BEIJING ,(July 5) XINHUA - Chinese experts expressed their suspicion over Russian's finding of pyramids on Kangrinboqe Mountain in Tibet, China Daily reported today. The English-language daily quoted the experts as saying that the Russians may have mistaken mountains shaped like pyramids to be pyramids. A group of Russian scientists claimed that they had found more than 100 pyramids and many cultural relics last year on Tibet's 6, 656-metre-high Kangrinboqe, the highest peak in the Gangdise Range. Yang Yichou, a geographer with the Institute of Geography under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, attributed the pyramid-like appearance of these mountains to the combined efforts of the geological movements and wind erosion. The Russian scientists did not support their discovery with any archaeological evidence, Yang added. Du Yongbin, a historian with the Chinese Center for Tibetan Studies in Beijing, said all the historical documents on Tibet, both in Tibetan and Chinese, do not ever mention pyramids at all. HONG KONG -- China's prominent researchers in the field of genetics He Fuchu and Zhang Chegong expressed fear that the human genome decoding can be misused to provoke wars or pursue a genocide policy. The two scientists said in an article published by the army daily Jiefangjuin Bao that high technologies could be used to develop new weapons. They recalled that Russian, American, German and British scientists had warned about the danger a few years ago. © (c) 1996-2000 ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved.
Работы по спасению исторических ценностей, затонувшего лайнера "Титаник" будет возглавлять пилот Ральф Витт и Грэм Джессоп в сотрудничестве с Международной компанией Oceaneering International Inc. и Институтом Океанологии им. П.П.Шершова Российской Академии Наук, на судне "Академик Мстислав Келдыш" и автономных аппаратах для проведения подводных исследований "Мир-1" и "Мир-2". Группу российских ученых будет возглавлять профессор Анатолий Сагалевич. CLEARWATER, Fla., Jul 7, 2000 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- G. Michael Harris, COO of RMS Titanic Inc. (OTCBB:SOST) and expedition leader for the July 20 salvage dive, today reiterated the team's commitment to preserving and protecting the priceless artifacts they plan to recover from the world's most famous shipwreck. "We are enthusiastic about the opportunity and privilege to secure and preserve items from the ship that are a direct link to history," said Harris. "Anticipation is definitely building around the country as to what the team will uncover down there," added Arnie Geller, CEO of RMS Titanic Inc. "People are already trying to speculate on what we will find. We do expect to yield a lot of high-profile artifacts that will surely deteriorate if we don't protect them. And our mission is to preserve the historic items we recover and, consistent with the company policy, no items will be auctioned." This upcoming expedition, continuing until Aug. 30, 2000, will focus on the recovery of specific, priceless, high-profile targets and other valuable artifacts. For the first time ever, the company will actually enter the ship through the cargo hold for the specific purpose of retrieving valuable artifacts and historic items. Previous Titanic expeditions have only filmed inside the ship and recovered items outside the ship in the half-mile-long debris field and have determined that the shipwreck is deteriorating quickly from the effects of microorganisms living in the deep ocean water. The undersea salvage work will be headed by Submersible-Pilot Ralph White and Salvage Master, Graham Jessop, in association with Oceaneering International Inc. and their MAGELLAN 725 ROV and the P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology Russian Academy of Sciences, along with their vessel "AKADEMIK MSTISLEV KELDYSH" and the submersibles "MIR 1 and MIR 2." Professor Anatoly Sagalevitch will be heading up the Russian delegation. There will be a team of 12 multinational scientists to continue the scientific research of Titanic. The new team has developed a state-of-the art ROV (remote operated vehicle) the size of a human hand, complete with fiber-optic capabilities which will facilitate the recovery efforts. Under its new management team, RMS Titanic Inc. is responsible for the worldwide sensation, "The Titanic Artifacts Exhibit," produced by SFX Family Entertainment (NYSE:SFX). The exhibit contain hundreds of artifacts salvaged from the Titanic's wreck site, two and a half miles below the North Atlantic. "The Titanic Artifacts Exhibit" brings back to life the unforgettable tale of the world's most famous maritime disaster, from the grandeur and spectacle of her design, to the personal stories of her passengers, to the tragic night of April 14, 1912, and to her subsequent discovery and the recovery of her artifacts on the ocean floor. RMS Titanic Inc. is the exclusive salvor-in-possession of the Titanic wreck, which gives the company sole ownership rights to any items recovered from the historic vessel's wreck site. In a June 1998 ruling, the Federal District Court (Virginia) commended the company for "maximizing the wreck's historical value and returning the wreck's artifacts to society for the general use and education of all mankind." During the years 1998, 1996, 1994, 1993 and 1987, research and recovery expeditions conducted by RMS Titanic Inc. have recovered in excess of 5,000 artifacts from the Titanic wreck site. More than 6 million people have attended exhibitions of the company's Titanic artifacts throughout the world, in locations such as Las Vegas; Boston; St. Paul, Minn.; Atlantic City, N.J.; Dallas; Orlando and St. Petersburg, Fla.; Memphis, Tenn.; Long Beach, Calif.; Toronto, Canada; Zurich, Switzerland; Tokyo and other cities in Japan; Hamburg, Germany; and at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, England. More information about RMS Titanic Inc. is available at its Web site, www.rmstitanic.net. © (c)2000 Business Wire. All rights reserved.
Сорок девять Американских ученых, лауреатов Нобелевской премии в области физики, химии, медицины и экономики, послали открытое письмо Президенту Биллу Клинтону, против решения о запрещении национальной системы ракетной защиты, в соответствии с договором противоракетной обороны ( ABM) 1972 года. Национальная система противоракетной обороны не может иметь никаких военных, политических или экономических оснований, говорится в письме MOSCOW, July 7 (Itar-Tass) - Forty-nine American scientists, Nobel Prize winners in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics, sent an open letter to President Bill Clinton on Thursday to urge against a decision on the national missile defense system banned by the ABM treaty of 1972. The national missile defense system can have no military, political or economic grounds, the letter says. Any advancement to such system would be a dangerous move to inflict a huge damage on the U.S. national security interests and spur on the arms race, it notes. Russia shares the profound concern, especially in view of the new tests in the missile defense sphere announced by the Pentagon, says a report of the Russian Foreign Ministry information and press department received by Itar-Tass on Friday. "We would like to hope that the White House will listen to the authoritative opinion of the scientific luminaries, genuine American patriots, and the public," the report says. © (c)1996-2000 ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved.
Technology: Despite the Zvezda module's successful launch, Moscow warns that funding problems could hold up the 16-nation project. A top space engineer here advised NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin to say a few prayers Wednesday before the launch of Zvezda, the key Russian module of the international space station. "He probably prayed well, and it helped," said Vladimir S. Syromyatnikov, chief of the electromechanical department at Russia's Energiya space company. "It was a perfect, perfect launch." But even as the Zvezda module began orbiting Earth, Russian officials were warning of more financial problems ahead, raising fears of further delays for the 16-nation project. In a bleak note amid the atmosphere of celebration, Yuri I. Grigoryev, deputy general designer at Energiya, warned that Russia will have to revise its plans for deployment of future modules. It will also face problems next year providing space vehicles for launches, he acknowledged. "I have to admit we have problems with lack of funding, and we will have to change our plans," he said. "In relation to the seven or eight elements [of the space station], unfortunately, I have to say that work on those modules is frozen. "So the program on the Russian segments of the international space station should be reconsidered, and we should revise our plans and make adjustments." he said. Goldin, attending the launch at Baikonur, Kazakhstan, played the diplomat Wednesday. During a news conference broadcast here at the Russian space facility outside Moscow, he praised Russians for overcoming enormous economic and political difficulties. His comments were a far cry from those he expressed in May 1998, when he voiced frustration and anger at the Russians over delays. At that time, he told a congressional hearing that he regretted the United States had not built its own version of the Zvezda module, despite Russia's vast experience in space station design and operation as a result of its Mir project. "It's been tough. We've been candid," Goldin said Wednesday. He also predicted problems ahead in the ambitious space endeavor. The project is expected to cost $60 billion by its completion, scheduled for 2005. "We're going to have some more problems," Goldin said after the launch. But he added, "The space station will be built, and then we are going to figure out how people will live and work in space, and we are going to get to Mars." Zvezda, the first module fully financed by Russia, cost more than $300 million. Initially scheduled for launch in early 1998, it will provide living quarters and house the space station's command systems. In a complex docking operation scheduled for Wednesday, the 43-foot-long, 21-ton module will hook up with the Russian Zarya and the U.S. Unity modules, which have been in orbit since 1998. The complexity of that maneuver has Russian and U.S. scientists biting their nails. Vladimir I. Lobachev, chief of the space center here in Korolyov, wiped sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief after the tension of Wednesday's launch and said he was overjoyed. "But my joy and relief will be far greater after the docking," he said. "Our biggest concern now is that we have just one Zvezda and no backup version, and we can't afford a failure," he said. "We don't get a second chance." In the 10 minutes between Wednesday's blastoff and the moment Zvezda reached orbit, the tension at the mission control headquarters at Korolyov was palpable. Two Proton rockets crashed last year, and a minor hitch occurred during a test launch this month. Syromyatnikov, who advised Goldin to say a prayer, admitted that he said a few himself. "You pray because a rocket is a special transportation vehicle. . . .Some people forget that it is almost 8 kilometers [about 5 miles] per second in velocity, and how extraordinary it is that this can be achieved and that it can be precise in time and place." Russia will send a crew into orbit to manually dock the station if the computer-directed operation fails. Then there will be rapid expansion of the space station, with 15 launches planned in the next 12 months. © (c)2000 / Los Angeles Times
STAR CITY,Russia, Jul 10, 2000 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- Weeds grow through the sidewalk and a skinny stray puppy seeks attention from visitors – a scene not from an obscure provincial village but from Russia's facility for training cosmonauts. Unlike spit-and-polish Western space programs, Russia's sometimes appears down at the heels. But with Wednesday's planned launch of a key module of the International Space Station, Russia intends to prove that it's back in space in a big way. "It's a very important step," said Konstantin Kreidenko, a spokesman for the Russian Aviation and Space Agency. "Many countries are depending on it." The 22-ton, 43-foot-long (20-ton, 13-meter-long) Zvezda module, whose name means "star," is the life center of the 16-nation space station project, providing accommodation and sanitation for the crew, as well as propulsion and flight control. For years, it looked more like it was on life-support. The United States, which initiated the ISS project in 1984, brought in Russia in 1993 to build the Zvezda in hopes of saving time and money. But the project, frustrated by cash shortages in the Russian space program, ran more than two years behind schedule and the delays cost an estimated dlrs 3 billion. The Zvezda was ready last year, but its launch was delayed after two Proton rockets - the type that are to lift it into orbit - crashed while launching satellites. These high-profile troubles came as Russia, with a budget of just 2.7 billion rubles (about dlrs 100 million) for space programs this year, was scraping for money to keep its Mir space station aloft. After several exotic plans fell through, including one to send an actor to the Mir to film scenes for a movie, the private investment group MirCorp provided funds for a mission just weeks before the government was to have scuttled the craft. The next mission to the Mir is to carry a "space tourist," a U.S. businessman who is to pay tens of millions of dollars for the trip. Even a recent reception to honor the latest Mir cosmonauts required some commercial sponsorship, with the Ford Motor Company showing its logo on stage and handing out credit applications in the lobby. The money-hunt and turning the Mir into an elite excursion destination, along with the Mir's frightening series of system failures and a fire in 1998, contrasts darkly with the Soviet Union's one-time primacy in space. In 1957, the Soviet Union put the world's first satellite in orbit, shocking Americans who regarded themselves as technologically superior. They put the first human in space four years later. The program's troubles are often an undercurrent in even the proudest statements of accomplishment. At the Mir reception at Star City, cosmonaut Alexei Kalerin said his two-month trip to resuscitate the space station was a mission "that pretty much nobody believed in." "It is our communal victory," he declared, standing under a faded and wrinkled poster of Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space. Proud statements aside, Russia still has to prove itself with the Zvezda. At a news conference last week, the head of the U.S. space agency NASA's programs with Russia, Capt. Michael Baker, struck a skeptical note when he said that crews could blast off for the ISS this fall "if all goes successfully (with Zvezda) and the United States is confident in this." The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress, has warned that station crews will face increased risk and noise because of Russia's failure to meet NASA safety standards. It says the module's aluminum and magnesium skin doesn't offer strong enough protection against collisions with space junk and its equipment will fail if cabin pressure is lost, jeopardizing the entire station. The launch of the Zvezda from the Baikonur cosmodrome in the former Soviet republic of Kazakstan comes 25 years almost to the day that U.S. and Soviet crews blasted off for a rendezvous in orbit that space buffs saw as heralding a new era of cooperation in space. The Zvezda launch is seen by some as carrying similar importance. "It's the key to sustaining human presence in space," said analyst John Pike of the Federation of American Scientists. He added that the project also has benefits on the ground, helping the often-tense relations between Washington and Moscow. "The space station is one of the few remaining areas of cooperation between the United States and Russia," he said. © (c) 2000 Associated Press, All rights reserved
BAIKONUR,Kazakstan, Jul 12, 2000 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- A Russian booster rocket streaked into clear blue skies Wednesday carrying a crucial piece of the International Space Station, speeding construction of the $60 billion project after more than two years of delay. The flawless launch of the Zvezda module from the Baikonur space facility in Kazakstan clears the way for six to eight U.S. shuttle flights a year through 2005 hauling hundreds of tons of additional modules and equipment. That couldn't happen until the Russian-built Zvezda was put in orbit, since it has the living quarters and flight controls to enable crews to live and work on the station for months. While Russia will still build and deliver parts of the 16-nation project, delays due to financial troubles in Russia can no longer set back work the way the Zvezda delay did, officials say. "We really couldn't continue construction of the station without this piece," said Robert Castle, Jr., NASA's flight director for shuttle and station mission operations. "This particular part is very important because it allows us to put a crew on the station, a permanent crew." Docking ports for future U.S.-built modules are already in place, so any Russian delays will only hold up their part of the station. A key mission is scheduled for September, when a shuttle will bring the first piece of the girder-like truss assembly that will hold giant solar panels. The first live-in crew is to arrive in October or early November aboard a Russian Soyuz vehicle, and a November shuttle flight will follow with solar panels that will dramatically increase the electricity supply. That is expected to pave the way for the U.S.-built Destiny science module, the center of the station's research activity, to arrive in January, 2001. Zvezda went into orbit unmanned and is scheduled to dock July 26 by computer with two other space station components, Zarya and Unity, launched in 1998. If the automatic linkup goes awry, two cosmonauts are standing by to fly immediately to Zvezda aboard a Soyuz rocket from Baikonur to complete the linkup. At Mission Control outside Moscow, Russian and U.S. space agency officials applauded as the module safely reached orbit approximately 10 minutes after launch at 8:56 a.m. Moscow time. The flight was held up by two crashes of Proton booster rockets over Kazakstan last year. Had Wednesday's launch suffered a similar failure, work on the station could have been delayed for years since there is no Zvezda spare. The launch decided "whether Russia's space program will go on existing or not go on existing," said a beaming Yuri Koptev, director of the Russian Aerospace Agency. "It decided the fate of a great international space project." NASA administrator Daniel Goldin said: "This is one of the happiest and proudest days of my life. We set a vision eight years ago and we stuck to that vision." President Reagan set the station program in motion in 1984. Nine years later, with the project in turmoil, President Clinton invited the Russians to join. Instead of saving the United States time and money as hoped, the Russians caused even more delays and created even bigger expenses for NASA - some $3 billion. © (c) 2000 Associated Press, All rights reserved
BAIKONUR COSMODROME, Kazakhstan - With a perfect launch on a picturesque day, Russia on Wednesday salvaged its crippled space program and restored momentum to the U.S.-led multinational effort to build a giant city in the heavens. © 2000, Chicago Tribune
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