UNITED STATES
Rocket motors arrive in LA
Two giant rocket motors required to display the retired NASA space shuttle Endeavour as if it is about to blast off arrived at a Los Angeles museum on Wednesday, completing their long journey from the Mojave Desert. The 35.3m motors, which are giant white cylinders, were trucked for two days from the Mojave Air and Space Port to Exposition Park, where the California Science Center’s Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center is being built to display the Endeavour. Donated by Northrop Grumman, the motors are the largest components of the two solid rocket boosters that would be attached to a space shuttle’s external tank to help the main engines lift the orbiter off the launch pad. Schoolchildren were among several hundred people who watched the move — the latest spectacle in the yearslong process of preparing to put Endeavour on permanent display vertically as if it was about to blast off.
UNITED STATES
Officer loses finger to bite
A New York City police officer lost his left ring finger up to the first knuckle when a reckless driving suspect bit him, prosecutors said on Wednesday. Lenni Rodriguez Cruz, 28, faces 25 years in prison for leading police on a car chase, crashing into several vehicles and biting a sergeant who was trying to put him in a holding cell, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said. On Sept. 20, an officer patrolling in the Jamaica section of Queens spotted Rodriguez Cruz driving a car with license plates that were not registered to the vehicle, Katz said in a news release. The officer tried to pull Rodriguez Cruz over, but he sped off, mounted a sidewalk and drove through a park, scattering parkgoers as they ran to safety, Katz said. Rodriguez Cruz kept driving and hit four vehicles, including an unmarked police car that was part of a barricade set up to stop him, Katz said. When officers pulled Rodriguez Cruz out of his crashed car, his breath smelled of alcohol, his speech was slurred and there was a cup containing an alcoholic beverage inside the car, Katz said. Officers took Rodriguez Cruz to the local police station, where he spit on the sergeant and bit the sergeant’s finger tip off, Katz said.
UNITED STATES
Man gives back cash
A Connecticut man who found a bag containing nearly US$5,000 in cash outside a bank had a criminal charge against him dropped on Wednesday after he gave the money back. Robert Withington, 57, went to Bridgeport Superior Court for a court hearing, but a state prosecutor informed Withington’s lawyer the charge was being dropped. Withington found the bag with US$4,761 on May 30 outside a bank in his hometown of Trumbull. It belonged to the Trumbull tax collector’s office, and a town employee had dropped the bag while walking to the bank to deposit the money, police said. A police officer had escorted the town employee to the bank, but neither noticed the bag being dropped, police said. Withington, a dog trainer, picked up the bag and drove off, police said. He was identified through surveillance video and arrested on Aug. 25. Before Wednesday’s court appearance, Withington had given the town a check in the amount of the missing money. Withington said that he did not do anything wrong. “They dropped the money. Someone from the town should be fired for being so irresponsible, but I did nothing wrong,” Withington said in a telephone interview. “I just found a money bag. It was just a big joke. They wasted my time. They slandered my name. It was very upsetting.”
‘TERRORIST ATTACK’: The convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri resulted in the ‘martyrdom of five of our armed forces,’ the Presidential Leadership Council said A blast targeting the convoy of a Saudi Arabian-backed armed group killed five in Yemen’s southern city of Aden and injured the commander of the government-allied unit, officials said on Wednesday. “The treacherous terrorist attack targeting the convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri, commander of the Second Giants Brigade, resulted in the martyrdom of five of our armed forces heroes and the injury of three others,” Yemen’s Saudi Arabia-backed Presidential Leadership Council said in a statement published by Yemeni news agency Saba. A security source told reporters that a car bomb on the side of the road in the Ja’awla area in
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
Yemen’s separatist leader has vowed to keep working for an independent state in the country’s south, in his first social media post since he disappeared earlier this month after his group briefly seized swathes of territory. Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) forces last month captured two Yemeni provinces in an offensive that was rolled back by Saudi strikes and Riyadh’s allied forces on the ground. Al-Zubaidi then disappeared after he failed to board a flight to Riyadh for talks earlier this month, with Saudi Arabia accusing him of fleeing to Abu Dhabi, while supporters insisted he was
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday announced a deal with the chief of Kurdish-led forces that includes a ceasefire, after government troops advanced across Kurdish-held areas of the country’s north and east. Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said he had agreed to the deal to avoid a broader war. He made the decision after deadly clashes in the Syrian city of Raqa on Sunday between Kurdish-led forces and local fighters loyal to Damascus, and fighting this month between the Kurds and government forces. The agreement would also see the Kurdish administration and forces integrate into the state after months of stalled negotiations on
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