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The shooting happened at 8:50 p.m. in the 9200 block of South Cottage Grove and he was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where his condition was stabilized, police said.
The circumstances of the shooting were unknown.
At 8:05 p.m., a bullet grazed the right shoulder of a man who heard shots while walking in the 8300 block of South Houston in the South Chicago neighborhood.
He declined medical treatment.
At least eight more people were wounded in separate shootings between 8:30 p.m. Friday and 6 a.m. Monday.
(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2016.
All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
SAN FRANCISCO – A new edition of an international space exploration planning document to be released early next year will offer an updated plan for human missions to the moon and Mars, emphasizing the role that NASA’s proposed Deep Space Gateway could play.
In January, NASA and 14 international space agencies plan to publish their common goals for exploration, including an extended presence in low Earth orbit, a cislunar habitat, moon missions and eventual excursions to Mars, in an updated Global Exploration Roadmap being drafted by the International Space Exploration Coordination Group (ISECG).
Since NASA’s first flight of its heavy-lift Space Launch System with an Orion capsule is scheduled for as soon as late 2019, it’s time to decide “what we are going to do with these vehicles,” Kathy Laurini, NASA senior adviser for exploration and space operations, said during a Global Exploration Roadmap community workshop at the NASA Ames Research Center Nov. 29.
“We’ve been engaged with our international partners on how we’ll use these to explore together.” ISECG, a voluntary organization whose members share non-binding plans and objectives, published its last Global Exploration Roadmap in 2013.
ISECG members will use the new Roadmap to show domestic policymakers and funding agencies how specific programs will contribute to global endeavors, said Laurini, who also serves as ISECG chair.
NASA, for example, will point to the roadmap as it seeks funding and authorization for future SLS and Orion missions.
NASA officials acknowledged, though, that the agency is waiting for confirmation of a new administrator and direction from the National Space Council.
Future exploration plans will become clearer when the Trump Administration and Congress weigh in on the agency’s budget, said Mark Geyer, acting deputy associate administrator for NASA’s Human Explorations and Operations Mission Directorate.
NASA also is seeking domestic and international support for its conceptual Deep Space Gateway.
“We see an orbital platform as playing a vital and synergistic role with anything you do on the surface,” said John Guidi, NASA advanced exploration systems deputy director.
For instance, reusable landers could move astronauts to the Deep Space Gateway, which could also serve as a jumping off point for exploration of near Earth asteroids and Mars.
“Cislunar orbit is the sweet spot.
It’s close enough to Earth and the moon but out of the gravity wells,” Guidi said.
In the new Roadmap, ISECG will emphasize a shared commitment in the next 10 to 15 years to continue operations in low Earth orbit, where space agencies can conduct microgravity research and test life support systems for future exploration missions.
Some of that work, though, may occur in new public or private space stations rather than the International Space Station.
The ISS partners have agreed to keep funding the space station through 2024.
To date, NASA and its international partners have been able to maintain the aging space station with spare parts.
However, older components, including the solar arrays, will need to be replaced by the end of the 2020s, said Robyn Gatens, deputy director of NASA’s ISS Division.
Even if the ISS partners do not make commitments to support it beyond 2024, the transition from space station to another platform should be gradual, Gatens added.
The new Roadmap lays out a three-phase plan.
The starting point, Phase 0, is ongoing research and testing on ISS.
During Phase 1 in the 2020s, international agencies would explore the lunar vicinity.
In that timeframe, NASA would work with partners to construct the Deep Space Gateway, a crewed outpost with less than 10 percent of the habitable volume of ISS, and agencies would send robotic missions to the lunar surface and prepare for human lunar exploration.
By Phase 2 in the 2030s, agencies would send exploration missions to orbit Mars.
Under current budget projections, NASA could launch one crewed SLS/Orion flight per year, with each Orion spending approximately 40 days at the Deep Space Gateway, Guidi said.
Four SLS missions in the 2020s could assemble elements of the Deep Space Gateway, including its power and propulsion bus, habitat, logistics module and airlock, Guidi said.
ISECG shared its draft Roadmap to encourage companies, government agencies and academic organizations to offer comments.
“The Deep Space Gateway is a concept for government-led exploration endeavors,” Laurini said.
“It is a commitment to being there.
And because we are there, it will offer opportunities for commercial entities.” Those commercial opportunities, ISECG partners believe, include playing key roles in delivering cargo to the Deep Space Gateway, relaying communications from the lunar surface, sending instruments to the surface of the moon to support government investigations of volatile organic compounds and transporting cargo to the moon to support crews spending time there.
Introduction On Feb. 1, 2017, the United States led Coalition was accused by local activists and journalists that it had bombed the headquarters of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) located in the Carlton Hotel in the city of Idlib, Syria.
Photos and videos allegedly showing the bombed headquarters quickly emerged online.
This open source investigation aims to verify the various claims made surrounding this incident.
Content Summary Claims Methodology Open Sources Findings Summary Based on open source research, it can be confirmed that the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) utilised the Carlton Hotel in Idlib city as a headquarters.
It can also be confirmed that the Carlton Hotel was recently severely damaged.
The US-led Coalition was accused of conducting an airstrike on the building in the early morning of Feb. 1, killing one SARC member, but the Coalition denies any involvement.
Neither the exact date of the attack nor the perpetrator can be established based on open sources.
What can be observed, however, is that a bomb appears to have pierced at least four floors before detonating.
Claims The following claims are circulating on social media: One or more airstrikes conducted by the US-led Coalition destroyed a part of the Carlton Hotel in Idlib city.
The Carlton Hotel was used by the SARC as headquarters.
This open source investigation aims to verify those claims by answering the following questions: Is there a Carlton Hotel in Idlib city?
Was the Carlton Hotel in Idlib was used by the SARC as headquarters?
Was the Carlton Hotel in Idlib was bombed?
If so, was it bombed by the US(-led Coalition)?
Methodology The investigation uses only openly available sources on the Internet.
In addition, a request to comment on this incident and the accusation was sent to the Coalition’s public affairs office.
Sources were found by, for example, searches on social media using certain keywords of internet.
One can think of a search on ‘Red Crescent Idlib’ in Arabic: “الهلال الأحمرادلب‎‎”.
These social media include Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and Instagram.
After the exact location of the incident was found, the coordinates have been used to conduct location-based searches in a 2-km radius on those same social networks.
Reference photos have been found via geotagged pictures on Panoramio.
All YouTube videos have been checked for the date and potential other, earlier uploads using Amnesty International’s YouTube Data Viewer, and images Google’s reverse image search has been used to see if the photos were not posted before the date of the attack.
Bellingcat has published several how-to guides to for beginning or advanced open source investigations.
All sources but one has geolocated.
Open Sources These are the main open sources found and used outside of the use of freely available mapping data and satellite imagery via Wikimapia, Google Earth, Google Maps, and Bing Maps.
Pro-opposition media, local activists and organisations have shared videos and photos showing the same severely damaged building, and large number of them accuse the Coalition for conducting the airstrikes: Al-Baladi News also published a video showing SARC employees in a ravaged building [link/archived], and Al Jazeera Arabic also sent a reporter to the scene who said it is not clear who conducted the airstrike [link/archived].
Findings 1.
Is there a Carlton Hotel in Idlib city?
Yes, based on open sources it can be confirmed that there is a Carlton Hotel in Idlib city.
First of all, the hotel (Arabic: فندق كارلتون) is listed as a four-star hotel on hotel booking websites (for example, hotelscombined.com [archived]) and Google Maps [archived].
The hotel is located in southern part of Idlib city, at the coordinates 35.9206001, 36.634748 (Wikimapia).
Secondly, the hotel is referred to in media, for example by esyria.net [archived] and dp-news.com [archived].
The articles are an interview with the hotel director and a news report that the hotel closed its restaurant in 2011, respectively.
Thirdly, photos that are geotagged on Panoramio, or that can be geolocated to the area, indeed show a building which bears a sign ‘Carlton Hotel’, including a logo and four stars.
2.
Was the Carlton Hotel in Idlib was used by the SARC as a headquarters?
Yes, based on open sources it can be confirmed that the SARC used the Carlton Hotel in Idlib as a headquarters.
First of all, nearly forty SARC members of the Idlib branch posed with four ambulances in front of the Carlton Hotel in a picture uploaded to their Facebook page on Jan. 17, 2017.
The same Facebook page also reported the attack which destroyed ‘most of [their] administrative offices but didn’t injure humans’ [link/archived].
Photos posted in Feb. 2016 shows that the Carlton Hotel was already used by SARC at that time [photo 1: link/archived; photo 2: link/archived; photo 3: link/archived; photo 4: link/archived].
Members of the SARC team declared to the Website for the Syrian Revolution that the building does not contain any headquarters of military factions.
Secondly, the official Twitter account of the delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Syria condemned the bombing, “a clear violation of [international humanitarian law”, hours after the attacked reportedly happened.
This tweet thus suggests that the ICRC Syria is aware that there is an aid branch operating in the destroyed location, which brings us to the next point: Was the Carlton Hotel in Idlib indeed bombed?
3.
Was the Carlton Hotel in Idlib was bombed?
If so, was it bombed by the US-led Coalition?
Based on open sources, it can be established that the west wing of the Carlton Hotel has been severely damaged.
Below are photos and screengrabs from videos showing that damage.
All footage taken outside of the building can be geolocated to the immediate surrounding of the Carlton Hotel.
The map below shows all locations from where photos or videos of the ravaged hotel were taken.
In a news report [archived], MICRO SYRIA claims that the Carlton Hotel, which houses the Red Crescent, was targeted by unknown aircraft at three ‘o clock at night of February 1, 2017.
A reconnaissance aircraft was seen in the sky an hour before the airstrike happened, media activist Ammar al-Adalba told Website for the Syrian Revolution.
He said that it was most likely an airplane from the Coalition that struck the SARC headquarters, resulting in destruction and fire inside the building.
As there is no (open or commercial) satellite imagery available around the date of the alleged strike, the exact date of the destruction cannot be confirmed.
There are no obvious visual indicators, like weapon remnants, that could identify the perpetrator of the attack, or the cause of the damage.
There is, however, footage of an object that appears to have pierced at least four floors of the building.
A rescue worker interviewed by Step News Agency claims that “a missile went from the roof down to the first floor.” Some have suggested the damage at the Carlton Hotel may be due to a delay-action bomb, which is designed to explode some time after impact (think of a bunker buster, for example).
Building upon that claim, it has been suggested that it must have been either the Coalition or the Russian Air Force that conducted the bombing; the Syrian Arab Air Force (SyAAF) is believed to be incapable of delivering such bombs during night time.
However, as Tom Cooper detailed in this War Is Boring piece, may well have the capacity to operate at night.
There is currently no visual evidence to confirm the use of a delay-action bomb, so the above remains speculation.
In reply to a request of information, the Coalition’s public affairs office e-mailed Bellingcat that “the Coalition did not conduct airstrikes in Idlib on Feb. 1, 2017.” With regards to injuries and casualties, the estimates by the local sources range from nine to eleven individuals that were injured.
At least one ambulance has also been severely damaged in the incident, photos and videos show.