■AUSTRALIA
Third oil plug fails
A Thai-based oil company yesterday failed in its third attempt to plug a leaking rig that has spilled thousands of barrels of crude into seas off Australia, alarming environmentalists. PTTEP Australasia said it had missed its target for a relief well some 2.6km below the seabed for the third time this month, and would try again in the coming days. The leaking wellhead, some 25cm wide, has been gushing off Australia’s Northwest since Aug. 21 with estimates putting the discharge at 400 barrels a day. The spill is reportedly Australia’s worst since offshore drilling began more than 40 years ago. Environment Minister Peter Garrett, the former frontman of rock band Midnight Oil, this week said PTTEP had agreed to pay for environmental monitoring of the area for at least two years.
■VIETNAM
Two frozen tigers seized
Authorities have seized two frozen tigers in the country where only a few dozen of the animals remain in the wild, state-linked media said yesterday. The tigers, weighing 40kg and 90kg, were discovered on Friday in a suburban district of Hanoi, the Thanh Nien newspaper said. At least four people, including the driver of a taxi transporting the animals, have been arrested pending investigations, the paper said. Police and forest rangers in Hanoi were not available for comment yesterday. The Tuoi Tre newspaper said one of the accused told police they bought the tigers south of Hanoi in Thanh Hoa Province and were bringing them to the capital for sale at the price of 2 million dong (US$111) per kilogram. There have been at least three similar seizures in Hanoi this year.
■AUSTRALIA
Baby survives train strike
A six-month-old baby has miraculously survived a train hitting his stroller, which rolled onto the tracks when his mother let go for an instant. The escape was captured on security camera footage that shows the red, three-wheeled stroller plunging off a station platform just as the commuter train pulls in, and the mother’s panicked lunge to grab it. The train pushed the stroller about 40m along the tracks before it stopped, but it did not go under the train. The baby, who was strapped into the stroller, received only a bump on the head. Police said they released the video, which was captured last Thursday at a suburban station in the southern city of Melbourne, to underscore the need for people to be extra safety conscious when using the train system. The dramatic footage led news bulletins across Australia and was shown internationally, and on YouTube. The whole incident took about seven seconds.
■INDIA
Fireworks blaze kills 32
A blaze erupted at a fireworks warehouse, killing at least 32 people and injuring 10 others ahead of a major Hindu festival yesterday. The victims in Friday night’s explosion were mainly traders buying fireworks in bulk as millions of Hindus prepared to celebrate Deepavali, the festival of lights, the Press Trust of India news agency reported. Setting off fireworks is a major part of the celebration’s evening festivities. Police pulled 32 bodies, most of them charred remains, from the warehouse in Pallipat near Chennai, the capital of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, PTI quoted local administrator Palani Kumar as saying. Three people have been hospitalized with burns, Kumar said. The cause of the fire was not immediately known.
RSS