Passengers on an American Airlines flight that was stuck on the tarmac in Austin for nearly 10 hours last month are pushing for a national Passengers Bill of Rights to protect traveling consumers. The proposal would require airlines to return passengers to terminal gates after three hours on the tarmac. It would also impose penalties on airlines for losing baggage and bumping passengers, and create a consumer committee to review and investigate complaints. The measure doesn’t yet have a backer in Congress. But it comes as lawmakers are increasing their scrutiny of the industry, with a hearing scheduled for today before the Senate Commerce Committee on the impact of airline mergers and consolidation. Heavy passenger loads during the past year have accompanied increased delays and complaints, according to the U.S. Transportation Department. ‘Enough is enough,’ said Kate Hanni, a Napa, Calif., resident who was stuck with her husband on American Flight 1348 in Austin for nearly 10 hours Dec. 29 during a trip from San Francisco to Mobile, Ala. Her flight was supposed to land at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport for a connection, but heavy thunderstorms diverted the plane to Austin. ‘Never again should anyone be […]
Children in homes full of books and educational games are less likely to get spanked, new research shows. Recent studies have found that corporal punishment can cause significant antisocial behavioral, such as lying, cheating, and hitting, in children as they grow older. So Andrew Grogan-Kaylor of the University of Michigan and his colleague Melanie D. Otis of the University of Kentucky wanted to find out what factors, independent of others, predict whether or not a parent is likely to ‘spare the rod.’ Their analysis of answers from 800 respondents on questions about their use of corporal punishment as well as many other family issues arrived at the intellectual stimulation factor. ‘This is a little bit surprising for parenting researchers that cognitive or intellectual stuff would cross over into behavioral stuff,’ Grogan-Kaylor told LiveScience. ‘Real people may know this altogether, but researchers have tended to separate the two areas.’ Hard Facts Other studies have shown that: More than 90 percent of parents of toddlers say they have spanked their child at least once. About 61 percent of mothers of 3- to 5-year-olds had spanked their child in the past week. Boys […]
The military calls its new weapon an ‘active denial system,’ but that’s an understatement. It’s a ray gun that shoots a beam that makes people feel as if they are about to catch fire. Apart from causing that terrifying sensation, the technology is supposed to be harmless – a non-lethal way to get enemies to drop their weapons. Military officials say it could save the lives of innocent civilians and service members in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. The weapon is not expected to go into production until at least 2010, but all branches of the military have expressed interest in it, officials said. During the first media demonstration of the weapon yesterday, airmen fired beams from a large dish antenna mounted atop a Humvee at people pretending to be rioters and acting out other scenarios that US troops might encounter in war zones. The device’s two-man crew located their targets through powerful lenses and fired beams from 500 metres away. That is nearly 17 times the range of existing non-lethal weapons, such as rubber bullets. Anyone hit by the beam immediately jumped out of its path because of the sudden blast of heat […]
WASHINGTON — Two minutes in the microwave can sterilize most household sponges, U.S. researchers reported on Monday. A team of engineering researchers at the University of Florida found that two minutes of microwaving on full power mode killed or inactivated more than 99 percent of bacteria, viruses or parasites, as well as spores, on a kitchen sponge. ‘People often put their sponges and scrubbers in the dishwasher, but if they really want to decontaminate them and not just clean them, they should use the microwave,’ said Gabriel Bitton, a professor of environmental engineering who led the study. ‘To guard against the risk of fire, people who wish to sterilize their sponges at home must ensure the sponge is completely wet,’ Bitton’s team wrote in an advisory. ‘Two minutes of microwaving is sufficient for most sterilization. Sponges should also have no metallic content. Last, people should be careful when removing the sponge from the microwave as it will be hot.’ Writing in the Journal of Environmental Health, Bitton and colleagues said they soaked sponges and scrubbing pads in raw wastewater containing fecal bacteria such as E. coli, viruses, protozoan parasites and bacterial spores. Then they […]
WINTON — All around this struggling farm town, chicken houses stand in the fields as a testament to the way many here earn their living — raising, slaughtering and processing chickens. It is an unlikely locale for an unlikely criminal case. Today, two employees of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a radical animal-rights group that opposes meat-eating, are on trial for the strangest of charges: killing animals. PETA is based in Norfolk, Va., but its work has international scope. The group, which raises more than $25 million a year from 1.6 million supporters, opposes any human use of animals, whether for food, fashion or research. In the more than two decades since its founding, it has become a major threat to medical researchers, meatpackers, fur sellers and others. Now, two of its employees stand accused of tossing garbage bags full of euthanized cats and dogs into a Dumpster behind a Piggly Wiggly in Hertford County, 130 miles northeast of Raleigh. Adria J. Hinkle and Andrew B. Cook, both of whom work in PETA’s Norfolk office, are charged with 21 counts each of animal cruelty, a felony that can carry prison time, along with littering […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
