The Four Chaplains were four Army chaplains who gave their lives when the USAT Dorchester was hit by a torpedo and sank on February 3, 1943. They helped other soldiers board lifeboats and gave up their life jackets when the supply ran out. 230 men of the 902 aboard survived the attack.
The chaplains were Lieutenants Rev. George L. Fox (Methodist); Rabbi Alexander D. Goode (Jewish); Fr. John P. Washington (Roman Catholic); and Rev. Clark V. Poling (Dutch Reformed). The four chaplains were all sailing on the USAT Dorchester troop transport ship on 3 February 1943 when the vessel was torpedoed by the German U-Boat U-223. As the vessel sank, the four chaplains calmed the frightened soldiers and sailors, aided in the evacuation of the ship, and helped guide wounded men to safety. The chaplains also gave up their own life vests.
The Day the Music Died (February 3, 1959), was the day of the plane crash that killed three popular American rock and roll musicians. Early that morning, at approximately 1:05 AM Central Standard Time, a Beechcraft Bonanza airplane carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, crashed in a farmer's field en route to a concert near Fargo, North Dakota, killing all three performers as well as the pilot, Roger Peterson. The phrase "The Day The Music Died" was coined by Don McLean in his 1971 song about the crash, "American Pie".
And the three men I admire most:
The Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost,
They caught the last train for the coast
The day the music died.
Posted by: Mike ||
02/03/2009 07:54 ||
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The Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB) yesterday handed over the cab service offices to its three lessees--BM Transport, Green Bangla and Baba Auto Gas after ousting the 'grabbers' from the cab service counters at Zia International Airport.
On Sunday, Leaders and activists of Airport police station unit of Awami League (AL) took control of the cab service counters after driving out the three lessees of CAAB. Nurul Islam, chief security officer of CAAB told The Daily Star that they handed over the offices to the authorities of the three firms at about 11:00 am in the presence of its chairman.
Earlier, police drove out the AL men who locked the offices of the three firms.
Officer-in-Charge of the Airport police station Khan Mohammad Sirajul Islam said additional police have been deployed in front of the airport terminal to avert any untoward situation.
The AL men locked the rooms of the three firms, owned by Sramik League leaders and workers, and took the possession of those offices on Sunday claiming that they have obtained a court ruling recently in favour of them.
Earlier on Saturday, some Juba League activists swooped on lessees' men at the airport to take control of the cab service counters there, leaving three people injured. The three firms won the bid last year, but the previous holders, a consortium of 14 firms, filed a writ petition alleging irregularities in the tender. Recently, they obtained the court ruling in their favour.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/03/2009 00:00 ||
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Jitendra Kumar Mohala, a 42-year-old chartered accountant, who claimed to be an armed hijacker onboard a Delhi-bound flight from Goa, reportedly claimed to be different things - a DGCA official, a sky marshal, a pilot. But nothing was as scary as his claim of being a hijacker. "He claimed to belong to a terror group called Maula and told an air hostess that he was carrying a pouch of infected needles that, if pricked, could sedate people. Psychologists say Mohala could be suffering from frustration aggression syndrome, which manifests itself in sudden bouts of violence behaviour. Is that anything like Sudden Jihad Syndrome?
He has been remanded to 14 days' judicial custody. He has been booked under sections 336 (endangering life and personal safety of others) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of IPC, as well as Suppression of Unlawful Act Against Safety Of Civil Aviation Act, 1982, which is non-bailable.
The other two persons detained along with Mohala - Sameer Uppal and Harmeet Anand - were released by Sunday late evening after questioning because there was nothing to suggest that they were active participants in the incident.
Sources said, during the flight, the chartered accountant made a dash to the front end of the aircraft where airhostesses were seated. "The crew got very scared but at the last minute, Mohala went inside the lavatory and locked himself there for some time. He went to the toilet many times. He also kept changing his seat during the flight," said sources. Typical hijacker or system testing behaviour. Why didn't they just lock him into the lavatory, given that his threat was needles, not bombs?
IndiGo president Aditya Ghosh commended the airhostesses' conduct. "The challenge for them was to keep each other
informed of what was going on without spreading panic among passengers. They, along with the pilot, did an amazing job of keeping calm while assuming all along that the unruly passenger could be armed," Ghosh said.
The flight's commander, captain Amit Singh, also played safe. I'd rather my pilot were effective rather than safe, but I'm hardly an expert on such things.
At 5.15pm, he told Delhi ATC on common frequency that an unruly passenger was creating ruckus on the plane while asking for priority landing. Suspecting something was wrong, the alert ATC official left this plane's frequency on so that they could hear what's transpiring in the cockpit. "This way, the ATC heard Captain Singh's conversation with the four airhostesses and thought they could have a hijack situation. Then the pilot asked for a discreet frequency as all planes use common frequency on final approach to hear what's going on in the sky and ground around them. This collective approach of the airhostesses, pilot and ATC ensured no one - passengers and other aircraft - knew about the unfolding midair terror drama," said sources. Ignorance could have meant death, but at least nobody panicked.
INDONESIAN Islamic hardliners have called for a ban on international organisations the Rotary Club and the Lions Club, saying they are part of a Zionist conspiracy, reports said on Monday.
The People's Ulema Forum (FUU) said the clubs were 'infidel' fronts for Freemasonry and the world Zionist movement and threatened Islam in the world's most populous Muslim country.
'They gather funds and give them to America and the Israeli Zionists,' FUU chairman Atian Ali Mohammad Da'i was quoted as saying in The Jakarta Globe daily.
'We urge all Muslims to renounce membership in the Rotary Club and the Lions Club. Otherwise they can consider themselves infidels.' He called on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to ban the groups.
Indonesian Muslims are overwhelmingly moderate but a vocal hardline fringe regularly succeeds in influencing policymakers despite opposition from secularists, civil society groups and religious minorities.
The FUU is an ultra-conservative group that has used force to stop Christian services and in 2002 issued a death fatwa (Islamic ruling) against a Muslim scholar who had criticised conservative Islam, the Globe reported.
Raja Juli Antony of the Maarif Institue, a moderate Islamic group, told The Jakarta Post there was no evidence that the Lions or Rotary clubs posed a threat to Islam.
He said they had made positive contributions to Indonesia's development through their charity works.
A senior member of the Indonesia Ulema Council, the country's highest religious body which last week issued a fatwa against certain forms of yoga, said it was not considering a ruling against the Lions or Rotary clubs.
The public service clubs - formed in the early 1900s and claiming some 2.5 million members around the world - were banned in Indonesia in 1962 for nationalist reasons but were allowed to reopen in 2000.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/03/2009 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
