DHAKA, Bangladesh (BNO NEWS) — At least fifteen people were killed on Friday when a bus plunged into a water-filled ditch in central Bangladesh, police said. Dozens more were injured.
The accident happened when the overcrowded bus was crossing a diversion road built for temporary use during the construction of a bridge on the highway. The bus went out of control due to the dilapidated condition of the road and plunged into a ditch, leaving 15 dead and 50 others injured.
Witnesses told the Daily Star newspaper that fourteen people died on the spot of the accident while another succumbed to his injuries on the way to the hospital. The injured were transferred to a nearby hospital, including six in critical condition.
The bus was heading to the southern Barisal district and was carrying more than 100 passengers who were due to attend a congregation. Many also got onto the top of the bus, witnesses said.
Road accidents are common in Bangladesh and many are blamed on reckless driving, poor road conditions and old vehicles. It is estimated that road accidents claim at least 13,000 lives a year and leave hundreds of thousands injured in the Asian country.
In July 2011, at least 53 people were killed when the driver of a truck lost control and plunged into a pond in the southeastern region of Bangladesh. The truck was carrying around 80 school children who were returning home after winning a district inter-school football championship.
24 Febr 2012
http://earththreats.com/2012/02/bus-plunges-into-ditch-in-bangladesh-killing-15/
Sunday, 26 February 2012
Valentine’s Day Mass Burial For Over 120 Bodies
Over 100 unclaimed bodies at the Police Hospital in Ghana will be buried in a mass grave at the Awudome Cemetery in Accra.
The Police hospital Mortuary in Accra designated for unknown bodies is congested and cannot admit new dead bodies by the middle of next month. The hospital has two fridges, one for identified bodies and the other for unknown bodies, which though designed to accommodate 30 bodies, now has over 120.
The Public Relations Officer of the hospital, Inspector Juliana Obeng, Speaking to the Times yesterday said the situation had compelled the hospital authorities to transfer some of the bodies to the Korle-Bu Teaching hospital Mortuary.
To solve the problem, the Police Hospital will from Tuesday February 14, begin disposing of all such bodies through mass burial. There hospital is therefore giving relatives and the public who have deposited their dead bodies at the hospital mortuary up to February 14 (valentine’s day) to collect them”, she stressed. Inspector Obeng said failure to collect the bodies would compel the hospital to embark on mass burial.
Inspector Obeng lamented the failure of relatives to claim bodies of their dead even when announcement were made and appealed to the public to take the announcement seriously.
The bodies have been stacked in the hospital’s mortuary for over a year.
Authorities at the hospital have said most of the bodies are those who died through criminal related offences. The Public Relations Officer of the Police Hospital, Chief Inspector Juliana Obeng, told Citi News the exercise is to decongest the morgue.
“It has become necessary because the ridge was built for 30 bodies at a time and has exceeded its capacity. It is now overflowing with over 120 bodies hence the need for a decongestion exercise,” she explained.
Chief Inspector Obeng explained that since most of the persons brought there were criminals or had no identification it made it difficult to trace the family members of the deceased.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.ghananaija.com/news/2012/01/police-hospital-mass-burial-on-valentine%E2%80%99s-day/
http://news.peacefmonline.com/social/201202/94903.php
The Police hospital Mortuary in Accra designated for unknown bodies is congested and cannot admit new dead bodies by the middle of next month. The hospital has two fridges, one for identified bodies and the other for unknown bodies, which though designed to accommodate 30 bodies, now has over 120.
The Public Relations Officer of the hospital, Inspector Juliana Obeng, Speaking to the Times yesterday said the situation had compelled the hospital authorities to transfer some of the bodies to the Korle-Bu Teaching hospital Mortuary.
To solve the problem, the Police Hospital will from Tuesday February 14, begin disposing of all such bodies through mass burial. There hospital is therefore giving relatives and the public who have deposited their dead bodies at the hospital mortuary up to February 14 (valentine’s day) to collect them”, she stressed. Inspector Obeng said failure to collect the bodies would compel the hospital to embark on mass burial.
Inspector Obeng lamented the failure of relatives to claim bodies of their dead even when announcement were made and appealed to the public to take the announcement seriously.
The bodies have been stacked in the hospital’s mortuary for over a year.
Authorities at the hospital have said most of the bodies are those who died through criminal related offences. The Public Relations Officer of the Police Hospital, Chief Inspector Juliana Obeng, told Citi News the exercise is to decongest the morgue.
“It has become necessary because the ridge was built for 30 bodies at a time and has exceeded its capacity. It is now overflowing with over 120 bodies hence the need for a decongestion exercise,” she explained.
Chief Inspector Obeng explained that since most of the persons brought there were criminals or had no identification it made it difficult to trace the family members of the deceased.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.ghananaija.com/news/2012/01/police-hospital-mass-burial-on-valentine%E2%80%99s-day/
http://news.peacefmonline.com/social/201202/94903.php
Anger as Argentina finds 51st train victim
Rescue workers in Argentina have found another body in the wreckage of a train that crashed two days earlier, raising the death toll to 51 and prompting angry reaction from family and friends of the victim.
Lucas Menghini Rey's body was missed in the chaotic response to Wednesday's crash, which has focused widespread anger at the government's failure to protect passengers from long-known safety threats in the train system.
Relatives and friends were in tears at Friday's news, while others keeping vigil at the station threw objects at passing buses and taxis.
Menghini Rey's identification was confirmed by sources investigating the crash, Argentina's state-owned Telam news agency and official Channel 7 reported.
Riot police responded to the protest with tear gas and batons, clearing the station and making arrests. At least one police officer was injured.
Some rioters started small fires and looted stores in the station as Menghini Rey's family and friends left in tears.
While the cause of the crash remains under investigation and the motorman who failed to stop in time has yet to make a statement, many commuters are furious that the government appeared to ignore repeated warnings about problems with Argentina's trains, including brake failures.
Many suspect corruption and mismanagement contributed to the crash, which also injured 703 of the 1,500 passengers when the eight-car train slammed into the end of the line at less than 12 mph (20 kph).
Menghini Rey had not appeared on any lists of the dead or injured, of whom about 30 of whom remain hospitalised. On Friday, city officials had announced that all other passengers had been accounted for.
His body was found after Nilda Garre, the country's security minister, personally took over and ordered police back to the wreck, searching "even in the most impossible places", Telam reported.
Inside the station, his family and friends stacked boxes plastered with his picture and numbers to call, along with the phrase "we are as fragile as cardboard", a feeling shared by many after seeing how the massive train cars crumpled and crushed hundreds of passengers inside.
Menghini Rey's family had not seen him since he said goodbye early that morning to his 3-year-old daughter, promising to bring her a toy when he came back from work at a downtown call centre.
Argentina's third deadly train accident in less than a year has focused attention on the dilapidated passenger rail system, privatised in 1995 and heavily subsidised by the government since then to keep ticket prices low.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/02/20122256339114233.html
Lucas Menghini Rey's body was missed in the chaotic response to Wednesday's crash, which has focused widespread anger at the government's failure to protect passengers from long-known safety threats in the train system.
Relatives and friends were in tears at Friday's news, while others keeping vigil at the station threw objects at passing buses and taxis.
Menghini Rey's identification was confirmed by sources investigating the crash, Argentina's state-owned Telam news agency and official Channel 7 reported.
Riot police responded to the protest with tear gas and batons, clearing the station and making arrests. At least one police officer was injured.
Some rioters started small fires and looted stores in the station as Menghini Rey's family and friends left in tears.
While the cause of the crash remains under investigation and the motorman who failed to stop in time has yet to make a statement, many commuters are furious that the government appeared to ignore repeated warnings about problems with Argentina's trains, including brake failures.
Many suspect corruption and mismanagement contributed to the crash, which also injured 703 of the 1,500 passengers when the eight-car train slammed into the end of the line at less than 12 mph (20 kph).
Menghini Rey had not appeared on any lists of the dead or injured, of whom about 30 of whom remain hospitalised. On Friday, city officials had announced that all other passengers had been accounted for.
His body was found after Nilda Garre, the country's security minister, personally took over and ordered police back to the wreck, searching "even in the most impossible places", Telam reported.
Inside the station, his family and friends stacked boxes plastered with his picture and numbers to call, along with the phrase "we are as fragile as cardboard", a feeling shared by many after seeing how the massive train cars crumpled and crushed hundreds of passengers inside.
Menghini Rey's family had not seen him since he said goodbye early that morning to his 3-year-old daughter, promising to bring her a toy when he came back from work at a downtown call centre.
Argentina's third deadly train accident in less than a year has focused attention on the dilapidated passenger rail system, privatised in 1995 and heavily subsidised by the government since then to keep ticket prices low.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/americas/2012/02/20122256339114233.html
Bangladesh: Dhaka ill-prepared for quakes
Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, is ill-prepared for earthquakes due to lack of awareness and unplanned urbanization, say experts.
“Total disregard for the national building code by the builders has left Dhaka extremely susceptible,” said earthquake expert and civil engineer Mehedi Ahmed Ansary, from Bangladesh University of Engineering & Technology (BUET).
In 2011 Dhaka’s roughly 11 million people were rocked by three earthquakes each registering at least six on the Richter scale - but without any casualties or damage, according to the Bangladesh Meteorological Department.
The Department said the most recent quake in September did not cause casualties due to “sheer luck” because the tremor stopped in less than two minutes.
But had luck not been on the capital’s side, the population would have been ill-prepared for any fallout, said Manish Kumar Agarwal, a programme manager for disaster preparedness at Oxfam’s Dhaka office.
In a “worst-case scenario”, more than 100,000 people may die and numerous others need hospitalization if a 7.5 magnitude earthquake from the nearby Madhupur Fault were to hit the capital, according to a 2009 study by the Comprehensive Disaster Management Programme (CDMP) under the Ministry of Food and Disaster Management.
Some 400,000 buildings in the country’s three largest cities - Dhaka, Chittagong some 200km south of Dhaka, and Sylhet in the northeast - are extremely vulnerable to earthquakes and would be damaged “beyond repair” in the event of a major quake, according to the CDMP study.
There are an estimated 849 major hospitals in these three cities, but most would be damaged or non-functional in the event of a major quake, according to the World Health Organization office in Bangladesh, which has since 2010 funded a health team to conduct hospital safety assessments nationwide.
Retrofitting
The government is recruiting 62,000 “urban community volunteers” to be disaster responders, of which “7,000 have already been trained and given tools to conduct search and rescue operations,” Mohammad Abdul Qayyum, CDMP national project director, told IRIN.
Qayyum added that earthquake preparedness has been included in the school curriculum through regular drills as of 2004, and the government drafted its first earthquake emergency plan in 2009.
According to Qayyum, CDMP is also conducting training programmes for masons and builders in cooperation with the government’s Housing and Building Research Institute.
“There are also plans to retrofit selected buildings such as hospitals to strengthen them against quakes,” he said.
Experts calculate that from the design stage, it costs an additional 4 percent to make a building resilient against disasters, but such costs multiply after the building’s construction.
Media campaign
Action Aid, Concern Universal, Concern Worldwide, Islamic Relief Worldwide, Oxfam GB and Plan International, under the platform of the National Alliance for Disaster Risk Reduction and Response Initiative, launched a media campaign three months after the September 2011 earthquake to educate residents about earthquake risks.
“Me, my wife and our six-year-old boy were running down to streets out of fear in our home, which is a 21-storey apartment building, at the time of an earthquake on 18 September 2011 as the whole building was shaking,” said resident Anwar Munir, still “haunted” by what turned out to be a 6.8-scale earthquake.
Dhaka is identified as one of world’s “megacities” - cities with at least 10 million residents - most at risk of liquefaction in the event of an earthquake, where soil can liquefy, according to the Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre in a 2010 publication.
“We still don’t know what to do in an event of an earthquake,” added Munir.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.speroforum.com/a/WYDUWKUBQN28/68860-Bangladesh---Dhaka-illprepared-for-quakes
“Total disregard for the national building code by the builders has left Dhaka extremely susceptible,” said earthquake expert and civil engineer Mehedi Ahmed Ansary, from Bangladesh University of Engineering & Technology (BUET).
In 2011 Dhaka’s roughly 11 million people were rocked by three earthquakes each registering at least six on the Richter scale - but without any casualties or damage, according to the Bangladesh Meteorological Department.
The Department said the most recent quake in September did not cause casualties due to “sheer luck” because the tremor stopped in less than two minutes.
But had luck not been on the capital’s side, the population would have been ill-prepared for any fallout, said Manish Kumar Agarwal, a programme manager for disaster preparedness at Oxfam’s Dhaka office.
In a “worst-case scenario”, more than 100,000 people may die and numerous others need hospitalization if a 7.5 magnitude earthquake from the nearby Madhupur Fault were to hit the capital, according to a 2009 study by the Comprehensive Disaster Management Programme (CDMP) under the Ministry of Food and Disaster Management.
Some 400,000 buildings in the country’s three largest cities - Dhaka, Chittagong some 200km south of Dhaka, and Sylhet in the northeast - are extremely vulnerable to earthquakes and would be damaged “beyond repair” in the event of a major quake, according to the CDMP study.
There are an estimated 849 major hospitals in these three cities, but most would be damaged or non-functional in the event of a major quake, according to the World Health Organization office in Bangladesh, which has since 2010 funded a health team to conduct hospital safety assessments nationwide.
Retrofitting
The government is recruiting 62,000 “urban community volunteers” to be disaster responders, of which “7,000 have already been trained and given tools to conduct search and rescue operations,” Mohammad Abdul Qayyum, CDMP national project director, told IRIN.
Qayyum added that earthquake preparedness has been included in the school curriculum through regular drills as of 2004, and the government drafted its first earthquake emergency plan in 2009.
According to Qayyum, CDMP is also conducting training programmes for masons and builders in cooperation with the government’s Housing and Building Research Institute.
“There are also plans to retrofit selected buildings such as hospitals to strengthen them against quakes,” he said.
Experts calculate that from the design stage, it costs an additional 4 percent to make a building resilient against disasters, but such costs multiply after the building’s construction.
Media campaign
Action Aid, Concern Universal, Concern Worldwide, Islamic Relief Worldwide, Oxfam GB and Plan International, under the platform of the National Alliance for Disaster Risk Reduction and Response Initiative, launched a media campaign three months after the September 2011 earthquake to educate residents about earthquake risks.
“Me, my wife and our six-year-old boy were running down to streets out of fear in our home, which is a 21-storey apartment building, at the time of an earthquake on 18 September 2011 as the whole building was shaking,” said resident Anwar Munir, still “haunted” by what turned out to be a 6.8-scale earthquake.
Dhaka is identified as one of world’s “megacities” - cities with at least 10 million residents - most at risk of liquefaction in the event of an earthquake, where soil can liquefy, according to the Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre in a 2010 publication.
“We still don’t know what to do in an event of an earthquake,” added Munir.
25 Febr 2012
http://www.speroforum.com/a/WYDUWKUBQN28/68860-Bangladesh---Dhaka-illprepared-for-quakes
Families want NZ mine photos released
The families of the 29 men killed in the Pike River Coal mine have applied to have photos showing the bodies of two workers made public.
Spokesman for the families, Bernie Monk, says they have been shown photos that are so clear they have been able to positively identify the bodies of two men.
"There are two men - we know who the two people are," he told New Zealand's Sunday Star Times.
The families are debating whether the photos should be publicly released to boost calls for a body recovery mission. They are also considering launching their own efforts to re-enter the mine.
Mr Monk said the families have applied to have the photos released and are waiting to hear back.
The decision to release the photos has to be made by the Royal Commission of Inquiry investigating the cause of the New Zealand mining disaster in November 2010.
Other photos seen by the families show that a box containing self-rescue kits had been opened after the first explosion.
Mr Monk said the photos were proof some of the miners had survived the November 19 blast.
A second explosion, four days later, ruled out any hope of survival, police said at the time.
The families have been frustrated by the slow progress towards recovering the bodies from the mine. They have recently sent a three-page letter to New Zealand Prime Minister John Key urging more action.
25 Febr 2012
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/13014951/families-want-nz-mine-photos-released/