Deathly Suspense and Timely Rescue

"I had heard stories about miracles, but I saw a miraculous rescue happening with my own eyes."

"We suddenly felt a jolt, and it all happened so suddenly that we thought all of us are going to die."

"They were telling us don't worry, help is coming,"

"We cried, and tears were in our eyes, as we feared the cable car will go down."

Osama Sharif, 15, rescued schoolboy

 

"I thought I was the smallest and I would die before anyone. I had no hope when I did not see any help and failed the attempt till 4pm [….]"

"I became hopeful when the army rescued Irfanullah and I lost hope again when it became dark and the army halted heli operations. I regained hope when a local man rescued the second boy."

Ibrar Ahmed, 13

 

"After four hours, the first military helicopter hovered over our heads and he tried his best but it did not succeed."

"The second heli returned with no success as well. It made me very worried that helicopters were not succeeding and we will die soon."

"I was hell scared and all the children started screaming. We started holding each other as it kept dangling. I thought I was dead now."

Attualah, 16

"I could see death in front of my eyes."

"The wind pressure was too fast and the cable car was dangling and it had no doors from one side for over a year."

"Everyone was crying."

Rizwanullah, 15

 

"To be honest, no matter how I was making children calm and telling them we would survive, I did not see any chance that we would."

"It was a chaotic situation. But I was struggling to find ways and my phone saved us."

Gul Faraz, 24, local man

From left: Niaz, Attaullah, Usama, Ibrar Ahmed, Rizwanullah, Gul Faraz and Sher Nawaz, after their rescue. Photograph: Shah Meer Baloch/The Guardian

Pakistan suffered a day of suspense praying for the rescue of six children and two adults on a makeshift chairlift that regularly transported people living in the area over a deep and wide ravine, that had suddenly malfunctioned, losing one of its guideropes, a cable that had broken, leaving the car dangling hundreds of metres above the canyon in a remote part of Pakistan. 

The passengers, in a routine method of transportation for the area and many others like it in geologically mountainous terrain where these makeshift chairlifts act as the sole means of travel and communication, became trapped early in the day on Tuesday. They were crossing a river canyon in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Battagram district. The six children, all adolescents on the car, were on their way to school.

 

Pakistani military and local rescue workers bring people from the dangling cable car to safety using ropes and harnesses. (Pakistan Rescue Military/The Associated Press)

 

Nearby residents watched in horror as the cable car was suspended on its single cable, hoping it too would not break and send those clinging to it to certain death, as they awaited a government response that would bring the trapped people to safety. Throughout the country Pakistanis in their offices, shops, restaurants, homes and hospitals crowded around televisions in the grip of drama, clasping hope of rescue.

"Relieved to know that ... all the kids have been successfully and safely rescued", commented caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar as he congratulated the military and other rescuers for that ultimate success of their endeavours. "Great team work by the military, rescue departments, district administration as well as the local people."

The rescue helicopters were  unable to fly after sunset, and it was feared that the wind created by the helicopter blades might further weaken the remaining cable. That concern resulted in rescuers shifting from an airborne rescue effort to an operation with high risks involving the use of one cable still intact to approach the car with the chairlift.

The commandos' rope was seen swaying in the wind against the mountainous landscape on footage played on television stations showing a child in a harness pulled to safety. Helicopter rescues in these circumstances described by an expert, are extremely delicate, emphasizing wind generated by helicopter blades threatening to weaken the remaining cable, it alone holding the car aloft.

 

People watch as an army soldier slings down from a helicopter during the rescue mission. (AFP/Getty Images)

 

Most of the rescued children, handed over to their families burst into tears. "Everyone was praying for this moment" commented Nazir Ahmed, a senior police officer in the area where the rescue mission took place. Before the rescue was completed those on the stranded, swaying car were provided with food and water. Some of the trapped were enabled contact by cellphone with their families.

The cable cars are often poorly maintained to the extent that yearly people die or become injured while using them. They are a necessity in the region however, frequently used by villagers to get around the mountainous regions of Pakistan. After this heart-stopping episode that garnered the bated breath of the wider public, the president stated his intention that safety inspections be undertaken for the country's cable cars and chairlifts.

The group of eight, the two adults and six children, were marooned in those dangerous conditions for six hours, suspended precariously 350 metres above ground, even before the helicopters were dispatched after appeals were sent for an emergency response to a potentially deadly situation. In the event, the disaster management authority rose to the occasion.

 

Youngsters who were trapped in a broken cable car receive first aid following their rescue, in Pashto village, a mountainous area of Battagram district in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, on Tuesday. (Nazir Mahood/The Associated Press)

 

 

Alberta Hyperloop : Enthusiasts and Naysayers

"There are some very obvious better ways to do it [construct a time-efficient transportation link between Edmonton and Calgary]. I think we need to focus on what we know already works."                                                                           "There's a lot of evidence out there showing regular high-speed rail already works. In reality I think it is a distraction tactic that can allow them [provincial authorities] to put off connecting Edmonton and Calgary indefinitely."                                               Ashley Salvador, Edmonton urban planner

"The Government of Alberta should not invest in a high-speed rail transit system in the Edmonton-Calgary corridor at this time because the population of the corridor is not sufficient to support the profitable operation of such a system."                      Feasibility study, Alberta economic standing committee, 2014

"Most of the high speed rail around the world are not profitable. It's not to fill up the train -- which is important -- it's to fill up the infrastructure."                              "That's the main difference compared to a conventional rail track."                    "Best-case scenario ... we could have a line operational by 2030."                Sebastien Gendron, CEO, co-founder, TransPod, Toronto

"The MOU [memorandum of understanding between the transit builder and the province of Alberta] facilitates the process of attracting private investment to the province, in order to build a multi-billion-dollar infrastructure project."                        TransPod, hyperloop project startup, Toronto

Artist renderings of the hyperloop the pod and its interior. Photo by TransPod illustrations

A provincially commissioned 2014 study estimated that by the time 2031 rolls around 105 million trips between Edmonton and Calgary annually would materialize, requiring for optimum efficiency that some type of high-speed transit between the two cities be considered, and there is no time like the present to consult beyond theorization, to weigh options and to commit to the future in necessary transit options.

What the province brought into view under a magnifying glass of potentials is a super-transit, high-tech link, a futuristic vision of a pod that literally sucks passengers through a tube to reduce the current three-hour drive from one city to the other to a preferential half-hour commute. "Electrically-driven magnetic propulsion" would whisk a transit pod within a tube suspended on pillars from point A to point E in record time.

That would be accomplished at speeds of up to 1,000 km/hr, roughly a speed similar to that of a jetliner. Artwork meant to convey what such a system would look like shows a tansluscent tube adjacent the side of a highway and in the tube, whistling along at breakneck speed, is a pod hosting travellers, commuting from one city to the other. By no means a spanking-new vision, but one that has been under discussion for decades.

Artist renderings of hyperloop infrastructure Photo: TransPod illustrations

The combined population of the two cities, 300 kilometres distant from one another, is roughly 2.3 million at the present time. Back in 2014 the study undertaken by an economic standing committee, reached the conclusion that the hyperlink could be set aside, as not a good idea. Conveying passengers alone, given the relatively sparse population simply didn't justify the outsize investment in a hyperlink.

To which, at the present time, TransPod's CEO responds that to make the system ever more practical it could be used as well to haul freight. Solar panels placed along the line could realize an added source of revenue. As the future moves ever closer, TransPod and the Alberta government agreed there would be no financial commitment, but for the time being additional study would be undertaken on the feasibility of a project such as the 1,000 km/h hyperloop duorail link.

According to the company, the project would be responsible for creating 38,000 jobs in the province through the course of ten years; construction and operation. The current provincial premier, Jason Kenney and the mayor of Calgary are both enthusiastic about the potential for such a link. "I'm excited about it. I don't know if it's real, I don't know=if it's science fiction, but we'll never know unless we continue to do more testing with folks other than one entrepreneur who talks about stuff a lot in the U.S.", commented Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi.

Artist's conception of a proposed hyperloop between Calgary (shown) and Edmonton. Photo by TransPod illustration

Heading East in a Hurry

"Jet lag is more than just an inconvenience. It's pretty devastating physiologically."
"If you're a constant traveller, you'll probably put on more weight, you'll probably have cardiovascular challenges and you may have some behavioural changes."
Carrie Partch, biochemist associate professor, University of California Santa Cruz

"We know ultra long-haul flights pose some extra challenges but that's been true every time technology has allowed us to fly farther."
"The research we're doing should give us better strategies for improving comfort and well-being along the way."
"After 19 hours on this flight, I think we've gotten this right. It feels like we've been on a flight a lot shorter than that."
Alan Joyce, Qantas chief executive

Crew celebrating after the 19-hour flight Credit: AFP

The International Air Transport Association has forecast that before the end of 2019, 4.6 billion people will have taken flight to somewhere from somewhere, on some airline. They also anticipate that by 2037 that number will almost double to 8.2 billion, the staggering impact on the environment notwithstanding. Among those who take long-distance flights and many do, there is the issue of jet-lag. In fact, therapies to counteract jet-lag are in growing demand by an estimated 6 percent annually making that particular industry worth by 2023, $732 million.

According to Global-Data, over 80 drugs meant to ameliorate the problem of disturbed sleep are currently in clinical development, to add to those already on the market. What's jet-lag? You know it when you feel it, after crossing three time zones fairly quickly flying through the air at jet-speed, the result being the body's internal clock is still set to its home timetable. It's that feeling of exhaustion when you arrive at your destination followed by insomnia later that night. That's jet-lag.

And if you're a constant traveller, your body becomes truly confused and you feel like death warmed over.

Travelling eastward reverses the familiar normalcy of the body's day-and-night cycle, so the outcome of west to east is more pronounced than the opposite. Sound complicated? It's more complex than  you may know, given that each of the billions of cells in the human body has its particular clock. Think heart function, food absorption, metabolism, all those organs disrupted.

Passengers exercising on board Credit: Getty

Scientists won a Nobel Prize in 2017 for their discovery that molecular mechanisms control circadian rhythms. The hope that a laboratory rodent can respond to medication to speed its internal clock adjustment, does not, unfortunately, translate to the formulation of a fast-acting pill that frequent flyers can use to help get over that notorious jet-lag. There are certain remedies such as exercise and whole food (not the usual in-flight fare) to help synchronize the body's adjustment to a new time zone.

A University of Boulder Colorado study in 2017 indicated that body-clock adjustment can be rapidly reached through exposure to natural light. Qantas Airways Ltd. this past Friday launched an experimental flight of 19 hours without stop -- the first such lengthy flight to have been attempted, with more to follow -- New York to Sydney, called Project Sunrise.

Qantas is testing a Boeing 787-9  New York to Sydney nonstop.

Source: Qantas

Not only time zones create the misery of feeling jet-lagged; also involved is poor-quality sleep, and the dry pressurized cabin air. "I've seen people disoriented a week after a flight", commented Conrad Moreira, medical director at the Travel Doctor-TM-VC clinic in Sydney, who prescribes a range of sleep-inducing drugs; anxious flyers included. These are tablets that contain melatonin, produced naturally in the body in sleep promotion.

The travel industry in general is anxious to find a solution to the extreme disorientation and discomfort that accompanies long-range flights, not just for passengers but for their own staff. IATA's latest fatigue-management manual indicates that some cabin crew may spend close to 21 hours awake on the day of a long-haul flight, despite an official duty period shorter than ten hours.

It is expected that data coming out of this first, experimental non-stop flight halfway around the world will render new and useful data, since scientists and medical researchers were meant to be present in the cabin, making a high-altitude laboratory out of Qantas's new Boeing Co. Dreamliner. During flight hours the scientists will have screened the pilots' brains for alertness, as well as monitoring food, sleep and activity of the fifty passengers on board.

Pilots will wear brain monitors during the nearly 20-hour flight.

Source: Qantas

Pride Before a Fall 

Paul Almasy/Corbis/Getty  Accidental Cliff Dive

A Polish couple's two young children watched as their parents climbed over the safety barrier and fell to their deaths while taking a selfie on a cliff in Cabo da Roca, Portugal. Once they took a step backwards to angle their shot, they tumbled off of the edge and into the perilous Atlantic Ocean below. Both bodies were not recovered until a day later, as dangerous weather and sea levels prevented their rescue. The traumatized children, ages five and six, were put into the care of Polish diplomats after witnessing the horrifying scene.

"My behaviour on this front ['travel photo addiction'] has been out of control for some time."
"I pre-visualize holiday outfits on social media posts. And you know it's getting ridiculous when you and your friends take exactly the same group selfies on holiday, swapping between each others' camera phones -- then like each other's identical Facebook posts."
Sherelle Jacobs, assistant comment editor, Daily Telegraph

"[...The thinking behind Facebook social network was always how to consume as much of the public's time and attention as possible.] And that means that we need to sort of give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while, because someone liked or commented on a photo or a post or whatever."
"And that's going to get you to contribute more content."
Sean Parker, founding president, Facebook

"When you see an advertisement someone is pushing at you, it makes you reluctant to accept it. But what social media influencers have is the pull factor."
"[As a follower] you're pulling that information, no one is forcing  you to see it. You've selected who you're aligned to."
Dimitrios Buhalis, head, tourism and hospitality department, Bournemouth University

Getty  “Ultimate Selfie” Gone Wrong

A teenage Romanian girl had attempted to take the special selfie on top of a train in the northern town of Iasi, Romania. According to a friend, 18-year-old Anna Urso was planning to post this "ultimate selfie" on Facebook. Urso decided to lie down on the roof of the stationary train car, but when she reached up with one of her legs to pose, but she hit an overhead live wire that shocked her with 27,000 volts. The young girl immediately burst into flames and was pronounced dead at the hospital after suffering burns on over half her of her body.

The irresistible draw of fame and fortune. The impulse and actual compulsion to be noticed. To be viewed as someone really on top of the world, a bold, smart, intriguing character eliciting the admiration of those who would like to do what you do and in the process of following and liking what you do, compelling you to ever more incautiously fascinating adventures, and the proof is right there, in the selfies you take of your smiling, audacious face, a phenomenal natural background framing your face as you achieve a micro-celebrity status, transitory, but pride-inducing.

Getty  A Deadly Current

Chezka Agas, a 17-year-old engineering student from the Philippines, was swept into a deadly wave on the beach on Bangui Bay during a birthday gathering. She was part of a group of engineering students in attendance that posed for a celebratory photo-op in front of the scenic Bangui windmills when the group became caught in the overpowering ocean current. Several of the party guests were injured, but only Agas drowned in the wave.

Last July you were Gavin Zimmerman, 19, focused on taking selfies while standing on a New South Wales, Australia cliff, when pride and incaution catapulted you to imbalance and death. Then in September you were Tomer Frankfurter, 18, whose spectacular fall of 250 metres in Yosemite National Park in California made another victim of selfie fame. Manuela Da Costa Macedo, another selfie-famer who in October fell from a 27th-floor balcony in Panama City, all the while clutching her selfie stick.

Among the most common causes of death were drowning and transport accidents, and then there's animal attacks, electrocution, fire and firearms adding up to 259 documented deaths attributable to "taking a selfie", even while those in the know believe that number is not the true reflection of selfie-induced deaths. Those who carefully plan their travel escapades with a view to capitalizing on exotic, strange, exciting, unusual or dangerous backgrounds, smugly happy face in the foreground represents an "ego travel" phenomenon.

Getty   Deadly Walrus 

A Chinese businessman named Jia Lijun tried to take a selfie with a one-and-a-half-ton walrus at a zoo in Liaoning province, China. Apparently, the man was a big fan of this particular walrus, having previously sent photos and videos of it to his friends and family along with the message, "so strong, so big.

Tour company Thomas Cook in its 2018 holiday report posits that over half of 18 to 24 vacationers visualize how their choice of vacation spot will appear on their social media posts before making the final decision of where they will stay and where they plan to travel. Older travellers too involve themselves in the same way with 15 percent of over-55 vacationers considering what to share online "to make their friends jealous", while deciding where they will book.

Getty      Accidental Explosion

Two Russian soldiers in the Urals region west of Siberia were posing for a selfie with a live grenade. The handheld explosive detonated unexpectedly and, going off in their faces. Only the phone with the photo survived.

The quest for extreme selfies led to the immediate deaths of 259 people, between the years 2011 and 2017, according to researchers at the U.S. National Library of Medicine last year, in their global study. For some of those involved, the recognition they crave goes beyond the social status they assume, but extends to the money they can attract as well. On Instagram "travel influencers" whose large followings influence tour operators and hotels to cash in, create a collaboration promoting ads.

More likes and followers are attracted to more extreme posts, all of this eventually racking up and converting to considerable income. It is the "pull factor" identified by Mr. Buhalis that businesses respond to, with social media content becoming more useful than conventional marketing. To that end, some in the travel business have introduced Instagram "butler" services, staff helpful in aiding clients to take the perfect selfies for their social media feed.

Night thunder storm lightning in sky.  Getty     Selfie Stick Lightning Rod

In July 2015, an unnamed English hiker was struck by lightning while trekking through the Brecon Beacons National Park in Wales. The fatal bolt was suspected to have hit the extended metal rod of a selfie stick and electrocuted the young man.