JETSTAR'S NEW PILOT

"Welcome aboard Jetstar Flight 189 from Brisbane non-stop to Sydney, if I can find the place. In the unlikely event that we crash it shouldn't be too stressful due to the fact that it will happen during darkness and we won't see it coming."

AN INTERNATIONAL DISASTER BODY

New Zealand's bold plan
to rebuild a city

By Kurt Bayer New Zealand Herald

6:00 PM Monday Jul 30, 2012

A scene from Christchurch on February 22, 2011 when 185 people died

A covered sports stadium is the showpiece inclusion in the rebuild blueprint for earthquake-damaged Christchurch city center announced today.

The much-anticipated blueprint includes 12 key sites for major facilities, including a new 2000-capacity convention center at a "postcard location" by the Avon River, a huge aquatic and indoor sports facility, revitalized square with a new central library, and Ngai Tahu cultural center.

Shops, restaurants, bars and cafes are expected to line the picturesque river's edge, as well as the sports stadiums, in a push to make the revitalized city "very much like Melbourne", according to Prime Minister John Key.

SEE THE FULL 120-PAGE BLUEPRINT HERE

The compact center of a rebuilt Garden City, designed to "solve the problem of too much land, not enough demand", will rise from a sweeping space flanked by the twisting Avon and a leafy, bright "college-campus style" frame.

It will take minutes to walk from the new city square, to the 35,000-seat covered stadium, which will have natural, fixed turf. Cycle ways will link historic Hagley Park to downtown.

The blueprint will result in a low-rise city, with a maximum height limit on new buildings of 28 meters, or up to eight storeys, and will be divided into precincts of health, arts and entertainment, retail, as well as the justice and emergency sectors.

Mr Key and Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee officially unveiled the highly anticipated blueprint this evening.

"As a former Cantabrian I am delighted to see this plan for new development and to know construction will soon be underway to rebuild my old hometown," Mr Key said.

The Christchurch Central Development Unit (CCDU), set up in April by the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (Cera) to plan the CBD rebuild, was given 100 days to come up with the blueprint.

The city center was largely destroyed in the magnitude-6.3 earthquake of February 22, 2011, which claimed 185 lives.

Investors and developers say they have been unable to consider any rebuild plans until they knew the location of the new civic facilities. Mr Brownlee said the recovery plan contained a blueprint for a smaller, greener, central city that will set Christchurch apart from any other urban center.

"The plan and its implementation are being watched by the rest of the world, which has also been supportive of Christchurch in its time of need," Mr Brownlee said.

"I anticipate a light, airy, college-campus style feel for the home of numerous innovative Christchurch companies and public sector agencies."

Mr Brownlee refused to say how much it may cost, saying only that the Government had allocated $5.5 billion on the earthquake recovery so far and had already spent $2.45b.

The Government will be working with around 800 city property owners, and will have the powers under the Cera Act 2011 to compulsorily buy land it needs to make way for key facilities.

Further details on a new hospital, advanced technology hub, and a justice precinct are expected to follow in coming months.

Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker said the plan was a "bold vision" while the blueprint received rave reviews from developers and investors at tonight's glitzy launch at the city council headquarters.

Millionaire city property owner Antony Gough said the city had been in "uncharted waters" but now had "a chart to lead the way".

Christchurch Airport boss Jim Boult believed the new central city would be the envy of similar sized cities throughout the world.

There were detractors, however, with about 250 people attempting to disrupt the launch with a vocal protest outside the council building, with chants including, 'Fix our homes before the CBD', and 'Mr Key, hear our plea, we need a road to recovery.'

Wider Earthquake Communities' Action Network (WeCan) spokesman Mike Coleman said today marked further evidence of a "corporate recovery" while residents in the eastern city suburbs were being "left to flounder".

"They open up the champagne bottles for the CBD but there's mere drips of water for the plebs in the suburbs."

Lindsay Carswell of the Christchurch Civic Trust welcomed the "bold vision" but questioned whether it would "actually happen."

Peter’s Comment

A bold, far-sighted plan but Christchurch will never feel like Christchurch ever again to the people who survived and still live there.

There is growing evidence that rescue and recovery from major disasters like Christchurch should be controlled by an international disaster organization. Events like Christchurch are just too big for a single nation to cope with.

Many countries sent teams to Christchurch within hours of the main event on February 22, 2011 and that help was certainly appreciated. But New Zealanders were in control with little or no experience of major disasters and the lack of a properly coordinated international response has left Christchurch and New Zealand with a legacy of errors, delays and frustrations that the country will have to live with for a very long time.

All of the above can be said without pointing an accusing finger at any particular official, politician or organization. In fact the leadership of Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker, just to mention one, was and continues to be outstanding. 

A MOVING EXPERIENCE

Overloaded!

The driver in the top picture was in training for
driving the truck in the bottom picture.

JETSTAR AUSTRALIA

Has Jetstar’s star fallen?

A Jetstar Airbus A-330

Posted on Facebook by Daniel Hazard after flying Brisbane to Sydney, in Australia

I was on the tarmac queuing to board flight DJ189 last night from BNE to SYD @8:30. It was particularly cold and we would have been waiting outside for about 8 minutes before we were able to board via the front stairs. I noticed an elderly lady in a wheelchair waiting at the bottom of the stairs, in the cold, where there were also strong aviation fumes. I notified the head steward when I reached the cabin, as I felt it was inappropriate that someone of that age should be left outside in the cold while the rest of us able-bodied passengers boarded ahead of her. My comment was treated with derision and I was informed that the head steward's responsibilities "did not include anything outside the plane". He did not even attempt to address my concerns and I noticed that the lady was the very last passenger to board the plane. I find it hard to believe that Jetstar could not have assisted this woman to board earlier, or in fact, at all during the boarding process. Other passengers certainly took notice and it made my trip very uncomfortable due to the obvious disrespect bestowed on the elderly woman. I am happy to speak to someone about this further. It was an absolute disgrace.

Peter’s Comment

Jetstar is a budget subsidiary of Qantas Airways and has been beset by passenger complaints since its launch a few years ago. They operate Airbus aircraft with comparatively inexperienced crews. There is even a website devoted to Jetstar complaints: http://www.dontflyjetstar.com/

However, I flew Jetstar a couple of times without finding fault other than crammed seating. They were the cheapest at the time so I suppose you only get what you pay for.

With a good book you can

block out the poor service

PO Box 110, Ngatea 3541, New Zealand

Print books: http://www.gypsybooks.co.nz

For your Kindle: https://www.smashwords.com/books/search

There is another way in which cheapest is not always best and that is in the choice of aircraft. In some aviation circles there is a saying: Boeings are designed by experts and can be flown by idiots. Airbuses are designed by idiots and must be flown by experts.  Because most pilots and crew, like passengers, value their hides most will want to fly in Boeings thereby leaving the Airbuses to the least experienced crews.

INDIA AND CLIMATE CHANGE

By BRYAN WALSH | @bryanrwalsh | July 31, 2012 Science-Time.com

How Climate Change and the Monsoons Affect India’s Blackouts

India's blackouts have left nearly 700 million people without power. The unstable monsoons are adding to demand for electricity—and climate change could disrupt the summer rains even further.

Waiting for the monsoon in India

Blame it on the rain—at least partially. Northern India has been plagued by prolonged blackouts over the past few days that have left some 600 million people without regular power. The electrical grid has never covered the entire country—around 300 million of India’s 1.2 billion citizens lack access to regular electricity—and isolated blackouts are common even in urban areas that normally get juice. But the collapse of the grid this week is something else, spreading to 22 of the country’s 28 states, with much of the capital of New Delhi plunged into darkness, hundreds of trains left dead in their tracks and car stalled thanks to the failure of traffic lights.

Though India’s regular experience with blackouts make it that much more able to deal with a prolonged power loss like this one—hospitals, offices and even homes have backup diesel generators and make frequent use of them—the disaster will make it that much harder to buy into the idea that the second-most populous country in the world is ready to compete with China on the global stage. Said Chandrajit Banerjee, director general of the Confederation of Indian Industry, in a statement:

The electricity supply in India

As one of the emerging economies of the world, which is home to almost a sixth of the world population, it is imperative that our basic infrastructure requirements are in keeping with India’s aspirations. The developments of yesterday and today have created a huge dent in the country’s reputation that is most unfortunate.

What’s behind the blackout? It’s not clear yet, though India’s rickety power grid is hardly invulnerable to stress. And that stress may be increasing, as growing industry and personal use in an increasingly rich India—think air conditioners to cool the subcontinent—outpace India’s ability to actually generate electricity.

And that’s where the monsoon could become a major problem. The great summer storms—which provide three-quarters of India’s annual rainfall—came late to the country this year, leaving much of northern India gripped in a killer drought and unrelenting heat. While the slow monsoons are unlikely to have directly caused the blackouts—the rains finally began to fall recently, enough to reduce temperatures—parched farmers in agricultural areas are turning to electric pumps in large numbers to bring groundwater to the surface for irrigation. If the monsoons continue to be erratic and slow in a global warming future, the demand for electricity to compensate for the heat and the drought will only increase.
Continued below . . . .

Available from Amazon or Smashwords

But what will climate change do to the monsoons? Like many regional impacts, that’s difficult for scientists to predict, especially since weather data on the monsoons in South Asia is still lacking, as the Economist pointed out in an article last week:

Too little is known about summer weather systems on the subcontinent. India is short of observation stations, weather planes, satellites, climate scientists and modelers. The government and foreign donors are scrambling to make amends. But even with better data, monsoons are ill-understood once they leave the sea or low-lying land. At altitude, notably, for instance, approaching the Himalayas, it is far trickier to grasp just how factors such as wind direction, air pressure, latent heating and moisture levels interact to deliver monsoon rains.

We do know that India, like the rest of the planet, has gotten hotter over the past six decades as man-made greenhouse gases have warmed the atmosphere. All other things being equal, that should lead to more precipitation—a hotter atmosphere means more evaporation and can hold more water. For the monsoons, the fact that the land is heating up faster than the oceans should actually draw in more moisture, which in turn should mean stronger monsoons. But that hasn’t happened yet.

Peter’s Comment

India is not only the world’s second most populous country, but it is also growing at a rate that will put it’s population ahead of China’s within the next few years.

India has long suffered from a lack of adequate infrastructure and that problem will worsen as the population explodes and as increasing personal wealth makes greater demands on the infrastructure.

But now we are lead to believe that India’s problems could be due to climate change, even though it is admitted that there is little local data to back that up.

In simple terms, monsoons are created by a combination of heat and moisture and are generally confined to tropical regions. Therefore if the world is getting warmer, as we are so often told, then the monsoons should start earlier rather than later.

But I believe we are often told anything that will support the theory of climate change. Of particular note is the alarmist way that everything about climate change is bad. But wait a minute. Surely some places are going to be better off with a warmer climate. Why don’t we hear about those places?

Perhaps a majority of places will be better off with a warmer climate. Doesn’t a substantial part of the world population take a break during winter in a warmer locale?

Perhaps the greatest tragedy of the Indian situation is that some people would have them believe that it is beyond their control to make their country a better place to live and do business.

LEAVE THE CAR, TAKE THE BUS

Bus Travel Making a Big Comeback

July 29, 2012 7:12 am by Ed Perkins Today in Travel

  

Riding the bus is no longer the last travel resort for students and budget travelers. Several big bus operators are competing for a share of the mainstream travel market with improved buses and faster schedules.

The bus "renaissance" in the United States was kicked off in 2006 by Megabus, a unit of Coach USA and a subsidiary of the Stagecoach Group, a big British rail-and-bus operator. It follows principles evolved in the United Kingdom since 1980:

·         Buses are modern (many are double-deckers) with onboard restrooms, Wi-Fi, and power outlets.

·         Typical route patterns radiate from a major city to cities within a radius of approximately 400 miles or less. Longer routes generally operate at least twice daily (one daytime, one overnight) with higher frequencies on busy routes.

·         Stops are limited; trips typically stop at no more than three intermediate cities between terminals.

·         Schedules are fast: Megabus competes head-to-head with Amtrak on many of its routes, and it usually either meets or beats the rail schedule.

·         Fares are capacity controlled, generally starting out with at least one seat for $1, with the price for the remaining seats increasing as more and more seats are sold.

Currently, the main Megabus "hub" cities are Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, New York, Toronto, and Washington, D.C. Most trips radiate from these hubs, but a few connect one hub to another.

Greyhound has also moved into this market, with a combination of upgrading, rebranding, and subsidiaries:

·         Bolt Bus, a subsidiary, operates linear routes along the busy eastern corridor from Boston to Washington, D.C., plus a new line between Portland and Vancouver.

·         Greyhound has "rebranded" some of its basic intercity product as Greyhound Express. Unlike Megabus, Greyhound Express promotes longer trips, often with connections, and operates from a combination of regional hubs in the East, Midwest, and South with a linear California route between Los Angeles and Sacramento or San Francisco.

·         Neon, another affiliate, runs a system between New York and Toronto that appears similar to Megabus.

·         As with Megabus, Greyhound's upgraded buses are equipped with onboard lavatories, Wi-Fi, power plugs, and reserved seats. Although Bolt advertises "extra legroom," it doesn't specify the seat spacing. One bulletin board, however, showed a post from a reader who measured Greyhound Express at 33- to 34-inch pitch and 18-inch width, which is actually a bit better than most economy air.

Most of the smaller bus companies that operate in the East are going for low fares. And although many offer Wi-Fi, their products seem to be low-end. One company, however, operates a truly upscale product: LimoLinerruns from Boston to New York with buses that feature wide one-by-two seating and extra legroom, along with the standard Wi-Fi. Fares, however, are quite a bit higher than on the mass-market lines, even higher than some off-peak Amtrak fares.

How do these new buses compare with flying and Amtrak? I've seen several reports, by both travel pros and individual travelers, and the consensus runs something like this:

Relax on the bus with a good book

PO Box 110, Ngatea 3541, New Zealand

Print books: http://www.gypsybooks.co.nz
E-books: https://www.smashwords.com/books/search

Compared with Amtrak, the new upscale buses are usually cheaper, they're often as fast or faster, and they run on many routes Amtrak doesn't operate and run more often on most routes where Amtrak does. But Amtrak is much more comfortable.

Compared with flying, on the relatively short-haul routes where they operate most frequently, buses are usually much cheaper than flying and close to competitive in elapsed time when you include the hassles of getting to/from airports and security lines. Bus seating seems to be about the same as economy air, with the advantage of no middle seats. On longer trips, however, buses are a real test of endurance.

My take on the new buses is that if you're looking for minimum cost, you should give them serious consideration for a trip of less than 400 miles. But Amtrak's a lot more fun.

Peter’s Comment

Bus travel has long been due for a renaissance in many parts of the world. Buses have a flexibility that rail travel lacks and the flexibility is logistical as well as economic.

Bus operators wanting to expand their services have one huge advantage over rail operators; the roads already go everywhere, but rail operators wanting to open new routes are faced with massive costs for land and infrastructure. An operator of a new rail route can only recoup the outlay with high fares and high volume patronage, a combination that will often be self-defeating except perhaps in mega cities.

But the real opportunity for bus operators of the future will also be in the suburbs of major cities. Once again the roads go everywhere but it will become increasingly difficult, frustrating  and more costly for cars to go everywhere as buses take a larger share of the roads with exclusive lanes and exclusive roads once used by cars.

Modern buses are nothing like the unreliable, uncomfortable rattle-traps of the past. They are also efficient, adaptable to route changes, can run profitably with fewer passengers than rail services and are less likely to suffer delays.

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

Nurse on drugs charges faces execution

By Greg Ansley New Zealand Herald

5:30 AM Wednesday Aug 1, 2012

The breaking wheel was used
during the Middle Ages and
in the 19th Century

A second Australian faces possible execution in Malaysia on drug trafficking charges, adding pressure to a campaign to end capital punishment in a country that has more than 800 prisoners on death row.

Melbourne nurse Emma Louise L'aigulle, 34, is alleged to have been arrested with Nigerian Esikalam Ndidi in a car with about 1kg of methamphetamine hidden under a seat.

Possession of 50 grams or more of the drug is considered trafficking and subject to a mandatory death sentence.

In November Perth man Dominic Jude Christopher Bird, 32, will go to trial charged with offering 167 grams of methamphetamine to undercover police officers.

The possibility of further death sentences will further burden Australian diplomacy as it tries to convince Asian neighbors to end capital punishment.

The San Quentin lethal injection suite

Last month Prime Minister Julia Gillard raised the death sentences imposed on Bali Nine heroin smuggling ringleaders Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

The two have sought clemency from Yudhoyono, their last chance of avoiding a firing squad by having their death sentences commuted to life imprisonment.

But Yudhoyono has already come under criticism for his decision to reduce the 20-year sentence imposed on former Gold Coast beautician Schapelle Corby by five years, which, with two years' remission earned for good behavior, brought her release date back from 2024 to 2019.

The governor of Bali's Kerobokan jail, where Corby was imprisoned after trying to smuggle 4.2kg of cannabis into the island, has confirmed she has been recommended for a further six-month reduction as part of this month's Indonesian Independence Day celebrations.

Renae Lawrence, a former Newcastle panel beater and the only female member of the Bali Nine, has also been recommended for a six-month reduction in her 20-year sentence, following good behavior remissions of more than two years.

The appearance of L'aigulle in a Kuala Lumpur court yesterday has swung attention back to Malaysia, which has executed three Australians for drug trafficking.

The hangings of Perth men Kevin Barlow and Brian Chambers in 1986, the first Westerners executed under the harsh mandatory sentences introduced in the Dangerous Drugs Act, caused a serious rift between Australia and Malaysia.

In 1993 Malaysia executed Queensland heroin trafficker Michael McAuliffe.

Although the death sentence is also imposed for murder, treason and terrorism, most prisoners facing execution have been given mandatory death sentences under Section 39B of the Dangerous Drugs Act.

Anti-capital-punishment activists Malaysians Against Death Penalty & Torture say 860 people are awaiting execution. Amnesty International says two people were executed and a further 324 sentenced to die between 2001 and 2011.

L'aiguille and Bird face possible execution under an act that reverses the onus of proof by requiring alleged traffickers to prove their innocence rather than the state establishing guilt.

Bird was arrested at a Kuala Lumpur coffee shop in March after allegedly offering to sell 168.7 grams of methamphetamine to undercover agents.

L'aigulle was arrested last month when detectives searched a parked car in which she was sitting and claim to have found drugs beneath a seat.

But there are indications Malaysia is rethinking its laws on capital punishment. It has appealed for mercy for one of its nationals facing execution for drug trafficking in Singapore and has been concerned by death sentences passed on more Malaysians elsewhere in Asia.

Within Malaysia, activists, including the nation's Bar Association, are calling for an end to capital punishment, senior minister Nazri Bin Abdul Aziz has supported its abolition, and the Government told the United Nations in 2009 it proposed replacing death with life imprisonment.

Meanwhile, in Sydney, federal police and customs said yesterday they had seized drugs worth A$500 million ($619.6 million) after a tip from the United States Drug Enforcement Administration.

The drugs, concealed in terracotta pots imported in containers through Port Botany, included 306kg of methamphetamine and 252kg of heroin.

Seven men, four from Hong Kong and three Australian residents but also Hong Kong nationals, have been charged with conspiring to import and attempted possession of the drugs.

Peter’s Comment

State killing of convicted criminals is barbaric.

It is most disturbing to note that Malaysia has a law that requires an accused to prove his innocence or face death. That law is unspeakably vile.

Throughout history almost every country has had a death penalty for a variety of crimes, but crime has never been reduced by severe punishment, or by executing criminals.

States have tried every imaginable means of execution at their disposal but the tide of crime has never been turned, except by improving socio-economic conditions.
Continued below . . .

THE ASKER TRILOGY

The means of execution have included burning, boiling, crucifixion, crushing, decapitating, disembowelment, dismemberment, drawing and quartering, elephant stamping, flaying, impalement, sawing, slow slicing and stoning. But nothing ever worked they way the exponents claimed it would.

In theory severe punishment teaches a lesson and makes the offender think carefully before offending again. There are several things wrong with this theory. First, most offenders are incapable of careful, rational thought and that exactly is why they find themselves in trouble with the law in the first place. Second, if the punishment is so severe that the offender dies, then the punishment is pointless as well as useless because after death the offender feels nothing.

Some say that having a death penalty acts as a deterrent. There are several things wrong with that claim. First, a person committing, or planning, a violent crime thinks only of the crime and not at all about the likely consequences. Second, many people committing a violent crime actually welcome their own death and immediately suicide after the crime.

Then there are the really mean-spirited people who callously say that execution is better than wasting money keeping criminals in prison. But they have got their facts totally wrong. It costs more to process and execute a criminal, by millions of dollars, than it does to lock them up for a lifetime.

Eighty-eight per cent of academic criminologists say that the death penalty is not a deterrent. Unfortunately, the masses who think they know will never let the politicians do what is best and indeed many politicians make rash promises on crime reduction purely to get elected.

That has happened repeatedly in the USA. But America has executed 13,000 people since colonial times. Crime has reduced in America over a long period of time, but that has been due to better living standards rather than punishment. Meanwhile the USA remains one of 19 countries worldwide that supports the death penalty.

So to conclude, I return to my earlier statement about socio-economic conditions. The patterns are well established throughout history and clearly show that increases in crime can be directly related to levels of unemployment, financial stress, hopelessness and frustration.