Bolivia shuts down Colombia crash airline

Yahoo – AFP, Rodrigo Almonacid, Dec 1, 2016

Rescue teams recover of the bodies from the LAMIA airlines charter flight that
crashed in the mountains of Cerro Gordo, municipality of La Union, Colombia, on
November 29, 2016 carrying members of the Brazilian football team Chapecoense
Real (AFP Photo/Raul Arboleda)

Medellín (Colombia) (AFP) - The Bolivian charter airline behind a plane crash that killed 71 people in Colombia was shut down Thursday, as shock grew over a harrowing recording of the pilot's final minutes without fuel.

Bolivia said it had suspended charter company LAMIA's permit and ordered an investigation into its operations.

It also sacked the executive staff of both the civil aviation authority and the airports administrator for the duration of the probe.

The government did not explain the decision.

But it came as investigators examine pilot error and air traffic control problems as possible factors in the Monday night crash, which killed most of Brazilian football club Chapecoense Real and 20 journalists traveling with them to a championship match.

LAMIA, which specializes in flying Latin American football teams, has ferried local clubs and national sides around the region, with players including superstar Lionel Messi.

Investigators are trying to piece together the last moments of the doomed flight, which slammed into the mountains outside Medellin with 77 people on board, six of whom miraculously survived.

Details of the jet's terrifying end emerged in an audio recording aired by Colombian media in which the pilot radioed frantically that he was out of fuel.

In the recording, pilot Miguel Quiroga contacts the control tower seeking priority to land.

The operator tells him he will have to wait seven minutes for another plane to land first.

"We have a fuel emergency, ma'am, that's why I am asking you for it at once, full stop," the pilot replied.

The timeline was not immediately clear, but shortly after the pilot radioed: "Ma'am, Lima-Mike-India 2933 is in total failure, total electrical failure, without fuel."

The operator responded: "Runway clear and expect rain on the runway Lima-Mike-India 2933. Firefighters alerted."

The pilot is heard asking: "Vectors, ma'am, vectors to the runway." Vectors is the term for the navigation service provided to planes by air traffic control.

The operator is heard giving him directions, and asking his altitude.

"Nine thousand feet, ma'am. Vectors! Vectors!"

Those were Quiroga's last words to the control tower.

Fans of Brazil's Chapecoense football club take part in a tribute to their players

killed in a plane crash (AFP Photo/DOUGLAS MAGNO)

Six-month wait

Colombia's civil aeronautics agency said the time sequence of the tape was "inexact," and had no comment on the content of the recording.

But the agency's air safety chief, Freddy Bonilla, confirmed at a news conference that the plane was out of fuel at the moment of impact.

Bonilla said international rules require aircraft to maintain fuel in reserve when flying between airports, and that the LAMIA plane had failed to do so.

The British Aerospace 146 jet was scheduled to make a refueling stop in Bogota, but skipped the Colombian capital and headed straight for Medellin, reported Bolivian newspaper Pagina Siete, citing a representative of the airline.

Civil aviation director Alfredo Bocanegra said it would take investigators at least six months to analyze the black box recorders recovered from the plane and reach a conclusion on the cause of the crash.

Bodies identified

Investigators finished identifying the victims' bodies Thursday.

A representative for the funeral homes preparing them said they would be sent home to Brazil, Bolivia, Venezuela and Paraguay late Thursday or early Friday.

Cinderella-story club Chapecoense had been traveling to what would have been the biggest match in its history, the finals of South America's second-largest club tournament, the Copa Sudamericana.

Tearful tributes to the club were held Wednesday evening, at the time the match was to have been played, in Medellin and the team's hometown, Chapeco in southern Brazil.

Both stadiums were packed to capacity.

Mourners held candles in the air in Chapeco as the handful of remaining players from the team took to the pitch in tears.

A minute's silence for Chapecoense will be held before every Champions League and Europa League game next week, UEFA said Thursday.

People participate in a tribute to the players of Brazilian team Chapecoense

killed in a plane crash in the Colombian mountains (AFP Photo/LUIS ACOSTA)

Caring for survivors

Six people survived the crash.

Bolivian crew members Ximena Suarez and Erwin Tumiri are expected to be released from hospital Thursday, an official said.

Chapecoense defender Alan Ruschel was in critical but stable condition in intensive care after having back surgery.

Journalist Rafael Henzel and player Helio Neto were listed as stable.

Goalkeeper Jakson Follmann was meanwhile set to undergo surgery again, after having his right leg amputated.

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Miracle motorbike that goes 500km… on a liter of water! (VIDEO)

RT.com, 25 Jul, 2015

A Brazilian man, Ricardo Azevedo from Sao Paulo, has shown off his wonder bike to the world. The magic machine can travel up to 500 kilometers on a liter of water.

The so-called “T Power H20” vehicle is powered by water and an external car battery to produce electricity and split the hydrogen from the water molecules.

As a result, combustion is created giving the motorbike the impetus to move.

READ MORE: World has 10 years to combat climate change, prevent health catastrophe – scientists  

In the video, Azevedo first drinks from the bottle, proving that it’s indeed water and not some kind of other fuel. Then he fills the canister and rides off. 

Azevedo also demonstrates how the bike works. The inventor shows that even polluted waters from the Tiete River can be used to fuel the vehicle.

READ MORE: Bioengineers invent engine powered by water vapor, artificial muscles 

The Brazilian is promoting his creation as an environment-friendly machine. 

“The advantage of this motorcycle, which works with the hydrogen that comes from the water, is that the result that comes out of the exhaust is water vapor. This is different from gasoline, which [produces] carbon monoxide," he told RT.

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Easy Taxi Makes Local Inroads

Jakarta Globe, Vanesha Manuturi & Dion Bisara, Sep 15, 2014

Easy Taxi allows users to hail the closest taxi via smartphone. 
(JG Photo/Yudhi Sukma Wijaya)

Jakarta. Six months after launching operations in Indonesia, Easy Taxi, a cab-booking mobile application, has recruited drivers from Blue Bird and Express, the country’s two largest taxi operators, to use their app in a bit to boost the service’s local capacity.

Brazil-based Easy Taxi launched its service in Jakarta in April. The company says it helps its users find the closest taxi to their location. The app removes the inconvenience of having to stand on the side of the road looking for taxis, as the driver and the user can locate each other at an agreed meeting point through the app.

The Easy Taxi app — available in 162 cities worldwide, including Singapore and Kuala Lumpur — currently has 15 million downloads globally. The company is establishing its operational inroads by partnering with both companies and drivers.

Easy Taxi usually approaches taxi operators first to feel out the opportunity for partnerships. If such an arrangement can’t be reached, Easy Taxi works directly with drivers, managing director Usman Lodhi told the Jakarta Globe on Monday.

“We’re not trying to take something away. We’re just trying to offer an additional channel for drivers to increase their livelihood,” Lodhi said.

Easy Taxi claims taxi drivers who work with the application see up to 50 percent more rides, compared with those who use conventional ways of finding customers.

Although the company typically charges a small fee — either to the drivers or the passengers, depending on the market — Easy Taxi’s service is currently still free in Indonesia as the company attempts to build its base, Lodhi said.

Cab companies’ reactions to Easy Taxi are mixed, pointing out the app’s redundancy with their own booking apps.

“We don’t have a partnership with Easy Taxi,” Teguh Wijayanto, head of public relations at Blue Bird Group, told the Jakarta Globe last week.

Teguh said Blue Bird drivers are not supposed to use any third-party booking apps. “We have our own application and we have our own fleet. Logically, why would [our drivers] add more fuss into their operations and use another application when there’s already one?”

But Express Transindo Utama president director Daniel Podiman, said on Monday that Easy Taxi was just another way for customers for reach the taxi operator.

“Express drivers are free to use all the apps that are available. If it’s easier for customers to reach us, why not?” Daniel said.

Easy Taxi may face an uphill battle convincing Jakartans of the service’s value proposition, however, as the city’s apparent abundance of taxis, licensed and not, means residents seldom face Singapore’s substantial cab queues or Kuala Lumpur’s notoriously uncooperative drivers. The experience of other cities’ introduction to Uber, however, suggests Easy Taxi’s Indonesia rollout will be worth watching.

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Brazil picks Sweden's Gripen for its air force

Google – AFP, Yana Marull (AFP), 18 December 2013

Brazilian Defense Minister Celso Amorim (L) speaks next to Air Force Commander

 Juniti Saito during a press conference in Brasilia on December 18, 2013 (AFP,

Evaristo Sa)

Brasília — Sweden's Saab edged out French and US rivals to win a multi-billion-dollar contract to supply Brazil's air force with 36 new fighter jets, Defense Minister Celso Amorim said Wednesday.

Saab's Gripen NG was in competition with the Rafale made by France's Dassault company and US aviation giant Boeing's F/A-18 fighter for the long-deferred FX-2 air force replacement program.

"After analyzing all the facts, President Dilma Rousseff directed me to inform that the winner of the contract for the acquisition of the 36 fighter jets for the Brazilian Air Force is the Swedish Gripen NG," Amorim told a press conference.

He put the actual value of the contract, earlier estimated at $5 billion, at $4.5 billion as Saab offered the cheapest price.

The announcement came after more than 10 years of discussions and repeated delays due to budgetary constraints.

It came as a surprise, as experts were forecasting a Dassault-Boeing duel.

Amorim said the Gripen, a state-of-the-art, multi-role fighter, got the nod based on performance, assurances of technology transfer and overall costs.

The Gripen, which was favored by the air force brass, is capable of performing an extensive range of air-to-air, air-to-surface and reconnaissance missions.

It can carry up to 6.5 tons of armament and equipment.

Munitions include various missiles, laser-guided bombs, and a single 27 mm Mauser BK-27 cannon.

The Gripen is in use in the air forces of Britain, South Africa, the Czech Republic, Thailand and Hungary.

Rousseff had postponed a decision on the FX-2 replacement contract in early 2011 for budgetary reasons but air force chiefs made it clear that it was an urgent matter.

The air force said the new fighter aircraft were needed to maintain an adequate air defense as it is to retire its 12 Mirage jets in late December.

Brazil bought the refurbished Mirage 2000 C/Bs from France in 2005 for $80 million to fly for five years.

A key requirement for the sale was technology transfers so that the planes can be assembled in this country and give a boost to the domestic defense industry.

Amorim said negotiations with Saab would take 10-12 months, with the signing of the contract expected at the end of next year and delivery of the first aircraft 48 months later.

The defense minister said Brazil's top planemaker Embraer "will benefit greatly" from the deal.

The G1 news website quoted Air Force spokesman Marcelo Damasceno as saying the Gripen jets "will meet the operational needs of the Air Force for the next 30 years."

In 2009, then president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had expressed a preference for the Rafale but later backtracked and left the choice to his successor Dilma Rousseff.

A source close to Dassault in Paris said the Rafale was the most expensive among the three aircraft in contention.

"There is a prototype of the Gripen NG, which already has 300 hours of flight," said Brazilian Air Force Commander Juniti Saito.

"We are going to develop the plant jointly with Sweden. with Saab, to have 100 percent of the plane's intellectual property," he added.

"Within the Air Force, the Gripen was always seen as the favorite because, even though it has many US-made components, it is a project that will be developed jointly with Brazil," the daily O Estado de Sao Paulo said.

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