More 9/11 remains identified in DNA database

The massive DNA database compiled after the World Trade Center terror attacks has linked 261 more body parts to its existing profile of victims since February, officials with the New York Medical Examiners office said Wednesday.

The additional DNA findings didn't increase the number of victims of the 9/11 attacks whose remains have been identified because in some cases the remains were linked to those known to have perished, Borakove said.

Currently, 1,633 victims have been identified, mostly through DNA analysis. A total of 2,753 people died in the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

In some cases, families of the victims have asked to have the newly identified remains provided for burial or disposition, while others want the medical examiner to retain them for now, Borakove said.

The identifications are being made in the ongoing effort to use evolving DNA technology to link remains and, where possible, make an identification to a victim, Borakove said.

After the crash of the two jetliners into the Twin Towers and their resulting collapse, the recovery effort found 21,817 human remains.

Of those body parts, 13,162 have been identified, leaving 8,655 without any DNA matches, Borakove said.

One of the last identifications of a named victim occurred in August 2011, when DNA matches identified the remains of Ernest James, 40, of New York City, who worked for the insurance brokerage Marsh & McLennan.

Monday 15 October 2012

http://www.newsday.com/911-anniversary/more-9-11-remains-identified-in-dna-database-1.4099347

Bangladesh among top five disaster-prone countries

Bangladesh has been named the fifth in the list of 173 countries that are most prone to natural disasters, according to a report.

The "World Risk Report 2012" examines which countries are more at risk from natural disasters than others, what contributes to this risk and what can be done about it, the Daily Star said.

Island nations Vanuatu, over 3,600 km from Australia in the Pacific Ocean, and Tonga, at a distance of 5,200 km from Australia, have the highest disaster risk.

Malta and Qatar face the lowest risk worldwide, said the report.

It said environmental degradation is a significant factor that reduces the capacity of societies to deal with disaster risk in many countries around the world.

The report was published in Brussels by the German Alliance for Development Works, UN University Institute for Environment and Human Security, and The Nature Conservancy.

"This report illustrates the powerful role that nature can play in reducing risks to people and property from coastal hazards like storms, erosion and floods," Michael Beck, lead marine scientist at The Nature Conservancy, was quoted as saying.

The top 15 most "at-risk" countries are all tropical and coastal. There, coastal habitats like reefs and mangroves are incredibly important for people's lives and livelihoods.

Monday 15 October 2012

http://www.siasat.com/english/news/bangladesh-among-top-five-disaster-prone-countries

2 more bodies, death toll rises to 31

After recovering two more bodies at Monpura upazila of Bhola, the official account of deaths from Thursday’s violent storm sweeping the coastal belt rose to 31 on Sunday.

Monpura police officer-in-charge Naresh Chandra Karmakar said the recovered bodies were identified as Dulal, 16, of Sakuchia and Amiruddin, 29, of Char Nizam.

Unofficial sources, however, fear the number of deaths to exceed 40 as many of the fishermen who went to fishing might have been washed away to the deep sea with their boats capsized.

Bhola deputy commissioner Khandokar Mustafizur Rahman said it would take some more time to know the actual number of deaths.

BIWTC salvage vessel Hamza did not succeed yet on Sunday to haul the sunken BIWTC sea truck ST Sheikh Russell and two other cargo vessels.

Rafikul Islam, BIWTC assistant director and in charge of the Hamza, said the sea truck was pulled to the shore but was still under water as Hamza’s crane was not capable of lifting it up.

The other two vessels that sank near the shore were anchored at the landing station, he added. Chairmen of some worst affected unions of Bhola said they started receiving food grains as relief for distribution to storm victims.

Dhal char union parishad chairman Rafikul Islam Patowari, Char Fasson upazila chairman Nazir Ahmed, Dasherhaat UP chairman Waliul Islam, Hazirhaat UP chairman Shahriar Dipak, Sadar UP chairman Alauddin, all three under Monpura upazila, said the Bhola district administration began sending food relief.

Monpura upazila nirbahi officer Wahidul Islam said distribution of money and materials to the homeless would begin as early as possible.

Bhola, Noakhali, Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar districts were worst affected by the storm.

Monday 15 October 2012

http://newagebd.com/detail.php?date=2012-10-15&nid=27080#.UHvsPj3cz3U

Funeral Strippers: Taiwan Strippers Perform For The Dead

In Taiwan, a way of honoring the dead is starting to take off (no pun intended) all over the country. Family members wishing to honor their deceased relatives and friends. They hire the funeral strippers! According to an AFP report, in some areas of Taiwan it is becoming very common for pole dancers and strippers to ply their trade during religious festivals to honor the “wandering spirits” that have recently passed (see video below). Women in bras and miniskirts dance to loud dance music and shake their bodies so the dead can be happy as they ascend towards the heavens.

This may be a new idea to those in the Western world but for Taiwan this craze is neither new nor unorthodox. Men, women and children all gather around to watch the funeral strippers get busy on stage.

A documentary by anthropologist Marc L. Moskowitz explains the phenomena in a film he released in 2011 called “Dancing for the Dead: Funeral Strippers in Taiwan.”

A synopsis of the film states:

“Funeral strippers work on Electric Flower Cars (EFC) which are trucks that have been converted to moving stages so that women can perform as the vehicles follow along with funerals or religious processions. EFC came to Taiwan’s public attention in 1980 when newspapers began covering the phenomenon of stripping at funerals. There is a great deal of debate about whether this should be allowed to continue. In Taipei, Taiwan’s capital, one often hears middle and upper class men complain about the harmful effects of this rural practice on public morality. In contrast, people in the industry see themselves as talented performers and fans of the practice say that it makes events more exciting.”

Moskowitz, in an interview with io9.com said:

“It’s not at all common for urbanites, but in rural settings, most people have seen these performances. Actual full stripping has gone underground because there were laws enacted against full nudity in the 1980s. Nonetheless, the documentarian noted that “almost everyone” he had spoken to for his film had said they had seen “full stripping.”

Taoist preist have said that funeral strippers have become a strong part of the culture in Taiwain because the gyrating naked bodies of women is a great way to appease the dead and the Gods that they are hoping to please and get into the after life.

Monday 15 October 2012

Read more at http://www.inquisitr.com/363018/funeral-strippers-taiwan-strippers-perform-for-the-dead-video/#ojmPFX8Mkxcb0Wsb.99

13 people killed, 26 injured in Sudan’s traffic accident

ABOUT 13 people were reportedly killed and 26 others injured in a traffic accident south of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, at the weekend.

Xinhua quoted a statement by Sudanese police as saying: “13 people were killed and 26 others injured in a traffic accident at Al-Takala Abbasher area in central Sudan’s Gezira State.“

The report noted that the accident took place when a passenger mini-bus heading from Khartoum to Al-Kamlin area collided with a bus heading to Khartoum.

The front tyre of the bus exploded, causing it to swerve from its course and later collided with the mini-bus on the opposite lane, the statement said.

The injured were transported to the hospital in Khartoum, while the bodies of the dead were transferred to the morgue.

Monday 15 October 2012

http://www.guardiannewsngr.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=101658:13-people-killed-26-injured-in-sudans-traffic-accident-&catid=98:africa&Itemid=557

New article: The visibility of disaster deaths in news images: A comparison of newspapers from 15 countries

The new issue of the International Communication Gazette includes a paper I wrote about the newspaper coverage of the devastating 2010 Haiti earthquake. Building on my work on news representations of death, the article develops a five-step typology of death images, and compares the coverage among 15 countries, from the Americas, Oceania and Europe. Here is the abstract of the paper. The extent to which newspapers display graphic images of death has rarely been studied in relation to the degree of the visibility of bodies, nor do many comparative analyses exist. This has led to a narrow understanding of how and why audiences are exposed to human suffering around the world. In examining newspaper images of the dead from the 2010 Haiti earthquake across 15 countries, this study develops a graphic image content scale to measure such visualizations. It finds significant differences in graphic images across the studied sample, both in terms of the amount of images and the degree of visibility of death. The study argues that major sociocultural influences, such as different religious traditions and societal levels of violence are part of the reason for the differences. Paper can be found here: http://gaz.sagepub.com/content/74/7/655.full.pdf+html Monday 15 October 2012

Andes survivors mark 40th anniversary of crash

A Uruguayan rugby team played a match that was postponed for four decades when their plane crashed in the Andes, stranding them for 72 days in the cordillera and forcing them to eat human flesh to stay alive.

The Old Christians Club squared off Saturday in Santiago against the Old Grangonian Club, the former Chilean rugby team they were to have played to mark the 40th anniversary of the crash made internationally famous by a best-selling book and a Hollywood movie.

Surviving rugby team members of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, whose ordeal inspired books and films, finally play match which was postponed for four decades

A Uruguayan rugby team played a match that was postponed for four decades when their plane crashed in the Andes, stranding them for 72 days in the cordillera and forcing them to eat human flesh to stay alive.

The Old Christians Club squared off Saturday in Santiago against the Old Grangonian Club, the former Chilean rugby team they were to have played to mark the 40th anniversary of the crash made internationally famous by a best-selling book and a Hollywood movie.

"At about this time we were falling in the Andes. Today we're here to win a game," Pedro Algorta, 61, a survivor of the crash said as he prepared to walk onto the playing field surrounded by the jagged mountains that trapped the group.

Military jets flew over the field, where parachutists in Chilean and Uruguayan flags landed. Survivors wept when officials unveiled a commemorative frame with pictures of those who died in the snowy peaks.

Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, also known as the Andes flight disaster, was a chartered flight carrying 45 people, including a rugby team, their friends, family and associates that crashed in the Andes on 13 October 1972.

The crash killed more than a quarter of the passengers and several others quickly succumbed to the freezing weather. Eight more were killed when an avalanche swept over the survivors' shelter, perched at over 3,600 meters altitude

The last 16 survivors were rescued on 23 December 1972, more than two months after the crash. Faced with starvation, and as hopes for a rescue mission dwindled, they made the near-impossible choice of eat flesh from the bodies of their dead comrades in order to survive.

"I think the greatest sadness I felt in my life was when I had to eat a dead body," said Roberto Canessa, 59, who was a teenage medical student at the time of the crash.

"I would ask myself: Is it worth doing this? And it was because it was in order to live and preserve life, which is exactly what I would have liked for myself if it had been my body that lied on the floor," he said.

Exasperated by more than two months in the frigid cordillera, Canessa and Fernando Parrado left the crash site to seek help.

After 10 days of trekking, they spotted a livestock herder in the foothills of the Chilean Andes who rode his horse to the nearest town to alert rescuers.

"I came back to life after having died. It's something that very few people experience," said Parrado, who has been a TV host, motivational speaker and race car driver. "Since then, I have enjoyed fully, carefully but without fear."

Monday 15 October 2012

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4291713,00.html

Souls of 40 unclaimed bodies to find peace

On Sarvapitri Amavasya on October 15, when many families pay homage to their loved ones, Pune-based Rashtriya Kala Akademi will immerse the ashes of nearly 40 unclaimed bodies in the river to give final peace to their souls.

The group has organised a special puja at Sangam Ghat on Sarvapitri Amavasya following which the ashes of the unclaimed bodies will be immersed in the river.

The group has kept the ashes in special lockers in Kailas crematorium behind SSPMS College on Raja Bahadur Mill Road. This year, the group has performed last rites of 405 unclaimed bodies.

Mandar Ranjekar, secretary of Rashtriya Kala Akademi told DNA, “In Hindu religion, many families perform pujas on Sarvapitri Amavasya in the memory of their loved ones. However, these unclaimed bodies do not have any family. Usually, the authorities cremate unclaimed bodies and dispose of the ashes. So, we thought that we will perform the last rites of these unclaimed bodies and immerse their ashes in the river to give their souls final peace.”

“We have performed the last rites of nearly 40 bodies in October and the ashes have been kept in the locker room of Kailas crematorium. On Monday, we have invited some well-known people at Sangam Ghat to immerse the ashes in water. On the same day, we will also felicitate civic workers who have contributed a lot in performing the last rites of unclaimed bodies,” Ranjekar said.

This initiative was started last year and the group had rented 36 lockers at Kailas crematorium to keep the ashes. Most of these unclaimed bodies do not have a name or identification, so we keep a record of the bodies by registering their post-mortem numbers, he said.

“Rashtriya Kala Akademi works in the field of art and culture and we feel that performing the last rites of the deceased, even if they are unclaimed, is a part of our culture. So, we have decided to undertake this initiative. We hope that our work will raise mass awareness and that such initiatives will be undertaken in other crematoriums as well,” Ranjekar said.

Monday 15 October 2012

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1752358