Losing The Amazon

The Independent - 20 may 2005

400,000 The number of landless peasants in Brazil.

750 The number of tree species in a 16 sq mile slice of Amazon forest. In the same area there are also 125 species of mammals, 400 species of birds and 100 species of reptiles.

4 billion The tonnage of wood the paper industry will be consuming annually by 2020 if it keeps up its current rate of production.

5,600 The acreage of rainforest destroyed to establish one pulpwood plant, which then consumes 2,000 tons of wood every day producing the electricity needed to run the factory.

22 The percentage of Brazil's population that lives below the poverty line.

10 million The number of unemployed Brazilians, out of a labour market of 89 million.

40-50 The estimated number of years that the rainforest will survive if deforestation continues at its current rate.

2.7 million Acres of rainforest are destroyed in Brazil every year.

33 The percentage of the world's remaining rainforests that are found in Brazil.

17.3 per cent of the Amazon rainforest has been destroyed.

137 Plant and animal species become extinct every day as a result of rainforest depletion.

1 A single Amazonian tree harbours as many species of ants as the entire British Isles.

40 The percentage of its annual income Brazil spends repaying its loans.

20 million people call the Amazon basin home, including 400 indigenous groups.

70 per cent of all logged timber ends up as unusable fragments or sawdust.

50 per cent of all the world's forests have disappeared.

1 million tons of wood are needed to produce enough charcoal to power a single Brazilian steel mill.

100 million hectares of land, or 20 per cent of the entire Amazon region, is held illegally according to the Brazilian government.

The Amazon Rainforest 2005

The Rape Of The Rainforest...

It is stark. It is scarcely believable. But the ruthless obliteration of the Amazon rainforest continues at a headlong rate new figures reveal - and today we reveal the man who more than any other represents the forces making it happen.

He is Blairo Maggi, the millionaire farmer and uncompromising politician presiding over the Brazilian boom in soya bean production. He is known in Brazil as O Rei da Soja - the King of Soy.

Brazilian environmentalists are calling him something else - the King of Deforestation. For the soya boom, feeding a seemingly insatiable world market for soya beans as cattle feed, is now the main driver of rainforest destruction.

Figures show that last year the rate of forest clearance in the Amazon was the second highest on record as the soy boom completed its third year. An area of more than 10,000 square miles - nearly the size of Belgium - was cut down, with half the destruction in the state of Mato Grosso, where Mr Maggi, whose Maggi Group farming business is the world's biggest soya bean producer, also happens to be the state governor.

Mr Maggi sheds no tears over lost trees. In 2003, his first year as governor, the rate of deforestation in Mato Grosso more than doubled.

In an interview last year he said: "To me, a 40 per cent increase in deforestation doesn't mean anything at all, and I don't feel the slightest guilt over what we are doing here. We are talking about an area larger than Europe that has barely been touched, so there is nothing at all to get worried about."

Many people violently disagree. The survival of the Amazon forest, which sprawls over 4.1 million sq km (1.6 million sq miles) and covers more than half of Brazil's land area, may be the key to the survival of the planet. The jungle is sometimes called the world's "lung" because its trees produce much of the world's oxygen. It is thought nearly 20 per cent of it has already been destroyed by legal and illegal logging, and clearance for cattle ranching. But the soya boom has dramatically stepped up the pace of destruction.

It began on the back of the BSE crisis in Britain, when the feed given to cattle suddenly became a matter of intense public concern. Cattle feed producers around the world switched to soya as an untainted source.

The boom was intensified by the fact that Brazil - in contrast to the US and Argentina - did not go down the GM route in its agriculture, so when most European countries went GM-free, it was from Brazil that they sought their soya bean supplies. Europe now imports 65 per cent of its soya from Brazil. A further impetus to the boom is coming from China, whose emerging middle class wants to eat more and more meat - so the demand for animal feed is soaring.

The soya boom is bitterly criticised by environmentalists. "It is turning the rainforest into cattle feed. It is gross," said John Sauven, head of the rainforest campaign for Greenpeace UK.

It first showed up in the deforestation figures in 2003, when after falling or staying steady for eight years, the rate of destruction leapt by 40 per cent in a single year, from 18,170 sq km to 25,500 sq km.

Since then the rate has stayed at its new high level, with 24,597 sq km cut down the next year, and, as the figures released yesterday by the Brazilian environment ministry showed, from satellite photos and other data, no less than 26,130 sq km of rainforest was cut down in the 12 months to August 2004. This was a further leap of 6 per cent on the year before and caused immense dismay, not least because President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's government adopted an action plan last year to protect the Amazon. The Environment Minister, Marina Silva, who is from the Amazon state of Acre, said the figure was high, but promised the country would "work to fight this in a structured way, with lasting and effective action, involving all sectors".

Greenpeace's Amazon co-ordinator Paulo Adario said the scale of the destruction was a tragedy, and showed that deforestation was "not a priority for the Lula government".

Mr Maggi, whose company grossed $600m last year, does not see the future as one of restricted soya plantings. He has called for a tripling of the amount of land planted with soybeans during the next decade in Mato Grosso, and his company announced last year that it intended to double the area it has in production.

How demand for soya drives the destruction

The production of soya beans is now a vital industry for Brazil. Agribusiness is the country's number one export earner, and soya is the principal commodity. The current government under President Lula actively promotes soya export as a means to earn foreign exchange for debt payments.

From the 1960s, the Brazilian government promoted soya cultivation so Brazil could become self sufficient in vegetable oils. Soya was increasingly planted on large-scale, fully mechanised farms in the south and the states on the Atlantic coast.

In the past, some agro-engineers believed soya would never threaten the rainforest, because of climatic limitations and soil conditions. Soya was thought to be "as adaptable to conditions of the tropical climate as a panda bear to the African savannah".

However, the development of new varieties has enabled the rapid expansion of soya plantations north, into the tropical states where the rainforest is situated.

Between 1995 and 2004, the area cultivated with soya increased by 77 per cent in the centre-west, with Mato Grosso becoming the single biggest producer. Now soya is rapidly advancing from all sides toward the heartland of the Amazon, fuelling massive deforestation.

Two companies dominate Brazil's soya business. Gruppo Maggi, owned by Blairo Maggi, Mato Grosso's governor, is considered to be the world's largest individual soya producer. The number one soy-exporter is the giant US grains business, Cargill. Michael McCarthy

Destruction Of The Amazon

STOP THE MEATRIX

Antarctica - The Last Refuge

Antarctica
A place of wonder and infinite possibilities.
Home to nearly 70% of the worlds freshwater.
A place that nobody owns.
It comprises 10 percent of the worlds area and has never known war.

The one place in the world that we have the opportunity to keep pristine, an entire continent that can still be protected from the negative effects of human use. Mission Antarctica

Antarctica Melting Fast

The worst fears of environmentalists are coming true:
Scientists have issued a new warning about the effects of climate change on Antarctica, saying that more than 200 glaciers are melting because of unusually high temperatures. Using aerial photos dating back to the 1940s and more recent satellite images, scientists from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) have discovered just how much these ice shelves have melted over the last 50 years, as temperatures have risen by around 3½ degrees F.

In a study published in the respected journal Science, these researchers explain that until the mid-1950s, most of the glaciers got bigger. During the decade after that, most of them were stable, but since then, they've been shrinking. During the past five years, the pace of this shrinkage has accelerated. But climate change may not be the only cause of this mass meltdown, which healted during the 1980s, despite continuing warming. Other important reasons for the melt could include warming ocean temperatures, which may also be caused by global warming, but scientists haven't yet figured out exactly how this works. Unknown Country

NOVA: Warnings From The Ice
Originally broadcast on April 21, 1998. Over the last half-century, the coastal ice on the Antarctic Peninsula has been gradually disappearing. Scientists are beginning to wonder if we are on the verge of a great flood that may consume the world's coastlines. In the program, a group of scientists heads south to Antarctica in the race to answer questions and heed the warnings from the ice.

Mission Antartica

Florida USA
If West sheet melted (17 foot rise)

Warnings From The Ice: Water World What would happen to the world's coastlines if the West Antarctic Ice Sheet melted, raising global sea levels by as much as 20 feet? Some scientists say a collapse is inevitable, possibly even imminent.

While you're at it, check out the same stretch of coast 20,000 years ago. It was the height of the Ice Age, when sea levels were 400 feet lower than today, and there was a lot more land to go around.

Finally, have a look at what would be lost if the East Antarctic Ice Sheet were to melt. No one believes this monstrous dome will disintegrate anytime soon. But if it did, it would raise seas around the world by as much as 200 feet. (To play it safe, these images depict a conservative rise of 170 feet.)

Intelligent Earthquakes

The frequency and the spread of earthquakes on the West coast of America are increasing rapidly. Back and forward the signals go, as though the earth has all the time in the universe. Slowly, with each passing - from one side of the earth to the other - stronger patterns emerge. For example, how the South American quakes mirror (at an angle) the Indonesian quakes on the other side of the planet.

I have watched this phenomenon for many months, and the build-up is agonisingly slow in human terms. Patterns are dotted across Alaska and California, then they seem to recede. The next time they come back the magnitudes are slightly larger. Now and then a much larger quake bounces off inland, or in the above case, South of Panama. Then the build-up of small beaded patterns resumes, and the whole cycle repeates itself.

The Indonesian waters seem to be the trigger point for the whole planet, but they are not the only areas to be effected by larger than usual earthquakes. Northern Sumatera, may be the lever, but the whole earth is being effected. Larger quakes will not confine themselves to Indonesia alone.

For The Swallows

It is now the 2nd of May 2005, and I can suggest that you observe carefully how the weather "feels" in your body and not simply how you feel about the weather. Because, the same thing is happening in 2005 as of today. The sky was clear in Southern Germany, the sun was incredibly hot. As the sun was setting the same "heat trap" effect began as in 2003. The heat increases and the body begins to sweat. As the sun moves below the horizon the heat density increases. It is bizzare!

Once more the number of Swallows seems to have decreased. By May there was always a good flock of Swallows in the sky. This year I have two Swallows who have appeared. These small signs signal big changes in our climate. Today the Swallows, tomorrow mankind!


A First-Hand Glimpse of Hell in Europe -- 13-Aug-2003

Let me share with you my observations of what is happening here in Europe, at least in middle Germany. The media reports lower temperatures than we have here every day, so you can add 5 degrees to anything you read. I think they have their official weather stations underground or inside caves. There is a very dry hot wind blowing, similar to what one would experience in the Sahara. Late at night and in the early hours of the morning the air remains incredibly warm. The walls of our houses are like ovens at night, and in the morning, the sun is burning hot. There is hardly any temperature change over a 24 hour period. It is simply hot all the time.

The leaves on trees and plants are dark brown. The wheat was half its usual height. The parks are empty. There are swallows that I watch each year, and when they arrived this spring, their numbers were half of what they were in previous years. Every year I've watched them flying in circles until late evening, but for many days there hasn't been a single swallow in the sky. I hope they haven't died. It just occurred to me that in England there was a large "swallow" crop circle recently. These are all small changes that seem like nothing to most people, but I know they are bad signs.

It's almost as though something is talking to us—the Sun? the Planet? Nature? I'm not sure. But people are very quiet. We are all behaving in the same way, as if whatever we need to survive this has been denied us. We're sitting right in the middle of the battlefield without protection.
In the past, we enjoyed a long period of stable weather that allowed excessive abundance and growth. In the background, there is a strange feeling that we haven't used this abundance well. In mid-June, when I already thought it was hot here, I went for a walk in the evening. For the first time in my life I became aware that all the trees were radiating sound. In fact everything in nature was creating this sound, which felt like a harmonic. I felt utterly ashamed of who we are as a species. Behind this harmonic I could feel an intense love, and also a sadness, because somehow we have failed.

If we don't get rain soon, how will animals make it through the coming winter? All types of grass are completely dried out, even in the surrounding woodlands. It must be incredibly hard for the deer. I read yesterday that the French Government deny this is a serious crisis, and yet they are allowing the nuclear power stations to pour water into rivers at higher temperatures than is usually allowed, which will kill all the fish. The Swiss have decided it's better to cut the output of the power plants than put hotter water into their rivers.

Where I live, they spray a lot of what look like chemtrails across the sky. In past years, it did seem to get cooler when the sky was filled with these spreading thin white clouds, but this is no longer the case. The sun seems to sit up there as the rightful ruler of the skies and those trails are not spreading the way they used to, as if there’s a total lack of moisture or water vapor. From here, it looks like the long trails are drying up as soon as they are sprayed.

Today the unrelenting, burning sun still beats down, almost as if there is a hole in the sky and some vital protection has vanished. The strangest thing of all happens late at night, when the sun goes down and the night becomes dark. The air almost begins to cool, but then the intense heat reappears. This heat is just as intense as the hottest part of the day, but it's in the middle of the night. This has become worse since the beginning of August.

I think if humans want to play a game of tennis against nature they are about to lose.

Weather Wars

Chemtrails -- The Genesis of Project Cloverleaf

Scott Stevens -- I received the following email on the 18th of April as it was forwarded to me from someone who may have answered several questions I have had about the incorporation of the civilian air fleet into a portion of this atmospheric project.

My questions have been: The weight and volume of the chemical mixture delivered while in flight including the delivery mechanism? How much of a financial burden is it to carry this extra weight aloft with each flight? How is the plumbing kept 'hidden' from the many mechanics. Who does and how are the tanks refilled? Read on: Did An Airline Mechanic Stumble Upon The Truth?

SIPL April 17 2005

For reasons you will understand as you read this I can not divulge my identity.

I am an aircraft mechanic for a major airline. I work at one of our maintenance bases located at a large airport. I have discovered some information that I think you will find important.

First, I should tell you something about the "pecking order" among mechanics. It is important to my story and to the cause to which you have dedicated yourself.

Mechanics want to work on three things. The avionics, the engines, or the flight controls. The mechanics that work on these systems are considered at the top of the "pecking order".

Next come the mechanics that work on the hydraulics and air conditioning systems.

Then come the ones who work on the galley and other non-essential systems. But at the very bottom of the list are the mechanics that work on the waste disposal systems.

No mechanic wants to work on the pumps, tanks, and pipes that are used to store the waste from the lavatories. But at every airport where I have worked there are always 2 or 3 mechanics that volunteer to work on the lavatory systems.

The other mechanics are happy to let them do it. Because of this you will have only 2 or 3 mechanics that work on these systems at any one airport. No one pays much attention to these guys and no mechanic socializes with another mechanic who only works on the waste systems. Fact is, I had never even thought much about this situation until last month. Like most airlines we have reciprocal agreements with the other airlines that fly into this airport. If they have a problem with a plane one of our mechanics will take care of it.

Likewise, if one of our planes has a problem at an airport where the other airline has a maintenance base, they will fix our plane.

One day last month I was called out from our base to work on a plane for another airline. When I got the call the dispatcher did not know what the problem was. When I got to the plane I found out that the problem was in waste disposal system. There was nothing for me to do but to crawl in and fix the problem.

When I got into the bay I realized that something was not right. There were more tanks, pumps, and pipes then should have been there. At first I assumed that the waste disposal system had been changed. It had been about 10 years since I had worked on this particular model of aircraft.

As I tried to find the problem I quickly realized the extra piping and tanks were not connected to the waste disposal system, at all. I had just discovered this when another mechanic from my company showed up. It was one of the mechanics who usually works on this particular type of plane, and I happily turned the job over to him.

As I was leaving I asked him about the extra equipment. He told me to "worry about my end of the plane and let him worry about his end!"

The next day I was on the company computer to look up a wiring schematic. While I was there I decided to look up the extra equipment I had found. To my amazement the manuals did not show any of the extra equipment I had seen with my own eyes the day before. I even tied in to the manufacturer files and still found nothing. Now I was really determined to find out what that equipment did.

The next week we had three of our planes in our main hanger for periodic inspection. There are mechanics crawling all over a plane during these inspections. I had just finished my shift and I decided to have a look at the waste system on one of our planes. With all the mechanics around I figured that no one would notice an extra one on the plane.

Sure enough, the plane I choose had the extra equipment! I began to trace the system of pipes, pumps, and tanks. I found what appeared to be the control unit for the system. It was a standard looking avionics control box but it had no markings of any kind.

I could trace the control wires from the box to the pumps and valves but there were no control circuits coming into the unit. The only wires coming into the unit was a power connection to the aircraft's main power bus.

The system had 1 large tank and 2 smaller tanks. It was hard to tell in the cramped compartment, but it looked like the large tank could hold about 50 gallons. The tanks were connected to a fill and drain valve that passed through the fuselage just behind the drain valve for the waste system.

When I had a chance to look for this connection under the plane I found it cunningly hidden behind a panel under the panel used to access the waste drain. I began to trace the piping from the pumps. These pipes lead to a network of small pipes that ended in the trailing edges of the wings and horizontal stabilizers.

If you look closely at the wings of a large airplane you will see a set of wires, about the size of your finger, extending from the trailing edge of the wing surfaces. These are the static discharge wicks. They are used to dissipate the static electric charge that builds up on a plane in flight.

I discovered that the pipes from this mystery system lead to every 1 out of 3 of these static discharge wicks. These wicks had been "hollowed out" to allow whatever flows through these pipes to be discharged through the fake wicks.

It was while I was on the wing that one of the managers spotted me. He ordered me out of the hanger telling me that my shift was over and I had not been authorized any overtime.

The next couple of days were very busy and I had no time to continue my investigation. Late one afternoon, two days after my discovery, I was called to replace an engine temperature sensor on a plane due to take off in two hours. I finished the job and turned in the paperwork.

About 30 minutes later I was paged to see the General Manager. When I went in his office I found that our union rep and two others who I did not know were waiting on me. He told me that a serious problem had been discovered. He said that I was being written up and suspended for turning in false paperwork.

He handed me a disciplinary form stating that I had turned in false paperwork on the engine temperature sensor I had installed a few hours before. I was floored and began to protest. I told them that this was ridiculous and that I had done this work.

The union rep spoke up at this point and recommended that we take a look at the plane to see if we could straighten it all out. I then asked who the other two men were. The GM told me that they were airline safety inspectors but would not give me their names.

We proceeded to the plane, which should have been in the air but was parked on our maintenance ramp. We opened the engine cowling and the union rep pulled the sensor. He checked the serial number and told everyone that it was the old instrument. We then went to the parts bay and went back into the racks.

The union rep checked my report and pulled from the rack a sealed box. He opened the box and pulled out the engine temperature sensor with the serial number of the one I had installed. I was told that I was suspended for a week without pay and to leave immediately.

I sat at home the first day of my suspension wondering what the hell had happened to me. That evening I received a phone call. The voice told me "Now you know what happens to mechanics who poke around in things they shouldn't. The next time you start working on systems that are no concern of yours you will lose your job! As it is, I'm feeling generous, I believe that you'll be able to go back to work soon." CLICK.

Again, I had to pick myself from off the floor. As my mind raced, it was at this moment that I made the connection that what had happened to me must have been directly connected to my tracing the "mysterious" piping.

The next morning the General Manager called me. He said that due to my past excellent employment record that the suspension had been reduced to one day and that I should report back to work immediately. The only thing I could think of was "what are they trying to hide" and "who are 'THEY'"!

That day at work went by as if nothing had happened. None of the other mechanics mentioned the suspension and my union rep told me not to talk about it. That night I logged onto the Internet to try to find some answers.

I don't remember now how I got there but I came across a site that talked about chemically-laced contrails.

That's when it all came together. But the next morning at work I found a note inside my locked locker. It said, "Curiosity killed the cat. Don't be looking at Internet sites that are no concern of yours."

Well that's it. Now I know 'THEY' are watching me.

While I don't know what THEY are spraying, I can tell you how they are doing it. I figure they are using the "honey trucks". These are the trucks that empty the waste from the lavatory waste tanks.

The airports usually contract out this job and nobody goes near these trucks. Who wants to stand next a truck full of sh--. While these guys are emptying the waste tanks, it makes sense that they could easily be filling the tanks of the spray system.

They know the planes flight path so they probably program the control unit to start spraying some amount of time after the plane reaches a certain altitude. The spray nozzles in the fake static wicks are so small that no one in the plane would see a thing.

God help us all.

-- A concerned citizen

Copyright © Scott Stevens and WeatherWars.info

Weather Wars