Today, Nokia announced that it’s going to cut 4,000 more jobs at its factories in Hungary, Mexico and Finland in an effort to improve the production efficiency of said plants. The company plans on moving a larger part of the production of its smartphones to Asia, which it says will help reduce the time it takes for its products to reach the market.

As Nokia continues to suffer the effect of the transition of its smartphone portfolio to Windows Phone, the company is looking for ways to cut costs until the huge investments start paying off. The cheaper labor cost in Asia should help the Finns reduce their production costs and, hopefully, go back in the black.

We are not exactly sure that moving your production thousands of kilometers from the actual markets will really improve the speed, but maybe Nokia is now more focused on reaching the rapidly expanding Chinese market instead of Europe and America.

Still, the company desperately needs to buy some time, until Windows Phone gets competitive enough to allow it to price its smartphones as high as Android and iOS top-dogs and, obviously the guys over at Espoo decided that this is what it takes.

Personnel reductions are planned to be phased through the end of 2012, so we will only see if Nokia made the right decision come the first 2013 financial result.

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In the fourth part of his pre-election manifesto published in Kommersant daily on Monday, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin touts the internet as an electronic means for making democracy more responsive to the people.

The premier is running for president in next month’s election.

Expressing the importance of “indispensable” democratic principles, Putin stresses at the same time that democracy-building is not just a matter of “copying and pasting” Western values into Russia.

“Genuine democracy cannot be produced overnight,” Putin states in the article. “You cannot just copy it by reproducing somebody else’s model; society has to be ready for democratic mechanisms.”

The Prime Minister recalls what transpired in the turbulent 1990s, when “democracy” was hastily introduced following the collapse of the Soviet Union.“What we got in the 1990s with the supposed coming of democracy was not a modern state,” writes Putin.

“What we got was turf wars between various clans and…semi-feudal fiefdoms.” By comparison, Russia’s political landscape today – with its more politically informed electorate – faces new challenges that demand new solutions.

“Today, the quality of the state does not match civil society’s readiness to participate in it,” Putin admits, in a nod to the opposition. “Our civil society has become much more mature, active and responsible – they should have the capacity to match increased public activism.”

­Spin doctors and image makers need not apply

In an apparent swipe at Western-style democracy, where, he suggests, substance has taken a back seat to sensationalism, Putin warns of the threat of democracy becoming just another form of cheap entertainment.

“We do not need the circus of various candidates competing with each other to give more and more unrealistic promises,” he says. “We don’t need a situation where all that is left of democracy is the facade, where democracy is understood as a one-time entertaining political show…where substance is forgotten for the sake of shocking statements and mutual accusations.”

Putin goes on to chastise the “spin doctors” and “image makers” who are attempting to “control politicians.”

What modern Russia needs, Putin says, is a “clear, quick and transparent mechanism for preparing, making and implementing both short-term and long-term decisions,” which will promote “constructive dialogue and mutual trust between society and the government.”

Putin advocates the active use of Internet technologies for building the foundation of responsible democratic institutions.

­Downloading Democracy

Russia, with its millions of regular internet users, has the means to overhaul its political system, right at its fingertips.

“Democracy should have mechanisms for direct and constant action… and efficient channels for dialogue, public oversight, communication and feedback,” Putin advises, offering examples as to how to use the available technology.

“It is important to create user-friendly, interactive interfaces for public authorities’ web portals, so that their plans and programs can be fully available, publicly discussed, and their implementation monitored,” he writes.

The top contender in next month’s presidential election says he will “ask web designers to assist the state” with implementing this proposal.

Putin then discusses how the internet can give voters direct participation in the democratic process, while also breaking down the mountain of red tape.

“I suggest introducing a rule for a mandatory review in Parliament of initiatives that collect one hundred thousand or more signatures on the internet,” Putin writes, citing a similar law in the UK. “Certainly the anonymous internet cannot serve this purpose, even though in a number of instances it helps reveal the mood of society… [Therefore] a procedure should be developed for the official registration of those who want to participate in this system”.

Putin believes that a widely available “internet democracy” would give citizens at the city and municipal levels “the opportunity to vote and introduce topical problems at local referendums or Internet polls.”

By way of example, Putin says residents of a given locale “should be given an opportunity to express their opinion on the performance of the head of the district police…after his first year on the job.”

The PM’s plans for promoting “internet democracy” are part of his Electronic Government project, scheduled to be completed by July.

“At present, our citizens have access to all information on political debates in Parliament, on world markets, and on the marriages and divorces of Hollywood celebrities,” Putin muses. “What they can’t do over the internet, however, is retrieve data on their utility bills, review their medical files, or find the name of their district police officer…

“Many state services are now available online… But most people need information that’s relevant for them: on their homes, nearby areas, neighboring parks, schools, and their municipalities.”

“The Electronic Government project should be aimed more precisely at the needs and requirements of the people,” Putin says, summing up his plans. “By means of information technology, state mechanisms should be made comprehensive and accessible to the public.”

­Corruption: the new cool

Addressing Russia’s perennial problem of corruption, Putin cited a conversation between Tsar Nicholas I and his chief of secret police Alexander von Benckendorff, when the former announced he wanted to stamp out graft, and got the following question in return, “Do you think there will be anyone left around you?”

The Prime Minister then quotes a recent poll on the aspirations of Russian children.

“In the turbulent 1990s teenagers dreamed of becoming oligarchs,” Putin said. “But now they want to be state officials; many view public service as a source of fast and easy cash.”

When discussing ways of dealing with individuals in high places fattening their wallets, Putin talks tough.

“The fight against corruption must become a national course, not a matter for political speculation… political exploitation,” he cautions. “We offer real, systemic solutions that will ensure a far more effective rehabilitation of state institutions and the use of new principles in our staff policy – eventually, our goal is to make reputational, financial and material losses so great, that corruption would no longer pay.”

“We will act consistently, reasonably and with determination. We will remove the fundamental causes for corruption and punish particular officials. We will boost motivation for those who want to serve Russia in good faith. We have always had plenty of such people, and they will be given a chance.”

“We have defeated oligarchy, and we will defeat corruption.”

In conclusion, Putin says that his solutions will help to make the power of the people – democracy – a genuine one.

“It’s these solutions that make public service function in the interests of people,” Putin writes. “And together, they ensure that Russia and its people enjoy sustainable and successful growth.”

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Long-term risks: Researchers found that smoking in men appears to be associated with more rapid cognitive decline

Those searching for another reason to stick to their resolution to give up cigarettes need look no further. A new study has warned that men who smoke are more likely to suffer dementia in later life.

Researchers found that smoking in men appears to be associated with a greater and more rapid cognitive decline.

Smoking is increasingly recognised as a risk factor for dementia in the elderly. And the number of dementia cases worldwide – estimated at 36 million in 2010 – is rising and is projected to double every 20 years.

Doctor Severine Sabia, of University College London, and her colleagues used the Whitehall II cohort study, which is based on employees of the Civil Service.

They examined the association between smoking history and cognitive decline in the transition from midlife to old age.

Data was obtained from 5,099 men and 2,137 women in the Whitehall II study, with an average age of 56 at the first cognitive assessment.

In the study, researchers analysed data using six assessments of smoking status over 25 years and three cognitive assessments over 10 years. They made four key findings.

The results suggest smoking in men is associated with more rapid cognitive decline, and men who continued to smoke over the follow-up experienced greater decline in all cognitive tests.

In addition, men who quit smoking in the 10 years preceding the first cognitive measure were still at risk of greater cognitive decline, especially in executive function – an umbrella term for various complex cognitive processes involved in achieving a particular goal.

However, long-term ex-smokers did not show faster cognitive decline.

Dr Sabia said: ‘Finally, our results show that the association between smoking and cognition, particularly at older ages, is likely to be underestimated owing to higher risk of death and dropout among smokers.’

She added that the results show no association between smoking and cognitive decline in women, although the underlying reasons remain unclear.

One explanation for the difference they observed between men and women might be the greater quantity of tobacco smoked by men.

The findings were published online in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry.

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It took researches 30 years of drilling through a four-kilometer-thick ice to reach the renowned subglacial lake. Most importantly, million years-old secrets will be unveiled without causing harm to the lake’s ecosystem.

­“Yesterday [on Sunday] our scientists at the Vostok polar station in the Antarctic completed drilling at depths of 3,768 meters and reached surface of the subglacial lake,” RIA Novosti quoted unnamed Russian scientist.

Lake Vostok is a unique aquatic ecosystem hidden under some four kilometers of ice. Its water has been isolated from the atmosphere – and therefore from the outer biosphere – for millions of years. Scientists believe that surveys of the lake can provide invaluable details on past and future climate changes.

It is not yet known whether the lake’s waters are inhabited – certain bacteria and, perhaps, more complex creatures, could potentially live – but scientists have everything now to find this out. The importance of such potential discovery is difficult to overestimate.

Drilling works around Vostok Station in the Antarctic began in the 1970s, at a time when scientists still had no idea that a lake lay under the four-kilometer-thick ice shield. It was only in 1996 that Russian specialists, supported by their British counterparts, discovered what later proved to be one of the world’s largest freshwater reservoirs.

However, in 1998 drilling was halted only 130 meters from the lake’s surface when the international community voiced concerns that its ancient waters risked being polluted if special precautions and technologies were not employed.

The relevant technology was developed in 2003 in St. Petersburg, and the international working group conceded that it was now safe to continue drilling.

Work resumed in 2005.

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Gendarme forces move toward protesters in Piata Universitatii square, Bucharest January 19, 2012.

Romania’s Prime Minster Emil Boc has resigned following weeks of public protest against IMF-backed austerity measures amid the debt crisis sweeping the European Union.

Announcing his resignation on Television on Monday, Boc said that he wanted to “defuse political and social tension” and to protect the stability of the country.

“We made this decision in order to alleviate the social and political situation in the country, but to not lose what Romanians have won with so much suffering, the country’s economic stability,” Boc said.

The resignation comes after three weeks of public demonstrations demanding the resignation of President Traian Basescu and the Boc government for imposing harsh austerity measures including a 25 percent cut in public sector wages, 24 percent increase in sales tax and a freeze on pensions.

Romania needed to implement the measures to qualify for the next installment of a 20bn euro bailout loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Boc’s resignation makes Romania the sixth European country to see a prime minister fall to the debt crisis.

Basescu has nominated former Justice Minister Catalin Predoiu as interim Prime Minister on Monday.

The European debt crisis has forced EU governments to adopt harsh austerity measures and tough economic reforms, triggering incidents of social unrest and massive protests in many European countries.

There are fears that more delays in resolving the eurozone debt crisis, which began in Greece in late 2009 and infected Italy, Spain and France last year, could push not only Europe but also much of the rest of the developed world back into recession.

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People take pictures of waves on a frozen sea in Constanta, 230 kilometres east from Bucharest, Romania on February 1, 2012

At least 223 people have died during a seven-day cold spell in eastern and central Europe where temperatures are expected to plummet even further over the weekend.

Most of the victims are from the European Union’s poorest countries, including Ukraine with as many as 101 people killed. Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and Latvia have also suffered large casualties.

The villagers were found frozen to death on the side of the road or in their unheated homes as temperatures dropped to as much as -38.1 degrees in some parts of the continent.

While Eastern Europe struggles to cope with record low temperatures, the severe cold has claimed lives in other parts of the continent as well, including three people in Austria and Greece.

France recorded its first death after an 82-year-old man died of hypothermia.

Thousands of people are still trapped in snow-blocked mountain villages in countries like Serbia and Bosnia.

Italy is also witnessing snowfall not seen in over a decade, with many Venetian canals frozen and Roman tourist sites closed.

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The head of the Russian defense industry, Dmitry Rogozin, has praised Vladimir Putin’s ethnic policy and called upon Russian nationalists to work hand in hand with the country’s authorities.

The outgoing NATO envoy, who was appointed deputy prime minister in charge of the defense industry this year, published his own article in the popular daily Izvestia, which seeks to expand on afeature by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in the same newspaper outlining his election manifesto on national and ethnic issues.

In today’s paper, Rogozin praises Putin’s article as an “unprecedented event” that will have long-term benefits for Russian statehood.

The deputy premier writes that the current trend of focusing on various smaller ethnic groups within the Russian Federation is constructive, but the authorities should not neglect the needs and problems of ethnic Russians. He also writes that society must understand that focusing on the problems of ethnic majority is not always extremist or supremacist.

Rogozin gives several examples from history to support his thesis that the leaders of the Russian state have turned to Russian nationalist ideas in times of trouble.This helped them to survive at a time when “the push of ethno-nationalism of the provinces the Soviet power perished and the USSR collapsed like an ice floe along national administrative borders.”

He concludes that in times of crisis, the authorities must turn to ethnic Russians as the main foundation of Russia’s statehood. He adds that that moment has arrived.

The outgoing NATO envoy predicts that the new century, which started with wars and shocks, will be really cruel. He goes on to reveal that four years of work at NATO headquarters filled him with an anxiety about the fate of the world which he has been unable to get over. Dmitry Rogozin believes that we have arrived at a period when resources need to be redistributed.He also states that the United States is no longer ashamed of its “hegemonic plans”. He says that international migration is overwhelming “European Christian civilization” which, according to the Russian vice premier, is in the steepest decline in its history.

Rogozin warns his readers that a weak Russia will fall victim to a world that only respects “brute armed physical force.” He says Russians must concentrate all their efforts on strengthening national unity and on the revival of Russia’s economic and military might, reanimate fundamental scienceand “get smarter spiritually and stronger physically to oppose the internal and external threats to our country.”

The deputy prime minister then blasted the Russian political opposition for targeting Putin in their criticism, saying that “Putin is the only leader left in Europe who has not been run over by a steamroller of American hegemonism.” The official claims that Putin’s defeat will only give succour to American politicians who dream of getting hold of the mineral riches of Siberian mineral resources with the aid of traitors inside Russia.

Dmitry Rogozin says Putin’s article only opened the discussion on the national problem and pledged that from now on, the issue of Russian nationalism will not be hushed up.He said that the Prime Minister’s article was the fruit of cooperation between the government and some Russian nationalist organizations. Rogozin then called upon the “patriotic movement” to bravely integrate itself into official structures of the Russian Federation.

Also outlined were such issues as the defense of ethnic Russians’ rights in foreign countries and highlighting the value of Russian culture and history. He also objects against using the word nationalism when referring to certain Russian organizations, and suggests the word patriotism instead.

At the same time, Rogozin writes that the ongoing crisis requires the consolidation of all “indigenous peoples of Russia” and all active and caring citizens.

Dmitry Rogozin ends his piece by reminding the public about his initiative to create the Volunteer Movement in Support of the Popular Front – the movement in support of the Army, Navy and defense industry. He announced the founding congress of the organization will take place in Moscow on February 26.

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In mountain permafrost in Mamontovaya, Yakutia (Siberia), Russian researchers discovered a previously unknown species of bacteria. Mice injected in the body with a solution containing these organisms, were healthier and lived longer than their counterparts. Have the scientists discovered the secrets of immortality?

The strange bacillus found in mammoth Mountain in the Siberian Republic of Yakutia is three million years old and appears to have special mechanisms which allow it to stay alive in the most inhospitable temperatures and conditions. It successfully shares at temperatures of five degrees Celsius above zero.

The Bacillus, Bacillus F, was injected into mice and increased life expectancy, having a positive impact upon the quality of life indicators of older specimens. The scientists involved in the study suspect that the Bacillus has properties which allow it to survive and create specific immune systems, according to the team leader, lead researcher of the Institute of Chemical Biology and Fundamental Medicine Academy of Sciences of Russia, Nadezhda Mironovoa.

In addition, the researchers examined mice that were injected with this Bacillius F, using MRI and found the existence of two types of mediators that were significantly higher: this is glutamate and taurine, and have properties of immune regulation and prolonging life expectancy the cell.

In this case, the first mediator is “responsible” for psychic stimulation, and second – by energetic processes. Thus, the metabolism of the vaccinated mice was accelerated, and if calculated according to age, in animals injected with bacteria, is 20-30% higher.

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Russia has lost $4 billion due to the loss of arms contracts with Libya as a result of the UN’s arms shipments embargo. Anatoly Isaikin, the General Director of Russia’s defense export giant Rosoboronexport, said that Russia had concluded arms contracts worth $2 billion with the previous administration of Libya. “We could conclude more contracts for the same amount,” the official told Interfax.

According to Isaikin, Russia stopped executing all defense contracts with Libya following the UN embargo. Moscow plans to conduct negotiations on the subject with the new Libyan administration as soon as the embargo is lifted. The negotiations will solve the fate of the previously concluded contracts, as well as other contracts, that were prepared for signing. “We do not build illusions about it,” the official said.

In the meantime, foreign media say that Russia’s similar arms contracts with Syria may end up the same. This is exactly the reason why Moscow is unwilling to approve the resolution of the Arab League in New York, Germany’s Suddeutsche Zeitung wrote.

Russia has recently vetoed the draft resolution of the UN Security Council, which urged to end arms shipments to Damascus. Western journalists concluded that Russia had a number of highly lucrative deals with Bashar Assad’s regime. The export of defense products and the energy business are the key branches of the Russian industry, the German newspaper said. In addition, Russia’s army base in the Syrian port of Tartus is the country’s only base in the Mediterranean Sea.

The strategy of trusting the old ties did not justify itself in Libya. Some experts say that Moscow’s tough position on Syria may cause serious damage to the Russian Federation, the publication also said.

In September 2011, a number of Western publications calculated Russia’s possible losses in Libya. In addition to $4 billion, which Russia lost as a result of the above-mentioned sanctions, Gaddafi’s government ordered anti-vessel complexes in the amount of 600 million euros.

It was also said that Russia’s several arms contracts with Syria totaling $2.5 billion were not likely to happen.

As long as the sanctions against Syria have not been approved yet, Russia will continue shipping military hardware to Damascus. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated that the Chariot vessel had delivered several tons of ammunition to Syria.

The contracts were signed and they must be executed, the minister said. Lavrov added that Assad was not Russia’s friend. He also said that he was certain that Russian arms were not used against the demonstrators who want the Syrian president to step down.

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Seagulls fly over frozen sea as icicles covers a fence in the city of Constanta, 230 kilometers east of the Romanian capital Bucharest, on February 1, 2012.

Severe cold spell has killed at least 83 people in Europe as temperatures dropped to below minus 30C (minus 22F) in some eastern regions of the continent.

Ukrainian officials on Wednesday reported that the number of the deaths attributed to the cold weather had risen to 43, with 28 people having been found dead on the streets, eight dying in hospitals, and seven in their homes.

The country’s Emergency Situations Ministry said more than 720 Ukrainians had also been hospitalized with hypothermia and frostbite.

Extremely low temperatures also caused schools and colleges to be closed in the capital Kiev.

In Romania, where parts of the Black Sea froze near the coastline, the death toll from the cold weather has risen to 14. Officials with the country’s Health Ministry say hundreds more were hospitalized with hypothermia.

Four more people died from hypothermia in Bulgaria, where 16 towns recorded their lowest temperatures in 100 years.

In Poland, five more people died because of cold snap, bringing the overall number to 20 since Friday.

German media reported that ice and sub-zero temperatures had led to the deaths of two women.

In Turkey, three crewmembers from a ship that sank during a storm in the Black Sea were saved near the northwestern port of Eregli, but eight people are still missing.

Many schools also remained closed across Hungary.

Other cold-weather-related deaths have been reported across the region, including in Russia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia.

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French President Nicolas Sarkozy has ridiculed Britain once again by saying that “the United Kingdom has no industry any more”, media reports said.

The recent spat was made during a prime time national TV broadcast, in which Sarkozy was trying to defend his decision to introduce an increase in the Value Added Tax (VAT) in an attempt to boost France’s failing economy.

By enforcing the 1.6 percent VAT rise, ordinary people will have to pay for social charges too.

The French President, who has admitted for the first time that he may lose upcoming elections in the Spring, also admitted that he was borrowing the measure from Germany, arguing that it had ‘helped to boost German competitiveness’ and had not led to a rise in prices.

But, when a journalist noted that Britain had experienced a rise in prices after increasing its VAT contributions, Sarkozy spat out the words: ‘The United Kingdom has no industry any more’.

His comments came as earlier in 2009, Sarkozy actually attacked a VAT rise in Britain, saying it had ‘absolutely failed’ to stimulate the economy.

Earlier in December, tensions between Britain and France over the future of the EU intensified after Sarkozy accused Prime Minister David Cameron of behaving like “an obstinate kid” when he wielded the British veto at the European summit.

Adding salt to Sarkozy’s injuries, fresh polls suggest that he will be defeated if, as expected, he stands for re-election in the upcoming elections in the Spring this year.

Britain and France had been suffering from an age-old mix of distrust, affection, and antipathy, which was never going to be overcome so easily.

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European Union leaders are expected in Brussels for their first summit of the year in attempt to reconcile austerity with growth and to approve a permanent rescue fund for the crisis-hit eurozone.

The half day summit on Monday is meant to focus on ways to generate growth and create jobs, while having more austere fiscal measures for nations with unsustainable levels of debt.

The summit coincided with a general strike against the Belgian government’s austerity measures that has kicked off in Brussels, bringing the city to a standstill.

EU leaders are also expected to put the finishing touches on a German-driven pact for stricter budget discipline and endorse the statutes of a 500 billion-euro rescue fund to be set up this year.

Most eurozone member states -, except the UK – have agreed to sign up to the new budget treaty, or “fiscal compact”.

Meanwhile, Greece’s unresolved debt restructuring negotiations with its private creditors may sour efforts to send a more optimistic message that Europe is getting on top of its debt crisis.

Currently there are more than 23 million unemployed people in European Union and there are fears that harsh austerity measures may harm enterprise and training.

Europe is battling a debt crisis that so far has prompted two international credit rating agencies to cut the ratings of at least five of its members including Italy, Spain and the EU’s second largest economy, France, which lost its triple-A credit rating.

There are fears that more delays in resolving the eurozone debt crisis, which began in Greece in late 2009 and infected Italy, Spain and France last year, could push not only Europe but also much of the rest of the developed world back into recession.

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Sarkozy, Karzai Agree to Push 2013 ‘Handover,’ But for Very Different Reasons.

In a move that was probably inevitable after they froze training operations last week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced that French troops will begin transferring control of their sphere of influence, in Kapisa Province, to the Afghan government in March and speed their withdrawal of troops.

The goal now is for the French to have all their troops out of Afghanistan by the end of 2013. The plan was previously for France, along with the rest of NATO, to complete their “handover” by the end of 2014.

Sarkozy and Afghan President Hamid Karzai discussed the announcement and now say they are pushing for the entire NATO “handover” to be sped up to the end of 2013. Sarkozy is presenting this as a faster end to the war. Karzai, who has in the past confirmed negotiations to keep US troops in the nation through 2024, is likely just in the market for the “handover” part, and the influence on the ground that might confer. Karzai’s government has been mostly sidelined in the US-Taliban talks due to its comparative lack of influence, particularly across the nation’s south.

The sudden interest in an exit plan by the French government is the result of an incident last week, in which four French soldiers were killed and a dozen others wounded in an attack by an Afghan soldier. The Afghan soldier was reportedly motivated by anger at a video of US Marines urinating on the corpses of several slain Afghans.

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They still can’t sleep at night since the Costa Concordia put them through the ordeal of their lives. A Russian couple that made it ashore safe and sound believe every passenger could still be alive had the rescue operation been better organized.

­They are just two of the passengers from over 4,000 people onboard the massive cruise ship Costa Concordia. Denis Golovkin and Olga Gridneva still have trouble sleeping at night.

“I don’t understand how they couldn’t have rescued everyone considering the liner sank no further than half a kilometer from land, in warm weather,” says Olga.

Sixteen bodies have so far been recovered and 16 people are still missing after the 290-meter long cruise liner struck a rock near the Tuscan island of Giglio.

Olga and Denis got onboard only two and a half hours prior to the disaster at the port of Civitavecchia. For them it was just the beginning of their cruise, as the liner was picking up passengers along the way.

The couple had just had dinner – incidentally, to the tune of the Titanic theme song – and were back in their cabin when the ship hit the reef.

“Our glasses, laptops and cellphones flew off the table,” Olga recalls. “The boat went too close to the shoreline where it wasn’t supposed to be. And we certainly felt it, like a really strong crash or shaking…”

They grabbed their life vests and Denis suggested taking warm clothes, considering the temperature outside was 12 degrees Celsius.

“I thought that we might actually have to jump overboard,” Olga says, “nobody was supervising us, we spent an hour and a half on the deck, and the speakers were saying, “Don’t worry, everything is fine…” It was very scary. It was a large ship, the height of a multi-storey building. When a sensible individual starts thinking that they might have to jump overboard they assess their abilities and realize that they don’t feel like jumping from this height at all.”

There were hardly any crew members in sight helping people. This Thursday, Italy’s top-ranking Coast Guard official, Marco Brusco, said that the Concordia’s Captain Francesco Schettino lost “a precious hour,” which made evacuating the ship even more difficult. Had the order been given earlier, “the lifeboats could have been launched calmly, people could have been reassured,” Brusco said in Senate testimony.

Instead, the evacuation was chaotic. No one knew where to run, what to do and no instructions were given out so a lot of people couldn’t leave the ship for quite a while. Denis and Olga were lucky to get off in one of the first lifeboats. Olga says that passengers were totally misinformed about what was going on and that no one had a clear picture of the real state of affairs: “Nobody told us to go out on deck. We did that on our own, following our instincts and based on what we could see and understand.”

Hours later, safe but still tense, people recounted their stories to each other. Many said there wasn’t enough room in the boats, with the situation only worsened by the fact that it was difficult to get the boats down to the water from the upper decks, especially on the portside where it proved simply impossible. Denis, an experienced seafarer, says the crew wasn’t up to the task: “I saw a crew member climb into the boat. He could hardly start the engine. On top of it all, before mooring at the pier, we had been circling and circling for a long time. In other words, the boat was driven not by a specialist.”

There were also reports that rich Russians were buying seats in the lifeboats – but Olga dismissed them with conviction in her voice: “One should bear in mind that this cruise was mostly for economy-class passengers. There were no particularly rich Russians on this ship.”

Twice the size of the Titanic and three times the length of a football pitch, the cruise ship Costa Concordia would have been much worse off had the tragedy happened further away from the shore and in colder waters. So far, the tragedy on the Concordia has claimed 16 lives. However as divers continue to comb the submerged parts of the ship, neither Denis nor Olga can comprehend how there could have been any casualties at all: “In the heart of Europe. There must have been enough lifeboats for everyone had the rescue operation been at least somewhat organized, or had there been some instructions. If so, I believe we wouldn’t have lost anyone.”

Source

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The interdepartmental committee, which investigates the reasons of the breakdown of Russia’s Phobos Ground spacecraft, presented the basic version of the accident. Sources at the space industry told Interfax said that, most likely, the spacecraft did not enter the departure trajectory to Mars due to the influence of plasma formation in the magnetosphere of the Earth. Scientists doubt, though, that this theory explains what exactly happened on board Phobos Ground.

Versions of the external impact have been voiced before. Specialists particularly blamed a US radar. American officials strongly rejected the accusations and refused to take part in the investigation of the space accident.

The results of the work of the intergovernmental committee were delivered to Russia’s Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos. The official announcement of the reasons of the accident is to be made on Sunday, Jan. 29.

The conclusion about the influence of the plasma formation was made as the scientists analyzed the launch date of the spacecraft – November 9 – and the powerful X-class solar flare, which took place on November 4. The solar activity was abnormal during that period. The flare was accompanied with the strong emission of the coronal mass (plasma) that weighed several billions of tons. The flare triggered a number of magnetic storms, which lasted for weeks.

The scientists found seven dangerous zones on the Sun as they were studying the phenomenon. The specialists concluded that it was the largest group of formations on the surface of the Sun since 2005. The square of the largest spot on the star was 17 times larger than the square of the Earth.

The experts thus concluded that the Russian spacecraft incidentally found itself in the cloud of plasma, and the electronic equipment of the vehicle went out of order.

Some Russian scientists said, though, that the official conclusion of the committee was not true to fact.

“This is impossible. Plasma formations of this type may appear at certain altitudes. As a rule, they are much weaker than would be required for exerting any influence on the spacecraft,” Marat Deminov, a chief scientist with the Institute of Earth Magnetism, Ionosphere and Radiowaves Propagation (IZMIRAN), told RIA Novosti news agency.

According to the professor, plasma formations may appear because of rocket emissions, but they are very weak. In addition, the USA’s HAARP in Alaska can warm up plasma in the ionosphere. However, the power of the ionosphere will not be enough to affect the electronic equipment inside the satellite anyway, the scientist added.

Natural plasma formations are incapable of affecting spacecraft, the scientist believes. “When they talk about the plasma formations, which are not connected with human activities, this is purely fiction. There are no facts to prove that,” Deminov stated.

In addition, scientists say that the situation with the solar activity could not affect the Phobos Ground either. Sergei Gaidash, the chairman of the department of space weather forecasts with IZMIRAN, told RIA Novosti that space weather for November 9 was normal.

“All was normal. There was nothing that could affect Phobos. We sent that document to the committee,” Gaidash said.

Source

Roscosmos

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