Italy votes for center-left candidate for premier












ROME (AP) — Italians are choosing a center-left candidate for premier for elections early next year, an important primary runoff given the main party is ahead in the polls against a center-right camp in utter chaos over whether Silvio Berlusconi will run again.


Sunday’s runoff pits a veteran center-left leader, Pier Luigi Bersani, 61, against the 37-year-old mayor of Florence, Matteo Renzi, who has campaigned on an Obama-style “Let’s change Italy now” mantra.












Nearly all polls show Bersani winning the primary, after he won the first round of balloting Nov. 25 with 44.9 percent of the vote. Since he didn’t get an absolute majority, he was forced into a runoff with Renzi, who garnered 35.5 percent.


After battling all week to get more voters to the polling stations for round two, Renzi seemed almost resigned to a Bersani win by Sunday, saying he hoped that by Monday “we can all work together.”


Bersani, a former transport and industry minister, seemed confident of victory as well, joking about Berlusconi’s flip-flopping political ambitions by asking “What time did he say it?” when told that the media mogul had purportedly decided against running.


Next year’s general election will largely decide how and whether Italy continues on the path to financial health charted by Premier Mario Monti, appointed last year to save Italy from a Greek-style debt crisis.


The former European commissioner was named to head a technical government after international markets lost confidence in then-Premier Berlusconi’s ability to reign in Italy’s public debt and push through sorely needed structural reforms.


Berlusconi has largely stayed out of the public spotlight for the past year, but he returned with force in recent weeks, announcing he was thinking about running again, then changing his mind, then threatening to bring down Monti’s government, and most recently staying silent about his political plans.


His waffling has thrown his People of Freedom party into disarray and disrupted its own plans for a primary — all of which has only seemed to bolster the impression of order, stability and organization within the center-left camp.


A poll published Friday gave the Democratic Party 30 percent of the vote if the election were held now, compared with some 19.5 percent for the upstart populist movement of comic Beppe Grillo, and Berlusconi’s People of Freedom party in third with 14.3 percent. The poll, by the SWG firm for state-run RAI 3, surveyed 5,000 voting-age adults by telephone between Nov. 26 and 28. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 1.36 percentage points.


It’s quite a turnabout for Berlusconi’s once-dominant movement, and a similarly remarkable shift in fortunes for the Democratic Party, which had been in shambles for years, unable to capitalize on Berlusconi’s professional and personal failings while he was premier.


But Berlusconi’s 2011 downfall and a series of recent political party funding scandals that have targeted mostly center-right politicians have contributed to the party’s rise as Italy struggles through a grinding recession and near-record high unemployment.


Angelino Alfano, Berlusconi’s hand-picked political heir, seemed again exasperated Sunday after a long meeting with his patron over Berlusconi’s plans. News reports have suggested Berlusconi might split the party in two and re-launch the Forza Italia party that brought him to political power for the first time in 1994.


“We have to work to reconstruct the center-right, and reconstructing it means having a big center-right party,” not a divided one, Alfano said.


He added that Berlusconi didn’t say one way or another if he would run himself. “It’s his choice,” he said. “If there are any decisions in this regard, he’ll be the one to say so.”


___


Follow Nicole Winfield at www.twitter.com/nwinfield


Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Bryce Dallas Howard film among the live-action short films on Oscar nominations shortlist












LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – “when you find me,” directed by “Twilight” star Bryce Dallas Howard and executive-produced by her father Ron Howard, is among 11 films that have been shortlisted for possible Oscars nomination, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences said Thursday.


Though the Academy typically only short-lists 10 entries, a tie in the nominations balloting resulted in an 11th title making the list. In all, 125 films originally qualified in the category.












From here, members of the Academy’s Short Films and Feature Animation Branch will select three to five nominees for the Oscars during December screenings in Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco.


Nominations will be announced January 10, with the Academy Awards taking place February 24.


Read the full short-list below.


“A Fábrica (The Factory),” Aly Muritiba, director (Grafo Audiovisual)


“Asad,” Bryan Buckley, director, and Mino Jarjoura, producer (Hungry Man)


“Buzkashi Boys,” Sam French, director, and Ariel Nasr, producer (Afghan Film Project)


“Curfew,” Shawn Christensen, director (Fuzzy Logic Pictures)


“Death of a Shadow (Dood van een Schaduw),” Tom Van Avermaet, director, and Ellen De Waele, producer (Serendipity Films)


“Henry,” Yan England, director (Yan England)


“Kiruna-Kigali,” Goran Kapetanovic, director (Hepp Film AB)


“The Night Shift Belongs to the Stars,” Silvia Bizio and Paola Porrini Bisson, producers (Oh! Pen LLC)


“9meter,” Anders Walther, director, and Tivi Magnusson, producer (M & M Productions A/S)


“Salar,” Nicholas Greene, director, and Julie Buck, producer (Nicholas Greene)


“when you find me,” Ron Howard, executive producer, and Bryce Dallas Howard, director (Freestyle Picture Company)


Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Cargo plane crashes in Brazzaville, 3 dead












BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) — A cargo plane owned by a private company crashed Friday near the airport in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, killing at least three people, officials said.


The Soviet-made Ilyushin-76 belonged to Trans Air Congo and appeared to be transporting merchandise, not people, said an aviation official who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.












The plane was coming from Congo‘s second-largest city, Pointe Noire, and tried to land during heavy rain, he said.


Ambulances rushed to the scene in the Makazou neighborhood, located near the airport, but emergency workers were hampered by the lack of light in this capital, which like so many in Africa has a chronic shortage of electricity.


“At the moment, my team is having a hard time searching for survivors in order to find the victims of the crash because there is no light and also because of the rain,” Congolese Red Cross head Albert Mberi said.


He said that realistically, they will only be able to launch a proper search Saturday, when the sun comes up.


Reporters at the scene fought through a wall of smoke. Despite the darkness, they could make out the smoldering remains of the plane, including what looked like the left wing of the aircraft. A little bit further on, emergency workers identified the body of the plane’s Ukrainian pilot, and covered the corpse in a blanket.


Firefighters were trying to extinguish the blaze of a part of the plane that had fallen into a ravine. They were using their truck lights to try to illuminate the scene of the crash. Although the plane was carrying merchandise, emergency workers fear that there could be more people on board.


Because of the state of the road connecting Pointe Noire to Brazzaville, many traders prefer to fly the roughly 400 kilometers (250 miles).


Africa has some of the worst air safety records in the world. In June, a commercial jetliner crashed in Lagos, Nigeria, killing 153 people, just a few days after a cargo plane clipped a bus in neighboring Ghana, killing 10.


Africa News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Sony’s radical PlayStation 4 controller concept: A motion-control device you can split in half












While Nintendo (NTDOY) has been busy innovating with unique controllers on the Wii and Wii U, Sony’s (SNE) DualShock controller for its PlayStation, PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3 has remained virtually the same since 1997. A newly discovered patent reveals Sony might be planning on a radical overhaul of the DualShock for the PlayStation 4 that’s rumored to arrive next year. U.S. patent 20120302347A1 details a “hybrid separable motion controller” that resembles a DualShock controller with two PlayStation Move sensor balls attached to it. Much like how the Wii Remote and Nunchuk controller combo separated the left and right hand input, the Sony controller patent goes one step further by allowing the two halves to be split and combined at any time – all without reducing the amount of buttons available.


The patent also highlights the inclusion of a “connection sensor for determining whether the controller is in a connected configuration or a disconnected configuration.”












One of the PlayStation Move’s biggest disadvantages is that it’s a separate controller and not the default one. As a result, most developers either saw it as merely a Wii Remote clone or as a niche controller with a limited install base not worth programming special controls for. If Sony were to include proper 1:1 motion controls within the default PS4 controller without turning its back on the “core” controller, it could greatly appeal to casual and core gamers.


Such a controller can be considered a natural evolution of the current DualShock 3 controller that sports limited motion controls using its three-axis accelerometer and gyroscope.


Of course, the controller is only a patent that may never make it to market, so don’t get your hopes up if it doesn’t happen.


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Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Wood stoves, extreme cold blight air at Alaska’s “North Pole”












ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) – Santa may need more than Rudolph’s bright nose to get through the grimy North Pole atmosphere.


North Pole, Alaska – the Fairbanks suburb, not the spot at the top of the globe – has posted some of the nation’s worst air-quality readings in recent days, thanks to high levels of wood smoke streaming into stagnant cold air.












Concentrations of particulates have made North Pole’s air “very unhealthy,” meaning children, the elderly and other vulnerable people should stay indoors and all residents should refrain from prolonged exercise, according to local government officials.


The “very unhealthy” classification was given in the past few days. A search of airnow.gov – the government portal which monitors air quality – did not reveal any other U.S. community currently with such poor quality air.


The problem stems from residents’ dependence on wood-burning stoves for heat in an extremely cold region prone to pollution-trapping temperature inversions, said officials with the Fairbanks North Star Borough, the regional government.


“As long as it’s cold and the air is still, we have a particulate problem,” said Jim McCormick, a technician with the borough’s Air Quality Division.


With temperatures in some spots below minus-30 degrees Fahrenheit (-34.4 C) and no relief forecast until next week, the air is expected to stay dirty, McCormick said.


As of Friday, particulate pollution in North Pole was worse than in Beijing, which is notorious for chronic air pollution, a Fairbanks newspaper columnist reported, although Reuters was unable to verify the claim independently.


Dermot Cole of the Fairbanks News-Miner said his research found only one city in the world, Guangzhou in southern China, with particulate readings that are currently worse than those in North Pole.


Alaska’s pristine, mountainous landscapes suggest crystal clean air. But the city of Fairbanks also has had recent problems, with air quality classified by the borough on Friday as “unhealthy” – not as dire as in North Pole, but still triggering warnings against outdoor activities.


The entire Fairbanks North Star Borough has been plagued for years with wintertime air pollution. It is consistently in violation of federal air-quality standards and is required under federal and state laws to come up with measures to clear the air, although they have proved elusive.


A local program that allowed residents to swap out old wood stoves for more efficient models was halted by an anti-regulation initiative that borough voters passed in October.


“That stopped it cold,” McCormick said.


(Editing by Tim Gaynor and Vicki Allen)


Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Two dead after bus crash at Miami airport

MIAMI (AP) — A bus carrying more than 30 people hit a concrete overpass at Miami International Airport, killing two people on board and leaving three others critically injured, officials said Saturday.

The large, white bus was too tall for the 8-foot-6-inch entrance to the arrivals area, said airport spokesman Greg Chin. Buses are supposed to go through the departures area, which has a higher ceiling, he said.

Two large signs warn drivers of large vehicles not to enter beneath the concrete overpass. One attached to the top of the concrete barrier reads: "High Vehicle STOP Turn Left." The other, placed to the left of the driveway several feet in front of the barrier, says all vehicles higher than the 8-foot-6 threshold must turn left.

Three people were at hospitals in critical condition. The other 27 passengers had been hurt, but their injuries were less extensive, authorities said.

Osvaldo Lopez, an officer with Miami-Dade aviation, said he first heard a loud noise Saturday morning and was certain it was some sort of car wreck.

He said he went inside the bus to help and found several passengers thrown into the center aisle. He said the passengers, many of whom were elderly, remained calm after the wreck.

"It was just very bloody," he said of the scene.

After helping the passengers, Lopez suffered some injuries of his own — his left arm and a finger on his right hand were both bandaged.

The body of one dead passenger was pulled from the bus late Saturday morning; the second person died after being taken to a hospital, police said.

Fire trucks and police cars swarmed the area Saturday morning, and the bus was blocked off by yellow police tape. A white cooler that had been filled with water bottles was on its side behind the bus, the front of which remained wedged beneath the overpass Saturday.

The bus was privately owned and typically used for tours, though police believe all the passengers were local residents, not tourists, said Miami-Dade police Lt. Rosanna Cordero-Stutz. The bus' ultimate destination was not yet known, but the driver was unfamiliar with the area near the airport and did not intend to wind up at the arrivals area, Cordero-Stutz said. The driver was being interviewed by investigators, she said.

The bus was going about 20 mph when it hit the overpass Saturday morning, Chin said.

The bus resembles others commonly used for charters and tours, with the driver seated low to the ground and passenger seats in an elevated area behind the driver's seat.

Markings on the bus showed it was owned by Miami Bus Service Corp. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration records found online show the company has had no violations for unsafe driving or controlled substances and alcohol. It also has not reported any crashes in the two years before Oct. 26, 2012.

The records show it did receive three citations related to fatigued driving in April 2011.

The company owns three motorcoaches, according to the records. Miami Bus Service Corp. officials did not immediately respond to a phone message Saturday.

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The Kids Are All Right: How Social Media Created a Generation of Activists












This week marked the nation’s inaugural  “Giving Tuesday,” a UN sponsored initiative, which utilized social media to encourage businesses, schools, and community members to give back. The effort resulted in $ 10 million worth of donations made in a single day, a 53 percent increase over the same day last year.


Conceived as a means to promote activism and charity, the campaign’s use of social media to spread its message is most likely a large part of the initiative’s success. 












Certainly people from every age group use Twitter and Facebook, but social media activism is especially resonant with young adults. According to TBWA, people between the ages of 18-29 strongly identify as activists and count social media as their first point of engagement when they learn about a new cause.


MORE: ‘Tis Always the Season to Give: Creating a Corporate Culture That Gives Back


In fact, about half believe that activism is important to their personal identity and about a third look to it as a means of socializing and relating to one another.


But more than identifying with activism, this younger generation’s aptitude for social media can effect real change. Look at the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Earlier this year, when the organization announced it would pull its funding for breast cancer screenings from Planned Parenthood, cutting off medical access for millions of women, Twitter and Facebook lit up with vitriolic statements, claiming the organization had become a puppet of the religious right. The ensuing bad press proved to be too much and within days, the organization reversed its decision and issued a public apology.


Similarly, when Florida law enforcement officials refused to arrest George Zimmerman after he fatally shot Trayvon Martin, the case lay dormant for almost a month. But an online petition started by Martin’s parents went viral and galvanized a nation demanding justice for the boy’s death. Zimmerman was arrested and charged as a result.


For all we hear about “kids these days” and their irresponsible use of social media−posting questionable pictures of themselves doing kegstands or letting Twitter corrode their ability to hold a thought for more than a nanosecond−it turns out that most are using it to express a genuine passion for changing the world around them. And they’re succeeding.


And these trends extend well beyond the U.S. That same age group in other countries shows similar interests in contributing to larger causes. China’s young adults for instance, lead the world in online political discussions and offline they donate the most money to charities. India’s younger generation ranks the first in the world when it comes to staying informed, and they’re the most optimistic about the impact their activism has on the world around them.


It seems that our youngest generation of adults are the ones leading the charge when it comes to effectively making a difference.


Do you consider yourself an activist? Let us know in the Comments what social causes inspire you to get involved.


Related Stories on TakePart:


• Secret Santas: Profiles in Anonymous Holiday Generosity


• Rwanda Genocide Survivor Wins Grant for Giving Back


• 40 U.S. Billionaires Pledge Half of Fortunes to Charity



A Bay Area native, Andri Antoniades previously worked as a fashion industry journalist and medical writer.  In addition to reporting the weekend news on TakePart, she volunteers as a webeditor for locally-based nonprofits and works as a freelance feature writer for TimeOutLA.com. Email Andri | @andritweets | TakePart.com


Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Obama accuses House GOP of holding middle class tax cuts 'hostage'





President Obama is urging Congress to extend tax breaks for the middle class, saying it's "unacceptable for some Republicans in Congress to hold middle class tax cuts hostage simply because they refuse to let tax rates go up on the wealthiest Americans."



With the clock ticking toward the so-called "fiscal cliff," Obama asked lawmakers in his weekly address to "begin by doing what we all agree on" and extend the middle class tax cuts set to expire at the end of the year.



Read: Cliff Dive: A Stalemate and a Scrooge Christmas



"With the issue behind us, we'll have more time to work out a plan to bring down our deficits in a balanced way, including by asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more, so we can still invest in the things that make our nation strong," he said from a toy manufacturing facility in Hatfield, Pa., where he delivered a similar message to workers Friday.



The president has launched a public campaign to try and force Republicans to sign on to his position on the expiring Bush tax cuts, asking them to pass a Senate bill that would maintain low middle class tax rates while allowing them to go up on the top income earners.



"If we can just get a few House Republicans on board, I'll sign this bill as soon as Congress sends it my way," he said.



Read: Could Outgoing Republicans Hold Keys to 'Fiscal Cliff'?



Earlier this week, the White House put forth a deficit reduction proposal to avert the looming tax increases and spending cuts set to kick in on Jan. 1, which included $1.6 trillion in tax increases over the next 10 years, $50 billion in new stimulus spending, $400 billion in unspecified Medicare cuts, and a measure to effectively end Congress's ability to vote on the debt limit. The offer, which closely mirrors the president's previous deficit-reduction plans, lacked concessions to Republicans, including detailed spending cuts, and was strongly rejected.



Since then, as House Speaker John Boehner put it, negotiations between the White House and House Republicans have come to a "stalemate."


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Cold, mold loom as hazards in Sandy disaster zones












NEW YORK (AP) — A month after Sandy’s floodwaters swept up his block, punched a hole in his foundation and drowned his furnace, John Frawley still has no electricity or heat in his dilapidated home on the Rockaway seashore.


The 57-year-old, who also lost his car and all his winter clothes in the flood, now spends his nights shivering in a pair of donated snow pants, worrying whether the cold might make his chronic heart condition worse.












“I’ve been coughing like crazy,” said Frawley, a former commercial fisherman disabled by a spine injury. He said his family doesn’t have the money to pay for even basic repairs. So far, he has avoided going to a shelter, saying he’d rather sleep in his own home.


“But I’m telling you, I can’t stay here much longer,” he said.


City officials estimate at least 12,000 New Yorkers are trying to survive in unheated, flood-damaged homes, despite warnings that dropping temperatures could pose a health risk.


The chill is only one of the potential environmental hazards that experts say might endanger people trying to resume their lives in the vast New York and New Jersey disaster zone.


Uncounted numbers of families have returned to coastal homes that are contaminated with mold, which can aggravate allergies and leave people perpetually wheezing. Others have been sleeping in houses filled with construction dust, as workers have ripped out walls and flooring. That dust can sometimes trigger asthma.


But it is the approaching winter that has some public health officials worried most. Nighttime temperatures have been around freezing and stand to drop in the coming weeks.


New York City‘s health department said the number of people visiting hospital emergency rooms for cold-related problems has already doubled this November, compared with previous years. Those statistics are likely only the proverbial tip of the iceberg.


Mortality rates for the elderly and chronically ill rise when people live for extended periods in unheated apartments, even when the temperature is still above freezing, said the city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas Farley.


“As the temperatures get colder, the risk increases,” he said. “It is especially risky for the elderly. I really want to encourage people, if they don’t have heat in their apartment, to look elsewhere.”


Since the storm, the health department has been sending National Guard troops door to door, trying to persuade people to leave cold homes until their heating systems are fixed. The city is also carrying out a plan to spend hundreds of millions of dollars helping residents make emergency repairs needed to restore their heat and hot water.


Convincing people that they could be endangering themselves by staying until that work is complete, though, isn’t always easy.


For weeks, Eddie Saman, 57, slept on sheets of plywood in the frigid, ruined shell of his flooded Staten Island bungalow. He stayed even as the house filled up with a disgusting mold that agitated his asthma so much that it sent him to the emergency room.


Volunteers eventually helped clean the place up somewhat and got Saman a mattress. But on Sunday the wood-burning stove he had been using for heat caught fire.


Melting materials in the ceiling burned his cheek. A neighbor who dashed into the house to look for Saman also suffered burns. The interior of the house — what was left of it after the flood — was destroyed.


Two days later, another fire broke out in a flood-damaged house across the street, also occupied by a resident trying to keep warm without a working furnace.


Asked why he hadn’t sought lodging elsewhere, Saman said he didn’t have family in the region and was rattled by the one night he spent in an emergency shelter. He said it seemed more populated by homeless drug addicts than displaced families.


“That place was not for me,” he said.


The Federal Emergency Management Agency offered to pay for a hotel, but Saman said he stopped looking because every inn within 100 miles of the city seemed to be booked solid through December.


Saman’s case may be extreme, but experts said it isn’t unusual for people to hurry back to homes not ready for habitation.


After Hurricane Katrina, medical researchers in New Orleans documented a rise in respiratory ailments among people living in neighborhoods where buildings were being repaired.


The issue wasn’t just mold, which can cause problems for years if it isn’t mediated properly, said Felicia Rabito, an epidemiologist at Tulane University’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. There was simply so much work being done, families spent their days breathing the fine particles of sanded wood and drywall.


People complained of something that became known as the “Katrina cough,” and while it subsided once the dust settled, researchers later found high lead levels in some neighborhoods due to work crews ignoring standards for lead paint removal.


A group of occupational health experts in New York City, including doctors who run programs for people sickened by World Trade Center dust after 9/11, warned last week that workers cleaning up Sandy’s wreckage need to protect themselves by suppressing dust with water, wearing masks and being aware of potential asbestos exposure.


“There are clearly sites that you don’t want children at … and it is very challenging for homeowners to know whether it is safe to go home,” said Dr. Maida Galvez, a pediatrician and environmental health expert at The Mount Sinai Hospital who is part of a team evaluating hazards in the disaster zone.


U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler has urged FEMA and the Environmental Protection Agency to develop a testing program that could give residents an indication of whether their homes were free of mold, sewage and other hazardous substances.


Farley, New York City’s health commissioner, said people entering rooms contaminated by floodwater should wear rubber boots and gloves, and exercise care in cleanup. The hazard posed by spilled sewage is a short-term one and experts say the disease-causing bacteria found in it can be wiped out with a good cleaning. But they say anything absorbent that touched tainted water, like curtains or rugs, should be thrown out.


As for the bitter cold, there was no test needed to tell John Frawley that his home is no place to be spending frigid autumn nights.


“A couple of days ago, I was shivering so badly, I just couldn’t stop,” he said.


Yet with winter nearly here, he still had no plan for getting his heat working again or his ruined electrical system restored, although he also has passed up some of the programs designed to help people like him.


And he has no intention of heading to a shelter.


Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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Cargo plane crashes in Brazzaville, 3 dead












BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) — A cargo plane owned by a private company crashed Friday near the airport in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, killing at least three people, officials said.


The Soviet-made Ilyushin-76 belonged to Trans Air Congo and appeared to be transporting merchandise, not people, said an aviation official who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.












The plane was coming from Congo‘s second-largest city, Pointe Noire, and tried to land during heavy rain, he said.


Ambulances rushed to the scene in the Makazou neighborhood, located near the airport, but emergency workers were hampered by the lack of light in this capital, which like so many in Africa has a chronic shortage of electricity.


“At the moment, my team is having a hard time searching for survivors in order to find the victims of the crash because there is no light and also because of the rain,” Congolese Red Cross head Albert Mberi said.


He said that realistically, they will only be able to launch a proper search Saturday, when the sun comes up.


Reporters at the scene fought through a wall of smoke. Despite the darkness, they could make out the smoldering remains of the plane, including what looked like the left wing of the aircraft. A little bit further on, emergency workers identified the body of the plane’s Ukrainian pilot, and covered the corpse in a blanket.


Firefighters were trying to extinguish the blaze of a part of the plane that had fallen into a ravine. They were using their truck lights to try to illuminate the scene of the crash. Although the plane was carrying merchandise, emergency workers fear that there could be more people on board.


Because of the state of the road connecting Pointe Noire to Brazzaville, many traders prefer to fly the roughly 400 kilometers (250 miles).


Africa has some of the worst air safety records in the world. In June, a commercial jetliner crashed in Lagos, Nigeria, killing 153 people, just a few days after a cargo plane clipped a bus in neighboring Ghana, killing 10.


Africa News Headlines – Yahoo! News


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