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Shiver me timbers: the coolest warship ever made
Label: WorldNParks steps up checks to prevent falling trees during storms
Label: Technology
SINGAPORE: The National Parks Board (NParks) has stepped up measures to ensure that fewer trees fall during storms.
In the last five years, an average of 300 trees fell a year in bad weather.
To ensure public safety, NParks has increased the number of checks on trees since the beginning of last year.
Checks on trees near busy roads are now made once every 12 months, up from once every 18 months.
For trees on non-busy roads, checks are conducted once every two years.
Oh Cheow Sheng, Director of Streetscape Division at National Parks Board, said: "We've stepped up checks on the trees along busy roads, and trimmed the crowns of trees. We've also removed trees that may be vulnerable to the impact of storms. As for trees with a heavier crown, we trim the crown to lighten its weight, so as to reduce the chances of the trees falling during heavy storms."
- CNA/de
Obama cuts Hawaii trip short to address "fiscal cliff"
Label: HealthKAILUA, Hawaii President Barack Obama is cutting short his traditional Christmas holiday in Hawaii to return to Washington as lawmakers consider how to prevent the economy from going over the so-called fiscal cliff, the White House said Tuesday.
Obama will fly back to the nation's capital Wednesday night, just five days after arriving in Hawaii, White House officials said. In the past, the president's end-of-the-year holiday in his native state has stretched into the new year.
Congress is expected to return to Washington on Thursday. Automatic budget cuts and tax increases are set to begin in January. So far, the president and congressional Republicans have been unable to reach agreement on any alternatives.
Seven days 'til the "fiscal cliff"
The Obamas in Hawaii
CBS News correspondent Nancy Cordes reported earlier Tuesday that the president will likely put pressure on Congress to pass a Democratic plan being drafted by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
"There still have been no conversations between Democrats and Republicans Tuesday on how to avert the fiscal cliff," Cordes reported from Hawaii. "That's a sure sign that Reid is working on crafting legislation on his own, which he'd essentially dare Republicans in the House and Senate to pass just before the deadline."
Cordes notes that Reid's bill would likely extend the Bush-era tax cuts for households making less than $250,000 a year. It may also include enough short-term spending cuts to temporarily offset, for about six to eight months, the across-the-board spending cuts set to go into effect on January 1, 2013.
Lawmakers have expressed little but pessimism for the prospect of an agreement coming before Jan. 1. On Sunday, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, said she expects any action in the waning days of the year to be "a patch because in four days we can't solve everything."
The Obamas were spending the holiday at a rented home near Honolulu. On Christmas Day, the president and first lady Michelle Obama visited with Marines to express thanks for their service.
"One of my favorite things is always coming to base on Christmas Day just to meet you and say thank you," the president said. He called being commander in chief his greatest honor as president.
Obama took photos with individual service members and their families.
Winter Storms Spawn Tornadoes Across South
Label: Business
A nasty Christmastime storm system spawned blizzard conditions in some states and at least 15 reported tornadoes in the South, damaging homes, taking out power lines and dangerously snarling holiday travel.
Severe weather swept across the United States during the Christmas holiday, bringing tornadoes and intense thunderstorms to the Gulf Coast, while dumping heavy snow and freezing rain on the Southern Plains.
At least 15 tornadoes were reported today from Texas to Alabama, putting this storm system potentially on track to be one of the largest Christmas day tornado outbreaks on record.
One large tornado was reported in Mobile, Ala., where there are about 19,000 customers without power and 23,429 statewide, according to Alabama Power. Kerry Burns, a Mobile resident originally from Boston, said the storm "sounded like a freight train."
Some buildings in the area, including some churches and a local high school, were reportedly damaged. Ray Uballe, another Mobile resident, said his dad was shaken up.
"He was in his apartment," Uballe said. "He said it sounded like an airplane and then the door flung open and then there was just debris flying."
Douglas Mark Nix, president of the Infirmary Health System, said one of their Mobile hospitals lost power and sustained damage. There were no early reports of injuries to staff or patients.
"We are operating now on generator power," he said. "We do not have substantial damage but we do have a number of windows out and we have some ceiling tiles down, throughout the facility at the main hospital.
"We can run for at least two weeks but I saw power crews out all over the city so I fully expect power to be restored within the next day or so," Nix added.
Melinda Martinez/The Daily Town Talk/AP Photo
Winter Weather Causes Holiday Travel Problems Watch Video
At least eight states were issued blizzard warnings today, as the storms made highways dangerously slick heading into one of the busiest travel days of the year.
Oklahoma got about 7 inches of snow all over the state making for treacherous road conditions. ABC News affiliate KOCO-TV in Oklahoma City said the weather was being blamed for a 21-vehicle wreck on Interstate 40, but no one was seriously injured.
Ice accumulation in Arkansas bent trees and power lines, leaving at least 50,000 customers across the state without power. About 10 inches of snow fell on Fayetteville, Ark.
The storms, which first wreaked havoc on the West Coast before moving east, are being blamed for at least one death in Texas.
Investigators in the Houston area told ABC state KTRK-TV in Houston that a young man was trying to move a downed tree that was blocking the roadway when another one snapped and fell on top of him. He was later pronounced dead at a hopsital.
The last time a number of tornadoes hit the Gulf Coast area around Christmas Day was in 2009, when 22 tornadoes struck on Christmas Eve morning, National Weather Service spokesman Chris Vaccaro told ABC News over email.
The deadliest Christmastime tornado outbreak on record was Dec. 24 to 26, 1982, when 29 tornadoes in Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and Mississippi killed three people and injured 32.
The last killer tornado around Christmas, Vaccaro said, was a Christmas Eve EF4 in Tennessee in 1988, which killed one person and injured seven. EF4 tornadoes can produce winds up to 200 mph.
No official word yet on the strength of the string of tornadoes reported today.
While some were preparing for a Christmas feast, others were hunkered down.
More than 180 flights nationwide were canceled by midday, according to the flight tracker FlightAware.com. More than half were canceled by American Airlines and its regional affiliate, American Eagle.
The storm system is expected to continue east into Georgia and the Carolinas Wednesday and could potentially spawn more tornadoes, according to the National Weather Service.
ABC News' Matt Gutman, Max Golembo and ABC News Radio contributed to this report.
2013 Smart Guide: Hot computing for a cool billion
Label: WorldRead more: "2013 Smart Guide: 10 ideas that will shape the year"
It has been called science's X Factor: six mega-projects vying for two prizes, each worth a cool €1 billion.
In 2010, the European Commission put out a call for visionary computing initiatives comparable to the moon landing or the mapping of the human genome. Such ultra-ambitious projects would change the way we think about the world and ideally solve some of its problems, too.
Of 21 ideas submitted, six were shortlisted for further development. These include the Human Brain Project - an attempt to simulate the brain using a supercomputer - and a scheme to create a new generation of electronic devices based not on silicon but graphene.
The winners will be announced at the end of January. The prize money, from European countries and private firms as well as the European Union, will be spread over 10 years.
Our money is on FuturICT, a real-life SimCity on a global scale. It will give individuals, companies and governments real-time information about the planet, and run simulations to find the best strategies for dealing with issues such as climate change.
FuturICT was conceived after the 2008 financial crash drove home our lack of understanding about today's hyperconnected world. The civilisation simulator will be an open platform, accepting data on anything from social media and the stock exchange to climate models and political preferences. Stay tuned for the start of something big.
If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.
All comments should respect the New Scientist House Rules. If you think a particular comment breaks these rules then please use the "Report" link in that comment to report it to us.
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Jasa SEO Murah
Label: Jasa Seo, Jasa Seo Murah
Adalah fakta bahwa Google merupakan situs yang paling banyak digunakan oleh orang seantero jagad. Berdasarkan peringkat Alexarank Google masih lebih sering diakses ketimbang Facebook!
Adalah fakta bahwa semakin tinggi peringkat sebuah situs, semakin tinggi pula result kunjungan oleh para pengguna Google. Bisa dibayangkan bagaimana nasibnya situs jualan Anda jika berada di halaman 2, 3 dan seterusnya!
Jika Anda memiliki situs web yang miskin pengunjung terlebih karena tidak berada di “posisi terhormat” di Google, hari ini Anda telah memasuki situs yang tepat! Mulai-lah memperkenalkan website anda kepada dunia!
Kami adalah team yang full time bekerja untuk Anda! Kecepatan dan best result adalah target kami. Membuat klien kami puas adalah fondasi utama bisnis jasa kami. Bahkan kami berhak untuk tidak menerima uang sepeserpun jika situs Anda tidak masuk dalam 5 besar hasil pencarian google untuk keywords yang anda tentukan!
SEO kami berdasar pada standarisasi SEO Google. Kami memastikan untuk memberikan Jasa SEO sesuai dengan update terbaru Google Panda dan Penguin sehingga klien kami akan mendapatkan hasil terbaik dalam hal peringkat dan keyword ditargetkan. Selain itu diseoin.com termasuk salah satu Jasa Seo Murah Bergaransi di Indonesia yang sudah berpengalaman
Syria peace envoy Brahimi meets opposition
Label: Technology
DAMASCUS: International peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met Tuesday in Damascus with three opposition groups tolerated by the regime, a day after holding talks with President Bashar al-Assad, an AFP correspondent said.
Brahimi, the UN-Arab League's special envoy to Syria, arrived in the country on Sunday to launch a fresh bid to end the country's spiralling conflict, which in almost two years has killed more than 44,000 people.
He met mid-morning Tuesday with a delegation of six people led by Hassan Abdel Azim, head of the National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change (NCCDC), at his Damascus hotel, the correspondent said.
The NCCDC brings together several Arab nationalist, Kurdish, socialist and Marxist groups.
Key among Abdel Azim's companions in the meeting were Mohammed Abu Qassem of the Tadamun (Solidarity) party and Bassam Takieddin.
With close ties to Moscow, the NCCDC rejects all calls for foreign military intervention in Syria's conflict. It is not a part of the recently formed National Coalition, which is recognised by dozens of states and organisations as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.
Brahimi had told reporters on Monday that he and Assad had "exchanged views on the many steps to be taken in the future".
He said the Syrian crisis was "always worrying", and expressed hope that "all parties are in favour of a solution that draws Syrian people together."
Assad described his meeting with Brahimi as "friendly and constructive," according to state television.
But the Local Coordination Committees, a grassroots network of anti-regime activists who organise anti-Assad demonstrations and document the conflict, blasted Brahimi and the international community for failing to stop the bloodshed in Syria.
"Brahimi's arrival in Damascus to discuss a new political initiative to solve the crisis caused by the regime... has not put a stop... to massacres," the LCC said in a statement.
"Regarding leaks about an initiative proposed by Brahimi, the LCC declares its rejection of any initiative that puts Syrians in a position where they are extorted and forced to choose between accepting unfair compromises, or the continuation of the regime's crimes against them," it added.
The statement repeated calls for "Assad and all political, military and security officials to leave power.
"Any plan that gives... this criminal regime impunity against a fair trial and accountability for their crimes is immediately rejected, as it threatens Syrians' chance to achieve justice," the LCC added.
Rumours are circulating that Brahimi may be floating an idea that would allow for a compromise solution in Syria's conflict, leaving Assad in power temporarily.
The rumours began as Vice President Faruq al-Sharaa told a pro-Damascus Lebanese newspaper last week that a clear winner was unlikely to emerge in Syria's war, and after Brahimi met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton early this month.
- AFP/jc
Zelizer: Six political lessons of 2012
Label: LifestyleSTORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Julian Zelizer: 2012 was a year of bitter domestic battles, turbulence overseas
- He says the weakness of GOP, renewed strength of liberalism were apparent
- Zelizer says the year also highlighted the influence of new immigrants in America
- Zelizer: Year ended with a tragic reminder about need to act on gun control
Editor's note: Julian Zelizer is a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University. He is the author of "Jimmy Carter" and of the new book "Governing America."
(CNN) -- 2012 has been a tumultuous year in American politics. With the presidential election capping off the year, Americans have witnessed a series of bitter domestic battles and turbulent events overseas. As the year closes out, it is worth thinking about some of the most important lessons that politicians and voters can learn from this year as they prepare for 2013.
Here are six:
The Republican brand name is in trouble: The GOP took a drubbing in 2012. To be sure, Mitt Romney ran a problematic campaign. His inability to connect with voters and a number of embarrassing gaffes hurt the chances for Republicans to succeed.
Julian Zelizer
Just as important to the outcome was the party that Romney represented. Voters are not happy with the GOP. Public approval for the party has been extremely low. Congressional Republicans have helped to bring down the party name with their inability to compromise.
Recent polls show that if the nation goes off the fiscal cliff, the Republicans would be blamed. According to a survey by NBC and the Wall Street Journal, 65 percent of people asked for a short word or phrase to describe the GOP came up with something negative. The Republican Party was also the lowest-rated political institution.
The exit polls in November showed that the GOP is out of step with the electorate on a number of big issues, including immigration and gay marriage. If Republicans don't undertake some serious reforms and offer fresh voices, all the new messaging in the world won't help them as the competition starts for 2016.
Opinion: Madness in the air in Washington
America has grown more liberal on cultural and social issues: The election results confirmed what polls have been showing for some time. If the 1960s was a battle over conservative "traditional family values" and liberal ideals of social relations, liberals eventually won. Throughout the year, polls showed, for example, that the public was becoming more tolerant of gay marriage and civil unions. Americans support the view that gay sex should be legal by a margin of 2-1, compared to 1977 when the public was split.
In the election, same-sex marriage was approved in three states, voters in Wisconsin sent to office the first openly gay senator, and two states approved of referendums to legalize the recreational use of marijuana. Americans are accepting of social diversity, and expect that the pluralism of the electorate will be reflected by the composition of elected officials in Washington.
While there are some conservative voices who lament these changes and warn of a nation that is veering toward Sodom, a majority are more than comfortable that some of the taboos and social restrictions of earlier eras are fading and that we live in a nation which is more tolerant than ever before. These social and cultural changes will certainly raise more questions about restrictive practices and policies that remain in place while creating pressure for new kinds of leaders who are responsive to these changes.
The Middle East remains a tinderbox: In the years that followed Barack Obama's election, there was some hope that the Middle East could become a calmer region. When revolutions brought down some of the most notorious dictators in the region, many Americans cheered as the fervor for democracy seemed to be riding high.
But events in 2012 threw some cold water on those hopes. The Muslim Brotherhood won control of the Egyptian government. In Syria, the government brutally cracked down on opponents, reaching the point in December where Obama's administration has started to talk about the possibility of the al-Assad regime using chemical weapons, though the severity of the threat is unclear. The battles between Palestinians and Israel raged with rockets being fired into Tel Aviv and Israelis bombing targets in Gaza.
Although national attention is focused on domestic policy, it is clear that the Middle East has the capacity to command national attention at any moment and remains as explosive as ever.
Our infrastructure needs repair: Hurricane Sandy devastated the Northeast in November, leaving millions of Americans on the East Coast without power and with damaged property. Soon after the hurricane hit, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo made an important point. The infrastructure of our cities is outdated and needs to be revamped so that it can withstand current weather patterns. Speaking of the need for levees in New York, Cuomo said: "It is something we're going to have to start thinking about ... The construction of this city did not anticipate these kinds of situations."
Regardless of whether Congress takes action on the issue of climate change, in the short term cities and suburbs must do more work to curtail the kind of damage wreaked by these storms and to mitigate the costs of recovery -- building underground power lines, increasing resources for emergency responders, building state-of-the-art water systems, and constructing effective barriers to block water from flooding.
The new immigrants are a powerful political and social force: As was the case in the turn of the twentieth century when Eastern and Southern Europeans came into this county, massive waves of immigration are remaking the social fabric of the nation. Latino-Americans, Asian-Americans and other new portions of the electorate who have been coming into the country since the reform of immigration laws in 1965 are coming to represent a bigger and bigger portion of the electorate.
Not only are their numbers growing as a voting bloc, but they are more organized and active than ever before, both on election day as well as in policy making.
Soon after the election, The New York Times reported that 600 members of United We Dream, a network of younger immigrants who don't have their papers, met for three days to plan how to lobby for a bill that would enable 11 million illegal immigrants to become legal. One of the leaders, Christina Jimenez, explained: "We have an unprecedented opportunity to engage our parents, our cousins, our abuelitos in this fight." They have both parties scrambling as Democrats are working to fulfill the promises that brought these voters to their side in November, while some Republicans are desperate to dampen the influence of hardline anti-immigration activists in their party.
We need to do something about guns. The year ended with a horrific shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut. When a 20-year-old went on a rampage apparently using guns that had been legally purchased by his mother, the world watched with horror. Several prominent conservative advocates of gun rights, including former congressman and television host Joseph Scarborough as well as Sen. Joe Manchin, made statements indicating that the time has come to impose stricter controls and regulations on the purchase of weapons. "I don't know anybody in the sporting or hunting arena that goes out with an assault file," Manchin said.
Over the next few weeks, there will certainly be a big debate about what caused this shooting. People from different perspectives will highlight different issues but making it more difficult for people to get their hands on certain kinds of weapons, while not a cure-all, can only diminish the chances of this happening again.
There are many more lessons but these six stand out. After the trauma of the past week, let's hope the new year starts off with better days.
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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Julian Zelizer.
Extreme weather worries across U.S. on Christmas Day
Label: HealthUpdated 12:05 a.m. ET
Both coasts of the country are dealing with unusual weather this week during an especially challenging time. An estimated 93 million Americans are expected to drive or fly more than 50 miles from home for the holidays.
In the Sierra Mountains, they're dealing with three feet of snow in some spots.
From the possibility of tornados to heavy snowfall, there is great potential for a travel nightmare this holiday season. The fast-moving storm system is expected to have a significant impact on airport travel as it moves east.
Meteorologist Jeff Beradelli of CBS Miami station WFOR-TV said the southern storm system is looking like a classic severe weather setup, with warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico colliding with the jet stream to create unstable conditions. We may see howling thunderstorms and numerous, possibly strong tornados on Christmas Day.
The storms could bring strong tornadoes or winds of more than 75 mph, heavy rain, quarter-sized hail and dangerous lightning in Louisiana and Mississippi, the National Weather Service said. The greatest risk is in areas north of Interstates 10 and 12, with the worst storms likely along and southeast of a line from Winnsboro, La., to Jackson and DeKalb, Miss., according to the weather service's Jackson office.
Five holiday tips for the travel industry
On the northern side of the system, there's a possibility of a very wide swath of heavy snowfall.
That will be good news on Christmas Day for folks expecting a white Christmas, but this is going to turn into a travel nightmare as the system makes its way up through the Ohio Valley, into the Great Lakes and interior portions of the Northeast. Some places will see one to two feet of snow, especially upstate New York and interior Pennsylvania.
Much of Oklahoma and Arkansas were under a winter storm warning, with freezing rain, sleet and snow expected on Christmas. A blizzard watch is out for western Kentucky. No matter what form it takes, travel Tuesday could be dangerous, meteorologists said.
"We understand that most people will be focusing on the holiday," said Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant. "Please plan now for how you will receive a severe weather warning, and know where you will go when it is issued. It only takes a few minutes, and it will help everyone have a safe Christmas."
In Alabama, the director of the Emergency Management Agency, Art Faulkner, said he was briefing both local officials and Gov. Robert Bentley on plans for dealing with a possible outbreak.
Forecasters said storms would begin near the Gulf Coast and spread north through the day, bringing with them the chances of storms, particularly in central and southwest Alabama. No day is good for severe weather, but Faulkner said Christmas adds extra challenges because people are visiting unfamiliar areas. Also, people are more tuned in to holiday festivities than their weather radio on a day when thoughts typically turn more toward the possibility of snow than twisters, he said.
In California, after a brief reprieve across the northern half of the state on Monday, wet weather was expected to make another appearance on Christmas. Flooding and snarled holiday traffic were also expected in Southern California.
Ten storm systems in the last 50 years have spawned at least one Christmastime tornado with winds of 113 mph or more (F-2) in the South, Chris Vaccaro, a National Weather Service spokesman in Washington, said in an email. The most lethal were the storms of Dec. 24-26, 1982, when 29 tornadoes in Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and Mississippi killed three people and injured 32; and those of Dec. 24-25, 1964, when two people were killed and about 30 people injured by 14 tornadoes in seven states.
A National Weather Service statement from Jackson, Miss., said the main questions are how far north and west the threat will spread — and whether the storms will be more scattered, resulting in a greater tornado risk, or more in the form of a squall line, resulting in a higher risk of damaging straight-line winds along with embedded tornadoes.
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