Previous Story
PACIFIC BRIEFS
|
Posted on Jan 16 2001
Police seize huge haul of marijuana
KOROR, Palau (Pacific Islands Report) — Police have seized over $500,000 worth of marijuana from a plantation in Angaur state.
Narcotics chief Theodore Subris said officials conducted a raid and seized over 500 marijuana plants after receiving a map from an anonymous source.
A police effort to locate the growers, who fled before the raid, is under way.
Hawaiian Air plane repaired In Tahiti
PAPE’ETE, French Polynesia (Pacific Islands Report) — A Hawaiian Airlines DC-10 that ran off the runway at Faa’a International Airport December 23 will be repaired in Tahiti.
Hawaiian spokesman Keoni Wagner said the parts need to repair the three-engine jet would be brought in from overseas.
The repair could take “several months,” he said, but the plane was not structurally damaged, an enquiry found.
On the evening of December 23, the DC-10 failed to come to a complete stop at the end of the Faa’a runway and ended up in the lagoon facing Pape’ete Harbor. There were no major injuries.
Vanuatu earthquake damages church
PORT VILA, Vanuatu (Pacific Islands Report) — An earthquake, which shook Vanuatu’s Espiritu Santo Island last week, damaged a church building, according to new reports received by the National Disaster Management Office.
The earthquake last Thursday registered 6.9 on the Richter scale.
The head of the National Disaster Management Office in Port Vila, Job Esau, said his office also received reports of damage to goods in some shops.
Fiji’s high vehicle death rate
SUVA, Fiji (Pacific Islands Report) — National Road Safety Council statistics show that deaths occurring on Fiji roads are four times higher than in other nations.
Fiji records 11 deaths per 10,000 vehicles annually compared to 3-4 deaths per 10,000 vehicles in other developed countries.
The council’s goal is to reduce motor vehicle accidents to five per 10,000 by the year 2005, NRSC executive director Chandra Shekar said.
