Navy Decides to Buy V-22 Ospreys for Carrier Delivery

The Navy will buy V-22 Osprey tiltrotors to replace its aging C-2A Greyhound turboprop aircraft in flying carrier on board delivery (COD) missions. Breaking Defense obtained a Jan. 5 memo, signed by Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert, and Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Joseph Dunford. It stipulates that the Navy will buy four V-22s each year from fiscal 2018 to 2020.

The MOU marks a major triumph for the Naval Air Systems Command V-22 program office, the Marine Corps and other Osprey advocates, ( Read more here )who have argued for years that the Navy should replace its aging conventional take off C-2As with vertical take off and landing V-22s.

“The Navy is responsible for modifying these V-22s into an HV-22 configuration for the COD mission,” the  MOU states. “The parties agree that subsequent documents will provide details on the concept of operations and milestones. A memorandum of agreement will detail reimbursable Marine Corps support for the Navy’s HV-22 transition, which includes training and potential deployment of Marine MV-22 aircraft and personnel to support COD requirements.”

The Navy-Marine Corps agreement must be ratified in the next defense budget and by Congress. It also depends in part on a prospective third V-22 multiyear procurement contract that would begin in fiscal year 2018.  C-2A maker Northrop Grumman has proposed building a modernized version incorporating features of the E-2D Advanced Hawkeye tactical early warning aircraft.

The twin-engine turboprop C-2As carry cargo, mail and passengers between aircraft carriers and shore — a mission called COD for “carrier on-board delivery.” The first Greyhound prototypes flew in 1964.The Osprey, built in a 50-50 partnership by Bell Helicopter Textron Inc. and Boeing Co. and in service with the Marine Corps since 2007 and the Air Force since 2009, tilts two large wingtip rotors up to take off and land vertically and forward to fly like a turboprop airplane, giving it far greater speed and range than conventional helicopters.

The MOU signed by Mabus, Greenert and Dunford marks a milestone in the history of the revolutionary V-22, which began in the early 1980s at the behest of Navy Secretary John Lehman but took a quarter century to get into service. The Navy was originally supposed to buy as many as 380 Ospreys for search and rescue and antisubmarine warfare missions, but after Lehman left office, the service cut its paper requirement for V-22s to 48. The Marines are acquiring 360 Ospreys and the Air Force Special Operations Command another 50. As of March, the program office reported that 257 of a planned 460 Ospreys, including two for research, development, test and evaluation, had been acquired. Under the latest multiyear contract, which ends in fiscal 2017, the “flyaway cost” for each Osprey is about $68 million.

Until the past couple of years, Navy leaders had shown little interest in actually buying their planned 48 Ospreys. But in 2011, the Marine Corps began qualifying its MV-22s for carrier landings, and a six-day “military utility assessment” conducted last summer off the coast of Florida, in which V-22s carried passengers and cargo to and from the USS Harry S Truman (CVN 75), found that: “The V-22 demonstrated an effective, flexible, and safe capability to conduct the COD mission with no modifications and no adverse impact to cyclic flight operations.”

Navy and Marine Corps commanders of Amphibious Ready Groups carrying Marine Expeditionary Units, meanwhile, have found that using the Osprey to carry passengers and cargo among the standard ARG complement of three vessels enables the ships to conduct separate operations at ranges far greater than possible when CH-46 Sea Knight helicopters were their primary supply aircraft.

Under the Jan. 5 MOU, the first dozen HV-22s would be taken from what would have been the Marine Corps share of V-22s built in fiscal 2018-20 under the prospective third multiyear contract. Those first Navy V-22s will be replaced in the Marine Corps inventory in fiscal years 2021, 2022, and 2023 with a dozen Ospreys “that would have been allocated to the Navy,” the memo provides.

 

Coup d’état underway in PAS to replace Hadi with Mat Sabu

Romance between PAS – UMNO now officially dead, the go ahead for the coup d’état to replace Hadi and gang will cumulate Hadi and gang’s removal at PAS’s April 27 to May 1 Muktamar in Kedah. The PAS divisions now will be electing  candidates from the “Save PAS” group at divisional levels who in turn will choose delegates for PAS  .The is cumulative of  secret talks between PAS and Amanah for dissolving Amanah and for the return of professionals to PAS. Mat Sabu will be invited to PAS as the next president of PAS and Amanah getting dissolved.

Hadi will be allowed the face saving resignation for medical reasons. Please Amanah do not do this as PAS is now a much damaged product.

2017 Darwin Awards - The idiots who pay the price for their stupidly

2017 Darwin Awards

2017 Darwin Awards - The idiots who pay the price for their stupidly

and I and my friends are the judges how stupid humans can be

1. (21 March 2017, Germany) Blasting apart a ticketing machine at the train station was supposed to buy him a ticket to the good life, but instead the 31-year-old purchased passage in the opposite direction, losing his life in an explosion that ripped the metal front panel off the machine.

The details are: he stiffened his resolve with a few drinks at a bar, he was spotted spraying cans of aerosol gas into a ticket vending machine, he placed the empties in a jute bag, and then he ignited the gas (by means undisclosed) causing an explosion that rocked the Dortmund neighborhood.

A bar acquaintance recognized him and called for emergency help. But, sprinkled with shrapnel wounds and suffering a substantial head injury, the man rapidly succumbed to death despite resuscitation efforts.

Safety measures as simple as wearing a leather jacket and motorcycle helmet would have changed the outcome for Mr. One Way Ticket Out.

2. (25 March 2017, Mexico) Standing on a truck on an airport runway, our Double-Darwin Award Winners Nitzia and Clarissa chose a regrettable location for a cell phone selfie. Ms. Corral, 18, and Ms. Miranda, 17, were attending horse races that were held on a track adjacent to the runway. According to the Diario de Chíhuahua, the noise of the races and the desire for a new profile picture distracted the young women. They did not hear the motor of the descending aircraft, and the wing of the small plane struck and killed them instantly.

The incident occured in Chínipas, Chíhuahua, in northern Mexico.

People, wake up! to the plain hard fact that a mobile phone is a deadly distraction. Mobile devices take our awareness away from the physical world, and the Darwin Awards archives are stuffed overflowing with testimony proving the tragic truth of this. We mourn the deaths of two beautiful and lively young people, and cut down by such a careless mistake.

Cell phones will kill you! Put them away and allow your senses to receive input from tangible reality. Please share this regrettable cautionary lesson, a public service announcement, #yourdeathmatters

3. (18 February 2017, Zimbabwe) Three male humans, three male elephants, and a dream of a perfect wildlife selfie combine to win to the first 2017 Darwin Award! In the town of Plumtree in southwestern Zimbabwe, Mr. Moses Ndlovu spotted three elephants in the bush. "Shrubbery! This will not do," he thought, and he and two friends began to drive the three male elephants into a clearing. The elephants cooperated, in a fashion.

A large bull elephant and two younger males came charging out of the shrubbery and headed for the provoking men! It was time to test the old truism, "I don't have to outrun that elephant, I just have to outrun you" The men took off running, each frantic to save his own hide. Moses, lagging behind, was trampled to death by the angry bull while his friends escaped.

The entire blunder was a pointless waste of time for man and beast. I am sorry you are dead, Moses Ndlovu, but what were you thinking? As a consolation, your lamentable death serves as a warning to others: #ElephantsWantPrivacy

4. Clement Vallandigham was a well-known Northern Democrat who campaigned for states' rights during the Civil War. In 1863 Vallandigham was convicted of treason for his speeches attacking the administration of President Lincoln. He was banished to the South, where he continued to voice his political views.

After the war, Vallandingham became a lawyer. In his last appearance in the courtroom, he represented a client on trial for murder. The accused man's defense was that the victim had drawn his own gun in a fashion that caused it to fire, killing himself. To prove the defense argument, Vallandigham demonstrated the victim's method of drawing a gun--using the loaded evidence gun as his prop. The firearm went off, and he lost his life--but proved his case.

5. (1992, California) Snakes flick their forked tongues in the air to "smell" the world, collecting molecules and analyzing them by pressing thir tongue tips tips them into small olfactory pits. An inebriated twenty-year-old man, apparently unaware of this biological fact, took umbrage when a wild rattlesnake stuck out its tounge at him. Tit for tat! He held the rattler in front of his face and stuck his tongue out right back at it. The snake expressed its displeasure at this turn of events by biting the conveniently offered body part. The toxic venom swelled the man's face and throat, choking him to death.

6. (22 January 2016, Michigan) Referred to as a "distracted driver," Clifford Ray Jones, 58, was driving without pants -- without seatbelt -- and with a porno flick screening on his mobile device. Add a wide-open sunroof on a cold winter Sunday, and you have a recipe for disaster.

He should have kept his hands on the wheel instead of the stick. In the wee hours (at 3:40am) Clifford's Toyota went out of control on the onramp to I-75, rolled, and crashed, ejaculating our hero through the sunroof in a spectacular climax to his life. Come and gone, Clifford and his beloved wanky will be fondly remembered in our archives.

7. (11 December 2016, England) Drop an iPhone into your bath water, no biggie, all you get is a nasty repair bill. But drop a charging iPhone into your bathwater...and suddenly coroners are demanding warning labels.

It is with chagrin that this writer, known to bathe while poking at her laptop keyboard, shares news of the explicable demise of Richard Bull and his iPhone. Mr. Bull, 32, plugged his charger into an extension cord and rested the charger on his chest while using the phone in the tub. He received severe burns on his chest, arm, and hand when the charger touched the water in his West London home, which mattered little as he was already dead from heart failure.

Those of us who plug into plugged-in electronics must heed the coroner's warning and take a breather in the loo. The sparky mix of electricity and water is a fact known to all, yet the doctor who conducted the iNquest plans to send a stern note to Apple. Perhaps one more warning label will solve our problem?

8. In Croatia stupid rises to a new level when a criminal in a padded penitentiary decides to whip out his contraband lighter.

(16 November 2015, Croatia) Bojan Bešić was a petty criminal who spent much of his life in prisons. A small-time crook with a police dossier as extensive as the literary works of Tolstoy, Bojan's career was marked by persistence rather than success. For example, death letters persistently sent to his ex-girlfriend landed the criminal 'mastermind' in Pula to serve an eight-month sentence, adding to a cumulative 5 years already spent behind bars.

During his incarceration, Bojan's behavior was so 'outstanding' that on a fateful Monday the prison guards locked him in a padded cell in solitary confinement. Little did they suspect that the cool-down time would leave him literally more hot-headed than before. The brilliant prisoner had managed to smuggle a lighter into the rubber room!

Both hands were cuffed behind his back, but that did not prevent our persistent pal from retrieving the lighter and flicking the Bic. Captured on video, at 3:35PM, Bojan strikes the lighter and purposely starts a fire near the door. The video, tactfully edited, shows the euphoria of the moment as the rubber wall begins to ablaze. As he nonchalantly swaggers around his tomb, the fire grows. Suddenly panic sets in as Bojan realizes that suffocation is imminent! What a surprise.

The prison guards were really not expecting the cell to burst into flames, and why would they? They noticed the smoky situation too late to save the prisoner from himself, making The Case Of The Charred Crook the first prisoner death in the history of the country. At 25 years of age, the only excellence Bojan Bešić displayed was in the manner of his demise. We recognize his outstanding effort with the not-coveted Darwin Award. Better luck next time.

Gratitude to Phil for his excellent translation, wit and style that lent a delicious flavor to the news article

9. (17 September 2014, Pakistan) Two correspondents nominated the gullible acolyte who volunteered to be killed and resurrected by a holy man--and not a holy man who was experienced with the procedure, but a beginner who thought he'd give it a whirl!

For five years a popular Sufi had been performing miracles for villagers in Mubarakabad. Now he was ready to increase the stakes to a full resurrection. But he was not interested reviving any old corpse--the novice naturally preferred to breathe life back into fresh meat. So the Sufi put Word out to his followers that he wanted to kill and revive a faithful man--a faithful married man--a married man with children! The Sufi seemed to be stacking the deck to resurrect a person with a strong incentive to return, a person with no desire to malinger in death. And in the grip of an overwhelmingly obvious Darwin Moment, 40-year-old Muhammad Niaz stepped up and volunteered to be murdered the very next day.

Lest anyone claim that Muhammad was mentally ill, which would disqualify him from a Darwin Award, please remember that resurrection by saints is an idea that is popular in Christianity as well. Bible verse Matthew 10:8 says that Jesus commanded his acolytes, "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons," and Catholic saints have been recorded as performing the miracle of raising the dead.

On Tuesday the idea was announced, on Wednesday the follower was killed, and on Thursday the overly optimistic Sufi was behind bars for murder. Generally no Darwin Awards are given for murder, but in this case the acolyte volunteered for the scheme and earned his just reward.

10. (19 August 2007, Serbia) It's well known that alcohol impairs judgement. It's well known that carnivorous wild animals and humans don't mix. What happens when we combine all three? One might expect men, beer, and bears to combine with lethal consequences. Such was the case for a 23-year old man who inadvertently fed himself to Masha and Misha at the Belgrade Zoo.

Serbia | It's well known that alcohol impairs judgement. It's well known that carnivorous wild animals and humans don't mix. What happens when we combine all three? One might expect men, beer, and bears to lead to lethal consequences.

Such was the case for a 23-year old man who fed himself to Masha and Misha at the Belgrade Zoo. His untouched clothes suggested that he approached the bears bare-naked by choice. The bears, fearing that his intentions were as dishonorable as they were ill-informed, meted out a quick justice.

The man's mauled corpse was found inside the bear habitat along with plenty of beer cans. Masha and Misha "reacted angrily" when keepers tried to recover the man's corpse, but were eventually persuaded to give up their prize.

The Zoo director said, "Only an idiot would jump into the bear cage."

MERS-CoV-like virus was in camels in 2003

Human interaction sexually with camels cause MERS to spread from Camels to humans. Only in Middle-East the camel shares the tent with the Arab man. read below to better understand why Middle-East is Hell

Study: MERS-CoV-like virus was in camels in 2003

Researchers reported yesterday that the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), or a very closely related virus, existed in camels in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2003—9 years before it was first found in humans.

Writing in Emerging Infectious Diseases, the scientists said they tested camel serum samples that had been collected in 2003 and 2013 and found that most of them—including all of the 2003 specimens—had antibodies to MERS-CoV.

"Dromedary camels from the United Arab Emirates were infected at high rates with MERS-CoV or a closely related, probably conspecific [same species], virus long before the first human MERS cases," says the report by researchers from Germany, the Netherlands, and the UAE. Christian Drosten, MD, of the University of Bonn was the senior author.

The first known human MERS cases occurred in Jordan in April 2012. Since then, 177 cases, 74 of them fatal, have been confirmed by the World Health Organization (WHO). The vast majority have been reported on and near the Arabian Peninsula, most of them in Saudi Arabia.

The new findings add to the growing evidence that MERS-CoV, or close cousins thereof, circulates in camels, but they don't answer the key question whether camels are the source of human MERS-CoV infections. Researchers say they need to spell out the genetic sequences of the camel viruses and compare them with human MERS-CoV sequences to unravel that.

The findings also raise the question why no human MERS cases were discovered until 2012, if MERS-like viruses were circulating in Middle Eastern camels for years before that. Experts speculate that the virus might not have been genetically equipped to infect humans until very recently.

Multiple serologic studies published last year pointed to MERS-CoV-like antibodies in camels in several countries, including Oman, Egypt, the Canary Islands, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, but did not find the virus itself in the animals.

In mid-December, scientists found that three camels on a Qatari farm were infected with MERS-CoV viruses very similar to those in two humans who owned and worked at the farm. But they couldn't discern if the camels had passed the virus to the people or vice versa, or if both hosts acquired it from some other source.

In the new study, the research team collected 651 serum samples from camels in the UAE, including 151 frozen samples obtained in 2003 and 500 gathered in 2013. The animals included young racing camels, adult livestock camels acquired from several other countries, and camels raised at a government veterinary lab.

Excluding cross-reactions
In testing the samples for MERS-CoV, the team took pains to avoid being misled by cross-reactions to bovine coronavirus (BCoV), which belongs to the same genus as MERS-CoV. They used a series of three tests, including an immunofluroescence assay for the MERS-CoV spike protein, a protein microarray, and a MERS-CoV-specific neutralization assay.

Overall, the authors found that 632 of 651 camels (97.1%) had antibodies against MERS-CoV, and this included all 151 of the 2003 samples. In addition, they found that 389 samples (59.8%) had high levels of MERS-CoV-neutralizing antibodies (titers higher than 1,280).

The neutralization assay made it possible to rule out cross-reactions between MERS-CoV and BCoV, the report says.

The researchers found that antibodies were more prevalent in adult camels than in young racing camels, which suggests that camels may be infected as juveniles.

They also tested 16 Bactrian camels from a German zoo—a different species from the dromedary camels in the UAE—and found no MERS-CoV antibodies. They said that finding may mean that Bactrian camels are less susceptible to the virus, but a more likely explanation is that the virus has a restricted geographic range.

In other steps, the team used polymerase chain reaction testing to look for coronaviruses in fecal samples from 182 of the camels. In two samples they found material that matched up with a strain of BCoV, but there was no evidence of MERS-CoV in the samples.

"The high rates of antibody prevalence in contemporary serum samples and samples from 2003 suggest that the virus has spread in camelids for some time," the authors comment. "However, recognition of camelids as the bona fide reservoir for MERS-CoV has to await sequencing of camelid-associated MERS-related CoV."

They add, "Our finding of high neutralizing antibody titers in camelids is suggestive (but not evidentiary) of the presence of viruses conspecific with MERS-CoV in camelids. Final confirmation will depend on the identification of virus sequences in camelids, which should expectably be closely related to human-specific MERS-CoV sequences."

Vincent Racaniello, PhD, author of Virology Blog and professor of microbiology and immunology at Columbia University, who was not involved in the study, said the findings, in combination with other recent studies, make it clear that viruses related to MERS-CoV have been circulating in camels for some time. The virus may have jumped to camels from bats, but that remains to be demonstrated through sequencing of bat and camel isolates, he added.

"It is important to note that serological assays cannot prove that camels are intermediate hosts for the virus, or that the virus originated from bats; only sequence analysis can provide this information," Racaniello commented by e-mail. He noted that only one study has described any camel MERS-CoV sequences, and no infectious MERS-CoV virus has yet been isolated from a camel.

As for why human MERS cases were not detected earlier, he said, "I would speculate that if camels were infected with a MERS-CoV like virus in 2003, then that virus simply did not have the proper nucleotide sequence to infect humans. It might only take one base change, or a handful, to let the 2003 virus infect humans. Perhaps the 'right' virus had not yet emerged in camels in 2003. The virus might have only recently entered camels (not long before 2003) and did not have a chance to spawn the mutants that could infect humans."

Other experts commented on the findings in a Canadian Press (CP) story published today, focusing on why no human cases were seen before 2012, if the virus was circulating in camels.

Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH, said the possibilities include that there were no human cases from 2003 to 2012, or that there were a few cases in those earlier years, but they went undetected until a change in the virus increased their number. Osterholm is director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, publisher of CIDRAP News.

Anthony Mounts, the WHO's lead scientist on MERS, told the CP he favored the latter explanation. He said the available genetic sequences of MERS suggest that the human virus emerged around mid-2011. That would suggest that the 2003 antibodies might be to a virus that was an ancestor of the current MERS-CoV but not exactly the same virus. That ancestral virus might have caused some human infections that went undetected, he said.

http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-persp...as-camels-2003

Next will be the Goats read here Arabs consider normal to have sex with a goat

A real funny interview of an idiot explaining why man must have 4 wives and why a woman cannot handle sex with 4 men.

A real funny interview of an idiot explaining why man must have 4 wives and why a woman cannot handle sex with 4 men. This video comes with a health warning “Too much laughter may kill you and watch this video at your peril “

Why why and why are these people acting so stupid. I am ashamed to call this guy my evolutionary  cousin

Videos of freak waves in the sea

Videos of freak waves in the sea. Watch videos below.

Act 355: ‘PAS taken for a ride by Umno’

PAS being the Naïve villagers could not see that UMNO’s game was to tear apart PAS from PH. Once it was official the PH does not want PAS in their opposition block, UMNO no longer had no more use for PAS. UMNO knows that the RU355 is a poison chalice will drive away the Malay support from UMNO and BN. The Malays whether Urban or rural have no stomach for Islamic law and look at PAS as bush of misfits. PAS now by itself and only have 20% to 30% of the Malay support they received in PRU – GE 14. They will act as spoilers in a few seats Kelantan, Kedah and Terengganu. Total Parliament seats affected are between 15 to 25 Parliament seats.

PAS is only left with memories of a failed romance with UMNO. If only TGNA was alive, he would have seen the bad intentions of UMNO.

PAS is now consign to the dustbin of Politics in Malaysia 

Idiots I told you all so , that UMNO is going to ride and shaft you all. 

YUP that was the PAS camel getting humped  

Act 355: ‘PAS taken for a ride by Umno’

Assoc Prof Dr Jeniri Amir says PAS has reason to be disappointed by BN’s decision to not adopt Hadi’s Bill

KUALA LUMPUR: PAS would be justified to feel that it has been shortchanged by Umno following BN’s decision to abort the tabling of the bill to amend the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act, or Act 355, said a political analyst.

Assoc Prof Dr Jeniri Amir of Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UniMas) said BN’s about-turn might even force PAS to rethink its strategy as of late PAS had been warming up to Umno.

“PAS will be disappointed…I believe (PAS president Abdul) Hadi (Awang) will rethink the party’s cordial relationship with BN, especially with Umno.

“He will have to re-evaluate PAS’ stand towards Pakatan Harapan,” Jeniri told Berita Daily.

Using a football analogy, he said: “Hadi passed the ball to Umno and then Umno dribbled it to the goalpost but did not score.”

Jeniri believed that the BN decision was good for maintaining harmony in the ruling coalition.

“BN must take into consideration the feelings of Sabah and Sarawak components and also its non-Muslim parties.

“In this move, Prime Minister Najib Razak has shown that he prioritised his allies more than the enemy,” he added.

The motion on the Act 355 amendments was tabled by PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang in the Dewan Rakyat through a private member’s bill last year but was not debated.

Recently, Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said the government would take over the bill and table it although several BN components including MCA said they had not been consulted.

Another analyst Prof Dr Abdul Halim Sidek believed that PAS should just continue with its effort to enhance the powers of the shariah court.

“It started as a private member’s bill, so PAS should just continue.

“I believe that the government refused to table the bill as there is resistance from the cabinet,” said the Universiti Kuala Lumpur law lecturer when contacted by Berita Daily.

Abdul Halim, however, questioned why certain parties are opposing the bill which he said would affect only Muslims.

Former diplomat Redzuan Khushairi also believed that PAS was played out by Umno on this matter.

“It was a scare but most of us always thought it was Umno’s political game, albeit a dangerous one.

“I also believe, not just PAS but Umno too has lost credibility in the process,” said the former Universiti Utara Malaysia academician.

Geostrategist Prof Dr Azmi Hassan, however, said PAS should shoulder the blame for this.

“PAS has been dilly-dallying on its purported cooperation with Umno. Therefore the decision by the government to not pursue the bill will not affect the current status too much,” Azmi said in a WhatsApp reply to Berita Daily..

He said the government felt that it was not beneficial to table the bill but it did not mean that Umno was not supportive of the bill.

The director of Centre for Policy Initiatives Dr Lim Teck Ghee said PAS will not ditch Umno despite this setback.

“It will still be looking to see how it can leverage its present dalliance with Umno to gain extra advantage in the coming election.

“It may want to give the impression that it will be going it alone but this is a charade,” Lim said in a reply to Berita Daily.

Lim said Hadi sees the other opposition parties as big threats to his reign as PAS president and also to the Islamic party’s success in elections.

“It is very clear that Hadi sees the opposition parties, especially Amanah and DAP, and even PKR, as the biggest threat to his leadership and the party’s electoral success,” he said.

After chairing the BN supreme council meeting yesterday, Najib said that the bill will remain a private member’s bill as the government will not adopt it.

Najib said BN made this decision based on the spirit of consensus practiced by the ruling coalition.