New Delhi’s half-marathon race yesterday used ultra-high frequency (UHF) radio waves to clear the air for the runners, an experimental technique the organizers hope could improve the city’s notorious air quality.
India is home to the world’s 14 most-polluted cities. Last year, the smoke from burning crop waste and thousands of firecrackers contributed to a toxic smog that blanketed the capital, New Delhi, and a large part of northern India.
New Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said the city would face the same fate this year if Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party did not do more to combat pollution.
Photo: Reuters
After medical experts urged the canceling of last year’s race, marathon organizers responded by bringing the race date forward to October, away from November’s Diwali festival when the firecrackers are set off.
They also tried to dampen down the dust that hangs over the city in winter, including reagents from the mining industry to treat roads, dropping water vapor along the course from a height of 6m.
The techniques also included using the UHF waves to dispel pollution from particulate matter measuring 2.5 micrometers or smaller, known as PM2.5, whose small size allows it to lodge deep in the lungs, damaging the respiratory system.
“It was a great day with clear skies and no pollution-related incidents among our 35,000 runners,” Vivek Singh, a managing director of race promoter Procam International, told reporters.
He said the Delhi government, which last year resorted to shutting power stations and banning some cars from roads to clear the air, should look at using the UHF technology, manufactured by Bengaluru-based company Devic Earth, to mitigate pollution.
“We have shown that it works and made a point to tell the authorities,” he added.
Amateur runner Pranav Patil said the air appeared clearer than last year, when competitors complained of burning eyes and sore throats.
“Today was better. My friends and I were happy, we ran hard and enjoyed the run,” the 26-year-old said.
“I did doubt signing up, but it was just the usual morning haze, and didn’t feel hard to run in,” said Emily Jackson, a British carbon market analyst living in New Delhi who competed in the race for the first time. “I only saw one person with a mask.”
Others were more cautious.
“Pollution is always there in Delhi. I think everybody should wear a mask,” said Neeraj Chhibba, who jogged along in a mask.
Singh said the measures had reduced pollution by at least 30 percent during the race, although readings from air quality at monitoring stations near the route were still rated as “very unhealthy” under international standards.
The US embassy Web site showed that levels of the smallest and most harmful airborne pollutants reached 199 at race time — eight times the WHO’s safe maximum.
The women’s race was won by Ethiopian Tsehay Gemechu in a course-record time of 1:06:50, while teenage compatriot Andamalak Belihu finished first in the men’s race with a time of 59:18.
Some say that the third time’s a charm. Not so for SpaceX, whose unmanned rocket on Wednesday exploded on the ground after carrying out what had seemed to be a successful flight and landing — fresh on the heels of two fiery crashes. It was yet another flub involving a prototype of the Starship rocket, which SpaceX hopes one day to send to Mars. “A beautiful soft landing,” a SpaceX commentator said on a live broadcast of the test flight, although flames were coming out at the bottom and crews were trying to put them out. The rocket exploded a few minutes later,
LEGAL ORDEAL: The heavy caseload involving 47 defendants and the vagaries of a Beijing-imposed security law made it difficult for the court to rule on bail requests Dozens of Hong Kong democracy advocates charged with subversion yesterday returned to court to complete a marathon bail hearing that was adjourned overnight when four defendants were rushed to hospital after hours of legal wrangling. Police on Sunday arrested 47 of the territory’s best-known dissidents for “conspiracy to commit subversion” in the broadest use yet of a sweeping National Security Law that Beijing imposed on the territory last year. The defendants represent a broad cross-section of Hong Kong’s opposition, from veteran former pro-democracy lawmakers to academics, lawyers, social workers and youth advocates. Hundreds of supporters gathered outside a courthouse on Monday for the
China, under growing global pressure over its treatment of Uighurs in Xinjiang, is mounting an unprecedented and aggressive campaign to push back, including explicit attacks on women who have made claims of abuse. As allegations of human rights violations in Xinjiang mount, with a growing number of Western lawmakers accusing China of genocide, Beijing is focusing on discrediting the female Uighur witnesses behind reports of abuse. Chinese officials have named women, disclosed medical data and information on their fertility, and accused some of having affairs and one of having a sexually transmitted disease. Officials said that the information was evidence of bad character,
The plane laden with vaccines had just rolled to a stop at Santiago’s airport in late January and Chilean President Sebastian Pinera was beaming. “Today is a day of joy, emotion and hope,” he said. The source of that hope: China — a country that Chile and dozens of other nations are depending on to help rescue them from the COVID-19 pandemic. China’s vaccine diplomacy campaign has been a surprising success: It has pledged about 500 million doses of its vaccine to more than 45 countries, according to a country-by-country tally by The Associated Press (AP). With just four of China’s many