■ United States
Woman trapped in tub
A 75-year-old Virginia woman became trapped in her bathtub for five days before she was rescued. Jane Fromal suffered slight dehydration even though she said she ran tap water to drink during the ordeal. Fromal was released on Sunday after being hospitalized for four days. Fromal said she drew a bath on April 9 to nurse a sore tailbone, then was unable to climb out. "I thought I'd get in the tub and soak," she said. "I didn't know I was going to soak for five days." Fromal finally received help last Wednesday when a neighbor's grandson noticed newspapers piling up in her driveway and insisted on his grandmother calling Fromal's family. Relatives found Fromal in the bathroom. After she was lifted to safety and donned a warm robe, Fromal didn't ask for food. She wanted a cigarette and a soda.
■ United Kingdom
Attack likely, insurer says
The likelihood of a terrorist attack on London has increased because of the impending election and Britain's support of the war on Iraq, according to a private risk assessment published yesterday. The assessment -- by Aon, a risk insurance broker -- raises the threat level for London from "guarded" to "elevated," higher than other Western capitals. Iraq is assessed as "severe." Britain's intelligence agency, MI5, assesses the threat from al-Qaeda-linked groups as "severe-general." It was raised to this level, MI5's second highest, at the end of 2003. Senior anti-terrorist officials say there is nothing to suggest that it should be raised further, despite the general election campaign. Aon, which concentrates on corporate clients, indicated on Monday that it adopted different criteria to MI5.
■ France
Collision alters Antarctica
The collision between a giant iceberg and an ice tongue landmass near the South Pole has changed the geography of Antarctica, the European Space Agency (ESA) said on Monday. According to an Envisat radar image, which was acquired on April 15, a 5km-long section of the Drygalski ice tongue broke off after a collision with the drifting B-15A iceberg. The bottle-shaped iceberg is around 115km long and has an area of more than 2,500km2, "making it as large as the country of Luxembourg," ESA said. It was largely unaffected by the smash-up. The B-15A iceberg had been drifting since January towards the ice tongue in McMurdo Sound on the Ross Sea. The iceberg is the largest remaining section of the B-15 iceberg that separated from the Ross Ice Shelf in March 2000.
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