News Burst 9 April 2020

• Police arrested a Seattle man at Bill Gates and Melinda Gates’ mansion for allegedly collecting more than 6,000 child rape photos. Rick Allen Jones, reportedly employed as an engineer at the Gates’ home, is also accused of trading pornography images via Gmail. The 51-year-old has been collecting child porn for a decade, according to King County prosecutors. In 2013, investigators started looking at Jones. They were able to track him down in March after he shared a suspicious image through Gmail. After failing to find Jones at his Ballard apartment, police found later found him at the estate. none of this alleged crime actually happened at the Gates mansion.

• Google has banned employees from using Zoom on company laptops and computers because of the security risks associated with the software, according to internal company emails. It’s unclear why Google allowed employees to use Zoom on company equipment since Google has its own competitor app, Hang. The app has become wildly popular during the quarantine, as people have used it to do “virtual hangouts” including happy hours and workout sessions. For Google, the math on Zoom is pretty straightforward: It’s a competitor, and it could potentially expose company secrets to hackers and “Zoom Bombers”.

• Italy on Wednesday closed its ports to NGO run migrant rescue ships because the coronavirus crisis means they can no longer be classified as places of safety. Due to the COVID-19 emergency, Italian ports ”do not meet the necessary requirements for the classification and definition of ‘place of safety’ as provided for by the Hamburg Convention on sea rescues” by foreign-flagged ships outside of the Italian search and rescue zone. The decree is valid for ”the entire emergency period”.

• About 60 Lampedusa residents including fishermen on Wednesday morning took to the streets and protested in front of the town council on the island of Lampedusa against Mayor Salvatore Martello due to the arrival of more migrants. ”We are in quarantine and they are out taking walks. No one should come to this island, no one,” yelled some of the protestors. The protest was held after three of the 46 migrant disembarked on Monday and ordered to remain in quarantine instead managed to leave the hotspot and were found in the center of the city. Lampedusa residents are afraid of catching COVID-19 and are angered that they are expected to comply with the decree while migrants have been found not doing so. Martello has said that the island inhabitants were right to be angered and is seeking to understand what happened at the hotspot. On Wednesday morning, a boat landed with about 67 people onboard that had asked for help via Alarm Phone.

• Italian soccer players have rejected taking a pay cut for the coronavirus emergency. On Monday Serie A agreed to a 30% cut for players and staff if the competition is not completed, and a one-sixth cut if it is. “It’s a disgraceful and unacceptable proposal,” said the vice president of players’ association AIC, Umberto Calcagno. “They want to make the players alone pay for the possible damage caused by the crisis.” [Hopefully will be the end of this football]

• Covid saved lives. A bridge collapsed Wednesday on a provincial road near Massa Carrara in Tuscany. A van was hit by falling masonry and the driver was taken to hospital with slight injuries. Another van driver was reportedly unhurt but in shock. A strong smell of gas was detected in the area. At the moment of the collapse a loud bang was heard. The bridge was placed under observation in November after a crack opened up in the asphalt. It was repaired. “It could have been a tragedy if we had had the traffic of a normal day,” said Tuscany Governor.

• Russia has the means to solve problems in any of the possible scenarios for the development of the coronavirus pandemic, but it will not be possible to completely avoid losses, although they can be minimized, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday. “We will work confidently and professionally. I would like to emphasize, we have everything for this – a stable macroeconomic situation, minimal state debt, a solid safety net in the form of reserves accumulated over previous years, we have means to solve problems in any of the possible scenarios. Finally, we have experience in overcoming crises from past years,” he said.

• Satellite launch company Rocket Lab announced earlier this week it had been forced to delay the launch of three US intelligence satellites from its New Zealand launch facility after that country ordered residents to stay home amid a spreading COVID-19 outbreak. The private space launch company announced this week it had been forced to postpone the launch from its New Zealand spaceport on the north island’s Mahia Peninsula for a second time. The rocket, which is due to lift three satellites for the US Department of Defense’s National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), was originally slated to launch on March 30 but now is not expected to blast off before April 23.

• A newspaper close to the Rouhani administration says a large number of nurses in Iran have lost their jobs during February, March and April as the income of private hospitals have been declining. Oddly enough, this is happening while the coronavirus outbreak is escalating in Iran according to Health Ministry officials, and President Hassan Rouhani resists continued restrictions out of economic concerns.

• POTUS on Obama: “He’s knows something [about Sleepy Joe] that you don’t know. That I think I know. But you don’t know.” We know.

• Singapore on Wednesday announced new measures to accelerate local food production as the coronavirus pandemic disrupts global supply chains, including a plan to turn car park rooftops in public housing estates into urban farms. The densely populated city-state produces only about 10% of its food needs. “The current COVID-19 situation underscores the importance of local food production, as part of Singapore’s strategies to ensure food security,” authorities said in a statement. “Local food production mitigates our reliance on imports, and provides buffer in the event of food supply disruptions.”

Sun Activity

An unexpected stream of solar wind is blowing around Earth on April 8th. The stream’s velocity is only moderately high (~450 km/s) but it contains south-pointing magnetic fields that can open cracks in Earth’s magnetosphere. Arctic sky watchers should be alert for auroras mixed with springtime twilight.

Active Weather

Severe Tropical Cyclone Harold (Category 4) w/v 110kts – 940hPa- SE of Tonga – Moving SE 30 kts.

Strongest EQ in Europe M3.0 Azores
Strongest EQ in North America M3.5 California
Strongest EQ on the Planet 5.4 411 km Wallis and Futuna
Deepest EQ M4.5 604 km Fiji Region News Burst 9 April 2020

News Burst 7 April 2020

• Thirty thousand Boeing employees on Wednesday must start taking vacation or sick time, or apply for unemployment, after the region’s largest private employer decided Sunday to keep its Puget Sound plants closed indefinitely. The workers had been paid during the initial two-week work stoppage that began March 25 but told employees Sunday in an email it “is extending the temporary suspension of operations at all Puget Sound area and Moses Lake sites until further notice.” Boeing has roughly 70,000 employees in the state. The decision affects about 30,000 of them, mostly production workers.

• After being admitted to the hospital over the weekend, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been taken to intensive care as his condition has apparently worsened dramatically overnight.

• The coronavirus pandemic has generated overwhelming support for the closure of markets selling illegal wildlife across Southeast Asia, an epicenter of the multi-billion-dollar trade, the World Wildlife Fund said in a public opinion poll on Monday Apr 6. About 93 per cent of about 5,000 people surveyed by WWF in March across three Southeast Asian nations as well as Hong Kong and Japan said unregulated markets selling wildlife should be shuttered to ward off future pandemics.

• Hong Kong extended its airport closure to foreign arrivals indefinitely as the number of coronavirus infections surpassed 900 and a leading microbiologist called for an emergency law requiring all residents to wear masks in public.

• Iranian Parliament’ Research Center has warned that the government’s delay in extending financial support to low-income people hit by the coronavirus outbreak may entail “painful consequences.” In an elaborate allusion to the possibility of dissent and protests in Iran, the report charged that what President Hassan Rouhani’s administration has done so far to support “the poor and vulnerable people” has been “belated, passive and non-proactive.” The report further warned that the continuation of this situation will end vulnerable people’s toleration and may lead to other painful events.

• If you use Apple iPhone or MacBook, here we have a piece of alarming news for you. Turns out merely visiting a website — not just malicious but also legitimate sites unknowingly loading malicious ads as well — using Safari browser could have let remote attackers secretly access your device’s camera, microphone, or location, and in some cases, saved passwords as well. Apple recently paid a $75,000 bounty reward to an ethical hacker, Ryan Pickren, who practically demonstrated the hack and helped the company patch a total of seven new vulnerabilities before any real attacker could take advantage of them.

• Google has released its mobile phone users’ location data for 131 countries, hoping that the trove will show whether people are obeying the world’s various lockdowns and social distancing measures. It may be the world’s largest such data dump available to the public and covers a span from mid-February to the end of March. The results are varied. Italy for example has seen a drop in traffic to places like shopping centers and recreational areas by 94% compared to the same time last year. California though, the first state in the U.S. to impose a lockdown, has only seen a drop by half. Arkansas is the lowest American state, with only a 29% drop. The data also shows surges in activity at parks and grocery stores in some countries, such as the UK. Google says the info is anonymous — without names, locations of individuals, or other personal info — hoping to allay privacy concerns. But it declined to say whether any authorities had requested more info. Facebook is also sharing some location data with researchers and governments, but has not made their findings public.

• U.S. farmers have destroyed millions of pounds of perishable food like tomatoes, lettuce and green beans because growers lost a vast number of customers after the coronavirus pandemic struck. “It’s a catastrophe, it really is,” said Tony DiMare, a long-time tomato grower based in Palm Beach County, Fla. DiMare said he let 10 million pounds of tomatoes rot on the farm in a region south of Miami because no market existed for them.

• The British Open has been cancelled for the first time since World War II due to the coronavirus. The 149th Open was scheduled to take place at Royal St George’s Golf Club in Kent in July.

• Migrant workers living in vast Singapore dormitories cut off from the outside world due to the coronavirus outbreak fear their cramped and squalid quarters are fast becoming a hotbed for infection. Singapore on Sunday said it had quarantined nearly 20,000 workers in two dormitories, made up of mainly Bangladeshi and other South Asian manual workers, after they were linked to at least 90 infections. The government said the action was needed to prevent broader transmission in the city-state – which is closing schools and offices this week due to a spike in cases – and said it had taken measures to reduce worker interaction in the dormitories and ensure they received salary, meals and medical support.

• Forest activists claimed they had observed more cases of deforestation in the Prey Lang area, in Cambodia, than before the Covid-19 outbreak. They alleged that three companies had sent workers to log and transport timber with no crackdown by the relevant authorities. An activist in Stung Treng province, told that the three firms – Think Biotech (Cambodia) Co Ltd, Angkor Plywood, and Thy Nga Co, Ltd Development – had sent workers to log and haul timber to a factory near the area before transporting the sawn wood to a major company. “Those who transport timber from the Prey Lang forest are not afraid of virus infection. I’ve seen between 10 and 20 vans hauling timber to Angkor Plywood per day.

• Comet ATLAS is fading. New data from astronomers around the world show that the once-promising comet is beginning to fade. Is Comet ATLAS doomed? Not necessarily. “The frustrating thing about comets is we often don’t know exactly what they’re doing or why they’re doing it. There’s still a chance that Comet ATLAS is just ‘taking a breather’ before another outburst.”

• Tonga’s Police have continued to massively target drug dealers and suppliers during the national lockdown, conducting eight drug-related arrests last week. All eight were for possession of methamphetamine and cannabis and were men aged between 26 and 49. Police seized 1.67 grams of meth, “nearly” 21 grams of cannabis as well as drug utensils and more than $US255 in cash.

• A Hungarian tourist who died of Covid-19 in Thailand had earlier withheld details of his visits to entertainment areas, which resulted in 112 medical staff being suspended from work and placed in quarantine. Dr Chalermpong Sukhonthapol, director of Vachira Phuket Hospital, revealed the details at a meeting of provincial officials in charge of combating the disease on Monday. He said the Hungarian man was involved in a road accident on March 25. He was first treated at Chalong Hospital and then transferred to Vachira Phuket Hospital. The patient had numbness and weakness in all limbs. He could talk, but did not mention his activities had put him at risk of Covid-19 infection though being asked.

Solar Activity

Solar wind flowing from this minor coronal hole could reach Earth on April ~10th.

Active Weather

Severe Tropical Cyclone Harold (Category 4) w/v 120kts – 924hPa- East of Vanuatu moving SE.

Strongest EQ in Europe M3.3 Greece
Strongest EQ in North America M3.4 Alaska
Strongest EQ on the Planet M5.0 Sinabang, Indonesia
Deepest EQ M4.3 222 km Molucca Sea News Burst 7 April 2020

News Burst 6 April 2020

• Archbishop Viganò said it’s as if Pope Francis now views himself as becoming “master of the Church, free to demolish it from within without having to answer to anyone. In short, a tyrant,” he said. Roman Catholics from deep within the Vatican are sounding the alarm bells today because Pope Francis is once again doing wacky, end times stuff. Today’s story comes from an article on the Catholic site Life Site News from a statement they received from Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò. Viganò is quite alarmed that Pope Francis has dropped the title ‘Vicar of Christ’ in the annual Vatican Yearbook, and instead has listed himself in ‘his own name’ of Jorge Mario Bergoglio. Life Site News and Viganò are rightly alarmed by this breach of long-standing Vatican protocol, but if they knew anything about bible prophecy, they’d really be quaking in their boots. What Pope Francis did is a prophecy of Antichrist! “But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you. I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive.” John 5:42,43 (KJB). The Roman Catholic Church is not the Church that Jesus shed His blood to create, it is the demonic counterfeit. Combined with Vatican City and the Holy See, it is actually MYSTERY, BABYLON from Revelation 17 and 18. Every pope for the last 1,700 years has pretended to be the ‘vicar of Christ’, the person ‘in place of Christ’ and running the Roman church. But every pope has also retained the title of Pontifex Maximus, the early pre-Catholic church fathers said that the Pontifex Maximus was the “King of Heathendom“, the evil high priest of the pagan mystery religion of Rome. And they were right.

• George Soros said that the U.S. economy could be headed for calamity as a result of President Donald Trump’s efforts to juice American business. “The stock market, already celebrating Trump’s military success, is breaking out to reach new heights,” he said. “But an overheated economy can’t be kept boiling for too long.” [GS, Your turn is fast coming]

• In what can only be described as a freak accident, a fire started in the rental car overflow lot of the Southwest Florida International Airport on Friday, damaging at least 3,500 cars and spreading to cover at least 15 acres. Thankfully, no one was hurt in the fire, and officials are currently getting down to the bottom of this. With Florida’s temperatures hitting the high 80s at times, a general dryness, and lack of rain, it’s pretty darn easy to start a fire this time of year. [Will insurance pay for these car that none would have used for who knows how long?]

• NASA’S ambitious Artemis programme aimed at returning astronauts to the lunar surface by 2024 has just been expanded even further, aiming to maintain a human presence on the Moon and, potentially, Mars after 2024. A 13-page report titled “NASA’s Plan for Sustained Lunar Exploration and Development” was submitted on 3 April to the National Space Council, an advisory group to President Donald Trump that is chaired by Vice President Mike Pence. The report mapped out a detailed justification for the project and offered key points towards its implementation. While originally the programme was focused on putting humans back on the Moon and establishing an ongoing presence there by 2024, the new proposal would extend Artemis beyond its original deadline.

• A Thailand lockdown to curb the spread of the sweeping infectious disease of China Virus has forced quite a few, including sex workers who previously worked in bars, massage parlours, and other venues, onto the streets. There, those who cannot afford self-isolation at home, are increasingly searching for clients, outside the curfew hours that took effect Friday from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. “I’m afraid of the virus but I need to find customers so I can pay for my room and food”, Pim, a 32-year-old transgender sex worker.

• India PM Narendra Modi has appealed citizens to switch off electric lights at 9 pm on Sunday for nine minutes, and light candles or diyas, or flash torchlights or mobile lights standing at their doorsteps or balconies. “Amid the darkness spread by the corona pandemic, we must continuously progress towards light and hope,” the PM said in an address to the nation on Friday. “We must continuously strive to take those of us most affected, our poor brothers and sisters, from disappointment to hope. We must end the darkness and uncertainty emanating from the crisis, by progressing towards light and certainty. We must defeat the deep darkness of the crisis, by spreading the glory of light in all four directions,” he said, adding: “We must awaken the superpower of 130 crore Indians.” Modi had earlier asked Indians to observe a Janata Curfew on March 22. At the time, he had exhorted people to express their gratitude to healthcare workers by clinking plates and spoons or or ringing bells at 5 pm for five minutes.

• Sumatran Tiger Rescued From Trap in Riau Forest Area. A team from the Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BBKSDA) in Riau along with employees from Riau Andalan Pulp and Paper acted quickly to evacuate the tiger and ensure it was able to receive medical treatment immediately. The tiger is now receiving treatment at the Dharmasraya Sumatran Tiger Rehabilitation Center. Observation results indicate that the female tiger is under five years old. The tiger has a body length of 170 centimeters and weight of 85-90 kilograms. Based on the 2019 data from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, there were only 603 Sumatran tigers remaining. The ministry has asked all parties to work together to preserve this species.

• The king of Thailand and his entourage have taken over a four-star spa hotel in the Bavarian Alps as unrest grows over his absence during the pandemic. Tens of thousands of Thais have defied the kingdom’s lèse-majesté laws, under which they can be imprisoned for up to 15 years for insulting the monarchy, in a rare spasm of online protest. Maha Vajiralongkorn — King Rama X — is not thought to have made a public appearance in his country since February, although it now has 827 confirmed coronavirus cases and four deaths. The hotel received special permission from local authorities to open for the king and his entourage of 20 women.

• A group of orangutans and otters living together at a Belgium zoo have formed an unlikely friendship. The otters live in a river that runs through the territory where “father” orangutan Uijan and “mother” orangutan Sari live with their 4-year-old son Berani. Pairi Daiza spokesman Mathieu Goedefroy told that the zoo has different animal species live together to make their lives “more fun and interesting.” He said that Uijan and Berani have formed a special connection with the otters and often play with them. While zoos in the US and communities around the world are closed to the public, for the time being, animals are still going about their daily lives — which includes needing to interact with others. Jacksonville Zoo in Florida set up a “playdate” on Friday with a few of its inhabitants, including Frizz the aardvark and penguins CJ and Sharky, who took a field trip to interact with a group of gorillas through glass.. “Our animals miss interacting with visitors,” Rouillard said. “To help with this and as part of their enrichment, we introduced animals who would not normally see each other in the wild.” Jacksonville Zoo representative.

• The Navy captain who has been at the center of controversy for penning a scathing letter to the Navy’s top command over a lagging response to coronavirus ravaging his crew aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt nuclear aircraft carrier in the West Pacific — now docked at Guam amid the emergency — has tested positive for COVID-19. There are currently at least 155 confirmed cases of Covid-19 among sailors aboard the aircraft carrier, according to the Pentagon.

• Protecting Pacific’s coconut palms from coconut rhinoceros beetle (CRB) has been an ongoing battle in the region. Since its first case of CRB in Mangaliliu in 2019, Vanuatu has stepped up responses to eradicate this pest from its islands with the support of the Pacific Community’s (SPC) Coconut Industry Development for the Pacific (CIDP) project. The beetle, which feeds on the crown of coconut trees, can spread rapidly if unchecked. The incursion had the potential to devastate the country’s coconut industry, which contributes 45% of the national GDP as well as providing a livelihood for tens of thousands of people in the country.

• This April 5 meditation was our most successful meditation ever! The critical mass has been reached many times over, with over 1 million people meditating. To properly evaluate such a huge achievement some time is needed, and a full report will be posted within two weeks. ~Cobra

Earth Activity

Earth is approaching a stream of debris from Comet Thatcher (C/1861 G1), source of the annual Lyrid meteor shower. If forecasters are correct, the Lyrids will peak on the night of April 21-22 with as many as 15 meteors per hour. These meteors are best seen from the northern hemisphere where the radiant is high in the sky before dawn. That’s when the radiant point – near the star Vega in the constellation Lyra – is highest in the sky, and when you’re likely to see the most meteors.

Strongest EQ in Europe M3.2 Romania
Strongest EQ in North America M4.4 California
Strongest EQ on the Planet M5.9 Indonesia
Deepest EQ M4.3 404 km East Timor

Active Weather

Severe Tropical Cyclone Harold (Category 4) w/v 110kts – 930hPa- Over Central Vanuatu moving SE.

News Burst 6 April 2020