View from a Rhino House: gun crime

On Saturday evening a 107-year-old man was killed in a shootout with a police SWAT team, after he waved a gun at two people in the US state of Arkansas.

Earlier on Saturday afternoon the police were called to a home in the city of Pine Bluff (population about 48.000) following reports that Monroe Isadore, was waving a gun at 2 (unidentified) people.

The pair (who were not being held hostage) left the immediate scene of the incident safely before police tried to arrest Mr Isadore, who was locked inside a bedroom. The police then attempted to speak with Mr Isadore who fired a number of shots through the door, according to the police report.

No officers were struck by the unaimed shots, & police called for backup, including a SWAT (Special Weapons & Tactics) team.

As part of their attempts to persuade Mr Isadore to come-out they then released gas into the room & forced open the door. Mr Isadore began shooting & officers returned fire, killing him.

No-one was injured in the incident except a possibly confused 107-year old man.

Anything I could add would be spurious in the extreme.

The guilty party.... — The guilty party….

Poor puss

From the seriously deranged people at Cyanide & Happiness.

View from a Rhino House: collective security beneath the waves

When a vicious killer seaweed touches a particular kind of spiky coral, the coral “sounds” a chemical siren that brings small reef-resident fish to the rescue.

Without a some sort of control, seaweed & algae can overrun a coral reef, as the polyp community dwindles in “a descent into slime,” says marine ecologist Mark Hay of the Georgia Institute of Technology. But within less than 15 minutes of contact with a toxin-making seaweed, an Acropora nasuta coral releases chemical compounds that prompt goby fish to seek out and eat-back back the seaweed, Hay & colleague Danielle Dixson reported in the issue of Science released on 9th November.

In reefs, corals & the seaweed algae that form lawns or shrubby thickets compete for light & space. As coral reefs reduce in size as a result of pollution, overfishing, climate change & other problems, biologists have seen swathes of seaweed take over. Rich seaweed intrusions repel or smother larval corals, accelerating what Hay calls the reef “death spiral.”

In this scenario, corals dwindle, & fish & other reef creatures find fewer safe coral-caves & valleys to live in. The reef then has fewer algae-eating fish, which means even less protection for the habitat-maker corals that support other co-operating forms of aquatic life. “Without these,” Hay says, “you have these algae-covered parking lots & not much else.”