Ballast

To the list of species that don't belong in Chesapeake Bay and probably will harm its delicate balance, add the veined rapa whelk, a snail with an appetite for shellfish that has been feasting on clams and oysters near Hampton Roads, Va.Watermen working around the mouths of the James and York rivers say they've seen these creatures that vaguely resemble the native conch for several years, but only recently did they know what they were and how much damage...

ONE OF THE advantages of living in a house for a long time is that when something breaks, it usually is a repeat performance. The mystery of "what is that terrible noise?" is gone.Over the years, for instance, I have learned that a "chirp" coming from the refrigerator freezer means the fan motor has gone kaput. I now know that a growl from underneath the kitchen sink means the garbage disposal is gummed up, probably with potato peels, and that the problem can be remedied with a wrench that fits into the disposal's belly.

THERE WAS A HUM in the kitchen. At first I treated the hum the way all veteran homeowners treat strange noises. I pretended it would go away.When it didn't, I checked out the usual suspects, the kids, the radio, the refrigerator. All were known noise offenders. The percentages were usually pretty high, that at any given moment, one of them would be guilty. But in this case, they were innocent.The "hummer" turned out to be a fluorescent light fixture. It was the first of four such fixtures, each about 2 feet long, that were attached to the bottom of the kitchen cabinets.

For the first time, the federal government will protect the Chesapeake Bay and other watersheds across the nation from invasive species carried by foreign ships.The National Invasive Species Act, signed yesterday by President Clinton, sets up a program to prevent contamination during the release of ballast water carried by giant ships from around the world.The policy is intended to halt the "game of biological roulette," said Dr. James Carlton, an authority on marine invaders."Right now, we don't [know]

THE UNITED STATES has declared war on alien invaders -- the potentially dangerous infiltrators of American waters that secretly travel in ballast water tanks of giant ocean-going ships.That's especially good news for the Chesapeake Bay, where more than 3 billion gallons of foreign water are dumped by cargo vessels each year. Hidden in that ballast water (taken on by ships for stabilization) are thousands of exotic, alien organisms that pose dramatic threats to the ecology of the estuary.The new National Invasive Species Act calls for ships to discharge their ballast tanks 200 miles from coastal waters, monitoring of the voluntary effort and funding of research to develop anti-invader techniques.

The Chesapeake Bay needs federal and even international help to prevent "invasions" by exotic fish, plants and parasites carried as stowaways aboard globe-trotting ships calling in Baltimore and Norfolk, Va., a new report says.Warning that visiting ships play "ecologic roulette" with the bay by discharging ballast water teeming with non-native organisms, committee of scientists, shipping agents and state and federal officials says an individual state like Maryland can do little to combat the threat.

Like oceangoing Trojan horses, ships calling in Baltimore carry hidden invaders: alien marine organisms that could damage the Chesapeake Bay, a scientist warned yesterday.They reach the bay in the 200,000 gallons of ballast water released hourly by ship traffic to Baltimore and Norfolk, ballast picked up in ports around the world, said Dr. James T. Carlton, director of maritime studies at Williams College-Mystic Seaport in Mystic, Conn.The ballast -- from Europe, Asia and Central and South America -- teems with tiny crustaceans, worms and the eggs and larvae of crabs, fish and shellfish that could harm the bay's native species, Dr. Carlton told the Chesapeake Bay Commission, a panel of bay-region legislators meeting in Annapolis.

GALESVILLE -- Teri Nilsen was still hooked to the trapeze when the gust hit Gandalf, a sleek Chesapeake 20, as it tacked, forcing the sailboat to heel until it almost dipped its spreader in the water.Nilsen scrambled to windward to add her human ballast to the battle with the wind to keep from capsizing. Seconds later, she had rehooked her line and was standing somewhat horizontally on the rub strip. Beneath her, Gandalf was surging through the 3-foot chop of West River again like the fast and beautiful lady the late Captain Dick Hartge had meant her to be when he built her back in the mid-1930s.

Replacing even one incandescent bulb in your home with a compact fluorescent is, unfortunately, a bit of an adventure. But it is well worth the effort, and once you have the system figured out, it will be easier to replace others. Each bulb you replace will save you between $24 and $48 over its lifetime, depending on your area's electricity rates. And it will help reduce acid rain and other nasty forms of air pollution.First, a novice's guide to what's out there. If you are interested in learning more about the technology, check the sources below.

The state ordered a contractor to remove railroad ballast dumped in a Baltimore County sinkhole this month, just weeks after the federal government announced plans to test soil from the same rail bed for contamination.The State Highway Administration two weeks ago ordered the removal of two truckloads that a contractor had dumped into the sinkhole on Falls Road, just south of the Baltimore Beltway, said Charles Harrison, SHA district engineer for Baltimore and Harford counties.The state cited concerns that the ballast had not been tested for pollutants, although the firm that hauled the rocks claims they were clean.

My Name Is Bruce *** ( 3 STARS) An exercise in self-indulgent filmmaking at its most endearing, My Name Is Bruce casts beloved grade-B horror star Bruce Campbell as obnoxious grade-B horror star Bruce Campbell, and wonders what would happen if the cinema worlds created for his films became real. At least, that's kind of what it does, in a we've-got-to-come-up-with-a-coherent-plotline-for-this-film sort of way. But mostly, what My Name Is Bruce does is give its director-star endless opportunities to make fun of himself.

Ballast : (Strand Releasi ng) A single mom on the Mississippi Delta copes with a man from her past while struggling to raise her son. With Tarra Riggs and JimMyron Ross. Let the Right One In : (Magnolia Pictures) A bullied 12-year-old boy finds love and revenge through a beautiful but odd girl who turns out to be a vampire. With Kare Hedebrant and Lina Leandersson. In Swedish with English subtitles. My Name is Bruce : (Image Entertainment) Actor Bruce Campbell is mistaken for his character Ash from the Evil Dead trilogy and forced to fight a real monster in a small town in Oregon.

Scientists at a new research center in Maryland will test strategies to kill invasive species and prevent them from hurting the Chesapeake Bay, according to an announcement scheduled for today. More than 150 exotic species are now thriving in the bay, often hitchhiking here in the ballast water of ships from Asia and Europe. A few of the most aggressive, like the oyster-killing parasite MSX, have overwhelmed native creatures. The new Maritime Environmental Resource Center at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science will be based in Solomons in Southern Maryland and receive about $5 million over five years from the state and federal governments.

A 712-foot ship loaded with coal that ran aground in the Chesapeake Bay was freed yesterday morning, a week after it became stuck off the coast of Tilghman Island. Workers tried for nearly three days to unload a portion of the 74,000 tons of coal aboard the carrier before finishing the job late Tuesday night. It took another eight hours to remove the ship's ballast water. Once its load was lightened, four tugboats wrested the MV Montrose off the shoal. The ship, which was bound for Romania, is now anchored at Solomons Island, where the Coast Guard is inspecting it. Divers will also examine the ship's bottom to make sure it isn't damaged, Coast Guard Petty Officer Christopher Evanson said.

CHICAGO - The Bush administration laid out an ambitious plan yesterday to clean up and protect the Great Lakes, but even some of the president's allies consider the $20 billion price tag to be unrealistic. Led by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, a group of local, state, tribal and federal officials called for more aggressive efforts to clean up contaminated ports, fix aging sewer systems, block invasive species and improve the shoreline. The group, organized by an executive order President Bush signed in May 2004, urged Congress and the states to make the world's largest freshwater system a greater priority.

SAN FRANCISCO - A judge has ordered repeal of a federal regulation that has allowed ships to discharge ballast water freely into U.S. harbors and coastal waters. U.S. District Judge Susan Illston said last week that the 1972 Clean Water Act prohibits the practice. Government and other reports have identified ballast water as the main source for the spread of invasive foreign species - more than 500 of them - that have been ruining U.S. wetlands and driving out native marine plant and animal life.

MINNEAPOLIS - The U.S. Coast Guard says it must find new ways to keep foreign species out of the Great Lakes, conceding that its regulation of transoceanic ships since 1993 hasn't done the job. In a little-noticed announcement in the Federal Register this month, the Coast Guard confirmed what scientists have been documenting for years: Invasive species can be carried into the Great Lakes in the residual water and mud at the bottom of ships' ballast water...

SUN SCORE : * Alexander the Great still conquers the known world of antiquity in Oliver Stone's Alexander, but, dramatically, absolutely nothing seems to happen. This nearly-three-hour feature plays like the most extravagant educational filmstrip ever made. The imagery merely illustrates the running - make that stumbling - commentary of the narrator, Alexander's one-time supporter Ptolemy (Anthony Hopkins), who relates the Greek king's story 40 years after the monarch's death. Alexander (Colin Farrell)

Tim Mullady peers into a microscope in a darkened room at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater. He is counting cells from a sample of ballast water taken from a ship, looking for Vibrio cholerae, the bacteria that cause human cholera -- and sometimes is discharged from that ballast into local waters along with scores of other "foreign" organisms. Mullady is part of the Marine Invasion Research Laboratory, which provides information from the forefront of the research community to the Coast Guard and Congress.

Tim Mullady peers into a microscope in a darkened room at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater. He is counting cells from a sample of ballast water taken from a ship, looking for vibrio cholerae, the bacterium that causes human cholera - and sometimes is discharged from that ballast into local waters along with scores of other "foreign" organisms. Mullady is part of the National Marine Invasion Research Program, which provides the Coast Guard and Congress with information from the forefront of the research community on this issue.