Nocere – Earth Disasters

It was a tragic day Saturday for the Togolese football team. 6 people died when the bus they were riding in went off the side of the road and fell into a ravine. The accident happened when they were 100 miles on the north side of the capital, Lome. The team, Shooting Star, was on their way to play in a game.

The passengers that perished were part of the team. Charles Balogoun, the Togo national goalkeeper was amongst the 6 that died. There were also 25 other passengers that had to be admitted to the hospital. Many had been burnt badly and had severe injuries.

It is being said that a tire burst prior to the driver loosing control of the bus resulting in it going off the side of the road and into the ravine. Some were able to get out of the bus, but weren’t really sure how they did it. Most of the team was able to get off the bus because they were in seats in the front of the bus.

The bus caught fire and pictures are being shown of the remains of the bus. It was burnt almost totally. In the pictures there is still some smoke coming from the smoldering fire.

Only last year, there were two players of the Togo national football team killed by insurgents that attacked the teams bus in Angola.

We hope for a quick recovery of all the passengers that had to be admitted to the military hospital in Lome for treatment.

Possibly More than 13 Die in Suicide Bombing in Iraq

In the middle east, in the Taji district of Baghdad, a suicide bomber drove his vehicle into a checkpoint located at a prison. The explosion took the lives of 13 people. There were 28 additional people hurt in the explosion. The injured includes members of the prison guard, and civilians. At this time, no one has accepted responsibility for the incident.

The attack happened on Monday. It is being investigated. There was also another attack on Monday where a mortar round hit in the heavily protected Green Zone. There were 2 people who died and possibly more. It fell into an outdoor parking area that was part of the Iraqi Parliament compound. The round hit a car parked there. At this time there is no information on the victims. The Green Zone is the central area of Baghdad that houses the Iraq’s government offices and quite a few embassies. The United States and the United Kingdom both have their embassies in the Green Zone.

Yet another incident that took the lives of two civilians happened in Baghdad close by the Baghdad international Fair Complex in the western part of Baghdad. There were 4 others injured.

All of the attacks happened on Monday. It seems that as the US is working on removing it’s troops, that the attacks are getting to be more and more frequent. At this time there are still 13,000 troops in Iraq.

The Fighting Between The Shi’ite Insurgents and Sunni Islamist Continue

On Wednesday, battles between the two resulted with 26 people being injured. The battle prevailed as the now prime minister is busy putting together a government under a Gulf plan to avoid a civilian uprising while alleviating out going President Ali Abdullah Saleh from his position.

The plan is to put together a government that includes resistance groups that help back getting Saleh out of power. Together they would guide the country to having a presidential election in February.

Last week, Saleh signed papers to hand his power over to his deputy. There is hope that this will end the uprisings and bring the country together. End the chaos that has grown during the political struggles over ending the presidency of Saleh.

Just last weekend, there were at least 25 people that died during a battle in the Houthi area. There were many students injured of the Dar al-Hadith religious school during the battle.

There is hope that now they can end these conflicts.

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Eighteen children died along with two adults. The bus and a coal truck hit head on in the Yulinzi township located in Zhengning county. It was in the area of Qingyang city. There were 20 casualties on the bus as children were on their way to school on Wednesday morning.

The bus that was built to hold only 9 passengers was found to be carrying 65 people including the driver. The driver of the bus was one of the casualties. The driver and five of the children perished at the scene of the accident. The other adult and 13 other children were said to have died at a later time.

There were 45 others passengers, almost all were children, that were hurt in the accident and were taken to the hospital where they are receiving treatment.

Most of the children were only kindergarteners.

Gas Leak in China Mine Kills 21 Miners

The urgency remains, time is critical for rescuing the trapped miners still in the mine in the south western Yunnan province. The rescue operation continues to try and find the miners that are trapped inside the mine by a gas leak. The mine, an illegal mine, had lost is mining license a year ago. It is being questioned as to was the accident an explosion or was it a gas leak? The Sizhuang mine is located in the Yunnan province’s Qujing city.

21 of the miners were killed on Thursday, November 10th, at the time of the accident. Another 22 are presumed trapped inside the mine. A day passed with no reports of any survivors being found. There is much emotion at the mine as family of miners have gathered searching for answers. Wanting news that their loved one has survived.

China’s mines are very dangerous. Just last year 2,600 miners died in mining accidents. Their safety record is much worse than any other country.  They also have the biggest mining industry which makes the accidents appear to be more. When taking into account how many mines there are in China, it may not appear to be as bad. Still the country produces about 40% of the worlds coal supply but they also are accountable for 80% of the yearly mining deaths. A miner in China has 100 times more of a possibility of dieing on the job than a miner in the US.

Just last week, there were 45 miners trapped in a mine for 36 hours in the Qianqiu colliery located in the city of Sanmenxia in the Henan province. There were 8 miners rescued from the mine on Friday and 14 of the miners were able to get out right after the accident on Thursday.

The 45 miners were rescued on Saturday. Images of miners being taken from the mine with their eyes covered to protect them from the brightness of the sun after being in the dark for so long.

As 75 miners had been working late on Thursday, a rock burst happened. That is an explosion that is a result of a sudden release of built up pressure. Prior to the rock burst, there had been an earthquake with a scale rating of 2..9. A new tunnel had to be dug to allow access to the trapped miners.

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Deadly Explosion at Military Base in Iran

There were 17 soldiers that perished in an explosion that happened at a military base close to the capital of Iran, Tehran. 12 others people had to be transported to near by hospitals. The blast was earsplitting, breaking windows of close by buildings and was heard by people as far as 25 miles away.

The fire from the explosion, which happened when there was a group of weapons being put inside a Revolutionary Guard depot, was still burning 2 hours after the blast. Traffic was tied up on near by roadways. It was a large portion of the depot that held weapons that exploded. At this time they are unaware of what caused the explosion. People are still in a shocked state.

A few people are stating that there was another explosion that followed the first on Saturday. Others are stating that they thought the explosion was a minor earthquake. They were letting no news reporters on the scene at the time. At first they were saying 27 had died, but the number has been lowered to 17.  It is being treated as an accident.

11 Die During Shelling of Yemen

In Taiz, there were 11 people who died during the shelling of Yemen while the government forces battled with resistance members. There were many more injured, some were civilians. It happened while a United Nations emissary was visiting Yemen. Jamal Benomar is pushing for the transition of power to put an end to many months of conflicts.

The protest started back in January of 2011 over President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s long term rule of 33 years. Protest against Saleh have increased in Taiz the last few weeks. Taiz is Yemen’s second largest city. It is located about 120 miles on the south side of the capital of Yemen, Sanaa. The most recent protest started on Thursday. On Thursday, there was one person that perished in the protest and many others wounded. Two of the residential areas had been blasted by the security forces overnight. The two areas were the front of the battle grounds of forces against the government. They are Zaid al-Moshki and al-Rawda. Also the Freedom Square was a part of the area being shelled.

On Friday, it was reported that 3 women and 2 children were amongst the dead.

In The Uk, 150 Home Flooded

There were as many as 150 dwelling flooded in the West Midlands as a water main busted in the early morning hours. It caused the flooding of many homes in the Blackwood Estate area in Streetly. The South Staffs Water company became aware of the burst at around 05:30GMT and put their engineers to work on it immediately. Some of the water was a deep as 3 feet in areas.

One woman,  who found 5 feet of water in her basement heard a loud roar of water. Sheila Howard stated, “It frightened me to death because I’m here all alone.”

Many others spoke of a loud noise from the incoming water. One man was shocked electrically as he was standing in water, and a lady was injured when she fell.

There are firefighters trying to help out the residents. There is work going on clearing drains out and keeping gullies clear to allow the water to flow out of the estate area.

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