The space rock flew within 186,000 miles of the planet after being spotted by astronomers a few days before.
While the distance from the planet might seem big, the asteroid in fact passed within the moon’s orbit, which orbits the planet from about 238,855 miles away.
(Makes ya want to duck, eh?)
The rock was spotted by stargazers at the Mount Lemmon Survey team, according to an alert by Minor Planet Center, part of the International Astronomical Union.
Researchers around the world keep a constant look out for any potentially dangerous rocks that might hit Earth, but an alarmingly small number have been identified.
Ex-astronaut Ed Lu recently told Wired.com, “While most large asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire country or continent have been detected, less than 10,000 of the more than a million dangerous asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire major metropolitan area have been found by all existing space or terrestrially-operated observatories. Because we don’t know where or when the next major impact will occur, the only thing preventing a catastrophe from a ‘city-killer’ sized asteroid has been blind luck.”
http://www.lfpress.com/2014/05/08/bus-sized-asteroid-narrowly-missed-earth
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I heard a comment once that America is tilted to the West, and anybody that’s a bit flaky or weird eventually rolls down to California ……., but that’s no longer true!
Today ya can find them anywhere!
The state Supreme Court upheld a challenge to Department of Motor
Vehicles’ rules, finding they were unconstitutionally broad by allowing
officials to deny requests for vanity license plates that “a reasonable
person would find offensive to good taste.”State officials could not be reached for immediate comment on Wednesday.
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Florida is a strange state. It has lots of sun, surf, is full of seniors and has some pretty loose gun laws to say the least.
It is also the breeding ground for some of the weirdest news stories.
There’s also enough crime stories for the Twitter account @_Floridaman to exist, reporting the wildest headlines that start with ‘Florida man.’
In honour of all the Florida men and women doing wacky things in the Sunshine State, we’ve gathered some of our favourite stories.
•Florida won’t let man marry his laptop
Mark “Chris” Sevier is definitely not the master of his own domain. Feel free to interpret that any number of ways considering the Florida man is demanding the state allow him to marry his own porn-infested computer, Gawker reports.
If gay people “have the right to marry their object of sexual desire, even if they lack corresponding sexual parts, then I should have the right to marry my preferred sexual object,” he said in his motion to intervene on the Florida gay marriage case.
Sevier, an attorney and music producer claims he “fell in love” with his computer and preferred “having sex with it” over other people or things.
That poor USB port. The state, however, isn’t allowing him to get hitched to it… for now.
•No shoes? You bet she still wanted service
Florida is a hot state. We get that.
But a Florida woman thought the old rule of no shoes, no shirt, no service didn’t apply to her at a west coast McDonald’s restaurant.
A topless Sandra Suarez, 41, entered the McDonald’s in Pinellas Park on March 24, and when an employee asked her to put on some clothes, she wasn’t lovin’ it. Instead she went on a rampage through the restaurant causing $10,000 in damage, according to a police report from the Tampa Bay Times.
In a video that went went viral in March, the woman is seen shoving cash registers onto the floor, overturning a drinks dispenser and throwing items at staff before helping herself to some ice cream.
•Otter attacks alligator, yep, you read that right
To most people, otters are adorable but this one is a killer.
The Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge in DeLeon Springs, Fla., posted some pretty intense photos on their Facebook page of an otter full-on attacking an alligator.
Staff said the otter killed the alligator, pulled it up onto the bank and proceeded to consume it, “as evidenced by crunching noises.”
The amazing photos were captured by Geoff Walsh and given to the US Fish & Wildlife Service.
They will haunt your dreams.
•Rare goblin shark caught off Florida coast
As if alligators, killer otters and little old’ ladies behind the wheel wasn’t enough to keep you away from Florida, this might.
A fishing crew off the coast of Florida was shocked to find among their shrimp a rare bottom-dwelling, hideous-looking monster known as a goblin shark.
Fisherman Carl Moore told the Houston Chronicle he didn’t even know what the 18-foot-long, bright-pink creature was when it dropped out of the net and began writhing on the deck.
“I didn’t get the tape measure out because that thing’s got some wicked teeth — they could do some damage,” he said.
It’s only the second time a goblin shark has been caught in the Gulf of Mexico, said an expert from the U.S. National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.
At least the beast is no longer swimming about, right? Wrong. They let it go!
•Alligator traded for beer
The U.S. dollar is still the legal tender in the Sunshine state, despite what Fernando Caignet Aguilera might think.
In Dec. 2013, the Florida man walked into a convenience store with a live alligator and attempted to trade it for a case of beer, according to wildlife authorities. Aguilera was cited for illegally capturing the animal, which was returned unharmed back into the wild.
•Oh, the huge manatee!
In March 2014, two Florida men in their 20s were charged with harassing an endangered species after authorities found a video of them jumping on manatees.
Photos on Facebook showed Taylor Blake Martin and Seth Andrew Stephenson luring the sea creatures near a dock in Cocoa Beach, where Martin jumped on an adult manatee and its calf. The pair face up to a year in prison and a $50,000 fine for violating the Florida Manatee Sanctuary Act.
•Man spreads dead fiancee’s ashes at Lenscrafters
Sometimes love can make you do crazy things – like going to the mall and spreading the ashes of your dead fiancee at the Lenscrafters.
No joke, a man in Sarasota, Fla., did just that – tossing the ashes and fleeing the store. Following their investigation, police announced the mourning man would receive grief counselling after he apologized for the outburst.
But there was one lingering question that wasn’t addressed: Why Lenscrafters?
•Mom brawl
What is it about talent shows that bring out tantrums? And among the parents no less.
A couple of moms stole the spotlight when they began brawling during a talent show at their daughters’ elementary school in St. Cloud, Fla. in May 2013.
The altercation reportedly began after Latisha James stood up to photograph her daughter, blocking Jessica Tyler’s view of the performance. After a heated exchange, Tyler returned to her seat before standing in front of James to take her own pictures.
The two allegedly came to blows after Tyler’s hand appeared to strike James’ three-year-old daughter as Tyler returned to her seat.
“Once she knocked my baby over, like I said, I just snapped,” James told WKMG Local 6. “And she did not say I’m sorry.”
Lakeview Elementary School has banned both women from attending future events
http://www.lfpress.com/news/world
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WELL KIDS, THE UNITED NATIONS IS ONCE AGAIN OUR “ASSHOLE OF THE DAY!”
Canadian diplomats and other experts say the the UN Human Rights Council (UNHCR) could appoint Hilal Elver as its special envoy on the right to food as early as this week.
The UNHCR has 37 “special envoys” who can use UN funding — and its good name — to investigate how individual countries are dealing with specific issues and make recommendations to deal with them.
But in a letter Baird sent to the UNHCR this week — a copy of which was obtained by QMI Agency — Baird argues that Elver’s previous statements and activities “shows indisputably that she is not a suitable candidate.”
“Her public record clearly demonstrates abysmal judgment, as well as
associations with fringe groups,” Baird said in a letter sent to
Baudelaire Ndong Ella, a diplomat from the African country of Gabon and
current UNHCR president.
Elver is a Turkish academic and lawyer who has been a research
professor of Global Studies at the University of California Santa
Barbara since 2002.
The advocacy group UN Watch said this week that, so far, Canada is the only country to oppose Elver’s appointment.
YOU MIGHT REMEMBER that the last special envoy on the right to food was Belgian Olivier de Schutter.De Schutter’s argued that the Harper government’s decision to allow Canadian wheat farmers to sell their product to someone other than the Canadian Wheat Board increased the incidence of hunger in Canada.
The Harper government rejected de Schutter’s conclusions.
Elver, who seems the odds-on bet to succeed de Schutter, is the Turkish-born spouse and collaborator of American Richard Falk, the controversial outgoing UN Special Rapporteur on Palestinian Human Rights. Falk’s work has drawn frequent condemnation and criticism from Canada as well as the U.S. and even UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.
“Elver is as dangerous as Falk. She spouts virulent anti-Western and anti-Israel invective, and celebrates the works of 9/11 Truther David Ray Griffin,” UN Watch’s Hillel Neuer wrote on the organization’s blog earlier this week.
Canada, the U.S. and others in the West have frequently criticized the UN Human Rights Council as a sham organization where the likes of Russia, China, Cuba and Iran use the imprimatur of the United Nations to attack nations, like Canada, that uphold democracy, the rule of law and human rights.
The UNHCR is made up of 47 countries, elected by the UN General Assembly in New York. Current members include notorious human rights abusers China, Cuba, Pakistan, Russia and Saudi Arabia.
(Story from the Toronto Sun)
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