Monday, October 26
New Delhi: From loud crackers and zon guns along runways to neem oil, India's largest airports deploy all kinds of tools-some high-tech, some deadly and some just noisemakers-to scare away birds, which are increasingly posing a threat to flight safety.Authorities in South Korea are investigating whether a bird hit brought down the Jeju Air jet that crashed at the Muan airport on Sunday, killing 179 of the 181 people on board. India has recorded a significant increase in bird hit incidents in the past two years, often causing pilots to return the plane to the airport or abort take-off. According to civil aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), bird hit incidents increased to 9.68 per 10,000 flights in September 2024 from 4.26 two years earlier. 116925521In one of th
Union Minister of New and Renewable Energy Pralhad Joshi on Saturday said India is ahead of other countries in the field of green hydrogen. The Union government has floated a tender for the world's largest green ammonia demonstration project, he said during a visit to a floating solar plant in the Omkareshwar Dam in Madhya Pradesh's Khandwa district. 116818375Further, the work of offshore wind power projects is underway and tenders have been invited in Gujarat, the minister told reporters. "When we talk about offshore wind power, it means installing windmills in the sea, which requires development and upgradation of ports and transmission infrastructure. Along with this, work on geothermal (power) is also underway, though it is at the primary stage," Joshi said. A revolution is taking pla
Nanded in central Maharashtra on Saturday acquitted all nine surviving accused in a 2006 blast case. While the detailed order was not yet available, a defence lawyer said the prosecution could not establish that the incident was a bomb blast. Of the total 12 accused in the case, two had died in the explosion, while one died during the course of the trial. District and Additional Sessions Judge C V Marathe acquitted the remaining accused on Saturday. An explosion took place on the intervening night of April 4 and 5, 2006, at the house of Laxman Rajkondwar, who was allegedly a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh worker, in Nanded city. Rajkondwar's son Naresh Rajkondwar and Vishva Hindu Parishad activist Himanshu Panse were killed, allegedly while assembling the explosive device, the investigators c
Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has accelerated gold purchases since October to mitigate revaluation risks to its foreign exchange stockpile and minimise currency volatility, with a part of the reserves that have come off record highs since late September likely also being used to cushion the rupee's fall against the US dollar.The central bank bought 20 tonnes of gold during October-November, compared with 30 tonnes during the first six months of the current financial year, showed an ET analysis of latest RBI data. "The buying of gold by central banks is driven by the need to diversify assets in which forex reserves are held," Gaura Sengupta, chief economist at IDFC Bank, told ET. "The high concentration of foreign currency assets in securities such as short-tenor US treasuries ope
Agriculture minister Shivaraj Singh Chouhan on Saturday reviewed various schemes with state agriculture ministers and sought their suggestions on ongoing programmes and budget allocation ahead of the Union Budget. During a virtual meeting, Chouhan expressed satisfaction over the agriculture and allied sector's likely higher growth rate of 3.5-4 per cent in the 2024-25 fiscal year, and urged state governments to work at a "faster pace", according to an official statement. He welcomed the State Bank of India's report showing that the rural poverty rate declined to below 5 per cent for the first time in FY24 from 7.2 per cent in FY23.116861699 The minister said the Centre is implementing a six-point strategy to boost the farm sector, including increasing production per hectare through resea
