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Monday, March 15, 2010

Pichilemu, Chile — A power outage affected many areas of Chile this evening. It is presumed to have been caused by a fault in the Chilean Sistema Interconectado Central (Central Interconnected System). Power was cut off between the Antofagasta Region and Los Lagos Region, including cities like Santiago, Valparaíso, La Serena, Pichilemu and Talca, at 20:50 (23:50 UTC). After twenty minutes, power was restored in some parts of Providencia.

It surprised the people that were in shopping centers and in massive events, like the game between Deportes La Serena and Audax Italiano, which was cancelled, and the solidarity concert “Rock por Chile” (“Rock for Chile”) that was being performed in Santiago’s Movistar Arena. The outage also interrupted the Chilean Subway; personnel are currently evacuating users.

The communications manager of Chilectra, the Chilean main power provider, reported to TVN that the power is coming back slowly to the Metropolitan Region. “We don’t know exactly what happened. We are not receiving power in the distribution network in Santiago. The power is coming back, but is probable that in the outlying areas will be more difficult. […] After the earthquake we did the corresponding fixes, so we don’t know if this is related to the earthquake directly,” Larraín said.

The Presidency General Clerk Minister, Cristián Larroulet said, as reported by El Mercurio, that the power was going to be restored in around three hours. “Effectively there’s an outage from Taltal until Los Lagos, probably because of the debility of the lines because of the earthquakes […] It is another consequence of the earthquake that affected our country,” he added.

The Interior Minister, Rodrigo Hinzpeter, as reported by El Mercurio at 22:20 local time (01:20 UTC), informed from the ONEMI that the outage that affected many areas of Chile was produced by a failure in a 500 kilowatts transformer from Charrúa-Temuco, that caused a major fault in the Central Interconnected System.

According to Clemente Pérez, Santiago’s Metro chief executive, Santiago’s subway was going to work normally today if the power service remains stable. The Central Interconnected System chief executive, Eduardo Ricke Muñoz, estimated at 22:44 local time (01:44 UTC) that the power service was going to be rerun in all the affected areas in the following two hours. It was later reported by El Mercurio that the failed transformer was located near Los Ángeles, in the Bío Bío Region.

At 23:54 local time (02:54 UTC), Rodrigo Hinzpeter said: “We still cannot rerun the power service in the Bío Bío region, but we are doing our best and we hope to restablish it in the next few hours”.

At 00:30 local time (03:30 UTC), ONEMI reported that the power was restored in an 88 per cent. They detailed by region:

• In the Antofagasta Region, the power in Taltal was restored.
• In the Atacama Region, the power was restored totally.
• In the Coquimbo Region, 98% of power has been restored.
• In the Valparaíso Region, the power was restored totally.
• In the Metropolitan Region, the power was restored totally.
• In the O’Higgins Region, the power was rerun completely.
• In the Maule Region, the power was completely restored.
• In the Bío Bío Region, power has not been restored (0%).
• In the Araucanía Region, 90% of the power supply has been restored.
• In the Los Ríos Region, the power was completely restored.
• In the Los Lagos Region, 90% of the power supply has been restored.

At 01:28 local time (04:28 UTC), Rodrigo Hinzpeter, the Interior Minister, informed via his Twitter account (@rhinzpeter), that the 93% of the power supply was rerun. The State Clerk also warranted that in Concepción, the power was restored in a 40%.

Later, ONEMI ratified the information that Hinzpeter provided, and detailed the power recovering region by region, and the regions that have changed their percentage are:

• The Coquimbo Region, the power was restored in a 98%.
• In the Bío Bío Region, the power has been restored in a 40%. San Pedro de La Paz, Coronel, Lota, Tomé and Penco have the power rerun. Arauco, Lebu and Talcahuano still don’t have power.
• The Los Lagos Region, has the power restored completely.

Saturday, August 6, 2005

Robin Cook, the former British foreign secretary and current Member of Parliament, has died of a suspected heart attack after collapsing on a walk with his wife on Ben Stack hill, Scotland. Cook, aged 59, was flown to a hospital in Inverness by a rescue service helicopter half an hour after collapsing.

A spokesperson for NHS Highland said that Mr. Cook arrived at hospital 90 minutes after his collapse, and was reported dead five minutes later. A postmortem examination has concluded that he died from hypertensive heart disease.

Mr. Cook was buried on August 12 at St Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh in a service attended by close family, friends and political figures from across the world. British Prime Minister Tony Blair however came under attack from Mr. Cooks friend and racing pundit John McCririck for his absence from the service.

Robin Cook served as Foreign Secretary under New Labour and was a critic of the war in Iraq. He resigned as Leader of the House of Commons in 2003 in protest against Prime Minister Blair’s foreign policies.

Saturday, November 4, 2006

On November 13, Torontonians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Don Valley East (Ward 33). One candidates responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Zane Caplan, Shelley Carroll (incumbent), Jim Conlon, Sarah Tsang-Fahey, and Anderson Tung.

For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Thirteen people are missing from a boat believed to have sunk off Madagascar’s Sainte Marie island on Thursday. Several Chinese people were on board, as well as some from Madagascar. Two crewmembers are safely rescued.

There appears to be one man from the Chinese mainland on board. Xinhua reports that there are also eight from Taiwan, and all are businessmen. In addition there are four crewmembers left, with two others rescued. The crew were all locals.

The boat had left Sainte Marie to travel 100km North to Masoala so that the businessmen could inspect some fishery assets. According to what Xinhua described as “a reliable source” at around 8:40 p.m. (1740 GMT) the vessel dropped anchor for reasons unknown about 20km from the coast. It is also reported the ship’s engine had failed and she was taking on water.

It is known that at around 12:40 a.m. Friday (2140 GMT Thursday) Liu Shouzhi, one of the Taiwanese on board, called his wife. He told her that the ship was in danger of capsizing due to strong winds. Contact with the vessel was lost shortly after.

According to the rescued crewmembers, who were picked up on Saturday morning, those on board the ship had abandoned her in two groups. All of them had life jackets on at the time. They reported the ship could carry thirty passengers.

The Madagascan Navy, coast guard and police are all participating in the search and rescue operation. Six ships and a number of aircraft have been deployed, and soldiers are assisting police in searching the nearby coastline.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Satire site Uncyclopedia, a parody of online encyclopedia Wikipedia, has been labeled by the Malaysian government as dangerous. The Internal Security Department of Malaysia issued the warning today, saying that the site has “messages and information insulting Malaysia”.

The warning notes the creation date of the website as being 5 January 2005, and hosted by Wikia, Inc., both of which are correct. However, it claims Wikia owns Wikipedia; Wikipedia is a charitable non-profit website owned by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, while Wikia is an independent, for-profit company.

The report evidently mentions that Uncyclopedia covers Malaysian “history, culture, the political leaders, the government, the national song and the name / history of the national flag,” none of which is “correct”. They accuse the website of helping to reinforce a bad international image of their country.

There are no reports of the site being blocked from access within the country, only this statement, which urges Malaysians not to circulate the content.

Uncyclopedia’s article on Malaysia begins:

The site has fired back with a parody article posted at the site under their UnNews section, titled Uncyclopedia Internal Security Department warns on Malaysia. The article suggests that the “Internal Security Department of the Uncyclomedia Foundation,” which is a facetious and fictitious parent organization of Uncyclopedia, identifies Malaysia “as a dangerous country… It warned its people not to use the country today.”

There are forty-seven individual language editions of Uncyclopedia, including Tolololpedia, which is written in Bahasa Melayu, the Malay language. This is in addition to fictional “language” editions which include Oscar Wilde, Newspeak, N00b, White Supremacist, and Re: PharmaccgRy.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Neverland Valley Ranch, owned by Michael Jackson, is to be sold at auction on March 19, 2008, unless Jackson pays over US$24 million.

Financial Title Company, the trustee of his Santa Barbara County, California, home and amusement park, has foreclosed on the property. They notified Jackson of the foreclosure and sale on Monday. Jackson had only just recently paid an overdue property tax bill of $600,000.

The court filing, addressed to Jackson, says, “You are in default of a deed of trust … Unless you take action to protect your property it may be sold at a public sale.” Fox News published the filing.

The foreclosure includes the ranch and all possessions on the property, inside or out.

The foreclosure auction will take place in front of the Santa Barbara County Courthouse in Santa Barbara. Jackson has until then to pay $24,525,906.61 he owes the title company.

In 2006, Jackson refinanced previous loans that had been bought up by Fortress Investment Group. The $300-million loan was secured with the aid of Sony Music Entertainment. However, the Neverland property was not part of that deal.

Jackson has not lived at Neverland since June 30, 2005, when he moved to Bahrain after a rape charge and subsequent acquittal.

Tuesday, January 2, 2007

Wikipedia blocked editing by a proxy IP address [1] belonging to Internet users in the Middle Eastern kingdom of Qatar for a period of twelve hours due to persistent vandalism originating from the IP.

Only one provider of high-speed Internet access operates in Qatar, and this provider has configured its network such that all its users share the same single IP address. In most cases, a single IP address corresponds to one user or a small group of users in one building or school. Because of this single-address configuration, Wikipedia was not able to implement its usual countervandalism solution, the blocking of individual IPs or user accounts. Wikipedia said that the action was taken after 200 repeated vandalism edits of the articles on sex, the United States, and the birthday of the prophet Muhammad.

A spokesperson for Wikipedia, said: “Qatar has not been banned from Wikipedia. Apparently Qatar basically has only one ISP, and nearly all of its traffic shows as coming from a single IP address.”

Jimmy Wales, the Wikipedia founder, emphasized the temporary nature of the block, saying, “This IP number was temporarily blocked for less than 12 hours, and a block of an entire nation would go absolutely against Wikipedia policy.”

At 21:26 UTC (5:26 p.m. ET) a Wikipedia admin unblocked the IP address with the reason given as: “This IP is the address for the entire nation of Qatar; it should not be blocked.”

Qatar only has around 219,000 Internet users, and much less of that number would actually be affected by the block.

Saturday, September 4, 2021

Latrobe City in Victoria, Australia recorded its first COVID-19 case in over seven months, after it was announced a person in Traralgon had tested positive to COVID-19 on Sunday.

The case has been linked to Melbourne’s current outbreak. The Victorian government’s COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar confirmed “this individual travelled to a funeral in Melbourne”, and no other people within the person’s household are at risk.

The case – which is Latrobe City’s first active case since January 12 – is one of 92 community transmission cases recorded on Sunday in Victoria. There are currently two COVID-19 testing sites in Latrobe City – one at The Healthcare Centre at 185-189 Princes Drive in Morwell, the other at Australian Clinical Labs at 10-12 Grey Street in Traralgon.

A drive-through testing site began operating at 12PM on Sunday, which is located at Dorevitch Pathology in Latrobe Regional Hospital. A pop-up testing site has also been established at the Gippsland Regional Indoor Sports Stadium. Both sites are located in Traralgon.

Concerning COVID-19 testing, Latrobe City mayor Sharon Gibson told Wikinews via email “I would like to see support from the Government for further Testing Stations to be opened across our City and additional Vaccination doses made available, so that anybody wanting to be vaccinated is able to do so as quickly as possible. We are willing to work with the relevant Agencies to ensure this can be rolled out ASAP.”

Independent state MP for Morwell Russell Northe called for more government support in testing Latrobe City residents. Through email, Northe told Wikinews “I have called upon the State Government to increase the number of testing options for our community given the current demand. Unfortunately despite the best efforts of testers many locals have been turned away from being tested [on Sunday] which understandably has left quite a few residents feeling upset and anxious.”

On Sunday, two COVID-19 exposure sites were recorded in Traralgon, both located at the Traralgon Centre Plaza. One was the Coles supermarket, exposed on August 22 between 11:45AM and 12:05PM, and the other is the food court, exposed on August 27 between 11:10AM and 11:15AM.

Two more exposure incidents were added yesterday – an additional exposure at the above food court between 12:25PM and 2:45PM on August 22, and an exposure at the Traralgon Woolworths on Seymour Street on August 23 between 5:20PM and 5:45PM. Anyone who visited these sites has been urgently advised to receive a COVID-19 test and self-isolate until they receive their results.

In regards to the earlier announcement of exposure sites, Sharon Gibson called upon people who had visited them or had symptoms to get tested. She said “I would urge people to be tested if they were anywhere near the Exposure Sites and if they have any symptoms at all, please go and get tested. Now it is especially important to follow the public health advice.” Gibson added “I would hope the person who has tested positive recovers quickly. As this is the last thing they need, considering they were at a funeral and would be grieving.”

National Party federal MP for Gippsland Darren Chester spoke to Wikinews via email, stating “with [Sunday]’s news of a positive case in Traralgon, it’s important to follow the public health advice, particularly around checking in, physical distancing and hand hygiene. The advice is clear, if you have symptoms, please get tested. Thanks to our frontline staff who are working hard to keep our community safe. I encourage everyone who is eligible for vaccination to make a booking and get the jab, to protect you, your family, and the wider community.”

Russell Northe expressed his hope the circumstances would be handled well in regards to the exposure sites. He wrote “there are a number of local exposure sites which have been announced and hopefully health authorities and contact tracers are able to get on top of the situation prior to it becoming a major issue like we have seen in other communities such as Shepparton.” The City of Greater Shepparton recorded nine COVID-19 cases on Sunday, adding to a total of 92 active cases in the area.

Northe also stated “many community members were shocked to learn on Sunday of an active COVID case in the region. The Latrobe Valley has been without COVID for many months and people are drained and tired by the continuation of lockdowns particularly given the absence of COVID in our community. Obviously the news [on Sunday] is very concerning but I thank local residents who have responded by going to get tested at the earliest possible opportunity.”