The 2013 chinook salmon run on the Columbia River is the largest ever, and could hit 1 million fish, following years of court-ordered actions to make the 14 dams in the Columbia Basin less lethal to fish. –AP
Wildlife and Wetlands Return to Former Coal Mine
Just three years ago, red and white smoke stacks loomed over the Wabamun power plant near the lake in Alberta, while across a highway at the Whitewood mine giant earth moving machines exposed soil and coal – same as it had for five decades.
Today, TransAlta Utilities is close to removing all evidence of both the industrial sites, having moved its major operations across the lake.
The company is completely returning the area into a mix of agricultural, wildlife and wetland habitat that have already been environmentally certified by Canadian officials. More than 277,000 trees have been planted on the sites, and recreation boat launches are being added to an enhanced shoreline.
(READ the full story, w/ photos, in the Edmonton Journal)
Kenya’s Youth Call for Unity, Not Reprisals, After Mall Attack
Former rival youth gang members from Nairobi’s slums advocated in an Op-Ed column for the best response to violence — peace and unity. “In the wake of the Westgate Mall terror attack, we implore people in Kenya not to respond with violence and reprisals, especially against Muslims and Somalis.”
“As Kenya searches for answers, Kenyan police and citizens must be careful to avoid the unjust profiling and hatred that will divide rather than heal a grieving people,” they wrote in the CS Monitor. “We know from experience that the best response to violence is through compassion, compromise, and community dialogue.”
(READ the full article in the CS Monitor)
Photo: Kenyan protest at UN – Andy in New York via Fllickr – CC
Furloughed Federal Workers Spend Unpaid Days Renovating Church
NASA worker Bruce Jackson went to work Wednesday morning despite the government shutdown.
Instead of going into Washington, the York County resident hung ceiling tiles and installed insulation in a Presbyterian Church classroom.
Jackson was one of a half dozen furloughed federal workers that spent their unpaid day off volunteering on a church renovation project, according to the Daily Press in Newport News, VA.
(READ the story or watch video from the Daily Press)
Photo credit: screenshot from Daily Press video
She Planned 22 Acts of Kindness For Her 22nd Birthday; What’s on Her List?
She’s a nursing major in college so we already knew she wanted to help people, but Hillary Sadlon poured on the kindness for others even on a day when she could have been pampering herself.
After seeing someone post online about how they did it, the Seton University senior spent months planning how she could be kind, generous and thoughtful on her upcoming birthday.
She made a giant list and dubbed her scheme, “Hillary’s 22 Random Acts of Kindness for Her 22nd Birthday.” We loved the items on this list.
She told the Setonian school newspaper that making a difference has “a contagious rewarding feeling that comes with it.”
Among the many good deeds she accomplished, she donated blood, left inspirational notes on cars, weeded her grandmother’s yard, left a gift for the mailman, brought flowers to local nurses and brownies to the neighbors, and brought balloons to a special education class.
What would be on your list? Tell us in the comments below.
(READ the story in the Setonian)
HP Becomes the First IT Company to Set Supply Chain Emissions Goals
Hewlett-Packard, now called HP, is the first IT company to set a supply chain greenhouse gas emissions reduction goal, recently announcing its target of a 20 percent decrease in its first tier manufacturing and product transportation-related emissions by 2020 from a 2010 baseline.
Earlier this year, HP became one of the first companies globally to publicly disclose its complete carbon footprint.
(READ the story in Triple Pundit)
Photo: oosp-flickr-cc
Teen Gives Money to Victim, to Right His Father’s Wrong
Seventy-eight-year-old Tona Herndon of Oklahoma was already vulnerable in every way when her purse was stolen while visiting her husband’s newly dug grave.
The thief’s mugshot flashed across the TV screen after he was caught and 15-year-old Christian Lunsford recognized the culprit right away. The man was his wayward father, who had been in and out of prison for years since leaving two years after Christian was born.
Then, the 15-year-old did something remarkable.
Police Officers Give Their Saturday to Fixing Kids’ Bikes
Officers in north Tulsa distributed 350 flyers in schools encouraging kids to come get their bikes repaired for free. The Oklahoma cops held the bicycle clinic as a way to provide residents with a service they might not otherwise have.
It ended up encouraging community goodwill, too, and gave residents a glimpse of police officers in a different light.
“This is new for me,” 16-year-old Immanuel Ortega, told Tulsa World after he watched officers Blake Hodges and Carter McQuigg disassemble his bicycle. “I’ve never seen policemen doing something like this unless it’s something crime-related.”
Barbecue was served at the event Saturday and Lee’s Bicycles donated spare parts.
(READ the story in TulsaWorld – SEE a Photo at MSN)
Photo via Flickr – by Cenas a Pedal – CC
UK Breaks its Renewable Energy Record
The UK has generated a record amount of energy from renewable sources in the second quarter of 2013, a full 15.5% of its total production – a jump of 5.8% compared to the same period last year. –Department of Energy And Climate Change
Switzerland to Launch ‘Janitor’ Satellite to Collect Pieces of Space Junk
Space junk is an ongoing problem for the world’s space administrations as decades worth of satellite launches and space missions have filled the Earth’s orbit with trash such as fuel tanks, lost tools and parts of derelict satellites.
In order to combat this growing hazard and to avoid potentially devastating collisions, the Swiss Space Center has announced CleanSpace One, a project to develop and build the first installment of satellites designed specifically to clean up space debris.
(READ the full story from Inhabitat)
Panicked Fawn Plucked From River in First Save for Rookie Wildlife Officer
An officer in training for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission saved his first life while on patrol last week.
Officer Keith Baber spotted a fawn swimming in circles, obviously in distress. With his partner steering the boat, the trainee was able to reach out and lift the exhausted deer from the water.
They brought it to safety on the river bank where they assumed the mother had been waiting. A very steep embankment on that side of the river likely gave the fawn trouble as it tried to gather a foothold.
The incident was celebrated on the Commission’s Facebook Page as Officer Baber’s first rescue. He is still in his field training period, having graduated from the FWC academy in August. He was patrolling with Officer Guy, his current Field Training Officer, on the Apalachicola River when they came across the deer.
Mom Crafts Superhero Capes for Ailing Kids Nationwide
One mother is giving more than 1,700 sick children a reason to smile. Robyn Rosenberger crafts capes to give children with terminal illnesses a chance to feel special – to feel like superheroes.
“She doesn’t just deliver capes, she bolsters children,” one child’s mother told TODAY. “It’s Robyn that turns them into superheroes.”
(WATCH the video below from NBC News)
Exercise Good As Or Better Than Heart Pills
Exercise can be as good as medication for people with conditions such as heart disease, a study has found.
The British Medical Journal report compared hundreds of trials involving nearly 340,000 patients and found exercise rivalliing some heart drugs and outperforming stroke medicine in preventing death.
“Moderate physical activity, for example, can reduce the risk of stroke by up to 27%.”
(READ the story in the BBC)
Thanks to Andrew N. for submitting the link!
Little Girl Donates $1000 to Buy Bulletproof Vest for Police Dog
Instead of birthday presents on her tenth birthday, Allison Henry asked for donations to a special project.
She wanted to raise a thousand dollars to buy a bulletproof vest for a four-legged K-9 officer named Ryker.
The Holyoke Police Department in Massachusetts thanked Allison for her successful fundraising effort during a special ceremony last week.
No More Robocalls for Many in the US
20,000 people complain to the Federal Trade Commission every month about robocalls, those annoying and persistent automated phone calls that are actually illegal but, until now, never-ending.
The FTC announced a contest last year offering $50,000 to anyone who could come up with a way to stop the calls. Today one of the co-winners, Aaron Foss, who is a software programmer, launched his new service called Nomorobo. Best of all? It’s free.
Ingenious 19-year-old Develops Plan to Clean up Oceans in 5 Years
Worried about the tiny fragments of plastic covering beaches and polluting food chains, 19-year-old Boyan Slat created the Ocean Array Plan, an ingenious project that could remove 7,250,000 tons of plastic from the world’s oceans in just five years.
With his concept called Marine Litter Extraction, Boyan Slat proposes a radical clean-up solution, for which he won the Best Technical Design award 2012 at the TU Delft University in the Netherlands, where he is a first-year Aerospace Engineering student.
Indigenous Canadian Living on Street Donates Big Settlement Check to Youth Center
In Canada, the past sins were finally accounted for recently, when the government paid restitution to those aboriginal Canadians who were forced into Residential Schools in the twentieth century.
One man in the Northwest Territories took his compensation, and inspired a community.
Charles Delorme, known by many in the Yellowknife area as “Charlie,” who has spent most of 40 years on the streets, donated the money from his residential school settlement to the SideDoor Youth Centre, which offers programs for at-risk youth and provides overnight shelter for teens.
(READ the story and VIEW the photo of Charlie, from the CBC News)
Thanks to Brenda Gelean, who said the story brought tears to her eyes, for submitting the link!
Pianist Born With Shortened Fingers Proves Experts Wrong
When Egyptian-born pianist Wael Farouk was 3 years old, his parents noticed that he was unable to grip objects, make a fist or straighten his fingers.
Doctors confirmed that the ligaments in Farouk’s tiny hands were shorter than normal, preventing him from full mobility. They suggested that Farouk exercise his hands regularly, so, on the boy’s third birthday, his father bought him a toy piano.
His parents saw very quickly that despite his hands, or perhaps because of them, Farouk and the piano developed a bond. But Farouk’s hands were also the reason the Cairo Conservatory of music almost denied his application to study piano there.
Only one teacher on the admissions panel advocated for Farouk. The rest of the panel ultimately conceded, giving him a trial period of three months, during which he was to complete two years of course work to prove his competency.
With the aid of his father’s strict military guidance, not only did Farouk complete the work, he excelled. Since then his father has been, in many ways, the inspiration for Farouk’s strict practice regimen.
“We all have our challenges. It’s your own decision whether you’ll let them stop you or whether you’ll let them provoke success out of you.”
Farouk has been studying in the United States since he accepted his first Fulbright Scholarship to The Catholic University of America in 2003. Now Farouk is at the Mason Gross School at Rutgers preparing for an upcoming Carnegie Hall concert that will include works by Sergei Rachmaninoff.
The New York Concert Review has called Farouk “a formidable and magnificent pianist,” for his command of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3, a piece that many believed the pianist never would be able to accomplish with his own two hands.
(WATCH the video below by Cameron Bowman – READ full article from Rutgers.edu)
Photo credit: Rutgers
Crowd of Helpers Show Up for Dying Soldier on Moving Day
A terminally ill soldier received more help than he could have imagined on moving day, as 100 soldiers, retirees, and civilians showed up to help the family move into a smaller residence over the weekend.
After a friend posted a request for help on an Army-related Facebook page, soldiers from units across Fort Bragg reported for duty at the Petrie home Saturday in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
Cars filled the streets in an overwhelming response for Chief Warrant Officer 5 Charles Petrie, who has honorably served the United States Army for almost 30 years.
“The support has been amazing,” said his wife, Terri Petrie. “It’s just a blessing. This year has been hard, and to have complete strangers help… to see the outpouring is amazing.”
“I don’t know how he reacted when everyone showed up, but you can tell he really appreciated it,” said Kendra Hartwick, wife of an Air Force retiree and member of the North Carolina Patriot Guard Riders. “I think about how blessed we are and how honored we are to help him out right now. Whenever we see a need, we try and help out.”
“My daughter texted me ‘Dad’s all choked up,’” said Terri.
Through all of the obstacles Petrie has faced in the last year, his attitude remains positive as he prepares his family for what is ahead, according a feature story on a military website, BlackAnthem.com.
(Additional Source: Fayetteville Observer)
Warren Buffett Invites Good Deed Dairy Queen Teen to Shareholders Meeting
A Minnesota teen’s act of kindness for a blind customer has prompted an outpouring of praise, including from billionaire Warren Buffett, who has invited the teen to his company shareholder’s meeting next year.
Joey Prusak, 19, gave $20 from his own pocket to a blind customer who dropped a twenty dollar bill that was snatched by a woman who refused to return it.
Since the story hit the internet, people have offered the young man jobs and even given him money for college.
He also got a special phone call from billionaire Warren Buffett, whose company owns Dairy Queen, requesting that Prusak attend the Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting in May, so that he can meet him.
(READ the story at Yahoo.com)