Threat Matrix: Daily Terror Threat

nothing on the local news websites either.

Police release photos of missing sailors

(New Haven-WTNH, Aug. 17, 2004 1:22 PM) _ Police have now released pictures of two Turkish sailors who jumped ship in the New Haven Harbor last week.

Cakir Karaguz And Tayyar Gokbulut were deck hands aboard the Nazil G. Police say the two stole life vests and survival suits and went overboard.

Police and the Coast Guard searched the waters off New Haven Harbor Friday. Searchers found the vests, but still no sign of the two men.

It's no longer on IPN either.

The story just went away.

One of my sales reps lives right there on Catawba Island. I'm trying to get in touch with her right now. She has a sailboat and goes to Put-in-Bay almost every weekend. She hasn't reported off sick (yet) but I will see if I can get the local scoop.

Turkish guys overboard...update:

Police release photos of missing sailors
http://www.wtnh.com/Global/story.asp?S=2185319&nav=3YeXPxDS

Yes, it was a red duffle bag in the left lane, the posting
is gone now, it was #0321 on the list of accidents.

I noted that the bomb is cleaned up and the lanes open now.
when I checked.

This looks like an answer for your explosion the other morning. :)

- - - - - - -

Fiery meteor streaks across predawn Monday sky here

Published August 17, 2004

They're called bolides--flaming meteors that race across the sky at tremendous speed and explode. They aren't terribly common. Yet, such a meteor caught the attention of many around 1 a.m. Monday as it streaked above the Chicago area, initiating a sonic boom. The bolide was observed by an air traffic controller at O'Hare and by the pilots of incoming aircraft, according to FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory. Ground-based observers called police in Park Ridge, Norridge and Chicago to report the event. Area astronomers suggested the fiery meteor may have been part of the annual Perseids display, which peaked a week ago. But, it may also have been a piece of earthbound space junk or a "sporadic"--a single isolated meteor--added astronomer Dan Joyce, who says bolides can travel at speeds up to 150,000 m.p.h. 50-60 miles above earth, but slow and heat up as they enter the denser lower atmosphere.

Wow, any news reports on this? I knew it was close but not immediate area. It did sound above in the air, I contended that.

Tracing the path of a bomb suspect

By Paul Watson

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - A suspected Al-Qaida explosives expert being hunted for more than a year by the FBI met secretly in Pakistan last spring with one of the terrorist network's planners and a computer engineer, Pakistani officials said Monday.

The suspected bomb maker, described as an Arab, managed to slip out of Pakistan along with senior Al-Qaida member Abu Eisa al-Hindi after a March meeting with computer engineer and communications coordinator Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan in the city of Lahore, said Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan of the Pakistan military.

Investigators found surveillance reports on buildings in the United States and Britain on Khan's computers and dozens of disks. But nothing that Khan told interrogators suggested a new attack plan was discussed at the March meeting, Sultan said in an interview.

``They just met. That is it,'' he said.

The major general said he could not identify the suspected explosives expert or his nationality. Time magazine identified him Monday as Adnan el-Shukrijumah, 29.

More than a year ago, the U.S. State Department offered a reward of as much as $5 million for information leading to Shukrijumah's arrest. In March 2003, the FBI described him as having several Arab aliases and carrying a Guyanese passport, but who might try to enter the United States with a Saudi, Canadian or Trinidadian passport.

At the time, his father told reporters that Shukrijumah had left home in the United States three years earlier and was last heard from in Morocco, where he was working as a computer engineer.

Pakistani authorities don't know where the suspected Al-Qaida bomb maker headed after the March meeting in Lahore, the major general said.

``I don't think he is in Pakistan,'' Sultan said. ``He is at large. I can't say there was a flaw in security. He might have come under some cover. We don't know because it was a discreet meeting.''

Iran Warns Israel on Nuclear Facilities
VOA News

A senior Iranian military commander says Iran would destroy Israel's Dimona nuclear reactor, if the Jewish state were to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.

Iran's first nuclear power station, at Bushehr on the Persian Gulf coast, is scheduled to begin operating next year.

Israel has not directly threatened to attack the facility. But the United States says it suspects Iran is secretly building nuclear weapons, and Israel says it will not allow Tehran to have a nuclear bomb.

Iran insists its nuclear program is for generating electricity and other peaceful uses.

Israel has never confirmed or denied having a nuclear arsenal. But its reactor at Dimona is widely believed to be the source of plutonium used to build as many as 200 nuclear warheads.

Oooops. Sorry about duplicating the sailor post.

Sky puts on a loud light show (Tribune photo by Alex Fledderjohn)
August 17, 2004

Starstruck

Did you see or hear the purported meteor early Monday?
Yes
No
{ Well, I have proof because I posted it here and logged the time HA!}

Sky puts on a loud light show
Blue-green glow and booming noises are thought to be from a meteor

By M. Daniel Gibbard
Tribune staff reporter
Published August 17, 2004

An object believed to be a meteor brought a fireworks show to the area early Monday, lighting the night and causing sonic booms that had some people marveling over the wonders of nature and others scrambling to call 911.

The bright lights and noise arrived just after 1 a.m. and were especially prominent in the west and northwest parts of Chicago and the suburbs, police said.

Meteor showers are common, especially during the annual Perseid showers this month, but this was different, experts said.

"Any time you hear a meteor, it's rare because that typically means the meteor didn't disintegrate until it got close to the ground," said Bart Benjamin, director of the Cernan Earth and Space Center at Triton College in River Grove. "It has to penetrate very deeply into the atmosphere."

In Buffalo Grove, Gary Franchi Jr., 27, was hanging out with friends in his back yard in the 100 block of Forest Place when something streaked across the sky, bathing everything in blue-green light.

"I've seen shooting stars before, but this was something else," Franchi said. "It was amazing. It lit up the entire back yard."

The fireball broke into three pieces and flamed out, he said. Shortly afterward, there were several loud booms.

"It was distinct. It was very deep, like a bass," he said.

Don Kunde of Northbrook was stargazing in his back yard when he saw it.

"This thing was huge. I thought it was a plane on fire for a second," he said. "It was hundreds of times the size of a shooting star."

The sound and light brought calls to 911, said Penny Mateck, a spokeswoman for Cook County sheriff's police.

Calls came from Leyden, Norwood and Elk Grove Townships, she said.

Norridge police also received calls, said Chief Charles Ghiloni.

"We responded with squad cars and ambulances, but there was nothing located," Ghiloni said.

Monday's meteor event was no match for one that hit the south suburbs in March 2003, but it is relatively rare to have two so visible incidents in a short period of time, said Mark Hammergren, an astronomer at the Adler Planetarium.

"From any one location you might expect something this bright every few years, maybe every five or 10 years," he said.

In the 2003 incident, the sky blazed with light seen from Wisconsin to Ohio when a large meteor hit the atmosphere and exploded.

Chunks of space rock rained down on Park Forest and Olympia Fields, knocking holes in roofs and leaving chunks of ancient debris for collectors to pick up. Some of the meteorites weighed several pounds, and one is on display at the planetarium.

Those finds, too, are rare, Hammergren said, and it could be why astronomers have not heard any reports of specimens this time.

"Most often, the object coming in burns up," he said.

Also, from the reports the planetarium received of the meteor's position, it is quite possible that any rock that survived would have ended up in Lake Michigan, he said.

Without physical evidence, it can be hard to tell exactly what people saw, but astronomers have received numerous calls and e-mails about lights and noise in the early morning, so they are fairly certain it was a meteor, he said.

The reports of loud noises also point toward the heavens.

"If there were sonic booms, that's a good sign there were meteorites dropped," Hammergren said.

There is also the chance that the object was not a rock but a piece of space junk, Benjamin said.

"[We have had] no reports of anything we know of falling to the ground, but there's lots of pieces of spacecraft up there, and not all of them are American," he said.

In Waukegan, authorities had a more earthly explanation for some bright lights residents reported overnight.

"We think it has something to do with the Batman movie that's being filmed downtown," said Cmdr. Dan Greathouse.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0408170289aug17,1,2309587.story?coll=chi-newslocal-hed&vote13857407=1

Pakistan claims Bin Laden trail still cold
Daily Times

[Excerpt]

LAHORE: Despite a surge in arrests of Al Qaeda suspects, investigators still had not found the trail of their main target, Osama Bin Laden, Los Angeles Times quoted a senior Pakistani anti-terrorism official as saying on Monday.

The paper reported that Brig Javed Iqbal Cheema, head of the National Crisis Management Cell at the Interior Ministry, said during an interview last week, "You can only be sure you're closing in on someone when you at least have a hint of his whereabouts. With regard to Osama Bin Laden, I would say that we are not getting any substantial leads as yet."

According to the report, Cheema said Pakistan was "working hand in glove with the US government" in a search that had captured more than a dozen suspects in the last two weeks. Moreover, Pakistani intelligence sources say FBI agents are playing a crucial role in tracking suspects by intercepting cell phone calls and other actions, the paper said.

One source familiar with the investigation said Washington had stepped up pressure on Pakistani authorities to turn their latest leads into the capture of more high-level targets before the US presidential election in November.

Another source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said "The next month and a half is absolutely crucial. The way the Americans are pressuring Pakistan, they want Osama Bin Laden", the report states.

Bush administration officials have denied US media reports that the United States was pressuring Pakistan to capture or kill Bin Laden and other Al Qaeda fugitives before the election.

yes you did . . .

no problemo. :)

U.K.'s Blair, Italy's Berlusconi Call for End of Najaf Fighting
Bloomberg News

Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) -- U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair and Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi called on Iraq's new government to work toward a political solution to end fighting in the Muslim holy city of Najaf.

Supporters of the Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr are battling U.S.-led forces in the region. The British and Italian leaders met in Sardinia, Italy, where Blair and his wife Cherie are visiting Berlusconi's residence, Villa Certosa.

``They expressed hopes for a successful national conference in Iraq and a resolution for the situation in Najaf,'' said a statement released by Blair's office in London. ``They are both committed to a peaceful and democratic future for the Iraqi people and the protection of holy sites.''

The two also condemned the ``massacre'' of refugees in Burundi and expressed concern about the treatment of refugees in the Darfur region of Sudan, where at least 10,000 people have died after militias rebelled against government forces.

ON THE NET...

http://phil.ist-backup.de/rncelectronic/
http://phil.ist-backup.de/rncelectronic/images/logo.jpg

http://www.anarco-nyc.net/
http://www.anarco-nyc.net/anarchistpanther.html

http://www.chicagonewyork.net/
http://chicagonewyork.net/images/header.gif
http://www.chicagonewyork.net/callouts/ravage.php

http://www.liteupbush.com/

http://www.counterconvention.org/

http://www.riseup.net/
http://lists.riseup.net/www/info/rnc-da

http://www.visualresistance.org/gallery.htm

http://www.infoshop.org
http://www.infoshop.org/gulag/stories.php

Thanks much for the update.

Thank you Ian, Skilling is da bomb ;)

And just think my kids think I'm paranoid, dillusional and HA have two articles now to prove to them, yes , I am sane and can even feel a 3.0 shaker ;)