text:
Bushfires in Australia(Redirected from Bushfire)
Bushfires are frequent events during the warmer months of the year, due to Australia's mostly hot, dry climate. Each year, such fires impact extensive areas. On one hand, they can cause property damage and loss of human life. Certain native flora in Australia have evolved to rely on bushfires as a means of reproduction, and fire events are an interwoven and an essential part of the ecology of the continent. For thousands of years, Indigenous Australians have used fire to foster grasslands for hunting and to clear tracks through dense vegetation.
Major firestorms that result in severe loss of life are often named based on the day on which they occur, such as Ash Wednesday and Black Saturday. Some of the most intense, extensive and deadly bushfires commonly occur during droughts and heat waves, such as the 2009 Southern Australia heat wave, which precipitated the conditions during the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in which 173 people lost their lives. Other major conflagrations include the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires, the 2003 Eastern Victorian alpine bushfires and the 2006 December Bushfires.
Global warming is increasing the frequency and severity of bushfires.[1]
The term "bushfire" builds on the concept of "the bush", referring to sparsely-inhabited regions. Bushfires in Australia are generally defined as uncontrolled, non-structural fires burning in a grass, scrub, bush, or forested area. Australia, being a geographically and meteorogically diverse continent, experiences many types of bushfires. There are two main categories, depending on local topography.
- Hilly/mountainous fires – burn in hilly, mountainous or alpine areas which are usually densely forested. The land is less accessible and not conducive to agriculture, thus many of these densely forested areas have been saved from deforestation and are protected by national, state and other parks. The steep terrain increases the speed and intensity of a firestorm. Where settlements are located in hilly or mountainous areas, bushfires can pose a threat to both life and property.
- Flat/grassland fires – burn along flat plains or areas of small undulation, predominantly covered in grasses or scrubland. These fires can move quickly, fanned by high winds in flat topography, and they quickly consume the small amounts of fuel/vegetation available. These fires pose less of a threat to settlements as they rarely reach the same intensity seen in major firestorms as the land is flat, the fires are easier to map and predict, and the terrain is more accessible for firefighting personnel. Many regions of predominantly flat terrain in Australia have been almost completely deforested for agriculture, reducing the fuel loads which would otherwise facilitate fires in these areas.
Common causes of bushfires include lightning, arcing from overhead power lines, arson, accidental ignition in the course of agricultural clearing, grinding and welding activities, campfires, cigarettes and dropped matches, sparks from machinery, and controlled burn escapes.
The natural fire regime in Australia was altered by the arrival of humans. Fires became more frequent, and fire-loving species—notably eucalypts—greatly expanded their range.[2] It is assumed that a good deal of this change came about as the result of deliberate action by early humans, setting fires to clear undergrowth or drive game.[3]
Plants have evolved a variety of strategies to survive (or even require) bushfires, (possessing epicormic shoots or lignotubers that sprout after a fire, or developing fire-resistant or fire-triggered seeds) or even encourage fire (eucalypts contain flammable oils in the leaves) as a way to eliminate competition from less fire-tolerant species.[4]
Some native animals are also adept at surviving bushfires.[5]
In 2009, a standardised Fire Danger Rating (FDR) was adopted by all Australian states. During the fire season the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) provides fire weather forecasts and by considering the predicted weather including temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and dryness of vegetation, fire agencies determine the appropriate Fire Danger Rating.[6] In 2010, following a national review of the bush fire danger ratings, new trigger points for each rating were introduced for grassland areas in most jurisdictions. See for example the following glossary[7]
Fire Danger Ratings are a feature of weather forecasts and alert the community to the actions they should take in preparation of the day. Ratings are broadcast via newspapers, radio, TV, and the internet.
|Fire Danger Index
|Catastrophic / Code Red
|Forest 100+ Grass 150+
|Forest 75–100 Grass 100–150
|Forest 50–75 Grass 50–100
|Very high
|Low to moderate
Regional managementEdit
The Australasian Fire Authorities Council (AFAC) is the peak body responsible for representing fire, emergency services and land management agencies in the Australasian region.
The Rural Fire Service (RFS) is a volunteer-based firefighting agency and operates as part of the Queensland Fire and Emergency Services.[8]
New South WalesEdit
The New South Wales Rural Fire Service (RFS) is a volunteer-based firefighting agency and statutory body of the Government of New South Wales.[9]
South AustraliaEdit
The Country Fire Service is a volunteer based fire service in the state of South Australia. The CFS operates as a part of the South Australian Fire and Emergency Services Commission (SAFECOM).
In Victoria, the Country Fire Authority (CFA) provides firefighting and other emergency services to country areas and regional townships within the state, as well as large portions of the outer suburban areas and growth corridors of Melbourne not covered by the Metropolitan Fire Brigade.[10]
Western AustraliaEdit
The Department of Fire and Emergency Services of Western Australia (DFES) and the Department of Parks and Wildlife (P&W) have joint responsibility for bushfire management in Western Australia.[11] DFES is an umbrella organisation supporting the Bush Fire Brigade volunteers, Emergency Services Cadets, Fire and Rescue Service, State Emergency Service, Volunteer Emergency Service, Volunteer Fire Service, Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service, and the Volunteer Marine Rescue Services.
Guidelines for survivalEdit
Local authorities provide education and information for residents in bushfire-prone regions regarding the location of current fires,[12] preservation of life and property[13] and when to escape by car.[14]
Bushfires in Australia can occur all year-round, though the severity and the "bushfire season" varies by region.[15] These seasons are commonly grouped into years such as "2006-07 Australian bushfire season" and typically run from June one year until May the next year.
In southeast Australia, bushfires tend to be most common and most severe during summer and autumn (December–March), in drought years, and particularly severe in El Niño years. Southeast Australia is fire-prone, and warm and dry conditions intensify the probability of fire.[16] In northern Australia, bushfires usually occur during the dry season (April to September),[17] and fire severity tends to be more associated with seasonal weather patterns. In the southwest, similarly, bushfires occur in the summer dry season and severity is usually related to seasonal growth. Fire frequency in the north is difficult to assess, as the vast majority of fires are caused by human activity, however lightning strikes are as common a cause as human-ignited fires and arson.
Climate changeEdit
Australia's climate has been trending toward more bushfire weather over the last 30 years.[18] The Climate Commission found that "The intensity and seasonality of large bushfires in south-east Australia appears to be changing, with climate change a possible contributing factor."[19]
A 2006 report by the Bushfire CRC acknowledges the complexity of climate predictions pointing out "Much of [Australia's] vegetation has a complex evolutionary and dependent relationship with fire. Fire has been part of these environments for tens of thousands of years and much native flora and fauna remains dependent on it in various ways."[20] In 2007, a study by the CSIRO (the national government body for scientific research in Australia), found evidence that climate change will lead to increases in very high and extreme fire danger rating days and earlier onset of the fire season.[21] Other studies investigating the historical record identify significant changes in Australia's bushfire season as a result of human activity.[22]
Major bushfires in AustraliaEdit
Bushfires have accounted for over 800 deaths in Australia since 1851 and the total accumulated cost is estimated at $1.6 billion.[23] In terms of monetary cost however, they rate behind the damage caused by drought, severe storms, hail, and cyclones,[24] perhaps because they most commonly occur outside highly populated urban areas.
Some of the most severe Australian bushfires, in chronological order, have included:
|Area burned
1 ha ≈ 2.5 acres
|Human Deaths
|Properties damaged
|Black Thursday bushfires
|≈ 5 million hectares (ha)
|6 February 1851
|about 12
|1 million sheep; thousands of cattle[25][26]
|Red Tuesday bushfires
|260,000 ha
|1 February 1898
|2,000 buildings[26]
|1926 bushfires
|February – March 1926
|Black Friday bushfires
|2 million ha
|December 1938 – January 1939, peaking 13 January 1939
|1944 Bushfires
|1 million ha estimated
|14 January – 14 February 1944
|more than 500 houses[26]
|1951-2 Bushfires
|Summer 1951–52
|at least 10[28]
|Black Sunday Bushfires
|South Australia
|39,000 ha - 160,000 ha
|2 January 1955
|40 dwellings including the Governor's summer residence at Marble Hill
|1961 Western Australian bushfires[29]
|Western Australia
|1,800,000 ha
|January–March 1961
|160 homes
|1962 bushfires
|14–16 January 1962
|450 houses[27]
|Southern Highlands bushfires
|New South Wales
|5–14 March 1965
|59 homes
|Tasmanian "Black Tuesday" bushfires
|Approximately 264,000 ha
|7 February 1967
|1,293 homes[26]
|Dandenong Ranges Bushfire
|1,920 ha
|19 February 1968
|53 homes 10 other buildings
|1969 bushfires
|8 January 1969
|230 houses[27]
|1974 Moolah-Corinya bushfires[30][31][32][33]
|Far Western New South Wales
|1,117,000 ha
|Mid December 1974
|40 homes
|1974 Cobar bushfire[30][31][32][33]
|Cobar NSW
|1,500,000 ha
|Mid December 1974
|1974 Balranald bushfire[31][32][33]
|Balranald NSW
|340,000 ha
|Mid December 1974
|1974/75 New South Wales bushfires[34][35][36]
|New South Wales
|4,500,000 ha
|1984/1985 season
|10,170 km of fencing, 50,000 livestock
Includes Moolah-Corinya, Cobar and Balranald fires
|Western Districts Bushfires
|103,000 ha
|12 February 1977
|116 houses, 340 Buildings
|1978 Western Australian Bushfires
|Western Australia
|114,000 ha
|4 April 1978
|6 buildings (drop in wind in early evening is said to have saved the towns of Donnybrook, Boyup Brook, Manjimup, and Bridgetown.)
|1979 Sydney bushfires
|Sydney, and Region NSW
|December 1979
|28 homes destroyed, 20 homes damaged[37]
|1980 Waterfall bushfire
|Waterfall, NSW
|>1 million ha
|3 November 1980
|5 firefighters
|14 homes[38]
|Grays Point bushfire
|Grays Point, New South Wales
|9 January 1983
|3 volunteer firefighters
|Ash Wednesday bushfires
|South Australia and Victoria
|418,000 ha
|16 February 1983
|about 2,400 houses
|1984 Western New South Wales bushfires[31][32][33]
|Western New South Wales grasslands
|500,000 ha (100+ fires)
|25 December 1984
|1985 Cobar bushfire[31][32]
|Cobar NSW
|516,000 ha
|Mid January 1985
|Fences and livestock on multiple properties/stations
|1984/85 New South Wales bushfires[31][32][33][34][35][36]
|New South Wales
|3,500,000 ha (6000 fires)
|1984/1985 season
|40,000 livestock, $40 million damage
Includes Western NSW grasslands and Cobar fires
|Central Victoria Bushfires
|50,800 ha
|14 January 1985
|180+ houses
|1994 Eastern seaboard fires
|New South Wales
|≈400,000 ha[40]
|27 December 1993 – 16 January 1994
|225 homes
|Wooroloo Bushfire
|Western Australia
|10,500 ha
|8 January 1997
|16 homes
|Dandenongs bushfire
|21 January 1997
|41 homes[41]
|Lithgow bushfire
|New South Wales
|2 December 1997
|Perth and SW Region bushfires
|Western Australia
|23,000 ha
|2 December 1997
|2 (21 injuries)
|1 home lost
|Linton bushfire
|2 December 1998
|Black Christmas
|New South Wales
|300,000 ha
|25 December 2001 – 2002
|121 homes
|2003 Canberra bushfires
|Canberra, Australian Capital Territory
|160,000 ha[26]
|18–22 January 2003
|almost 500 homes[41]
|2003 Eastern Victorian alpine bushfires
|over 1.3 million ha
|8 January – 8 March 2003
|41 homes
|Western Australia
|December 2003
|(2,110,000 ha of forest burnt during the 2002–2003 bushfire season in the S/W of WA)
|Eyre Peninsula "Black Tuesday" or Wangary bushfire
|South Australia
|77,964 ha
|10–12 January 2005
|93 homes
|2006 Central Coast bushfire
|Central Coast, New South Wales
|New Years Day, 2006
|Jail Break Inn Fire
|Junee, New South Wales
|30,000 ha[42]
|New Years Day 2006
|Livestock losses estimated to be over 20,000. Seven homes, seven headers and four shearing sheds destroyed. 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) of fencing damaged.[43]
|2005 Victorian bushfires
|160,000 ha
|December 2005 – January 2006
|57 houses, 359 farm buildings, 65,000 stock losses, fires occurred in the Stawell, Moondarra, Anakie, Yea, and Kinglake regions[44]
|Grampians Bushfire
|January 2006
|Pulletop bushfire
|Wagga Wagga, New South Wales
|6 February 2006
|2,500 sheep and 6 cattle killed, 3 vehicles and 2 hay sheds destroyed as well as 50 km of fencing.
|The Great Divides Fire
|1,048,000 ha
|1 Dec 2006 – March 2007
|51 homes
|2006-07 Australian bushfire season
|September 2006 – January 2007
|Dwellingup bushfire
|Western Australia
|12,000 ha
|4 February 2007
|Kangaroo Island Bushfires
|South Australia
|95,000 ha
|6–14 December 2007
|Boorabbin National Park
|Western Australia
|40,000 ha
|30 December 2007
|Powerlines and Great Eastern Highway, forced to close for 2 weeks
|Black Saturday bushfires
|450,000+ ha
|7 February 2009 – 14 March 2009
|2,029+ houses, 2,000 other structures
|Toodyay Bushfire
|Western Australia
|3,000+ ha
|29 December 2009
|Lake Clifton Bushfire
|Western Australia
|2,000+ ha
|11 January 2011
|10 homes destroyed
|Roleystone Kelmscott Bushfire
|Western Australia
|1,500+ ha
|6–8 February 2011
|72 homes destroyed, 32 damaged, Buckingham Bridge on Brookton Highway collapsed and closed for 3 weeks whilst a temporary bridge was constructed and opened a month after the fires
|Margaret River Bushfire
|Western Australia
|4,000 ha
|24 November 2011
|34 homes destroyed including the historic Wallcliffe House[45]
|Tasmanian Bushfires
|20,000+ ha
|4 January 2013
|At least 170 buildings
|Warrumbungle Bushfire
|New South Wales
|54,000 ha
|18 January 2013
|At least 53 homes, 118 sheds, agricultural machinery and livestock. Infrastructure destroyed at Siding Spring Observatory.[46]
|2013 New South Wales bushfires
|New South Wales
|100,000+ ha
|17 October- 28 October
|As of 19 October 2013[update] at least 248 buildings destroyed statewide (inc. 208 dwellings),[47] another 109 damaged in Springwood, Winmalee and Yellow Rock[48][49]
Major fires also occurred in the Hunter, Central Coast, Macarthur and Port Stephens regions causing significant damage.
|Carnarvon bushfire complex
|Western Australia
|800,000 ha +
|27 December 2011 - 3 February 2012
|11 pastoral stations (fences, watering systems, water points, stock feed).
|2014 Parkerville bushfire
|Western Australia
|386 ha
|12 January 2014
|56 homes.
|2015 Sampson Flat bushfires
|South Australia
|20,000 ha
|2 January - 9 January 2015
|27 homes, 140 outbuildings
|2015 O'Sullivan bushfire (Northcliffe - Windy Harbour)
|Western Australia
|98,923 ha
|29 January – 20 February 2015
|1 home and 1 inhabited shed, 5 farm sheds and thousands of hectares of production forests (karri and jarrah) or national parks.
|2015 Lower Hotham bushfire (Boddington)
|Western Australia
|52,373 ha
|January 2015
|1 house, 1 farm shed, 1 bridge and thousands of hectares of production forest (jarrah) or national parks.
|2015 Esperance bushfires
|Western Australia
|more than 200,000 ha[50]
|October – November 2015
|About 10 houses and public buildings (Scaddan), 15,000 stock losses, 5 Nature Reserves et most area of Cape Arid national park.
|Perth Hills bushfire complex - Solus Group
|Western Australia
|10,016 ha
|15 to 24 November 2015
|Jarrah production forest and Conservation Park.
|2015 Pinery bushfire
|South Australia
|More than 85,000 ha
|25 November - 2 December 2015
|91 dwellings
|2016 Murray Road bushfire (Waroona and Harvey)[52]
|Western Australia
|69,165 ha
|January 2016
|181 dwellings (166 only in Yarloop) and thousands of hectares of Lane Poole Reserve and production forest (jarrah).
|2017 New South Wales bushfires
|New South Wales
|52,000+ ha
|February 11–14, 2017
|35 dwellings.[53]
|2017 Carwoola bushfire
|New South Wales
|3,500 ha
|February 17–18, 2017
|11 dwellings destroyed; 12 damaged.[54]
|2018 Tathra bushfire
|New South Wales
|1,200 ha
|March 17-18, 2018
|69 houses and 30 caravans/cabins destroyed; 39 damaged.[55]
See alsoEdit
- Early 2009 southeastern Australia heat wave, which generated extreme fire conditions
- Angry Summer, 2012–2013 Australian summer.
- McArthur Forest Fire Danger Index
- Wildfire
- Pyrotron, a device designed to help firefighters better understand how to combat the rapid spread of bush fires
- ^ Milman, Oliver (24 October 2013). "Climate Council finds 'clear link' between bushfires and climate change". The Guardian. Retrieved 26 October 2013."There is a "clear link" between climate change and bushfires, with the current New South Wales fires influenced by a rising frequency of hot, dry days, according to the climate body that had its funding withdrawn by the Coalition government. * * * The Climate Council's interim findings, drawn from 60 peer-reviewed studies, show climate change is influencing the number of extremely warm days in Australia, as well as prolonged periods of low rainfall."
- ^ Flannery, T. (1994) "The future eaters" Reed Books Melbourne.
- ^ Wilson, B., S. Boulter, et al. (2000). Queensland's resources. Native Vegetation Management in Queensland. S. L. Boulter, B. A. Wilson, J. Westrupet eds. Brisbane, Department of Natural Resources.
- ^ White, M. E. 1986. The Greening of Gondwana. Reed Books, Frenchs Forest, Australia.
- ^ Effects of fire on plants and animals "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 30 January 2011. Retrieved 27 December 2010.. Retrieved June 2012
- ^ "New Warning System Explained". Country Fire Authority. Retrieved 1 February 2010.
- ^ Country Fire service of South Australia website http://www.cfs.sa.gov.au/site/home/cfs_glossary.jsp. Retrieved September 2011
- ^ "Rural Fire Service Queensland".
- ^ "NSW Rural Fire Service". New South Wales Government. Retrieved 30 October 2010.
- ^ "Country Fire Authority". Country Fire Authority. Retrieved 30 October 2010.
- ^ "Welcome to DFES". Department of Fire and Emergency Services of Western Australia. Retrieved 30 October 2010.
- ^ "NSW Current Fires". NSW Rural Fire Service.
- ^ "How to survive a bushfire" (PDF). NSW Rural Fire Service. Retrieved 20 February 2017.
- ^ "Driving in a bushfire". Retrieved 20 February 2017.
- ^ Luke RH, McArthur AG (1978). Bushfires in Australia. Canberra: Australian Government Publishing Service.
- ^ Sullivan, Rohan (11 February 2009). "Hot and dry Australia sees wildfire danger rise". The Association Press. Retrieved 13 February 2009.
- ^ "Monsoonal Climate". Questacon. Retrieved 9 September 2006.
- ^ "Bushfire weather in Southeast Australia: Media Brief", The Climate Institute, 26 September 2007. Retrieved 24 October 2013.
- ^ "The Critical Decade: Climate science, risks and responses" Archived 24 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine., The Climate Commission, 2011. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
- ^ "CLIMATE CHANGE AND ITS IMPACT ON THE MANAGEMENT OF BUSHFIRE" (PDF). Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre. September 2006. p. 4. Retrieved 25 October 2013.
- ^ CSIRO (2007). "Bushfire Weather in Southeast Australia Recent Trends and Projected Climate Change Impacts". Retrieved 25 October 2013.
- ^ Jones, Roger. "Fire and climate change: don't expect a smooth ride". The Conversation. Retrieved 24 October 2013.
- ^ "Summary of Major Bush Fires in Australia Since 1851". Romsey Australia. Retrieved 29 October 2010.
- ^ "EMA Disasters Database". Emergency management Australia. Retrieved 30 October 2010.
- ^ Black Thursday. Retrieved 10 February 2009.
- ^ a b c d e ABS 1301.0 – Year Book Australia, 2004. Australian Bureau of Statistics. 24 March 2006. Retrieved 10 February 2009
- ^ a b c "Major bushfires in Victoria". Department of Sustainability and Environment. Archived from the original on 2 September 2006. Retrieved 15 February 2009.
- ^ "Chisholm, Alec H.". The Australian Encyclopaedia. 2. Sydney: Halstead Press. 1963. p. 207. Bushfires.
- ^ Matthews, H (2011) Karridale Bush Fires 1961, Karridale Progress Association Inc. ISBN 978-0-9871467-0-0
- ^ a b "The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales on December 21, 1974 · Page 1". Newspapers.com. Retrieved 2018-02-13.
- ^ a b c d e f Mac Dougall, I D (2003). "A National User-Driven approach towards a coordinated Fire Research Program" (PDF). The Australian Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre Program.
- ^ a b c d e f "Bush Fires / Wild Fires - Australian Bushfire History". www.australiasevereweather.com. Retrieved 2018-02-13.
- ^ a b c d e "Our Service's story" (PDF). NSW RFS Bush Fire Bulletin Souvenir Liftout 2010 Part Two. Retrieved 14 February 2018.
- ^ a b Ellis, Kanowski & Whelan (2004). COAG National Inquiry on Bushfire Mitigation and Management (PDF). Commonwealth of Australia. p. 341.
- ^ a b 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission Final Report (PDF). Parliament of Victoria. 2010. p. 347. ISBN 978-0-9807408-1-3.
- ^ a b "Bushfires in NSW: timelines and key sources" (PDF). NSW Parliament Issues Backgrounder Number 6. NSW Parliamentary Research Service. June 2014.
- ^ "Bushfire – Sydney and Region:1 December 1979". Attorney-General's Department (Australia). Retrieved 9 January 2013.
- ^ "1979 – 1980, Sydney and Region bushfire". Ministry for Police and Emergency Services. 18 September 2007. Retrieved 9 January 2013.
- ^ Mutton, Sheree (9 January 2014). "Shire fire horror still lingers 20 years on". St George & Sutherland Shire Leader. Fairfax Regional Media. Retrieved 22 January 2018.
- ^ "Bushfires – Get the Facts". Attorney-General's Department. Retrieved 9 January 2013
- ^ a b c Norther Daily Leader, "Some past bushfires in Australia, p.3, 10 February 2009
- ^ "Bushfire threat eases in NSW". The Sydney Morning Herald. 4 January 2006. Retrieved 20 March 2009.
- ^ "Generous support coming in for farmers affected by bushfires". NSW Department of Primary Industries. New South Wales Government. 6 January 2006. Retrieved 20 March 2009.
- ^ http://home.iprimus.com.au/foo7/firesum.html
- ^ "Rain could help damp down WA bushfires". ABC News. 25 November 2011. Retrieved 22 October 2013.
- ^ Van de Wetering, Jodie (11 March 2013). "A timeline of the Coonabarabran bushfires". ABC (Western Plains). Retrieved 22 October 2013.
- ^ "Update – Damage assessment and fire investigation" (PDF) (Press release). New South Wales Rural Fire Service. 19 October 2013. Retrieved 22 October 2013.[permanent dead link]
- ^ "Watch and Act – Linksview Road Fire, Springwood (Blue Mountains) 19/10/13 11:40". NSW Rural Fire Service. 19 October 2013. Retrieved 19 October 2013.
- ^ Madden, James. "Firestorm destroys NSW communities as hundreds of homes could be lost". The Australian. Retrieved 25 October 2013.
- ^ http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/esperance-bushfire-flares-up-again--and-more-lightning-could-be-on-the-way-20151121-gl4ho8.html
- ^ Taylor, Roxanne; Powell, Graeme (18 November 2015). "German backpackers, farmer believed dead in Esperance fires". ABC News. ABC. Retrieved 18 December 2015.
- ^ Fergusson, Euan: Report of the Special Inquiry into the January 2016 Waroona Fire ("Reframing Rural Fire Management"), Government of Western Australia, Volume 1: Report, 29 April 2016.
- ^ "35 homes razed in NSW blazes: RFS". SBS News. SBS. 15 February 2017. Retrieved 15 February 2017.
- ^ Le Lievre, Kimberley; Groch, Sherryn; Brown, Andrew (18 February 2017). "Police investigate blaze near Queanbeyan as fire crews battle on". The Canberra Times. Retrieved 21 February 2017.
- ^ "Bushfire in Tathra wipes out 69 homes, residents still unable to return to NSW south coast town". ABC. 19 March 2018. Retrieved 20 March 2018.
External linksEdit
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Bushfires in Australia.
- "Bushfires overview". CSIRO.
- "Australian fire risk and season maps". Romsey Australia.
- "Real-time Australian Bushfire Map". The Unorthodox Engineers.
- "Sentinel". Geoscience Australia.[permanent dead link]
- "Australian Bushfire Map prone area map". balrating.


text:
Meeting the Extraordinary Challenges of Our Times
What challenges?
The Transition Movement supports local Transition Initiatives, engaging people and communities
in strengthening themselves against the effects of these monumental challenges,
resulting in a life that is more fulfilling, socially connected and resilient.
A Transition Town is a community led response to the twin (and inter-connected) challenges of Peak Oil and Climate Change. The speed of growth in numbers of Transition Towns appears to be matching the speed of change we are now seeing in food and fuel prices, as global oil production slows and awareness of our impact on the climate increases.
A Transition Initiative is a community working together to look Peak Oil and Climate Change squarely in the eye and address this BIG question:
"For all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we significantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)?"
The resulting coordinated range of projects across all these areas of life leads to a collectively designed energy descent pathway.
. . . .If we collectively plan and act early enough there's every likelihood that we can create a way of living that's significantly more connected, more vibrant and more in touch with our environment than the [way we live] today.

subset: commoncrawl


text: Many years ago I wrote to Sydney Brenner to ask this same question. Unfortunately, I have lost his reply, but I remember that he wasn't able to give me a detailed genotype: he answered only that it is a uracil auxotroph of E coli B. (The only thing I'm unsure of is that it was "B".) -- Leon Avery (214) 648-4931 (voice) Department of Molecular Biology and Oncology -1488 (fax) University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center 5323 Harry Hines Blvd leon at eatworms.swmed.edu Dallas, TX 75235-9148 http://eatworms.swmed.edu/~leon/


text:
Servicios Personalizados
- Citado por SciELO
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Links relacionados
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Journal of the Chilean Chemical Society
versión On-line ISSN 0717-9707
J. Chil. Chem. Soc. v.54 n.1 Concepción 2009
J. Chil. Chem. Soc, 54, N° 1 (2009); págs: 93-98
MANUEL BRAVOa1*, ALEJANDRO C. OLWIERTb, BEATRIZ OELCKERSa
a1 Laboratorio de Química Analtica y Ambiental, Instituto de Química, P. Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, P.O. Box 4059, Valparaíso, Chile. *e-mail: email@example.com.
a SQM Industrial, Aníbal Pinto 3223, Antofagasta, Chile,
b Departamento de Química Analítica, Facultad de Ciencias Bioquímicas y Farmacéuticas, Universidad Nacional de Rosario e Instituto de Química Rosario (CONICET), Suipacha 531, Rosario (2000) Argentina.
Multivariate calibration of UV-visible spectral data using partial least-squares (PLS) has been applied to the determination of the nitrate content in Chilean Caliche samples, in the concentration range from 1 to 20% NaNO3 The multivariate approach is required since the samples do also contain unknown interferences which are spectrally active in the useful wavelength region for nitrate quantitation (near 301 nm). A set of fifteen calibration samples was employed to build the multivariate model, selected using the Kennard-Stone methodology, starting from real Caliche samples whose nitrate content was previously determined using the reference Devarda method. The figures of merit of the multivariate model were satisfactory (the limit of detection and quantitation reached 0.04% and 0.12 % of NaNO3, respectively, with an average error of prediction of 0.3 % of NaNO3). Then, the PLS model was then applied to a set of independent Caliche samples. The results were compared with a univariate UV approach, and with the nitrate content determined by the reference method, using the linear regression of predicted vs. reference concentration values, together with the elliptical joint confidence region test for the slope and intercept of the latter regression. The results indícate that the univariate method is unsuitable for analyzing the presently studied samples, unlike the multivariate model. Finally, the analytical methodology proposed appears as reliable and cheap alternative for routine analysis of a large number of caliche samples.
Keywords: Nitrate determination, UV-visible spectrophotometry; Multivariate calibration; Partial least-squares
The north of Chile has the biggest Caliche mineral deposits known in the world and the only source of commercially-exploited natural nitrates in the planet. Caliche is the name of the raw material used for fertilizer production based on sodium nitrate. During the production process, Caliche ore is ground mechanically and transferred to a vat leaching plant, where its nitrate content is extracted and further processed to get crystallized as sodium or potassium nitrate. For this reason, a fast and accurate method to quantitate the content of mtrate is fundamental to evaluate the quality of the raw material and to control the lixiviation process.
There are several experimental approaches to evaluate the nitrogen content in different kind of samples1, but the Kjeldahl method still remains as the reference method. It is both precise and accurate, but it is very time consuming, which is a disadvantage for industrial applications where the analytical data are required to regulate a manufacturing process. Other faster methods have been proposed, such as the Dumas method2 for total nitrogen, or the Devarda method3 for nitrate determination, which is based on the reduction of nitrate to ammonia in an alkaline médium by Devarda's alloy (50% Al, 45% Cu and 5% Zn), distillation of the ammonia and titration with standard acid The latter ones are recognized as reference methods to be applied to different nitrogen matrices, and show lower analysis times in comparison with the Kjeldahl method. However, they require an average time of ca. 5 minutes for their application, and henee they are impracticable in our case, where the analysis of several hundred of samples each day is needed.
In this context, the UV determination of mtrate extracted from Caliche appears as a rapid and cheaper alternative. The nitrate ion presents two UV absorption bands in water: a broad and very intense band at 220 nm, and a less intense one at 301 nm. However, in both of these spectral regions several other inorganic anions absorb UV radiation, and therefore the latter may produce an overestimation of the nitrate content when the univariate calibration approach is employed.
Multivariate calibration methods applied to absorptive spectral data are being increasingly used for the analysis of complex mixtures4,5. Several chemometric tools have been reported in the literatura for spectroscopic data6, although the most popular are principal component regression (PCR)7, partial least-squares regression (PLS)8 and the recently introduced variants of hybrid linear analysis (HLA)9-15, which are based in the net analyte signal (NAS) concept16,17. AU these techniques have the advantage of using full spectral information, they allow for a rapid determination of mixture components, often with no prior separation, and the calibration can be performed ignoring the concentrations of all components except the analyte of interest in complex samples. This malees these methods especially appealing for the nitrate determination in Caliche, whose matrix components may show absorption spectra which are severely overlapped with those from the analyte. Sorne multivariate methods have been used to evaluate the nitrate concentration in flltered and unfiltered water samples from a water treatment plant by classical least-squares (CLS)18 and PLS19 with satisfactory results.
In this paper, we report the nitrate determination in Caliche samples by UV-visible absorption spectroscopic data and PLS multivariate calibration. The latter methodology is expected to provide a predictive model for the quantitation of nitrate in samples with severe spectral overlapping with other sample components, in contrast to the classical univariate UV calibration at a single wavelength.
After a careful selection of samples assisted by a chemometric methodology, the PLS multivariate approach was applied to a set of real Caliche samples, and the predicted nitrate content was compared with the reference Devarda method. It should be noticed that among the analyzed Caliche samples, the nitrate content could have varied between 1 and 20%. While the usual univariate method employs two sepárate calibrations, one for the lower concentration range and an another one for the higher range, the multivariate approach provides good prediction results at both extremes of this rather wide concentration range using a single calibration set of measurements. Furthermore, the total time of analysis was less than 1 minute per sample, indicating that the developed method is well suited to be applied in a routine laboratory of analysis.
UV-visible absorption spectra were obtained with a Unicam UV-VIS spectrophotometer Model 530 (Del Carpió Analysis, Santiago, Chile), using 1.00 cm quartz cells. For all samples, the spectra were recorded between 190 and 500 nm with an interval of 1 nm (311 data points per spectrum), saved in ASCII format and transferred to PC Pentium 4 for subsequent manipulation.
The reference procedure for nitrate determination in Caliche samples was adapted from the AOAC Official Method 892.01 for nitrogen determination in fertilizers. These analyses were carried out on a Gerhardt distillation system model Vapodest 6 (Gerhardt, Germany) with automated analysis of 12 samples. The nitrogen concentrations are reported as percentage of sodium nitrate (% NaNO3).
All experiments were performed with analytical-reagent grade purchased from Merck S.A. (Santiago, Chile). The solutions of boric acid and sodium hydroxide, both 0.1 mol L-1, were preparad on a daily basis for nitrate quantitation.
Univariate UV method
Standards for the univariate method are prepared by dissolving sodium nitrate in Milli-Q water. Two sepárate calibrations are routinely performed, one for low nitrate concentrations and one for high nitrate concentrations. The first calibration is done using three triplicate standards in the range 0.20-1.00 g L-1, with the following results: slope = 0.0910(8), intercept = -0.0023(5) and R2 = 0.9994 (standard deviations in the last significant figure in parenthesis). The second calibration is performed using five triplicate standards in the range 2.00-10.00 g L-1, leading to slope = 0.0845(4), intercept = 0.0058(3) and R2 = 0.9997.
Calibration and test sets for PLS
The calibration set was composed of fifteen Caliche samples, with contents of nitrate between 1 and 20% (expressed as % NaNO3), as previously evaluated by the Devarda method. They were selected from a set of 70 Caliche samples, collected in the period September 2006-February 2007 from the SQM facilities placed in the Atacama Desert in Chile. The material was grounded (< 100 µm), homogenized and stocked in polyethylene bags until analysis. The sample selection was based on the Kennard-Stone methodology20 applied to the UV spectra in the relevant region 250-350 mn (see below for details on its implementation). This chemometric procedure employs the distance between samples as a selection criterion. The test set was composed of the remaining 55 samples, which were therefore different than those employed for calibration.
For the UV-visible spectral measurements, 2.00 g of a grounded Caliche sample were placed in a 100 mL Erlenmeyer flask with 50 mL of HPLC-grade water. The slurry was mechanically shaken for five minutes and filtered with a Whatman 42 filter by gravity. The filtered solution was directly analyzed by UV-visible spectrophotometry as described below.
Theory and software
PLS is a well-known multivariate calibration methodology, and details on its implementation are easily available21. The method involves a two-step procedure: 1) calibration, where the relation between spectra and reference component concentrations is established from a set of standard samples, and 2) prediction, in which the calibration results are employed to estímate the component concentrations in unknown samples21. In the PLS-1 version , all model parameters are optimized for the determination of one analyte at a time. During the model training step, the calibration data are decomposed by an iterative algorithm, which correlates the data with the calibration concentrations using a so-called 'inverse' model21. This provides a set of loadings (P, size JxA, where J is the number of wavelengths and A the number of latent PLS variables), weight-loadings (W, size JxA) and regression coefficients to be applied to a new sample (v, size AX1). Given the spectrum of an unknown sample xu (size Jx1), the latter is projected onto the space of the loadings and weight-loadings to provide the test sample scores tu:
The sample scores are then multíplied by the regression coefficients to estímate the analyte concentration y:
Before calibration, it is usual to assess the optimum number of latent variables in order to avoid overfitting, by applying the well-known cross-validation method described by Haaland21 (see below).
The figures of merit were evaluated in according with IUPAC's recommendations22. The sensitivity for a given analyte k has been calculated as:
where ||·|| indicates the Euclidian norm and bk is the vector of regression coefficients provided by the PLS-1 model. The selectivity indicates the part of the total signal that is not lost due to spectral overlap, and can be defined in the multivariate context by resorting to NAS calculations:
SEL= ||Net analyte signal in unknown sample|| / ||Total signal of unknown sample|| (4)
where the net analyte signal is computed by projecting the spectrum for the unknown sample orthogonal to the space spanned by all other components except the analyte of interest23.
Finally, the limit of detection (LOD) and quantitation (LOC) were evaluated as:
where s0 is the standard error in concentration for samples of low or near-zero analyte concentration, and is given by:
where h is the sample leverage, a parameter placing the unknown sample relative to the calibration space, sc is the standard error in calibration concentrations, sr is the instrumental noise level and SEN the sensitivity.
The PLS-1 algorithm was applied using the Toolbox MVC124 written for MATLAB [25], because these routínes allow one to evaluate the figures of merit based of the ÑAS theory17,22.
It should be noticed that UV-visible spectra were measured in a rather wide spectral range, as can be appreciated in Figure la, where regions with both very high and very low absorbance are apparent. It is known that multivariate models may benefit from suitable wavelength selection, which avoids noisy or high-absorption regions, as well as heavily overlapped spectral zones. Although a useful spectral region can be visually identified between 250 and 350 nm, a fine tuning is possible with the tools provided by MVC1. A moving-window strategy implemented in this toolbox allows one to perform leave-one-out cross-validation in a set of spectral regions defined by a given first wavelength and spectral window. A comprehensive search of the optimum cross-validation variance is performed, as a function of first wavelength and window width. This permits the location of a suitable working region where calibration results are optimal. The Toolbox MVC1 is freely available on the internet26.
The Kennard-Stone algorithm was applied using an in-house MATLAB routine.
The nitrate ion presents two UV absorption bands in water: a broad and very intense band at 220 nm, and a less intense one at 301 nm. Figure 1a shows the spectra for the entire set of 70 Caliche samples, where nitrate signals are identified. From the inspection of this Figure and the zoomed window (Figure 1b, between 250 and 350 nm), it is apparent that some samples present a strong overlapping of the band ascribed to nitrate ion and at least one spectral interference, whose absorption maximum is near 294 nm. According to our knowledge of the samples, this spectral interference appears to correspond to either sulfur- or iodine-containing species. Principal component analysis (PCA) of these UV spectra (in the 250-350 nm region ) shows that two components explain ca. 94% of the spectral variability across this set of samples. The corresponding PCA loadings and scores are presented in Figures 2a and 2b respectively. As can be seen, most samples are grouped along the dashed line which is shown in the score-score plot of Figure 2b. For these particular samples, the spectral interference is minimal, and the univariate UV method provides nitrate concentrations which are comparable to those obtained by the reference Devarda method.
A group of samples, however, appear outside this region , some of them presenting significant contributions from the first PC score. On the other hand, the first PC loading shows a maximum at 294 nm (Figure 2b), a wavelength corresponding to the spectral interference described above. For these samples, the univariatc method yields nitrate concentrations which are signiflcantly higher than the reference methodology.
Sample selection for PLS analysis
When a multivariate model is required for the prediction of the analyte concentration in samples containing other UV responsive components, all possible sources of variation which can be found in test specimens must be included in the calibration set. A procedure for selecting samples more or less equally distributed over the calibration space is thus needed. In cases where only real samples are available, an experimental design is not possible, as in the presently discussed analytical problem. When many samples and their corresponding spectra are available, a representative set covering the calibration signal space can be built. Several approaches are available for selecting representative calibration samples. The simplest is random selection, but it is open to the possibility that some source of variation will be lost. Kennard and Stone proposed a sequential method uniformly covering the experimental region 20. The procedure consists of selecting, as the next sample to be included for calibration, the one which is most distant from those already selected. The distance is usually the Euclidean distance in the signal space. As starting points, either two objects which are most distant from each other can be selected, or the one closest to the mean (we have employed the first alternative). The distance is then measured from each of the remaining samples to each of the samples which have already been selected and determine which are the smallest. From the latter the one for which the distance is maximal is selected and added to the set. The calibration space is filled by successively applying the above scheme. Kennard and Stone called their procedure a uniform mapping algorithm20.
Samples were selected from the 70-sample available set of Caliche specimens following this procedure: for a given number of calibration samples, a PLS model was built in the relevant region 250-350 nm and prediction was made on the remaining samples. The root mean square error (RMSE) was computed for an increasing number of calibration samples. Figure 3 shows how the RMSE error varíes with the number of samples selected by the Kennard-Stone methodology. As can be seen, fifteen samples provide reasonably good prediction results on the remaining 55 samples. Moreover, it was confirmed that ca. half of the samples having spectral interferences were included in the calibration set, with the remaining ones left for prediction in the test set.
Univariate UV analysis
In the presence of interferences it is difficult to correlate absorbance values at a single wavelength (i.e., at 301 nm) to the concentration of nitrate, because an overestimation of nitrate concentration will be observed for these complex samples. For the sake of comparison with the multivariate approach described below, the set of 55 test samples was analyzed using the univariate UV methodology, and the results were compared with those provided by the reference Devarda method. Figure 4a shows the predicted vs. reference nitrate concentrations in the test samples, where clear outliers are visually detected, corresponding to samples containing the interferences discussed above.
One convenient way of comparing predictions made by two different methodologies when the concentration range is wide is to apply linear regression analysis of the values found by the method under test against those provided by the reference method27. The recommended test for the statistical study of the obtained results is the so-called elliptical joint confidence region (EJCR) of the slope and intercept of the regression line26. If the ellipse includes the theoretically expected values of (1, 0), this indicates that the proposed methodologies are comparable in accuracy. The specific results when the univariate UV method at 301 nm is compared with the reference Devarda method are: slope = 1 ± 1 and intercept = 1 ± 8. This clearly shows that the univariate method is not suitable for the analytical problem at hand, because of large uncertainties in defming the slope and intercept. Under these conditions, the EJCR is inappropriately large.
PLS Results
In order to build a multivariate calibration model for nitrate quantitation, PLS coupled to leave-one-out cross-validation was first performed in order to estímate the optimum number of latent variables, using the full spectral information recorded for the calibration samples. This was done by computing the ratios F(A) = PRESS(A < A*)/PRESS04) [where PRESS = Σ (yi,nom -yi,pred)2, yi,nom and yi,pred are the nominal and predicted concentrations for each calibration sample, A is a trial number of factors and A* corresponds to the mínimum PRESS], and selecting the number of factors leading to a probability of less than 75% that F> 121. For the full spectral data (190-500 nm), five factors were estimated on the basis of the above criterion.
Before proceeding with PLS calibration and prediction, UV-visible absorption spectra recorded for the calibration samples were restricted to the spectral region suggested by the moving-window strategy described above. A mínimum spectral window of 10 nm and five maximum factors were employed for conducting the search of the optimal calibration conditions. The results indicated that a suitable working region for the analysis of nitrate is from 251 to 310 nm (see Figure 5), where the cross-validation results led to the conclusion that three PLS factors were needed (see Table 1). The selected spectral region appeared to be reasonable in view of the known spectral properties of the nitrate ion (Figure 1) and is close to the one employed for PC A analysis on the complete set of samples (see above). Likewise, the reduction in the number of components (from five to three) stems from the selection of a restricted region where the number of contributing components is less than those responding in the full spectral width.
Using three latent variables in the spectral region discussed above, PLS was then calibrated and applied to the set of test samples. The predicted concentrations, compared with the values obtained by the reference method, are displayed in Figure 4b. For assessing the predictive ability of the method, the root mean square error (RMSE) and relative error of prediction (REP%) were estimated as 0.35% NaNO3 and 3.7% respectively, with an R2 value close to 1 (Table 1). This provides reasonable statistical indicators for the PLS predictions. It should be noticed that the RMSE quoted in Table 1 carries the uncertainty of the Devarda method, which is propagated to the PLS predicted values. Since the reference technique shows an average error of ca. 0.2% NaNO3 (expressed as absolute nitrate content), the PLS RMSE value can be corrected as28:
Equation (8) yields a corrected average error of 0.3% NaNO3 for the PLS method, comparable to that for the reference methodology.
Further insight into the comparison of PLS with the reference Devarda method is gained by linearly regressing the predicted nitrate contents vs. those determined by the reference method. The linear fit yields: slope = 1.02 ± 0.05, intercept = -0.09±0.4. Not only the individual confldence regions contain the ideal values (1 and 0 respectively), but also the elliptical joint confídence region does include the theoretically expected values of (1, 0), indicating that the proposed methodology is comparable in accuracy with the Devarda method (Figure 6).
Finally, the multivariate figures of merit for the PLS method, which are useful for method selection, are reported in Table 1 as estimated by the MVC1 Toolbox. As can be seen, they are appropriate for the determination of nitrate in the working range of nitrate concentrations, since the limit of detection and quantitation are well below the mínimum tested concentration in the studied Caliche samples (1.7 % NaNO3).
Multivariate calibration of UV-visible spectra for a set of Chilean Caliche samples allows one to develop a fast, reliable and precise method for nitrate determination in the presence of interferences. The results obtained with this method are comparable to the reference Devarda method, although it is considerably simpler and faster, and therefore highly suitable for the routine analysis of a large number of samples. In contrast, the univariate approach has been shown to be unsuitable because of the presence of spectrally active interferents at its working wavelength.
SQM is gratefully acknowledged for financial support. A. Olivieri thanks to Universidad Nacional de Rosario, CONICET (Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas, Project No. PIP 5303) and ANPCyT (Agencia Nacional de Promocion Científica y Tecnológica, Project No. PICT04-25825) for financial support.
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4. J. A. Arancibia, G. Martínez-Delfa, C. E. Boschetti, G. M. Escandar, A.C. Olivieri. Anal. Chim. Acta 553,141, (2005). [ Links ]
5. J. A. Arancibia, A. Rullo, A. C. Olivieri, S. Dionezio, M. Pistonesi, A. Lista, B.S. Fernández Band. Anal. Chim. Acta 512,157, (2004) [ Links ]
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(Received 21 July 2008 - Accepted 3 November 2008)


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NEW YORK — It was supposed to be our IPO, the people's public offering.
Facebook, the brainchild of a young CEO who sauntered into Wall Street meetings in a hoodie, was going to be bigger than Amazon, bigger than McDonald's, bigger than Coca-Cola. And it was all made possible by our friendships, photos and family ties.
Then came the IPO, and it flopped. Facebook's stock finished its first day of trading just 23 cents higher than its $38 IPO price. It hasn't been that high since.
Even amid the hype and excitement surrounding Facebook's stock market debut a year ago Saturday, there were looming doubts. Investors wondered whether the social network could increase advertising revenue without alienating users, especially those using smartphones and tablet computers.
The worries intensified just days before the IPO when General Motors said it would stop paying for advertisements on the site. The symbolic exit cast a shroud over Facebook that still exists.
Facebook's market value is $63 billion, some two-thirds of what it was the morning it first began trading. Shares closed Friday at $26.25, down 30.9 percent from its IPO price.
Despite its disappointing stock market performance, the company has delivered strong financial results. Net income increased 7 percent to $219 million in the most recent quarter and revenue was up 38 percent to $1.46 billion.
The world's biggest online social network has also kept growing to 1.1 billion users. Some 665 million people check in every day to share photos, comment on news articles and play games.
The company's executives and engineers have quietly addressed the doubts that dogged the company. Facebook began showing mobile advertisements for the first time last spring. It launched a search feature in January and unveiled a branded Facebook smartphone in April.
Even GM has returned as a paying advertiser.


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The permanent contemporary art collection (1958 2001) at the Ferens Art Gallery was the focus for investigation in the 2008-09 semester. This collection amalgamates themes of history, sexuality, self image, identity, and questions ideas of multiculturalism, feminism, diversity. The artists use a range of modern digital media, technology, sculpture and unconventional materials to convey their wide ranging strands of research and practice. The students have created inspired new course integrated artwork in response to this collection.
Guided by Education Project Officer Adele Howitt, the college staff embraced the project and extended the outcomes to include critical and theoretical learning journeys for Connect>Create on mylearning.org, audio responses available as MP3 downloads, multi media interpretations, sculpture, ceramics, photography and digital film.
The programme was supported by a lecture series that included talks by artists whose work is in the Ferens permanent collection of contemporary art. Visiting artists included Dalziel & Scullion, Colin Gray, Chris Debrowolski, Richard Wilson & Anne Bean.


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Well, with VistaPrint doing 50 oversized postcards free (including own design upload) or 100 regular sized postcards free, I decided to make my own !
DH chose one in the 8 I designed. It's the one with the sunset. I attach all my templates for your usage. For the back of the postcard, you can do simply a blank back. I did a "waterprint" of the image by using the "recolor" option in powerpoint 07, deleted the words and added our monogram (cf the file called "back, without the monogram).
I also attach a pdf of how they should look. The fonts I used are :
Bradley Hand ITC
Tempus Sans ITC
Matisse ITC
Curlz MT
The languages in the one that has several languages are Russian, Spanish, French, Hindi, English, and Bulgarian. This was done to adapt to my guests, it can of course be customized (just google what you're looking for).
Before uploading to vistaprint, make sure to have only one side per file (ie, one file for front, one file for back) and save the file to a pdf.
I hope this will inspire some of you ! Enjoy !


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Texas on the Potomac regularly presents guest opinions from across the political spectrum. Today, as President Obama hosts a health-reform summit at Blair House, we offer you a guest blog from Houston Rep. John Culberson:
Official photo
Rep. John Culberson
President Obama should listen to the millions of Americans who have said no to a government takeover of health care.
The president's latest plan for health care reform includes more spending, more taxes, and more government control – ideas the American people have repeatedly rejected. Unfortunately it seems that President Obama has not been listening. The president said he wants to sit down with Republicans and Democrats at today's health care summit to discuss their ideas. First, President Obama should listen to the millions of Americans who have said no to a government takeover of health care.
The president and House Democrats should also listen to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) whose Director on Monday indicated he does not have the information necessary to provide adequate or timely estimates of the potentially enormous costs of the president's plan. How can we have an honest discussion about a health care plan when no one knows how much it will cost? I would urge the House and Senate to postpone any floor action on a health care reform bill at least until CBO can provide a complete cost estimate for the legislation.
Sadly, the president isn't even listening to himself. In 2005, when asked about the use of reconciliation to jam a bill through the Senate Barack Obama said, "[W]hat I worry about would be you essentially still have two chambers – the House and the Senate – but you have simply majoritarian, absolute power on either side. And that's just not what the Founders intended." Given that the American people have repeatedly said "no" to a government takeover of health care and the costs of this plan are unknown, I hope the president will commit today to not jamming the bill through the Senate under reconciliation. As the president previously noted, using reconciliation is a tacit acknowledgement that the bill lacks bipartisan support and not what our Founders intended.
I look forward to hearing from the president and my colleagues today. I am confident that we can lower health care costs without adding to our already unsustainable debt burden and raising taxes on Americans who are struggling from the recession.


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What does arabic numerals mean?
Definitions for arabic numerals
Here are all the possible meanings and translations of the word arabic numerals.
Arabic numerals
Arabic numerals or Hindu numerals or Hindu-Arabic numerals or Indo-Arabic numerals are the ten digits. They are descended from the Hindu-Arabic numeral system developed by Indian mathematicians, in which a sequence of digits such as "975" is read as a single number. The Indian numerals are traditionally thought to have been adopted by the Persian and Arab mathematicians in India, and passed on to the Arabs further west. This has been disputed by some, who have presented certain manuscripts as evidence that the numerals in their current form developed from Arabic letters in the western regions of the Arab World. The current form of the numerals developed in North Africa, distinct in form from the Indian and eastern Arabic numerals. It was in the North African city of Bejaia that the Italian scholar Fibonacci first encountered the numerals; his work was crucial in making them known throughout Europe. The use of Arabic numerals spread around the world through European trade, books and colonialism. Today they are the most common symbolic representation of numbers in the world. The reason the digits are more commonly known as "Arabic numerals" in Europe and the Americas is that they were introduced to Europe in the 10th century by Arabic-speakers of North Africa, who were then using the digits from Libya to Morocco. Europeans did not know about the numerals' origins in ancient India, so they named them "Arabic numerals". Arabs, on the other hand, call the system "Hindu numerals", referring to their origin in India. This is not to be confused with what the Arabs call the "Hindi numerals", namely the Eastern Arabic numerals used in the Middle East, or any of the numerals currently used in Indian languages.
Chaldean Numerology
The numerical value of arabic numerals in Chaldean Numerology is: 3
Pythagorean Numerology
The numerical value of arabic numerals in Pythagorean Numerology is: 2
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Translations for arabic numerals
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Will 2013-14 Trail Blazers Be a One-Shot Wonder or an All-Time Portland Great?May 5, 2014
It's no matter of hyperbole to suggest—if not scream from the rooftops—that Damian Lillard's shot to beat the Houston Rockets in Game 6 and end the Portland Trail Blazers' first-round series was the greatest in franchise history.
But don't take my word for it. Just ask Jason Quick, who's been covering the Blazers beat in some capacity for The Oregonian since 2000:
Yes, Maurice Lucas hit a game-winner to beat Denver in Game 1 of the 1977 Western Conference semifinals, a shot that continued the Blazers' unexpected journey to the NBA title.
But it didn't end a series.
And yes, Brandon Roy hit a 30-footer with 0.8 seconds left in overtime, off an inbounds pass, to beat Houston in 2008, in a shot that coach Nate McMillan said "came from the heavens."
But that was in November. In the regular season.
In fact, this was the first buzzer-beating shot to win a playoff series since John Stockton beat Houston in 1997.
That one shot already assures these 2013-14 Blazers of prominent placement among this franchise's most memorable outfits.
Of which, frankly, there aren't that many. Portland's NBA franchise is middle-aged compared to the league's 29 other constituents, with this year being the Blazers' 45th. As much success as they've enjoyed in those four-and-a-half decades (i.e. 31 playoff appearances in their last 39 seasons, 21 straight between 1983 and 2003), the list of squads worth celebrating is relatively short.
There was the Mike Dunleavy-guided edition that appeared in back-to-back Western Conference Finals in 1999 and 2000. Both times, the Blazers—then organized around the likes of Rasheed Wallace, Damon Stoudamire and Arvydas Sabonis (to name a few)—were ousted by the eventual champions. Few in Rip City will ever forget the indignity of the Blazers' fourth-quarter collapse against the Los Angeles Lakers after the turn of the millennium.
And yet, that team can't be completely dismissed. After all, those Blazers won 59 regular-season games and were the last ones to advance in the postseason until this year's Lillard-led upstarts squeaked past the Rockets in six.
That being said, those Portland teams that bridged the Y2K gap pale in comparison to the ones that established themselves among the league's elite just as the "Showtime" Lakers were nearing the end of their illustrious run. These Blazers, coached by Rick Adelman, appeared in three straight Western Conference Finals, advanced to the NBA Finals in 1990 and 1992 and set a franchise record for regular-season wins (63) in 1990-91 that still stands to this day.
Despite their successes, Adelman's Blazers are most widely remembered for the history that was made against them.
Which team did the "Bad Boy" Detroit Pistons dominate for their second consecutive title? The Blazers.
Which team was the last to be beaten in a postseason series by Magic Johnson? The Blazers.
Which team was victimized by Michael Jordan's infamous shoulder shrug? Yup, the Blazers.
The sharp hindsight afforded by history would suggest that Portland's first pro sports franchise could (and maybe should) have had many more moments worth celebrating if not for a few unfortunate missteps along the way. The Blazers of the early 2000s were undone by poor chemistry and unsavory personalities, to the point that a moniker like "Jail Blazers" fit a bit too snuggly.
Portland might've stocked its display case with Larry O'Brien Trophies from the late 1980s and into the 1990s had then-GM Stu Inman passed on Sam Bowie for a North Carolina kid by the name of Michael Jordan in the 1984 NBA draft.
Heck, even the vaunted team that won the Blazers' lone title in 1977 can be seen, in some respects, to have underperformed. That group, coached by the late Dr. Jack Ramsey, was young, talented and tight-knit. Those Blazers were led by a supremely skilled post player, in Hall of Famer Bill Walton; a tough, productive power forward in the midst of his prime, in Maurice Lucas; and a studly, second-year point guard, in former Memphis Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins.
Portland stormed through the West, sweeping Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's Lakers in the conference finals, before ousting Julius Erving's Philadelphia 76ers from the finals in six games.
That run looked to be just the beginning of a dynasty in Rip City. The Blazers had gone all the way in the franchise's postseason debut. The roster featured just one player (Herm Gilliam) who was over the age of 30 at the time. They'd dominated both ends of the floor so thoroughly in the playoffs, after winning 49 games during the regular season, that even the sky seemed too conservative an estimate for their collective ceiling.
That is, until injuries, particularly those to Walton's foot and ankle, combined with the dreaded "Disease of More" to sink the Blazers' ship shortly after it had set sail in pursuit of championships.
So far, this year's Blazers can be described in much the same manner. They, too, are new to this whole "playoffs" thing—as a unit, anyway. Their strength lie up front, particularly in the personage of LaMarcus Aldridge. The All-Star forward, in the midst of his breakout campaign at the age of 28, became just the third player in NBA history to score 40 or more points in consecutive road games to start a playoff series when he piled up 46 and 43 in Games 1 and 2, respectively, in Houston.
Lillard, like Hollins before him, is taking the Association by storm in just his second season as a pro. His focus and accuracy on that series winner in Game 6 was sharpened by a season full of buzzer-beaters and dramatic moments in crunch time, like this one.
And this one.
And this one too.
Just as the entire team's mentality was sharpened by injury-related tragedy, the likes of which was all too befitting of this franchise's past. These Blazers were fashioned on a foundation of the "woulda's," "coulda's" and "shoulda's" of knee troubles that cut short Brandon Roy's superstar potential, shortly after three straight All-Star selections, and undermined Greg Oden's before he ever so much as set foot in an NBA game.
And before Kevin Durant, the No. 2 pick in 2007 after Oden, once again rendered Portland a not-so-forgettable footnote in another team's tale of triumph.
These Blazers, talented as they were and are, came essentially out of nowhere to dominate the NBA's news cycle early on in 2013-14. They sped out to a shockingly hot start (22-4, then 31-9) behind an offense that thrived on ball movement and perimeter shooting. But the Blazers dipped back under the radar during the season's middle months as concerns about their reliance on the long ball and a suspect defense came home to roost.
A stretch of nine wins in its last 10 regular-season games did little to put Portland back in the spotlight, even less so when a first-round matchup against the Rockets, who'd congealed into something resembling a championship contender, began to materialize.
That series now rests among the highlights of Blazers lore. Portland's penchant for close games—a red flag during the regular season—worked in its favor against Houston, whose fourth-quarter execution paled in comparison to that of the battle-tested Blazers.
As impressive as it was for them to fend off a quality opponent like the Dwight Howard-James Harden Rockets, it'll take more than surviving the first round for Terry Stotts' Blazers to realistically challenge the teams of Ramsey, Adelman or even Dunleavy in the organization's historical hierarchy.
Especially since Houston-Portland featured two teams that were, in essence, evenly matched, as their identical 54-28 records would suggest.
The next step? Upending a San Antonio Spurs squad that represented the West in the finals last season, won 62 games this season and saw its Hall of Fame Big Three of Tony Parker, Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili eviscerate the Dallas Mavericks in Game 7 of their first-round series.
The Blazers haven't sent the Spurs out of the playoffs since 1990, before David Robinson embarked upon his own decorated career. Portland, though, has some reason to believe that this club can do what Clyde Drexler and friends did nearly a quarter-century ago.
The Blazers split their season series with the Spurs, and may well have taken three out of four if not for Patty Mills' surprising heroics (29 points off the bench) shortly after the All-Star break. Portland is younger, more athletic and better rested than San Antonio and sports an offense that should be able to carve up a Spurs defense that allowed the Mavs to score 106.8 points per 100 possessions while jacking up 22.4 three-point attempts a night.
Not that Portland doesn't have plenty of its own concerns to address. Chief among those is the Blazers' defense (or lack thereof) at the point. Mills' midseason explosion was but one of many enjoyed by floor generals at the Blazers' expense this season. According to Hoops Stats, Portland allowed opposing point guards to average 23.1 points—the third most in the NBA, behind only the Lakers and the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Lillard isn't entirely at fault for that, though the 23-year-old's often lackadaisical effort and execution on that end certainly didn't help. The Blazers struggled to prevent their foes from parading to the rim. According to NBA.com, Portland allowed the second-most shots within the restricted area this season.
Not that the Blazers were or are entirely doomed by this. They held their opponents to the third-lowest field-goal percentage (.568) in that precious space during the regular season. Moreover, they managed to scoot past the Rockets in Round 1, despite allowing Houston to attempt nearly 40 shots per game from the real estate nearest the rim.
Portland's apparent weakness therein is, in part, a matter of design, as noted by Bleacher Report's Adam Fromal back in November:
The Blazers aren't content to use the typical scheme employed in the Association, one that revolves around packing players into the paint for as long as possible. Instead of protecting the rim, they're conceding easy attempts there and defending the three-point arc as aggressively as possible.
The numbers bear this out. The Blazers allowed their opponents to shoot a below-average 35.5 percent from three on the fewest attempts (18.3) during the regular season. The Rockets were able to launch plenty of three-pointers against Portland's defense in the opening round but connected on just 31.8 percent of their looks.
That scheme should come in handy against San Antonio, which led the league in three-point percentage (.397) in 2013-14 and torched the Mavs on 38.3 percent of its long-range looks in the seven-game showdown between those two Texan titans.
The Blazers must hope, too, that their perimeter brigade, led by Lillard and Wesley Matthews, comes up big against the Spurs. Portland attempted the third-most threes during the regular season, scoring 26.4 percent of its points from deep—the seventh-highest share in the league, per NBA.com. Making it rain from behind the line will be no easy feat for the Blazers, not against a Spurs team that tied Portland for the fewest attempts allowed.
But three-point shooting alone won't be enough to extend the Blazers' Cinderella run. The Golden State Warriors, another plucky upstart with three-point prowess, shot 36.9 percent on 20.3 attempts from deep against the Spurs in last year's playoffs, only to lose in six games. The Mavs shot even better than that against San Antonio this year (37.6 percent on 22.4 three-point tries) on the way to a seven-game ouster.
If this Portland team is going to march its way up the ladder of the most beloved in the city's history, it'll have to find a way to stop Tony Parker. The 31-year-old Frenchman is San Antonio's best and most important player and has been for some time now. His masterclass against the Mavs' sieve-like backcourt (32 points on 11-of-19 from the floor, 10-of-13 from the free throw line) not only secured the series for the Spurs, but assured that they'd advance with as much ease as the final score of Game 7 (119-96) would suggest.
Simply put, when Parker's dictating the flow of the game, the Spurs are nigh on unstoppable. When he's not, they're vulnerable.
As pivotal as LaMarcus Aldridge may be to Portland's hopes, then, the Blazers' fate ultimately rests in the hands of Lillard. Assuming he and Parker are matched up against one another on both ends of the floor, it'll be up to Lillard to run his fellow All-Star ragged on offense and keep him out of the lane on defense.
That's much easier said than done and may be rendered moot if Gregg Popovich and Terry Stotts decide to slide their best perimeter defenders (i.e. Kawhi Leonard and Nicolas Batum, respectively) onto each other's best playmakers.
And even if the Blazers somehow escape this seven-game series with four wins of their own, it's not as though they'll be able to waltz right into the finals. Before that, Portland will first have to contend with either the Oklahoma City Thunder or the Los Angeles Clippers in the Western Conference Finals. The Blazers held their own against those two this season, at 4-3, though one of the four wins came in the season finale, in which Portland and L.A. played most of their starters sparingly, if at all.
All of which is to say, these Blazers have their work cut out for them if they're to assure themselves a spot atop the franchise's historical ledger. Edging out the magical '77 squad would require no less than the acquisition of this year's Larry O'Brien Trophy—a tall order, indeed, given the claim that the two-time defending-champion Miami Heat have to it.
At this point, it seems unlikely that Portland will be the last one standing among the eight teams still in contention. Then again, there appeared to be little hope of the Blazers making it this far prior to the start of the 2013-14, and even less of them avoiding a Game 7 in Houston after Chandler Parsons' layup dropped through the net with 0.9 seconds remaining in Game 6.
We all know how that turned out. We'll see what the future holds for these Blazers when they take the court for Game 1 of the Western Conference Semifinals in San Antonio on Tuesday.
Follow the Blazers' journey with me on Twitter!


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It's a fun & happenin' place, so have a look around!
If this is your first trip to my homepage, WELCOME!Take a look around and don't be a stranger… come back again. If you've been here before, WELCOME BACK!I'm happy to know that you found it worthwhile to visit again. In either case, e-mail a link to my page to your family and friends if you think there is anything they might enjoy.
Now on Tommy's World: You REALLY CAN make money online (in modest amounts). I've done it and you can too!!! CLICK HERE to find out how!!! Some of those "money makers" are represented in the banner ads below.
… Okay, now ON WITH TOMMY'S WORLD!!!
Navigating in Tommy's World
Here is a brief table of contents of the things you will find on these pages. Most of these are represented in the navigation buttons on the top of the page.
Photographs Family, pets, the basic photo subjects that you see all over the web.
My Story A short narrative of who I am, where I am, and how I got to be both.
Our Story A continuation of My Story.
Links to Other Pages Around the Web. These are various links pages connecting to some of the places around the Web that I enjoy visiting and find interesting enough to share them with others. Each has some special significance and meaning to me. Feel free to check them out if you want to learn more about me and my interests! I welcome any comments or suggestions of other similar sites that you think I might be interested in. The pages include some commentary by yours truly. Over the years, many pages come and go on the Internet. I do my best to keep these links updated, but often the pages out there disappear without warning. My apologies if a page you are looking for turns out to be a dead link.
Americana Lighthouses, Railroads, Barns, and Covered Bridges. Picturesque America.
Art and Music Just some of my current favorites.
Catholic and Inspirational Pages My favorite spiritual and inspirational web sites.
Friends' Homepages These are the personal homepages of various special people.
Fun and Games These are the ones where you can easily waste a couple of days; some are quite creative and addictive.
Miscellany These are helpful and interesting sites that do not fall neatly into any other categories shown here.
Nostalgia Remember the old days? The television, toys, and products that you remember?
Relive that time again. (Apologies to the generations prior to mine — my nostalgia only goes back to the mid 1970's, so there isn't much, if anything, represented before then).
Ohio Cities and Attractions & Alumni Pages I've focused on the areas of Ohio that I have familiarity with and the three areas I've lived: Steubenville, Toledo, and Sandusky. I've also included links to the schools I have attended, and some alumni pages that cover the globe.
Sports Sites Links to my favorite sports teams and sound bytes from the "colorful" home team radio announcers. You will also find links to the better sports media pages. I also have created a Tribute to Pops page dedicated to the great Willie Stargell — one of my boyhood heroes..
Worthy Causes Around the Web These are varied organizations, each with a web presence, which I believe in and have thus deemed them "worthy causes."
Stickman My creation.
Check back later! I have been adding more of my favorite sites all the time and I will continue to do so in the future. If any of the links I've provided in these pages don't seem to work, send me e-mail so that I can update or delete them. I try to do this occasionally when I see a broken link, but sometimes I do not
notice them right away.
Also, if anyone out there wants to add a link to my site from your own, please let me know that you are adding the link. I've moved this page twice already. If I ever have to move the web site again, I would like to know where all of the current outstanding links are so that I can let those people know of my own address change. There are already many thousands of dead links out there on the Net. I wouldn't want to be the cause of even a few more. So just help me out by notifying me of the links you create to my pages.
These are all old photos for the most part.
Thanks for stopping by, and be sure to come back soon! The only other advice I have is for you to keep your seat belts fastened and lay off the alcohol if you're going to be driving. Do whatever you need to do to make a difference in the world. (Preferably a difference for the better)…
Tommy's World has welcomed
Tommy's World was last modified on:
May 25, 2016
These modifications included:
minor editing
A few people have asked… (okay, nobody has actually asked, but I know you've all been wondering)… No, this is not a self portrait. It's just a stickman that I drew the very first time I was ever exposed to the Windows Paintbrush program back in 1993. As my initial creation, I saved it to a floppy disk, and I couldn't think of a better place to immortalize my artwork than on my own web page. (And, NO — I have absolutely NO plans to include "stickman" in the Stick Figure Death Theater page linked in the attached pages… He's been around for nineteen years now, and I have no plans to kill him off). If you're interested in helping fund future artistic excursions, I accept any and all donations.


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The library accepts orders
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We charge for the delivery of books by airmail (standard):
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On Friday, we've asked author, Becky Albertalli to do an interview with us. We're in LOVE with her book Simon vs. The Homo-Sapiens Agenda! So, the rest of the week will be full of posts devoted to it.
To start things off, here's our review:
Simon vs. The Homo-Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
Release Date: April 7, 2015
Simon doesn't talk about his love life with his friends. Mostly because it isn't exactly taking off, but also because he has a pen pal. Someone who he can really open up to, someone who he can share his secrets with. Someone who he can tell he's gay.
Since this is not the ancient past, Simon's exchanges with his penpal happen via email. Simon knows that he and "Blue" go to the same school, since Simon found him on the school's confessional tumblr, but he doesn't know who he is. All the same, he can't help feeling closer to Blue than he does to some of the friends he's had since elementary school.
But all that closeness may be jeopardized by forgetting to log out of his gmail in the computer lab. Now someone's got some serious blackmail material on both Simon and his mysterious friend. If it gets out, not only will Simon's secrets be public, but there's a good chance he'll never find out who Blue really is.
This is a funny, romantic realistic read. The characters talk like teens and the drama is every bit as big as the drama in your lunch room. Simon is sweet and means well, but often does exactly the wrong thing and that makes him all the more real a narrator. It's very refreshing to read a book where you aren't at all sure if the main character will do the brave thing that needs doing. Simon is an average kid with a sharp wit. He'd be right at home in our TAB book club and just like I'd love to read books narrated by those teens, I loved spending time with Simon's story. You'll be missing out if you miss this debut.


text: I read an article today about a Canadian family that received a letter from a neighbor. The letter was a hate mail letter directed towards their autistic son. Their teenage son, severely autistic, sounds a lot like mine. I cringed and was sickened by this quote in the . . . → Read More: Shocking Letter Targeting Autism Child


text: This dad from Portland, James Winter, bought shades and staches for his kids and nephew and remade the Beasties' "Sabotage" music video as a sort of tribute to the late Adam Yauch. It's quite a riot. The kids look like they're having fun, and not being exploited for their cute factor.


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Nissan to Develop 2014 GT-R NISMO
Nissan is expanding its performance arm: The automaker announced today that it plans to offer a NISMO version of the 2014 GT-R supercar. This is the third vehicle to launch under the NISMO brand; it follows the revised 370Z and new Juke NISMO versions that were unveiled at the 2013 Chicago Auto Show.
Currently, the NISMO version of the 2013 370Z is expensive, adding $5,200 to the price of the Touring version of the coupe, but according to Nissan, that will change during the next year. The automaker plans to make the NISMO brand more affordable and accessible.
"For many would-be NISMO customers, the only way to experience a NISMO performance car has been through a game like Sony's Gran Turismo series. Now we can bring them into the family of Nissan owners with exciting, real NISMO cars created by a dedicated and experienced team that is fully linked to the digital world and well aware of what these new customers are looking for in a performance road car." Simon Sproule, Nissan's corporate vice president for marketing and communications, said in a statement.
Although the automaker confirmed that the 2014 GT-R is the next model to get the NISMO treatment, details are slim. Nissan has only announced that it will be available in dealerships next year. "We know that enthusiasts around the world will be itching to know more about the forthcoming GT-R NISMO. It's too early to share any details yet, but fans can be certain we'll be applying all of our motorsport expertise to creating a GT-R NISMO worthy of the name," NISMO President Shoichi Miyatani said in a statement.
As for the other recently introduced NISMO models, Nissan says the Juke gets around 100 performance modifications compared with the regular version and the 370Z has some exterior body modifications and interior trim additions. The 2013 Nissan Juke NISMO will go on sale this summer and the 2014 370Z NISMO will be in dealerships this spring. No word yet on pricing for either of these cars.
2013 Nissan Juke NISMO at the 2013 Chicago Auto Show
2014 Nissan 370Z NISMO: Photo Gallery
More Nissan News on Cars.com


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On Thursday, January 13, Lawyers Alliance of New York is offering a workshop focusing on the Incorporation, Tax Exemption and Fiscal Sponsorship in forming a nonprofit organization.The workshop will be at Lawyers Alliance, 171 Madison Avenue in New York City. The seminar will begin at 9:30 a.m. and will end at 11:30 a.m.
Forming a nonprofit organization is among the most satisfying, rewarding and challenging opportunities one can undertake. Getting a nonprofit off to the right start can mean the difference between success and failure. The workshop will review the basic questions regarding the benefits and obligations of incorporation and tax-exempt status and will explain the requirements for qualification as a New York State not-for-profit corporation.
The workshop will also explore the benefits of federal tax-exemption and the process for seeking that recognition, including the requirements of charitable purpose and charitable class, the need to project specific revenues and expenses, the limitations on lobbying and political activities, and all aspects of the application process.
For information about available CLE credits and fees, visit CLE Events on The Metropolitan Corporate Counsel website at www.metrocorpcounsel.com.
To register, visit www.lawyersalliance.org.


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The Wales fly-half Rhys Priestland, one of the architects of an impressive series of performances that has taken serial underperformers in the World Cup to the last four, is a major doubt for Saturday's semi-final against France because of a shoulder injury he sustained against Ireland last weekend.
Priestland sat out training on Tuesday, along with the captain Sam Warburton, the centre Jamie Roberts and the second row Luke Charteris, who are all expected to be fit to face France. The injury to his left shoulder, which forced him off the field three minutes from the end of the victory over Ireland, was originally described as a stinger but it has yet to respond to treatment.
Priestland had not played at fly-half for Wales until the friendly international against England at Twickenham last August, when he was moved from full-back six minutes before the kick-off after Stephen Jones suffered a calf strain during the warm-up, but he has become a key member of the side, starting in four of their five matches in the World Cup and coming on as a replacement against Namibia.
His calmness under pressure and quick decision-making helped Wales qualify from a tough group, one of a group of young players who have played without inhibition in the tournament. If he were to be ruled out when Wales announce their team on Thursday, the coach Warren Gatland would have to choose between Stephen Jones and James Hook, who was not selected for the match against Ireland.
"Rhys has had a bump and I would be there if needed and selected," said Hook. "I have been in the camp for the last six weeks and I am familiar with the calls. If I am called upon, I would be chuffed. It was really difficult watching on Saturday, but you get caught in the emotion on the bench and get behind the boys.
"It was a terrific performance and it was nice to get on and have a couple of minutes to savour a little bit at the end. Rhys has taken his chance superbly and he fully deserves the credit he has been having. The young players spur you on with the energy they bring in training and off the field. The older boys are feeding off that, which is good and healthy for the team.
"France played well in beating England. Everyone knows about their flair and unpredictability. They have talent from one to 15 but we have played them enough to realise we can beat them. The performance against Ireland was pretty complete, but the boys appreciate that there are always areas for improvement. There has not been a lot in our recent games against France. Little errors have cost us. If we continue what we have been doing in the tournament so far and cut them out I am sure we can get the result we want."
Jones, who is playing in his fourth World Cup, said the younger players, like Priestland, had energised the older ones. "It is a pleasure to be a part of this squad," he said. "I have only started one match, but I am happy to be here. We have gathered momentum as we have gone along: the snowball has got bigger."


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