Look north

March 09, 2016 - Daily News Briefing

A progressive shift in Canadian politics is embodied in a visitor to Washington.

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In an effort to expand government transparency, the United States will in the coming weeks publicly release the total number combatant and civilian casualties from US counter-terrorism strikes carried out abroad since 2009, the White House announced Monday. The assessment won't cover areas of "active hostilities," like Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan, but will focus on the shadowy regime of strikes the United States has launched against terrorist targets in other parts of the world, such as Libya, Somalia, and Yemen.

Citing the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Environmental Protection Agency's Lead and Copper Rule, seven families in Flint have filed a lawsuit against Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, as well as other current and former government officials and corporations. The federal lawsuit, which is seeking class-action status, alleges that tens of thousands of residents have suffered physical and economic injuries and damages as a result of exposure to lead in the city's drinking water. The families accuse officials of downplaying the severity of the contamination, and failing to take action over the dangerous levels of lead in drinking water.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s agricultural landscape will experience notable transformation from climate change as early as 2025, reports a new study by researchers with the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT). By assessing staple crops that account for half of sub-Saharan Africa’s food supply, the study’s nine authors predict when and where landscapes will experience “transformational adaptation.” In some regions, climate change has impacted the land to the point of no return and the area is no longer suitable for current staple crops.

Flash flooding is likely to become a more frequent problem in both wet and dry regions of the globe as global warming brings intensified precipitation, new research shows. The researchers, conducted by climate change scientists at the University of New South Wales, analyzed 60 years of weather observations in the wettest and driest regions. Future projections indicate that incidence of flooding will likely increase in dry regions more quickly than elsewhere, however, the expected increase doesn’t mean that more water will become available in the dry areas. The heat caused by global warming will likely lead to increased evaporation, which means that more frequent flooding events will have little impact on overall water storage rates.

According to an annual report by the Governors Highway Safety Association, 2015 saw a 10 percent increase in pedestrians killed in motor vehicle crashes compared to a four percent decline in overall traffic deaths during the same period. In the first six months of 2015, 2,368 pedestrians were killed by traffic crashes. Despite these discouraging numbers, new safety tools are being implemented across the country to help ensure pedestrian safety. And it may be easy to focus on the overall increase in pedestrian fatalities but a number of states actually witnessed a decrease in these deaths. While 26 states and the District of Columbia reported higher numbers in 2015, three states reported the same rate and 21 states saw fewer pedestrian deaths than the year before.

The mayor of DeBary, Fla., is preparing to travel from Cuba to Key West on a homemade raft next month. Mayor Clint Johnson says he plans to fly to Cuba with his wife and build a raft out of basic supplies before rowing back to the United States by himself. He says he wants to see for himself what Cuban refugees experience when making the 90-mile trek. Johnson said the idea came to him in light of recent steps to renew diplomatic relations between the US and Cuba. The Obama administration reopened an embassy in Havana in 2015, for the first time in 54 years, and the president plans to visit Cuba later this month.

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