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San
José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, Vol. 16, No. 178
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 © PaleoBios/Edwin
Cadena
The skeleton of the
fossilized sea turtle measures almost 2 meters. Oldest sea
turtle fossil found in Colombia
By the Senckenberg Research Institute and
Natural History Museum
Scientists at the Senckenberg Research Institute in Frankfurt have described the world’s oldest fossil sea turtle known to date. The fossilized reptile is at least 120 million years old, which makes it about 25 million years older than the previously known oldest specimen. The almost completely preserved skeleton from the Cretaceous, with a length of nearly 2 meters, shows all of the characteristic traits of modern marine turtles. The study was published in the scientific journal PaleoBios. “Santanachelys gaffneyi is the oldest known sea turtle” says the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, but the statement is no longer up to date. “We described a fossil sea turtle from Colombia that is about 25 million years older,” said Edwin Cadena, a scholar of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at the Senckenberg Research Institute. Cadena made the unusual discovery together with his colleague James Parham of California State University, Fullerton. “The turtle described by us as Desmatochelys padillai sp. originates from Cretaceous sediments and is at least 120 million years old,” says Cadena. Sea turtles descended from terrestrial and freshwater turtles that arose approximately 230 million years ago. During the Cretaceous period, they split into land and sea dwellers. Fossil evidence from this time period is very sparse, however, and the exact time of the split is difficult to verify. “This lends a special importance to every fossil discovery that can contribute to clarifying the phylogeny of the sea turtles,” explains the turtle expert from Columbia. The fossilized turtle shells and bones come from two sites near the community of Villa de Leyva in Colombia. The fossilized remains of the ancient reptiles were discovered and collected by hobby paleontologist Mary Luz Parra and her brothers, Juan and Freddy Parra, in 2007. Since then, they have been stored in the collections of the Centro de Investigaciones Paleontológicas in Villa Leyva and the University of California Museum of Paleontology. Cadena and his colleague examined the almost complete skeleton, four additional skulls and two partially preserved shells, and they placed the fossils in the turtle group Chelonioidea, based on various morphological characteristics. Turtles in this group dwell in tropical and subtropical oceans; among their representatives are the modern hawksbill turtle and the green sea turtle. “Based on the animals‘ morphology and the sediments they were found in, we are certain that we are indeed dealing with the oldest known fossil sea turtle,” adds Cadena in summary. A happy story for the Dia del Niño By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Today is the Dia del Niño, children's day, and schools all over the country are having special events, and parents are preparing gifts for their youngsters. The class party at the Escuela Sormaria Romero is going as planned even though a thief managed to take money that the youngsters and parents had collected for the last eight months. The money had been stored in a file cabinet at the school, and the lock was forced. The school is in San Rafael Arriba de Desamparados and the class of 25 youngsters refused to be victims. They managed to raise in just a few days the amount that they needed. ". . . thanks to people with big hearts who helped with their donations they will have a great time sharing some ice cream, pie and some presents," said one father.  Poder Judicial
photo
This is the Pirris dam
project where the fatal fall took placeSurvivors
receive damages for fatal fall
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The Sala Primera has held the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad responsible for the fatal fall of a worker in March 2010 and awarded his survivors 40 million colons, a bit more than $75,000. The workplace accident was at the Proyecto Hidroeléctrico Pirrís where the employee fell from a scaffolding some 60 meters, nearly 200 feet. The hydro project involves the construction of a high dam. Even though the company had an occupation security plan in force, provided training and required the use of security equipment, the court still found that the electrical institute lacked effective oversight. Do-it-yourself guns appear to be popular By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Those who want them seem to have no trouble fabricating a firearm. Fuerza Pública officers detained individuals in two separate cases Monday night in which suspects carried homemade weapons. One case was in Upala, where police suspect they thwarted robberies. In Pavas, they said they detained three persons and a quantity of drugs. Making a firearm is not difficult even though a user might risk the loss of a hand. There are many instructions available on the Internet. Basically a tube of metal serves as the barrel of the weapon, and the firing pin might be as basic as a rubber band. That's what officers found in Upala. Calibers range from .22 to a hefty 12-gauge. |
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, Vol. 16, No. 178 | |
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| Small refund in electrical costs proposed by rate-setting
agency |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Following changes in the utility rates is enough to make the head swim. The Compañía Nacional de Fuerza y Luz just asked for a rate hike of more than 30 percent. But now the price regulating agency is proposing a cut in rate that would average about 2.72 percent. The agency, the Autoridad Reguladora de Servicios Públicos, said that the reduction was due to the higher use of renewable sources to produce power. In other words, the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad is not burning as much expensive petroleum. |
The rate
reduction or rebate would be applied from October to
December and benefit 100 percent of those who receive electricity form
the grid, including those serviced by cooperatives in rural areas, the
agency said. The exact percentage would vary based on the distribution
firm, with customers in the metro area getting reductions of more than
3 percent. The Authoridad estimated that the average family would save about 800 colons a month due to the reduction. That is about $1.50. The proposal is the subject of a public hearing next week. |
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Snagged
plates will go postal
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff Under an agreement approved Tuesday, license plates confiscated by traffic police will go in the mail. The officers of the Policía de Tránsito no longer will hand deliver the confiscated plates to regional offices of the Consejo de Seguridad Vial. Instead, that job will go to the Correos de Costa Rica. The Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transportes said that the new system will save 60 million colons (about $113,000) in gasoline and travel time as well as 530 hours of police time a month. Traffic police will pay Correos 8,700 colons (about $16.40) per pickup regardless of the number of confiscated plates, according to the agreement. There are 27 regional offices of the traffic police, and Correos will pickup and deliver the plates three times a week. Motorists who lost their plates due to traffic violations still will have to show up at a regional office of the Consejo de Seguridad Vial to pay a fine and recover the plates, said the ministry. |
 Policía de Tránsito photo
Traffic police have to be handy with a
screwdriver.
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| U.S. citizens, particularly younger ones, seem receptive to
socialism |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Free college tuition. Doubling the minimum wage. A single-payer, universal health care system. Those are just a few of the campaign promises by Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, who does not try to hide that he embraces a form of socialism. The independent Vermont senator's self-identification as a socialist is a rarity for politicians in the United States, which, unlike most other Western democracies, does not have any sort of significant socialist presence represented on its political left wing. Since the Cold War, the term has become something of a dirty word in U.S. politics: a phrase used not just as a description of a political and economic system, but as an insult used by conservatives in an attempt to tarnish the reputation of their left-leaning rivals. Despite his self-described socialist views, Sanders is experiencing an unexpected wave of popularity, and is drawing some of the largest, most electric crowds of any presidential candidate so far. Sanders is now running a solid second to the Democratic frontrunner, former secretary of State Hillary Clinton. In some polls, he has even taken the lead. According to an NBC News/Marist poll released Sunday, Sanders has opened up a nine-point lead on Mrs. Clinton in New Hampshire, which hosts the country's first primary. A separate poll released late last month suggests he also has crept to within single digits of Mrs. Clinton in the crucial, bellwether state of Iowa. Does Sanders' newfound mainstream popularity suggest Americans are changing their views on socialism? For many younger Americans, that appears to be the case, according to a University of Massachusetts, Amherst economics professor, Richard Wolff, who said the socialist label is not nearly as scary as it once was. "For people 30 years of age and younger, saying, 'Bernie Sanders is a socialist' cuts exactly no ice," Wolff said. "It's useless. It doesn't persuade anyone." A Gallup poll conducted earlier this year lends weight to that view. In the 18-29 age bracket, 69 percent of respondents said they would have no problem voting for a socialist presidential candidate. Older Americans, however, were less sure, with only 47 percent of respondents of all ages saying they would vote for a socialist. One reason why younger people are more open to the 73-year-old Sanders' message is that they may not even remember the Cold War, said Wolff. "Those battles are now two or three decades old. For young people, this is barely known history," he said. Another possible explanation for the popularity of Sanders' message is the recent turmoil in the U.S. economy that has led to rising inequality. That is the case for Christy Goldsmith, a doctoral student who lives in Columbia, Missouri. "The biggest problem in America in my view is the wealth gap," she said. Ms. Goldsmith worked for Hillary Clinton's unsuccessful presidential campaign in 2008, but said she now plans to vote for Sanders. "I don't mind publicly identifying as democratic socialist at all," she said. "But I think it's important to make the distinction between that and socialism." That phrase democratic socialist is the same one Sanders often uses to describe himself. As a political concept, it is distinct from the Marxist-Leninist brand of socialism |
commonly
associated with one-party
rule and state dominance of the economy. Sanders recently explained the concept of democratic socialism in a crowdsourced question and answer session published by the NowThis online media portal. "What democratic socialism is about is having a government which reflects the interest of ordinary people rather than what is currently the case, the billionaire class," Sanders said. As he often does, Sanders used Scandinavian countries, specifically, their universal health care, state-funded college education system and generous worker benefits, as a model for government practices he would like to see. Sanders also dismissed the notion that these views are incompatible with a democratic system. "In most of those countries the voter turnout is a lot higher than it is in the United States," he said. "They are pretty vigorous democracies." Sanders' views are basically in line with mainstream social democratic and labor parties in northern Europe, according to John Halpin, who studies political theory and public opinion at the Center for American Progress. "His socialism is basically the wide provision of public goods like universal health care, paid vacations, family leave, and debt-free college education financed by progressive taxation on the wealthy and corporations," Halpin said. Given the differences between these policies and traditional socialism, there is some debate as to whether Sanders should even be called a socialist at all. Noam Chomsky, the renowned leftist political analyst and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is among those reluctant to use the phrase to describe Sanders. "I think he should be regarded as a New Deal Democrat, which is about what socialism has come to mean, very remote from its traditional meaning," said Chomsky, referring to supporters of Franklin D. Roosevelt's domestic relief programs in the 1930s. "That places him far to the left in today’s political spectrum, in which mainstream Democrats are what used to be called moderate Republicans," Chomsky said in an email. Like most other analysts, Chomsky thinks it is very unlikely that Sanders will win the Democratic nomination. But the senator could still affect the presidential race in other ways. "His campaign opens up questions and issues that are otherwise marginalized, and will probably press the Democrats toward somewhat more progressive positions. In words at least," Chomsky said. Stephen Zunes, professor of politics and international relations at the University of San Francisco, said Sanders has already changed the dynamic of the race. "Clinton, who has traditionally sided with the more center-right of the Democratic Party, has shifted her rhetoric to a much more populist kind of tone, which is clearly a reaction to Bernie Sanders and his growing popularity,” he said. Could a Sanders campaign really open the door for more people in the United States to identify themselves as socialists? Halpin, with the Center for American Progress, said it is not likely. "Americans generally don't like predetermined ideological labels and believe they can take ideas across the spectrum," he said. "Without an organized socialist party or movement, it's hard to see it making much of an impact on its own." Trevor Burrus, a research fellow at the CATO Institute, a libertarian research organization in Washington, agrees. "I think real socialist policies are still quite unpopular," he said. "The popularity of highly redistributive welfare states, as well as animosity toward the rich, tend to go up when the economy slows down, as it has done in recent years," he said. |
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A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, Vol. 16, No. 178 | |||||||
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| Kentucky county court clerk allowed to leave her jail cell By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Alternately tearful and smiling, Kentucky county court clerk Kim Davis, who had been jailed after refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, told a crowd of more than a thousand supporters to keep on pressing after her release Tuesday. “I just want to give God his glory,” said Mrs. Davis, who is an Apostolic Christian. Holding religious signs in front of the Carter County Detention Center in Grayson, Kentucky, and singing religious songs, her supporters cheered. Mrs. Davis' release came as a happy surprise to them. They gathered for a rally with Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, who was standing by Mrs. Davis’ side when she spoke. Huckabee called Mrs. Davis an incredibly brave lady. “I told Kim today that she has shown more courage than almost any politician I know, and most any pastor I know, because she has not only said something, she has been willing to put her life at risk," Huckabee said. Huckabee, a Baptist minister and former governor of Arkansas, told Mrs. Davis' supporters that she "has ignited something across this country where people are tired of the tyranny of judicial action that takes people's freedoms away, takes their basic fundamental constitutional rights and puts them in jeopardy, and a tyranny of a legislative court that believes that it can make up law and somehow find a way to enforce it." Huckabee and fellow Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz had planned jailhouse visits before Mrs. Davis was ordered released. U.S. District Judge David Bunning ordered Mrs. Davis jailed for contempt of court when she refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses because of her religious convictions. Mrs. Davis' release after six days in jail was possible, the judge said, because five of her six deputy clerks in Rowan County "stated under oath they would comply with the court's order and issue marriage certificates to all legally eligible couples." The sixth deputy clerk is Mrs. Davis' son, and he has not been granting licenses. Bunning made clear as he released Mrs. Davis that she was not to interfere in any way, directly or indirectly with the efforts of her deputy clerks to issue marriage licenses to gay couples. Davis is expected to return to work in a few days. “Kim Davis will not violate her conscience,” her attorney, Mat Staver, said, adding that her conscience had not changed after six days in jail. Staver is chairman of the Liberty Council, a religious-rights group that is providing legal counsel to Mrs. Davis. He said the court order did not resolve the underlying issue. “Kim Davis has asked for a very simple accommodation — remove her name and her authority from the marriage certificates — and that is what we’ve asked from the very beginning," Staver said. "Kim still is asking for that today and will continue to ask in the future.” What this means in the face of Bunning’s order for Mrs. Davis not to interfere is not clear. “You’ll find out in the near future,” Staver told reporters in front of the detention center. But analysts said removing Mrs. Davis’ name from the certificates was not at all a simple request because county clerks by legal definition are required to grant marriage licenses. “As county clerk, I am responsible for providing many services to the people of Rowan County,” Mrs. Davis writes on the county Web site. “These duties include general categories of clerical duties of the fiscal court: issuing and registering, recording and keeping various legal records, registering and purging voter rolls, and conducting election duties and tax duties.” Elected last November by a slim majority of Rowan County’s 23,000 residents, Mrs. Davis still has more than three years to serve as county clerk. The U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in a ruling in June, making it the law of the land. “While Davis has the right to believe whatever she likes, as a public official, she has no legal basis to refuse to follow the Supreme Court’s ruling,” said Sarah Warbelow of the Human Rights Campaign, a civil rights organization that promotes gay and transgender equality. But Mrs. Davis has said she is subject to a higher law, and that God will sanction marriage only between a man and a woman. She was headed home after her release to spend time with her husband, whom she has barely seen in six days, and to sleep in her own bed. But when asked by a reporter outside the detention center whether spending six days in custody was “worth it,” Davis nodded her head yes. Mrs. Clinton issues apology over her private email server By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has conceded that her use of a private email server when she was U.S. secretary of State was a mistake. "Yes, I should have used two email addresses," Mrs. Clinton said in a statement posted late Tuesday night on her Facebook page. "One for personal matters, and one for my work at the State Department." She apologized and took full responsibility, but said her use of the private email account "was aboveboard and allowed under State Department rules." "I know this is a complex story," Mrs. Clinton added. "I could have and should have done a better job answering questions earlier." The letter came hours after she apologized directly in an interview with ABC television news. The apology marks an evolution in Mrs. Clinton’s position over the past five days, amid disappointing polls and worries among her campaign staff that the email server issue is hurting her. Monday, in an interview with The Associated Press, Mrs. Clinton maintained that she did not have to apologize for her use of the private server. “What I did was allowed,” she said. Three days earlier, Friday, Mrs. Clinton expressed regret but stopped short of an apology. “I am sorry that this has been confusing to people,” she told NBC television, adding that there are “answers to all these questions.” The Clinton campaign has had a spate of bad poll news just in the last few days. The numbers show her support dropping: Tuesday, a Monmouth University poll showed that Mrs. Clinton’s support among Democrats has fallen to 42 percent, an 18 point drop since April. An NBC/Marist poll released Sunday showed Mrs. Clinton’s opponent, Sen. Bernie Sanders, has opened a 9-point lead in New Hampshire, the state where the first election primary will be held. A Survey USA poll released Friday showed Republican front-runner Donald Trump ahead of Mrs. Clinton by five percentage points, 45 to 40. “The only thing that Clinton regrets is that she got caught and is dropping in the polls,” said Republican National Committee spokesperson Allison Moore on Monday. “Hillary Clinton’s reckless attempt to skirt government transparency laws put our national security at risk.” Former Guatemalan president ordered to face trial for fraud By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A Guatemalan judge has ordered former president Otto Pérez Molina to stand trial on corruption charges, days after he resigned over a customs fraud scandal that has stoked outrage in the Central American country. Judge Miguel Ángel Gálvez ordered the former president held, saying there was enough evidence to link him to a scam known as La Linea, or "The Line,'' in which business people paid bribes to avoid import duties through Guatemala's customs agency. Friday Pérez Molina denied accusations that he accepted $800,000 from business owners. Pérez Molina's former vice president, Roxana Baldetti, already has been jailed and faces charges. The scheme, uncovered last year by prosecutors and a U.N. commission which is investigating criminal networks in the country, is believed to have defrauded the state of millions. Sunday Guatemala held general elections in a climate of widespread disgust with politics. Comedian and political novice Jimmy Morales won the race, but fell well short of the 50 percent needed to avoid a runoff. He will face either former first lady Sandra Torres or millionaire businessman Manuel Baldizon in a second-round vote Oct. 25. Vice President Alejandro Maldonado is serving out the remainder of Perez's term, which ends Jan. 14. U.S.-EU deal would protect personal information data By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The United States and European Union reached a deal Tuesday giving EU citizens the right to sue if their personal information is misused in the U.S. "Robust cooperation between the EU and U.S. to fight crime and terrorism is crucial to keep Europeans safe," EU Commissioner Vera Jourova said. "But all exchanges of personal data such as criminal records, names or addresses need to be governed by strong data protection rules." The deal, called the data protection umbrella agreement, says data transfers between European and American law enforcement officials can be shared only for the purpose of fighting or investigating crime, including terrorism. It says if a third party should get its hands on this data for incompatible purposes, European citizens can sue in a U.S. court. Americans currently have the same legal right. The agreement also helps clear a path for the EU's plans to collect EU air passenger data. Washington sought such a measure after years of discussion about how to safeguard personal information while combating terrorism and crime. European and American officials spent four years working on the agreement. A central concern among the Europeans whose memories of dictatorships' surveillance linger has been the pressure that the U.S. government exerts on American corporations to hand over personal data, including information on EU citizens, on the ground of national security. The discussions took on extra urgency in Europe after former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden revealed that the super-secret U.S. National Security Agency was spying on U.S. citizens and some foreigners as part of the fight against terrorism. The U.S. Congress must approve the umbrella agreement before it takes force. Child mortality rates cut dramatically, U.N. reports By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Global mortality rates for children under 5 have fallen by more than half since 1990, when the Millennium Development Goals for addressing effects of poverty were established, a U.N. interagency group reported today. Despite the huge success, the group's report said most countries still missed the target of reducing child mortality by two-thirds. In 1990, 12.7 million children under 5 died from largely preventable diseases. The U.N. said that fewer than 6 million children die yearly now, or 16,000 per day. While this is significant progress, health agencies said much more needs to be done to save lives. The report noted that children are most at risk during the first month of life, when 45 percent of all under-5 deaths happen. It said 1 million infants die the day they are born, and nearly 2 million die in the first week of life. The report said about 62 of the world’s countries have met the development goal target to reduce under-5 mortality by two-thirds. Another 74 countries have cut deaths by at least half. It noted that the leading causes of child mortality include premature birth, pneumonia, complications during labor and delivery, diarrhea, sepsis and malaria. Democrats seem to have votes to block Iran deal disapproval By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Members of the U.S. Senate came back from a month-long recess Tuesday and immediately made headlines. Senate Democrats now have the 41 votes required to block an expected resolution of disapproval on the international deal with Iran to curb its nuclear program. Although it is not clear how votes on the deal will play out in the Senate, the wave of support among Senate Democrats is viewed as a major foreign policy accomplishment for Democratic President Barack Obama. Democratic Sens. Ron Wyden of Oregon, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Gary Peters of Michigan came out in favor of the Iran nuclear deal Tuesday, meaning that Senate Democrats likely will be able to prevent a disapproval resolution from passing in their chamber. Obama already has said he would veto a disapproval measure. The House of Representatives, with its large Republican majority, is expected to pass a disapproval resolution on the Iran nuclear deal Friday. But Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi also says she is confident Democrats would be able to sustain a presidential veto if one were required. During the recess, Obama personally called lawmakers in an effort to win over their support, and those efforts appear to have paid off. White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the growing support in Congress has gratified administration officials, who’d expressed hope upon the tentative deal’s announcement in mid-July that members would consider it carefully and spend time with experts in the U.S. intelligence community. He said Obama "would expect those members of Congress who support the agreement to take the necessary steps to prevent other members from undermining the agreement." Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, announced he would join all 54 Republicans in opposing the deal. Three other Democratic senators also reject the Iran deal, and no Republican lawmaker in either the House or Senate has come out in favor of it. Critics of the deal say that Tehran’s leaders cannot be trusted and that the accompanying end to sanctions will provide them with a bonanza of cash and a boost to their international standing. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell asked that every senator report to the chamber Wednesday to debate the deal. "Keep in mind that while President Obama will be out of office in a few months, the rest of the world will have to deal with this agreement for much longer," he advised. McConnell said the Senate should conduct a serious and respectful debate. The Republican leader also called on Democrats to avoid using filibuster to block a vote on the actual disapproval resolution. But Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said that virtually every important vote in the chamber requires 60 votes to pass, and that the Iran nuclear deal vote is certainly an important one. He and McConnell sparred over how and when a vote should be held, without reaching an agreement Tuesday. |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's sixth news page |
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 Melbourne University
photo
Bones and skull of Antillothrix
bernensis
Ancient monkey
sheds light on primates
By the Melbourne University news staff
An international team of scientists have dated a species of fossil monkey found across the Caribbean to just over 1 million years old. The discovery was made after the researchers recovered a shin bone belonging to the species of extinct monkey Antillothrix bernensis from an underwater cave in Altagracia Province, Dominican Republic. The fossil was embedded in a limestone rock that was dated using the uranium-series technique. In a paper published this week in the Journal of Human Evolution, the team use three-dimensional geometric morphometrics to confirm that the fossil tibia does indeed belong to Antillothrix bernensis, a primate that existed on Hispaniola relatively unchanged for over a million years. This monkey, roughly the size of a small cat, was tree-dwelling and lived largely on a diet of fruit and leaves. Helen Green of Melbourne University’s School of Earth Sciences, a lead researcher involved in the dating of the limestone surrounding the fossils, said the question of the age of primate fossils from this region has puzzled scientists since the days of Charles Darwin. "The presence of endemic new world monkeys on the Caribbean islands is one the great questions of bio-geography, and our work on these fossils shows Antillothrix existed on Hispaniola relatively morphologically unchanged for over a million years. By establishing the age of these fossils, we have changed the understanding of primate evolution in this region," said Dr. Green. At Brooklyn College, part of the City University New York, and Northeastern Illinois University researchers Alfred Rosenberger and Siobhán Cooke have been working in the Dominican Republic since 2009, searching for rare fossil remains of mammals to investigate how these animals were adapted to their unique, island environments. "Very little was known about the native monkey from this island," said Dr. Cooke, "Prior to our discoveries in Altagracia, we knew almost nothing even though this species was first described by Renato Rímoli back in 1977." To better understand how this primate was uniquely adapted to its environment, Melissa Tallman and her student Andrea Morrow from the Grand Valley State University, used a specialized technique to model the three-dimensional shape of the monkey’s leg bone. This helped them to reconstruct how the small primate might have moved about in its environment and allowed the comparison of relatively young examples of Antillothrix bones to the newly discovered million year old specimens. At the University of Melbourne, Helen Green and Robyn Pickering worked in the state of the art isotope chronology laboratory in the School of Earth Sciences, where they measured the levels of uranium, thorium and lead present in the limestone rocks today using the results to calculate an age of 1.3 million, plus or minus 110,000 years. This discovery was made possible by the collaboration between the Dominican Speleological Society, the Museo del Hombre Dominicano in Santo Domingo, and Brooklyn College. Cave divers, Cristian Pittaro, Phillip Lehman, Dave Pratt, and Victoria Alexandrova were responsible for finding the bone in Padre Nuestro Cave. Today these caves are underwater, making them a challenging environment in which to seek fossils. |
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From Page 7: Casa
Presidencial
graphic
This is a rendering of the new
$39 million hangarAirport
maintenance hangar to be ready in 2016
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The new hangar for Coopesa R.L. is expected to be ready next year. This is a $39 million project that will allow the aircraft maintenance firm vacate land needed for expansion at Juan Santamaría airport. The property on which the new hangar will stand is outside the current airport limits. Once finished, the airport fencing will be extended to include the new facility. Coopesa is what is known in the business as an MRO, maintenance, repair, and overhaul. The 50-year old firm is in six other countries. The construction is in the hands of FCC Construcciones S.A. The finished hanger will be able to accommodate six aircraft at once. Most of the work up until now has been preparing the site. In addition, there are access roads that are being built. |
