Analysis: Scientists look to solve ozone threat to Africa's food security

By Gloria Dickie - Yesterday


Plant ecophysiologist Felicity Hayes places a damaged leaf of a Silver Birch tree inside a LI-COR analyser at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology research site near Bangor

© Reuters/PHIL NOBLE

ABERGWYNGREGYN, Wales (Reuters) - Plant scientist Felicity Hayes checks on her crops inside one of eight tiny domed greenhouses set against the Welsh hills. The potted pigeon pea and papaya planted in spring are leafy and green, soon to bear fruit.


A wheat sample exposed to increased levels of Ozone is seen at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology research site near Bangor

© Reuters/PHIL NOBLE

In a neighbouring greenhouse, those same plants look sickly and stunted. The pigeon pea is an aged yellow with pockmarked leaves; the papaya trees reach only half as tall.

The only difference between the two greenhouse atmospheres - ozone pollution.

Hayes, who works at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (UKCEH), is pumping ozone gas at various concentrations into the greenhouses where African staple crops are growing. She is studying how rising ozone pollution might impact crop yields - and food security for subsistence farmers - in the developing world.


Spatial data analyst Katrina Sharps examines a wheat crop that has been exposed to increased levels of Ozone inside a solar dome at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology research site near Bangor

© Reuters/PHIL NOBLE

Ozone, a gas formed when sunlight and heat interact with fossil fuel emissions, can cause substantial losses for farmers, research suggests, by quickly aging crops before they reach full production potential and decreasing photosynthesis, the process by which plants turn sunlight into food.


Plant ecophysiologist Felicity Hayes monitors the level of Ozone being added to solar domes at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology research site near Bangor

© Reuters/PHIL NOBLE

Ozone stress also reduces plants' defences against pests.

A 2018 study in the journal Global Change Biology estimated global wheat losses from ozone pollution totalled $24.2 billion annually from 2010 to 2012.

In a January paper published in Nature Food, researchers tallied some $63 billion in wheat, rice and maize losses annually within the last decade in East Asia.

Scientists are particularly worried about Africa, which will see more vehicle traffic and waste burning as the population is set to double by mid-century.

That means more ozone pollution, a major challenge for smallholder farmers who make up 60% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa.

"There is a serious concern that ozone pollution will affect yields in the long run," said senior scientist Martin Moyo at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics in Zimbabwe.


Damage is seen on the leaf of a Silver Birch tree exposed to increased levels of Ozone at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology research site near Bangor

© Reuters/PHIL NOBLE

He called out an "urgent need for more rural studies to determine ozone concentrations" across the continent.

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Earlier this year, scientists with the UK-based non-profit Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI) set up ozone monitoring equipment around cocoa and maize fields in Ghana, Zambia and Kenya.

But most African countries do not have reliable or consistent air pollution monitors, according to a 2019 UNICEF report. Among those that do, few measure ozone.

RISING OZONE

In the stratosphere, ozone protects the Earth from the sun's ultraviolet radiation. Closer to the planet's surface, it can harm plants and animals, including humans.

While air quality regulations have helped reduce ozone levels in the United States and Europe, the trend is set to spike in the opposite direction for fast-growing Africa and parts of Asia.

Climate change could also speed things along.

In areas of Africa with high fossil fuel emissions and frequent burning of forests or grassland, new research suggests hotter temperatures could make the problem worse as they can accelerate chemical reactions that create ozone.

While research has found North American wheat is generally less impacted by ozone than European and Asian counterparts, there have been fewer studies on African versions of the same crops that over decades of cultivation have been made more suitable to those environments.

Once every two weeks in a Nairobi market, farmers from the countryside bring samples of their ailing crops to a "plant doctor" in hopes of determining what is affecting their yields.

"A lot of (ozone) symptoms can be confused with mites or fungal damage," said CABI entomologist Lena Durocher-Granger. "Farmers might keep applying fertilizer or chemicals thinking it's a disease, but it's ozone pollution."

Her organization is working with UKCEH to help people identify signs of ozone stress and recommend fixes, such as watering less on high ozone days. Watering can leave leaf pores wide open, causing plants to take in even more ozone.

RESILIENT CROPS

In her Welsh greenhouses, Hayes was exposing crops in one dome to the lowest amount - 30 parts per billion - similar to the environment of North Wales. In the dome with the highest ozone level, plants were receiving more than triple that amount, mimicking North Africa's polluted conditions.

Hayes and her colleagues have found that certain African staples are more affected than others.

In a dome filled with a mid-level amount of ozone, North African wheat plants had quickly turned from green to yellow within just a few months.

"You get tiny thin grains that don't have all the good bits in them, a lot of husk on the outside and not as much protein and nutritional value," Hayes said.

That fits with research her team published last year on sub-Saharan plant cultivars, which found that ozone pollution could be lowering sub-Saharan wheat yields by as much as 13%.

Dry beans could fare worse, with estimated yield losses of up to 21% in some areas, according to the same study, published in Environmental Science and Pollution Research.

"Beans are a useful protein source in Africa, and subsistence farmers grow a lot of it," said Katrina

Sharps, a UKCEH spatial data analyst.

Sub-Saharan millet, however, seemed more ozone tolerant. Yet Africa produced about half as much millet as wheat in 2020.

"If the soil and growing conditions are suitable," Sharps said, "subsistence farmers may consider growing more millet."

(Reporting by Gloria Dickie; Editing by Katy Daigle, Marguerita Choy and Bill Berkrot)

Jamaica’s labour minister responds to workers’ claims of abuse at Canadian farms

Jamaica’s minister of labour and social security is refuting migrant workers’ claims that Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program (SAWP) is akin to “systemic slavery.”

Earlier this month, Jamaican farm workers in Ontario sent a letter to Minister Karl Samuda detailing abysmal living and working conditions on two farms he was set to tour days later. The letter urged Jamaica to lobby Canada to grant seasonal workers permanent resident status to address the precarity of being tied to an employer who can fire and deport workers at any time.

Nearly two weeks after visiting the farms, Samuda’s office released a statement responding to the letter that painted a different picture.

“While the conditions varied from farm to farm, the housing conditions ranged from good to excellent,” Samuda said. “We observed no evidence of mistreatment.”

He added that “it is not appropriate for the government of a democratic country to lobby another to grant its people permanent residency.”

An average of 10,000 Jamaicans participate in SAWP each year, a majority of whom are returning workers, said Samuda. He called the program “essential” to thousands of Jamaican families, rural communities and the entire country.

“I cannot see persons enthusiastically participating in a [program] for 35 years under the conditions which are now being asserted,” his statement reads.

The conditions he refers to were described in the farm workers’ letter as crowded and surveilled living quarters, insufficient food, physical intimidation and verbal threats from bosses, punishments for “not working fast enough” and exposure to dangerous pesticides.

It is important to protect the rights of farm workers and safeguard the program, said Samuda.

The anonymous workers who wrote to Samuda with their grievances say they feel “betrayed” by his response, according to a press release from Migrant Workers Alliance for Change. They said their bosses threatened to shut down the farm after their appeal to the minister garnered media attention.

The Jamaican government employs liaison officers based in Canada to safeguard the interests of workers and address any challenges they experience, Samuda’s statement noted. The liaison service collaborates with Canadian authorities to investigate reports of mistreatment and relocate workers if needed, it added.

In their letter to Samuda, Jamaican workers said liaison officers do not respond to their calls for help, or worse, side with the bosses and make it difficult for them to be rehired next season.

The minister’s message is clear: migrant workers can’t look to the authorities for help; they must protect themselves, the workers’ statement said.

Foreign workers have the same rights to workplace protections as Canadians and permanent residents under applicable federal, provincial and territorial employment standards and collective agreements, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) communications officer Jeffrey MacDonald told Canada’s National Observer in an emailed statement. Along with reporting mistreatment to provincial and territorial labour authorities — which establish labour and workplace safety standards for all workers — tips can be reported to Service Canada.

As of June 2019, foreign workers with an employer-specific work permit can apply for an open work permit if they are being mistreated by their current employer, which allows them to find work on another farm, MacDonald said.

When this happens, the worker’s former place of work is inspected and employers found breaking program rules can be fined or banned from hiring foreign workers.

“Tens of thousands of temporary workers transition to permanent status each year,” the IRCC statement said, noting: “Of the 406,000 foreign nationals who became permanent residents in 2021, nearly 169,000 of them transitioned from worker status.”

The department said it will continue to explore methods to improve the process of transitioning foreign nationals from temporary status to permanent residency.

Despite Samuda’s response, migrant workers will continue to organize and push for permanent residency “to combat these abusive bosses so they have less power to threaten us and our families,” the authors of the letter said.

“The agri-food industry in Canada exported C$82.2 billion worth of goods, which is four times the GDP of Jamaica,” Syed Hussan, executive director of the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, said in a press release. “It is no surprise that the Jamaican government has turned to exporting people for the sake of remittances, and takes the side of exploitative bosses instead of workers.”

Natasha Bulowski, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Canada's National Observer

UAP

Video Of Mysterious Drone Swarm Over Navy's Most Advanced Destroyer Released

Adam Kehoe and Marc Cecotti - Yesterday

The U.S. Navy has released a new video from an incident that involved six unidentified drones flying over its most advanced surface combatant, the USS Zumwalt. The incident occurred in the waters off the coast of Southern California in April 2019.

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Video Of Mysterious Drone Swarm Over Navy's Most Advanced Destroyer Released© USN via FOIA

The War Zone received the video via the Freedom of Information act as part of our ongoing investigation into reports of drone swarm incidents that occurred near Navy vessels intermittently throughout 2019 off Southern California. Our previous update in the investigation produced a number of briefing documents, including an unclassified video and photographs that provided a significant increase in detail about these strange incidents. While the bulk of the drone swarm events occurred in July of 2019, we learned of several new events that occurred earlier in the year. Among these was the incident involving the USS Zumwalt.

The incident occurred at approximately 8:30 PM Pacific Time on April 24th 2019, around 17 nautical miles from the Marine Corps base at Camp Pendleton in international waters. During the event, the USS Zumwalt reported that as many as six unknown unmanned aerial systems (UAS) were seen operating nearby at altitudes ranging from 300 to 1000 feet. At one point in the incident, the UAS reportedly crossed over the deck of the USS Zumwalt. As in similar past incidents, the drones were documented by the Ship Nautical Or Otherwise Photographic Interpretation and Exploitation team, or "SNOOPIE team." These sailors essentially act to document dangerous, uncertain, or unusual situations using a variety of commercial-grade cameras.

You can view the newly obtained footage from the incident and listen to a sailor’s accompanying narration here:



A briefing slide and photograph from the incident was previously published by The War Zone, and is shown again below


US Navy via FOIA

It should be noted that the USS Zumwalt (DDG-1000) is a unique vessel as the lead ship in its class of controversial, but technologically advanced stealthy surface combatants. The ship's stealth technology is designed to allow it to be more survivable than other destroyers, including being able to operate closer to enemy territory during certain operations.

Detailed analysis of the low-resolution video is difficult given that it was taken at night. While unclassified records released to the public tend to be underwhelming, it is likely that the USS Zumwalt had access to a range of sophisticated sensors during the incident.

The only clear feature in the video is a set of several lights in a rectangular formation. The lights appear to be white and green, with an intermittently blinking red light presumed to be in the center of the object. A sailor comments that the UASs do not appear to be armed in the narration.

For further analysis, we spoke with David Kovar, CEO of URSA Inc. Kovar’s firm specializes in drone security issues, including criminal investigations and UAV threat management. Kovar stated that “I’m unable to determine much of the configuration of the aircraft. It appears to have four regularly spaced running, or navigation lights.”

Kovar stated that given the context of the narration and the briefing slide, the object could be a “multi-rotor, likely a quad, UAV with running lights.” However, he noted that this assessment is based on a typical configuration of quadcopter lights. He stated that while the video could match other objects, as well, given the lack of detail in the video, it appears consistent with the description of a UAS in the narration and the briefing slide. Of course, other potential types exist, including smaller gasoline-powered fixed-wing types that pack long ranges or hybrid types that can takeoff and land vertically but are more efficient in forwarding flight with the help of a pusher propeller and wing-like appendages. The latter has become a favorite of the Chinese Navy.

A former drone industry analyst who declined to be named due to their current employment highlighted several other features of interest. The analyst commented that “while the video isn't of the best quality, I don't see anything on the drone that would make me think it's something that couldn't be purchased off the shelf from a current commercial drone manufacturer.” The analyst added, “the fact that the narrator said that there was a pattern of flight where there were no changes in altitude tells me that the drones were either programmed to fly a certain route or controlled from a distance while possibly on altitude hold, which to me isn't the hallmark of any advanced technology.”

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Video Of Mysterious Drone Swarm Over Navy's Most Advanced Destroyer Released© Provided by The Drive

They further commented, “what is interesting is that they reported 6 drones and they were 17 miles off the coast of Southern California. This tells me that these drones were likely launched from a boat and that this was likely a planned 'mission' because no one has 6 drones on a boat for recreational purposes.” The analyst further stated that physically capturing the drone “is really the only way a forensic assessment can be made to determine the origin and capabilities associated with an [unidentified] drone.”

The observation of bright lights on unidentified UAS has been a recurring feature in several of the other drone swarm incidents we have investigated. In a previous interview, DroneSec CEO Mike Monnik told The War Zone that his firm’s database of drone incidents has registered an uptick in swarm events, and that in some cases less capable drones are used as “canaries” that intentionally distract or probe the defense of a potential target. There is also a long Cold War history of technologies designed to intentionally stimulate air defense systems in order to capture valuable signals intelligence, which you can read more about here.

As in the other drone swarm cases from this general area and timeframe, several key questions remain unanswered. Based on the briefing slide above, we have reached out to Carrier Strike Group Nine to inquire if the operator of the drones was ever positively identified, or if any effort was made to track the drones to their ultimate destination. They have not responded at the time of writing. The Chief of Naval Operations Michael Gilday previously stated that the Navy did not get to the bottom of similar incidents that occurred in the same region later in the same year. In a congressional hearing earlier this year, representatives of the Navy and Department of Defense explained that several of the incidents were in fact related to drone swarms, but did not offer further details.



Video Of Mysterious Drone Swarm Over Navy's Most Advanced Destroyer Released© Provided by The Drive

While details about these incidents have been difficult to come by, drone swarms are becoming a general area of increasing interest for the Navy. Just in the last month, the Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division ran an event called “Silent Swarm 22.” Conducted at ranges with the Michigan National Guard's National All-Domain Warfighting Center, this was a “large scale experimentation event” that brought together over 150 participants to focus on “Electromagnetic Warfare (EW) employed on small multi-domain unmanned systems (UxS).”

Notably, the logo, seen below, for the event depicts a warship surrounded by a web and a swarm of various fixed-wing and rotor-wing drones. Reflections of the drones can be seen in the water, perhaps a nod to the “multi-domain” reference and the more inclusive UxS acronym in the event’s description.

Michigan National Guard

This is just one of a number of major Navy exercises focusing on unmanned systems, and those efforts are only accelerating and have been for years

While the Navy focuses on forward-looking efforts to employ drone swarms, it is not the only player in this space. The string of drone swarm incidents throughout 2019 demonstrates that surveillance of key naval assets is being conducted in the areas where they train – often within miles of the American coast. Drone swarms are not a theoretical emerging technology threat, but rather a present tense reality. U.S. adversaries are openly developing and deploying these capabilities and all indications point to the fact that networked swarms of lower-end drones will be absolutely critical to prevailing in future high-end maritime conflicts.

The inherent difficulty of reliably detecting, tracking, and countering drones has created a unique challenge for the Pentagon in recent years. In fact, it is among the department’s biggest tactical and strategic concerns. The often ambiguous footage from incidents has led to an overlap of the drone issue with longstanding cultural interest in UFOs – a dilemma that The War Zone has reported on for some time. Disambiguating drone surveillance incidents from headier claims appears to be a priority of lawmakers, though it remains to be seen how the Department of Defense will make such distinctions in practice.

Perhaps more importantly, it remains to be seen how effective the Navy and Department of Defense will be in investigating and resolving these incidents in an era when once considered highly advanced drone technology is becoming increasingly sophisticated and accessible.

7 bears euthanized in Crowsnest Pass following human interactions

As the hot weather dries out their food supply, bears in southwestern Alberta are making their way into communities within the Crowsnest Pass.


A screengrab from a video in Blairmore resident Lisa Sygutek's backyard.

© Courtesy: Crowsnest Pass Herald

Eloise Therien - Yesterday 

And people are feeding them -- either intentionally, or by accident.

"The problem with that is we take these wild animals and we turn them into habituated animals that pose a threat to public safety and security," explained Christy Pool, the president of the Crowsnest Pass BearSmart Association.

Read more:
Jasper National Park warns of grizzly bears wandering into townsite

Things like leaving garbage bins out overnight, neglecting to bring pet food inside or leaving fallen tree fruit in the open can lead to the death of a wild animal, according to Pool.

"It is so important to consider your actions and the effect that they have all the way down the line," she pleaded.

"It's just such a simple thing to keep things clean and food contained and garbage contained."

According to Pool, seven bears in Blairmore and Frank were euthanized within a two-day period this week after they became too accustomed to being fed within the community.

"Over the years, I think it's usually maybe one, maybe two (bears)," she said.

Video: Advocates say 7 bears euthanized in Crowsnest Pass is ‘unacceptable’

Lisa Sygutek is a frustrated resident of Blairmore, Alta. She said she is no stranger to wildlife, having encountered numerous bears on hikes and deer on her property. She tries to keep her area very bear safe.

However, over the last several days, a bear in her yard was a cause for concern.

"This is the first year where it's been abnormal for me," Sygutek explained.

She posted a video to Facebook showing the animal up a tree in her backyard. She said at one point it had two cubs with it.

"This is the first time a bear has looked at me and not been scared -- at all."

While Sygutek lives extremely close to a mountain, advocates believe due diligence is needed for all kinds of residents and visitors.

Residents of Radium Hot Springs rally to save bighorn sheep from death on the highway

"It's something we can avoid," said former environment and forestry worker Darryl Johnson. "Whether you're a full-time resident here, a part-time resident here (or) a visitor here, understand that this is a community embedded in the mountains."

Johnson added that he believes the loss of so many bears in such a short period is "unacceptable."

According to Pool, a local wildlife peace officer has issued fines related to people contravening municipal bylaws related to feeding wildlife and leaving attractants out.

"I do know that fines have been levied this year, it's just whether or not people take it seriously is the other part of it," Pool said.

More information on bear encounters, attractants and deterrents can be found on the BearSmart website.

Edmonton and area to mark International Overdose Awareness Day on Wednesday

Anna Junker -  Yesterday -Edmonton Journal


Rhonda Pouliot will be attending her first International Overdose Awareness Day on Wednesday.


Participants in International Overdose Awareness Day march through Edmonton on Aug. 31, 2021.

Her 34-year-old son, Chris Shea, died on April 12 of this year, six days after he experienced an overdose and was admitted to the intensive care unit at the Misericordia Hospital.

“I’m on my own healing journey right now. I’m trying to make sense of what happened in a situation where there is no sense,” Pouliot said. “I want to feel connected to other people who have experienced something similar.”

Shea had been using drugs since he was 19. He had been attending 12-step treatment programs and focused on going to the gym when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and he could no longer attend in person.

“That’s when things started to go downhill,” said Pouliot. Shea relapsed in February and wasn’t able to get a spot in treatment until April 9.

“He continuously used in that time because there were no resources and of course, his use wasn’t supervised by anybody,” Pouliot said. “There was nobody prescribing him a specific dose. He was getting the supplies from whomever.”

On April 6 he took a fatal dose. A friend administered Naloxone to Shea, who believed he was fine because he was breathing, and she ended up falling asleep because she was also using drugs.

“When she woke up later, he was unresponsive again and that was it,” Pouliot said.

Shea is one of 817 Albertans who have died between January and June of this year from a drug poisoning. Since the province began tracking records six years ago, 7,319 Albertans have died.

Moms Stop the Harm, a Canada-wide group advocating for better drug policies, is hosting its annual event marking International Overdose Awareness Day (IOAD) at Victoria Park Site 6 in Edmonton at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. The event commemorates loved ones lost to the drug poisoning crisis that experts believe is largely due to a toxic drug supply.

Edmonton’s IOAD event will include a formal program, a raffle to raise funds for a memorial garden, and Naloxone training. Pictures of loved ones will be on display and the evening will end with a candlelight vigil at the High Level Bridge that will also be lit up in purple.

Angela Welz, a member of Moms Stop the Harm organizing Wednesday’s event, said it will be an evening of support.

“We want to build a circle of love and understanding to family members who have lost a loved one and have a hard time sometimes with this type of disenfranchised and stigmatized grief,” she said. “Society doesn’t seem to understand what’s involved when you lose a loved one to substance use harm.”

In a statement, Mike Ellis, associate minister of mental health and addictions, said IOAD is a reminder of lives lost.

“Alberta’s government is building a recovery-oriented system of care to ensure that people with addiction have access to treatment and recovery resources that save lives,” he said.

With drug poisoning numbers on a bumpy decline, Ellis noted the province is cautiously optimistic the trend will continue.

“We will carry on working tirelessly to reduce deaths even further,” he said.

Meanwhile, Wetaskiwin will also be hosting its inaugural event for IOAD. The vigil will take place at Jubilee Park at 7 p.m. Wednesday and will also highlight resources available to the community.

According to data obtained by Postmedia , 15 people died of a drug poisoning in Wetaskiwin County last year.

Rhonda Watt has been doing outreach to address drug poisonings in the community. Her son, Eric, was 19 when he died of an overdose in 2017.

Watt said about two weeks ago, a girl overdosed and was revived at a low-barrier clinic located at the Wetaskiwin Mall. That same day, four other overdoses occurred in the vicinity of the clinic.

“It’s hitting hard right now and I’m tired,” she said. “I’m tired of saying the same thing over and over again and getting the same response that they’re choosing it. No, they aren’t.”

ajunker@postmedia.com

Last surviving member of The Monkees is suing the FBI
Judy Kurtz - Yesterday

The Monkees singer Micky Dolenz is suing the FBI in an effort to “obtain any records” the agency has on the hit band and its members.

Last surviving member of The Monkees is suing the FBI© Provided by The Hill

A lawsuit filed by Dolenz, the last surviving member of the band, noted the performer had “exhausted all necessary required administrative remedies” after submitting a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to receive the files from the FBI.

Portions of an FBI file on the “I’m a Believer” singers were released in 2011 and included references to anti-Vietnam War rhetoric and “subliminal messages” depicted on a screen at a 1967 Monkees concert that an informant claimed featured “left wing innovations of a political nature.”

The FBI was known to keep tabs on several famous faces during the 1960s and 1970s under then-Director J. Edgar Hoover, including anti-war musicians such as John Lennon and John Denver, among others.

Dolenz’s attorney, Mark Zaid, told Rolling Stone that the 77-year-old entertainer and the last surviving member of the band had originally submitted a FOIA request in June to obtain the full file from the FBI. The lawsuit was brought after the FBI failed to follow through with the FOIA request within 20 working days, as is legally required, Zaid told the music publication.

Zaid wrote on Twitter on Tuesday that he has been a Monkees fan since the early 1970s, calling it a “pleasure to be representing” Dolenz.

“Why was the FBI monitoring the band back in the late 1960s? We will find out!” Zaid said.

Micky Dolenz Sues FBI to Get Full File on The Monkees

Gil Kaufman - Billboard

Yesterday 

Micky Dolenz 

© Matthew Eisman/GI

Micky Dolenz wants the full story. The last surviving member of the 1960s-era made-for-TV band The Monkees filed a lawsuit against the FBI on Tuesday (August 30) demanding that the agency turn over all unredacted documents about his band collected during their swinging heyday.

After the agency released a heavily redacted version of their file on the band (erroneously ID’d on the title page as “The Monkeys”) in 2011, the suit notes that Dolenz filed a Freedom of Information Act request on June 14 of this year in order to get the full story. After his request was not answered in a timely manner, Dolenz’s lawyer, Mark S. Said, filed the suit against the FBI on the drummer/singer’s behalf to get access to the whole file.

More from Billboard

Bob Rafelson, Director of ‘Five Easy Pieces’ and Co-Creator of ‘The Monkees,’ Dies at 89

“This lawsuit is designed to obtain any records the FBI created and/or possesses on the Monkees as well as its individual members,” the suit reads. “Mr. Dolenz has exhausted all necessary required administrative remedies with respect to his [Freedom Of Information Act/Privacy Act] request.” The band starred in an eponymous musical sitcom from 1966-1968 and sold more than 75 million albums thanks to such beloved hits as “Pleasant Valley Sunday,” “Daydream Believer” and “Last Train to Clarksville.”

The suit notes that Dolenz, 77, and the three deceased members of the Monkees — singer/guitarist Michael Nesmith, bassist/singer Peter Tork and singer Davy Jones — “were known to have associated with other musicians and individuals whose activities were monitored and/or investigated b the FBI, to include, but not limited to: John Winston Lennon (and the three other Beatles as well) and Jimi Hendrix.”

A portion of the document released by the FBI noted that an FBI informant attended a show on the band’s inaugural 1967 tour, describing, “subliminal messages” that were allegedly depicted on the screen, “which, in the opinion of [informant] constituted ‘left wing intervention of a political nature… These messages and pictures were flashed of riots, in Berkley, anti-U.S. messages on the war in Vietnam, racial riots in Selma, Alabama, and similar messages which had unfavorable response from the audience.”

At press time it was unclear what information might be included in the redacted portions of the band’s file what, if anything, it could reveal about the FBI’s surveillance of the group. A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Justice had not returned Billboard‘s request for comment at press time.

Click here to read the full article.

Dispute in B.C. reveals cracks in Canada's shipbreaking regulations

Yvette Brend -CBC - Yesterday 

When Mary Reynolds started flying her camera-equipped drone over a small stretch of Vancouver Island shoreline she landed in the middle of a fight between local activists and a company that dismantles old watercraft.

The 71-year-old's videos, posted on her blog, showed how Deep Water Recovery was taking apart old barges and other vessels at its site in Union Bay, B.C. — a violation, say activists, of regional and provincial zoning regulations, that endangers an environmentally sensitive area rich with oysters.

Locals are upset that Deep Water Recovery has continued operating, despite a cease-and-desist order from the province. Deep Water and some of its people were, in turn, upset by Reynolds's many flyovers.

One time, she alleges in a civil suit, a "volatile and out of control" man snatched her drone out of the air and a different man confronted her, yelling obscenities and calling her a troublemaker.

"I came back with a mouthful at him," Reynolds told CBC News with a laugh.

"It's just. It's bizarre. It's absolutely bizarre," she said of the June 11 incident.

Reynolds says her drone was returned to her porch three days later, damaged a memory card.

In a counterclaim, company director Mark Jurisich denies Reynolds's accusations, alleging she engaged in a "malicious campaign" of trespassing and harassment, trying to shut down his business.

Those are just a few of the accusations traded over the last few years between the company and local activists who don't want shipbreaking to continue in their backyard. It's an industry known globally as having the potential to pollute shorelines with harmful substances like asbestos and PCBs and for which, experts warn, Canada needs to establish clear laws.


Legal experts say the dispute has revealed gaps in Canadian law around shipbreaking, which can end up being handled by regional governments.

© Curt Petrovich/CBC

The Concerned Citizens of Baynes Sound (CCOBS) has been lobbying against Deep Water Recovery not long after they saw the first vessels being dismantled two years ago on the shores of nearby Baynes Sound, the channel that runs between Vancouver Island and Denman Island.

"It's an ecological area that needs protection," said Ray Rewcastle, CCOBS president.

"We pride ourselves on our shorelines, why would we even allow this to happen?"


Local activist Ray Rewcastle says the shoreline near Union Bay is an 'ecological area that needs protection.'

© Curt Petrovich/CBC

'Mish-mash' of jurisdictions

Environmental lawyer Carla Conkin says CCOBS is fighting a "sort of do it yourself" operation that's breaking down barges and other large vessels on the beach without a dry dock or other internationally accepted safety protocols for dismantling ships to prevent pollution or escaped toxins.

A B.C. ferry that was at the site was not recycled there, according to B.C. Ferries.

"We moored it there as we didn't have any space at our refit facility in Richmond during our refit season," said Deborah Marshall, executive director of public affairs for the ferry service.

"The ship is back at the refit facility now. We are looking at recycling options. No decision has been made as yet."

Marshall says no B.C. ferries have been recycled at this site.

Conkin says the site also disturbed a creek, and there were concerns about workers living on site in a trailer.

"These guys are flying by the seat of their pants on the beach, basically dismantling major sized vessels," she said.

"No one pays attention to what happens to ships when they die and have to be dealt with."

Deep Water Recovery denies the allegations.

Neither Jurisich nor his lawyer agreed to interview requests from CBC News.


Old ships anchored in Union Bay at the Deep Water Recovery site on May 10.

© Curt Petrovich/CBC

Jurisich recently told The Tyee he is filling a vital role in the marine recycling industry and that he has always followed the rules. He told the online magazine that Deep Water has has dismantled 13 or 14 vessels.

His lawyer, in that same article, vowed to "vigorously defend" the company.

Conkin says part of the problem in Union Bay is the complex "mish mash" of levels of government involved.

'Pretty slippery'

The site is overseen by the province, which handles the shoreline, while the regional district oversees the high part of the beach. The federal government, meanwhile, oversees vessels, transport and the environment.

Conkin says Comox Valley Regional District (CVRD) is "ill-equipped" to deal with shipbreaking issues and, after reviewing how the site's usage has changed, says she believes the province was manipulated.

"It's pretty slippery," she said.

Deep Water Recovery arrived when it took over a company called Union Bay Industries, and its 30-year log-salvaging licence.

But then the company shifted into ship dismantling, asking in 2019 for B.C.'s Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development to allow the moving and storage of vessels for repair and recycling.

Instead provincial regulators worked with the company and wrote it a new licence allowing the movement of ships over the foreshore so they can be dismantled in the higher portion of the site — which falls under regional government jurisdiction. That company's lease over the land expires in 2038.


Workers carry a rope line to fasten a decommissioned ship at the Alang shipyard in the western Indian state of Gujarat, on March 27, 2015.

© Amit Dave/Reuters

Deep Water "stepped into the shoes of that log-sorting company and then slipped their way through to getting lease amendments to allow for shipbreaking," said Conkin.

"The company has been capitalizing on the different levels of government and how they're not co-ordinating with each other."

Canada has no federal shipbreaking rules. The industry here is small, but key in countries like Turkey, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, which feed the recycled steel back into their economies.


A worker uses a cutting torch to dismantle the hull of a barge at the Galloo ship recycling plant in Ghent, Europe's largest ship recycling plant, in 2015.

© Francois Lenoir/Reuters

Canadian owners used to send their old vessels overseas, but towing has become expensive and environmental rules now limit some exports.

Transport Canada says countrywide regulations are under consideration. But in the meantime, it also lists a total of 47,321 Canadian-registered vessels, — including 3,054 large ships, over 100 gross tonnage — that at some point will all need to be scrapped.

A March 2021 report commissioned by Transport Canada says Canada is far short of the capacity needed to deal with vessels reaching end of life between 2021 and 2030.

The industry is high-risk and expensive — deconstruction of one passenger ferry can cost more than $2 million, says Wayne Elliott, founder of Marine Recycling Corp., Canada's largest shipbreaker.

His company operates a shipyard in Campbell River, B.C., and is setting up a new site in Port Mellon.

He says he considered setting up at the Union Bay site, but skipped it given the ecologically sensitive location and proximity to people's homes.


A barge crashed into Vancouver's seawall during November 2021 storm and ran aground on Sunset Beach where it still sits, a visible reminder of the need for more ship salvage and dismantling experts in Canada.© Ben Nelms/CBC

"That made us decide it wasn't worth going after," said Elliott.

One international advocacy group says Canada should halt all shipbreaking that does not involve a dry dock to contain contaminants.

Belgium-based NGO Shipbreaking Platform says Deep Water Recovery's plan to dismantle the NOAAS Miller Freeman — a former U.S. research vessel — poses hazards as the ship is rife with toxic paint and asbestos.

Nicola Mulinaris of NGO says what's happening in Union Bay is "really shocking" and a good case to strengthen industry standards in Canada.

The province issued a cease-and-desist order on Feb. 17, demanding Deep Water stop all shipbreaking activities. But that didn't happen.

Likewise, the CVRD on April 14 filed a notice of civil claim to halt the operation, alleging a zoning violation.

But the company continued to dismantle ships.

This process is still ongoing in court.

By Aug. 24 regional officials said they were seeking a permanent injunction to halt the operations.

In his response to the injunction, Jurisich alleges that the region knew of the company's intention to ship-break and only reversed approval in "bad faith" for political reasons.

The Comox Valley Regional District declined comment for this story. The K'ómoks First Nation, whose traditional territory Deep Water is operating on, also declined comment, but in an earlier statement said the site is "an environmental disaster waiting to happen."

The Environment Ministry said in a statement it is "continuing to investigate" concerns about pollution at Union Bay, but officials did not agree to be interviewed.


This Union Bay site on Vancouver Island's east side, north of Denman Island, was a log-sorting operation for 30 years.

© Curt Petrovich/CBC

Elizabeth May and running mate Jonathan Pedneault among six Green leadership hopefuls

OTTAWA — Elizabeth May is running on a joint ticket to reclaim the leadership of the Green Party, sources say.


Elizabeth May and running mate Jonathan Pedneault among six Green leadership hopefuls

© Provided by The Canadian Press

The former party leader is expected to launch a joint bid for the leadership Wednesday in Sidney, B.C., with her running mate, Jonathan Pedneault.

They are two of six candidates cleared by the party to run, according to two Green Party sources with direct knowledge of the situation who were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about it.

Sarah Gabrielle Baron, who ran as an Independent against former Conservative leader Erin O'Toole in Durham, Ont., in last year's election, and Simon Gnocchini-Messier, a federal public servant who ran for the Greens in Hull-Aylmer, Que., will also run.

Anna Keenan and Chad Walcott are also expected to join the race on another joint ticket.

The winner, to be announced in November, will take over from interim leader Amita Kuttner, who stepped in after the resignation of Annamie Paul last year.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 30, 2022.

Fuel shortages, inclement weather disrupting Canadian North's High Arctic flights

WE NEED AIRSHIPS FOR THE NORTH

Yesterday 

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OTTAWA — An airline that services Canada's North says an ongoing fuel shortage at some airports in the High Arctic and inclement weather are causing significant disruptions to its operations.


Fuel shortages, inclement weather disrupting Canadian North's High Arctic flights

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Canadian North first announced fuel shortages at airports in Pond Inlet, Arctic Bay, Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord in Nunavut two weeks ago.

As a result, the airline said there were fewer seats available on flights to those communities and some cargo shipments could be delayed as planes had to carry more fuel


Canadian North says weather disruptions are also affecting service in the High Arctic.

It says its customer contact centre has been experiencing a higher than average call volume because of the travel disruptions.

The airline says it is working with the fuel available to move as many passengers and as much freight as possible.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 30, 2022.

Surprise! Protons Contain a Subatomic Particle That’s Heavier Than the Proton Itself

Robert Lea - Yesterday 

POP MECH

But when the charm quark is present, it still only accounts for around half of the proton’s mass. How can that be?

New research shows that protons contain intrinsic charm quarks.

This is despite the fact that subatomic charm quarks are about 1.5 times more massive than the proton, itself.

When charm quarks are present, they carry about half of the proton’s mass.

Protons are particles that exist in the nucleus of all atoms, with their number defining the elements themselves. Protons, however, are not fundamental particles. Rather, they are composite particles made up of smaller subatomic particles, namely two “up quarks” and one “down quark” bound together by force-carrying particles (bosons ) called “gluons.”

This structure isn’t certain, however, and quantum physics suggests that along with these three quarks, other particles should be “popping” into and out of existence at all times, affecting the mass of the proton. This includes other quarks and even quark-antiquark pairs.

Indeed, the deeper scientists have probed the structure of the proton with high-energy particle collisions, the more complicated the situation has become. As a result, for around four decades, physicists have speculated that protons may host a heavier form of quark than up and down quarks called “intrinsic charm quarks,” but confirmation of this has been elusive.

Now, by exploiting a high-precision determination of the quark-gluon content of the proton and by examining 35 years’ worth of data, particle physics data researchers have discovered evidence that the proton does contain intrinsic charm quarks.

What makes this result more extraordinary is that this flavor of quark is one-and-a-half times more massive than the proton itself. Yet when it is a component of the proton, the charm quark still only accounts for around half of the composite particle’s mass.
The Weirdness of Quantum Mechanics

This counter-intuitive setup is a consequence of the weirdness of quantum mechanics, the physics that governs the subatomic world. This requires thinking of the structure of a particle and what can be found within it as probabilistic in nature.

“There are six kinds of quarks in nature, three are lighter than the proton [up, down, and strange quarks] and three are heavier [charm, up, and down quarks],” Stefano Forte, NNPDF Collaboration team leader and professor of theoretical Physics at Milan University, tells the Nature Briefing podcast. “One would think that only the lighter quarks are inside the proton, but actually, the laws of quantum physics allow also for the heavier quarks to be inside the proton.”

Forte — the lead author of a paper published earlier this month in the journal Nature, describing the research—and his team set out to discover if the lightest of these heavier quarks, the charm quark, is present in the proton.

When the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and other particle accelerators smash protons against each other (and other particles, like electrons) at high energies, what emerges is a shower of particles. This can be used to “reconstruct” the composition of the original particle and the particles that comprised it, collectively known as “partons.”

Each of these partons carries away a portion of the overall momentum of the system — the momentum distribution—with this share of momentum known as the momentum fraction.

Forte and colleagues fed 35 years of data from particle accelerators, including the world’s largest and most powerful machine of this kind, the LHC, to a computer algorithm that pieces proton structure back together by looking for a “best fit” for its structure at high-energies. From here, the team calculated the structure for the proton when it is at rest.

This resulted in the first evidence that protons do indeed sometimes have charm quarks. These are labeled “intrinsic” because they are part of the proton for a long time and are still present when the proton is at rest, meaning it doesn’t emerge from the high-energy interaction with another particle.

“You have a chance, which is small but not negligible, of finding a charm quark in the proton, and when you do find one, it so happens that that charm quark is typically carrying about half of the proton mass,” Forte says on the podcast. “This is quantum physics, so everything is probabilistic.”
The “Intrinsic” Charm Quark Scenario

Romona Vogt is a high-energy physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California, who wrote a “News and Views” piece for Nature to accompany the new research paper.

She explains to Popular Mechanics how charm quarks could be connected to proton structure and how the intrinsic charm quark scenario differs from the standard scenario that sees protons comprised of just two up and one down quarks joined by gluons.

“Charm quarks come in quark-antiquark pairs in both the standard scenario and the intrinsic charm one,” Vogt says. “In the standard scenario, a gluon radiates this pairing during a high-energy interaction. Because of the charm quark’s mass, it is too heavy to be part of the ‘sea’ of light up, down, and strange quarks.”

This means the charm quark doesn’t have a large role when physicists calculate the standard parton momentum distribution functions until momentum reaches a threshold above mass.

“That’s very different from the intrinsic charm scenario where the charm distribution carries a large fraction of the proton momentum,” Vogt adds. “Because in the intrinsic charm quark scenario, the quark-antiquark pair is attached to more than one of the up and down quarks in the proton they travel with. That’s why the charm quarks appear at large momentum fractions.

“The proton is more or less ‘empty’ in this scenario or has a small size configuration because the proton is just up, up, down quarks and charm quark pairs with no other quarks at low momentum fractions in the minimal model of intrinsic charm.”

Vogt suggests that the NNPDF Collaboration’s results could lead other researchers to ask if other quarks could play a role in the composition of protons.

“One question these findings might raise is whether or not there are other intrinsic quark scenarios, like intrinsic bottom and intrinsic strangeness,” she says.