Read in the National Geographic by Amanda Fiegl

In rural East Africa, where nearly 90 percent of households are off the grid and large solar panels are costly, hazardous kerosene lamps are the norm. Enter portable micro-solar systems, which development groups are introducing for $10 to $25.  These generate one or two watts – enought to power LED lights and recharge batteries – as well as income for local salespeople.

And micro-solar provides another kind of power.  Dorica Magomba (see picture) a Masai farmer in Tanzania’s Iringa Region, uses it to scare hyenas away from livestock at night.  “When you have light” says photographer Lynn Johnson, who met Magomba while working in the region, “you have courage”.

A Russian official’s daughter, who knocked down two people when driving, killing one, is facing a retrial. A Russian court says there were major violations in procedure during the first hearing.

Images of the crash caused public outrage. They showed Anna Shavenkova, daughter of the head of Irkutsk’s election committee, checking the damage to her car and not the victims.

The accident in December 2009 claimed the life of one woman and severely injured another. Shavenkova was given a three-year suspended sentence which was recently revoked.

The retrial is expected to start soon, but that brings little hope to Yulia Pyatkova, one of Shavenkova’s victims.

“A person can commit a crime and remain unpunished. Anna Shavenkova was not and will not be punished properly for what she did to us. I am sure of it.”

It is not the first time that children of high-ranking officials have caused controversy with their reckless driving and apparent lack of punishment.

Read in the BBC News:  H a  H a  H a  … she wants to run for President… well, then!!!

Former Alaskan governor and potential 2012 presidential contender Sarah Palin has made a gaffe on a radio show by saying North Korea is a US ally.

Answering questions from host Glenn Beck she said, “Obviously, we’ve got to stand with our North Korean allies.”

Corrected by Mr Beck, she replied: “Yeah. And we’re also bound by prudence to stand with our South Korean allies, yes.”

Ms Palin says she is deciding whether to run for president in 2012.

Her slip of the tongue over North Korea will provide more ammunition for critics who say she doesn’t have sufficient knowledge or experience for high office.

Former First Lady Barbara Bush recently said that Ms Palin should “stay in Alaska” rather than run for president.

The conservative US website The Weekly Standard came to Ms Palin’s defence, pointing out that “she correctly identified North Korea as our enemy literally eight seconds before the mix-up”.

Sarah Palin makes gaffe

Related articles

• Sarah Palin: ‘We Gotta Stand With Our North Korean Allies’ – ABC News (news.google.com)

A Libyan Airbus jet crashed as it tried to land in Tripoli airport….

Image by nothing via Flickr

By ROBERT BARR and JILL LAWLESS Associated Press Writers © 2010 The Associated Press

April 15, 2010, 9:02AM

LONDON — Ash from Iceland’s spewing volcano halted air traffic across a wide swathe of Europe on Thursday, grounding planes on a scale not seen since the 9/11 terror attacks. Thousands of flights were canceled, tens of thousands of passengers were stranded and officials said it was not clear when it would be safe enough to fly again.

In a sobering comment, one scientist in Iceland said the ejection of volcanic ash — and therefore disruptions in air travel — could continue for days or even weeks.

Authorities stopped all flights over Britain, Ireland and the Nordic countries. The shutdown closed London’s five major airports including Heathrow, Europe’s busiest, a major trans-Atlantic hub that handles over 1,200 flights and 180,000 passengers per day.

With the cloud drifting south and east across Britain, the country’s air traffic service banned all non-emergency flights until at least 7 a.m. (0600 GMT, 2 a.m. EDT) Friday.

Irish authorities closed their air space for at least eight hours, and aviation authorities in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland took similar precautions.

Airport shutdowns and flight cancellations spread across Europe — to France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland, Sweden, Finland and Switzerland — as well as around the world.

The volcano’s smoke and ash poses a threat to aircraft because it can affect visibility, and microscopic debris can get sucked into airplane engines and can cause them to shut down. Health officials said the plume, which rose to between 20,000 feet and 36,000 feet (6,000 meters and 11,000 meters), posed no threat to human health.

Airlines in the United States were canceling some flights to Europe and delaying others.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown said her agency was working with airlines to try to reroute some flights around the ash cloud, which lies above the Atlantic Ocean close to the flight paths for most routes from the U.S. east coast to Europe.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Volcanic ash shuts air space across Europe (msnbc.msn.com)
• Volcanic Ash Disrupts British Flights (npr.org)
• Icelandic volcanic ash cripples European airports (thestar.com)

Al Jazeera English – Europe – Iceland volcano prompts evacuations.

Image via Wikipedia

Killer Waves Rock Mediterranean Cruise

ATHENS, Greece (March 3) — A 26-foot wave smashed into a cruise ship carrying nearly 2,000 people in the Mediterranean on Wednesday, smashing glass windshields and killing two passengers, according to officials and news reports.

Another six people suffered light injuries, the Greek coast guard said in a statement. The victims were identified as a German and an Italian man.

Read article

Related articles by Zemanta

• Two killed as freak wave smashes into cruise ship (guardian.co.uk)
• Waves kill 2 on cruise ship in Mediterranean (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Giant waves kill two on Mediterranean cruise ship (telegraph.co.uk)
• 26-foot wave kills 2, injures 6 aboard cruise ship (msnbc.msn.com)

Simon Ammann holt seine dritte Olympische Goldmedaille.

Didier Défago Olympiasieger in der Abfahrt

Abfahrtsgold für Didier! An Stelle von Topfavorit Didier Cuche, der nur Sechster wurde, sprang dessen Westschweizer Namensvetter Didier Défago in die Bresche.

Cologna läuft entfesselt zu Olympia-Gold

Dario Cologna hat sein grosses Ziel bereits im ersten Anlauf erfüllt und lief über 15 km in freier Technik zum Olympiasieg.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Swiss Ski Jumper Wins 1st Gold Medal of Vancouver Olympics (nytimes.com)
• Winter Olympics 2010: Didier Defago swoops to win gold medal in the men’s downhill (telegraph.co.uk)
• World Cup champ Cologna back training after injury (seattletimes.nwsource.com)