AFP UK

Russia successfully docked its troubled laboratory module Nauka with the International Space Station on Thursday after more than a decade of delays, the country’s space agency Roscosmos said. 

The mission comes as Russia seeks to boost its space industry, which has fallen behind since the collapse of the Soviet Union and struggles to keep up with competition from the United States. 

“There is contact!!!” Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin said on Twitter as Russia completed the first docking of an ISS module in 11 years. 

Images released by Roscosmos showed the new addition to the Russian segment of the ISS docking with the nadir (Earth-facing) port of the Zvezda service module at 1329 GMT. 

It will now take several months and multiple spacewalks to fully integrate the module with the space station. 

The Nauka module blasted off last week from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, carried by a Russian Proton rocket.  

The launch was closely watched by the European Space Agency as the module was travelling with the European Robotic Arm, the first robot arm that will be able to work on Russia’s ISS segment. 

– Decades in the making –

Nauka — which means “science” in Russian — will be primarily used for research and storing laboratory equipment. 

It will also provide more storage space, new water and oxygen regeneration systems and improved living conditions for cosmonauts of the Russian ISS sector.

The Nauka multipurpose laboratory module was conceived as early as the mid-1990s when it was intended as a back-up for the Russian control module Zarya. 

It was later repurposed as a science module but joined a line-up of stagnating Russian space projects that have fallen victim to funding problems or bureaucratic procedures.

The launch of the 20-tonne Nauka — one of the largest modules on the ISS — was initially scheduled for 2007 but has been repeatedly delayed over various issues. 

While last week’s launch was succesful, Nauka experienced several “hiccups in orbit” during its eight-day journey to the ISS, the European Space Agency said.

“We won’t lie… We had to worry for the first three days,” Rogozin told journalists after Nauka had docked, according to the RIA Novosti news agency. 

Nauka replaces the long-serving Pirs docking module, which joined the ISS in 2001 as a temporary addition but ended up staying in service for two decades.

Making room for Nauka, Pirs detached from the ISS earlier this week, mostly burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere and with its remains falling into the Pacific Ocean.

– Russia’s future on ISS –

Launched in 1998 and involving Russia, the United States, Canada, Japan, and the European Space Agency, the ISS is one of Russia’s few remaining collaborations with the West as tensions continue to simmer over a litany of issues. 

The ISS is divided into two sections: the Russian Orbital Segment operated by Russia, and the remainder run by the US and other partners.

For years, US space agency NASA was reliant on Russia to ferry its astronauts to the ISS and paid millions of dollars for a seat on a Soyuz rocket.

But last year Russia lost its monopoly for manned flights to the ISS after the succesful mission of Space X, the company belonging to US billionaire Elon Musk. 

In April, Russia said it is considering withdrawing from the ISS programme citing ageing infrastructure, and is planning to launch the first core module of a new orbital station in 2025.

Russia has announced a series of projects in recent years, including a mission to Venus and a station on the moon, but as the Kremlin diverts funding in favour of military ventures, analysts question the feasibility of these ambitions. 

Russia successfully docked its troubled laboratory module Nauka with the International Space Station on Thursday after more than a decade of delays, the country’s space agency Roscosmos said. 

The mission comes as Russia seeks to boost its space industry, which has fallen behind since the collapse of the Soviet Union and struggles to keep up with competition from the United States. 

“There is contact!!!” Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin said on Twitter as Russia completed the first docking of an ISS module in 11 years. 

Images released by Roscosmos showed the new addition to the Russian segment of the ISS docking with the nadir (Earth-facing) port of the Zvezda service module at 1329 GMT. 

It will now take several months and multiple spacewalks to fully integrate the module with the space station. 

The Nauka module blasted off last week from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, carried by a Russian Proton rocket.  

The launch was closely watched by the European Space Agency as the module was travelling with the European Robotic Arm, the first robot arm that will be able to work on Russia’s ISS segment. 

– Decades in the making –

Nauka — which means “science” in Russian — will be primarily used for research and storing laboratory equipment. 

It will also provide more storage space, new water and oxygen regeneration systems and improved living conditions for cosmonauts of the Russian ISS sector.

The Nauka multipurpose laboratory module was conceived as early as the mid-1990s when it was intended as a back-up for the Russian control module Zarya. 

It was later repurposed as a science module but joined a line-up of stagnating Russian space projects that have fallen victim to funding problems or bureaucratic procedures.

The launch of the 20-tonne Nauka — one of the largest modules on the ISS — was initially scheduled for 2007 but has been repeatedly delayed over various issues. 

While last week’s launch was succesful, Nauka experienced several “hiccups in orbit” during its eight-day journey to the ISS, the European Space Agency said.

“We won’t lie… We had to worry for the first three days,” Rogozin told journalists after Nauka had docked, according to the RIA Novosti news agency. 

Nauka replaces the long-serving Pirs docking module, which joined the ISS in 2001 as a temporary addition but ended up staying in service for two decades.

Making room for Nauka, Pirs detached from the ISS earlier this week, mostly burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere and with its remains falling into the Pacific Ocean.

– Russia’s future on ISS –

Launched in 1998 and involving Russia, the United States, Canada, Japan, and the European Space Agency, the ISS is one of Russia’s few remaining collaborations with the West as tensions continue to simmer over a litany of issues. 

The ISS is divided into two sections: the Russian Orbital Segment operated by Russia, and the remainder run by the US and other partners.

For years, US space agency NASA was reliant on Russia to ferry its astronauts to the ISS and paid millions of dollars for a seat on a Soyuz rocket.

But last year Russia lost its monopoly for manned flights to the ISS after the succesful mission of Space X, the company belonging to US billionaire Elon Musk. 

In April, Russia said it is considering withdrawing from the ISS programme citing ageing infrastructure, and is planning to launch the first core module of a new orbital station in 2025.

Russia has announced a series of projects in recent years, including a mission to Venus and a station on the moon, but as the Kremlin diverts funding in favour of military ventures, analysts question the feasibility of these ambitions. 

Three people were reported dead Thursday and more than 100 injured as thousands of firefighters battled huge blazes spreading across the Mediterranean resort regions of Turkey’s southern coast.

Officials also launched an investigation into suspicions the fires that broke out Wednesday in four locations to the east of the tourist hotspot Antalya were the result of arson.

Turkey’s disaster and emergencies office said three people were killed — including an 82-year-old who lived alone — and 122 injured by the fires.

“Treatment of 58 of our citizens continues,” it was quoted as saying by the Anadolu state news agency.

The fires first emerged across a sparsely populated region about 75 kilometres (45 miles) east of Antalya — a resort especially popular with Russian and other eastern European tourists.

But they were creeping closer Thursday to sandy beaches dotted with hotels and resorts.

Images on social media and Turkish TV showed residents jumping out of their cars and running for their lives through smoke-filled streets lit up by orange flames.

The heavy clouds of smoke turned the sky dark orange over a beachfront hotel complex in the town of Manavgat.

Agriculture Minister Bekir Pakdemirli said a hotel was also being evacuated near the tourist city of Bodrum — some 300 kilometres west of Antalya — as new fires broke out across the southern coast.

Pakdemirli said 150 cows and thousands of sheep and goats had perished in the flames.

– Full mobilisation –

The fires were raging with temperatures approaching 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) and wind gusts of 50 kilometres (30 miles) an hour.

But Antalya mayor Muhittin Bocek said he suspected foul play because the fires started in four locations at once.

“This suggests an arson attack, but we do not have clear information about that at this stage,” Bocek said.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said an investigation had already been launched.

The Russian embassy said Moscow had sent three giant firefighting aircraft to dump fire retardant on the burning forests to contain the flames.

More than 4,000 Turkish firefighters had been dispatched across the region to help contain the damage and search for people needing help.

They rescued 10 people on Thursday who were stranded on a boat in a lake that was surrounded by burning forest.

“All of the state’s means have been mobilised,” Environment Minister Murat Kurum said. “All our teams are in the field.”

Wine growers in the Champagne region, home to the world’s most exclusive bubbly, on Thursday scrapped a century-old rule governing the distance between vines, sparking fierce resistance from traditionalists.

For the past 100 years, the maximum allowed distance between vine rows has been 1.5 metres (five feet), which experts had always believed represented the ideal balance between yield and quality.

Greater spacing, they said, would take away the need for the vines to compete for water and nutrients with neighbouring plants, a struggle that helps them produce smaller and higher-quality crop loads with just the right amount of acidity.

But the small space between rows, and between each vine, makes mechanisation difficult as machines for pruning, fertilising or harvesting can’t easily navigate the narrow gaps.

A 15-year study conducted by growers association SGV, scientists and champagne houses found that larger spaces would allow a 20-percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions thanks to wine growing equipment that would perform better and more efficiently than the straddle tractors now in use.

“The aim is to accompany the necessary agro-ecological transition by adapting Champagne vines to climate change, while at the same time preserving the quality and unique quality of Champagne vines, and the economic sustainability of wine growers,” said SGV’s president, Maxime Toubart.

– ‘Debate over’ –

SGV’s board voted on Thursday to allow a space of between 2 and 2.2 metres between each plant in future, and allow them to grow up to a height of 2 metres compared with 1.2 to 1.3 metres now.

The study also found that working the soil would become easier, as would pest control.

And while there would be room for fewer vines, each plant’s increased production would make up for the shortfall.

“Vines would become more resistant to drought and need fewer additives,” said Vincent Legras, a winegrower who has experimented with wider spaces between vines since 2007 and is in favour of the change. 

“For me the debate is over,” he said.

But local opponents say they expect rising inequalities between wine growers, and fear for local traditions, grape quality and jobs.

“Under the cover of environmental concerns they are implementing a business project of cost cutting,” said Patrick Leroy, boss of the far-left CGT-Champagne trade union. “These strategies will destroy jobs.”

Up to a quarter of the sector’s 10,000 jobs could be lost, he said, adding he feared a “programmed extinction” of the Champagne region’s unique production methods.

But SGV’s Toubart said each wine grower would be free to decide on whether to use the new leeway and that, either way, change would be slow. “It will be a long transition, over one, two or three generations,” he said.

The spacing rule is one of a number of strict criteria producers must respect to remain part of the exclusive club authorised to use the Champagne label.

Apart from exclusively using grapes from the region itself, they must also apply specific methods for pressing the fruit and for fermentation.

The most prestigious of the world’s sparkling wines, Champagne accounts for just nine percent of global sparkling wine consumption, but 33 percent of its value.

More than half the 244 million bottles shipped each year go to buyers outside France.

Britain has become warmer, wetter and sunnier this century due to climate change, an annual report by leading meteorologists said Thursday, prompting warnings of record summer temperatures in future decades.

The study — the State of the UK Climate 2020 — found that last year was the third warmest, fifth wettest and eighth sunniest on record in the UK.

It was the first time that a single 12-month period has registered in the top 10 for all three variables. 

The trend has already led to increasingly extreme weather, as Britain’s temperatures rise “slightly above” the global mean, the report said.

Lead author Mike Kendon, of the National Climate Information Centre (NCIC), said it was “plausible” the country could regularly hit summer temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2040, even with climate change mitigation policies.

The UK’s highest temperature ever recorded is 38.7 degrees Celsius (101.7 degrees Fahrenheit), set in July 2019.

“We’re already seeing climate impacts globally and in the UK from our changing climate and, clearly, those are set to continue,” Kendon told BBC radio.

The report revealed that 2020 was the UK’s third warmest year since records dating back to 1884, with all the top 10 hottest having occurred over the last 20 years.

The decade since 2011 has been on average 0.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the 1981–2010 average and 1.1 degrees Celsius hotter than 1961–1990.

Britain has also been on average six percent wetter over the last three decades than the preceding 30 years. 

Six of the 10 wettest years since 1862 have occurred in the last 22 years.

Professor Liz Bentley, chief executive of the Royal Meteorological Society — which publishes the annual report in its International Journal of Climatology — said UK heatwaves would become “much more intense” and likely top 40 degrees Celsius. 

“It’ll start to become something that we see on a much more regular basis,” she added.

– ‘Front and centre issue’ –

Last week, flash flooding in London followed a scorching mini-heatwave, while the Met Office this month issued its first ever “extreme heat” warning. 

Similar extreme weather events have occurred around the world in recent years, including flooding in South America and Southeast Asia, record-shattering heatwaves and wildfires in Australia and the US, and devastating cyclones in Africa and South Asia.

Just this month, historic floods killed at least 180 people in Germany and at least 99 in China, while monsoon landslides and flash flooding in Bangladesh left at least 14 people dead.

John Kerry, the former US secretary of state turned climate envoy, called Thursday for more adaptation funding to make countries “more resilient”.

“Adaptation has not received the level of input and funding that it needs,” he said at a London Science Museum discussion alongside former UK leader Tony Blair.

“It’s got to become a front and centre issue for governors, mayors, prime ministers, finance ministers.”

Britain will host the crucial COP26 summit in November, when scores of countries will try to agree collective measures to prevent catastrophic climate change.

Tom Burke, chairman of environmental think-tank E3G, said the gathering would be the first of its kind where “the science of climate change has been validated by events”. 

“It’s no longer what scientists say, it’s what people are experiencing… in their own lives,” he told reporters, noting Prime Minister Boris Johnson needed to be “much more visible” diplomatically ahead of COP26.

Johnson’s spokesman said the issue was “a priority” for the British leader and that he was “proud of what this government’s doing to tackle climate change”.

As thick clouds of smoke billow across the vast Siberian region of Yakutia, Yegor Zakharov and his team are racing to stop its smouldering forests from burning even more.

Members of Russia’s Aerial Forest Protection Service, his team spent a recent July evening patrolling a five-kilometre (three-mile) trench they had dug at the edge of the village of Byas-Kyuel to keep an approaching wildfire at bay.

Wearing respirators against the acrid smoke, the men lit strips of rubber tyre they hung from sticks, then tapped them onto the dry forest floor on the other side of the trench to start a controlled burn.

The team has lost track of how many blazes they have tackled since late May — mostly successfully, sometimes not — as Yakutia suffers through yet another ever-worsening wildfire seasons.

“We held one property for eight days but it burned in the end because the tractors never got to us,” Zakharov said, explaining that in such cases they use shovels to dig trenches instead.

But even more than equipment, the 35-year-old brigade leader has another urgent plea: “We need more people.”

Fuelled by summer heatwaves, wildfires have swept through more than 1.5 million hectares (3.7 million acres) of Yakutia’s swampy coniferous taiga, with more than a month still to go in Siberia’s annual fire season.

Vast areas of Russia have been suffering from heatwaves and droughts driven by climate change in recent years, with numerous temperature records set.

It is the third straight year that Yakutia — Russia’s coldest region and bordering the Arctic Ocean — has seen wildfires so vicious that they have nearly overwhelmed the forest protection service. 

– Limited manpower –

The group of about 250 full-time staffers and 150 summer contract workers, who track the fires by air and drop in by parachute or on off-road trucks, is responsible for a region roughly five times the size of France.

Their goal, said Yakutia’s chief pilot observer Svyatoslav Kolesov, is to put out the fires entirely. But they also have to contend with blazes that overwhelm their manpower.

The number of firefighters in the region is far from adequate, Kolesov told AFP, recalling that when he started in 1988 the group had around 1,600 people before facing cuts over the years.

Kolesov, who monitors fires from daily flights and issues instructions to teams on the ground, said that because of limited resources the group will often keep an eye on a new blaze until it becomes sizeable. Only then will it send in a team.

“And if the fires spread quickly and soon cover a large area, then we try to save inhabited areas and strategic objects,” he said.

Environmentalists have long argued that Russia underfunds its forest fire fighting capabilities.

The country’s environment ministry is itself open about the policy, in 2015 issuing a decree that allows regions to ignore blazes if the cost of fighting fires outweighs the expected damages. 

“We’ve said for years that Russia needs to increase its budget to fight wildfires by at least three times,” Grigory Kuksin, the head of Greenpeace’s wildfire unit in the country, told AFP.

– ‘Everything would burn’ –

In early July, Russia mobilised its defence and emergencies ministries to help Yakutia battle the wildfires, while dozens of volunteers also took up the fight.

But the lack of funds for the Aerial Forest Protection Service — the only group wholly dedicated to fighting wildfires, according to Kolesov — are evident on the ground.

Brigade leader Zakharov said he asked officials repeatedly for a quad bike that never arrived so his men didn’t have to patrol their trench on foot.

“I lent most of my equipment to a team at a nearby fire,” he explained.

Later he received the all-terrain vehicle, but not before officials during a recent planning meeting disparaged the progress his team of five full-time staffers and eight summer contractors had made.

“What right do they have to criticise us?” Zakharov said, adding he had stormed out before the meeting had ended.

“Our guys have been working in the forest for a month straight. Anyone would start getting tired.” 

The brigade leader and his men were planning to fight on nonetheless. After Byas-Kyuel, they planned to move straight on to the next fire without taking a break. 

“If we weren’t around,” Zakharov said, “everything would burn.”

Britain has become warmer, wetter and sunnier this century due to climate change, an annual report by leading meteorologists said Thursday, prompting warnings of record summer temperatures in future decades.

The study — the State of the UK Climate 2020 — found that last year was the third warmest, fifth wettest and eighth sunniest on record in the UK.

It was the first time that a single 12-month period has registered in the top 10 for all three variables. 

The trend has already led to increasingly extreme weather, as Britain’s temperatures rise “slightly above” the global mean, the report said.

Lead author Mike Kendon, of the National Climate Information Centre (NCIC), said it was “plausible” the country could regularly hit summer temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2040, even with climate change mitigation policies.

The UK’s highest temperature ever recorded is 38.7 degrees Celsius (101.7 degrees Fahrenheit), set in July 2019.

“We’re already seeing climate impacts globally and in the UK from our changing climate and, clearly, those are set to continue,” Kendon told BBC radio.

The report revealed that 2020 was the UK’s third warmest year since records dating back to 1884, with all the top 10 hottest having occurred over the last 20 years.

The decade since 2011 has been on average 0.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the 1981–2010 average and 1.1 degrees Celsius hotter than 1961–1990.

Britain has also been on average six percent wetter over the last three decades than the preceding 30 years. 

Six of the 10 wettest years since 1862 have occurred in the last 22 years.

– ‘Intense’ –

Just last week, flash flooding in London followed a scorching mini-heatwave, while the Met Office issued its first ever “extreme heat” warning this month. 

Similar extreme weather events have been seen around the world this year.

Professor Liz Bentley, chief executive of the Royal Meteorological Society — which publishes the annual report in its International Journal of Climatology — painted a grim picture of the UK’s meteorological future.

“These (heatwaves) are just going to become much more intense — we’re likely to see 40 degrees (Celsius) in the UK,” she said, adding it would “start to become something that we see on a much more regular basis.”

Britain is preparing to host the crucial COP26 UN summit in November, when scores of countries will try to agree collective measures to prevent catastrophic climate change in the coming decades.

Tom Burke, chairman of the environmental think-tank E3G, told reporters Thursday that the gathering would be the first of its kind where “the science of climate change has been validated by events”. 

“It’s no longer what scientists say, it’s what people are experiencing… in their own lives,” he said, urging Prime Minister Boris Johnson to be “much more visible in the diplomacy” ahead of COP26.

Johnson’s spokesman said the issue was “a priority” for the British leader and that he was “proud of what this government’s doing to tackle climate change”.

An 8.2 magnitude earthquake struck off the Alaskan peninsula late Wednesday, the United States Geological Survey said, generating small waves but no major tsunami before all warnings were canceled.

The earthquake hit 56 miles (91 kilometers) southeast of the town of Perryville, the USGS said.

The quake struck at 10:15 pm Wednesday (0615 GMT Thursday). Perryville is a small village about 500 miles from Anchorage, Alaska’s biggest city.

The US government’s National Tsunami Warning Center immediately issued an alert for south Alaska and the Alaskan peninsula but canceled all warnings about three hours later.

The maximum wave height detected by the center was eight inches (21 centimeters) above tide level with small tsunamis hitting at least six points off Alaska’s coastline.

Tsunami warning sirens had been broadcast across Kodiak, an island with a population of about 6,000 people, along Alaska’s coastline. Locals living close to sea level were told to evacuate to higher ground. 

Small waves hit the coast of Kodiak, according to a broadcaster on local radio station KMXT. She said authorities had lifted evacuation orders, with no reports of any damage.

“This is the largest earthquake to happen in the Alaska region since 1965,” Michael West, state seismologist with the Alaska Earthquake Center, told Alaska Public Media. 

Alaska is part of the seismically active Pacific Ring of Fire.

The state was hit by a 9.2-magnitude earthquake in March 1964, the strongest ever recorded in North America.

It devastated Anchorage and unleashed a tsunami that slammed the Gulf of Alaska, the US west coast, and Hawaii.

More than 250 people were killed by the quake and the tsunami.

A 7.5 magnitude earthquake also caused tsunami waves in Alaska’s southern coast in October, but no casualties were reported.

Britain has become warmer, wetter and sunnier this century due to climate change, an annual report by leading meteorologists said Thursday, prompting warnings of record summer temperatures in future decades.

The study — the State of the UK Climate 2020 — found that last year was the third warmest, fifth wettest and eighth sunniest on record in the UK.

It was the first time that a single 12-month period has registered in the top 10 for all three variables. 

The trend has already led to increasingly extreme weather, as Britain’s temperatures rise “slightly above” the global mean, the report said.

Lead author Mike Kendon, of the National Climate Information Centre (NCIC), said it was “plausible” the country could regularly hit summer temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 Farenheit) by 2040, even with climate change mitigation policies.

The UK’s highest temperature ever recorded is 38.7C, set in July 2019.

“We’re already seeing climate impacts globally and in the UK from our changing climate and, clearly, those are set to continue,” Kendon told BBC radio. 

“We’re already locked into climate change over a long period of time into the future.”

The report revealed that 2020 was the UK’s third warmest year since records dating back to 1884, with all the top 10 hottest having occurred over the last two decades.

The decade since 2011 has been on average 0.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the 1981–2010 average and 1.1 degrees hotter than 1961–1990.

Alongside rising temperatures, Britain has been on average six percent wetter over the last three decades than the preceding 30 years. 

Six of the 10 wettest years since 1862 have occurred since 1998.

Just last week, flash flooding in London and southeast England followed a scorching mini-heatwave when temperatures climbed to above 30C.

The Met Office earlier this month also issued its first ever “extreme heat” warning.

Professor Liz Bentley, chief executive of the Royal Meteorological Society — which publishes the annual report in its International Journal of Climatology — painted a grim picture of extreme weather in the future.

“These (heatwaves) are just going to become much more intense — we’re likely to see 40 degrees in the UK,” she said.

“As we hit 1.5 degrees of global warming, that’s going to not just become something that we see once or twice, it’ll start to become something that we see on a much more regular basis.”

An 8.2 magnitude earthquake struck off the Alaskan peninsula late Wednesday, the United States Geological Survey said, generating small waves but no major tsunami.

The earthquake hit 56 miles (91 kilometers) southeast of the town of Perryville, the USGS said.

The quake struck at 10:15 pm Wednesday (0615 GMT Thursday). Perryville is a small village about 500 miles from Anchorage, Alaska’s biggest city.

The US government’s National Tsunami Warning Center immediately issued a tsunami alert for south Alaska and the Alaskan peninsula.

It initially warned of hazardous waves over the next three hours.

But after nearly three hours the maximum height detected by the center was eight inches (21 centimeters) and it downgraded the tsunami threat alerts to advisories.

Tsunami warning sirens had been broadcast across Kodiak, an island with a population of about 6,000 people, along Alaska’s coastline.

Small waves hit the coast of Kodiak, according to a broadcaster on local radio station KMXT. She said authorities had lifted evacuation orders, with no reports of any damage.

“This is the largest earthquake to happen in the Alaska region since 1965,” Michael West, state seismologist with the Alaska Earthquake Center, told Alaska Public Media. 

Alaska is part of the seismically active Pacific Ring of Fire.

Alaska was hit by a 9.2-magnitude earthquake in March 1964, the strongest ever recorded in North America.

It devastated Anchorage and unleashed a tsunami that slammed the Gulf of Alaska, the US west coast, and Hawaii.

More than 250 people were killed by the quake and the tsunami.

A 7.5 magnitude earthquake also caused tsunami waves in Alaska’s southern coast in October, but no casualties were reported.