South Asia Current Affairs

Thursday, 21 July 2011

Boeing avoids 'heart attack' in 737 battle with A320neo

A new American Airlines Boeing 737. Photo: Reuters

Boeing is taking a page from Airbus's playbook seven months after the European aircraft maker began reaping record sales by upgrading its workhorse jet.
The US planemaker won an order for 200 single-aisle jets yesterday from American Airlines, with half of its jets updated variants of its latest 737 airliner to follow Airbus down the route of new engines. Airbus took home 260 orders, in the biggest-ever industry deal.
Boeing's decision ends months of speculation about whether it would upgrade its 737 or pick the more expensive option of a complete redesign that can cost more than $US10 billion. Airbus unveiled its A320neo in December, and has won more than 1000 orders or commitments to make it the fastest selling jet ever.
"This could have been a catastrophe for Boeing," said Richard Aboulafia, vice president of the Teal Group, a Fairfax, Virginia-based aviation consulting firm. "Boeing recognised this as the heart-attack moment that it was."
The A320neo is slated for delivery in 2015. Boeing said its re-engined jet will enter service in "mid-decade" and reach American in 2018. Directors will vote on the matter next month, and sales will start "this fall," Boeing said.
Like the current 737, the new variant will have one engine option only, the Leap-X power plant built by CFM International, a joint venture between General Electric Co. and Safran SA of France. The neo, which stands for "new engine option," offers an alternative engine made by Pratt & Whitney.
With American poised to rejuvenate its fleet, Chicago-based Boeing managed to avert an upset by a carrier that had bought only US jets since 1987.
Boeing decided to revamp the 737 after hitting a "stumbling block" in the effort to build an all-new jet, its preferred choice, Jim Albaugh, the commercial airplanes chief, said yesterday in an interview. While the technology for a new jet is available, it wasn't clear that Boeing could achieve high-volume output to permit the 2020 launch that carriers were demanding, he said.
"It came down to talking to customers, and when we talked to them about the prospect of a new airplane pushing out to the right, it became pretty apparent there was a bias to do something now, to do the new engine," Albaugh said.
As recently as last month, Albaugh said at the Paris Air Show that customers were willing to wait for "something more revolutionary."
Boeing had plenty of time to decide, Albaugh said at the time, echoing repeated comments by executives that they favored an all-new jet ready by decade's end. He said yesterday that the new plane now will shift "well into the next decade."
'We love competition'
Airbus also spent months studying the feasibility of re- engining. Both companies have struggled to maintain multiple programs, with Airbus still working to improve output of its A380 superjumbo and keeping its A350 wide-body jet on target for a 2013 introduction. Boeing is more than three years late on its 787 Dreamliner, and its latest 747 is also behind schedule.
"We love competition, and the fact that we have the neo on the market and they have their re-engining means that the competition will continue without dramatic differences," Airbus sales chief, John Leahy, said in a telephone interview. "An all-new plane offer would not be stabilizing."
Airbus has said it doesn't expect to have the technology for an all-new narrow-body jet until the middle of next decade.
Fan size
Boeing's overhaul concept had earlier envisioned engines with 70-inch (177cm) fans, up from 61 inches (154cm) on the newest 737, and would have forced the planemaker to raise the landing gear and strengthen the wing. Engineers went back to work with engine makers to study 65- to 66-inch fans that would be more efficient and prompt fewer changes to the plane. The A320 sits further off the ground, making larger engines easier to fit.

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'Has-been' question pushes thin-skinned Paris Hilton over the brink

Past her prime time? ... Paris Hilton throws a tantrum over fasing popularity question.

Don't try asking Paris Hilton if she is a has-been.
Hilton, 30, walked out of a television interview, portions of which aired on Wednesday, after being asked whether other reality TV stars have grabbed the celebutante limelight from her after 15 years of being famous for being famous.
The question by a reporter on the US network ABC was prompted by dismal ratings for Hilton's latest reality TV show The World According to Paris, which debuted to just 400,000 US viewers on cable channel Oxygen in early June.
"Do you worry at times that the people who have followed in your footsteps, like Kim Kardashian, have overshadowed you," ABC News journalist Dan Harris asked Hilton.
"No, not at all," she replied, adding tersely that she was not upset about the low ratings for her TV show.
"Ever worry about your moment having passed?" pressed Harris.
Hilton gave a derisive "Huh" and walked off for what Harris described as a long and heated talk with her publicist.
She later resumed the interview and said; "I've been doing this for 15 years now, so it's been a long time. So just like any other business person or someone in the industry, it's always important to reinvent yourself and come up with new projects."
Excerpts were shown on US talk show Good Morning America on Wednesday, with the full interview to run on ABC's Nightline later in the day.
Hilton, the great-granddaughter of Hilton Hotels founder Conrad Hilton, has built a multi-million dollar business of fashion, perfume and other products based on her celebrity and lavish Los Angeles lifestyle.
In the mid-2000s, Hilton and her friend Nicole Richie, daughter of singer Lionel Richie, starred in reality TV show The Simple Life, in which the two of them travelled through the United States living and working with ordinary Americans.
Kim Kardashian, 30, and her socialite sisters however have caught up fast since 2007 on the back of reality show Keeping Up With the Kardashians and multiple spinoff TV series.

The latest series of that show debuted in June to 2.5 million viewers, while the raucous Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi of Jersey Shore fame helped attract more than eight million US viewers to that reality show's third season earlier this year.

Pakistan secretly funded lobbying

Pakistani soldiers on patrol. Photo: Reuters

A ''DECADES-LONG'' operation by Pakistan's spy agency to influence US policy on Kashmir was aided by American citizens who funnelled money to members of Congress and illegally hid their foreign connections, US prosecutors say.
Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai, 62, and Zaheer Ahmad, 63, were charged this week in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act and lying to federal agents.
Prosecutors said the two moved about $US4 million ($A3.75 million) from Pakistan's government through the Washington-based Kashmiri American Council to sway US legislators with campaign contributions and other lobbying activities.
The council, headed by Fai, is ''actually run'' by elements of the Pakistani government, including Pakistan's military intelligence service, the Inter-Services Intelligence Agency, or ISI, the Justice Department said in a statement.
The pair failed to disclose their affiliation with Pakistan's government as required by law, and Fai gave false answers in 2007 when asked by the FBI about the links, the government charged.
In an interview with FBI agents at his home on March 3, Fai ''implied that he had no relationship with anyone in the government of Pakistan,'' Sarah Webb Linden, an FBI special agent, said in an affidavit.
A search of Fai's home, office and a storage facility turned up documents detailing the council's Washington strategies, including budget requirements for contributions to members of Congress and trips to Kashmir for legislators, money for opinion pieces distributed to the media, as well as money for seminars and conferences. One document allegedly called for $US100,000 for contributions to members of Congress in 2009.
The council's goal is to build support for Pakistani interests in Kashmir and offset lobbying by India over the disputed territory, the US said in court papers.
The case against Fai and Ahmad originated with information provided to the FBI from a witness in 2005. The informant, who was trying to have his jail sentence reduced, told investigators that Pakistan's spy agency was using the Kashmiri American Council to further the interests of the government of Pakistan. BLOOMBERG

Lion attacks rise after full moon

A lion is most likely to eat you just after a full moon, research shows.
Other predators, such as wolves, may also be at their most dangerous when the moon starts to wane.
The discovery, from an African study of 500 lion attacks, could explain the full moon's place in folklore as a harbinger of evil or disaster, and its association with werewolves and vampires.
Scientists studied records of nearly 500 lion attacks on Tanzanian villagers between 1988 and 2009.
In more than two-thirds of cases, the victims were killed and eaten.
The vast majority of attacks occurred between dusk and 10pm on nights when the moon was waning and providing relatively little light.
Lions hunt most successfully when darkness allows them to surprise their prey, but on bright moonlit nights they might have to go hungry.
The period immediately following a full moon provides a lion with a welcome opportunity to catch up on missed meals.
As the moon wanes, it does not appear until well after dusk, which near the equator occurs early even in summer.
Peak danger times for humans are therefore the active hours after sunset, especially the day after a full moon.
The pattern emerged clearly when the researchers compared attack rates with moon phases.
Attacks were a third more frequent during the second half of the cycle, when there was little or no moonlight.
Chief investigator Dr Craig Packer, a lion expert based at the University of Minnesota College of Biological Sciences in the US, said: "People start out at moderate danger during days 0-4, when the moon is only a sliver and sets shortly after sunset.
"Danger then declines as the moon gets brighter each evening, with very few attacks in the nights just before the full moon.
"Then, wham, danger spikes as those hungry lions can now operate in darkness for the rest of the lunar cycle.
"The post-full-moon spike is restricted to relatively few hours of full darkness before the largish moon rises later in the evening."
Lion attacks also increased during the rainy season, when the moon was more likely to be obscured by clouds.
The study, published in the online journal Public Library of Science ONE, involved checking measurements of lion belly size logged regularly since 1978, and records of lion attacks kept by Tanzanian government authorities.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/environment/animals/lion-attacks-rise-after-full-moon-20110721-1hqg0.html#ixzz1Six0J7Xv

Who's dirtier: men or women?

Girl, woman lying in mud, covered in mud.

Down on her muck ... do men really have worse hygiene than women?

This will really revolt those who didn't like the idea of not washing hair for style's sake, outlined in Beauty Beat last week. It will positively disgust them - readers like AJ (''I can't believe people are using fashion as an excuse for poor hygiene'') and C. Fairy (''Unwashed hair on men or women is hideously obvious and revolting'') - and it may be a turn-off for you too. It's a new range of beauty products designed for those who can't be bothered.

Its hero product is a body spray that's meant to mask body odour. Sort of a Febreze for the furry bits. It is described as an alternative to deodorant, to be sprayed under the arms ''for a freshen up instead of using the odd squirt of cologne''. The range is from Lush and it's called Dirty and it's out in September. Interestingly, it is for men.

To be fair, it does not seem to be wholly designed for dirty people. According to the media release, the concept is to layer various products (including shower gel, shaving cream and hair cream) with different fragrances to make a ''complete'' and combined manly fragrance called Dirty. But to be realistic, would any man use every product in a range every day? Let alone a man who ''can't be bothered with too much paraphernalia in the mornings''?

And the intentions of the Dirty body spray ($19.95) are very clear. Says the label: ''If you've got no time for a full-on Dirty routine in the morning, take an 'Italian shower' instead and spritz yourself liberally with this body spray before you head out the door.'' I am not sure if this is offensive to Italians but I think it may be just a little offensive to the male sex (especially those from Italy). Does this imply that men are lax, lazy and basically grotty? Why aren't women offered a similar product? Garnier has just launched a 48-hour deodorant (two days without bathing!) for both men and women. Or maybe Lush is on to something. Perhaps men are a whole lot less clean and fastidious than women. Any cleaner of public toilets would argue otherwise. What do you think? Who are cleaner - men or women?

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