Free Republic

Paris (AFP) - A rapidly melting glacier atop East Antarctica is on track to lift oceans at least two metres, and could soon pass a "tipping point" of no return, researchers said Wednesday. To date, scientists have mostly worried about the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets as dangerous drivers of sea level rise. But the new study, following up on earlier work by the same team, has identified a third major threat to hundreds of millions of people living in coastal areas around the world. "I predict that before the end of the century the great global cities of...

Man treads on ant nest, falls 100mOctober 21, 2003A MAN who got out of his car to answer a call of nature ended up injured and stranded when he stepped on an ants' nest and fell down a 100 metre slope. The hapless motorist's ordeal began when he stopped beside the road in the Lamington National Park, on the Gold Coast hinterland, around midnight last night, police said. He first stood on a nest of meat ants, which swarmed out and began biting him. As the man scrambled away from the nest he lost his footing and tumbled 100 metres...