Sunday, August 28, 2011

Tropical Storm Irene, recently downgraded from a hurricane, passed over New York City at about 0900 local time (1300 UTC) today, bringing heavy rain and winds up to 65 miles per hour (96.6 km/h).

Flooding has been reported in New York City, where the Hudson River spilled over its banks into Manhattan and the East River briefly flooded. Floods were also reported in Brooklyn. Water was reported to be inside Battery Park and near the New York Mercantile Exchange. The water level of New York Harbor is as much as four feet higher than normal, with a predicted storm surge of up to eight feet.

Elsewhere in the northeast, suburbs of Philadelphia also flooded; mayor Michael Nutter described the scene in one area as “couches, furniture, all kinds of stuff floating down the street.”

Up to eleven people have been reported killed by the storm, five in North Carolina, three in Virginia and one each in Florida, Maryland and Connecticut. Some three million people evacuated from areas expected to be impacted by the storm, and another three million are reported to be without power.

Irene made landfall in North Carolina on Saturday, bringing up to fourteen inches (~36 cm) of rain and a storm surge measuring four feet in the Cheasapeake Bay with it. At about 0530 local time today, the storm made its second landfall as it passed over Little Egg Inlet, New Jersey.

According to New Jersey governor Chris Christie, the storm is expected to cause damage “in the billions of dollars, if not in the tens of billions of dollars.”

Wednesday, June 30, 2021

Earlier this month, Wikinews spoke with University of Sussex professor of economics L. Alan Winters regarding the decision of the United Kingdom to leave the European Union (EU) in the 2016 Brexit referendum and the subsequent negotiations leading up to and following the EU–UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement of December, which he has researched extensively. In a call, a Wikinews correspondent spoke with Professor Winters about recent developments in UK trade policy to learn more about his observations.

Winters is professor of economics at the University of Sussex, as well as founding director and fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO). His career spans over 15 years, including as chief economist at the Department for International Development, director of the Development Research Group of the World Bank, CEO of the Migrating Out of Poverty Research Programme Consortium and advisor for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the Commonwealth Secretariat, the European Commission, the European Parliament, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the World Trade Organization and the Inter-American Development Bank.

Three reports where Winters is listed as an author were used as reference during the interview: “COVID-19 will reinforce the Brexit shock”, “The Costs of Brexit” and “Taking stock of the new UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement: governance, state subsidies and the level playing field”.

Winters was awarded the title “Companion of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath”, styled C.B., on June 16, 2012 as part of the 2012 Birthday Honours.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

NASA’s Cassini–Huygens spacecraft has discovered evidence for a large-scale saltwater reservoir beneath the icy crust of Saturn’s moon Enceladus. The data came from the spacecraft’s direct analysis of salt-rich ice grains close to the jets ejected from the moon. The study has been published in this week’s edition of the journal Nature.

Data from Cassini’s cosmic dust analyzer show the grains expelled from fissures, known as tiger stripes, are relatively small and usually low in salt far away from the moon. Closer to the moon’s surface, Cassini found that relatively large grains rich with sodium and potassium dominate the plumes. The salt-rich particles have an “ocean-like” composition and indicate that most, if not all, of the expelled ice and water vapor comes from the evaporation of liquid salt-water. When water freezes, the salt is squeezed out, leaving pure water ice behind.

Cassini’s ultraviolet imaging spectrograph also recently obtained complementary results that support the presence of a subsurface ocean. A team of Cassini researchers led by Candice Hansen of the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona, measured gas shooting out of distinct jets originating in the moon’s south polar region at five to eight times the speed of sound, several times faster than previously measured. These observations of distinct jets, from a 2010 flyby, are consistent with results showing a difference in composition of ice grains close to the moon’s surface and those that made it out to the E ring, the outermost ring that gets its material primarily from Enceladean jets. If the plumes emanated from ice, they should have very little salt in them.

“There currently is no plausible way to produce a steady outflow of salt-rich grains from solid ice across all the tiger stripes other than salt water under Enceladus’s icy surface,” said Frank Postberg, a Cassini team scientist at the University of Heidelberg in Germany.

The data suggests a layer of water between the moon’s rocky core and its icy mantle, possibly as deep as about 50 miles (80 kilometers) beneath the surface. As this water washes against the rocks, it dissolves salt compounds and rises through fractures in the overlying ice to form reserves nearer the surface. If the outermost layer cracks open, the decrease in pressure from these reserves to space causes a plume to shoot out. Roughly 400 pounds (200 kilograms) of water vapor is lost every second in the plumes, with smaller amounts being lost as ice grains. The team calculates the water reserves must have large evaporating surfaces, or they would freeze easily and stop the plumes.

“We imagine that between the ice and the ice core there is an ocean of depth and this is somehow connected to the surface reservoir,” added Postberg.

The Cassini mission discovered Enceladus’ water-vapor and ice jets in 2005. In 2009, scientists working with the cosmic dust analyzer examined some sodium salts found in ice grains of Saturn’s E ring but the link to subsurface salt water was not definitive. The new paper analyzes three Enceladus flybys in 2008 and 2009 with the same instrument, focusing on the composition of freshly ejected plume grains. In 2008, Cassini discovered a high “density of volatile gases, water vapor, carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, as well as organic materials, some 20 times denser than expected” in geysers erupting from the moon. The icy particles hit the detector target at speeds between 15,000 and 39,000 MPH (23,000 and 63,000 KPH), vaporizing instantly. Electrical fields inside the cosmic dust analyzer separated the various constituents of the impact cloud.

“Enceladus has got warmth, water and organic chemicals, some of the essential building blocks needed for life,” said Dennis Matson in 2008, Cassini project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

“This finding is a crucial new piece of evidence showing that environmental conditions favorable to the emergence of life can be sustained on icy bodies orbiting gas giant planets,” said Nicolas Altobelli, the European Space Agency’s project scientist for Cassini.

“If there is water in such an unexpected place, it leaves possibility for the rest of the universe,” said Postberg.

Friday, June 24, 2016

The man who murdered Christina Grimmie following a June 10 concert lived “like a hermit” and had apparently never met the singer, but was infatuated with her and had spent recent months changing his appearance in an effort to win her over, according to information released on Wednesday by police in Orlando, Florida.

Kevin James Loibl, age 27, took a taxicab to Orlando on June 9 from his St. Petersburg home, bringing along two 9mm Glock handguns and extra ammunition. He spent that night in a hotel. Following Grimmie’s June 10 performance at The Plaza Live, he approached her as she signed autographs and opened fire, shooting her in the head once and the torso three times. Grimmie’s brother Marcus then tackled Loibl, who broke free, backed against a wall, and killed himself with a single shot to the head.

Christina Grimmie was pronounced dead at Orlando Regional Medical Center just before 11:00 p.m. She was buried in a private ceremony in her hometown in New Jersey on June 16. A public memorial in nearby Medford attracted thousands of family, friends and fans.

Police interviewed several of Loibl’s co-workers including Cory Dennington, self-described as Loibl’s “only friend in the world”, who said Loibl had an unrealistic infatuation with her and was constantly watching her videos and monitoring her online activity. Dennington said Loibl had lost weight, whitened his teeth, and gotten eye and hair surgery in an effort to look better for Grimmie, whom he considered his “soul mate”. Loibl would get defensive when told hoping for a relationship with the singer was “illogical”.

Witnesses also said Loibl had not mentioned attending Grimmie’s Orlando concert, and none of them knew of any threats. His father and brother did not know Loibl owned any guns, police said. Each weapon was purchased legally at one of two St. Petersburg gun shops.

Investigators were unable to crack the encryption on Loibl’s phone, and it appeared he had destroyed his computer’s hard drive. Police believe Loibl acted alone and, since he is deceased, they closed their case on Wednesday. They offered no motive for the shooting.