Endeavour Readied for VAB Trip

10:14 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

In Orbiter Processing Facility-2 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians are halfway complete with a three-day leak test on space shuttle Endeavour's environmental control and life support system, as well as structural leak tests.

The shuttle's move, also known as rollover, to the Vehicle Assembly Building is scheduled for Dec. 12. Once inside, the Endeavour will be hoisted and then lowered onto the waiting mobile launcher platform where the massive external fuel tank and solid rocket boosters stand ready.

Today, the six STS-130 astronauts are studying flight procedures at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Shuttle Endeavour, with its payload of the Tranquility node and the seven-windowed Cupola module, is targeted to launch Feb. 4, 2010.

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Lung Cancer's Racial Gap Narrowing

10:11 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

cigaretteEfforts to prevent teens from smoking have helped narrow the racial disparity in lung cancer incidence and death rates among adults in the United States, researchers say.

Smoking causes most lung cancer cases in the United States. Lung cancer cases have been consistently higher in blacks than in whites at all ages. Since the 1970s, programs to reduce smoking by teens have proven highly effective.

In the new study, researchers analyzed 1992-2006 data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Cancer Institute and found that lung cancer death rates among men decreased by 7.9 percent per year in blacks and 3.6 percent per year in whites. Among women, lung cancer death rates decreased by 4.8 percent per year in blacks and 1.9 percent per year in whites.


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AU condemns killing of Somali ministers

10:04 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

The killed Somali ministers include Qamar Aden Ali, the country's health minister, Ahmed Abdulahi Waayeel, the minister of education, and Ibrahim Hassan Addow, the minister of higher education.

Dubai-based Al Arabiya Television said one of its cameramen, Hasan al-Zubair, had been killed while Shabelle Media has already reported that its journalist Mohamed Amin Adan shabelle was killed in the event as well.

Islamists are fighting the UN-backed government, which controls small pockets of territory in the country.

Somalia's President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmad described the attack as a national disaster.


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Alcohol rehab numbers outstrip hard drugs

9:58 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

ALCOHOL has again outstripped illicit drugs like heroin and ice as the number one reason for admissions at a major Australian rehab service.

Problem drinking topped Odyssey House's 2009 admission list, because 26 per cent of those seeking care over the year named it as their "principal drug of concern".

It was fractionally down from the 29 per cent of Odyssey House admissions last year, and 28 per cent in 2007, but it still headed the list for the third year running.

Alcohol has done so since 2007 - when Odyssey House's drinking-related admissions exceeded those for illicit drugs for the first time in 30 years.


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Body found in New Brighton

9:47 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

police-carChristchurch police say they found the body of a man in South Brighton on Thursday afternoon.

Detective Senior Sergeant Virginia Le Bas says she was unable to prove the man was Peter Graham, 51, a tourism operator missing from his Christchurch home since Sunday, or if there had been any foul play involved.

"We're just going through our investigations and should know more after a post mortem tomorrow," she told NZPA tonight.

Graham had not contacted family or friends since the weekend and those who knew him described this as out of character.

The body was found in Blighs Gardens, South Brighton.


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Lawyer for woman who denied Woods affair to discuss allegations

9:38 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

tiger-woodsA woman who denied having an affair with Tiger Woods will hold a news conference with her lawyer Thursday, a day after the golfer apologized for his "transgressions."

Attorney Gloria Allred said she will make a statement about Rachel Uchitel's relationship with Woods. Allred said Uchitel will attend the 11:30 a.m. PT (2:30 p.m. ET) news conference but will not speak.

The statement follows an apology by Woods on Wednesday for "transgressions" that let his family down - the same day US Weekly magazine alleged that Woods had an affair with another woman, Jaimee Grubbs, 24, whom it identified as a cocktail waitress.

The magazine also published what it says is a voicemail message from Woods to Grubbs.


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ABC cancels another Adam Lambert performance

9:30 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

adam-lambertAs far as ABC is concerned, the controversy surrounding Adam Lambert still hasn't cooled down enough for him to be handled. For the second time, the network has cancelled an appearance by the onetime American Idol favorite.

"Yes, sadly friends, ABC has canceled my appearances on Kimmel and NYE," Lambert, 27, wrote on his Twitter account. ":( don't blame them. It's the FCC heat."

The singer's racy American Music Awards performance earned the FCC and the network thousands of complaints from viewers who thought his homoerotic gyrations inappropriate for TV.

ABC quickly nixed an appearance on "Good Morning America," saying his stage style was not suited for a morning show - a move Lambert took in good humor.


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Climate change threatens life in Shishmaref, Alaska

9:22 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

coupleWhen the arctic winds howl and angry waves pummel the shore of this Inupiat Eskimo village, Shelton and Clara Kokeok fear that their house, already at the edge of the Earth, finally may plunge into the gray sea below.

"The land is going away," said Shelton Kokeok, 65, whose home is on the tip of a bluff that's been melting in part because of climate change. "I think it's going to vanish one of these days."

Coastal erosion has been an issue for decades here, but rising global temperatures have started to thaw the permafrost that once helped anchor this village in place. Sea ice that protects Shishmaref's coast from erosion melts earlier in the spring and forms later in the fall. As a result, the increasingly mushy and exposed soil along Shishmaref's shore is falling into the water in snowmobile-sized chunks.


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25 years on, Bhopal still suffers from gas leak tragedy

8:27 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

Bhopal-disasterT.R. Chouhan walked solemnly through the rusted remains of the Union Carbide pesticide factory in Bhopal, India. "I come here frequently," he said. "We used to work here, and now this is the condition of the plant. So it feels really bad."

Chouhan was a 10-year veteran employee of the plant when disaster struck 25 years ago. Shortly after midnight on December 3, 1984, a cloud of methyl isocyanate gas wafted into the Bhopal atmosphere. Outside the factory's concrete walls, quiet neighborhoods quickly became chaotic.

"Everybody started screaming, 'There's a gas leak, there's a gas leak!' So we started running," recalled Bhopal resident Bashiran Bi.


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Italy plans to deploy 1,000 more troops to Afghanistan

7:47 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

italy-troopsThe Italian government plans to participate in the international troop buildup in Afghanistan by sending 1,000 more troops there next year.

The Italian Defense Ministry confirmed the troops would be deployed in the second half of 2010, a complement to the nearly 2,800 Italians already in the western part of the country.

Italy is one of 43 countries serving under the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

Based in Herat, the Italian military is the lead nation in ISAF's Regional Command West. 22 Italian service members have been killed in the Afghan conflict.


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Huckabee defends clemency decision for cop shooting suspect

6:45 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

huckabeeFormer Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said he was aware of Maurice Clemmons' long and violent criminal history when he commuted his 108-year prison sentence, but he couldn't have foreseen the deadly consequence of his act.

"You're looking at this nine years later and trying to make something as if I can look into the future," Huckabee said Wednesday before a speech at Jacksonville University.

"I wish I could have. Good Lord, I wish I had that power. I wish I could have done that. But I don't know how anyone can do it," he said.

Police fatally shot Clemmons, 37, on Tuesday in Seattle, Washington, after a two-day manhunt that began after he allegedly killed four officers at a coffee shop.


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Endeavour, Crew Prep for STS-130 On-going

9:36 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

Technicians in Orbiter Processing Facility-2 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida are preparing space shuttle Endeavour for its move to the Vehicle Assembly Building on Dec. 12.

Throughout the next three days, they'll leak test Endeavour's environmental control and life support system. Techs also are testing the space shuttle main engine and aerosurface hydraulics, as well as testing and calibrating the Inertial Measurement Units, or IMUs, which provide navigational information for the shuttle while it's in orbit.

Meanwhile, Endeavour's STS-130 astronauts ‪are practicing an integrated launch simulation today at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.


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In Women, Aspirin Might Ward Off Eye Trouble

8:51 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

eyeWomen who take low-dose aspirin to protect their heart might be helping their eyes as well.

A new study by Harvard University researchers found what they described as a modest benefit for aspirin in preventing age-related macular degeneration (AMD), an eye disease that destroys sharp, central vision.

"The data indicate that long-term treatment with low-dose aspirin has no large beneficial or harmful effect on risk of AMD," said the study's lead researcher, Dr. William G. Christen, an epidemiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

"But, the data could not rule out a possible modest benefit," he said.


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Tunisia: Another journalist jailed

8:43 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

jailed-journalistZouhair Makhlouf, the editor of El-Mawkif, an opposition daily for the Progressist Democratic Party, was arrested on October 21 and charged for a video report he made on the state of the environment in the industrial zone of Nabeul in northeast Tunisia, AFP said.

The complaint was filed by a craftsman who was questioned for the report and who accused the journalist of breaking the law on publishing photos without consent.

The court upheld the complaint that the photos were illegal and published in conditions offensive to the plaintiff's dignity.

Makhlouf was also ordered to pay 6,000 dinars (3,100 euros) in damages.


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Barnaby Joyce looking for lower house move

8:26 AM / Posted by Megaan / comments (0)

Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce wants to move to the lower house if his new boss Tony Abbott promotes him to the coalition frontbench.

The newly installed opposition leader on Wednesday said he would like Senator Joyce to be a part of his frontbench team and was considering his options.

Senator Joyce said he was all for the promotion.

"I'm strongly considering it and that means I'm more than likely to do it,'' he told ABC TV.

"It's not really a decision for me, it's a final announcement for Tony.''
Senator Joyce said if the appointment was confirmed, he'd be looking to move to the House of Representatives.


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