(CNN) — A disabled Carnival Cruise Lines ship with thousands of passengers on board was nearing its pier in San Diego on Thursday, although it will take some time for it to dock, the Coast Guard said.

As of about 7:30 a.m. (10:30 a.m. ET), the Carnival Splendor was about four miles from its pier, said Coast Guard Petty Officer Rachel Polish. Towed by six tugboats, it was approaching at about 6 mph, meaning it should be at the pier in less than an hour, she said.

But when it arrives, the tugs must be reconfigured and bring the ship in portside, or on its left side, she said. That process could take a while, Polish said.

The passengers — all 3,300 of them — will disembark with tales from the three-day ordeal that began with a fire in the ship’s engine room. Engineers were unable to restore power to the ship after the fire was extinguished, leaving passengers without air conditioning, hot showers or decent meals. Instead, they had to settle for Spam and Pop-Tarts dropped off by the USS Ronald Reagan, which came to assist.

Aerial footage showed passengers congregating on the decks and at the railing as the ship was towed in.

While Carnival said Wednesday that most passengers knew that the Splendor’s crew was doing the best it could, there were reports of passengers pledging not to take up the company’s offer of a free replacement trip.

The vessel became stranded Monday after an engine-room fire off the coast of Mexico.

Because the ship is without most of its power, the company decided to wait until daylight for tugboats to deliver the Splendor to a dock, Carnival Cruise Lines CEO Gerry Cahill said at a news conference.

Carnival noted that as the ship gets closer to the coast, passengers are increasingly able to receive “intermittent cellular service.”

The ship’s crew had set up a call center for passengers to make urgent calls.

“Obviously, with eight phones and 3,300 people, you are going to have a pretty big backup,” Cahill said.

One passenger, David Zambrano, a KUSA-TV employee, called his Denver, Colorado, station Wednesday from his cell phone and said many passengers were in the dark in their cabins and had to wait in line for two hours to eat the cold meals, which were being delivered to the ship by helicopter from the USS Ronald Reagan.

“Many of the people I have talked to said that they will never take another cruise again, especially with Carnival,” said Zambrano, who was able to enjoy some sunlight because he has a stateroom with a balcony.

“It’s nothing like anyone expected, no,” Zambrano said. “You stand in line for two hours just to get your food because everybody goes to the same place to pick up their food. And, so you stand in line and you wait, then once you get your food, you leave and you look for something to do.

“People are playing cards. People are standing around just kind of talking. They’re getting to socialize,” Zambrano said. “It’s not what you would expect on a normal cruise, of course not, but it’s — they’re doing their best. The crew is doing their best to keep everybody satisfied and make sure that they’re watching everything.

“The only thing that made it really tough was when the facilities were all broken down and all the bathrooms weren’t working and people were starting to get uncomfortable,” Zambrano said. “But now that they started getting those things going and the water flowing, then that made all the difference.”

In addition to offering a free cruise, Carnival has promised passengers a refund and said it will cover transportation costs.

“Conditions on the ship have been challenging,” said Cahill, reiterating apologies to families.

“We’re disappointed about it. Reports from the ship show guests believe we are doing the best we can,” Cahill said. “We ruined their vacations. I am optimistic they will return.”

Cahill said the crew has done the best it can in making the passengers comfortable, including offering free drinks. The pool was closed because the ship didn’t have the power to run its chlorination system.

Passenger Lenora Chavez said Wednesday some of the plumbing was at capacity and vomit bags were hanging in corridors.

“It smells like a lot of people are throwing up,” she said. “I can smell that a lot.”

But the situation had improved Thursday morning as the ship neared land, Chavez said.

“It has not been too bad,” she said. “Everybody has been in good spirits. We have had entertainment and a lot of music. They are trying their best to keep us comfortable.”

Carnival told CNN that most of the plumbing is functioning and the ship’s doctors report few ill passengers.

A crew of about 1,200 is on board.

A U.S. Navy aircraft carrier resupplied the cruise ship Tuesday evening. Sailors stood on the deck of the USS Ronald Reagan in 50-yard lines, handing off boxes of water, frozen bread, sandwich meats, granola bars, paper plates and more for the Splendor.

Navy pilot Tamara Graham and Chief Petty Officer Steve Sinclair said they made 15 round trips from the Reagan to the stranded cruise ship.

“When we first showed up on scene, [passengers] were taking pictures, and flash bulbs were going off everywhere,” Sinclair said. “Once we dropped our equipment, we were getting a lot of waves.”

The Reagan received 60,000 pounds of food, bottled water and supplies by airlift for the cruise ship, said Cmdr. Greg Hicks, spokesman of the U.S. Third Fleet.

Graham said water “was definitely the top priority” on the list of supplies to bring on board the ship.

Carnival said it is making hotel and flight arrangements for guests once they reach port. About 100 representatives will be at the port Thursday to help passengers with transportation, hotel and other needs, Cahill said.

Crews will follow environmental and sanitation protocols when they begin unloading food spoiled because of the loss of refrigeration, said Carnival spokeswoman Joyce Oliva.

The fire occurred about 6 a.m. Monday in the engine room of the Splendor, the cruise line said in a statement on its website. The blaze was extinguished, and no passengers or crew were injured.

Engineers were not able to restore power to the ship, which was operating on auxiliary generators, a Carnival statement said.

The seven-day cruise along the Mexican coast departed Sunday from Long Beach, California. Carnival has canceled a seven-day cruise that was to leave November 14 from Long Beach, the company said.

“We’ve been in business for 35 years,” Cahill said. “We’ve never had anything like this happen before.”

John Heald, Carnival’s senior cruise director, blogged Wednesday from the Carnival Splendor. “I have to say that the crew has been absolutely epic and I am so very proud of each and every one of them,” he wrote.

“One thing is for certain though,” Heald added. “I doubt anyone onboard will ever, ever want to eat a sandwich ever again.”

Source(article): CNN

Source (pictures): VIRGINHOLIDAYSCRUISES, CRUISEWEB,THECRUISESENTRE

Copiapo, Chile (CNN) — In a desolate patch of Chile’s Atacama Desert, a world mesmerized by a 68-day tale of true grit expects a joyful ending Tuesday.

One by one, 33 miners, trapped in a gold and copper mine since the start of August, will put on green coveralls made of moisture-resisting material and personalized with names like Victor Antonio Segovia Rojas. Juan Illanes Palma. Alex Vega Salazar.

The oldest is 63. The youngest, only 19.

They’ll have on fresh underwear and socks when they climb into a claustrophobic capsule a little wider than the span of their shoulders.

They will be instructed on the communications equipment and the oxygen supply inside the rescue tube. And they will put on special goggles to protect their eyes, accustomed the vampiric darkness of the caved-in mine, to the lights up above.

Then the order to hoist will ring out and each man will begin a slow, bumpy, upward journey through half a mile of rock.

The men have been placed on liquid diets in case they vomit on the way to the surface and they have been exercising for an hour a day. One of the miners, Yonni Barrios, is a paramedic and has been weighing his fellow miners daily, taking blood tests and doing daily urine analysis.

It’s unclear exactly when the rescue will begin but it is likely to go from night into day. Some of the men will feel the intense chill of a desert night; others may come out to a searing sun burning high in a cloudless sky.

The rescue capsule will spin as it rises. It will be harrowing. And dark. Like a scary amusement park ride.

Except the thrill for these 33 men will lie at the end of the ride, when each will see the families they probably feared they would never see again.

“As he comes out he will be reborn,” said Nelly Bugueno about her son Victor Zamora Bugueno, a carrier pidgeon handler and a poet.

Nelly Bugueno has been camping out with the other families above the caved-in mine in this spartan area void of hotels, gas stations or any other amenities. They named it Camp Esperanza (Hope).

Tuesday, that hope was apparent as the families sang songs and could not contain the joy of long-awaited reunions.

Children played soccer in front of a red school house erected at the camp and 33 flags — 32 Chilean and a single Bolivian — representing the nationalities of the men buried underneath.

“God is in all places, At the same time your family loves you,” read a sign for Mario Nicolus Gomez Heredia, the oldest of the miners.

Gomez began mining at the tender age of 12. He became a spiritual leader for the trapped men and requested a crucifix and statuettes of saints so the men could construct a shrine.

But amid hope also lurked fear. What if something went wrong?

Claudio Lobos, brother of Franklin Lobos, 53, who once played soccer in a Chilean league, craved reassurance.

The cage looked small. Will his brother fit in there? Was it safe? he asked.

He was told the Chilean government has used every resource to save his brother. What more could a journalist say?

The first to come out will be five fit miners who possess the most technical know-how so that they can advise the rescue teams.

The next five will be the physically weakest, a term perhaps not appriopriate for anyone who has survived more than two months in the bowels of the earth. But one of the miners has diabetes; another has black lung.

The last to come out will be Luis Alberto Urzua Iribarren, 54. Like the captain of a sinking ship, the shift supervisor volunteered to stay behind until all his men were safe.

Once the men have been extracted, they will undergo about two hours of health checks at a field hospital set up at the mine. They will then be flown by helicopter to a hospital in the town of Copiapo — approximately a 15-minute flight.

Miners who are healthy enough will be allowed to visit briefly with family members in a reunion area before being taken to the hospital. Some have exhibited anxiety, according to Chilean Health Minister Jaime Manalich, and may experience psychological problems.

For the 33 men, the only contact with the outside world was through a small bore hole that sent them food, water and other supplies.

High above them, on a sweltering desert day, the buzz of electrical generators brought in by hordes of media began to drown out other sounds. About 1,500 journalists from 39 nations gathered hoping to tell a story survival.

But on this day, the entire world was watching with hope in their hearts for a very happy ending.

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): GUARDIAN.CO, DAILYMAIL,

GARDEN GROVE, Calif. - Thieves in Orange County stole $100,000 in toys and food donated to the poor, leaving an agency scrambling to recover just 24 days before Christmas.

Sgt. James Colgrove said crooks broke into an underground storage facility in Garden Grove over the weekend. They took an estimated 20,000 pounds of food and about $25,000 worth of toys that were donated to the United Labor Agency of Orange County.

Colgrove says the goods were being collected for homeless families and those whose breadwinners recently lost jobs.

“There are going to be a lot of homeless and underprivileged children and families who are going to go without,” Colgrove told The Orange County Register.

Colgrove told the California newspaper that detectives believe the heist happened between Friday and Monday morning. Employees were being interviewed to determine how someone could haul away the huge load without being noticed, the newspaper reported.

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): THECHRISTMASGUIDE,

I was watching the news tonight and they made mention that local Costco stores were rationing rice? I Googled the topic and found that this is happening everywhere. Here is an interesting story:

Food Rationing Confronts Breadbasket of the World.

By JOSH GERSTEIN Staff Reporter of the Sun April 21, 2008

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Many parts of America, long considered the breadbasket of the world, are now confronting a once unthinkable phenomenon: food rationing. Major retailers in New York, in areas of New England, and on the West Coast are limiting purchases of flour, rice, and cooking oil as demand outstrips supply. There are also anecdotal reports that some consumers are hoarding grain stocks. At a Costco Warehouse in Mountain View, Calif., yesterday, shoppers grew frustrated and occasionally uttered expletives as they searched in vain for the large sacks of rice they usually buy. “Where’s the rice?” an engineer from Palo Alto, Calif., Yajun Liu, said. “You should be able to buy something like rice. This is ridiculous.” The bustling store in the heart of Silicon Valley usually sells four or five varieties of rice to a clientele largely of Asian immigrants, but only about half a pallet of Indian-grown Basmati rice was left in stock. A 20-pound bag was selling for $15.99. “You can’t eat this every day. It’s too heavy,” a health care executive from Palo Alto, Sharad Patel, grumbled as his son loaded two sacks of the Basmati into a shopping cart. “We only need one bag but I’m getting two in case a neighbor or a friend needs it,” the elder man said. The Patels seemed headed for disappointment, as most Costco members were being allowed to buy only one bag. Moments earlier, a clerk dropped two sacks back on the stack after taking them from another customer who tried to exceed the one-bag cap. “Due to the limited availability of rice, we are limiting rice purchases based on your prior purchasing history,” a sign above the dwindling supply said. Shoppers said the limits had been in place for a few days, and that rice supplies had been spotty for a few weeks. A store manager referred questions to officials at Costco headquarters near Seattle, who did not return calls or e-mail messages yesterday. An employee at the Costco store in Queens said there were no restrictions on rice buying, but limits were being imposed on purchases of oil and flour. Internet postings attributed some of the shortage at the retail level to bakery owners who flocked to warehouse stores when the price of flour from commercial suppliers doubled. The curbs and shortages are being tracked with concern by survivalists who view the phenomenon as a harbinger of more serious trouble to come. “It’s sporadic. It’s not every store, but it’s becoming more commonplace,” the editor of SurvivalBlog.com, James Rawles, said. “The number of reports I’ve been getting from readers who have seen signs posted with limits has increased almost exponentially, I’d say in the last three to five weeks.”