KAZAKHSTAN
Crew docks with ISS
A Russian rocket carrying a multinational crew yesterday successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS) less than six hours after the launch, NASA television showed. The Soyuz TMA 17M carrying Oleg Kononenko of Russia, Kjell Lindgren of the US and Kimiya Yui of Japan roared skyward from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the barren Kazakh steppe at 9:02pm GMT on Wednesday. After a flyaround at about 350m, the rocket maneuvered to rendezvous with the ISS at 2:46am GMT yesterday. “We have contact,” a NASA announcer said, as the craft soared high above the coast of Ecuador, 402km above the Pacific. One solar array did not deploy on time, but this did not affect the rocket’s flight, as the others were still operating, NASA said.
UNITED STATES
Cosby lawsuit bid fails
Bill Cosby lost his latest bid to fend off a lawsuit accusing him of sexually abusing a 15-year-old girl at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles in 1974, as the California Supreme Court on Wednesday denied the comedian’s petition to review the case. The accuser’s attorney, Gloria Allred, said the decision cleared the way for litigation brought by Judy Huth, now in her 50s, to proceed, and that she intended to take Cosby’s sworn deposition within the next 30 days. There was no immediate response from Cosby or his lawyers, who have consistently denied allegations of sexual misconduct.
UNITED STATES
Cyclist waits on new bike
A 254kg man biking across the nation to lose weight hit a snag in Rhode Island. The Newport Daily News reported that a bent rim on Eric Hites’ bicycle has kept him in Tiverton since late last week, 145km from where his ride began in Falmouth, Massachusetts. Newport Bicycle is outfitting Hites with a new bike that can withstand his weight. In two weeks on the road, the 40-year-old says he has lost 27kg. Hites says he has always been a big person. He hopes to lose lots of weight and gather material for a second book. He previously authored a humorous cookbook entitled Everybody Loves Ramen, which includes 50 recipes he developed in college.
UNITED STATES
Teacher pleads brain defect
The attorney for a New Jersey high-school teacher accused of having sex with six male students said she has a brain condition that left her defenseless to the students’ aggressive behavior. Nicole DuFault of Caldwell pleaded not guilty in April to aggravated sexual assault and child endangerment charges. Her attorney, Timothy Smith, told NJ.com that the 36-year-old teacher suffers from “frontal lobe syndrome,” a condition that experts say is associated with socially inappropriate behavior. It also leaves people unable to control impulses, among other symptoms.
UNITED STATES
Teens sex rate drops
The ratio of teenagers who have had sex has dropped significantly over the past quarter-century, with less than half of 15 to 19-year-olds reporting they had a sexual experience, the National Center for Health Statistics said on Wednesday. Fourty-four percent of never-married females in that age group reported having had sex at least once, down from 58 percent, who said they had done so in a survey released in 1988, data showed. The prevalence of sexual activity among teen males also dropped to 47 percent from 69 percent over the same period. The center’s National Survey of Family Growth surveyed 1,037 female and 1,088 male teenagers from 2011 to 2013.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion