Just Numbers

Shorter Drives

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 09:00:00 +0000

#transport - U.S. motorists drove at least 100 billion fewer miles November 2007-October 2008 than in the same period a year earlier, according to U.S. transportation officials.

The Highway Trust Fund financed primarily by federal gas tax receipts, collected $31 billion in revenue October 2007-September 2008, $3 billion less than it collected in fiscal year 2007.

Source: UPI

Everest Deaths

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 06:27:00 +0000

#death - Most deaths on Mount Everest occur above 8,000 meters during descents from the summit in the so-called "death zone".

Researchers who analyzed the reported 212 deaths on the 29,000-foot mountain between 1921 and 2006 have concluded that high-altitude cerebral edema appears to be associated with an increased risk of death.

The American, British and Canadian researchers found that the overall death rate for climbers and sherpas (locals hired to assist climbers) over those 86 years was 1.3 percent (1.6 percent among climbers and 1.1 percent among sherpas). Over the past 25 years, the death rate for climbers descending via the longer Tibetan northeast ridge was 3.4 percent, and 2.5 percent on the shorter Nepal route.

Source: Washington Post

Largest Animal

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:49:00 +0000

#animals - There are estimated to the less than 25,000 Blue Whale's left in the world's oceans, no more than 11 percent of the 1911 Blue Whale population.

The Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) is believed to be the largest animal to have ever lived: even larger than the largest dinosaur. A member of the order Cetacea, the maximum recorded weight of a Blue Whale was 190 tonnes (209 tons) for a specimen measuring 30 m (100 ft) in length, while longer ones, up to 33.3 m (110 ft), have been recorded but not weighed.

Blue Whale populations have been severely depleted by whaling and approximately 360,000 Blue Whales are estimated to have been caught and killed in the Southern Hemisphere during the 20th century. Before whaling the largest population of Blue Whales was in the Antarctic, numbering between 202,000 and 311,000. A 2002 report estimated there were just 5,000 to 12,000 Blue Whales worldwide located in five or more groups. The Blue Whale population is generally accepted to have increased in recent years.

Source: Extreme Science, Wikipedia, New South Wales Government, The IUCN Red List

Obese Kids

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 14:30:00 +0000

#health - Up to 25 percent of all children in the United Kingdom will be obese by the year 2050, according to the British Heart Foundation (BHF). This will make it much more likely that children will become obese adults, and run a far greater risk of developing coronary heart disease, the UK’s biggest killer.

The BHF is urging the Government to take action, in particular to bring in tighter regulations in the marketing of ‘junk food’ to children.

Source: The Guardian, Food4Thought

2008 US Election Turnout

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 11:38:00 +0000

#politics - 2008's US presidential election saw the highest voter turnout since 1960, according to the Center for the Study of the American Electorate at American University.

According to the Center's research, African-American turnout was a major factor in turnout increase, while college-educated and college-resident youth turnout also increased and played a major role in Barack Obama’s victory.Turnout increased most in the South, where Obama made inroads thanks to a huge black turnout, of any region.

However, the surge in election turnout was an 'Obama phenomenon' and does not necessarily mean higher political engagement.

Source: Boston.com, Center for the Study of the American Electorate

Less Anemic

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:37:00 +0000

#health - 7 percent of women and 4 percent of children in the USA have anemia, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Results from a large, nationally representative trial, the National Health and Nutritional Examination Surveys (NHANES), indicate that anemia rates are in decline.

Results of the study were published in the December 2008 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Anemia is a condition in which there's a lower-than-normal number of red blood cells in the blood. Symptoms can include fatigue, chest pain and shortness of breath.

Source: Washington Post, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Richest Under 30

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 09:30:00 +0000

#music - R&B singer Beyonce Knowles has been named as the richest star under 30 - with an estimated $80 million (GBP55 million) in the bank.

The 27 year old star, topped the list of wealthy young celebrities compiled by Forbes magazine, just weeks after Knowles and her husband Jay-Z were named Hollywood's richest couple by the publication.

Pop superstar Justin Timberlake, 27, came second with earnings of $43 million (GBP30 million), followed closely by U.S. basketball player Kobe Bryant with $39 million (GBP26.8 million).

The top ten richest stars under 30 is as follows:

1. Beyonce Knowles - $80 million (GBP55 million)
2. Justin Timberlake - $43 million (GBP30 million)
3. Kobe Bryant - $39 million (GBP26.8 million)
4. LeBron James - $38 million (GBP26.1 million)
5. Roger Federer - $35.2 million (GBP24.1 million)
6. Keira Knightley - $32.2 million (GBP22.03 million)
7. Maria Sharapova - $26.1 million (GBP17.9 million)
8. Daniel Radcliffe - $25.1 million (GBP17.2 million)
9. Miley Cyrus - $25.1 million (GBP17.2 million)
10. Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen - $15 million (GBP10.3 million).

Source: Contact Music

Beedle

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 17:00:00 +0000

#books - The Tales of Beedle the Bard sold 367,625 copies in the first three days after publication on December 4, making it the UK's fastest-selling book of the year.

JK Rowling's latest Harry Potter spin-off sold almost five times as many copies in its first few days after publication as its nearest rival, Guinness World Records 2008, which sold 73,000 over the same time period, according to market analysts Nielsen BookScan.

The success of the 109-page collection of short stories, which Rowling did not originally intend for publication, underlines the powerful hold she continues to exert over readers – and the book industry. The Tales of Beedle the Bard is mentioned in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Source: The Telegraph

Largest Global Advertiser

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 15:39:00 +0000

#advertising - Procter & Gamble Co. ranked as the top advertiser in 2007, having spent almost $9.4 billion worldwide.

The maker of Tide, Olay and Pampers outspent Unilever, the second-highest advertiser, by almost two-to-one. Unilever spent $5.2 billion, according to a special publication by Advertising Age that ranks global marketers.

Just $3.7 billion of P&G’s ad budget is spent in U.S., according to AdAge, while $3.1 billion is spent in Europe.

L’Oreal ranked as the third-largest advertiser, with $3.4 billion, followed by General Motors, with $3.3 billion.

Source: Business Courier, AdAge

Gingerbread

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 13:31:00 +0000

#charity - More than 100 houses make up the world's largest Gingerbread Village, built in the lobby of the Prescott Resort in Prescott, Arizona, USA.

The annual Whimsical Village helps raise funds for Yavapai Big Brothers Big Sisters, which received donations last year via 'lot sales' and gingerbread men cookie decorating.

Source: The Prescott Resort

World Hunger

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 11:21:00 +0000

#food - The number of undernourished people in the world rose to 963 million in 2008, compared to 923 million in 2007 according to preliminary estimates published by FAO in December 2008. 40 million people have been pushed into hunger in 2008 primarily due to higher food prices and the ongoing financial and economic crisis could tip even more people into hunger and poverty during 2009.

Prices of major cereals have fallen by over 50 percent from their peaks earlier in 2008 but they remain high compared to previous years. With prices for seeds and fertilizers (and other inputs) more than doubling since 2006, poor farmers could not increase production. As a result, cereal production in developed countries is likely to rise by at least 10 percent in 2008. The increase in developing countries may not exceed even one percent.

The vast majority of the world's undernourished people - 907 million - live in developing countries, according to the 2007 data reported by the State of Food Insecurity in the World. Of these, 65 percent live in only seven countries: India, China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan and Ethiopia. In sub-Saharan Africa, one in three people - or 236 million (2007) - are chronically hungry, the highest proportion of undernourished people in the total population.

Source: Food & Agriculture Organisation

Mexico Mob Hits

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 16:00:00 +0000

#crime - Mexico saw 5,000 violent homicides during 2008.

Violence in early December 2008 resulted in 35 violent deaths in 24 hours, which took the number of deaths related to organized crime to more than five thousand. The violent murder rate in Mexico currently exceeds one death per hour.

From 22 October to 2 December 2008, ninety law enforcement persons have been murdered in Mexico. There have now been 7,882 assassinations linked to organized crime since President Calderon took office in December 2006.

Source: Right Side News

1,000 Cuppas A Day

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 14:20:00 +0000

#food - Kurush Bharucha tastes up to 1,000 cups of tea a day at Lipton's factory in the Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

Beginning his career in Kolkata, India, Bharucha has travelled the world to sample local harvest ands has worked for the Lipton tea brand for the past 23 years. Bharucha has memorised the flavours of almost every tea in the world. With one swirl around his super-sensitive taste buds, he can tell which country the tea originated from and which time of year it was harvested.

Source: Khaleej Times

North Korean Food Aid

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 10:47:00 +0000

#food - Nearly 40 percent of North Korea's population will need food assistance in 2009, according to United Nations food agencies, largely because of critical shortages of fertilizer and fuel.

The World Food Program and the Food and Agriculture Organization said food production was down again for the third year running, in a joint report that said 8.7 million people out of North Korean's total population of 23 million — or 38 percent — will need food assistance in the coming year.

Food assistance will be needed until the next harvest, in October 2009, the report by the two Rome-based U.N. agencies predicted.

The impoverished communist country has relied on foreign assistance to feed its people since natural disasters and mismanagement devastated its economy in the mid-1990s.

Source: Associated Press, World Food Program, Food & Agriculture Organisation

Viva La Vida

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 15:06:00 +0000

#music - Coldplay's “Viva La Vida” was listened to more than three million times by hundreds of thousands of Last.fm members during 2008 taking it to number one on the music streaming site's annual music survey.

“Viva La Vida”, which was only released in May 2008, was followed by Coldplay's "Violet Hill" in second place, whilst the album that both songs came from, "All His Friends", was the most listened to album amongst Last.fm's online membership. Last.fm recorded the plays of 650 songs every second of 2008 and 'scrobbled' the site's 25 million users to monitor their listening habits.

Source: Last.fm, CNET UK

Rarest Wolf

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:16:00 +0000

#animals - Less than 500 of the world's rarest wolves live on a handful of mountains in Ethiopia and are on the brink of extinction.

In its stronghold in the Bale Mountains National Park the Ethiopian wolf lives in close contact with the Oromo people, which places the wolf at great risk of catching the rabies virus from the dogs the Oromo use to herd livestock. A team of Oxford University and Ethiopian conservationists are currently battling to save the Ethiopian wolf from a rabies outbreak by creating a ‘barrier’ of vaccinated wolf packs.

Source: Science Daily

Santa Physics

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 11:00:00 +0000

#xmas - Santa would have to travel at 650 miles per second, visiting some 822.6 homes per second in order to complete his global Christmas gift run, according to calculations by physcisists.

Assuming that Santa Claus exists and that his reindeer and sleigh can actually fly, physcisists calculated that he would have to visit 91.8 million homes delivering presents to up to 378 million Christian children worldwide. By travelling East to West, Santa could take advantage of different time zones and thereby give himself 31 hours to deliver 321,200 tonnes of Christmas gifts. Despite travelling at 3,000 times the speed of sound, Santa would be on a tight schedule and have just 1/1000th of a second to park, slip down the chimney, fill the kids Christmas stockings, drink his glass of milk, eat his complimentary Christmas snack and get back in his sleigh.

Source: Spy Magazine, Snopes.com

Russian Panama Journey

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 08:49:00 +0000

#navy - A Russian warship used the Panama Canal on Friday 5 December 2008 for the first time since World War II, after taking part in joint Russian-Venezuelan maneuvers.

The anti-submarine ship "Admiral Chabanenko" entered the canal at the Caribbean port city of Colon late on 5th December evening and docked at the former US naval base of Rodman in Panama's capital on Saturday afternoon. It was the first time a Russian warship had entered the canal since 1944, when the waterway was under US control and Russia and the United States were allied in the anti-Nazi coalition.

The 169-meter (554-foot) Admiral Chabanenko, which carries out operations against piracy and international terrorism, belongs to Russia's Northern Fleet.

Deepest Oil Well

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 06:03:00 +0000

#oil - Shell Oil Company has drilled a subsea well 9,356 feet (1.77 miles) below the water’s surface in the Gulf of Mexico setting a world water depth record.

Located at the Perdido Development approximately 200 miles from Houston, the oil well is 35 percent deeper than the previous oil well record of 6,950 feet, also set by Shell at the Gulf of Mexico’s Fourier field. At Perdido, Shell intends to drill an even deeper well at the Tobago field at 9,627 feet, which will surpass its current world record.

The Perdido Development drill 35 wells (22 direct vertical access and 13 remote) in the Great White, Tobago and Silvertip fields located in Alaminos Canyon. Moored in about 8,000 feet of water, the drilling and production facility will be the deepest in the world. Nine polyester mooring lines averaging more than two miles in length now hold the spar in place. The floating structure will weigh 50,000-tons and be nearly as tall as the Eiffel Tower when fully operational.

Sources: Oil Voice

Malnutrition

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 01:00:00 +0000

#health - 300,000 children suffer from acute malnutrition annually in Somalia, according to UNICEF. Somalia has the highest levels of malnutrition in the world.

Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) rates of more than 20 percent have been reported, with the figure rising to 28 percent in some areas. GAM rates of 30 percent indicate a famine situation.

Although there are 220 therapeutic feeding centres across the country, more than 70 percent of the population lacks reliable access to safe water.

Source: UNICEF

Angelina

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:00:00 +0000

#entertainment - Oscar winner Angelina Jolie is 2008's highest paid actress, taking home a pay package of $15-20-million per movie, according to the annual rankings released by The Hollywood Reporter.

As usual, topping the trade papers' 17th Annual Power 100 list, Oprah Winfrey is easily entertainment industry's most influential woman. Claiming the No. 2 spot with $15 million for 'Duplicity' scheduled for a 2009 release, Oscar winner Julia Roberts, 41, returns after a long hiatus from the screen.

Reese Witherspoon, 32, last year's No. 1 and who won an Oscar for her role in 'Walk the Line', dropped to No. 3, earning $14-million for 'Four Christmases', the comedy that opened last week.

Source: Top News

Times Square LEDs

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 19:12:00 +0000

#advertising - New York's Time Square video screen uses 12 million LEDs (light-emitting diodes). The 16,000 sq ft. electronic billboard wraps around three sides of New York City's One Times Square building, stretches to a height of 340 ft and takes up about as much space as 60 regular-sized billboards.

Source: Design News

Christmas Trees

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 13:04:00 +0000

#xmas - 31.3 million real Christmas trees were sold in the USA in 2007 versus 17.4 million artificial trees, according to the National Christmas Tree Association.

The US$2.5 billion US Christmas tree industry is expected to sell roughly 48 million real and fake trees in 2008. Over 300,000 trees are sold via the Internet or mail order catalogs, about 21 percent of Christmas trees sold were from chain stores, 15 percent by non-profit groups, 13 percent from retail lots and 35 percent from choose and cut farms.

Christmas trees have been sold commercially in the United States since about 1850.

Source: National Christmas Tree Association

Rudolph

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 10:43:00 +0000

#xmas - "Rudolph," a show that debuted in 1964, was US fourth-rated TV program during the week it aired in December 2007. It finished behind only "CSI," "Grey's Anatomy" and "60 Minutes." The same month "A Charlie Brown Christmas," penned by the late Charles Schulz in 1965, was No. 1 in its time slot and proved to be the highest-rated broadcast of the year among children age 2-11.

TV classics of Christmas past still exert a powerful spell.

Source: Mercury News

Backstroke

noreply@blogger.com (Carrington) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 07:08:00 +0000

#sports - American swimmer Randall Bal swam 50 metres backstroke in 24.33 seconds breaking the men's world record at a meeting in Eindhoven on Saturday 6 December 2008.

The previous world record was set by Briton Liam Tancock at 24.47seconds set at the British Olympic trials in April 2008.

Source: AFP