Free Republic

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ADVISORY -- the California wildfires by Scott Jordan Some quick googling results in an estimation of on the order of 10-12 tons of fuel per acre of chaparral such as that burning in California; see, for example, http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/rogue-siskiyou/biscuit-fire/feis/46-appendix-b1-fire-behavior-fuel-model-descriptions.pdf and http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/pnw_rp486.pdf. The latter link provides some nice measures of CO2 emissions when this stuff burns: around 3200 pounds of CO2 per ton, varying with burn intensity and so forth. So when an acre burns, it produced on the order of 38,000 pounds of CO2. About 500,000 acres of California have burned according to the latest news reports on http://news.google.com....

CBS) LOS ANGELES A 70-year-old Tarzana man riding a bicycle Wednesday was struck and killed by an SUV, authorities said. Joseph Miller was riding in the 3500 block of Reseda Boulevard shortly before 9 a.m. when he was struck by an SUV driven by a woman who was uninjured, according to city fire official Brian Humphrey and Capt. Ed Winter of the county coroner's office. The circumstances of the death were under investigation.

More than two dozen of Jason Ray's family and close friends were at his hospital bedside Sunday, holding a vigil as the University of North Carolina mascot lay gravely injured after being hit by an SUV. The 21-year-old senior remained on life support and in extremely critical condition Sunday, two days after he was run down near his hotel in Fort Lee. Ray, who suited up as UNC's ram mascot, Rameses, was in New Jersey for the NCAA men's basketball tournament, a portion of which is being played at the Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford. Ray's father, Emmitt, who...

Seeing Demonic Grins, Glaring Eyes? Auto Makers Add Edge to Car 'Faces'; Say Goodbye to the Wide-Eyed Neon Kirk Perry wanted a vehicle that would haul his family and tow a bass boat. He discovered an SUV with all that plus another feature he likes -- a really mean expression. "I like the wide, snarling look," the 50-year-old small-business owner in Lake Owassa, N.J., says of the Audi Q7, which he plans to buy when it comes out this spring. "It reminds me of the movie 'The Mummy' -- when the monster comes out of the ground and starts swallowing...

Don't look now, but the next time the arrow on your gas gauge hovers near the ominous letter E, your wallet may have the privilege of making history at the pump. Gas prices on Martha’s Vineyard topped $3 per gallon this weekend. (Staff photo by Tim Correira) For the first time in Bay State history, gas prices have soared above the astronomical $3 mark - at gas stations on Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. "I think I'll get a moped," said Nantucket resident Edward Hickey, 77, who will shell out $94.50 the next time he fills the 30-gallon tank on his...

Safety Campaign Turns SUVs Into Big, Hairy Beasts POSTED: 1:32 pm EST January 31, 2005 Picture your SUV as a hairy, growling beast -- something of a cross between a buffalo and something from the Star Wars movies. A new safety campaign launched Monday by governments from all 50 states wants you to picture the big vehicles as a creature known as Esuvee. The monster is meant to remind people that driving a sport utility vehicle as if it were an ordinary passenger car can be fatal, according to a media release. In 2000, rollover crashes killed 9,873 occupants of...

Aaron Carter Drives Over Mattress, Escapes SUV Moments Before Flames Erupt 01.07.2005 9:51 AM EST Singer and his passenger treated for minor bumps and bruises. Aaron Carter emerged unscathed from an accident late Wednesday night when he hit a mattress with his SUV, causing the vehicle to burst into flames. The singer, 17, was driving his 2004 Cadillac Escalade on Florida's Turnpike, north toward Orlando, at around 12:30 a.m. when a mattress fell from the cargo bed of a delivery truck ahead of him, according to his spokesperson. Carter drove over the mattress, which became lodged under the SUV and...

One person is dead after an SUV fleeing from state troopers headed the wrong way across the Howard Frankland Bridge and crashed into oncoming traffic early this morning. Investigators say that a Honda CRV was involved in a minor fender-bender in the Kennedy-Westshore area around 1:40 a.m., but when troopers arrived on the scene, the vehicle took off, striking a trooper in the process. "The gentleman in the vehicle refused all FHP trooper commands to stop and step out of the vehicle, backed his car into two FHP patrol cars, and struck Trooper Maddox with the Florida Highway Patrol's Tampa...

-- A federal judge refused Monday to toss out a charge that could lead to a minimum 30-year prison term for a Caltech grad student implicated in a multimillion-dollar "eco-arson" spree at SUV dealerships. William Jensen Cottrell, 24, is charged with arson, conspiracy to commit arson and the use of a destructive device in a violent crime. The latter charge carries a mandatory minimum of 30 years in federal prison if Cottrell is convicted -- far longer than he would face if convicted only of the other charges. The defense employed a number of legal arguments to try to persuade...

A Caltech graduate physics student pleaded innocent today to firebombing and vandalizing more than 100 sports utility vehicles in a suspected protest attack by a radical environmentalist movement against the gas-guzzling vehicles. William Cottrell, 23, a graduate student at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., pleaded not guilty to the charges laid out in a nine-count indictment. Cottrell could face more than 30 years in prison if he is convicted. According to the indictment, Cottrell and "other known and unknown co-conspirators" went on a spree of firebombing and vandalizing sports utility vehicles in the Los Angeles area in...

(Mecosta Township, February 13, 2004, 2:29 p.m.) Police are searching for a stolen SUV whose driver they say may be involved with the rape and kidnapping of a 16-year-old girl in Mecosta County. Police tell 24 Hour News 8 the teenager was abducted last Friday while walking home from school in Big Rapids. Officers think the suspect took the girl to an empty summer home, broke into the house, and assaulted her. A Colfax Township resident found the girl tied up in the snow off a roadside embankment. Police are looking for a 1997 Jeep Grand Cherokee that was stolen...

<p>The last of three recent Douglas Freeman High School graduates pleaded guilty yesterday to a federal conspiracy charge for vandalism against construction sites, fast-food restaurants and sport utility vehicles parked in western Henrico County.</p> <p>John Burton Wade, 18, pleaded guilty yesterday morning in U.S. District Court. Virden Blackwell, 20, pleaded guilty Dec. 18, and Aaron Labe Linas, 18, pleaded guilty Wednesday.</p>