearing in the Julian Assange extradition appeal, at the High Court in London - Copyright Matt Dunham /AP

Lawyers acting on behalf of the U.S. government on Wednesday challenged a British judge’s decision to block the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to face espionage charges in the United States, arguing that assessments of Assange’s mental health should be reviewed.

The British judge, Vanessa Baraitser, ruled in January that Assange was likely to kill himself if held under harsh U.S. prison conditions. The U.S. government is appealing.

Clair Dobbin, a lawyer who represented U.S. authorities during a High Court preliminary hearing on Wednesday, argued that Assange does not meet the threshold of being “so ill” that he cannot resist harming himself.

She said a decision not to prosecute or extradite an individual would require “a mental illness of a type that the ability to resist suicide has been lost.” Assange's condition did not come close to being of that nature, and he has not made serious attempts on his life before, she argued.

She added that Assange “orchestrated one of the largest thefts of data in history."

On Wednesday, the 50-year-old Australian, wearing a dark face mask, listened in by video link from London’s high-security Belmarsh prison, where he has been held since 2019.

Outside the court, Assange’s partner, Stella Moris, described him as an “innocent man accused of practising journalism.”


“For every day that this colossal injustice is allowed to continue, Julian’s situation grows increasingly desperate,” Moris, who has two young children with Assange, told his supporters and reporters.

“Julian has been denied the love and affection of his family for so long. Julian and the kids will never get this time back. This shouldn’t be happening," she added.

Julian Assange: WikiLeaks founder denied bail by UK court due to continued concerns he could abscond

What is WikiLeaks? What did Julian Assange do? Why does the US want to extradite him?

A group of protesters, including Jeremy Corbyn, the former leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, held placards reading “Journalism is not a crime” and shouted “Free Julian Assange!” to the beat of a drum as police looked on.

U.S. prosecutors have indicted Assange on 17 espionage charges and one charge of computer misuse over WikiLeaks’ publication of thousands of leaked military and diplomatic documents a decade ago. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison.

In January, Baraitser, the district judge, accepted evidence from expert witnesses that Assange had a depressive disorder and an autism spectrum disorder. She agreed that U.S. prison conditions would be oppressive, saying there was a “real risk” he would be sent to the Administrative Maximum Facility in Florence, Colorado, the highest security prison in the U.S.

But she rejected defence arguments that Assange faces a politically motivated American prosecution that would override free-speech protections. She said the U.S. judicial system would give him a fair trial.

Supporters and lawyers for Assange argue that he was acting as a journalist and is entitled to First Amendment protections of freedom of speech for publishing documents that exposed U.S. military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Lawyers for the U.S. government, however, have said the case is largely based on "his unlawful involvement” in the theft of the diplomatic cables and military files by U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning.

Assange was arrested in London in 2010 at the request of Sweden, which wanted to question him about allegations of rape and sexual assault made by two women. In 2012, Assange jumped bail and sought refuge inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he remained holed up for the next seven years.

Ecuador withdrew the asylum it had granted him in 2019 and he was then immediately arrested for breaching bail. Sweden dropped the sex crimes investigations in November 2019 because so much time had elapsed.

Dobbin, presenting the U.S. government, said Wednesday that the need to scrutinize January's ruling was “substantially increased” given the “extraordinary lengths” Assange had already gone to in order to avoid extradition.

“He was willing to break the law and no cost was too great, both in terms of the cost of policing his being in the embassy and of course the cost to himself,” she said.

A decision was not expected Wednesday.

NASA’s new space suits are delayed, making a 2024 Moon landing ‘not feasible’

The agency’s lunar-grade astronaut suits are behind schedule, an inspector general report says

By Joey Roulette Aug 10, 2021

The person in the white suit is wearing a prototype of NASA’s new xEMU in 2019, whose development has been delayed, an inspector general report found. 

Photo by Joel Kowsky / NASA via Getty Images


NASA’s development of new astronaut space suits will be nearly two years late and nix its effort to land humans on the Moon by 2024, an inspector general report released on Tuesday found. Those delays compound a daunting set of schedule challenges NASA already faces — from the development of its new human-rated lunar lander to getting its massive Space Launch System rocket off the ground.

An audit from the agency’s Office of Inspector General said NASA is on track to spend more than $1 billion on space suit development by the time its first two suits are ready, which would be “April 2025 at the earliest,” the report said. “Given these anticipated delays in spacesuit development, a lunar landing in late 2024 as NASA currently plans is not feasible.”

NASA is trying to return astronauts to the surface of the Moon for the first time since 1972 under its Artemis program that was spawned by the Trump administration in 2019. The program, as set by former Vice President Mike Pence, called for a crewed lunar landing in 2024 — a deadline that President Biden’s transition team deemed unrealistic. But NASA continues to embrace the date, with administrator Bill Nelson insinuating delays are likely because “space is hard.”

NASA’S SPACE SUIT DESIGN HAS CHANGED WITH SHIFTING SPACE PRIORITIES, DRIVING UP COSTS AND DELAYS

NASA has already spent $420 million on space suit development since 2007, before the advent of its Artemis program, and it plans to “invest approximately $625.2 million more” through 2025, the report said. The space suit’s design and purpose have changed repeatedly over the years as NASA’s priorities in space teeter between new administrations. A new Artemis-tailored space suit design, called xEMU, was unveiled in 2019. Current suits worn by astronauts on the International Space Station are restrictive, haven’t been upgraded in decades, and aren’t designed for long walks on the Moon.

The xEMU program anticipated development delays by allotting 12 months of wiggle room on its path to meet the 2024 Artemis deadline. But that schedule margin has already disappeared after NASA ran into funding shortfalls, closures to NASA centers during the COVID-19 pandemic, and more technical challenges, the report found. NASA slashed the space suit program’s planned $209 million budget by $59 million after Congress gave the agency 77 percent of what it requested for its Gateway Program in 2021, under which space suits are developed. That set the program back three months, the report said.

NASA space suit engineer Kristine Davis models a prototype of the agency’s new lunar space suit in 2019. Photo by Xinhua / Liu Jie via Getty Images

Intermittent closures to NASA’s Johnson Space Center during the pandemic caused at least three more months of delays, the report said. Then there were the hardware problems. Design upgrades and other changes caused production issues with the suit’s Display and Control Unit — the screen astronauts will use to control the suit’s critical functions. Circuit boards within a key part of the suits’ life support system, needed “rework” to ensure communications between the suit and the astronaut — and other astronauts — worked right.

The program was hit with another delay when NASA halted testing for the suit’s assembly process. The team caused an unspecified “component failure” after “staff used the wrong specifications to build a complicated” life support system interface. When auditors interviewed NASA personnel about this flub, they blamed schedule pressure, among other issues. Additional factors included “a communication breakdown among the team” and the team’s rapid growth, “including the addition of inexperienced personnel.” An “unreleased drawing” and old hardware used during tests were also to blame, personnel told auditors.

Currently, 27 different entities are pitching in to build different parts of the space suit, the report notes. NASA previously contracted with just two companies, Hamilton Standard and ILC Dover, to build the space suits it currently uses on the ISS.

“Seems like too many cooks in the kitchen,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk opined on Twitter in response to the news, adding in another tweet: “SpaceX could do it if need be.” It’s unclear whether SpaceX has an active space suit development program; government astronauts who have flown the company’s Crew Dragon capsule wear SpaceX-designed flight suits, not long-duration space suits. Some private companies are already planning to design their own space suits, including Axiom Space, which, this month, posted new jobs for space suit engineers.

NASA’s space suit woes aren’t the only threat to its 2024 goal. The agency’s inspector general, Government Accountability Office, and NASA’s aerospace safety panel have all expressed concern that development delays in NASA’s human lunar lander and Space Launch System programs — the core organs of the Artemis program — will make a 2024 landing nearly impossible, with the safety panel raising fears that the hastened landing date could lead to schedule pressure among engineers.

In response to the report, NASA’s human exploration chief Kathy Lueders said the agency plans to rejig its space suit development schedule and carry out a space suit test on the ISS by June 2022, before the first crewed Artemis mission poised for sometime in 2023. For that mission, astronauts will fly around the Moon in NASA’s Orion capsule without a lunar landing. The next mission, Artemis III, will have the Moon landing.

“Demonstration and testing of [the space suits] on ISS are a priority,” Lueders said.

Elon Musk offers for SpaceX to make NASA spacesuits, after watchdog says program to cost $1 billion (PER SUIT!!)

PUBLISHED TUE, AUG 10 2021
Michael Sheetz@THESHEETZTWEETZ

KEY POINTS

Elon Musk offered SpaceX’s services to help NASA make its next-generation spacesuits.

His proposal came in response to a report by NASA’s inspector general on the work being done to develop a new line of Extravehicular Mobility Units, which are informally called spacesuits.

NASA has spent more than $420 million on spacesuit development since 2007 but, even with another $625 million in spending planned, the inspector general report found that the spacesuits for the agency’s lunar missions will “not be ready for flight until April 2025 at the earliest.”

Kristine Davis, a spacesuit engineer at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, wears a ground prototype of the new Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU), during a demonstration on Oct. 15, 2019.
Joel Kowsky / NASA

Elon Musk offered SpaceX’s services to help NASA make its next-generation spacesuits, after a watchdog report on Tuesday said the agency’s current program is behind schedule and will cost more than $1 billion.

“SpaceX could do it if need be,” Musk wrote in a tweet.

Musk’s company has developed and made flight suits for astronauts who launch into orbit in SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft. The flight suits are primarily designed to protect the astronauts in case of a fire inside of the spacecraft, or if the cabin depressurizes. Building spacesuits would be a more complex and challenging endeavor, given the need to survive outside of a spacecraft in the harsh environment of space.

NASA spokesperson Monica Witt, in a statement to CNBC on Musk’s offer, pointed to the agency’s request last month to companies in the space industry for feedback on “purchasing commercial spacesuits, hardware, and services.”

From left: Mission specialist Thomas Pesquet of the ESA, pilot Megan McArthur of NASA, commander Shane Kimbrough of NASA, and mission specialist Akihiko Hoshide of JAXA.
SpaceX

Musk’s proposal came in response to a report by NASA’s inspector general – which is the investigative office which audits the agency for fraud and mismanagement – on the work being done to develop a new line of Extravehicular Mobility Units, which are informally called spacesuits.

Astronauts on board the International Space Station use spacesuits “designed 45 years ago for the Space Shuttle” program, the report noted. The IG also highlighted that those spacesuits have been “refurbished and partially redesigned” over the past decades to continue working.

The space agency has started three different spacesuit programs since 2007, the inspector general found, and has spent $420.1 million on development since then. Additionally, the report said NASA “plans to invest approximately $625.2 million more” on development, testing and qualification to complete a suit for a demonstration on the ISS and two suits for the crewed mission to the moon – for a total cost of “over $1 billion” through 2025.

NASA Inspector General


Beyond the soaring cost, the inspector general said delays “attributable to funding shortfalls, COVID-19 impacts, and technical challenges” have eliminated the chance the spacesuits are ready in time. The spacesuits will “not be ready for flight until April 2025 at the earliest,” the report said. NASA originally said the spacesuits would be ready by March 2023.

NASA needs new spacesuits for its Artemis program, which was announced by former President Donald Trump’s administration and has continued under President Joe Biden. Artemis is expected to consist of multiple missions to the moon’s orbit and surface in the years ahead, with NASA aiming to land astronauts on the lunar body by 2024. Although NASA has stuck to the 2024 goal, the inspector general has warned repeatedly that the schedule is threatened by several major programs that are key to Artemis’ success.

Musk earlier this year called the 2024 timeline “actually doable,” after SpaceX became one of the critical pieces of Artemis by winning a $2.9 billion contract to use its Starship rocket to deliver astronauts to the moon’s surface.

The spacesuits have a multitude of different components, which the inspector general noted are supplied by 27 different companies. That’s a point Musk also highlighted, saying in a tweet that it “seems like too many cooks in the kitchen.”

SpaceX did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment on whether the company has begun work on its own spacesuits. While the company hasn’t publicly disclosed spacesuit plans, it is one of nearly 50 companies that expressed interest in NASA’s program to purchase privately developed spacesuits and spacewalk services.