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Toronto mayor denies, finally, use of crack cocaine

Posted: 25 May 2013 12:50 AM PDT


By Julie Gordon

TORONTO (Reuters) - Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, under pressure to respond to allegations he was filmed using drugs, said on Friday that he does not smoke crack cocaine and could not comment on a video he had not seen or does not exist.

"There has been a serious accusation from the Toronto Star that I use crack cocaine. I do not use crack cocaine, nor am I an addict of crack cocaine," he told a news conference.

The Toronto Star and Internet gossip blog Gawker reported last week they had separately seen a cellphone video that allegedly shows Ford smoking a substance from a crack pipe while in the company of people involved in the drug trade.

"As for a video, I cannot comment on a video that I have never seen or does not exist," said Ford, who did not take questions from reporters.

His comments mark his first direct response to the allegations since the Star and Gawker stories were published last Thursday. Shortly afterward, he called the reports "ridiculous," but did not give a full statement or denial.

Since the allegations surfaced, he has been hounded by news media at every turn, while several city councilors and allies have encouraged him to confront the issue directly.

The Toronto Sun, a right-leaning newspaper generally considered to be Ford-friendly, published an editorial on Thursday demanding the mayor either strongly deny the allegations or step down from office to seek medical help.

Earlier on Friday, six members of the mayor's executive committee, including Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday, published an open letter to the mayor urging him to confront the allegations.

Ford told reporters he had remained quiet on the advice of his solicitor.

The video, which Reuters cannot independently verify, is allegedly being shopped around by people involved in the drug trade. Gawker launched a "Crackstarter" campaign to raise $200,000 to buy it and publish it online.

The controversy, meanwhile, has made headlines across Canada and around the world, and drawn ridicule from late-night TV humorists Jimmy Kimmel and John Stewart.

On Wednesday, Ford lost his much-loved job as a volunteer high school football coach, and on Thursday he fired his chief of staff.

This is not the first controversy for Ford, who has drawn criticism for skipping city council meetings to coach football and engaging in a confrontation outside his home with a reporter.

He was briefly ordered out of office in 2012 after being found guilty of a conflict of interest, but won an appeal and was allowed to finish his four-year term.

(With additional writing by Cameron French; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson and Philip Barbara)

Venezuela to create new workers militia

Posted: 24 May 2013 10:11 AM PDT

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) Venezuela's president has ordered the creation of a new workers' militia as part of an existing pro-government fighting force.

President Nicolas Maduro gave few details about the militia including how many members it would consist of.

It would be part of the Bolivarian Militia created by late President Hugo Chavez, which consists of roughly 120,000 volunteers.

The announcement in a speech in Caracas late Wednesday got little attention in the Venezuelan media.

Maduro urged the crowd to imagine the respect the working class would command if it had "300,000, 500,000, 1 million, 2 million uniformed workers, armed, prepared to defend the sovereignty of the homeland."

Critics have warned such militias could be used to cement the socialist government's hold on power.

Kid Rock, Rolling Stones on scalping, summer tours

Posted: 24 May 2013 10:00 AM PDT


NEW YORK (AP) Kid Rock is a scalper.

The 42-year-old Grammy winner, who is launching a summer tour where most tickets are priced at $20, said he's scalping about 1,000 tickets from each show to make up for the cheaper regular price.

"I'm in the scalping business, but you know what? We told everyone. A lot of artists have been doing this for years behind fans' backs, taking all these backdoor deals," he said. "We look at StubHub and other places and see what they're selling them for and we just undercut them."

Kid Rock's "$20 Best Night Ever Tour" kicks off June 28 in Bristow, Va., and the Detroit native, who released his debut album in 1990, said he likely scalped secretly on past tours.

"I'm sure we have," he said. "I can't say for sure, but I'm not going to say that we haven't. I wouldn't be surprised if we did."

Kid Rock's discount ticket pricing is leading a change in tours where scalpers play a major role as the marketplace for secondary sources for tickets continues to grow, especially in a summer when key acts like The Rolling Stones, Beyonce, Paul McCartney, Taylor Swift, Justin Timberlake and Jay-Z are on the road.

"If I see a scalper, I'll scalp him," the Rolling Stones' Keith Richards said, laughing.

He said he would like to play free shows to balance the high cost for tickets; The Rolling Stones' "50 & Counting Tour" has a range of ticket prices, and Pollstar reported that the average price of a ticket among the tour's seven shows was $355.14.

"I'd do some free shows. I'd work my butt off and I don't care how much. But these are set up above my head, man," Richards said in a recent interview. "You're kind of locked in a thing here whether you like it or not. I wish it was five bucks a ticket."

The Rolling Stones did play a secret show at the Echoplex club in Los Angeles last month, where fans got in by winning a lottery and had to be ID'd and given photo bracelets to eliminate the chance of scalping the tickets, which were just $20.

But Mick Jagger said there isn't much the artists can do about scalping and secondary sources for tickets.

"The artist is totally powerless in this. People have made a lot of fuss about it before, but on the other side, some people are like, 'We might as well participate in it.' And you can't really blame the artist for participating in it because why shouldn't they in a way?" he said. "I know we don't participate in it, but nevertheless, I don't blame people if they wanted to do it."

"You can look at it like, 'Well, no one's making any money except these secondary ticket selling companies and they're making more money than anyone,'" Jagger continued. "It's completely legal so until it's illegal, there's nothing much anyone can do about that."

Ticketmaster's North American President Jared Smith said Kid Rock's deal, which he completed with Ticketmaster partner Live Nation, is a first of more to come, though they might not be as risky as Kid Rock's plan, which also includes $4 draft beers and $20 T-shirts.

"I absolutely believe that we're starting to see the real acceleration of some really healthy things in pricing that are going to create new opportunities for fans to come and experience it in a really special way," Smith said.

A small way that artists have been able to control scalping is through paperless tickets, which only allows the buyers of the tickets to use them at shows and are not allowed to resell them. Smith said paperless tickets, which launched five years ago, accounts for "about 1 percent" of the tickets at Ticketmaster.

"It hasn't grown necessarily as a percentage of the total tickets that we sell, but we certainly see more artists employing it," Smith said. "When it really first started, it was kind of looked at as a tool to use across the entire seats in the arena, but it's really become a tool for the best seats in the house. Increasingly we see artists using it very, very targeted for like the top 500 seats in the house or the top 1,000 seats."

Bruce Springsteen, Keith Urban, New Kids on the Block, Radiohead, Rascal Flatts, Selena Gomez, Muse, Miley Cryus, Iron Maiden, Atoms for Peace and Eric Church are among the acts using paperless tickets.

On his "Wrecking Ball World Tour" last year, Springsteen used paperless tickets for 20 percent of the seats, and Ticketmaster said its data showed that Springsteen's decision helped reduce scalping by 75 percent. (New York is the only state where Springsteen couldn't offer paperless tickets because the state does not allow nontransferable tickets).

StubHub, the largest reseller of tickets, said business is booming thanks to the top acts on the road as well as summer festivals. But the company, which has a partnership with AEG, knows the idea of paperless tickets hurts their business.

"That limits a person's right to resell or transfer or to just give away their ticket. We do not support that because we believe in a fan's right to do whatever they want with their tickets," said Alison Salcedo, the head of U.S. Communications for StubHub. Fan Freedom, an organization that supports the rights of ticket holders, echoed StubHub's thoughts on paperless tickets.

"I don't see any reason why nontransferable tickets need to be the solution," said Joe Potter, the CEO of Fan Freedom, which is financially supported by StubHub. "Scalpers get tickets through pre-sale and fan club memberships."

Ticketmaster isn't against the idea of reselling tickets, in fact they resell concert tickets online.

"More often or not tickets are underpriced, that's why you see so much resell activity," Smith said. "What we try to do is make sure it's done very transparently."

Ticket holders are allowed to sell tickets at any price on sites like StubHub and ticketsnow.com, that's why Kid Rock isn't selling tickets for the first two rows at his shows. He's randomly pulling fans from the nose bleed sections to enjoy his concert from the venue's best view. And the first 20 rows at his shows are seats offered through paperless ticketing.

"We really don't know what we're going to make yet. We were doing estimates on it and they're already going through a lot of these numbers, and it looks like it's going to be a good summer," he said of what his potential tour earnings.

Kid Rock, whose tour openers include ZZ Top, Uncle Kracker and Kool and the Gang, is playing the same venues he's performed at in the past, but he said he's filling up more seats and selling tickets faster. Even scalpers have approached the performer to cut deals.

"I've had people in the scalping business come at me already and try to make side deals like, 'I can make you thousands of dollars, hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash if you'll just flip a few of these tickets our way for certain shows,'" he recalled.

_____

Follow Mesfin Fekadu at http://www.twitter.com/MusicMesfin

Apple, former Washington wallflower, now at center of tax fight

Posted: 24 May 2013 09:25 AM PDT


By Andy Sullivan, Gabriel Debenedetti and Poornima Gupta

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - For years, Apple Inc kept a low profile in Washington as it grew into one of the most valuable companies in the world. Now the iPad maker has taken the lead, perhaps inadvertently, on a top priority for U.S. business: simplifying America's tax code.

Chief Executive Tim Cook, who was called before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on Tuesday to answer questions about Apple's alleged tax avoidance, used his appearance to plead for an overhaul of corporate taxes. That marked a sharp turnabout for a company that until now has been content to let rivals like Google and Microsoft fight Washington policy battles.

And even though the scrutiny Apple has come under in Washington could further challenge the company as it copes with a sagging stock price, rising competition and questions about its labor practices, it may have little choice but to commit fully to the fight over the corporate tax code.

"They are very, very tactical," said a former Apple lobbyist who asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for the company. "They only join issues they really care about."

Recently, Apple has backed unsuccessful legislation that would have allowed international companies to bring overseas profits back home without paying the 35 percent corporate income tax.

Repatriation of profits has been a top concern for U.S. companies, which collectively have more than $1.5 trillion sitting offshore. Most say they keep the money there to avoid the taxes they would face by bringing it home.

Bowing to increasing shareholder pressure to distribute some of the $100 billion it keeps overseas, Apple has opted to borrow money at low interest rates rather than bring the cash home and take the tax hit.

Apple's Washington office referred questions to its California headquarters. Officials there declined to comment.

Apple has spent far less than other corporate titans on Washington lobbying over the past decade, records show, and the company has often declined to work with other technology companies on issues affecting the industry as a whole. It dropped out of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 2009 after it disagreed with the business lobby's stance on climate change.

The company spent about $2 million on lobbying last year, up from $180,000 in 1999, records show. This year it is on pace to nearly double last year's figure.

Apple's lobbying expenditures still pale in comparison with those of Microsoft Corp., which spent $8.1 million in 2012, and Google, which spent $16.5 million, records show.

And unlike other businesses such as AT&T and Exxon Mobil, Apple has not set up a political action fund to distribute employee contributions to congressional allies - a common tool for wielding influence in Washington.

"Clearly, Apple does not have a huge footprint for the tech sector. I don't mean to denigrate almost $2 million (spent on)lobbying - that's a lot of money - but it's not as much as other tech companies have been spending," said Bill Allison, editorial director for the Sunlight Foundation, a non-profit that deals with money in politics.

Lobbyists not associated with the firm privately said Apple's minimal Washington presence could have put it in the crosshairs of the Senate subcommittee, which on Monday accused the company of ducking $9 billion in U.S. taxes through offshore subsidiaries. The lobbyists pointed to the example of Microsoft, which had little presence in Washington before antitrust investigators at the Department of Justice nearly succeeded in splitting the company up in the 1990s.

Though Apple, like many other Silicon Valley companies, served as an important source of campaign money for Democratic candidates in the 2012 election, it has enlisted experienced Republicans to make its case in Washington.

Apple's chief lobbyist, Catherine Novelli, served as a top trade official in Republican President George W. Bush's administration. Other in-house lobbyists have worked as aides to senior Republican lawmakers, including Texas Representative Joe Barton, who used to oversee tech issues as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, records show.

The company also has hired outside firms to extend its reach in Congress and throughout government. Lobbyists at Fierce, Isakowitz & Blalock and Capitol Tax Partners have worked for the Bush administration and top Republicans like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

The Glover Park Group and the Franklin Square Group have provided lobbyists from the Democratic side of the aisle who lobby on tax, broadband, electronic waste and spectrum issues.

The company has also enlisted Jon Bernstein, a former Democratic staffer at the Federal Communications Commission, to lobby that agency and the White House on subsidies for broadband access and technology-related legislation.

None of the lobbyists immediately responded to requests for comment.

The company does have one ace in its pocket: its sleek gadgets. Even lawmakers who grilled Cook on Apple's tax practices said they were avid iPhone and iPad users.

"I love Apple!" Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill declared.

(Reporting by Andy Sullivan and Gabriel Debenedetti in Washington and Poornima Gupta in San Francisco; Writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Marilyn W. Thompson and Tim Dobbyn)

Big Earthquakes Create Global-Scale GPS Errors

Posted: 24 May 2013 08:59 AM PDT

Thirteen years of supersized earthquakes, such as today's (May 24) magnitude-8.3 in Russia, have contaminated GPS sites around the world, a new study finds.

The Global Positioning System is a network of satellites and ground stations that provide location information anywhere on Earth. Except for spots in Australia, western Europe and the eastern tip of Canada, every GPS site on the ground underwent small but important shifts since 2000 because of big earthquakes, according to a study published May 6 in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth.

The research confirms that great earthquakes, those bigger than magnitude 8.0, can have far-reaching effects on the Earth's crust. And because GPS is critical for everything from calculating satellite orbits to sea level rise to earthquake hazards, scientists can't ignore these tiny zigs and zags, the researchers conclude.

"We have to find a way to deal with it," said Paul Tregoning, lead study author and a geophysicist at Australia National University in Canberra. "The community needs to work out how to find all the offsets, estimate them accurately and get everyone to agree on how to correct them," he told LiveScience.

Tregoning and his colleagues modeled the sudden jolts in Earth's crust from each of the 15 biggest earthquakes since 2000. They discovered that crust thousands of miles away from the faults had moved horizontally by as much as a tenth of an inch (a few millimeters). The model was checked against a few spots around the planet. On average, the earthquakes deformed the crust by a hundredth of an inch every year (0.4 millimeters a year) about the width of the lead in a mechanical pencil. [7 Craziest Ways Japan's Earthquake Affected Earth]

"It's quite amazing to us that we can see this and detect this," Tregoning said.

These tiny effects won't make a difference to the GPS in cars or phones, or the tough little units carried by hikers and mountaineers. But scientists who need precise measurements to calculate sea level rise or satellite orbits should be concerned, Tregoning said.

The changing Earth

Here's why these seemingly small changes matter. Scientists who rely on GPS need to compare one place to another. There are a handful of stable spots around the world, usually in the interior of continents, called the terrestrial reference frame. For example, a geologist measuring the speed of the Pacific plate would compare it with the North American reference frame. But Tregoning's study shows these stable spots were shifted by the massive earthquakes.

Disturbing the reference frame will introduce errors into GPS measurements, Tregoning said. It could also throw off calculations of satellite orbits. "If the coordinates of the tracking stations are wrong, then the orbit isn't right either," he said.

"I think he's identified a good problem," said Don Argus, a principal research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., who was not involved in the study. Argus is part of a group that uses GPS to calculate satellite orbits and conduct research on the changing Earth.

"It's difficult to find a stable frame with these post-seismic transients," Argus said. "The earthquakes are making things a little hard for the people on our floor."

While Argus and his colleagues already account for the deformation caused by earthquakes, it takes computers at JPL 24 hours to churn through the calculations, Argus said. "I've got the best plate motion model out there," he told LiveScience.

Tregoning hopes that the next update to the International Terrestrial Reference Frame System, the internationally agreed upon reference for GPS research, will consider the wide-ranging effects of big earthquakes.

"We have to agree on how to improve the reference frame," he said. "People doing regional studies will find that they potentially get a different answer, and it will potentially be a more accurate answer."

Editor's note: This story was updated May 24 to include information about the May 24 Okhotsk earthquake.

Email Becky Oskin or follow her @beckyoskin. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

7 Ways the Earth Changes in the Blink of an Eye Image Gallery: This Millennium's Destructive Earthquakes 10 Best GPS Navigation Systems Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Canada businessman's corruption trial on in Cuba

Posted: 24 May 2013 07:22 AM PDT


HAVANA (AP) A Canadian businessman caught up in a corruption probe in Cuba apparently went on trial Thursday, nearly two years after he was detained and his import company, Tri-Star Caribbean, was shuttered.

Sarkis Yacoubian arrived at an Interior Ministry courthouse in Havana in a black sedan with tinted windows, and was seen being escorted inside by two men.

He did not speak to reporters, nor did Canadian Ambassador Matthew Levin, who also attended the proceedings. Foreign journalists were not allowed access to the court, and government officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

President Raul Castro has repeatedly spoken of a need to root out entrenched corruption on this Communist-run island, and his anti-graft drive has swept up foreign business executives from at least five nations, as well as government officials and dozens of Cuban employees at key state-run companies.

The Toronto Star and El Nuevo Herald reported last week that Yacoubian was indicted last month on charges of bribery, tax evasion and "activities damaging to the economy." He reportedly faces up to 12 years in prison.

In a phone interview from jail, he said he had no choice but to pay island officials to secure business contracts, and claimed to have blown the whistle on corruption involving Tri-Star and other companies.

"They found out this was an epidemic going all over the place and I was the fall guy," Yacoubian was quoted as saying by the Star and El Nuevo Herald, the Miami Herald's Spanish-language sister newspaper. "They want to give an example to the rest of the businessmen. They want to scare them to death."

Another Canadian businessman, Cy Tokmakjian, president of the Tokmakjian Group, which was raided and closed down in September 2011, is also awaiting trial, as is a Briton who headed the investment firm Coral Capital Group.

In late April, Havana announced that the Tokmakjian Group's operating license had been rescinded due to unspecified actions "that are contrary to the principles and ethics that should characterize commercial activity and contravene Cuban judicial order."

Other acknowledged or rumored corruption probes have targeted food distributor Rio Zaza, run by a Chilean man who was close to former President Fidel Castro; Cuba's civil aviation authority; cigar manufacturer Habanos SA, and state telecom Etecsa.

More than 150 foreign businesspeople and scores of small South American and European companies have been kicked out of the country.

Thursday's court proceedings took place at the same converted mansion where U.S. government subcontractor Alan Gross was sentenced to 15 years for crimes against the state after he was caught bringing restricted communications equipment onto the island and setting up unauthorized Internet networks.

___

Associated Press journalist Fernando Gonzalez in Havana contributed to this report.

___

Peter Orsi on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Peter_Orsi

Jersey shore reopens for 1st post-Sandy summer

Posted: 24 May 2013 07:10 AM PDT


SEASIDE HEIGHTS, N.J. (AP) New Jersey rolled out some of its big guns Friday to proclaim that the shore is back following Superstorm Sandy, using Gov. Chris Christie and the cast of MTV's "Jersey Shore" to tell a national audience the state is ready for summer fun.

In fact, they even hired fun. the rock band whose anthem "We Are Young" captures the spirit of this blue-collar oceanfront playground that was devastated by the Oct. 29 storm and has been furiously rebuilding ever since. The band played a free concert on the beach.

"This is known as a happy place," said Paul "Pauly D" Del Vecchio, one of the cast members of "Jersey Shore," which was filmed here until wrapping up last year. "Right after the storm, it was the exact opposite: dead, silent. To see this place being rebuilt makes me happy."

Christie, who has been racing up and down the shore opening boardwalks and talking up shore tourism all week as the summer kickoff approached, appeared on the "Today" show Friday, giving him a national pulpit to preach his message of recovery.

"Anybody who lives in New Jersey, the Jersey shore is in your heart," Christie said. "This means everything to our state."

The show was broadcast from Seaside Heights, where the storm swept a roller coaster into the ocean, making for one of Sandy's iconic images. The roller coaster was taken away this month, but Casino Pier, the seaside amusement park where it used to sit, plans to have 18 rides open this summer.

Christie said about 80 percent of the shore will look as it did last summer, and acknowledged more work needs to be done to fully recover. He is to tour parts of the storm-hit shore next Tuesday with President Obama.

Declaring the shore officially open for the summer, the governor cut a 5-mile long ribbon symbolically linking some of the shore towns that were hardest hit by the storm. He and organizers said they hope it will qualify for the Guinness World Records title for the longest ribbon-cutting.

Tourism is a $38 billion industry in New Jersey, and shore towns are counting on a good summer to help them recoup major losses they incurred after the storm. A storm that parked itself over the shore and was expected to bring rain through Sunday morning didn't exactly help.

But Kevin Stewart, owner of JR's Ocean bar & Grill on the boardwalk, led a Champagne toast with his bar employees right after Christie cut the ribbon.

"Here's to a great summer!" he said as they clinked plastic cups that would normally be filled with beer.

JR's only put up its new sign at 5:30 a.m. Friday, about 90 minutes before Christie arrived for his broadcast. The business was devastated by Sandy, with 6 feet of water in it that left behind 5 feet of sand. It lost all its inventory and signs, which cost about $300,000 to replace.

But Stewart said he is optimistic about this summer at the shore.

"If we get good weather, the people will still come here," he said. "Ninety percent or better of this town is rebuilt and ready to go. At the end of the day, this just might work."

Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, of "Jersey Shore," said crowds will be back this summer.

"You just come here to have a good time," she said. "It's a great place. You come here with your friends. Everybody's here, it's getting rebuilt; it's just amazing."

Her cast-mate Deena Cortese urged tourists to patronize Seaside Heights as it recovers.

"It's kind of like a family on the boardwalk here," she said. "Everybody needs to come this summer, especially for them."

Mark Romanowski, a bartender at JR's, said the "Jersey Strong" slogan that has adorned T-shirts, bumper stickers and sweatshirts for fundraising efforts since the storm is not a cliche.

"It really is the mentality we have here," he said. "People in Jersey, we may have our differences but the one common denominator is we have each other's backs."

___

Wayne Parry can be reached at http://twitter.com/WayneParryAC

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Wash. I-5 bridge collapse caused by oversize load

Posted: 24 May 2013 06:52 AM PDT


MOUNT VERNON, Wash. (AP) A truck carrying an oversize load struck a bridge on the major thoroughfare between Seattle and Canada, sending a section of the span and two vehicles into the Skagit River below, though all three occupants suffered only minor injuries.

It happened about 7 p.m. Thursday on the four-lane Interstate 5 bridge near Mount Vernon, about 60 miles north of Seattle, and disrupted travel in both directions.

Initially, it wasn't clear if the bridge just gave way on its own. But at an overnight news conference, Washington State Patrol Chief John Batiste blamed it on a tractor-trailer carrying a tall load that hit an upper part of the span.

"For reasons unknown at this point in time, the semi struck the overhead of the bridge causing the collapse," he said.

The truck made it off the bridge and the driver remained at the scene and cooperated with investigators.

Two other vehicles went into the water about 50 feet below as the structure crumbled. Three people were rescued and were recovering Friday.

Drivers were told to expect delays. Detours have been set up to try to ease the congestion. Batiste urged drivers to avoid the area if possible, especially over the Memorial Day weekend. Traffic along the heavily travelled route could be affected for some time. The bridge is used by an average of 71,000 vehicles a day.

"The I-5 corridor is totally disrupted," said Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who went to the scene Thursday night.

"Thanks to the rescuers and a little bit of luck, we had three Skagitonians who made it out of the Skagit River alive," Inslee said.

Dan Sligh and his wife were in their pickup on Interstate 5 heading to a camping trip when a bridge before them disappeared in a "big puff of dust."

"I hit the brakes and we went off," Sligh told reporters from a hospital, adding he "saw the water approaching ... you hold on as tight as you can."

Sligh, his wife and another man in a different vehicle were dumped into the chilly waters of the Skagit River.

Sligh and his wife were taken to Skagit Valley Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The other man was reported in stable condition at United General Hospital in Sedro-Woolley, hospital CEO Greg Reed said.

Sligh said his shoulder was dislocated in the drop into the water, and he found himself "belly deep in water in the truck." He said he popped his shoulder back in and called out to his wife, who he described as being in shock initially as they waited for rescuers to arrive in boats.

The bridge was inspected twice last year and repairs were made, Transportation Secretary Lynn Peterson said.

"It's an older bridge that needs a lot of work just like a good number of bridges around the state," she said.

Transportation officials are working on plans for either a temporary or permanent replacement, she said.

The National Transportation Safety Board was sending an investigative team.

Jeremiah Thomas, a volunteer firefighter, said he was driving nearby when he glimpsed something out of the corner of his eye and turned to look.

"The bridge just went down, it crashed through the water," he said. "It was really surreal."

Deyerin said the water depth was about 15 feet, and the vehicles half-visible in the water likely were resting on portions of the collapsed bridge.

Crowds of people lined the river to watch the scene unfold.

"It's not something you see every day," said Jimmy O'Connor, the owner of two local pizza restaurants who was driving on another bridge parallel to the one that collapsed. "People were starting to crawl out of their cars."

He said he and his girlfriend were about 400 yards away on the Burlington Bridge when they heard "just a loud bang."

"Then we looked over and saw the bridge was down in the water," he said.

He pulled over and saw three vehicles in the water, including the camping trailer that landed upside-down, he said.

The bridge was not classified as structurally deficient, but a Federal Highway Administration database listed it as being "functionally obsolete" a category meaning that the design is outdated, such as having narrow shoulders and low clearance underneath.

The bridge was built in in 1955 and had a sufficiency rating of 47 out of 100 at its November 2012 inspection, Transportation Department spokesman Noel Brady said Friday. Washington state was given a C in the American Society of Civil Engineers' 2013 infrastructure report card and a C- when it came to the state's bridges. The group said more than a quarter of Washington's 7,840 bridges are considered structurally deficient or functionally obsolete.

The mishap was reminiscent of the August 2007 collapse of an I-35W bridge in Minneapolis that killed 13 people and injured another 145 when it buckled and fell into the Mississippi River during rush-hour.

Sligh was thankful.

His wife was "doing OK" and that he had "lots of cuts," he said. "You're kind of pinching yourself and realize you're lucky to be alive."

___

Baker reported from Olympia, Wash. Associated Press writers Chris Grygiel in Seattle and Terry Tang in Phoenix also contributed to this report.

Stephen Hawking Gets Superhero Treatment in New Comic

Posted: 24 May 2013 03:34 AM PDT

Living legend Stephen Hawking has already achieved superhero status in the eyes of many science geeks, and now his ideas are being honored in comic book form.

"Stephen Hawking: Riddles of Time & Space" (Bluewater) details the life story of the physicist, from his early days at Cambridge and struggles with a body-wrecking disease to his academic achievements and current fame.

Hawking, 71, is widely considered one of the greatest scientific minds since Albert Einstein, and he has greatly enriched our understanding of the universe over the past several decades. His work with fellow cosmologist Roger Penrose helped unite Einstein's general theory of relativity and quantum theory. Hawking also studied black holes, with a groundbreaking theory that the cosmic monsters do actually emit a faint glimmer of radiation. [The 10 Best Time-Traveling Heroes of All Time]

But his life has been marked by physical challenges. At age 21, Hawking was diagnosed with the motor neuron disease called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. The disease eventually robbed him of his mobility and later his ability to speak; today, Hawking uses a speech-generating device controlled by the muscles in his cheek.

"The very concept of making an engaging comic book where the protagonist is essentially immobile is a pretty tall order, but I think the key to us keeping it exciting was being able to get inside his mind (one of the greatest of our time) and show some of his most abstract concepts in a visual and dynamic way," artist Zach Bassett said in a statement.

One page detailing Hawking's ideas about black holes puts the scientist into conversation with Einstein, picturing him as Michelangelo's Adam reaching out to Einstein as God.

"Additionally, we got several chances to tip our hat to many famous artistic icons of pop culture, as well as famous people that he's met, taken inspiration from or even inspired himself," Bassett added. Hawking has been featured on "Star Trek: The Next Generation," "The Simpsons," "Futurama" and "The Big Bang Theory."

"The most surprising thing about Stephen Hawking is his razor wire wit that is sometimes withering and other times matched with a puckish sense of humor," the comic book's writers, Michael Lent and Brian McCarthy, said in a statement.

The scientist is indeed prone to pithy comments. Lent and McCarthy said their favorite Hawking quote is: "I have noticed that even people who claim everything is predetermined and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road."

The comic was released on April 21 and is also available as an e-book.

Follow Megan Gannon on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

Portrait of Genius: Stephen Hawking Exhibit Photos Now and Then: 10 Mind-Bending Time Travel Stories in Comics 8 Shocking Things We Learned From Stephen Hawking's Book Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Sorrentino serves up a cinema banquet at Cannes

Posted: 24 May 2013 03:06 AM PDT


CANNES, France (AP) Paolo Sorrentino has a thing about food appropriately enough, for the director of a sumptuous feast of a film, "The Great Beauty."

The Italian auteur's Cannes Film Festival entry is a journey through Rome in the company of observant but aimless writer Jep Gambardella (actor Toni Servillo). Sorrentino's camera takes viewers through the sacred, profane and teeming streets to medieval churches and grand palazzi, modernist homes and debauched poolside parties. All are wearily watched by Jep, who is turning 65 and trying to recapture his passion for life.

Along the way the film provides sharp portraits of characters who have lost their way amid the endless distractions of urban living including a Roman Catholic Cardinal too busy dispensing his favorite recipes to offer spiritual counsel. It's one of many signs in the film of a society that has come unmoored from its bearings.

"When I think about it, I find it's quite extravagant the way everyone talks about food," the director said during an interview in Cannes. "I think this obsession with food has reached people who should deal with the Holy Spirit.

"I fall into the trap myself," he admitted. "One of my favorite shows is 'Masterchef.'"

"The Great Beauty" the title can refer to the Eternal City, or to life itself has been well received at Cannes, where Servillo is being mentioned as a candidate for the best-actor prize in Sunday's awards.

Some viewers, though, found it overwhelming: too rich in strange and beautiful imagery a flock of flamingoes and a giraffe make memorable appearances and too suffused with talk and ideas.

Sorrentino says that's partly the point life and Rome are both overwhelming. One early scene shows a tourist photographing a sublime view of Rome, and keeling over dead.

"The perception of beauty is one of the strongest feelings you can have. You can even die from it," said Sorrentino, a weary-eyed man most people are after a few days at the festival who is given to succinct answers.

Or, the film suggests, you can simply be numbed into aimlessness by the distractions of urban life.

Sorrentino said the original idea for the movie came from the image of "a very long party."

"I wanted to reproduce the idea that sometimes you go to parties with extremely high expectations, and then you are longing to get away as quickly as you can," he said.

"Our country offers marvelous opportunities, but people don't seize them, because they're too busy partying and enjoying themselves. That's why we have so many missed opportunities.

"If I wanted to give a political interpretation of the movie, I'd say the theme was missed opportunities.

"But the film focuses on feelings, on human beings' feelings, which are undermined by the fatigue of living, of human existence. I think that is not just an Italian characteristic."

In contrast to his main character, a 65-year-old writer coasting on the success of his sole novel, 42-year-old Sorrentino is impressively prolific. One of 20 films in the running for Cannes' coveted Palme d'Or, "The Great Beauty" is Sorrentino's fifth movie to compete at the festival. He won the third-place Jury Prize in 2008 for "Il Divo" a dramatization of the life of Italian politician Giulio Andreotti and was last here in 2011 with his English-language comedy-drama "This Must Be the Place," which starred Sean Penn as a rock star.

"The Great Beauty" takes him back to Italy, and with its air of melancholy and regret, feels like the work of a much older director.

"I take that as a compliment," Sorrentino said. "I hope that when I get older I'll have the opportunity to make the movies I should have made when I was young.

"I'm trying not to waste my time. I'm trying to seize opportunities when I can, because I'm a lucky man my job is connected to my amusement. Job and fun in my case coincide. I work a lot because I like it a lot."

___

Jill Lawless can be reached at http://Twitter.com/JillLawless

China's Lenovo buys and diversifies to outshine PC rivals

Posted: 24 May 2013 02:13 AM PDT


By Lee Chyen Yee and Umesh Desai

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Lenovo Group Ltd's bold acquisitions in its flagship PC business, a foray into mobile gadgets, and a relatively light debt load are setting it apart from PC rivals as industry shipments take their steepest fall in decades.

Lenovo, a sliver away from unseating Hewlett-Packard Co as the world's top PC maker by shipments, posted on Thursday an estimate-beating 90 percent rise in quarterly profit, its fastest in seven quarters.

"They have been aggressive in acquiring several distributors in different regions such as Brazil, Europe and Japan over the past few years, so that basically gave them better distribution, as well as gains in market share," said Warren Lau, an analyst at Maybank Kim Eng Securities in Hong Kong.

The Chinese PC maker posted net profit of $126.9 million in the quarter ended in March, up from $66.8 million a year earlier, based on Reuters calculations using full-year and nine-month financial data.

That beat expectations of a $110 million net profit and was the fastest pace since the first quarter of the 2011/2012 fiscal year, when growth doubled.

Research firm IDC said global PC shipments fell 13.9 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013, the biggest decline since it began tracking the market on a quarterly basis in 1994, as consumers switched to mobile computing and Windows 8 sales fell short of expectations.

With shipments unchanged in the first quarter, Lenovo is outstripping other vendors. PC shipments from HP, Dell Inc, Acer Inc and Asustek Computer Inc fell by 11-33 percent during the same period, IDC said.

The latest IDC data showed that Lenovo's market share was 15.3 percent, just 0.4 percentage points lower than HP.

Lenovo shares far outperformed those of its rivals last year. This year Lenovo, up 3 percent, is still beating Acer.

Dell and HP have staged strong recoveries, but Lenovo's quarterly net profit has risen consistently over the past few years. By contrast, HP's net profit was down 32 percent and Dell's was down 79.5 percent year-on-year, according to the companies' latest quarterly financial results.

For the full year, Lenovo's net profit rose by a third to $635.1 million, it said in a statement to the Hong Kong stock exchange, beating an estimate of $618.2 million in a poll of 31 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

STRATEGIC BUYS

Lenovo has spent heavily over the past few years to strengthen its PC business, with purchases such as Brazilian electronics maker CCE last year, Germany's Medion in 2011 and IBM's PC business in 2005.

Its slew of acquisitions has also sparked market talk that it might be interested in IBM Corp's server business, as well as handset makers Research In Motion Ltd and Nokia Oyj.

Lenovo has declined to comment on the rumors.

Lenovo has cash totaling $4.5 billion, vastly outweighing debt of $423 million, and giving it the muscle for more buyouts.

HP and Dell have total debt of $28.2 billion and $7.2 billion respectively, compared with their cash balances of $12.6 billion and $10.9 billion.

"We expect Lenovo to remain acquisitive as it is hungry for growth and so despite high cash balances they will not hike the dividend," said Jefferies technology analyst Ken Hui.

The Beijing-based company has shed its staid image as the maker of all-business ThinkPads, and now churns out multi-colored IdeaPad Yoga convertible ultrabooks which have helped build its brand in China and beyond.

Though newer to smartphones than to its core PC business, Lenovo is the No.2 smartphone and media tablet vendor in China, a success it hopes to duplicate in other emerging markets such as Russia and India, where competition from Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, Apple Inc and others is fierce.

"They are in the right niche markets and hitting the right segments at the right price points. But this is not sustainable in the long run unless the mobility business steps up," said a Hong Kong-based technology banker.

(Additional reporting by Tripti Kalro in BANGALORE and Twinnie Siu in HONG KONG; Editing by Daniel Magnowski)

West Bank and romance prominent in 'Omar'

Posted: 24 May 2013 02:02 AM PDT


CANNES, France (AP) One of the more buzzed-about films at the Cannes Film Festival, "Omar," is set in the West Bank, and the Palestinian conflict is a key part of the plot.

But the film's lead actor, Adam Bakri, says the location or political motif isn't that important.

"The fact is that it is an international story, it happens in the West Bank but it doesn't even say in the film that it happens in the West Bank," he explained.

"So everybody can identify with it. Everybody can really go with it. I think it has a very strong political message but it is underneath, it is not straightforward, which I think is the genius of the film."

"Omar," which is being shown in the "A Certain Regard" section of Cannes, is directed by Hany Abu-Assad, director of the 2005 film "Paradise Now," which won earned him an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe for best foreign film.

In his latest film, the Israeli-born director of Palestinian descent uses the political upheaval between Palestinians and Israel as the backdrop to a love story between characters Omar and Nadia. Omar must climb the separation wall between the Palestinian territories and Israel to see his love, and during one attempt, he is brutally attacked by an Israeli soldier. Afterward, he and his friends band together to kill an Israeli soldier in revenge, and the plot takes more twists.

Despite the political threads in the film, Abu-Assad said the film's romantic plot is the key component.

"I don't know anybody in this world who didn't enter the experience of being madly in love with someone. Me too. And I am always fascinated by how people lose themselves in this subject and how they become insecure. Actual insecurity is the reason why people are in love, but also why this love ends up very badly," he said.

"All love stories in history end up tragic, 'Romeo and Juliet,' 'Othello,' but also like in our modern history, 'Casablanca,' even the 'Titanic' you know, it is a tragic ending. 'In the Mood for Love,' that is a great love story," Abu-Assad continued. "All of these examples gave me the inspiration to do something about my version of love and betrayal but involved in a political thriller because I love political thrillers. These two genres I tried to mix in a way that could become an exceptional movie."

American-born actor Waleed F. Zuaiter is among the actors in "Omar" and also helped Abu-Assad get financing for the film. Abu-Assad has said it is the first film to be completely financed by Palestinians.

"I jumped into it head first, asked as many questions as I possibly could to learn things on the producer's side, and here we are," Zuaiter said.

___

Follow Sian Watson at http://www.twitter.com/nekeamumbi

Moore Tornado Damage Revealed in Google Maps Image

Posted: 24 May 2013 01:55 AM PDT

A satellite image available via Google Maps shows the path that a deadly tornado took as it tore through Moore, Okla., on Monday (May 20) and the scar it etched into the suburban landscape.

In the Google Maps image, you can also click on tabs to see local reports of damage purple tabs indicate the most severe damage.

At its most intense, the twister was a rare EF5, the most devastating type of tornado. Its winds likely exceeded 200 mph (322 km/h) when it barreled through Moore.

The tornado cleared a path up to 1.3 miles (2 kilometers) wide along a 17-mile-long (27 km) stretch of central Oklahoma, according to the National Weather Service. The twister touched down 4.4 miles (7.1 km) west of Newcastle at 2:45 p.m. CDT and ended 4.8 miles (7.7 km) east of Moore, a southern suburb of Oklahoma City, at 3:35 p.m. CDT.

At first, the tornado caused little damage on the ground. But it ramped up quickly, intensifying to EF4 levels in about 10 minutes, the NWS said. The twister produced widespread EF4 scale damage, as can be seen in the image in the center of its path.

At least 24 people were killed by the tornado, and more than 300 were injured, according to local officials. The precise amount of damage will take several days to fully evaluate, but as this and other images of the Moore tornadoshow, it was severe.

EF5 tornadoes are strong enough to blow away big houses and collapse tall buildings. EF4 tornadoes can level sturdy homes and send cars and other large objects flying.

"The debris ball from the tornado, as seen on Doppler radar, expanded to over 2 miles in diameter, and debris was carried over 100 miles [160 km] from Moore," Jeff Masters of Weather Underground wrote on his WunderBlog.

Email Douglas Main or follow him on Twitter or Google+. Follow us @OAPlanet, Facebook or Google+. Original article on LiveScience's OurAmazingPlanet.

Oklahoma Tornado - 'This Is War Zone Terrible' | Video The Top 5 Deadliest Tornado Years in U.S. History 4 Things You Need to Know About Tornado Season Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Kerry meets Israelis, Palestinians in bid to revive talks

Posted: 24 May 2013 01:49 AM PDT


By Arshad Mohammed

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry held separate talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials on Thursday and acknowledged there was considerable skepticism that the two sides would resume peace negotiations.

There were no signs of any breakthrough as Kerry visited Israel for the fourth time in his four months in office to try to revive a peace process that has been moribund for more than two years.

Israeli-Palestinian negotiations broke down in late 2010 in a dispute over Israeli construction of Jewish settlements on occupied West Bank land that the Palestinians want as part of their future state.

"I know this region well enough to know that there is skepticism. In some quarters there is cynicism and there are reasons for it. There have been bitter years of disappointment," Kerry said as he and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posed for pictures.

"It is our hope that by being methodical, careful, patient, but detailed and tenacious, that we can lay out a path ahead that can conceivably surprise people but certainly exhaust the possibilities of peace."

Kerry met Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for lunch in the West Bank city of Ramallah and returned to Jerusalem to see Shimon Peres, who holds Israel's largely ceremonial post of president. He will have breakfast on Friday with Netanyahu.

Before their meeting on Thursday morning, Netanyahu said he wanted to restart peace talks.

"It's something I hope the Palestinians want as well and we ought to be successful for a simple reason - when there's a will, we'll find a way," Netanyahu said.

The two men discussed ways to advance peace, Kerry's ideas for an economic plan to boost Palestinian growth and the "escalating violence" in neighboring Syria's civil war, a senior U.S. State Department official told reporters after the meeting.

Peres wished Kerry success in his mission but the U.S. top diplomat responded by saying success would be a prize for the adversaries, not his.

"You said that 'if you succeed' or 'if you fail' - I think it's not me, Mr. President. It really is a question of whether Israel and the Palestinians make the choices," Kerry told Peres and added that regional players had reached a "critical moment".

"This moment is a really critical moment for the region and particularly for Israel and for Palestine and for Jordan ... the importance of trying to resolve this in this moment, where there is a willingness for people to look for a way, can't be overstated," Kerry said.

SETTLEMENTS

Last week, Kerry telephoned Netanyahu to voice U.S. concern at Israel's plan to declare legal four unauthorized West Bank settler outposts.

Most of the world deems all Israeli settlements in the West Bank as illegal. Israel, which captured the land in the 1967 Middle East War, disputes this. There are about 120 government-authorized settlements in the West Bank and dozens of outposts built by settlers without official sanction.

The main issues that would have to be resolved in a peace agreement include the borders between Israel and a Palestinian state, the future of Jewish settlements, the fate of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem.

In his visits to the region, Kerry is also trying to put together an economic package for the Palestinians to go alongside the U.S. political initiative.

European diplomats, in meetings with Palestinian leaders, have been trying to steer them away from any notion the European Union might present a peace plan of its own. British Foreign Secretary of William Hague also held talks with Netanyahu and Abbas on Thursday.

(Additional reporting by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Jon Hemming)

Simple Vision Test Predicts IQ

Posted: 24 May 2013 01:46 AM PDT

A simple visual test is surprisingly accurate at predicting IQ, according to new research.

The study, published today (May 23) in the journal Current Biology, found that people's ability to efficiently filter out visual information in the background and focus on the foreground is strongly linked to IQ. The findings could help scientists identify the brain processes responsible for intelligence.

That doesn't mean snappy, efficient visual processing leads to smarts, said study co-author Duje Tadin, a neuroscientist at the University of Rochester in New York. Instead, common brain processes may underlie both intelligence and efficient visual processing.

IQ hunting

Since the 1800s, the forefathers of IQ testing, including Sir Francis Galton (who also pioneered the science of fingerprinting), suspected that highly intelligent people also have supersensory discrimination.

But studies in the subsequent decades have found only a modest connection between IQ-test scores and people s ability to quickly or accurately spot motion in images.

Tadin and his colleagues were studying a separate question on visual perception in 12 participants when they found something striking: IQ seemed to be correlated strongly with performance on a visual task.

The test asked users to spot the direction of motion on a series of black-and-white stripes on a screen. Sometimes, the lines formed inside a small central circle, and other times, they were large stripes that took up the entire screen. Participants also completed a short IQ test. [Watch Video of Motion and Test Your Smarts]

The team noticed that people with higher IQs were good at spotting motion in the small circles, but terrible at detecting motion in the larger black-and-white stripes.

Because they had looked at so few people, Tadin and his colleagues wondered if their results were a fluke. They repeated the experiment with 53 people, who also took a full IQ test.

The ability to visually filter the motion strongly predicted IQ in fact, motion suppression (the ability to focus on the action and ignore background movements) was as predictive of total IQ as individual subsections of the IQ test itself.

Relevant information

As people walk, the background scenery is always changing, so efficient brains may be better at filtering out this irrelevant visual information. And that efficiency could be operating across a wide range of tasks, Tadin said.

"What happens in brains of high-IQ people is, they're automatically processing motion of small moving objects efficiently, whereas they're suppressing the background," Tadin said.

The findings reshape the conventional view that quick thinking leads to smarts.

"Speedy processing does matter, but it's only half the story. It's how you filter out things that are less relevant and focus your speedy resources on what is important," Tadin said.

Big variation

The study reveals new insights into brain efficiency and smarts, said Kevin McGrew, director of the Institute for Applied Psychometrics and owner of www.themindhub.com.

Even though the link between IQ and visual filtering was very strong, IQ tests won't be replaced by motion tracking anytime soon, said McGrew, who was not involved in the study.

"Their task accounts for or explains about 50 percent of the IQ scores," McGrew told LiveScience. "That is impressive in psychology, but it still means there is 50 percent of the scores that they're not explaining."

Follow Tia Ghose on Twitterand Google+. Follow LiveScience @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

10 Ways to Keep Your Mind Sharp 10 Things You Didn't Know About the Brain Top 10 Things that Make Humans Special Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

How the White Tiger Got His Coat

Posted: 24 May 2013 01:44 AM PDT

The strikingly beautiful, milky coats of white tigers are caused by a single change in a known pigment gene, a new study finds.

Since their discovery in the Indian jungle centuries ago, white tigers, a variant of Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris tigris), have had a certain mystique. Captive white tigers have been inbred to preserve the recessive white coat trait, leading some to speculate the trait is a genetic defect. But the genetic basis of tiger whiteness was not known. (A recessive trait will only show up if the individual gets two genes for that trait, one each from mom and dad.)

White tigers have now disappeared from the wild. "The white tiger represents part of the natural genetic diversity of the tiger that is worth conserving, but is now seen only in captivity," study author Shu-Jin Luo of China's Peking University said in a statement. [Iconic Cats: All 9 Subspecies of Tiger]

Luo and colleagues are calling for a captive management program to maintain both white and orange Bengal tigers, and possibly to reintroduce the cats back into the wild.

To find out the genetics responsible for white tigers' creamy hue, Luo's team mapped the genomes of a family of 16 tigers both white and orange in China's Chimelong Safari Park. The researchers also sequenced the full genomes of the three parent tigers. They validated their findings in 130 unrelated tigers.

The team focused on a pigment gene called SLC45A2, which is linked to light coloration in modern Europeans as well as horses, chickens and fish. The white tigers carried a variant of this gene that inhibits the production of red and yellow pigments without affecting black pigments, results showed.

The gene variant explains why the majestic cats lack the rich orange shade of their feline cousins but still have their famous dark stripes. The findings are detailed today (May 23) in the journal Current Biology.

Now that the researchers have identified the white color gene, they want to investigate how these two color varieties, white and orange, have survived through evolution.

Records of white tigers in India date back to the 1500s, Luo and colleagues say. They appear able to survive in the wild, as their primary prey, such as deer, are probably colorblind. The animals were widely hunted, and the last known free-ranging white tiger was shot in 1958. Habitat destruction probably contributed to the cats' decline.

Follow Tanya Lewis on Twitter and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook & Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

Gallery: Tiger Species of the World Image Gallery: One-of-a-Kind Places on Earth In Images: Tigers Rebound in Asia Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Runways at Heathrow Airport shut after BA incident

Posted: 24 May 2013 01:37 AM PDT


LONDON (Reuters) - London's Heathrow Airport closed both its runways on Friday following an incident with a British Airways plane, the airport operator said.

British Airways said it was investigating the issue and operator Heathrow Limited said all the passengers had been evacuated.

(Reporting by Kate Holton; editing by Stephen Addison)
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