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An Anonymous Coward writes:

Shortly after 8 am this morning certainly 1 but possibly 2 large explosions were heard in the main departure hall of a Brussels Airport (Belgium), one of Europe's busiest airports. Fire services confirm casualties; first news is that part of the roof of the departure hall has collapsed. The explosion(s) were situated at the American Airlines check-in booth, according to first reports by Belgian news (without mentioning of source(s)).

Last week saw the arrest by Belgian police of Europe's main wanted fugitive, IS operative Salah Abdeslam.

UPDATE: More attacks in Brussels Subway system, CNBC has some info here.

Original Submission

GungnirSniper writes:

Intel's longtime President and CEO Andy Grove has died. He was 79, and was Intel's first hire. Born in pre-war Hungary, he survived both the Nazi occupation and Communist rule to immigrate to America at the age of 20.

Present at Intel's 1968 founding with Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, Andy Grove became Intel's President in 1979 and CEO in 1987. He served as Chairman of the Board from 1997 to 2005. Both during his time at Intel and in retirement, Grove was one of the most influential figures in technology and business, writing best-selling books and widely cited articles, and speaking out on an array of prominent public issues.

"We are deeply saddened by the passing of former Intel Chairman and CEO Andy Grove," said Intel CEO Brian Krzanich. "Andy made the impossible happen, time and again, and inspired generations of technologists, entrepreneurs, and business leaders."

Grove played a critical role in the decision to move Intel's focus from memory chips to microprocessors and led the firm's transformation into a widely recognized consumer brand. Under his leadership Intel produced the chips, including the 386 and Pentium, which helped usher in the PC era. The company also increased annual revenues from $1.9 billion to more than $26 billion.

Wikipedia and Wikiquote have more background:

Technology will always win. You can delay technology by legal interference, but technology will flow around legal barriers.

Original Submission

mendax writes:

While not exactly related to tech, many here will be interested in learning about the crash of a Flydubai Boeing 737-800 (FZ981) at the Rostov-on-Don airport. Russian news media reports no survivors of the 55 passengers and 7 crew. Read about it here or here for starters. What's interesting about this crash is that it was caught on a surveillance camera, as the Reuters article linked to above and this link show. As always with these kinds of disasters, it's too soon to tell the cause although it may be due to a stall.

takyon: RT: "Pilot error, bad weather & technical failure suspected in FlyDubai crash that killed 62."

Air-traffic control and local emergency services confirmed that the Boeing 737-800 jet crashed near the runway during a second approach in conditions of poor visibility. "According to preliminary data, the Boeing 738 crashed in poor visibility conditions, some 50-100 meters left of the runway," the source said.

Original Submission

martyb writes:

Nancy Reagan, wife of former US President Ronald Reagan, passed away today at the age of 94 of congestive heart failure.

The New York Times reports:

Nancy Reagan, the influential and stylish wife of the 40th president of the United States who unabashedly put Ronald Reagan at the center of her life but who became a political figure in her own right, died on Sunday at her home in Los Angeles. She was 94.

[...] "Without Nancy, there would have been no Governor Reagan, no President Reagan," said Michael K. Deaver, the longtime aide and close friend of the Reagans who died in 2007.

President Obama said on Sunday that Mrs. Reagan "had redefined the role" of first lady, adding, "Later, in her long goodbye with President Reagan, she became a voice on behalf of millions of families going through the depleting, aching reality of Alzheimer's, and took on a new role, as advocate, on behalf of treatments that hold the potential and the promise to improve and save lives."

Australian Broadcasting Corporation News reports:

Nancy Reagan, devoted wife and trusted confidante to late president Ronald Reagan who after his death became the most ardent guardian of his political legacy, has died aged 94.

The former first lady died at her home in Los Angeles from congestive heart failure, her spokeswoman Joanne Drake said.

She will be buried next to her husband at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, Ms Drake said.

"She is once again with the man she loved," her stepson Michael Reagan wrote on Twitter.

One tech-related aspect of Ronald Reagan's presidency was his championing of the Strategic Defense Initiative aka "Star Wars":

The Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) was a proposed missile defense system intended to protect the United States from attack by ballistic strategic nuclear weapons (Intercontinental ballistic missiles and Submarine-launched ballistic missiles).

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Antonin Scalia, a sitting U.S. Supreme Court Justice, has died:

US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia - one of most conservative members of the high court - has died. Justice Scalia's death could shift the balance of power on the US high court, allowing President Barack Obama to add a fifth liberal justice to the court. The court's conservative majority has recently stalled major efforts by the Obama administration on climate change and immigration.

Justice Scalia, 79, was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1986. He died in his sleep early on Saturday while in West Texas for [a] hunting trip, the US Marshall service said. Justice Scalia was one of the most prominent proponents of "originalism" - a conservative legal philosophy that believes the US Constitution has a fixed meaning and does not change with the times.

Justice Scalia's death is, unsurprisingly, now being widely reported.

From the San Antonio Express News:

According to a report, Scalia arrived at the ranch on Friday and attended a private party with about 40 people. When he did not appear for breakfast, a person associated with the ranch went to his room and found a body.

[...] The U.S. Marshal Service, the Presidio County sheriff and the FBI were involved in the investigation. Officials with the law enforcement agencies declined to comment.

A federal official who asked not to be named said there was no evidence of foul play and it appeared that Scalia died of natural causes.

A gray Cadillac hearse pulled into the ranch last Saturday afternoon. The hearse came from Alpine Memorial Funeral Home.

Most major news outlets are covering this story, including CNN [video autoplays], The Washington Post, The New York Times, and NBC.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

As expected, gravitational waves, which were predicted by Albert Einstein a century ago, have been detected by the LIGO Collaboration:

Scientists are claiming a stunning discovery in their quest to fully understand gravity. They have observed the warping of space-time generated by the collision of two black holes more than a billion light-years from Earth. The international team says the first detection of these gravitational waves will usher in a new era for astronomy.

It is the culmination of decades of searching and could ultimately offer a window on the Big Bang. The research, by the LIGO Collaboration, has been accepted for publication in the journal Physical Review Letters. The collaboration operates a number of labs around the world that fire lasers through long tunnels, trying to sense ripples in the fabric of space-time. Expected signals are extremely subtle, and disturb the machines, known as interferometers, by just fractions of the width of an atom. But the black hole merger was picked up by two widely separated LIGO facilities in the US.

The historic paper in question: Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger (open, DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.061102)

Archived video of the press conference webcast will be available here.

NASA provided an infographic for their Astronomy Picture of the Day feature with details about the discovery.

Also at NPR, NYT, Scientific American, and Ars Technica Live, The New Yorker. BBC's Jonathan Amos offers an analysis of the discovery.

Original Submission

-- OriginalOwner_ writes:

Previously: Militia Occupies Federal Building in Oregon After Rancher Arson Convictions

Russia Today reports:

Ammon Bundy, the leader of the armed group occupying a federal wildlife refuge near Burns, Oregon, and four others have been arrested by law enforcement amid gunfire, according to the FBI.

At 4:25 pm on [January 26], the FBI and Oregon State Police "began an enforcement action to bring into custody a number of individuals associated with the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. During that arrest, there were shots fired", the Bureau said in a statement.

The FBI said one person who was "a subject of a federal probable cause arrest is deceased". He said they are not releasing any information on the person "pending identification by the medical examiner's office".

One person suffered non-life threatening injuries and was taken to a local hospital for treatment. He was arrested and is in custody.

The arrested individuals include:
- Ammon Edward Bundy, age 40, of Emmett, Idaho.
- Ryan C. Bundy, age 43, of Bunkerville, Nevada.
- Brian Cavalier, age 44, of Bunkerville, Nevada.
- Shawna Cox, age 59, of Kanab, Utah.
- Ryan Waylen Payne, age 32, of Anaconda, Montana.

CNN, NYT, Washington Post, BBC, OregonLive.

Original Submission

cmn32480 writes:

From the BBC:

Iran holds two US Navy boats and crew, Pentagon says, adding it has assurances Tehran will return them "promptly"

As this was released at about 4:15pm Eastern time (9:25pm UTC) there are no futher details at this time.

We will update this summary when more information is available.

UPDATE - 9:35pm UTC:

The incident happened near Farsi Island after one of the ships encountered mechanical problems. Fox News reported that the sailors had drifted into Iranian waters, but that has not been independently confirmed. Iran has assured the US that the sailors and two small vessels would be returned promptly, the Associated Press reported.

Original Submission

GungnirSniper writes:

Legendary rock showman David Bowie has passed away from cancer at the age of 69.

This comes after the recent passings of Scott Weiland and Lemmy Kilmister. Keith Richards is still standing.

See also BBC coverage.

Original Submission

North Korea Detonates First Hydrogen Bomb

HughPickens.com writes:

The NYT reports that North Korea has announced it has detonated its first hydrogen bomb dramatically escalating the nuclear challenge from one of the world's most isolated and dangerous states. "This is the self-defensive measure we have to take to defend our right to live in the face of the nuclear threats and blackmail by the United States and to guarantee the security of the Korean Peninsula," said a female North Korean announcer on the state-run network. "With this hydrogen bomb test, we have joined the major nuclear powers." The North's announcement came about an hour after detection devices around the world had picked up a 5.1 seismic event that South Korea said was 30 miles from the Punggye-ri site where the North has conducted nuclear tests in the past.

"North Korea's fourth test — in the context of repeated statements by U.S., Chinese, and South Korean leaders — throws down the gauntlet to the international community to go beyond paper resolutions and find a way to impose real costs on North Korea for pursuing this course of action," says Scott Snyder, a Korea expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. According to the Times, the test is bound to figure in the American presidential campaign, where several candidates have already cited the North's nuclear experimentation as evidence of American weakness — though they have not prescribed alternative strategies for choking off the program. The United States did not develop its first thermonuclear weapons — commonly known as hydrogen bombs — until 1952, seven years after the first and only use of nuclear weapons in wartime.

mendax writes:

The New York Times is reporting a claim made by the North Korean government in which is says that it has detonated a hydrogen bomb:

a claim that, if true, would dramatically escalate the nuclear challenge from one of the world's most isolated and dangerous states.

In a brief announcement, about an hour after seismic detectors around the world picked up a 5.1 magnitude seismic event along the country's northeast cost, officials said that the test was a "complete success." But it is difficult to tell whether that boast is true, and it may be weeks or longer before detectors sent aloft by the United States and other powers can determine what kind of test was conducted.

The apparent North Korean test took place at or near the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, where the three previous tests have been conducted over the past nine years. But if the North Korean claim is true, this one was of a of a different nature.

Like most of the rest of the world who know something about the physics of these devices, I'm very skeptical of this claim, given that, even on a slow news day, the North Korean government has about as much credibility as the boy who cried wolf.