London becomes first city to use pollution charge zone
London: London is the first city in the world to implement a 24-hour, seven day a week Ultra Low Emission Zone, inside which vehicles will have to meet tough emissions standards or face a charge, media reported.
Monday’s introduction of the zone, known as the ULEZ, aims to reduce toxic air pollution and protect public health, according to a press release from the office of Sadiq Khan, mayor of London.
Vehicles are responsible for around half of harmful nitrogen oxide air emissions in the British capital, contributing to a toxic air health crisis that increases the risk of asthma, cancer and dementia as well as causing thousands of premature deaths every year, the release says.
“This is a landmark day for our city. Our toxic air is an invisible killer responsible for one of the biggest national health emergencies of our generation,” Khan said in the statement.
“The ULEZ is the centerpiece of our plans to clean up London’s air — the boldest plans of any city on the planet, and the eyes of the world are on us.”
According to a CNN Business report, under new rules introduced April 8, polluting vehicles will be discouraged from entering the ULEZ thanks to a daily charge of £12.50 (around $16) for some cars, vans and motorbikes and £100 ($130) for trucks, buses and coaches. (IANS)
Toddler disables dad’s iPad for nearly half century
San Francisco: A Washington DC-based journalist was locked out of his iPad for nearly half a century after his three-year-old toddler tried to use the device with the incorrect password.
“Uh, this looks fake but, alas, it’s our iPad today after 3-year-old tried (repeatedly) to unlock. Ideas?” Evan Osnos, a staff writer with New Yorker magazine posted on Twitter.
“That caption accompanied a screenshot of his iPad, which showed an onscreen notice that the personal tablet had been disabled for security reasons.
“The prompt advised Osnos to try again in 25,536,442 minutes. That comes out to 48.59 years, which would indicate Osnos may try and access his iPad again by late 2067,” the New York Daily News reported late on Monday.
According to the iPhone-maker’s guidelines, users experiencing the problem are advised to restore and update their settings through iTunes. Any data that’s not backed up, however, would be irretrievably lost.
“We’re still locked out,” Osnos was quoted as saying by the New York Daily News. (IANS)
Woman lived till 99 with most organs on wrong side of body
Salem (Oregon): Rose Marie Bentley was an avid swimmer, raised five kids, helped her husband run a feed store, and lived to the ripe age of 99. It was only after she died that medical students discovered that all her internal organs — except for her heart — were in the wrong place.
The discovery of the rare condition, which was presented this week to a conference of anatomists, was astounding — especially because Bentley had lived so long. People with the condition known as situs inversus with levocardia often have life-threatening cardiac ailments and other abnormalities, according to Oregon Health & Science University.
Cameron Walker’s class at the university in Portland was examining the heart of a cadaver last year when they noticed the blood vessels were different. When they opened the abdominal cavity, they saw that all the other organs were on the wrong side.
The unusual blood vessels helped the heart compensate. In a telephone interview Tuesday, Walker described his reaction to the find as “definitely a mix of curiosity, fascination and a sense of wanting to explore a little bit of a medical mystery — a medical marvel really — that was in front of us.” “And I would say the students felt something very similar,” Walker, an assistant professor of anatomy, told The Associated Press. (AP)
Greece opens shipwreck sites to divers as underwater museums
Steni Valla: Near the northern Greek island of Alonissos lies a remarkable ancient shipwreck: the remains of a massive cargo ship that changed archaeologists’ understanding of shipbuilding in antiquity.
Now this spectacular find is to become the first ancient shipwreck to be made accessible to the public in Greece, including to recreational divers. Greece’s rich underwater heritage has long been hidden from view, off-limits to all but a select few, mainly archaeologists.
Scuba diving was banned throughout the country except in a few specific locations until 2005, for fear that divers might loot the countless antiquities that still lie scattered on the country’s seabed.
Now that seems to be gradually changing, with a new project to create underwater museums. Divers will be able to tour certain shipwrecks and non-divers will experience the sites through virtual reality in information centers on land.
The first of these sites is the Peristera shipwreck, named for the uninhabited Greek island opposite Alonissos where it was discovered in the early 1990s. (AP)
