A hurricane-damaged Louisiana skyscraper is imploded

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A crowd watches as the Hertz Tower in Lake Charles, Louisiana, is imploded on Sept. 7, 2024. (AP)
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This aerial photo shows broken windows of the Hertz Building from Hurricane Laura days in Lake Charles, Louisiana, US, days before it was imploded on.Sept. 7, 2024. (The Advocate via AP/Pool)
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This aerial photo shows broken windows of the Hertz Building from Hurricane Laura days in Lake Charles, Louisiana, US, days before it was imploded on.Sept. 7, 2024. (The Advocate via AP/Pool)
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The Hertz Tower, that was heavily damaged after Hurricanes Laura and Delta in 2020 is seen just before it is imploded in Lake Charles, Louisiana, US, on Sept. 7, 2024. (AP)
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The Hertz Tower, that was heavily damaged after Hurricanes Laura and Delta in 2020 is seen just before it is imploded in Lake Charles, Louisiana, US, on Sept. 7, 2024. (AP)
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Updated 08 September 2024
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A hurricane-damaged Louisiana skyscraper is imploded

  • Formerly known as the Capital One Tower, the building had been a dominant feature of the city’s skyline for more than four decades
  • After a series of hurricanes ripped through southwest Louisiana in 2020, the building became an eyesore, its windows shattered and covered in shredded tarps

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana: An abandoned, 22-story building in Lake Charles, Louisiana — once an icon in the city that became a symbol of destruction from hurricanes Laura and Delta — was imploded Saturday after sitting vacant for nearly four years.
The Hertz Tower crashed down in a matter of seconds after a demolition crew set off a series of explosions inside. The tower fell in a large cloud of dust into a pile about five stories high.
The building, formerly known as the Capital One Tower, had been a dominant feature of the city’s skyline for more than four decades. However, after a series of hurricanes ripped through southwest Louisiana in 2020, the building became an eyesore, its windows shattered and covered in shredded tarps.
For years the owners of the building, the Los Angeles-based real estate firm Hertz Investment Group, promised to repair the structure once they settled with their insurance provider Zurich in court, The Advocate reported. The estimated cost of bringing the building back up to code was $167 million. Eventually, the two parties settled for an undisclosed amount.

 

The demolition was funded by $7 million in private money secured by the city. Hertz still owns the property and the future of the site is undetermined, according to the city.
Lake Charles Mayor Nic Hunter described the implosion of the building as “bittersweet.”
“I know how hard the city tried to work with several development groups to see it saved, but ultimately ... it proved to be too tall a task,” Hunter said before the implosion. He was in office during the hurricanes. “At this juncture, I am ready for a resolution. It’s been four years. It’s been long enough.”
Lake Charles, which sits on the banks of the Calcasieu River and is a two-hour drive from Houston, is home to around 80,000 residents. While the city is known for its copious amounts of festivals, bayous, casinos and its Cajun flair, it also has been labeled by the Weather Channel as America’s “most-weather battered city.”
Hurricane Delta crashed ashore in southern Louisiana in October 2020 just six weeks after Laura took a similar, destructive path onto the US Gulf Coast. At the time, Lake Charles was already reeling from damage caused by Laura, which battered roofs, claimed more than 25 lives in the region and left mud and debris filling streets.
The Hertz tower offers an example of the city’s long road to recovery following back-to-back hurricanes that inflicted an estimated $22 billion in damage, according to the National Hurricane Center.
While there are signs of rebuilding and growth in much of Lake Charles, there are still buildings that remain in disarray and residents living in the same conditions as four years ago — waiting for financial relief to rebuild their homes, looking for affordable housing after the hurricanes’ destruction exacerbated the housing crisis or stuck in court with their insurance provider to get a fair payout.


Sri Lanka carrier grounds captain after mid-air argument

Updated 15 October 2024
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Sri Lanka carrier grounds captain after mid-air argument

  • Captain clashes with the female copilot over her stepping out without arranging another crew member to accompany him in the cockpit
  • Cabin crew had to persuade the captain to let the first officer back into her seat on the Airbus A330

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s national airline grounded a captain after he locked out his female copilot when she took a toilet break during a flight from Sydney to Colombo, officials said.
Sri Lanka’s aviation regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), had initiated an investigation.
“The airline is fully cooperating with the relevant authorities, and the captain has been grounded pending the outcome of the investigation,” SriLankan Airlines said in a statement.
The captain clashed with the female copilot over her stepping out without arranging another crew member to accompany him in the cockpit, in line with standard operating procedures, an airline source said.
Cabin crew had to persuade the captain to let the first officer back into her seat on the Airbus A330.
The two-pilot aircraft landed without incident.
The cash-strapped carrier has been plagued with chronic delays and shortages of technical crew after it ran out of money to pay for refurbished engines for some of its grounded aircraft.
Successive governments have tried to sell off the debt-laden carrier.
The International Monetary Fund demanded the restructuring of loss-making state enterprises, including SriLankan airlines, when it granted Colombo a $2.9 billion bailout last year.
The bailout came after the South Asian island defaulted on its $46 billion external debt in April 2022 as it faced an unprecedented shortage of foreign exchange needed for essential imports.
With nearly 6,000 staff, SriLankan Airlines is the biggest and most expensive of the cash-haemorrhaging companies that are draining the budget.
However, analysts had warned that finding a company willing to pour money into the carrier would be immensely challenging given its history of interference, mismanagement and turbulent partnerships.


A Hong Kong zoo seeks answers after 9 monkeys die in 2 days

Updated 15 October 2024
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A Hong Kong zoo seeks answers after 9 monkeys die in 2 days

HONG KONG: Hong Kong’s oldest zoo is seeking answers in a monkey medical mystery after nine animals died in two days, including three members of a critically endangered species.
Part of the Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens has been sealed off and disinfected, and experts have been called in to conduct necropsies and toxicological tests, Hong Kong leader John Lee said in his weekly press briefing Tuesday.
Eight monkeys were found dead on Sunday, and another died Monday after unusual behavior. The deceased animals included a De Brazza’s monkey, a common squirrel monkey, four white-faced sakis and three cotton-top tamarins — a species listed as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
“Whenever we have any news, if there’s a new development, an announcement should be made as soon as possible, so that everyone can know about the facts,” Lee said.
On Monday, the government held an urgent interdepartmental meeting about the deaths. It said in a statement that another De Brazza’s monkey’s behavior and appetite were found to be unusual, requiring further observation.
But all 80 other animals in the gardens were in normal condition, it added.
Jason Baker, senior vice president of animal rights group PETA Asia, said the deaths raised concerns about a possible outbreak of a zoonotic disease such as monkeypox, which can jump from animals to humans.
“Monkeys in captivity are often exposed to pathogens that cause diseases that can be transmitted to humans, including tuberculosis, Chagas disease, cholera and MRSA,” he said in a statement.
He said the only way to ensure the well-being of animals and prevent the spread of zoonotic diseases is to stop confining them in unnatural environments.
The Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens — the oldest park in the former British colony — fully opened to the public in 1871. It is a rare urban oasis in the downtown Central district of the financial hub which returned to Chinese rule in 1997.


Boeing will lay off 10% of its employees as a strike by factory workers cripples airplane production

Updated 12 October 2024
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Boeing will lay off 10% of its employees as a strike by factory workers cripples airplane production

  • Boeing has lost more than $25 billion since the start of 2019.

Boeing plans to lay off about 10% of its workers in the coming months as it continues to lose money and tries to deal with a strike that is crippling production of the company’s best-selling airline planes.
New CEO Kelly Ortberg told staff in a memo Friday that the job cuts, which could total about 17,000 positions, will include executives, managers and employees.
The company has about 170,000 employees worldwide, many of them working in manufacturing facilities in the states of Washington and South Carolina.
Boeing had already imposed rolling temporary furloughs, but Ortberg said those will be suspended because of the impending layoffs.
The company will delay the rollout of a new plane, the 777X, to 2026 instead of 2025. It will also stop building the cargo version of its 767 jet in 2027 after finishing current orders.
Boeing has lost more than $25 billion since the start of 2019.
About 33,000 union machinists have been on strike since Sept. 14. Two days of talks this week failed to produce a deal, and Boeing filed an unfair-labor-practices charge against the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers.
As it announced layoffs, Boeing also gave a preliminary report on its third-quarter financial results — and the news is not good for the company.
Boeing said it burned through $1.3 billion in cash during the quarter and lost $9.97 per share. Industry analysts had been expecting the company to lose $1.61 per share in the quarter, according to a FactSet survey, but analysts were likely unaware of some large write-downs that Boeing announced Friday.
The company based in Arlington, Virginia, said it had $10.5 billion in cash and marketable securities on Sept. 30.
The strike has a direct bearing on cash burn because Boeing gets half or more of the price of planes when it delivers them to airline customers. The strike has shut down production of the 737 Max, Boeing's best-selling plane, and 777x and 767s. The company is still making 787s at a nonunion plant in South Carolina.
“Our business is in a difficult position, and it is hard to overstate the challenges we face together,” Ortberg told staff. He said the situation “requires tough decisions and we will have to make structural changes to ensure we can stay competitive and deliver for our customers over the long term.”


Partial remains of British climber believed found 100 years after Everest ascent

Updated 11 October 2024
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Partial remains of British climber believed found 100 years after Everest ascent

  • The expedition found a foot encased in a sock embroidered with “AC Irvine“
  • The pair, who were seeking to become the first people to conquer Everest, were last seen around 245 meters from the summit before they disappeared

LONDON: The partial remains of a British mountaineer who might — or might not — have been one of the first two people to climb Mount Everest are believed to have been found a century after their ascent of the world’s highest peak, according to an expedition led by National Geographic.
Ahead of the release of a documentary film, the television channel said Friday that the expedition found a foot encased in a sock embroidered with “AC Irvine” and a boot that could be that of Andrew “Sandy” Irvine, who disappeared at the age of 22 along with his co-climber, the legendary George Mallory, near Everest’s peak on June 8, 1924.
The pair, who were seeking to become the first people to conquer Everest, were last seen around 800 feet (245 meters) from the summit before they disappeared. Their fate has been debated by climbers and historians alike, with some postulating that they had stood atop of the world before heading down and disappearing.
Mallory’s body was found in 1999 but there was no evidence that could point to the two having reached Everest’s summit at 29,032 feet (8,849 meters).
There is still no such evidence, though the apparent discovery of Irvine’s remains could narrow the search for a Kodak Vest Pocket camera lent to the climbers by expedition member Howard Somervell. For mountaineers, it’s the equivalent of the Holy Grail — whether there is photographic proof on that camera to show that the two did reach the summit before Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953.
The sock and boot were found at a lower altitude than Mallory’s remains, on the Central Rongbuk Glacier below the North Face of Mount Everest.
“This was a monumental and emotional moment for us and our entire team on the ground, and we just hope this can finally bring peace of mind to his relatives and the climbing world at large,” said climb team member and National Geographic explorer Jimmy Chin.
Chin did not say exactly where the remains were found because he wants to discourage trophy hunters. But he’s confident that other items — and maybe even the camera — are nearby.
“It certainly reduces the search area,” he told National Geographic.
The Irvine family has volunteered to compare DNA test results with the remains to confirm his identity.
His great-niece and biographer, Julie Summers, said she reacted emotionally when she found out about the discovery.
“I have lived with this story since I was a 7-year-old when my father told us about the mystery of Uncle Sandy on Everest,” she said. “When Jimmy told me that he saw the name AC Irvine on the label on the sock inside the boot, I found myself moved to tears. It was and will remain an extraordinary and poignant moment.”
The find, made by Chin along with climbers and filmmakers Erich Roepke and Mark Fisher, was reported to the London-based Royal Geographical Society, which jointly organized Mallory’s and Irvine’s expedition along with the Alpine Club.
“As joint organizer of the 1924 Everest expedition, the society deeply appreciates the respect Jimmy Chin’s team has shown Sandy Irvine’s remains and their sensitivity toward Sandy’s family members and others connected to that expedition,” said Joe Smith, director of the society.
The partial remains are now in the possession of the China Tibet Mountaineering Association, which is responsible for climbing permits on Everest’s northern side.


Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs sex trafficking trial set for May 2025

Updated 11 October 2024
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Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs sex trafficking trial set for May 2025

NEW YORK: Music mogul Sean Combs is set to go on trial for racketeering and sex trafficking on May 5, 2025, a judge said in a court hearing Thursday.
The rapper known as “Diddy” will remain incarcerated, said federal judge Arun Subramanian, after he was indicted last month on three criminal counts that allege he sexually abused women and coerced them into drug-fueled sex parties using threats and violence.
Combs has twice been denied bail, as prosecutors have voiced concerns of witness tampering. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
As he entered the courtroom, Combs, wearing a light-colored wrinkled shirt and pants, greeted his mother and children who were attending the hearing.
Prosecutor Emily Johnson said there was still more evidence to explore, noting that 96 electronic devices had been seized in March and that more charges were possible.
Allegations have been building against the Grammy winner since last year, when singer Cassie, whose real name is Casandra Ventura, alleged Combs subjected her to more than a decade of coercion by physical force and drugs as well as a 2018 rape.
A spate of similarly lurid civil lawsuits since have painted a picture of Combs as a violent man who used his celebrity status to prey on women.
And in a bombastic announcement, lawyers said more than 100 people who say Combs assaulted or exploited them — some of them children — were planning more legal action.
The explosion of allegations against him has highlighted a culture in the music industry that many people contend allows for a wider pattern of rampant sexual misconduct.