A woman is supporting aid efforts in Morocco after narrowly escaping the recent earthquake in the country.

Rebecca Calvert, from Windsor, Berkshire, was staying in a small village in the Atlas Mountains when the disaster struck on 8 September, killing almost 3,000 people.

The location was just 20 miles from the epicentre of the quake.

Mrs Calvert, who was on a hiking trip with a friend, said it felt like a “really heavy deep thunder”.

The friends had just gone to bed when at about 23:00 BST she felt “things raining down”.

“You don’t know what’s happening, it’s pitch black and you’re trying to find something normal for it in your head but it’s terrifying,” Mrs Calvert said.

When it stopped, they went outside and heard “wailing of women”, “crying of babies” and “men shouting”.

“That was just awful and went on for a long time and made us realise […] how enormous the situation was,” Mrs Calvert remembered.

The whole village slept outside, “on to the crumbly steps” of the hotel as they had felt that was the safest place.

She said a Moroccan man later showed them “a great big crack across the top of the ceiling” of his parents’ house.

Husband Will Calvert said it had been “a huge relief” to hear from her on 10 September after spending the previous day with family, “trying to make contact any way we could”.

Mrs Calvert, who has since returned home and is currently visiting her sister in Brittany, is planning a fundraiser for the Red Cross appeal at The Swan pub in Clewer, Windsor, after being touched by how “generous and helpful” the Moroccan villagers had been.

Lee made landfall as a post-tropical cyclone packing hurricane-force winds in a far western part of Canada’s Nova Scotia province on Saturday, flooding roads, downing trees and cutting out power for tens of thousands of people along the North Atlantic coast.

At least one storm-related fatality was recorded on Saturday. A motorist in the U.S. state of Maine died after a tree fell on his vehicle, local media reported.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its latest advisory that Lee was moving north after it made landfall on Long Island, a small island southwest of Halifax, on Saturday. The still-powerful weather system packed maximum sustained winds of 65 mph (100 km/h) with higher gusts, forecasters said.

Lee, now located about 40 miles (60 km) east-southeast of Eastport, Maine and about 130 miles (215) west of Halifax, is expected to weaken steadily during the next couple of days.

It brought strong winds, coastal flooding and heavy rains to parts of coastal Maine and Atlantic Canada.

In the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, around 120,000 people were without power on Saturday as winds knocked down trees and felled power lines. In neighboring New Brunswick, nearly 20,000 people experienced power outages.

“Crews have been able to restore power to some customers … however, conditions are getting worse. In many cases, especially when winds are above 80 km/h (49.7 mph), it isn’t safe for our crews,” Matt Drover of the Nova Scotia electric utility said earlier on Saturday.

People whose homes were swept away by flooding in Libya’s eastern city of Derna a week ago faced the dilemma on Sunday of whether to stay and risk infection or flee through areas where landmines have been displaced by the torrents.

Thousands of people were killed after two dams above Derna broke on Sept. 10 during a powerful storm, bringing down residential blocks lining a usually dry riverbed as people slept. Many bodies have been washed out to sea.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on Saturday cited a death toll of 11,300 from the Libyan Red Crescent. However, a spokesman for the Libyan Red Crescent appeared to cast doubt on that, saying “figures are changing and the Red Crescent is not responsible for this.”

OCHA spokesperson Eri Kaneko said it was difficult to get exact casualty figures as the search for bodies and survivors continues, and said the World Health Organization (WHO) had so far confirmed 3,922 deaths. The health minister for the Libyan eastern government on Sunday said 3,283 had died.

More than 1,000 have already been buried in mass graves, according to the United Nations, and aid groups have warned against the practice. Libyan authorities have confirmed that 150 people have been poisoned by polluted water in the flood-hit areas.

Mohamed Wanis Tajouri said he had come to Derna from Benghazi down the coast with fellow medical students to carry out disinfection and sterilization work. “After floods epidemics occur,” he said.

Sunrise on Sunday revealed a scene of quiet devastation, with piles of rubble cleared to the sides of empty roads along with tangled metal including pieces of wrecked cars.

Hamad Awad sat on a blanket on an empty street with a bottle of water and bedding alongside him.

“I am staying in our area trying to clean it and trying to verify who is missing,” he said. “Thank God for giving us patience.”

Entire districts of Derna, with an estimated population of at least 120,000, were swept away or buried in mud. State media said at least 891 buildings had been destroyed in the city, whose mayor has said 20,000 people may have died.

Mohamed Alnaji Bushertila, a government employee, said 48 members of his wider family were missing. Another resident said survivors were at a loss over what to do next.

“We still do not know anything, we are hearing rumours, some are trying to reassure us, others are saying you need to leave the city or stay here,” said the man, who gave just one name, Wasfi. “We have no water and no resources.”

The homeless are surviving in makeshift shelters, schools or packed into the houses of relatives or friends, OCHA said.

Floodwaters had shifted landmines and other ordnance left over from years of conflict, posing an extra risk to the thousands of displaced people on the move, it added.

OCHA said that according to the latest data from the International Organization for Migration, more than 40,000 people had been displaced across northeastern Libya, but warned that figure was likely to be higher.

Aid organizations have flown in emergency aid and some countries have sent supplies, although international officials say much more help is needed.

Four members of a Greek rescue team were killed in a road accident en route to Derna from Benghazi, while seven others were left in a critical condition, the health minister for the Libyan eastern government said on Sunday. Three members of a Libyan family were also killed and two were critical.

A French field hospital was being prepared in footage aired by Libya’s Al Masar television.

“People came with aid from all over, and this made it easier on us, and we felt that we are not alone,” said Derna resident Hassan Awad as civil protection workers from Algeria searched the rubble of multi-storey buildings in the city for survivors.

Awad pointed to a rusty pole between two buildings and said clinging to it was how his family had survived the flood which tore through their home, covering everything in mud.

“We found dead bodies, of neighbours, friends and loved ones,” he said. On the seafront, an excavator moved smashed furniture and cars to try to find victims underneath.

Another excavator cleared rubble from buildings as rescue workers paused and knelt nearby to pray.

In al Badya, a coastal settlement west of Derna, the hospital was treating victims from Derna as well as its own.

Doctors built makeshift dams in the street when the flooding hit to try to hold back the water, but it rose within the building.

The flooding affected machinery on the lower level of the hospital, the hospital’s head, Abdel Rahim Mazek, said.

Elsewhere in the town, volunteers handed out clothing and food.

Volunteer Abdulnabi said the team came from Ajaylat, around 800 miles (1,200 km) away in western Libya, divided from the east by more than a decade of on and off conflict.

The country of 7 million people has lacked a strong central government since a NATO-backed uprising that toppled Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 and its oil wealth is dispersed among competing groups.

Analysts said the disaster had brought some coordination between the internationally-backed administration in Tripoli in the west and the rival administration in the east but that reconstruction efforts would likely reopen fault-lines.

Residents in different parts of Lagos are lamenting the devastating impact of the early morning rain on their houses.

Flooding caused by the heavy rainfall has submerged a number of houses in the affected areas.

Oko-baba in Agege, Egbede, Ikotun, Ajegunle, and Ojo were among the worst hit areas as the flood swept through streets and houses.

Residents were seen bailing out water from taking over their houses.

The floodwater covered many houses in Ijanikin, Alaba International market area, Ajangbadi and Etegbi, all in Ojo.

Water also overflowed most drainage channels in the affected areas and escaped into houses. In some neighbourhoods, it destroyed fences and gates.

Those in the affected communities are battling to salvage some of their property, while many families had temporarily relocated.

Residents, who live close to canals, appealed to the state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, to come to their aid by dredging the canals.

The territorial coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Ibrahim Farinloye, appealed to the residents of Lagos State to take utmost precautions.

He said NEMA and other emergency agencies were assessing some flash points and holding discussions with the affected communities with a view to proferring immediate solutions to the situations.

Farinloye said, “NEMA is assisting the owner of a building that its fence collapsed and helping to salvage the building by reconstruction of the fence to solidify the base to prevent it from collapsing on the next bungalow building.

“In addition, children and women wears, mattresses, antiseptic and other immediate assistance to the impacted population at Orile Agege Local Government Area are being made available to provide immediate succour to about 200 people this afternoon.”

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The San Rafael National Park is a national reserve that is still a proposed national park, and it is located in the southeastern part of the Republic of Paraguay.

Covering an area of about 69,000 hectares (171,000 acres) from the upper Tebicuary River basin, in the San Rafael hills, it was recommended to be a national park in 1992, however, formal steps to finalize this decision have not been taken yet.

The entire protected area is under threat from the large-scale farming that is slowly engulfing the countries in South America, as well as the small slash-and-burn farmers who are clearing the way in order to make more space for their agricultural activities.

This national park is of significant importance to the small nation of Paraguay, as it has Atlantic Forest, grasslands and wetlands, which furthermore give shelter and refuge to the wildlife that calls San Rafael their home.

There are some plans which would put this piece of land in the proposed Trinational Biodiversity Corridor that stretches in Brazil and Argentina as well, nonetheless, due to the private ownership of the almost entire park, this process is going really slow.

Certainly, one of the last remaining gems in Paraguay is the pristine Atlantic Forest, but as it grows on red soils and due to a mixture of greed and lack of proper education there is increasing pressure for the forest to be replaced by soy fields in compliance with the policy that ‘production is progress’ done by the government.

Beginning from 2016, there is no effective management that would protect the reserve/park, so the clearing of the forest and converting the land to an agricultural one has increased, making the fauna to find shelter in the smaller portions of flora.

From that fauna, the most significant ones that can be found are jaguar and South American tapir, in addition to more than 400 bird species, among which 12 are globally threatened with extinction.

All in all, being definitely one of the last places where the wildlife can find refuge from the ever-growing agricultural practices, there is still hope that the San Rafael National Park will be protected and brought to the state it deserves to be in, large and full with flora and fauna.

A new excavation project in Jerusalem has unearthed steps unseen in over 2,000 years at a place where the New Testament records Jesus as having healed a blind man.

The Israel Antiquities Authority, the Israel National Parks Authority and the City of David Foundation early this year announced that the Pool of Siloam, a biblical site cherished by Christians and Jews, will be open to the public for the first time in 2,000 years in the near future.

In recent weeks, archeologists achieved significant progress in the excavation, unearthing some eight steps descending into the Pool which had not been seen in 2,000 years — around the time when Jesus walked the earth.

The ongoing excavations within the City of David , the historic site of Biblical Jerusalem, particularly of the Pool of Siloam and the Pilgrimage Road, serve as one of the greatest affirmations of that heritage and the millennia-old bond Jews and Christians have with Jerusalem,” Ze’ev Orenstein, director of International Affairs – City of David Foundation said.

Not simply as a matter of faith, but as a matter of fact,” he added.

The City of David Foundation is a non-profit organization established in 1986, “dedicated to the preservation and development of the City of David and its environs, and is committed to connecting people of all faiths and backgrounds to ancient Jerusalem.”

“The half-mile running through the City of David, from the Pool of Siloam in the south, continuing along the Pilgrimage Road, up to the footsteps of the Western Wall, Southern Steps and Temple Mount, represents the most significant half-mile on the planet,” Orenstein said.

“There is no half-mile anywhere on Earth which means more to more people not to millions, but to billions — than the half-mile that is the City of David,” he added.

According to estimates, the Pool of Siloam passed through many stages of construction and reached the size of 1.25 acres. (City of David Foundation)

The pool was first built roughly 2,700 years ago as part of Jerusalem’s water system in the eighth century B.C.

The construction unfolded during the reign of King Hezekia as cited in the Bible in the Book of Kings II, 20:20, according to the two Israeli agencies and the City of David Foundation.

According to estimates, the Pool of Siloam passed through many stages of construction and reached the size of 1.25 acres. According to a passage in the Gospel of John, Jesus restored the sight of a man born blind at the Pool of Siloam.

A small section of the pool, which has been fully excavated, has been accessible to the public for several years. The vast majority of the pool is being excavated and will either be opened piecemeal or once the entire site is unearthed.

Rev. Johnnie Moore, president of the Congress of Christian Leaders, told Fox News Digital ,
“In the Pool of Siloam, we find evidence of history preserved for us, revealed at just the right time.”

“Theologically, it affirms Scripture, geographically it affirms scripture, and politically it affirms Israel’s unquestionable and unrivaled link to Jerusalem. Some discoveries are theoretical. This one is an undeniable. It is proof of the story of the Bible and of its people, Israel,” he said.

A stroke of luck revealed the pool in 2004, when infrastructure work carried out by the Hagihon water company uncovered some of the pool’s steps. The Israel Antiquities Authority, under supervision of professors Roni Reich and Eli Shukron, launched a survey. As a result, the northern perimeter, as well as a small section of the eastern perimeter of the Pool of Siloam, were uncovered.

“Whether in the halls of the United Nations, ongoing efforts by Palestinian leadership, or on university campuses, Jerusalem’s Biblical heritage is under assault,” said Orenstein.

Orenstein noted that in few years’ time, visitors to the City of David will be able to witness the factual history for themselves and “see with their own eyes, touch with their own hands, and walk with their own feet upon the very stones their ancestors walked thousands of years ago, as they made their way to Jerusalem on pilgrimage.”