Peanut Butter News

Full Story at CNN.com

(CNN) — Punxsutawney Phil, America’s most famous rodent prognosticator, saw his shadow Tuesday, signaling six more weeks of winter.

Phil emerged from his ceremonial tree stump at Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania, to a cheering crowd that had waited in the cold for his annual prediction.

It is the 99th time that Phil — in his various incarnations — has seen his shadow, according to groundhog.org, the official Web site of the groundhog club in Punxsutawney, about 75 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, in western Pennsylvania.

Full Story at msnbc.com

BEIJING – China announced plans Thursday to cut its carbon emissions by up to 45 percent as measured against its economic output — a commitment from the world’s largest polluter that builds momentum ahead of a widely anticipated climate conference in Copenhagen next month.

The announcement comes a day after President Barack Obama promised the U.S. would lay out plans to substantially cut its greenhouse gas emissions at the summit.

Full Story at CNN.com

Heene is the storm-chasing father whose giant Mylar balloon ascended into the sky late last week, sparking fears that his 6-year-old son Falcon was aboard.

A dispatcher with the Larimer County Sheriff’s Department declined to release any information about the search, but said the office will hold a news conference at 1 p.m. ET Sunday. Calls to the department’s spokeswoman were not immediately returned.

“We anticipate criminal charges will be filed sometime in the near future,” Sheriff Jim Alderden told CNN late Saturday.

Speculation over whether Thursday’s incident, which prompted a widespread search, was a hoax has mounted against Heene, father of three young boys. Explainer: How ‘balloon boy’ drama began »

Full Story atCNN.com

The youngest of five children, he was only 8 when his father died.

For three decades, he’d carried with him mere snapshots of memories: Family time at Christmas. Riding on the back of Dad’s motorcycle. Tommie Stephney’s love for drag-racing.

But as the 37-year-old Douglasville, Georgia, man set out September 22 to try and save a woman whose car was swept away by rushing waters, he thought of his father’s drowning. He, too, had fought to rescue people struggling against currents.

That was in 1979.

Tommie Stephney, a City of Atlanta employee, dove into the Chattahoochee River in Atlanta, Georgia, to save canoeists who’d flipped their boat, his son said. He safely brought two to shore. The third, he said, panicked — forcing them both under. It would be a week before his father’s body was found.

Full Story at CNN.com

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) — India on Wednesday launched a second satellite to study oceans.

The cube-shaped Oceansat-2 will monitor the interaction between oceans and the atmosphere, as part of climate studies, according to the country’s main space agency.

The satellite, launched from India’s southeast coast, carried six nanosatellites from European universities as auxiliary payloads, said the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). It also is equipped with two solar panels projecting from its sides, for generating power and charging batteries.

India says it has the world’s largest constellation of remote-sensing satellites — 16, including Oceansat-2. They produce images for uses such as agriculture, rural development, water resources, forestry and disaster management.

Full Story at CNN.com

Delicious,” he says, kissing the tips of his fingers on one hand, making the universal sign for good tasting food.

William tells me he went out on a boat with some friends a few days ago and shot the whale. I’m not sure how I feel about this.

Welcome to Greenland. On this remote but enormous island subsistence whale hunting is allowed.

This was just the memorable start to an extraordinary journey.

Cameraman Neil Bennett and I had traveled to the small town of Tasiilaq in southeastern Greenland to meet up with the Arctic Sunrise, a ship belonging to the environmental group Greenpeace. Read Neil’s blog on filming in challenging conditions

Full Story at msnbc.com

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla. – Tropical Storm Claudette made landfall on the Florida Panhandle early Monday, making it the first named storm to hit the U.S. mainland this year.

Even before its arrival, Claudette dumped heavy rains in some areas Sunday. But it was not expected to cause significant flooding or wind damage.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Bill formed in the Atlantic Ocean, making it the first named Atlantic hurricane of 2009. Bill’s maximum sustained winds were near 75 mph. The National Hurricane Center expected Bill to grow stronger and said it could become a major hurricane by Wednesday.

Full Story At msnbc.com

SACRAMENTO – Federal water managers said Friday that they plan to cut off water, at least temporarily, to thousands of California farms as a result of the deepening drought gripping the state.

U.S. Bureau of Reclamation officials said parched reservoirs and patchy rainfall this year were forcing them to completely stop surface water deliveries for at least a two-week period beginning March 1. Authorities said they haven’t had to take such a drastic move for more than 15 years.

Full Story At  CNN.com

A review of records by city workers reveals Schur, at one point, went to his own bank to make back payments, but was unable to do so because that bank was not an approved pay station for the city.

“Maybe he had dementia. I don’t know that. We may never know,” City Manager Robert Belleman told CNN.

Schur’s body was found in his bedroom. Authorities said the temperature inside his home was 32 degrees. A limiter installed a few days earlier had shut off power because of unpaid bills.

City officials have said Schur may not have known he could reset the power switch to keep on his gas heat.

Full Story At Yahoo! News

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Officials on Thursday warned victims of last week’s ice storm not to eat peanut butter packets from emergency meal kits distributed by the federal government because they had been recalled for possible salmonella contamination.

The kits were shipped to Arkansas and Kentucky to help feed some of the 1.3 million people left without power for days at the height of the storm. No illnesses have been reported and recalls were ordered out of “an abundance of caution,” said Jay Blanton, a spokesman for Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear.

Full Story At  CBS News

(CBS/AP) In the first real test of the Obama administration’s ability to respond to a disaster, senior Kentucky officials are giving the federal government good marks for its response to a deadly ice storm.

Yet more than 300,000 residents remained without power Monday and some areas had yet to see aid workers nearly a week after the storm, a fact not lost on some local authorities.

The winter blast turned out to be the worst natural disaster in Kentucky’s history, reported CBS News correspondent Hari Sreenivasan. More than 5,000 utility workers were working around the clock to get people back online.

Full Story At  CBS News

(CBS) The digging out continued across much of the heartland Sunday after a crippling ice storm last week killed at least 42 people. Nearly 700,000 people in five states are still without power, including hard-hit Kentucky, which has mobilized its entire National Guard, reports CBS News correspondent Hari Sreenivasan.

Kentucky is picking up the pieces from a storm unlike any it has ever seen.