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Tag Archives: sights
Davos 2023: Big Oil in sights of climate activist protests
DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 16 (Reuters) – Big oil firms came under pressure at the start of the World Economic Forum (WEF) from activists who accused them of hijacking the climate debate, while a Greta Thunberg-sponsored “cease and desist” campaign gained support on social media.
Major energy firms including BP (BP.L), Chevron (CVX.N) and Saudi Aramco (2222.SE) are among the 1,500 business leaders gathering for the annual meeting in the Swiss resort of Davos, where global threats including climate change are on the agenda.
“We are demanding concrete and real climate action,” said Nicolas Siegrist, the 26-year-old organiser of the protest who also heads the Young Socialists party in Switzerland.
The annual meeting of global business and political leaders opens in Davos on Monday.
“They will be in the same room with state leaders and they will push for their interests,” Siegrist said of the involvement of energy companies during a demonstration attended by several hundred people on Sunday.
The oil and gas industry has said that it needs to be part of the energy transition as fossil fuels will continue to play a major role in the world’s energy mix as countries shift to low carbon economies.
[1/5] Climate activists display a banner during a protest ahead of the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2023 in the Alpine resort of Davos, Switzerland, January 15, 2023. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann
On Monday, a social media campaign added to the pressure on oil and gas companies, by promoting a “cease and desist” notice sponsored by climate activists Thunberg, Vanessa Nakate and Luisa Neubauer, through the non-profit website Avaaz.
It demands energy company CEOs “immediately stop opening any new oil, gas, or coal extraction sites, and stop blocking the clean energy transition we all so urgently need”, and threatens legal action and more protests if they fail to comply.
The campaign, which had been signed by more than 660,000 people, had almost 200,000 shares on Monday morning.
Sumant Sinha, who heads one of India’s largest renewable energy firms, said it would be good to include big oil companies in the transition debate as they have a vital role to play.
“If oil people are part of these conversations to the extent that they are also committing to change then by all means. It is better to get them inside the tent than to have them outside the tent,” Sinha, chairman and CEO of ReNew Power, told Reuters, saying that inclusion should not lead to “sabotage”.
Rising interest rates have made it harder for renewable energy developments to attract financing, giving traditional players with deep pockets a competitive advantage.
As delegates began to arrive in Davos, Debt for Climate activists protested at a private airport in eastern Switzerland, which they said would be used by some WEF attendees, and issued a statement calling for foreign debts of poorer countries to be cancelled in order to accelerate the global energy transition.
Additional reporting by Kathryn Lurie; Editing by Alexander Smith and Alex Richardson
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Ian becomes a major hurricane as it churns toward Cuba, with Florida’s west coast in its sights
Ian intensified into a major hurricane packing sustained winds of around 115 mph early Tuesday morning as it churned toward western Cuba. The storm was expected to continue strengthening as it passed over Cuba on a track for the Gulf of Mexico, with Florida’s west coast in its path later this week.
Mandatory evacuations were ordered Monday in low-lying areas surrounding Tampa Bay, and officials asked others in the area to voluntarily evacuate, knowing it could take some time to move hundreds of thousands of people out of Ian’s path.
Ian, a Category 3 storm as of Tuesday morning, was forecast to become an even stronger Category 4 with top winds of 140 mph before striking Florida as early as Wednesday. Tampa and St. Petersburg appeared to be among the most likely targets for their first direct hit by a major hurricane in a century. Even if Ian doesn’t hit the area directly, it could still feel the effects of the storm, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis warned.
“You’re still looking at really significant amount of rain, you’re looking at a lot of wind, you’re looking at a lot of storm surge, and so, yes, follow that track, but don’t think because that eye may or may not be in your area that you’re not going to see impacts,” DeSantis said during a Monday afternoon press conference. “You’re going to see significant impacts.”
The governor said the state had suspended tolls around the Tampa Bay area and mobilized 5,000 National Guard troops, with another 2,000 on standby in neighboring states. More than 27,000 power restoration personnel were put on standby to help after the storm, DeSantis said.
“Please treat this storm seriously. It’s the real deal. This is not a drill,” Hillsborough County Emergency Management Director Timothy Dudley said at a Monday news conference on storm preparations in Tampa, where some mandatory evacuations were ordered.
As many as 300,000 people may be evacuated from low-lying areas in Hillsborough County alone, Administrator Bonnie Wise said at a news conference. Schools and other locations were opened as shelters.
In Pinellas County, which includes St. Petersburg, officials issued evacuation orders that start taking effect Monday evening. Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said no one would be forced to leave, but they would remain at their risk.
“What it means is, we’re not going to come help you. If you don’t do it, you’re on your own,” Gualtieri said. “For all practical purposes, get out. Right now. Everybody needs to go.”
The evacuation zone is all along Tampa Bay and the rivers that feed it, encompassing MacDill Air Force Base and well-known neighborhoods such as parts of Hyde Park, Davis Islands and Ybor City.
NOAA/National Weather Service
As of 2:30 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday morning, Ian was moving north-northwest at 13 mph and was located only about 35 miles south of Cuba’s southwestern shores, according to the National Hurricane Center. Its maximum sustained winds had increased to 115 mph.
Authorities in Cuba were evacuating 50,000 people in Pinar del Rio province, sent in medical and emergency personnel, and took steps to protect food and other crops in warehouses, according to state media.
“Cuba is expecting extreme hurricane-force winds, also life-threatening storm surge and heavy rainfall,” U.S. National Hurricane Center senior specialist Daniel Brown told The Associated Press.
The hurricane center predicted areas of Cuba’s western coast could see as much as 14 feet of storm surge Monday night or early Tuesday.
YAMIL LAGE/AFP/Getty
In Havana, fishermen were taking their boats out of the water along the famous Malecon, the seaside boardwalk, and city workers were unclogging storm drains ahead of the expected rain.
In Havana’s El Fanguito, a poor neighborhood near the Almendares River, residents were packing up what they could to leave their homes, many of which show damage from previous storms.
“I hope we escape this one because it would be the end of us. We already have so little,” health worker Abel Rodrigues, 54, said.
In the Tampa Bay area, a storm surge of up to 10 feet of ocean water and 10 inches of rain, with as much as 15 inches in isolated areas. That’s enough water to inundate low-lying coastal communities. Florida residents were getting ready, lining up for hours in Tampa to collect sandbags and clearing store shelves of bottled water.
NOAA/National Weather Service
Nervous anticipation led to long lines for gas, packed grocery stores and empty shelves, CBS News correspondent Omar Villafranca reports from Clearwater, Florida.
“We are going to get these sandbags in front of the garage, the garage door, the front door… and pray we’re good,” Gabriel Alley, who moved to Clearwater from California, told CBS News.
Ian’s impending arrival also prompted NASA to haul its Artemis 1 rocket off its launch pad and back to the protection of the agency’s Vehicle Assembly Building, likely ending any chance of launching the unpiloted moonshot before November.
“A lot of people on the Florida Peninsula and into the Florida Panhandle are at risk and need to be ready to take action quickly,” said Rick Knabb, a hurricane specialist with The Weather Channel, “and the slow motion that we expect from Ian means we could have wind, storm surge and rain-induced flooding.”
DeSantis has declared a state of emergency throughout Florida and urged residents to prepare for the storm to lash large swaths of the state with heavy rains, high winds and rising seas.
“We’re going to keep monitoring the track of this storm. But it really is important to stress the degree of uncertainty that still exists,” DeSantis said at a news conference Sunday, cautioning that “even if you’re not necessarily right in the eye of the path of the storm, there’s going to be pretty broad impacts throughout the state.”
NOAA
Flash and urban flooding is possible in the Florida Keys and Florida Peninsula through midweek, and then heavy rainfall was possible for north Florida, the Florida Panhandle and the southeast United States later this week.
The hurricane center has advised Floridians to have hurricane plans in place and monitor updates of the storm’s evolving path.
President Biden also declared an emergency, authorizing the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, to coordinate disaster relief and provide assistance to protect lives and property. The president postponed a scheduled Tuesday trip to Florida because of the storm.
NASA’s DART Spacecraft Sets Sights on Asteroid Target
NASA’s DART spacecraft is due to collide with the smaller body of the Didymos binary asteroid system in September 2022. Credit: ESA–ScienceOffice.org
From this distance—about 20 million miles away from DART—the Didymos system is still very faint, and navigation camera experts were uncertain whether DRACO would be able to spot the asteroid yet. However, once the 243 images DRACO took during this observation sequence were combined, the team was able to enhance it to reveal Didymos and pinpoint its location.
This image of the light from asteroid Didymos and its orbiting moonlet Dimorphos is a composite of 243 images taken by the Didymos Reconnaissance and Asteroid Camera for Optical navigation (DRACO) aboard DART on July 27, 2022. Credit: NASA JPL DART Navigation Team
“This first set of images is being used as a test to prove our imaging techniques,” said Elena Adams. She is the DART mission systems engineer at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. “The quality of the image is similar to what we could obtain from ground-based telescopes, but it is important to show that DRACO is working properly and can see its target to make any adjustments needed before we begin using the images to guide the spacecraft into the asteroid autonomously.”
A number of navigation simulations using non-DRACO images of Didymos have already been conducted by the team. However, DART will ultimately depend on its ability to see and process images of Didymos and Dimorphos, once it too can be seen, to guide the spacecraft toward the asteroid, especially in the final four hours before impact. At that point, DART will need to autonomously self-navigate to impact successfully with Dimorphos without any human intervention.
“Seeing the DRACO images of Didymos for the first time, we can iron out the best settings for DRACO and fine-tune the software,” said Julie Bellerose, the DART navigation lead at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. “In September, we’ll refine where DART is aiming by getting a more precise determination of Didymos’ location.”
Using observations taken every five hours, the DART team will execute three trajectory correction maneuvers over the next three weeks. Each of these will further reduce the margin of error for the spacecraft’s required trajectory to impact. After the final maneuver on September 25, approximately 24 hours before impact, the navigation team will know the position of the target Dimorphos within 2 kilometers (1.2 miles). From there, DART will be on its own to autonomously guide itself to intercept the asteroid moonlet. DART will slam into Dimorphos at 4 miles (7 kilometers) per second.
DRACO has subsequently observed Didymos during planned observations on August 12, August 13, and August 22.
Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) manages the DART mission for NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office as a project of the agency’s Planetary Missions Program Office. DART is the world’s first planetary defense test mission, intentionally executing a kinetic impact into Dimorphos to slightly change its motion in space. While the asteroid does not pose any threat to Earth, the DART mission will demonstrate that a spacecraft can autonomously navigate to a kinetic impact on a relatively small asteroid and prove this is a viable technique to deflect an asteroid on a collision course with Earth if one is ever discovered. DART will reach its target on September 26, 2022.
War for the south: Ukraine sets its sights on regaining cities and towns lost to Russian troops
Outside, the garden shed is stacked with Javelins and other shoulder-launched anti-tank weapons.
The owners of the house, who fled to Poland after the war broke out in late February, are happy in the knowledge that their village is now back in Ukrainian hands.
Senior Lieutenant Andrii Pidlisnyi was one of the soldiers that drove the Russians out two months ago. “At first, it was a defensive operation to stop them,” he says. “After that we found some good places where we can make offensive operations and take back our territories. And now we’re doing that.”
Pidlisnyi commands a unit of 100 men tasked with identifying Russian positions, often by drone. They then call in the artillery.
On his computer, he shows CNN bodycam videos from his missions earlier in the war. He has had some close calls, but says his morale is high after recent successes. US hardware has helped.
One video shows Pidlisnyi sitting in a trench, using his drone to pinpoint Russian tank positions. “Call in the American gift,” he says over the radio.
Russian troops are now on the defensive in this part of the south — unlike in the east, where Ukrainian troops are the ones being forced to cede ground.
But here too, it is a slog. The aim for soldiers like Pidlisnyi is to take small strategic pockets, areas of high ground with views of occupied Ukrainian towns in the distance, from where further gains can be made.
“I’m not sure we will win it [by] the end of this year,” he says, referring to retaking Russian-occupied areas in Ukraine’s south. “Maybe not until the end of next year.”
The Ukrainian troops claim to have won back some territory. They say they pushed the Russians out of two more villages along the Mykolaiv-Kherson border early this week.
But it is a large area of open rolling farmland where any advancing forces would be exposed, and the Russians have had several months to build defensive positions in three layers across the region.
And the Ukrainians have limited assault forces — for much of this conflict they have been playing defense and that has degraded some of their best units.
Weapons provided by Western allies are, by and large, not designed for ground offensives, and the Ukrainians are short of air cover for any advancing forces.
Ukrainian forces have also been sustaining heavy losses in the south, though the military rarely provides details.
There are growing signs that the Russians are reinforcing their military presence in Kherson, determined to hold it as a vital part of the land bridge to Crimea — and as the peninsula’s main source of water.
In the past two weeks large convoys have trundled west from Mariupol through Melitopol to Kherson.
Many civilians have already fled. Ukrainian officials estimate that nearly half the population of Kherson has left the region for Ukrainian-held territory.
They accuse the Russians of preventing more people from leaving cities like Melitopol, in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region, so that they can be exploited as “human shields” in the event of a Ukrainian offensive.
Shifts on the battleground
Ukraine’s southern front begins near Mykolaiv, a port city to the north of Russian-held Kherson city. It is struck by missiles and rockets almost every day.
To the south and east, a meandering front line runs from the Black Sea coast through farmland and up towards Zaporizhzhia region.
This area is a long way from the calcified Donetsk front — fought over since 2014 — but it is now just one part of a battlefield that stretches for more than 1,000 kilometers.
Along the line, artillery pieces face off, in battles one Ukrainian soldier described as “ping-pong with cannons.”
It has been that way for months.
Now, the Ukrainians say they have an advantage: Donated weaponry, particularly the HIMARs rocket system supplied by the US, is taking out crucial storage depots and command posts and ammunition dumps deep in Russian-held territory.
This month, Ukraine says it destroyed at least two ammunition dumps at Nova Khakova in the Kherson region. Ukraine has also hit three bridges across the Dnipro River, and even a transport of Russian S-300 missiles — a revamped surface-to-air projectile which has rained horror on Mykolaiv.
More Russian hardware will replace what is lost.
CNN has obtained exclusive video footage, taken by partisans, showing S-300 missiles at Dzhankoi railway station in occupied Crimea. Satellite imaging and analysis provided by Maxar indicates as many as 50 S-300 missiles on railcars at the station on Thursday 21 July. Just one S-300 could destroy a building somewhere in Ukraine.
Yet despite the enormity of the Russian war machine, Ukraine’s military leaders have said this month’s strikes on Russian stores and resupply routes could turn the tide on the battlefield.
Now, multiple frontline soldiers have backed that up — telling CNN they believe the Russians have noticeably fewer rounds to fire at them.
“We had about two to three weeks where they didn’t have enough ammunition to fight us with artillery, rockets and so on,” Snr Lt Pidlisnyi says.
On another part of the southern front, Ukraine Armed Forces Captain Volodymyr Omelyan tells CNN surgical strikes behind enemy lines are a part of an ongoing modernization Ukraine’s strategy.
“We believe that Russians will surrender much faster, especially in Kherson region when we already hit three main bridges, two automobile bridges and one railway one,” says Omelyan, who was a politician before he joined the army.
Omelyan says gains are being made “day by day” on the battlefield, but that Ukraine chooses not to advertise them: “It’s a good policy of our commanders to talk about what’s happening after it’s already happened.”
Readying for a long fight
In the southern industrial town of Kryvyi Rih, Ukrainian forces are put through their paces: Reservists and national guardsmen armed with pellet guns must storm a house. Ukrainian police are on the level above, playing the part of the Russians.
After an hour of mock fighting, the trainees have failed to take the top floor — a sign of how deadly and difficult hand-to-hand urban warfare is.
Their commander, Oleksander Piskun, was gravely injured pushing Russian-backed separatists out of cities in the eastern Donbas region in 2014, and has used a wheelchair since.
“Street combat, the battle to storm a settlement is the hardest combat,” he says. “It is more difficult because we are not capturing settlements, we are liberating settlements. These are our cities, these are our people.”
For now, the fight on the southern front is dominated by artillery, not by street combat. Ukrainians say the future will bring an assault on Kherson, but first, the long-range battle must be waged and won.
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U.S. Open 2022 – Sights, sounds and best moments from the third round
BROOKLINE, Mass. — A lot can happen on a Saturday at the U.S. Open, especially with a leaderboard as packed as this one. With a mix of big names and lesser-known ones, things could get interesting on a cooler, windier day at The Country Club.
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Here is what is happening:
Keegan Bradley getting some hometown support
Bradley was born in Vermont and lived in New Hampshire, before moving to Hopkinton, Massachusetts, about 25 miles west of Boston, before his senior year of high school.
“As a kid, I dream of playing in front of Boston fans and being a Patriot or being in the Garden,” Bradley said. The 2011 PGA Championship winner is making the most of the support. He fired a 1-under 69 for the second straight round and is in serious contention to win his second major. Bradley called walking down 18 on Saturday “one of the most amazing moments of my entire life.”
“I got to feel what it feels like to play in Fenway, to play in the Garden, to play in Gillette Stadium,” he said “I felt like a Boston player there. That was a moment I’ll never forget the rest of my life. I appreciate the fans giving me that, and I hope to have them cheer again [on Sunday].” — Mark Schlabach
Going for the fan favorite vote
Any kids in Boston looking for a last minute father’s day gift? I’ve got two extra US Open final round tickets to give out. Comment below, why it should be you. Best answer wins…You can only follow my group though 😏🤪 @usopengolf
— Min Woo Lee (@Minwoo27Lee) June 18, 2022
Rahm from the trees
Between the rock outcroppings and the thick fescue at the U.S. Open this week, we have seen our fair share of tough shots, but none have been as unique as the one Jon Rahm had to hit on the par-5 eighth hole Saturday. Rahm’s ball ended up nestled underneath a tree.
Rahm tried to practice multiple types of swings — left-handed, right-handed while standing on top of the tree trunk — but ended up deciding to hit it backward with his right hand. The ball trickled out for fewer than 20 yards. Rahm smashed his next shot to the green but had to eventually settle for a bogey. — Paolo Uggetti
😬 #USOpen pic.twitter.com/alqPib3pZG
— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) June 18, 2022
From Casey Martin to Aaron Wise
Aaron Wise is in contention at the U.S. Open, and his rise in professional golf started at the end of the 2020-21 season, when he pulled an old putter out of his garage. It was the same one his golf coach at Oregon, Casey Martin, used when he qualified for the 2012 U.S. Open at Olympic Club in San Francisco. Martin won a Supreme Court case against the PGA Tour for the use of a cart because of a birth defect that made it difficult for him to walk. Martin had part of his right leg amputated in October. Martin gave the putter to Wise while Wise was playing for the Ducks. He won an NCAA individual title and helped Oregon win its only national championship in 2016. He ranks 23rd in putting this week, gaining more than 3 strokes on the field. — Schlabach
Make room at the top for 2️⃣@aaronwise_ moves to -5. #USOpen pic.twitter.com/KNVTesb9dn
— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) June 18, 2022
Scottie Scheffler from downtown
Scottie Scheffler! Solo leader! #USOpen pic.twitter.com/qijCMELkwf
— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) June 18, 2022
The wind is whipping
Here’s what the leaders are facing at The Country Club, according to Denny McCarthy, who was among only a few players who shot under par so far today: “Firmer. Chillier temperatures. Wind out of the north-northwest. It played a little different. It tilted around a little bit where all the holes played a little bit different today. It required a little more thinking.”
He said the 502-yard 10th hole was playing more like a par-5 than a par-4 because of 25 mph winds straight in players’ faces. He said it was difficult to keep approach shots on No. 12 on the green because of the front pin placement. Even though McCarthy had a birdie on the par-4 13th, he said the hole was “brutal.” “That might be a skin,” he said. — Mark Schlabach
But it’s still spicy out there
Justin Thomas wasn’t pleased after a USGA rules official denied him relief from a drain in the middle of the fairway on the fourth hole. His ball was inches to the right of the drain. He would have been granted relief if the drain had been affecting his stance or the line of his swing. After chunking his shot, Thomas let his frustration out in a, well, very colorful way. “That’s what pisses me off, because so many other people would lie about being able to hit that, but it’s just like, I’m not going to hit it. That’s f—ing bulls—, man,” Thomas said to caddie Jim “Bones” Mackay, before tossing his iron at his bag.
According to a USGA statement: “During the discussion, Justin was asked if the drain was going to interfere with his swing, to which he replied it was not. Because there was no interference from the drain, Justin was not provided relief. Rule 16.1a(1) states that interference from an immovable obstruction exists when the ball touches or is in or on the obstruction, or the obstruction physically interferes with the player’s area of intended stance or area of intended swing. The Rule goes on to state that if the obstruction is close enough to distract the player but does not otherwise interfere, there is no relief under the Rule.” — Schlabach
Frustration on No. 4.pic.twitter.com/0YEm1abVGZ
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 18, 2022
Bad bounce
The course at The Country Club is already playing much harder through the early Saturday wave than it had the first two days, so it felt like adding insult to injury when Hideki Matsuyama’s second shot into the short par-4 fifth hole hit the flag on a bounce and rolled all the way back into the greenside bunker.
Hideki Matsuyama’s shot hits the stick and rolls into the bunker. 😮
📺: @nbc and @peacockTV pic.twitter.com/hxFwRb0GXr
— Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) June 18, 2022
Matsuyama got up from the sand and back on the green, but the damage was done. What would have likely been a birdie to get him into red numbers turned into an unfortunate bogey that put him at 1 over. — Uggetti
Tough conditions
Moving Day at the 122nd U.S. Open might seem more like Grinding Day for the 64 players who survived the 36-hole cut. With winds picking up at The Country Club, and the USGA having its typical fun with pin placements on the weekend, players are having a very difficult time so far. According to the USGA, greens were rolling in the upper 12s and were double cut and rolled Saturday morning.
With more than half the field having started its round, only two players who have played at least nine holes — Australia’s Todd Sinnott and Denny McCarthy — are under par. Several high-profile players, including Joaquin Niemann, Bryson DeChambeau, Tyrrell Hatton and Max Homa, are already 5 over or worse. — Schlabach
A stinger
Xander Schauffele isn’t the only member of his team who will be attempting to battle back on Saturday. His father and coach, Stefan, is back out at The Country Club after being stung in the upper lip by a hornet. Probably not the stinger he had in mind in the windy conditions. — Schlabach
The name game
Announcements on the first tee at this U.S. Open have not gone well. On Friday, Scott Stallings, who grew up in Worcester was introduced as being from “War-chester.” It’s actually pronounced “Woostah,” and the locals let the guy who said it know about it. On Saturday, things got worse.
Justin Thomas is pretty famous. Just won the PGA Championship. Ranked fifth in the world. Simple, right? Nope. He was introduced as “Justin Thompson.”
For accuracy’s sake
At the U.S. Open, you pick your spots very carefully. Here’s what the players will be staring at all day.
It’s moving day!
Here are the hole locations ⛳️ for Round 3 of the 122nd #USOpen at The Country Club. pic.twitter.com/8LQD53NKAm
— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) June 18, 2022
The money talks
Thanks to LIV Golf, the sport is talking a lot more about money these days. On Saturday morning, the USGA released the full purse breakdown for this week.
Let’s start first with those who didn’t make the cut. They each got $10,000 for the two days of work. Now, to the real money (keeping in mind that Charl Schwartzel took home $4.75 million for winning the first LIV event in London. The total payout is $17.5 million. Here is what a spot in the top 10 is worth:
1. $3.15 million
2. $1.89 million
3. $1.23 million
4. $859,032
5. $715,491
6. $634,415
7. $571,950
8. $512,249
9. $463,604
10. $425,830
The player who finishes 60th will take home $36,852.
Sightings at The Country Club
Boston sports representing @USOpenGolf ⚾🏈 pic.twitter.com/kUBTaS1eRl
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 18, 2022
Soaking in the scenes @USOpenGolf.@WashWizards star @KyleKuzma took in the action at The Country Club on Saturday. pic.twitter.com/d2THBM69e0
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 18, 2022
China may have its sights set on a mission to Venus
China is considering adding a mission to Venus to its plans for planetary exploration, according to a senior Chinese space official.
The country launched its first interplanetary mission, Tianwen 1, to Mars in 2020; the mission’s orbiter and Zhurong rover remain at work at the Red Planet. But the mission won’t be alone as China plans to go further afield. Wu Weiren, the chief designer of China’s lunar exploration program, told Chinese state media earlier this month that Tianwen 2, 3 and 4 missions are set to follow the Mars mission. (Tianwen means “questions about the heavens” and comes from an ancient Chinese poem.)
Though these were not named, China revealed in a recent space white paper that it plans to launch a mission that will sample an asteroid and visit a comet, a Mars sample-return mission and a probe to explore the Jupiter system. Wu added that China is also considering adding Venus to its targets for exploration in the interview, which was published March 7.
Related: China’s Mars orbiter snaps amazing selfies above Red Planet
Wu offered no further details of the potential mission.
Scientists in China did, however, propose a mission to Venus early in the last decade. The orbiter mission, which was not selected for further development work, would have focused on the planet’s atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere, as well as carry out surveys its the surface and internal structure, according to a 2014 paper.
The second planet from the sun became a hot topic following the September 2020 announcement of a detection of phosphine, a chemical associated with life processes on Earth, in the Venusian atmosphere.
Last year, NASA and the European Space Agency announced three missions to the hottest planet in the solar system. Now, China may be next to sign up for a trip in toward Earth’s erstwhile twin.
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A year after landing on Mars, Perseverance rover sets sights on intriguing new target
The joy and excitement of the successful landing for the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter, taking place during a time of hardship for so many, echoed around the globe.
For Vandi Verma, chief engineer of robotic operations for Perseverance at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, landing day was just the beginning.
Verma specializes in remotely driving rovers on Mars from here on Earth and has expertly maneuvered the Spirit, Opportunity and Curiosity rovers in the past, in addition to writing flight software for them. As soon as Perseverance’s wheels touched down, Verma was ready to prepare the rover for its new home on another planet and help the helicopter begin its independent journey.
“It feels like you’ve got this massive upgrade, and it’s like driving a new car and you just feel the smoothness of it,” Verma said of driving the rover. “Every day on Mars, something is unusual or unexpected. Yet things have gone amazingly well, just beyond our expectations.”
The hardest selfie ever
Perseverance’s journey began by sharing the very first video of a mission landing on Mars and some of the first sounds humans have heard of the red planet, as well as beautiful images from Perseverance’s suite of cameras. Those same cameras helped capture the inaugural flight of Ingenuity as it lifted up through the Martian atmosphere.
Before Ingenuity was let loose, the JPL team knew they wanted to capture a selfie of the two robots. Their best opportunity was right before Perseverance drove off to a lookout point like a proud parent, ready to let its video camera roll on the “first Wright brothers moment” on another planet.
But taking the selfie was such a complicated endeavor that it almost didn’t happen, Verma said. Although Perseverance has a long robotic arm measuring 7 feet (2.1 meters), the rover’s bit carousel — which stores the historic samples it’s collecting — protrudes from the front of the rover, making it hard to get the right angle. The rover team had to work through multiple issues to figure out how Perseverance would arrange its massive arm without colliding with its own body.
In the end, the team stitched together multiple images to capture everyone’s favorite explorers in an iconic selfie.
Since landing, Perseverance has clocked 2.45 miles (3,944 meters) and collected six rock samples from intriguing Martian rocks. The rover has set and broken single-day driving distance records several times, going for a drive of 1,050 feet (320 meters) on Monday, with more expected in the future.
The Ingenuity helicopter, designed as an experiment meant for only five flights, has performed 19 aerial excursions on the red planet since April. Over the summer, Ingenuity was so successful that it graduated from an experiment to become Perseverance’s scout, flying over varied terrain and spotting points of interest for the rover to investigate.
The historic chopper mission has flown 2.4 miles (3,885 meters) for a total duration of 34 minutes.
These achievements haven’t come without challenges, including Perseverance encountering some rocks that didn’t want to give up samples and Ingenuity’s software glitches. But any issues have helped to bond the mission team more closely as they worked on solutions to keep the robots healthy, Verma said.
Setting off for the delta
Perseverance and Ingenuity have spent the majority of the past year exploring the floor of Jezero Crater, once home to a Martian lake more than 3 billion years ago. Now, it’s time for the robotic explorers to move on to their main reason for being on Mars: studying the remains of an ancient river delta that once fed into the lake.
“When we chose the landing site, it was because of the delta; that’s the reason we’re here,” said Briony Horgan, associate professor of planetary science at Purdue University and a scientist on the Perseverance mission. “We’ll spend most of the next year on the delta, exploring this ancient lake and river environment and looking for signs of ancient life like organic material and signs of microbes.”
Sandwiched between layers of sediment preserved in the delta rocks may be evidence of microfossils or other signs of life, if it existed on the red planet.
The ambitious Mars Sample Return mission, a multistep collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency, will rely on innovations, like launching from the Martian surface for the first time, to retrieve the rock samples collected and cached by Perseverance and return them to the Earth in the 2030s.
Scientists studying those samples could answer the big question: Was there ever life on Mars?
“Kids generally want to learn something because it’s going to have an impact on the world,” Verma said. “When the Martian samples come back in the 2030s, very likely the scientists to study these will be the students who are in school right now.”
Perseverance and Ingenuity are just the first step in exploring Mars in new ways while paving the way for future missions that could explore the possibility of life on other planets in our solar system.
“It’s an incredibly ambitious mission, with goals that are leaps and bounds beyond any previous Mars rover and really any previous space mission had been supposed to do: how far and fast we’re supposed to drive, how many samples we’re supposed to drill,” Horgan said.
Square Enix sets sights on new release date for Hitman Sniper: The Shadows
Square Enix today announced a new release date for Hitman Sniper: The Shadows. This game is the latest entry in the Hitman Sniper franchise, one that takes action away from Agent 47, pulling back to the edges of the open sandboxes Hitman fans are so familiar with, tasking them with causing havoc and killing targets with nothing but a sniper rifle.
Hitman Sniper: The Shadows is now slated to be released on March 3, 2022. The last news about the game was that it had been delayed indefinitely. After a brief time in beta in two regions, the developers pulled the game from stores due to bugs and glitches that needed to be fixed before it could be rolled out worldwide.
Fans can pre-register for an alert when the game goes live on its official website. It also seems that those who pre-register will be given some exclusive rewards on release day, but they’ve not been outlined at the time of writing.
In Hitman Sniper: The Shadows, players take on the role of a set of new ICA agents. Each one is highly skilled with a sniper rifle and has a unique ability that makes them more effective in certain situations or for specific kills over others on their team. Players will need to take out targets using the same techniques from the mainline Hitman games, such as distractions, poisoning, and good old-fashioned headshots. However, Hitman Sniper: The Shadows will also introduce new mechanics that allow players to manipulate and murder their targets with sniper rifle-specific methods.