Coast Guard combs ocean for ‘mayday’ boater
A rescue helicopter combed the waters off Malibu last week Wednesday after receiving a mysterious mayday transmission from a boater, authorities said in a Los Angeles Times report.
“This is King Fisher I, mayday, mayday, mayday, come back Coast Guard,” a man’s voice was heard saying over the radio about 2:09 a.m., according to U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Matthew Schofield.
The man made no further transmissions. The radio call was traced to an area about 30 miles offshore from Point Dume.
A U.S. Coast Guard rescue helicopter flew search patterns over the area but had not found any stranded or distressed vessels.
The Coast Guard has posted an audio recording of the transmission online and is asking anyone who recognizes the voice to call 310.521.3801.
Closure scheduled for Malibu Canyon
Malibu Canyon Road will be intermittently closed within about one mile of HRL Laboratories between the hours of 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on April 8. The closures will be approximately five minutes in duration and may occur four to five times during the posted hours.
Southern California Edison will be transporting poles and materials via helicopter from the HRL heliport to a canyon in the Cross Creek Road area and the FAA requires that traffic be stopped whenever a helicopter flies over the highway.
Search for Mitrice Richardson continues
The search for Mitrice Richardson, who vanished last September from outside the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station, has shifted to Downtown Los Angeles.
Numerous church members on Sunday joined a group of volunteers to search in the skid row area.
Chip Croft, a video producer who helped to coordinate Sunday’s event, said in a Los Angeles Times report Monday that there have been several credible sightings of Richardson downtown.
Richardson, 24, a Cal State Fullerton graduate, vanished after being released from the Malibu/Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station after midnight on Sept. 17, 2009. She had no car, no purse and no cellphone. She had been arrested at Geoffrey’s Malibu for not paying a dinner bill and was reported by staff to have been acting strangely. Authorities have searched Malibu hills and canyons several times without finding a trace of her.
Hard-to-kill snails infest Santa Monica Mountain watersheds
New Zealand mudsnails have taken over four watersheds in the Santa Monica Mountains and are spreading fast, expanding from the first confirmed sample in Medea Creek in Agoura Hills to nearly 30 other stream sites in four years, according to a report by the Los Angeles Times.
The invasive species, found in many waterways in the U.S. West, the Great Lakes and Canada, reproduces asexually, so “it just takes one to infest a water body,” Mark Abramson, a stream restoration expert for the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Commission, said in the report.
Mudsnails now infest the Malibu Creek, Trancas Creek, Ramirez Creek and Solstice Creek watersheds. They’ve claimed Malibou Lake, Malibu Lagoon and Cold Creek.
In an ironic twist, the spread of the infestation locally may be the result of environmentalists’ efforts to improve stream-water quality in the Santa Monica Mountains, an effort Abramson spearheaded.
Equipment used by contractors and volunteers to help test water for groups such as Heal the Bay may have spread the mudsnails from stream to stream. The tiny mollusks cling to gear like fuzz to Velcro. Mudsnail infestations have cropped up where monitoring was completed.
Mudsnails don’t look like much: An adult is about the size of a grain of rice. But one can produce 40 million clones, Danuta Bennett, a researcher at UC Santa Barbara, said in the report. They quickly drive out insects and tiny animals that provide food for frogs, birds and fish.
With their hard shells, mudsnails make a poor food substitute. Trout fed a diet of mudsnails get thinner. Tadpoles in mudsnail havens starve, Bennett said.
Being eaten hardly matters to a mudsnail: They can be excreted alive, ready to reproduce some more.
Bennett and fellow researchers are working to combat the mudsnails by introducing the parasites that keep their populations in balance in New Zealand. But such bio-control strategies require extensive research to ensure they don’t cause a new, exotic infestation.
Currently, there appears to be no way to eradicate them. Officials hope only to stop their spread.
General Plan underway for Topanga State Park
The California Department of Parks and Recreation is developing an updated general plan for Topanga State Park.
The General Plan will delineate a number of management areas and corridors. It will recommend goals and guidelines for specific areas of the park, as well as for the park as a whole.
The goals and guidelines will address future management of park resources, land use and development, visitor use and operational issues. The General Plan may also make recommendations for levels and types of use, capacities and visitation, and location and type of future facilities.
A workshop for public input on the General Plan is slated to take place May 11 at the Stewart Hall facility at Temescal Canyon Gateway Park.
Topanga State Park was created on a landscape that is rich in layers of cultural history and prehistory. Human occupation goes back at least 8,000 to 10,000 years, to an early Paleo-Indian culture. In addition to the long chain of occupation collectively referred to as the Topanga Culture, the park contains lands traditional to both the Tongva and Chumash peoples, historically marking an interface between these two groups.
More information can be obtained online at www.parks.ca.gov.
County animal shelters now open Sundays
The Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control recently announced that its animal shelters are now open on Sundays so adopters have an additional day to find a new pet.
“Opening on Sundays gives us an additional opportunity to showcase the many wonderful animals in our shelters,” Department Director Marcia Mayeda said in a press release. “Weekends are a popular time to find a new family member at the local animal shelter, and we want to ensure we are using every opportunity to increase pet adoptions.”
In addition to increasing adoption opportunities, by opening Sundays the Department hopes to reunite lost pets with their owners a day sooner.
The Department has been able to achieve this goal by realigning staff schedules and without incurring any additional operating cost, the press release states.
“Local government budgets are particularly challenged during these difficult economic times, and we are happy to have found creative solutions to enhance services without additional costs to taxpayers” Mayeda said.
The Department also hopes to see an increase in revenue generated by the additional business day, thereby providing more resources to help homeless animals.
The six Los Angeles County animal shelters, located in Downey, Baldwin Park, Carson, Castaic, Lancaster and Agoura Hills are now open seven days a week.
Operating hours are Mondays through Thursdays from 12 p.m. to 7 p.m., and Fridays through Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
More information can be obtained online at www.animalcare.lacounty.gov.
CWC surpasses animal care record
The California Wildlife Center recently announced that as of Dec. 31, 2009, it had surpassed the 20,000 animals it has admitted and cared for since its inception in 1998.
As urban sprawl and development edge further and further into the hillsides and other wild habitats surrounding the Los Angeles region, an increasing number of wildlife have become displaced from their native territories. As they resort to foraging for food, water and shelter in human roads, neighborhoods and other environments, they inevitably come into contact with cars, domestic pets, garden poisons and other dangers not present in the wild. While this has added to CWC’s patient load, it has also enhanced the organization’s ability to learn about these animals in ways that can hopefully help other wild patients in the future.
CWC is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the rescue, rehabilitation and release of sick, injured or orphaned native wildlife in Southern California.
More information can be obtained online at californiawildlifecenter.org.
Radiation detectors installed at Port Hueneme
U.S. Customs and Border Protection recently announced the deployment of Radiation Portal Monitors at Port Hueneme to prevent terrorists from attempting to smuggle radiological materials used in nuclear and radiological dispersal devices.
“This advanced technology enhances our capabilities in keeping the flow of legitimate trade critical to the U.S. economy, while protecting our country from terrorists and their weapons of mass destruction,” Todd Hoffman, CBP port director of Los Angeles/Long Beach seaport complex, said in a press release.
RPMs are detection devices that provide CBP officers with a passive, non-intrusive means to screen containers, vessels and vehicles for the presence of nuclear and radiological materials. The deployment of portal monitors is an important component of CBP’s multi-layered strategy.
These systems do not emit radiation but are capable of detecting various types of radiation emanating from nuclear devices, dirty bombs, special nuclear materials, natural sources, and isotopes commonly used in medicine and industry. They are safe for anyone passing by them, including children and pregnant women.
By Olivia Damavandi