Virgin Galactic preps rocketplane for first commercial sub-orbital flight to space

BY WILLIAM HARWOOD
JUNE 28, 2023 / CBS NEWS

Four-and-a-half years after an initial sub-orbital test flight, Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic is finally ready to begin commercial operations with the launch Thursday of a six-man crew, including three Italian researchers, on an up-and-down flight to the edge of space aboard the company's winged spaceplane.

"We're launching The Spaceline for Earth with #Galactic01, our first scientific research mission!" Virgin tweeted. The crew will "conduct more than a dozen experiments in space, which will examine how microgravity affects the human body and other materials."



The flight was chartered by the Italian government and does not include any wealthy "space tourists." It comes just 10 days after a commercial submersibile imploded in the Atlantic Ocean during descent to the wreck of the Titanic. The submersible's five passengers were killed.

What effect, if any, the Titan submersible mishap might have on the commercial space tourism market is not yet known, but it highlights the risk inherent in such extreme adventures.

Blue Origin, owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, already offers commercial sub-orbital flights aboard its New Shepard spacecraft and Virgin plans a steady stream of similar flights following Thursday's mission.

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A file photo showing Virgin Galactic's VSS Unity rocketplane dropping away from its carrier jet seconds before firing its hybrid rocket motor to boost the ship out of the lower atmosphere.

VIRGIN GALACTIC

Thursday's flight, taking off from Spaceport America near the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, will be Virgin's sixth piloted sub-orbital mission and its first carrying paying passengers.

The company recently completed a lengthy upgrade of its twin-fuselage VMS Eve carrier jet, launching a successful space flight on May 25 — its first in two years — with six company employees on board.

The flight plan for Thursday's launch calls for the Eve carrier jet to lift VSS Unity to an altitude of around 45,000 feet. Seconds after release from Eve's wing, the spacecraft's hybrid rocket engine will ignite, propelling the ship up and out of the dense lower atmosphere.

At the controls will be veteran Virgin pilot Mike Masucci, making his fourth flight, and co-pilot Nicola Pecile, an Italian making his first. Their passengers are veteran Virgin astronaut trainer Colin Bennett, Italian Air Force Col. Walter Villadei, Lt. Col. Angelo Landolfi and Pantaleone Carlucci representing Italy's National Research Council.

Seconds after release from its carrier jet, VSS Unity's rocket motor ignites to begin the climb to space.

File photo.VIRGIN GALACTIC

"Proud that @NicolaPecile will fly his first spaceflight with @ItalianAirForce and @CNRsocial_ crew aboard," tweeted Jameel Janjua, Eve's co-pilot for Thursday's flight.

Villadei is serving as commander of the "Virtute 1" mission aboard the spaceplane. He is in training to visit the International Space Station as part of a commercial crew to be launched by SpaceX for Houston-based Axiom Space.

Villadei, Landolfi and Carlucci will serve as both microgravity researchers and test subjects in a variety of experiments to learn more about the effects of weightlessness. It's not known what Virgin charged for their three seats, but the company advertises a cost of $450,000 per ticket.

"Virgin Galactic's research missions will usher in a new era of repeatable and reliable access to space for government and research institutions for years to come," CEO Michael Colglazier said on the company's web page.

After the ship's rocket engine cuts off, the crew will be weightless for three to four minutes as the ship climbs to a maximum altitude of just over 50 miles, the somewhat arbitrary threshold of space where aerodynamic forces no longer have any discernible effect.

In a radical departure from Blue Origin's more traditional booster-and-capsule design, Virgin opted for an air-launched spaceplane featuring wings that pivot 60 degrees upward near the top of the trajectory, helping orient and slow the ship as it re-enters the atmosphere

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At the top of its trajectory, the spaceplane's wings flip up 60 degrees in a technique known as "feathering," helping slow and orient the ship as it descends back into the atmosphere.

VIRGIN GALACTIC

Invented by legendary aircraft designer Burt Rutan, the innovation is known as "feathering." As the spacecraft descends, the feathered wing-and-tail booms generate enormous drag like a badminton shuttlecock, reducing re-entry speeds and heating while acting to put the ship in the proper orientation without pilot intervention.

Once back down in the discernible atmosphere, the wings pivot back down parallel with the fuselage, the ship becomes a glider and Masucci and Pecile will guide it to touchdown at Spaceport America's 12,000-foot-long runway. From takeoff to landing takes about one hour.

Virgin Galactic to send Italian researchers to space, then regular commercial flights

Virgin Galactic's passenger rocket plane VSS Unity, borne by twin-fuselage carrier jet dubbed VMS Eve, takes off with billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson and his crew for travel to the edge of space at Spaceport America near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, U.S., July 11, 2021. REUTERS/Joe Skipper/File Photo

By Susan Montoya Bryan | AP
June 15, 2023 

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Virgin Galactic announced Thursday that monthly commercial flights to the edge of space will begin for ticket-holders in August, following a research flight planned for the end of June.

The space tourism company will be taking up a team of specialists with the Italian Air Force and the National Research Centre of Italy to conduct microgravity research. The window for that research flight will begin June 27 and span the next three days, with timing depending on the weather.

After that, those who have been waiting more than a decade for their ride aboard Virgin Galactic’s rocket-powered space plane are expected to get their chance. The company said the first of those flights will begin in early August, with monthly flights following that.

“This next exciting chapter for Virgin Galactic has been driven by innovation, determination and a commitment to delivering an unparalleled and truly transformative customer experience,” CEO Michael Colglazier said in a statement.

Virgin Galactic has been working for years to send paying passengers on short space trips and in 2021 finally won the federal government’s approval. The company completed its final test fight in May.

After reaching an altitude of nearly 50,000 feet (15,000 meters), Virgin Galactic’s space plane is released from a carrier aircraft and drops for a moment before igniting its rocket motor. The plane shuts off once it reaches space, providing passengers with silence, weightlessness and an aerial view of Earth. The rocket ship then glides back to the runway at Spaceport America in the New Mexico desert.

Virgin Galactic has sold about 800 tickets over the past decade, with the initial batch going for $200,000 each. Tickets now cost $450,000 per person.

The company said early fliers have already received their seat assignments.

The highest profile test flight came in July 2021 when Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson beat fellow billionaire and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and rocket company Blue Origin into space. Bezos ended up flying nine days later from West Texas, and Blue Origin has since launched several passenger trips.

Russian general who knew about Wagner rebellion goes missing: Report

The well-known association between General Sergei Surovikin and Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin has fueled speculation that Surovikin may face repercussions, including potential investigation, for his alleged support of the mutiny.

India Today World Desk
New Delhi,

UPDATED: Jun 29, 2023 

Gen Sergei Surovikin currently serves as the head of the Russian aerospace forces and had previously held the position of Moscow's supreme commander in Ukraine. (Reuters photo)

 The whereabouts of a top Russian military general have been unknown to the public since Saturday, sparking speculation regarding his involvement in the recent mutiny by mercenary group Wagner. According to reports from US intelligence sources, it is alleged that General Sergei Surovikin, a former leader of the Russian invasion force in Ukraine, had prior knowledge of the uprising led by Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Gen Sergei Surovikin currently serves as the head of the Russian aerospace forces and had previously held the position of Moscow's supreme commander in Ukraine. In 2022, Prigozhin publicly welcomed Surovikin's appointment, referring to him as a "legendary figure" and one who was "born to serve his motherland."

The well-known association between Surovikin and Prigozhin has fueled speculation that Surovikin may face repercussions, including potential investigation, for his alleged support of the mutiny. However, in a statement late on Friday, Surovikin unequivocally denounced the uprising and expressed support for the Russian government, urging the mutineers to cease their actions.

“We fought together with you, took risks, we won together,” Surovikin was quoted by The Guardian as saying. “We are of the same blood, we are warriors. I urge you to stop. The enemy is just waiting for the internal political situation to escalate in our country.”

Russia holds General Sergei Surovikin over Wagner mutiny: Reports

The Moscow Times Russian-language service and a military blogger reported Surovikin’s arrest over links to the Wagner mercenary force uprising.

Russia's General Sergei Surovikin attends a meeting with President Vladimir Putin in Sochi, Russia, 2021 [File: Sputnik/Mikhail Metzel/pool via Reuters]

Published On 29 Jun 2023

Russian authorities have reportedly detained General Sergei Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, amid a reported purge of military officials following the short-lived rebellion by Wagner mercenary forces, according to sources cited by the Moscow Times newspaper and a Russian military blogger.

Surovikin, nicknamed “General Armageddon” by the Russian media for his reputed ruthlessness, is a veteran of Russia’s wars in Chechnya and Syria who has been decorated by Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Citing two sources close to Russia’s Defence Ministry, the Russian-language service of The Moscow Times reported on Wednesday that Surovikin was arrested due to what one of the unnamed sources said was choosing Wagner chief Yevgeny “Prigozhin’s side during the uprising”.

A Russian military blogger, Vladimir Romanov, also reported Surovikin’s arrest on Wednesday, according to the Moscow Times, while the Washington, DC-based think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW) reported another Russian source as claiming that military “affiliates” of Surovikin had been “accused of complicity in the rebellion”.

Russia’s Defence Ministry has yet to comment on the reports of Surovikin’s detention, the newspaper said.

The ISW reported on Wednesday that a prominent Russian military blogging site had claimed that a “large-scale purge” of the Russian military command was under way following the attempt by Wagner forces to enter Moscow and apprehend the country’s senior military leaders.

Russia’s Ministry of Defence is undergoing what Rybar, a pro-Kremlin military analysis channel on Telegram, described as a “crash test” for loyalty amid apparent “indecisiveness” by some in the Russian military command when it came to crushing the Wagner mutiny and their “support” for the private mercenary force, the ISW reported.

Rybar said the uprising by the Wagner force had “become a pretext for a massive purge in the ranks of the Russian Armed Forces”.

“If Russian authorities did arrest Surovikin then the Kremlin will likely use Surovikin and his affiliates as scapegoats to publicly explain why the Russian military and Russian internal security apparatuses responded poorly to the rebellion and to justify a potential overhaul of the Russian military leadership,” the ISW wrote.

“ISW cannot confirm any of these speculations about the command changes at this time, but it is evident that the armed rebellion is continuing to have substantial ramifications in the information space.”

‘A lot of speculation’: Peskov

The Reuters news agency cited three United States officials on Wednesday as saying that Surovikin was known to be sympathetic to the Wagner rebellion but it was unclear if he actively supported it.

Surovikin had been in support of Prigozhin but Western intelligence did not know with certainty if he had helped the rebellion in any way. As the uprising unfolded, he had publicly urged Wagner fighters to return to their bases on Saturday, Reuters reported.

The New York Times also reported that Surovikin had advance knowledge that Prigozhin was planning a rebellion and that Russian authorities were checking if he was complicit

Putin addresses Wagner fighters after mutiny

The Kremlin, asked on Wednesday about the Times report, said there would be “a lot of speculation” in the aftermath of the Wagner mutiny, which saw mercenaries reportedly come to within 200km (124 miles) of Moscow.

“There is now a lot of different speculation and gossip surrounding these events,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday, according to Russian news agencies.

“I think that’s an example of that,” he said, dismissing the Times report.

The Russian army and the people “all stood by the President (Vladimir Putin) during the uprising”, Peskov added.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko confirmed on Tuesday that the Wagner boss, Prigozhin, had arrived in the country as part of a deal he brokered and which narrowly prevented Wagner mercenaries from marching into Moscow. Wagner fighters have been offered an abandoned military site where they can “put their tents while thinking what to do next”, Lukashenko said.

Putin weakened

Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Wednesday the failed mutiny had weakened Putin but it was unclear if it would make the Kremlin any more likely to withdraw its troops from Ukraine.

“I do believe he is weakened as this shows that the autocratic power structures have cracks in them and he is not as firmly in the saddle as he always asserts,” Scholz said in an hour-long interview with German broadcaster ARD.

Scholz said he did not want to participate in speculation about how long Putin would likely remain in office, saying the West’s aim in supporting Ukraine was to help it defend itself, not to bring about regime change in Russia.


‘All bets are off’: An uncertain future after Wagner mutiny

Asked if at any point on Saturday he had hoped the insurrection by the Wagner mercenaries was the end of Putin’s rule, he said it would have made no sense as it was unclear if what would come after Putin would be better.

“The Wagner troops are a military unit that is acting very aggressively all over the world, and very concretely also in Russia’s war against Ukraine,” Scholz said.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

Top Russia generals disappear from public view amid rumors of arrests after mutiny


Fighters of Wagner private mercenary group walk along a street while being deployed near the headquarters of the Southern Military District in the city of Rostov-on-Don, Russia, on June 24, 2023. (Reuters)


Reuters
Published: 29 June ,2023

Russia’s most senior generals have dropped out of public view following a failed mercenary mutiny aimed at toppling the top brass, amid a drive by President Vladimir Putin to reassert his authority.

Unconfirmed reports say at least one person has been arrested.

Armed forces chief of staff General Valery Gerasimov has not appeared in public or on state TV since the aborted mutiny on Saturday when mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin demanded Gerasimov be handed over. Nor has he been mentioned in a defense ministry press release since June 9.

Gerasimov, 67, is the commander of Russia’s war in Ukraine, and the holder of one of Russia’s three “nuclear briefcases,” according to some Western military analysts.

Absent from view too is General Sergei Surovikin, nicknamed “General Armageddon” by the Russian press for his aggressive
tactics in the Syrian conflict, who is deputy commander of Russian forces in Ukraine.

A New York Times report, based on a US intelligence briefing, said on Tuesday he had advance knowledge of the mutiny and that Russian authorities were checking if he was complicit.

The Kremlin on Wednesday played down the report, saying that there would be a lot of speculation and gossip.

US officials told Reuters on Wednesday that Surovikin had been in support of Prigozhin, but that Western intelligence did not know with certainty if he had helped the rebellion in any way.

The Russian-language version of the Moscow Times and one military blogger reported Surovikin’s arrest, while some other military correspondents who command large followings in Russia said he and other senior officers were being questioned by the FSB security service to verify their loyalty.

Reuters could not determine whether Surovikin had been arrested or was being screened, along with others, for their reliability in a more standard exercise.

Rybar, an influential channel on the Telegram messaging application run by a former Russian defense ministry press officer, said a purge was underway.

He said the authorities were trying to weed out military personnel deemed to have shown “a lack of decisiveness” in putting down the mutiny amid some reports that parts of the armed forces appear to have done little to stop Wagner fighters in the initial stage of the rebellion.

“The armed insurgency by the Wagner private military company has become a pretext for a massive purge in the ranks of the Russian Armed Forces,” Rybar said.

Such a move, if confirmed, could alter the way Russia wages its war in Ukraine — which it calls a “special military operation” — and cause turmoil in the ranks at a time when Moscow is trying to thwart a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

It could also cement or elevate the positions of other senior military and security figures regarded as loyal.

There was no official comment on what was going on from the defense ministry.

Winners and losers

Some Russian and Western military and political analysts believe Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, a veteran Putin ally who Prigozhin wanted to bring down with Gerasimov because of his alleged incompetence, may actually now be safer in his job.

“I think he (Prigozhin) actually expected something would be done about Shoigu and Gerasimov, that Putin would rule in his favor,” Michael Kofman, a Russian military specialist at the Carnegie Endowment think tank, wrote on Twitter.

“Instead, his mutiny may have ensured their continued tenure, despite being universally recognized as incompetent, and widely detested in the Russian Federation’s armed forces.”

General Viktor Zolotov, head of the National Guard and once Putin’s bodyguard, appears to be another beneficiary after appearing in public to say his men were ready to “stand to the death” to defend Moscow from Wagner.

He has spoken of the possibility of getting heavy weaponry and tanks for his forces in the wake of the mutiny.

Gerasimov was conspicuous by his absence when Putin on Tuesday thanked the army for averting a civil war, unlike Shoigu who has made several public appearances since.

Surovikin, Gerasimov’s deputy, was last seen on Saturday when he appeared in a video appealing to Prigozhin to halt his mutiny. He looked exhausted and it was unclear if he was speaking under duress.

Dara Massicot, an expert in the Russian military at the RAND Corporation think tank, said that something looked odd about the video, in which Surovikin has an automatic weapon on his lap.

“I noted a few days ago, there was something very off here. He’s not wearing his insignia or rank tabs. 30+ years in the military and he’s not got them on, even at night? Nope,” she wrote on Twitter.

There were unconfirmed Russian media and blogger reports on Wednesday evening that Surovikin was being held in Moscow’s

Lefortovo detention facility after being arrested.

Alexei Venediktov, a well-connected journalist, said - without citing his sources - that Surovikin had not been in touch with his family since Saturday and that his bodyguards had gone silent too.

Prigozhin, who had spent months vilifying Shoigu and Gerasimov for their alleged incompetence in the Ukraine war, had frequently praised Surovikin who is widely respected in the army for his experience in Chechnya and Syria.

Surovikin, who did a stint as overall commander of the Ukraine war before Gerasimov was appointed to take over, is regarded by Western military analysts as an effective operator and had sometimes been mooted by Russian war correspondents as a potential future defense minister.

Lawrence Freedman, Emeritus Professor of War Studies at King’s College London, said Surovikin’s removal, if true, could be more destabilizing to Russia’s war effort than Saturday’s mutiny “especially if other associates of Prigozhin/Surovikin start to get purged.”

“Surovikin (is) a brute but also one of the more capable Russian commanders,” Freedman said on Twitter.

Study: Living Near Green Space Makes You 2.5 Years Younger

June 28, 2023 
Agence France-Presse

A woman walks across a bridge at a public park in Beijing, June 7, 2022.

WASHINGTON - City parks and green spaces help counter heat, boost biodiversity and instill a sense of calm in the urban jungle - and they also help slow biological aging, a study found.

People who have access to green spaces were found to be on average 2.5 years biologically younger than those who do not, according to the study, published Wednesday in Science Advances.

"Living near more greenness can help you be younger than your actual age," Kyeezu Kim, the study's lead author and a postdoctoral scholar at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, told AFP.

"We believe our findings have significant implications for urban planning in terms of expanding green infrastructure to promote public health and reduce health disparities."

Exposure to green spaces has previously been linked with better cardiovascular health and lower rates of mortality.

A visitor is pictured at The Walk food courtyard, a space designed with green spaces and artificial water bodies to help filter out polluted air, in New Delhi, Feb. 6, 2019.

It's thought that more physical activity and social interactions are at play, but whether parks actually slowed down aging on a cellular level has been unclear.

To investigate, the team behind the study examined DNA chemical modifications known as methylation.

Prior work has shown that so-called epigenetic clocks based on DNA methylation can be a good predictor of health conditions such as cardiovascular disease, cancer and cognitive function, and are a more accurate way of measuring age than calendar years.

Kim and colleagues followed more than 900 white and Black people from four American cities — Birmingham, Alabama; Chicago; Minneapolis; and Oakland, California — from 1986 to 2006.

Using satellite imaging, the team assessed how close the participants' residential addresses were to surrounding vegetation and parks. It then paired this data with blood samples taken in years 15 and 20 of the study, to determine their biological age.

The team constructed statistical models to evaluate the results and control for other variables such as education, income and behavioral factors, like smoking, that might have affected the results.

They found that people whose homes were surrounded by 30% green cover within a 5-kilometer (3-mile) radius were on average 2.5 years younger biologically compared with those whose homes were surrounded by 20% green cover.

The benefits were not evenly shared. Black people with more access to green space were only one year biologically younger, while white people were three years younger.

"Other factors, such as stress, qualities of the surrounding green space, and other social support, can affect the degree of benefits of green spaces in terms of biological aging," said Kim, adding that the disparities required further study.

For example, in deprived neighborhoods, parks used for illicit activities might be less frequented, negating the benefits.

Next steps might involve investigating the link between green spaces and specific health outcomes, she added. It's also not yet clear how exactly greenery reduces aging, only that it does, she said.

Epidemiologist Manuel Franco of Spain's University of Alcala and Johns Hopkins University called the research a "well-designed study."

"We have more and better scientific evidence to increase and promote the use of urban green spaces," said Franco, who was not involved in the study.

Volunteers plant native plants to promote green urban spaces, in Green Park, London, on May 8. | REUTERS

Explainer | What to know about Japan’s plan to release treated radioactive water from Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea

The plan to dump treated radioactive waste water from a nuclear plant into the sea has stirred debates in South Korea, and led to boycotts of Japanese goods in China

Japanese fishermen, whose livelihoods could be severely impacted, have also vehemently opposed the waste water disposal plan


Amy Sood

SCMP
29 Jun, 2023

Environmental activists denounce the Japanese government’s plan to start releasing treated radioactive water from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean. Photo: AP

As Japan prepares to release treated radioactive waste water from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea, opposition to the controversial plan continues to simmer across the region.

The country’s nuclear regulator on Wednesday began a final inspection of the water which is currently stored in about 1,000 huge tanks. It will be filtered and diluted before being released through an underwater tunnel that stretches one kilometre into the ocean.

But while Tokyo has sought to do its due diligence – seeking approval from its domestic nuclear regulator and ensuring the water meets international safety standards – the venture continues to spark controversy.

A Greenpeace statement expressed concerns that the released radioactivity could alter human DNA, and Pacific Island nations have stated their worries that the move could contribute to nuclear contamination of the Blue Pacific.

The matter has also stirred debates in South Korea, and led to a consumer boycott of Japanese cosmetics in China.

Why the worry over Japan’s nuclear waste plan? France has done it ‘for decades’
21 Mar 2023

In Hong Kong, Secretary for Environment and Ecology Tse Chin-wan said on Wednesday that if the discharge went ahead as planned, the city would immediately prohibit the import of aquatic products from the coastal prefectures in proximity to Fukushima and impose “stringent import control” on other such goods from elsewhere in Japan.

Local fishing communities in Fukushima are still suffering from bans on their produce, and many oppose the plan fearing reputational damage bringing financial losses to their business.

But the Japanese government maintains the water is safe, and is hoping to get a green light from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is set to release its final report on the safety of the Fukushima plan soon.

The United Nations and nuclear experts in Japan have also said the treated waste water poses no threat.

The science

A massive earthquake and tsunami that hit the Japanese coast in 2011 melted down three reactors at the Fukushima plant and killed thousands of people.

Twelve years later, the damaged reactor cores still need to be cooled with water. But space to store this liquid is running out.

According to Associated Press, the tanks containing the treated water will reach their capacity in 2024. Last month, the storage tanks reached 97 per cent capacity, prompting Japan to move ahead with its plan to filter, treat and dilute the contaminated water before discharging it into the Pacific Ocean this summer.

Under the plan spearheaded by the nuclear plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), more than 1.3 million tons of water will be gradually released over two to three decades.

That proposal, as well as the safety of the treated water, has been questioned. Liu Guangyuan, the Commissioner of China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong has argued that if the water is truly safe, it should be released off the coast of Japan rather than building a seabed tunnel to discharge it into the ocean.

I think there is an understandable perception that all radioactive materials are dangerous, particularly radioactive and liquid waste, but this is not the caseTony Irwin, nuclear engineer

The water is being treated on-site to remove most of its radioactive materials, but will still contain trace levels of tritium – a radioactive form of hydrogen that is difficult to separate from water. Scientists say there is no viable technology to remove the negligible concentrations of tritium from this volume of water.

“I think there is an understandable perception that all radioactive materials are dangerous, particularly radioactive and liquid waste, but this is not the case,” said Tony Irwin, an honorary associate professor at the Australian National University’s nuclear physics department.

Irwin pointed out that Japan is meeting international standards for safe levels of tritium, and is in fact choosing a conservative limit to release over a fairly long stretch of time.

‘I would be willing’: South Korean PM offers to drink treated Fukushima water
14 Jun 2023

“The Fukushima water discharge is not a unique event or without precedent, because nuclear power plants worldwide have been routinely discharging water containing tritium for over 60 years without harm to people or the environment.

“And in most of these cases, there is tritium at higher levels than what is planned with Fukushima,” he added.

Experts believe the real danger could be the continued storage of contaminated water in the event of a spill from another natural disaster or human error.

Tanks containing water from the disabled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant. Photo: Reuters

Fishing communities


However, there are still concerns that certain dangerous radionuclides – like cobalt and strontium – might slip through the filtering and water treatment process. Many scientists and environmentalists have also said there is a lack of knowledge about the long-term effects of exposure to even low doses of tritium.

To this point – Irwin asserted that the independent inspection by the IAEA provides confidence that only water with safe levels of tritium will be discharged.

“Samples of the water were tested by Tepco and seven other independent labs [globally], and the results showed a high level of agreement that there was no additional radioactive nuclides at significant levels at all,” he said.

Japan must also continually monitor the water quality once it has been discharged into the sea, and invite independent bodies and scientists to do so too, experts added.

But Japanese fishermen – whose livelihoods could be severely impacted – have vehemently opposed the waste water disposal plan.

A member of an environmental group places signs symbolising the Fukushima nuclear disaster during a rally against Japan’s disposal of radioactive water, outside the Japanese embassy in Seoul, South Korea. Photo: EPA-EFE


The industry’s reputation suffered greatly following the 2011 nuclear disaster, when dozens of countries banned imports of produce from Fukushima and other nearby prefectures. The United States and the European Union only eased their restrictions in 2021.

“We cannot support the government’s stance that an ocean release is the only solution,” said Masanobu Sakamoto, president of JF Zengyoren, or the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives, according to the Associated Press.

“Whether to release the water into the sea or not is a government decision, and in that case we want the government to fully take responsibility,” he added.

Tokyo has said that it will set up a fund to promote Fukushima seafood and provide compensation to fishermen in case sales fall due to safety concerns.

South Korean lawmaker challenges Japan officials to drink Fukushima water
16 May 2023

Diplomatic dilemmas

The issue has become a hot topic in the parliament of South Korea, Japan’s neighbour separated only by a body of water.

The country’s main opposition, the Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) is seeking collective action with Pacific nations against the Japanese plan, but the government is seeking a more diplomatic approach – urging the public and the opposition to await the results of safety reviews.

The political divide comes as no surprise as South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has been trying to mend the country’s historically troubled relationship with Japan to deepen military ties.

In May, a 21-member South Korean delegation was welcomed by Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to visit the Fukushima plant to examine safety concerns.

Like in Japan, members of the ruling party are also making efforts to alleviate public concerns about produce safety in South Korea, visiting seafood markets and vowing to support businesses who fear a drop in sales.

Activists gather in Seoul to protest against a planned release of water from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant. Photo: AFP

Opposition lawmakers, however, maintain that the ruling party is prioritising diplomatic relations over public safety.

In China, viral social media campaigns are spreading on Weibo and Chinese lifestyle platform Xiaohongshu, with users listing Japanese brands and questioning their safety.

Major Japanese cosmetic company Shiseido saw its largest weekly stock plunge in nearly 10 months, and a 6.8 per cent drop in its shares, according to Bloomberg.

But some observers suggest this might be a short-lived phenomenon.

“I don’t think there will be a huge material impact in the long-term,” said Jeanie Chen, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar in Japan.

The outcry on social media might have some immediate impact on the sales of Japanese goods, but unless the Chinese government makes a strong line or bans the products, it will not be substantial, she added.

Additional reporting by the Associated Press

Is gun violence an epidemic in the U.S.? Experts and history say it is

June 29, 2023
By  Destinee Adams

NPR

KRISTON JAE BETHEL/AFP via Getty Images

Six months into the year, more than 21,000 people have died because of gun-related injuries in the United States.

Doctors and public health officials have a word to describe the rising number of people killed or hurt by guns in recent years: epidemic.

"I would certainly consider the problem of firearm injuries and firearm violence as an epidemic in the United States," said Patrick Carter, director of the University of Michigan Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention, whose research is partly funded by the National Institutes of Health.

"When we think about what the term epidemic means, it means a sudden increase in the numbers, or incidents, of an event over what would be considered a baseline level," Carter told Morning Edition.

Since the mid-2000s, the United States has seen year-after-year increases in the number of deaths and injuries from guns "that would mirror what we would consider to be a sudden increase consistent with an epidemic," Carter said.



HEALTH
Firearms overtook auto accidents as the leading cause of death in children

The "epidemic" label and what it means

For those charged with protecting public health in the United States, like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an epidemic is defined as a sudden outbreak or an unexpected spike in an illness in a single country or area. Because COVID-19 spread around the world, it was considered a pandemic.

The label — which has been applied to infectious diseases as well as things like opioid addiction — creates a sense of emergency or crisis.

The top public health official in the country, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, has long called the deaths and injuries from firearms an "epidemic."

"Whenever you have a large number of people dying from preventable reasons that constitutes a public health crisis," he told NPR's Here and Now in January. "And that has been the case for gun violence, sadly, in our country for a long time."

President Biden has also referred to the increase in gun violence in the United States as a "gun violence epidemic" several times, including on National Gun Violence Awareness Day.

So have doctors and health researchers.

The UCLA Center for Health Policy Research held a symposium in February titled "Addressing Gun Violence as a Public Health Epidemic."
Sponsor Message

Experts at the symposium took an approach reminiscent of how health officials approach epidemics of disease. They discussed "expanding our lens beyond prosecuting gun crime to prevention, harm reduction and even culture-shifting."

Gun deaths increased by 23 percent, from 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic, to 2021, according to Pew Research Center.

HEALTH
Gun deaths hit their highest level ever in 2021, with 1 person dead every 11 minutes

The number of gun deaths in 2021, 48,830, was the largest on record, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The level of violence "most definitely is a public health emergency," said Daniel Webster, an American health professor and director of the Center for Gun Violence Prevention and Policy at Johns Hopkins.

Should gun violence be framed as an illness — using terms like epidemic?

"It is a leading cause of death for large segments of the population, including young people," he said. "And it also has enormous impacts beyond fatalities that really affect mental health and well-being, even for those who are not directly shot."

Students from Philadelphia hold photos of gun violence victims at a rally at the Pennsylvania Capitol pressing for stronger gun-control laws, March 23, 2023, in Harrisburg, Pa.

Marc Levy/AP

Numbers still high in 2023

Gun violence appeared to slightly ebb last year as the COVID-19 pandemic subsided. The final number of gun-related deaths in 2022 is still being tallied as places like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pull together numbers on suicides. There were an estimated 20,138 firearm deaths, excluding suicides, according to The Trace.

But gun violence continues to shake American life this year, especially during holidays when people are in large gatherings. There have been more than 300 mass shootings this year. And half of gun-related deaths this year were suicides.

Chicago was struck by gun violence over the Juneteenth and Memorial Day weekends, which both turned out to be some of the deadliest spans the city has seen in years, Sophie Sherry, Chicago Sun Times reporter, told Morning Edition.

Over the Juneteenth weekend 75 people were shot in the city and 13 people died.

"What the count is right now would be the most people shot in a single week," Sherry said on the Tuesday after Juneteenth. "Memorial Day weekend was also one of the most violent since 2016 with 61 people shot here in the city. But unfortunately, obviously, this past weekend, we saw far more shootings than that."

Over the same weekend, four people were shot in an apartment complex behind a church in Kellogg, Idaho; they all died from gunshot wounds. There were also mass shootings in California, Maryland, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Washington state and Wisconsin.

NATIONAL
Multiple mass shootings leave dead and injured across the U.S. during holiday weekend

The United States has been here, or close to it, before.

There were 14.6 gun deaths per 100,000 people in 2021, which is the highest rate since the early 1990s, and just below the historic peak of 16.3 deaths per 100,000 people in 1974, according to Pew Research.

In the 1990s, the rise of gun deaths were also referred to as an epidemic by the National Institutes of Health.

In 1993, gun manufacturers increased the production of guns priced at $100 or less, while the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms slacked off, according to "The Role of Supply in 1980s and 1990s Youth Violence." That year murders, with weapons such as guns, arson and poison, reached its highest point on record at the time.

The next year, the federal government doubled ATF law enforcement funding from $2 million to $4 million, which reinforced the Brady Background Check and reduced gun purchases, according to The Trace. As the 1990s unfolded, cheap gun manufacturers went out of business because of liability lawsuits, and gun suicide and murder rates decreased.

Taking the public health approach

"It is a public health issue. It mirrors every other public health issue that we've had in this country," Carter said. "Like any other public health problem, it is possible to solve with data-driven solutions."

Surgeon General Murthy said that viewing gun violence as a public health emergency will lead to more insight and data on the causes of violence and possible ways to curb it. Still, he's resisting a push from the California Medical Association to publish a Surgeon General's report on the hazards of gun violence similar to the major 1964 report on the dangers of smoking.

After declaring gun violence a "public health crisis" in 2016, the American Medical Association has regularly put forward ways to help bring down the number of deaths and injuries.

Most recently, in early June, it officially called for strengthening background checks and limiting the sale of multiple firearms. This allows more doctors to petition courts for protective orders for patients at risk of gun violence, and pushes social media companies to remove posts "glorifying firearm violence."

Meanwhile, Webster says establishing purchaser licensing requirements reduces gun-related homicides, suicides and mass shootings.

He also suggests community violence intervention programs in low-income communities. These programs put individuals with "street credibility" in positions to promote non-violent alternatives to conflict.

Carter says identifying gun violence as an epidemic is just a step in the right direction to addressing the fatal problem in America, because it leads to thinking about how to use scientific and public health resources "toward addressing all facets of the problem."

"I think it is an important label. But I don't think it's sufficient to address the problem," Carter said.

Lisa Lambert edited this digital story.

Philippines court disbars Marcos adviser over ‘misogynistic’ outburst

June 29, 2023

MANILA (AFP) – The Philippines Supreme Court said yesterday it has stripped a new adviser to President Ferdinand Marcos of the right to practise law over a “misogynistic” outburst against a journalist.

Marcos appointed lawyer Lorenzo Gadon as his adviser on poverty alleviation on Monday, highlighting his “legal expertise and extensive experience in various industries”.

The Supreme Court voted unanimously the next day to disbar Gadon over his “misogynistic, sexist, abusive and repeated intemperate language”, the court’s public information office said in a statement yesterday.

However, Marcos’s top aide, Lucas Bersamin, said Gadon would remain in his position and the president “believes he will do a good job”.

The court cited a viral video in which Gadon “repeatedly cursed and uttered profane remarks” against a woman journalist before last year’s election, which it described as “indisputably scandalous”.

“The court pointed out that Gadon unfortunately failed to realise that lawyers are expected to avoid scandalous behaviour, whether in their public or private life,” the public information office said.

Gadon, who backed Marcos’s bid for the presidency but failed in his own attempt to win a Senate seat, was previously convicted and suspended from practising law for three months for using “offensive and intemperate language”, and faced 10 other administrative cases, the statement said.

“Although these cases have yet to be decided, the volume of administrative complaints filed against Atty. Gadon indubitably speaks of his character,” it said.

Gadon said in a statement posted on Facebook he would appeal against the decision because the penalty was “too harsh”.

He claimed the reporter had been “blatantly spreading lies” against Marcos during the 2022 election campaign.

The left-wing Akbayan Party described Gadon as a “buffoon” and called on Marcos to rescind his appointment.

After being appointed to new presidential adviser role, Larry Gadon disbarred by the Supreme Court

By Coconuts Manila

Jun 29, 2023 | 2:17pm Manila time

The Supreme Court unanimously disbarred Larry Gadon just after he was newly appointed as the Presidential Adviser for Poverty Alleviation. The decision comes after a viral video showed Gadon using derogatory language and hurling expletives against journalist Raissa Robles.

In a statement released on Wednesday, the high court condemned Gadon’s “misogynistic, sexist, abusive, and repetitive intemperate language” towards Robles, deeming the video indisputably scandalous and discrediting to the legal profession.

Additionally, the Supreme Court found Gadon in direct contempt of court for making baseless allegations of partiality and bias against Senior Associate Justice Marvic Leonen and Associate Justice Alfredo Benjamin Caguioa.

It is worth noting that Gadon had previously faced suspension from practicing law due to his use of offensive and intemperate language.

The Supreme Court emphasized that the legal profession is reserved for individuals who possess intellectual, academic, and moral competence. They stated that there is no place for misogyny and sexism in this noble profession, affirming their zero-tolerance policy towards any form of abuse, particularly when committed by an officer of the court.

In response to the Supreme Court’s decision, Gadon expressed his intention to file a motion for reconsideration, believing the ruling to be excessively harsh given the alleged cause. He also asserted that his disbarment will not impact his new role in the Marcos administration, emphasizing that his appointment does not require the practice of law.

Gadon further clarified that he had ceased practicing law since 2015.

After foul-mouthed remarks against journalist Raissa Robles, Supreme Court suspends Larry Gadon
The highest court of the land said that it was acting motu proprio or “on its own.” 

Read more.

Chinese spy balloon used US tech to spy on Americans: Report

Analysis from several US defense and intelligence agencies, found that the balloon carried commercially available US gear, along with more specialized Chinese sensors and other equipment to collect photographs, video and other information to transmit to China, the Wall Street Journal said, citing US officials.

Reuters
UPDATED: Jun 29, 2023 

The findings support a conclusion that the craft was intended for spying, and not for weather monitoring as China had claimed. (Reuters photo)

By Reuters: The Chinese spy balloon that passed over the US early this year used American technology that helped it collect audio-visual information, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing preliminary findings from a closely held investigation.

Analysis from several US defense and intelligence agencies, found that the balloon carried commercially available US gear, along with more specialized Chinese sensors and other equipment to collect photographs, video and other information to transmit to China, the WSJ said, citing US officials.

The findings support a conclusion that the craft was intended for spying, and not for weather monitoring as China had claimed, the report said.
But the balloon did not seem to send data from its eight-day passage over Alaska, Canada and some other contiguous US states back to China, WSJ said.

The White House and the Federal Bureau of Investigation did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In February, the US shot down the balloon, which had flown over sensitive military sites, sparking a diplomatic crisis.

THE IMPERIAL DAIQUIRI

A Brief History of American Empire in One Cocktail

Ian Seavey | Jun 14, 2023

Rum, lime, and sugar. On their own, each of these ingredients have marked important developments throughout human history. When shaken together, they create a refreshing, translucent elixir enjoyed by Ernest Hemingway, John F. Kennedy, Facundo Bacardi, and Fidel Castro. While people have crudely mixed rum with lime and sugar since European colonization, the daiquiri rose to prominence as a direct result of the American imperial project in the Caribbean during the burgeoning classic cocktail age from 1860 to 1920. More so than the Cuba Libre (rum, Coca-Cola, and lime), the daiquiri has endured as a cultural touchstone, connecting people downing the frozen variety on Bourbon Street in New Orleans with those sipping a classic one in Havana.

The daiquiri is a product of the history of empire in the Caribbean. Ian Seavey

Delicate yet bold, versions of the daiquiri are found in various cocktail books of the 1910s, but the most widely circulated was in Hugo Ensslin’s iconic 1916 tome, Recipes for Mixed Drinks. Ensslin, a German immigrant and New York bartender, initially referred to the drink as the Cuban cocktail, but subsequent editions called it the daiquiri. While Ensslin was correct about the daiquiri originating in Cuba, its origins are more muddled. Since there is no such thing as a cocktail archive, the colorful and often fictitious tales about the drink’s creation have mostly survived through oral histories and recipe books.

The most widely accepted story claims that Jennings Cox, an American engineer, created the drink around 1898, after the American invasion of Cuba during the War of 1898. Cox managed mines around the town of Daiquirí and with the workday complete, he invited a friend over for a drink to escape the scorching heat. Cox combined the local Cuban rum (most likely Bacardi), with lime, sugar, and ice in a cocktail shaker and gave it a forceful shake. His guest was enthralled with the drink and asked what it was called. Surprised, Cox admitted the potion had not yet been named but thought it resembled something close to a rum sour. His guest scoffed at the underwhelming tone of “rum sour” and instead suggested calling it a “daiquiri” for the town where they worked. Thus, the daiquiri was born. 

Jennings Cox admitted the potion had not yet been named but thought it resembled something close to a rum sour.

Alternative accounts profess that Cox’s guest was actually Facundo Bacardi, the patriarch and creator of Bacardi rum. Bacardi began distilling rum in his hometown of Santiago de Cuba in 1862. Seeking a clearer and more drinkable rum, he discovered a new way to filter the spirit through charcoal. This process revolutionized a stagnant industry of whom pirates, paupers, and slaves were thought to be the primary consumers. Bacardi’s light rum became the standard for Cuban rum—versatile enough to sip neat while also working well in a mixed drink.

During the Spanish-American War, American soldiers quickly developed a taste for Bacardi rum and subsequently daiquiris. As with many other histories of US empire, the military was responsible for transplanting parts of local culture, in this case drink, back to the mainland. It took about 10 years for the daiquiri to catch on in the United States, but by 1909, the Army Navy Club in downtown Washington, DC, had been renamed the Daiquiri Lounge. This solidified the daiquiri as a proper American cocktail despite relying on distinctly Cuban ingredients.

A decade later, after the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act outlawed the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors, thirsty Americans turned toward their Caribbean empire to find a legal drink. With Prohibition virtually unenforceable in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands, the colonies saw a wave of new tourism, bringing with it economic and environmental exploitation. Absentee American sugar companies bought up land and often abused local populations in those islands to produce sugar, rum, and other commodities cheaply. 

Some colonial tipplers like Ernest Hemingway decided to emigrate and rode out Prohibition one daiquiri at a time. Constantino Ribalaigua Vert owned and operated Hemingway’s favorite bar, El Floridita, in Havana, Cuba. Dubbed the dean of Cuban bartenders, Vert popularized the frozen daiquiri. After shaking the components with cubed ice in a cocktail shaker, he strained the mixture over a mound of crushed ice, instead of serving it up (with no ice) as most recipes called for. Vert’s frozen daiquiri quenched the thirst of numerous local Cubans and American tourists. Hemingway was known to down 7 to 10 of them after he finished writing for the day. His writing and cult of personality increased the drink’s popularity among Americans throughout the 1930s and 1940s.

World War II hampered rum production in the Caribbean with German U-boats threatening transatlantic commerce. After the war, rum production grew exponentially, but many Cubans were increasingly dissatisfied with Americans’ continued exploitation of the local population. When Fidel Castro ushered in the Cuban Revolution in 1959, he sought to nationalize the rum industry to increase the legitimacy of his government. Bacardi rum had historically been one of the most profitable Cuban businesses, but the family detested Castro’s revolution. Declared traitors for supporting the previous US-backed dictator, Fulgencio Batista, the Bacardi family abandoned the distilleries and their equipment in Cuba and fled to Puerto Rico in 1961 to continue operations. A once proudly Cuban company, Bacardi still manufactures all its rum outside of Cuba today.

This new, distinctly American version of the daiquiri has little in common with Vert’s original concoction.

The daiquiri too became a casualty of the Cold War. As relations with Cuba soured in the late 50s and early 60s, Americans created a new version of the drink that eliminated the nuance of the original cocktail, part of a more general trend towards American consumers eating and drinking more easily accessible processed foods. The daiquiri fell victim to this trend as many bars and restaurants began serving frozen premade mixes that included a number of cloyingly sweet syrups. This new, distinctly American version of the daiquiri has little in common with Vert’s original concoction and virtually all remembrance of the elegant, Cuban-created drink faded from American popular memory. A resurgence of cocktail culture in the 1990s, spearheaded by American bartender Dale DeGroff, ushered in the daiquiri’s comeback. Ultimately, the daiquiri is a part of the enduring cultural legacy of American imperialism in the Caribbean, enjoyed by tourists and locals alike. 

So, the next time you want to quench your thirst on a hot day, make a daiquiri or two. But remember its history. Cheers/salud!

RECIPE

Daiquiri

2oz light rum
3/4 oz lime juice
1/2 oz of sugar or simple syrup

Mix all components in a cocktail shaker with cubed or crushed ice and shake vigorously for 10-15 seconds or until ice cold. Strain into a chilled coupe or cocktail glass and garnish with a lime wheel.

 

Editor’s Note: This article originally misidentified Hugo Ensslin’s Recipes for Mixed Drinks (1916) as the first mention of the daiquiri.

---

Ian Seavey is a history PhD candidate at Texas A&M University. He tweets @HurricaneSeavey.

CRYPTO CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

The Second FTX Asset Recovery Report Is Packed With Bombshells

David Z. Morris
Tue, June 27, 2023


The second report of John J. Ray III and his FTX restructuring team (the “debtors”) was released on Monday, June 26, and it’s a doozy. The report firms up our sense of specific financial flows, including the use of customer funds for political donations and venture capital investments at defunct crypto exchange FTX and related hedge fund Alameda Research. Among those are many flows to entities controlled by friends and family of Sam Bankman-Fried, reinforcing the picture of a vast and coordinated criminal effort.

More explosively, the report claims that FTX executives were aware as early as August 2022 that the exchange was missing more than $8 billion in customer funds. This recasts many statements made by executives like Caroline Ellison, and especially by FTX CEO and co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried himself, in the following weeks and months.

This is an excerpt from The Node newsletter, a daily roundup of the most pivotal crypto news on CoinDesk and beyond. You can subscribe to get the full newsletter here.

Even more damning, the report describes Bankman-Fried getting very hands-on in furtherance of the overall fraud.

Two notes before diving in: First, all of the following are allegations made by the FTX liquidators. The claims may or may not surface or be confirmed in the separate criminal trial against Sam Bankman-Fried, currently scheduled to begin in October. And second, for clarity, I’ll be referring throughout to “customer funds” interchangeably with “commingled funds,” because by their nature, the vast majority of commingled funds would likely have been customer funds.
Into the spaghettiverse

While the details are spicy, the main course of the report is the following big bowl of spaghetti, representing the flows of FTX customer funds. Note how many flows end at “to be determined” – the recovery team’s work, clearly, is not yet done.

Highlights of this mess include the claim that $20 million of FTX customer funds went to Guarding Against Pandemics (GAP), a quote-unquote “nonprofit” run by Gabe Bankman-Fried, Sam’s brother. Though this funding was already known, the report seems to be the first authoritative claim that funding to GAP came from specific bank accounts full of commingled (that is, customer) funds. This deepens existing questions about the Bankman-Fried family’s knowledge of and participation in the fraud.

Throughout the report, we see SBF’s closest friends and associates eagerly gobbling up what were stolen funds. The FTX Foundation, another quote-unquote “nonprofit” entity that was itself funded with customer money, donated $400,000 to an unnamed Effective Altruism organization that made YouTube videos promoting that troubling ideology.

See also: Sam Bankman-Fried's Altruism Wasn't Very Effective | Opinion

Then there are the (again quote-unquote) “venture investments.” These were seemingly not real investments, but rather financial cutouts primarily created to recycle and obscure stolen FTX user funds. The new report specifically describes the “investment” of $450 million worth of FTX customer funds into an entity called Modulo Capital.


Modulo Capital had been founded by two known Bankman-Fried associates, Duncan Rheingans-Yoo and Xiaoyun “Lilly” Zhang. According to the New York Times, Yoo was only two years out of college, and Zhang (like Caroline Ellison) was a former romantic partner of Bankman-Fried.
Smoking guns

Finally on the money front, we get some new insight into the massive personal loans that went to FTX executives, many meant to fund political donations (themselves wildly illegal). The debtors report makes the important claim that “the evidence identified by the Debtors indicates the transfers were ‘loans’ in name only.”

Way back in November of last year I described these loans as a “smoking bazooka” indicating clear criminal intent – the new report appears to be confirmation of that assessment. And there’s more where that came from – the report is packed with tidbits that suggest goings-on at FTX were overtly and intentionally criminal.

For one, the report claims that “by August 2022, the FTX Senior Executives and [Caroline] Ellison privately estimated that the FTX.com exchange owed customers over $8 billion in fiat currency that it did not have. They did not disclose the shortfall.” This $8 billion shortfall was hidden in a fake account with a negative $8 billion balance, referred to internally as belonging to “our Korean friend.”

That account was known, but I’m not aware of any similarly authoritative source making specific claims that execs knew about the shortfall as early as August. This would be incredibly bad for Sam Bankman-Fried, who made countless representations to FTX’s rock-solid finances after that, further clarifying his fraudulent machinations.

But the report also makes a claim that would somehow be even worse for SBF if it were demonstrated in his criminal case. It describes a “Payment Agent Agreement” intended to make the flow of FTX customer deposits through Alameda Research bank accounts look intentional, rather than some mix of negligence and fraud.

While the debtors found that the payment agreement document was created in April of 2021, it was backdated to an “effective date” of June 1, 2019. This was seemingly intended to create the impression that FTX customer funds had always flowed through Alameda. In fact, of course, that flow was an exigent strategy to circumvent banking controls, and it seems to have underpinned the larger fraud.

In short, the payment agent agreement document is evidence of a criminal conspiracy.

And according to the debtors report, Sam Bankman-Fried signed the fraudulently backdated document with his own, actual hand: “Notably, while Bankman-Fried regularly executed agreements electronically using DocuSign, which electronically records the date and time of execution, Bankman-Fried signed the Payment Agent Agreement with a wet signature.”

This is just radioactively bad for Bankman-Fried’s criminal defense, for two reasons. First, the one-time use of a physical signature indicates a clear strategy to avoid generating Docusign metadata that might reveal the document was not signed in 2019. That clearly indicates Bankman-Fried was engaging in conspiracy to commit and conceal fraud.

See also: FTX's Bankruptcy Fees Already Topped $200M, Court Examiner Says

Second, a physical signature means it’s possible someone actually saw Bankman-Fried sign the document, and/or that it can be clearly established that the signature is his. This would eliminate even the farfetched hypothetical defense that Bankman-Fried’s electronic signature was somehow faked and he was actually unaware of the document.

To reiterate, it’s not certain that these and other facts claimed in the debtors report will become part of Bankman-Fried’s criminal trial, but it seems very likely most will.

So while we were already pretty sure Sam Bankman-Fried was cooked, it’s starting to look like he’s downright deep-fried.

Banks raised questions in 2020 about FTX-affiliated hedge fund's wire activity, FTX says

Hannah Lang
Mon, June 26, 2023

Illustration shows FTX logo

(Reuters) - Certain banks working with FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried's trading firm Alameda Research raised questions about the firm's wire activity as early as 2020, according to a report released by FTX on Monday.

Some banks began rejecting wires to or from Alameda the same year that the cryptocurrency exchange scrambled to access the U.S. banking system, the report said.

Federal prosecutors have alleged that Bankman-Fried stole billions of dollars in customer funds to plug losses at Alameda. FTX, which filed for bankruptcy in November after Bankman-Fried resigned as CEO, has estimated that approximately $8.7 billion in customer assets were misappropriated from the exchange.

Bankman-Fried has pleaded not guilty to 13 counts of fraud and conspiracy. He has previously said that when FTX did not have a bank account, some customers wired money to Alameda and were credited on FTX. Bankman-Fried did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.

In 2020, certain banks working with Alameda pressed the firm on its wire transfers, according to the report.

One bank representative wrote to Alameda about references to FTX in the company's wire activity and asked whether the account was being used to settle trades on FTX. An Alameda employee responded that while customers "occasionally confuse FTX and Alameda," all wires through the account were to settle trades with Alameda, according to the report.

The Alameda employee's response was false, FTX said on Monday. In 2020 alone, one of Alameda's accounts received more than $250 billion in deposits from FTX customers and more than $4 billion from other Alameda accounts that were funded in part by customer deposits, the report said.

Bankman-Fried, a 31-year-old former billionaire, rode a boom in digital assets to accumulate an estimated net worth of $26 billion, and became an influential political and philanthropic donor before FTX declared bankruptcy.

(Reporting by Hannah Lang in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis)