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Saturday, December 26, 2009

The new Antonov An-148 jet made its first commercial flight from Saint Petersburg, Russia to Moscow on Thursday.

Starting with one of the busiest regional routes in Russia new Antonovs are to connect the other major destinations throughout Europe.

The new aircraft was designed in the Ukraine by the famous Antonov design bureau and is manufactured in Voronezh, Russia. The twinjet features a high-wing design, glass cockpit and 68 passengers cabin with a 3.5 thousand km range at the average 800 km/h cruising speed.

The first serial airplane has recently joined the fleet of Rossiya (the “Russia”) airline under lease contract with Ilyushin Finance Company.

Friday, February 5, 2021

On Tuesday, Captain Sir Tom Moore died after suffering from COVID-19 and pneumonia, in a hospital in Bedford, England. Moore had raised nearly £ 33 million for the National Health Service (NHS) last year by walking 100 laps around his garden by his 100th birthday. He was also a World War II veteran who fought in the Burma campaign.

His daughters announced his death saying “the last year of our father’s life was nothing short of remarkable”, adding he was “an incredible father and grandfather, and he will stay in our hearts forever”.

Moore was born in Keighley, in West Yorkshire, England. He joined the British Army in 1939. After leaving the army, he was an instructor in the Armoured Fighting Vehicle School in Bovington, Dorset. He moved to Bedfordshire in 2007 where his family lived.

In April 2020, he began to walk laps around his garden in an attempt to raise £1000 for the NHS during the COVID-19 pandemic. His campaign became highly popular, resulting in raising millions of pounds, and broke the Guiness world record for the most raised by an individual doing a charity walk. He also released a duet with singer Michael Ball, which reached number one on the UK charts, making Moore the oldest person to make this achievement. On his birthday, April 30, the British Army made him an honorary colonel; and in July, Elizabeth II knighted him for these achievements.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid his respects, saying Moore was “a hero in the truest sense of the word”, adding “he embodied the triumph of the human spirit”. Labour Party leader Keir Starmer said “Britain has lost a hero”. A spokesman for Buckingham Palace said the Queen would send a private message of condolence to the family of Moore. Flags at buildings such as 10 Downing Street flew at half mast to pay respect.

Moore had previously suffered from skin cancer on his head, and broke his hip in 2018. He said his hospital treatment inspired him to fundraise for the NHS, describing the staff who treated him as “marvellous”. He is survived by two daughters and four grandchildren.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

A powerful 6.4 magnitude earthquake hit southern Taiwan on Thursday. According to USGS the epicenter was 23.1 km (14.4 miles) deep. The quake struck at 8:18 a.m. (0018 UTC) in a mountainous region on the southeast coast and 40 miles east of cities of Tainan and Kaohsiung on the southwest coast. The earthquake was felt in capital Taipei which is 155 miles north of the epicenter.

Several fires were started and Taipei’s high-speed railway lines were stopped and are undergoing safety checks. CTI news agency reported one person was injured by falling debris in Kaohsiung, and one woman was hospitalized in the southern city of Chiayi. One person was hurt by a falling tree according to Central News Agency.

A spokesman for Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou assured that the concerned authorities had been instructed to follow the situation closely and take steps so as to alleviate the damage caused and survey the dislocation. The Ministry of Defense has dispatched troops to report on the damage. The Taiwan Ministry of Interior and the National Fire Agency said electricity was cut off near the epicenter but further information was not possible.

The quake was followed by many aftershocks, the largest of 4.8 on the Richter scale. Kuo Kai-wen who is the director of the Central Weather Bureau’s Seismology Center denied presence of any geological relations between the Chile earthquake and this earthquake in Taiwan.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

According to Iraqi police, at least 95 people have been killed and half a thousand wounded after six explosions in Iraq’s capital of Baghdad on Wednesday.

Eyewitness reports say that two main attacks targeted the finance and foreign ministries. Police sources say that the blasts, which were caused by vehicles filled with explosives, all took place within several minutes.

Major General Qassim Atta, spokesman for the national armed forces’ operation in the capital, said that “a truck bomb went off near the Salhiyeh intersection and it caused casualties and a number of civilian cars were destroyed. We accuse the Baathist alliance of executing these terrorist operations.”

As a result of the attacks, Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki called for a security review. “The criminal operations that happened today no doubt call for a re-evaluation of our plans and our security methods to face the terrorist challenges,” he said.

The attacks are the deadliest in Baghdad since June 24, when 62 people died after a bomb on a motorcycle detonated.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

It can be difficult to be John Reed.

Christopher Hitchens called him a “Bin Ladenist” and Cathy Young editorialized in The Boston Globe that he “blames the victims of terrorism” when he puts out a novel like Snowball’s Chance, a biting send-up of George Orwell‘s Animal Farm which he was inspired to write after the terrorist attacks on September 11. “The clear references to 9/11 in the apocalyptic ending can only bring Orwell’s name into disrepute in the U.S.,” wrote William Hamilton, the British literary executor of the Orwell estate. That process had already begun: it was revealed Orwell gave the British Foreign Office a list of people he suspected of being “crypto-Communists and fellow travelers,” labeling some of them as Jews and homosexuals. “I really wanted to explode that book,” Reed told The New York Times. “I wanted to completely undermine it.”

Is this man who wants to blow up the classic literary canon taught to children in schools a menace, or a messiah? David Shankbone went to interview him for Wikinews and found that, as often is the case, the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

Reed is electrified by the changes that surround him that channel through a lens of inspiration wrought by his children. “The kids have made me a better writer,” Reed said. In his new untitled work, which he calls a “new play by William Shakespeare,” he takes lines from The Bard‘s classics to form an original tragedy. He began it in 2003, but only with the birth of his children could he finish it. “I didn’t understand the characters who had children. I didn’t really understand them. And once I had had kids, I could approach them differently.”

Taking the old to make it new is a theme in his work and in his world view. Reed foresees new narrative forms being born, Biblical epics that will be played out across print and electronic mediums. He is pulled forward by revolutions of the past, a search for a spiritual sensibility, and a desire to locate himself in the process.

Below is David Shankbone’s conversation with novelist John Reed.

Tuesday, April 19, 2005

Denunciations of corruption, bribe, collection of bribes from refugees [1] and of sexual scandal involving the peacekeepers [2], [3] threaten the Organization of the United Nations (UN).

The gravest denunciations involve the aid project to Iraq, called Oil-for-Food. Grave denunciations of bribe exist, superfluous accounting and collaboration with the ex-dictator Saddam Hussein, against staff of the UN, companies and politicians of several countries. Even the secretary of the UN, Kofi Annan was suspicious of participation in the plan of corruption. And also grave doubts still hover about his son, Kojo Annan.

The gravity of the denunciations threatens not only the credibility of the UN, but its existence.

Secretary Kofi Annan said that he is going to promote reforms in the organization. [4]

Wednesday, July 13, 2005

Bernard Ebbers, founder and former CEO of telecommunications giant WorldCom, now MCI, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for his role in the corporate accounting fraud totaling US$11 billion. The once-powerful company plunged into bankruptcy in July 2002.

The sentence was handed down by Manhattan federal court Judge Barbara S. Jones. Mr. Ebbers, who is 63, asked for a lenient sentence due to his failing health and a heart condition, and because of his philanthropy.

Prosecutors pushed for a life sentence, and said the sentencing “should prove to be a deterrent” to corporate wrongdoing. “The enormity of the crimes that Ebbers committed cannot be overstated: the fraud at WorldCom was the largest securities fraud in history,” prosecutors wrote in papers filed last month.

Jones rejected defense lawyers’ contentions that the government overstated the losses, and that Ebbers was not a mastermind of the wrongdoing. Jones believed Ebbers deserved a harsh sentence, and said “Mr. Ebbers was the instigator of the fraud.”.

Ebbers appeared to be tense when arriving at the court and even shoved a photographer out of his way. After the sentence was given, Ebbers was seen weeping. His first day of prison will be October 12.

In March, Ebbers was found guilty of fraud, conspiracy, and seven counts of filing false documents with regulators.

WorldCom emerged from bankruptcy last year under the name MCI, which was one of the many companies WorldCom had acquired. In May, Verizon agreed to acquire the company.

Wednesday, December 28, 2005Black American women living in communities with high poverty rates are significantly less likely to be screened for cervical cancer, a study finds.

The Harvard School of Public Health’s Geetanjali Dabral Datta investigated the relationship between individual characteristics and larger socioeconomic factors and cervical cancer screening rates. The Febreuary 1 issue of Cancer carries the study. More than 40,000 black women from across the United States participated in the Black Women’s Health Study.

“African-American women have twice the mortality rate from cervical cancer as white women,” said Elizabeth Ward, the director of the American Cancer Society. “Researchers need to investigate how those differences are related to socioeconomic status. One of the big factors that may account for this finding is access to high-quality medical care. Often communities that have high poverty rates either lack access to good quality care, or people have to travel longer distances to obtain high-quality care.”

David L. Katz at Yale University’s School of Medicine said; “While this finding is not surprising, it is noteworthy just the same. No one should die of cervical cancer, because a simple screening test reliably finds the condition in its earliest stages when cure is almost universally achievable. Yet, several thousand deaths from this cancer occur each year in the U.S.”