Storms, shots, and snakes: environmental news from Reuters

The same Overnight News Digest that included the news I recycled into Movie news for Talk Like a Pirate Day also contained two stories with an environmental angle.  Here they are with two environmentally themed videos from Reuters for added value.

First, Killer storms savage Mexico.


This video accompanied Manuel lashes northwest Mexico as storm misery spreads by Lizbeth Diaz and Anahi Rama.

(Reuters) - Tropical Storm Manuel lashed Mexico's northwest coast with heavy rains on Thursday, prompting evacuations and adding to flash floods that have unleashed chaos across Mexico and killed at least 97 people.

Storms have inundated vast areas of Mexico since late last week, wrecking roads, destroying bridges and triggering landslides that buried homes and their occupants. Roads became raging rapids in the Pacific resort of Acapulco, stranding some 40,000 tourists.

Emergency services said heavy rains were beating down on the northwestern state of Sinaloa and that hundreds of people had been evacuated from coastal communities.

Next, Greenpeace video shows activists held at gunpoint.

Greenpeace releases video they say shows its activists were held at gunpoint before being arrested during their protest at a Russian arctic oil platform. Linda So reports.

Finally, something downright odd, if not any less serious, as Daniel Trotta reports New York town finds 850 snakes in man's home.

(Reuters) - Authorities in the New York town of Shirley found 850 snakes, including two illegal 6-foot-long (2-meter) Burmese pythons, in the home and garage of an animal control officer suspected of dealing in the reptiles, local media reported.

Shirley and Suffolk County officers raided the home on Thursday, Newsday of Long Island reported, citing town officials and publishing a photo of officers holding the pythons.

I wonder if we can trade him for the Greenpeace activists. :-)