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YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan — The U.S. government faces a $1.4 million fine for damage caused to a Philippines national park when the minesweeper USS Guardian ran aground on a coral reef in January, Philippine officials said Monday. The fine total, converted from 58.4 million Philippine pesos, is based on a 2009 law detailing fines based on total area damaged, unauthorized entry and other violations. A statement from Tubbataha Reefs National Park superintendent Angelique Songco called the fine just a “slap on the wrist.” “However, we respect the rule of law, and this is the fine stipulated,” Songco said in...

The commanding officer and three crewmembers aboard a U.S. Navy minesweeper have been relieved of their duties amid an investigation into how the $300 million ship got stuck on a reef near the Philippines and had to be scuttled. The USS Guardian became stuck on a reef in the Tubbataha National Marine Park, a World Heritage Site in the Sulu Sea some 400 miles southeast of Manila in January. The Navy said in a statement that the officer and crewmembers were relieved because the ship's grounding did not comply with its navigation procedures and accountability standards. Last week, the Navy...

YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan -- The commanding officer of the former minesweeper USS Guardian and three others have been relieved of duty following the initial investigation into the grounding of the Sasebo-based ship on a reef in the Philippines, Navy officials said Thursday. Lt. Cmdr. Mark Rice, executive officer Daniel Tyler, the ship’s enlisted assistant navigator and the officer of the deck at the time of the ship’s grounding were all relieved because they “did not adhere to the standard navy navigation procedures,” Expeditionary Strike Group Seven spokesman Lt. Brian Wierzbicki said. Rice and the others were relieved by Rear...

Navy planning to procure warships from the U.S., South Korea India is planning to procure eight new South Korean minesweepers for its Navy to augment its fleet of warships capable of detonating sea mines. The Navy is also considering procuring two American used Osprey-class minesweepers, navy officials said here. “Defence Ministry is holding commercial negotiations with the Kangnam Corporation of South Korea for procuring eight minesweepers of which two would be constructed at the vendors’ shipyards and the rest would be built in India,” they said. At present, the Navy operates 12 minesweepers of the Pondicherry and Karwar class that...

Sniffer 'hero rats' saving lives in minefields and labs by Otto Bakano Mon Nov 8, 12:24 pm ET .MOROGORO, Tanzania (AFP) – A baby rat in a tiny red and black harness twitches its pointed nose incessantly, probing a grassy field where it is being trained by a pioneering Belgian NGO to smell out deadly landmines. Other rats trained under the same scheme have already helped clear large swathes of land in neighbouring mine-infested Mozambique. Babette, the two-month-old baby, walks unsteadily across the weedy patch followed by two trainers rolling a bar that teaches her to go back and forth...

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From North Carolina comes a report that a State Senator wants to erase all game applications from state workers' computers. His belief: that preventing government employees from playing Solitaire and Minesweeper will recoup millions of dollars worth of productivity for the state. "...The solitaire crackdown here, though perhaps rare in its specificity, is part of a behind-the-scenes battle over personal time that's affecting not just unionized state workers in North Carolina, but sales reps in Washington and phone-bank workers in San Francisco..." This effort is, itself, a giant waste of time. It makes about as much sense as teaching Mandarin...