Monday, May 24, 2021

After UAE flight ban, Pakistan is next big opportunity for private jet operators

 


Private jet operators will be hoping to make the same impact to and from destinations in Pakistan with the latest restrictions being placed on commercial flights from the country.

Pakistan is pretty much mirroring what's going on in India and that’s very much based on the fact that you have got a lot of wealth from there being based here (in the UAE), said Holger Ostheimer, Managing Director, DC Aviation Al-Futtaim, a project jet services company.

The UAE has cut commercial flights from the country, alongside Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, while maintaining the curtailment of services from India. Earlier, Pakistan had imposed restrictions on inbound flights.

Charter flight rates are expressed in block hours per flight. The general rule of thumb is about $6,000 per hour. The costs vary based on factors such as flight hours and type of aircraft among others. DC Aviation, which follows a fixed pricing regime, said its prices have remained the same since last year.

Thursday, May 13, 2021

Throwback:;When former Pakistan skipper Imran Khan almost got married to Bollywood actress Rekha


 Former Pakistan skipper and presently the Prime Minister of the country Imran Khan who is regarded as one of the greatest all rounders to have played cricket was the ladies man in his era. Not only did he have the ability to win games with his brilliance but he also won hearts with utmost ease  such was his charm. The 1992 World Cup winning captain has been known to have many beautiful women around him during his playing days.

Back then Pakistan and India played bilateral ties regularly which meant the players of the two nations were close to each other.It also gave an opportunity to cricketers of both countries to make friends across the border. Imran seemed to be a big beneficiary of this as he was often linked up with glamourous Bollywood actresses. It was no surprise that he clean bowled the ladies with his oratory skills and looks.

A report on the Star which was published back then has surfaced on the social space again and it is grabbing all the attention. The report claims the former Pakistani captain almost got married to yesteryears Bollywood diva Rekha. It is believed that Rekha’s mother was quite happy with the development in her daughter’s life. The same report also claimed that Imran spent quality time with the actress in Mumbai for a month and was spotted often near the beaches.

People who saw the couple reported that they seemed quite close and that they loved each other deeply and passionately.




He once said The company of actresses is good for a short period. I enjoy their company for some time and then move ahead. I cannot even think of marrying a movie actress.


According to reports Imran also had flings with Bollywood actresses Shabana Azmi and Zeenat Aman among others.

Imran retired from cricket in 1992 but remained an iconic figure in his country which helped him enter politics. He got elected as the Prime Minister of Pakistan in 2018.

Tuesday, May 11, 2021

Haval H6 SUV Comes to Pakistan


 Pakistan’s crossover SUV segment has had a substantial growth over the last few years. It had been almost non existent until early 2018, with the exception of a few imported vehicles, but is now more populous than any other automotive segment.

Sazgar Engineering Works Limited [SEWL] also aims to have its presence felt in the segment through the launch of two new SUVs in Pakistan, the Haval Jolion and the H6. The H6 test unit has arrived in Pakistan after the introduction of the Jolion test unit.

Much like the Jolion, the Haval H6 is a compact crossover SUV that will compete in the highly competitive local crossover market. The test unit is a 3rd generation H6 SUV that debuted in China in mid-2020.

The H6 can be had with several powertrain options, but it is believed that the one for Pakistan will have a 1.5 liter turbocharged 4 cylinder engine that makes 169 hp and 285 Nm of torque and is paired to a 7 speed DCT automotive gearbox. The international market also has a hybrid variant that is accompanied by a single electric motor and a 45 kWh lithium ion battery pack.

As the latest generation vehicle, the H6 is loaded with features like LED headlights and tail lights, daytime running lights (DRLs), multiple drive modes, Radar Cruise Control, Traction Control, a smart infotainment touchscreen, an Anti-Lock Braking System (ABS), a fully Digital Head Unit Display (HUD), and various driver-assist features.


It will be interesting to see how Haval positions this new SUV in Pakistan alongside the Jolion that falls under the same category. Perhaps it is planning to launch just one of the two SUVs in the market after thoroughly testing both.

The price of the H6 in the international market starts at just over $17,000 (Rs. 2.66 million) and goes up to $20,000 (Rs. 3.06 million). This seems too good to be true for the Pakistani market.

However, in the range of Rs. 3 million to 4 million, the H6 could be a credible contender in the growing SUV market of Pakistan.

A hidden continent birthed a new subduction zone near New Zealand

 


South of New Zealand in the Tasman Sea is a stretch of stormy ocean where the waves regularly swell 20 feet (6 meters) or more and the winds blow at 30 mph (48 km/h) on a good day. Deep below these stormy seas, Earth is unquiet, too. This region is home to the Puysegur Trench, site of one of the youngest subduction zones on the planet. Here, the Australian plate is shoved under the Pacific plate, creating frequent large earthquakes, including a 7.2 magnitude quake in 2004. 

Now, new research reveals how this baby subduction zone came to be. Over millions of years, a bit of the 'hidden' continent of Zealandia on the boundary between the Australian and Pacific plates, got stretched and shifted in a way that led the denser oceanic crust to slam into  and under  it. This finding that positioning different types of crust against one another at a preexisting plate boundary leads to subduction may help to explain how other new subduction zones around the world form.

Subduction zones are one of the most important, if not the most important, plate boundaries, said study lead author Brandon Shuck, a doctoral candidate at The University of Texas at Austin. They're really the main drivers of plate tectonics, so they're the primary reason why the plates on Earth actually move. And also they're very destructive plate boundaries We don't really understand well how they start out and how they form in the first place.

Subduction zone formation is mysterious because subduction zones are, by nature, destructive. When a plate of oceanic crust dives under continental crust, the rocks at the surface twist, break and deform. The oceanic slab, meanwhile, churns into the mantle, where it's melted beyond recognition. This leaves little geological history behind to study. 

The subduction zone in the Puysegur margin is young enough that this history has not yet been erased. That makes it an ideal spot to answer the question of how subduction zones form in the first place, Shuck told Live Science. There's not yet any good explanation of how tectonic plates break open and start subducting

Studying the Puysegur margin is no easy feat, though, because it's in the Roaring Forties, the latitudes between 40 degrees south and 50 degrees south where the winds and currents are brutal. Scientists aboard the research vessel Marcus Langseth set out to this region in 2018 as part of the South Island Subduction Initiation Experiment. It was a challenging trip, Shuck said. The crew had to spend almost a quarter of the time sheltering behind islands to avoid gales. 

Our boat was rolling side to side by like 20 degrees at one point, Shuck said. It was a mess.

In spite of the weather, the researchers were able to deploy seafloor seismometers and to take seismic surveys of the subsurface, a method which uses reflected sound waves to see underground structures

The new data allowed the researchers to put together a history of the young subduction zone, which Shuck presented at the virtual meeting of the Seismological Society of America on April 22, the same day the study was published in the journal Tectonics. It all started about 45 million years ago, when a new plate boundary between the Australian and Pacific plates began to form because of a force called extension  basically, tectonic forces pulled the two plates apart like putty. 

The oceanic crust at the plate boundary responded to this extension predictably: As the crust thin, magma from the mantle pushed up through fractures, hardening into new rock. This process is called seafloor spreading, and it's how new oceanic crust forms.

But there was a catch: The secret continent of Zealandia.  Zealandia is a submerged section of continental crust the size of Australia around New Zealand. Zealandia was perched over the north end of this extensional zone. As continental crust is thicker and more buoyant, the extensional forces working at the plate boundary couldn't crack Zealandia. Instead, the continental crust merely stretched as it spread, creating a thinned out zone now known as the Solander basin. 

Now there were two plates. The Australian Plate, to the west, consisted of continental crust from Zealandia in the north and new oceanic crust in the south. The Pacific Plate, to the east, also consisted of oceanic crust in the south. To the north, the Pacific Plate hosted the thinned out continental crust of the Solander basin. At the plate boundary, oceanic crust bumped up against oceanic crust, and continental crust against continental crust.

Likely little of interest would have happened, if not for another tectonic shift 25 million years ago. 

At that time, the Australian Pacific plate boundary stopped pulling apart. Instead, the plates started to move past each other, creating what's known as a strike-slip fault. Now, the Pacific plate was moving south, and the Australian plate was moving north. This opposing movement brought the oceanic crust of the Australian plate right next door to the thin Solander basin continental crust on the Pacific plate.

This was the key to starting subduction, Shuck said: Continental crust is more buoyant than denser oceanic crust, and this difference in buoyancy allowed the denser part of the Australian plate to slide under the lighter Pacific one, especially because the boundary between these continental and oceanic plates was already weakened by the earlier strike slip faulting. The findings drive home how important strike-slip movement is to tectonics, Shuck said. 

How plates rotate is really important, he said. If you just think about pulling things apart and pushing them together you don't really create that much contrast, but with strike slip, you're translating (sliding a portion of crust) and it's super efficient. Just imagine, with the plates sliding past each other, you're going to cause materials of different properties to come together eventually.

There are other spots around the globe where strike slip movement is happening in the same place as the compression and convergence of plates, particularly along the Queen Charlotte fault north of Vancouver and south of Alaska, Shuck said. That fault may be a place where a subduction zone could potentially form, he said. 

But there are also many questions left to answer about the fault south of New Zealand. Speaking at the Seismological Society of America meeting on April 22, geophysicist Caroline Eakin of Australian National University described a research trip to Macquarie Ridge, an undersea ridge 620 miles (1,000 km) south of New Zealand on the same fault as the Puysegur margin. In October 2020, scientists deployed seafloor seismic instruments at this rugged ridge, which is only 28 miles (25 km) wide but rises 3.7 miles (6 km) from the surrounding topography. 

The researchers will return to pick up the instruments and their data in November 2021, as long as the weather allows. If the Puysegur margin is in the Roaring Forties, Macquarie Ridge is in the "Furious 50s." The research ship encountered 68 mph (109 km/h) winds while trying to deploy the instruments and spent 38% of the mission in such bad weather that scientists aboard couldn't do anything but shelter in place and wait. Nevertheless, they are hopeful that the new ocean-bottom seismometers (OBS) will open their eyes to what's going on beneath the ridge. Right now, the researchers know there are large quakes originating in the region, but they don't know much about how deep in the crust they are, what kind of faults they occur on or what kind of tsunami risks they pose to coastal areas in Australia. 

The OBS data will also allow us to image the subsurface beneath the plate boundary for the first time using different seismic imaging techniques," Eakin told Live Science. "Currently, most of our observations tell us about what is happening at the surface or near surface, but we have no idea what is happening beneath the surface of the plate boundary in the Macquarie Ridge region.

One question they hope to answer: Will the fault at Macquarie Ridge begin to turn into a subduction zone, too? The Puysegur margin and Macquarie Ridge are related and are experiencing similar changes in plate motion over time, Eakin said, though Puysegur is further along in the process. Macquarie Ridge, being two slabs of oceanic crust coming together, might be more resistant to subduction than the continental crust and oceanic crust boundary at Puysegur, Shuck said; but subduction zones can also spread along a fault from a single point. 

Those two segments could actually link up  maybe  in the future.


لانگ مارچ فائیو بی: چین کا 21 ٹن وزنی بے قابو خلائی راکٹ زمین پر کب اور کس جگہ گرنے کا امکان ہے


 چین کا ایک بے قابو راکٹ جو زمین کے مدار میں گھوم رہا تھا اب آئندہ آنے والے دنوں میں زمین کی فضا میں داخل ہونے والا ہے اور سائنسدانوں کو یہ معلوم نہیں ہے کہ یہ کہاں گرے گا۔

خیال رہے کہ سنہ 1990 کے بعد سے 10 ٹن سے زیادہ وزنی کسی بھی مشین یا راکٹ کو زمین کے مدار میں دانستہ طور پر نہیں چھوڑا گیا تاکہ وہ بے قابو ہو کر زمین پر گرے۔ مگر اب اگلے چند دنوں میں 21 ٹن وزنی لانگ مارچ فائیو بی نامی راکٹ زمین پر گرنے والے سب سے بڑے راکٹس میں سے ایک ہو گا۔

اس راکٹ کی لمبائی 98 فٹ، جبکہ چوڑائی 16 فٹ ہے اور اس کے ذریعے اپریل کے آخر میں چین کے نئے خلائی سٹیشن کو مدار میں لے کر جانے کی تیاریاں کی گئی تھیں۔ اس وقت یہ مدار سے 27 ہزار 60 کلومیٹر فی گھنٹہ کی رفتار سے زمین کی جانب بڑھ رہا ہے۔

بی بی سی کے نامہ نگار برائے سائنس جوناتھن ایموس کا کہنا ہے کہ یہ ایک ایسے زون کی جانب بڑھ رہا ہے جو خط استوا سے 41 ڈگری شمال اور جنوب کے درمیان ہے۔ شمال میں یہ علاقہ نیویارک، استنبول اور بیجنگ تک جاتا ہے اور جنوب میں ویلنگٹن اور چلی تک-

انھوں نے کہا کہ اگر آپ اس زون یا علاقے سے مزید شمال یا جنوب میں رہتے ہیں تو یہ آپ پر نہیں گر سکتا اور اگر آپ اس زون میں بھی رہتے ہیں اور یہ خط استوا سے قریب ہے، تب بھی اس کا آپ پر گرنے کا امکان بہت کم ہے۔ 70 فیصد زمین پانی سے ڈھکی ہوئی ہے، اس لیے اگر یہ زمین کے ماحول میں آتشیں داخلے کے بعد کچھ بچ جاتا ہے تو زیادہ امکان یہی ہے کہ یہ پانی میں گر جائے گا-

Monday, May 10, 2021

گارمنٹس کی آڑ میں کروڑوں روپے مالیت کی ہیروئن اسمگل کرنے کی کوشش ناکام


 کسٹم حکام نے گارمنٹس اور جیکٹ کی آڑ میں کروڑوں روپے مالیت کی ہیروئن بیرون ملک بھیجنے کی کوشش ناکام بنادی۔

ایکسپریس نیوز کے مطابق پاکستان کسٹمز نے انٹرنیشنل میل آفس میں کامیاب کارروائی کرتے ہوئے گارمنٹس اور جیکٹ کی آڑ میں ہیروئن بیرون ملک بھیجنے کی کوشش ناکام بنادی۔

کسٹم حکام نے بتایا ہے کہ ایک کلو 980 گرام ہیروئن پشاور سے بک کرائی گئی تھی،  اور بذریعہ پارسل برمنگھم برطانیہ بھیجی جارہی تھی، ہیرونِ ملک بھیجے جانے والے پارسلز کی معمول کی چیکنگ کے دوران واردات کا انکشاف ہوا، عالمی مارکیٹ میں ہیروئن کی قیمت 1 کروڑ 90 لاکھ روپے بنتی ہے۔  کسٹم حکام نے مقدمہ درج کرکے ملزم کی گرفتاری کے لیے ٹیم تشکیل دے دی ہے۔


Pakistan imposes Eid lockdown as COVID cases soar


 Pakistan on Saturday began a nine-day shutdown affecting travel and tourist hotspot in a bid to prevent a surge in COVID 19 cases during the Muslim holiday of Eid ul Fitr.

Already battling a third wave of infections and increasingly nervous about the crisis across the border in india, the government has imposed the most severe restrictions since a one-month lock down in April last year.

From today all businesses across the country will be closed. People will not be allowed to go into the markets to do their shopping for Eid Al Jazeera’s Kamal Hyder reported from the capital, Islamabad

The Pakistani government feared that it will not be able to cope due to a possible lack of ventilators and oxygen if the situation sees the likes of which India is confronting.

Asad Umar, the planning minister who is responsible for leading Pakistan’s pandemic response, said Pakistan was facing a dangerous situation.

These measures have been necessitated by the extremely dangerous situation which has been created in the region with the spread of virulent mutations of the virus Umar said on Twitter adding the country needed to unite.

Eid which comes at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, usually sees the mass movement of people around the country and tourist spots crowded with Pakistanis.

Last year the country saw a spike in cases in the weeks after the celebrations.

Businesses hotels and restaurants as well as markets and parks will be closed, while public transport between provinces and within cities has been halted.

The military has been mobilised to monitor the restrictions

Mosques, however will remain open. Authorities fear curbs on places of worship could ignite confrontation in the deeply conservative Muslim republic.

Impoverished Pakistan has recorded more than 850,000 infections and 18,600 deaths, but with limited testing and a deprived healthcare sector many fear the true extent of the disease is much worse.

Pakistan has seen a daily death toll of more than 100 in recent weeks.

Health officials have warned that hospitals are operating at close to capacity and they have rushed to increase the number of intensive care beds

International flights have been slashed and border crossings with Iran and Afghanistan closed, except for trade.

Flights and land crossings with neighbouring India reeling from a devastating outbreak with hundreds of thousands of new cases a day were closed before the pandemic because of political tensions.

Since last year, Pakistan has reported nearly 18,800 deaths from COVID 19 and more than 854,000 confirmed cases, according to Johns Hopkins University

Pakistan, which has so far vaccinated only a fraction of its population, received its first batch of 1.2 million Astra Zeneca doses on Saturday under the delayed COVAX global vaccine sharing scheme for lower-income countries.

Sunday, May 9, 2021

Changes you can make to your diet and lifestyle to ease those painful migraines


 Around 190,000 people suffer a migraine attack each day in England alone, and it is estimated that six million people in the UK experience migraines at some time in their lives.

As many as a quarter of women and up to 10 per cent of men report suffering attacks and the effects can have a huge impact

But many experts believe changes to diet and lifestyle can create a significant improvement in symptoms so what should you try

It is believed that migraines are caused by chemical changes in the nerve cells of the brain says Jane Clarke dietician and founder of Nourish Drinks.

For some of us certain chemicals or compounds in our food can be the culprit. You may be sensitive to MSG the flavour enhancer found in many processed foods

Or keeping a food and migraine diary may reveal that tyramine, an amino acid found in mature cheese, peanuts, chocolate broad beans and fermented foods such as sauerkraut could be your migraine weak spot.

Sitting at a screen all day in a forward hunching position the dreaded tech-neck posture will cause aches and pains in your back, neck and shoulders which can lead to headaches and even migraines.


Saturday, May 8, 2021

Punjab allows inter district public transport to operate till May 10

 


The Punjab government has allowed interdistrict public transport to operate till May 10 it emerged Saturday

Publuc transport will remain suspended in the province from 6pm on May 10 to 6pm on May 15.

The Punjab government earlier decided to impose a lockdown across the province for two weeks starting May 8.

Tourist spots in the province will remain closed and checkpoints will be established in every city to restrict the movement of people

The measures are aimed at stemming the spread of coronavirus.

The virus has so far claimed 8,952 lives in Punjab, while the number of confirmed cases in the province stands at 316,333.


پسند ناپسند پر ٹیم منتخب ہوتی ہے‘ ایک اور کھلاڑی بول پڑے


 قومی ٹیم کے سابق کپتان شعیب ملک کا کہنا ہے کہ پسند ناپسند پر قومی ٹیم منتخب ہوتی ہے۔

 آل راؤنڈر شعیب ملک نے کہا کہ میں مصباح کو دو عہدے دئیے گئے تو حمایت کی تھی، ان کے خلاف نہیں ہوں لیکن وہ کوچنگ کے لیے تیار نہیں ہیں۔

شعیب ملک نے کہا کہ دو بندے منتخب کرنا ہوں فون آجائے تو تیسری کرسی بھی رکھ دی جاتی ہے۔

انہوں نے کہا کہ فاسٹ بولرز محمد عامر، وہاب ریاض اور عماد وسیم کی ٹیم کو ضرورت ہے۔

ایک سوال کے جواب میں شعیب ملک نے کہا کہ ٹی ٹوینٹی ورلڈ کپ کھیلنا چاہتا ہوں اس کے لیے بہت محنت کررہا ہوں۔

واضح رہے کہ اس سے قبل محمد عامر، وہاب ریاض نے بھی سلیکشن کمیٹی پر سخت تنقید کی تھی۔

وہاب ریاض کا کہنا تھا کہ ہمارے ہاں کھلاڑی کا ناکام ہونا برداشت نہیں کیا جاتا نوجوان کھلاڑیوں کو سوچ سمجھ کر ٹیم میں ‏شامل کرنا چاہیے۔


Friday, May 7, 2021

Aamir Liaquat’s third wife is not "mentally stable", confirms Haniya’s father


 A little ray of hope for Pakistani television host Aamir Liaquat Hussain as his self proclaimed third wife vigorously tried to defame him but has recently been labelled "mentally unstable" by her very own father

Haniya Khan is on a mission to eradicate the little respect attached to television host Aamir Liaquat’s name. 

Aamir Liaquatis on the receiving end of unending controversies some due to his own unique nature and some stewed by his self proclaimed third wife Haniya Khan who accused him and his current Wife Tuba of using black magic against her.

Haniya calls herself Aamir’s third wife and she even revealed a lot of evidence to strengthen her accusations.

However, Aamir Liaquat gave a statement that his only wife is Tuba.

Haniya has been doing live sessions on a daily basis and has also declared that she has filed an FIR against Aamir Liaquat and the police is totally in her favour. 

After everything got out of hand Haniya’s father Tariq Pervez appeared in an interview.

He declared that he doesn’t know anything about Haniya and Aamir’s marriage.

Haniya’s father, we believe on a very embarrassing note declared that Haniya’s mental health is not stable and her mental condition started deteriorating after she made a "Chilla" for her sister who was very sick.

He further mentioned that Aamir Liaquat Hussain has visited their house once before Ramazan but he didn’t mention anything related to his and Haniya’s wedding. 

Tariq Pervez is exceedingly distressed with his daughter’s current state and appealed to the government to bring her back to him.


Amazon adds Pakistan to the Approved Selling Countries List


 Pakistan has finally bagged a position in the Amazon approved selling countries. Although it might take 12 to 24 hours for the process to be finalized up and running. Accounts can be made using Pakistani details.

Standing ovation to the efforts of the people behind this incredible achievement, Aisha Moriani [Joint Secretary Ministry of Commerce], Omer Gajial [Ex Amazon Category Development Head for Amazon North America division], and Shoaib Sarwar [deputy Consul General Consulate General Pakistan, Los Angeles] along with the team members of NECC [National Ecommerce Council] and Badar Khushnood from Pakistan Software Houses Association, just to name a few.

They have been working day and night in getting Pakistan added in Amazon’s approved sellers list, and their hard work has paid off.

This milestone will drastically change the game and result in a new era of economic growth as more sellers will visit the platform than ever before.

Previously, Adviser to Prime Minister on Commerce and Investment Abdul Razak Dawood emphasised that the trend of e commerce had accelerated in recent years with the development and easy accessibility of internet. He added that due to the Covid 19 pandemic, the importance of e-commerce had increased manifold, making it an extremely vital sector of the economy.

Now that Pakistan has been added to the approved sellers list of Amazon, one can only pray and hope for this to  steer in the positive direction for the development of the country.

Here’s to hoping that Pakistanis don’t pull a Daraz on Amazon.

Thursday, May 6, 2021

Perseverance's Hazard Cameras View Ingenuity's Fourth Flight

 


NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter is viewed by one of the hazard cameras aboard the Perseverance rover during the helicopter’s fourth flight on April 30, 2021.

The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter was built by JPL, which also manages this technology demonstration project for NASA Headquarters. It is supported by NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate and Space Technology Mission Directorate NASA’s Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center provided significant flight performance analysis and technical assistance during Ingenuity’s development. Aero Vironment Inc., Qualcomm, Snapdragon, and SolAero also provided design assistance and major vehicle components. The Mars Helicopter Delivery System was designed and manufactured by Lockheed Space Systems in Denver.

 A key objective for Perseverance’s mission on Mars is astrobiology including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet’s geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith [broken rock and dust].

Subsequent NASA missions in cooperation with ESA [European Space Agency], would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in depth analysis.

The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA’s Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.

JPL which is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.

Wednesday, May 5, 2021

یورپی ملک میں 150 روپے میں گھر خریدیں


 اگر آپ ایک گھر خریدنا چاہے تو کم از کم بھی لاکھوں روپوں کی ضرورت تو ہوتی ہے مگر کیا آپ ایسا مکان خریدنا پسند کریں گے جس کی قیمت صرف ایک ڈالر لگ بھگ 150 پاکستانی روپے ہو

اٹلی کے ایک قصبے میں ایک ڈالر میں گھر خریدنے کی اسکیم کے تحت امریکی ریاست کیلیفورنیا سے تعلق رکھنے والی خاتون نے تین ڈالرز میں تین گھر خرید لیے تاہم گھروں کی تزئین و آرائش پر 60 ہزار ڈالرز کا خرچہ آئے گا۔

دی میل کی رپورٹ کے مطابق حالیہ برسوں میں اٹلی کے گاؤں اور قصبوں سے بڑے پیمانے پر لوگ شہروں کی طرف منتقل ہوگئے ہیں، آبادی کی منتقلی کو روکنے کے لیے اٹلی نے ایک ڈالر میں گھر خریدنے کی اسکیم شروع کردی گئی ہے لیکن ایک ڈالر والے گھروں سے جڑے دیگر لوازمات اور اخراجات نے امریکی خاتون کو پریشان کردیا ہے

کاروبار سے وابستہ روبعیہ ڈئنیلز نامی خاتون نے 2019 میں اپنے لیے سسلی کے شہر موسومیلی میں ایک ڈالر میں ایک گھر خریدا تھا اور بعد میں مزید دو گھر اپنے بچوں کے لیے خریدے تاہم اس پیشکش میں باقی معاملات بھی شامل ہیں جن کا خاتون کو گھر کی خریداری کے وقت معلوم نہیں ہوسکا

رپورٹ کے مطابق خریدار کو ایک ڈالر کا مکان خریدنے سے قبل ہزاروں ڈالرز سیکیورٹی ڈپازٹ کی مد میں جمع کرانے ہوتے ہیں خریدار کو تین سال کے اندر اندر تزئین و آرائش کا کام مکمل کرنا ہوگا جس کے بعد سیکیورٹی ڈپازٹ واپس مل جاتا ہے۔

خاتون کے ساتھ ان کے دوستوں اور خاندان کے دیگر کئی افراد نے بھی سیسیلی میں مکانات خرید لیے ہیں اور اب وہ سب اس شہر میں ریٹائرمنٹ کی زندگی گزارنے کا ارادہ رکھتے ہیں۔

اگرچہ خاتون سستے گھر خریدنے پر خوش دکھائی دے رہی ہیں تاہم انہوں نے دوسروں کوو گھر خریدنے سے متنبہ کیا ہے ان کا کہنا ہے کہ ہر کسی کو سستے گھروں کے بارے میں حقیقت کا علم ہونا چاہیے اگر کوئی آپ کو ایک ڈالر میں مکان بیچتا ہے تو آپ کو معلوم ہونا چاہیے کہ آپ کو اسے ٹھیک بھی کرنا ہوگا اور تزئین و آرائش پر اخراجات بھی آئیں گے۔


A giant piece of space junk is hurtling towards Earth. Here's how worried you should be.?

 


A large piece of space debris, possibly weighing several tonnes is currently on an uncontrolled reentry phase (that’s space speak for “out of control”) and parts of it are expected to crash down to Earth over the next few weeks.

If that isn’t worrying enough it is impossible to predict exactly where the pieces that don’t burn up in the atmosphere might land. Given the object’s orbit, the possible landing points are anywhere in a band of latitudes a little farther north than New York, Madrid and Beijing and as far south as southern Chile and Wellington, New Zealand.

The debris is part of the Long March 5B rocket that recently successfully launched China’s first module for its proposed space station. The incident comes roughly a year after another similar Chinese rocket fell to Earth, landing in the Atlantic Ocean but not before it reportedly left a trail of debris in the African nation of Cote D'Ivoire.

At the time, experts noted this was one of the largest pieces of human made debris ever to fall to Earth. We cannot say with certainty what fate awaits this latest piece of space junk.


Australia already holds the record in the category of who can be hit by the biggest piece of space junk. In 1979, the 77 tonne US space station SkyLab disintegrated over Western Australia, peppering the area around the southern coastal town of Esperance with fragments.

At the time, the event was met with with excitement and a sense of lightheartedness, and many pieces were collected by space enthusiasts. Esperance shire council flippantly issued NASA with a fine for littering, and a US radio station later raised enough money to pay the debt

Although there have been no recorded deaths or serious injuries from people being hit by space debris, that’s no reason to think it’s not dangerous. Just one year before SkyLab’s demise, a Soviet remote sensing spy satellite Cosmos 954 plummeted into a barren region of Canada’s Northwest Territories spreading radioactive debris over several hundred square kilometres.

With the Cold War at its height, the sensitivity of the nuclear technology on board Cosmos 954 led to an unfortunate delay in locating and cleaning up the wreckage, because of the distrust between the Soviet Union and the Canadian/US recovery effort.

The clean up operation took months but located only a portion of the debris. Canada billed the Soviet Union more than C$6 million, having spent millions more but was ultimately paid only C$3 million.

Since the late 1970s, pieces of space debris have fallen to Earth regularly and are viewed with increasing concern. Of course, more than 70% of Earth is covered by oceans and only a minuscule fraction of the remaining 30% is covered by your house. But for anyone falling foul of the extremely long odds the consequences would be truly disastrous.

It was just a quirk of fate that Cosmos 954 did not land on Toronto or Quebec City, where the radioactive fallout would have necessitated a large scale evacuation. In 2007, pieces of debris from a Russian satellite narrowly missed a Chilean Passenger Plane flying between Santiago and Auckland. As we send more objects into space, the chances of a calamitous crash landing will only increase.

International law sets out a compensation regime that would apply in many circumstances of damage on Earth, as well as when satellites collide in space. The 1972 Liability Convention a UN treaty, imposes liability on launching states for damage caused by their space objects which includes an absolute liability regime when they crash to Earth as debris.

In the case of the Long March 5B, this would impose potential liability on China. The treaty has only been invoked once before (for the Cosmos 954 incident) and therefore may not be regarded as a powerful disincentive. However, it is likely to come into play in the future in a more crowded space environment, and with more uncontrolled reentries. Of course, this legal framework applies only after the damage occurs.

Other international guidelines regarding debris mitigation and long term sustainability of space activities set out voluntary standards intended to limit the probability of collisions in space, and minimize the breakup of satellites either during or after their missions.

Some satellites can be moved into a graveyard orbit at the end of their operational life. While this works well for certain specific orbits at a relatively high altitude, it is impractical and hazardous to start moving the vast majority of satellites around between orbital planes. Most of the millions of pieces of space junk are destined either to orbit in an uncontrollable manner for many years or if they are in low Earth orbit, to gradually descend towards the Earth, hopefully burning up in the atmosphere before contact with terra firma.

A globally coordinated space traffic management system will be vital to avoid collisions that would result in loss of control of satellites, leaving them to tumble helplessly in orbit or fall back to Earth.

Comprehensively tracking every satellite’s movement and functionality is even harder than it sounds, because it would inevitably require countries to be willing to share information they often currently regard as confidential matters of national security.

But ultimately global cooperation is essential if we are to avoid an unsustainable future for our space activities. In the meantime, don’t forget to gaze upwards every now and then you might spot some of the most spectacular litter on the planet.

Tuesday, May 4, 2021

Mashal Khan calls out trolls for dragging her into Saboor Ali's engagement


 Actor Mashal Khan who was previously dating actor Ali Ansari has called out trolls in a recent statement after the latter's engagement announcement. Ansari, who recently made headlines after getting engaged to Saboor Aly had taken to social media and share several pictures from their baat pakki event.

Khan who had been rather public about her romance with Ansari was mentioned by the gossip mongers, who inquired about her personal life. Now in a statement, the Dulhan star has taken to social media and called out everyone who involved her in Ansari and Aly's relationship.

It is so sad that a moment which is supposed to be of so much happiness for a couple has been turned into idle gossip, Khan shared in an Instagram story. It has come to my knowledge that several attempts are being made to pull me into Ali Ansari and Saboor Aly's engagement announcement.

The actor went on to congratulate the couple and added, Let's not try to ruin someone's moment, shall we? We laud Khan for taking a stand on the matter.

Earlier, the Gul-o-Gulzar starlet took to her Instagram and shared a loved-up photo with Ansari from their engagement ceremony. Baat pakki. With the blessings of our families, I’m ready to jump into a new life with an amazing person, Alhamdulillah, she wrote in the caption.

Ansari had also taken to the photo video sharing app and marked, Baat pakkiHonestly I'm in a mix of all kinds of emotions right now but most importantly, I'm happy. From this day forward, you should not walk alone.



UAE Hope Mars orbiter; The Arab world's first interplanetary mission


 The Hope Mars Mission, also called the Emirates Mars Mission, is the first un crewed interplanetary satellite spearheaded by the United Arab Emirates (UAE). In fact, the Hope satellite is the first planetary science mission led by an Arab-Islamic country.

The UAE purposely selected lofty goals for the project, which was designed in part to mark the country's 50th anniversary. The Hope spacecraft launched successfully on July 19, 2020 aboard a Japanese rocket and arrived successfully in orbit around Mars on Feb 9, 2021

At launch, the Hope satellite had a total mass including fuel of 3,300 lbs. (1,500 kilograms) according to NASA. And at about 7.78" feet (2.37 meters) wide and 9.51" feet (2.90 m) tall, the probe is about the size and weight of a small car. Four to six 120 newton Delta V thrusters will propel the spacecraft using hydra-zine, and inorganic and highly volatile chemical. 

After seven months of space travel, the probe reached orbit around Mars in February 2021. Once its science work begins, the spacecraft will study the Red Planet for a full Martian year (687 Earth days or about two years). If things go well, the mission may receive a two-year extension that would take the spacecraft into 2025

Hope will collect the scientific data using three state of the art technologies mounted on the satellite

The Emirates Exploration Imager (EXI); This multi band camera will take 12 megapixel images at a spatial resolution of less than 5 miles (8 kilometres). The camera will be able to image the Martian atmosphere in three visible bands and three ultraviolet bands, all of which will help the mission to measure dust, water ice and ozone abundance in the atmosphere.

The Emirates Mars Infrared Spectrometer (EMIRS); In collaboration with Arizona State University, the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center designed EMIRS to measure the dust, ice clouds, water vapor and temperature profile of the Martian atmosphere.

The Emirates Mars Ultraviolet Spectrometer (EMUS); This spectrometer will measure changes in the thermosphere the structure of the hydrogen and oxygen exospheres around the planet; and the ultraviolet emissions of hydrogen, oxygen and carbon monoxide in the atmosphere. It will also track changes in the exosphere by season solar inputs and winds driven by the lower atmosphere

Built in collaboration with the University of Colorado Boulder, University of California, Berkeley, and Arizona State University, the Hope spacecraft is in many ways a state of the art weather satellite. It will help answer some outstanding questions about Mars climate and atmosphere. The satellite mission has four primary objectives

Search for the connection between current Martian weather and the ancient climate of Mars. Substantial geophysical evidence suggests that Mars was once a much warmer and more humid world, with substantial liquid water on its surface. Those past conditions may have been optimal for some form of life to evolve.

Study the mechanisms that have driven oxygen and hydrogen out of Mars' atmosphere. Loss of the Martian atmosphere is believed to be the root cause behind Mars becoming a cold desert in which water can exist only as either vapor or ice. Understanding what is driving (and may have driven) away these crucial parts of the atmosphere could help researchers understand how the Martian atmosphere has evolved over time and potentially how life on Mars could have been lost.

Study the connections between the lower and upper atmospheres of Mars.

Create a global picture of how the Martian atmosphere varies throughout the day, season and year. Current available data provides temperature and climate information for only a small stretch of time on Mars. If successful, the data collected by the Hope satellite will provide the first holistic view of the Martian climate every day of the year for multiple year

Hope launched from Japan's Tanegashima Space Center on a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries H - IIA rocket on July 19, 2020, after several days due to weather. The spacecraft successfully separated from the rocket about an hour after liftoff. 

In the course of its seven month, 300 million mile (480 million km) voyage, Hope accomplished several planned course corrections using its Delta-V thrusters. Because those operations went better than expected, the craft also collected some bonus data along the way, inspecting hydrogen near Mars as well as examining interplanetary dust. 

On Feb. 9, 2021, Hope performed a 27 minute thruster burn to slow down enough to enter orbit around Mars. During the burn, mission personnel on the ground could only wait and hope that their work paid off 

With the successful orbit insertion, the UAE became the fifth entity to reach Mars, joining NASA, the Soviet Union, the European Space Agency and India. China joined that group one day after the UAE with the Mars orbit insertion of its Tianwen -1 mission.

While the probe is gathering science observations, it will orbit over the planet near its equator once every 55 hours.

When Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the United Arab Emirates, announced in July 2014 that the UAE would send a satellite to Mars, he said that the launch date would be in July 2020, only six years from his announcement. That timing coincides with the alignment of Earth and Mars, which occurs once every two years. It also meant the spacecraft would reach Mars in 2021, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the United Arab Emirates' formation

Hope is one aspect of the Emirati government's push for space development. The government also established a program meant to drive toward building a habitable settlement on Mars by 2117. And in September 2019, the United Arab Emirates sent its first Emirati astronaut into space. Hazzaa Ali Almansoori, a former pilot, spent eight days on the International Space Station, where he performed a series of experiments and gave a tour of the station in Arabic.

But the United Arab Emirates Space Agency the government agency tasked with developing and regulating a world-class space sector for the United Arab Emirates was established only in 2014, the same year that the Al- Amal (Arabic for "hope") mission was announced. And it wasn't until April 2015 that Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the vice president and prime minister of the United Arab Emirates, established the Mohammad Bin Rashid Space Center, where the Hope satellite would actually be built. 

We chose the epic challenge of reaching Mars because epic challenges inspire and motivate us, Mohammed bin Rashid said in the 2014 statement. The moment we stop taking on such challenges is the moment we stop moving forward

The Emirates called the satellite "Hope" because its manufacture and scientific data would hopefully provide value for the future in two major ways: helping scientists understand how atmospheres evolve over time and helping to modernize the Arab world.

Understanding how factors such as sunlight, dust and temperature affect the entire Martian atmosphere each day and throughout the seasons could also illuminate details about the atmosphere around the Earth and even planets around other solar systems, called exoplanets, according to the mission’s scientific goals. Scientists could also use the information to model the future of Earth's atmosphere, such as how it may evolve under the forces of climate change.

The Emirati government has also said that it sees this satellite as a way to bring the Arab world back to the forefront of science and astronomy a position the region hasn't held since the Islamic Golden Age, from the ninth century to the 13th century.

During that time, the Muslim world was the stronghold of knowledge in philosophy, math, astronomy and medicine. The Arabs made pioneering strides in algebra and trigonometry and further developed astronomical tools such as sundials. But since the end of its halcyon days, the Arab world has statistically made little contribution to science, according to a review in The New Atlantis.

The Hope satellite is an attempt to help change that. 

This is the Arab world's version of President John F. Kennedy's moonshot  it's a vision for the future that can engage and excite a new generation of Emirati and Arab youth, said Yousef al Otaiba, the UAE's ambassador to the United States, during the UAE Embassy's National Day celebration in 2015, The National reported. 

The Emirati government invested over $5.5 billion into space-exploration efforts, according to The National. And as the first-ever Arab-Islamic mission to another planet using a satellite built entirely by a Muslim nation, Hope is expected to help catalyze the development of a new generation of Arab scientists and engineers. They, in turn, will help shift the country's economic system away from the oil industry and prepare it for a world that depends less on oil, Sarah Amiri, the mission's science lead, told Scientific American in 2016. 

As of July 2019, more than 70 Emirati scientists and engineers, almost all under age 35, were working on the mission. That number was expected to grow to 150 by 2020, according to Smithsonian.com. After the Mars arrival of the probe, Gulg News emphasized the youth of the engineering team and the relative youth of the UAE.