Tag Archives: Boston

Massachusetts elevates wildfire risks due to dry conditions

Farmers battle drought conditions

Important Takeaways:

  • The National Weather Service’s Boston/Norton office said in its weekend forecast discussion that there is an “elevated fire weather risk” because of dry weather.
  • “Dry conditions will continue this weekend with increasing winds, which will lead to renewed elevated fire weather risk,” the forecast said.
  • Fire weather outlooks issued by the NWS are intended to indicate areas where forecast weather conditions “will result in a significant threat for the ignition and/or spread of wildfires,” according to the National Integrated Drought Information System. An elevated risk is based on wind and relative humidity.
  • The wildfire risk in Massachusetts this weekend is elevated, not critical, so it is not an urgent risk to residents. However, there are still ways to stay safe in the event of an elevated fire risk.

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Nor’easter blasts New York, Boston while snow buries northern New England

power-outage-northeast

Important Takeaways:

  • Winter has some tricks left up its sleeve as millions of people across the region brace for a nor’easter that’s impacting cities like Boston and New York City with wind gusts up to 60 mph and heavy rain, while areas farther north are preparing for the possibility of feet of snow
  • More than 116,000 customers lost power in Maine as of Thursday morning while 48,000 New Yorkers were left in the dark
  • This comes after the Midwest and Great Lakes region saw their fair share of winter weather, with portions of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula under a Blizzard Warning while other areas of the state, as well as parts of Wisconsin, remain under Winter Storm Warnings and Winter Weather Advisories.
  • Flooding a concern due to heavy rain, melting snow

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Intelligence experts are eyeing high end brothels in Boston and DC targeting politicians, lawyers, scientists

Boston-Brothels

Important Takeaways:

  • High-end sex ring in Boston and D.C. areas was ‘honeypot’ scheme by Russia, China, South Korea or even Israel – to ensnare US officials, intelligence experts believe
  • Intelligence experts are becoming increasingly convinced that six high end brothels in the suburbs of Boston and Washington, D.C. were set up by a foreign nation as an espionage ‘honeytrap’.
  • They believe the brothels – allegedly masterminded by a 41-year-old South Korean woman – targeted politicians, high ranking government officials and defense contractors.
  • But the mystery is which country was behind the scheme. Russia, China, Korea itself, or even Israel, are all seen as possibly being behind the scheme.
  • ‘Having the Koreans out front could have been a false flag to give China or another country plausible deniability if the plot unraveled,’ a one-time CIA senior operations officer told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview.
  • The brothels were raided in November and prosecutors said they were looking to charge 28 people in Massachusetts alone.
  • The ring’s clients, who paid rates of up to $600 an hour, included corporate executives, professors, lawyers, and scientists.
  • None of the clients have been identified or charged so far, but they could soon be unmasked after federal prosecutors last month announced they are seeking criminal charges.
  • Aspiring clients had to submit a membership application before they could book an appointment.
  • Required documentation included government-issued ID, phone and email contacts, employer information and credit card records, according to court records.
  • Bizarrely, numerous political, military and business officials provided it all without blinking an eye
  • The FBI rates the danger posed by Beijing’s influence operations to be so serious that it established a special unit dedicated to countering the threat in 2019.
  • In January of this year, Congressman Eric Swalwell lost his seat on the House Intelligence Committee due to reports that he developed a warm friendship with alleged Chinese intelligence operative Christine Fang in the mid-2010s.

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Largest Satanic gathering in history will be in Boston at an event called SatanCon 2023

Romans 1: 25 “They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.”

Important Takeaways:

  • SatanCon announces 2023 plans for Boston
  • “SatanCon,” which will be in Boston April 28-30.
  • Boston, home of the original Tea Party, some of America’s most historic buildings, a world-renown symphony, and now, the “The Largest Satanic Gathering in History.”
  • The report noted, “Those who purchase the ‘Demon Circle” $160 tickets will receive access to the ‘Satanic Marketplace,’ access to ‘on-site programming tracks,’ an official TST SatanCon 2023 t-shirt, TST SatanCon stickers, and a SatanCon 2023 button.”
  • The sponsoring group “made headlines last year for seeking a court declaration to allow abortions for their Texas members, claiming that the laws violate their ‘religious freedom’ to perform ‘abortion rituals.’”

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Powerful nor’easter expected from Philly to Boston

Luke 21:25,26 “There will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Important Takeaways:

  • Winter Storm Watches issued for Boston, New York, Philadelphia ahead of powerful weekend nor’easter
  • A powerful nor’easter will develop into a “bomb cyclone” off the East Coast
  • Expected to intensify into a bomb cyclone, a term used to describe a low-pressure system that undergoes “bombogenesis” – defined as a rapid pressure drop of at least 24 millibars in 24 hours or less – indicative of a very intense storm.
  • Heavy snow, high winds and coastal flooding are expected
  • You’re advised to avoid all unnecessary travel across this region.
  • A large portion of the Northeast coast could face a significant threat of coastal flooding, high surf and beach erosion. Astronomical tides will already be running high this weekend as we approach a new moon, which will only make these threats worse.

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Smoke from U.S. West wildfires leaves Easterners gasping

By Peter Szekely

(Reuters) – Dozens of wildfires in the western United States and Canada, led by a massive blaze in Oregon, are sending smoke eastward, worsening air quality and causing colorful sunsets in some places.

More than 80 large wildfires in 13 western states charred nearly 1.3 million acres (526,090 hectares), an area larger than the state of Delaware, by Tuesday, according to the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho.

But due to the jet stream and other cross-continental air currents, the regional disasters were being felt nationally.

Wildfire smoke prompted an advisory from New York health and environmental authorities on Tuesday for fine particulate matter as the region’s Air Quality Index hit 118, which is unhealthy for sensitive groups such as people with breathing problems.

AQI readings well above 100 were also recorded in other Northeast cities, including Boston, Hartford and Philadelphia.

In Cleveland and Detroit, AQI topped 125, which NIFC meteorologist Nick Nauslar said was likely caused by smoke from Canadian wildfires in southeast Manitoba and southwest Ontario.

“Sunsets look prettier, redder, more colorful” said National Weather Service meteorologist Bob Orevec of the Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Maryland.

While some smoke diffuses into the upper atmosphere after traveling thousands of miles, it still can lower air quality, Nauslar said.

Unhealthy AQI readings were recorded on Monday in parts of Idaho and Montana, which, along with Washington state, are in the wind-driven path of smoke from southern Oregon’s Bootleg fire, according to air resource adviser Margaret Key.

“Wildfire smoke exposure also increases susceptibility to respiratory infections including COVID, increases severity of such infections, and makes recovery more difficult,” Key said by email.

The Bootleg fire, already the country’s largest wildfire, grew by 24,200 acres overnight to nearly 388,600 acres (157,260 hectares), about half the size of Rhode Island. Some 2,200 personnel managed to contain 30% of it, officials said.

As of Tuesday, the fire had destroyed 67 homes and was threatening 3,400 more. An estimated 2,100 people were under evacuation orders or on standby alert to be ready to flee at a moment’s notice.

Rising smoke from the fire raging in and around the Fremont-Winema National Forest about 250 miles (400 km) south of Portland has already produced at least two pyrocumulonimbus clouds, an unusual phenomenon often called fire clouds, the NIFC’s Nauslar said.

“It can start to produce its own lightning, and essentially become a fire generated thunderstorm,” he said by phone. “This can cause rapid and erratic fire spread.”

(Reporting by Peter Szekely in New York; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

U.S. charges former Harvard fencing coach, businessman with bribery scheme

By Nate Raymond

BOSTON (Reuters) – A former Harvard University fencing coach and the chief executive of a telecommunications company were arrested on Monday on charges that they engaged in a bribery scheme aimed at securing the admission of the businessman’s two sons to the Ivy League school.

Federal prosecutors in Boston said that Jie “Jack” Zhao paid more than $1.5 million in bribes so that Peter Brand, the former coach, would help his sons get into Harvard by recruiting them to the men’s fencing team.

The charges followed an investigative report by the Boston Globe last year into how Brand sold his home to Zhao for over its assessed market value. Harvard in July 2019 fired the longtime coach following the report.

The Globe’s report came a month after federal prosecutors in March 2019 unveiled the first charges in the U.S. college admissions scandal, in which wealthy parents engaged in bribery and cheating schemes to secure spots for their children at selective universities.

That investigation has led to charges against 57 people, including celebrities and corporate executives. U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling called the latest case “part of our long-standing effort to expose and deter corruption in college admissions.”

Lawyers for Brand and Zhao, who co-founded iTalk Global Communications Inc, did not respond to requests for comment.

Prosecutors said that in 2013, Zhao made a $1 million donation to a fencing charity operated by an unnamed co-conspirator that, in turn, contributed $100,000 to a foundation established by Brand and his wife.

Zhao also paid for Brand’s car, made college tuition payments for his son, paid the mortgage on his home and later bought the residence from the coach for above its market value, prosecutors said.

That purchase allowed Brand to buy a more expensive home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which Zhao paid to renovate, they said.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Bill Berkrot)

Severe COVID-19 riskier than heart attack for young adults; antibiotic shows no benefit

By Nancy Lapid

(Reuters) – The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

More young adults survive heart attacks than severe COVID-19

Among COVID-19 patients treated at 419 U.S. hospitals from April through June, only about 5% were ages 18 to 34. But that group had “substantial rates of adverse outcomes,” according to a report on Wednesday in JAMA Internal Medicine. Roughly one in five needed intensive care, one in 10 needed mechanical ventilation, and nearly 3% died. While the mortality rate is lower than in older adults, it is roughly double the death rate of young adults from heart attacks, the authors say. Obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes were tied to higher risk for adverse events. For young adults with more than one of these conditions, the risk of a bad outcome was similar to middle-aged adults without the risk factors. More than half of hospitalized young adults were Black or Hispanic, “consistent with prior findings of disproportionate illness severity in these demographic groups,” the authors said. “Given the sharply rising rates of COVID-19 infection in young adults, these findings underscore the importance of infection prevention measures in this age group,” the concluded.

Antibiotic fails to help hospitalized COVID-19 patients

The antibiotic azithromycin did not appear to provide any benefit to hospitalized COVID-19 patients who were having trouble breathing, according to a study in Brazil. At 57 hospitals, 243 COVID-19 patients who needed oxygen or mechanical ventilation were randomly assigned to receive azithromycin, while 183 similar patients did not get the antibiotic. All received other standard treatment, which in Brazil included hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug that other studies have shown provides little or no benefit. While azithromycin did not appear to do any harm, after 15 days it was not associated with any patient improvement nor did it reduce their risk of death. In an April survey of more than 6,000 physicians in 30 countries, azithromycin was the second most commonly prescribed treatment for COVID-19, the study investigators wrote in The Lancet medical journal. The absence of any benefit in this new study “suggests that the routine use of this strategy should be avoided,” they said.

Risk of catching COVID-19 while hospitalized can be low

Among nearly 8,500 patients admitted to a large Boston hospital between early March and the end of May, only two became sick with coronavirus infections that may have been acquired while they were hospitalized, doctors report. One likely was infected by a spouse who initially appeared well during daily visits but who developed symptoms while the patient was still hospitalized. That was before visitor restrictions and universal masking rules had been implemented. The other patient developed symptoms four days after leaving the hospital. The source of the infection is not known. According to a paper published on Wednesday in JAMA Network Open, infection control efforts at the hospital included dedicated COVID-19 units with airborne infection isolation rooms, personal protective equipment for staff and monitoring to make sure those were used correctly, universal masking, visitor restriction, and liberal COVID-19 testing of symptomatic and asymptomatic patients. These “robust and rigorous infection control practices may be associated with minimized risk” of COVID-19 spreading through hospitals, the authors conclude. Their findings, if replicated at other U.S. hospitals, “should provide reassurance to patients,” they said.

Longer-term COVID-19 lung damage can improve over time

COVID-19 lung damage persists long term but tends to improve, researchers reported on Monday at the European Respiratory Society International Virtual Congress. Researchers studied 86 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, 48% of whom had a smoking history and 21% of whom required intensive care. At 6 weeks after discharge, 47% of patients still reported feeling short of breath. By 12 weeks, that dropped to 39%. CT scans still showed lung damage in 88% of patients at six weeks, dropping to 56% at 12 weeks. “Overall, this study shows that COVID-19 survivors have persisting pulmonary impairment weeks after recovery. Yet, overtime, a moderate improvement is detectable,” lead researcher Dr. Sabina Sahanic, from University Clinic of Internal Medicine in Innsbruck, Austria, said during a press briefing. A related study featured at the meeting stressed the importance of early pulmonary rehabilitation after COVID-19 patients come off a ventilator. This should include balance and walking, muscle strengthening, respiratory exercises and endurance training. “The sooner rehabilitation started and the longer it lasted, the faster and better was the improvement in patients’ walking and breathing capacities and muscle gain,” coauthor Yara Al Chikhanie, from Grenoble Alps University in France, said in a statement.

(Reporting by Nancy Lapid; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

United Airlines bets on Florida, adding dozens of flights a day starting November

By David Shepardson

(Reuters) – United Airlines is adding up to 28 daily nonstop U.S. flights to Florida starting Nov. 6 as the Chicago-based airline bets on a rebound in leisure travelers heading to sunny skies.

The direct flights are from non United hub cities in Boston, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, New York/LaGuardia, Pittsburgh and Columbus, Ohio to four Florida destinations.

United said it is part of its “continuing strategy to aggressively, and opportunistically manage the impact of COVID-19 by increasing service to destinations where customers most want to fly.” But the carrier said it could reduce the number of flights if COVID-19 infections in Florida remain high.

New Florida flights will go to Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Orlando and Tampa.

Ankit Gupta, United’s vice president of domestic network planning, said the new flights represent “United’s largest expansion of point-to-point, non-hub flying and reflects our data driven approach to add capacity where customers are telling us they want to go.”

United can adjust up or down. Gupta said the added Florida flights could amount to more than 400,000 additional seats this winter season. He said many U.S. travelers are picking Florida instead of international destinations.

There are modest signs of improving air travel demand. The Transportation Security Administration said it screened 831,789 people on Sunday — the first time it screened more than 800,000 people since March 17. That is still down 70% over prior year figures.

Still, Florida has reported 542,792 coronavirus cases, the second most of any U.S. state behind only California, according to a Reuters tally, and more than 10% of all reported U.S. cases. If coronavirus cases in Florida remain high, “we will adjust our plans,” Gupta said.

Southwest Airlines chief executive Gary Kelly said at a Texas Tribune forum on Wednesday the airline is still trying to figure how many flights to offer as it works to reduce its $20 million a day losses. “It is pure guesswork at this point” Kelly said.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by David Gregorio)

Government health experts warn U.S. cities of ‘trouble ahead’

By Doina Chiacu

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – White House health experts are warning of an uptick in the percentage of people testing positive for COVID-19 in U.S. cities including Boston, Chicago and Washington, urging local leaders to maintain health safety measures to avoid a surge.

“This is a predictor of trouble ahead,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Thursday.

Fauci was asked on CNN about comments made by his White House coronavirus task force colleague, Dr. Deborah Birx, identifying new areas of concern in major cities, even as authorities see encouraging signs across the South.

Baltimore and Atlanta remain at a “very high level,” as well as Kansas City, Portland, Omaha and California’s Central Valley, Birx told state and local officials in a telephone call Wednesday. A recording of the call was obtained by the journalism nonprofit Center for Public Integrity.

White House data shows small increases in the percentage of positive COVID-10 tests in Chicago, Boston and Detroit and those places need to “get on top of it”, Birx said.

Even in cities and states where most people are doing things right, Fauci said, a segment of people not wearing masks or following social distancing remains vulnerable to infection and can keep the virus smoldering in U.S. communities.

“Unless everybody pulls together, and gets the level way down over baseline, we’re going to continue to see these kind of increases that Dr. Birx was talking about in several of those cities,” Fauci said.

White House coronavirus experts have in recent days sent regular warnings to cities and states not to relax anti-coronavirus measures too much before the virus is under sufficient control.

On average, 1,000 people are dying each day nationwide from COVID-19. The U.S. death toll is now over 157,000, with 4.8 million known cases.

President Donald Trump, in contrast, has played down the staying power of the virus, saying on Wednesday “it will go away like things go away” as he urged U.S. schools to reopen on time for face-to-face lessons.

Trump also said children are “almost immune” from COVID-19, prompting Facebook Inc on Wednesday to take down a post by the Republican president containing a Fox News video clip in which he made the statement. Facebook said it violated its rules against sharing misinformation about the virus.

Chicago’s mayor said on Wednesday that school would be online-only in September, after the teachers’ union and many parents in the city objected to a plan to allow students the option of attending class twice a week in pods of 15.

Chicago is the third-largest school district in the United States behind New York and Los Angeles, with 350,000 students.

Los Angeles has already announced that students will be kept home, while New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has said he expects to have children attend classes part of the time.

(Reporting by Doina Chiacu; editing by Philippa Fletcher)