Terrifying 'doublet' earthquakes add to California's seismic dangers. Venezuela shows the risks

The first earthquake, measuring magnitude 7.2, struck Venezuela on Wednesday evening with horrific force. But just 39 seconds after it started, an even more powerful magnitude 7.5 temblor struck, making a catastrophic disaster even worse.

A seismic one-two punch, which seismologists call a "doublet," has added to the unease over what is shaping up to be one of the Western Hemisphere's worst quakes in years.

While less known to the general public, doublet earthquakes have long been studied by seismologists. Several have occurred in California, including major twin 1992 quakes in Southern California that prompted officials to issue an unprecedented public warning.

"It's obviously not the most common thing that happens with earthquakes, but it's definitely not like an unusual physical phenomenon," said Julian Lozos, an associate professor of geophysics at Cal State Northridge.

—Los Angeles Times

Ex‑Trump adviser John Bolton pleads guilty in classified case

Former U.S. national security adviser John Bolton, a Baltimore native, pleaded guilty in federal court at Greenbelt on Friday to retaining national defense information.

The plea resolves a case accusing Bolton, 77, of mishandling classified material while serving in the White House. He admitted to one count of unlawfully retaining national defense information as part of a plea agreement that dismisses the remaining 17 counts in the indictment, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland.

The son of a Baltimore firefighter, Bolton grew up in a row house in a working-class neighborhood behind Mount St. Joseph High School. He attended McDonogh School in Owings Mills in the mid-1960s before attending Yale College and Yale Law School. He later served in several Republican presidential administrations and became one of the nation’s most prominent foreign policy figures.

Bolton served as President Donald Trump’s national security adviser from April 2018 until September 2019. Prosecutors said he incorporated highly sensitive classified information he learned during his government duties into personal “diary” entries documenting his daily activities.

—The Baltimore Sun

Lake Superior has a new resident: The bloody red shrimp

DULUTH, Minn. — Donn Branstrator and his team pulled up the traps just offshore of the Duluth-Superior Harbor. There, in the nets, were dozens of tiny wriggling red-spotted shrimp, both male and female, some pregnant, some juvenile.

It was the first evidence that Hemimysis anomala, commonly known as bloody red shrimp, which is native to the Caspian Sea, had established a self-sustaining population in Lake Superior, according to a study published recently in ScienceDirect.

The invasive shrimp, which were found last summer, had survived at least one winter in the frigid Superior waters, and are likely here to stay, said Branstrator, a biologist for the University of Minnesota Duluth.

“So they’re here now,” he said. “But the jury is still out on how abundant they’re going to become and how widespread throughout Lake Superior they’re going to be.” The fear with any invasive species is that it will disrupt and change the food web and ecology in a lake.

—The Minnesota Star Tribune

Ukraine’s Crimea attacks expose limits of Putin’s protection

Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine is rebounding on Russia in Crimea, amid escalating attacks on the Black Sea peninsula that he annexed in 2014.

Ukrainian drone and missile strikes are disrupting Russian logistics and supply routes to Crimea, plunging the region into crisis as officials resort to emergency measures. Electricity blackouts leave thousands of residents without running water while many Russians complain they’re unable even to flee because of a ban on fuel sales at filling stations.

Even the port city of Sevastopol, home to Russia’s Black Sea Fleet before the war, is not immune from the difficulties following attacks on its power grid this week, which also disabled water pumping stations. The local utility company deployed mobile tankers to supply residents.

The deteriorating situation for Russians in Crimea underscores the recent improvement in Ukraine’s position in the war that Putin started. His approval rating among Russians soared after Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 then stoked violence in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the conflict that led to the 2022 full-scale invasion.

—Bloomberg News