"It demonstrates the potential enormity of the problems society may face over the coming centuries"

 UiT scientists on the new data from the Barents Sea.

New Barents Sea study points to how global sea level will continue to rise.


Научно-исследовательское судно «Хелмер Ханссен» у северо-западного побережья Шпицбергена. Фото: Келвин Шеклтон

By  Elizaveta Vereykina
April 20, 2023

A recently published study from geologists at UiT The Arctic University of Norway has provided new insight into what was happening beneath the Barents Sea ice sheet around 15,000 years ago. The data gathered will help to better understand the processes occurring under present-day climate change.

What was discovered?

According to a global consensus of scientists it is virtually certain that global sea level will continue to rise over the 21st century. For the 900 million people (1 in 10 globally) living in coastal zones around the world now, including in coastal mega-cities, this danger is particularly acute.

“Unravelling the glacial changes that occurred in the marine setting of the Barents Sea during the warming at the end of the last ice age is important as it gives us a unique long-term perspective into how ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica today could respond in the future.” UiT researcher Dr Henry Patton says to The Barents Observer.

For the first time, this research which has been conducted over the last 5 years, has put some numbers on how fast this former ice sheet in the Barents Sea retreated.

“Like the present-day ice sheets, this Barents Sea ice sheet was immense, reaching up to 3 km thick in places, but we are starting to think that the whole system collapsed very quickly, raising global sea level by many metres in just a few centuries,” says Patton.

UiT team examining glacial sediments obtained in a core taken from the Barents Sea floor. The sediments are collected within a plastic liner roughly 10 cm wide (shown in the background). By examining the nature of these seafloor sediments more closely we can learn more about the type of environment they were deposited in. Photo: Mauro Pau, 2021

Newly discovered seafloor deposits have provided new information on how fast this vast ice sheet was shrinking through the central Barents Sea 15,000 years ago. The data the team found shows the ice sheet was retreating between 580 and 1600 m per year on average, for at least 91 years. At this pace, most of the ice sheet is likely to have disappeared from across the entire Barents Sea within 1000 years, raising global sea level by around 6 m in the process.

This geological data shows that the continuous, fast retreat of ice sheets over many decades, and possibly centuries, is not unprecedented under a rapidly changing climate. Chronological data constraining this ice-sheet collapse has previously been a long-standing knowledge gap.

Dr Henry Patton examining newly collected multibeam echosounder data in the instrument room onboard Helmer Hanssen. Photo by Mauro Pau, 2021.

“If our numbers are correct this collapse event would have contributed to an extraordinarily fast pace of sea level rise, - Dr Patton says - and it demonstrates the potential enormity of the problems society may face over the coming centuries if the current ice sheets continue to destabilise”.

Yet, he added, pinning down these future quantities of melt over the coming decades and centuries is not straightforward as the feedbacks that operate between the oceans, climate and ice are highly nonlinear.

How was it done?

To uncover information about the glacial past published in this study, the UiT team has been surveying and mapping the Barents Sea area from research vessels since 2020. Sometimes scientists would stay on the research ship for up to three weeks. The team in their research also incorporated open data collected by the Norwegian Hydrographic Service through the MAREANO programme.

Scientists Calvin Shackleton and Henry Patton with other team members in the ‘wet lab’ onboard Helmer Hanssen in 2015, waiting for a sediment core to be retrieved 300 metres below from the Barents Sea floor. When the team works on the ship deck it’s important for them to wear clothes that are visible and warm.

By piecing together these high-resolution snapshots surveyed from the Barents Sea floor - like in a jigsaw puzzle - a clearer picture of the glacial history of this region can emerge. The mapping included in this UiT study comes from a very remote region in the central Barents Sea, near the Norwegian - Russian border. Scientists believe this region hosted some of the last remnants of the last ice sheet before it finally melted away.Here you can use a map demonstrating an interactive reconstruction of the Eurasian ice sheet during the last ice age

Such observational data are vital for guiding numerical simulations that try to reconstruct the behaviour of the old ice sheets. Lead researcher of the study, Dr Calvin Shackleton from the Norwegian Polar Institute in Tromsø, points out that satellite data, which has been used to monitor the present-day ice sheets over the last 40 years, are unable to observe the processes happening underneath the ice sheet. This makes the geological data left behind by these older ice sheets like in the Barents Sea such a valuable archive to investigate.

“The detection of traces of water at the interface between the ice sheet and seafloor is of importance as the water acts as a lubrication, allowing the ice above to flow faster and thus more quickly transfer its mass to the more climate-sensitive regions at lower elevations.”

From left to right: scientists Calvin Shackleton and Henry Patton onboard Helmer Hanssen with a glacial fjord in Svalbard in the background.

 Photo by Mariana Esteves

Research ship Helmer Hanssen acquiring data in the Barents Sea in 2020. 

Photo by Henry Patton.

Why is this important?

Continued sea level rise is one of the most concerning processes occurring around the planet now. There have been multiple statements at the highest political levels about an existential threat not only for big cities from London to Shanghai, but also for many small island nations.

Earlier this year the UN Secretary-General António Guterres pointed out in a statement: “For the hundreds of millions of people living in small island developing States and other low-lying coastal areas around the world, sea-level rise is a torrent of trouble….The impact of rising seas is already creating new sources of instability and conflict” he said.

According to Dr Patton, quantifying this sea level rise and being able to adapt to its impacts are key aspects driving the need to better understand the science behind present-day climate change. Specifically, as he says, it’s now visible from how water carved the seafloor and deposited sediments that meltwater was abundant beneath the Barents Sea ice sheet, and thus able to regulate how the ice above flowed as it collapsed. Some of this water, researchers think, was fed from the ice-sheet surface, showing that this Arctic ice sheet was increasingly susceptible to melting as temperatures in the atmosphere rose.

A contemporary glacier in the Swiss Alps. Photo by Henry Patton


Another recent study has similarly mapped glacial landforms in the Norwegian Sea, showing how fast the last ice sheet over Scandinavia retreated back into Norway at around the same time the Barents Sea ice sheet was also collapsing. The rates they found are exceptionally higher, at 55 to 610 m per day (in comparison to the 580 to 1600 m per year from UiT), and faster than anything ever observed today or in the last ice age. These very fast rates, however, were likely only ever sustained over a period of days to months.

Nevertheless, both studies highlight the profound speed by which ice sheets can quickly destabilise and lose mass, and provide a strong warning on the importance of better understanding the nature of contemporary climate change and its impact on society. People need to know what dangers to face in the future. But, as scientists say, the research is still ongoing:

“The Barents Sea is a very large place and the mapping of this glacial imprint left behind on the Barents Sea floor is still far from complete”, says Dr Patton.

The massive hole in the ice in today’s Switzerland, Gornergletscher in the Alps - that’s the way how water that melts on the surface can be transported underneath the ice to lubricate it, same as it happened in the past. Photo by Henry Patton

The geographical area of the conducted research on the border between Norway and Russia. The red line outlines a channel where water used to flow beneath the ice sheets. The green areas are sediment piles deposited by this water, and give indication of how fast the ice margin retreated.

"Protest region." Karelia gets another independent journalist on foreign agent list

Nataliya Yermolina has been doing journalism and civil society work for decades. She is the latest of several Karelians added to the "foreign agent" list.

Nataliya Yermolina was on the 21st of April included in the list of so-called "foreign agents."
Photo: Igor Podgorny  

SHE IS HOLDING A CLASSIC SLAVIC WOMANS DANCE FORM

By Atle Staalesen
April 25, 2023

“I’ve been waiting for this moment for a long time,” Yermolina tells the Barents Observer.

“So far, I am only making fun of it all. I am experiencing the first moment of congratulations, I feel like a hero of the day or a person who has won something cool.”

“I have not yet realized the cons, but feel like on the crest of a wave,” she adds.

The north Russian region of Karelia today has the highest number of so-called foreign agents per capita in all of Russia. Yermolina is the fifth journalist and civil society activist from the region included in the list. She follows Georgii Chentemirov, the leader of the Karelian Journalism Union and reporter for the Barents Observer, that was included in the list in early April.

Status as “foreign agent” includes a stringent regime on labelling publications and social media contents, as well as comprehensive economic reporting to Russian authorities. It is not clear whether Yermolina intends to meet Moscow’s demands.

The Republic of Karelia has a population of about 530 thousands. It is located along the border with Finland and has for decades been involved in close cross-border cooperation with the neighbouring Nordic country.

Nataliya Yermolina established the Agriculture Club art center in Karelia.

 Photo: Darya Ananina

According to Yermolina, Karelia is a “protest region” because of its many descendants of exiled dissidents.

“We are all descendants of deportees, even back to the Tsarist times. It was expensive to exile people to Siberia, but Petrozavodsk [the Karelian capital] was not far away and all kinds of disobedient people were sent here to Karelia. They gave us a good-quality undergrowth,” she underlines.

Yermolina last year fled to Montenegro, and learned about her inclusion in the infamous list from friends.

She is known for he independent journalism and civil society activities. She is board member of the Karelian Union of Journalism, the only union of its kind in Russia that officially has condemned the new censorship laws in Russia.

Yermolina is also the person behind the Agriculture club, the art center in Petrozavodsk that organises courses, classes, exhibitions, concerts and movie festivals.

TikTok’s head of US trust and safety is leaving

He was a key leader for the separate entity TikTok recently created to try and avoid a US ban.

By Alex Heath
May 2, 2023

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

TikTok’s head of trust and safety for the US, Eric Han, is leaving the company on May 12th, according to two people familiar with the matter and an internal memo to employees I’ve seen.

His departure comes as TikTok is still trying to clench a deal to avoid a ban by the US government. Han has been leading TikTok’s safety teams in the US for several years, and in December, he was named the head of trust and safety for TikTok US Data Security (USDS), a separate entity created to convince the government that the app shouldn’t be banned.

In the memo to employees announcing his departure, Andy Bonillo, interim USDS general manager, said he will be “stepping in to lead USDS T&S on an interim basis” until “we identify Eric’s replacement for the longer term.” Bonillo’s title already says “interim” because the US government has yet to approve TikTok’s USDS proposal and would ultimately have the final say on who runs it.

Related My visit to TikTok’s transparency theater

“Over the past four years, Eric helped safeguard our U.S. community through an incredible stage of growth,” Bonillo said in the memo. “We remain dedicated to upholding our commitments to the TikTok community - both in the U.S. and around the world - as we continue to invest in trust and safety as a cornerstone of those efforts.”

After this story was published, TikTok spokesperson Maureen Shanahan emailed me to say that Han’s role specifically focused on the “compliance, safety strategies, and moderation for content involving US users’ private data.” The implication is that he had little to no oversight of, say, the trust and safety efforts for TikTok’s video recommendations in the US, despite the company saying in December that he was leading the company’s US legal policy and threat intelligence teams in his new role.

“Outside USDS, TikTok’s global Trust and Safety team oversees the platform’s safety policies, processes, and systems for our global community, including the US,” Shanahan wrote in the email. “TikTok’s Head of Trust and Safety is based in Dublin with leaders across the US, Ireland, and Singapore. Our global Trust and Safety team develops global safety policies for the platform and oversees moderation of content that does not involve US users’ private data.”

TikTok’s fate in the US feels as uncertain as ever right now, with states like Montana trying to ban the app and the bipartisan RESTRICT Act making its way through Congress. The Biden administration has sent smoke signals indicating that TikTok’s USDS proposal isn’t enough to appease its national security concerns and that it will likely demand a full divestiture of TikTok from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance. The Chinese government obviously doesn’t like that idea, which, as the saying goes, puts TikTok between a rock and a hard place.

Revelations from Sudanese and American officials about Wagner Group’s assistance to Rapid Support Forces (RSF) 

On April 24, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed “deep concern” about the activities of Wagner Group mercenaries in Sudan and asserted that the Russian private military company (PMC) “simply brings more death and destruction wherever it is involved.” Blinken’s dire warning followed revelations from Sudanese and American officials about Wagner Group’s assistance to Rapid Support Forces (RSF) chief Mohammed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo. These allegations included claims that Wagner supplied the RSF with surface-to-air missiles from its Khadim and Jufra installations in Libya or offered such weaponry from its stockpiles in the Central African Republic (CAR).

Although there is mounting evidence of the Wagner PMC’s clandestine support for Hemedti, Russia’s approach to the intra-military conflict in Sudan is more nuanced than it appears. Russia’s primary goal is not to see one or another side win the civil war but rather to thwart a democratic transition in Sudan, as continued authoritarian rule facilitates profits from Sudanese gold mines and the construction of a Russian Red Sea naval base in Port Sudan. These objectives will likely encourage Moscow to eschew a hard alliance with Hemedti and maintain favorable relations with his main rival, the chief of Sudan’s Armed Forces, Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan.

Since hostilities erupted between Burhan and Hemedti on April 15, Russia has launched propaganda attacks on Sudan’s democratic transition process. In an April 25 statement, Moscow’s deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, Anna Evstigneeva, claimed that “external powers tried to enforce the transfer of authority to civil powers artificially” and argued that the December 2022 democratic government transition framework was not sufficiently inclusive. Evstigneeva framed Sudan’s transition attempts as a catalyst for the Burhan-Hemedti conflict by stating that “fragile stability in the country fell prey to those attempts to establish a so-called democracy,” and she chastised efforts to make international assistance contingent on a civilian transition.

Evstigneeva’s comments were echoed by major Russian Telegram channels. The “Militarist” channel linked the Burhan-Hemedti conflict to Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland’s democracy promotion efforts in Sudan. Former Kremlin advisor Sergei Markov compared the Burhan-Hemedti clash to the conflicts between Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin during the Soviet Union’s final days and praised ousted President Omar al-Bashir as a Leonid Brezhnev-style stabilizing figure.

While Russia’s aversion to a democratic transition in Sudan mirrors its earlier responses to the 2011 Arab Spring and 2013-14 Euro-Maidan Revolution in Ukraine, it also underscores why authoritarianism is a necessary enabler of Russian interests in Sudan. As part of his sprawling business empire, Wagner Group chief and Kremlin-linked oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin oversees the “Russian Company,” a tightly guarded gold mining plant in al-Ibediyya, 200 miles north of Khartoum. Due to Russian collusion with Sudan’s military leadership, 16 gold smuggling flights reportedly left Khartoum International Airport for Russia in 2021-22. This smuggled gold allegedly provided the Kremlin with vital hard currency for Russia’s military operations in Ukraine. Although the Sudanese military authorities charged one Russian national for gold smuggling, they have allowed gold processing to resume at a key Wagner-linked facility and dropped probes against other employees. A civilian government in Khartoum, particularly one not intertwined with Russia’s smuggling nexus, would likely prosecute these crimes more vigorously.

Russia’s Port Sudan naval base ambitions also explain its support for Sudan’s military leadership. After meeting with his Sudanese counterpart, Ali al-Sadiq, on Feb. 9, 2023,  Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that Russia and Sudan had finalized the terms for the Port Sudan facility’s construction. While the basing agreement needs Sudanese parliamentary approval to take effect, it is broadly supported by Sudan’s military brass. In March 2022, Hemedti likewise stated that Sudan should consider a naval base accord with Russia if it did not threaten its national security. As Russia’s base construction plans received backlash from local tribes and the United States, its Red Sea power projection ambitions could suffer under a pro-Western civilian Sudanese government.

Russia is not firmly aligned with either Burhan or Hemedti in the present armed conflict. And that non-aligned position is reflected in expert commentaries. In an April 17 RBC interview, IMEMO RAS Center for International Security researcher Stanislav Ivanov argued, “Whoever wins, the attitude toward Russia is unlikely to change.” Yet Institute of African Studies expert Sergey Kostelyanets contends that neither Burhan nor Hemedti will swiftly advance the Port Sudan base project if they prevail, as they wish to avoid antagonizing the West. Meanwhile, a prolonged conflict in Sudan is also not in Russia’s interests. Kostelyanets asserted, “Any military-political destabilization, and the current one is no exception, is a threat to such sensitive agreements as agreements on the creation of foreign bases.” Persistent instability would risk exacerbating violence in gold smuggling along the Sudan-CAR routes and necessitate further costly interventions by Wagner mercenaries. 

Even as the civil war continues to rage, Russia is unlikely to provide large-scale support for Hemedti. In an April 21 interview with The Financial Times, Hemedti insisted that the RSF has suspended military training links with Wagner Group. Moreover, there is substantial institutional mistrust of Hemedti inside the Kremlin. In a 2021 interview with this author, Russian State University for the Humanities Professor Sergei Seregichev contended that “Sudan’s revisions of the agreement on the Russian military base worsens the image of Hemedti as a reliable partner for Russia.” This suggests that the Wagner Group’s ability to support Hemedti could be limited to what Prigozhin can procure.

So as the conflict in Sudan drags on, Russia will probably try to position itself as a supporter of a diplomatic solution and hedge its bets in the Red Sea region. Shortly after the outbreak of hostilities, Prigozhin declared, “I want peace for the Sudanese people” and offered to mediate between Burhan and Hemedti. The Kremlin has backed African-led solutions to the Sudan crisis, which would contrast with how the West ignored African voices during the 2011 Libyan civil war. Prolonged instability in Sudan could also see Russia deepen its security partnership with neighboring Eritrea. “Rybar,” a major Russian Telegram channel, expressed tentative support for Russia’s construction of a low-cost logistics point in coastal Eritrea, as an alternative to the Port Sudan base agreement. 

Although Russia has vested interests in the Burhan-Hemedti conflict, it is unlikely to actively pursue a blanket destabilization strategy in Sudan. Instead, it is likely to balance close ties with both warring parties and continue actively opposing a democratic transition in Sudan. Regardless of whether Burhan or Hemedti ultimately prevails, Russia is well positioned to remain an influential stakeholder in Sudan and a vexing complication for the U.S.’s Red Sea security strategy.

Samuel Ramani is a tutor of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford, where he received his doctorate in March 2021, and an associate fellow at RUSI. His first book, Russia in Africa: Resurgent Great Power or Bellicose Pretender?, was published by Oxford University Press and Hurst and Co. in 2023. Follow Samuel on Twitter @samramani2. 

Photo by IBRAHIM ISHAQ/AFP via Getty Images

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More than 100 000 refugees flee Sudan amid intense fighting

• Thousands of refugees are crossing the border to leave Sudan.
• The UN estimates that up to 800 000 may flee the country.
• So far, 436 civilians have died in the conflict.

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A United Nations refugee official said on Tuesday that more than 100 000 refugees have now crossed from Sudan to neighbouring countries to escape the conflict that erupted last month.

"Over 100 000 refugees are estimated to be among those who have now crossed to neighbouring countries, including Sudanese refugees," Olga Sarrado, spokesperson at United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, told reporters at a briefing in Geneva.

Reuters reported that people may flee Sudan as a result of the ongoing conflict, the UN refugee agency said, including Sudanese nationals and thousands of existing refugees living temporarily in the country.

"In consultation with all concerned governments and partners, we've arrived at a planning figure of 815 000 people that may flee into the seven neighbouring countries," Raouf Mazou, UNHCR assistant high commissioner for refugees, told a member-state briefing in Geneva, Switzerland.

Some 73 000 have already left Sudan, he added.

READ | The UN now fears 800 000 people may flee Sudan, if things don't change fast

Mazou's estimate includes approximately 580 000 Sudanese, while the others are refugees who had settled in the country for safety.

Smoke billows over residential buildings in Khartoum as deadly clashes between rival generals' forces have entered their third week.

AFPAFP

UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi later said the planning figure was indicative. 

"We hope it doesn't come to that, but if violence doesn't stop we will see more people forced to flee Sudan seeking safety," he said in a tweet.

The international body has said a catastrophic humanitarian situation has already been unfolding since the fighting that erupted on 15 April.

Hundreds have been killed and thousands wounded in the clashes between Sudan's army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

17 hours ago2:06

Canadian ambassador feared for his life while helping people escape Sudan

Millions of Sudanese, unable to afford the inflated prices required to escape the battles, have sheltered in their homes with dwindling food and water and frequent power cuts.

The UN and other aid organisations have cut services, though the World Food Programme said it was resuming operations in more secure areas on Monday after staff were killed early in the war.

"It is expected that, over the following days, these operations would extend to El-Gadarif, Gezira, Kassala, and the Blue Nile," Al Jazeera's Biesan Abu-Kwaik said, reporting from UN headquarters.

United Nations aid chief Martin Griffiths warned the country was at "breaking point" and that the international body fears the war's effect both on Sudan and the broader region.

He said:

The scale and speed of what is unfolding in Sudan is unprecedented.

Griffiths is scheduled to visit Sudan on Tuesday.

Al Jazeera's Fadel Abdelrazzaq, reporting from Adré at the Chadian-Sudanese border, said that between 10 000 and 20 000 Sudanese refugees arrived in Chad since the beginning of the conflict, according to Chadian authorities and UNHCR.

Jame' Noor, reporting from near Djibouti airport, said evacuation operations were under way. 

"In the past few days, there were a lot of Canadian nationals coming through. Most of those evacuated were Sudanese with dual citizenship. They flew from Djibouti to Kenya and then to Canada," he said.

A ferry transporting some 1 900 evacuees docks near a Saudi warship after it travelled across the Red Sea from Port Sudan to the Saudi King Faisal navy base in Jeddah during mass evacuations from Sudan.

AFPPHOTO: Fayez Nureldine, AFP

This handout satellite photograph shows a major crossing point at the Sudanese border of Argeen with Egypt, as buses wait in line to evacuate passengers into Egypt. Fighting raged in Sudan on 28 April, despite rival forces agreeing to extend a truce aimed to stem nearly two weeks of warfare that has killed hundreds and caused widespread destruction.

AFPPHOTO: ©2023 Maxar Technologies, AFP

A ferry transporting some 1 900 evacuees docks near a Saudi warship after it travelled across the Red Sea from Port Sudan to the Saudi King Faisal navy base in Jeddah during mass evacuations from Sudan.

AFPPHOTO: Fayez Nureldine, AFP

This handout satellite photograph shows a major crossing point at the Sudanese border of Argeen with Egypt, as buses wait in line to evacuate passengers into Egypt. Fighting raged in Sudan on 28 April, despite rival forces agreeing to extend a truce aimed to stem nearly two weeks of warfare that has killed hundreds and caused widespread destruction.

AFPPHOTO: ©2023 Maxar Technologies, AFP

Ethiopian authorities officially announced the arrival of 6 000 people from 46 nationalities via the Gallabat-Metemma border.

Al Jazeera's Hiba Morgan, reporting from Khartoum, said air raids on Monday hit the northern and eastern parts of the capital Khartoum despite numerous ceasefire attempts.

"In the early hours of the afternoon, around 12 local time [10:00 GMT], air strikes were launched by the Sudanese army around what residents say are RSF positions including a fuel tanker," Morgan said.

Heavy artillery was used in proximity to the presidential palace, which is under the control of the RSF.

The correspondent said:

The Sudanese army wants to regain control of the palace because it is near the general command of the army headquarters.

Morgan added the fighting had caused a fire to break out in one of the buildings near the palace.

Al Jazeera's Haitham Uweit said that fighting also extended to new areas, including Al-Jerif East in the eastern part of the Blue Nile to the east of Khartoum.

"The most violent confrontations were in Khartoum Bahri, specifically in Al-Halfaya, Shambat, North Kafouri, and the industrial area," he said.

Uweit added that according to UN envoy to Sudan Volker Perthes, the two warring sides have agreed to send representatives for UN negotiations.

"No definite information is available on the when and where of the negotiations," Uweit said.

According to the Sudan Doctors Syndicate, 436 civilians are dead so far, and 2 175 have been injured.

UN says conflict in Sudan may trigger refugee crisis

TEHRAN, May 02 (MNA) – The UN refugee agency has warned that bloodshed in Sudan could cause 800,000 people to leave for neighboring countries.

The United Nations has warned of an influx of refugees fleeing to Sudan's neighboring countries, as the fighting continues between the country's top military generals, DW reported.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said late on Monday that the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) was bracing, alongside governments and partners, "for the possibility that over 800,000 people may flee the fighting in Sudan for neighboring countries."

"We hope it doesn’t come to that, but if violence doesn’t stop we will see more people forced to flee Sudan seeking safety," Grandi said on Twitter.

Following air strikes in the capital of Khartoum, on Sunday the UN and other international interests appealed yet again for Generals Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Daglo to agree to a 72-hour ceasefire for another three days.

The situation in Sudan escalated amid disagreements between the army chief, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who also heads the ruling Sovereignty Council, and the head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (known as Hemedti), who is al-Burhan’s deputy on the council.

The main points of contention between the two military organizations are related to the timeline and methods of forming unified armed forces of Sudan, as well as who should become the commander-in-chief of the army: a career military officer, which is the option supported by al-Burhan, or an elected civilian president, as Dagalo insists.

On April 15, clashes between the two structures erupted near a military base in Merowe and in the capital, Khartoum, and continued on Tuesday despite an earlier ceasefire. According to the country’s health ministry, more than 600 people have been killed in the country since the conflict broke out.

AMK/PR

Natural gas fueled the fatal Pa. chocolate factory explosion, preliminary report finds
2023/05/02
Rubble at the site of the R.M. Palmer chocolate factory in West Reading, Pennsylvania, on March 27, 2023. - Steven M. Falk/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

PHILADELPHIA — A natural gas-fueled explosion destroyed a West Reading chocolate factory building in March, the National Transportation Safety Board said in a preliminary report Tuesday. Seven people were killed and 11 were injured in the R.M. Palmer blast that rocked the tight-knit borough of about 4,500 people.

The source of the likely gas leak was not laid out Tuesday, and will be a focus of the ongoing investigation, according to the NTSB report.

Still, the preliminary information laid out by investigators forms the clearest picture of what happened the day of the explosion, just 65 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

According to investigators, 35 office staff and 70 production employees were working in two R.M. Palmer buildings that shared a block with an apartment building.

Employees from “Building 2,” which was flanked by an apartment building and another Palmer building, told investigators they smelled natural gas before the blast. Employees from the building next door said they smelled rotten eggs.

The explosion occurred shortly before 5 p.m., destroying Building 2 and causing “significant structural damage” to the Palmer building next door. Three families in the neighboring apartment building were displaced as a result of the explosion.

UGI Corporation serviced the Palmer buildings with natural gas coming through two mains adjacent to the accident site, but reported that there had been no known work in the area, nor a pressure spike in gas use ahead of the explosion.

In a statement, the company said it supports the ongoing investigation.

“We remain focused on providing accurate, timely and comprehensive information to the NTSB to assist them in analyzing and understanding the events of that day,” read the statement.

Employee interviews collected by NTSB investigators echo claims made in news reports and in a lawsuit against Palmer and UGI in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.

“The gas leak at the factory and the horrific explosion it caused was foreseeable, predictable, and preventable,” reads the wrongful death suit filed by a family member of one of the victims.

The suit alleges workers reported a natural gas smell to the company to no avail.

Six of the people killed in the blast are believed to have died from blast injuries, according to the Berks County Coroner’s Office. Investigators believe the seventh victim died from thermal burns. Their ages ranged from 30 to 63.

The rest of the investigation and final report could take up to 24 months to complete and will also focus on “related industry practices and federal regulations.”

With the NTSB no longer needing access to the explosion site, West Reading officials said the Palmer properties and others on the block will return to their respective owners, who will be responsible for clean-up efforts.