Do you know about tetrapods?
Two South Mumbai buildings have complained about vibrations to the BMC. Structures that were removed for the Mumbai Coastal Road Project will be returned by the civic body.
During high tide over the past weekend, residents of two buildings on Marine Drive, the iconic 3-km promenade in south Mumbai, reported “unusual vibrations.”
As part of the ongoing Coastal Road Project (MCRP), the residents wrote to Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal and Additional Municipal Commissioner Ashwini Bhide to explain the unusual vibrations.
The Mumbai Coastal Road Project is under Bhide’s supervision.
A tetrapod is a four-legged creature in Greek. To prevent erosion and water damage, four-legged concrete structures are placed along coastlines.
In the late 1940s, the first tetrapods were used in France to protect the shore from the sea. Waves and currents are dissipated by interlocking but porous barriers formed by them. Interlocked tetra pods act as a barrier that remains stable against waves when buffeted by these large structures.
To maintain South Mumbai’s reclaimed shoreline, tetrapods, each weighing about 2 tonnes, were placed along Marine Drive in the late 1990s.
The cranes were temporarily removed to facilitate reclamation for the ongoing Coastal Road Project – 10.58 km of coastal road from Princess Street in Marine Drive to the Worli end of the Bandra-Worli Sea Link. Along Marine Drive alone, there are over 6,000 tetrapods.
It was no doubt felt by “almost all” residents of the two buildings that the vibrations occurred.
Many residents of Shreeniketan and Gobind Mahal buildings (sea-facing buildings between G&F Road and Marine Drive) have been experiencing vibrations over the last few days, they wrote in their letter to the BMC.
In the afternoons, they said, “the vibrations last one second and occur in intervals for 30-60 minutes.”. Similar to an earthquake, these vibrations felt like tremors. There were many of us who searched if Mumbai had been hit by an earthquake. Imagine an earthquake-like tremor occurring 20-30 times every hour.”
In order to study the impact of the phenomenon, the BMC has provided vibration monitoring instruments at the site. The corporation has not officially stated that the removal of the tetrapods caused the vibrations but has agreed to reinstall the structures. According to the BMC, they will be put back during low tide over the next two-three days.
To alleviate the fears of citizens of the said societies, BMC has asked the contractor to restore the tetrapods. According to the civic body, the contractor has begun work on placing tetrapods at the site.
Coastal Road contractor and management consultant representatives visited the site on Monday, along with the civic staff. According to an official, the vibrations were caused by high tides, furious high waves, and gusty winds last Friday.
Netflix announced cheaper rates.
In the Asia Pacific, the company added 1.1 million new users in the June quarter, resulting in a 23 percent revenue growth over last year. Due to price cuts in India, the average revenue collected from each user in the region decreased.
In response to Netflix losing nearly a million subscribers in the three months ended June 30, it announced it would launch a cheaper, ad-supported version of its streaming service starting next year.
Over 2,00,000 subscribers left the video streaming giant during the January-March quarter due to the war in Ukraine, which led to a suspension of its services in Russia. There were also some Covid-related disruptions due to rising inflation, fierce competition, and fierce competition.
According to Netflix, it lost 0.97 million subscribers in the June quarter, beating projections that it would lose as many as 2 million.
Due to price cuts in India, the company’s average revenue per user fell, despite adding a significant number of users in the Asia Pacific (APAC) in the June quarter.
In the June quarter, Netflix added 1.1 million new subscribers in the APAC region, which includes India. Last year, the region added a million new subscribers. APAC revenue grew by 23 percent compared to last year, but Netflix’s average revenue per member (ARM) in APAC fell nearly 2 percent due to price cuts announced in India last year.
In the APAC region, Netflix’s revenue increased by 23 percent because it added more subscribers – more people in the region are now paying for Netflix.
The 2 percent decline in average revenue per member, mainly due to price cuts in India, means that each customer is paying less. “Excluding India, APAC ARM grew 4% on a constant currency basis,” the company reported.
An ad-supported tier will be introduced in the early part of 2023, according to the company. Microsoft was announced earlier as the company’s partner for selling and powering its ads. It may roll out its ad-supported version gradually across markets, starting with those where “significant advertising spend is incurred.”
Our intention is to roll it out, listen and learn, and iterate quickly to improve the offering. “In a few years, our advertising business will likely look quite different from what it did on day one,” Netflix wrote to shareholders.
Our goal is to create an advertisement model that’s more seamless, relevant, and effective for consumers, as well as for our advertising partners. Our ad tier will take some time to grow, but over the long run, advertising can enable substantial incremental membership (through lower prices) and profit growth (through ad revenues).
Netflix’s biggest problem is account-sharing, since nearly 100 million households around the world share their Netflix accounts, resulting in a loss of revenue. Our long-term ability to invest in and improve our service is undermined by widespread account sharing among households, the company said.
In Chile, Costa Rica, and Peru, Netflix was asking people to pay more for the ability to share their accounts. Netflix announced on Monday (July 18) that users in Argentina, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras will have to pay more if they want to stream from more than one home starting in August.
Reasons for the heat waves
Temperatures over 40°C were recorded in some parts of Britain Tuesday, a record for any part of the country.
Several places in Britain recorded temperatures above 40°C on Tuesday, marking the first time any place in the United Kingdom has exceeded this mark during a particularly hot summer in Europe. There were a few places in France last month that recorded temperatures over 45°C – an all-time high.
Other countries in Europe are also experiencing extreme heat, which is made even worse because domestic air conditioning is not very common there. Some countries have seen a slight drop in temperatures in the last two days but still, have higher temperatures than normal for this time of year.
Temperatures were unusually high due to a combination of global and local factors, as is the case in most such situations. Globally, climate change has been driving temperatures upwards, which, in general, is evident all over the world.
The last eight years were the hottest ever recorded through direct measurements since the 1880s, according to NASA analysis. In 2021, the temperature was the sixth highest ever recorded. Temperatures have been higher than usual in most regions of the world for the last several years. Compared to the average of the 30-year period between 1991 and 2020, each month of this year has recorded substantially higher average temperatures in the United Kingdom. In keeping with this trend, the current heatwave in the UK and Europe began in the second week of July.
However, climate change alone cannot explain the record-breaking temperatures in Europe. These kinds of high temperatures are usually caused by some unusual combinations of local, short-term warming phenomena that accentuate already high baselines caused by climate change. Currently, a low-pressure system over the European region is attracting hot air from northern Africa. There is also speculation that the Arctic Ocean is warming unusually.
There has been, and still is, a slow-moving high-pressure area transporting hot air from North Africa over western and central Europe. Hot air is moving northward, affecting Portugal, Spain, France, now the UK, and soon to reach the Benelux countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg), western Germany, Switzerland, and northern Italy. Local/regional temperature records are expected to be broken this week, according to the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) on Monday.
There was a similar air circulation phenomenon in June as well when not only France but Norway and many other countries experienced record high temperatures. It is common for such local events to last only a few days, and their effects dissipate shortly thereafter. On Wednesday, temperatures in Britain dropped to a certain extent. After a few hours, the temperature had dropped by as much as 15°C in France on the day the 45°C mark was breached.
In the UK, we can now look forward to more typical weather now that the extreme heat has passed. For most of southern and eastern England, a thunderstorm warning has been issued today (Wednesday) as moister air from the Atlantic triggers thunderstorms and heavy showers. The south and east of England will continue to experience thunderstorms on Friday, but by the weekend, it will be drier, brighter, and increasingly warm. Dan Suri, a forecaster at UK Met Office, was quoted as saying in a statement that northern and western parts of the country would experience relatively fresher weather over the weekend as it grows breezier and wetter.
A worrying aspect of global warming is the rise in temperatures. A record number of high temperatures are being recorded every year, and there is no sign of a reduction in temperatures anytime soon.
A World Meteorological Organization official warned on Thursday that heatwaves like those currently experienced in Europe would become more common in the future.
In the future, these kinds of heatwaves will become commonplace. Stronger extremes are expected. We have pumped so much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that the negative trend will continue for decades. Climate change will lead to more frequent heatwaves due to the fact that we haven’t been able to reduce our emissions globally,” Petteri Taalas, secretary-general of WMO, said.
In recent years, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which provides the most authoritative analysis of climate change science, has repeatedly warned of a sharp increase in extreme weather events such as rainfall, heatwaves, droughts, and flooding. Within a decade, global temperatures are likely to exceed 1.5°C higher than in pre-industrial times, according to the IPCC’s most recent report.
Do you know about Narinder Batra?
In addition to being fascinating and complex, Narinder Batra is also intelligent. Several sporting bodies have benefited from his influence. How did things go wrong for him?
Narinder Batra’s profile is available on the website of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
Batra’s diverse business interests include hospitals, hospitality, education, exports, commodities, home furnishings, home appliances manufacturing, automobile dealerships, automobile components manufacturing, transport, LPG and petrol tankers, special trucks, and transport vehicles.
Additionally, the Batras own gas stations, petrol pumps, and a solar power plant, and they have won a bid for a private seaport in Gujarat, according to the website.
Aside from these, Batra is perhaps the most powerful and influential Indian sports administrator of recent years. At the height of his power, the former hockey player from Jammu was president of the Indian Olympic Association (IOA), the International Hockey Federation (FIH), and a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
A case for alleged misappropriation of funds was filed against Batra by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Monday.
The personality of Batra is fascinating and complex. Many sporting bodies have benefited from his influence, such as the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) and Hockey India, a federation he founded. It was one of the bitterest battles in the Indian sports administration that he fought with the former Indian Hockey Federation president KPS Gill over who should govern the sport.
Batra’s colleagues and fellow sports administrators might have felt rubbed the wrong way as he reached various positions of power. The president had disagreements with several fellow IOA office-bearers on a variety of issues, which provided fodder for gossip.
When it came to hockey, a sport Batra played at the national level, and he continued to lead India even after becoming the head of the world body. Whether it was the performance of the national teams or the hiring and firing of foreign coaches and experts, his decision was the final word.
It is his work that has made India the financial center of world hockey, with a large portion of the sponsorship money coming from the country. Next year’s World Cup will be the third edition to be held in India in four years.
As well as making a strong presence on the pitch, India won the bronze medal at the Tokyo Olympics for men during Batra’s tenure.
Batra’s indefatigable energy was another aspect of his personality. Every time he picked up the phone, he was online and ready to talk. In contrast to other sports administrators in the country, he cultivated relationships with journalists instead of the other way around.
When he felt the need, Batra has not shied away from taking on federations or state governments. A frustrated Hockey India president moved international hockey events from Delhi to hockey-loving cities like Ranchi, Bhubaneswar, and Raipur, where the state governments were more supportive.
In May, the Delhi High Court struck down Batra’s post of ‘life member’ in Hockey India, which had enabled him to contest, and win, the election to become IOA president.
The order did not stay even after Batra appealed, as a larger Bench of the High Court refused to do so. Since his IOC membership was linked to the IOA role, Batra decided not to run for re-election as IOA president in order to focus on his role as FIH president, the first Asian in this position. A second term, until 2024, had also been won by him.
Following raids conducted at Hockey India and IOA offices, as well as his residences in New Delhi and Jammu, the CBI claims to have found “incriminating documents/records” against Batra.
edited and proofread by nikita sharma
