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At least two women have died and 39 people are injured after a 4.0-magnitude earthquake hit the Italian island of Ischia.

Rescuers are desperately trying to reach two brothers trapped under rubble after the quake brought down several buildings.

They pulled free the boys’ seven-month-old brother at around 04:00 local time, several hours after the tremor struck.

The island of Ischia, off the coast of Naples, has a population of about 50,000.

Ischia is extremely popular with tourists, many of whom were out in the bars and restaurants when the earthquake hit at 20:57 – striking at a depth of around 3 miles just north of the Casamicciola commune.

One elderly woman was reportedly killed by debris falling from a church, while another body was found in the rubble of collapsed building.

Image source CBC

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At least 1,500 people have been left homeless, Il Messagero reports.

The seven-month-old boy was rescued from a family home that collapsed, to cheers from the emergency workers.

The father and two women, one of whom is pregnant, were also saved from the rubble.

Now rescuers are trying to reach the baby’s two brothers. They have been given water by the emergency workers, local media reported.

Angelo Borrelli, head of civil protection, told was quoted by La Repubblica as saying they were cautiously optimistic of reaching the boys, but warned as “more time passes the more the situation becomes complicated”.

Parts of the island were said to be without power.

A hospital in another badly hit commune, Lacco Ameno, had to be evacuated. According to local media, the injured were treated outside the building and a number of patients were airlifted to Naples.

The Italian Red Cross confirmed on Twitter they were working with local authorities.

Extra ferries, from Naples to Ischia, were laid on during the night to bring more rescue workers to the island and allow holidaymakers to leave. Dozens of people are said to have ended their holidays early and Italian media said some tourists were sleeping on benches waiting for boats to arrive.

An emergency response team was quickly on the scene, partly because additional numbers were already on Ischia to fight localized bush fires.

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Your family may not be together when disaster strikes, so plan how you will contact one another. Think about how you will communicate in different situations.

Complete a contact card for each adult family member. Have them keep these cards handy in a wallet, purse or briefcase, etc. Additionally, complete contact cards for each child in your family. Put the cards in their backpacks or book bags.

Check with your children’s day care or school. Facilities designed for children should include identification planning as part of their emergency plans.

Complete a contact card for each family member in case of disasters

Complete a contact card for each family member in case of disasters

Family Communication Tips

Identify a contact such as a friend or relative who lives out-of-state for household members to notify they are safe. It may be easier to make a long-distance phone call than to call across town, so an out-of-town contact may be in a better position to communicate among separated family members.

Be sure every member of your family knows the phone number and has a cell phone, coins or a prepaid phone card to call the emergency contact. If you have a cell phone, program that person(s) as “ICE” (In Case of Emergency) in your phone. If you are in an accident, emergency personnel will often check your ICE listings in order to get a hold of someone you know. Make sure to tell your family and friends that you’ve listed them as emergency contacts.

Teach family members how to use text messaging (also known as SMS or Short Message Service). Text messages can often get around network disruptions when a phone call might not be able to get through.

Subscribe to alert services. Many communities now have systems that will send instant text alerts or e-mails to let you know about bad weather, road closings, local emergencies, etc. Sign up by visiting your local Office of Emergency Management web site.

 

A Photoshop alteration raised alarms over a pretty model in a burnt orange dress, who appeared to have had a run-in with a very heavy airbrush.

The devilishly bad piece of retouching at Simply Be left the brunette with an apparently freakishly clawed left hand, complete with six fingers and right-angled gashes.

Alongside the sharp digits, the unwitting model’s right hand was given a stumped, forked thumb.

As Vernon and the team at the Photoshop Disasters write: “On the upside, her dress is a lovely color, and the photo has made this model the most in-demand guest at all finer marshmallow and wienie roasts.”

The alteration begs the question of whether the rest of the image – including the dress for sale – has been unrealistically and misleadingly enhanced.

A devilishly bad piece of retouching at Simply Be left a model with an apparently freakishly clawed left hand, complete with six fingers and right-angled gashes

A devilishly bad piece of retouching at Simply Be left a model with an apparently freakishly clawed left hand, complete with six fingers and right-angled gashes

After the story made its way onto Jezebel, Simply Be quickly changed the image to something for more human and less ghoulish.

The kimono dress is now worn by a model who, the site acknowledges, is a “non-mutant” – and, thankfully, rather more attractive – version.

As if Photoshop hadn’t already had enough criticism of late, the blunder adds fuel to the anti-retouching lobby.

Moves to restrict the use of retouching on commercial images are gaining momentum, no thanks to the embarrassing backlash that airbrushing errors such as this creates.

On the basis of a poll that found that readers were increasingly feeling deceived by commercial images, Glamour magazine has just announced that it will ask commissioned photographers not to alter the shapes of models – even if a celebrity requests a ‘digital diet’.

No matter how beautiful or famous, celebrities and models alike regularly fall foul of over-zealous retouching – with some companies, such as Makeup Forever, increasingly making a point of only publicizing entirely unaltered images.