Heather Redfern, a spokeswoman for the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, said a high-speed train ran into another one that was stationary and unoccupied at the 69th Street Terminal in the city’s Upper Darby suburb.

“All 42 people on board the train that was moving were injured and all appear to be non life-threatening,” she said, adding the cause of the crash just after midnight was being investigated.

A passenger named Ronnie told local news channel NBC10: “My face hit the wall, put a big hole in the wall and I went straight down and I blacked out.

“There was blood everywhere. The driver is all banged up and there was this one girl bleeding out of her face pretty bad.”

Thirty-six people were left with minor injuries when two New York subway train cars careened off the tracks in June.

The US rail network suffers from chronic underfunding and accidents are not infrequent, particularly on the busy East Coast corridor.

Firefighters were digging with their bare hands to pull 11-year old Ciro, the last of three brothers buried in the debris, about 13 hours after the quake struck.

“There was silence for a while, they were tired. Then they began speaking again and we drew comfort from that,” said Luca Cari, a firefighter spokesman.

A woman was killed in Casamicciola, in the north of the small tourist island, by debris that fell from a church, while the body of another was spotted in the rubble of a collapsed house, local media reported.

A handout photo made available by the Italian Fire Department shows Italian firefigters saving a child, whose name is Mattias, from the rubble of his house in Ischia, Italy, 22 August 2017.  // EPA PHOTO

Firefighters broke into applause as a dusty Mattias, 7, was pulled free from under the bed where he had taken refuge. His 11-year old brother Ciro was conscious and talking to rescuers as they dug through to him.

Emergency workers had previously recovered the boys’ seven-month- old brother, Pasquale, crying but alive, after hours of effort overnight after their pregnant mother sounded the alarm.

“In Casamicciola, a building collapsed and three people were pulled alive from the rubble — two women and a man,” the head of the local department of civil protection, Angelo Borrelli, said at a press conference early Tuesday.

Two small communes, Casamicciola and neighbouring Lacco Ameno, had borne the brunt of the quake, he added.

The quake hit the northwest of the island at 8:57 pm (1857 GMT), at a depth of just five kilometres.

Italian authorities first put Monday night’s quake at a 3.6 magnitude, but later revised it upward to 4.0 magnitude.

The main earthquake was followed by 14 smaller aftershocks, Borrelli said.

Several buildings in the area collapsed while others had large, ominous cracks.

Thirty-nine people were injured, one seriously.

 – ‘A horrible experience’ –

The Rai News 24 television channel broadcast images of holidaymakers by their cars with their bags packed, with other people sitting in their gardens or outside their houses.

Many cars were waiting at the Ischia port eager to head back to Naples.

The quake struck just days ahead of the first anniversary of the 6.0 magnitude quake that killed nearly 300 people in and around Amatrice in central Italy. In October 2016 and January 2017 three other earthquakes hit the same region.

Francesco Peduto, head of Italy’s National Geologists Association, on Tuesday slammed shoddy construction and a lack of earthquake prevention measures, saying a 4.0-magnitude quake should not have brought down buildings.

Italian firemen and emergency workers search through rubble of a collapsed house in Ischia, on August 22, 2017. // AFP PHOTO

“It’s frankly extraordinary that people continue to die for earthquakes of this size,” he said.

The quake response has benefited from the presence of emergency responders who were on the island to fight the forest fires that have plagued Italy this summer, local media said.

“I was on the couch watching TV. Blackout, shaking, something fell on my head. I scream, my mother grabs me and we ran outside,” one witness wrote on Twitter.

Teams of firefighters, including two units specialised in extracting people from rubble, were quickly mobilised, said Bruno Frattasi, who oversees the fire department.

Ischia’s only hospital was also hit and had to be partially evacuated, with five patients transferred to another medical facility by helicopter.

Restaurants were packed and many stores were still open when the shaking began, witnesses said on Twitter.

“A horrible experience, everything was shaking, plunged into darkness, houses were collapsing… a nightmare,” one wwrote

Ischia is often hit by earthquakes, with its worst dating back to July 1883, when an estimated 5.8-magnitude quake killed more than 2,000 people.

Italy straddles the Eurasian and African tectonic plates, making it vulnerable to seismic activity when they move.

Wong, Nathan Law and Alex Chow were sent to prison last Thursday for their leading role in the initial protest that sparked the months-long Umbrella Movement of 2014 — demonstrations and street blockades calling for democratic reforms.

Their jailing has been slammed by international rights groups and politicians and has prompted accusations that the independence of Hong Kong’s courts has been compromised under pressure from Beijing.

Tens of thousands turned out in protest Sunday.

Wong was at High Court Tuesday as part of another case dating back to the Umbrella Movement.

He is one of 20 activists charged with contempt of court for violating an order to clear the Mong Kok protest camp — scene of some of the most violent clashes during the demonstrations.

In closing arguments prosecutor Victor Dawes said that by obstructing bailiffs the defendants had intended to “interfere with the administration of justice” which amounted to criminal contempt.

Dawes added that the large crowd meant there were safety and public order concerns.

Crowds of protesters gathered around workmen trying to tear down road barricades in November 2014 which were part of the Mong Kok camp, leading to scuffles with police who made arrests and pushed them back.

Defence lawyer Hectar Pun said the injunction was to remove obstructions, not people, from the road.

“The plaintiffs or plaintiff agents or bailiffs…are not authorised to clear human beings from the area,” he told the court.

 – ‘Determined attitude’ – 

Other activists sentenced on contempt charges have received up to three-month prison terms.

Supporters packed the courtroom and the areas outside.

Before the case began, Veteran activist Leung Kwok-hung, known as Long Hair, shouted: “They have Rimsky Yuen — you have the Hong Kong people!”, referring to the city’s justice minister at the centre of the controversy over the jailings.

Joshua and fellow defendant Raphael Wong, who is also in custody, responded with a cheer from the dock, surrounded by four uniformed guards.

Hong Kong was returned from Britain to China in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” arrangement, guaranteeing freedoms unseen on the mainland, but there are growing concerns those rights are disappearing as an assertive Beijing tightens its grip.

The government has vehemently denied there was political interference in the decision by the Court of Appeal last week to overturn previous non-custodial terms for Wong, Law and Chow. The court jailed them for six to eight months after a sentencing review brought by the department of justice.

Prosecutors have filed a raft of cases against pro-democracy activists with fears that more will be jailed in the wake of last week’s judgement.

Lester Shum, another prominent Umbrella Movement activist and one of the defendants in court Tuesday, said before the hearing that he felt relaxed about his case, adding he was inspired by the “determined attitude” of other jailed activists.

The hearing was adjourned due to an approaching typhoon and is set to resume Wednesday.

He charmed the crowd as he greeted and took selfies with admirers at Putrajaya Equestrian Park on Sunday.

Prince Abdul Mateen, who is sixth in line to the Brunei throne, is representing his country in the equestrian polo events at the 29th Kuala Lumpur SEA Games (KL2017).

He is among the Brunei royals listed in Brunei’s polo team – which include his elder sister Princess Azemah Ni’matul Bolkiah, 33, Pengiran Muda Bahar Bolkiah, 36, Pengiran Muda Abdul Qawi, 43 and Faiq Jefri Bolkiah,19.

The prince won the hearts of many after a video of the 26-year-old royal exiting a tent to greet and take selfies with a crowd of cheering spectators went viral.

The impromptu meet-and-greet took place after the Brunei Equestrian polo team’s practice match against Singapore on Sunday evening.

Many women were heard cheering and screaming his name, with some holding placards, when the prince made his way to the crowd.

The smiling prince shook hands and took selfies with the crowd.

“Who knew out of sudden a prince could come out from a tent and walk straight away in front of you,” commented Twitter user @Hanaaa_95.

“Prince of Brunei was so kind. No wonder people all over the world love him,” commented Twitter user @lily_breath.

Several netizens also commented on Prince Abdul Mateen’s good looks.

Prince Abdul Mateen has a strong social media following of 509,000 on Instagram, and he has posted a number of photos since arriving in Kuala Lumpur for the SEA Games.

He has also been featured on several publications, such as GQ Thailand, Elite Daily and Mashable, labelling him as a “hot royal” and “handsome prince”.

The Bruneian polo team will be facing the Malaysian team today.

Thailand’s Princess Sirivannavari Nariratana, 30, will also be representing her country in the dressage portion event of the equestrian competition between Aug 21 and 23.

Our very own Terengganu Ruler Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin bagged a gold medal in the equestrian endurance event at the 2017 SEA Games on Sunday.

Its director-general, Admiral Zulkifli Abu Bakar, said certain foreign reports stating that the operation was being led by Singapore and the collision between the USS John S. McCain and oil tanker MV Alnic MC occurred in Singaporean waters were not true.

He said the accident happened at 5.30am some 4.5 nautical miles off the coast in Teluk Ramunia.

“It is in our waters, so we are leading the SAR operations. There is no sign of the missing sailors so far,” he told reporters at the MMEA headquarters here yesterday.

He said various assets have been deployed by the MMEA, Royal Malaysian Navy and maritime police in the operation.

“The search zones have been divided into four sectors, each comprising a square of five-by-five nautical miles,” he added.

Admiral Zulkifli said assets from Singapore were also in the area conducting their own search.

The collision took place close to Pulau Batu Putih, the focus of a territorial dispute between Malaysia and Singapore.

To this, Admiral Zulkifli said, “now is not the time for arguments”. “We will communicate with the Singaporean authorities,” he assured.

He said the Indonesian navy was also sending two ships, KRI Parang and KRI Cucuk, to help out. He said he did not want to speculate on what caused the collision, but noted that the region where it took place experienced intense maritime traffic.

“It is the entrance into the Singapore Straits and Malacca Straits, which sees over 80,000 ships passing through each year,” he pointed out.

Admiral Zulkifli said both ships have been directed to Singapore’s Changi port for repairs and investigation.

“USS John S. McCain suffered a gash on its port side while it is unclear if the Liberian registered MV Alnic MC had any damage,” he added.

Besides the 10 missing sailors, five were injured in the incident but are reportedly stable and being treated at a Singapore hospital.

The McCain was heading to Singapore for a routine port visit after conducting a sensitive freedom-of-navigation operation last week by sailing near one of China’s man-made islands in the South China Sea.

Bullet train trips between Beijing and Shanghai will get faster from that date when Fuxing bullet trains run at 350 kilometres per hour, bringing passengers in China the world’s fastest commercial trains, China Railway Corp said.

Currently, the trip between the two metropolises, on one of China’s busiest rail lines, takes from four hours and 49 minutes to six hours, the difference arising because of varied numbers of stops being made.

China reduced its bullet trains’ maximum speed to about 300km/h in August 2011 for safety reasons.

The newest generation bullet train, the Fuxing, has been in operation since June 25. On July 27, railway authorities completed testing of the Fuxing, which will allow the restoration of the maximum speed to 350 km/h.

Passengers will have more arm and leg room and free Wi-Fi, with better-placed charging plugs for phones and computers that are located near the armrests instead of below the seats, China Railway Corp said.

In addition, comprehensive and scientific assessments have shown the rail line meets the requirements for bullet trains run at that high speed, and given the ample preparations made, rail authorities and experts have guaranteed that Fuxing trains are capable of the high speed, according to the company.

“Restoring bullet trains’ top speed to 350km/h is a sign of the maturity of China’s high-speed railway technologies,” Liu Xu, vice-president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, told Xinhua in a previous interview.

Fuxing trains, the product of Chinese railway standards and technologies, have improved safety, comfort and energy conservation, according to China Railway Corp.

Following their debut on the Beijing-Shanghai line, they will be put into operation in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei area on Monday, serving 10 stops in the region, including Tianjin, Baoding and Shijiazhuang, the company previously said.

There, Fuxing trains will run at a maximum of 300km/h.

The longest tunnel – 8,755 metres – on the Harbin-Mudanjiang high-speed railway was expected to be finished on Sunday, marking a major step for the northeastern high-speed rail, China Central Television reported.

Chief of Naval Operations Admiral John Richardson ordered commanders to set aside time, perhaps “one or two days” within a week, for crews to sit down together after the destroyer USS John S. McCain collided with a tanker off Singapore.

And this will be carried out in parallel to the start of “comprehensive review” of practices.

“As you know, this is the second collision in three months and the last of a series of incidents in the Pacific theater,” Richardson said.

“This trend demands more forceful action. As such, I have directed an operational pause be taken in all of our fleets around the world.”

The admiral did not rule out some kind of outside interference or a cyber attack being behind the collision, but said he did not want to prejudge the inquiry and his broader remarks suggested a focus on “how we do business on the bridge.”

US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, on a visit to Jordan, said Richardson’s “broader enquiry will look at all related accidents, incidents at sea, that sort of thing. He is going to look at all factors, not just the immediate one.”

Ten US sailors were still missing after Monday’s collision between the McCain and the Alnic MC in the busy shipping lanes of the Singapore Strait, near the Strait of Malacca, which left a large hole in the USS John McCain’s hull.

A major search involving ships and aircraft from Singapore, Malaysia and the US was launched for the missing sailors.

Search efforts continued Tuesday with aircraft from the amphibious assault ship USS America joining the hunt, which was focused on the area in which the collision occurred, the navy said.

The USS America — which arrived in Singapore Monday — was also providing support to crew members from the McCain, helping to drain water from the warship and repair systems damaged in the accident

The badly damaged destroyer limped into port in the southeast Asian city-state of Singapore under escort Monday after the dramatic pre-dawn accident.

– ‘Full transparency’ –

=======================

Analysts said the accident, which came after June’s collision off Japan involving a US warship, raised questions about whether the US Navy was overstretched in Asia as it seeks to combat Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea and North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.

The US Navy said there was “significant damage to the hull” of the vessel, which led to flooding of crew sleeping areas, machinery and communications rooms.

A helicopter took four of the injured to a Singapore hospital for treatment, while the fifth did not need further medical attention, the navy said.

The warship had been heading for a routine stop in Singapore after carrying out a “freedom of navigation operation” in the disputed South China Sea earlier in August around a reef in the Spratly Islands, sparking a furious response from Beijing.

The damaged vessel is named after US Senator John McCain’s father and grandfather, who were both admirals in the US navy.

McCain himself, who as a naval pilot was shot down during the Vietnam War and held prisoner, welcomed the review.

“I agree with Admiral Richardson that more forceful action is urgently needed to identify and correct the causes of the recent ship collisions,” he said.

“I expect full transparency and accountability from the Navy leaders as they conduct the associated investigations and reviews.”

President Donald Trump tweeted: “Thoughts and prayers are w/ our @USNavy sailors aboard the #USSJohnMcCain where search and rescue efforts are underway.”

The tanker involved in the collision, which was used for transporting oil and chemicals and weighed over 30,000 gross tonnes, sustained some damage but no crew were injured, and Singapore said there was no oil pollution.

In June, seven American sailors died when the destroyer USS Fitzgerald collided with a Philippine-flagged cargo ship in a busy channel not far from Yokosuka, a gateway to container ports in Tokyo and nearby Yokohama.

The dead sailors, aged 19 to 37, were found by divers in flooded sleeping berths a day after the collision tore a huge gash in the ship’s side.

A senior admiral announced last week that the commander of the destroyer and several other officers had been relieved of their duties aboard their ship over the incident.

Both the USS John McCain and USS Fitzgerald are part of the US Seventh Fleet based in Yokosuka.//AFP

A grand phenomenon of this magnitude certainly deserves to be documented, which is why the space agency is using its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) to capture its essence.

According to a recent NASA press release, people along the line of “totality” are urged to wave their hands and cheer as the LRO’s camera captures an image of the Moon’s shadow on Earth.

“I’m really excited about this campaign because it is something so many people can be a part of,”  Andrea Jones, LRO public engagement lead at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, said. “So much attention has been focused on the lucky folks who will get to experience eclipse totality, but everyone in an entire hemisphere of the Earth can wave at the Moon as LRO takes our picture!”

NASA also made it known that the Moon will be far enough from Earth during the eclipse, which will make the resolution of the images at only 2.5 miles per pixel.

“While people should not expect to see themselves in the images, this campaign is a great way to personalize the eclipse experience,” said Noah Petro, LRO deputy project scientist at Goddard. He added that the camera wouldn’t be able to capture people or buildings, but would still cover continents, clouds and large surface features.

Although people are invited to celebrate the extremely rare occurrence, NASA advised those who will be in the 70-mile-wide path to use proper eclipse glasses when staring at the Sun—even as it begins to vanish.

By Friday, President Donald Trump had sacked him.

However, in a matter of hours Bannon vowed to go to war for the president and keep fighting what he called his enemies in Congress and elsewhere.

Some reports suggest that Trump’s strategy chief already knew his days were numbered when he picked up the phone to make a surprise call to the American Prospect.

But he gave no hint of it as he regaled editor Robert Kuttner with plans to push aside his rivals within Trump’s administration and start a trade war with China.

“To me, the economic war with China is everything. And we have to be maniacally focused on that,” he declared.

This week, however, the national security establishment was focused on North Korea’s nuclear threat — a crisis dismissed as a “sideshow” by Bannon.

And much of the media and the US public was focused on a threat much closer to home: white nationalism and the rise of the so-called “alt-right.”

In his interview, Bannon was dismissive of the torch-bearing “clowns” in polo shirts and khakis who brought violence to Charlottesville last week.

But — for all he would like to be seen as the mastermind behind Trump’s improbable rise to power — Bannon’s image is still linked to those white nationalists.

Before joining Trump’s campaign, Bannon the self-described “economic nationalist” was the publisher of Breitbart, the provocative right-wing news outlet which he rejoined within hours of leaving the White House.

This site was and is, in Bannon’s own words, a platform for the alt-right, a loosely defined movement of mainly young white men espousing far-right and white nationalist ideas.

Any temptation to laugh off the alt-right as online poseurs evaporated on Saturday when a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville degenerated into violence.

A suspected Nazi sympathizer then drove his car into a crowd of anti-racism demonstrators, leaving one woman dead.

When Trump himself drew fire for defending some of the right-wing crowd as “fine people,” eyes also turned to Bannon, as the figurehead of the “nationalist” camp within the White House.

In his first comments since his departure was announced, Bannon vowed to keep fighting for the president from outside the White House.

“If there’s any confusion out there, let me clear it up: I’m leaving the White House and going to war for Trump against his opponents — on Capitol Hill, in the media, and in corporate America,” the far-right firebrand said in an interview with Bloomberg News.

And Breitbart News said he was coming back as executive chairman.

Global power

In an op-ed on the site, Breitbart writer Joel Pollak suggested that Trump ousted Bannon in “an effort to save his presidency after Charlottesville” but warned the president not to turn his back on his right-wing supporters.

“Steve Bannon personified the Trump agenda,” Pollak wrote.

The 63-year-old former navy lieutenant turned political operative was seen as the brain behind Team Trump’s decision to rail against a “global power structure” opposed to American values — a favorite theme of nationalist conspiracy-mongers.

After making his name at Goldman Sachs during the 1980s boom years, Bannon founded his own investment bank before selling it to Societe Generale in 1998 and going on to be a Hollywood producer.

Some of his projects were standard entertainment fare, but political documentaries that he produced on late president Ronald Reagan, populist darling Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement brought him into right-wing circles.

Ultimate outsider

Bannon became an investor in Andrew Breitbart’s eponymous media venture — focused around a site designed to buck what its founder saw as the progressive left’s grip on the news agenda.

Democrats and liberals were in the site’s crosshairs, but mainstream Republican lawmakers also felt its lash, accused of failing to stand up strongly enough to then president Barack Obama.

When Breitbart died in 2012, Bannon took over.

The site, which had been the ultimate outsider force, latched on to the Trump phenomenon and helped drive the billionaire to the White House.

Victory also brought Bannon to the West Wing and, for a while the ultimate anti-establishment outsider became one of the most powerful insiders on the planet, just a few steps away from Trump’s Oval Office.

He quickly raised hackles in Washington, especially at the State Department and the Pentagon, where officials resisted Bannon’s determination to exile his supposedly “globalist” foes and replace them with nationalists.

But his power rested on his relationship with Trump, who came to resent the way Bannon was portrayed as the all-powerful eminence grise behind the scenes at the White House.

Now he is an outsider again, but one who swears he’s not finished fighting for Trump.