Clocks slay time... time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.
William Faulkner
For disappearing acts, it's hard to beat what happens to the eight hours supposedly left after eight of sleep and eight of work.
Doug Larson
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Chile's killer quake sends out Pacific-wide tsunami
Huge waves surged across the Pacific on Sunday forcing hundreds of thousands to scramble for safe ground after Chile's devastating earthquake killed more than 300 people, razed buildings and tore up bridges and roads. Skip related content
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Chile's President Michelle Bachelet said more than two million people in the South American nation had been affected by the 8.8 magnitude quake. Rescuers dug for survivors as scores of aftershocks rattled Concepcion, the main city near the epicenter.
But ripples from the massive tremor -- one of the 10 strongest recorded in the past century -- spread much further afield.Waves over two meters (seven feet) high crashed into the Chilean coast, carrying boats far inland near Concepcion. The tsunami killed at least five people, and leaving 11 missing, in the remote Robinson Crusoe islands before pressing on across the Pacific to Hawaii, Polynesia and beyond.
About 50 countries and territories along an arc stretching from New Zealand to Japan were put on alert, five years after the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed more than 220,000 people.
World pledges aid to quake-hit Chile
Japan ordered more than 320,000 people away from its east coast. Sea surges up to 1.2 metres (four feet) high slammed ashore Sunday and part of the port of Nemuro was flooded. "Please do not approach the coast at any cost," Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama warned in a national address.
The power had gone by the time the waves reached Russia and Australia and Chile was left bearing the brunt of the tsunami and quake devastation.
In the port of Talcahuano near Concepcion, trawlers were carried inland to the town square where they lay marooned next to abandoned cars. In the nearby resort of Dichato a small boat was carried 400 metres from the coast.
After touring the worst affected areas Saturday, Bachelet said in an address to the nation that she found it hard to spell out the magnitude of the disaster.
"The power of nature has again struck our country," she said, declaring six of Chile's 15 regions "catastrophe zones".
Chronology: Major quakes and tsunamis
Highways were sliced to pieces, bridges imploded and buildings fell as the quake struck before dawn.
"This is a catastrophe of immense proportions, so it will be very difficult to give precise figures," Interior Minister Edmundo Perez Yoma said. Officials estimated up to 1.5 million homes could be destroyed or damaged.
In Santiago, some 325 kilometers (200 miles) northwest of the epicenter, some people were still in the nightclubs and bars celebrating the start of the weekend when the quake struck just after 3:00am. The capital was plunged into near darkness as power and communications lines were snapped and roofs came down. Santiago airport was closed.
Related article;70,000 evacuated as tsunami reaches Japan
"It was the worst experience of my life," said 22-year-old Sebastian, standing outside his house in eastern Santiago.
"Friends who were at clubs said it was pandemonium," said Santiago resident Maren Andrea Jimenez, an American expert working for the United Nations. "It was scary! Plaster began falling from the ceiling."
Only the Internet was left working for many people who did have power and word of the quake with images were spread by Twitter and Facebook social blogging networks.
At Curico, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of the epicenter, the quake destroyed about 90 percent of the town's historic center, reported the local radio station which set up a newsroom in the main square powered by an emergency generator.
The European Union, United States and other immediately countries offered assistance.
US President Barack Obama said: "Early indications are that hundreds of lives have been lost in Chile and damage is severe. On behalf of the American people, Michelle and I send our deepest condolences to the Chilean people."
Related article: Panic in the streets of Chile
But Chile's Foreign Minister Mariano Fernandez asked countries that offered aid to hold off until authorities could assess the emergency needs.
Chile does not want "aid from anywhere to be a distraction" from disaster relief, Fernandez said, adding: "Any aid that arrives without having been determined to be needed really helps very little."
Unlike Haiti, struck by a devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake on January 12 which killed 217,000 people, Chile is one of Latin America's wealthiest countries.
The total value of economic damage is likely to range between 15 billion and 30 billion dollars, a US risk modeling firm, EQECAT, predicted. This is about 10-15 percent of Chile's real gross domestic product.
Related article: World pledges aid to quake-hit Chile
The US Geological Survey said it had recorded more than 51 aftershocks ranging from 4.9 to 6.9 since the quake.
Chile lies along the Pacific "Rim of Fire" and is regularly rocked by quakes, but damage is often limited as they mostly hit in remote desert regions.
The epicenter of the latest quake was a few hundred miles north of the biggest earthquake on record, a 9.5-magnitude monster in May 1960 that killed between 2,200 and 5,700 people and triggered a huge tsunami that reached as far as New Zealan
Premier League - Ramsey suffers serious injury
Arsenal have reacted angrily after midfielder Aaron Ramsey suffered a serious injury that echoed the broken leg sustained by team-mate Eduardo da Silva in 2008.
Shawcross left the field in tears, while players from both sides were visibly traumatised as medics administered emergency treatment and gave Ramsey oxygen.
The game was stopped for several minutes before Ramsey was stretchered into an ambulance and driven away from the Britannia Stadium.
Sky television decided not to show replays of the challenge because they considered the footage to be too upsetting.
Manager Arsene Wenger said the injury was a consequence of the excessively physical approach teams take against his side.
"The only thing is we do not know how long he will be out, but it is certainly long term," he said.
"I'm not very happy with the tackle. I just want to say we know what we are expecting, a battle everywhere.
"But we have now lost three players -- (Abou) Diaby, Eduardo and now Ramsey today, a boy of 19 years old to horrendous tackles.
"The first two were out for nine months to a year, and I don't believe in coincidence when you suffer this as many times as we do.
"When you see a player get injured like he (Ramsey) did tonight, its not acceptable."
Stoke manager Tony Pulis said he was "desperately upset" as well, adding: "Ryan has no malice in him at all, he is a young kiddie and he was crying his eyes out as he went off the pitch.
"He will be devastated. There is no way in a million years he would set out to do that to any player.
"Our thoughts go out to Aaron and everyone connected to Arsenal Football Club."
"There was absolutely no malice in the challenge. I would never, ever go out to hurt a fellow professional," Shawcross later said on the club's website.
"I am deeply upset that Aaron has suffered such a bad injury and my thoughts are with him. I would like to send him my best wishes too for a speedy recovery."
Arsenal went on to win the game 3-1 with goals from Nicklas Bendtner, Cesc Fabregas and Thomas Vermaelen after Danny Pugh opened the scoring for Stoke.
Speaking after the game, Fabregas called for referees to stamp out on dangerous challenges, saying: "You could say we are not protected enough. I think so."
Croatian striker Eduardo missed nearly a year with a compound leg fracture following a tackle by Birmingham City's Martin Taylor in 2008. Diaby was injured after a challenge by Sunderland's Dan Smith two years earlier.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
cars uk and ireland
Top 10 new cars to fall in love with
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Top ten most expensive cars in production
There are expensive cars and there are super expensive cars. The days of machines costing significantly north of £1 million ... More > >
Preview: Geneva Motor Show
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Top 10: hot new cars due on sale
The Detroit Show had a distinctly global theme to it this year and many of the exhibits are due to hit the showrooms in the ... More > >
The world's newest concept cars
The first major motor show of the year, in Detroit, threw up its fair share of brand new concept cars. Incredibly, many of ... More > >
Top 10 most beautiful cars in Detroit
They say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so without further ado, behold the ten cars on display at the 2010 ... More > >
All-American stars of the Detroit Show
To mark the start of the 2010 Detroit Auto Show we've picked 10 of the most American stars of the event in the past. It's ... More > >
Detroit 2010 preview: Mercedes-Benz E-Class Cabriolet
Mercedes reckons the biggest news surrounding its new drop-top is the addition of the 'Aircap', a spoiler on the ... More > >
Detroit 2010 preview: MINI Beachcomber concept
Want to know what next year's MINI SUV will look like? Squint at the Beachcomber concept and imagine it with doors, ... More > >
Detroit 2010 preview: BMW Concept ActiveE
Under the fancy stickers and blue neon lighting of the Concept ActiveE sits a 'regular' electric 1 Series Coupé that&... More > >
Detroit 2010 preview: BMW Z4 sDrive35is
We're still no fans of BMW's new nomenclature, but the prospect of a faster, even more aggressive looking Z4 has us ...World Video News
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UK Braced For Floods As Storms Approach
Parts of the UK have been warned to brace for flooding amid predictions of torrential rain and strong winds. Skip related content
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Forecasters said storms would sweep across southern England tonight and push northwards throughout Sunday.
"Stormy conditions over western parts of Europe will spread into southern Britain tonight, bringing torrential downpours and strong gusty winds," Sky news weather presenter Jo Wheeler said."By the middle of the day the wet weather will reach central parts of the country, possibly bringing some snow to the higher ground."
Parts of Yorkshire were already under water, with localised flooding in the York, Selby and Malton areas.
Many roads in and around Scarborough were also covered, while the Leven Bank Bridge in Yarm was closed after cracks began to show.
The structure carries the A1044 over the River Leven and was closed as a precaution while a structural assessment was carried out.
"It was noticed that cracks had appeared on the bridge possibly as a result of the heavy rain," a spokesman for Cleveland Police said.
Yorkshire's overnight heavy rain overnight led to the death of a 53-year-old woman whose four-wheel drive was swept up in flooding.
The body of Vanessa Robson, from Beverley in East Yorkshire, was found in Hartoft Beck after her Land Rover was spotted under a nearby bridge.
It is believed she had tried to cross the brook but got caught by floodwaters.
Sea King pilot Flight Lieutenant Nigel Lynch said weather conditions at the time were terrible and the river was extremely swollen.
The Environment Agency has four flood warnings in force - on the River Went, in South Yorkshire, the upper River Hull in East Yorkshire, part of the River Ouse, in North Yorkshire and Lustrum Beck, in County Durham.
It added there was a possibility of flooding from rivers in Kent, Sussex, Hampshire and other southern regions following heavy rain earlier this the week.
:: For more information, refer to the Met Office website.
Tsunami hits Chile as Pacific rim braces for impact
A tsunami crashed into Chile's coast Saturday in a potential portent of disaster across the vast Pacific ocean as nations went on alert for towering waves generated by a killer earthquake. Skip related content
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Sirens blared in French Polynesia to warn residents to find higher ground as a tsunami watch went into effect across the Pacific's "Ring of Fire" after the 8.8-magnitude quake in Chile, which left at least 122 people dead.
Nations along an arc stretching from New Zealand to Japan implemented emergency plans that were beefed up after the Indian Ocean disaster of 2004, when a series of immensely destructive tsunamis killed more than 220,000.The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, set up by Pacific governments after a tsunami unleashed by a deadly 9.5 magnitude earthquake in Chile in 1960, warned of possible "widespread damage" as outsized waves raced across the ocean.
"We could be looking at an all-day event," US National Weather Service meteorologist Eric Lau told AFP in Washington.
"It will stop once it hits the land masses on the other side of the Pacific, in Asia. The wave is spread out across the entire body of water in the Pacific."
Authorities in the US state of Hawaii, where the warning centre is based, said residents would shortly start hearing tsunami sirens.
"If you live anywhere in the evacuation zone, you have to evacuate," Oahu Emergency Management Department John Cummings said. "We're going to treat this as a destructive-type tsunami."
One tsunami measuring 7.7 feet (2.34 meters) slammed into Talcahuano, one of about 11 coastal towns in Chile hit by the wave, according to the Pacific centre. There was no immediate word of casualties.
Chile's remote Robinson Crusoe Island, some 700 kilometres (430 miles) from the mainland, was also smashed by a huge wave, while President Michelle Bachelet announced a partial evacuation of Easter Island.
The pan-Pacific tsunami warning applied also to Central America, and authorities as far afield as Russia's Sakhalin island were monitoring the potential for tidal trouble.
In the tourist paradise of French Polynesia, the local government said the first waves were expected to reach the Gambier archipelago imminently. Sirens and loudspeaker announcements woke up residents in the middle of the night.
New Zealand warned of a wall of water up to three metres (10 feet) high potentially hitting some of its outlying islands and part of the South Island, as the country's National Crisis Management Centre went on alert.
The civil defence ministry said the tsunami could strike the country's east coast from 7:05 am Sunday (1805 GMT Saturday).
The Joint Australian Tsunami Warning Centre warned of the "possibility of dangerous waves, strong ocean currents and foreshore flooding" along the coast between Sydney and Brisbane.
Authorities in Indonesia and Taiwan said they were monitoring, while Philippine officials started planning for possible evacuations.
Jake Phillips, a forecaster with Australia's Bureau of Meteorology, played down the risk of major flooding in heavily populated coastal areas.
"But there is a marine threat and that would include anyone out boating or rock fishermen," he said.
Memories are still raw in Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga of a terrifying tsunami that trashed entire villages in September, leaving 184 dead.
The Hawaii operation manages a network of early-warning electronic buoys strung across the Pacific Ocean. But the September waves came so suddenly as to give little time for escape.
A week later, a rapid succession of quakes off Vanuatu created panic across the South Pacific. The region is in the middle of the "Ring of Fire", a belt of seismic fury responsible for most of the world's tremors and volcanoes.
Any tsunami will show up in Australia from about 8:15 am on Sunday (2115 GMT Saturday), officials said.
Seismic waves could reach the east coast of Japan around noon Sunday (0300 GMT), according to the country's meteorological agency.
"We would like people to be fully on alert for related information," agency official Yasuo Sekita told a hastily arranged news conference, as Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama ordered his government to be ready for relief work.
Scorecard: India vs. South africa
Sardar patel stadium, motera, ahmedabad
South Africa won by 90 runs
India275/1044.3 overs
Highlights
Last Wicket
Jadeja c Boucher b Tsotsobe 36 (35 b 2x4 1x6) SR: 102.85; 275/10 (44.3)Match Details
- South africa won the toss (Elected To Bat)
- Umpires: Ian Gould and Sanjay Hazare
- Third Umpire: Shavir Tarapore
- Match Referee: Andy Pycroft
India
- Captain:
- MS Dhoni
- Wicket Keeper:
- MS Dhoni
South africa
- Captain:
- JH Kallis
- Wicket Keeper:
- MV Boucher
South africa 1st Innings
| Batsman | Status | Ru | Mi | Ba | 4s | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LL Bosman | c RA Jadeja b YK Pathan | 68 | - | 46 | 7 | 4 |
| HM Amla | c M Vijay b RA Jadeja | 87 | - | 103 | 8 | 0 |
| JH Kallis | notout | 104 | - | 94 | 5 | 3 |
| AB de Villiers | notout | 102 | - | 59 | 11 | 3 |
| HH Gibbs | Did Not Bat | |||||
| MV Boucher | Did Not Bat | |||||
| J Botha | Did Not Bat | |||||
| RE van der Merwe | Did Not Bat | |||||
| DW Steyn | Did Not Bat | |||||
| M Morkel | Did Not Bat | |||||
| LL Tsotsobe | Did Not Bat | |||||
Extras: 4
- b - 0,
- lb - 2,
- w - 0,
- nb - 2,
Overs: 50.0, 2 wickets
| Bowler | Ov | Ma | Ru | Wic | Wid | Nb |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S Sreesanth | 9.0 | 0 | 83 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| S Tyagi | 8.0 | 0 | 59 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| A Mithun | 8.0 | 0 | 63 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| RA Jadeja | 10.0 | 0 | 53 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| YK Pathan | 10.0 | 0 | 66 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| V Kohli | 2.0 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| RG Sharma | 3.0 | 0 | 28 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Fall of wickets:
- 113 (LL Bosman, 15.4 Ov)
- 192 (HM Amla, 32.5 Ov)
India 1st Innings
| Batsman | Status | Ru | Mi | Ba | 4s | 6s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KD Karthik | c HM Amla b DW Steyn | 11 | - | 11 | 2 | 0 |
| M Vijay | c MV Boucher b LL Tsotsobe | 25 | - | 16 | 5 | 0 |
| V Kohli | c MV Boucher b DW Steyn | 57 | - | 71 | 4 | 1 |
| RG Sharma | c LL Tsotsobe b J Botha | 48 | - | 61 | 3 | 0 |
| MS Dhoni | c MV Boucher b DW Steyn | 9 | - | 7 | 0 | 1 |
| SK Raina | c WD Parnell b J Botha | 49 | - | 30 | 5 | 1 |
| YK Pathan | c DW Steyn b LL Tsotsobe | 5 | - | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| RA Jadeja | c MV Boucher b LL Tsotsobe | 36 | - | 35 | 2 | 1 |
| S Sreesanth | lbw b RE van der Merwe | 1 | - | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| A Mithun | st b RE van der Merwe | 24 | - | 23 | 0 | 2 |
| S Tyagi | notout | 1 | - | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Extras: 9
- b - 0,
- lb - 5,
- w - 4,
- nb - 0,
Overs: 44.3, All out
| Bowler | Ov | Ma | Ru | Wic | Wid | Nb |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DW Steyn | 8.0 | 1 | 37 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| LL Tsotsobe | 9.3 | 0 | 58 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| M Morkel | 7.0 | 0 | 48 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| RE van der Merwe | 10.0 | 0 | 47 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| J Botha | 10.0 | 0 | 80 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Fall of wickets:
- 22 (KD Karthik, 2.6 Ov)
- 40 (M Vijay, 5.2 Ov)
- 135 (RG Sharma, 24.6 Ov)
- 156 (MS Dhoni, 27.2 Ov)
- 157 (V Kohli, 27.6 Ov)
- 179 (YK Pathan, 31.2 Ov)
- 233 (SK Raina, 36.2 Ov)
- 237 (S Sreesanth, 37.2 Ov)
- 273 (A Mithun, 43.3 Ov)
- 275 (RA Jadeja, 44.3 Ov)
City stun Chelsea as Bridge gets revenge on Terry
Wayne Bridge got a measure of revenge over John Terry as Carlos Tevez and Craig Bellamy both struck twice to secure a 4-2 victory for Manchester City over nine-man Chelsea at Stamford Bridge on Saturday. Skip related content
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Terry and Bridge came face to face for the first time since allegations surfaced about the Chelsea's skipper relationship with Bridge's former partner.
The pair's meeting before kick-off saw Bridge ignore Terry's offer of an outstretched hand before City fought back after falling behind to Frank Lampard's goal to dash Chelsea's hopes of extending their lead at the top of the table.A miserable day for Chelsea, who are just one point ahead of Manchester United, hit a low when Juliano Belletti and Michael Ballack were both shown red cards.
The way Tevez paraded Bridge in front of the visiting supporters after clinching the win made it clear that the other City players also considered this to be a grudge match.
But the point-scoring that really mattered is now reflected in the Premier League table where City moved above Tottenham into fourth place.
Bridge announced last week he was not available for selection for future England squads because he felt his position was "untenable". And England coach Fabio Capello was in the stand to see what he would be missing as well as check on the form of a number of his players.
Faced by a City side that showed precious little attacking intent during the opening 45 minutes, Ancelotti's side were allowed to dominate possession yet uncharacteristically lacked conviction inside their opponents box.
The biggest culprit was, surprisingly Didier Drogba who spurned three good opportunities before Lampard finally eased home nerves.
The Ivory Coast forward should have done better with a 25th minute header and then saw a tame shot deflected over of the leg of Nigel De Jong.
But his clearest chance came in the 36th minute when Lampard's miscued shot presented Drogba with a close range volley that the striker fired wastefully over.
Chelsea finally conjured a move of quality that led to the home side taking a 42nd minute lead.
Joe Cole found space in midfield and placed a weighted pass into the path of Lampard's diagonal run which the England midfielder with a first time shot that flew low across City keeper Shay Given and inside the far post.
Chelsea had only to hold out for three minutes and Carlo Ancelotti might have been reasonably satisfied at the interval.
However the coach's mood turned much darker when he saw his side produce a catalogue of defensive errors to gift the visitors an equaliser on the stroke of half-time.
Bridge's punted clearance cleared a moment of danger from the City area and was turned into an attacking pass by John Obi Mikel's mis-directed header and Tevez snatched possession from Terry, rounded Ricardo Carvalho, and slotted past Hilario's weak save.
The goal clearly gave Roberto Mancini's side a lift at the start of the second half and they forced a lead within five minutes of the restart from another breakaway goal.
This time it was Bellamy who led the charge, collecting Gareth Barry's pass inside his own half before out-pacing Mikel and placing a left foot finish across Hilario and inside the far post from a tight angle.
The Chelsea keeper was again unconvincing and on the evidence of this performance, Petr Cech's four-week absence with a calf problem could feel like a very long time to Ancelotti.
Belletti was caught out by Barry in the 75th minute and brought down the City midfielder to earn a red card and concede a penalty that was converted by Tevez.
Ballack walked six minutes later when he collected a second yellow card before Bellamy completed another sweeping move to strike City?s fourth in the 86th minute.
Lampard struck his second in the last minute after Barry had brought down Nicolas Anelka in the area.
Murder probe over woman and child
A murder investigation has been launched after the bodies of a woman and a child were found at a house. Skip related content
Hampshire Police said a relative of the dead woman made the discovery at 9.05am on Saturday morning at the property in Totton, near Southampton.
Their next of kin are currently being notified and post-mortem examinations on the bodies are expected to take place over the weekend.A Hampshire Police spokesman said: "Detectives from Hampshire Major Crime Team have launched a murder inquiry after the bodies of a woman and a child were found at an address in Myrtle Avenue in Totton, near Southampton.
"Officers were called to the address at 9.05am this morning when the bodies were discovered by a relative. Detectives are currently trying to establish the circumstances that led to the deaths and are appealing for information."
He said police were keen to speak to anyone who had seen someone acting suspiciously in the Myrtle Avenue area, or who had left a house in an "agitated state".
Hampshire Police has not released the age or sex of the child.
The force has not said if the two people found dead were related and has not yet released any information about how they died.
Di Brooks, a member of Totton and Eling Town Council, said it was "absolutely horrendous" news. "It's not something you would expect," she said. "I'm really, really shocked."
The Hampshire coroner has been informed.
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With a unit price of $1000USD, MotionNode is the lowest cost full-featured 3D orientation sensor available.
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Our Software Development Kit (SDK) provides real-time access to all outputs of the MotionNode pipeline. The SDK is open source and available in the C++, C#, Java, and Python programming languages.
Dozens Killed As Chile Hit By Major Quake
At least 47 people have been killed after a huge earthquake struck the Chilean coast, causing buildings to collapse in the capital Santiago. Skip related content
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The death toll was announced by President Michelle Bachelet who has declared a "state of catastrophe" following the quake, which measured a significant 8.8 on the Richter scale.
It shook the city for about a minute and a half in the early hours of the morning.There were also power cuts in the capital, which is about 200 miles away from the quake's epicentre.
That was close to the town of Maule, and happened at a depth of 22 miles at 03:34am (06:34am UK time).
The epicentre was also 56 miles from Chile's second largest city Concepcion, where more than 200,000 people live along the Bio Bio river.
Several big aftershocks later hit the south-central region, including ones measuring up to 6.9.
President Bachelet also said parts of the country were without basic services and called for calm.
She added that a huge wave swept into a town in the south of the country.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre said of the quake: "Sea level readings indicate a tsunami was generated.
"It may have been destructive along coasts near the earthquake epicentre and could also be a threat to more distant coasts."
But reports later claimed the tsunami warning had been lifted in southern Chile, citing the country's navy.
Simon Shalders, who lives in Santiago, told Sky News: "There was a lot of movement. The houses were really shaking, walls were moving backwards and forwards, and doors were swinging open.
"The power is still out here. There's quite a few choppers flying around in Santiago I suppose checking out the worst-affected areas."
He added: "The new buildings in Santiago are designed to withstand fairly strong quakes and they probably held up pretty well.
"Santiago has got a history of earthquakes and basically there's not a lot of old construction in Santiago because of these earthquakes.
"They have fallen down and been rebuilt. They've all had their turns and they build them up again."
Tsunami warnings were issued for Chile and Peru and less-urgent tsunami watches were in force for Ecuador, Colombia, Antarctica, Panama and Costa Rica.
Bruce Presgrave from the US Geological Survey told Sky News: "Earthquakes of this size can cause substantial damage and casualties over a fairly wide area.
"This is much bigger than the Haiti earthquake but is in a more sparsely populated area."
He went on: "The latest quake is along what would be considered part of the Pacific 'ring of fire'. It's a very active seismic zone.
"It's just north of the area along the Pacific coast of Chile where the largest earthquake recorded in the 20th century occurred.
"That was the 9.5 magnitude event in 1960. There was substantial damage and casualties in Chile. It also produced a Pacific-wide tsunami that did damage and caused some casualties in places such as Hawaii and as far as Japan."
Arsenal title hopes face stern test at Stoke
Arsene Wenger believes Arsenal can still win the Premier League but that theory is set for a stern test at Stoke City on Saturday. Skip related content
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Tony Pulis's Potters are the type of gritty team that Wenger's passing purists, who are six points behind leaders Chelsea, seem to find the most difficult to beat.
Stoke have prospered on their long-awaited return to the top flight via a robust style that often features Rory Delap's prodigious throws into the box.And they are in form at the moment, with Wednesday's FA Cup replay victory over Manchester City extending an unbeaten run that dates back to last year.
In addition, Arsenal have not won at Stoke since 1982 and have already lost there this season in the FA Cup fourth round.
Arsenal defender Sol Campbell is unfazed about the prospect of battling with Stoke's power-houses however and argues that the game is merely one difficult assignment in a series.
"It's simple, we have to win as many games as possible," Campbell said.
"Other teams at the top will be playing each other, so we just have to look after ourselves and make sure we're firing on all cylinders.
"Whoever plays must give it everything they've got in these remaining games and see where it takes us."
Campbell is on standby should France international William Gallas fail to recover from a calf injury, although there is another experienced defender in contention in Mikael Silvestre, who was also in defiant mood.
"We're still in the race and that's important," he said. "We are nearly in March and that's when things are going to be decided.
"As long as we are in it, we will fight until the end. We're going to be ready to face Stoke and get the three points."
Stoke will be without the suspended Abdoulaye Faye but Senegal midfielder Salif Diao has pushed his claim for a start after coming off the bench to score his first Premier League goal in seven years by netting the winner last week at Portsmouth.
Another man who wants a start is former Reading striker Dave Kitson, who came off the bench to score the opener against Manchester City in midweek.
Pulis was satisfied a player who seemed nothing more than an expensive misfit a few weeks ago is now making a contribution.
He said: "We had a good chat a couple of weeks ago after the transfer window and Dave's come back from the wilderness really.
"We agreed for him to get his head down, work hard and, if he gets his chance, take it. He's done smashing."
Stoke will play Chelsea in the FA Cup quarter finals on March 7 but Pulis was concentrating only on Arsenal.
"Let's get Saturday's game out of the way first," he said.
"We're still unbeaten this year. It would be lovely to get through that game still unbeaten, then we can go to Stamford Bridge and give it our best shot."
Stoke defender Ryan Shawcross, who scored his side's second goal on Wednesday, insists his side deserve to be acknowledged as more than just a long-ball outfit.
"We took our goals well and it shows the calibre of players we have got. Mine was a bit more direct but you have to go for them," he said.
"I think we showed what a good football team we are. We get tagged for kicking and heading it but we have got some very talented footballers, big international players. I think we played some good football."
Younis takes Pakistan job
Former Test captain Waqar Younis has accepted an offer from the Pakistan Cricket Board to take over as national team coach.
"I have received a proper offer from the Pakistan board and I am ready to take on this challenge," Waqar said in Sydney, where he is based with his family.
Waqar who played 87 Tests and 262 one-day internationals between 1989 and 2003 said the PCB had given him a contract that runs through the 2011 World Cup.
"That is fine with me. I see this job as a big challenge as Pakistan cricket has great talent and potential to deliver top results against all teams," Waqar said.
Waqar will replace another former skipper Intikhab Alam, who has been released as head coach despite having a two-year contract with the board that ends this November.
Since 1995, the board has changed the coach at least 14 times with former England player Bob Woolmer enjoying the longest stint from 2004-07 until his sudden death during the last World Cup in the West Indies.
PCB chairman Ejaz Butt also said that they would be looking at appointing foreign consultants on a series-to-series basis when required.
Waqar, who was a bowling coach with the national side from 2006-07, said he had no issues working with foreign consultants and would return to Pakistan soon to finalise his agreement with the board.
Fans warned over World Cup tickets
Police have warned World Cup football fans not to try to buy tickets from websites such as eBay and Gumtree. Skip related content
Related photos / videos
Fifa, the competition organiser, said some "unscrupulous individuals" were using websites to try to profit from fans who are desperate to see their team.
Paper tickets will only be printed a few weeks before the competition starts and must be collected in person from collection points in South Africa.Rules state that tickets are also only to be used by the ticket holder named at the time of purchase.
A spokeswoman for Scotland Yard's central e-crime unit said: "Tickets will only be issued in South Africa for the World Cup.
"So anyone claiming to be able to supply tickets will be either supplying counterfeit tickets or nothing will be received.
"Given that tickets for the World Cup can only be collected in South Africa, it appears that any site offering tickets will have criminal intent."
Fifa said in a statement on its website: "While genuine tickets are sold online exclusively via the official website Fifa.com, unscrupulous individuals are taking advantage of the great appeal of this event by trying to use the internet to sell tickets they do not possess.
"A special team from Fifa's legal affairs division is working closely with international authorities to monitor the internet for such illegal offers and to take action to combat them."
Top 10 worst mobile technologies
Last week we counted down the ten best mobile devices and services of the last few decades. This week we look at some of the worst. Skip related content
It should be said, the "top ten worst" lists are a lot more fun to write than the "top ten best" lists. Fawning over successful devices over and over gets a bit repetitive, and after a while you feel more like a salesman than a journalist. Scepticism and schadenfreude is much more fun.
Over its history the mobile industry has produced some real stinkers, but if there are any you think we're missed the Comments section is below.Honourable mention: Twitter Peek
Shaun Nichols: Twitter has become a pretty big deal over the last couple of years. It seems just about everyone in the western world has signed up for the service and shared their innermost thoughts 140 characters at a time.
Despite its fairly limited use and huge user churn rate, Twitter is generating a ton of buzz and hype. Among those who have bought into that hype are the makers of the Twitter Peek.
The $99 device allows you to post tweets while on the go. Unfortunately, that's all it does. You buy the handset and then pay a monthly data fee to do something that just about any decent smartphone handset already does. If you're like the majority of people who sign up for Twitter, the Twitter Peek will be little more than a paperweight within a month.
Iain Thomson: I can remember laughing really quite hard when Shaun bought up the subject of the Tweet Peek at our weekly video news roundup. The idea that some idiots would spend money on a device to use Twitter alone was hilarious.
Twitter is explicitly designed to work well on mobile phones. Crucially, with a phone you can also make calls, access the internet and stay in touch. Why then do you need a clipped phone that does just one function.
The Twitter Peek is for people who know nothing about technology (a fairly large market), have money to burn (a considerably smaller one) and are dedicated Twitter users who don't want to access the site on their phone (micro-market size). All in all we don't expect to see many sold.
Honourable Mention: Compaq Portable
Iain Thomson: We gave one of Apple's early attempts at a mobile computer a very hard time a few weeks back but when it comes to lemons of the mobile computing sphere it's difficult to beat Compaq's first ever PC, the 'Portable'.
When the founders of Compaq formulated their plan to take on IBM at the Houston House of Pies they knew they needed a selling point IBM couldn't match. IBM dominated the market with the 'no-one ever got fired for buying IBM' ethos of the day so they came up with the Portable, which was basically a desktop PC with the screen built in and a carrying handle.
Quite frankly they should have added wheels. At 28lb this behemoth would put you in traction and the nine inch green screen wasn't exactly the best thing to spend a day staring at. Still and all it was popular, selling over 50,000 units and putting Compaq in line to become one of the leading lights of the forthcoming PC revolution.
Shaun Nichols: It may not be a cell phone, and it's hardly what most would call "mobile," but there's more than enough to put the Compaq Portable on the list.
In terms of hardware, the Portable wasn't that bad. It sported 128kb of memory, a pair of floppy disc drives and a relatively small price tag. The big problem was that it wasn't really portable. The gimmick may have been nice, but in terms of practicality you could save yourself a fair amount of money and just purchase a regular desktop computer.
Still, the fact that it came along a good seven or eight years before true notebook systems actually appeared keeps the Portable limited to our honourable mention section.
10. iPhone "I am rich" App
Shaun Nichols: When Apple began to open up the App Store service to third-party developers, we knew that the quality of software would vary. Some great products could be had for a bargain, and some pretty dumb stuff was offered at pretty audacious costs.
None, however, were more audacious than the "I am rich" vanity application. Calling it an application is a bit generous- all it did was display an image of a small red jewel in the centre of the screen. The price charged to perform this task? $999.
Yes, one thousand dollars to put a little picture of a ruby on your iPhone and remind everyone that you have a lot more money than common sense. Apple pulled "I am rich" shortly after its introduction, but the little jewel would not be denied, and the application showed up a few months later as an Android store offering.
Sort of the "Great Gatsby" of phone apps.
Iain Thomson: We had to put at least one application on the list and this is it - a app that shows the world what a pillock you are. "I am Rich" was the app for that.
The really stunning thing is that some people actually bought it. It boggles the mind that some people would do this. After all, most people won't know what it is and the rest of the population who does thins you're an idiot.
Throughout much of human history men and women have displayed their wealth in order to attract mates. Showing wealthy showed you were smart enough to survive and would be a good provider. My only hope is that applications like "I am Rich " will serve a valuable evolutionary purpose in making some people unbreedable with.
9. Nokia 7380
Iain Thomson: I said last week that Nokia engineers aren't the coolest people in the world and the Nokia 7380 is the best example of why they should stop trying.
The 7380 was dubbed the Lipstick Phone, because it was designed to look like a lipstick holder, albeit one with a camera, leather side-panels and a tiny screen. But what made the phone really revoutionary was that the phone didn't have a keypad. Instead there was just a rotary dial that scrolled through numbers and letters on the screen.
Now as we've seen with the iPod rotary controls are not necessarily a bad thing, particularly if you are only using them once every five minutes or so. But for writing anything, keying in a number or anything that requires too much turn and clicking, and you've got a very bothersome interface. Add in the fact that the phone had a lousy 52MB of memory and a camera that was fuzzy at best and you had a horrible little device.
Nokia never intended the phone to be a first-use devices, but something that could be slipped in a pocket and taken out for a night. The launch saw lots of beautiful people using them and then the handset went on sale to the general public and was about as popular as rabies.
Shaun Nichols: Iain and I are both major proponents of getting more women into the engineering and programming fields. Not only does it expand he talent pool, it also brings fresh perspectives that help prevent disasters like the Nokia "lipstick" phone.
It's hard to imagine a couple of female engineers sitting on the 7380's design team and agreeing that this was something all women would want to use. They might also have been able to break their male geek counterparts of the notion that general consumers buy gadgets for gadgets' sake.
Man or woman, there's no reason to think that the rotary control would be a good idea. Dialing a phone number is something that even in the old days of operator switchboard connections was instaneous: you either told the operator the number or you put your finger in the rotary hole or hit the keypad. The act of scrolling through characters on a screen makes even the act of placing a local call incredibly tedious.
8. Edge networks as wireless "broadband"
Shaun Nichols: This one wasn't entirely the fault of the technology itself, but of the user expectations that preceded it. Edge was one of the early "wireless broadband" systems and for many users it was the first experience with mobile browsing and internet services.
Unfortunately, Edge didn't exactly qualify as wireless "broadband" in the way most people had come to know it. Connection speeds were significantly slower than 3G or Wi-Fi, and when the network got crowded, Edge was more like " wireless dial-up."
The problem was that users and developers figured that Edge could in fact perform like a Wi-Fi broadband connection, causing unreasonable performance expectations. Many were left pulling their hair out over pokey connection speeds when accessing the networks.
Fortunately, 3G networks have been deployed for most of the major metropolitan areas of Europe and North America, and with the exception of the occasional dead spot most users rarely have to deal with Edge.
Iain Thomson: Edge was an interim technology at best, but that wasn't how it was sold.
Basically you got a tiny speed boost for mobile internet with equipment that you could strap onto the back of the existing infrastructure at a small cost. But that doesn't make for a compelling sales pitch so instead the marketers got to work and tried to convince people that Edge was the second coming.
That it was nothing more than a stopgap was painfully honest but Edge came about at a time when everyone was desperate for more mobile data speed. Edge provided this, but at a heavy cost for such a small boost.
7. N-gage
Iain Thomson: Ah the N-gage, a handset so bad they launched it twice.
As portable gaming systems got really popular Nokia thought it would like a slice of that market and brought out the N-gage handset. However, Nokia was to find out there's a lot more to a good games platform than the hardware.
The first N-gage was a disaster. It had little games support, the screen wasn't much to look at and the controls had obviously been designed by a phone engineer rather than a gamer. On top of these failings was the use of Symbian Series 60 as an operating system. Series 60 is a fantastic operating system for making phone calls, but it's a lousy games platform.
Sales were weak at best, particularly as the phone was so oversold by Nokia. No expense was spared at the launch and bold predictions for the3 handset's success were predicted. Nokia was even caught fibbing about the phone. It claimed that it had sold 400,000 units in the first two weeks but in fact these were just the number of phones it had shipped to retailers. In fact barely 6,000 had been purchased by end users.
In 2005 Nokia relaunched the platform, with much better hardware, but by then it was too late. No self-respecting gamers would be seen using one and the N-gage began a steady decline. By the end of the year Nokia's great gaming experiment will be over.
Shaun Nichols: The N-gage was a good enough idea that didn't have the computing muscle or correct design to really make it in the market. The idea was to target the gamer market by making a hybrid game system and phone.
Now, dropping a phone into a portable gaming system is not a bad idea, but trying to drop a gaming console into a phone is a terrible idea.
Nokia came at the device from the wrong end and tried to turn traditional mobile phone hardware and OS platforms. Adequate perhaps for smaller casual and puzzle games, but not nearly enough to run high-end games. For the targeted market, running the N-gage was a bit like a Formula One driver being forced to race in a go-kart.
I don't think it will be long before someone actually does get it right and put phone hardware into a high-end gaming handheld. Apple is just about there with the iPhone, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if Sony, Microsoft and even Nintendo are developing something as well.
6. Motorola Rokr
Shaun Nichols: Least we forget, the iPhone wasn't the first attempt to combine an iPod and a mobile phone. That honour goes to Motorola's disastrous Rokr.
The handset was unveiled in 2005, a time when the "smartphone" was still emerging and most of us had phones that didn't do much more than make and receive phone calls. Motorola thought that it could appeal to a sizable market if it added the ability to play music on a phone.
The company enlisted the help of Cingular and Apple, and the outcome was the "Rokr" phone. The $250 device had the ability to store and play up to 100 songs. As it turned out, people weren't exactly enamoured with the low storage capacity and the high price point was out of reach for most of the device's targeted young consumer market.
If you take the Rokr into account, it's little wonder Apple was so particular about who it partnered with on the iPhone.
Iain Thomson: Rumours that Apple was going to launch a music phone had been floating around for years and then the Rokr was announced. It was one of the most underwhelming bit of kit out there.
As Shaun has mentioned the chief problem was capacity. Who wants jut 100 songs? Nobody cared that you could snyc your phone with iTunes, they just wanted a decent sized music collection.
I'm still a bit perplexed by the Rokr to be honest. I can understand Apple limiting the phone to 100 songs so that it didn't start to cannibalise its own iPod sales. What I don't get is why they did it in the first place. They must have known the end result would be a stinker. The paranoid side of me thinks it could have been Steve Jobs lowering expectations to increase the impact of the iPhone but that makes little sense, since the iPhone was so revolutionary in its own right.
5. WAP
Iain Thomson: Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) was the wrong technology in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The concept itself is simple enough. Strip out a lot of the heavy code in HTML that handsets couldn't handle, program in Wireless Markup Language (WML) instead and you should be able to get the internet on your phone. It was launched in 1999 at the heart of the dotcom boom and we were told it would revolutionise how people used the internet on phones.
The amount of hype at launch was ridiculous. BT Celllnet ran endless adverts showing a silver surfer with the slogan 'surf the mobile internet'. In fact the experience was less than edifying. There were precious few WAP sites to visit, those that were were rather dire and the graphics were useless. I lost count of the number of people who got venture capital for WAP companies and were going to make it big. None of them survived.
In the end the only way to get people using the internet on a handset was to make them fast and big-screened enough to use the regular internet. WAP was a logical response to a problem, but just the wrong answer for users and programmers.
Shaun Nichols: If your product is going to require everyone to completely redesign and rebuild every web site, it had better be not only a technological breakthrough, but also have a huge user demand.
In 1999, much of the general public was still accessing the web on dial-up connections and spending most of their time on portal sites or within "walled garden" ISPs. Aside from that, mobile phones were still just that - phones that you could carry around.
A few years later, the user climate had changed and the hardware market had caught up. Broadband was prevalent, most everyone had become comfortable with using both the web and mobile phones, and both the wireless networks and handset components were able to handle HTML. WAP was thrown on the garbage heap of technology and rightly so.
4. Microwave harm reports
Shaun Nichols: A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. A little knowledge combined with a lot of paranoia can be outright catastrophic. In the early part of the decade, the paranoid throngs recovered from their Y2K paranoia and shifted focus to the theory of dangerous mobile phone radiation.
The thinking was that mobile phones emit microwaves, and since microwaves are considered a form of radiation, then we all might as well stick pellets of plutonium in our ear canals because everyone's brain was being bombarded by killer radioactive waves.
The whole thing wasn't done any favours by the (dis)information superhighway. Web and email hoaxes furthered the myth by claiming mobile phone radiation was able to cook everything from eggs to popcorn to the human brain.
Iain Thomson: There's so much muddled thinking on this that is makes my fists clench and my teeth itch.
If you look at the last 100 years of technology there have always been people who were scared that it was making them sick. People protested against radio because it was thought by some to be harmful and the same is now true for mobile signals and wireless. Studies come and go but the balance of evidence seems to be pointing to the fact that mobile emissions are harmless in moderation.
So why all the headlines and scare stories, why the protests by NIMBYs every time a new mobile phone mast goes up? Well it's down to ignorance and laziness, on many parts. On the ignorance side of things people should actually be pressing for more mobile phone masts. The amount of energy the phone uses to try and find a signal decreases the closer you are to a mobile mast, so fewer masts means more of that 'dangerous' radiation being pumped into your head.
As for the laziness side of the equation that is aimed at my industry - the press. It's a terribly easy story to write, that the mobile phones that everyone carries and uses could kill you. Instant attention grab, huge market of interested parties and all you have to do is quote a dodgy survey or study and job done.
We all need to be a lot smarter about how we assign risk, and mobile telephony is a case in point. I'm willing to be there are people complaining about electromagnetic interference who smoke, drink heavily or eat poorly, any one of which will harm you more than your phone.
3. AT&T
Iain Thomson: AT&T makes it high on the list because so many people in the US are having a really bad time with the mobile network, and the company shows little sign that it has got the message.
AT&T won the lottery to sell the iPhone in the US. This was a huge bonus in terms of pulling people onto its network. Unfortunately the type of customers it drew were those that wanted to use the iPhone to access the internet. Telcos had been whining for ages that no-one was paying for mobile data but the second people wanted to start doing that then the network infrastructure began to break down
iPhone users in major US cities, particularly San Francisco and New York, began to get lots and lots of dropped calls, and slow internet connections. In response AT&T admitted that it had problems, announced an investment plan in the network and then talked about raising prices to discourage people from going online.
When Verizon started a series of adverts to capitalise on this weakness AT &T threatened legal action, which fizzled out when the company was forced to admit that Verizon data was correct. All in all it's been a very disappointing few years for the network.
Shaun Nichols: As if I needed another reason to dislike Luke Wilson, now I have to watch those dumb TV commercials while looking down at the lone, flickering reception bar on my phone.
Apple has to be beyond livid with AT&T at this point. When they first introduced the iPhone and shopped it around no doubt AT&T (then Cingular) swore up and down that their network could handle anything the iPhone could throw at it. One year later when the iPhone 3G launched and AT&T's network buckled under the user traffic, it was painfully apparent that the carrier was woefully unprepared for the launch.
At this point, it might be best for everyone to cut off the exclusivity deal between AT&T and the iPhone. Apple would get to cut deals with other telcos, customers would be able to move to new carriers and AT&T would see the stress on its network from iPhone traffic lessen.
2. Windows CE
Shaun Nichols: For all the attention being paid to mobile phones, from Android to WebOS to iPhone to Symbian, there would be a much smaller market for them if Microsoft had done a better job with Windows Mobile and its core component, Windows CE.
Built for embedded systems, Windows CE is the heart of the company's mobile platform and has more than a few limitations, among them stability issues and gripes over capacity and performance.
These days, however, there is plenty of hope. Microsoft may be working on a major, if not complete overhaul of CE, and if the OS can't be brought up to snuff there are more than a few competitors looking to take over.
Iain Thomson: We didn't call it wince for nothing when Microsoft first got into the mobile market space.
Windows CE was initially Microsoft's answer to Palm and the performance of the early versions left many wondering what the question was. The software was power-hungry, not terribly effective and was the guts behind a lot of also-rans in the handheld computing and mobile market.
Windows CE also made it so high on the list because it spawned Windows Mobile, which remains a dog of an operating system. Windows Mobile was basically Windows CE with some improvements but it has hardly been inspirational in performance. Microsoft is a declining force in the mobile operating systems market and looks set to fall further.
1. CDMA
Iain Thomson: Last year we praised GSM for taking a sensible, co-operative approach to mobile operating standards. It seemed fitting that we look at the competition.
Code division multiple access (CDMA) stemmed from research carried out by actress turned inventor Hedly Lamarr. It was picked up by the US military and eventually patented by Qualcomm, and remains a proprietary standard. It's only used in the US, japan and South Korea these days and it's a fly in the ointment for many mobile users on the move
Over a billion people use GSM phones worldwide and the standard has many advantages. Less than a quarter of that number use CDMA, albeit a wealthy and valuable part of the market. Qualcomm is going to milk CDMA for as long as it can and so US users are still going to have to use two phones if they travel, although the shockingly low numbers of Americans with a passport may explain CDMA's continued popularity.
Shaun Nichols: Betamax vs VHS, HD-DVD vs Blu ray, CDMA vs GSM. Every time you have two competing standards both on the market at once you are going to see a sizable number of users get shafted. In this case, it's customers of CDMA phone carriers.
Granted, the roaming costs associated with using your phone abroad keeps most people from using their phones and risking a monster monthly bill. But carriers are increasingly working on plans which allow users to keep their handsets on and staying in touch while out of the country. When that becomes commonplace, being stuck on CDMA networks could become especially painful, and the system could see its demise accelerate.
Here's to hoping that the companies working on the next-generation wireless broadband standards learn their lesson and can either settle on one system or at least make the formats compatible.
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