Thousands evacuated after fire engulfs Dubai tower. No casualties caused by blaze...(video YT)

A huge fire engulfed one of the world's tallest residential towers in Dubai's Marina district, sending bright yellow flames several stories high, but there were no reports of casualties, civil defence officials said.
The fire broke out at about 2am on Saturday in the 86-storey Torch tower on the northeast end of the densely populated district, which is packed with multi-storey skyscrapers.
High winds whipped through the area and debris from the fire cluttered nearby streets after the blaze appeared to be extinguished.

The civil defence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there were no reports of deaths or injuries.
The cause of the fire was not immediately clear.
The Marina area is home to dozens of towering apartment blocks and hotels, many of them built over the past decade. The apartments are popular with Dubai's large number of expatriate professionals.
Police blocked off areas around the 336 metre-high Torch tower, which still had power. Lights were on in many of the apartments inside and multiple fire trucks and police vehicles were on the scene.
Residents of at least one neighbouring tower were told to evacuate as a precaution because of strong winds, but they were later allowed back inside.
One witness said the fire started in the middle of the tower before spreading down, describing it as like "the Titanic going down". Flaming material falling from the initial fire then set a lower part of the building ablaze, witnesses said.
Rescue efforts
Torch tower resident Steve Short, 53, of Liverpool, England, praised the work of firefighters who arrived quickly. He said fire alarms alerted residents to the blaze and building management sent workers knocking on doors to ensure residents got out.
Resident RJ Morlock, 33, of Houston, shot video on his phone that showed bright yellow flames reaching what appeared to be several stories on two separate parts of the building. He said residents were nervous coming out but fire crews were able to bring the situation under control.
"I was really surprised they got it under control pretty quickly," he said. "It looked like it was going to go up."
As daylight broke, residents waiting across the street to be allowed back home were able to see the extent of the blaze: External cladding on the corner of more than two dozen stories from roughly the 50th floor to the top were mangled and charred black.
Cleanup crews dressed in orange uniforms swept up pieces of shattered glass and other debris covering the street outside the building.
 http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/02/thousands-evacuated-fire-engulfs-dubai-tower-150221012315584.html
21/2/15
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California Wildfires Destroy Homes

Firefighters battling two massive fires in Northern California may finally have some relief, with more humid conditions forecast, but thunderstorms could bring more fire-causing lightening.

The two fires have destroyed 11 homes and scorched thousands of hectares of land since Friday.
State fire spokeswoman Captain Amy Head said fire crews in Northern California were trying to beat back wildfires burning near the town of Burney in Shasta County on Monday.


Burney residents faced possible evacuation as the two blazes, now within a few kilometers of one another, threatened their town.

The fires started at about the same time in Lassen National Forest. They have destroyed hundreds of kilometers of forest, burned down at least 8 homes and now threaten to destroy more buildings.

Northern California has been suffering through one of the worst droughts on record.

East of the state's capital Sacramento, hundreds of homes were evacuated along the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range after the so-called Sand Fire burned ten residences and seven other buildings.

The blaze, which fire officials said may have been started by a vehicle driving over dry vegetation, is only 35 percent contained as firefighters face dry conditions, high winds, and triple-digit temperatures.

A second fire west of Yosemite National Park quadrupled in size overnight to consume 859 hectares. It forced the evacuation of about 100 homes in the community of Foresta, where one house was destroyed.
The park remains open.
Federal fire officials are working to contain 19 blazes in six western states, with state and local teams battling dozens more throughout the region.
 http://www.voanews.com/content/california-wildfires-destroy-homes/1971693.html
4/8/14
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M6.1 deadly quake rattles southwest China

Earthquake kills at least 175 and injures more than 1,400 others in Yunnan province.

An earthquake has struck southwestern China, killing at least 175 people in a remote mountainous area of Yunnan province, and causing some buildings, including a school, to collapse.

Some 1,400 people were injured and 181 missing, Xinhua and state broadcaster CCTV said, citing the authorities.
The official Xinhua news agency said that the epicentre of Sunday's quake was in Longtoushan town in Yunnan's Ludian county.
Communications have been seriously affected and rescuers are rushing to the scene, the report said.

Al Jazeera's Adrian Brown, reporting from Kunshan, China, said: "This quake has happened in a very very remote area of southwest China.

"The difficulty for rescuers is going to be the time it takes to reach this area."
Pictures posted online by state media showed troops stretchering people away, and bricks which had fallen off buildings damaging cars, Reuters news agency reported. 

'Not quake proof'
Many people rushed out of buildings onto the street after the quake hit, electricity supplies were cut and at least one school collapsed, Xinhua added.

"The problem is a lot of the structures in this area are simply not quake proof. This is a very impoversihed region and very remote", Brown reported.

The US Geological Survey said the quake registered at shallow depth of less than 1 mile (1.6 km). Chinese state media said was felt most strongly Yunnan, as well as in the neighbouring provinces of Guizhou and Sichuan.
The government is sending 2,000 tents, 3,000 folding beds, 3,000 quilts and 3,000 coats to the disaster zone, the report said.
Ludian is home to some 265,900 people, Xinhua added. China is frequently struck by quakes in this part of the country. A quake in Sichuan in 2008 killed almost 70,000 people.
A quake in the same region in 2012 kiled 80 people.
Earlier in the day a less severe quake struck Tibet, causing no casualties.
 http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2014/08/deadly-quake-rattles-southwest-china-20148313030154246.html
3/8/14
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• M 6.1 - SICHUAN-YUNNAN-GUIZHOU RG, CHINA - 2014-08-03 08:30:14 UTC....local time: 16:30.....

Magnitude	Mw 6.1
Region	SICHUAN-YUNNAN-GUIZHOU RG, CHINA
Date time	2014-08-03 08:30:14.1 UTC
Location	27.26 N ; 103.50 E
Depth	10 km
Distances	258 km N of Kunming, China / pop: 1,023,674 / local time: 16:30:14.1 2014-08-03 22 km W of Zhaotong, China / pop: 109,400 / local time: 16:30:14.1 2014-08-03

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• M6.1 - 11km WNW of Wenping, China

• Event Time

1. 2014-08-03 08:30:13 UTC
2. 2014-08-03 16:30:13 UTC+08:00 at epicenter
3. 2014-08-03 11:30:13 UTC+03:00 system time

• Location

27.245°N 103.427°E depth=10.0km (6.2mi)

• Nearby Cities

1. 11km (7mi) WNW of Wenping, China
2. 29km (18mi) WSW of Zhaotong, China
3. 91km (57mi) WNW of Weining, China
4. 135km (84mi) ESE of Xichang, China
5. 731km (454mi) NNW of Ha Noi, Vietnam

Egypt to raze illegal buildings along Nile to help farmers

Photo: nationalgeographic.com

CAIRO - Egypt will destroy all buildings along the Nile River and its tributaries that were erected illegally, the water and irrigation minister said on Monday, seeking to protect canals needed to help grow food.
The government will "not be complacent in the face of encroachment on the Nile River and its tributaries and streams", Minister Mohamed Abdel Motteleb was quoted as saying by the state news agency MENA.


Egypt is the world's biggest wheat importer, a drain on its precarious finances.

 Officials say illegal building along the Nile has increased in the turbulent years since a 2011 uprising which also scared away investors and tourists, major sources of foreign exchange.
[jpost.com]
9/6/14

A strong 7.8-magnitude aftershock and an earlier 6.4-magnitude rocked Chile’s northern coast today (April 3)

SANTIAGO — A strong 7.8-magnitude aftershock and an earlier 6.4-magnitude rocked Chile’s northern coast today (April 3) even as Chilean authorities assessed the damage from a massive earthquake that struck off the northern coast on Tuesday.There are no immediate reports of new damage or injuries from today’s aftershocks.

Tuesday’s 8.2 magnitude quake that shook northern Chile on Tuesday killed six people and triggered a tsunami with 2m waves.

As the ocean waves receded, over 900,000 people who had evacuated the country’s low-lying coastal areas returned to their homes, some to find their houses and livelihoods in ruins.More than 2,600 homes were damaged and fishing boats along the northern coast were smashed up. However, most infrastructure held up and mines in the world’s No. 1 copper producer were generally functioning normally.The arid, mineral-rich north is sparsely populated, with most of the population concentrated in the port towns of Iquique and Arica, near the Peruvian border.In Peru, the earthquake led to temporary power outages and evacuations in some southern towns, but did not cause serious damage or injuries.Chilean President Michelle Bachelet visited Iquique yesterday and praised people’s orderly response to the emergency.“We are here to recognise the calm behaviour of the people of Iquique who showed great civic responsibility, as did those of Arica. I think you have given us all a tremendous example,” she said.The government would put great effort into restoring services, she added.Finance Minister Alberto Arenas said the government would place “no limit on the use of resources to address this emergency.”Ms Bachelet, who was sworn in as president less than a month ago, is likely conscious of the stinging criticism she faced near the end of her first term in office in 2010, when the government was seen to have responded inadequately to a much bigger 8.8 quake and tsunami that killed over 500 people.

• DAMAGE LIMITED

It was too early to estimate financial losses, but they were expected to be much lower than the US$30 billion (S$38 million) from the 2010 quake, which affected the more densely populated central region, said earthquake expert Alexander Allmann at reinsurer Munich Re.“The quake has caused severe damage to some buildings in the affected region, but in general the building standards in Chile are comparatively high, allowing buildings and infrastructure to withstand such quakes reasonably well,” said Mr Allmann.“The small tsunami triggered by the quake is not expected to have caused significant damage.”Small fishing vessels in the ports appeared to be among the worst affected.“We struggled just to be able to get a bigger boat and now look at it,” a woman from Iquique’s fishing community, in tears, said in a video posted on Reuters.Several smaller aftershocks, some as big as 5.2 magnitude, continued yesterday and some ports in the area remained closed........http://www.todayonline.com/world/americas/chile-assesses-damage-after-massive-quake?singlepage=true
3/4/14
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• A strong 8.2-magnitude earthquake has struck off the northwestern coast of Chile... 

 

Part of Vasari Corridor roof collapses in Florence. Restoration work has begun on the historic walkway, after plaster and tiles fall over the weekend

Florence' Vasari Corridor, theartnewspaper.com

Emergency restoration work started today on a section of Florence’s famous Vasari Corridor, after some plaster and tiles fell from the roof on Friday. The damage occurred in the section of the raised corridor that passes next to the church of Santa Felicita, just over the Ponte Vecchio, on the south side of the river Arno.
It is reported that no one was hurt, and museum professionals are already establishing the best course of action to restore the damage to the building. Around ten portraits have been removed from the walls as a precaution while restoration work begins, but the popular tourist site will remain open.


Coincidentally, the same portion of the corridor was due to be closed most of next month while curators install a series of self-portraits of 20th-century and contemporary artists for an exhibition that is scheduled to open at the end of September.

The Vasari Corridor is a long, raised passageway that connects the Palazzo Vecchio, in Piazza della Signoria, with Palazzo Pitti, on the other side of the river Arno. It passes through and along some of Florence’s most important landmarks, such as the Uffizi galleries, the Ponte Vecchio and the Boboli Gardens. It was designed and built in 1564 by Giorgio Vasari, the quintessential renaissance man, artist, architect and writer, to allow Cosimo de Medici and the rest of the Florentine elite to walk safely through the city.

A car bomb explosion in 1993, suspected to have been set off by the Mafia, damaged the section of the corridor closest to the Uffizi’s entrance, including works by Rubens, and killed six people.
http://www.theartnewspaper.com/articles/Part-of-Vasari-Corridor-roof-collapses-in-Florence/30213
19/8/13

China’s tallest building nears finish in Shanghai (video YT)

Visitors get a good view of the Pudong financial district with the Shanghai Tower (right), which is undergoing construction and scheduled to finish by the end of 2014. (Reuters)

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SHANGHAI: A topping out ceremony has been held for China’s tallest building in the financial hub of Shanghai.
At 632 meters (2,073 feet), the Shanghai Tower in the city’s Pudong district is the world’s second-tallest building, surpassed only by Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, which soars 829.8 meters (2,722 feet).

Topping out means the final beam has been placed at the top of the building. Once completed next year, the Shanghai Tower will have retail and office space, and a luxury hotel. It was designed by the US architectural firm Gensler.

China’s booming economy has fueled a building frenzy, including some of the world’s tallest buildings. The Shanghai Tower replaces the Shanghai World Financial Center — completed in 2007 — as the country’s highest building.
 http://www.arabnews.com
3/8/13

Explosion fails to demolish disused building in Brisbane

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Heavy machinery was brought in to help demolish a silo in Australia after a controlled explosion failed to bring the building down.


The silo, at an industrial site south west of Brisbane, was reduced to more than 4,000 tonnes of rubble after a jackhammer finished the job.