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Phoenix Airport Car Service

Another type of vehicle modified for multiple passenger use is the motorized stage, applied to the same tasks as the earlier stagecoach. It is not considered a true limousine but rather in its design and application is between a sedan and a bus. While a bus will have a central interior aisle for access to seating, a stage has multiple doors that allow access to transverse forward facing seats. Examples of the type were constructed not only from sedans (e.g., Chrysler New Yorker, Cadillac DeVille), but also from station wagons; many of the station wagon conversions sported a large rack, running the length of the roof, for carrying the passengers' baggage.

This type of vehicle was once rather common in some locations. An example of its use was in the transport of travelers arriving by railroad at Merced, California to Glacier National Park and Yosemite National Park in the first half of the 20th century. In Glacier National Park, these were referred to as "Jammers" in reference to the nickname of their gear-jamming drivers. In Yosemite, passengers would then stay in rustic platform tent camps or more expensive lodges (both of which are still available) and hike or rent bicycles for movement around the park.

BERLIN (AFP) –
German police arrested two top Rwandan militia leaders Tuesday suspected of atrocities committed in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo, prosecutors said.

Ignace Murwanashyaka, 46, the leader of Rwanda's Hutu FLDR rebels, was seized in the western city of Karlsruhe on suspicion of crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in eastern DR Congo between January 2008 and July this year.

His deputy Straton Musoni, 48, was arrested in Stuttgart on the same charges.

Federal prosecutors said their Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) are suspected of "killing several hundred citizens, raping several women and pillaging and burning several villages" in eastern DR Congo.

They said the arrests follow a year-long investigation.

Human Rights Watch say the FDLR have killed 630 civilians between January and September this year.

"The accused are strongly suspected, as members of the foreign terrorist organisation FDLR, of committing crimes against humanity and war crimes," the prosecutors said in a statement.

The FDLR fled neighbouring Rwanda after the 1994 genocide in which 800,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, were slaughtered.

Its leaders are strongly suspected of taking part in the genocide and have been actively sought by Rwanda.

The movement is almost entirely composed of ethnic Hutus opposed to the government of Rwandan President Paul Kagame, which welcomed the arrests. Hutu rebels in DR Congo: weak but a threat

"The UN and the international community have realised there is no way they can stop what is happening in the DRC without dealing with those (FDLR) who are in Europe," a Rwandan official told AFP in Kigali.

Kigali has long voiced concern over the FDLR's use of Germany as a safe haven despite a UN Security Council resolution imposing travel and financial restrictions on the group's leaders.

The FDLR, whose fighters are thought to number around 5,000, has carried out a brutal campaign of murder, rape and pillage against civilians in eastern Congo despite a joint military operation by Kinshasa and Kigali to clear them out of the region.

In a report in May, UN experts concluded that Murwanashyaka was involved in co-ordinating FDLR operations from February this year.

Recently, the militants have been deliberately targeting civilians to punish them for their government's decision to launch military operations against them, human rights groups said in a report last month.

They say that since the operations began in January, 1,000 civilians have been killed, 7,000 women raped, and more than 6,000 homes have been razed to the ground.

Human Rights Watch said earlier this month that government soldiers had "deliberately killed" more than 500 civilians since March during operations against the FDLR.

The UN mission in DR Congo (MONUC) announced on November 2 that it was immediately withdrawing logistical support for Congolese army units linked to 62 killings.

NEW YORK (Reuters) –
Lazard Ltd (LAZ.N) on Tuesday named insider Kenneth Jacobs as CEO and chairman, succeeding legendary Wall Street dealmaker Bruce Wasserstein, who died last month.

The move was widely expected and signals the investment bank is not seeking to change its focus on businesses such as merger advisory and restructuring, analysts said.

Jacobs, 51, has been with the firm for more than two decades and is an experienced dealmaker. He has worked on transactions for clients including GlaxoSmithKline and IBM, even as he has risen to increasingly senior posts.

"The key to Lazard is you have to be a player-coach," Jacobs said in a 2006 interview with BusinessWeek. "You have to have clients and be involved in big transactions. Otherwise, you get no respect."

Lazard shares drifted down 0.35 percent to $39.51 in morning trading.

Jacobs joined Lazard in 1988 and was named a partner in 1991. He became deputy chairman in 2002.

He was chosen to succeed Wasserstein in large part because he provides a bridge to the days when Lazard was a private partnership, said William Cohan, author of the Lazard history "The Last Tycoons."

Jacobs played a key role in keeping the firm together through tumultuous times, Cohan said. Wasserstein turned Lazard from a partnership legendary for its private fiefdoms and infighting into a public company.

"Jacobs has always been there for Lazard through all the upheavals the firm has had during the last ten years," Cohan said. "He has always been the guy behind the scenes holding the firm together.

POWER STRUGGLES

Lazard's board picked Jacobs unanimously.

In a lengthy announcement that listed several leadership changes, Lazard said Steven Golub, interim chief executive since Wasserstein's death, will continue as Lazard vice chairman and chairman of its financial advisory group. Golub had been considered a candidate for CEO.

Deputy Chairman Gary Parr, also considered a CEO candidate, will become director and vice chairman. There was some doubt about whether Parr, a prolific dealmaker, wanted the job of CEO.

"He is very adept at what he does, but I think he is not someone who would be excited about doing all the administrative stuff and being the CEO running the business," said Michael Holland, president of Holland & Co, noting that Parr is chairman of the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York Inc.

Lazard also announced Tuesday that Ashish Bhutani, who is CEO of Lazard Asset Management, will become a director and vice chairman.

Steven Heyer, a director since Lazard's initial public offering in 2005, will become lead director, a new board position.

Antonio Weiss was named global head of investment banking.

(Reporting by Steve Eder; editing by John Wallace)

LOS ANGELES – Mya is tops among semifinalists on "Dancing with the Stars."
The singer topped the judges' leaderboard on Monday with 87 points out of a possible 90 for the three dances she performed with her professional partner, Dmitry Chaplin.
Model Joanna Krupa and partner Derek Hough finished in second place with 81 points. Reality star Kelly Osbourne and her partner, Louis Van Amstel, are in third place with 78 points; while entertainer Donny Osmond and his partner, Kym Johnson, landed in last place with 74 points.
One couple will be eliminated from the ABC dance competition during Tuesday's episode. The new "Dancing" champ will be crowned next week.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Sarah Palin's book is highly anticipated in her home state — but she's no Harry Potter.
David Cheezem, co-owner of Fireside Books in Palmer, said people have been calling to make sure they'll be able to get the former GOP vice presidential candidate's memoir, "Going Rogue." He's opening early with coffee and doughnuts to celebrate the Tuesday release.
"I'm excited about the event," he said. "Am I as excited as I was for Harry Potter? No. That was huge."
When the last three Potter books were released, the entire downtown area became a virtual Hogwarts, the boarding school for witches and wizards attended by the boy wizard. Merchants, including Cheezem, held trivia contests, and shoppers dressed up in character.
Palmer is adjacent to Wasilla, the hometown of Palin, who resigned as Alaska governor in July. Cheezem said he's hoping some of that regional connection spills over to people buying the book from his store — at the full $28.99 price. So far, 23 of his 100-book shipment are spoken for.
"People are not just buying the book for political affiliations," he said. "They're buying it because Sarah Palin grew up here and they know her children and they know her."
Other sellers are offering discounts on the 413-page book, with some national retailers marking the book at about $9.
Pandemonium Booksellers in Wasilla will knock off at least 20 percent, said storeowner Shannon Cullip. Her store has 100 copies available and has another 100 sold through pre-order, including 25 from just one customer.
But there are a few non-fans among the loving hometown crowd, too.
"It's always mixed," Cullip said. "People either love her or they hate her. They either would rather die than read her book or they can't wait to read it and they think everything needs to read it, too."
The Borders store in Anchorage is slashing the price by 30 percent for general customers and 40 percent for members of its Borders rewards program.
Rob Jack, the store's sales manager, said "Going Rogue" will be the first thing customers see when they walk in the door. But he declined to discuss how many books are available or how fast they're selling, only that pre-orders are in the triple digits.
"It's an anticipated book all right," he said. "There's a buzz all right."
The same discounts apply at Borders' Waldenbooks store in Wasilla. The books are going briskly, with half of the 300 copies already claimed, according to employee Crystal Dietz. The store was getting more and more calls leading up to the release date, with some asking if any signings are scheduled for Palin, who is launching a national book tour this week. There's been no word yet on any Alaska appearances.
"A lot of people calling from out-of-state to order from us," Dietz said. "They want the book sent from Wasilla just, I guess, because she's from here and everyone wants to be a part of that."
At Gulliver's Books in Fairbanks, tins of candies packaged as "Sarah's Embarrassmints" are a hot item, far outselling Palin's book.
Store owner David Hollingsworth said he has received 10 pre-orders out of his 100 copies. It's nothing like the frenzy he saw for the 2,000 copies he ordered with the last installment of the Potter series.
The July 2007 release of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" prompted two young sisters to wait in line outside his store for 11 days, living out in their parents' camper. Hollingsworth also had a midnight release for Potter fans but didn't plan to repeat those hours for "Going Rogue."

"Yes, it's a big deal, but we've had bigger deals," he said.

Coinciding with Palin's national book tour, the Alaska Democratic Party announced Monday it was launching a Web site to hold Palin accountable on some issues. It's called "Say nO to Sarah," or SOS.

"It's a response to all the calls we've gotten from outside of Alaska from people wanting to know what's fact and what's fiction regarding Sarah Palin's record," party spokesman Kevin Harun said.

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On the Net:

"Going Rogue": http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780061939891/Going(underscore)Rogue/index.aspx

Alaska Democratic Party: http://www.sarahwatch.org/

KABUL – Afghanistan's president welcomed his re-election by default Tuesday and reached out to opponents, promising to create a government of national participation and banish corruption that has undermined his administration.
President Hamid Karzai spoke a day after he was declared victor of an election so marred by fraud that his opponent dropped out of a planned runoff because he said it could not be free or fair.
Karzai said he wants people from every part of the country in his government, including Taliban who are ready to cooperate with the administration and political opponents. But he never mentioned his former challenger Abdullah Abdullah by name.
"Those who want to work with me are most welcome, regardless of whether they opposed me in the election or whether they supported me in the elections," Karzai said.
The Taliban claimed their own victory, saying in a statement the canceled runoff showed their efforts to derail the vote by threats and attacks were successful.
"Our brave mujahedeen were able to disrupt the entire process. Even the airstrikes and ground forces were not able to stop our mujahedeen from their attacks," the statement said. The canceled vote also showed that Afghans heeded their call not to participate in an election they said was the tool of foreigners, the statement said.
Election officials had cited concern about security as one reason not to go ahead with a vote with a foregone conclusion.
Abdullah, who once served as Karzai's foreign minister, has said he will not join Karzai's administration, but will work from the outside for reforms and for national unity.
Karzai did not spell out how he would institute reforms, nor mention whether he is willing to make concessions to his opponents.
Karzai did say that he needs international support and does not want to squander the goodwill of those supplying thousands of troops and funds to Afghanistan.
Even so, people close to Karzai and Abdullah say they spent the past few days negotiating privately about ministry seats or accommodating Abdullah's platform in some way. The U.S. and its allies have also pressured Karzai to institute reforms and to reach out to the Abdullah camp.
President Barack Obama said Monday that he had called for a new chapter during a telephone call congratulating Karzai over his re-election.
When Karzai offered assurances, Obama told him that "the proof is not going to be in words. It's going to be in deeds."
Karzai acknowledged during the press conference that Afghanistan "has a bad name from corruption." He has repeatedly promised to tackle corruption during his previous five years as president but with no success.
"We will do our best through all possible means to eliminate this dark stain from our clothes," he said.
He did not give details about how he will institute reforms, or mention and specifics about what he will do to reach out to opponents beyond welcoming them if they want to join with him.
Karzai did say that he needs international support and does not want to squander the goodwill of those supplying thousands of troops and funds to Afghanistan.
He said he wants to "make sure that the taxpayers' money coming to us from your countries is spent wisely and rightly by us, the Afghan government, and also by the donors themselves."

The messy end to the election left the United States and its allies with the difficult task of helping the Karzai government restore legitimacy both at home and abroad. Public support for the war is already dropping in the U.S. and other countries with troops in Afghanistan. The image of a fraud-stained Afghan partner does little to reverse the slide.

But those same nations were reticent to go through with a Nov. 7 runoff that risked lives.

Taliban attacks killed dozens during the first round in August, while in some areas, militants cut off the ink-marked fingers of people who had voted.

Organizing enough security to prevent violence in a hastily arranged runoff would have posed a serious challenge for coalition forces in Afghanistan, and some officers commanding NATO forces voiced relief at the vote's cancellation.

Col. Benoit Durieux, who heads the battalion of some 750 French Foreign Legion in the Surobi area east of the capital, said his men could now focus on other tasks.

"We clearly won the first round against the Taliban in terms of securing the elections," Durieux told The Associated Press in the Tora forward operating base, some 40 miles (65 kilometers) east of Kabul. "Why give them the opportunity of a replay?"

The Taliban said last week's suicide bombing of a guesthouse used by U.N. election workers "showed that even they are not safe in Kabul." The attackers killed five U.N. staffers and three Afghans.

It insisted that all decisions about the vote had been taken by Western powers, saying that "the announcement of the election result yesterday showed for the people that all the decisions about the elections were made in Washington and London."

The Taliban regarded the election as a Western plot and had threatened to ramp up attacks on those participating in the runoff.

NATO and Afghan forces had two to three months to prepare the security of the first round on Aug. 20. But organizing a second round in barely two weeks had been viewed as a major challenge, Durieux said. "And the insurgents saw our techniques, our positions during the vote, so they'd have more insight" to try to disrupt a new round of voting, he said.

____

Associated Press Writers Elena Becatoros in Kabul and Alfred de Montesquiou in Surobi contributed to this report.

LOS ANGELES – The first interview with Rihanna about Chris Brown's assault on her is airing this week on ABC.
The network says the pop star's one-on-one with Diane Sawyer will air Thursday and Friday on "Good Morning America" and Friday evening on the news magazine "20/20."
Brown's attack on then-girlfriend Rihanna occurred in February. He was sentenced in August to five years' probation, six months of community labor and a year of domestic violence counseling after he pleaded guilty to felony assault.
Rihanna's ABC interview coincides with the debut of her new single, "Russian Roulette," from her upcoming album, "Rated R." It's her first CD since 2007's multiplatinum "Good Girl Gone Bad."

Foreign policy never goes according to campaign plan, but for President Barack Obama, who promised a hard-headed new engagement with the world, the last week and the weeks he sees looming ahead must be discouraging.
Across a region spanning Pakistan to the Mediterranean, foreign leaders seem to be challenging the very premise of his policy: That foreign countries can reasonably be persuaded to move in the direction of common interests, and that a better-loved America can get more done.
In Afghanistan, an all-out effort to promote a legitimate election turned into a scramble to prevent a civil war and ease the defrauded challenger off the stage. Iran convinced the White House to drop its late-September deadline for action, and then appears to have rejected a deal on nuclear fuel. Great powers like Russia and China show no appetite for crucial concessions, while the American Congress continues to block major action on a pillar of Obama’s policy goals – international action on climate change.
“This is a clarifying moment,” said David Rothkopf, a former Clinton administration foreign policy hand. “It’s not the week that they wanted to have happen, but sometimes it’s better to get your rough lessons early when the stakes are lower.”
Another Democratic analyst, the National Security Network’s Heather Hurlburt, labeled this “back down to earth week.”
“None of these things is more ugly than they were a week or a month or six months ago,” she said. “They’ve now done the easy things, and we got spoiled for six or eight or ten months: Easy thing, applause, Nobel Prize. We’re now at the stuff that’s really hard.”
Less sympathetic analysts see the clarification in more negative terms.
“For an administration that came in thinking it was going to be more realistic than the previous administration, they’ve certainly been hit in the head by real facts,” said Gary Schmitt, a former Republican congressional staffer and a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, citing a “growing perception that they’re the team that can’t shoot straight.”
“They had – ironically for realists – unrealistic expectations on what they could accomplish,” he said. 
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a possible Republican opponent in 2012, accused Obama of indecision on Afghanistan.
"The president has known about this issue for a long time. He received a report from Gen. [Stanley] McChrystal for what, four months ago, and has not been able to make a decision," Romney said on the CBS "Early Show." "This is very, very unfortunate for the people there and for our troops."
It’s a cliché of presidencies that foreign policy priorities set themselves, and that presidents have far less control than they imagine they will. Obama’s key priorities looked, weeks ago, intact. On his most profound challenge, Afghanistan, he was herding key constituencies – form the British military to the American Democrats – toward a consensus.
“There had been a huge amount of momentum behind his emphasis on Afghanistan – thanks also significantly to [envoy Richard] Holbrooke – and this election has halted all that momentum,” said Peter Galbraith, an American diplomat who left the U.N. mission to Afghanistan in a dispute over the election.
In Iran, meanwhile, detailed and painstaking talks over shipping nuclear fuel to Russia – subject of cooperation with French and Russian leaders – also foundered last Friday, when Iran rejected the deal.
Iranian officials were quoted Monday offering only the haziest reassurances. The country’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, told reporters that Iran has “some technical and economic considerations” about the proposal, the Associated Press reported.
The central problem in those two theaters, and in others, has been the lack of a reliable partner whom Obama can engage.
“There is a unifying issue in the Palestinian Territories, in Iraq, in Iran, in Afghanistan, and in Pakistan, and that is you need to have a trustworthy partner and the people on the ground need to want to change,” said Rothkopf. “Unless both of those conditions are present then you’re playing at the margins.”
Some analysts also question the focus of an administration whose foreign policy seems dominated by the president’s personal interest.

“The administrating is finding it difficult to have six major priorities,” said Jon Alterman, the director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It’s not a question of can the administration walk and chew gum, but it’s hard to devote high level attention to a wide diversity of things.”

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s trip to the Middle East and Central Asia in recent days contributed to the impression of an unsettled policy approach. In Pakistan, she said bluntly that the Pakistanis ought to know where Al Qaeda leaders are – then walked the candid comment back. In Israel, she praised Israeli leaders for their willingness to compromise – then rushed to shore up a Palestinian leadership that appears to have been badly weakened by that same compromise.

And so Obama has been forced to adjust his targets. On Afghanistan, he declared Karzai’s election “legitimate” Monday – a statement of hope as much as a description of reality. On Iran, he faces congressional pressure for harsh sanctions, and a choice of imperfect options – some weaker compromise with skeptical Russian and Chinese partners on international sanctions, or sanctions enacted by the sort of Bush-style coalition of the willing – dubbed “the coalition of the like-minded nations" he’s long derided.

What had appeared to be a new approach to foreign policy – a combination of charismatic leadership, moral suasion, and cool judgment of interests – at this moment looks like a simpler pragmatism.

But that, for those who want Obama to succeed, is still a welcome change.

“Any foreign policy is going to have ups and downs but what characterizes Obama’s foreign policy is a great deal of pragmatism and strategy,” said Galbraith. “Strategy by definition means you’re always evaluating the circumstances – the terrain – and making adjustments.”

Read More Stories from POLITICOConservatives take aim at leaders, Crist, other racesCLICK: Fists fly at WaPo newsroomWinning Dede: How Dems got her nodGOP warns Boxer on climate billPolls: Hoffman leads in New York 23

Seat Heaters

A bucket seat is a seat contoured to hold one person, distinct from bench seats which are flat platforms designed to seat multiple people. Bucket seats are standard in fast cars to keep riders in place when making sharp or quick turns.

In suitably equipped cars, seats and mirrors can be adjusted using electric controls. Some vehicles let the driver(s) save the adjustments in memory for later recall, with the push of a button. Most systems allow users to store more than one set of adjustments. This allows multiple drivers to store their comfort settings, or a single driver to store several different occupant positions. Some vehicles associate memorized settings with a specifically numbered, remotely operated key fob, resetting a seat to the position associated with that fob when the vehicle is unlocked (e.g. key fob #1 sets seats to memory position #1, #2 to #2, etc.)

MOUNTAIN HOME, Idaho – If Marion Lewis had his way, he'd take Washington, D.C.-area sniper John Allen Muhammad into the Idaho desert near his home and kill him slowly, over three days.
"He would be screaming the whole time. That's why I can't claim to be a good Christian," said Lewis, whose 25-year-old daughter was killed in Maryland in the 2002 sniper spree.
But instead of personal retribution, Lewis would settle for being present in the Virginia death chamber Nov. 10 when Muhammad is scheduled to die.
He doesn't have the money for the trip to see his daughter's killer breathe his last breath. The 57-year-old construction worker says he has been waylaid by the recession, hasn't held a steady job for two years and has been collecting unemployment on-and-off since 2007. He's trying to unload a house near Boise in a short sale.
Though Lewis acknowledges he feels "a little ghoulish," he called syndicated news program Inside Edition looking for help to pay for a journey he believes will put some semblance of closure on his daughter's murder. He has learned that justice has its price.
On Thursday morning, he said the New York-based show has agreed to finance a four-day trip to Virginia, in exchange for interviews before and after Muhammad's execution. Lewis says he'll return about $900 in donations he received from private citizens since his story started getting attention this week, along with sending the donors thank-you notes.
"There's never been any question about watching that animal die, for me," said Lewis, who lives with his wife, Jo, and two beagles in a scruffy home two miles from the tidy cemetery where his daughter is buried.
His daughter, Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera, was vacuuming her minivan Oct. 3, 2002 at a gas station near where she lived in Silver Spring, Md., when Muhammad and his young accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, gunned her down. She was one of 10 people killed in the three-week killing spree.
Lewis' living room walls are covered in pictures reminding him of the tragedy: Lori on her wedding day; Lori and Nelson Rivera, the Honduran landscaper she met at a Mormon church and married; their daughter, Jocelin, now 10.
Patricia Allue, director of the Prince William County Victim/Witness Program in Virginia, said Lewis contacted her office looking for assistance but she didn't have funds available. Officials in Maryland, where Lori Rivera was killed, didn't immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
And the Virginia Department of Corrections doesn't provide financial assistance to victims' families to attend executions. Officials there have been in contact with relatives of Muhammad's and Malvo's victims, including those killed in Maryland and Washington, D.C., in part because the facility in rural southern Virginia where the execution will take place has limited capacity for those wanting to watch Muhammad die.
Larry Traylor, a prisons spokesman, said his agency does help families like Lewis' with logistics: Directions to the execution spot, nearby hotels, details about how family members enter execution viewing rooms after other witnesses, then leave first after it's over, to protect their privacy.
"We try to chat with them, to explain what the process is, to put their mind at ease and help them make the decision as to whether they want to attend," Traylor said. "Then, it's really up to them."
Fearful he'd miss the execution, Lewis called Inside Edition, a 20-year-old news program that mixes celebrity news, investigations and human-interest stories.
The show will pay for Lewis to fly to Virginia on Nov. 8, attend the execution two days later, and then return to Idaho after Muhammad is dead. Lewis said he isn't quite sure what attending will bring, but he doesn't want to miss it.
"As far as closure, this will never be closed," he said.
Lewis said his daughter's death has changed his family in ways both big and small. Jocelin, Lori's daughter, lives with her father and his new wife in Northern California. Her mother was murdered when the then 3-year-old was too young to understand she was never coming back, Lewis said.
Lewis quit a job four years ago working at a gravel pit near Boise. The lulls between each new load of rock into the crusher he was operating gave him too much time to think about his daughter.

The only thing better than being in the death chamber Nov. 10 would be to personally execute Muhammad, he said.

"Pushing the button, yeah," Lewis said. "During the trial, I never went to the court because I didn't figure I needed to end up in jail. His guards wouldn't have been able to keep him from me."

WASHINGTON – Federal investigators are scrambling to determine what happened aboard a Northwest Airlines jetliner whose crew flew 150 miles past its destination while air traffic controllers, other pilots and even a flight attendant back in the cabin tried to get their attention.
Investigators don't know whether the pilots may have fallen asleep, but National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Keith Holloway said Friday that fatigue and cockpit distraction will be looked into.
The plane's flight recorders were brought to Washington Friday, but the cockpit voice recorder is an older model that contains only the last 30 minutes of conversation. That makes the investigation more difficult since that time would be taken up by the flight back to Minneapolis — the intended destination — and the landing there Wednesday night.
Flight 188's recorders were delivered to the NTSB's Washington office. The pilots, both temporarily suspended, are to be interviewed by investigators next week. The airline, acquired last year by Delta Air Lines, is also investigating.
The crew told authorities they were distracted during a heated discussion over airline policy, the NTSB said.
Wednesday night, the airliner with more than 140 passengers aboard zoomed past Minneapolis at 37,000 feet at what was supposed to be the end of a flight from San Diego. Worried about who was actually at the controls, officials asked the crew to prove who they were by executing turns after they finally were contacted.
On the ground, police and FBI agents prepared for the worst, and the Air National Guard put fighter jets on alert at two locations as the drama unfolded.
Pilots from two other planes in the vicinity were finally able to reach the pilots using a different radio frequency, a controllers union spokesman said. A flight attendant in the cabin also was able to contact them by intercom, said a source close to the investigation who wasn't authorized to talk publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
By that time, the Airbus A320 was over Eau Claire, Wis., and the pilots had been out of communication with air traffic controllers for over an hour. They turned back and landed safely in Minneapolis, the plane's scheduled destination.
The plane passed over Minneapolis at 37,000 feet just before 8 p.m. local time. Contact with controllers wasn't established until 14 minutes later, NTSB said.
Air traffic controllers in Denver had been in contact with the pilots as they flew over the Rockies, FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown said. But as the plane got closer to Minneapolis, she said, "the Denver center tried to contact the flight but couldn't get anyone."
Denver controllers notified their counterparts in Minneapolis, who also tried to reach the crew without success, Brown said.
Officials suspect Flight 188's radio might still have been tuned to a frequency used by Denver controllers even though the plane had flown beyond their reach, said Doug Church, a spokesman for the National Air Traffic Controllers Union. Controllers worked throughout the incident with the pilots of other planes, asking them to try to raise Flight 188 using the Denver frequency, he said
That was unsuccessful until two pilots working with Minneapolis controllers finally got through just before the plane turned around, Church said. Minneapolis controllers don't have the capability of using the Denver frequency, but pilots do, he said.
After re-establishing contact with the plane, controllers asked the pilot in charge to execute a series of turns to show he was in control of the aircraft, Church said.
"Controllers have a heightened sense of vigilance when we're not able to talk to an aircraft. That's the reality post-9/11," he said.
Passenger Lonnie Heidtke said he didn't notice anything unusual before the landing except that the plane was late.
The flight attendants "did say there was a delay and we'd have to orbit or something to that effect before we got back. They really didn't say we overflew Minneapolis. ... They implied it was just a business-as-usual delay," said Heidtke, a consultant with a supercomputer consulting company based in Bloomington, Minn.

Once on the ground, the plane was met by police and FBI agents. Passengers retrieving their luggage from overhead bins were asked by flight attendants sit down, Heidtke said. An airport police officer and a couple other people came on board and stood at the cockpit door, talking to the pilots, he said.

"I did jokingly call my wife and say, 'This is the first time I've seen the police meet the plane. Maybe they're going to arrest the pilots for being so late.' Maybe I was right," Heidtke said.

The pilots' explanation that they were distracted by shop talk "just doesn't make any sense," said Bill Voss, president of the Flight Safety Foundation in Alexandria, Va. "The pilots are saying they were involved in a heated conversation. Well, that was a very long conversation."

The FAA is updating rules governing how many hours commercial pilots may fly and remain on duty. The NTSB also cautioned government agencies this week about the risks of sleep apnea contributing to transportation accidents.

In January 2008, two pilots for go! airlines fell asleep for at least 18 minutes during a midmorning flight from Honolulu to Hilo, Hawaii. The plane passed its destination and was heading out over open ocean before controllers raised the pilots. The captain was later diagnosed with sleep apnea.

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AP Airlines Writer Joshua Freed and AP Writers Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis and Dave Koenig in Dallas contributed to this report.

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On the Net:

FlightAware.com tracking of Northwest Flight 188: http://bit.ly/2QV9hX

National Transportation Safety Board http://www.ntsb.gov

LONDON – The head of Britain's domestic spy agency said Friday that Britain's security services try to make sure they do not collude in the torture or mistreatment of detainees by foreign governments, but acknowledged it was not possible to guarantee that it never happened.
Jonathan Evans, director-general of domestic security agency MI5, said that following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, Britain had to work with other countries that had more experience dealing with al-Qaida related terrorism, even if those countries operated on different standards.
"Our intelligence resources were not adequate to the situation we faced and the root of the terrorist problem was in parts of the world where the standards and practices of the local security apparatus were very far removed from our own," he said.
Evans made his comments at a speech at his former college, Bristol University, in the west of England Thursday evening. The speech was made public Friday.
"Given the pressing need to understand and uncover al-Qaida's plans, were we to deal, however circumspectly, with those security services who had experience of working against al-Qaida on their own territory, or were we to refuse to deal with them, accepting that in so doing we would be cutting off a potentially vital source of information that would prevent attacks in the West?" he said in the speech.
"In my view we would have been derelict in our duty if we had not worked, circumspectly, with overseas liaisons who were in a position to provide intelligence that could safeguard this country from attack," he said.
Evans said Britain's security services "work hard to ensure that we do not collude in torture or mistreatment."
"Enormous effort goes into assessing the risks in each case, But it is not possible to eradicate all risk. Judgments need to be made," he said.
Evans' comments come a month after Britain's foreign intelligence agency, MI6, reported one its officers to authorities amid concerns over the U.K.'s possible complicity in torture. Police are also investigating claims that an MI5 officer was complicit in the mistreatment of a former Guantanamo Bay detainee.
The British government was forced to admit last year that one of its remote outposts — the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia — had twice been used by the United States as a refueling stop for the secret transfer of two terrorism suspects. Human rights group say the practice of transferring suspects without formal extradition proceedings opens the door for third-party countries to torture and interrogate suspects outside international standards.
Evans said he could not comment on specific cases. He said he did not condone all aspects of U.S. policy but said intelligence sharing with U.S. authorities was vital.
"I do not defend the abuses that have recently come to light within the U.S. system since 9/11," he said. "But it is important to recognize that we do not control what other countries do, that operational decisions have to be taken with the knowledge available."
Evans said he accepted criticisms from the British parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee — a panel of lawmakers that meets in private to scrutinize intelligence work — which said Britain's security services were slow to detect patterns in U.S. practice after Sept. 11, 2001, but added: "The U.K. has gained huge intelligence benefits from our cooperation with the U.S. agencies in recent years, and the U.S. agencies have been generous in sharing intelligence with us."

PARIS – French farmers angry over financial woes have blocked the famed Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris and set hay ablaze.
About 150 farmers from rural regions of France spread hay and piled tires across the wide street lined with high-end shops before setting them on fire. Firefighters quickly put out the flames.
Farmers are staging protests around the country Friday to call attention to their difficulties, made worse as food prices have fallen from record highs in 2007. Protests disrupted traffic on highways from Toulouse in southern France to Moselle in the northeast.
Jean-Michel Lemetayer, the head of farmers' union FNSEA, appealed to the government for a "major emergency plan" including tax cuts to help French farmers compete with European rivals.

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Another very popular situation where costumes are employed are for sporting events, where people dressed as their team's representative mascot help the club or team rally round their team's cause. Animal costumes which are visually very similar to mascot costumes are also popular among the members of the furry fandom where they are referred to as fursuits.

The amount of make-up used on a dancer depends on the venue, lighting, and the distance of the audience. To enhance the dancer’s face and make it visible from a distance, the face’s bone structure should be emphasized, there should be a space between the eyebrows, and the eyes should stand out. The further away the audience is the bolder make-up required (Cooper 78).

Earthquakes and tsunamis, such as the powerful quake that occurred today in the South Pacific and wave it generated, can often go hand-in-hand.

Tsunamis, which can travel over the ocean surface from many hundreds of miles, can be generated when chunks of the planet's crust separate under the seafloor, causing an earthquake. Today's temblor was put at magnitude 8.0 by the U.S. Geological Survey. The potential height of the tsunami is not yet known.

Here's what happens: One slab of lifting crust essentially rapidly acts as a giant paddle, transferring its energy to the water.

Tsunamis can also be caused by volcanic eruptions, underwater detonations and even landslides.

Exactly what caused today's tsunami is not yet clear. And officials have been scrambling to issue watches and warnings and estimate what might occur.

The resulting waves are hard to predict for several reasons. Nobody knows how a quake has affected the seafloor until hours, days or even months after the event. And a tsunami is almost imperceptible on the open ocean, rising to full ferocity only as it nears the shore.

While more tsunami-sensing buoys cover the ocean than before the devastating 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, these waves can still be missed.

Not all seafloor earthquakes will generate a tsunami - if the friction between the crustal plates occurs very deep below the ocean floor or move in a way that causes a minimal paddle effect, a tsunami isn't as likely to form.

The 2004 quake just off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, was colossal, eventually put at magnitude 9.3. But an 8.7-magnitude earthquake in 2005 that originated at the same location, while large enough to generate a devastating tsunami, scientists say, did not do so. The exact reasons remain mysterious.

The 2004 tsunami, and those spurred by the 9.2-magnitude Great Alaska Earthquake in 1964, were examples of teletsunamis, which can cross entire oceans.

Several devastating tsunamis have occurred throughout recorded history, including one that leveled Lisbon, Portugal in 1755 and one generated by the explosion of Krakatoa in Indonesia that drowned an estimated 36,000 people.

Except for the largest tsunamis, such as the 2004 Indian Ocean event, most tsunamis do not result in giant breaking waves; instead they come in much like very strong and fast-moving tides, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. As a tsunami nears the shoreline, the rising seafloor forces a wave that might have been just inches tall into a monster that can be several feet high.

The Pacific Ocean basin is particularly prone to tsunamis; a study earlier this year found that the tsunami risk to the west coast of the United States was higher than previously thought.

Video - Recreating an Ancient Tsunami
Tsunamis: The Grave, Global and Unpredictable Threat
West Coast Tsunami Risk Higher Than Thought
Original Story: Earthquakes and Tsunamis: How They WorkLiveScience.com chronicles the daily advances and innovations made in science and technology. We take on the misconceptions that often pop up around scientific discoveries and deliver short, provocative explanations with a certain wit and style. Check out our science videos, Trivia & Quizzes and Top 10s. Join our community to debate hot-button issues like stem cells, climate change and evolution. You can also sign up for free newsletters, register for RSS feeds and get cool gadgets at the LiveScience Store.