■VENEZUELA
Chavez to ‘zap’ clouds
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez says he will join a team of Cuban scientists on flights to “bomb clouds” to create rain amid a severe drought that has aroused public anger because of water and electricity rationing. Chavez, who has asked Venezuelans to take three-minute showers to save water, said the Cubans had arrived in Venezuela and were preparing to fly specially equipped aircraft above the Orinoco River. “I’m going in a plane; any cloud that crosses me, I’ll zap it so that it rains,” Chavez said at a ceremony late on Saturday with family members of five Cubans convicted of spying in the US. Many countries have programs aimed at altering weather patterns, commonly known as cloud seeding, although the effectiveness of such techniques is disputed. Firing silver iodine at clouds is one common method.
■UNITED STATES
Hudson pilot criticizes book
The pilot who guided his disabled plane to a safe emergency landing in the Hudson River said that a new book that underscores the role of the jet’s automation technology in the landing was inaccurate. Captain Chesley Sullenberger told the New York Times on Sunday that the book Fly By Wire by William Langewiesche “greatly overstates how much it mattered” that the Airbus A320 featured an automated cockpit. Sullenberger ditched US Airways Flight 1549 on Jan. 15 when geese strikes killed the power in the jet’s engines. All 155 on board survived. He said the outcome would have been the same without the automation.
■UNITED STATES
Books finally returned
A high school librarian in Phoenix said a former student at the Arizona school returned two overdue books checked out 51 years ago along with a US$1,000 money order to cover the fines. Camelback High School librarian Georgette Bordine said the two Audubon Society books checked out in 1959 and the money order were sent by someone who wanted to remain anonymous. Bordine said the letter explained that the borrower’s family moved to another state and the books were mistakenly packed. The letter said the money order was to cover fines of US$0.02 per day for each book. That would total about US$745. The letter said the extra money was added in case the rates had changed.
■NICARAGUA
Police seize weapons cache
Police on Sunday seized a large cache of weapons and explosives from suspected members of Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel after a police car chase outside Managua, a spokeswoman said. The weapons included 61 automatic rifles, mostly AK-47s and four M-16s, two grenade launchers, 10 hand grenades, 20 sticks of dynamite and more than 19,000 rounds of ammunition, Vilma Reyes told a press briefing. They were found inside a car the suspected drug traffickers fled from after being chased by police on a highway outside Managua, she said.
■UNITED STATES
Director Wendkos dies at 84
Paul Wendkos, who directed more than 100 films and television shows during a 50-year career, including the 1959 surf movie Gidget, has died. He was 84. Family spokeswoman Christie Craig said Wendkos died on Thursday in Malibu of a lung infection that followed a stroke. Gidget, starring Sandra Dee as an all-American surfer girl, was a hit and led to two sequels for Wendkos. For television, he directed series such as The Rifleman and Hawaii Five-O.
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