Explosion at Cyprus naval base

I woke up earlier than usual today.  It was hot and my air condition wasn’t working for some reason.  It turns, the power was gone.   Not just my apartment or building.  Driving through the city to work, I saw a number of traffic lights not working.  People at work from all over Limassol confirmed that they experienced a power cut as well.  What happened?  Apparently, there was a huge explosion at Cyprus naval base.  People say there was an ammunition stock that exploded.  Rumor has it that 10 to 12 people are presumed dead.  There is extensive damage to the area, including the power station, where the fire broke down.

The news are scarce at the moment.  Here is a link I found that confirms some of the rumors I’ve heard around the office.

NICOSIA, Cyprus — A Cyprus Defense Ministry spokeswoman says around 10 people are feared dead following a massive explosion at a naval base.

Aliki Stylianou could not immediately confirm the cause of the explosion which occured at the Evangelos Florakis Naval Base on the Mediterranean island’s southern coast on Monday at around 6:00am (0300GMT).

State television CyBC is reporting that the explosion also caused numerous injuries and extensive damage to homes in villages near the naval base.

Police spokesman Michalis Katsounotos said that a fire at a nearby power station has been contained.

 

Update: Here is an article from Cyprus News.

Day in brief – 2011-07-09

Day in brief – 2011-07-08

PHP upgrade, server downtime, and WordPress wierdness

I’ve upgraded the server to PHP 5.3.  The packages just showed up as alternative (php53) in the list of available upgrades and I was having troubles with earlier PHP versions, so I went for it.  It didn’t go quite as easy and simple as I expected.  Apache started crashing often.  It took me a few re-installs and configuration tweaks to fix these things.  It looks like now it’s fine.

As a side effect, I noticed a whole bunch of posts titled “Auto Draft” showing in the front page of my blog.  I wasn’t working with WordPress at the time, so it was strange to see new empty content posted.  Apparently, it’s a somewhat known issue with WordPress 3.0.  While I was trying to get rid of the empty posts, it seems I deleted a few posts  of mine own from the last couple of days. Maybe they will still show up.  Maybe not.

Anyway, I apologize for all the inconvenience.  If you notice anything else misbehaving, please let me know.