Safety on our beaches

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Story Created: Apr 1, 2014 at 11:13 PM ECT

Story Updated: Apr 1, 2014 at 11:13 PM ECT

THE recent drowning of 26-year-old Sashell Ross at Bacolet beach once again raises concerns about the safety of those who use our beaches. At present, Tobago is an ideal getaway and place of relaxation for many Trinidadians almost every weekend. Also, many Tobagonians and foreign visitors recognise the importance of a sea bath to their physical well-being. The fact that there are beaches on the island which are relatively free from pollution helps to add attraction for both local and foreign people seeking to enjoy sun, sea and sun. As the old saying goes, the sea has no branches. This means that safety is a priority at all beaches. Whether those beaches are on the Atlantic or Caribbean side of the island, the sea bathers cannot be ignored. Bacolet Beach, for example is a very beautiful and enchanting place to bathe when the water is calm. However, those who are acquainted with the beach, know there is a current pulling from east to west when the water is rough. Also when the inter-island ferry passes in the vicinity of the beach, there is always a vicious ripping of the waves. It means that it would be wise for those in the water to come out and allow the normality of the waves to return. Such native knowledge could well be printed on public notice boards at the beach, because to be forewarned is to be forearmed'. Lifesaving information could also be printed. Even though the Tobago House of Assembly's Division of Tourism will have its hands full at present with the upcoming jazz event, it is hoped that the operatives at the Division will ensure later on to remember the safety of the public on our beaches. It is also essential for the well used beaches on the island to have properly trained and fully equipped lifeguards. Also, members of the public must themselves be aware of certain basics when they go to enjoy a sea bath. There must be a limitation on alcohol or drug consumption which can cause an individual to lose his or her sense of judgement. Be careful of what games are played while bathing because in the heat of the moment, one can forget the principle of safety first. The Tobago Hotels Restaurants and Tourism Association is now calling on the Division to provide more lifeguard cover on the popular tourist beaches, like Grafton and Turtle Beach. While it accepts that the Division does put public notices on many unmanned beaches, it is warning that this shouldn't be a cheap option and that nothing replaces full lifeguard cover, who can often act as first responders to any beach related incident. We believe the Tobago beaches remain one of our island's primary attractions; we must therefore keep them safe for ourselves and our visiting friends.

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Safety on our beaches

Calls for more lifeguards on Tobagos beaches

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By Katy Stickland

Story Created: Apr 1, 2014 at 11:24 PM ECT

Story Updated: Apr 1, 2014 at 11:24 PM ECT

TOURISM leaders are calling on the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) to provide more lifeguards for the islands beaches. It comes following the drowning of 26-year-old Sashell Ross at Bacolet beach earlier this month. The Maravel pre-school teacher was on holiday with friends in Tobago when she got into difficulty in the water. The beach has no lifeguard cover. The President of the Tobago Hotels Restaurants and Tourism Association, Nicholas Hardwicke says although it is impossible and impracticable to have lifeguard cover on all of Tobagos beaches, major public beaches should be covered. Some beaches such as Lambeau have no bathers but lifeguard cover. Grafton, Turtle Beach, Grange and Back Bay which are visited by hundreds of bathers a week during the season have no coverage, says Hardwicke. If lifeguard facilities are not provided on the beach then you should at least have enough adequate signage to warn the visiting public to exercise caution. The THA has taken some strides towards this, although it is not universal. But this should not be a cheap option. We need lifeguard facilities at all the key beaches. The THAs Division of Tourism and Transportation provides lifeguard cover for nine of Tobagos beaches including Store Bay, Pigeon Point, Mt. Irvine, Bloody Bay, Castara, Kings Bay, Charlotteville and Speyside. There are currently no lifeguards on duty at Little Rockly Bay (Lambeau) because the lifeguard tower is closed for renovation work. Hardwicke says the provision of lifeguards is a benchmark issue and one we have been aspiring to for a long time. Their importance is not just that theyre there for the protection of swimmers in the water but in many incidences lifeguards are the first responders to incidents which can happen in a beach environment. They are an authoritative presence which is required. They provide an important link to other law enforcement and emergency response agencies, said Hardwicke. I first raised this in1999 and there was a unanimous agreement by all stakeholders and government that something should be done. It is now 2014 and nothing has been done. From a public safety point of view we want to see the facilities with appropriately trained, manned and capable teams put in place. There is much more that they could do. Tobago News asked the THAs Division of Tourism and Transportation to respond to the concerns. Up until press time there had been no response.

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Calls for more lifeguards on Tobagos beaches

Changing The Face Of Astronomy Research

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hide captionStudents from CUNY's AstroCom NYC program meet for a weekly class at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Dennis Robbins, an associate professor of science education at CUNY's Hunter College, teaches Betsy Hernandez (from left), Jaquelin Erazo, Ariel Diaz and Mario Martin.

Students from CUNY's AstroCom NYC program meet for a weekly class at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Dennis Robbins, an associate professor of science education at CUNY's Hunter College, teaches Betsy Hernandez (from left), Jaquelin Erazo, Ariel Diaz and Mario Martin.

Shooting for the stars is expensive.

Advanced sciences like astronomy require years of study and graduate degrees. And the soaring cost of college can be a heavy obstacle for low-income and minority students hoping to break into those fields.

A program at the City University of New York hopes to lift that burden by providing scholarships and one-on-one mentoring to underrepresented students.

AstroCom NYC is designed for CUNY scholars like Ariel Diaz, who first felt the pull of astronomy when he was a Marine stationed in North Carolina. Diaz was miserable at the time; he missed his friends and family back in New York City.

"I would go to the beach with my friend," he says. "We would just go to the beach, have a beer and just look at the stars, and everything was OK."

Diaz finished his service three years ago and came home, enrolling in a CUNY community college. When it was time to take a science class, he thought about that time on the beach.

"I like stars ... let me take an easy course," he remembers thinking. "Let me take an easy astronomy course."

Diaz laughs now, because it wasn't easy. As any Astronomy 101 student can tell you, it's far more physics and math than stargazing. Diaz needed help passing calculus. But he says it was worth it to learn about stars and galaxies.

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Changing The Face Of Astronomy Research

April Astronomy Events: From A Total Lunar Eclipse To Mars Opposition And 'Zero Gravity Day' [VIDEO]

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The first astronomy event of April will be the Mars opposition on April 8. Mars will be directly opposite of the sun, with Earth in the middle, but the Red Planet will not be at its closest point to Earth on that day. Mars' closest approach to Earth will be on April 14, due to Mars' orbit, reports Space.com. The last Mars opposition occurred on March 3, 2012.

Some people may be talking about a planetary alignment that will occur on April leading to what is being called "Zero Gravity Day."An article from News-hound.org states that on Friday, due to Pluto lining up with Jupiter and the Earth, will create a strong enough counter-force to Earth's gravity. The reduction of gravity will let people float for a few seconds at the precise time of alignment, 9:47 a.m., according to the article.

"Zero G Day" and #ZeroGDay quickly populated social media when the article was first published. Slate quickly debunked the story, noting the lack of planetary alignment on Friday as well as the lack of gravitational pull that could be caused by the distant planet.Not only is "Zero G Day" a hoax it was a fake news story only a few months ago. The first News-hound.org report happened in January, notes Slate.

While the Mars opposition may not be a great viewing event, the total lunar eclipse on April 15 will be the best astronomy event in April. According to EarthSky, the total lunar eclipse, also known as a red moon, on April 15 will be the first of three total eclipses that will occur in 2014. The next total lunar eclipse will occur on Sept. 28 and the final eclipse will take place on Oct. 8. The lunar eclipse will be easily visible throughout North America.

April's full moon also occurs on the 15th. The full moon is traditionally known as the Pink Moon. According to the Farmers' Almanac, April's full moon gets its name from one of the earliest blooming flowers of spring, phlox subulata also known as moss pink.

The last astronomy event of April may be the most spectacular. The second meteor shower of 2014, the Lyrids, occur between April 16 and 25, with its peak on April 22, notes EarthSky. Skygazers can expect 10 to 20 meteors per hour during the peak of the Lyrids.

A video discussing the total lunar eclipse, the Lyrids and Mars opposition, courtesy of NASA, can be viewed below.

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April Astronomy Events: From A Total Lunar Eclipse To Mars Opposition And 'Zero Gravity Day' [VIDEO]

See a comet up close on Astronomy Day

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This Saturday, at our annual Carroll College Astronomy Day event, well have observatory tours, well look for sunspots with our solar telescope and, best of all, youll get a chance to watch us build a model comet, right in front of your eyes. I love watching the kids laugh with delight as we shape the steaming, stinking, ice-cold mass and hold it up for all to see. So, what is a comet? And how can we build one?

For thousands of years, most people around the world saw comets as frightening mysteries. The sun, the moon and the stars go through their cycles regularly and predictably. But then suddenly a comet would appear in the sky for a few weeks or months. People thought they were bad omens, warnings of war, plague and the death of kings. And then science was born.

Today, we know that comets are something like dirty snowballs, typically a few miles across, roughly the size of a mountain. They spend most of their time far from the sun in the outer reaches of our solar system, where its cold and dark, living in Plutos neighborhood. However, a comet will occasionally fall in close to the sun, and then things get interesting. The suns heat melts the comets outer layers, causing them to spew out an enormous cloud of gas and dust, thousands or millions of miles across. This gas ball, called the coma, is usually the first thing that we can see from here on Earth. Then, the suns wind and radiation begin pushing the comets gas away, giving the comet a tail which can stretch for a hundred million miles across space.

The comet that we build on Saturday will be a lot smaller, but the ingredients will be scientifically correct. Well begin with a big chunk of dry ice, frozen carbon dioxide. Normally, carbon dioxide is a gas, part of the air around us. However, when cooled to a temperature of minus 109 degrees, carbon dioxide becomes solid. Well smash up our dry ice with a hammer then mix in a bunch of water and ammonia, just like a real comet. The dry ice will freeze them together into a big steaming icy ball, with a horrible smell from the ammonia. As we combine them, well mix in some sand and dirt: Real comets leave a trail of dust and gravel behind them as they move through space. Comets also contain a mix of complex organic molecules, so well stir in a dash of dark corn syrup for good measure. Our final result will be spewing out a stinking dry ice fog as it drips and melts its way to oblivion.

Our annual astronomy day event will run from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 5, in Simperman Hall Room 114 on the Carroll College campus. Comet building will begin at 1 p.m., so please stop by and see for yourself what a comet looks like up close!

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See a comet up close on Astronomy Day

Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO – R.I.F.T.: This is Just the Beginning (2014) HD – Video

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Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO - R.I.F.T.: This is Just the Beginning (2014) HD
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Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO - R.I.F.T.: This is Just the Beginning (2014) HD - Video

Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO – R.I.F.T.: Humans Are Born, Not Programmed (2014) HD – Video

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Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO - R.I.F.T.: Humans Are Born, Not Programmed (2014) HD
Subscribe to TRAILERS: http://bit.ly/sxaw6h Subscribe to COMING SOON: http://bit.ly/H2vZUn Like us on FACEBOOK: http://goo.gl/dHs73 Transcendence VIRAL VIDEO...

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Aerospace manufacturing takes off in Southern states

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The South is home to auto giants Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen and Nissan Motor Co. It is increasingly attracting some of the biggest names in aviation, including Boeing Co. in South Carolina, Airbus in Alabama, Gulfstream Aerospace Corp. in Georgia, and GE Aviation in North Carolina.

Aerospace companies are taking a cue from the auto industry and moving their manufacturing operations to Southern states. The regions lower costs, generous state incentive packages, and right-to-work laws that make it hard for unions to organize are motivating these companies to choose the South.

Four Southern states are among the top 10 states in aerospace job growth between 2007 and 2012, with South Carolina far ahead of the others, thanks to Boeing. Aerospace jobs in South Carolina jumped by more than 600 percent over that time period, from 865 workers to 5,685 workers, said Amy Holloway, president of Avalanche Consulting of Texas, who analyzed data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Boeing selected North Charleston, S.C., in 2009 to produce its 787 Dreamliner aircraft, in large part because of the $900 million in tax breaks and other incentives the state offered over 30 years.

North Carolina ranks second in aerospace job growth with a nearly 34 percent increase over the same period. California, Connecticut, Kansas, Texas, and Washington state still have 65 percent of the countrys nearly 500,000 aerospace jobs. But of those states, only Washington state has seen an increase in aerospace jobs since 2001, Holloway said.

The other states have either remained relatively unchanged or lost employment. California, for example, has lost more than 8,000 aerospace jobs since 2002, including Lockheed Martin, which moved its corporate headquarters to the Washington, D.C., area. Besides opening its plant in South Carolina, Boeing in 2012 announced it was closing its Wichita, Kan., plant and moving that production to Oklahoma, Texas and Washington state, affecting more than 2,100 workers.

U.S. manufacturing jobs in general were waning even before the recession, with employment shrinking by 22 percent between 2002 and 2012. The aerospace sector grew 7 percent over that same period. Even with the fiscal austerity in Washington, D.C., sales in the aerospace industry grew 41 percent from 2002 to 2012, driven largely by military and international sales, Holloway said.

And the sector is expected to grow. Boeing projects a demand for 35,000 new planes by 2032. Airbus projects building more than 29,000 jets in the same period.

States are fighting to land these jobs. Boeing, the worlds largest aerospace company, sparked a bidding frenzy among states last year when a workers union in Washington state rejected the companys contract offer and the company started looking elsewhere to make its 777X jet. Missouri, for example, held an emergency special legislative session in December 2013 and approved a $150-million-a-year economic incentive package to lure Boeing there.

Washington kept the project after the union decided to accept the offer after all, including freezing pensions and changing to a 401(k) plan. But the significant incentives being offered reflect the importance of these jobs to states.

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Aerospace manufacturing takes off in Southern states

Nanobiotix Selected to Present Data from NBTXR3 Clinical Trial at the 50th Annual Meeting of the American Society of …

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Regulatory News:

NANOBIOTIX (Euronext: NANO ISIN: FR0011341205), a clinical-stage nanomedicine company pioneering novel approaches for the local treatment of cancer, today announced that it has been selected by the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) to present data from its clinical trial evaluating NBTXR3 in advanced soft tissue sarcoma.

The clinical trial will be presented during the congress session dedicated to sarcoma.

This years ASCO will take place in Chicago from 31 May to 3 June, 2014. The Annual Meeting brings together more than 25,000 oncology professionals from a broad range of clinical research specialties.

The NBTXR3 study was selected from over 5,500 abstracts received by the Scientific Program Committee of ASCO for review.

Laurent Levy, CEO of Nanobiotix said: We are honored that ASCO has invited us to present our NBTXR3 data in front of the international oncology community. This is an encouraging step for our team and our partners and we will continue to develop innovative therapies aimed to improve patient care in the fight against cancer.

About NANOBIOTIX - http://www.nanobiotix.com

Nanobiotix (Euronext: NANO / ISIN: FR0011341205) is a clinical-stage nanomedicine company pioneering novel approaches for the local treatment of cancer. The Companys first-in-class, proprietary technology, NanoXray, enhances radiotherapy energy to provide a new, more efficient treatment for cancer patients. NanoXray products are compatible with current radiotherapy treatments and are meant to treat a wide variety of cancers via multiple routes of administration.

Nanobiotixs lead product NBTXR3, based on NanoXray, is currently under clinical development for soft tissue sarcoma and locally advanced head and neck cancer. The Company, based in Paris, France, has partnered with PharmaEngine for clinical development and commercialization of NBTXR3 in Asia.

Nanobiotix is listed on the regulated market of NYSE Euronext in Paris (ISIN: FR0011341205, Euronext ticker: NANO, Bloomberg: NANO: FP).

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Nanobiotix Selected to Present Data from NBTXR3 Clinical Trial at the 50th Annual Meeting of the American Society of ...

‘Breakthrough’ Acid Stem Cell Study: Something is Grossly Wrong

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Genetic irregularities add further confusion to acid bath stem cell studyReuters

Ground-breaking research that originally promised a huge leap in stem cell research has been dealt another blow this month after further irregularities in the authors' findings were discovered.

In January, Haruko Obokata of the Riken Centre for Developmental Biology in Japan said she hadproduced two stem cell lines from mice by washing mature cells in acid -a safer and easier way of reprogramming mature cells to an embryonic state.

At the time, researchers said the findings were hugely important for the future of stem cell therapy and its ability to fight diseases.

However, shortly after publication, the Riken centre's president, Ryoji Noyori,was forced to apologise for what he called "sloppy" work after the firstirregularities in the findings emerged.A subsequent investigation was launchedfollowing complaints of duplicated images and failed attempts to copy her findings.

According to Nature magazine,investigators have now found that the two stem cell lines came from different strains, suggesting the papers came from different mouse strains to what was claimed.

"Something is grossly wrong," says Hiromitsu Nakauchi, a University of Tokyo stem cell researcher.

Teruhiko Wakayama from Yamanashi University, who collaborated on the papers, performed genetic analysis on the stem cell lines. He told Nature that he had expected a genetic match between the stem cells and the source mice, but that this was not the case.

"This is really, really confusing... so far I do not see any proof of misconduct. Moreover, I am still not convinced that [the findings] are bogus"

Biologist Hans Scholer

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'Breakthrough' Acid Stem Cell Study: Something is Grossly Wrong