Seventy-two Canadian potash miners walked away from an underground fire and toxic smoke on Monday after being locked down overnight in airtight chambers packed with enough oxygen, food and water for several days. Mosaic Co., the Minneapolis, Minn.-based owner of the mine in Esterhazy, Saskatchewan, said the successful rescue was because of the chambers, extensive training of rescue workers and support from the rural community. Analysts said the rescue could serve as a lesson for counterparts in the United States, China and other countries.
Afghanistan: Attacks thwarted
Security forces defused two roadside bombs near the heavily guarded U.S. Embassy in Kabul and arrested a suspected suicide attacker driving a minibus packed with explosives and gas canisters close to a U.S. base, officials said. The thwarted attacks came as international donors gathered in London to discuss Afghanistan’s future. Authorities fear militants opposed to the country’s U.S.-backed government may time high-profile attacks to coincide with the meeting.
U.S. soldier sentenced in punching
A U.S. military court in Kabul sentenced an American soldier to six months confinement and a reduction in rank after finding him guilty Monday of punching detainees, the military said. The conviction of Sgt. Kevin D. Myricks came three days after another soldier was convicted for mistreating the same two detainees at a base in eastern Afghanistan in July. Myricks was found guilty of one count of maltreatment of two detainees and another count of conspiracy to maltreat a detainee. He was reduced in rank to a private and sentenced to six months confinement, a U.S. military statement said.
Poland: Toll lowered in collapse
Poland’s prime minister said new federal regulations would allow authorities to close buildings whose roofs aren’t cleared of snow, and investigators picked through twisted metal in Katowice to determine why an exhibition hall’s roof buckled. Officials lowered the death toll from Saturday’s collapse during a racing pigeon fair in southern Poland from 67 to 62, blaming the discrepancy on the confusion surrounding the accident. Experts collected snow samples from the roof to determine if it had been cleared regularly, as the building’s owners claim it was.
England: Man trips, destroys vases
A visitor to a British museum in Cambridge tripped on his shoelace, stumbled down a stairway and fell into a display of centuries-old Chinese vases, shattering them into “very small pieces,” officials said Monday. The three Qing dynasty vases, dating from the late 17th or early 18th century, had been donated to the Fitzwilliam Museum in 1948 and were among its best-known artifacts. They sat on the windowsill beside the staircase for 40 years. The visitor wasn’t injured.
From Herald news services
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