Gained in Translation

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I was just reading a report (PDF) about the damages caused by Hurricane Catarina, a very anomalous event, to Brazil in 2004. The report is written in English but reading through, I rather doubt that's the first language of its authors. I was amused to come across this paragraph in particular:

The impact was intense over the fauna. Coastal birds were blown towards the valleys and the mountain range situated 40 km from the coast. Many birds died and sickened due to virus infection and inadequate feeding. It was also noticed an increase on the number and aggressiveness of mosquitoes, and farm animals behaved inappropriately 1 hour before the hurricane.

Hurricane or no hurricane, I hate it when farm animals behave inappropriately. It's bad enough when people do it, but when a pig starts...well, I won't say.

P.S.: Sorry, I couldn't resist...

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There has not been much hurricane activity in the Atlantic for a while now, so unsurprisingly the reporting is starting to slip again. This post goes out to all you reporters at CNN and Reuters and Yahoo and everywhere else.
Odile was the strongest hurricane to strike the Baja Peninsula during the period of available data, roughly similar to Hurrican Olivia (1967). The storm reached Category 4 strength but was then weakened because of interaction with the effects of a prior hurricane in the area (Norbert).
Last Saturday night, party animals that we are, some friends and I went on

That was shameless.

I know. But I couldn't leave such a gem buried in an obscure report.