Free Republic

Discovered on May 4 on a beach in Robertsport, in the country’s far north-west, the 63-metre tanker, Tamaya 1, was last seen on April 22 after leaving its registered port in Panama. With the vessel’s last known location far outside pirate waters, authorities are struggling to determine why the crew would have abandoned the ship. The Liberian maritime authority could only speculate as to why the ship was empty, however evidence of a fire in the captain's quarters supported the theory of foul play. ... The Liberian government has been criticised for taking more than two days to realise the...

An Iranian military official said Iran conducted its third ballistic missile test-firing since the country’s landmark nuclear deal went into effect in January, but a few hours later Iran’s defense minister countered the report. The semiofficial Tasnim News Agency reported earlier Monday that the country fired a missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles) two weeks ago, citing Brig. Gen. Ali Abdollahi. The missile was precision-guided and could accurately strike a target with a 26-foot margin of error, he said. But Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Hossein Dehghan said Iran hadn’t test-fired a missile of the range cited by...

Gov. Jerry Brown is ordering California to permanently follow some conservation measures taken during the state's drought. Brown's order on Monday came as water officials consider whether to ease a 20 percent conservation order for cities and towns. The order does not set a mandatory percentage for saving water. The latest call for changes came after El Nino storms left a healthy snowpack and brimming water reservoirs in Northern California. Brown's executive order requires cities and towns to continue monthly reporting of water use. In addition, bans on overwatering lawns will become lasting. Brown's executive order also requires better drought...

Discovered in June 2005, Pluto’s outermost moon Hydra is thought to have formed four billion years ago during a massive impact event that created Pluto and Charon. Despite its age, this 31-mile-wide moon appeared remarkably clean and bright in New Horizons images during the spacecraft’s historic close pass through the Pluto system in July 2015. Scientists’ initial speculation was proved right when data from the spacecraft was analyzed and revealed that Hydra, like its name [??], is covered in nearly pure water ice. Measured with the Linear Etalon Imaging Spectral Array (LEISA) on New Horizons’ Ralph instrument, the spectral signature...

Austria’s chancellor resigned Monday, citing insufficient political support within his party to deal with challenges, including efforts to confront the ongoing migrant crisis. The surprise move by Werner Faymann followed a back-of-the-pack showing last month by his Social Democratic Party in the first round of the presidential election, which was led by the right-wing Freedom Party that favors a harder line against migrants and refugees streaming into Europe. Faymann, chancellor since 2008, was the European Union’s second-longest-serving national leader after German Chancellor Angela Merkel and among the highest-profile political casualties amid uneasiness over the waves of migrants and others seeking...

22-year-old UC Santa Barbara student was arrested Saturday after, authorities say, he punched a pastor in the face more than 30 times in what officials believe was a random attack. The incident began when Father Jon-Stephen Hedges heard a knock at his front door in the 6800 block of Fortuna Road at about 2:15 a.m. Saturday, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Office said in a statement. A man, later identified as Paul Gusman, was calling for help and throwing his body against the door, officials said. Fearing that someone was in trouble, Hedges opened his door. Gusman, who was naked...

Metzler told the newspaper that the officer, a nine-year veteran of his department, was shot after a traffic stop initiated by a different police officer. The suspect then got into a fight with the second officer, who reportedly attempted to use a stun gun on the driver. ... The Illinois State Police said later Sunday that Pendleton, who was also believed to be wounded, has additionally been charged with attempted murder of a police officer. Authorities said Pendleton fled the area in a stolen pickup truck and is armed with an AK-47 assault rifle. ...a trooper responding to a call...

Nvidia's Ansel is designed to give you all the tools you need to create artistic in-game screenshots of your favorite scenes. Take control of the camera, change the lighting, add a vignette, or snap a 360-degree image. Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang revealed a surprising new addition to the company’s portfolio of graphics technologies. The company founder talked about a new form of artwork that has emerged from the gaming community. Several digital artists have made a name for themselves by capturing breathtaking images of video game scenes. Huang said that some of those artists are able to capture such imagery...

During a Saturday news conference, Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz said 76-year-old Vibeke Rasmussen, a Quincy College professor, died after she was stabbed more than 35 times in her apartment Thursday night. Plymouth police were called to Tideview Path around 1 p.m. to check on Rasmussen. When no one answered, officers gained access to her apartment where they found her body. Investigators say neighbors heard a woman screaming in the area of her apartment. Police identified 24-year-old Tyler Hagmaier as the suspect in Rasmussen’s death. Hagmaier lived in the apartment across from Rasmussen. The motive is a mystery, but...

"I just shot my brother on accident," a man is heard yelling on a 911 call released by police in St. Cloud, Florida. "We were in a fight and I grabbed a gun and I shot him....I'm so sorry." A woman's voice is also heard on the 911 call telling the operator, "I'm going to kill my son." "I hope you go to jail," the voice said.

Valravn gives riders a sweeping view of Lake Erie before dropping them over 200 feet on a 90-degree free fall that hits a top speed of 75 mph. It also turns riders upside down three times. The roller coaster has already broken records. It's now recognized as the tallest, fastest and longest dive coaster. Cedar Point's 18th roller coaster. Only Six Flags Magic Mountain, in Santa Clarita, California, has more roller coasters with 19.

In Illinois, Exelon again warned that the long-challenged Clinton and Quad Cities plants would shut down unless the Illinois legislature passed a bill that would provide economic support for the two plants ... Meanwhile in Florida, Florida Power & Light’s (FPL’s) bid to build two more units at its Turkey Point Nuclear Plant south of Miami continues to run into opposition. On April 20, a state court reversed approval for a new transmission line that would carry power from the two reactors. Two days later, the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) approved a plan to deal with serious saline...

Known as 2014 MU69, the object is thought to be unchanged since the birth of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago.... ... Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel submitted plans last month to NASA to fly past the relatively tiny chunk of icy matter on New Year's Day 2019. If NASA approves it, the extended New Horizon mission could give a close-up view of what has so far only appeared to scientists as a faint dot of light. ... The object is in a 300-year orbit around the sun in the Kuiper Belt, a region of space beyond...

The technology is built into a Flexible Organic Light Emitting Diode (FOLED) touchscreen that can be bent by the user. In addition to the oft stated upsides of a bendy smartphone, a built-in bend sensor (similar to what the lab deployed in its recent ReFlex prototype) leverages the motion as another means with which to interact with the handset. The pair of disembodied hands in the demo video use the motion to move objects along the phone’s Z-axis. In the case of Angry Birds, that means stretching back the bird-catapulting slingshot. The tension on the phone correlates with that of...

The red planet will soon be closer to Earth that it has been in 11 years: On May 30, Mars will be about 46.8 million miles (75.3 million kilometers) from Earth. Yes, that’s still a long way off, but sometimes Mars is 249 million miles (400 million kilometers) from Earth. What does this close approach mean for sky watchers? It means Mars will appear bigger and brighter from May 18 until June 3, according to NASA. But you don’t have to wait. Mars already is putting on a spectacular show in the early morning sky. And you don’t need a...

The daughter of the late Slipknot bassist Paul Gray can sue a doctor for the loss of her father's companionship, even though she was still a fetus when he died, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled Friday. The court acknowledged it's the first time it's had to decide such a case centered on the rights of a child during the time it is a fetus, but it cited similar conclusions in cases from Massachusetts and Wisconsin. The justices warned that it would be a mistake for anyone to try to apply the rationale behind the ruling to the abortion debate. The...

Future Interfaces Group, a research lab within Carnegie Mellon University, released a look at a novel solution to this problem: making the skin on your arm and hand act like a touchscreen for your smartwatch. The system uses a signal-emitting ring worn on the finger to communicate with a sensing band attached to the watch. When the finger wearing the ring touches the skin, a high-frequency electrical signal spreads across your arm. It uses the distance between the ring and four pairs of electrodes in the watchband to triangulate the position of your finger in 2D space. "The great thing...

The U.S. economy added the fewest number of jobs in seven months in April and Americans dropped out of the labor force in droves, signs of weakness that left economists anticipating only one interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve this year. Nonfarm payrolls increased by 160,000 jobs last month as construction employment barely rose and the retail sector shed jobs for the first time since December 2014, the Labor Department said on Friday. April's job gains were the smallest since September and below the first-quarter average job growth of 200,000. Adding to the report's soft tone, employers added 19,000...

Beginning March 14, 2016, a number of small magnitude earthquakes have occurred beneath Mount St. Helens, at a depth between 2 and 7 km (1.2 to 4 miles). Over the last 8 weeks, there have been over 130 earthquakes formally located by the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network and many more earthquakes too small to be located. The earthquakes have low magnitudes of 0.5 or less; the largest a magnitude 1.3. Earthquake rates have been steadily increasing since March, reaching nearly 40 located earthquakes per week. These earthquakes are too small to be felt at the surface. The earthquakes are volcano-tectonic...

banner poppy crop in Helmand this year will add significant revenue to the Taliban's coffers, a senior U.S. military spokesman based in Afghanistan told reporters at the Pentagon Thursday, as hundreds of U.S. troops remain in the volatile southern Afghan province where the Taliban has made gains since the fall. “There is a concern that with this very good poppy crop that they had this year, it is going to result in the Taliban being able to turn that into money for their efforts,” said Brig. Gen. Charles Cleveland, a spokesman for U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. Cleveland added...