LONDON (Reuters) - Scotland dodged a heavy blow to its economy on Friday with a deal to rescue its biggest industrial site and safeguard up to 1,400 jobs.
Operator Ineos said it would continue to operate the Grangemouth petrochemical plant and refinery after the Unite union agreed to a three-year pay freeze and a cut in pension benefits and pledged not to strike for three years. Britain and Scotland also pledged to provide financial support.
"Redundancies will be very limited. There's a future for this site, and it's long-term sustainable," Calum MacLean, chairman of Grangemouth UK, said at a news conference.
Ineos had previously said losses would force it to shut the petrochemical plant and could also threaten the future of the 210,000 barrel-per-day refinery, Scotland's only refinery which provides around 70 percent of its fuel.
A Grangemouth closure would have damaged the governing Scottish National Party as it campaigns for independence from Britain ahead of a referendum in September next year. Many Scots have told pollsters that their biggest concern will be the likely impact a separation would have on the economy.
Switzerland-based Ineos said shareholders would invest 300 million pounds ($485 million) in the site to cover losses.
Around half of this will go to fund a new terminal for importing gas from the United States, which is due to be built by 2017.
The rest would cover Grangemouth's ongoing losses, said Tom Crotty, a director at Ineos Group. Ineos has said the complex was losing 10 million pounds per month.
"We've given the chemicals business another 15 to 20 years on the back of new raw materials, new contracts and significant investment," MacLean said.
Crotty said the company was restarting both plants from Friday and they could be fully operational within two weeks.
Ineos is the full owner of the petrochemical plant and a joint owner of the refinery along with PetroChina, which holds 49.9 percent.
Union members, among other concessions, agreed to give up a final-salary pension plan for a defined-contribution plan.
"Obviously today's news is tinged with sadness. Decent men and women are being asked to make sacrifices to hold onto their jobs, but the clear wish of our members is that we work with the company," Pat Rafferty, Unite's Scottish secretary, said in a statement.
SAVING JOBS
The Scottish government has agreed to provide a 9 million pound grant to support Grangemouth, and the British government has given initial approval for a 125 million pound loan guarantee, Ineos said. The loan would contribute to the shareholders' 300 million pound investment.
"A really important petrochemical plant will stay open, savings thousands of jobs, not just at that plant but in the supply chain," British Prime Minister David Cameron told the BBC.
A closure of the refinery, which provides power for a major oil pipeline, might also have reduced supplies of the major North Sea crude that underpins the Brent oil benchmark, used as a basis for setting oil prices around the world.
Europe's oil refining industry is under extreme pressure from lower-cost competitors in the United States, the Middle East and Asia, while regional demand has declined.
Such market pressures led to the closure of British refiner Coryton near London in 2012 after its parent company, Swiss-based Petroplus, filed for bankruptcy.
Unite had been in a dispute with Ineos for weeks over the dismissal of a union representative. The company halted operations at the two plants earlier this month and demanded changes in terms and conditions to restart them.
"Grangemouth is the powerhouse of the Scottish economy. It now has a fighting chance of upholding this crucial role into the future," Unite's Rafferty said.
Employment lawyer David Fenton at Keystone law said the closure was an extreme tactic to force the union to back down and could set a worrying precedent.
"This should not be used as a tactic for future disputes - i.e. accept our terms or we will close down. It is after all a tactic that can only be used once if your bluff is called." ($1 = 0.6186 British pounds)
(Additional reporting by Dmitry Zhdannikov; editing by Jane Baird)
The Nintendo 3DS is an excellent handheld gaming system, but the 3D feature isn't integral. The third dimension can look very convincing, but you need to keep your head and the 3DS very still when using it, and many gamers turn off the 3D after playing for a while. The 3DS XL has the same problem, and at $200, it costs the same as a Sony PlayStation Vita now. You probably wouldn't want to give any of these devices to a small kid for fear of damage from abuse, and the 3D screens come with a warning for children ages six and under. Nintendo tackles these issues with the 2DS, a less expensive handheld ($129.99 list) with a flat (rather than clamshell) design, no 3D support, but compatibility with every feature and game available on the 3DS. The 3DS XL or the PS Vita might be more appealing to you, but the 2DS earns our Editors' Choice for being an affordable, accessible, and feature-filled game system you can safely give to your kids.
Design Shaped like a thin wedge of cheese, the 2DS sports a slightly rounded top that's wider than the curved bottom. The face and back panel are mostly black, with a red or blue band around the edge (the red version looks particularly gouda-like). The wider top edge holds the game card slot, the power port, and shoulder buttons. The thin bottom edge houses the headphone jack and a Sleep switch that puts the 2DS in a power-saving standby mode, just like closing the clamshell Nintendo handhelds does. On the triangular right edge, there's a place for the included stylus, an SD card slot, and a lanyard hole. On the left are the volume slider and another lanyard hole.
The face of the 2DS contains the displays and all of the controls of the 3DS XL, placed similarly to where they would be with the clamshell handheld unfolded. The 3.5-inch upper and 3-inch lower screens (both of which are actually parts of the same LCD panel, covered by a plastic bezel) sit in the center of the handheld. The display is flanked by a circular analog pad and digital direction pad on the left, and four face buttons (A, B, X, and Y), Start, and Select buttons, and the Power button with power and charging indicators on the right. A front-facing camera sits above the top screen, matched by a pair of cameras around back that let the 2DS capture 3D video despite not being able to display it. (The 3D video feature is more useful for augmented reality features in certain games, which are fully functional on the 2DS.) A large Home button lives below the bottom screen.
Since it doesn't fold like the 3DS or 3DS XL, the 2DS dwarfs the other two handhelds in their closed positions. The unfolded 3DS XL is larger, and the 2DS is less pocketable. For a device with 3.5-inch and 3-inch screens, it feels downright clunky, when compared with the 3DS and its identical screen sizes, and even the 3DS XL with its big 4.9-inch top screen, and the PS Vita with 5-inch OLED touch screen. It's a tradeoff that comes with the nice price; the 3DS XL and Vita each cost $70 more, and the original 3DS costs $40 more and offers a much sleeker, smaller body. The lack of a hinge makes the 2DS seem sturdier than the 3DS, though, at least in the sense that the most vulnerable spot on the clamshell design is now gone. The handheld feels more plasticky and less solid than the 3DS and 3DS XL.
The controls are fortunately untouched from the 3DS and 3DS XL, and the face buttons and analog pad are as large as they are on the 3DS XL. The shoulder buttons are slightly larger, and are concave to feel much more comfortable under the fingers while you play. Depending on your tastes, the controls might sit too high on the front of the 2DS and too close to the shoulder buttons to feel comfortable. This is mostly an issue for adult users with larger hands. Kids should find the 2DS much easier hold and play with.
Features You can do anything on the 2DS you could do on the 3DS, except see images in 3D. 3DS games will render in 2D, and with the exception of a few minor puzzles in some games that rely on the 3D effect, like Super Mario 3D Land, this won't affect game play. You can still play original DS games either in card form or downloaded to an SD card. A respectable number of downloaded games fit on the included 4GB card, but you can expand to up to a 32GB card to get a massive library of 3DS, DS, and Virtual Console titles onto the system. The StreetPass and all Mii Plaza features and optional games that go with them work here. You can still use the 3D camera (the camera app defaults to 2D, but you can switch to 3D mode to take photos and videos to view on a 3DS), and the front-facing camera, the Web browser, and even Netflix and Hulu Plus are all the same. Basically, the 2DS is a 3DS that doesn't display 3D.
The 2DS is clearly Nintendo's attempt to make a more accessible handheld for kids. It succeeds in putting parents at ease with its lower price and hinge-free design (and 2D screen, if the effects of 3D are a concern). The 3DS and 3DS XL are still far superior handhelds for adult gamers who want to play Nintendo handheld games, but at just $130 the 2DS gives little hands a sturdy, inexpensive game system with loads of games. It easily earns our Editors' Choice for its price, features, and appeal.
[Warning: Spoilers ahead for last Sunday's episode of Homeland, "Game On"]
After watching the last scene of Sunday's Homeland, the fourth outing in its third season, many viewers may want to revisit the last few episodes. "I'm hoping that's the general consensus," executive producer and showrunner Alex Gansa tells The Hollywood Reporter. "This should answer some questions for people."
Carrie (Claire Danes) finally made her way out of her forced institutionalization -- and though circumstances seemed to be pushing her toward turning her back on the CIA, the last scene of the episode reveals that she and Saul (Mandy Patinkin) have actually been working together all along. Carrie and her mentor choreographed her second turn being thrown under the bus by her employers in an attempt to bring down the terrorist network involved in the bombing.
Gansa, who chatted with THR about the big twist, explains that the unseen wheels were set in motion as soon as the second season faded to black, where Homeland is shifting its attention now, and how Brody (Damian Lewis) will fit in down the road.
How long have Saul and Carrie been in cahoots?
We started the year by talking about what had happened at the end of season two. Carrie and Saul are together, standing there with all of the bodies around them. Clearly, they are culpable for what happened -- Saul and Carrie together. As intelligence officers, the first thing that they would try to do is to turn this tragedy into something positive. That's what they went to work on the day after the bombing. How were they going to catch the guys responsible for this? A plan was hatched quite quickly in the aftermath of the attack on the CIA.
Does this mean the CIA fallout will play a lesser role now?
We view season three in three movements -- each being four episodes -- with this being the end of the first movement. It was a long con that they played in order to draw out this Iranian intelligence officer, Majid Javadi [Shaun Toub].
The cast and producers were very candid about a lot of early season-three plot points during in the summer. Was that intended to play up the red herring?
We were also playing a bit of a con here from the story room. That said, one of the thing we've learned from our CIA consultants is that the most successful intelligence operations are 95 percent true -- and the 95 percent that's true, in this case, is that Saul and Carrie were culpable and that, largely, the CIA as an organization would look for a scapegoat to lay the blame on. Saul and Carrie were playing on that natural, institutional inclination to find a scapegoat. They used that, but when you go back to the first three episodes, you can see the toll that it's taking on both of them. The con also has its consequences.
Like that moment between Carrie and Saul in the hospital at the end of the second episode.
It comes down to the line toward the end of this episode when she says, "You really should have gotten me out of the hospital." That was one step too far. That was the part of her role-playing that hit too close. Although they are in this ruse together, it's painful for Carrie to admit that she's to blame for what happened and to think that because she was on her meds, she missed stopping the attack. All of that is true and playing through her head.
What does the next movement focus on?
They are now in the process of luring him out into the open and landing this guy. That's the substance of the second movement.
How will Brody figure in to all of this?
I will say that Brody becomes a principal player in the architecture of the last sweep of episodes. His predicament down in Caracas and his separation from Carrie and Saul is really paramount as we move into the next two movements of the season.
Did you have any reservations about having an episode ("Tower of David") that was almost exclusively from Brody's point of view?
It was really a function of how much story was to be told there. Just anecdotally, some people felt we were with him too much and others felt we were with him too little. It felt right to us to establish his predicament and to parallel his plight with Carrie's. These are two people in some very desperate circumstances. The show has paralleled their stories before and some of the most successful episodes that we have done have drawn comparisons between their predicaments.
Stylistically, the episode was very different from the rest of the series.
I sort of leave it to the audience to tell us if we were successful or not, but it's fun for us to mix up the show a little bit and not tell the same story over and over again -- to take a risk here and there. We also teased the audience by not having Brody in the first two episodes, so we gave them a healthy dose of him in number three.
The Brody family storyline has really been dominated by Dana (Morgan Saylor) this season. When did you decide you'd focus so much on her?
Because Brody was not onscreen and not part of the story in those first couple of episodes, we really wanted to tell the aftermath of the bombing in a more personal way. The relationship between Dana and her father is very strong. It's stronger than his relationship with Jessica [Morena Baccarin] and certainly stronger than his relationship with Chris [Jackson Pace]. Going back to the first season … the first time that Brody came back from captivity, he gives his wife a hug -- but it's kind of a tentative one. The first time we see him open up, it's in response to his daughter. That led to the end of season one, when she talks him off the ledge when he's about to explode that vest inside the bunker with the vice president. Her role grew through season two, and she just felt like the logical person. For the weight of what her dad did, it just landed on her in a more profound way.
How much does the story stick with Dana moving forward?
You'll see in the next four episodes, and certainly the last four, that she doesn't play as big of a role. She's not physically onscreen a lot, but her presence is there in a profound way for Brody and for Carrie.
How was all the secret-keeping for you personally?
We've taken a degree of pleasure in it. I was an amateur magician when I was a kid, and for me, the best tricks were the ones where the magician convinces the audience that he's made a mistake – only to prove at the end that he's been ahead of them all along. We've been leaning into that idea a little bit, and hopefully it will have paid off in episode four.
A woman drives a car in Saudi Arabia on Sunday. Saudi Arabia is the only country where women are barred from driving, but activists have launched a renewed protest and are urging women to drive on Saturday.
Faisal Al Nasser/Reuters/Landov
A woman drives a car in Saudi Arabia on Sunday. Saudi Arabia is the only country where women are barred from driving, but activists have launched a renewed protest and are urging women to drive on Saturday.
Faisal Al Nasser/Reuters/Landov
Activists in Saudi Arabia tried once, they tried again and now they're making a third challenge to the kingdom's long-standing ban on female drivers.
Some women have recently made short drives, posting videos on social media sites, and many more are planning to get behind the wheel on Saturday.
Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that effectively prohibits women from driving, a ban supported by conservative clerics. While there is no law formally banning female drivers, the government does not give them licenses.
Government authorities seem to be more lenient these days, however.
Sara Hussein, 32, says it's time to claim the right to drive.
"Think back in history — Rosa Parks was the only person who sat down on the bus, wasn't she? And then it started to happen gradually," Hussein says. "It does have to start with the few brave people who are willing to risk whatever there is to risk."
Hussein's mother, Aziza al-Yousef, who is in her 50s and teaches computer science at King Saud University, is a key organizer of the drive-in. Activists set Saturday as a date for a national road rally, but also encouraged women to just get behind the wheel any time.
"We are saying, 'Just go ahead and drive now,' " says al-Yousef. "I know women started driving. The messages are in the hundreds. We are counting the videotapes."
YouTube
Activists have been challenging Saudi Arabia's ban on female drivers by taking to the road and posting videos. Here is one of what organizers say are 100 videos posted so far.
The mother and daughter say the videos are coming from across the kingdom and even show one man teaching his wife and sister to drive.
Relying On Male Drivers
Saudi Arabia was made for driving, with wide open spaces and cheap gas. The sprawling capital, Riyadh, is as big as Los Angeles, with no dependable public transportation.
Women must rely on men to drive them around. They may be male relatives or drivers who are part of the country's imported labor. But this is expensive and an intrusion into their lives, many women say.
As the country changes bit by bit, the prohibition on female drivers can contradict other efforts by the government. For example, the government is urging private companies to hire more women. It is hard to see how that can happen unless women can drive to work, Hussein says.
"No one has been given orders from higher up" to arrest female drivers, she adds.
Al-Yousef says this campaign, the third challenge to the driving ban, has learned from past mistakes.
In 1990, 47 women made the first attempt to challenge the ban. They all lost their jobs, were prohibited from traveling for years, and were shunned for their defiance.
The next challenge came in 2011, when activists Maha al-Qatani was the first Saudi woman to get a traffic ticket. The campaign fizzled after some women were jailed for driving. But soon after, King Abdullah said women could vote in local elections, and 30 women were appointed to the 150-member Shura Council, an advisory body to the king.
Going For A Spin
Al-Yousef — who has an international driver's license — says she and other drivers don't want to break laws aside from the one banning driving.
She now takes a short drive every day and invites me to join her for a cruise around the capital. We get in the front, her male driver climbs in the back, and we take to the road.
"I need people to see that it is normal; we have to let people accept it," al-Yousef says. "It doesn't mean anything if you drive only one day."
The afternoon traffic is so heavy that nobody notices two women in the front seat of a car.
Then we approach a police station.
"Let's see what their reaction is," she says. "You watch it; it's going to be on your right."
She says the head of the national police stated publicly that his officers would not arrest women for driving. But they will ticket those without a license, which is impossible for a woman to get here.
Al-Yousef drives like a pro. She learned while attending a university in the U.S. The only time she shows excitement is when another activist calls her.
"I am driving!" she announces with a distinct rise in her voice.
We end our drive at her front door, where her husband is waiting to meet her.
"Hello, I'm a coward. How do you do," her husband, Moisen al-Haydar, says with a laugh.
Al-Haydar says he's given up driving. He's proud of his wife for braving Riyadh's hectic traffic. He supports her driving campaign, but he's worried, too.
Threats Against Activists
There have been online threats and insults against activists. Al-Yousef filed a case this week against the attackers in court. Also this week, conservative clerics urged King Abdullah to stop Saturday's drive-in, but the king did not meet with the complaining clerics.
Al-Yousef sweeps away her husband's concerns and sits down to check the latest driving videos.
"We've had four today and we are now up to 100 videos," she says as she turns up the volume on the latest driving demonstration.
Al-Yousef translates the Arabic in the video: "She says this is a very positive movement; Saudi ladies should have the choice to drive her own car. And she named the tape, 'Yes, we can.' "
The final decision is up to the king, who has said he believes women have the right to drive, but hasn't said when.
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The government staunchly rejected arguments that climate change is causing the wildfires ravaging parts of eastern Australia following a record hot start to the spring season.
"That is complete hogwash," Prime Minister Tony Abbott told News Corp. Australian newspapers in an interview published on Friday.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt backed his prime minister, saying no individual event can be linked to climate change.
But a climate science organization abolished by Abbott's government released a report on Friday declaring a clear link between climate change and the wildfires. The severity and scale of the fires was unprecedented for this time of year, it said. Last month had been the hottest September on record in New South Wales state. The 12 months preceding it had been the hottest year on record across Australia.
The government abolished the state-funded Climate Commission after being elected last month. But the organization survives through public donations as the Climate Council to continue its independent work of communicating reliable information about global warming.
To deny the influence of climate change on extreme fire weather placed people and property an unnecessarily high risk, the report warned. The findings are interim, and the final report will be released next month.
Will Steffen, a Climate Council member and director of the Australian National University's Climate Change Institute, said he was frustrated that the established science on global warming was not yet accepted in Australia.
"We'd like to see a discussion in this country that gets beyond these futile debates about the science that have been settled for decades in the scientific literature and get on with the real debate about what is really the best way of dealing with the problem," Steffen told reporters. "That's where the political debate really needs to be."
Abbott argues that Australia has experienced wildfires for more than 200 years of European settlement and had suffered worse fires in the past.
This week, he accused Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, of "talking through her hat" when she referred to the Australian wildfires as the world "paying the price of carbon" in the atmosphere.
"They are desperate to find anything that they think might pass as ammunition for their cause," Abbott said, referring to people who link the fires to global warming and who criticize his government's climate change policies.
Abbott's conservative government plans to repeal laws that force Australia's worst greenhouse gas polluters to pay a tax for every ton of carbon dioxide that they emit. The tax was introduced last year to reduce Australia's abundant greenhouse gas emissions.
Australia is one of the world's worst greenhouse gas emitters on a per capita basis because of its heavy reliance on cheap coal for power generation. As the world's driest continent after Antarctica, scientists warn that Australia is also particularly vulnerable to climate extremes that come with climate change.
A U.N.-created climate change panel issued a major report in Stockholm last month that said it was "extremely likely," or 95 percent likely, that global warming was man-made. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the British meteorological office also released research in September that used computer simulations to conclude that climate change influenced some recent weather occurrences in Europe and the United States.
The wildfires that have burned around Sydney razed more than 200 homes and resulted in two deaths. One resident died of a heart attack while throwing buckets of water on his home last week, and a pilot died Thursday when his plane crashed while attempting to drop water on flames.
Adam Bandt, a lawmaker for the Australian Greens party that champions the carbon tax, was widely accused of politicizing the disaster when be tweeted at the height of the fire emergency last week: "Tony Abbott's plan means more bushfires for Australia & more pics like this of Sydney."
His comment came as television networks were airing images of destroyed homes.
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The government staunchly rejected arguments that climate change is causing the wildfires ravaging parts of eastern Australia following a record hot start to the spring season.
"That is complete hogwash," Prime Minister Tony Abbott told News Corp. Australian newspapers in an interview published on Friday.
Environment Minister Greg Hunt backed his prime minister, saying no individual event can be linked to climate change.
But a climate science organization abolished by Abbott's government released a report on Friday declaring a clear link between climate change and the wildfires. The severity and scale of the fires was unprecedented for this time of year, it said. Last month had been the hottest September on record in New South Wales state. The 12 months preceding it had been the hottest year on record across Australia.
The government abolished the state-funded Climate Commission after being elected last month. But the organization survives through public donations as the Climate Council to continue its independent work of communicating reliable information about global warming.
To deny the influence of climate change on extreme fire weather placed people and property an unnecessarily high risk, the report warned. The findings are interim, and the final report will be released next month.
Will Steffen, a Climate Council member and director of the Australian National University's Climate Change Institute, said he was frustrated that the established science on global warming was not yet accepted in Australia.
"We'd like to see a discussion in this country that gets beyond these futile debates about the science that have been settled for decades in the scientific literature and get on with the real debate about what is really the best way of dealing with the problem," Steffen told reporters. "That's where the political debate really needs to be."
Abbott argues that Australia has experienced wildfires for more than 200 years of European settlement and had suffered worse fires in the past.
This week, he accused Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, of "talking through her hat" when she referred to the Australian wildfires as the world "paying the price of carbon" in the atmosphere.
"They are desperate to find anything that they think might pass as ammunition for their cause," Abbott said, referring to people who link the fires to global warming and who criticize his government's climate change policies.
Abbott's conservative government plans to repeal laws that force Australia's worst greenhouse gas polluters to pay a tax for every ton of carbon dioxide that they emit. The tax was introduced last year to reduce Australia's abundant greenhouse gas emissions.
Australia is one of the world's worst greenhouse gas emitters on a per capita basis because of its heavy reliance on cheap coal for power generation. As the world's driest continent after Antarctica, scientists warn that Australia is also particularly vulnerable to climate extremes that come with climate change.
A U.N.-created climate change panel issued a major report in Stockholm last month that said it was "extremely likely," or 95 percent likely, that global warming was man-made. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the British meteorological office also released research in September that used computer simulations to conclude that climate change influenced some recent weather occurrences in Europe and the United States.
The wildfires that have burned around Sydney razed more than 200 homes and resulted in two deaths. One resident died of a heart attack while throwing buckets of water on his home last week, and a pilot died Thursday when his plane crashed while attempting to drop water on flames.
Adam Bandt, a lawmaker for the Australian Greens party that champions the carbon tax, was widely accused of politicizing the disaster when be tweeted at the height of the fire emergency last week: "Tony Abbott's plan means more bushfires for Australia & more pics like this of Sydney."
His comment came as television networks were airing images of destroyed homes.
The glitch-ridden website built for people to purchase compulsory health insurance under the Affordable Care Act will be fixed in time for applicants to enroll in plans before the law’s deadline to sign up, contractors who built the site assured lawmakers on Thursday.
“The experience will be improved as we go forward, and people will be able to enroll by the Dec. 15 time frame,” Cheryl Campbell, senior vice president for CGI Federal, the company that helped build the government website, told members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. “We’re seeing improvements day over day.” (People who want their coverage to become effective Jan. 1 must enroll by Dec. 15.)
The launch of HealthCare.gov has been fraught with accessibility problems since it launched Oct. 1. Users have complained that they are unable to create accounts or complete the application process to buy insurance from companies participating in the new government-run marketplace.
On Thursday, the Republican-majority committee questioned four private contractors who coordinated with the Department of Health and Human Services to build the site about why the site has so many early problems.
The contractors testified that their contributions to the site had tested well before the launch and that they had not recommended that the site launch be delayed.
Despite assurance that the website would be fixed in time, the White House on Wednesday night announced that applicants would be able to sign up for insurance until March 1, 2014 — the original deadline was Jan. 1 — without facing a penalty. Republicans and even some Democrats, meanwhile, have called for the law's individual mandate to purchase insurance to be delayed for at least a year because of the problems.
The federal government plans to announce official enrollment numbers by mid-November, officials said.
The BBC reports its iPlayer apps for Android and iOS have crossed a new milestone, with 20 million downloads total since launching back in 2011. Of course, that number might be a little inflated by certain individuals downloading it multiple times (our UK staff alone probably accounts for several ...
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is furious about the U.S. eavesdropping on her calls. She is the latest to protest loudly to the U.S. as the EU gathers for a regular summit. The meeting should have focused on immigration and the economy, but will be sidetracked by the continued NSA spying anger.
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Audie Cornish.
MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:
And I'm Melissa Block. We begin this hour with the latest news about the extent of the National Security Agency's spying activities. The Guardian newspaper came out with a report this afternoon saying that the U.S. has monitored the phone traffic of 35 world leaders. The paper cites a document from 2006. The news comes after revelations yesterday that the NSA tapped German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cell phone.
The news further damages U.S. relations with Western Europe. German officials reacted to the news with deep concern.
THOMAS DE MAIZIERE: (Speaking foreign language)
BLOCK: That's the German Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere speaking with German public broadcaster ARD. He called the allegations really bad. He also said that as long as America is Germany's best friend, it really can't work like this. Meanwhile, at the European Union summit in Brussels, many leaders are expressing indignation that the U.S., their strongest ally, is engaging in any spying on European officials and citizens.
For more, we're joined by NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson. She is in Berlin. And Soraya, this is the latest in a series of revelations about the NSA's activities, including earlier revelations this summer about spying on Germany, but reaction now seems to be much stronger.
SORAYA SARHADDI NELSON, BYLINE: Yeah, I mean, they've been pretty upset by this all along. I mean, you're looking at German history here where during the East German Communist times the Stasi did a lot of spying on people and certainly during the Cold War there was a lot of it and then go back to World War II.
But I think what's particularly outrageous to them now is the fact that this was done on the chancellor herself. This is arguably the strongest or most important leader in Europe and certainly in Germany and so there really is a feeling of betrayal.
BLOCK: This all led to Chancellor Merkel calling President Obama. He apparently assured her that her phone is not being listened to. So I'm a little confused. If the NSA was tapping Merkel's phone, what does that mean? They were tapping it, but just not listening to what she was saying?
NELSON: Well, I think what President Obama was trying to tell her was that it's not being listened to now and it's won't be listened to in the future, but he didn't address, in fact, what happened in the past. And this is the $64,000 question, if you will, and what people in Germany want to know is, you know, did this, in fact, happen and what happened before.
And it sort of leads to the whole issue of why Germans aren't placated by these assurances by the president. They don't feel he's taking these allegations seriously and they don't really like the, trust me, it's OK, don't worry about it approach that they're seeing.
BLOCK: And apart from Germany, Soraya, what other reaction has there been across Europe?
NELSON: Well, there's a lot of outrage being expressed by leaders. The French president, for example, who had also called the U.S. ambassador in Paris on the carpet to answer questions about spying allegations there, wants to see this on the EU summit agenda, that this whole matter be discussed.
And also, Annette Heuser who is the executive director of the Bertelsmann Foundation in Washington says some European leaders are calling for pulling the Transatlantic trade talks on hold.
ANNETTE HEUSER: Bottom line is, Europeans are not accepting this when it comes to the transatlantic relationship because you don't spy on your friends and I would say this NSA scandal is a political phenomena right now that is happening across the Atlantic.
NELSON: She adds that the proposed trade agreement is the only prestigious project that Europeans and Americans have in the pipeline so this is a real serious issue.
BLOCK: And Soraya, it got even more serious today with that report I mentioned from The Guardian newspaper which says the NSA was able to monitor the phones of 35 world leaders. What more can you tell us about that?
NELSON: The newspaper cites a memo from October 2006 that it said it got from Edward Snowden. Now, this NSA memo doesn't name the world's leaders who were spied and said that it didn't receive much in the way of useful intelligence. But what was interesting is that they were asking U.S. officials in other departments to handover - basically open up their Rolodexes and hand over foreign contacts, with the hopes that they would get more intelligence from those individuals.
BLOCK: From those phone numbers.
NELSON: From those phone numbers.
BLOCK: OK. NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson in Berlin. Soraya, thanks.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.
NEW YORK (AP) — Ellis Island will reopen to the public Monday, almost exactly a year after Superstorm Sandy's swells reached 8 feet and badly damaged the former U.S. immigration entry point.
"We are delighted to be able to share Ellis Island's uniquely American story with the world once more," Superintendent David Luchsinger said in a statement Thursday.
The Oct. 29 storm swamped boilers and electrical systems, and the 27.5-acre island in New York Harbor was without power for months.
The Ellis Island Immigration Museum, housed in the main building on the island, showcases the stories of the millions of immigrants who passed through the island to start their lives in the United States.
More than a million documents, photographs and other artifacts at the museum were moved before the storm because it was impossible to maintain the climate-controlled environment needed for their preservation.
While the halls and buildings will reopen, the artifacts remain in a temporary storage facility in Maryland, park officials said. There's no estimate on when they will return to the island, because considerable work to upgrade and fix the buildings is still ongoing.
"You're not going to see a complete restoration of Ellis Island for a while," spokesman John Warren said.
Crews are still working on revamping so that the next bad storm won't leave the island shuttered for a year, he said.
Nearby Liberty Island, which also flooded during Sandy, reopened on July 4th but was closed during the partial federal government shutdown.
"I can think of no better way to celebrate Lady Liberty's 127th birthday than to welcome visitors back to the place where those 'huddled masses yearning to breathe free' first came to our shores," Luchsinger said, referring to a line in the Emma Lazarus poem "The New Colossus," which is engraved on a plaque hung inside the statue's pedestal.
There's no cost estimate yet on how much it will take to repair and revamp the island.
FiLE - In this April 15, 2014 file photo, Dr. Vladimir Keilis-Borok, of the University of California, Los Angeles, listens to questions from reporters regarding his earthquake prediction, in Palm Springs, Calif. Keilis-Borok, a seismologist who sought to predict earthquakes died on Oct. 19, 2013 at his home in Culver City after a long illness, according to the University of California, Los Angeles. He was 92. (AP Photo/The Desert Sun, Wade Byars, File)
FiLE - In this April 15, 2014 file photo, Dr. Vladimir Keilis-Borok, of the University of California, Los Angeles, listens to questions from reporters regarding his earthquake prediction, in Palm Springs, Calif. Keilis-Borok, a seismologist who sought to predict earthquakes died on Oct. 19, 2013 at his home in Culver City after a long illness, according to the University of California, Los Angeles. He was 92. (AP Photo/The Desert Sun, Wade Byars, File)
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Vladimir Keilis-Borok, a seismologist who believed earthquakes could be predicted months in advance, has died. He was 92.
Keilis-Borok died on Oct. 19 at his home in Culver City after a long illness, according to the University of California, Los Angeles, where he had taught since 1998.
The Russian scientist gained prominence after a strong earthquake in Japan and another in Central California occurred in 2003 within a time period that was forecast by his international team of seismic experts.
"Earthquake prediction is called the Holy Grail of earthquake science and has been considered impossible by many scientists. It's not impossible," Keilis-Borok said in a statement released by UCLA in January 2004.
He then made a bold claim: A quake of magnitude-6.4 or larger would rock a 12,000-sqaure-mile region east of Los Angeles before Sept. 5, 2004 — a large swath that includes the Mojave Desert, the Coachella Valley, the Imperial Valley and eastern San Diego County.
He gave it a 50-50 chance, basing his prediction on a pattern of earthquakes recorded in the region over the past decades including the magnitude-7.3 Landers earthquake in 1992 and the 7.1 Hector Mine quake in 1999.
But the quake never struck and critics said he had been lucky in his previous predictions. Despite the failed attempt, Keilis-Borok still had a few supporters.
Earthquake prediction today remains elusive. Most scientists are generally pessimistic about ever having that ability and have instead focused on emergency preparedness and advocating for an early warning system designed to give people a few seconds of notice after a quake occurs but before damaging waves spread widely.
Born in Moscow on July 31, 1921, Kellis-Borok earned his doctorate from the Academy of Sciences in Moscow. He worked at UCLA from 1998 to 2010, when he retired. He was known as "Volodya" by close friends.
Kellis-Borok is survived by a daughter, Irina Kashin, a granddaughter and two great-grandchildren, the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.
Twitter plans to price its IPO shares between $17 and $20 when it lists on the New York Stock Exchange, the company said Thursday in a filing
Based on an assumed initial public offering price of $18.50—the midpoint of the range—Twitter estimates the net proceeds from the sale of shares of common stock will be roughly $1.25 billion, the company said in documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Some 80.5 million shares of common stock will be registered, according to the filing.
Releasing its IPO price range positions Twitter to begin its “road show,” seeking to raise funds from investors across the country. In documents filed last week, the company said it would list its shares under the ticker symbol TWTR on the New York Stock Exchange, representing a big win for the market over rival Nasdaq.
Twitter has yet to determine a date for the listing, though one report suggested Nov. 15 could be the day.
Twitter’s IPO is likely to be one of the hottest of the year and the most prominent in social media since Facebook went public last year. Twitter’s share price range will be markedly lower than Facebook’s, which priced its IPO at $38 per share.
Twitter filed for its highly anticipated public offering earlier this month.
Zach Miners, IDG News Service , IDG News Service
Zach Miners covers social networking, search and general technology news for IDG News Service More by Zach Miners, IDG News Service
Gene-diet interaction may help explain link between eating meat & colorectal cancer risk
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
24-Oct-2013
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Contact: Cathy Yarbrough press@ashg.org 858-243-1814 American Society of Human Genetics
Findings may have public health significance since diet is modifiable risk factor for colorectal cancer
A newly discovered potential gene-diet interaction for colorectal cancer was reported today (Thursday, Oct. 24) at the American Society of Human Genetics 2013 meeting in Boston. The interaction may shed light on the statistically significant increased risk of colorectal cancer that is associated with consumption of red and processed meat, the researchers said.
"If replicated, our findings have a relevant public health significance because diet is a modifiable risk factor for colorectal cancer," said Jane Figueiredo, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine, who presented the study this morning at the ASHG meeting.
"It is conceivable that selected individuals at higher risk of colorectal cancer based on genomic profiling could be targeted for screening, diet modification and other prevention strategies," added Dr. Figueiredo, one of the scientists collaborating in the international NIH-funded Genetics and Epidemiology of Colorectal Cancer Consortium (GECCO).
The scientists also determined that the lower colorectal cancer risk associated with vegetable, fruit and fiber intake also was linked to genetic variants.
The possibility that genetic variants may modify an individual's risk for disease based on diet has not been thoroughly investigated but represents an important new insight into disease development, said Ulrike Peters, Ph.D., M.P.H, who headed the study and is a Member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center's Public Health Sciences Division in Seattle.
The study is the first colorectal cancer investigation with the statistical power to identify gene-dietary interactions across the genome of a large population of individuals, said Li Hsu, Ph.D., Member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the study's lead biostatistician.
The study population totaled 9,287 patients with colorectal cancer and a control group of 9,117 individuals without cancer, all participants in 10 GECCO observational studies.
Scientists systematically searched 2.7 million variants to identify those that are associated with the consumption of red meat and processed meat as well as fruits and vegetables. The genetic sequences and information about the participants' medical history and diet are in the GECCO database.
A significant interaction between the genetic variant rs4143094 and processed meat consumption was detected. This variant is located on the same chromosome 10 region that includes GATA3, a transcription factor gene previously linked to several forms of cancer. The transcription factor encoded by this gene normally plays a role in the immune system.
On chromosome 8, a statistically significant diet-gene interaction was found in another variant, rs1269486. This variant was associated with reduced risk of colorectal cancer.
How specific foods affect the activities of genes has not been established. Drs. Peters and Figueiredo speculate that digestion of processed meat may promote an immunological or inflammatory response that may trigger tumor development. The GATA3 transcription factor normally would help suppress the immunological or inflammatory response. However, if the GATA3 gene region contains a mutation, it may encode a dysregulated transcription factor that impacts its ability to suppress the response.
In addition to uncovering a novel gene-diet interaction for colorectal cancer, the GECCO study may have important implications for understanding the underlying causes and biological pathways of cancer, said Dr. Peters.
"Our study highlights two genetic regions that are biologically interesting in cancer," she said, referring to the variants located near GATA3 and at 8q23.3.
"These genetic loci may have interesting biological significance given their location in the genome, and further functional analyses are required," said Dr. Peters.
The GECCO multi-institutional research team continues to investigate gene-diet interactions through independent studies on a well-characterized large cohort of European colorectal cancer patients and a collaboration with the Colorectal Cancer Trans-disciplinary study (CORECT) consortium.
"GECCO aims to continue to discover additional colorectal cancer-related variants by investigating how genetic variants are modified by other environmental and lifestyle risk factors, including biomarkers as well as how they influence patient treatment response and survival," Dr. Peters said.
Colorectal cancer is a multi-factorial disease attributed to lifestyle, environmental and genetic causes. Over 30 genetic susceptibility alleles for colorectal cancer have been pinpointed throughout the genome. They include rare variants that have a strong impact on risk and common variants that are low risk.
###
The scientists' ASHG abstract is titled, "Genome-wide analyses highlight gene interaction with processed meat and vegetable intake for colorectal cancer risk." Link to abstract online: http://www.ashg.org/2013meeting/abstracts/fulltext/f130123041.htm
About ASHG
The American Society of Human Genetics is the primary professional membership organization for nearly 8,000 human genetics specialists worldwide. The ASHG Annual Meeting is the world's largest gathering of human genetics professionals and a forum for renowned experts in the field. For more information about ASHG, visit: http://www.ashg.org.
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Gene-diet interaction may help explain link between eating meat & colorectal cancer risk
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
24-Oct-2013
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]
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Contact: Cathy Yarbrough press@ashg.org 858-243-1814 American Society of Human Genetics
Findings may have public health significance since diet is modifiable risk factor for colorectal cancer
A newly discovered potential gene-diet interaction for colorectal cancer was reported today (Thursday, Oct. 24) at the American Society of Human Genetics 2013 meeting in Boston. The interaction may shed light on the statistically significant increased risk of colorectal cancer that is associated with consumption of red and processed meat, the researchers said.
"If replicated, our findings have a relevant public health significance because diet is a modifiable risk factor for colorectal cancer," said Jane Figueiredo, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine, who presented the study this morning at the ASHG meeting.
"It is conceivable that selected individuals at higher risk of colorectal cancer based on genomic profiling could be targeted for screening, diet modification and other prevention strategies," added Dr. Figueiredo, one of the scientists collaborating in the international NIH-funded Genetics and Epidemiology of Colorectal Cancer Consortium (GECCO).
The scientists also determined that the lower colorectal cancer risk associated with vegetable, fruit and fiber intake also was linked to genetic variants.
The possibility that genetic variants may modify an individual's risk for disease based on diet has not been thoroughly investigated but represents an important new insight into disease development, said Ulrike Peters, Ph.D., M.P.H, who headed the study and is a Member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center's Public Health Sciences Division in Seattle.
The study is the first colorectal cancer investigation with the statistical power to identify gene-dietary interactions across the genome of a large population of individuals, said Li Hsu, Ph.D., Member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the study's lead biostatistician.
The study population totaled 9,287 patients with colorectal cancer and a control group of 9,117 individuals without cancer, all participants in 10 GECCO observational studies.
Scientists systematically searched 2.7 million variants to identify those that are associated with the consumption of red meat and processed meat as well as fruits and vegetables. The genetic sequences and information about the participants' medical history and diet are in the GECCO database.
A significant interaction between the genetic variant rs4143094 and processed meat consumption was detected. This variant is located on the same chromosome 10 region that includes GATA3, a transcription factor gene previously linked to several forms of cancer. The transcription factor encoded by this gene normally plays a role in the immune system.
On chromosome 8, a statistically significant diet-gene interaction was found in another variant, rs1269486. This variant was associated with reduced risk of colorectal cancer.
How specific foods affect the activities of genes has not been established. Drs. Peters and Figueiredo speculate that digestion of processed meat may promote an immunological or inflammatory response that may trigger tumor development. The GATA3 transcription factor normally would help suppress the immunological or inflammatory response. However, if the GATA3 gene region contains a mutation, it may encode a dysregulated transcription factor that impacts its ability to suppress the response.
In addition to uncovering a novel gene-diet interaction for colorectal cancer, the GECCO study may have important implications for understanding the underlying causes and biological pathways of cancer, said Dr. Peters.
"Our study highlights two genetic regions that are biologically interesting in cancer," she said, referring to the variants located near GATA3 and at 8q23.3.
"These genetic loci may have interesting biological significance given their location in the genome, and further functional analyses are required," said Dr. Peters.
The GECCO multi-institutional research team continues to investigate gene-diet interactions through independent studies on a well-characterized large cohort of European colorectal cancer patients and a collaboration with the Colorectal Cancer Trans-disciplinary study (CORECT) consortium.
"GECCO aims to continue to discover additional colorectal cancer-related variants by investigating how genetic variants are modified by other environmental and lifestyle risk factors, including biomarkers as well as how they influence patient treatment response and survival," Dr. Peters said.
Colorectal cancer is a multi-factorial disease attributed to lifestyle, environmental and genetic causes. Over 30 genetic susceptibility alleles for colorectal cancer have been pinpointed throughout the genome. They include rare variants that have a strong impact on risk and common variants that are low risk.
###
The scientists' ASHG abstract is titled, "Genome-wide analyses highlight gene interaction with processed meat and vegetable intake for colorectal cancer risk." Link to abstract online: http://www.ashg.org/2013meeting/abstracts/fulltext/f130123041.htm
About ASHG
The American Society of Human Genetics is the primary professional membership organization for nearly 8,000 human genetics specialists worldwide. The ASHG Annual Meeting is the world's largest gathering of human genetics professionals and a forum for renowned experts in the field. For more information about ASHG, visit: http://www.ashg.org.
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Share
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
All appearances of condemnation aside, proponents of the Rubiniux X project are embarking on an effort to modernize the Ruby language, bringing it into the Internet era and focusing on improved concurrency.
A glance at the recent formal announcement of Rubinius X could give the impression it was written by a Ruby antagonist, as it belittles the language, saying, "Ruby is a dying language. Business is over its dalliance with Ruby. No major startup is lauding their use of Ruby, and existing businesses are migrating away or simply writing new applications in a different language."
But the engineer who unveiled Rubinius X, Brian Shirai, of Engine Yard, emphasized he is an advocate, not an opponent: "I love Ruby. I think it's a fantastic language."
Ruby, he said, is more accessible than newer languages like Scala, but it needs to be brought into the networked, Internet era. "The motivating idea behind Rubinius X today is that there are no computers that do anything interesting without talking to at least one other computer. The Internet is forever." But Ruby's core library was built back in the Windows 3.0 days in the 1990s, before Internet dominance, Shirai added. Rubinius X is focused on the writing of collaborative, concurrent applications.
Recently, Ruby founder Yukihiro Matsumoto said he saw no need for major improvements to Ruby in his CRuby implementation, but Rubinius X advocates will continue overhauling the language anyway. Rubinius X builds on Rubinius, an implementation of Ruby that also stressed concurrency via native threads, but version 10 takes concurrency a step further. "More than any specific feature in Rubinius X, it is that the entire system is being reworked from the bottom up to support the highest degree of concurrency and parallelism possible," Shirai said. "Certain APIs are being changed, further concurrency abstractions are being added, and all of this is built-in, instead of being an afterthought relegated to the 'standard library' or other libraries."
Key features of Rubinius X for concurrency include promises and nonblocking I/O. "Promises are a more modern mechanism for concurrency," Shirai said. Promises refer to constructs used for synchronizing in some languages, in which an object acts a proxy for result that is initially unknown, often because the computation of its value is not yet complete.
Version X also is slated to include persistent and concurrent data structures, as well as mirrors and object capabilities. Mirrors are a construct providing structure for composition through encapsulation and separation of object and meta-data object operations, according to Rubiniux X advocates; object capabilities structure interactions to control collaboration. Code-loading in Rubinius X, meanwhile, enables the combining of components into a single, running program.
Matsumoto gave an endorsement to Rubinius X, despite the criticism heaped on Ruby itself. "I am a true believer of diversity," he said. "So I consider Rubinius itself diversity." But Matsumoto said he was not sure Rubinius would survive. Still, he expects it to enrich the Ruby ecosystem.
"[Shirai] claimed 'Ruby is a dying language,' but as long as Ruby continues evolving, [including Rubinius], I think it will keep growing."
I’m officially Mrs. Blackstock We got married yesterday at Blackberry Farms in TN, the most beautiful place ever!
Awww, I love this so much. Even tho we knew that Kelly and Brandon were planning to elope, we didn’t know when the couple were planning to say their I Dos. I love that they got themselves hitched on their terms, in the setting they wanted and without any outside intrusion. Kelly makes a beautiful bride and Brandon, a handsome groom. I am just so happy for the both of them. Kelly Clarkson (ahem, Mrs. Blackstock) is truly one of my faves and I am thrilled at her happiness. Let’s send the newlyweds all of our love and heartiest congratulations on their happy nuptials :)
NASA's TRMM satellite shows wind shear's effect on Tropical Storm Lorenzo
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
23-Oct-2013
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Contact: Rob Gutro robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
NASA's TRMM satellite data provided forecasters at the National Hurricane Center with a good look at how wind shear is affecting Tropical Storm Lorenzo in the Atlantic Ocean.
Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) using data from NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite noted in the discussion on Oct. 23 at 5 a.m. EDT that the data from the TRMM satellite pass at 0247 UTC/10:47 p.m. EDT on Oct. 22 "nicely showed the separation of the low- and mid-level cloud features due to northwesterly shear. Despite the [wind]shear, Lorenzo is maintaining deep convection."
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Tropical Storm Lorenzo on Oct. 22 at 14:30 UTC/10:30 a.m. EDT that showed the strongest thunderstorms in the eastern quadrant of the storm.
At 5 a.m. EDT on Oct. 23, Tropical Storm Lorenzo had maximum sustained winds near 50 mph/85 kph. The center of Lorenzo was located near latitude 29.6 north and longitude 49.2 west, about 940 miles/1,515 km east of Bermuda. Lorenzo is moving east near 8 mph/13 kph and is expected to turn northeast in the next day.
The NHC noted that Lorenzo will continue facing wind shear and will move into cooler waters, which will further sap its strength. In a couple of days, Lorenzo is expected to become a remnant low pressure area.
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NASA's TRMM satellite shows wind shear's effect on Tropical Storm Lorenzo
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
23-Oct-2013
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Contact: Rob Gutro robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center
NASA's TRMM satellite data provided forecasters at the National Hurricane Center with a good look at how wind shear is affecting Tropical Storm Lorenzo in the Atlantic Ocean.
Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) using data from NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite noted in the discussion on Oct. 23 at 5 a.m. EDT that the data from the TRMM satellite pass at 0247 UTC/10:47 p.m. EDT on Oct. 22 "nicely showed the separation of the low- and mid-level cloud features due to northwesterly shear. Despite the [wind]shear, Lorenzo is maintaining deep convection."
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Tropical Storm Lorenzo on Oct. 22 at 14:30 UTC/10:30 a.m. EDT that showed the strongest thunderstorms in the eastern quadrant of the storm.
At 5 a.m. EDT on Oct. 23, Tropical Storm Lorenzo had maximum sustained winds near 50 mph/85 kph. The center of Lorenzo was located near latitude 29.6 north and longitude 49.2 west, about 940 miles/1,515 km east of Bermuda. Lorenzo is moving east near 8 mph/13 kph and is expected to turn northeast in the next day.
The NHC noted that Lorenzo will continue facing wind shear and will move into cooler waters, which will further sap its strength. In a couple of days, Lorenzo is expected to become a remnant low pressure area.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
The BBC reports its iPlayer apps for Android and iOS have crossed a new milestone, with 20 million downloads total since launching back in 2011. Of course, that number might be a little inflated by certain individuals downloading it multiple times (our UK staff alone probably accounts for several ...
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