Media Advisory 4: 2008 Joint Assembly

27–30 May
Greater Fort Lauderdale - Broward County Convention Center
Fort Lauderdale, Florida

Additional press conference and workshop

Two events have been added to the 2008 Joint Assembly press schedule.

Reporters are invited to attend these events in the Press Conference Room (Room 301, Level 3, Conference Center) or to call in and view the speakers' slides on the Web. For details about how to call in and to see slides remotely, please refer to our earlier press release, available online at http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/prrl/2008-18.html#two

The added events are:

Press Conference THU11

Early arrivals to the Americas?
Thursday, 29 May
1100h EDT

New data from archeological sites in Mexico supports previous, contentious evidence of human occupation of the Americas 40,000 years ago—much earlier that previously thought. The data come from both previously studied and new sites. Using such techniques as 3D laser scanning, exploration-geophysics methods, and stable isotope analysis of human bones, scientists are investigating what may be preserved human footprints and other tell-tale features of sites in Puebla and the Baja California Peninsula.

Participants

Silvia Gonzalez: Professor, School of Biological and Earth Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK
Jaime Urrutia Fucugauchi: Professor, Geophysics Institute, National University of Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico
Nicholas Beer: School of Biological and Earth Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK

Session U54B

Press Workshop THU13

Saving Venice from the Sea
Thursday, 29 May
1300h EDT

Currently, Venice, Italy gets flooded about 100 times per year, compared to some seven times annually a century ago. The frequent inundations occur because the city is sinking, while sea level is rising. A massive, controversial, approximately $7 billion project is under way to protect Venice from the sea. Engineers have designed a series of three giant barriers composed of some 80 gates to block water flowing from the Adriatic. The chairman of the international panel that oversees the project, known as MOSE, will describe the state of the project—now 40 percent complete—and the challenges that it still faces.

Participants

Rafael Bras: Professor, Civil & Environmental Engineering, Earth, Atmospheric, & Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

Session U33C

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