Drunk Driving, Overloading Behind Meghalaya Bus Crash; Villagers Loot Victims

Initial investigations have revealed that drunken driving and overloading led to the road accident that left 30 people dead and 26 injured at Tongseng village in East Jaintia Hills district on Wednesday. Thirty persons, including women and children died while 26 were critically injured when the Tripura-bound bus fell into a deep gorge along the NH 44 early morning on Wednesday. According to Abhishek Chandra, the District Magistrate of Unakoti, “the driver who is presently undergoing treatment at Silchar Medical College Hospital, was completely drunk at the time of the mishap. The main driver died in the accident. According to sources, the ticket counter in Guwahati had issued only 36 tickets but at the time mishap 56 passengers were travelling in the ill-fated bus. Meanwhile, out of the 30 passengers who died in the bus accident only 15 were identified on Thursday. “Officials from Tripura who were camping in the district headquarter have identified as many as 15 of those who died either on the spot or succumbed to their injuries,” East Jaintia Hills Deputy Commissioner Abhishek Bhagotia said.

The district administration has set up a control room in Jowai where people can contact either through e-mail (syiem123@gmail.com) or through telephone 0365-2220711 and mobile +91 94361-06342. Officials have ruled out any fresh casualty on Thursday. Meanwhile, nine bodies were taken to Tripura. Two bodies were taken to Guwahati airport. Both were employees of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY). The District Magistrate of Unakoti (Tripura) Abhishek Chandra, who arrived in Khliehriat on Wednesday, made all necessary arrangements for taking the bodies of the deceased to their native places. Expenditure involved in transportation of deceased including those from West Bengal and Bihar is borne by the Government of Tripura.

Villagers Loot Victims

When mourners were grieving over their loved ones who perished in Wednesday’s bus accident at Tongseng village, the villagers, who came out to offer their helping hand in rescue operations were actually busy looting the belongings of the passengers of the ill-fated vehicle. “I am not happy with what had happened,” the District Magistrate of Unakoti District, Abhishek Chandra said on Thursday. “We could not recover even a single mobile phone. We suspect all costly belonging including cash were stolen”, said Chandra.

Local people, who were engaged in rescue operations, charged Rs 5,000 per body, a senior police official said adding Rs 2,500 was demanded per coffin. For dropping bodies, demands by vehicle owners ranged between Rs. 10, 000 to Rs. 12, 000. “It seems every one is taking advantage of the situation”, said a senior government official.

Friday 10 August 2012

http://www.northeasttoday.in/our-states/meghalaya/drunk-driving-overloading-behind-meghalaya-bus-crash-villagers-loot-victims/

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Lagos begins release of bodies of Dana crash victims today

THE Lagos State government will this morning start the release of 132 bodies of Dana plane crash victims.

The charred bodies are to be given in batches and in alphabetical order from today till Saturday to the families. The identities of the bodies scheduled for release have been pasted at the information centre of the Dana Air Crises Centre at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, (LASUTH), Ikeja.

Families and friends of the victims and representatives of the state government at a meeting yesterday in LASUTH heard that 132 bodies had been fully identified through their DNA samples tested abroad while 16 others have not.

The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, told The Guardian that the bodies would be released in batches to reduce chaos, “as there are other documents that they are going to fill for legal reasons.”

“These include the issue of next of kin, who authorises releases and the processes of release. We are releasing another 132 bodies now that are fully identified,” Idris said.

Members of the 200 families and friends that attended the meeting were still in mourning mood. Some of them expressed displeasure against state officials, whom they blamed for keeping bodies of the deceased for more than two months after the disaster.

Following the June 3, 2012 plane crash in Iju, Lagos, about 45 bodies were identifiable, 97 burnt beyond recognition and six bags containing body parts were gathered, requiring DNA test overseas.

On why some of the 45 identifiable bodies would not be released, Idris said it was to ensure that they were given to the right families. He noted that there were cases where two families had come forward for the same body.

“Some of the identifiable bodies were wrongly tagged at the crash site, while some tags fell off in the course of taking them to the morgue. So, what we are doing is to reduce the pains that the bereaved families are going through. We gain nothing by keeping the bodies,” he said.

Pathologist and Chief Examiner in the inquest, Prof. John Obafunwa, said the DNA test recorded 88 per cent success rate and the process is still continuing to identify the remaining 16 bodies.

The state government also disclosed that arrangement for the bodies of foreigners on-board the ill-fated plane, would be worked with the relevant embassies.

Information from the Ministry of Justice showed that processes for the issuance of death certificates would begin on Monday. Meanwhile, an Assistant General Manager of Airports Rescue and Fire Fighting Services, Mr. John Ekpe, at the ongoing hearing of Coroner Inquest into the crash, told the court yesterday that they could not access the actual site of the incident immediately because of the crowd.

Ekpe told Magistrate Oyetade Komolafe they had an emergency plan and disaster emergency team but the search and rescue functions outside the airport falls on the National Emergency Agency.

In his testimony before the court, he said the rescue team was at the crash site with two fire trucks and a water tanker before any other agency, but could not access the actual site of the incident because of the crowd.

Another witness, Sanni Enessi, the Chief Fire Fighter Station Commander of the airport, said the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria has a checklist of agencies it calls for emergency plan.

The inquest continues tomorrow with Federal Road Safety Commission, Total Oil, Forte Oil and two other witnesses for appearance.

Friday 10 August

http://ngrguardiannews.com/index.php?option=com_content&id=95013%3Alagos-begins-release-of-bodies-of-dana-crash-victims-today&Itemid=559

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Dana crash: DNA results out, 132 bodies for collection

Two months after Dana plane crashed in Lagos, killing all 153 passengers on board, the Lagos State Government yesterday said that 132 bodies of the victims were ready for collection by their relatives from today. 16 others are still being processed.

This followed the conclusion of the Deoxyribonucleic Acid results, otherwise known as DNA, in the United Kingdom.

Speaking during a meeting with the affected families at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, LASUTH, Ikeja, yesterday, Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, disclosed that the results were out.

Some of the medical personnel who carried out the tests were also present at the meeting, while the families of the victims had been appropriately notified which day of the week their representatives would come for the corpse.

Idris said that the state government would be releasing the 132 identifiable bodies to relatives of the victims in batches of 20 to authorised claimants from today.

He said the bodies would be released in alphabetical order and the names of the victims that had been identified would be pasted at the Lekan Ogunshola Memorial Morgue, adding that relatives should come with appropriate documents to claim the bodies.

Idris said: “We have got some of the results of the DNA analysis from the UK.

“The experts have released the results and we felt it necessary to brief the families of the victims on the processes and documentation needed to claim the bodies.

“We will release the bodies in batches of 20 in alphabetical order daily from Thursday to reduce the chaos and to resolve some legal processes needed to claim the bodies.”

LASUTH Chief Pathologist and Chief Medical Examiner, Prof. John Obafunwa, said that 16 other bodies were still being processed.

Obafunwa said that the corpses would only be released to their next of kin after the presentation of necessary documents.

He listed the order of priority for the next of kin as spouses, children, parents siblings, half- brothers and sisters, grandparents, nephews and nieces.

“The next of kin is in this order and they have to present legal documents before the bodies would be released to them.

“But, in the case where the next of kin is not available, he or she has to authorise someone else to collect the body with appropriate identification.

“The authorised person has to come with the driver’s licence, national identity card, international passport and letter of authorisation by the next of kin,” he said.

Already, service of songs had been held for some of the victims of the plane crash.

It will be recalled that one week after the crash, the Lagos State government withheld the corpses on the grounds that DNA tests must be conducted on them for identification purposes to avoid giving bodies to wrong families.

This action brewed controversies. Concerned relations were told to wait until the results were released before coming for collection of bodies.

One of the major reasons the state government took the decision was as a result of controversies and physical confrontations among some family members over the rightful owners of some bodies.

This consequently led to a build-up of tension at LASUTH mortuary, which later got to a peak when an angry relative attacked morgue officials with a cutlass following the state government’s refusal to release the bodies already identified by family members.

The assault was interrupted by a special squad of the Rapid Respond Squad, RRS, of the police. As the police held the angry relative, he was shouting, “You people can eat my brother’s body if you want, since you don’t want to release him to us.”

The police had to station a team of RRS to man the mortuary 24 hours because of these unpleasant developments at the mortuary. Meanwhile, a Lagos State Coroner’s court conducting inquest into June 3 Dana plane crash was yesterday told the challenges some rescue agencies faced in responding to the disaster.

Testifying at the resumed inquest proceedings yesterday, an Assistant General Manager, Airports Rescue and Fire Fighting Services, Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria, FAAN, Mr.John Ekpe, told the coroner, Mr. Alexander Komolafe, that there was no emergency agency that had all the equipment required to save the lives of victims.

The witness said the FAAN rescue team was at the crash site early enough with two fire trucks and a water tanker ahead of other agencies but could not access the actual site of the incident because of the crowd.

Ekpe said by the time his team could accessed the site, “our team recovered dead bodies from the nose of the plane, which was not completely burnt, while Julius Berger was called to evacuate the affected buildings and wreckages with their heavy equipment.’’

Ekpe also told the coroner that FAAN had an emergency plan and disaster emergency team but the search and rescue functions outside the airport falls on the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA.

Another witness, a Chief Fire Fighter Station Commander /Head of Department of the Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting Services of FAAN, Mr. Sanni Enessi, said that the authority had a checklist of agencies it often call for emergency plan.

Cross-examined by lawyers at the proceedings, Enessi explained that there was no source of water supply near the crash site, adding that the Water Corporation was far away from the scene, hence that the team had to go back to the airport to collect water.

The fire chief said the challenges the team faced on its way was that the road was too narrow and bad, and the surging crowd inhibited the emergency operations. Enessi added that the number of police drafted to the scene was not adequate initially but later more men arrived.

The coroner adjourned the inquest proceedings till tomorrow when the officials of the Federal Road Safety Commission, FRSC, Total Oil, Forte Oil and two other witnesses are expected to appear

Thursday 9 August 2012

http://nationalmirroronline.net/news/47950.html

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Relatives pray at Khmer Rouge mass grave

More than 200 villagers gathered in Siem Reap’s Kralanh district yesterday to pray and seek solice for relatives executed during the Khmer Rouge regime after their remains were found over the weekend at the southern base of Trung Bat mountain.

Do Dantrey village deputy chief Muth Samkhan told the Post by telephone that cars and motorbikes came to the village in droves yesterday to light incense and pray for the dead.

“Before, we just know that here is a former Khmer Rouge’s prison. We didn’t know they killed a lot of people and buried them underground. We have so much pity, and many cried when they prayed,” Samkhan said.

The village chief added that some villagers from farther afield who had heard the news of the gruesome discovery journeyed to the village to find out if the remains of their missing relatives were there.

Authorities yesterday continued to embargo any more groundwork in the area until experts could arrive to examine the one-time graveyard, now a commercial soil excavation site.

More than 100 people have attended a Buddhist ceremony in rural Cambodia at the site of a freshly uncovered Khmer Rouge mass grave.

Buddhist monks led prayers and people came with offerings of food and drinks Thursday, five days after about 20 skulls and bone fragments were unearthed at the site of a former Khmer Rouge prison.

Village chief Chheng Theng said the offerings were meant to give sustenance to the souls of the dead "because we know they died hungry."

Siev Bun Sorn, 54, whose nine family members were killed in Trung Bat mountain prison, said that he was shocked and pitied his family, whom Pol Pot’s men murdered at the site.

“My anger disappeared for years, but when I saw the bones, I got angry immediately but could not let alone the thought of how much he had suffered,” Bun Sorn said, adding he had only escaped a similar fate by being transferred to a work movement unit.

He said he would be joining other mourners in a traditional Khmer ceremony once authorities allowed the public into the area.

“I am not sure I can find any bodies of my family members, because it was many years ago and they were buried in only one hole,” he said.

Vann Bunna, director of Siem Reap’s Department of Cult and Religion, said that his officials would begin research today to report to the province about the status of the bones and where they should be kept.

Thursday 9 August 2012

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012080857872/National-news/relatives-pray-at-khmer-rouge-mass-grave.html

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Unearthing Remains in Potter's Field to Give Names Back to the Nameless

On a winter’s night in early 2004, after a late visit at his parents’ house near Cleveland, Javier Reveron called his mother to let her know he had driven home safely. Then he vanished.

Javier Reveron, who went missing in 2004, shown with his mother, Judy, in 2000. He is among those whose bodies have been identified using expertise gained from a decade of using DNA to identify victims of the World Trade Center attack.

Evidence would point to New York. A plane ticket was bought and used. A car parked near La Guardia Airport was broken into, and some of Mr. Reveron’s belongings were found: his wallet, a driver’s license, business cards and a banana peel. There would be sightings, most likely false, in places like Queens and Ohio. Then the trail went dry.

But about six years after his disappearance, the New York City medical examiner’s office discovered what became of Mr. Reveron.

The office is undertaking an ambitious effort to identify the nameless dead in the city’s potter’s field, seeking to capitalize on the expertise that it gained over the last decade identifying remains from the World Trade Center attack.

Through old-time detective work and newer DNA technology, the office established that Mr. Reveron, 27, had drowned not long after arriving in New York in early 2004, and that his body was buried on Hart Island, home to the potter’s field, the graveyard of the poor, unclaimed and, in rare cases, the unidentified.

Some 980 bodies have been found in the city, or its waterways, since 1990 whose identities have never been determined. After a month or more in one of the city’s morgues, the unidentified victims are generally sent to be buried in the same trench graves on Hart Island as the indigents.

But now, as the medical examiner’s office conducts a systematic review of its old cases, the office is not only reopening dormant case files; it is also opening old graves.

Since 2010, the city has exhumed 54 bodies from the potter’s field for further study. So far, the effort has led to about 50 identifications, mostly through DNA evidence.

In the case of Mr. Reveron, his parents, Rigoberto and Judith, came to New York to try to find their son. They handed out fliers and visited store owners who thought they may have seen him. When friends visited New York, the Reverons would give them more fliers to distribute.

“All to no avail,” Rigoberto Reveron said via telephone from his home in Lorain, Ohio. “We didn’t know he had already been buried.”

In March 2010, Mr. Reveron filled out an electronic form concerning missing and unidentified people. Within a few days, he got a call from Ben Figura, the director of identification at the medical examiner’s office, who said, “I personally want to get involved and help you find him.”

The medical examiner’s office got critical biographical information about Mr. Reveron’s son: He was a high school and college wrestler who after college was found to be bipolar. He had an appendectomy, had donated a kidney to his older brother and had the scars from both operations.

That information, Mr. Reveron said, matched “a John Doe buried on Hart Island.” The match was then confirmed by DNA, using an autopsy sample and DNA taken from the parents.

“In April 6, 2010, our chief of police and pastor of our church came looking for my wife and I to tell us a positive match had been made,” Mr. Reveron said. “Six years later.”

The medical examiner’s office declined to discuss any case in which an identification had been made, citing privacy concerns. But the cases, according to a person familiar with the identification process, have also included Sean Wheeler, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice who disappeared in late 2003 after a car accident on the Henry Hudson Parkway. His body was found about three months later, floating in the Hudson River by a ferry captain, but it was not until 2010 that a match was made.

Mr. Wheeler’s relatives said they had been in touch with the medical examiner’s office in early 2004, so it was somewhat frustrating to have had to wait so long for an affirmative match. The confirmation of Mr. Wheeler’s death “was very depressing,” an aunt, Kimberly Wheeler, of Independence, Mo., said. “It shouldn’t have taken so long if they’d put any effort into it.”

Another aunt, Carol Wheeler, said that the initial match was based on his appearance, height and weight, and a distinctive fraternity brand on Mr. Wheeler’s arm, and that it was confirmed by DNA testing of his aunts and uncles. “We came to the conclusion that New York was a big city and a lot of people go missing,” she said. “As time went on, you know, it became a cold case.”

Not all of these nameless dead perished unnoticed. The unknown cases include several Chinese immigrants who drowned after the Golden Venture ran aground off Queens in 1993. The episode drew extensive news coverage and shed light on the brutal conditions and deprivations that some Asian immigrants endured to make it to New York.

Another old case that has attracted the attention of the medical examiner’s office is that of “Baby Hope.”

The young girl, about 5 years old, has been known as Baby Hope since shortly after her body was discovered packed into a picnic cooler off the Henry Hudson Parkway in 1991.

As the subject of an active homicide investigation, her body was exhumed in 2007 from St. Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx even before the medical examiner’s office had begun looking into all of its old unknown cases. But at the time, biologists were unable to extract any DNA because her bones were in such poor condition.

“She had been in a cooler in the sun, and her bones were very brittle,” said Sheila Estacio Dennis, an assistant director in the medical examiner’s department of forensic biology.

By 2011, because of advances in the medical examiner’s office in the DNA extraction process, Ms. Dennis said, the office was able to obtain a full DNA profile. It did not yield a match to existing DNA databases from convicted felons or from active missing person cases in which samples had been collected.

Investigators believe that her parents, or one of them, most likely murdered her, as no one has come forward to identify the girl as his or her child.

In reviewing hundreds of old cases, the medical examiner’s office has in effect been conducting a census of “the unknowns,” as Mr. Figura calls them.

The deceased are overwhelmingly male, typically white and often homeless. They are usually found in Manhattan. The sidewalk is a common deathbed, as are subway platforms, where 106 of the unknowns — or 11 percent — were found.

Some 15 percent are presumed homicide victims. About 22 percent of the unknowns are pulled from the water, and investigators presume that many are suicides.

In most of the older cases, the medical examiner’s office typically keeps a tissue sample from the autopsy, which has been used to extract DNA samples in numerous instances over the last three years. In cases without an autopsy sample, the medical examiner’s office has sought to exhume the body.

Fingerprints have also led to identifications in a few cases, as improvements have been made in the sensitivity of the software that compares uploaded prints to various databases. Simply running the prints again years later has resulted in several identifications, Mr. Figura said.

Central to the medical examiner’s efforts is a public database, called Namus, containing information on 7,645 missing person cases and the remains of 8,516 unidentified victims. The database has helped investigators, the relatives of missing persons and even amateur sleuths try to establish matches between the known missing persons cases and the unidentified.

Mr. Reveron’s father, an usher for the Cleveland Indians and a former city councilman in Lorain, followed Mr. Figura’s instructions to use Namus to give a fuller profile of his missing son.

When the identification was confirmed, the Reverons requested that their son’s remains be returned. They learned that Javier’s body had been disinterred before, when investigators suspected that he might have been a match with someone else. When the match came up negative, his body was reburied on Hart Island.

The Reverons decided to cremate the remains in New York, and then took the ashes back to Ohio. On June 19, 2010, the Reverons gave their son “a Catholic Mass and a proper Christian burial,” Mr. Reveron said.

He said the family was grateful to Mr. Figura, saying that without his “personal involvement, we’d still be searching.”

But, he added, “What happened in six years should’ve only happened in one year.”

Thursday 9 August 2012

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/09/nyregion/medical-examiner-opens-old-cases-and-graves-to-identify-dead.html?pagewanted=all

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DANA crash: 64 days gone, victims’ families bemoan non-release of corpses

As at the early hours of last June 3, when Mr. Femi Shobowale prepared to board the DANA aircraft heading for Lagos from Abuja, the thought never flashed through his mind that that would be actually a journey of no return, let alone getting to his destination.

The charming but resolute man, happened to be a pious Christian of the popular Apostolic Faith Church and what more a son to one of the pioneer member of the church in Nigeria, his untimely departure from the world of the mortals has no doubt dealt a big blow on the Shobowale's Family.

Still grappling with unbelievable and jolting news of his death, recent development has compounded the family's grief, as they still awaits the release of the corpse of their deceased son to allow them give him a befitting burial rite.

They are among relatives of the illfated DANA crash victims, yet to get the lawful compensation from the affected airline..

MEMORIES

The bereaved wife, Mrs. Titilope Shobowale, a young woman, while recounting to National Daily her last conversation with her hubby, said “he called to tell me he was about leaving Abuja and will be in Lagos very soon, that Sunday morning after which he said we should pray together for a safe trip and that was all, I never imagined it was his last prayer. My husband was actually part of those who were not burnt in the crashed aircraft, that informs why they could use his phone to call me and break the news, I was totally devastated. I later sent all the necessary document asked for by the airline operator to facilitate compensation but till this moment nothing of such has been given to us, they did even speak about it. When we got there to ask for his corpse, which due to the fact that he did not get burnt we could easily identified , we were told to wait for six week when the results of a compulsory DNA carried out on the charred bodies will be available before we can get the retrive the corpse of my husband, we learnt this last Sunday that the result of the DNA is available and we would be called upon before this week runs out but till this very moment we have not heard anything, I am thus appealing at this junction that they should, please release my husband dead body for him to be properly buried”.

35 days, after which the Dana Airplane crashed at Iju Ishaga area of Lagos State, in which 153 passengers and six crew members on board were consumed. One of the victims, Femi Shobowale, who would have celebrated his 48th birthday on June 28th if not for the unexpected fate that took him away, until his death he was a staff of Town Crier a company handling the marketing gamut of MTN.

The management of Dana Air has said that initial payments will soon be made to about 57 families of the victims of the Dana plane crash which occurred on June 3, 2012, by the insurers that insured the flight.

However, in a statement issued by the company, only 57 families out of the 120 of the victims involved in the accident have sent in completed forms for compensation. According to the statement, only 57 families out of the 120 of the victims involved in the accident have sent in completed forms for compensation.

Information from the hospital authorities confirmed that six identifiable bodies had so far been released, while seven other bodies ready for collection since the weekend were yet to be claimed as the hospital was waiting for the families to show up just as four more bodies were cleared for collection yesterday.

When our reporter got to the family house of Late Shobowale, at the Apostlic Faith Church hostel in Anthony Village. the family wore mournful looks, it a somber scene no doubt, when she was introduced, they were so pleased and she was offered a seat while they wait for the aged mother of the deceased of 82 years, she couldn't speak out because their eyes were heavy, so the younger son decided to speak with National Daily.

The younger brother ,Mr Joseph Biyi Shobowale comment on his late elder brother, he said this is not his first time of traveling to Abuja for the same assignment, he was a cheerful person, full of live, never a dull moment with him, he was the kind of person that put smiles on people face, whenever they are down. That very Sunday my brother was supposed to come back home to his wife and family, she said he spoke with him like two hours ago, and he said he will be home in one hour time, so two hours passed ,he didn't see the husband ,she then decide to call me to inform me that his husband is not yet back from Abuja, that she heard on radio and television that there was a plane crashed in Agege,she hope and prayed her husband is not among the people ,he then told her not to worry that, he will call him. He then try calling him in the evening of that Sunday, but the phone was switched off and I even slept very well because I don't want to believe that he died, but the next morning being Monday, I was too heavy to get up from bed, I received another call that people should come and identify their love ones that was in the crashed.

Its so unfortunate that he went and did not come back, I think he would have survived the crash, because he has not any injury on his body, even his cloth was still looking neat, when we went to identify him at Luth, we were told that it was only seven bodies that was not burnt and my elder brother was among them, it was like he just comb his hair and stepped out of his house, his phone was switch off, wallet and everything was intact. its was through his phone they use to call us and we have concluded we know why God allow this to happen, there are a lot of people that were not able to identify their person, because they were burnt beyond recognition, but we thank God our case is different. I think what killed my brother was the smoke and the fact that the rescue team could not easily access the spot of the mishap, perchance he would have been one of the lucky survivor had it been that help got there on time.

There was nothing that indicated that was his last moment, because after calling the wife that in one hour time, he should be home, and the last person he called was our cousin he has a business with him on Monday, he told him that he will be leaving Abuja soon, “by tomorrow we are going to get this thing done”. Not until when the wife couldn't reach him, after waiting for several hours, that she later heard about the plane crash and informed accordingly and I confirmed it but prayed that will not our portion. I then called his boss in the office that my brother is not yet back, he later got back to me, after going to inquire at the airport to confirm if he was among the people in the plane crash, that his name was on the manifest, it now dawn on me that I will not see him again. We then went to general hospital, when I saw his lifeless body. Even one of the nurses who known my late elder brother, when she saw the body, she refuse to believe that he was the one, not until when they called the name, she almost fainted, even that Sunday my mother and I were discussing about him, unknowingly that he is gone already and the wife has not been able to sleep since the incident.

The last person Femi called on Sunday,was Olufemi Idowu his cousin who also spoke about him, he was a man of vision, cheerful, hard working, very focus person, We didn't talk about anything serious, its was just about our business, if you see him for the first time, he will treat you like a special person, he has help me a lot, if you have any problem he will encourage you to stay positive that problem will go, because am into visual and audio packaging business .Because of the kind of person his was I decide to work with him, anytime MTN has event he use to call me to come and cover it, everybody thinks I work with MTN whereas I just a audio-visual packaging expert. He is a person that you cannot forget easily, because he makes everybody feel important and bring out the best in you. John Ojo is a family friend, who also spoke about him, he took to the family house and our reporter was told that Femi has been so good to him, they were suppose to travel this coming week to Oyo state concerning “Ajisebioyo” Programme, he has promised to help me make it big this year and even told me to help him get white inner shirt, which I brought six for him. John said he even called him on that Sunday when he was coming back, only to received a call from his office driver telling me that he was in the plane crash that night.

Femi was such a cheerful person, who can never leave one unhappy, if you come in contact with him. He once talks about starting his company by December this year, his wife is pregnant almost

Tuesday 8 august 2012

http://www.nationaldailyngr.com/special-feature/dana-crash-64-days-gone-victims-families-bemoan-non-release-of-corpses

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Flooding eases after killing 23 in Philippines

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Widespread flooding that killed at least 23 people, battered a million others and paralyzed the Philippine capital briefly eased Wednesday, allowing rescuers on rubber boats to reach a large number of distressed residents still marooned in submerged villages.

Government forecasters said the monsoon rains that overflowed major dams and rivers crisscrossing Manila and surrounding provinces would gradually abate and lead to sunny weather later this week after 12 days of relentless downpours.

The deluge that began late Sunday was the worst since 2009, when hundreds died in rampaging flash floods. "We're still on a rescue mode," said Benito Ramos, who heads the government's main disaster-response agency. "Floods are receding in many areas but people are still trapped on their roofs." Ramos said the massive flooding turned half of Manila into "a water world" on Monday evening and into Tuesday.

At least 23 died, including nine in a landslide in a hillside slum in suburban Quezon City and several others who drowned in outlying provinces.

More than 1.2 million people were affected by the deluge, including 783,000 who fled from their inundated homes.

With the receding floodwaters, some of the displaced have started returning to their homes but others stayed put despite the hard conditions in emergency shelters as rain clouds again darkened the sky Wednesday afternoon.

Carmen Empesao said she panicked and left with her three grandchildren when waist-deep floodwaters swamped her home in the hard-hit city of Marikina. "We fled without any food and the clothes we managed to grab were wet and cannot be worn," Empesao, 60, told The Associated Press in an evacuation center teeming with 3,000 displaced.

Rescue efforts shifted into high gear Wednesday, with more than 130 emergency crewmen from two provinces reaching the capital city of 12 million people to help their overwhelmed teams, including police and soldiers.

Rescuers used rubber boats and ropes to navigate flooded streets where many people climbed on rooftops to escape neck-deep waters.

Food and drinking water were in short supply because of impassable roads. President Benigno Aquino III distributed food packs in flood-hit communities south of Manila. Ramos said he was overwhelmed by the extent of the flooding when he flew aboard a helicopter with Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin for an inspection Wednesday, although he added that water in many areas was beginning to recede. "In some areas, I could not tell the sea from the flooded villages," he told The AP.

Manila was drenched with more than half of a month's worth of rain in just 24 hours starting Monday. A typhoon in eastern China that has helped intensify the southwest monsoon in the Philippines blew further into the Chinese mainland, prompting Filipino forecasters to predict better weather the rest of the week. "We may see the sun tomorrow," government forecaster Glaiza Escullar said. She added that heavy but brief downpours may still sporadically drench the coastal capital.

Although heavy rains may ease, she warned that up to three storms or typhoons were expected to lash the country this month.

At the height of the flooding, many residents called radio and TV stations desperately asking to be rescued. TV footage showed rescuers dangling on ropes to bring children and other residents to safety from a rooftop.

Vehicles and even heavy trucks struggled to navigate water-clogged roads, where hundreds of thousands of commuters were stranded.

The government suspended work and classes Tuesday but most offices opened Wednesday. Traffic was still light as workers began clearing roads of debris, trash and fallen trees.

In 2009, massive flooding spawned by a typhoon devastated Manila and surrounding areas, killing hundreds.

Wednesday 8 August 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/10379699

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Meghalaya bus accident kills 31

SHILLONG: Thirty-one people were killed and 27 injured when a bus proceeding from Assam to Tripura rolled down a hill in Meghalaya early Wednesday, police said.

Two women were among those killed when the bus rolled down a 100 metre deep gorge in Tongseng, East Jaintia Hills district police chief M K Dkhar told IANS.

Tongseng is about 150 km east of Shillong, the capital of Meghalaya. The privately-owned night bus was on its way from Guwahati in Assam to Tripura capital Agartala.

Of the injured, Dkhar said seven were rushed to Silchar Medical College in southern Assam and the rest in nearby hospitals in the district. "The rescue operations are over and investigation has begun to ascertain the cause of the accident," the officer said.

A Tripura official told IANS in Agartala that 27 people died on the spot.

The driver of the bus, who also died, lost control of the bus when he was taking a turn in the terrain cramped Assam-Agartala highway.

Tripura transport minister Manik Dey told IANS that a state government team had left for the site. He said the place where the disaster site was "extremely accident prone". "Every year a number of accidents have occurred in the area. killing many people."

India has the highest annual road death toll in the world with more than 110,000 people dying each year in accidents caused by speeding, careless driving and poor roads.

Wednesday 8 August 2012

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Meghalaya-bus-accident-kills-31/articleshow/15403915.cms

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Senegal road accident leaves 22 dead

DAKAR — At least 22 people were killed in a collision between a bus and a truck in the centre of Senegal on Tuesday morning, the fire department said. "

It was a collision between a 35-seat bus and a truck transporting charcoal above the village of Sikilo.

The preliminary toll is 22 dead and one injured," an official from the fire department told AFP.

Tuesday 7 August 2012

http://gulftoday.ae/portal/1171cde5-215a-412a-ab95-4c69ccac8f7e.aspx

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Khmer Rouge mass grave uncovered in Cambodia

Workers found the skeletal remains of at least 17 people last week when they used an excavator to dig up soil for commercial use in Kralanh district, said Siem Reap province deputy military police chief Nhim Seila.

"Some of the skulls were found blindfolded and the hands and feet were tied up with shoelaces," Nhim said, adding that many of the skulls appeared to have suffered heavy blows. "According to locals, this was a place where the Khmer Rouge killed people every day during the regime.

I think there are hundreds of skeletons in the grave," Nhim said. Military police have closed off the site for inspection.

The Cambodian countryside is littered with thousands of mass graves from the Khmer Rouge regime's reign of terror in the late 1970s when up to two million people died from starvation, overwork, torture or execution.

The Documentation Centre of Cambodia, which researches the atrocities, identified the area in Kralanh as a "Killing Field" in 1998 and estimated some 35,000 bodies are buried there, its director Youk Chhang told AFP.

He said he hoped Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes court, which is currently trying the three top surviving Khmer Rouge leaders, would examine the site for potential evidence of crimes committed by the regime.

"The bones cannot find peace until the truth they hold in themselves has been revealed," he said. It is not uncommon for Cambodians to uncover Khmer Rouge graves and monks and villagers usually take the bones to a local pagoda or cremate them, Youk added.

Tuesday 7 August 2012

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/cambodia/9455336/Khmer-Rouge-mass-grave-uncovered-in-Cambodia.html

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Bodies of Mexican Miners Recovered After Collapse

A rescue team found and recovered the bodies of six workers trapped inside a coal mine in the northern Mexican state of Coahuila, officials told Efe.

State Public Safety Secretary Jorge Luis Moran Delgado said initial reports indicated five miners were trapped but that that number later rose to six, while another worker, Armando Robles Piña, was rescued alive.

Coahuila’s deputy emergency management chief, Francisco Martinez, also confirmed to Efe Friday afternoon that a rescue crew had recovered the bodies of the six miners who perished in the accident. “The most recent report is that we now have the bodies of the six people and all that’s left is to officially identify them,” the official said.

Martinez said some 75 rescue workers using special equipment took part in the search operation at the mine, which is located in the town of San Juan Sabinas and operated by the Mimosa unit of Minera del Norte, a subsidiary of steelmaker Altos Hornos de Mexico.

Moran said an investigation will now be launched “to determine the causes of this fatal accident.” He said the accident occurred at a large coal mine being “professionally” developed by a company “that normally has all the permits and (complies with all) safety standards.” “Unfortunately, accidents happen in all situations,” Moran said, adding that Mimosa “has been fully cooperating with authorities” and contributed to the search-and-rescue effort.

 In a statement, Mimosa said the one worker rescued alive had “only bruises” and was taken to a hospital for treatment.

It added that a pocket of methane gas caused a giant landslide of “approximately 100 tons of coal” and that “proper functioning of the ventilation system prevented the gas from igniting and exploding, while the automatic control systems inside the unit instantly suspended the operation.” The mine’s equipment allowed “the immediate and risk-free exit of 285 workers who were on the first shift,” Mimosa said.

The Labor Ministry, for its part, said that once the rescue efforts have concluded it will conduct a “special inspection of safety and hygiene conditions to identify possible violations of (mining) regulations.” The ministry said it has instructed the federal prosecutor for the defense of labor, “who is already in the region,” to provide free legal counseling and representation to the workers and their families.

Seven men were killed last week in an explosion at a coal mine in the nearby town of Muzquiz, Coahuila. A July 25 explosion killed seven miners, highlighting lax safety conditions in small mines that are often poorly regulated.

Coahuila is home to numerous coal mines, many of which fall short of official safety standards.

Men have mined the largely unregulated, small "pozito" mines that dot Coahuila for more than a century.

A February 2006 gas explosion at the Pasta de Conchos coal mine in San Juan de Sabinas, Coahuila, killed 65 men. Only two of the bodies were ever recovered.

Monday 6 August 2012

 http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews.com/notitas-de-noticias/details/bodies-of-mexican-miners-recovered-after-collapse/17613/

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A week after the train fire, bodies continue to arrive

Bodies of the passengers aboard the Tamil Nadu Express that caught fire continue to arrive one after another even a week after the accident that occurred on July 30.

The family members of M.V. Sambasiva Rao (34), who succumbed to burns in the train mishap, performed the funeral at his native village Javvanapudi in Krishna district on Friday.

Mr. Rao suffered 80 per cent burns.

The charred body of Ilapogu Nagarani (52) was brought to his native place at Nandigama in the district and the final rites were performed on Saturday.

Nagarani’s daughter Pallavi and his son-in-law K. Venkata Ramana of Anigandlapadu village in the district, also died in the accident.

 A pall of gloom descended in the villages with the bodies of the victims arriving one after the other. The body of S. Jaswani (22), arrived a couple of days after the accident to his house in Kanuru village.

Of the 28 passengers who boarded the New Delhi-Chennai Central train which met with the fire accident at Nellore on July 30, most of them were youth and were working as software professionals in Chennai or on lookout for jobs.

The software engineers and the young couples used to shuttle between Chennai and Vijayawada during weekends to spend time with their families. “Young engineers used to prefer Tamil Nadu express train which arrives in Vijayawada around midnight (12.15 a.m.) and reach Chennai at 7.15 a.m. which was convenient for the techies to attend their office”, said an engineer. “My brother, Venkata Ramana, used to travel by TN express. But, we never expected that it was his last visit.

It is our misfortune that three members of our family died in the accident”, Ramana’s elder brother K. Nagaraju bemoaned.

Monday 6 August 2012

http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Vijayawada/article3733753.ece

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Angolan football fans killed in bus accident

23 fans of Angolan soccer club Kabuscorp were killed and 29 injured when their bus overturned on the road back to Luanda after an away match, state news agency Angop reported on Sunday.

The accident happened on Saturday in Kwanza Sul province after the fans had watched their team play in the country's top division at Libolo, about 370 miles (600km) southeast of Luanda, Angop said.

Kabuscorp president Bento Kangamba said: "I am distraught and sad. The place where the accident took place is very dangerous and the driver was young and he was probably speeding."

He added that the bodies of the dead had been taken to Luanda, while the injured fans received treatment at hospitals in Kwanza Norte province. He did not give details on the severity of their injuries.

President José Eduardo dos Santos said in a statement that he was "deeply saddened" by the accident. Angola has one of the highest traffic-related death tolls in the world.

According to police, 3080 people died in 2010 due to road accidents, which are the second-biggest cause of death in the south-western African nation after malaria.

Kabuscorp received international attention in January when they signed striker Rivaldo, the Brazilian World Cup winner and former World Footballer of the Year.

Monday 6 August 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/06/angolan-football-fans-killed-bus

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N. Korean Floods Leave 400 People Missing, 212,000 Homeless

North Korea said 400 people were missing and about 212,000 were left homeless following heavy rains and floods that lasted through July.

The floods killed 169 people and injured 144, while destroying more than 8,600 houses and submerging 43,770 residential buildings, the official Korean Central News Agency said yesterday.

At least 65,280 hectares of farmland was damaged, KCNA said. Inundation of coal mines north of Pyongyang threatens to hurt the isolated communist country that relies on exports of underground minerals as one of few legitimate ways to earn foreign currencies.

North Korea, now under the leadership of Kim Jong Un, has been grappling with decades of food shortages and economic mismanagement, while its nuclear weapons and missile programs have cut international support. North Korean Premier Choe Yong Rim toured Anju, where almost all public buildings and industrial facilities were flooded or destroyed, with water and power supplies cut off, KNCA said in a separate report.

Choe was briefed on the damages in the city and held a meeting, the agency said. United Nations staff members based in North Korea made visits on July 31 with the Red Cross and other non-governmental organizations to two storm-struck counties to investigate and assess damage and needs, Christopher de Bono, Unicef’s chief of communications for East Asia and the Pacific, wrote in an e-mail last week.

UN Visit The visits were made at the request of the North Korean government, according to a July 30 statement on the website of the UN’s North Korea office.

The UN expanded sanctions against the North after it conducted a long-range missile test on April 13. The test also cost Kim a deal with the U.S. for 240,000 metric tons of food promised in exchange for a moratorium on nuclear and missile tests.

North Korea’s rainy season began on July 18 as Typhoon Khanun struck the Korean peninsula, hitting northwestern coastal areas the hardest.

The monsoon season set in after the country’s worst drought in a century threatened wheat, barley and potato harvests.

Sunday 5 august 2012

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-08-04/north-korean-floods-leave-400-people-missing-212-000-homeless

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Death toll from Beijing rainstorm climbs to 78

The death toll from rain-triggered disasters and accidents in Beijing on July 21 has climbed to 78 as one more body was recovered, the Beijing flood control and drought relief headquarters said Saturday.

The victim found in the worst-hit suburban Fangshan district in southwestern Beijing, where 43 died, was identified as Li Ruixin, a 65-year-old native of Hebei province, said Liu Hongwei, a spokesman for the headquarters.

Of the 78 victims, 10 remained to be identified, Liu said.

The severe landslides and flash floods complicated the search for missing people as well as the victims' identification, but the work never stopped, the official said.

The Beijing city government substantially raised the death toll to 77 from 37 on the night of July 26, releasing their names, ages and reasons of death, following public outrage over the government's lack of transparency in tackling the disaster and also its insufficient weather alert and disaster rescue.

Beijing was battered by the heaviest rain in six decades on July 21. Average precipitation hit 170 mm, while a township in the suburban district of Fangshan recorded 460 mm of rain.

Sunday 5 August 2012

 http://www.china.org.cn/china/2012-08/05/content_26132213.htm

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Bodies Recovered in Flooded Mine in China

Beijing - Rescue workers have recovered the bodies of eight mine workers trapped in a flooded coal mine in the northern Chinese province of Shanxi, while an investigation into the cause of the accident is under way.

Twenty-two out of 34 workers who were working underground at the time the mine flooded last Wednesday could escape, while the rest were trapped.

Four of them were rescued on Friday.

The coal mine belongs to Ji'anda Coal Mining Co. Ltd. of the Shanxi Luhe Coal-Chemical Group

Saturday 4 August 2012

http://www.cadenagramonte.cu/english/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=11797:bodies-recovered-in-flooded-mine-in-china&catid=3:world&Itemid=14

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Tamil Nadu Express fire toll 34

The death toll in the Tamil Nadu Express fire mishap rose to 34 on Saturday with Sukhdev Singh of Amritsar dying of burns at the Narayana Hospital here. Sukhdev Singh, 23, suffered 55 per cent burns in the July 30 accident.

His father Gurdeep Singh, a plumber at the Northern Railway Mechanical Workshop, Amritsar, is making arrangements to take the body back home by a flight from Chennai.

A student of the Indian Maritime University, East Coast Road, Chennai, Sukhdev was returning with three co-students after visiting Amritsar.

On Friday, one of the passengers, M.V. Sambasiva Rao, died of burns. Relatives of Avinash, a passenger and native of Warangal who had been missing, could not identify him.

Till now, no one has claimed the bodies of a woman and a man lying at the mortuary of the DSR District Headquarters Hospital here.

Divisional Railway Manager Pradeep Kumar said the Commissioner of Railway Safety conducted an inquiry on August 2 and 3.

He recorded the statements of railway officials, the Government Railway Police, the Railway Protection Force, the district administration and the Police and Fire departments.

Of the eight injured being treated at the Narayana Hospital, the condition of four is serious. An injured passenger, Kumud Kumar Bansal of Agra, is expected to be discharged on Monday.

Mr. Bansal faced money shortage as the compensation of Rs. 25,000 given by the Railways was exhausted. His relatives had sought the help of officials to take him back to Agra.

Sunday 5 August 2012

http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/tamil-nadu/article3727192.ece

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Multan fireworks explosion toll rises to seven

MULTAN: Another dead body was found from the rubble of building that collapsed as a result of bomb explosion in Hussain Aghai Chowk Bazar here, raising the death toll to seven.

According to rescue sources, an explosion occurred due to the fireworks material present in a house near a school at Hussain Agahi Chowk Bazaar.

Due to the blast, a building collapsed while several near-by buildings were also damaged.

A case had already been registered against the couple for keeping fireworks material. SHO Kup police station has been suspended over poor security while departmental investigation against DSP Haram Gate Sadiq Mehdi is underway.

Fire brigades were trying to control the blaze that broke out as a result of blast until the last reports.

Sunday 5 August 2012

 http://www.dinnews.tv/index.php/en/?option=com_content&view=article&id=6428

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Uttarkashi flash floods : 31 dead, 40 missing

Dehradun - In the worst tragedy to hit Uttarkashi in more than 30 years, 31 people have died and at least 40 are feared missing in the flash floods that occurred late on Friday night.

The MeT department has warned of more heavy rains today. A cloud burst in the middle of Friday night triggered landslides and flash floods, which destroyed hundreds of homes in the Uttarkashi area.

The cloud burst swept away bridges and a large chunk of the Gangotri national highway. Chardham yatra has been suspended to all four shrines with hundreds of pilgrims stranded.

ITBP and state disaster management forces are currently involved in the rescue operations. About 200 families have been evacuated from low lying regions of Uttarkashi to higher ground. "Nearly 2000 people have been affected in the floods.

200 families have been displaced and have been arranged to live in a relief camps like bhavans and schools. Seven people are missing till now in the Gangotri river," Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna said.

 In Varanasi, the level of Ganga has risen by more than an inch and the ghats, where daily ceremonies usually take place, have submerged in water.

Several residents have been evacuated from the affected area.

Sunday 5 August 2012

Read more: http://www.indiavision.com/news/article/national/331532/uttarkashi-flash-floods--31-dead-40-missing/#ixzz22gKjlmNu

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NDRRMC: Death toll from Typhoon Gener, monsoon rises to 45

The death toll from tropical cyclone "Gener" (Saola) and the southwest monsoon rose further to 45 Sunday, with four members of a family in Mindanao being the latest fatalities.

National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) head Benito Ramos said a mudslide fell on the house of the victims in Midsalip in Zamboanga del Sur Saturday.

The NDRRMC said the mudslide and a subsequent flash flood swept the victims' house after a tornado (buhawi) hit the area.

 It also said a person previously missing, 15-year-old John Marck Rigueros of Benguet in northern Luaon, was confirmed dead as of Saturday.

The NDRRMC said Gener and the southwest monsoon have so far affected 190,196 families or 858,534 people in 1,207 villages in 150 towns and 28 cities in 35 provinces.

Of these, 3,258 families or 14,181 people are being served in 94 evacuation centers.

Sunday 5 August 2012

http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/268372/news/nation/ndrrmc-death-toll-from-typhoon-gener-monsoon-rises-to-45

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Lessons for disaster management

If the Indian Railways fails to learn its lessons from tragedies like the one at Nellore, then it is condemning thousands of other passengers to a similar fate.

CHENNAI: At 4:30 a.m. on the morning of July 30, sleeping passengers in carriage S11 on the Chennai-bound Tamilnadu Express were awoken by a blazing fire, as the train approached the east coast town of Nellore, just two and a half hours shy of its final destination.

At least 32 people burned to death in the train, their bodies charred so badly that hospitals were forced to use DNA analysis to identify the victims for anxious families.

Officials have not ruled out a short circuit in the train toilet or sabotage, considering one survivor reported hearing a loud bang in the burning train car.

Whether or not gas cylinders or other inflammable materials were aboard the train is yet to be established by the Railway’s formal inquiry.

For grieving family members, the inquiry might be too little too late. But if similar tragedies are to be avoided in the future, authorities must use this accident to draw lessons in disaster management for the colossal Indian railway network, which operates 9000 trains carrying 18 million passengers daily.

This number does not include the countless thousands who travel on train roofs, undeterred by the risk of fatal injuries inside mountain tunnels or the possibility of electrocution.

It quickly became apparent to disaster management experts, after the fire had been put out and the survivors pulled to safety, that the lack of emergency preparedness on most Indian trains is a huge liability.

It was the gatekeeper of a railway crossing who first noticed the fire in the passing carriage and notified the Nellore railway station, which halted the train. By then screaming passengers had already pulled at the emergency brake. The burning car was immediately separated from the train to prevent the fire spreading to other coaches. But this did not make up for the fact that there were no fire alarms in the train cars.

The public relations officer of the South Central Railway, Frederick Michael, confirmed to IPS that there were no fire hydrants in the sleeper car. “Since it was night time, the passengers had closed all the windows and one door of the vestibule that connects to the rear car was also locked for the night to prevent criminal elements’ entry and mischief,” he said.

The other vestibule door, according to reliable sources, was also closed for the night, resulting in a death trap for the passengers. Inflammable material like synthetic cushion covers and curtains, inadequate emergency exits and fire extinguishers, to say nothing of a poorly trained cabin crew are the main culprits in this avoidable disaster, experts told IPS.

No public address system 

Lower class train cars, which carry millions of Indians, do not contain a single fire extinguisher or hydrant. Nor are passengers instructed in basic emergency evacuation procedures. Further, there is no public address system on board the long-distance non-luxury trains.

Railway coaches are in dire need of inflatable life rafts with a rigid hull, disaster management experts aver. These rafts should automatically unfurl themselves as escape chutes from the hinges of the emergency exits in case of a fire, or during a water evacuation.

These can help save lives and can also double up as easy transport for frail, infirm and physically challenged passengers.

Wide emergency exits with collapsible shutters that can automatically open during emergencies need to be installed by the dozen in every train car.

Currently each car has only four emergency exits and four entry doors for carriages that accommodate 72 passengers and probably carry scores of other unreserved commuters.

The spokesman of the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai told IPS that ICF only manufactures coaches for Indian Railways but is not responsible for the design of the carriages, nor the rolling stock – hardware such as wheels, steps or sleeper frames – within them. The fact that the Railway Authority does not provide for the needs of physically challenged persons is hazardous to all passengers during emergencies and seriously hinders rescue operations – with the infirm or the disabled getting left behind, or other passengers stuck behind them.

The average height of the train floor is at least 1.5 metres above the ground. The steps are arranged more like a ladder than a staircase, making it impossible for physically challenged passengers to use them unassisted.

Though the mobile “medical relief van” stationed at all railway stations reached the burning train within minutes, they found they could not access the passengers inside, as the inflammable material and burning heat had caused the doors’ locks to melt and fuse together.

 Ambulances rushed the critically injured survivors to the district general hospital after rescue teams cut through the burning car.

If the fire had occurred in the countryside it would have led to far more casualties, experts say.

A review needed 

CU Rao, general secretary of the Indian Red Cross Andhra Pradesh chapter, the state where the tragedy occurred, told IPS, “The Nellore branch of the Indian Red Cross scurried to (transport) injured passengers to various hospitals, installed freezers to keep the corpses awaiting DNA identification, brought their mobile blood bank to the site of the disaster, and distributed food packets to survivors in the immediate aftermath of the calamity.” But these services should be the responsibility of the railway authorities.

Emergency equipment should be installed in every railway station across the country as part of disaster mitigation efforts, especially since the railway network has been responsible for the deaths of 1,200 people in the last five years alone according to statistics provided by Indian Railways.

Michael believes that “a review of design is urgently called for; hereafter we will have to heed attention to alternative designs.” Wide collapsible doors that automatically roll up in the event of fires are far more effective than doors that have to be opened manually.

 Locks and emergency brakes need to be automated to ensure heat does not create vacuum chambers and seal doors shut.

If the Indian Railways fails to learn its lessons from tragedies like the one at Nellore, then it is condemning thousands of other passengers to a similar fate.

Sunday 5 August 2012

Read more: http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/top-news/2012/08/05/lessons-for-disaster-management/#ixzz22gIjegm0

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North Korean rainstorms return, causing 31 deaths

Torrential rain and a typhoon in North Korea have killed 31 people and left 16 missing since Sunday, the official news agency reported on Wednesday.

Earlier in July, a week of heavy rainfall and floods caused 88 deaths and left thousands homeless.

It is feared that flooding in many parts of the impoverished country will deal a severe blow to North Korea's already malfunctioning economy.

The storms destroyed 46,000 hectares of crops to exacerbate its already serious food shortage.

 "Downpours swept some east and west coastal areas of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea on 29-30 July, leaving 31 people dead and 16 missing," the KCNA news agency reported.

A United Nations inter-agency team had already been deployed to the two hardest-hit areas to assess the damage with a view to developing an aid plan.

Since the mid-1990s, North Korea's farm sector has frequently been devastated by floods and drought. The new disaster could harm leader Kim Jong-un's efforts to repair the moribund economy, especially as floods damaged some coal mines, North Korea's primary energy source

Thursday 2 August 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/01/north-korea-rainstorms-typhoon

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US aircrew's remains found in sunken WWII aircraft

The remains and personal belongings of five American airmen have been recovered from the wreck of a US Air Force plane, almost 70 years after it sank in Canadian waters, a diplomat said Tuesday.

The amphibious plane was accidentally discovered by underwater archeologists in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence in 2009 and a 50-person US military team was sent earlier this month to search for the remains of the crash victims.

They found the aircraft resting upside down in pitch black, frigid waters, about 40 meters (131 feet) down, two kilometers (1.2 miles) off the coast of Longue-Pointe-de-Mingan, Quebec, said US Consul General Peter O'Donohue. "In these extremely difficult circumstances, you could see the stress on the faces of the divers who were returning from the wreck," he told AFP, noting that the aircraft remained in fairly good condition. "The team has been able to recover quite a few artifacts, including instruments, personal items, even part of a log book that is still legible after 70 years under water... as well as human skeletal remains."

The Catalina seaplane had foundered in rough weather during takeoff on November 2, 1942, in the waters surrounding what is now the Mingan Archipelago National Park Reserve in the eastern part of the gulf.

The plane was based at Presque Isle, Maine, in the United States, and it serviced an airfield in Longue-Pointe-de-Mingan, about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) northeast of Montreal.

Nine people were on board when the aircraft went down but four crew members escaped the flooding plane and were rescued by local fishermen rowing out from shore in open boats in rough seas. The five others perished, trapped inside.

The recovery "was quite emotional for everyone on the ship and people in the local village who felt a connection with the American airmen who have been just offshore from their village for the past 70 years," O'Donohue said.

Around 84,000 US servicemen who served in conflicts since the Second World War are still missing.

O'Donohue said he witnessed on the Canadian waterway "a sacred mission to recover US soldiers lost in war." In the United States, "there's a deeply held sense that servicemen whenever possible should be returned to their families and given a respectful burial... in our own soil," he explained.

 In 1941 and 1942, the United States constructed a series of airfields in eastern Canada to ferry aircraft to Allied air forces in northern Europe, as part of the so-called "Crimson Route."

The construction of the airfield in Longue-Pointe-de-Mingan was meant to serve as an emergency landing strip along the ferry route between Presque Isle and Goose Bay, Labrador.

Other items recovered from the wreck include a watch, a pair of glasses, navigational instruments, and pieces of uniforms.

The bones and artifacts will be sent to a US military base in Virginia for forensic identification, including dental records and DNA. The Catalina sea plane will remain where it lies.

Wednesday 1 August 2012

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/us-aircrews-remains-found-sunken-wwii-aircraft-184153155.html

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Philippine farmer finds mass grave; 30 skeletons exhumed

MANILA - A Philippine farmer unearthed a mass grave with the skeletal remains of up to 30 people believed to be victims of an internal purge by communist rebels in the 1980s, the army said on Sunday.

Rommel Malinao was ploughing his field in a remote village in Quezon province, south of Manila, when he made the discovery on Saturday, army spokesman Major Harold Cabunoc said.

The army deployed a team to cordon off the site and with the help of police forensics experts exhumed the skeletons. “As of last count, there were about 30 human skeletons,” Cabunoc said. “We believe these were victims of the New People’s Army (NPA) ‘kangaroo courts’, which sentenced to death many members they had suspected as government intelligence agents.”

The NPA is the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines, which has been waging a Maoist rebellion since 1969 — one of the longest-running communist insurgencies in Asia.

At its peak in the 1980s, NPA numbers were believed to have reached 26,000, but that is now down to only 4,000 fighters due to losses on the battle field.

The government alleges that in the mid-1980s, the NPA set up so-called ‘kangaroo courts’, which condemned to death hundreds believed to have become agents for the state.

Various mass graves have been unearthed by the military since 2009, but Saturday’s find was believed to contain the biggest number of skeletons so far, Cabunoc said.

Cabunoc added that villagers interviewed by the army near the site said many of their relatives whom they had suspected of joining the NPA went missing in the 1980s and had not been heard of since.

Some of the skeletons showed the hallmarks of torture, although further verification was needed, he said.

President Benigno Aqu-ino re-opened peace talks with the communists in February last year but the negotiations have been delayed by the rebels’ demand to release detained comrades.

Wednesday 1 August 2012

http://www.omantribune.com/index.php?page=news&id=124258&heading=Asia

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ID-card may reveal mystery of crashed AN-12 aircraft

Manali (Himachal Pradesh), Aug 1 (IANS) A frayed identity card bearing the name Arjun Singh of Pune may reveal the 45-year-old mystery crash of an AN-12 aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) into the snow-capped mountain of Lahaul Valley of Himachal Pradesh.

A group of trekkers, from local mountaineering institute NALS Outdoor India Private Ltd., has found the identity card of Arjun Singh, aircraft wreckage, shoes and clothes spread over a glaciated area at an altitude of over 17,500 feet near the Chandrabhaga peak.

Trekker and expedition leader Dinanath Thakur told IANS Wednesday that during descent of the majestic CB-13 peak (Chandrabhaga peak 13), located at an altitude of 6,164 metres or 20,624 ft, they found the debris of an aircraft scattered over Dakka Glacier July 15. "We have handed over the identity card to sub-divisional magistrate on return to Manali," he added.

 The other two members of the expedition were Kamlesh Kumar and Kuber Kumar. The AN-12 aircraft of the IAF had taken off from Chandigarh Feb 7, 1968, on a routine logistics sortie with 102 people on board to Leh in Jammu and Kashmir.

The ill-fated aircraft carrying 102 passengers, including four crew members, 92 Army and six IAF personnel, had taken off from Chandigarh to Leh. Minutes before landing, the pilot — flight lieutenant HK Singh — was radioed to return to Chandigarh due to inclement weather. The flight took a U-turn and lost contact with the radio operator after some time. The aircraft, according to the IAF, was not able to negotiate the bad weather en-route and hit the Chandrabhaga peak. There were no survivors of the crash.

The flight’s disappearance remained a mystery for 35 years until mountaineers from Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports, Manali, recovered its wreckage and a body, identified as Beli Ram, resident of Akhnoor, in 2003. In August 2007, three more bodies were accidentally recovered. Search for the bodies has been stopped since 2009.

It was only in July 2003 that an expedition from the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports in Manali discovered the wreckage site.

And last week, three youths – Deena Nath, Kamlesh Kumar and Kuber Kumar — from Manali accidently found the scattered wreckage, including machine parts, clothes, documents and human remains, during their CB-13 peak climbing expedition.

They also discovered an identity card of a soldier, Arjun Singh from Pune, with ASC (Army Service Corp) written on it. The trekkers said they would have salvaged more but had to return to base camp due to lack of time and rations.

“There are lots of things scattered around the valley and melting snow has exposed them,” said expedition coordinator Deena. Searching for the remains of the soldiers should not prove very difficult this year, he added.

Since the crash, only four bodies have been recovered and 98 bodies are still beneath the snow. Their families are writing to the government to launch a search and bring the bodies back for last rites. After half a dozen searches by the military failed to yield results, the operation was called off in 2009. Now when most people have forgotten about the accident, the recovery of the identity card has sent a wave of hope among the relatives.

Kamlesh said Dhaka glacier, at a height of 16,000 feet, has receded and exposed vast areas. “Plane debris are lying there which could be helpful in establishing the cause of the crash. We found a bunch of human hair too,” he added. Youths have handed over the documents to Manali sub-divisional magistrate for further action.


The team also found the mortal remains and documents of Pioneer Beli Ram.

His remains were moved to his native village in Akhnoor and cremated with full military honours.

Subsequently, the Indian Army has launched expeditions every summer to recover bodies of the lost soldiers. Code named Operation Punaruthan-III, an expedition of the army retrieved three bodies Aug 9, 2007, near the Chandrabhaga peak.

The cause of the crash is still a mystery as the black box (flight data recorder) has not been recovered.

 Thakur, who is currently on another mountaineering expedition in Leh and is to return to Manali Aug 8, said: "There are chances that aircraft's major portion could be located in the glacier's southern portion where the debris was spotted." "It seemed that the glacier mass was thinned more this season compared to the previous years. This might help the subsequent search parties of the army to recover more human remains and other vital aircraft parts," he added.

Manali sub-divisional magistrate Balbir Thakur, who was given the identity card by the trekkers, Wednesday handed it over to Col. Arun Kainthla, Administrative Commandant posted at army transit camp at Palchan, some nine km from here.

Wednesday 1 August 2012

 http://pluzmedia.in/news/crime-disaster-accident/54055/id-card-may-reveal-mystery-of-crashed-an-12-aircraft

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18 train fire victims remain unidentified

Hyderabad - Eighteen of the 32 people who died in the Tamil Nadu Express fire in Andhra Pradesh Monday are yet to be unidentified even as a forensic team Tuesday inspected the gutted coach.

Relatives of missing passengers, who are believed to have perished in the disaster, are reaching Nellore, where the tragedy struck, for identification.

Railway officials said only 14 of the 32 dead have been identified. At least 32 people were killed and 27 were injured when a coach of the New Delhi-Chennai super fast express train caught fire early Monday near Nellore railway station.

The bodies of the victims were shifted from Nellore railway station to Government Hospital in the town, about 450 km from here.

Railway officials said the bodies would be kept at the hospital till Tuesday evening to enable the relatives to identify them.

The bodies will later be shifted to Perambur railway hospital in Tamil Nadu. All arrangements were made to preserve the bodies at the railway hospital.

Since majority of the bodies were charred beyond recognition, the identification has become a tough task. The authorities were also preparing for DNA test on the bodies to ascertain the claims of their relatives before handing over the remains.

The relatives are facing the mental trauma of identifying the skeletal remains bundled in white cloth. Some of them were agitated over the failure of railway authorities to at least provide them information.

Of the 14 bodies identified so far, six were from Andhra Pradesh, five from Chennai and three from Amritsar.

Meanwhile, a team of forensic experts visited Nellore railway station and inspected the gutted S11 coach as part of the investigations.

The team would collect the samples and submit their finding to railway officials, conducting the probe.

The forensic report will be crucial in view of the claims by some survivors and witnesses that they heard explosions before flames engulfed the coach. T

here are also reports of traces of kerosene found in the ill-fated coach. They have expressed doubt over short circuit being the cause of fire.

Railway Minister Mukul Rai, who visited Nellore Monday night, said the commissioner, railway safety, would probe the tragedy from all angles.

Tuesday 31 July 2012

http://sg.news.yahoo.com/18-train-fire-victims-remain-unidentified-061554122.html

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Ebola Outbreak in Uganda Kills 14

The deadly Ebola virus has killed 14 people in western Uganda this month, health officials have said, ending weeks of speculation about the cause of a strange disease that has prompted many people to flee their homes.

The officials and a World Health Organisation representative confirmed the outbreak at a news conference in Kampala on Saturday.

In a joint statement, the Ugandan government and WHO said: "Laboratory investigations done at the Uganda Virus Research Institute… have confirmed that the strange disease reported in Kibaale is indeed Ebola haemorrhagic fever." .

Kibaale is a district in mid-western Uganda, where people in recent weeks have been troubled by a mysterious illness that seemed to have come from nowhere.

Ugandan health officials had been stumped as well, and spent weeks conducting laboratory tests that were at first inconclusive.

Health officials told reporters in Kampala that the 14 dead were among 20 reported with the disease. Two of the infected have been isolated for examination by researchers and health officials.

A clinical officer and, days later, her four-month-old baby died from the disease caused by the Ebola virus, officials said.

There is no cure or vaccine for Ebola, and in Uganda, where in 2000 the disease killed 224 people and left hundreds more traumatised, it resurrects terrible memories.

There have been isolated cases since, such as in 2007 when an outbreak of a new strain of Ebola killed at least 37 people in Bundibugyo, a remote district close to the Congolese border, but none as deadly as in 2000.

Ebola, which manifests itself as a haemorrhagic fever, is highly infectious and kills quickly. It was first reported in 1976 in Congo and is named for the river where it was recognised, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

A CDC factsheet on Ebola says the disease is "characterised by fever, headache, joint and muscle aches, sore throat, and weakness, followed by diarrhoea, vomiting, and stomach pain. A rash, red eyes, hiccups and internal and external bleeding may be seen in some patients". Scientists don't know the natural reservoir of the virus, but they suspect the first victim in an Ebola outbreak gets infected through contact with the blood or other bodily fluids of infected animal, such as a monkey—who may have become infected by bats, researchers hypothesize.

Once the virus infects a human, it spreads to others through contact with the blood, urine, or other bodily fluids of the infected person, putting family members, hospital staff, and others who tend to the ill at risk.

Infected people remain contagious even after they are dead—a challenge because traditional funeral rites in Uganda call for touching a loved one's body. The virus can be transmitted through direct contact with the blood or secretions of an infected person, or objects that have been contaminated with infected secretions. During communal funerals, for example, when the bereaved come into contact with an Ebola victim, the virus can be contracted, officials said, warning against unnecessary contact with suspected cases of Ebola.

In Kibaale, some villagers had started abandoning their homes in recent weeks to escape what they thought was an illness linked to bad luck, because people were quickly falling ill and dying, officials said. "Being a strange disease, we were shocked to learn that it was Ebola," Byaruhanga said. "Our only hope is that in the past when Ebola broke out in other parts of Uganda it was controlled."

Officials also worry that other villagers suffering from other diseases might be afraid to visit the hospital for fear of catching Ebola, he said.

Monday 30 July 2012

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/29/uganda-ebola-outbreak-confirmed

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13 die in Nigeria’s ghastly road crash

No fewer than 13 passengers died in a motor accident on the Benin-Ore road, the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) confirmed on Sunday.

In a statement issued by Mr Bisi Kazeem, Deputy Corps Public Education Officer, the commission stated that the accident happened at kilometre 53, before Ohosun town, zone 5.12 toll gate unit command in Edo State at 7.45 a.m on Sunday.

Kazeem said the accident, which involved two vehicles, was caused by the driver of the Anambra Mass Transit Toyota Hiace bus, with registration number YB 610 EPE (Lagos), who for no reason drove against traffic on the Benin-Ore lane.

The driver faced an oncoming Iveco truck descending a slope, resulting in head-on collision.

The bus was coming from Lagos carrying traders dealing in electronics and 13 out of the passengers in the bus died, while three people survived including the truck driver.

The victims, according to FRSC, have been taken to Shiloh Hospital, Ugbogui in Edo for treatment while corpses were deposited at the mortuary of the same hospital.

The Commission said the obstruction caused as a result of the accident had been promptly cleared

Monday 30 July 2012

http://pmnewsnigeria.com/2012/07/29/13-die-in-nigerias-ghastly-road-crash/

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Dana air crash inquest: update

John Obafunwa, Chief Medical Examiner at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, said that some of the passengers on the ill-fated flight died from inhalation of toxic fumes after the crash. “They must have been alive to inhale the smoke,” said Mr. Obafunwa, a professor of Forensic Pathology.

Mr. Obafunwa cited fume inhalation and multiple injuries as the causes of more than half of the deaths.

“Fractures to the skull, damage to the brain, punctures in the lungs, severe blood loss. All of these things can individually cause death,” he added.

Mr. Obafunwa also stated that the test results of the DNA tests carried out for unidentifiable bodies would be available next week. “We asked for samples from parents, siblings, and offsprings. These are what we'd use to compare victims' DNA profile and confirm the identity,” Mr. Obafunwa said.

Haphazard response 

The inquest, which began last month, continues to shed light on the uncoordinated and haphazard operations of the nation's emergency rescue agencies.

Testimonies given by the Fire Service, the police, and other emergency response teams showed that although relevant agencies arrived minutes after the crash, lack of appropriate equipment delayed rescue efforts.

 Julius Berger, a private construction company, had to bring in her cranes and other heavy duty equipment, over an hour after the crash, before rescue and response could be undertaken.

In a deposition to the inquest signed by Tanko Ashang, the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) stated that crowd control was a major issue that hampered rescue efforts at the accident site.

 “Another clog in the wheel was co-ordination of the various stakeholders. Regular joint simulation exercises and informal meeting between members of various organizations will engender more effective collaboration in future operations,” said Mr. Ashang, NEMA's legal adviser. “A de-briefing meeting will soon be organized for all stakeholders by NEMA in order to gain from lessons learnt from this operation for better performance in future,” Mr. Ashang added.

Monday 30 July 2012

http://premiumtimesng.com/news/national/6228-DANA-CRASH-Police-blunder-Dana-air-crash-inquest-infuriates-coroner.html

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25 pilgrims killed in road accident in Haryana

At least 25 people were killed when the mini truck they were travelling in collided with a truck at Siwani in Haryana's Bhiwani district on Monday.

While 22 people were killed on the spot, three succumbed to injuries while being taken to hospitals in Bhiwani and Hisar, Bhiwani SP Satish Balan told PTI.

The mini-truck was carrying pilgrims from Ghugha Maari temple in Rajasthan to Kalayat near Kaithal district of Haryana.

The canter carrying 60 pilgrims of Sisarhato village in Kaithal district was returning from Amarpura dham in Rajasthan.

The accident occurred on a blind curve on the road at around 8:30 am. According to reports, most of the passengers were asleep at the time of accident.

The residents of nearby village rushed to the spot to extract injured people and bodies of the victims from the mangled remains of the vehicle.

The injured werwe sent to nearby hospitals in Hansi and Hisar town.

Monday 30 July 2012

http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/Haryana/25-pilgrims-killed-in-road-accident-in-Haryana/Article1-904088.aspx

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Andhra Pradesh train fire: 47 killed, probe ordered

At least 47 passengers were charred to death and 25 others injured when a fire broke in a coach of the Chennai-bound Tamil Nadu Express near Nellore early this morning after a suspected short circuit.

Twenty-six passengers were rescued from the coach S 11 which was completely gutted, Nellore Collector Sridhar said.

Out of 72 passengers travelling in the ill-fated S11 coach of New Delhi-Chennai Tamil Nadu Express, 28 were from Chennai, while 17 passengers were from Delhi.

As the train was passing through Nellore, which is about 150 km from Chennai, some people noticed the fire and informed railway authorities. "The death toll in the affected coach will be around 30-35," he said. Rescue workers have recovered 12 bodies while efforts were on to retrieve others from the compartment.

The coach had around 70 seats.

 "There was a short circuit near the toilet and the train was moving at a speed of 110 kms per hour. It was going to Chennai from Delhi.

All the passengers were asleep when the fire broke out at 4:30 am. People were not able to come out immediately," he said. "The fire spread fast and the passengers could not come out through one of the doors because of the fire. So the other edge of the coach was to be used. Some people could come out and others succumbed to death," he said.

The bodies have been charred so it is difficult to identify them, Sridhar said.

15 passengers are believed to have jumped down from the burning compartment.

A total of 72 passengers were travelling in the reserved compartment.

A witness told reporters that many were trapped inside when the flames engulfed the compartment. "I was lucky to come out but many passengers could not escape as two doors were jammed and the smoke spread fast," said Sudhir.

Fire fighting personnel extinguished the fire and rescue workers were using gas cutters and other equipment to retrieve the bodies.

 Ambulances were pressed into service to shift the injured to hospital.

Top officials including district collector and superintendent of police rushed to the scene and supervised rescue and relief work.

The district collector said burning bogie was detached to prevent the fire from spreading to other compartments.

He quoted some witnesses as saying that the fire was caused by short circuit near the toilet. As the train was not moving at full speed, some passengers either entered the adjoining compartment or jumped down.

However, those sleeping on the upper berths could not escape as the smoke spread fast and even the doors were not opening.

Meanwhile, railway minister Mukul Roy has ordered an inquiry into the Tamil Nadu Express fire mishap and announced an exgratia payment of Rs. five lakh each for the next of the kin of those killed in the incident. He also announced a payment of Rs. one lakh each for those who were grievously injured and Rs. 25,000 for those who suffered simple injuries.

The inquiry by D K Singh, Commissioner of Railway Safety of South-Central Circle, will look into the cause of the mishap near Nellore in Andhra Pradesh. Railway Ministry spokesperson Anil Saxena said relief has been despatched through the accident relief medical train from Bitragunda station.

Fire brigade from Nellore reached the site and extinguished the fire, he said, adding Railway Board Chairman Vinay Mittal along with senior officials have rushed to the accident site.

A special train has been arranged for carrying relatives of affected passengers from Chennai to Nellore.

Saxena said Railways has instructed General Managers of all zones to exercise extra vigil and launch a special safety drive regarding precautions to be taken to avoid recurrence of such accidents.

Monday 30 July 2012

 http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/Hyderabad/Andhra-Pradesh-train-fire-47-killed-probe-ordered/Article1-904036.aspx

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