All over the world, people are worrying about ‘Swine Flu’ or Influenza type A. It’s a virus that is closing schools, resteraunts, cinemas and cancelling sports games all over Mexico.

Well, it all started when a pig caught bird flu and pig flu at the same time combining into a whole new flu!! This is all possible because birds and pigs have similar sells. Years later a pig caught the same flu and caught human flu at the same time creating Swine Flu.

It spreads by people coffing and sneezing. The terrible disease has put hundreds in hospital, because humans haven’t built an immunity to it yet.

The health authority say that it may turn into a pandemic. A pandemic is when the whole world is effected by a virus or disease. A pandemic comes on an average of about forty years. But it is better to deal with a pandemic now rather than any point in history.

Scientists are working really hard to come up with a vaccine for the virus, but in the mean time people should wash their hands regularly and try not to spread many germs.

By Monique

Are the oceans becoming acidic? Well its bad news for the oceans and all the creatures that live there. As the world is becoming more polluted and global warming is becoming a big issue. Carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere doing damage. When waves crash in the ocean, the carbon dioxide in the air is getting caught in the water. When that happens, more and more carbonic acid is ending up in the ocean.

The Great Barrier Reef, the biggest living structure made from living organisms on earth, is suffering from this problem. Discoloured coral is only one of the problems coming from this issue.

Another problem is that the Polyps on coral that produce limestone are dying. And when limestone comes into contact with acid, it with crumble up and break apart. Also Plankton is shrinking, which could affect the whole food chain!! Because Plankton is eaten by Krill which is eaten by big fish and whales. As ä result of that there wont be as many sea creatures.

I think that people should be more conscious of the environment, if they still want things like The Great Barrier Reef to be here in many years to come.

By Monique

On March the 13th 2009, cyclone Hamish created huge waves. A ship called the Pacific Adventurer was traveling from New Castel to Brisbane, carrying 31 big containers of chemicals was caught in those huge waves. The waves sent the 31 containers of chemicals over board, one made a hole in the fuel tank as it was falling into the water. 200, 000 Lt of oil leaked into the water.

Over 60 km of coast line on Moreton island was covered in oil. It was expected to take over a week to clean up, and will cost over 700, 000 dollars. It is feared that the missing 31 containers filled with dangerous chemicals will leak into the ocean, suffocating fish.

Because oil is lighter than water, it will float on top of water and therefor it can cover huge distances. The government fined the Pacific Adventure’s insurance company 1.5 million dollars, and the ships captain .5 million dollars.

By Monique R

After the tragic bush fires of Black Saturday, not only humans lost their lives, their homes and many have been burnt. Many native animals have been killed. One million have been expected dead. But for the lucky ones who managed to survive the terrible fires, they have lost their homes and left with nothing to eat.

Healesville Animal Sanctuary, being in the fire affected area had to relocate. Now that they have found somewhere to relocate to, they are back busier than ever saving lives of those who can’t take care of themselves.

At Healesville Animal Sanctuary, the vets have been treating burns from a lot of native animals, all in desperate need of more bush to live in. Melbourne Zoo is one of the many places in Victoria taking animals from Healesville Animal Sanctuary. This is making more room for other injured or homeless fire affected animals. I think Healsville Animal Sanctuary is doing a great job on saving as many animal lives as possible after the tragic bush fires.

By Monique

The Archibald Art Prize is an annual art competition, which is held in Australia and has so far for 88 years. There are a few rules to the Archibald Art Prize; your painting has to be a portrait, and it has to be of a well known person. A painting of the Bananas In Pyjamas wasn’t allowed to enter because they are not real people!!

Every year hundreds of people enter the Archibald art prize. Some of the paintings don’t look exactly like the real person. That’s because the artists try to capture the character of the person, not their outside appearance.

This year the winner of the $50, 000 prize money is Guy Maestri, who did a painting of Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu.

 If your painting is a bit too silly for the Archibald Art Prize, there is a competition called the ‘Bald Archies’. The Bald Archies is for paintings that aren’t serious enough for the Archibald Art Prize.

By Monique R