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Friday, December 15, 2017

On Tuesday, parents of baby Vanellope Hope Wilkins and representatives of Glenfield Hospital in Leicester, England reported to the press that Vanellope has survived three weeks after being born with her heart outside her chest, a rare birth defect known as ectopia cordis. She has been operated on three times, initially less than an hour after her birth on November 22, and will need further surgery; doctors believe she is the first baby in the United Kingdom to survive being born with the condition.

Vanellope’s parents, Naomi Findlay and Dean Wilkins, live in Bulwell, Nottinghamshire; Vanellope is Naomi’s third child. They learnt about the defect from a prenatal scan, but opted not to terminate the pregnancy. She was delivered prematurely by caesarian section by 50 people including four teams, placed in a sterile plastic bag and operated on 50 minutes later for the first of three times so far. Frances Bu’Lock, a consultant paediatric cardiologist at Glenfield, noted that unlike some cases of ectopia cordis, she does not have any heart defect or other displaced organs; at nine weeks, part of her stomach also protruded, but by sixteen weeks, only her heart was affected. Dr. Bu’Lock had originally told her parents she had only a “remote” chance of surviving.

Ectopia cordis is very rare and reportedly occurs in fewer than eight of every million babies born alive. It usually leads to a stillbirth when the pregnancy is not terminated, and with the likelihood of other associated congenital defects, plus the risk of infection, Vanellope’s survival is very unusual. Dr. Martin Ward-Platt, a member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, stated “we wouldn’t expect a case like this to happen in the UK more often than once every five to 10 years.”

Her mother said they called her Vanellope after a character in the Disney film Wreck-It Ralph because she was born with “a glitch”.

Friday, September 9, 2005

New Orleans, Louisiana —After Category 4 storm Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans, on the night before August 29, 2005, several flood control constructions failed. Much of the city flooded through the openings. One of these was the flood wall forming one side of the 17th Street Canal, near Lake Pontchartrain. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is the primary agency for engineering support during such emergencies. A USACE team was assessing the situation in New Orleans on the 29th, water flow was stopped September 2nd, and the breach was closed on September 5th.

Wednesday, July 21, 2021

A week-long lockdown began at midnight yesterday in the City of Orange, Blayney Shire, and Cabonne Shire local government areas in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, after a local resident was infected with COVID-19 by a truck driver at the Nestlé Purina PetCare food factory in Blayney, which the driver had visited daily from July 13 to 16.

The decision to go into lockdown follows what ABC News described as a “crisis cabinet meeting” of the New South Wales government. Under the new regulations, residents of the three areas will only be permitted to leave their homes for “essential” reasons. Shops, schools, and construction are remaining open. Five sites in Orange have been listed as exposure venues, and people who visited one or more are advised by NSW Health to get tested for the coronavirus and to self-isolate for two weeks.

A lockdown in the Greater Sydney area, including the Blue Mountains, Wollongong, Shellharbour, and Central Coast, has been ongoing since June 26 due to an outbreak of the Delta variant of COVID-19. New South Wales yesterday recorded 78 new cases of COVID-19. The Western NSW Local Health District has put hospitals on red alert, limiting visits.

Thursday, July 7, 2005

A Florida man is being charged with 3rd degree felony for logging into a private Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) Internet access point without permission. Benjamin Smith III, 41, is set for a pre-trial hearing this month in the first case of its kind in the United States.

This kind of activity occurs frequently, but often goes undetected by the owners of these wireless access points (WAPs). Unauthorized users range from casual Web browsers, to users sending e-mails, to users involved in pornography or even illegal endeavours.

According to Richard Dinon, owner of the WAP Smith allegedly broke into, Smith was using a laptop in an automobile while parked outside Dinon’s residence.

There are many steps an owner of one of these access points can take to secure them from outside users. Dinon reportedly knew how to take these steps, but had not bothered because his “neighbors are older.”

Wednesday, June 2, 2010File:IPad-02.jpg

Jetstar Airways, a Qantas owned Australian low-cost airline, has announced plans to trial Apple iPads as an in-flight entertainment option. This trial would make Jetstar one of the first airlines in the world to offer the iPad.

Starting later this month, Jetstar plans to begin a two-week trial, during which passengers will have the option to rent iPads for AU$10 on domestic flights longer than an hour. Thirty iPads would be available on each test plane. These devices would be preloaded with games, e-books, music and video content. Internet access however will be disabled as per Jetstar’s policy on internet connected devices, said spokeswoman Andrea Wait.

The iPads offered by Jetstar, will be specially customized by Bluebox Avionics. Bluebox Avionics, at present, is the only company to offer iPads as part of an in-flight entertainment system. Jetstar will be the first to offer the Bluebox Avionics iPad based systems, though, Bluebox Avionics has said the system will be available to other airlines soon.

Shortly following the initial release of the iPad, Jetstar chief information officer Stephen Tame speculated that the iPad “may lead in the future the end of airline in-flight entertainment systems”. Depending on the results of the trial, iPads may replace existing Jetstar in-flight entertainment systems.

Jetstar chief executive Bruce Buchanan said he expected the iPads to be very popular during the trial. If the trial is successful, the airline would “be looking to roll out the devices across our entire domestic and international network later in the year”, said Buchanan.

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Northrop Grumman and Airbus parent company European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company EADS N.V. (EADS) have unexpectedly defeated Boeing for a US$40 billion (GB£20.1 billion) contract to supply the United States Air Force (USAF) with 179 new aerial refueling tankers at a rate of 15 a year.

It is the biggest contract of its kind since the Joint Strike Fighter program. That contract was fought for between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, Lockheed ultimately winning the contest.

JSA Research defence analysist Paul Nesbit said that Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul (MRO) operations across the aircraft’s fifty-year service life could push the value of the contract as high as US$100 billion. Northrop Grumman CEO Ron Sugar said in an interview “Everyone told us we were crazy, that we had no chance. But we took a big swing and in this case, we hit a home run.”

USAF officials said that the contract had been awarded based on competence, track record and competitive pricing, with UBS analyst David Strauss saying “The key decision was the amount of fuel the bigger plane could carry. In the armed services, you can never have too much gas in the air.” USAF also denied that creating jobs in the US was a factor; job supply had been the reason Boeing were expected to win, with the airframer promising 44,000 new positions at 300 suppliers in 40 states.

The Northrop Grumman KC-45 tankers – more often known as KC-30s – are based on the Airbus A330 MRTT. The first four aircraft will be assembled at the main Airbus factory in Toulouse, France but by 2010-11 production of the remainder will be carried out at a facility in Mobile, Alabama. This is thought likely to create 1,500 to 2,000 jobs and support 25,000 others. 60% of the parts will be supplied by domestic manufacturers. EADS had previously announced plans to shift much production to the US due to the current weakness of the dollar.

General Arthur Lichte, head of USAF’s Mobility Command, said it is hoped the first aircraft can be tested in 2010 and in operation three years afterwards. USAF’s chief of staff General Duncan McNab stated “The tanker is the number-one procurement priority for us right now. It is the first step in our critical commitment to recapitalize our aging fleet to move, supply, and position assets anywhere.”

There is still a possibility of Boeing challenging the decision; Boeing themselves were successfuly challenged by Lockheed and Sikorsky in 2006 over a US$10 billion contract to supply search and rescue helicopters to the Pentagon. A statement by Boeing given by Boeing spokesman William Barksdale said “Obviously we are very disappointed… Once we have reviewed the details behind the award, we will make a decision concerning our possible options.”

Washington senator Patty Murray, who hails from the same state where Boeing bases their commercial airliner operations, said in a critical statement “We are shocked that the Air Force tapped a European company and its foreign workers to provide a tanker to our American military. At a time when our economy is hurting, this decision to outsource our tankers is a blow to the American aerospace industry, American workers and America’s military.”

Washington representative Norm Dicks said he too was “shocked”, releasing a statement saying “This decision is even more disappointing because the Air Force had previously favored the Boeing 767 tanker and we were prepared to move forward with the production of 100 tankers in 2003, before the process was halted due to the Boeing scandal. I regret that it has taken so long to respond to what was—and is—an urgent need to replace these older aircraft. And even more regrettable is the decision to award the contract to Airbus, which has consistently used unfair European government subsidies to take jobs away from American aircraft workers.”

Kansas senator Sam Brownback said “It’s stunning to me that we would outsource the production of these airplanes to Europe instead of building them in America. I’ll be calling upon the Secretary of Defense for a full debriefing and expect there will be a protest of the award by Boeing.” Todd Tiahrt, a Kansas representative, said “We should have an American tanker built by an American company with American workers. I cannot believe we would create French jobs in place of Kansas jobs.”

A group of Washington politicians released a joint statement saying “We will be asking tough questions about the decision to outsource this contract… At a time when our economy is hurting, this is a blow not only to our state, but more than 40 states across the country who would help build this national plane.”

Alabama Governor Bob Riley said “To say this is a great day for Alabama is a monumental understatement. This will go down in history as one of our greatest days.” Ralph Crosby, EADS’s North America CEO and ex Northrop executive commented the business has “committed our full resources to support this vital program for our prime contractor, Northrop Grumman, the Air Force, and the war fighters that this system will serve for decades to come. We already have begun the work necessary to expand our U.S. industrial footprint in support of this important program.”

EADS chief executive Louis Gallois commented “This major selection is a win-win for our customers, for allied industrial cooperation and for EADS. It signals a quantum-leap forward in our commitment to the US defence customer, reflects and supports our global strategy to increase EADS’s industrial presence in key markets and our goal to balance the company’s defence and commercial portfolios.” General Arthur Lichte said “This will be an American tanker, flown by American airmen with an American flag on its tail and, every day, it will be saving American lives.

Boeing had initially agreed to lease 100 tankers, but in 2003 a scandal erupted when it emerged that Boeing executive Michael M. Sears arranged a job for USAF official Darleen Druyun while negotiations were still underway. Both served jail sentences for corruption charges and a competition was opened up to award a new contract.