Word: sturgeon
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...have caused the level of the Aral Sea to drop 40 ft. It is possible that this body of water, the world's sixth largest sea, will not exist in 20 years. Siberia, once pristine, is laced with wastes from steel, chemical and coal industries. Worrisome numbers of dead sturgeon are floating atop the polluted Volga River, threatening the Soviets' prestigious caviar supply. Resorts along the Black Sea have banned swimming after the government's warning that the waters are contaminated with dysentery and typhoid germs...
...that the earth struck back. Amid an unnerving global heat wave, scientists took the planet's temperature and debated whether the greenhouse effect had already begun. At the beach, syringes replaced seashells. The wholesale destruction of forests in northern India and Nepal helped spawn a tragic flood in Bangladesh. Sturgeon were infected by toxic wastes in the Soviet Union, threatening the caviar supply. And, belatedly, the environment returned as a compelling political issue...
...coastal waters strongly affects vacationers, homeowners and resort operators, its first (and often most vocal) victims are fishermen. Commercial fishing in the U.S. is a $3.1 billion industry, and it is increasingly threatened. Fisherman Richard Hambley of Swansboro, N.C., recalls that only a few years ago, tons of sturgeon and mullet were pulled out of the White Oak River. "Now that is nonexistent," he says. "There are no trout schools anymore. Crabs used to be like fleas. I'm lucky to get a few bushels." Ken Seigler, who works Swansboro's Queens Creek, has seen his income from clams...
...longest jury trial in U.S. history -- a 44-month marathon -- finally ended last week in Belleville, Ill. The long-suffering twelve-member circuit court jury found Monsanto Co. guilty of failing to warn the town of Sturgeon, Mo., about the risk of a 1979 spill containing the toxic chemical dioxin. The jury ordered the chemical company to pay $16.2 million in damages, then left the courthouse to celebrate with Judge Richard Goldenhersh over margaritas and daiquiris at a nearby Mexican restaurant. Monsanto, meanwhile, announced that it will appeal...
...official visit last week to the Soviet Union that she breathlessly declared her most "fascinating and invigorating" ever. At a performance of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake in Moscow's Bolshoi Theater, Thatcher and Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev delayed the second act for 20 minutes while they conferred over smoked sturgeon about arms control. The next day Foreign Minister Sir Geoffrey Howe was forced to improvise at a British embassy luncheon when the Prime Minister arrived two hours late. Reason: her morning meeting with Gorbachev had gone into overtime...