Flight Over Baffin Island...[ 3084 ]

Ice Bridge Flight Over Baffin Island

Ice Bridge closed out the fourth week of its Arctic campaign with a flight over the striking landscape of eastern Greenland's Geikie Peninsula and a survey of a Canadian ice cap before taking two days off over the weekend. Soon the mission will return to Thule to finish up Arctic flights for 2013.

The morning of April 12, 2013 saw the P-3B take off for a flight to the west, across the Davis Strait to Canada's Baffin Island. 
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This island, the largest one in Canada, is home to an ice formation known as the Penny Ice Cap. This mission was a repeat of airborne surveys by the ATM and radar teams flown in 1995, 2000 and 2005, and added new survey lines along ICESat ground tracks. 
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Previous airborne surveys showed the ice cap thinning and glaciers retreating in the area and the April 12 mission aimed at measuring several glaciers in the area to see how much the Penny Ice Cap has melted in recent years.

The image captures ice covered fjord on Baffin Island with Davis Strait in the background.
Image Credit: NASA/Michael Studinger

The Boston explosions ..[ 3083 ]

Pakistan Taliban deny involvement with Boston explosions

Andrew Buncombe //Tuesday 16 April 2013

The Pakistan Taliban, which claimed responsibility for a 2010 bomb plot in New York, has denied involvement in the Boston marathon attack.

A spokesman for the militant outfit said that while it supported attacks on the US and other nations, it was not behind Monday's assault that killed three people and left more than 140 injured.'

"We believe in attacking US and its allies but we are not involved in this attack," a spokesman for the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP, Ehsanullah Ehsan, told the AFP.
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Speaking from an undisclosed location, he added: "We have no connection to this bombing but we will continue to target them wherever possible."
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In the spring of 2010, an online video apparently produced by the Taliban claimed responsibility for a failed plot to attack Times Square, though a spokesman subsequently denied it. Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad was later jailed for life for plotting the attack.
During his trial, Mr Shahzad said he had had received bomb-making training during a 40-day stay with the Pakistani Taliban. He was also shown in a video embracing Hakimullah Mehsud, commander of the TTP, who has on several occasions announced plans to attack major US cities
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Mr Shahzad said that upon his return to the US from Pakistan's tribal areas he planned the bombing and acted alone. He had left a vehicle packed with explosives in Times Square. Street vendors spotted smoke coming from the vehicle and contacted police.
"It's a war. I am part of the answer to the US terrorising the Muslim nations and the Muslim people," Shahzad later told a judge.
While reports suggest investigators in Boston are following various leads, no individual or group has claimed responsibility for the double blast.
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White House officials told reporters the attack was being treated as an act of "terrorism" though President Obama was careful not to use the word or to speculate about who may have been responsible when he spoke.
"We will find out who did this. We'll find out why they did this," he said. "Any responsible individuals, any responsible groups, will feel the full weight of justice."

N.Korean imagined strikes on U.S....[ 3082 ]

North Korean video shows imagined strikes on U.S.

Apr. 14, 2013 3:50 AM   |  

A screen grab of a North Korean propaganda video that includes animation of four nuclear strikes against the United States. U.S. government officials say North Korean missiles do not have the capability of reaching the United States. / Uriminzokkiri

by Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY

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A video released by Saturday by North Korea shows nuclear launches against the United States reaching four sites, including Washington, D.C., California, Hawaii and what the announcer describes as Colorado Springs, but which looks like Arkansas. U.S. officials were clear they did not believe the belligerent nation has missiles capable of reaching the United States.
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The video was released Saturday on Uriminzokkiri, a North Korean government web site. It has also been posted on YouTube.
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In it, each of the U.S. targets explodes into a ball of flames as the missiles strike on the map. The Colorado Springs attack is presumably because the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is located near there, as well as the U.S. Air Force Academy. However based on the map the North Koreans posted, the attack site is actually in either southern Arkansas or northern Louisiana.
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The video, typical of North Korean propaganda, is introduced by a male voiceover while a female news anchor in the traditional Korean hanbok dress reads from news headlines. The images are accompanied by synthesizer music and sounds of thunder. Further in, jarring montages of missile launches and military equipment are accompanied by what sound like 1970s power rock guitar solos. The video had more than 225,000 hits on YouTube by Saturday afternoon.
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Tensions on the Korean peninsula have been building all week. U.S. officials say that they expect North Korea to perform a missile test soon but insist that while the unpredictable government might have rudimentary nuclear capabilities, it has not proven it has a weapon that could reach the United States.
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The effort is expected to test the North's ballistic missile technologies, not a nuclear weapon, said a senior U.S. defense official who was granted anonymity by the Associated Press to discuss intelligence matters.
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The Pentagon does not plan to try to shoot down any missiles North Korea might launch unless they unexpectedly head for a U.S. or allied target, several officials said. As a precaution, the U.S. has arrayed in the Pacific a number of missile defense Navy ships, tracking radars and other elements of its worldwide network for shooting down hostile missiles.
Bruce Bennett, a Rand Corp. specialist on North Korea, said this week there is a "reasonable chance" that North Korea has short-range nuclear missile capability, but it is "very unlikely" that it has one that can reach the U.S.
Contributing: Associated Press



  North Korean video shows imagined strikes on U.S.

Space Transportation System....[ 3081 ]

First Shuttle Launch

A new era in space flight began on April 12, 1981, when Space Shuttle Columbia, or STS-1, soared into orbit from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Astronaut John Young, a veteran of four previous spaceflights including a walk on the moon in 1972, commanded the mission. Navy test pilot Bob Crippen piloted the mission and would go on to command three future shuttle missions. 

The shuttle was humankind's first re-usable spacecraft. The orbiter would launch like a rocket and land like a plane. The two solid rocket boosters that helped push them into space would also be re-used, after being recovered in the ocean. Only the massive external fuel tank would burn up as it fell back to Earth. It was all known as the Space Transportation System.

Twenty years prior to the historic launch, on April 12, 1961, the era of human spaceflight began when Russian Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit the Earth in his Vostock I spacecraft. The flight lasted 108 minutes.

Pictured here: a timed exposure of STS-1, at Launch Pad A, Complex 39, turns the space vehicle and support facilities into a night- time fantasy of light. Structures to the left of the shuttle are the fixed and the rotating service structure.

Image Credit: NASA

North Korea...[ 3080 ]

Nicholas Kristof on North Korea

Piers Morgan|Added on April 10, 2013"The New York Times" Nicholas Kristof gives his analysis of the situation in North Korea, and the potential for violence.
.( Video )