Thursday, June 17, 2010

Mayanmar AF Copter MI-2 crash Pindaya

A military helicopter crash during a training exercise in Shan State yesterday killed four air-force personnel including three officers and injured one, air force sources said due to bad weather near Pindya

MI-2 helicopter hit a mountain in bad weather at around noon near Pindaya Township, Shan State, killing Major Kyaw Kyaw Win, two captains and a corporal. A badly injured lieutenant was taken to Aungpan Hospital, a source in the Burmese Air Force told Mizzima media.

Kyaw Kyaw Win from Namsan Air Base was a holding a training exercise with another aircraft out of the air force helicopter school at Meikhtila when he encountered bad weather, a policeman from a nearby township said. “The helicopter, which crashed near Pindaya, flew from Meikhtila based to Namsan on June 15. On the next day … it was flying with another helicopter when it crashed”, another air force source said.

Burma’s military junta bought 22 Mil Mi-2 “Hoplite” helicopters from Poland between 1990 and 1992, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute arms-transfers database. The Burmese Air Force has experienced several such mishaps in the last few years.Another mishap occurred in the month of January,when an F-7M jet fighter a Chinese built version of the Russian Mig-21 flew out of Mingaladon Air Base, crashed at Rangoon International Airport in Mingaladon Township, killing its pilot.Burma media agencies

Rains Lanslide in Rakhine State Burma

A flash floods Rescue workers were scrambling to provide aid to tens of thousands left homeless in western Myanmar and neighboring Bangladesh Thursday after flash floods and landslides killed 100 people. At least 46 were left dead as bridges and homes were damaged after record rainfall of more than 13 inches (33 centimetres) Wednesday in parts of Rakhine State in military-ruled Myanmar, the New Light of Myanmar newspaper said. Two days continuous raining here for two days more than 500 people are homeless or in dilapidated conditions with thin sheets of blue plastic, are in state of shambles wondering what to do next. Lots of people are living in the compounds of the temples lobby.

Torrential rain led to the collapse about halfway along the road on the approach to the Tawgaunggyi tunnel, blocking the 16-mile (26 kilometre) highway from about 11 p.m. on Sunday until 4 p.m. today. The 660-feet (200-metre) tunnel passes under a section of the Mayu mountains and was built by the British.

“The rain was too heavy that night [Sunday] and it’s been raining since early yesterday evening,” a Buthidaung resident told Mizzima. “The access road to the tunnel … had an earthen base so it was eroded by this torrential rain. It’s been raining today for the whole day too.” A total of about 30 trucks were stranded on the highway at the either end of the tunnel until 4 p.m. today.

In Bangladesh, 55 people were killed on Wednesday after the worst rains in decades struck a day earlier, officials said, forcing rescuers to battle blocked roads and floods to get aid to remote communities hit by landslides.

Sunday, June 13, 2010

NLD party 66 saplings in 318 townships celebrating Aung San Suu Kyi birthday

Aung San Suu Kyi Burma’s democracy leader,who on 19th June 2010 is her 65th birthday in detention,has now been detained for almost 15 years.National League for Democracy party young members have started planting more than 20,000 saplings today in states and divisions in honour of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s 65th birthday on June 19. In tribute to their leader, NLD Youth members plan to grow 66 saplings in each of the 318 townships across the country, except in Kayah State, which has no NLD branch offices. Burmese traditionally plant saplings on birthdays for each year of life up to their age for the coming year: thus the 66 trees for Suu Kyi’s 65th anniversary.

NLD central committee member Phyu Phyu Thin said the campaign to plant 20,998 saplings on June 19 was also a conservation awareness campaign.Members today planted the shady tree varieties, Padauk, Gangaw, Khayay, rain tree, and Bandar (Indian almond), at their offices, in monastery compounds, on personal land holdings or at pagodas in South Dagon, Hlaing Tharyar and South Okkalapa townships in Rangoon Division.

Suu Kyi will be again forced by the ruling Burmese junta to celebrate her birthday under house arrest as her current 18-month sentence for entertaining uninvited guest, US citizen John Yettaw, is scheduled to end in November.

The remainder of the sentence would be waived if she “stays at her home in discipline”, the government announced recently.NLD Pegu Township chairman Myat Hla said members would plant 66 gold mohur saplings in Pegu on June 19. Rangoon-based Forest Resource Environment and Development Association (Freda) vice-chairman U Ohn said the trees should be grown in forests, on mountains and on barren hilltops in a “sweeping manner”, so the trees’ roots can play their part in preserving topsoil.

“Growing trees is good but conservation of standing forests and trees is better,” he said. “Felling a tree and replanting a new tree … can [still] damage the environment.” “Forests absorb all [most of] the rainfall, which can make the climate comfortable. Depletion of forest leads to erosion, which can make climate change.” Freda started its tree-growing activities in 1999 and since Cyclone Nargis hit the Irrawaddy Delta its groves reportedly cover 3,000 acres (1,214 hectares). Forest covered 60 per cent of Burma’s total area of 656,577 square kilometresin year 1975,this cover was now just 41 per cent,the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation reported last month.

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