Victoria River Mysteriously Turns Bright Green - Update
nationalpost - Horrified nature-lovers at Goldstream Provincial Park watched as the Goldstream River turned bright green late Wednesday afternoon.
The fluorescent green colouring appeared to start about 500 metres on the Victoria side of the entrance to the park and, over the course of an hour, the substance flowed down into the environmentally sensitive estuary.
By 5:30 p.m. the river, known for its dramatic salmon runs, eagles and other wildlife, was back to its normal colour.
Ministry of Environment teams were immediately sent to the area to investigate and members of Langford Fire Department collected samples for analysis.
No dead fish or animals had been found by early evening.
Earlier in the day a fountain beside Veterans Memorial Parkway in Langford also turned bright green, said Langford Fire Chief Bob Beckett.
UPDATE:
ctvbc - Officials from B.C.'s Ministry of Environment have determined that the substance used to turn the Goldstream River in Langford, B.C. neon green Thursday was non-toxic.
Lab results showed that the bright green hue was caused by a synthetic, organic compound called fluorescein, which is most commonly used as a fluorescent dye tracer in fluids.
Ministry staff say the substance is water soluble and don't think any fish or fish habitat were harmed by the incident.
Officials still don't know who dumped the fluorescein into the river.
Fire Chief Bob Beckett thinks the green waters may have been the result of an ill-conceived prank.
"In all likelihood it's a hoax. It may be a non-toxic substance but it's unfortunate that we had to utilize all sorts of resources to investigate this," he said.
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Psychic to be Buried Alive for a Week to Raise Money for Charity
thisisscunthorpe - A psychic will be buried six feet underground for charity.
Ian Lawman, who is also an exorcist and TV star, says he wants to stretch his talents and get as close to death without actually dying.
Of the week-long burial he said: “I have had the idea of being buried alive for two years now.
“At first it was just a thought, but now my coffin has been made I am becoming a lot more nervous.”
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As the date of the burial approaches, Mr Lawman is training to ensure everything goes to plan.
“I won’t have any food or drink for seven days, but I will be taking 12 food tablets equalling 2,000 calories a day.
“My training involves hours of meditation, lying still for long periods of time. The coffin is larger than your average size, but movement is still limited.”
A live webfeed will be streamed throughout the seven days, enabling Mr Lawman to share his experiences and feelings with his fans.
No stunt of this nature would be complete with out an historic setting,
and Mr Lawman is confident he has the perfect location in Dudley Castle, near Birmingham.
He said: “I will be one foot away from the bones of soldiers lost in battle.
“With my gift as an exorcist, I travel all over the world and feel very lucky.
“I do have my doubts about the event, because the last six attempts by other people have gone wrong.
“Coffins have collapsed, people have overheated and others have had panic attacks.
“The coffin will have two funnels leading to the surface.
“One will be for viewers, over the seven days, to look down so they know I am in there, the other to supply oxygen underground.”
Money raised will go to PC David Rathband’s Blue Lamp Foundation for injured emergency service workers.
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Indiana Motorists Pull Over After Spotting Triangle UFO
MUFON CMS - Indiana, December 27, 2010 - triangular shaped UFO with 2 red lights on side and one white orb in middle of craft sighted over Cleveland Ave.
I was driving southbound on Cleveland Ave, when the car in front of me put his breaks on and started to swerve like he wasn't paying attention.
Then something caught the corner of my eye and I looked up to see a large flying craft.
I pulled over as did the car in front of me and the car behind me. All of us got out to look at this thing.
It was triangular in shape with 2 red lights on one side and a large glowing white orb in the centre. It was approximately 2000ft in the air, completely silent, flying in a west to east direction. The colour of the craft was a white-greyish colour. It looked like there was something on the back of it, or like the back was a square, but it was really hard to tell.
There were also 2 jets flying over the craft, turning around and coming back. I tried to film it with my camera phone but I'm unable to make anything out. I lost sight of the object over the treeline.
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Rael, Founder and Spiritual Leader of the Raelian Movement: 'For His Stance on Condoms, Pope Benedict XVI Should be Prosecuted for Crimes Against Humanity.'
LAS VEGAS, Dec. 26, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Rael, founder and spiritual leader of the Raelian Movement, said in a statement issued this morning that Pope Benedict XVI should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity "for his strong stance against the use of condoms".
A spokesperson for the Raelian Movement said that while recent publications "hint that the pope has finally come to favor condom use," the Vatican has just clarified Benedict's recent comments, emphasizing that he didn't mean condoms should be used to avoid pregnancy.
"In a statement released by the Vatican, the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith said the pope wasn't talking about using condoms during sex between married couples or as a form of contraception," the Raelian spokesperson explained. "Instead, according to the statement, he said they could be used in cases such as reducing the risk of HIV infection for male prostitutes.
In his own statement, Rael poked fun at the pope's position.
"Of course, condoms shouldn't be used to prevent pregnancy because we need billions of additional babies to reach overpopulation as soon as possible," he said. "Then we can watch billions starve to death because there isn't enough food on Earth for all of them!"
Rael said the Vatican's statement demonstrated a lack of compassion.
''For such a message, the pope should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity, which will happen one day!" Rael said, adding that millions of people die from AIDS "because they are good Catholics who listen to this irresponsible 'religious leader.' "
In London on Sept. 13, European Raelian Movement filed a lawsuit against Pope Benedict XVI (formerly Cardinal Ratzinger) in the High Court, Queen's Bench Division. Allegations in the suit include charges of violating international human rights laws and perpetrating genocide by continuing to claim that condoms don't stop the spread of AIDS. The file is still being processed by the High Court.
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USS Enterprise Skipper Recorded Raunchy Films On Vessel
hamptonroads - In one scene, two female Navy sailors stand in a shower stall aboard the aircraft carrier, pretending to wash each other. They joke about how they should get six minutes under the water instead of the mandated three.
In other skits, sailors parade in drag, use anti-gay slurs, and simulate masturbation and a rectal exam. Another scene implies that an officer is having sex in his stateroom with a donkey.
They're all part of a series of short movies produced aboard the Norfolk-based aircraft carrier Enterprise in 2006 and 2007 and broadcast to its nearly 6,000 sailors and Marines. The man who masterminded and starred in them is Capt. Owen Honors - now the commander of the carrier, which is weeks away from deploying.
The videos, obtained by The Virginian-Pilot this week, were shot and edited with government equipment, many of them while the Enterprise was deployed supporting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
At the time, Honors was the carrier's executive officer, or XO, the commanding officer's deputy. He took command of the ship in May.
In the videos, Honors indicates that he's trying to entertain the crew. They were shown roughly once a week on closed-circuit shipwide television, according to a handful of sailors who were assigned to the Enterprise at the time. The sailors requested anonymity for fear of retribution.
One of them said he mailed a complaint about the videos to the Navy Inspector General this week. Others said crew members who raised concerns aboard the ship in 2006 and 2007 were brushed off.
The videos were part of what Honors, 49, called "XO Movie Night."
"They were the XO's project," said one former Enterprise sailor, a ship video-grapher who on one occasion was asked to help in the filming. "He was the one coming up with scripts and the jokes. He was the one planning it."
The Enterprise, the world's first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, is set to deploy overseas this month. The videos raise serious questions about Honors' judgment, especially while the carrier is under way, said another sailor, an officer aboard the Enterprise who was also there when the videos were being shown.
"When the ship pulls away from that pier, he's it," the officer said. "To me, that's scary."
It's unclear why the videos recently resurfaced, although one sailor who spoke to the newspaper said they remain on at least one shipboard computer.
Honors is a native of Syracuse, N.Y., and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1983. He went on to fly the F-14 Tomcat and work as a test pilot before serving as XO on the Enterprise from July 2005 to September 2007.
Honors did not respond to requests for comment. Neither did the Enterprise's then-commanding officer, Larry Rice, who was later promoted to the rank of the rear admiral and now works at the Norfolk-based U.S. Joint Forces Command.
Rear Adm. Raymond Spicer and Vice Adm. Daniel Holloway, who commanded the Enterprise carrier strike group during Honors' time as XO, could not be reached.
The Navy released a written statement late Friday in response to The Pilot's inquiries.
"The videos created onboard USS Enterprise in 2006-2007 were not created with the intent to offend anyone," the statement said. "The videos were intended to be humorous skits focusing the crew's attention on specific issues such as port visits, traffic safety, water conservation, ship cleanliness, etc."
The statement said that when leaders with the carrier strike group became aware of the inappropriate content in early 2007, production of the videos ended.
At least one video that includes anti-gay remarks and officers pretending to masturbate was made after July of that year, according to Honors' comments in it.
The Navy said it plans to launch an investigation.
At the beginning of the videos, Honors jokes that his bosses shouldn't be held responsible for them. "As usual, I want to say that the captain and the admiral - they don't know anything at all about the content of this video or the movie this evening, and they should absolutely not be held accountable in any judicial setting," he says.
The sailors who spoke to the newspaper said it's hard to believe that Honors' superiors on board weren't aware of the videos as soon as he began showing them in 2006, given that they were routinely broadcast for the entire crew.
"People talked about them," the former ship videographer said. "People looked forward to them - at least the people who thought they were funny."
A female sailor who was assigned to the Enterprise at the time said she and a number of other women on board were offended by the videos. She said some crew members complained about them, and in fact, Honors acknowledged it on camera. In one movie, he says, "Over the years I've gotten several complaints about inappropriate materials in these videos, never to me personally but, gutlessly, through other channels."
He adds, "This evening, all of you bleeding hearts... why don't just go ahead and hug yourself for the next 20 minutes or so, because there's a really good chance you're gonna be offended."
Then Honors tells his viewers to get ready for something that always pleases: "the F-bomb." The video goes on to show a string of clips edited together in which he uses the expletive.
The next portion is a series of clips displaying Honors and other sailors, including officers, pretending to masturbate. It's set to a song called "Spank."
After that, the video returns to Honors. "Finally, let's get to my favorite topic - something foreign to the gay kid over there: chicks in the shower," he says.
He gestures to the person next to him - who, through a trick of video, is Honors wearing the blue coveralls of a Navy surface warfare officer, or SWO. SWOs include the officers who crew the ship; they don't include fighter pilots and other aviators. Repeatedly in the videos, Honors, a former Top Gun pilot, draws distinctions between aviators and SWOs and refers to SWOs as "fags."
The video then shows two female sailors pretending to shower together and two male sailors pretending to shower together. While the shots imply nudity, they don't show any; the men are filmed from the waist up and the women from their shoulders.
In one instance, the women are in the shower stall with a cardboard cutout of Honors.
The sailors who spoke to The Pilot estimated that Honors made a few dozen videos for XO Movie Night. They said not all of them contained sexual jokes and anti-gay remarks.
The videos were shot and edited using equipment from the ship's public affairs office, which typically spends deployments documenting and publicizing the good work of sailors.
Of note is the quality of the XO Movie Night videos and the time that Honors appears to have devoted to them, even as the Enterprise was simultaneously supporting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and its air wing was dropping record numbers of bombs. The videos have plots, scripts, props and recurring characters.
In several instances, Honors plays more than one character in the same scene. To achieve this, it appears he recorded different takes in which he played the different roles, and then superimposed the takes over each other, allowing himself to appear on screen as two or three people at once.
"Some of it was pretty complicated stuff," the former ship videographer said.
The videographer said that while he knew the movies weren't appropriate, in some ways he can understand how they happened.
"In his defense, I'll say that sometimes, when you've been out to sea for a while, cut off from everything, you start to think things that you would never normally do are actually a good idea," he said. "You do stupid stuff to stay sane."
He added that electronic communication with the rest of the world while at sea can be difficult; it was nearly impossible to e-mail or upload videos from the carrier in 2006 and 2007.
"He probably figured they'd never get off the ship."
