Twister hits Malacca

It could have been a scene from the movie Twister.

Tiles and tables flew, roofs were ripped off and trees and street lamps uprooted when a massive thunderstorm hit parts of Malacca just before midnight on Sunday.

Hotel manager James Pang, 45, was among those who witnessed the storm's wrath. He said he was awakened by a very loud noise outside his Taman Aman house.

Massive damage: Overee pointing to his house which is now without a ceiling after the storm in Malacca.

“I looked out and saw the tiles from my porch being carried away by the wind. Then I saw a plastic table from one of the Portuguese restaurants 600m away fly into my compound,” he said.

Pang's four-wheel-drive vehicle, which was parked in his porch, was severely damaged by falling tiles. He estimated the total damage to his property at RM15,000.

Witnesses said it only took five minutes of the thunderstorm to tear off the roofs of more than 100 houses in Taman Aman, the Portuguese Settlement, Padang Temu, Bandar Hilir Garden and Seaview Garden.

This is the first time such an incident had happened in these areas.

At the Portuguese Settlement, huge trees were uprooted and the decorative street lamps atthe famous dining at the Portuguese Square were torn off and scattered everywhere.

Scattered mess: The decorative street lamps that usually lend a romantic ambience to the famous al fresco dining at the Portuguese Square lying on the street.

Resident Anthony Overee, 49, said he was watching television with his wife when suddenly their entire ceiling gave way.

“Thank God we were not injured. My two daughters were sleeping in their rooms so I immediately woke them up and we went to the back of the house for shelter,” he said.

SMK Canossa Convent in the settlement, which is already in need of repair, was also badly hit.

Principal Chin Siok Hoon said three out of the four school blocks were badly hit and the damage could easily come up to RM50,000.

Kota Melaka MP Wong Nai Chee, who visited the area yesterday, said that of the 100 houses, about 10 were severely damaged, especially those located near the sea.

He said residents have been urged to file police reports and state their losses so they could get aid from the state government.

Chief Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Ali Rustam, who visited the area, said the state government, through the Welfare Department, would immediately hand out RM200 to each family as an emergency aid.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Man Answers Nature Call and Saves 100!

Residents of the longhouse salvaging their belongings from the rubble.

One man’s urge to answer nature’s call saved 100 residents of Rumah Merikan ak Johnson from being buried alive in Banting Lingga, Sri Aman, on Thursday. Renjis Empati, 57, was walking to the toilet outside the longhouse at 2am when he saw his kitchen slowly collapsing. He then ran to the ruai (longhouse walkway) and shouted to warn residents of the 14-door longhouse and nine other homes.

"I could feel the earth trembling and saw the longhouse collapse into a sinkhole."

The farmer was left with the pair of shorts he was wearing and a shotgun he took from his house before the building collapsed.
"All my belongings, including jars passed down from my ancestors, are lost."

Residents of the longhouse treat Renjis like a hero now.

"If it were not for him, most of us would be dead by now," said Lada Rentap, 67.

Lada could only save her Mykad when she fled from the longhouse.

Another victim, Limah Buma, 70, said it was "horrifying".

"I was dragged by my husband. I could not walk as the floor was wobbling and when we reached the stairs outside, it slowly sank one rung at a time into the earth," she said.

Limah could not contain her emotions and burst into tears when she said all her hand-woven rattan mats, which she had collected since she was a 12-year-old girl, were lost in the incident.

"I also lost seven jars, passed down from my ancestors. Those were priceless. Those jars were hundreds of years old," she said.

There are five longhouses situated close to each other in the village, which was founded more than a century ago.

Yesterday, the Sri Aman Community Welfare Department presented RM13,200 to the villagers.


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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Antarctic melting may be speeding up

Rising sea levels and melting polar ice-sheets are at upper limits of projections, leaving some human population centers already unable to cope, top world scientists say as they analyze latest satellite data.

A United Nations report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in February projected sea level gains of 18-59 centimeters (7-23 inches) this century from temperature rises of 1.8-4.0 Celsius (3.2-7.8 Farenheit).

"Observations are in the very upper edge of the projections," leading Australian marine scientist John Church told Reuters.

"I feel that we're getting uncomfortably close to threshold," said Church, of Australia's CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research said.

Past this level, parts of the Antarctic and Greenland would approach a virtually irreversible melting that would produce sea level rises of meters, he said.

There has been no repeat in the Antarctic of the 2002 break-up of part of the Larsen ice shelf that created a 500 billion ton iceberg as big as Luxembourg.

But the Antarctic Peninsula is warming faster than anywhere else on Earth, and glaciers are in massive retreat.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Putrajaya Landslide buries 23 cars, 1,200 evacuated

Around 1,200 residents were evacuated early Thursday morning when a part of a 12m high hillslope crashed down on a parking lot, burying 23 cars under tonnes of soil and undergrowth.

The force of the landslide flipped over some cars and crushed them.

The soil came to a halt mere inches away from a kindergarten housed at one of the blocks.

However, no one was injured in the 4am incident.

Residents from 330 units of three blocks of 15-storey high apartments in Precinct 9, were asked to evacuate by the police immediately after the incident.

According to officials a special committee had been formed to study the safety of the hillslope as an open reservoir holding over 40 million litres of water sits on the hilltop.

One of the official said the committee would be carrying out soil and various other tests to determine the cause and ensure the area was safe.

The apartments are the residential quarters for civil servants from the various ministries in the administrative capital.

Some 150 police were then dispatched to secure the area affected.

A 12-member Smart team and 36 firemen, together with five sniffer dogs, were also reined in.

One resident Mohamad Haidhir Hamzah, 32, whose Naza Citra car was buried under the heap of soil, said he was woken up by a loud noise at around 3.30am but went back to sleep thinking that it was merely noise from the construction area behind his apartment in Block B.

"It's usual for us to hear such noises because of the movements of construction lorries and machinery. So, I thought it was one of those times.

"But then I was woken up by the police informing me to evacuate the premises immediately with my wife and toddler daughter. I didn't even have time to bring any food or clothes with me," he said.

Usually he would not park his car at the lot behind the apartment.

"But I came back at 5pm on Wednesday and my parking lot was already full so I had to move my car there," he said. He added the car was only a year old.

Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan, who turned up around 9.30am to inspect the damage and spoke to the residents, said affected civil servants could take time off to deal with the problem.

"Ikram (Public Works Institute of Malaysia) has yet to give us an initial assessment of the damage as well as the condition of the ground.

"I am sure they will turn up for work as soon as the matter is settled," he said, adding that the Government would look into all matters, including the issue of aid and compensation for those affected.

Putrajaya Corporation chairman Tan Sri Samsuddin Osman said it had made arrangements for residents to be temporarily placed at the community hall in Precinct 9.

"I have been told by Ikram that the building is stable but they want to conduct further tests on the ground. If they decide that it will be too dangerous for the residents to return, we will arrange for them to stay in the apartments in Precinct 14," he said.

Putrajaya police chief Supt Abdul Razak Abdul Hamid said the landslide measured some nine to 12-metre high and covered a three-metre wide area.

"We have determined that no one was hurt in the incident,” he said.

Source
[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Tremors felt in Malaysia after quake strikes Sumatra

- For those of you in KL, did you feel it? Our seats were moving!! Scarry!! -

KUALA LUMPUR: Tremors were felt in parts of peninsular Malaysia and Singapore after an earthquake struck southern Sumatra at 11.50am.

There is no threat of a tsunami, the Meteorological Department said.

The earthquake measured 5.8 on the Richter scale, it said.

Meanwhile the AP reported from Jakarta:

A powerful earthquake in western Indonesia killed at least four people Tuesday, flattening hundreds of buildings and overwhelming hospitals on Sumatra island, officials and witnesses said.

It was felt hundreds of kilometers (miles) away in Singapore, where some office buildings were evacuated, and in neighbouring Malaysia.

The magnitude 6.3 quake killed at least two children, a teacher and a woman in a market in the Sumatran town of Solok, said police spokesman Supriadi, adding that hundreds of buildings collapsed, including a state bank.

At least two hospitals were struggling to cope with a flood of patients, many of them suffering cuts and broken bones, said Supriadi, who like many Indonesians goes by only one name.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the tremor had a preliminary magnitude of 6.3 and struck 50 kilometers (around 30 miles) from Padang, a city on Sumatra's western coast.

It had a depth of 33 kilometers (about 20 miles).

"Everything in my house were fell down... a cabinet hit me,'' said Rahma Nurjana, a Padang resident.

"My neighbor's house collapsed.''

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii said the earthquake occurred on land, meaning no tsunami warnings would be issued.

The tremor was felt in Singapore, 430 kilometers (265 miles) from the epicenter, forcing the evacuation of several older office buildings, TV station Channel NewsAsia reported.

Residents in Malaysia's largest city, Kuala Lumpur, also reported tremors.

Indonesia, the world's largest archipelago, is prone to seismic upheaval due to its location on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire,'' an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

In December 2004, a massive earthquake struck off Indonesia's Sumatra island and triggered a tsunami that killed more than 230,000 people, including 131,000 people in Indonesia's Aceh province alone.

A tsunami off Java island last year killed nearly 5,000.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Twelve fingers and Eleven Toes

A boy is born in Germany with six fingers on each hand and eleven toes.

Doctors say it is most unusual for a child to be born with extra fingers and toes, but otherwise be completely healthy.

Eleven-month old Yassir has now had his extra toe removed and will soon be able to learn to walk.

His extra fingers will be removed in a few months, so he'll be like all the other children when he goes to school.

Click here to Watch the Video

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Rare Orchid (Monomeria barbata ) Found in Malaysia

IPOH: The mysterious orchid picked up by two environmentalists deep in the jungles of Cameron Highlands has turned out to be the rare Monomeria barbata – a first for Malaysia.

Embi Abdullah, 59, who stumbled across the orchid with his friend while trekking in the Ruil mountains last year, said the Forest Research Institute Malaysia (FRIM) and the French Orchid Society had recently confirmed the genus and species.

Exciting find: Embi examining the orchid, which has been confirmed as ‘Monomeria barbata’.

The Monomeria barbata, first discovered 200 years ago in Nepal and the Eastern Himalayas, grew only in cool weather on treetops some 1,600m to 2,000m above sea level, he said.

“This is an exciting breakthrough for Malaysia because this genus of orchid – the Monomeria – has never been found here before.

“The plant has been recorded in Nepal, north-eastern India, Vietnam and Myanmar, but never in Malaysia,” he added.

“This canopy orchid is also rarely found in the wild even in its countries of origin because of ongoing development now,” said Embi, who has studied orchids for over 15 years.

According to a scientist from FRIM, Embi and his friend N. Madi were not the first to discover the orchid as another Malaysian had brought it back for identification about two or three years ago.

However, this has not damped Embi's excitement as he has been asked by the French Orchid Society to submit a paper describing the Malaysian variant of the flower.

Although the flower is now widely available among orchid enthusiasts in Europe, the Monomeria barbata found in the Cameron Highlands might be unique to Malaysia alone.

“There is a difference between our plant and those in Europe. The colour on the surface of the lip is yellow on theirs, while ours is brown.

“In Europe, the plant is also described as small and miniature but ours is medium-sized,” said Embi.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Quake Shakes up Asia's Internet

Nearly all of Asia's earthquake-disrupted Internet service and 80 percent of its phone service was to be restored by noon Thursday, a Taiwanese official said following one of the largest telecommunications outages in years to hit Asia.

Lin Jen-hung, vice-general manager of Taiwan's Chunghwa Telecom Co also said that four ships with crews to repair the two undersea data transmission cables ruptured during Tuesday's powerful earthquake in Taiwan will arrive in the affected area on Jan 2.

The 6.7 magnitude earthquake and aftershocks on Tuesday night and Wednesday caused disruptions for major telecommunications operators from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, China, Singapore and South Korea -- with ripple effects spreading beyond Asia.

In Hong Kong, a government statement said Thursday it would take at least five days to partially repair the damage to two undersea cables.

The government urged Internet users not to log onto overseas websites for unessential reasons.

People were also told not to repeatedly make non-urgent telephone calls to overseas numbers if earlier attempts failed.

A Hong Kong telecommunications official said all seven major cables serving the Chinese territory were affected, some severely.

"Six of them have been completely damaged and there is a remaining one with a limited capacity," Au Man-ho of the Telecommunications Authority told reporters.


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Quake shakes up the Net

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Cockles Haven

It was an unexpected bounty for the villagers at Telok Sepat in Sura, near here, when millions of blanched cockles were washed ashore on Christmas Day.

Thousands of people – many from nearby areas and outstation – rushed to the beach with buckets and scoops after word spread of the abundant kerang covering the beach like a carpet over two kilometres of the South China Sea shoreline.

There was an estimated 4,000 people, from little children to senior citizens, racing to gather this hard-shell marine species, which is boiled or grilled and eaten with chilly or tomato sauce or made into spicy sambal.

There was excitement in the air and the beach looked like a spot for a festive event, with many pitching tents to spend overnight at the beach.

"It’s not always that we can get this lucky and to get a free and fresh supply of kerang from the sea at this enormous scale,” said 46-year-old technician Salleh Jamalludin from Kuantan.

“At least I can do a bit of saving on my weekly grocery bill. The whole family loves a kerang meal,” he said, adding that his family gathered 10 buckets of cockles.

“Everyone were feverishly collecting the cockles and I was satisfied with what we harvested in just 60 minutes,” he said.

Siti Fauziah Ahmad Syaid and her family had come to escape the flood madness in her hometown in Segamat and was pleasantly surprised that this other “madness” had occurred while she was taking a holiday here.

She managed to fill four sacks within 30 minutes.

“I will return to Johor and cook cockle dishes for my neighbours who are still at the flood relief centres,” she said.

A check by The Star showed that the cockles were still being washed ashore in abundance yesterday morning. People were still coming in droves, although it was 2am.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]

Fears of Tsunami Ease After Taiwan Quake

TAIPEI, Taiwan - A powerful earthquake struck off southwestern Taiwan on Tuesday, briefly prompting fears of a tsunami on the second anniversary of the quake and deadly waves that killed thousands in south Asia.

Taiwanese media reported one person died and three were injured when their home collapsed in the southern city of Pintung. Other reports said city streets had cracked and a major bridge was damaged. They said fires were burning out in the area, apparently caused by downed power cables.

The quake was felt throughout Taiwan. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated its magnitude at 7.1, while Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau measured it at 6.7. It was followed eight minutes later by 7.0 magnitude aftershock, the USGS said.

Two hours later, an official at Japan's Meteorological Agency said there was no longer any danger of a destructive tsunami headed for the Philippines, as had been predicted.

"The danger has passed," said Hiroshi Koide of the agency's earthquake section. "We predicted tsunami based on the depth and magnitude of the earthquake. But ultimately, it appears no large tsunami were triggered."

Phone lines were cut in the southern cities of Kaohsiung and Pingtung, possibly hindering reports of damage by residents, the CTI Cable News reported. Several high-rise hotels swayed violently in Kaohsiung, it said.

Liao Ching-ling, a 30-year-old manager at Kaohsiung's Ambassador Hotel, said she had never before felt such a strong quake: "The building swayed so badly that many panicky guests ran out of their rooms and into the streets."

The initial tremor was centered at sea about 13 miles southwest of Hengchun on the southern tip of Taiwan, the bureau said. Hengchun is about 260 miles south of Taipei.

Quakes frequently shake Taiwan, which is part of the Pacific's "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin. Most are minor and cause little or no damage, but a 7.6-magnitude earthquake in central Taiwan in September 1999 killed more than 2,300 people.

A 9.1-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Indonesia on Dec. 26, 2004 caused a tsunami that killed at least 230,000 people in 11 countries. Those waves reached as high as 33 feet.

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[tags : unusual wierd bizzare]