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Monday, June 18, 2012


FLOODED SETI AGAIN DISPLACES 9 FAMILIES AFTER EARLIER HAVOC KILLING NEARLY 80 PERSONS Kathmandu, 18 June: Floods in Seti River that occurred this [Monday] morning displaced at least nine families at Yamdi in Hemja VDC, Kaski. The families were displaced after the river changed its course following heavy rainfall on Sunday night. At least 30 had died and many went missing due to a flood in the same river about a month ago as well. Usha Lalchan, 16, daughter of local Laxmi Lalchan has sustained injuries on her mouth while attempting to escape the flood. According to the District Police Office, Kaski, families of Khamba Singh Gurung, Janmaya Paudel, Laxmi Bahadur Lalchan, Pramila Bhandari, Kabita Timalsina, Khadak Sunar, Dhan Bahadur Sarki, Hina Kumari Gurung and Parbati Chapai were displaced. Similarly, a truck bearing Ga 1 Kha 3710 number plate was swept away by flood some 200 meters downstream from the area, Santa Bahadur Gurung, owner of the truck said. Likewise, the flood has also washed away the drinking water pipe planted in the area. nnnn BHAKTAPUR’S PEACOCK WINDOW ON UNESCO’S WORLD HERITAGE LIST NEGLECTED Kathmandu, 18 June: The famous historical Mayurjhyal known as the Mhayakha in local parlance is currently battling for survival, RSS reports from Bhaktapur.. This ancient wooden window frame with intricate carvings is listed in the UNESCO's world heritage list. It gets its name from the statuette of a peacock that is mounted on the wooden window frame. Peacock is known as Mayur in Nepali language, thus the name of the window is Mayurjhyal or the peacock window. The Mayurjhyal is kept at a cell to the south-east corner of the Dattatraya Temple in Bhaktapur. The Mayur or peacock statuette that is mounted on the window is headless for nearly four decades now. The head of this ancient statuette was reportedly broken in the great earthquake of 1933 and the bodies concerned have not so far felt the need of restoring it. People of the locality have already informed the Office for the Preservation and Care of Monuments and Ancient Palaces under the Bhaktapur Municipality on the need of preservation of this ancient window. But the office has so far not taken any measures to that end. Nnnn CHINESE SPACECRAFT DOCKS WITH ORBITING MODULE Kathmandu, 18 June: A Chinese spacecraft carrying three astronauts docked with an orbiting module Monday, another first for the country as it strives to match American and Russian exploits in space, AP reports from Beijing . The Shenzhou 9 capsule completed the maneuver with the Tiangong 1 module shortly after 2 p.m. (0600 GMT), 343 kilometers (213 miles) above Earth. The docking was shown live on national television. Astronauts will live and work in the module for several days as part of preparations for manning a permanent space station. The crew includes 33-year-old Liu Yang, an air force pilot and China's first female space traveler. The docking was a first for Chinese manned spaceflight. In November 2011, the unmanned Shenzhou 8 successfully docked twice with Tiangong 1 by remote control. Monday's docking also was completed by remote control from a ground base in China. A manual docking, to carried out by one of the crew members, is scheduled for later in the mission. Two crew members plan to conduct medical tests and experiments inside the module, while the third will remain in the spacecraft. Liu is joined by mission commander and veteran astronaut Jing Haipeng, 45, and crew mate Liu Wang, 43. The three are to spend at least 10 days in space on China's fourth manned mission, which was launched Saturday from the Jiuquan center on the edge of the Gobi desert in northern China. China is hoping to join the United States and Russia as the only countries to send independently maintained space stations into orbit. It is already one of just three nations to have launched manned spacecraft on their own. Another manned mission to the module is planned later this year. Possible future missions could include sending a man to the moon. The Tiangong 1, which was launched last year, is due to be replaced by a permanent space station around 2020. That station is to weigh about 60 tons, slightly smaller than NASA's Skylab of the 1970s and about one-sixth the size of the 16-nation International Space Station. China has only limited cooperation in space with other nations and is excluded from the ISS, largely on objections from the United States. China first launched a man into space in 2003 and conducted a two-man mission in 2005. A three-man trip in 2008 featured the country's first spacewalk. nnnn

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