Quick thinking of woman passerby saves two-year-old girl who had been left unattended in apartment in Hangzhou A two-year-old Chinese girl left unattended fell 10 stories from her family’s apartment window but survived, thanks to a woman passing by, state media reported on Sunday. The toddler was in a critical condition with internal bleeding and other unspecified injuries while the woman who caught her suffered a broken arm, China Central Television and the Xinhua news agency said. The girl, named as Zhang Fangyu but known by her nickname Niu Niu, was in the care of her grandmother on Saturday afternoon when the woman left the 10th-floor apartment outside the eastern city of Hangzhou to run an errand, CCTV said. Neighbours saw Niu Niu dangling from the apartment window for several minutes, Xinhua said, and when the girl fell, Wu Juping “kicked off her high-heeled shoes” and ran to catch the child. “It was so urgent. I saw her when she was about to fall and rushed there, and after tens of seconds she fell off,” CCTV quoted Wu as saying. Wu, a 31-year-old mother, told CCTV that when she saw the little girl she thought of her own seven-month-old son, who had once fallen from a high chair and cut his mouth: “I thought to myself, ‘I should stretch my arms to her. Because I am right here, I must get her.’ Then I made it. I caught her in my arms.” The impact knocked Wu out and broke her left arm, reports said. CCTV quoted an unidentified doctor at Zhejiang children’s hospital as saying that a scan showed no damage to Niu Niu’s brain but that the girl’s abdomen was swollen in a sign of possible injury to organs. China guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Quick thinking of woman passerby saves two-year-old girl who had been left unattended in apartment in Hangzhou A two-year-old Chinese girl left unattended fell 10 stories from her family’s apartment window but survived, thanks to a woman passing by, state media reported on Sunday. The toddler was in a critical condition with internal bleeding and other unspecified injuries while the woman who caught her suffered a broken arm, China Central Television and the Xinhua news agency said. The girl, named as Zhang Fangyu but known by her nickname Niu Niu, was in the care of her grandmother on Saturday afternoon when the woman left the 10th-floor apartment outside the eastern city of Hangzhou to run an errand, CCTV said. Neighbours saw Niu Niu dangling from the apartment window for several minutes, Xinhua said, and when the girl fell, Wu Juping “kicked off her high-heeled shoes” and ran to catch the child. “It was so urgent. I saw her when she was about to fall and rushed there, and after tens of seconds she fell off,” CCTV quoted Wu as saying. Wu, a 31-year-old mother, told CCTV that when she saw the little girl she thought of her own seven-month-old son, who had once fallen from a high chair and cut his mouth: “I thought to myself, ‘I should stretch my arms to her. Because I am right here, I must get her.’ Then I made it. I caught her in my arms.” The impact knocked Wu out and broke her left arm, reports said. CCTV quoted an unidentified doctor at Zhejiang children’s hospital as saying that a scan showed no damage to Niu Niu’s brain but that the girl’s abdomen was swollen in a sign of possible injury to organs. China guardian.co.uk
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Family of murdered British woman will be able to question alleged killer Tatsuya Ichihashi in court The family of the murdered British woman Lindsay Hawker have arrived in Japan on the eve of the trial of the man accused of killing her and burying her body in a bathtub four years ago. “We are here to get justice for my daughter, it’s been a long time coming,” Hawker’s father, Bill, said at Narita airport near Tokyo. “I can’t say much more because the trial is about to start, except to thank the police and everyone who’s been involved in this case. Now we just want to get it over and done with.” Tatsuya Ichihashi has been charged with raping and murdering Hawker, then 22, and disposing of her body at his apartment in Ichikawa, a suburban town in Chiba prefecture, just east of Tokyo, in March 2007. Hawker, from Brandon, near Coventry, had been beaten and strangled, and her hands and legs bound with plastic gardening cord. As “victim participants” under Japan’s court system, the Hawkers will be permitted to question Ichihashi during his trial, which opens on Monday with the first of six hearings at Chiba district court. At the court’s discretion, they may also give their opinion on sentencing. Before leaving Heathrow on Saturday, Bill Hawker, who travelled with his wife, Julia, and their two daughters, Lisa and Louise, said: “We’re a strong family and we’re going to see this through to the end.” The court has appointed six members of the public to serve as lay judges at the trial following the introduction of limited trial by jury in 2009. The lay judge system allows members of the public to work alongside professional judges to determine guilt or innocence and decide on a sentence. The presiding judge, Masaya Hotta, is expected to hand down a ruling on 21 July after consulting the lay judges and three professional judges. The verdict could hang on whether the jurors believe Ichihashi intended to kill Hawker after she accompanied him to his apartment following a private English lesson at a nearby cafe. Ichihashi has reportedly said he inadvertently crushed her windpipe while trying to prevent her calling for help. He has admitted disposing of Hawker’s body but denies the rape and murder charges. Ichihashi, a 32-year-old former horticulture student, evaded several police officers when questioned at the entrance to his apartment about Hawker’s disappearance and fled in his socks, dropping a rucksack containing cash. Inside, officers discovered Hawker’s naked and battered body buried in a sand-filled bathtub on the balcony. Despite a reward of 10 million yen (£80,000) for information leading to his arrest and 8,000 reported sightings, Ichihashi evaded police for more than two and half years. He spent time in 23 of Japan’s 47 prefectures, found casual work on construction sites and underwent extensive plastic surgery in a bid to evade capture. He was arrested in November 2009 in Osaka while waiting to board a ferry to the southern island of Okinawa. A passenger had contacted port officials after recognising Ichihashi, who was wearing a hat, sunglasses and a paper surgical mask. Ichihashi wrote to the Hawkers while he was in custody apologising for their daughter’s death, but the family dismissed the letter as a ploy to gain a lenient sentence. Earlier this year he published a book , Until I Am Arrested, which detailed his two years and seven months as a fugitive. He described the book as “a gesture of contrition”, adding that he wanted royalties to go to the Hawker family or a charity. Ichihashi does not discuss his alleged crimes in the book, but recounts his daily quest to evade capture. He travelled between Aomori in Japan’s north to Okinawa, a subtropical island in the far south. He described how he had removed a mole from his face to alter his appearance, before having several rounds of plastic surgery, paid for with cash earned during 13 months working on an Osaka construction site. Hawker had arrived in Japan in October 2006 to work at an English conversation school after graduating with a biology degree from Leeds University earlier that year. Japan Justin McCurry guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Family of murdered British woman will be able to question alleged killer Tatsuya Ichihashi in court The family of the murdered British woman Lindsay Hawker have arrived in Japan on the eve of the trial of the man accused of killing her and burying her body in a bathtub four years ago. “We are here to get justice for my daughter, it’s been a long time coming,” Hawker’s father, Bill, said at Narita airport near Tokyo. “I can’t say much more because the trial is about to start, except to thank the police and everyone who’s been involved in this case. Now we just want to get it over and done with.” Tatsuya Ichihashi has been charged with raping and murdering Hawker, then 22, and disposing of her body at his apartment in Ichikawa, a suburban town in Chiba prefecture, just east of Tokyo, in March 2007. Hawker, from Brandon, near Coventry, had been beaten and strangled, and her hands and legs bound with plastic gardening cord. As “victim participants” under Japan’s court system, the Hawkers will be permitted to question Ichihashi during his trial, which opens on Monday with the first of six hearings at Chiba district court. At the court’s discretion, they may also give their opinion on sentencing. Before leaving Heathrow on Saturday, Bill Hawker, who travelled with his wife, Julia, and their two daughters, Lisa and Louise, said: “We’re a strong family and we’re going to see this through to the end.” The court has appointed six members of the public to serve as lay judges at the trial following the introduction of limited trial by jury in 2009. The lay judge system allows members of the public to work alongside professional judges to determine guilt or innocence and decide on a sentence. The presiding judge, Masaya Hotta, is expected to hand down a ruling on 21 July after consulting the lay judges and three professional judges. The verdict could hang on whether the jurors believe Ichihashi intended to kill Hawker after she accompanied him to his apartment following a private English lesson at a nearby cafe. Ichihashi has reportedly said he inadvertently crushed her windpipe while trying to prevent her calling for help. He has admitted disposing of Hawker’s body but denies the rape and murder charges. Ichihashi, a 32-year-old former horticulture student, evaded several police officers when questioned at the entrance to his apartment about Hawker’s disappearance and fled in his socks, dropping a rucksack containing cash. Inside, officers discovered Hawker’s naked and battered body buried in a sand-filled bathtub on the balcony. Despite a reward of 10 million yen (£80,000) for information leading to his arrest and 8,000 reported sightings, Ichihashi evaded police for more than two and half years. He spent time in 23 of Japan’s 47 prefectures, found casual work on construction sites and underwent extensive plastic surgery in a bid to evade capture. He was arrested in November 2009 in Osaka while waiting to board a ferry to the southern island of Okinawa. A passenger had contacted port officials after recognising Ichihashi, who was wearing a hat, sunglasses and a paper surgical mask. Ichihashi wrote to the Hawkers while he was in custody apologising for their daughter’s death, but the family dismissed the letter as a ploy to gain a lenient sentence. Earlier this year he published a book , Until I Am Arrested, which detailed his two years and seven months as a fugitive. He described the book as “a gesture of contrition”, adding that he wanted royalties to go to the Hawker family or a charity. Ichihashi does not discuss his alleged crimes in the book, but recounts his daily quest to evade capture. He travelled between Aomori in Japan’s north to Okinawa, a subtropical island in the far south. He described how he had removed a mole from his face to alter his appearance, before having several rounds of plastic surgery, paid for with cash earned during 13 months working on an Osaka construction site. Hawker had arrived in Japan in October 2006 to work at an English conversation school after graduating with a biology degree from Leeds University earlier that year. Japan Justin McCurry guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick had an very informative op-ed piece in the Washington Post this week: At our 25th college reunion in 2003, Grover Norquist — the brain and able spokesman for the radical right — and I, along with other classmates who had been in public or political life, participated in a lively panel discussion about politics. During his presentation, Norquist explained why he believed that there would be a permanent Republican majority in America. One person interrupted, as I recall, and said, “C’mon, Grover, surely one day a Democrat will win the White House.” Norquist immediately replied: “We will make it so that a Democrat cannot govern as a Democrat.” In a way, Republicans have accomplished that. This spring, in an effort to reduce the deficit, a Democratic president proposed to cut $2 trillion in spending, much of it from domestic programs Democrats have long championed . Last week, Republican leaders withdrew from talks with the vice president on a bipartisan plan to reduce the deficit because, as another part of the solution and like every bipartisan budget deal for decades, the president proposed to raise revenue. Specifically, he proposed to raise $1 in new revenue (through closing loopholes or ending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans) for every $2 in spending cuts. In response to that modest proposal, Republican leaders walked out. It is now clear that the Republican strategy is to drive America to the brink of fiscal ruin and then argue that the only way out is to cut spending for the powerless. Taxes — a dirty word thanks to Norquist’s “no new taxes” gimmick — are made to seem beyond the pale, even as the burden of paying for our society shifts disproportionately to the middle class and working poor. It is the height of fiscal folly. It is also not who we are as a country. Yet, as Gov. Patrick points out, “The only spending Republicans are willing to discuss cutting is spending that helps the poor and vulnerable — meaning anything that does not touch the interests of large corporations and the very rich.” Oh, you noticed that, too, Governor? I remember sitting in the Dunster House dining hall at Harvard with Norquist when we were sophomores or juniors in college, while he explained his view of government, or lack thereof. It sounded logical — the notion that we could live independently of each other, making our own decisions in our own self-interest. But then who puts out the fires? Who answers the calls to 911? Who educates poor children? Who helps people with disabilities? I’d like to think that the most prosperous nation in human history can have both freedom and security. I think we have reached a point where my personal success is not threatened by a program to help our parents retire with dignity. Voters are smart enough to see that taxes are one of the ways we get those things. They are the price we pay for civilization . This is something I often point out to Ayn Rand devotees: “Ever notice there aren’t any children in her books? Or old people, or sick people?” Yes, taxes are the price we pay for civilization. Too bad so many politicians have been hypnotized by the despicable Grover Norquist into thinking otherwise.
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Click here to view this media Karoli already brought attention to this the other day when the crew over at Fox & Friends was complaining about Media Matters and their Drop-Fox campaign and the network’s recent attempts to have Media Matters stripped of their tax-exempt status in her post here — Fox & Friends Whines About Media Matters and “Your Tax Dollars” . This Saturday on Fox’s sorry excuse for a media watchdog program, Fox News Watch, they carried on about Media Matters in not just one, but two segments on their show, continuing their harping about the group going after Fox and their new “boot camp” which The Washington Post wrote about here — Media Matters boot camp readies liberal policy wonks for the camera’s close-up . Thankfully the panel on Fox News Watch included their one token liberal, Jehmu Greene , who actually did a very good job of making a lot of the same points that Karoli did in her post linked above. If Fox wants to complain about Media Matters tax-exempt status, then they’d better be careful what they wish for or organizations like Brent Bozell’s Media Research Center along with a lot of other organizations they both named should be losing theirs as well. I imagine she’ll be relegated back to being the one token liberal with five of them screaming over her on their business shows they air on Saturday mornings after this appearance. Click here to view this media News Corpse has a very good post on this same issue and made some excellent points on why Fox’s complaints are ridiculous as well — When Fox News Attacks: The Assault On Media Matters [Updated] : [June 29, 2011] In case you haven’t noticed, Fox News has recently initiated a sustained assault on the media watchdog group, Media Matters . In the past week they have featured numerous stories with the express purpose of challenging the group’s right to exist. This latest batch of complaints stem from comments made last March by Media Matters founder, David Brock. He was quoted in Politico as saying that the organization was shifting its focus toward Fox News to one of “guerrilla warfare and sabotage.” Under those circumstances it may not be surprising that Fox has taken up a barrage of criticism aimed at Media Matters. It seems only fair that Fox defend itself from such an overt declaration of war. The only thing that might refute that perspective is – reality. Fox News began this war long ago with aggressive and false assertions that cast Media Matters as hacks, anti-American, violent, and communist. They alleged that George Soros was pulling their strings long before Soros ever made any contributions the group. Fox stalwarts like Bill O’Reilly and Glenn Beck engaged in rhetoric so hostile that it inspired actual physical attacks against Media Matters and their progressive allies. So if this is war, it is one wherein Fox is the aggressor. Another thing that makes this blitzkrieg unseemly is that Fox likes to pretend that it is a news enterprise. While Media Matters has as its mission to monitor the press, report their findings, and take actions to improve the state of the media, Fox is over-stepping ethical boundaries in becoming an activist enterprise targeting ideological foes. That is not the role of legitimate journalism. On the basis of that criteria, Fox News argues that Media Matters is in violation and should have their tax-exempt status revoked. That’s an interesting argument because it implies that attacks on Fox News qualify as opposition to political campaigns and/or candidates. Without that stipulation there is no violation on the part of Media Matters. So Fox is, in effect, admitting that they are a political operation. Shocking, I know. If Fox wants to acknowledge that they are not a news network, but a political entity, and change their name to the Fox Republican PR Agency, then I would be willing to call on Media Matters to lay off. Absent that, Fox should drop this inane pretense and go back to pretending they are a news network. Read on…
Continue reading …Rafael Nadal v Novak Djokovic – Wimbledon 2011 men’s final live | Jacob Steinberg
July 3, 2011 No Comment
• Hammer F5 or turn on our auto-refresh tool for updates • Email jacob.steinberg.casual@guardian.co.uk for a chat • Follow Jacob on Twitter if that’s your thing The toss. Djokovic calls heads. And it’s tails. An early psychological blow for Nadal, but he chooses to receive. Djokovic will serve first then. The players are led through the corridors and out on to Centre Court. Djokovic, walking a few paces ahead of Nadal, is in his regulation cap, although there’s not much sun today. Then again, my brother wears sunglasses inside. We all have our little quirks. Nadal is wearing his trademark headband. He’s jumping up and down, a nervous ball of energy. He’s got his game face on. This is going to be good. Sue Barker asks what Tim Henman’s handicap is. A useless second serve, I’d say. It’s 10 years since this marvellous game, by the way. I love John McEnroe. He exudes cool. And he was in Curb Your Enthusiasm . Anyway, turns out he’s going for Nadal in five as well. Maybe he never backed Djokovic then. Or maybe he’s changed his mind. It’s not a crime. Boris Becker is talking about the boxing farce last night. “At least David Haye went 12 rounds,” says the German. There was more diving in that travesty of a match than in the Djokovic v Tsonga tussle on Friday. Borg tips Nadal to win – in five sets. There, Borg agrees with me. Borg. Bjorn Borg is on the BBC. A man who knows a thing or two about retirement, he expects Roger Federer to quit if he doesn’t win a major next year. Ah, yes, Federer. How strange not to have him here on the final Sunday. Borg didn’t say whether the Swiss great would win another major – but I think we know. Imagine playing tennis against a brick wall that can predict what you’re going to do in three shots’ time. A brick wall that never misses. A brick wall with plenty of tricks of its own, one that can mix power and subtlety, slice and spin. A brick wall with formidable levels of self-belief. A sentient brick wall. I’m terrifying myself already, and having read this, you’re probably sitting in a corner of your room, hunched over, rocking back and forth, furiously weeping. It’s the Mitch Hedberg principle taken to the Nth degree – and this is what it is like to play against Rafael Nadal. How do you beat this? Well, you can make like Andy Bernard , but that only leads to a disciplinary hearing, anger management and a broken fist. For a set and three-and-a-half games on Friday, Nadal was outplayed by Andy Murray, who produced some of his finest tennis ever. We can all pinpoint the moment the match changed though: that missed forehand at 15-30 on Nadal’s serve. It wasn’t Gascoigne against Germany at Euro 96 territory, but it was close. Reprieved, Nadal was never going to lose. Drop your level for a millisecond, and you’ve got more chance of finding your way out of the Bermuda Triangle than locating a route back against him. Which is precisely what happened to Murray. It’s debatable whether Murray actually did anything wrong. Plenty of his shots were hard, accurate and in the corner; it’s just that they kept on coming back over the net, and when that happens, it can drive a player to the edge of insanity. Watch Nadal when he loses a point. The camera pans to him and he’s livid with himself, frowning, grunting and thoroughly resolved to bludgeon a path to the next 20. How intimidating is that? Perhaps not so much for Novak Djokovic. There was a time when this match would have been a foregone conclusion – in fact, probably only a year ago. For a while, it seemed like Djokovic, if not wasting his talent, was certainly not making the most of it. Too often, he would crumble on court, always ready to find a reason to lose. That Djokovic is history. He’s already the world No1, and a 43-match unbeaten run was only ended by a superhuman effort from Roger Federer in the French Open semi-final. His backhand is glorious, his forehand has improved immeasurably and his movement rivals Nadal’s. He’s won the Australian Open and he’s won his last last four matches against Nadal (although he still has an 11-6 losing record overall). But he’s never beaten Nadal in a grand slam match, and even though he was outstanding when the pair met in the US Open final last year, he was defeated. If this match is half as good as that one, we could be in for a treat. And it still might not be enough for Djokovic. Over five sets against Nadal, it’s not enough to be excellent; you have to be perfect. My prediction A stick to beat me with once Djokovic wins 6-0, 6-0, 6-0 : Now then, I don’t like disagreeing with John McEnroe – not that he’ll be bothered – but I fancy Nadal to edge it in four sets (or, if we’re being greedy, five). Although it’s surely not going to be straight sets, I can’t go against Nadal. This is Djokovic’s first Wimbledon final though. It could spur him on. If Nadal wins, The Leftorium will be the place to be tonight. Following on from Petra Kvitova’s win yesterday, it could be a famous weekend for lefties. The action starts at: 2pm. The action ends at: An unspecified time. Wimbledon 2011 Rafael Nadal Novak Djokovic Wimbledon Tennis Jacob Steinberg guardian.co.uk
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Andrew Lansley to welcome key Dilnot recommendation of a cap on total amount any person has to pay for care in their old age The government is ready to accept the key recommendation of a report on support for elderly people and cap the total amount individuals are expected to pay for personal care in their old age, the health secretary indicated on Sunday. But Andrew Lansley made clear that no decision had been made on the level of the cap beyond which the state would pick up the care bill. The health secretary said he expected to give a “very positive” response to the report of the Dilnot commission on the future funding of care and support when it is presented on Monday. Economist Andrew Dilnot’s central recommendation is expected to be an overall cap of between £30,000 and £50,000 on the total amount any individual has to pay for care – at an estimated cost to the exchequer of £2bn or more a year. He believes this would save thousands of pensioners from having to sell their homes to pay for residential care, and would enable insurers to offer cover for the potential cost of personal care. Experts suggest companies could offer insurance to cover care costs of up to £50,000 for a one-off premium of around £17,000. Dilnot’s commission is also expected to recommend a more generous threshold for means-tested assistance from the state, which currently goes only to those with assets worth less than £23,250. Charities have issued a call for all-party talks to ensure that reform is not kicked into the long grass, and David Cameron and Labour leader Ed Miliband have both said they are ready to take part in discussions of this kind. Miliband on Saturday wrote to Cameron and his deputy, Nick Clegg, offering to put aside Labour’s proposals for a levy on the estates of the deceased to pay for care – derided as a “death tax” by Tories – in order to seek cross-party consensus. In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph , Miliband said he had written to the Conservative and Liberal Democrat leaders to offer talks “in good faith”, with no preconditions. The Labour leader wrote: “In return, I hope you both will show the same kind of leadership of your parties as well. The last thing Britain needs is for Andrew Dilnot’s proposals to be put into the long grass. We three party leaders are of similar age and the same generation. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity which our generation must address.” Lansley said that he would also like to see charities and representatives of elderly people and their carers contribute to the debate on the Dilnot recommendations. The health secretary – who said he had not yet read the report – told BBC1′s Andrew Marr Show: “I think we are going to give a very positive response. We are going to treat it as the basis for engagement.” But he added: “Andrew Dilnot’s commission makes clear that there is a range of issues within their own report that need to be resolved and on which it is fair for people to be able to express their view: where a cap should be set; how it is to be paid for; issues with the threshold for the means test; how the means test should be applied to people in the future, so they contribute to the cost of their care. And of course if people are in residential homes, they raise the question of the extent to which they should pay for their accommodation costs – as it were, their ‘hotel’ costs in residential homes.” Lansley made clear that keeping the status quo was not an option. “We will not be able to give people the quality of care and support and the sense of security that they need in the future unless we have change,” he said. Social care Long-term care Older people Health Health policy Public services policy guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …WaPo’s Upside-Down Sunday Sermon: ‘Overt Bigotry’ in the Overwhelmingly Gay Art World Must Be Banned
July 3, 2011 No CommentOn Sunday, the Lord’s Day, The Washington Post knows how to bow to its god, too: political correctness. In Sunday’s Arts section, critic Philip Kennicott announces these maxims. 1) The Western art world and art history is overwhelmingly gay; 2) The level of tolerance for any conservative dissent from this overwhelming gayness is now zero; and 3) While “homophobia” has yet to banned from society, it certainly should be forbidden in the art world. Kennicott began by announcing a “reckoning in the winds” for practitioners of “overt bigotry” in America: There may be a reckoning in the winds. Attitudes about gays and lesbians, and about same-sex marriage in particular, are now changing so fast that American culture is suffering from cognitive dissonance: still prone to habits of homophobia while simultaneously aware that overt bigotry is no longer acceptable in much of the public square.
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Exxon Mobil pipeline rupture leaks hundreds of barrels of oil into key waterway and tourist attraction, prompting evacuations An Exxon Mobil pipeline that runs under the Yellowstone river in Montana ruptured on Saturday and has leaked hundreds of barrels of oil into the waterway, causing a 25-mile (40km) plume that fouled the riverbank. The breach in south-central Montana led to temporary evacuations of hundreds of residents along a 20-mile stretch of the river, a key tourist attraction in the region that runs through the famous national park of the same name. Cleanup crews deployed booms and absorbent material as the plume moved downstream at around 7mph (10km/h). The river has no dams on its way to its confluence with the Missouri river just across the Montana border in North Dakota. It was unclear how far the plume might travel. “The parties responsible will restore the Yellowstone river,” Brian Schweitzer, the governor of Montana, said. Exxon Mobil spokeswoman Pam Malek said the pipe leaked an estimated 750 to 1,000 barrels of oil for about half an hour before it was shut down. Other Exxon officials estimate up to 42,000 gallons (158,982 litres) of crude oil escaped. Duane Winslow, Yellowstone county director of disaster and emergency services, said the plume was dissipating as it moved downstream. “We’re just kind of waiting for it to move on down while Exxon is trying to figure out how to corral this monster,” Winslow said. “The timing couldn’t be worse,” said Steve Knecht, chief of operations for Montana disaster and emergency services , who added that the plume was measured at 25 miles near Pompeys Pillar national monument. “With the Yellowstone running at flood stage and all the debris, it makes it dang tough to get out there to do anything.” Brent Peters, the fire chief for the city of Laurel, said about 140 people in the area were evacuated early on Saturday due to concerns about possible explosions and the overpowering fumes. He said they were allowed to return at about 4am after the fumes decreased. Winslow said hundreds of residents downstream were told to evacuate in the early morning hours as authorities knocked on doors, but it was unclear how many did. In a statement, Exxon Mobil said it was sending a team to help with the cleanup, and that state and federal authorities had been alerted to the spill. The Exxon Mobil Pipeline Company “deeply regrets this release”, it said. Oil spills Oil Exxon Mobil Oil United States Pollution guardian.co.uk
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