The Russian scientific mission ship, trapped in dense pack ice off East Antarctica since Christmas Day, is close to being rescued as Chinese icebreaker Snow Dragon nears.
The crew can see the Snow Dragon icebreaker, which will try to cut a path through the ice allowing the research vessel to reach open water.
The Akademik Shokalskiy ship has 74 on board and is being used by the Australasian Antarctic Expedition.
They are following the route explorer Douglas Mawson travelled a century ago.
Akademik Shokalskiy ship has 74 on board and is being used by the Australasian Antarctic Expedition
One of the leaders of the expedition, Chris Turney, tweeted an image of the Snow Dragon icebreaker on the horizon as it approached the ship.
The Chinese icebreaker – twice the length of the Shokalskiy – may ask for assistance from two other boats, the French vessel L’Astrolabe and Australia’s Aurora Australis.
The research ship was trapped by thick sheets of ice that were driven by strong winds about 1,500 nautical miles south of Hobart – the capital of the Australian state of Tasmania.
There had also been fears that blizzards could hamper the rescue effort
The Shokalskiy is well stocked with food and is in no danger, according to the team.
Although trapped for the moment, the scientists are continuing their experiments. They have been measuring temperature and salinity through cracks in the surrounding ice.
Kenya is holding a meeting of East Africa’s leaders on growing violence in South Sudan, where more than 1,000 people are believed to have died.
The talks come a day after South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit met the Kenyan president and Ethiopian PM.
Meanwhile, the UN said the first peacekeeping reinforcements were expected to arrive in 48 hours.
South Sudan violence erupted 12 days ago between forces loyal to Salva Kiir and those backing his ex-deputy Riek Machar.
Kenya talks come a day after South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit met the Kenyan president and Ethiopian PM in Juba
The fighting has forced more than 100,000 to flee their homes, with about 60,000 seeking refuge at UN compounds across the country, UN officials say.
East African regional leaders from the eight-member bloc, known as IGAD, are meeting in Kenya’s capital Nairobi to follow up on issues raised during Thursday’s talks with President Salva Kiir in South Sudan’s capital Juba.
Salva Kiir met Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta and Ethiopian PM Hailemariam Desalegn. The talks were described by Ethiopia as “very constructive and very candid”.
Thai government said it would ask the army to provide security for February’s elections, as the military called for restraint on both sides.
Thailand is facing increasingly violent protests, with two killed and dozens injured in recent days.
On Thursday, the Electoral Commission said the polls should be postponed to ensure the safety of candidates.
However, government officials said parliament was already dissolved so there was no legal reason for a delay.
Fighting broke out on Thursday at a stadium where election candidates were being registered.
A group of protesters, some throwing stones and evidently some who were armed, tried to break into the stadium.
One police officer and one protester were killed in the clashes.
Thailand is facing increasingly violent protests, with two killed and dozens injured in recent days
Deputy PM Surapong Tovichakchaikul said the government would ask the army to help secure candidate registrations on Saturday.
“I will also ask the military to provide security protection for members of the public on the 2 February elections,” he added in a televised address.
Speaking to reporters on Friday, Thai army chief Prayuth Chan-ocha did not address the government’s request.
Instead, he urged restraint on both sides and an end to street violence and said the army had shown “red traffic lights to both sides so things will calm down”.
When asked if the army would intervene, Prayuth Chan-ocha said: “That door is neither open nor closed.”
The army, which mounted a successful coup only seven years ago, remains a powerful player in Thai politics.
The army has staged several coups in the past, and ousted former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, who is also brother to current premier Yingluck Shinawatra, in 2006.
Yingluck Shinawatra called the snap election earlier this month, following weeks of protests.
However, the opposition Democrat party is boycotting the polls.
Yingluck Shinawatra’s Pheu Thai Party won the last election in 2011 and has a big majority in parliament.
Tori Spelling spent a happy Christmas amid Dean McDermott cheating reports.
On Wednesday, Tori Spelling, 40, posted a photo of their four kids – Liam, 6, Stella, 5, Hattie, 2, and Finn, 16 months – posing in front of an elaborate tree along with the message: “Merry Christmas from the McDermotts.”
“As another year comes to a close, I can’t help but feel so grateful for all of my blessings,” Tori Spelling wrote on her website.
“My beautiful family, my amazing friends, and of course, all of you! We’re spending the day together – cuddling, cooking, baking, unwrapping gifts, eating, watching movies and counting our blessings.”
According to Us Weekly, Dean McDermott, 47, picked up a 28-year-old woman named Emily Goodhand while promoting his hosting spot on Chopped Canada in Toronto earlier this month.
“He was flirting. His personality is very charming. I was drinking, so what he said is blurry,” Emily Goodhand said of their putative December 6 meeting.
“But he was talking about his kids and his work. And when people open up, you feel closer to them in some way. I felt like I could trust him. And we know a lot of the same people, so we had that in common.”
Dean McDermott supposedly slipped Emily Goodhand his number and hotel room key, which she claims she used that night.
“He told me he and Tori had a s**less marriage,” alleged Emily Goodhand.
“I believed him.”
Tori Spelling nor Dean McDermott have yet to comment on the story, but Emily Goodhand maintains she regrets the alleged liaison and would like to apologize to Tori.
“I made a stupid decision,” Emily Goodhand said.
Tori Spelling and Dean McDermott married in 2006 after hooking up on the set of a Lifetime movie while both were married to other people.
Paul Anthony Ciancia – the man charged with murdering a federal security officer at Los Angeles International Airport in November – has pleaded not guilty in California.
Paul Ciancia, 23, denied first-degree murder and 10 other charges during a brief court appearance.
The trial was set for February 11th in LA federal court.
Gerardo Hernandez, 39, a father of two, was checking IDs when he was shot dead. Three other people were wounded in the attack.
Paul Anthony Ciancia was charged with murdering a federal security officer at LA airport in November
Paul Ciancia had been taken to hospital after being shot by police four times.
Hernandez was the first Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agent killed in the line of duty since the agency was formed in 2001.
After coming to the US from El Salvador as a teenager, Gerardo Hernandez married his wife on Valentine’s Day in 1998. He had worked at the airport since 2010.
Paul Ciancia allegedly entered Terminal 3 at the airport on November 1st with a rifle and shot Gerardo Hernandez at close range.
Police say Paul Ciancia had a handwritten letter stating he wanted to kill multiple TSA officers and “instill fear in your traitorous minds”.
Kanye West has been sued by former child soul singer Ricky Spicer over claims of copyright infringement.
Ricky Spicer, who sang with The Ponderosa Twins Plus One, sued Kanye West in Manhattan Supreme Court in New York City on Monday, alleging the rapper used his vocals without permission.
Former Ponderosa Twins Plus One singer Ricky Spicer sued Kanye West alleging the rapper used his vocals without permission
In the suit, Ricky Spicer claims Kanye West sampled the vocals from his former group’s song Bound for his hit Bound 2, which appears on his Yeezus album.
The lawsuit also targets Kanye West’s label Roc-A-Fella Records and three others. Ricky Spicer is seeking unspecified damages.
Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and their kids made a pre-Christmas Target run in Robina, a suburb of Queensland, Australia, over the weekend.
“Team at our Target Robina store are thrilled that Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and their children shopped at Target today,” an elated Stuart Machin tweeted on Sunday, according to the Gold Coast Bulletin.
Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and their kids made a pre-Christmas Target run in Robina
“They made sure no one was around to blow their cover,” a source told the Australian news outlet.
“The store manager waited until everyone had gone home and opened it up secretly for them at 7.30 pm on Sunday. She said they shopped for around an hour and a half to buy presents for their children and friends.”
Angelina Jolie, 37, has been on Australia’s Gold Coast over the past few months filming her second directorial venture, Unbroken.
Yusef Lateef, a multi-instrumentalist known for fusing jazz and Eastern music, has died at 93.
Grammy-winning Yusef Lateef played in bands with Dizzy Gillespie and Charles Mingus and gained a global following as one of the first to incorporate world music into jazz.
In 1987, Yusef Lateef won a Grammy for best new age performance for Little Symphony, on which he played all the instruments.
Yusef Lateef had battled prostate cancer and died on Monday at his home in Shutesbury, Massachusetts.
Yusef Lateef played in bands with Dizzy Gillespie and Charles Mingus and gained a global following as one of the first to incorporate world music into jazz
An obituary posted by the Douglass Funeral Home in Amherst said he was “well known for his support and mentorship of up and coming artists” and that he had been performing up to summer 2013.
Born William Emanuel Huddleston in 1920, Yusef Lateef emerged out of the Detroit jazz scene in the 1940s and ’50s before moving to New York in 1960.
Yusef Lateef began his career as a tenor saxophonist but also mastered the flute, oboe and bassoon and used woodwind instruments from many countries in his music.
New York hedge-fund founder Robert W. Wilson has died at 87 in an apparent suicide.
He committed his life to giving the fortune he made from investing to charities.
According to Bloomberg News, Robert Wilson died on December 23rd after allegedly leaping from his 16th-floor residence at the San Remo apartment building on Manhattan’s Central Park West.
Robert Wilson donated $100 million each to the World Monuments Fund, the Nature Conservancy, the Environmental Defense Fund and the Wildlife Conservation Society.
The World Monuments Fund works to preserve architectural and cultural heritage sites around the world.
Robert Wilson committed his life to giving the fortune he made from investing to charities
One of Robert Wilson’s favorite initiatives was “saving” Catholic private schools, although he was an atheist.
He believed that private schools offered better educations than “the union-controlled inner-city schools.”
He also gave millions to the Archdiocese of New York over the years and became a good friend of Edward Cardinal Egan.
Police said the window to Roberts Wilson’s apartment was open and the death was not deemed suspicious.
Robert Wilson was married to his only wife, Marilyn, for about 35 years before they divorced. He has no children.
At least 5 people have been injured by a bomb blast close to a bus in Cairo, Egypt’s health ministry has said.
Earlier reports of a death have been discounted.
The bomb was planted on a pedestrian island and exploded as the public bus passed by in the northern district of Nasr City, a security source said.
It comes a day after the government declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization.
At least 5 people have been injured by a bomb blast close to a bus in Cairo
Explosive experts detonated a second bomb that was planted in an advertising board close to where the first explosion went off in Nasr City.
The Muslim Brotherhood, whose candidate Mohamed Morsi won the presidential election in 2012 before being deposed by the military earlier this year, had already been outlawed.
A Muslim Brotherhood leader in exile vowed that protests would continue.
In recent months, Egypt has seen a wave of attacks which the authorities have blamed on Islamist militants.
China and South Korea got angry after PM Shinzo Abe visited Yasukuni shrine that honors Japan’s war dead, including some convicted war criminals.
Shinzo Abe said his visit to Yasukuni was an anti-war gesture.
But China called the visit “absolutely unacceptable to the Chinese people”, and Seoul expressed “regret and anger”.
China and South Korea see Yasukuni as a symbol of Tokyo’s aggression during World War Two, when Japan occupied large parts of China and the Korean peninsula.
The US embassy in Tokyo said in a statement it was “disappointed” and that Shinzo Abe’s actions would “exacerbate tensions” with Japan’s neighbors.
China, Japan and South Korea are embroiled in a number of disputes over territory in the East China Sea.
It was the first visit to Yasukuni by a serving prime minister since Junichiro Koizumi went in 2006.
Shinzo Abe, who took office in 2012, entered the shrine on Thursday morning, wearing a morning suit and grey tie. His arrival was televised live.
PM Shinzo Abe visited Yasukuni shrine that honors Japan’s war dead, including some convicted war criminals
“I chose this day to report [to the souls of the dead] what we have done in the year since the administration launched and to pledge and determine that never again will people suffer in war,” he said.
“It is not my intention at all to hurt the feelings of the Chinese and Korean people.”
Officials said Shinzo Abe visited Yasukuni shrine in a private capacity and was not representing the government.
But Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said: “We strongly protest and seriously condemn the Japanese leader’s acts.
“This poses a major political obstacle in the improvement of bilateral relations. Japan must take responsibility for all the consequences that this creates.”
Japan made an unwritten agreement with China in the 1970s that serving leaders would not visit the shrine.
But now, Shinzo Abe appears to have broken that deal.
In August, Shinzo Abe sent a ritual offering to the shrine but was not among a group of dozens of Japanese politicians who visited Yasukuni.
During an earlier period in office between 2006 and 2007 he said he would not even discuss visiting the shrine “as long as the issue remains a diplomatic problem”.
Yasukuni commemorates some 2.5 million Japanese men, women and children who have died in wars.
But the souls of hundreds of convicted WW2 criminals are also enshrined there.
Fourteen so-called Class A criminals – those who were involved in planning the war – are among those honored. They include war-time leader General Hideki Tojo, who was executed for war crimes in 1948.
More than half a million households in the north-eastern US and the south-eastern Canada are still without electricity after last weekend’s severe ice storm.
Utility crews are working round-the-clock, but warn that some homes could be without power at least until Saturday.
In Toronto, 72,000 people were without electricity on Christmas Day, officials in Canada’s Ontario province said.
At least 27 deaths in the region have been linked to the storm.
Most of those were caused by apparent carbon monoxide poisoning as people used gas generators, charcoal stoves and other appliances to heat their homes in freezing temperatures.
In Toronto, 72,000 people were without electricity on Christmas Day
“I understand they want to keep warm, but you cannot do this. This is deadly,” Toronto Mayor Rob Ford warned earlier this week.
Other fatalities were caused by traffic accidents.
Elsewhere in Canada, tens of thousands of people are still without power in New Brunswick and Quebec, and hundreds in Nova Scotia.
In the US, states from Maine to Michigan have been affected by the adverse weather.
Travel between Toronto and Montreal, Ottawa and New York had been disrupted.
Environment Canada meteorologist David Phillips warned earlier this week that the ice would remain as temperatures stayed below freezing.
Turkey’s PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan has announced a major cabinet reshuffle after three ministerial resignations over a corruption inquiry.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan named 10 new ministers – almost half of his total roster – after talks with President Abdullah Gul.
One of those who quit, Environment Minister Erdogan Bayraktar, had urged Recep Tayyip Erdogan to step down himself.
Police are investigating allegations of illicit money transfers to Iran and bribery for construction projects.
Erdogan Bayraktar, Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan and Interior Minister Muammer Guler quit after their sons were taken into custody.
All three deny any wrongdoing.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan has announced a major cabinet reshuffle after three ministerial resignations over a corruption inquiry
In Istanbul, protesters held a street rally against corruption in the government. There were reports of clashes with riot police late on Wednesday evening.
Commentators believe the scandal stems from a power struggle between Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government and an influential US-based Muslim cleric, Fethullah Gulen, who is said to have many followers within Turkey’s police and judiciary.
Supporters regard the Hizmet movement inspired by Fethullah Gulen as the benign, modern face of Islam, but critics question its motives.
Fethullah Gulen, who has denied any involvement in the investigation, left Turkey in 1999 after being accused by the then government of plotting to establish an Islamic state. He was cleared of that charge but has never returned to Turkey and now lives in Pennsylvania.
The government has dismissed dozens of police officials who were either involved in the investigation or thought to be linked to Fethullah Gulen.
Journalists have been prevented from entering police buildings, leading to claims that the government is trying to impede the investigation.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan submitted the new cabinet line-up to President Abdullah Gul late on Wednesday.
Among those who lost his job was EU Affairs Minister Egemen Bagis.
Egemen Bagis is accused of being involved in the corruption scandal – but has not been detained or formally charged.
Thai riot police have fired teargas at protesters trying to prevent political parties from registering for February’s elections at Bangkok’s stadium.
About 500 protesters tried to storm Thai-Japanese stadium where election commission officials were working.
PM Yingluck Shinawatra called the snap elections after weeks of protests that demanded an unelected “people’s council” take power.
Thai riot police have fired teargas at protesters trying to prevent political parties from registering for February’s elections
The demonstrators say political reforms are needed before polls can take place.
On Thursday, the protesters – some of whom were throwing stones – tried to break into the stadium where the electoral commission was registering candidates.
But police responded with tear gas, dispersing the crowd.
There were no reports of serious injuries.
Yingluck Shinawatra dissolved parliament and called an election on December 9th, after more than 150,000 demonstrators took to the streets calling for her government to step down.
Last Sunday, she said elections must take place and urged protesters to express their views at the ballot box.
“If we don’t hold on to the democratic system, what should we hold on to?”
Her Pheu Thai Party won the last election in 2011, and has a majority in parliament.
However, protesters say Yingluck Shinawatra’s brother – ousted former leader Thaksin Shinawatra – remains in charge.
Thaksin Shinawatra is currently in self-imposed exile after he was overthrown in a military army coup in 2006 and convicted of corruption.
Kim Kardashian got into the holiday spirit in earnest on December 24 by giving back to those in need and then celebrating with loved ones.
For her first Christmas Eve as a mother, Kim Kardashian, 33, visited the L.A. Children’s Hospital with half-sister Kendall, where they cheered up young patients and staff alike.
Kim Kardashian and Kanye West inside the “Naughty or Nice” photo booth
Kim Kardashian had also tons of fun inside the “Naughty or Nice” photo booth, where she goofed off with pals like Robin Antim, designer Rachel Roy and her fiancé Kanye West, 36.
Kim Kardashian and Kanye West made Christmas-kissy faces in the cute black-and-white snapshot: “Kisses goodnight,” she wrote.
Jersey Shore’s Jennifer “JWoww” Farley is pregnant with her first child.
Now in her second trimester, Jwoww, 27, and fiancé Roger Mathews told family and friends via a Christmas card that showed off a sonogram image.
“We couldn’t’ have wished for a better gift this Christmas! Happy Holidays from our growing family to yours! Love, Jenni, Roger and arriving July, 2014 Baby Mathews.”
Jwoww and Roger Mathews got engaged in September 2012
Jennie Farley also broke the news via her website: “We wanted to share this exciting news with you all first because you have been a part of our lives these past few years and seen the love between Roger and me develop and blossom.”
“We are so excited to share this new chapter of our lives with you as we become parents and create more memories with a new addition to our family!”
Jwoww and Roger Mathews got engaged in September 2012.
Drummer Ricky Lawson has died at a suburban Los Angeles hospital following a brain aneurism at the age of 59.
He collaborated with musicians including Michael Jackson, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins and Whitney Houston.
Ricky Lawson collaborated with musicians including Michael Jackson, Eric Clapton, Phil Collins and Whitney Houston
Ricky Lawson’s uncle, Paul Riser of Detroit, said Tuesday that Lawson was removed from life support 10 days after the aneurism diagnosis and died around 7 p.m. Monday.
Ricky Lawson was being treated at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center in Long Beach, California, about 25 miles south of Los Angeles.
Edward Snowden has delivered an “alternative” UK Christmas message, urging an end to mass surveillance.
The broadcast was carried on Channel 4 as an alternative to Queen Elizabeth’s traditional Christmas message.
Edward Snowden, 30, focused on privacy, saying: “A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all.”
He has temporary asylum in Russia after leaking details of US electronic surveillance programs.
Edward Snowden has delivered an “alternative” UK Christmas message, urging an end to mass surveillance
Edward Snowden opened his two-minute message, recorded in Russia, with a reference to novelist George Orwell, author of 1984, saying the surveillance technology described in his works was “nothing compared to what we have today”.
He said: “A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. They’ll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves, an unrecorded, unanalyzed thought.
“The conversation occurring today will determine the amount of trust we can place both in the technology that surrounds us and the government that regulates it.
“Together we can find a better balance, end mass surveillance and remind the government that if it really wants to know how we feel, asking is always cheaper than spying.”
Channel 4’s alternative Christmas message has in the past featured Iran’s then-President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad and fictional characters Ali G and Marge Simpson.
Delaney Brown – the terminally ill girl who received support from thousands of Christmas carolers outside her home over the weekend – died early on Christmas morning, her family said.
On December 21st, thousands gathered outside Delaney Brown’s home in eastern Pennsylvania to fulfill her wish for a huge holiday singalong.
Delaney Brown, 8, of West Reading “passed away quietly with her loving family by her side”, family spokesman Christopher Winters said in a statement Wednesday.
Last Saturday night, the crowd cycled through holiday favorites such as Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer and Jingle Bells and ended with a chorus of Happy Birthday to the girl, who turned 8 on Friday, The Reading Eagle reported.
Delaney Brown received support from thousands of Christmas carolers outside her home over the weekend
Shortly after the caroling began, the family’s Facebook page showed a picture of Delaney Brown giving two thumbs up with the text: “I can hear you now!!! Love you!”
Delaney Brown – whose nickname was Laney, – was diagnosed in May with a rare form of leukemia. The community held fundraisers to defray the cost of her medical expenses.
An update posted on Christmas Day on the “Team Laney” Facebook page said: “My heart breaks right now. Our little angel on earth earned her pink glittery angel wings in heaven. She took her last breath at home in her bed at 3:10 surrounded by all her family and friends. I miss her so much already.”
“Laney was a wonderful, kind, and loving child, who brought so much joy to our lives,” the family said.
“Even as her illness progressed, Laney never stopped having faith, she continued to smile in spite of her pain, and she showed more concern for all of us than for herself.”
President Barack Obama urged Americans to remember troops serving far from home and embrace the spirit of the season and give back in his annual Christmas message.
“Our extraordinary men and women in uniform are serving so that the rest of us can enjoy the blessings we cherish during the holidays,” Barack Obama said in a pre-recorded message with first lady Michelle Obama by his side.
“But that means many of our troops are far from home and far from family.”
President Barack Obama urged Americans to remember troops serving far from home and embrace the spirit of the season and give back in his annual Christmas message
Barack Obama urged people to celebrate Christmas with service by volunteering at a soup kitchen, buying gifts for kids in need or organizing food and clothing drives.
“For families like ours, that service is a chance to celebrate the birth of Christ and live out what He taught us – to love our neighbors as we would ourselves; to feed the hungry and look after the sick; to be our brother’s keeper and our sister’s keeper,” the president said.
In his weekly radio and Internet address, Barack Obama says the values Jesus taught can spur Americans of all faiths to be better parents, friends, neighbors and citizens.
First Lady Michelle Obama echoed the message, saying: “So as we look to the New Year, let’s pledge ourselves to living out those values by reaching out and lifting up those in our communities who could use a hand up.”
UPS acknowledged getting swamped by the seasonal cheer and failing to deliver thousands of orders in time for Christmas.
“The volume of air packages in our system exceeded the capacity in our network,” UPS spokeswoman Natalie Godwin said in a statement.
Now, even as the company is lionized on the holiday cover of Bloomberg Businessweek for making “dreams come true”, customers are streaming online to pummel the shipping giant.
For some of the customers the void under the tree came despite days of phone-and-Web wrangling with UPS customer service. In Houston, the Amaya family toggled between tracking their package online and waiting by the door for UPS to arrive. But after 10 days and two delays, they finally gave up hope.
Christmas is about more than just stuff, many posters acknowledged, but even some of the smaller, more symbolic gifts of Christmas got lost in transit.
“UPS understands the importance of your holiday shipments,” the company said in a Christmas Day statement on its website.
“However, the volume of air packages in our system exceeded the capacity of our network immediately preceding Christmas so some shipments were delayed.”
UPS acknowledged getting swamped by the seasonal cheer and failing to deliver thousands of orders in time for Christmas
Amazon.com, one of UPS’s biggest clients, cited UPS’s “failure” in an apologetic email to customers Wednesday morning. UPS itself is on a condolences tour, telling NBC in a statement that only “a small percentage” of packages were affected and pledging that most of these will arrive by Thursday.
The last time a significant number of UPS packages were late for Christmas was 2004, when an ice storm crippled Worldport, the UPS distribution center in Louisville, Kentucky, in the run up to the holiday. Back then employees ended up manually loading packages for days, and surprising revelers with Christmas Day deliveries. This year the company declined to call its workers in for holiday service.
It’s still unclear where the UPS network broke down, and the company has declined to specify the size of the problem. But Bloomberg Businessweek detailed the challenges likely to have stymied Santa’s corporate helper this year – and spotlighted the man who may take a fall for the year’s mishaps.
Scott Abell is known as “Mr. Peak” to the brown-shirted faithful, and he spends his whole work year outlining the company’s holiday delivery plans, scrambling hundreds of planes and thousands of trucks from his office at Worldport.
Beyond icy weather, which reportedly hampered UPS distribution hubs, the company was likely squeezed by a smaller window for holiday shopping and a record number of e-purchases being pushed through at the last minute. There were just 26 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas. At the same time, there was the continued growth of online shopping, which not only facilitates last-minute gifting but often rewards it with deeper discounts.
Online spending jumped 9%, to $37.8 billion, between November 1st and December 15th, according to the online research firm comScore, and retailers expect overall holiday sales to be up nearly 4%, exceeding $600 million.
UPS anticipated delivering 132 million bundles in the week before Christmas, according to Bloomberg Businessweek, and to meet that wave of holiday cheer, Scott Abell organized 55,000 part time workers, 23 extra planes and what amounts to a second fleet of delivery trucks.
A last-minute decision by one of UPS’s clients – reportedly Amazon.com – dumped additional packages into the system last weekend, but Scott Abell doubled the number of shifts at Worldport, still hoping to stay ahead. It wasn’t enough.
Scott Abell usually heads to Florida in January to play golf and decompress after the madness of the holidays. When he returns, the 31-year veteran of the company gathers his lieutenants for a special lemon session, detailing all that could have gone better in the weeks before.
Santa Claus proved he can also travel by sea in the Florida Keys.
Santa, played by Keys dive shop operator Spencer Slate, took some time off from getting ready for his annual Christmas toy run to dive amid the marine life in Elbow Reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.
The yellowtail snapper, angelfish and other Florida Keys inhabitants seemed to appreciate the visit from St. Nick.
Santa took some time off from getting ready for his annual Christmas toy run to dive amid the marine life in Elbow Reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary
Spencer Slate has been donning the jolly man’s outfit for years to take the plunge but there is a serious side to his shenanigans. Dive customers frequently have the opportunity to have their photo taken with Santa for an extra fee and the revenue goes to a local children’s charity to fund gifts during the holiday season.
Elbow Reef is situated about six miles off Key Largo. The site features the wreck of the City of Washington, a late 1800s military supply vessel that was converted into a coal barge and sunk off Key Largo in 1917.
Florida police officers stepped in to donate presents to a family whose Christmas gifts and dog were stolen Monday.
Tampa police say burglars broke into Melody Russell’s home, stole her two children’s gifts from under the tree and snatched the family’s puppy.
Melody Russell, a 33-year-old property manager, said the thieves broke in to her home northeast of downtown Tampa while she was at work Monday. She came home to find the back door open, all presents under the tree gone and Honey, their 12-week-old Shih Tzu, missing.
Florida police officers stepped in to donate presents to the family whose Christmas gifts and dog were stolen
Her two children, 7-year-old Marissa and 5-year-old Marcus, were at her sister’s home when the burglary happened. Marissa cried for a half hour when Russell broke the news about Honey.
“My kids are so in love with that puppy,” she said.
The white and tan puppy did not yet have a microchip, Melody Russell said.
Melody Russell said she had bought a handful of modest gifts for each of her children – Nerf guns and slippers and Ninja turtle toys.
“Typical Christmas stuff,” said Melody Russell, who is a single mother.
“Nothing extravagant.”
Tampa Police are investigating the case – and they also tried to save Christmas for the Russell family.
Melody Russell said that after the officers wrote their reports and processed the crime scene at her home, she sat in the living room, praying to God for strength. It was 1 a.m. on Christmas Eve, she said, and the phone rang.
It was a Tampa Police officer, telling her that he and his entire squad were coming to her house with gifts.
When police dispatchers and Squad 204 heard about the theft, they quickly chipped in to buy Marissa and Marcus presents.
“Every single one of them had gifts in their hands,” Melody Russell said.
As of Wednesday morning, the tweet had more than 261,000 retweets and close to 200,000 favorites.
Justin Bieber claimed via his Twitter account late Tuesday night that he is supposedly retiring
Forty-two minutes after the retirement tweet, Justin Bieber blamed the media for his apparent career-ending decision: “The media talks a lot about me. They make a up a lot of lies and want me to fail but I’m never leaving you, being a belieber is a lifestyle.”
Last week, Justin Bieber told radio station Power 106 that his album, Journals, would be his last, and that he planned to retire.
Later, Justin Bieber’s reps claimed he was just joking, but suggested that the pop star take some time off after the movie release.
