'Quake' Lake in China Drains; Orphans Remain

The quake centered in Sichuan province killed 69,127 people, with 17,918 still missing, according to the latest government figures.

The provincial government has estimated about 7,000 of the victims were children with no siblings. The National Population and Family Planning Commission will send a medical team to the quake zone to perform reverse sterilization operations on couples that want to have another child, Xinhua reported.

China's family planning policies restrict most couples to one child, although rules allow for another baby if their child is killed, severely injured or disabled.

Authorities said they had recorded 4,700 unclaimed children whose parents presumably died in the quake. But Civil Affairs Ministry official Zhang Shifeng said the final number of orphans was expected to be about 1,000 to 2,000, as children were gradually handed over to members of their extended families.

Zhang said parents from around China were showing huge interest in adopting quake orphans, with 10,000 families registering for adoption in one province alone. He indicated the ministry could give priority to parents who (lost) children in the quake.

Quake in China - Ian Williams Reporting

Great Rift Valley Fault Line in Africa Births Two Massive Earthquakes

MSNBC News reports:

KIGALI, Rwanda - At least 21 people were killed and 200 seriously injured when two earthquakes struck Rwanda and neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo on Sunday, police and the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The quakes struck close together in Africa's great lakes region along the same western Great Rift Valley fault line.

The first quake, with a magnitude of 6.0 and its epicenter in Democratic Republic of Congo, happened at 10:30 a.m., followed by another 5.0 quake in southern Rwanda.

Earthquakes at Mount St. Helens

Mount St. Helens Steaming

VANCOUVER, Wash. (AP) — Steam seeping from a fracture atop the lava dome in Mount St. Helens' crater and the mountain's first noteworthy seismic activity since 2004 have caught scientists' attention this week as signs that something is moving inside it.

While the likelihood of a major eruption seemed low, scientists have quit venturing into the volcano's crater and are checking the monitoring equipment along St. Helens' flanks.

"We're just being cautious. It's not that we're anticipating any activity," Cynthia A. Gardner, scientist in charge of the U.S. Geological Survey's Cascades Volcano Observatory, said Wednesday.

Express Train Derails in Pakistan, Killing Fifty

Pakistan - An express train crowded with holiday travelers derailed in southern Pakistan early Wednesday, killing at least 50 people and injuring many more, officials said.

The passenger express was going from Karachi to Lahore when about 12 of its 16 carriages came off the rails near Mehrabpur, about 250 miles north of Karachi, the officials said.

On Tuesday, December 18th:

ISLAMABAD: A 5.1-magnitude earthquake jolted central Pakistan on Tuesday but there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage, officials said.

The epicentre of the quake was around 300 kilometres (200 miles) southwest of the city of Peshawar, a seismological department official said.

"The quake originated at 10:56am (0556 GMT) from the border area between Punjab and Baluchistan provinces," he said.

Jakarta Shook by 7.1 Magnitude Earthquake

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP)- A strong earthquake shook eastern Indonesia on Saturday, sending panicked residents running out of their homes.

The tremor struck with a preliminary magnitude of 7.1 at a depth of about 60 miles in Maluku province, about 1,700 miles east of the capital, Jakarta, according to the Indonesian Meteorology and Geophysics Agency. The U.S. Geological Survey put the quake at a magnitude 6.3.

There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries and no tsunami alert was issued...

Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago with 17,500 islands, is prone to seismic upheavals because of its location on the so-called Pacific “Ring of Fire,” an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

Imagine the overwhelming fear the people of Indonesia must have felt and perhaps are still feeling after this quake, given the devastation of several years ago when a similar deep ocean quake occurred killing a multitude of people.