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Monday, October 1, 2007

Tyler Currie is running as an Progressive Conservative candidate in the Ontario provincial election, in the riding of Trinity-Spadina. Wikinews’ Nick Moreau interviewed him regarding his values, his experience, and his campaign.

Stay tuned for further interviews; every candidate from every party is eligible, and will be contacted. Expect interviews from Liberals, Progressive Conservatives, New Democratic Party members, Ontario Greens, as well as members from the Family Coalition, Freedom, Communist, Libertarian, and Confederation of Regions parties, as well as independents.

Sunday, June 26, 2005

MTV Networks’ MTV and VH1 have secured the rights to distribute over cable networks the Live 8 series of concerts which will be taking place at 8 venues in Europe, North America and Japan. The concerts are meant to raise awareness of poverty in Africa and charitable donations to fight it.

America Online holds the rights to broadcast Live 8 over the Internet and is currently in talks with American Broadcasting Company to also broadcast the concert.

MTV, VH1, and its college network, mtvU will broadcast the concert from noon to 8 PM. This will be the second outing for MTV, as they broadcasted the original Live Aid concert. If ABC decides to air the concert as well, this will also be their second going as well. According to MTV, this is the longest MTV has gone without a televised event since the coverage of the violent, riot-filled Woodstock 1999.

Two radio networks will also broadcast the concert. The subscription-based XM Satellite Radio will broadcast the original five announced concerts but will not broadcast the Tokyo or Barrie concerts. Premiere Radio Networks will broadcast the concerts tailored to the three genres of urban, rock and roll and pop music.

Some of the performers slated are: U2, Coldplay, Madonna, Dave Matthews Band, Jay-Z, Destiny’s Child and a reunited Pink Floyd.

Friday, August 12, 2011

Police authorities say the body of Suzette York, 49, was found shortly after 11am on Wednesday morning in a classroom at Memphis Junior Academy in Memphis, Tennessee, United States. Police also state a 17 year-old male student, Eduardo Marmolejo, was later taken into custody and has been charged with first-degree murder. Reports indicate Ms. York had been a science and math teacher and was currently serving as the principal at the private academy affiliated with the Seventh Day Adventist Church.

According to police, Ms. York was found lying in a pool of blood by another teacher at the school on Wednesday. The alleged assailant cited dislike and anger with York as motivating the attack. The court appointed two defense attorneys, who requested mental evaluation of the defendant.

A former student of the school described Ms. York as “a wonderful person who was very much involved with her students”. The mayor of Memphis described the incident as “tragic all the way around”.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

Officials from France’s aviation accident investigation agency, the Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA), announced on Tuesday that they had recovered the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) of Air France Flight 447. It was located and brought to the surface by a Remora 6000 unmanned submarine, then taken aboard the Île de Sein, one of the vessels taking part in the recovery and salvage efforts.

This came two days after an announcement on Sunday that the crash-survivable memory unit of the flight data recorder (FDR) of the aircraft had been located and brought to the surface. The chassis of the FDR was located on April 27, with the memory unit missing. It was found a short distance from the chassis. It was also brought to the surface by the Remora 6000.

With the recovery of both recorders, which are reported to be “in good condition”, French officials hope to determine what caused the Airbus A330-200 to crash into the Atlantic Ocean on June 1, 2009, when it departed Rio de Janeiro’s Galeão International Airport before it was lost 600 miles (965 km) off the coast of Brazil en route to Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport with 228 passengers and crew on board.

The leading theory at the moment is that the crew received incorrect air speed readings from the aircraft’s pitot tubes, devices which measure how fast the aircraft is traveling. Experts say the tubes may have become iced over, causing the crash. The plane’s Aircraft Communications Addressing and Reporting System (ACARS) sent out 24 messages over a four-minute long period stating numerous problems and warnings, including incorrect air speed warnings occurring aboard the aircraft, just prior to it going down.

However, chief operating officer of the International Bureau of Aviation, Phil Seymour, speaking to CNN, believes the memory unit will not be of much use to investigators saying because of the depth it was located at, “If you were to throw a computer into the ocean, imagine how all the parts would eventually split and you have the corrosive effects of seawater and the depths involved.” Seymour believes the wreckage will help reveal what happened as more is recovered.

“It may be that the more wreckage they find will help them to piece it all together, which bit by bit could help them build a picture of what caused the plane to come down,” he added.

A BEA spokesperson had agreed with that possibility a few days earlier when speaking to the Associated Press about the recovery of the flight data recorder. “We can’t say in advance that we’re going to be able to read it until it’s been opened,” the spokesperson said. As

The wreckage of the Airbus A330-200, was found back on April 8 at a depth of 3,800 and 4,000 meters (2,070 to 2,190 fathoms or 12,467 feet and 13,123 feet), by a team from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, using a Remus robotic submarine and its side-scan sonar. After the wreckage was found, another Remus robot submarine with cameras was sent down to the site, where it filmed bodies in the wreckage. The location of the recorders were localized within 2 square miles (5 square kilometers) of the flight’s last position last year.

In March, a French judge placed the European aircraft maker Airbus and Air France under investigation for possible involuntary manslaughter charges in the 2009 crash. Both are paying the cost of the search which is estimated to be $12.7 million (nine million euro). The crash is the deadliest in Air France’s history.

Wednesday, March 30, 2005German retail corporation Rewe plans to open several Penny Market discount stores in Romania in the middle of this year. Rewe is mainly interested in opening stores in cities such as Ploie?ti, Câmpina, Tecuci, Foc?ani, One?ti, Craiova, Caracal, Constan?a, Medgidia, Alexandria and Ro?iori de Vede. Most of these cities have populations of below 100,000 people, and Rewe is hoping to take advantage of a market that has not been highly tapped into, since most of Romania’s larger cities, such as Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and Ia?i, already have multiple large supermarkets and discount stores.

Rewe also announced that, over the next few years, it intends to open a total of 50 Penny Market and XXL Mega Stores in Romania. Rewe already operates 14 several highly-successful Billa supermarkets throughout Romania, mainly in large cities, as well as 8 Selgros stores. Rewe has previously made announcements that it wishes to expand its Billa and Selgros brands more extensively. The total value of the company’s investment in Romania is around 200 million euro.

Romania is currently going through a retail boom, especially in the supermarket and discount stores area. Large corporations such as Rewe and Carrefour have established very successful branches in Romania, and other retail giants such as Tesco and WalMart have announced their intention to enter the Romanian market, which is the largest in Southeastern Europe.

The mini MAX discount company said it would open three stores in Romania, in April-May of this year, in the cities of Slatina, Târgovi?te and Urziceni. It plans to open up to 100 stores until the year 2010. Meanwhile, Tengelmann, Rewe’s rival, said it would invest 200 million euro in Romania to open 120 supermarkets in the next five years.

Monday, October 30, 2006

On November 13, Torontoians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Etobicoke Centre (Ward 3). One candidate responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Doug Holyday (incumbent), Peter Kudryk, Lillian Lança, and Ross Vaughan.

For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.

Tuesday, March 10, 2015

Edgar Lungu, the current President of Zambia, is to undergo medical treatment aboard after collapsing while on stage in Lusaka on Sunday during a ceremony for International Women’s Day. The Presidency announced yesterday that Lungu will have throat surgery abroad.

Doctors on Sunday diagnosed him with malaria. Lungu spoke to the press from hospital on Sunday saying “I am looking forward to going home. Doctors have done their tests and they have found traces of malaria, but they are doing further tests and they will let me know what next after before the end of the day”.

A later announcement identified his condition instead as a narrowing of the oesophagus, which he had previously received treatment for three decades ago. Despite not announcing where Lungu would head to be treated the Presidency did say he would undergo a “high-tech medical procedure which is currently unavailable in Zambia”.

Lungu, who only became the Zambian President in January, has previously dispelled rumours of his health. During the election he fought back against comments about his health calling it a “smear” campaign against him.

Some in Zambia have claimed the presidency is “jinxed”. Lungu’s predecessor Michael Sata died in October of last year at the age of 77 in London, England. Sata died only six years after serving President Levy Mwanawasa died following a stroke.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Ivy Bean, thought to have been the oldest person using the popular social networking site Twitter, has died at age 104.

By the end of her life, Bean had 53,535 followers (a term used on Twitter to indicate you are watching a person’s posts) on the site and was something of an internet phenomenon. In 2008, she became known as the oldest person on Facebook, a title held previously by a 97-year-old French man. Bean frequently updated her Twitter page with videos and descriptions of activities in her daily life that included her winning of the Gold Medal in Frisbee in the Over-75 Olympics in Bradford, Northern England as well as recipes and meeting former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

At the beginning of July, Bean was admitted to hospital suffering from jaundice. On July 23rd, Bean returned to the care home where she was a resident, but was no longer able to operate her Twitter account. Manager of the care home Pat Wright took over the account and began posting on Bean’s behalf.

It was posted on July 26th that Bean was in a poor condition and yesterday, Wright posted “Ivy passed away peacefully at 12.08 this morning”.

Many of Bean’s followers posted messages of condolence, making Bean the second-most discussed topic on the Twitter yesterday. Among her followers were Peter Andre and Chris Evans.

Ivy Bean was born November 8, 1905, seven years before the telephone network was established.