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Hospitals declare "code red" in Wellington, New Zealand Hospitals have declared "code red" in Wellington, New Zealand. They are unable to accept patients due to a lack of nurses. US Senate says no to pullout of US troops from Iraq The U.S. Senate voted on the pullout of troops from Iraq, but the amendment fell 8 votes to pass bill.

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Skull study confirms humans originated in Africa A genetic study by U.K. scientists performed on 6,000 skulls from around the around the world, reveals that the origin of mankind lies in southeastern Africa.

Wikipedia Current Events
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above 14,000 points for the first time in history, partly as a result of a good earnings report from IBM. The largest Viking treasure discovery in the United Kingdom since the nineteenth century made near Harrogate in northern England is announced. Suspected Somali insurgents target a peace meeting with mortar fire but accidentally kill six children. A federal judge dismisses a case brought by Valerie Plame against members of the Bush Administration in connection with the Plame affair. Death toll in the Mumbai building collapse rises to 26 as rescue operations continues. Russia expels four British diplomats in the ongoing row over the extradition of Andrei Lugovoi for the suspected murder of Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko. A report commissioned by the Solomon Islands Government is critical of the handling of last year's Honiara riots by the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands (RAMSI). Iraq's main Sunni political block, the Accordance Front, agrees to end its boycott of the Shi'ite dominated parliament. Heritage Oil and Gas finds a petroleum deposit in Uganda. HOG estimates the deposit contains several billions of barrels of oil, the largest find in Africa in over a decade. Japanese media reports claim that the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant will remain closed for at least a year following the 2007 Chūetsu offshore earthquake. Three bombs in Pakistan kill at least 52 people with at least 160 people killed in bomb attacks since the storming of the Lal Masjid mosque.

Web browser Firefox threatens dominance of Internet Explorer in Europe
The French web survey provider XiTiMonitor reports that in their study conducted from Monday, July 2 to Sunday, July 8, 2007 on 95'827 websites, web browser Mozilla Firefox reached a 27.8% share in Europe, compared to 21.1% during the same period last year.

Firefox has its biggest market share in Slovenia and Finland where it amounts to 47.9% and 45.4%, respectively, while only 14.6% of people from the Netherlands and 15.2% of surfers in Denmark used Firefox in this survey. The share rose most in Ireland: from 24.9% to 38.6% (i.e. +13.7 points).

Microsoft's web browser Internet Explorer remains the most popular browser in Europe with a market share of 66.5%. Opera and Safari have a 3.5% and 1.7% share respectively, with other browsers at less than 1%.

Oceania remains the region with the highest usage of the freely licensed and open source software browser Firefox, with 28.9%. The continent with the strongest relative increase in market share is South America, where there is a 30% increase compared to last March. Numbers from the U.S. based company Net Applications Inc. last month showed a fall in Firefox's share from 15.42% in April to 14.54%.

After F1 test, Bourdais hopes to return to winning form in Edmonton
Fresh off his three-day test for Scuderia Toro Rosso at Spa-Francorchamps, three-time Champ Car World Series Champion Sebastien Bourdais is hoping to return to his championship form at this weekend’s Rexall Grand Prix of Edmonton.

Frenchman Bourdais, born and raised in Le Mans, home to one of motorsport’s Crown Jewels, The 24 Hours of Le Mans, has long aspired to driving in Formula One, considered by many to be the pinnacle of racing, and his solid test results may have brought him one step closer to landing a seat with Toro Rosso for 2008.

Bourdais’ error-free test and respectable 8th fastest time earned team co-owner Gerhard Berger’s approval who noted "Bourdais has done everything right, which is exactly what we expected of him. He has exactly the right attitude for the job."

Scuderia Toro Rosso is part of the Red Bull stable, and is considered the ‘junior team’ to Red Bull Sports Drink billionaire owner Dietrich Mateschitz’ primary Red Bull Racing F1 team. They recently picked up an option on Bourdais for 2008, an encouraging sign that the Frenchman may finally achieve his life-long goal of driving in F1.

Back in North America, Bourdais readies himself for the Rexall Grand Prix of Edmonton, in the unusual position of being third in points standings. Three DNF’s, stronger competition, and the parity that the new Panoz DP01 has brought to the series after the years of development that Bourdais’ team, Newman/Haas/Lanigan lavished on the previous Lola chassis had given them an on-track advantage, has resulted in Bourdais scrambling to claim his fourth consecutive title and the accompanying Vanderbilt Cup, before presumably heading off to F1.

Dow Jones Industrial closes above 14,000 for first time ever
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), The United States main stock market on Wall Street, has broken an all-time closing record, to close at 14,000.41 points which is up 82.19 points from its last close.

This is the first time the DJIA has ever closed above 14,000. The Dow Jones began its debut on May 26, 1896.

Russia expels four UK diplomats
Russia has today expelled four UK diplomats in the ever escalating row over the extradition of Andrei Lugovoi, the chief suspect in the murder of former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko who was poisoned with Polonium 210 in London, November 2006.

This move by Russia follows the expulsion of four Russian diplomats, three days ago, by the UK and Russia says that the UK officials must leave within ten days and that they will review all visa applications for UK officials.

UK Foreign Secretary David Milliband said he was "disappointed" by the "completely unjustified move". However Russian President Vladamir Putin said that he thought both countries could settle the "mini-crisis".

Documents show Fred Thompson worked for Pro-Choice group
Billing records uncovered by the New York Times show that Fred Thompson was paid for about 20 hours of work as a Washington, DC lobbyist on behalf of a group to ease restrictive federal rules on abortion counseling in the 1990s. Recently Thompson "flatly denied" the charge and said he "did not recall doing any work for the organization."

The records show that Thompson worked part-time from 1991 to 1994 for the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, and earned about $5,000 for work he did in 1991 and 1992.

Skull study confirms humans originated in Africa
Scientists from the United Kingdom have revealed, in a genetic study performed on 6,000 skulls from ancient male humans from around the world, that the origin of mankind as we know it began in southeastern Africa, which scientists refer to as "The Cradle of Man".

"We have combined our genetic data with new measurements of a large sample of skulls to show definitively that modern humans originated from a single area in Sub-Saharan Africa," said Andrea Manica, one of the researchers at the Department of Zoology of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England.

Skulls vary in size and shape as humans began to spread out from the African continent, and the scientists compared those characteristics to those of later humans along with their DNA.

Manica says that this does not confirm suspicions that humans eventually bred with Neanderthals, but that "whatever the product of that mating was, it didn't breed back into the population."

Some scientists disagree with the study, calling it "mistaken".

"You can't find the origin of people by measuring the variability of their skulls. The main problem with the paper is that it takes some assumptions from genetics papers of 10 to 15 years ago that we now know are wrong. Africa is ecologically diverse, and cranial variation is a function of environments. The most important feature that is related to climate is skull size. So by correcting for climate, they are subtracting a major component of variability," said John Hawks, a researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Much more information about the history of human revolution and useful reference can be found at Wikipedia's "human" page.

The oldest skull believed to have been tested was at least 40,000 years old.

Tour de France: Robbie Hunter wins stage 11
Robbie Hunter of South Africa has won stage 11 of the 2007 Tour de France. Hunter edged out Fabian Cancellara and Murilo Fischer in a tight sprint.

Michael Rasmussen of Denmark retained the overall lead finishing the stage with the first peleton. The biggest change in the chase for the yellow jersey was Christophe Moreau losing more than three minutes on the leaders and dropping out of the top ten.

For a good portion of the stage, Wegmann, Florencio, Gilbert, Millar and Fofonov had the lead. The five-man breakaway group was gobbled up by the peleton. With 30 km to go the peleton split into two clearly defined main groups with about 1:40 seperating them. The gap grew to two full minutes with 20 km to go. The second peleton finished 3:17 behind Hunter's time.

The 182.5 km stage 11, from Marseille to Montpellier, is the first of two transition stages between the Alps and the Pyrenees, with no major climbs.

In the wake of the doping test of Patrik Sinkewitz, German networks ZDF and ARD ended their live coverage of the Tour. In response, Tour organizers, Amaury Sport Organisation, signed deals with Sat.1 and ProSieben, so that German fans can continue to watch.

"With the agreement of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) a replacement solution has been found. We have leased the TV rights to Sat.1 and ProSieben," Yann Le Moenner of ASO told Reuters.

Wreckage of gas tanker removed after crash onto railway line in County Durham, England
A gas tanker which crashed onto a preserved railway line in Wolsingham, County Durham in the north of England has been removed. Yesterday, the vehicle fell 70 feet from a road bridge onto the Weardale Railway below and left the driver with serious injuries from which he later died in hospital.

The driver of the Calor Gas vehicle has been named as Peter Williams who was 25 and from the Darlington area.

The tanker was said to be carrying 13,000 litres of liquefied petroleum gas at the time of the accident and nearby homes were evacuated due to fears the gas may leak from the vehicle.

Chris Hockaday, from County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service described the operation to empty the tanker of gas and remove it from the scene, saying, "The decanting finished at about 10pm and the tanker was then dragged along the track by a tractor, where it was lifted onto another vehicle by the specialist recovery company. It was then moved to a secure site for examination. The authorities left the scene at about midnight. Before decanting the gas we had to right the vehicle, something which had to be done under great control in an operation which took about two hours."

The Weardale Railway, which operates over a five mile section of restored track between Stanhope and Wolsingham, remains closed, however the company were optimistic about resuming services on the line.

Managing director of the Weardale Railway, Steve Raine, said "The tanker was moved late last night so we haven't yet been able to properly examine the track. However, the damage appears to be quite light and we're hoping we can get that fixed today." He said that services were most likely to resume this Saturday.

Hospitals declare "code red" in Wellington, New Zealand

The Capital & Coast District Health Board today issued a "code red" for two Wellington hospitals. Both Wellington Hospital and Kenepuru Community Hospital have a staff shortage of about 20 nurses, and the hospital is calling on "any qualified nurses in the community who are between jobs, are on extended leave or are semi-retired, who might be able to help fill in, or to do some short term work for us", according to Dr Robyn Toomath, a director of clinical support services at the Health Board.

"As of today we are around 20 nurses down compared to our usual staffing levels, primarily due to illness" said Dr Toomath. "We have physical beds available, but we can't admit patients unless there are appropriate levels of staff to safely resource those beds."

The message to the general public was to "please save our Emergency Department for emergencies", she said. "We want to be able to focus our Emergency Department resources on patients who genuinely need hospital-level care."

Any qualified nurses who are willing to help at either of the two hospitals should contact Steve Crew in the Patient Services Coordination Unit, at the Capital and Coast District Health Board.

Today in History
1402 – Forces under Timur defeated the Ottomans in the Battle of Ankara and captured Sultan Bayezid I.

1866 – Third Italian War of Independence: The Austrian Navy led by Wilhelm von Tegetthoff defeated a much larger Italian fleet in the Battle of Lissa.

1940 – Billboard magazine published its first "Music Popularity Chart".

1944 – Adolf Hitler survived an assassination attempt by German Resistance member Claus von Stauffenberg, who placed a bomb hidden inside a briefcase during a conference at the Wolfsschanze military headquarters in East Prussia.

1969 – The Apollo 11 lunar module landed on the Sea of Tranquillity, where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would become the first men to walk on the moon six and a half hours later.

July 20 is Independence Day in Colombia (1810); Friends' Day in Argentina and other Latin American countries.

Quote of the Day

People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things. ~ Sir Edmund Hillary

Word of the Day

surfeit; n

An excessive amount of something.

Overindulgence in either food or drink; overeating.

A sickness or condition caused by overindulgence.

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