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Climate Activists Block Private Jets in Netherlands

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Climate Activists

Hundreds of climate activists in the Netherlands halted private jets from leaving Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on Saturday. Protesters from Greenpeace and Extinction Rebellion sat around private jets.

Greenpeace Netherlands’ Dewi Zloch stated that the activists want “fewer aircraft, more trains, and a ban on unneeded short-haul flights and private jets.”

According to military police, several demonstrators were dragged away for being on airport premises without authorization.

In response to Greenpeace’s open letter, Schiphol’s new CEO, Ruud Sondag, stated that the airport aims to be an “emissions-free airport by 2030 and net climate-neutral aviation by 2050.” And we have a responsibility to lead the way in that,” he said, admitting that it needed to happen faster.

More than 120 international leaders will attend this year’s United Nations climate talks, which begin on Sunday in the Red Sea beachfront resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Thorny issues on the agenda for the Nov. 6-18 negotiations include further reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing financial aid to impoverished countries dealing with the effects of climate change.

Egypt is facing a storm of criticism as it prepares to host the COP27 climate meeting beginning Sunday, which rights groups claim is a crackdown on protestors and activists.

Climate Activists

After Egyptian dissidents abroad called for protests against President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on November 11, during the United Nations climate conference, rights groups accused the Egyptian authorities of arbitrarily detaining activists.

Human rights organizations claim that security officers have set up checkpoints on Cairo streets, stopping people and examining their phones for anything relevant to the scheduled protests.

According to the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms (ECRF), an NGO, 93 climate activists have been imprisoned in Egypt in recent days.

According to national security prosecution investigations, several arrested allegedly sent demonstration footage using social chat applications.

Some were also accused of using social media inappropriately, distributing false information, and joining terrorist organizations, a repressive allegation regularly employed by the state establishment against climate activists.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Friends of the Earth, and many other organizations have all spoken out in support of the arrested climate activists.

Climate Activists

Climate protestors have flung tomato soup, scattered potatoes, and even attached themselves to iconic paintings in recent weeks.

The climate activists stated that their activities were intended to draw attention to the use of fossil fuels and the global environmental catastrophe.

Last month, two activists spilled tomato soup on Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers at London’s National Gallery.

“Which is more valuable, art or life?” the two activists posed to others in the gallery. “Is it more valuable than food?” More than just justice? “Do you care more about preserving a picture or preserving our world and people?”

Two more climate activists spread potatoes on a glass-covered painting by French painter Claude Monet inside a German gallery several weeks later.

Another protester hung his head from the glass covering of a famous painting by Johannes Vermeer, Girl with a Pearl Earring, in Amsterdam’s The Hague.

A climate activist who stuck his head to Vermeer’s painting said, “How do you feel when you witness something beautiful and priceless supposedly being destroyed before your eyes?” in a viral video. “Where is that sensation when you watch the planet being destroyed?” he asked.

The protests were in response to a recent incident in which protestors threw paint at the Mona Lisa in the Louvre.

Climate Activists

Climate activists also bonded themselves to a replica of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper at London’s Royal Academy of Arts, Sandro Botticelli’s Primavera at Florence’s Uffizi Gallery, and a sculpture at the Vatican.

Alex De Koning is a spokesperson for Just Stop Oil, the organization responsible for tossing soup cans onto Van Gogh’s painting.

He stated that the organization will target paintings and artwork “unless the government makes a significant statement about the closure of new fossil fuel assets in the U.K.”

“There are still people who are far more offended about that action than the 33 million people in Pakistan who floods have uprooted,” he told Euronews.

However, University of Pennsylvania climate scientist Michael Mann expressed concern that the activists’ activities would harm their cause.

According to the Associated Press, such moves will turn off those who are “natural allies in the climate war.” Some of those people, according to Mann, “will associate such behaviours with climate advocacy and activism.”

Climate Activists

Dana Fisher is a University of Maryland social scientist. She claimed that the protestors appeared to have targeted paintings with glass covers to inflict minimal damage.

“These approaches are explicitly focused toward attracting media attention,” she told the Associated Press.

People’s attention has traditionally been drawn to attacks on artwork.

A supporter of women’s suffrage slashed The Toilet of Venus, a famous Spanish artist Diego Velazquez’s painting, in London’s National Gallery in 1914.

An Iranian artist sprayed the words “Kill Lies All” on Pablo Picasso’s anti-war masterpiece Guernica at the Museum of Modern Art in New York during the Vietnam War.

The paint was removed, and the museum official shortly after the individual vandalized the mural.

Mona Lisa, the most renowned painting of all time, has been assaulted more than any other work of art. Over the years, people have thrown rocks, chemicals, paint, and even a teacup at da Vinci’s picture.

The Louvre has subsequently placed the Mona Lisa behind bulletproof glass, keeping people at a safe distance.

Following the Girl with a Pearl Earring incident, a Dutch cultural official stated, “Everyone has the freedom to make a statement.” But, please, respect our common heritage. Climate Activists attacking vulnerable objects of art is not the proper course of action.”

 

Climate Activists Blame Climate Change on Heat Wave in UK

UK Protesters Decry Climate Change After Record Heat Wave

 

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United CEO Tries To Reassure Customers Following Multiple Safety Incidents

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united

United Airlines is attempting to reassure passengers following a spate of accidents on its Boeing jets this year. In a statement to customers, the airline states that safety is “at the center of everything that we do.”

“While they are all unrelated, I want you to know that these incidents have captured our attention and sharpened our focus,” CEO Scott Kirby wrote in a Monday morning statement to customers.

united

United CEO Tries To Reassure Customers Following Multiple Safety Incidents

On Friday, a United Boeing 737-800 landed in Medford, Oregon, missing an underside fuselage panel.

Earlier this month, United experienced four mishaps, all involving Boeing jets. A United Boeing 737-900ER blew flames from its engine after takeoff from Houston, a Boeing 777 lost a wheel during takeoff from San Francisco, a Boeing 737 Max slipped off a runway in Houston, and a United Boeing 777 trailed hydraulic fluid as it left Sydney.

“Our team is reviewing the details of each case to understand what happened and using those insights to inform our safety training and procedures across all employee groups,” Kirby continued.

The airline is extending pilot training by one day, retooling training for new mechanics, and “dedicating more resources to supplier network management.”

Passengers witnessing a run of negative articles about the airline and its Boeing jets may consider booking elsewhere. In its letter, the airline is attempting to keep consumers from departing. As of the end of last year, 81% of the jets used on United’s mainline operations were manufactured by Boeing, compared to little more than half of the jets in rivals Delta and American Airlines’ mainline fleets.

Aside from the problems on  flights, the most dramatic Boeing incident this year featured an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9, which lost a door stopper on a January 5 flight, resulting in a gaping hole in the plane’s side. And last week, a Latam Airlines flight from Sydney, Australia, to Auckland, New Zealand, fell unexpectedly, throwing some passengers to the cabin ceiling.

united

United CEO Tries To Reassure Customers Following Multiple Safety Incidents

Investigators are still investigating the causes of both events, but a preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board showed Boeing left the bolts required to keep the door plug in place on the 10-week-old Alaska Air jet. Boeing asserted that an incident in the cockpit rather than a problem with the aircraft’s systems may have caused the Latam accident.

The age of the aircraft in the United incidents suggests that the problem could be with their staff rather than Boeing’s well-documented quality faults. For example, Boeing purchased the jet that lost its panel on a Friday trip in 1998. So, Boeing’s quality difficulties are likely unrelated to that occurrence.

However, Boeing’s issues have impeded United’s operations. Due to the FAA’s production slowdown, it has halted hiring a new class of pilots since it will receive fewer new planes from Boeing this year, as previously promised. In January, the Alaska Air incident grounded its 737 Max 9 jets for three weeks.

united

United CEO Tries To Reassure Customers Following Multiple Safety Incidents

Furthermore, approval of a new generation of Boeing jets, the 737 Max 10, ordered by United, has been delayed due to the company’s quality and safety issues.

Kirby told investors last week that United is considering purchasing more jets from Boeing competitor Airbus. He also stated earlier this year that the Alaska Air incident was the “straw that broke the camel’s back” on United’s plans to receive deliveries of the Max 10 in the near future.’

SOURCE – (CNN)

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For The Past Year, Global Ocean Temperatures Has Set New Records On A Daily Basis.

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ocean

According to new data, the world’s oceans have now been subjected to an unprecedented year of heat, with new temperature records being smashed every day.

Global water surface temperatures began breaking daily records in mid-March last year, according to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer, raising fears about marine life and extreme weather worldwide.

ocean

For The Past Year, Global Ocean Temperatures Has Set New Records On A Daily Basis.

“The amplitude by which previous sea surface temperature records were beaten in 2023, and now again in 2024, is remarkable,” said Joel Hirschi, associate head of marine systems modelling at the National Oceanography Centre in the United Kingdom.

Gregory C. Johnson, a NOAA oceanographer, reported that the global average ocean temperature in 2023 was 0.25 degrees Celsius higher than the previous year. That increase “is equivalent to about two decades’ worth of warming in a single year,” he told CNN. “So it is quite large, quite significant, and a bit surprising.”

According to scientists, human-caused global warming, along with El Niño, a natural climate trend characterized by higher-than-average water temperatures, is accelerating  heat.

The biggest repercussions are for marine life and global weather. As the global waterwarms, hurricanes and other extreme weather phenomena, such as blistering heat waves and heavy rains, may gain more force.

High temperatures are already wreaking havoc on coral. In March, based on aerial observations, authorities declared that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is witnessing its seventh mass bleaching episode.

Bleaching happens when heat-stressed corals release the algae that dwell in their tissue and serve as a food supply. If water temperatures continue too high for too long, corals will starve and die.

ocean

For The Past Year, Global Ocean Temperatures Has Set New Records On A Daily Basis.

Data from NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch program suggest that the crisis extends far beyond Australia, with the world potentially facing a fourth worldwide mass coral bleaching event in the coming months.

Ocean heat creates the conditions for more powerful hurricanes. “The warmer the ocean, the more energy to fuel storms is available,” said Karina von Schuckmann, an oceanographer at Mercator Ocean International in France.

Temperatures in the North Atlantic, an water area important for storm generation, have been unusual, startling some scientists who are still investigating the specific causes.

“At times, the records (in the North Atlantic) have been broken by margins that are virtually statistically impossible,” Brian McNoldy, a senior research associate at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School, said to CNN.

If water temperatures remain high in the second half of 2024 and a La Niña event intensifies the Atlantic hurricane season, “this would increase the risk of a very active hurricane season,” Hirschi explained.

The oceans contain around 90% of the world’s excess heat generated by burning planet-heating fossil fuels. “Measuring water warming allows us to track the status and evolution of planetary warming,” Schuckmann stated in an interview with CNN. “The ocean is the sentinel for global warming.”

El Niño is expected to weaken and fade in the coming months, perhaps reducing record water temperatures if La Niña replaces it.

ocean

For The Past Year, Global Ocean Temperatures Has Set New Records On A Daily Basis.

“In the past, surface temperature values have decreased after the passage of El Niño,” Schuckmann said. However, she cautioned that it is now hard to forecast when water temperatures will fall below record levels.

While natural climatic variability will cause water temperatures to vary, NOAA’s Johnson predicts that in the long run, they will “continue to break records as long as greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere rise.”

SOURCE – (CNN)

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Reactions As Vladimir Putin Secures A Fifth Term As Russia’s President After Tightly Controlled Vote

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putin charged with war crimes

Vladimir Putin won a historic fifth term as Russia’s president on Monday, as the electoral commission announced the results of a referendum in which he faced no serious challenges and took place amid the toughest crackdown on dissent and free speech since Soviet times.

putin

Reactions As Vladimir Putin Secures A Fifth Term As Russia’s President After Tightly Controlled Vote

Putin claimed that the landslide majority demonstrated Russians’ “trust” and “hopes” in him, while lawmakers throughout Europe blasted the vote as a hoax and Russia’s efforts to conduct elections in seized portions of Ukraine that it claims as its territory.

Here’s what Putin, European leaders, and others say:

“Of course, we have a lot of work ahead. But I’d like to clarify one thing: no one has ever been able to intimidate or stifle our will or self-conscience since our consolidation. They have failed in the past and will fail in the future. Vladimir Putin, President of Russia.

“The elections took place in an ever-shrinking political space, which has resulted in an alarming increase of violations of civil and political rights, and precluded many candidates from running, including all those opposed to Russia’s illegal war of aggression.” – Statement from the European Union.

“These Russian elections highlight the intensity of repression under President Putin’s administration, which tries to stifle all dissent to his illegal war. Putin eliminates his political opponents, controls the media, and declares himself the winner. “This is not a democracy.” — David Cameron, UK Foreign Secretary.

putin

Reactions As Vladimir Putin Secures A Fifth Term As Russia’s President After Tightly Controlled Vote

“Searches at voting stations’ entrances, attempts to examine ballots before voters place them in ballot boxes, and detentions of voters who arrived at noon. According to reports, at one voting location in Moscow, police asked that the chairman of a commission (of poll workers) unlock a ballot box and hand them a ballot with anything inscribed on it. This is the first time in my life that I have witnessed such ridiculousness.” — Stanislav Andreychuk, co-chair of Golos, the independent election watchdog, on Telegram.

putin

Reactions As Vladimir Putin Secures A Fifth Term As Russia’s President After Tightly Controlled Vote

“The Russian election was one without a choice. Holding so-called elections in portions of Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia violates international law. It is all the more amazing that so many Russians made it known over the weekend that they do not agree with this Russian president. That you go to a polling station even if you’re surrounded by military earns me the highest respect.” — German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock.

SOURCE – (AP)

 

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