Rio de Janeiro Hits the Gas in Push Toward Its Zero Carbon Goal
In its efforts to slash its climate-changing emissions nearly to zero by 2050, Rio de Janeiro has chosen a perhaps unlikely place to start: its trash bins.
At a huge waste treatment plant outside of the famed beach city, methane gas released by buried municipal garbage is captured and turned into energy as part of the city’s key push to meet its ambitious goals to become carbon neutral.
Every day, trucks unload 10,000 tons of waste at the CTR waste treatment plant in Seropedica, about 60 kilometers (37 miles) northwest of Rio de Janeiro.
The plant turns household and industrial food and yard waste, which once would have rotted in a landfill – creating a major source of climate-change-spurring emissions – into biogas that is sold to industries or to the state’s gas company.
The waste treatment plant, unusual in Latin America, can produce 20,000 cubic meters of purified gas an hour, according to Jose Henrique Monteiro Penido, the head of environmental sustainability at COMLURB, Rio’s waste management company.
“Everyone talks about recycling but the biggest environmental problem is the organic fraction of garbage,” he said.
Once in a landfill, rotting material releases methane that can, in the short term, drive climate change at a much faster pace than emissions from other sources, such as automobiles or air conditioners.
That gas, and the slurry left over from putrefying waste, “is the most serious problem,” Penido said.
Rio de Janeiro, part of the C40 Cities initiative – a network of cities pushing climate action – has committed to reducing its climate changing emissions by 20 percent between 2005 to 2020.
The city of about 6.7 million is also one of more than 70 cities worldwide that are aiming to become “carbon neutral” by 2050, meaning they will produce no more climate-changing emissions than they can offset by other means, such as planting carbon-absorbing trees.
Cities account for about three-quarters of carbon dioxide emissions, according to the United Nations, and consume more than two-thirds of the world’s energy.
That means whether they succeed or fail in curbing emissions will have a huge impact on whether the world’s goals to prevent the worst impacts of climate goals are met.
From planting trees to promoting renewable energy and cleaner methods of transport, such as electric cars and buses, each city is going about achieving its carbon neutral goals in different ways, and with varying degrees of success.
In Rio de Janeiro’s case, changes to waste treatment are responsible for about two-thirds of emissions reductions made so far, according to Jose Miguel Carneiro Pacheco, manager of climate change and sustainable development at the city’s department of conservation and environment.
Biogas production from the Seropedica plant alone accounts for a third of the reductions in emissions so far in Rio de Janeiro, Pacheco said.
Goals at risk?
Whether Rio de Janeiro will reach its emission reduction targets in full by 2020 is unclear – and the goal is at risk, officials and environmentalists say.
A lack of private investment and delays in large-scale public works have lowered the city government’s estimate of the emissions cuts possible by 2020 to 18 percent “if everything stays as it is”, Pacheco said.
The launch of an additional waste treatment center, for example, has been delayed, as has a new metro train line for the city, as well as installation of new high-capacity express bus lanes.
The 2020 targets could still be achieved, Pacheco said, but only if the delayed projects – or other efforts – push ahead, he said.
“We need to measure the emission reductions contained in the 2017-2020 strategic plan to see if we can achieve the remainder by 2020,” Pacheco said.
But the push for lower emissions comes as Rio struggles to recover from its worst financial crisis in decades, brought on in part by public corruption scandals and lower prices for its key export products, including oil.
That financial crunch has made efforts to attract private funding for clean energy projects and other emissions-reducing ideas harder, Pacheco said.
The city, for instance, failed to find a taker for a public tender to replace the city’s 430,000 street lights with energy-saving LED bulbs. It is now looking for a partner to install solar panels in about 1,500 schools, he said.
“The city’s economic situation is not favorable for these projects, which demand big investments,” he said.
Growing risks
Nationwide, environmentalists fear Brazil’s growing deforestation – a driver of climate change – will worsen under the right-leaning government of President Jair Bolsonaro, who took office in January and has promised to open up more protected land for mining and agriculture.
Brazilians consider climate change the main threat to the country’s and the planet’s safety, above terrorism and the state of the economy, a 2017 study from the Washington-based Pew Research Center found.
For Mauro Pereira, executive director of the non-profit Defensores do Planeta, a youth-led environmental rights group based in Rio de Janerio, the city’s leaders are doing too little to keep pledges to curb emissions and ensure residents get a voice in decisions made.
“Until 2012, City Hall did well but not in the last years,” Pereira said in a telephone interview.
For instance, he said, when Rio hosted the 2016 summer Olympics, it had an agreement with the Olympic committee to plant 12 million tree seedlings in the city – and 24 million in the state as a whole – to compensate for the environmental impacts of the event.
But, to date, only about half of those – 5.5 million – have been planted in the city, Pereira said.
In a statement, Rio’s City Hall said it was “unaware” of the number cited by Defensores do Planeta and confirmed only a commitment to plant 13,500 trees in the Parque Radical de Deodoro park as an Olympic environmental legacy.
In addition, City Hall said the 24 million tree-planting target was proposed by the state of Rio de Janeiro but was re-evaluated and discarded after the state, the Olympic Committee and other bodies involved found that it was not feasible.
Pereira, however, said he had followed the negotiations for the Olympic games and that the targets were not dropped.
He said the city was doing well on some other environmental measures including improving waste treatment, adding bike lanes to curb emissions and installing solar energy in schools.
He said he was concerned about the effects of climate change in Rio, especially in its poorer areas, and urged city officials to carry out more risk assessments.
Almost every year, torrential rainstorms trigger fatal mudslides and flooding in mountaintop neighborhoods in and around Rio de Janeiro.
The flatter and largely poor zones to the west of downtown also face a growing heat threat, as climate change brings more extreme temperatures, he said.
“The West zone is very hot – 48, 49 degrees, and that’s in addition to torrential rains. We’re already worried about the rainy season from January onwards,” he said. “We just want City Hall to comply with its international agreements for the city to become an example for the world.”
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5G-connected robots, cars, drones and virtual-reality gaming sets are among the thousands of futuristic gadgets on display at this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. While there is much excitement over how 5G networks will transform our everyday lives, the conference is overshadowed by the standoff between the United States and Beijing over the Chinese telecoms giant Huawei – which the U.S. says could be used by the Chinese government for espionage. Henry Ridgwell has more.
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Most Popular Last Name in Each US State
Smith is the most common last name in the United States, followed by Johnson, Miller, Jones, Williams, and Anderson, according to genealogy company Ancestry.com.
What the most common surnames in the United States have in common is that they all have English, Scottish, Irish or Welsh roots because people from those countries were among the first Europeans to settle in North America.
Last names were not commonly used in England until 1066, when population growth made it necessary. Inspirations for a second name, or surname, were generally inspired by the father’s name, where a person lived, their occupation, or even a nickname.
The name Smith was likely derived from blacksmiths. For example, over time, “Richard the smith” became simply “Richard Smith.” A person named Robertson may well be the descendant of a person once known as “Robert’s son,” and Mr. Appleby could have lived near an apple orchard or tended to one.
It would not be hard to guess what someone named Tom Carpenter did for a living. Other last names derived from the kind of work people did include Archer, Baker, Brewer, Butcher, Cook, Dyer, Farmer, Judge, Mason, Page, Potter, Taylor and Weaver.
Today, where you live in the United States can determine which name you hear the most. Northwesterners are more likely to meet an Anderson, while on the East Coast people named Brown are more common.
There’s much more variety in the American Southwest. Texas, California, New Mexico, and Arizona have large Latino populations and a variety of names such as Garcia, Hernandez, Martinez, and Chavez.
Overall, the 50 most common last names in the United States grew in numbers between 2000 and 2010, except for the name of “Hall” which dropped. The surnames that saw the largest jump in volume during that time period are Spanish in origin and include the names Hernandez, Ramirez, and Rodriguez.
The name Nguyen, which can be traced back to a Vietnamese royal dynasty, also saw a large increase, according to 24/7 Wall Street.
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Look But Don’t Touch as Smartphone’s Flexible Future Unfolds
Flexible and folding formats framed the future of smartphones this week as manufacturers focused on new forms in an effort to jolt the market out of uniformity and re-invigorate sales.
But anyone hoping to tap or swipe Huawei’s Mate X, a smartphone that wraps the screen around the front and back, was soon disappointed at Barcelona’s Mobile World Congress.
Initial cheers were quickly followed by gasps when the Chinese firm revealed its eye-watering 2,299 euros ($2,600) price tag, although that includes a 5G connection.
This is even more than Samsung’s Galaxy Fold, which was unveiled last week and will be priced from $1,980 when it goes on sale in some markets in April. It was on display in Barcelona in a glass case like a museum artefact.
While the hands-off stance indicates neither firm has a consumer-ready device, 2019 would be remembered as the year of the foldable Ben Wood, chief of research at CCS Insight, said, adding that the new format was still in its infancy.
“But we are at the stone age of devices with flexible displays; it’s a whole new phase of experimentation after the sea of smartphone sameness we have seen for the last decade.”
Samsung took the opposite approach to Huawei by putting its folding screen on the inside of its device, with another smaller screen on the front panel for use when its is closed.
“That was the solution we felt was best for longevity,” Samsung’s European Director of Mobile Portfolio & Commercial Strategy Mark Notton told Reuters.
Smartphone makers have been trying to innovate to persuade consumers to upgrade from devices which already meet most of their needs, in an effort to reverse falling sales.
And although more vendors will soon follow with their own takes on foldable displays, 2019 will not be the year they go mainstream, market analysts Canalys said. They will remain exclusively ultra-luxury devices with fewer than 2 million expected to be shipped worldwide this year, Canalys added.
The mobile market slipped 1.2 percent in 2018, research company Gartner says, although it expects growth of 1.6 percent in 2019, driven by replacement cycles in the largest and most saturated markets China, the United States and Western Europe.
Gearing up for 5G
With 5G next generation mobile networks not becoming widely available until 2023 in the United States and China and 2026 in Europe, analysts say, the vast majority of customers will be buying the latest 4G devices like Samsung new Galaxy S10.
Nonetheless, manufacturers such as LG were keen to show they could squeeze 5G technology into 4G smartphone form, although most lacked launch or pricing information.
Chinese maker OnePlus had a 5G device running a video game using a 5G connection on show, but visitors were teased with only a glimpse of the phone’s screen in a display cabinet.
“For us, launching means commercial availability, it doesn’t mean PowerPoint,” OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei told Reuters.
“We are confident we are going to be one of the first with a commercially available smartphone in Europe,” he said, adding that this would be within the first half of 2019.
Xiaomi Corp, which ranked fifth in smartphone shipments in the last quarter according to IDC, did reveal pricing information along with its first 5G device.
“Xiaomi has fired the starting gun with a $599 price. That will bring tears to the eyes of many other mobile phone makers,” Wood said, adding that many sub-scale makers such as Sony, LG and others could find it tough to make any kind of margin on 5G.
Sony did not show a 5G device, relying instead on its ownership of a major Hollywood studio to release a new line of Xperia phones with a 21:9 display ratio optimized to watch movies and Netflix content.
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The famed annual Venice Carnival is in full swing with revelers donning beautiful costumes and extraordinary masks. The masks range from historical classics, to modern, original creations. VOAs Deborah Block takes us to a shop in the city of canals that makes intricate masks by hand.
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Iraqi Antique Collector Turns His House into a Museum
There is more than a century of Iraqi history in Sheikh Yousif Akar’s house, a modest home in the holy city of Najaf which the retired teacher has crammed full of local antiques collected over 50 years.
Rifles dating back to when the city was run by the Ottomans or the British sit alongside drinking vessels, coins and historic photographs.
The small museum has attracted a few curious antique lovers, but he rarely advertises for visitors as his house is too small to receive guests.
The 80-year-old hopes the state will take over the collection when he is gone.
“At the end of my life, I wish they would allocate to a place for me to keep these antiquities … for Najaf, for Iraq” he said.
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Scientists: Evidence for Man-Made Global Warming Hits ‘Gold Standard’
Evidence for man-made global warming has reached a “gold standard” level of certainty, adding pressure for cuts in greenhouse gases to limit rising temperatures, scientists said Monday.
“Humanity cannot afford to ignore such clear signals,” the U.S.-led team wrote in the journal Nature Climate Change of satellite measurements of rising temperatures over the past 40 years.
They said confidence that human activities were raising the heat at the Earth’s surface had reached a “five-sigma” level, a statistical gauge meaning there is only a one-in-a-million chance that the signal would appear if there was no warming.
Such a “gold standard” was applied in 2012, for instance, to confirm the discovery of the Higgs boson subatomic particle, a basic building block of the universe.
Benjamin Santer, lead author of Monday’s study at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, said he hoped the findings would win over skeptics and spur action.
“The narrative out there that scientists don’t know the cause of climate change is wrong,” he told Reuters. “We do.”
Mainstream scientists say the burning of fossil fuels is causing more floods, droughts, heat waves and rising sea levels.
U.S. President Donald Trump has often cast doubt on global warming and plans to pull out of the 197-nation Paris climate agreement which seeks to end the fossil fuel era this century by shifting to cleaner energies such as wind and solar power.
Sixty-two percent of Americans polled in 2018 believed that climate change has a human cause, up from 47 percent in 2013, according to the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication.
Satellite data
Monday’s findings, by researchers in the United States, Canada and Scotland, said evidence for global warming reached the five sigma level by 2005 in two of three sets of satellite data widely used by researchers, and in 2016 in the third.
Professor John Christy, of the University of Alabama in Huntsville which runs the third set of data, said there were still many gaps in understanding climate change. His data show a slower pace of warming than the other two sets.
“You may see a certain fingerprint that indicates human influence, but that the actual intensity of the influence is minor [as our satellite data indicate],” he told Reuters.
Separately in 2013, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that it is “extremely likely,” or at least 95 percent probable, that human activities have been the main cause of climate change since the 1950s.
‘Virtually certain’
Peter Stott of the British Met Office, who was among the scientists drawing that conclusion and was not involved in Monday’s study, said he would favor raising the probability one notch to “virtually certain,” or 99-100 percent.
“The alternative explanation of natural factors dominating has got even less likely,” he told Reuters.
The last four years have been the hottest since records began in the 19th century.
The IPCC will next publish a formal assessment of the probabilities in 2021.
“I would be reluctant to raise to 99-100 percent, but there is no doubt there is more evidence of change in the global signals over a wider suite of ocean indices and atmospheric indices,” said Professor Nathan Bindoff, a climate scientist at the University of Tasmania.
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Mexican Leader Knocks Racism at Home After ‘Roma’ Oscar Wins
Mexico’s president on Monday denounced racism in his country a day after the Mexican film Roma emerged as a big winner at the Academy Awards with a plot that highlighted prejudice and inequality.
Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuaron won the best director Oscar on Sunday for his semi-autobiographical film Roma, which told the story of an indigenous domestic worker who cares for a middle-class family in 1970s Mexico City.
The movie also won awards for best foreign language film and cinematography, and President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador fielded several questions about Roma at his regular morning press conference.
Asked if he agreed with Cuaron that Mexican society remains rife with racist prejudice, the veteran leftist did not mince his words.
“I completely agree. Unfortunately, there is a lot of racism in Mexico,” he said.
Lopez Obrador, who in the 1970s worked for the indigenous affairs bureau in his home state of Tabasco in southern Mexico, has pledged to give priority to the poor as president.
Cuaron noted that the film emphasized the divided nature of Mexico’s social structure, opening up a much-needed discussion on racism and domestic worker rights.
“It’s a moment in which the country has recognized itself as a racist country,” he said at an event in Los Angeles last week.
In his acceptance speech, he thanked the Academy for recognizing a movie centered around an indigenous woman, saying her character represents the “70 million domestic workers in the world without work rights.”
Lopez Obrador admitted that he has yet to see the movie, but said he will do so soon. He added that the success of Roma has become a source of pride for many Mexicans.
Named for the neighborhood in the Mexican capital where it is set, Roma stars Yalitza Aparicio as a maid named Cleo who becomes pregnant as she looks after a family with four children just as the parents are splitting up.
While cheers echoed through Roma when the film began collecting Oscars on Sunday, revelers were disappointed when Aparicio did not win the Best Actress award, the first indigenous woman to be nominated for the honor.
Reactions to her performance sparked a debate in Mexico over discrimination faced by darker-skinned indigenous or mixed-race Mexicans, a topic often relegated to the sidelines of political discussions in the country.
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Green Climate Fund Names France’s Glemarec as New Chief
The $8 billion Green Climate Fund, set up to help developing nations tackle global warming, named Yannick Glemarec of France as its new executive director Monday after his predecessor quit.
Former leader Howard Bamsey of Australia stepped down in July after what the fund described as a “difficult” board meeting marred by disputes between rich and poor nations about how to select projects in developing nations.
“Yannick Glemarec brings 30 years of experience in climate change, development, finance and their inter-relationships,” the fund said in a statement. He has previously had senior jobs at U.N. Women and the U.N. Development Program.
The fund, set up in South Korea in 2014, is trying to help developing nations to cut their greenhouse gas emissions and adapt their economies to extremes such as floods, droughts, downpours and rising sea levels.
It has been plagued by internal disputes and U.S. President Donald Trump denounced it as a waste of taxpayer dollars. He halted U.S. contributions as part of his decision to leave the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
Trump’s decision cut the fund to $8 billion from $10 billion originally pledged. The United States under President Barack Obama promised a total of $3 billion but had provided just $1 billion by the time Trump took office.
The fund has a portfolio of 93 projects in developing nations worth about $4.6 billion. It had been led by interim chief Javier Manzanares of Spain since Bamsey quit.
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Oscar Win Seen Ending Shame About Menstruation That Puts Women at Risk
Giving an Academy Award to a documentary about periods set in India will help shatter the monthly shame that impacts millions of women globally, with some even dying in isolation while menstruating, health campaigners said on Monday.
The Netflix film “Period. End of Sentence.,” set in a village in northern India, clinched the Oscar for best short documentary on Sunday, shining a spotlight on a topic rarely discussed openly in the country.
For many women in South Asia, especially adolescent girls, menstruation is shameful and uncomfortable.
From being barred from religious shrines to dietary restrictions to a lack of toilets and sanitary products that prevent them from going to school and work, they face many challenges when they have their periods, health experts say.
“Although this film shows a negative side of India, it will help trigger more conversation about periods – a natural bodily process that is usually talked about in hushed tones, if at all,” said Surbhi Singh, founder of Delhi-based Sachhi Saheli, a charity that raises awareness about menstrual health.
“This will help people look deep within themselves and, hopefully, make them realize how they treat menstruation.”
In rural areas, a lack of awareness and the high cost of pads mean many women instead use unsanitary rags, increasing the risk of infections and disease.
The problem is more dire in Nepal, where an ancient Hindu tradition that banishes women to animal sheds during their periods claims lives year after year as a result of suffocation, animal bites or cold.
Earlier this month, a teenager died sleeping in a hut, becoming the fourth victim in less than a month.
The 26-minute documentary, directed by Rayka Zehtabchi and produced by India’s Guneet Monga, focuses on rural women in Uttar Pradesh state who start a sanitary pad business after generations of limited access to basic hygiene products.
When a sanitary pad vending machine is installed in their village, they decide to make and sell their own brand.
The women follow the lead of Arunachalam Muruganantham, who invented a low-cost machine for manufacturing sanitary pads.
His story inspired Bollywood’s first film on menstrual hygiene, “Padman”, with the popular action hero Akshay Kumar wearing a sanitary pad and talking about periods.
It triggered a nationwide conversation.
“Now, the whole world will turn up and see what is happening. This will help more people to understand the perfect menstrual health hygiene,” Muruganantham, who features in the Oscar-winning film, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
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UAE Says its First Astronaut Going Into Space in September
The first astronaut from the United Arab Emirates will blast off into space on Sept. 25 on a trip to the International Space Station, authorities announced Monday.
Either military pilot Hazza al-Mansoori or engineer Sultan al-Neyadi will be the first Emirati in space, part of an ambitious space program for this Gulf Arab nation home to the world’s tallest building and the busiest airport for international travel.
But the two men, selected from over 4,000 applicants, say they aren’t worried after the recent failure of another Russian rocket carrying astronauts to the space station.
“After the incident we were more confident with the preparedness of the mission,” al-Mansoori told The Associated Press. “In case of any failure there is equipment onboard the rocket to ensure the safety of the crew, which made us more confident that the system works with a high level of adequacy.”
That incident happened Oct. 11, which saw a Soyuz-FG rocket carrying U.S. astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexei Ovchinin fail shortly after launch due to a damaged sensor. The two men landed safely in Kazakhstan.
“The astronauts who were involved will go into space soon,” al-Neyadi said. “This shows how safe the Soyuz is, that astronauts are able to survive in case of any accident.”
Both men have undergone intensive training at the Star City space center outside of Moscow, which included pressure chamber tests, centrifuge tests, parabolic flight training, and winter survival training. Parabolic flights allow astronauts to train for being weightless in space.
“Since I’m a pilot, I was able to withstand a gravitational force of 9-G,” al-Mansoori said. “Now I must train in this sort of gravitational force, 0-G, the lack of gravity.”
Al-Neyadi said the biggest challenge he faced was not a physical one.
“The most difficult thing perhaps was learning Russian, since it’s the only language which we will use to communicate with the crew onboard the vessel,” he told the AP. “It was also the language they used while training at the center in Russia.”
The Russian Soyuz spacecraft is currently the only vehicle that can ferry crews to the International Space Station after the U.S. space shuttle fleet retired.
Organizers had said they’d announce the name of the astronaut going Monday. They didn’t, without offering an explanation. It remains unclear when authorities will choose the first astronaut to go in September.
The first astronaut will travel in September with the Russian space mission aboard Soyuz MS-15 and spend eight days at the International Space Station. The selected astronaut will return onboard the Soyuz MS-12 and then be replaced by the second astronaut.
The UAE has a fledgling space program with big ambitions. It launched its first locally made satellite, KhalifaSat, in October from Japan. It also wants to launch a probe to Mars in 2020.
The UAE also says it wants to colonize Mars by 2117, with a fully functioning city of 600,000.
Though the men will be over 400 kilometers (250 miles) above the Earth’s surface while on their trip, the Emirati astronauts will have a taste of home when they travel closer to the stars. Russia’s state-owned RIA Novosti news agency quoted an unnamed industry source saying that UAE space travelers have been offered a menu of Arab dishes to select from when they go into space. The men have chosen maqloubeh, a one-pot rice dish, salona, a lamb stew, and the standard hummus, the agency reported.
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2019 Oscars Were About Diversity
Green Book, the heartwarming drama about the friendship between an eclectic African – American musician and his uncouth white driver during the segregation era won three Academy awards including Best Picture. That most coveted award fit right in to the night of diversity at the Oscars. VOA’s Penelope Poulou has more.
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The Segregation-Era Film "Green Book" Crowned Best Picture at the Oscars
The segregation-era road-trip drama “Green Book” was crowned best picture at the Academy Awards, handing Hollywood’s top award to a film seen as a feel-good throwback to some but ridiculed as an outdated inversion of “Driving Miss Daisy” by others.
In a year where Hollywood could have made history by bestowing best-picture on Netflix (“Roma”) or Marvel (“Black Panther”) for the first time, the motion picture academy instead threw its fullest support behind a traditional interracial buddy tale that proved as popular as it was divisive. But Peter Farrelly’s “Green Book” weathered criticism that it was retrograde and inauthentic to triumph over more acclaimed films and bigger box-office successes. Spike Lee was visibly upset by the win.
“Green Book” also won best supporting actor for Mahershala Ali and best original screenplay.
Lee won his first competitive Oscar while the motion picture academy spread around awards for Ryan Coogler’s superhero sensation “Black Panther,” Alfonso Cuaron’s black-and-white personal epic “Roma,” and the Freddie Mercury biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody” at a brisk, hostless Oscars awash in historic wins for diversity.
Lee’s win for best adapted screenplay to his white supremacist drama “BlacKkKlansman” gave the Dolby Theatre ceremony Sunday its signature moment. The crowd rose in a standing ovation, Lee leapt into the arms of presenter Samuel L. Jackson and even the backstage press room burst into applause.
Lee, whose film including footage of President Donald Trump following the violent white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, spoke about the upcoming election.
“The 2020 election is around the corner. Let’s all mobilize. Let’s be on the right side of history,” said Lee, who was given an honorary Oscar in 2015. “Let’s do the right thing! You knew I had to get that in there.”
The biggest surprise of the night, was in the best actress category. Olivia Colman won for her Queen Anne in the royal romp “The Favourite,” denying Glenn Close her first Oscar. Close remains the most-nominated living actor never to win, with seven nominations.
“Ooo. It’s genuinely quite stressful,” said a staggered Colman, who later turned to Close to say she was her idol, “And this is not how I wanted it to be.”
“Bohemian Rhapsody,” which kicked off the ABC telecast with a performance by Queen, won four awards despite pans from many critics and sexual assault allegations against its director, Bryan Singer, who was fired in mid-production. Its star, Rami Malek, won best actor for his full-bodied and prosthetic teeth-aided performance, and the film was honored for editing, sound mixing and sound editing.
“We made a film about a gay man, an immigrant who lived his life unapologetically himself,” said Malek. “We’re longing for stories like this. I am the son of immigrants from Egypt. I’m a first-generation American, and part of my story is being written right now.”
The lush, big-budget craft of “Black Panther” won for Ruth Carter’s costume design, Hannah Beachler and Jay Hart’s production design, and Ludwig Goransson’s score. Beachler had been the first African-American to ever be nominated in the category. Beachler and Carter became just the second and third black women to win non-acting Oscars.
”It just means that we’ve opened the door,” Carter, a veteran costume designer, said backstage. “Finally, the door is wide open.”
Two years after winning for his role in “Moonlight,” Mahershala Ali won again for his supporting performance in the interracial road-trip drama “Green Book” – a role many said was really a lead. Ali is the second black actor to win two Oscars following Denzel Washington, who won for “Glory” and “Training Day.” Ali dedicated the award to his grandmother. “Green Book,” a film hailed by some as a throwback and criticized by others as retrograde, also took best original screenplay.
The night’s co-lead nominee “Roma,” which is favored to hand Netflix its first best picture win, notched Mexico’s first foreign language film Oscar. Cuaron also won best cinematography, becoming the first director to ever win for serving as his own director of photography. Cuaron referenced an especially international crop of nominees.
“When asked about the New Wave, Claude Chabrol said there are no waves, there is only the ocean,” said Cuaron, referring to the French filmmaker. “The nominees tonight have proven that we are a part of the same ocean.”
The wins for “Roma” gave Netflix its most significant awards yet, while “Black Panther” – along with best animated film winner “Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse” – meant the first Academy Awards for Marvel, the most consistent blockbuster factor Hollywood has ever seen.
Queen launched Sunday’s ceremony with a medley of hits that gave the awards a distinctly Grammy-like flavor as Hollywood’s most prestigious ceremony sought to prove that it’s still “champion of the world” after last year’s record-low ratings.
To compensate for a lack of host, the motion picture academy leaned on its presenters, including an ornately outfitted Melissa McCarthy and David Tyree Henry and a Keegan-Michael Key who floated down like Mary Poppins. Following Queen, Tina Fey – alongside Amy Poehler and Maya Rudolph – welcomed the Dolby Theatre audience to “the one-millionth Academy Awards.”
Rudolph summarized a rocky Oscar preamble that featured numerous missteps and backtracks by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: “There is no host, there won’t be a popular movie category and Mexico is not paying for the wall.”
The trio then presented best supporting actress to Regina King for her pained matriarch in Barry Jenkins’ James Baldwin adaptation “If Beale Street Could Talk.” The crowd gave King a standing ovation for her first Oscar.
“To be standing here representing one of the greatest artist of our time, James Baldwin, is a little surreal,” said King. “James Baldwin birthed this baby.”
The inclusivity of the winners Sunday stood in stark contrast to the (hash)OscarsSoWhite backlash that marked the 2016 and 2015 Oscars. Since then, the academy has worked to diversity its largely white and male membership, adding several thousand new members and opening the academy up internationally.
More women won Oscars than ever before. Still, this year’s nominations were criticized for not including a female best director nominee or a best-picture nominee directed by a woman.
Though the once presumed front-runner “A Star Is Born” appeared to flame out as awards season continued, it won, as expected, for the song “Shallow,” which Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper performed during the ceremony. As she came off the stage, Cooper had his arm around Gaga as she asked, “Did I nail it?”
Best documentary went to Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s “Free Solo,” which chronicles rock climber Alex Honnold’s famed, free solo ascent of Yosemite’s El Capitan, a 3,000-foot wall of sheer granite, without ropes or climbing equipment. “Free Solo” was among a handful of hugely successful documentaries last year including the nominated Ruth Bader Ginsberg documentary “RBG” and the snubbed Fred Rogers doc “Won’t You Be My Neighbor.”
“Thank you Alex Honnold for teaching us to believe in the impossible,” said Vasarhelyi. “This film is for everyone who believes in the impossible.”
Adam McKay’s Dick Cheney biopic “Vice” won makeup and hairstyling for its extensive physical transformations. The category was one of the four that the academy initially planned to present during a commercial break and as its winners – Greg Cannom, Kate Biscoe and Patricia Dehaney – dragged on in a litany of thank-yous, they were the first to have their microphone cut off.
To turn around ratings, Oscar producers pledged a shorter show. In the academy’s favor is a popular crop of nominees: “Bohemian Rhapsody,” “A Star Is Born” and, most of all, “Black Panther” have all amassed huge sums in ticket sales. Typically, when there are box-office hits (like “Titanic”), more people watch the Oscars.
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‘Roma’ Wins Foreign Language Film Oscar
Mexico’s “Roma” is the winner of the best foreign language film at the Oscars.
Other films of director Alfonso Cuaron have won Academy Awards, but “Roma” now becomes the first film from Mexico to win the Oscar for best foreign language film. The movie’s dialogue is in Spanish and Mixtec.
It is Cuaron’s second win of the night. Earlier in the ceremony, he won the best cinematography award.
“Green Book”
Mahershala Ali is the winner of the Academy Award for best supporting actor. The win comes for his performance in “Green Book.”
It’s the second Oscar for Ali, who won in the same category in 2017 for “Moonlight.” In “Green Book” he plays Don Shirley, an African-American classical pianist, who tours the Deep South.
He thanked Shirley at the outset of his acceptance speech, saying telling Shirley’s story pushed him as an actor.
Ali dedicated his win to his grandmother, who he said is always pushing him to remain positive.
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Fun Facts & Figures from This Year’s Oscar Nominations
Some fun and interesting facts about Tuesday’s nominations for the 91st Academy Awards:
-After more than 30 years and some two dozen films, Spike Lee received his first Academy Award nomination for best director for “BlacKkKlansman.” It’s also the first time one of his movies has been nominated for best picture.
-Glenn Close’s best actress nomination for “The Wife” is her seventh, and could finally mean her first Oscar. She has more nominations without a win than any other living actor or actress.
-“Black Panther” is the first Marvel movie – and the first superhero film of any kind – to be nominated for best picture. Its $700 million box-office take is more than the earnings of the other seven best-picture nominees combined.
- “Roma” is the first Netflix film to be nominated for best picture.
- Sam Elliott’s first Oscar nomination – for best supporting actor in “A Star Is Born” – comes 50 years after his first acting credit, on the TV series “Judd, for the Defense.”
-Rami Malek, nominated for playing Queen frontman Freddie Mercury in “Bohemian Rhapsody,” is the only first-time Oscar nominee among the men up for best actor. He’s up against multiple nominees Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Viggo Mortensen and Willem Dafoe.
- Yalitza Aparicio’s nomination for “Roma” comes in her first role as an actress.
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This is the second of Hollywood’s four versions of “A Star Is Born,” to get a best picture nomination, along with the 1937 original. The 1954 and 1976 versions each got several Oscar nominations, but not for best picture.
- No women were nominated for best director this year. The number of female directorial nominees in the 91-year history of the Oscars remains five.
- Eighty-seven countries submitted movies to be considered for best foreign language film. Five got nominations : Germany, Japan, Lebanon, Mexico and Poland.
- Bob Hope hosted the Oscars a record 19 times. No one is scheduled to host this year’s ceremony.
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Part of Brooklyn’s Coney Island Avenue Named After Pakistan Founder
The United States has a long tradition of recognizing foreign figures by naming streets after them. Often that’s done at the request of an immigrant community with a significant presence in the area. That’s the case along of stretch of Brooklyn’s Coney Island Avenue in New York City, which has been renamed after the founder of modern Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. VOA reporter Aunshuman Apte attended the naming ceremony and has this report.
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Harpoon Deployed to Spear Space Debris
One of the unintended consequences of the space race is the amount of junk that’s now floating around our planet. Most of it is little stuff, but even something as small as a screw can do a lot of damage when it’s moving at 17,000 kilometers per hour. That’s why there are now plans to clean up the mess. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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‘Beale Street’ Tops Spirit Awards; Close Wins Best Actress
Two years after his “Moonlight” triumphed on the eve of the Oscars, Barry Jenkins’ adaptation of the James Baldwin novel “If Beale Street Could Talk” Saturday topped the 34th Film Independent Spirit Awards, winning best film, best director and best supporting female for Regina King.
The Spirit Awards, always a casual preamble to Sunday’s Academy Awards, featured a few things the Oscars don’t have: a host (actress Aubrey Plaza) and female filmmaker nominees, including Tamara Jenkins (“Private Life”), Debra Granik (“Leave No Trace”) and Lynne Ramsey (“You Were Never Really Here”).
But as much as the afternoon belonged to women, Jenkins’ lyrical period drama emerged the biggest winner two years after his “Moonlight” won at the Spirits and (despite a touch of trouble with the envelopes) at the Oscars. Given his fellow nominees, even Jenkins was sheepish about it.
“I’m not gonna lie, man,” said Jenkins accepting the directing award. “I didn’t want to win this.”
Jenkins used his speech to instead largely urge more movies to be made with female directors and specifically credited the Scottish filmmaker Ramsey — who encouraged Jenkins as a film student — for inspiration.
“This award has your DNA in it,” Jenkins said.
Female filmmakers honored
“Leave No Trace” and “You Were Never Really Here” won other awards, though. “You Were Never Really Here” won for its editing. Granik was honored with the Spirits’ second annual Bonnie Award, a grant for midcareer female directors. The audience gave her a standing ovation.
“I wasn’t expecting such a love bomb,” a clearly moved Granik said.
A day before many expect her to finally win her first Academy Award, best female lead went to Glenn Close for her performance in “The Wife.” Close was accompanied everywhere by her loyal white Havanese dog Pip: on the awards’ “blue carpet,” on stage with her, and backstage speaking to reporters. While Close accepted her award, Pip rolled on his back alongside her.
“I hope you don’t mind Pippy came up here with me,” Close said. “He’s my date.”
Fewer Oscar contenders
This year’s Spirits included fewer Oscar contenders than usual, which meant a chance, as Plaza said, for the Spirits to get back to their roots and honor “the movies that are too good to be seen.”
Their best-picture winner has often predicted Oscar-winners, including “Moonlight,” ″Spotlight,” ″Birdman” and “12 Years a Slave.” But last year Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” took the Spirits’ top honor before Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water” won at the Academy Awards. This year, “Beale Street” is nominated for three Oscars but not best picture.
King, though, is the front-runner for best supporting actress.
“If you haven’t seen it, go see it,” said King of “Beale Street” before chuckling. “I’m still promoting.”
Smaller-budget films
The Spirit Awards limit nominees to films with budgets of $20 million and less, eliminating bigger budget contenders like “Black Panther” and “A Star Is Born.” They also focus on American movies, limiting Oscar nominees like “Roma” and “The Favourite” to the best international film category, which Alfonso Cuaron’s “Roma” won.
Cuaron, whose film is favored to become the first foreign language film to win best picture Sunday, said he believes cinema is growing more diverse, “and that will make this category irrelevant.”
Ethan Hawke won best male lead for “First Reformed,” an award collected for the absent actor by his co-star, Amanda Seyfried.
Marielle Heller’s “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” took awards for both Richard E. Grant’s supporting performance and best screenplay for Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Witty. Holofcener called up Heller to join them on stage.
Best first feature went to Boots Riley’s madcap political satirical “Sorry to Bother You.” In his acceptance speech, Riley, a longtime musician making his directorial debut, spoke out against U.S. involvement in Venezuela. He said film is growing more socially conscious.
“There are real movements out there happening on the streets,” Riley said. “Rightly so, film is responding to that.”
Other awards
Other awards included best documentary for the Oscar-snubbed Fred Rogers documentary “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”; best first screenplay went to the comedian-turned-director Bo Burnham for “Eighth Grade”; Luca Guadagnino’s “Suspiria” won the Robert Altman ensemble award and best cinematography; and the micro-budget “En El Septimo Dia” won the Spirits’ John Cassavetes Award, which honors movies made for less than $500,000.
In her opening monologue, Plaza tweaked the Oscars: “The network’s first choice was no one, but they were already booked for tomorrow.”
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WHO: Pregnant Women Exposed to Ebola Should Get Vaccine
An independent advisory body convened by the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends pregnant women and breastfeeding women in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo be vaccinated against the deadly Ebola virus. Latest WHO figures put the number of Ebola cases in the DRC at 853, including 521 deaths since the beginning of the outbreak in August.
More than 80,000 people so far have been vaccinated against Ebola in the African country’s conflict-ridden North Kivu and Ituri provinces during the current outbreak. The vaccine is still in its experimental stage. But since 2015 it has been given to thousands of people in Africa, Europe and the United States.
The studies of the efficacy of the vaccine are not conclusive. However, they indicate the serum is safe and protects people against Ebola. On the basis of accumulated evidence, the group of immunization experts recommends continued ring vaccination for Ebola in DRC.
Ring vaccination is a strategy that prevents the spread of the disease by vaccinating only those likely to be infected with the virus. WHO spokesman, Tarek Jasarevic says the experts advise pregnant women at high risk of infection and death from Ebola should be given the vaccination.
“So, this aim, this vaccinating of women would protect them, provide them with more protection. But we also know that if we use this ring vaccination that women who are in the community that is vaccinated then have a low risk. So, it is really between risk and benefits and we hope that the use of the vaccine in pregnant women will generate some data for the future,” Jasarevic said.
The group of experts advise the vaccine be given to pregnant women in their second or third trimester as well as to breastfeeding women and babies under one year old.
The experts also recommend that one or more of three other new experimental Ebola vaccines be tested in areas neighboring the affected regions. They say pregnant and breastfeeding women should be included in these trials.
The WHO says all vaccinated pregnant women will be closely monitored until the birth of their babies to see if there are any adverse effects.
your ad hereHate Crimes Increasing, But Few Turn Out to be Hoaxes
The number of hate crimes, or crimes against a protected minority, has increased over the last several years in the United States. Advocates fear the alleged false reporting of a hate crime by an American actor may cause people to doubt real victims and prevent some victims from going to the police. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti takes a look at the impact of a hate crime hoax in a country facing deep divisions.
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Oscars Fail to Include Asian Films, Community, Critics Say
The Oscars this year features a diverse range of nominations from the first Netflix film, Roma to Black Panther as possibly the first superhero film that could win the Best Picture award. Since the twitter campaign #OscarsSoWhite began in 2015, the Academy Awards has been criticized for lacking diversity and failing to include marginalized communities. Critics say this year’s nominations, as usual, failed to recognize the Asian community. VOA’s Anna Kook has more.
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Singer R. Kelly Arrested at Chicago Precinct
R&B star R. Kelly was taken into custody after arriving Friday night at a Chicago police precinct, hours after authorities announced multiple charges of aggravated sexual abuse involving four victims, including at least three between the ages of 13 and 17.
The 52-year-old singer, whose real name is Robert Kelly, was driven to the station in a dark colored van with heavily tinted rear windows. The vehicle pulled up outside the precinct about 8:15 p.m. and a security detail for Kelly kept reporters and cameramen at arms’ length as he exited the side door.
Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi tweeted a short time later that Kelly was under arrest.
Kelly did not respond to questions from reporters as he walked inside the building. He was expected to be held overnight before an appearance Saturday in bond court.
Cook County State’s Attorney’s Kim Foxx announced 10 counts Friday against the Grammy winner. She said the abuse dated back as far as 1998 and spanned more than a decade.
Decades of allegations
Kelly has been trailed for decades by allegations that he violated underage girls and women and held some as virtual slaves.
The singer, who was acquitted of child pornography charges in 2008, has consistently denied any sexual misconduct.
“He is extraordinarily disappointed and depressed. He is shell-shocked by this,’’ Steve Greenberg, Kelly’s attorney, told The Associated Press.
The arrest sets the stage for another #MeToo-era celebrity trial. Bill Cosby went to prison last year, and former Hollywood studio boss Harvey Weinstein is awaiting trial.
New video evidence
Best known for hits such as “I Believe I Can Fly,’’ Kelly was charged a week after Michael Avenatti, the attorney whose clients have included porn star Stormy Daniels, said he gave prosecutors new video evidence of the singer with an underage girl.
At a news conference in Chicago, Avenatti said a 14-year-old girl seen with R. Kelly on the video is among four victims mentioned in the indictment. He said the footage shows two separate scenes on two separate days at Kelly’s residence in the late 1990s.
During the video, both the victim and Kelly refer to her age 10 times, he said.
Avenatti said he represents six clients, including two victims, two parents and two people he describes as “knowing R. Kelly and being within his inner circle for the better part of 25 years.’’
The new charges marked “a watershed moment,’’ he said, adding that he believes more than 10 other people associated with Kelly should be charged as “enablers’’ for helping with the assaults, transporting minors and covering up evidence.
The video surfaced during a 10-month investigation by Avenatti’s office. He told the AP that the person who provided the VHS tape knew both Kelly and the female in the video.
Acquitted of child pornography charges
The jury in 2008 acquitted Kelly of child pornography charges that arose from a graphic video that prosecutors said showed him having sex with a girl as young as 13. He and the young woman allegedly seen with him denied they were in the 27-minute video, even though the picture quality was good and witnesses testified it was them, and she did not take the stand. Kelly could have gotten 15 years in prison.
Charging Kelly now for actions that occurred in the same time frame as the allegations from the 2008 trial suggests the accusers are cooperating this time and willing to testify.
Each count of the new charges carries up to seven years in prison. If Kelly is convicted on all 10 counts, a judge could decide that the sentences run one after the other, making it possible for him to receive up to 70 years behind bars. Probation is also an option under the statute.
Legally and professionally, the walls began closing in on Kelly after the release of a BBC documentary about him last year and the multipart Lifetime documentary “Surviving R. Kelly,’’ which aired last month. Together they detailed allegations he was holding women against their will and running a “sex cult.’’
In the indictment, the prosecution addressed the question of the statute of limitations, saying that even abuse that happened more than two decades ago falls within the charging window allowed under Illinois law. Victims typically have 20 years to report abuse, beginning when they turn 18.
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Your Flight’s Seat-Back Screen May Be Watching You
Now there is one more place where cameras could be watching you — from 30,000 feet.
Newer seat-back entertainment systems on some airplanes operated by American Airlines and Singapore Airlines have cameras, and it’s likely they are also on planes used by other carriers.
American and Singapore both said Friday that they have never activated the cameras and have no plans to use them.
However, companies that make the entertainment systems are installing cameras to offer future options such as seat-to-seat video conferencing, according to an American Airlines spokesman.
A passenger on a Singapore flight posted a photo of the seat-back display last week, and the tweet was shared several hundred times and drew media notice. Buzzfeed first reported that the cameras are also on some American planes.
Cameras standard features
The airlines stressed that they didn’t add the cameras — manufacturers embedded them in the entertainment systems. American’s systems are made by Panasonic, while Singapore uses Panasonic and Thales, according to airline representatives. Neither Panasonic nor Thales responded immediately for comment.
As they shrink, cameras are being built into more devices, including laptops and smartphones. The presence of cameras in aircraft entertainment systems was known in aviation circles at least two years ago, although not among the traveling public.
Seth Miller, a journalist who wrote about the issue in 2017, thinks that equipment makers didn’t consider the privacy implications. There were already cameras on planes, although not so intrusive, and the companies assumed that passengers would trade their images for convenience, as they do with facial-recognition technology at immigration checkpoints, he said.
“Now they’re facing blowback from a small but vocal group questioning the value of the system that isn’t even active,” Miller said.
American Airlines spokesman Ross Feinstein said cameras are in “premium economy” seats on 82 Boeing 777 and Airbus A330-200 jets. American has nearly 1,000 planes.
“Cameras are a standard feature on many in-flight entertainment systems used by multiple airlines,” he said.
Singapore spokesman James Boyd said cameras are on 84 Airbus A350s, Airbus A380s and Boeing 777s and 787s. The carrier has 117 planes.
Cameras not turned on
While the airlines say they have no plans to use the cameras, a Twitter user named Vitaly Kamluk, who snapped the photo of the camera on his Singapore flight, suggested that just to be sure the carriers should slap stickers over the lenses.
“The cameras are probably not used now,” he tweeted. “But if they are wired, operational, bundled with mic, it’s a matter of one smart hack to use them on 84+ aircrafts and spy on passengers.”
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Virgin Galactic Takes Crew of 3 to Altitude of 55 Miles
Virgin Galactic’s spacecraft reached an altitude of more than 55 miles (88.5 kilometers) on Friday, carrying for the first time a passenger in addition to its two pilots.
SpaceShipTwo, built by British billionaire Richard Branson to carry tourists into space, launched from California’s Mojave desert and flew to an altitude of 55.87 miles (89.9 kms), the company said.
The US definition of space is anything over an altitude of 50 miles. The Virgin craft made it past that for the first time in December, reaching an altitude of 50.9 miles.
Branson announced with great fanfare at the time that it was the first time since NASA ended its space shuttle program in 2011 that an American vessel had carried humans into space.
However, the Virgin craft still has not crossed the internationally accepted boundary between Earth’s outer atmosphere and space, known as the Karman Line, which is set at an altitude of 62 miles (100 kms).
“SpaceShipTwo, welcome back to space,” wrote Virgin Galactic as it Tweeted updates throughout the event, without sending out any live footage.
The spacecraft travelled at a speed of Mach 3, or three times the speed of sound in its ascent, and landed without incident at the Mojave spaceport.
It is designed to carry six passengers, but test flights are years behind schedule in large part because of an accident that killed a test pilot in 2014.
Branson told AFP earlier this month that he hoped the test flights would be far enough ahead by July that he would be able to join a flight.
For the first time Friday, the flight carried a passenger, Virgin Galactic’s Beth Moses, who will be in charge of training the company’s future space tourists.
To take off from the ground, SpaceShipTwo is carried by another larger plane, WhiteKnightTwo, which resembles a combination of two airplanes attached by their wing tips.
When it is high enough, it releases the spaceship which then fires up its own rocket engine and ascends for roughly a minute into space.
At the apogee, its passengers float in zero-gravity for several minutes. It then descends and glides back to the landing strip.
Branson’s main rival is Blue Origin, created by billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
Bezos told an audience in New York this week that his New Shepard suborbital vehicle would start flying people later this year and to a greater altitude than SpaceShipTwo.
“One of the issues that Virgin Galactic will have to address, eventually, is that they are not flying above the Karman Line, not yet,” Bezos said, quoted by Space News.
New Shepard has already flown above the Karman Line, but not with people on board.
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