U.S. Blames Iran for Saudi Oil Attack, Trump Says ‘Locked and Loaded’
September 15th, 2019Via: Reuters:
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday the United States was “locked and loaded” for a potential response to the attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil facilities, after a senior U.S. administration official said Iran was to blame.
ICE Is Building State-Of-The-Art Urban Warfare Training Facility, Hyper-Realistic Simulations Of Homes In Chicago And Arizona
September 15th, 2019Via: Newsweek:
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is looking to build a “state-of-the-art” “urban warfare” training facility that will include “hyper-realistic” simulations of homes, hotels and commercial buildings in Chicago and Arizona.
In an acquisition form for the procurement of “hyper-realistic training devices” for a new training facility for its expanding Special Response Team (SRT) program, ICE outlined the details of plans for its new training center in a document published on the U.S. Federal Business Opportunities website.
While ICE sought to redact the location of the new training facility in the document, it was not successful in doing so.
After copying and pasting the document’s contents into a separate document, Newsweek was able to establish that the facility will be built at the Office of Firearms and Tactical Programs’ (OFTP) Tactical Operations Complex (TOC) at Fort Benning, Georgia.
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Among the training devices expected to be included at the new training site are “hyper-realistic props/design” that simulate “residential houses, apartments, hotels, government facilities and commercial buildings,” along with other training configurations.
The “devices” are defined as “scalable, portable, modular” training structures that would be “made from portable shipping containers or other appropriate modular materials that can be relocated to alternate sites as needed.”
“Hyper-realistic is defined as ‘such a high degree of fidelity in the replication of battlefield conditions in the training environment that participants so willingly suspend disbelief that they become totally immersed and eventually stress inoculated’,” ICE says.
Hyper-realism, the agency states, is “a critical component to this acquisition as the details provide essential information that must be acknowledged, processed and acted upon to minimize risk to our Special Agents, Deportation Officers and SRT operators during high-risk search and arrest warrants, fugitive operations, undercover operations, hostage rescue, gang operations, etc.”
“For example, details like the number of dishes left on the table, toys in the yard, lighting, furniture, etc. all provide clues that allow our agents and officers to infer vital information that directly affects their safety and the potential resolution or outcome in the scenario,” it continues. “Learning to process this information quickly to identify whether there are children present, or how many people are currently in the structure is a necessary skill developed in training.”
Saudis Race to Restore Oil Output After Aramco Attacks
September 15th, 2019Flashback: Trump and Saudi Arabia Both Want Higher Oil Prices
Mission accomplished.
Via: Bloomberg:
Saudi Arabia is racing to restore oil production after a brazen drone strike on a key Aramco facility slashed its output by half, or about 5% of world supply, an assault that the U.S. has blamed on Iran.
State energy producer Saudi Aramco lost about 5.7 million barrels per day of output after 10 unmanned aerial vehicles on Saturday struck the world’s biggest crude-processing facility in Abqaiq and the kingdom’s second-biggest oil field in Khurais, the company said.
Aramco would need weeks to restore full production capacity to a normal level, according to people familiar with the matter. The producer however can restore significant volume of oil production within days, they said. Aramco could consider declaring force majeure on some international shipments if the resumption of full capacity at Abqaiq takes weeks, they said.
The attack will likely rattle oil markets and cast a shadow on Aramco’s preparations for what could be the world’s biggest stake sale. It’s also set to escalate a showdown pitting Saudi Arabia and the U.S. against Iran, which backs proxy groups from Yemen to Iran and Lebanon.
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Saudi Aramco, which pumped about 9.8 million barrels a day in August, will be able to keep customers supplied for several weeks by drawing on a global storage network.
The Saudis hold millions of barrels in tanks in the kingdom itself, plus three strategic locations around the world: Rotterdam in the Netherlands, Okinawa in Japan, and Sidi Kerir on the Mediterranean coast of Egypt.
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For the global oil market, the 5.7 million barrels a day outage is the worst single and sudden supply disruption ever, surpassing the loss of Kuwaiti and Iraqi petroleum supply in August 1990, and the loss of Iranian oil output in 1979 during the Islamic Revolution, according to data from the U.S. Energy Department.
The U.S. Department of Energy said it’s prepared to dip into the Strategic Petroleum Oil Reserves if necessary to offset any market disruption.
South Africa’s Xenophobic Crisis
September 15th, 2019Via: serpentza:
Magnesium: Mineral Content of Vegetables Has Declined 80–90% Last 100 Years
September 14th, 2019This is from 2018.
Via: Nutrients:
Magnesium is a critical mineral in the human body and is involved in ~80% of known metabolic functions. It is currently estimated that 60% of adults do not achieve the average dietary intake (ADI) and 45% of Americans are magnesium deficient, a condition associated with disease states like hypertension, diabetes, and neurological disorders, to name a few. Magnesium deficiency can be attributed to common dietary practices, medications, and farming techniques, along with estimates that the mineral content of vegetables has declined by as much as 80–90% in the last 100 years. However, despite this mineral’s importance, it is poorly understood from several standpoints, not the least of which is its unique mechanism of absorption and sensitive compartmental handling in the body, making the determination of magnesium status difficult. The reliance on several popular sample assays has contributed to a great deal of confusion in the literature. This review will discuss causes of magnesium deficiency, absorption, handling, and compartmentalization in the body, highlighting the challenges this creates in determining magnesium status in both clinical and research settings.
Saudi Arabia Oil Facilities Ablaze After Drone Strikes
September 14th, 2019Via: BBC:
Drone attacks have set alight two major oil facilities run by the state-owned company Aramco in Saudi Arabia, state media say.
Footage showed a huge blaze at Abqaiq, site of Aramco’s largest oil processing plant, while a second drone attack started fires in the Khurais oilfield.
The fires are now under control at both facilities, state media said.
A spokesman for the Iran-aligned Houthi group in Yemen said it had deployed 10 drones in the attacks.
The military spokesman, Yahya Sarea, told al-Masirah TV, which is owned by the Houthi movement and is based in Beirut, that further attacks could be expected in the future.
Worms Fail to Thrive in Soil Containing Microplastics
September 14th, 2019Via: Guardian:
Worms fail to thrive in earth containing microplastics, new research has shown, adding to the growing body of evidence of impacts from the increasingly widespread contaminants on the natural world.
The rosy-tipped earthworm, Aporrectodea rosea, is one of the most common found in farmland in temperate regions. Scientists found that worms placed in soil loaded with high density polyethylene (HDPE) – a common plastic used for bags and bottles – for 30 days lost about 3% of their body weight, compared with a control sample of similar worms placed in similar soil without HDPE, which put on 5% in body weight over the same period.
Bas Boots, lecturer in biology at Anglia Ruskin University, and lead author of the study, said the specific reasons for the observed weight loss were not yet clear, but could be owing to the effects of microplastics on the worms’ digestion. “These effects include the obstruction and irritation of the digestive tract, limiting the absorption of nutrients and reducing growth,” he said.
Mark LaGanga’s WTC 9/11 Video
September 13th, 2019Via: YouTube:
Google Collects Face Data Now
September 12th, 2019Via: Cnet:
Google’s latest smart display brings with it a controversial new feature that’s always watching. Face Match, introduced on the Google Nest Hub Max, uses the smart display’s front-facing camera as a security feature and a way to participate in video calls. It also shows you your photos, texts, calendar details and so on when it recognizes your face.
This mode of facial recognition sounds simple enough at first. But the way companies like Google collect, store and process face data has become a top concern for privacy-minded consumers. Plenty of people want to know who has their personal information once it makes its way into the cloud.
U.S. Beats Saudi Arabia to Become Top Oil Exporter on Shale Boom
September 12th, 2019Via: Bloomberg:
The U.S. briefly became the world’s No. 1 oil exporter as record shale production found its way to global customers, and there are prospects for more.
Surging output from shale helped America ship almost nine million barrels a day of crude and oil products in June, surpassing Saudi Arabia, the International Energy Agency said in a report, citing gross export figures. There’s room to send even more supply overseas as companies add infrastructure to transport the burgeoning production from fields in Texas and New Mexico to the coast.
