NANAIMO REGION
NATION & WORLD
Race by the lake
Tourism dollars rose in a productive February
Kenyan gunman was a son of state official
More than 900 runners took part in the annual ‘Fletcher’s Challenge’ enge’
Nanaimo’s accommodation industry, airport and BC Ferries all saw a rise in tourist dollars. A3
One of the gunmen that killed 148 people was the son of a Kenyan government official. A7
Page A3, A5
The newspaper of record for Nanaimo and region since 1874 || Monday, April 6, 2015
Unique skill
Vancouver Island University student Will Hills is set to return to 100,000-year-old Belgium dig site, where he will put his unusual skill set to important use
CITY
Fuelling station talks in progress SPENCER ANDERSON DAILY NEWS
Vancouver Island University student Will Hills.
[JULIE CHADWISK/DAILY NEWS]
Refitting a vital process for historical researchers
I
t’s an unusual skill that most people, even in the field of archaeology, wouldn’t even know they possessed. However Vancouver Island University student Will Hills has had the opportunity through the Education Abroad initiative to cultivate an interest in refitting analysis, an archaeological technique that allows researchers to explore how ancient humans constructed tools from flint and other materials. Next month Hills will make his second trip to Scladina cave. It’s a Middle Paleolithic archeological site in Belgium made famous by the significant discovery of a 100,000-year-old jawbone from a 10-year-old child which yielded previously unknown information about Neanderthal mt-DNA. Hills previously worked at the site on a two-month internship
run through the university and me all fit together,” Hills said. organized by former instructor “(Refitting) is an analytical Cheryl Roy as a partnership with research method used in archaethe University of Liege. ology to piece together artifacts Once he arrived, Hills was that once were connected. So given a one-metre by 50you can do it with flint, centimetre plot to excavor quartz, or pieces of ate with a trowel, and pottery or bones. In told to slowly remove this case it was a block the layers of sediment to of flint that had been reveal a variety of Lithic broken apart by a Neanmaterial, including aniderthal in the process of mal bones and horse and making a stone tool.” cave bear teeth. The purpose of refitHowever it was when ting is to give researchHills noticed a variety of Julie ers information on refittings that had been how the material was Chadwick completed by on-site knapped and broken The Write archaeologist and Lithics Profile apart, as well as on how expert Kévin Di Modica the site was formed, he at the on-site museum added. It turned out that his interest was Hills had also had an piqued. unusual knack for fitting “Basically I mentioned it to him the pieces together. and he was like, ‘Do you want to “He definitely showed skill and try it?’ and he gave me this bag of he showed patience. There’s a lot 36 pieces of flint that he assured of things you can do in archaeol-
» Use your smartphone to jump to our website for updates on these stories or the latest breaking news.
See DIG,Page A5
Former spy brings new info to decade-old case
Intermediate T-Men bring in new coach
John Kiriakou gives a rare peek into the CIA’s arrest and torture of Canadian Maher Arar, saying multiple colleagues warned against doing so in debates. » Nation & World, A6
Along with his two sons, former Senior B Timbermen veteran Pat O’Dwyer is hoping to improve Nanaimo’s Intermediate A team after a 4-14 season a year ago. » Sports, B1
Local news .................... A3-5 Markets ................................A2 Nation & World ................. A6
Mostly cloudy High 11, Low 4 Details A2
ogy and paleoanthropology that require some degree of patience but this — think about doing a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle where you don’t have a picture to work from and all the pieces look essentially the same,” said VIU anthropology professor David Hopwood, who will supervise the student trip to Scladina this year. “So that’s basically what Will was doing, and he apparently had an aptitude for it, which is one of the reasons why he’s being invited back.” Once he had worked with flint and became familiar with the process, Hills was given the more difficult task of refitting their collection of quartz pieces, which are much more fragile. Most of the researchers were on vacation, so Hills got to work on his own and managed to complete 14 refittings.
Editorials and letters ..... A4 Sports ................................... B1 Scoreboard ........................ B4
Classified ............................ B6 Obituaries ........................... B6 Comics ................................. B7
Natural gas giant Fortis BC is in talks with the City of Nanaimo to potentially locate a compressed natural gas fuelling station on city property, the company confirmed this week. Fortis spokeswoman Grace Pickell said the company is also in talks with “a variety of other businesses” about options it could take to expand CNG fueling options on Vancouver Island. Nanaimo Mayor Bill McKay says the discussions could be a good opportunity for the city to expand its CNG fleet of vehicles. It could also offer a revenue source for the city if a Fortis facility was operated on city property, although McKay acknowledged there is another company in town which is seeking to build a CNG and diesel fueling station, “which I would encourage.” “It’s interesting that we’ve got all this interest in CNG now,” McKay said. McKay cited the public works yard as a potential location. “However, if there’s a commercial operator out there that wants to put his own fueling station in, then that also becomes a place where we could fuel up potential fleet-wide truck use as well,” he said. In an email, Fortis said the company “has been working with fleet managers across B.C. to switch their vehicles to natural gas” since 2009. “We’ve provided incentives to fuel about 400 vehicles with compressed and liquefied natural gas. In fact, Nanaimo is home to 25 BC Transit buses fueled with compressed natural gas.” Because natural gas is a cleaner-burning fuel, the cars and trucks in the province that use the fuel have the potential to eliminate up to 38,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions for year, “FortisBC is always looking for opportunities to expand our fueling operations on Vancouver Island,” said Vito Triggiano, director of sales for the company. Pickell said discussions are still at a preliminary stage and said it was too early to discuss details. SAnderson@nanaimodailynews.com 250-729-4255
Crossword .......................... B5 Sudoku ................................. A2 Horoscope .......................... B7
C
HO M
E
O
W
L
E OM
T
E
Nanaimo Daily News, nanaimodailynews.com and Harbour City Star reach more than 60,000 readers each week in print and online. General inquires: 250-729-4200 | Newsroom: 250-729-4224 | To subscribe: 250-729-4266 | Copyright 2015. All rights reserved
$1.25 TAX INCLUDED