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BOCA GRANDE - A shark bit an Austrian tourist on the ankle Friday as the man stood in chest-deep water in the Gulf of Mexico, days after one tourist was killed and another was seriously injured by sharks elsewhere in the state, authorities said. Armin Projer, 19, was upright in the water when he was bitten, said Lee County sheriff's spokeswoman Ileana LiMarzi. He was airlifted by helicopter to Lee Memorial Hospital in Fort Myers, where he was in good condition, hospital spokeswoman Pat Dolce said. "It is a confirmed shark attack,'' LiMarzi said. "Someone else in the water saw...

An unidentified resident in the town of Batabano reinforces the roof of his house... MIAMI - A tropical storm watch was issued Friday for central Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle, where residents are still recovering from last year's hurricanes. Arlene, the Atlantic hurricane season's first named tropical storm, was centered about 10 miles south-southeast of the western tip of Cuba at 5 a.m. EDT. It was moving north about 8 mph, and could cross near or over western Cuba as it moved into the Gulf of Mexico early Friday, forecasters said. Wind and rain extended 140 miles to the north...

Editor's note: Following is a transcript from Thursday's roundtable discussion involving Sen. John Edwards, the Democratic vice presidential candidate, and a group of Lee Enterprises editors and executives who met for about 45 minutes in Davenport. Quad-City Times Publisher Michael Phelps: My question is on the draft vs. the all-volunteer armed forces. Those fighting and dying and shedding blood and limbs in the war now are largely are not coming from families of congressmen, corporate executives or academics, rather from those motivated by patriotism, along with work, health card and education benefits. Would the best test of the nation's resolve...

Ivan strikes Cuba directly The Ivan cyclone finally directly struck Cuba while passing the peninsula of Guanahacabibes, in the extreme west of the island, announced Monday evening the cuban weather services. "the face of the eye of Ivan touched ground in Cuba with the course of San Antonio", in the peninsula of Guanahacabibes, with 18H45 local (22H45 GMT), announced with television the head of the forecasts of the cuban Institute of meteorology, José Rubiera.

000 WTNT34 KNHC 050837 TCPAT4 BULLETIN HURRICANE IVAN ADVISORY NUMBER 11 NWS TPC/NATIONAL HURRICANE CENTER MIAMI FL 5 AM AST SUN SEP 05 2004 ...IVAN BECOMES THE FIFTH HURRICANE OF THE 2004 SEASON... INTERESTS IN THE LESSER ANTILLES SHOULD MONITOR THE PROGRESS OF IVAN. AT 5 AM AST...0900Z...THE CENTER OF HURRICANE IVAN WAS LOCATED NEAR LATITUDE 9.7 NORTH...LONGITUDE 44.3 WEST OR ABOUT 1210 MILES... 1950 KM...EAST-SOUTHEAST OF THE LESSER ANTILLES. IVAN IS MOVING TOWARD THE WEST NEAR 21 MPH...33 KM/HR. A GRADUAL TURN TOWARD THE WEST-NORTHWEST IS EXPECTED DURING THE NEXT 24 HOURS. MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS HAVE INCREASED TO...

Coast Guard searching for missing helicopter in Gulf 09:59 AM CST on Wednesday, March 24, 2004 Associated Press HOUSTON - The U.S. Coast Guard was searching the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday for a missing helicopter that had 10 people aboard. The chartered helicopter was en route from Galveston to an oil exploration ship about 130 miles east of South Padre Island. The helicopter's last radio transmission came from the pilot just after 7 p.m. Tuesday when it was about 90 miles south of Galveston. "We are hoping that something went wrong and they maybe...

GALVESTON -- It must have seemed like deja vu Sunday to Galveston County Commissioner Eddie Janek to find police dragging another dismembered body from Galveston Bay near his island home. Two years ago, the discovery of 71-year-old Morris Black's hacked-up torso and limbs in the same area led to a murder trial that involved one of the richest men in America and focused a national spotlight on this island resort city. Janek was amazed at the coincidence of a headless torso being found just weeks after a jury acquitted New York millionaire Robert Durst of murder in Black's death. Later...

Thirty-three miles west-southwest of John's Pass, in a part of the Gulf of Mexico where the water is more than 100 feet deep, a Madeira Beach company wants to start a farm. The crop: fish. The company's plan calls for raising thousands of cobia, amberjack and other species in conical net cages anchored to the sandy bottom. Once the fish are big enough, they would be sold to seafood companies. If Florida Offshore Aquaculture gets federal permits for a two-year experiment, the company's founders will establish the first fish farm ever attempted off Florida's coast, and one of the first...

By LYNN BREZOSKY, Associated Press Writer SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas - A hurricane watch was posted Sunday along the South Texas coast as Tropical Storm Claudette crawled across the Gulf of Mexico. Campers packed up and left low-lying South Padre Island and the Coast Guard helped rescue swimmers caught in strong currents. AP Photo (AP Video)   The projected path would bring the storm across Padre Island with landfall Tuesday afternoon north of Brownsville, said Jim Campbell, a forecaster in the National Weather Service (news - web sites) office in Brownsville. A hurricane watch was in effect along the Texas...

Statement as of 10:00 PM CDT on June 29, 2003 ...Bill moving northward and getting a little better organized... at 10 PM CDT...0300z...a Hurricane Watch has been issued from Intracoastal City Louisiana eastward to Morgan City Louisiana. A Hurricane Watch means that hurricane conditions are possible in the watch area within the next 36 hours. A Tropical Storm Warning remains in effect from east of High Island Texas to Pascagoula Mississippi. A Tropical Storm Warning means that tropical storm conditions are expected in the warning area within the next 24 hours. At 10 PM CDT...0300z...the center of Tropical Storm Bill...

This is the second storm of the season, following the extremely rare April tropical storm Ana. TROPICAL STORM ANA LIVE THREAD: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/898165/posts Post news articles, NHC bulletins, watches, warnings, hype, and speculation here. Forecasts currently indicate a landfall between Brownsville and Gulfport within 2 days, followed by a turn to the east. It probably will strengthen before landfall, possibly into a minimal hurricane. More probable landfall between Port Lavaca, Texas and Jennings, Louisiana. Tropical storm watch from San Luis Pass, Texas to Morgan City, Louisiana. Cities most likely to be affected include Houston, Beaumont, Port Arthur, Texas City, The Woodlands,...

<p>The Gulf of Mexico is the most troubled of the nation's deteriorating coastal regions, and much of the blame lies in Louisiana waters, according to a new Environmental Protection Agency report.</p> <p>Gulf problems include wetlands loss, contamination of commercial fish by toxic materials, areas of water where dangerously low levels of oxygen threaten organisms, and bottom sediments that are contaminated with toxics, the National Coastal Condition Report says.</p>

Divers find evidence of black water's devastation Monday, April 1, 2002 By CATHY ZOLLO, crzollo@naplesnews.com Dead and dying sponges crumbled in Ken Nedimyer's hand as he made his way along the bottom of the Northwest Channel off Key West last week. Slow-growing brain corals like this one were the hardest hit of the corals by the black water. This one in the Northwest Channel off the Keys has been dead about a week and just after the black water's movement into the area. Brain coral grows about a centimeter a year. Courtesy Ken Nedimyer Nearby, brain corals had recently died...