Author Topic: TAR Disaster Curse  (Read 319069 times)

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Offline georgiapeach

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #150 on: April 04, 2011, 01:17:42 AM »
Hang tight DrRox!! I should be good until tomorrow night...
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Offline DrRox

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #151 on: April 04, 2011, 02:32:07 AM »
I will Peach.......but I meant to tell you tomorrow after I see what happens here......not tonight.......sometime on Monday.
Matthew 7:15


Offline DrRox

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #152 on: April 04, 2011, 06:31:16 AM »
The rockin and rollin started about 330 am.......60/70 mph winds....lots of rain and hail.......didnt or havent heard any thing about tornados yet........but its heading toward you at about 60 mph.........dont forget to duck!!!!
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Offline Prophet

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #153 on: April 04, 2011, 07:44:46 AM »
Earthquake of magnitude 6 at India-Nepal border, tremors felt in Delhi

NDTV Correspondent, Updated: April 04, 2011 17:59 IST


New Delhi:  An earthquake measuring 6 on the Richter scale and with an epicentre in Nepal shook parts of north India, including capital Delhi and its suburbs on Monday evening. There are no reports yet of damage or loss of life. (Read: Tweets on quake)

Reports from Noida and Gurgaon and parts of Delhi said strong tremors were felt, with furniture shaking in buildings. Tremors were also felt in Lucknow and Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh and mild tremors were reported in Shimla in Himachal Pradesh too. (Felt quake? Comment here)
 
India's earthquake monitoring network said the quake took place at 5.01 pm and the depth of the quake was 10 km.

Surfers are writing in at NDTV.com to describe their experience. S Gopi wrote in from Munsyari at the Indo-Nepal border to say, "Experienced strong tremors in Munsyari, located at the remote area of Indo-Nepal border...heavily shocking the people...But..we are safe...Thanks God."

"The earthquake was pretty strong and was there for more than 15-20 seconds. It shook the entire building," wrote Pankaj from Noida.
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Offline AmazingRace

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #154 on: April 04, 2011, 09:19:39 AM »
Yikes! Constant prayers for everyone's safety.  :(


Offline redskevin88

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #155 on: April 17, 2011, 09:17:46 PM »
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13109627

43 dead in US storms... Jet & Cord are from Oklahoma, so I thought this might be relevant...

Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #156 on: April 25, 2011, 12:17:20 PM »
Hi folks, sorry for jumping in late - I've been super busy... Partially because of the earthquake/tsunami.

Our Mixi.jp TAR community is still going on, but it has been fairly quiet. I think most of the fans in Japan live in the big cities like in the Tokyo area, and they are all trying to conserve electricity (due to the Fukushima nuke plant outages knocking out up to 30% of the power in the 50Hz Eastern Japan - note that Western Japan is on 60Hz and is on a completely different grid). I know most of the key members are safe, but I do not know if ALL of them are safe. Our thoughts and prayers are with them.


Anyway, I live in the Seattle area and have bought my tix to go see "The Ride" tomorrow night and hopefully Phil as well!

I made these really cool stickers for charity events - I don't have a good means to share a photo, but it's a motif of the Japanese flag with an abstracted view of the 4 main islands.  (I need to get a YFrog account)

The sticker reads:

がんばれ、日本! (Gambare, Nippon!)
We're with you Japan

I am hoping to take a handful of these and have Phil sign them, for two purposes:
* to let the Japanese fans at mixi.jp know that Phil is thinking of them
* to sell these (hopefully 3 of them) to the top 3 bidders, and donate ALL of the proceeds to charity (with corporate matching) - most likely the American Red Cross or Peacewinds America

Question to folks on this forum:
Do you think the other racers would be willing to autograph these stickers for the same cause? How would I be able to reach out to them?

If any of you could help, that would be great.
「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #157 on: April 25, 2011, 12:22:06 PM »
My heart goes out to all affected, and I pray for the best for all, in Japan and elsewhere!

Is Kenchan or any of our other posters based in Japan?

I think Kenchan is US based, but his buddies that did the leg work are in Tokyo.

Sorry for the late reply - yes, I am in Seattle, but Kuni lives in the Tokyo area.
Tokyo is ok--- desipte the various challenges (temporary food shortage, sporadic train schedules, ongoing power limitations, etc.), the city is still functioning. I have seen him log into Mixi, but I haven't seen any comments from him on our community.  Everyone over there is trying to save power, and TAR may be one of the last things on their minds right now.  I wouldn't blame them.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2011, 12:26:34 PM by kenchan »
「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #158 on: April 25, 2011, 12:24:49 PM »

Is Kenchan or any of our other posters based in Japan?

I think Kenchan is US based, but his buddies that did the leg work are in Tokyo.

His family in Tokyo are safe. He is trying to reach our TAR compatriots.

Thanks Peach, for passing this along.

We have such great friends here at RFF!  I hope to meet you guys someday and chat in person!!!
「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline georgiapeach

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #159 on: April 25, 2011, 12:34:47 PM »
Thanks Ken, please keep us updated and pass along our love?
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Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #160 on: April 25, 2011, 12:58:02 PM »
Thanks Ken, please keep us updated and pass along our love?

Of course, Peach!

I pledged to the members of our mixi.jp TAR community that I would keep writing the episode logs in Japanese so that could find some relief in the TV show they love the most.

And episode logs - that's what I do everyweek - not so much a PBP (hats off to the guys who do this on the Survivor Sucks forum), but fairly close. I write down details from the episode - ALL of the clues, the location details, and really great lines (Flight Time and Zev have provided the best ones in TAR18), and turn them into Japanese. 

This way, the fans that are not very well versed in English (quite a few of them) get something closer to a full TAR experience.  In fact, many of them join the community so they can get an in-depth view at what was aired in the episode.

The fun parts for me are:
* helping to bridge the language gap - not just from English, but also from the various American accents - Kisha/Jen and FT/BE have been somewhat difficult for the Japanese audience, so my translations seem to help them
* to translate all of the silly American slang and cultural references to something similar in Japanese (and sometimes that's a challenge - especially with Jet/Cord - heh heh, how do I translate "Oh my gravy!" to Japanese?)
* and of course, chatting about all of the tasks. 

Some of these guys in our mixi.jp community pick up on details that I have missed - like in the TAR18 Japan episode, one of the members picked up on a particular name in the credits at the end of the show - so he searched on it, and found a blog of one of the senior instructors at the Yabusame Dojo at the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu!  I should probably write up a post on it here, once I get permission from the blog owner.

「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline georgiapeach

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #161 on: April 25, 2011, 01:57:00 PM »
Oh yes, we would love to hear about that credit!

And sounds awesome, a wonderful gift for them and excellent for your Japanese too!
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Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #162 on: April 25, 2011, 01:58:50 PM »
Oh yes, we would love to hear about that credit!

And sounds awesome, a wonderful gift for them and excellent for your Japanese too!

It's a lot of fun!
« Last Edit: April 26, 2011, 01:39:37 AM by kenchan »
「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline mjriches2005

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #163 on: April 25, 2011, 02:09:15 PM »
Hey everyone this may count not as a disaster but more of conflict.  Right now I've been reading the news and there is soldier-related protest in Burkina Faso right now, especially in the capital of Ouagadougou where TAR12 went to on the 3rd and 4th legs of the season.

Offline freds

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #164 on: April 28, 2011, 10:57:42 AM »
An explosion hit a coffee shop at Marrakech, Morocco. The explosion is at jema el fna square, place of the roadblock of the leg 6 of TAR3.

Quote
A massive explosion ripped through a cafe popular among tourists in the Moroccan city of Marrakech on Thursday, killing 14 people including foreigners and wounding 20 in what the government called a criminal act.

If confirmed as terrorism, the blast in the iconic Djemma el-Fna square would be Morocco's deadliest bombing in eight years.

The explosion just before noon tore the facade off the two-story terracotta-colored Argana cafe, leaving awnings dangling. Panicked passersby dragged away bodies and tried to put out flames with fire extinguishers, witnesses told The Associated Press.

Moroccan government spokesman Khalid Naciri said that the 14 slain people came from a variety of countries but he did not say which ones.

"We worked for more than an hour, maybe less, on the hypothesis that this could eventually be accidental. But initial results of the investigation confirm that we are confronted with a true criminal act," Naciri said in an interview with France-24 television.

He said that more about the bombers' methods should be known within hours.

"There was a huge bang, and lots of smoke went up, there was debris raining down from the sky. Hundreds of people were running in panic, some towards the cafe, some away from the square. The whole front of the cafe is blown away," witness Andy Birnie, of north London, told the AP by telephone. Birnie is honeymooning in Marrakech.

The square is a UNESCO World Heritage site known for its snake charmers, fire breathers and old town, or medina.

"It was lunchtime so the square was very busy. We had just walked into the square, but were shielded by some stalls," Birnie said.

The state news agency MAP quoted a statement from the Interior Ministry as saying that 14 people were killed and 20 hurt in the explosion. The ministry said it appeared to be a "criminal act" and an investigation is under way.

The nationalities of the victims were not immediately clear. The Spanish foreign ministry said it wasn't aware of any Spaniards among the victims but that its consul in Casablanca was making inquiries.

Morocco is largely calm but was hit by terrorist bombings in Casablanca in 2003 that killed 45 people, including the suicide bombers. Moroccan authorities have regularly rounded up terror suspects since then and have been on alert for terrorist activity.

The Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, or GICM, a militant group was believed linked to those attacks. The GICM has also been implicated in the deadly attacks in Madrid in March 2004.

Al-Qaida has an affiliate operating in North Africa that stages regular attacks and kidnappings in neighboring Algeria. Morocco has said in the past that it has dismantled several al-Qaida plots. Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb currently holds four Frenchmen hostage after kidnapping them in Niger last year, and recently released new images and audio recordings of their voices.

Portuguese tourist Alexandre Carvalho, a 34 year-old call center worker from southern Portugal said, "I had just arrived at the square, the area where most cafes are located. Suddenly I heard this massive explosion, I had my back turned to it, I turned around to see it the explosion had happened on the veranda of a cafe.

"There were at least 10 injured people, lots of debris, things flying up in the air. I saw people in a panic running towards the area with fire extinguishers, some people being carried away. I believe the injured were mostly tourists, judging by what they were wearing," Carvalho told AP by telephone.

Offline Parovic

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #165 on: May 14, 2011, 06:44:02 AM »
A 5.1-magnitude earthquake, Spain's deadliest in 55 years, occurs near the town of Lorca

Offline mjriches2005

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #166 on: May 14, 2011, 01:33:58 PM »
A 5.1-magnitude earthquake, Spain's deadliest in 55 years, occurs near the town of Lorca

Lorca is far away from Algeciras (TAR3) and Barcelona (TAR10).  My hearts are out to the people in the town; but how could that be connected to any race season?

Offline Prophet

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #167 on: May 14, 2011, 01:40:01 PM »
We are in Cordoba on Redwings' Europe race which is only a little over two hundred miles away.  :lol:


There were actually two earthquakes and they are not accustomed to them so there was a lot of damage. I hope they will be alright.
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Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #168 on: June 16, 2011, 02:28:11 AM »
Quick update on Japan - this isn't a comprehensive report, but things are definitely going in the right direction.

I'm still collecting funds for donations, as help is still needed.  My friends in Tokyo are also doing their part, organizing cook-offs for the evacuees and such.



「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline theschnauzers

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #169 on: June 16, 2011, 04:45:14 PM »
I wasn't paying too close attention earlier this week, but Christchurch had a couple more 6.0-range earthquakes.

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Offline topaz

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #170 on: June 22, 2011, 07:43:40 AM »
omg, TAR 19 is now racing and info removed and my country, the Philippines are now have these 2 typhoons that cross to it for a week and hopefully that won't be affected if they'll visit to my country for that season within this week. :'(


no spoilers in discussion threads please.
« Last Edit: June 22, 2011, 08:00:30 AM by georgiapeach »

Offline georgiapeach

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #171 on: July 09, 2011, 03:26:22 PM »
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysian police fired repeated rounds of tear gas and detained over 1,400 people in the capital on Saturday as thousands of activists evaded roadblocks and barbed wire to hold a street protest against Prime Minister Najib Razak's government.

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Offline Alfwin

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #172 on: July 09, 2011, 09:34:52 PM »
TOKYO (AP) — A strong earthquake with a magnitude of 7.1 hit Japan's northeastern coast on Sunday, prompting a tsunami warning for the area still recovering from a devastating quake and killer wave four months ago.

Residents in coastal areas were warned to evacuate, but there were no immediate reports of damage.

The quake hit at 9:57 local time (0057 GMT), and a warning of a possible tsunami was issued for most of the northeastern coastline. The epicenter of the quake was in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Japan's main island, Honshu, at a depth of about 6 miles (10 kilometers).

Officials said they expected tsunami of less than one meter in some areas.

Japan's northeastern coastline was devastated by an earthquake and tsunami on March 11 that left nearly 23,000 dead or missing and touched off a nuclear crisis at a badly damaged facility in Fukushima.

Officials said there were no reports of abnormalities at the Fukushima plant caused by Sunday's quake. Airports in the area were also functioning normally.

Japan is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries. Dozens of strong aftershocks have been felt since the March 11 disaster, which measured a 9.0 magnitude and was the strongest in Japanese history.

Sunday's quake registered 4 on the Japanese scale of 7, meaning it was felt as moderately strong. Because of the damage from the March quake and tsunami, however, many buildings in the area are structurally weak and seawalls have been destroyed, making the region more vulnerable to relatively weaker quakes.

Hang on Japan!  :(

Offline kenchan

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #173 on: July 09, 2011, 11:11:36 PM »
Thanks Alfwin...
Here is the USGS page on that quake, registered as a 7.0.
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eqinthenews/2011/usc0004sg6/

The quake happened over 3 hrs ago and the Tsunami alert was cancelled 2 hrs ago. Looks like "the coast is clear", but I did see a report of a 10cm wave in Iwate.

Nearly 4 months after 3/11 and "aftershocks" are still happening. This is terrifying, given the Japanese media and twittersphere are filled with many disheartening stories too sad to share here...

Saving grace for Japan today: the Women's soccer team beat the reigning champs Germany in the FIFA Women's World Cup. GO NADESHIKO, ALL THE WAY!
« Last Edit: July 09, 2011, 11:37:13 PM by kenchan »
「超たのしい~!♪」
-Tyler McNiven riding a fold-up bike in the night streets of Tokyo, TAR9

Offline theschnauzers

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Re: TAR Disaster Curse
« Reply #174 on: July 10, 2011, 12:29:49 AM »
The strong aftershicks and secondary quakes go on for months after the main quake occurs. We're seeing this in Japan, and in New Zealand, and it was the case in the other earthquakes in the past decade, such as the Great Tsunami earthquake at Christmas 2004, and the earthquake a few years ago that generated deadly tsunami in Samoa, Chile, and China.

The Japanese have been luckier than the folks in Christchurch, that is for sure. The city centre and neighborhoods that haves shown to be quite unstable are not going to be rebuilt, those areas are being bought out and turned into greenbelts/ That's a smart move.
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