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Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Venezuela firefighters continue battling refinery blaze

PARAGUANA, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuelan firefighters continued battling a blaze at the country's largest refinery on Tuesday, struggling to extinguish a third fuel storage tank following a blast that killed nearly 50 people in the nation's deadliest oil industry accident.

Flames began shooting out of the storage tank at the 645,000-barrel-per-day Amuay refinery at around 8:00 a.m. (1230 GMT), less than an hour after Reuters witnesses and state oil company PDVSA said the fire had been completely extinguished.

On Monday, Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez told Reuters in an exclusive interview that the facility could restart operations on Friday if the blaze is out by Wednesday.

The charred remains of two other fuel tanks, which had been extinguished before dawn, stood half-melted from three days of the blazing inferno.

The explosion at Amuay on Saturday killed 48 people and helped pushed up U.S. fuel prices in markets that were already bullish because of a threat that Tropical Storm Isaac could disrupt refinery operations on the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Traders say the impact on fuel markets may continue even after Amuay is up and running again. Tank farm accidents often cause problems with gasoline blending, which means PDVSA may have to boost imports.

Chavez said at the scene on Monday that he was creating a fund worth about $23 million to help pay for clean-up operations and replace homes destroyed by the pre-dawn blast.

It was one of the most deadly oil industry accidents in recent years, nearing the toll of the 1997 fire at India's Visakhapatnam refinery that killed 56 and topping the 2005 blast at BP Plc's Texas City refinery in which 15 people died.

(Additional reporting by Marianna Parraga; Writing by Brian Ellsworth; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/one-three-tank-fires-extinguished-venezuela-refinery-055226584.html

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Belgians fear pedophile's ex-wife may be freed

BRUSSELS (AP) ? Even after all these years, the mere mention of the name "Marc Dutroux" can wipe the smile off the face of almost any Belgian.

And now that the convicted pedophile and killer's ex-wife ? an accomplice who let two of his victims starve to death ? is on the verge of release, Belgium is being forced to relive some of its darkest moments.

On Tuesday, the nation's highest court will likely approve granting Michelle Martin conditional freedom, even though she served little more than half of the 30-year sentence she was given for her part in the mid-1990s kidnappings, rapes and killings. One of Belgium's most loathed criminals could walk free within hours or days afterward.

For many in this country, memories that had been largely buried are now resurfacing.

"We are scared for our children, obviously, for the other children as well," said Celine Doignies, a bar owner in the village of Malonne where Martin is expected to move into a convent as part of the conditions of her release.

Martin depicted herself as a more passive culprit than Dutroux, acting on the whims of a psychopath. But she is still blamed for aiding her then-husband's depraved and murderous spree, and is particularly loathed for letting two 8-year-old girls starve to death while Dutroux was briefly imprisoned.

The Court of Cassation will decide on appeals from the prosecutor's office and the families of victims on Tuesday and rule if procedural errors were made in the decision of a lower court to approve Martin's conditional release. Barring such errors, nothing stops her from leaving prison.

Dutroux, who was an unemployed electrician and convicted pedophile on parole at the time of the crimes, was convicted eight years after his 1996 arrest of abducting, imprisoning and raping six girls between the summers of 1995 and 1996. He was also found guilty of murdering two of the six girls, who ranged in age from 8 to 19 years old.

The two 8-year-olds starved to death in a secret basement dungeon built by Dutroux, who left them in Martin's care while he was serving four months in jail for theft. The last two kidnap victims came out alive after the police took action.

The Dutroux case was a watershed moment for the nation. It ended decades of social tranquility and rattled the government system as little had since World War II. In a nation of 10 million at the time, one demonstration drew more than 300,000 angry people onto the streets of Brussels to demand immediate change.

Beyond the gruesomeness of the crimes, the population was infuriated by the ineptitude of the police and judicial systems, which left several glaring opportunities to catch the criminals ? and save lives ? go to waste.

An investigator heard voices in Dutroux' cellar next to the dungeon but didn't take proper heed. Authorities spread over different judicial districts failed to communicate properly. A parliamentary inquiry laid bare many other ailments in the police and justice systems, laying the cornerstone for reforms.

"We often talk about the pre- and post-Dutroux era," said Professor Brice De Ruyver, head of Ghent University's Institute for International Research on Criminal Policy. "It has almost brought the country, at that time, balancing on a state of revolution."

But when it comes to the judicial system, many people say the reforms did not go far enough, and the Martin case has brought those concerns to the forefront.

Under Belgian law, release is possible after a convict has served one-third of his or her sentence, including credit for pre-trial detention. It is rarely questioned for common criminals, but obviously in Martin's case, a lot of emotion is involved.

Dutroux himself was sentenced in 2004 to life in prison with no possibility of parole because, the judge said, of "the danger he represents to society." Some of his victims' parents are now galvanizing the public once again as they demand that Martin, too, stay in jail.

"What does one have to do to serve a full sentence?" asked Pol Marchal, who lost his 17-year-old daughter, An, in the killing spree.

Marchal is demanding a bigger say in the decision on whether Martin should be released. He and Jean-Denis Lejeune, the father of another victim, went to see Prime Minister Elio Di Rupo last Friday, and Di Rupo promised more reforms.

"I understand the emotions of the families and the population," Di Rupo said. "The abominable crimes are still very much in our memory."

De Ruyver said the public's confidence in the justice system remains "extremely low. This is, for a democratic state of law, a very explosive situation."

"Those who are responsible for justice reform haven't yet succeeded in making clear to the public that justice is now functioning better than during Dutroux' times," the professor said.

Again, protests have been staged, including in Malonne, the home of the Clarisse convent some 75 kilometers (45 miles) south of Brussels.

There, if she is released, Martin will have to work some 20 hours a week to pay for lodging and she will have to meet weekly with authorities to determine the extent to which she is meeting the conditions of her release. In theory, she has limited freedom to move.

De Ruyver mentioned several reasons why Martin should not yet be released, foremost among them being that early conditional release is meant to help reintegrate a person into society. That is the opposite of what Martin will be doing if she shelters in the Clarisse convent of Malonne, he said.

"She is hiding herself from society, going to a monastery and living there, in a closed community. This is not taking back your place in society," he said. In addition, he said, "If society says 'I don't want you back,' you have a big problem."

The extent to which that is the case with Martin is underscored by the special measures authorities will have to take to protect her from possible attacks if she makes it to the bucolic convent. Media reports say some 40 police will guard the convent day and night, at a cost of 5,000 euros a day.

That alone is another sore point.

"You cannot underestimate the enormous cost of law enforcement being operational there and at the same time not be used in other, more important aspects of crime fighting," De Ruyver said.

Lejeune, whose daughter Julie was one of the girls who starved to death, was pessimistic that the parents could at this point keep Martin in jail, noting they've been unable to find a legal basis for it.

But, he added, "regarding others who have committed equally bad crimes, there will be reform taking shape in the justice department."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/belgians-fear-pedophiles-ex-wife-may-freed-114711125.html

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Minister hints at resignation in Heathrow airport row

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's transport minister said on Tuesday she would probably resign if the government gave in to pressure to expand London's Heathrow airport.

Prime Minister Cameron's government has ruled out building a third runway at Heathrow before the next election, in part to appease the junior coalition partner, the Lib Dems, but the issue has returned to the agenda with the economy still stuck in recession.

Government insiders say Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne have an open mind on expanding Heathrow but that they were unlikely to reverse their policy before the election, due in 2015.

Transport Secretary Justine Greening was asked by BBC radio to respond to comments by a fellow Conservative, goading Cameron to approve the new runway and show if he was a "man or a mouse".

Asked if she would remain in the cabinet if the government decided to back the airport expansion, she said: "I think it would be very difficult for me to do that."

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Tim Yeo, who chairs parliament's Energy and Climate Change committee, said backing the third runway would give the government a "sense of mission".

"The prime minister must ask himself whether he is man or mouse," he wrote. "An immediate go-ahead for a third runway will symbolise the start of a new era, the moment the Cameron government found its sense of mission. Let's go for it."

Several options are being considered to increase the southeast of England's strained airport capacity: a third runway for Europe's busiest airport, Heathrow, a second runway at London Stansted, or a new airport in the estuary of the river Thames.

The government blocked development of a third Heathrow runway as it came to power in 2010, to boost its environmental credentials and win the backing of thousands of households who would be affected by increased air traffic over the capital.

Heathrow operator BAA, owned by Spain's Ferrovial, believes the airport is falling behind European rivals like Paris, Frankfurt and Amsterdam in the battle for lucrative routes to China because of the constraints on growth.

The prime minister's spokeswoman said the government would stick to its coalition deal, which rules out expanding London's Heathrow, Gatwick or Stansted airports.

"The prime minister has said that the coalition parties made a pledge not to have a third runway and that's a pledge we will keep. The position is we don't see the argument for a third runway," the spokeswoman said.

Colin Stanbridge, head of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, urged the government to "put politics aside" and build a third runway, which he said was the solution to Britain's "short-term capacity crunch".

The government will launch an aviation consultation document later this year

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Abbas; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cameron-urged-expand-heathrow-airport-083905892--finance.html

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Exoplanet pair orbits two stars

Outer orb sits in habitable zone of binary star system

Web edition : 6:34 pm

BEIJING ? And then there were two. The Kepler spacecraft has spied the first pair of planets passing in front of the binary star system they orbit. Adding spice is that the outer planet ? a potential Neptune-like world ? inhabits the life-friendly zone around the two stars.

?It receives about 88 percent the amount of energy the Earth receives from the sun,? says William Welsh of San Diego State University, who is scheduled to report the finding August 29 at the International Astronomical Union meeting. ?And it?s a multiple planet system. It?s hard enough to imagine how you get one planet in the binary; now we have two.?

The system, called Kepler-47, could have even more planets: A tantalizing but unconfirmed hint of an additional world lurks in the blinking starlight produced when the planetary companions pass between the two stars and Earth. The additional blink has been seen clearly just once, so more observing time would be needed to confirm a third planet. Kepler-47 is in the constellation Cygnus.

The results also appear online August 28 in Science.

So far, scientists know that the outer planet, Kepler-47c, is roughly 4.6 times wider than Earth and that it goes around the stars every 303 days. The inner planet is three times wider than Earth, and whips around the stars every 49 days. One of the stars is similar to the sun, and the other is much smaller and dimmer. The two stars orbit one another about every seven days.

Determining the boundaries of the habitable zone in binary systems usually isn?t simple because the moving stars create a shifting region in which liquid water could survive on an orbiting planet. But this pair of stars cooperated. ?It?s a sunlike star and a real wimpy star,? Welsh says. In the case of the smaller one, ?you just ignore it.?

Kepler-47c is probably too big and gassy to host life, but if it had an Earth-sized moon, that could serve as a potential exo-incubator. ?It?s pure speculation,? Welsh says. ?But being in the habitable zone, if it had a big moon around it, it?s in the right place to have the conditions you would need for life.?

There is no evidence of such a moon, but smaller ones, more like Saturn?s moon Titan, could be present. ?If this object had a moon the size of Titan, that could be very interesting,? Welsh says.

Found in: Astronomy and Atom & Cosmos

Source: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/343336/title/Exoplanet_pair_orbits_two_stars

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Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Peterson lawyers mount defense at murder trial

Joel Brodsky left, and Joe Lopez, right, defense attorneys for former Bolingbrook, Ill., police officer Drew Peterson, speak to the media outside the Will County Courthouse in Joliet, Ill., Monday, Aug. 27, 2012, during a break in Peterson's murder trial. The judge in the case rejected a request by the defense to acquit Peterson after prosecutors rested Monday. Peterson has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in the 2004 death of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. (AP Photo/Paul Beaty)

FILE - In this May 8, 2009 file photo, former Bolingbrook, Ill., police officer Drew Peterson leaves the Will County Courthouse in Joliet, Ill., after his arraignment on charges of first-degree murder in the 2004 death of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. Prosecutors are expected to rest their case Monday, Aug. 27, 2012, at Peterson's murder trial. Heading into Monday, they've called more than 30 witnesses over a month's time in their bid to prove Peterson killed his third wife. After the state rests, the defense is expected to ask the judge to enter a not guilty verdict before jurors even begin deliberations. (AP Photo/M. Spencer Green, File)

JOLIET, Ill. (AP) ? Drew Peterson's defense team began Monday to try to counter the state's portrayal of the former suburban Chicago police officer as a bully who is more than capable of slaying his third wife.

Prosecutors rested their four-week, 30-plus witness case earlier on Monday, ending with a dramatic letter from the alleged victim, in which Kathleen Savio said she feared her spouse would kill her.

Peterson, now 58, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in Savio's 2004 death. The former Bolingbrook police sergeant was only charged after his fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, went missing in 2007.

In her frantic 2002 letter to a Will County prosecutor, Savio accused her estranged husband of breaking into her house and putting a knife to her throat.

"He asked me several times if I was afraid," according to the letter, which was written during acrimonious divorce proceedings. "I started to panic. He pulled out his knife that he kept around his leg and brought it to my neck. I thought I'd never see my boys again."

Two years later, Savio, 40, was found dead in a bathtub at her home with a gash on the back of her head. Her death was initially deemed accidental but reclassified a homicide after Stacy Peterson disappeared.

Before he was arrested and jailed in 2009, the swaggering Drew Peterson went on a media blitz to declare his innocence. His legal defense started in earnest Monday in front a jury clad in various sports jerseys, one of their many dress-alike stunts.

If Peterson is convicted, he faces a maximum 60-year prison term.

The defense's first witness was Mary Pontarelli, a neighbor and close friend of Savio's who also had testified for the state about finding Savio's body. Pontarelli conceded Monday she never saw Peterson strike Savio or even raise his voice at her.

"He was very respectful ... a good neighbor," she said. "He's a funny guy, he makes jokes about things ? not in a mean way."

She also told jurors Savio would have fought back if attacked. The defense has said the absence of defensive wounds on Savio bolstered their contention she died accidentally.

"She's tough," Pontarelli agreed. "She wouldn't let someone hit her without her hitting back."

Rob Sud, a Bolingbrook police officer who went to Savio's house the night her body was found, also testified Monday. He said he saw nothing in house to raise his suspicions that her death was anything but accidental.

"There wasn't some grand conspiracy to cover something up was there?" defense attorney Steve Greenberg asked, though a judge sustained an objection before the officer could answer.

After prosecutors rested Monday morning, Judge Edward Burmila rejected a defense request that he acquit Peterson even before the case goes to jurors. To grant a directed verdict ? which are commonly asked for, but rarely granted ? he would have had to conclude that the state fell so far short of proving their case there was no need to go on.

"We have no theory about what happened to this lady?" Greenberg said in arguing for the motion, his voice rising. "There's nothing, here! ... They just hope this jury or your honor dislikes Drew Peterson ? so let's presume he did it."

Without any physical evidence following a botched initial investigation, prosecutors had to rely heavily on hearsay evidence, mostly comments that Savio made before she died and that Stacy Peterson made before she vanished.

Hearsay ? statements not based on a witness's direct knowledge ? is normally barred in trials in the United States, but Illinois passed a law tailored to Peterson's case, dubbed "Drew's Law," allowing hearsay in rare circumstances.

Peterson attorney Joel Brodsky told reporters Monday the defense intends to call to the stand the eldest of Savio's and Peterson's two sons, Tom Peterson, to "tell what he knows about his father's innocence." The recent high school graduate is expected to testify Wednesday.

Defense attorneys also told the judge they want to put Savio's divorce lawyer, Harry Smith, on the stand, in a bid to dent the credibility of hearsay related to Stacy Peterson. Burmila will decide Tuesday if Smith will be allowed to say Peterson called him in 2007 to ask if she could squeeze Drew Peterson for money by threatening to tell police he killed Savio.

___

Don Babwin also contributed to this report.

___

Follow Michael Tarm at www.twitter.com/mtarm

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-08-27-Drew%20Peterson%20Trial/id-d153e0dbea06488fbca8e6fc93a4b752

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Male snails babysit for other dads: Family secrets of marine whelk Solenosteira macrospira

ScienceDaily (Aug. 28, 2012) ? Pity the male of the marine whelk, Solenosteira macrospira. He does all the work of raising the young, from egg-laying to hatching -- even though few of the baby snails are his own.

The surprising new finding by researchers at the University of California, Davis, puts S. macrospira in a small club of reproductive outliers characterized by male-only child care. Throw in extensive promiscuity and sibling cannibalism, and the species has one of the most extreme life histories in the animal kingdom.

The family secrets of the snail, which lives in tidal mudflats off Baja California, are reported online in a study in the journal Ecology Letters.

In the study, UC Davis researchers report that, on average, only one in four of the hundreds of eggs that a male S. macrospira carries around on his back belong to him. Some carry the offspring of as many as 25 other males.

Such extreme cases provide the raw material on which natural selection can work and shed light on more "mainstream" species, said study author Rick Grosberg, a professor of evolution and ecology at UC Davis.

"It opens our eyes to viewing other kinds of behavior not as weird or harmful but as normal," he said.

The snails were first described in an amateur shell-collectors newsletter, The Festivus, in 1973. Grosberg started studying the animals in 1994, when he brought some back from a collecting trip and realized that only male snails had egg capsules on their shells.

When the snails mate, the female glues capsules containing hundreds of eggs each to the male's shell.

The male's shell likely acts as a substitute rock, since the snails' habitat offers few surfaces on which to glue eggs, said co-author Stephanie Kamel, a postdoctoral researcher in Grosberg's lab.

Moving in and out with the tide on dad's (or stepdad's) back also protects the egg capsules from the extremes of heat and drying they might face if left on a stationary rock.

A male's shell may become covered in dozens of capsules, each containing up to 250 eggs. As the eggs hatch, a process that takes about a month, some of the baby snails devour the rest of their littermates. Typically only a handful of hatchlings survives the fratricide to emerge from a capsule and crawl away.

Kamel carried out DNA analysis of brood capsules to determine the eggs' parentage. On average, she found that the male snails had sired just 24 percent of the offspring on their backs. Many had sired far less.

"The promiscuity in the female snails is extraordinary," Kamel said, noting that some females mate with as many as a dozen different males.

Why do they do it? Typically in the animal kingdom, females invest more resources in an egg than a male does in a sperm, so mothers have a stronger interest in providing parental care. Males may mate with multiple partners to increase their chances of siring offspring, but typically make less investment in caring for those young. When dads do get involved, it's nearly always because they are assured that all or most of the offspring are their own. Male sea horses, for example, carry developing young in a pouch -- but all are their own genetic offspring.

One explanation could be that caring for the kids just doesn't cost the male snails much. But by tethering individual snails to a post sunk in the sand, Grosberg was able to follow them over time and show that the capsules do impose a significant burden, reflected in weight loss.

It may be that carrying the egg capsules simply represents the best of limited options for the males, Grosberg said, since it's impossible for them to mate without the female attaching an egg capsule to their backs.

Or carrying egg capsules may be a way for a male to show a female that he's good parent material.

"If he wants to get any action, he has to pay the price," Grosberg said.

Grosberg is fascinated by the conflicts that occur between parents, between siblings, and between parents and offspring as they each try to get resources and maximize their success in breeding. You can see these conflicts and rivalries all the way from simple animals to humans, he notes.

"Everything that intrigues me about family life happens in these snails," he said.

At the same time, no animal has gone as far as humans in evolving increasing cooperation between relatives, tribes and larger and larger (and less closely related) groups over time.

"We're good at seeing other forms of reward," Grosberg said.

The work was funded by the National Science Foundation.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California - Davis.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

Stephanie J. Kamel, Richard K. Grosberg. Exclusive male care despite extreme female promiscuity and low paternity in a marine snail. Ecology Letters, 2012; DOI: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2012.01841.x

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/laXchHNF_SM/120828163036.htm

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