Russians Rushing to Arctic Drill Sites

• by Joel Boyce
• August 31, 2012
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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — As the remnants of Hurricane Isaacpushed their way up the Mississippi valley on Saturday, spinning off severe thunderstorms and at least four tornadoes, some on the Gulf Coast were impatient with the pace of restoring power days after the storm dragged through the region.

While New Orleans streets were bustling again and workers were returning to offshore oil rigs, thousands of evacuees couldn't return home to flooded low-lying areas of Louisiana and more than 400,000 sweltering electricity customers in the state remained without power.

Meanwhile, the National Weather Service said two tornadoes touched down in rural areas of north-central Illinois and at least two touched down in rural southeast Missouri. There were no reports of damage in Illinois, and Missouri officials said some power lines caught on fire.

By midday Saturday, the storm had dumped up to 5 inches of rain in parts of Illinois. And the National Weather Service said it was bringing more rain and some drought relief to parts of theMississippi and Ohio River Valleys.

In Louisiana, the number without power was down from more than 900,000. However, in heavily populated Jefferson Parish near New Orleans, parish president John Young said Entergy Corp. was too slow in restoring electricity.

"I don't see boots on the ground," said Young, who complained that he has seen repair trucks sitting idle in a staging area and fielded calls from residents and business owners complaining about a lack of progress.

"We've restored about 45 percent of our customers in about a day and a half, Entergy spokesman Chanel Lagarde said. He added that crews have come in from 24 states. "In many situations, crews have driven all day and have worked their 16-hour day and have to rest for the day."

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said he too was anxious to get power back on. "Like everybody else, my patience is wearing thin," he said.

On Saturday afternoon, St. Tammany Parish officials ordered a mandatory evacuation of areas south of the Pearl River diversion canal, for fear a lock on a canal will fail. Parish authorities said the order could affect anywhere from several hundred to 2,000 residents in the rural area north of Slidell.

Parts of coastal Plaquemines Parish, where thousands were evacuated, remained under water. The National Weather Service has said Isaac dumped anywhere from 10 to 20 inches of rain on south Louisiana and south Mississippi.

In the water-logged town of Lafitte, Mayor Tim Kerner was allowing property owners and residents to return and begin cleaning up.

Meanwhile, Gulf of Mexico oil platforms were being repopulated after Isaac forced shutdown of most Gulf oil production.

People stuck inside stuffy, powerless homes were comparatively lucky. The governor's office said more than 4,000 were in state, local or Red Cross shelters as of Saturday morning and that doesn't count others who took refuge with friends, family or in hotels.

LaPlace resident Roshonda Girrad was staying in a state-run shelter in Alexandria, 200 miles from her home. She was waiting for the chest-deep waters in her neighborhood to recede.

"The showers are horrible. The food is horrible," Girrad said. "I'm not from around here. I don't know what's going on. We're in the dark."

Isaac dumped as much as 16 inches of rain in some spots, and about 500 people had to be rescued by boat or high-water vehicles.

In New Orleans, most of the downtown area and the French Quarter had power again Saturday. The annual Southern Decadence festival, a celebration of gay culture, was underway. And the Superdome, which sustained minor damage, prepared to host a Saturday night football game between Tulane and Rutgers.

Newly nominated Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney visited flood-ravaged communities on Friday, and President Barack Obama said he would arrive Monday — appearances this part of the country is all too familiar with after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the 2010 Gulf oil spill.

To the east, officials pumped and released water from a reservoir, easing the pressure behind an Isaac-stressed dam in Mississippi on the Louisiana border. The threat for the earthen dam on Lake Tangipahoa prompted evacuations in small towns and rural areas.

Crews intentionally breached a levee that was strained by Isaac's floodwaters in southeast Louisiana's Plaquemines Parish, which is outside the federal levee system. Parish President Billy Nungesser said the work was slow-going.

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BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian warplanes and ground forces pounded the country's largest city Aleppo with bombs and mortar rounds on Saturday as soldiers clashed with rebels in its narrow streets,activists said.

The latest violence shows that government troops are still struggling to clear the city of lightly-armed rebel forces nearly five weeks after they stormed their way into it.

Activists also said rebels captured an air defense facility in the east of the country near the border with Iraq, where opposition forces have claimed advances over the past days.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the clashes in Aleppo were concentrated in several tense neighborhoods — Hanano, Bustan al-Qasr, Sukkari and Maysar. It reported injuries and damage to buildings.

Another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees, said the government was making heavy use of warplanes in attacking rebel areas.

A video obtained by The Associated Press Television News showed rebel fighters, some in civilian clothes, in the street trading fire with government troops.

Activists say that this is the second day of a rebel push in Aleppo dubbed "Northern Volcano" targeting security facilities in the city and the surrounding province, including an artillery training school, a compound of the feared air force intelligence, and a large army checkpoint.

For over a year after the uprising against President Bashar Assad regime began in March 2011, Aleppo and Damascus stayed relatively quiet. But in July, rebels launched a brazen attack on the two cities, capturing several neighborhoods.

Government forces have regained most of the Damascus area but are being held at bay in Aleppo.

In the east, the Observatory reported that rebels captured an air defense post in the town of al-Boukamal in the oil-rich province of Deir el-Zour that borders Iraq. A video released by activists showed soldiers who said they were captured at the post after rebels took it. The authenticity of the video could not be independently confirmed.

The fighting comes as veteran U.N. diplomat Lakhdar Brahimi is due to begin a peacemaking mission, replacing Kofi Annan who quit after his six-point plan including an April 12 cease-fire failed to stop the bloodshed.

Unlike Annan, who was based in Geneva for six months, Brahimi will make his center of operations in New York, where he hopes he can better influence the U.N. Security Council to unite around a plan to end the violence.

Russia and China used their vetoes on the council to block U.N. sanctions against the Syrian regime, despite entreaties by the U.S. and other Western nations.

Annan blamed divisions on the 15-nation Security Council for the failure to persuade Assad and the opposition to end the conflict.

Brahimi, a former Algerian foreign minister who has been a U.N. envoy to Afghanistan and Iraq, said his first task will be to overcome the divisions in the Security Council and get it to speak "with a unified voice."

Activists say more than 20,000 people have been killed since the beginning of the uprising, which eventually became a civil war.

Despite the government's control of Damascus, opposition fighters continue to stage attacks using hit-and-run tactics in neighborhoods where they enjoy popular support, activists say.

Early Saturday, government forces bombarded the capital's southern neighborhood of Tadamon followed street fighting with rebels there, the Observatory said. The LCC said troops also shelled the nearby neighborhood of Hajar Aswad.

The state-run news agency SANA said army Brig. Gen. Taher Subeira was killed by "terrorist" who placed a bomb under his car parked in front of his Damascus home and detonated it when he got into the vehicle.

The Observatory said the bodies of five unknown people were found in the neighborhood of Qadam, shot execution-style.

Other clashes were reported in Idlib province on the border with Turkey, in Daraa near the Jordanian frontier, and in the central province of Homs near Lebanon, activists said.

SANA meanwhile reported Saturday that 225 detainees who took part in anti-government protests were released. The amnesty by authorities is the second in a week as some 378 prisoners from Damascus and the central province of Homs were freed on Monday.

Rights activists say tens of thousands of Syrians have been detained over the past 18 months.