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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 116 | |||||||||
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| Costa Rica Expertise Ltd http://crexpertise.com E-mail info@crexpertise.com Tel:506-256-8585 Fax:506-256-7575 |
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 Observatorio Vulcanológico y
Sismológico de Costa Rica graphic
Graphic shows location of camera and the dormant Chato volcano.Arenal volcano online
for viewing by public By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The Arenal volcano is now under 24-hour electronic watch by scientists at the Observatorio Vulcanológico y Sismológico de Costa Rica. The link is HERE! The observatory, part of Universidad Nacional, installed a camera at the base of the mountain in May for testing, and now the camera is online for use by the public. The Internet signal is being relayed by the Arenal Observatory Lodge, said the scientists. The purpose is not just to amuse the public. The camera will be watching when no one else is, said the Observatorio Vulcanológico y Sismológico. Many important events take place out of the range of other instruments that the scientists have installed near the mountain, they said. Then there is the rain and clouds that block the view, they added. Plans call for a better camera that will zoom in and out and move horizontally. The scientists also said they would like more infrared imaging. The camera only sees the south sides of the mountain because it is placed to the south. Unlike other volcanos, Arenal erupts continually and sends flaming rocks down its slopes. The observatory also has a camera at the Turrialba volcano, but it is out of service temporarily. Tourism chamber hosting charity bingo Friday By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The tourism chamber plans its 25th annual bingo night Friday at the Hotel Crowne Plaza Corobici near Parque la Sabana. The chamber estimated that some 1,200 would attend and compete for some 200 prizes that include tours, dinners, hotel stays, trips overseas and other tourism-related activities. The event is a benefit for the Fundación Pro Unidad de Cuidados Paliativos del Hospital de Niños. The chamber, the Cámera Nacional de Turismo, calls the evening Bingotur. Those interested in participating can obtain more information at 2234-6222 or by contacting the hotel the day of the event, the chamber said. Admission is 7,000 colons or about $14.
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 116 | |||||||||||
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 A Luis Diego Ramos work captures the
essence of a small Tico restaurant.
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Auction tonight seeks to
promote photos as an art form
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A foundation that promotes photographic art in Costa Rica plans an auction tonight at 7 o'clock at a gallery in Escazú. The photos have been juried and 19 artists will be displaying 60 photos mostly of Costa Rican life. Part of the proceeds from the auction will go to the Fundación Imago for its educational work. Some will go to the photographers. |
The location is the Galería
Arte Hoy in Avenida Escazú. Olympus
Imaging America Inc. is helping to sponsor the event. Some of the
photos were shown at the Salón Anual de la Imagen show
last year. Each
is authentic and part of a limited edition, said the foundation. Photography as an art form is not well established in Costa Rica. The works that will be auctioned tonight are museum quality designed to last at least 100 years. The foundation characterizes photographic works as cultural icons. |
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High court absolves chief
prosecutor in Rodrigo Arias case
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The Corte Suprema de Justicia has voted 21 to 1 not to punish the fiscal general, Jorge Chavarría Guzmán, in the case of Rodrigo Arias Sánchez. The court started an investigation in January after newspapers reported that Chavarría, after he was named but before he was sworn in, asked that a formal interrogation of Arias be suspended. The court said it could not substantiate a charge of influence peddling by the fiscal general and noted that the interrogation of Arias eventually took place May 31. This is the case related to the use by the Óscar Arias Sánchez administration of some $2 million that came from the Banco Centroamericano de Integración Económica. Rodrigo Arias was the chief of staff for his brother. The Arias administration said that the money was not public money, although several Costa Rican agencies said that the funds should have been treated as such and placed in a budget. The money was used to encourage the passage of the free trade treaty with the United States because the administration hired some treaty opponents as legislative consultants, among other uses. Basically the money was a slush fund. The court Monday released a chronicle of events which began when a prosecutor, Emilia Navas. took over the job of reorganizing the office of Delitos Económicos, |
Corrupción y Tributarios last
August. She said in a deposition that she
found the Arias case, which dated from 2008, in a file in a
prosecutor's office. Last Oct. 5 she decided the case had merit and moved to interrogate Rodrigo Arias, said the court. Arias was supposed to appear Oct.14. Oct. 8 Chavarría met with the then-acting fiscal general, Lilliam Gómez, and asked her to delay the appearance by Arias until he had studied the case, the court said. Ms. Navas objected to this decision and asked Ms. Gómez to send her a written instruction, which came via email. The court said it could not prove that José María Tijerino, who then was security minister, called Chavarría Oct. 8 or 9 to ask about the Arias investigation. Nor could the court prove that Chavarría personally contacted prosecutors after he was sworn in to suspend the interrogation, the court said. Tijerino has said several times that he did make calls involving the case and that he regretted that he had done so. The supreme court appoints the chief prosecutor, who then heads the Minsterio Público, the prosecutorial agency. In action Monday, Luis Paulino Mora Mora was re-elected to another four-year term as president of the Corte Suprema de Justicia. The vote was unanimous. Mora has served 42 years in the judiciary. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 116 | |||||||||
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| Another night of work on the infamous
platina bridge |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The bad sign is that television commentators have stopped making jokes about the platina bridge. The problems with the span on the Autopista General Cañas started in 2009 when metal covering an expansion joint became loose. The metal resisted every effort to tack it down, so a full-scale rebuilding of the bridge deck took place over Christmas holidays. Now the bridge deck is eroding and the exposed rebars resist every effort to cover them with concrete. The last attempt was supposed to be late Saturday and early Sunday. The Consejo Nacional de Vialidad blamed weather conditions for not completing the work, even though the weekend saw few downpours. Now more work is scheduled for Tuesday night starting at 10 p.m. and continuing until 5 a.m. Wednesday. |
Detours will be set up. The rebar was put down in two layers with the top layer set 90 degrees to the first. So workmen are going to try and fill again the two-inch square pockets between the rebar. They did that once before and the concrete eroded. Some engineers outside the Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transporte doubt that the bridge deck will ever be smooth. They suggest that the bridge has too much flexibility and the weight of vehicles grinds the rebar against any concrete that is put down. Just as bridges that fell down became the hallmark of the Óscar Arias Sánchez administration, the platina bridge, called that because of the rogue metal plate or platina, is becoming the symbol for the Laura Chinchilla administration. And television commentators do not smile now because the bridge problem has evolved from humorous. |
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| Internet study shows that a few dominate
discussion lists |
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By the University of Georgia news service
The Internet is often thought of as a forum that enables egalitarian communication among people from diverse backgrounds and political persuasions, but a University of Georgia study reveals that online discussion groups display the same hierarchical structure as other large social groups. "About 2 percent of those who start discussion threads attract about 50 percent of the replies," said study author Itai Himelboim, assistant professor in the university's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication. "So although we have this wide range and diversity of sources, only a few of them are actually attracting attention." Himelboim, whose latest findings appear in the early online edition of the journal Communication Research, examined discussions among more than 200,000 participants in 35 newsgroups over a six-year period. He focused his analysis on political and philosophical newsgroups on Usenet, the oldest Internet discussion platform, and is currently exploring patterns of communication in newer social networking services, such as Twitter. To identify the differences, if any, that exist in the content posted by popular participants and their less popular counterparts, Himelboim and colleagues Eric Gleave and Marc A. Smith of Connected Action Consulting Group examined the content of a subset of the messages. Only 12 percent of messages from the popular posters presented their own comments and opinions. Most of the time, they simply imported content from other news sources. Of the imported content, 60 percent came from traditional media, such as The New York Times, CNN and other national and local outlets, while 8 percent came from blogs and personal Web sites. Some 15 percent of posts used content from online-only news sites, and 6 percent of posts used content |
from government and nonprofit
organizations. "For the news media, these findings are pretty encouraging," Himelboim said. "We still need someone to go out and search for information to bring it to us, and that’s a traditional journalistic role." For those who fancy the Internet as a great equalizer that brings equality to the voices of the masses, however, the findings suggest that it could never meet that lofty ideal. Himelboim said he wasn’t surprised to find that online discussion groups tend to become hierarchical. Even in grade school, he pointed out, everybody wants to be friends with the most popular kid. What did surprise Himelboim was that the larger the group gets, the more skewed the network of interactions becomes. People exhibit what’s called a preferential attachment toward those with many connections, which suggests that having many connections makes it easier to make more connections. Himelboim said that because people can only spend so much time communicating with others, the growth of these so-called hubs comes at the expense of their less-connected counterparts. In a related study that randomly assigned nearly 200 participants to one of several simulated forums, Himelboim and his colleagues found that posting high-quality content is necessary for attracting attention — but not sufficient. That is, high quality posts with few replies drew few additional replies and never became hubs. So what does one need to do to attract attention on the Internet? "That’s the million dollar question," Himelboim said. "But just posting a lot will not make you a hub for attracting attention." |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 116 | ||||||||||
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| Ash from Chile's volcano causes woes in Australia By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A volcanic ash cloud from Chile has left thousands of travelers stranded for a second day in Australia and New Zealand. Strong winds have carried the ash more than half way around the world since Chile's Puyehue volcano erupted more than a week ago. The cloud of volcanic ash has been blown 10,000 kilometers (about 6,200 miles) across the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and has drifted over parts of southern Australia and New Zealand causing travel chaos for thousands of travelers. The main concentration passed over New Zealand Sunday and into the Pacific Ocean, but there are still small parts of the cloud which have broken off and that’s affecting airlines in Australia,” noted Gordon Jackson. He is a meteorologist with the Volcanic Ash Center in Darwin. Scores of flights have been canceled over the past two days. Services between New Zealand and Australia have been disrupted, along with many domestic routes in both countries. Australia's national airline Qantas said all flights in and out of the southern island of Tasmania, and those to New Zealand were grounded Monday. Other carriers have, however, decided to resume flights. Virgin Australia said it believed it was safe to fly to Melbourne, Tasmania and New Zealand, adding its planes would fly around or under the ash. Air New Zealand has kept its passenger services in the air by rerouting flights and flying at lower altitudes “to completely avoid the ash.” The airline said it was monitoring developments closely. Richard Arculus, a professor of geology at the Australian National University, believes the ash cloud will soon be blown back towards South America. “You can see the ash coming. It has come all the way around the Atlantic and across the Southern Ocean, Indian Ocean and is almost going to do a loop on itself. It is heading back towards South America. So it will take a few days for that to disperse. The question of course for travelers is — what is the density of particles per cubic meter, that's the thing the airlines worry about,” said Arculus. The Puyehue volcano in Chile has been erupting for the past week, throwing South American air travel into chaos as it spews ash high into the atmosphere. In neighboring Argentina the cindery cloud has closed roads, blanketed grazing pastures and a ski resort. Local and international flight schedules have been severely disrupted. Last year a volcano in Iceland sent vast plumes of ash over parts of Europe, grounding more than 100,000 planes as authorities were concerned over potential damage from the razor-sharp ash particles to jet engines. In November eruptions of Indonesia's Mount Merapi caused the cancellation of dozens of flights. U.N. chief pledges aid for flooding in Colombia Special to A.M. Costa Rica
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he was deeply moved by the devastation he saw when he flew over the flood-affected areas of Colombia on the weekend and expressed the United Nations readiness to help the government to continue providing aid to the estimated three million people affected. "Help and solidarity must reach all Colombians, whatever their origin — Afro-Colombian people, indigenous groups, women and children," Ban told reporters at a joint press conference with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos Calderón in the city of Cartagena. "The United Nations stands ready to help Colombia''s most vulnerable people. It is that message and our common goal to strengthen our work together that has been at the heart of my visit to Colombia and my meetings with President Santos," said the secretary general. He commended Colombia for playing an active positive role in South America and the Caribbean, especially its commitment to forging regional solidarity in support of Haiti. Ban pointed out that South America is rich in experiences that are relevant to the global agenda of human rights, transitioning to democracy, combating poverty and tackling climate change. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, June 14, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 116 | ||||||||||
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Latin American news Please reload page if feed does not appear promptly |
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
President Laura Chinchilla signed the free trade agreement with the People's Republic of China Monday. The legislature passed the document May 31. Witnessing the event was Wei Chuanzhong, vice minister of quality, supervision and quarantine for China. He signed an additional protocol that eventually will see Costa Rican beef going to China. Although beef is included in the trade treaty, additional paperwork is needed due to the sensitive nature of the product. Prison sweep nets booze By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
In another prison sweep, this one in Liberia, police found 109 knife-like objects, homemade weapons, marijuana and gallons of bootlegged alcohol. Some 120 prison guards and 70 Fuerza Pública officers conducted the sweep at the Centro de Atención Institucional Calle Real. Police said the type of alcohol the prisoners were making is based on a mixture of bread, fruit and yeast. The mixture converts to an alcoholic drink in three days, they said. This is a type of drink that is well known in the countryside. Hospital will clean up island ' By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Workers at the Hospital Monseñor Sanabria in Puntarenas will join with municipal employees July 8 to clean up and collect recyclable materials from the Isla Chira, according to hospital director Randall Álvarez. Some 100 fishermen and other residents of the island also will participate, the hospital said. The cleanup also is designed to eliminate breeding spots for dengue-carrying mosquitoes. Mob attacks police officers By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Fuerza Pública officers and traffic policemen were met with a hail of rocks Sunday night when they tried to collect a stolen vehicle in Barrio Fray Casiano de Madrid in Chacarita, Puntarenas. Police said that initially eight officers faced a mob of 350 persons. Officer Esteban González Núñez suffered a bullet wound to his mouth that damaged many of his teeth, said the Fuerza Pública. Three other officers suffered injuries from rocks, officials added. Officers said the attacking mob included children, women and the elderly. Less than 10 persons were detained but the investigation is continuing, they added. |
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James
DeRoy
