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06/07/2024

Leading hydrogen aircraft startup is suddenly grounded
Universal Hydrogen had raised $100 million from investors to build hydrogen-fuel-cell aircraft. Now it’s liquidating its business.
Around this time last year, Universal Hydrogen was flying high. The startup had successfully flown a 40-passenger aircraft using primarily hydrogen over a series of trips from central Washington down to Mojave, California. The test flights marked a significant — if still very early — milestone in the broader global quest to decarbonize air travel.

Universal Hydrogen apparently won’t get the chance to fly its plane again.

Last week, the Los Angeles–based company informed shareholders that Universal Hydrogen is shutting down, having burned through the $100 million it raised from investors, The Seattle Times first reported. The company’s backers included GE Aviation, American Airlines, and the venture capital arms of Airbus, JetBlue, and Toyota.

Mark Cousin, chair and CEO of Universal Hydrogen, said the four-year-old startup had failed to raise further financing from new investors to develop its technology. It couldn’t convince existing investors to fork over more cash either.

“We were unable to secure sufficient equity or debt financing to continue operations and similarly were unable to secure an actionable offer for a sale of the business or similar strategic exit transaction,” Cousin wrote in a June 27 letter to shareholders.

“It is our sincere hope that these efforts will live on as part of a future entity,” he added. (Cousin didn’t immediately return Canary Media’s request for comment.)

Universal Hydrogen was pursuing a two-pronged strategy for cleaning up passenger aircraft.

First, it retrofitted existing, oil-burning planes with hydrogen-fuel-cell systems and electric motors. Second, the company was designing hydrogen storage containers that could be transported from hydrogen production facilities by truck or train, then deposited directly into an aircraft’s body — no pipelines required.

“Our business model resolves the chicken-and-egg problem between hydrogen airplanes and hydrogen infrastructure by developing both in parallel, and with a uniquely low-cost approach,” Paul Eremenko, the company’s cofounder and former CEO, said in March 2023, following the startup’s first successful test flight near Moses Lake, Washington.

Globally, commercial air travel accounts for over 2 percent of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions every year, though flying may actually be responsible for 4 percent of total global warming when condensation trails and other non-CO2 factors are taken into account.

05/07/2024

'99% of drivers' don't know what this road sign means
Knowing your road signs is an essential part of learning to drive. But one driver is convinced that there's very few of us that know what the meaning behind one in particular.

Passing your theory test is one vital cog in being able to legally get behind the wheel without an instructor next to you in the passenger seat. That's because it teaches you all the warning signs to watch out for, as well as vital information such as what speed limit signs mean.
Sure, even if you pass with flying colours, it does't make you a perfect driver by any means. Yes, we see you, the ones dubiously overtaking us despite us driving at the speed limit.

Basic limit signs aside (nothing too hard about numbers in a circle is there, really) those driving for a long time would be forgiven for not remembering what every sign means. And to be honest, I'm sure many would be lying if they could say they knew every sign when sitting the theory test in the first place.

But over on Reddit, one motorist has vented about one sign in particular. They reckon that many of us wouldn't be able to clock what it means at all.
It's incredibly common and found on thousands of roads across the United Kingdom.

We're talking about the white circle with a diagonal black stripe through it at a 45 degree angle.

"I'm convinced 99% of drivers don't know what this sign means," the Redditor posted.
What does the official line say on the RAC?
The RAC website explains, saying: "A white circular sign with a single black diagonal stripe through it tells you that the national speed limit applies on the upcoming stretch of road. It supersedes any previous speed limit signs you may have had to adhere to, such as passing through temporary roadworks.

"Of course, even when the national speed limit applies, it might not always be safe to drive at that speed, so use your common sense on this."

So, while it says you can legally drive at 60mph, the law clearly states that it is first and foremost about being safe. That includes driving the speed of the traffic around you.

The national speed limit depends on the road you're on. It's 30mph in built up areas with street lights, unless you can see a sign stating otherwise.

04/07/2024

Great

Check out Khurram Butt’s video.

04/07/2024

How Gaza’s hospitals became battlegrounds
Relentless bombardment, power outages and shortages have pushed nearly every hospital in the beleaguered northern Gaza Strip out of service, with evidence of repeated attacks on and in the vicinity of medical facilities despite the presence of doctors, patients and civilians inside, a CNN analysis has found.

At least 20 out of 22 hospitals identified by CNN in northern Gaza were damaged or destroyed in the first two months of Israel's war against Hamas, from October 7 to December 7, according to a review of 45 satellite images and around 400 videos from the ground, as well as interviews with doctors, eyewitnesses and humanitarian organizations. Fourteen were directly hit, based on the evidence collected and verified by CNN and analyzed by experts.

Israel launched its bombardment and ground invasion of the Gaza Strip after Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attack, in which at least 1,200 people were killed and more than 240 others taken hostage. In the first two months of the war, at least 17,100 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks on the strip, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. At the time of publishing, that number was more than 23,400.

Israel says that Hamas operates inside and underneath hospitals, and is using them for military operations, including as command centers, weapons stores and to hide hostages. The Israelis have released footage they say is evidence of those Hamas operations. The videos do not offer definitive proof, and Hamas has denied the claims.

CNN sent a list of the hospitals identified as damaged or destroyed to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). In response, the IDF said it “did not conduct any targeted attacks against hospitals in the Gaza Strip,” adding that “Hamas systematically misuses hospitals and medical facilities.”

Tracking how aerial bombardment has impacted hospitals in northern Gaza gives a sense of the scale and scope of devastation that the war has wrought on the enclave’s health system — and the knock-on impact to civilians who have relied on the facilities for shelter and care, and are more in need of their services now than ever before.
magery obtained by CNN showed that two hospitals were completely flattened. Attacks on and around the strip’s three pediatric hospitals forced them to cease services. The only hospitals offering dedicated cancer and psychiatric treatment also stopped operating after having been damaged. By the end of the period reviewed, only four hospitals were partially functioning, according to OCHA, the UN humanitarian agency. None had surgery capacity.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said on December 21 that no hospitals were functioning in northern Gaza and injured patients who were unable to be moved were “waiting to die.” According to the WHO, as of January 10, six hospitals in the north were partially functioning.

To provide a window into how Gaza’s hospitals became battlegrounds, CNN took an in-depth look at the deterioration of the strip’s biggest and second biggest medical facilities, Al-Shifa and Al-Quds, up until they ceased operations in November. Al-Shifa has since resumed some services.

Israeli authorities say both hospitals have been used by Hamas for military purposes. The IDF published images of a tunnel shaft and military equipment it said its forces found inside the Al-Shifa complex and video of what appeared to be an armed man outside Al-Quds Hospital. Hamas and hospital officials have denied that the militant group has operated from inside the facilities.

Taken together, the two hospitals reflect the similarities CNN observed in reviewing evidence from the first two months of the war: that what should be protected facilities are being bombed, encircled and shot at by tanks, and that surrounding infrastructure, ambulances and roads are being hit, affecting efforts to treat patients, evacuate facilities and deliver aid.

Several of the hospitals assessed as part of this analysis, including Al-Shifa and Al-Quds, appeared to have been attacked by Israel, according to imagery of munitions fragments, large impact craters, tanks, tank shell holes and tracks from heavily armored vehicles. Experts who reviewed the imagery for CNN said that the aftermath was consistent with damage from high-grade military weaponry used by the IDF.

03/07/2024

US deploys rarely seen nuclear sub while Putin holds war games in the Med
A US Navy nuclear-powered submarine has made a rare appearance in a show of force this week.

The USS Tennessee ballistic submarine popped up in the Norwegian Sea on Tuesday and was accompanied by a guided-missile cruiser and two naval aircraft.

It’s thought the sub surfaced as a show of force after Russia sent a nuclear-powered submarine and naval fleet to Cuba.

It comes as the Kremlin plays war games in the Mediterranean Sea with its own show of force.
It what appears to be further sabre rattling from Putin, Moscow has deployed the missile cruiser Varyag in the Med to conduct drills and demonstrate his capability.

The 611ft-long warship simulated attacking an enemy ship, destroying a submarine, and destroying kamikaze drones and other airborne weaponry.

The Kremlin is projecting its maritime power by maintaining his Pacific Fleet flagship in the Mediterranean, calling at the Libyan port of Tobruk after taking part in a joint exercise with the Egyptian Navy.
USS Tennessee can carry up to 20 Trident nuclear missiles and surfacing demonstrated ‘multi-domain readiness in action’, a spokesperson for the US 6th Fleet said on X.

One of the naval planes, an E-6B Mercury, took part in an operation off the coast of Norway on Sunday.

Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists, said the flight ‘indicated forward operations with nuclear missile submarines’ – and described the USS Tennessee surfacing as ‘a blunt signal to Russia’.

The locations of nuclear submarines are rarely publicised by the US Navy, but since 2020 it has been making its presence known in the North Atlantic and other nearby seas much more often, Business Insider reports.

Russia is also often intentional when revealing the locations of its own nuclear submarines, including one of its Severodvinsk-class submarines which was spotted in Cuba earlier this month.
Under international agreement, Putin can’t move the Varyag or other Pacific Fleet vessels to the Black Sea, despite the significant weakening of his Black Sea Fleet due to Ukrainian missile and kamikaze drone attacks.

‌NATO member Turkey under the Montreux Convention is restricting access to the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits for Russian warships.

‌The Varyag – which arrived in the Mediterranean in April – is expected to sail to Latin America as Putin seeks to show Russia as a world power challenging the West.

02/07/2024

Wao. What a fight

Check out Khurram Butt’s video.