For Rosetta, a landing and ending on a comet
When the spacecraft makes a gentle belly flop onto the comet Friday, it will bring to an end to the most ambitious mission ever for the European Space Agency. Since its arrival in August 2014 at Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, Rosetta has been sending reams of data and exquisite photographs of the comet, providing insights and surprises about one of the fragments left over from the formation of the solar system 4 1/2 billion years ago.
Report accuses Sudan of 'scorched earth' tactics in Darfur
UNITED NATIONS — Amnesty International said Thursday that Sudanese government forces had laid waste to dozens of villages in the restive region of Darfur, bombing them from the air, burning homes, looting livestock and raping women — while preventing United Nations peacekeepers from going there to protect civilians.
Advisory committee, ethics forum, carbon neutrality among enacted elements of Climate Action Plan
Spearheading efforts to combat climate change on MIT’s campus and worldwide, the Office of the Vice President for Research and other departments are enacting components of the Plan for Action on Climate Change released last October and revised in March.
Delta Phi Epsilon moves into Boston house
Members of MIT’s newest sorority, Delta Phi Epsilon, have moved into their recently-acquired brownstone house at 515 Beacon Street in Boston.
Decrease in drug and alcohol violations, increase in reported rapes, MIT Police reports
A student igniting a poster in a common area and another student tossing a flaming pillow in a dumpster were just two causes of fire reports made to the MIT Police in the past three years, according to the 2016 Annual Security and Fires Safety Report.
Corrections
A caption published in last week’s issue mistakenly stated that football players knelt during the pledge of allegiance before the game. In fact, it was during the national anthem.
Add date, finals exam schedule, flu shots
This semester’s final exam schedule is available at http://finals.mit.edu/
Cloudy weather will stick around
Cloudy and muggy weather should continue through Friday as a front approaches Boston from the south. Warm, tropical air is being squeezed between a low pressure system to our southwest and high pressure to the northeast. Today, the vicinity of the high pressure system will limit rain chances in Boston. As the high breaks down tomorrow, an area of rain will move in from the south, bringing moderate rainfall and patchy fog. Rain chances remain high through the weekend as the persistent low to our east makes its way toward New England. Meanwhile, the National Hurricane Center is watching a recently-developed tropical storm in the Caribbean which could potentially impact the U.S. next week. Although a tremendous amount of uncertainty remains, Tropical Storm Matthew will be closely monitored in the coming days. Several weather models show the storm trekking west before taking a sharp turn and continuing north along the east coast. Models also show the system strengthening, putting it at hurricane status in the next several days. Its implications for the east coast will be more certain by the end of the weekend.
A look at FredFest
An eclectic mix of band performances ranging from avant-garde to punk rock, East Campus’s annual concert FredFest is a reflection of the dorm community itself: idiosyncratic yet inclusive.
Carmen sets out to shock: opera for millennials
“Love” and “death” sound remarkably similar in French: l’amour and la mort. This near-homonymity is the thematic core of the opera Carmen. The titular main character is inexorably drawn to the two.
How a nuclear missile and falling socket almost obliterated Arkansas
On September 18, 1980, Arkansas was almost obliterated when a mechanic dropped a heavy socket down a shaft, puncturing the fuel tank of a Titan II missile carrying a nuclear warhead. If nothing else, Command and Control will inspire engineers striving to build redundant, foolproof safety measures on their dangerous devices.
Kidnapping, Korean film, and Kim Jong Il take center stage in gripping documentary
North Korea is a black box that always seems to be lurking in the news with headlines that range from the shocking to the downright bizarre. The Lovers and the Despot, directed by Rob Cannan and Ross Adams, straddles both the shocking and the bizarre as this documentary unpacks the compelling true-crime story of Kim Jong-Il’s kidnapping of famed South Korean actress Choi Eun-Hee and her ex-husband, the accomplished South Korean director/producer Shin Sang-Ok.
Dark comedy and stunning fashion shine in Jocelyn Moorhouse’s newest Australian film
Picture a small, dusty town evocative of the American Wild West. Now, in lieu of cowboys, gunslingers, and rugged beards, imagine a small pack of women milling around town aimlessly, leaning dramatically against pillars, and stretching theatrically atop ladders, all while dressed in the finest haute couture more appropriate on a Milan or Paris runway rather than in the Australian Outback. It is precisely this sort of visual and contextual dissonance successfully powering the darkly comedic engine of The Dressmaker, an Australian film directed by Jocelyn Moorhouse, that keeps the viewer engrossed and laughing for the majority of its 118-minute runtime.
In the beginning, storks delivered babies
Storks presents a new twist on the classic notion of “storks delivering babies.” After a human girl named Tulip (voiced by Katie Crown) is orphaned in a stork-related disaster, storks give up their high-pressure gig and now deliver for an online store reminiscent of Amazon.com. Junior (voiced by Andy Samberg), is up for promotion, but in order to get the job, he has to fire Tulip, working at the warehouse due to a lack of a human home, who doesn’t fit in with the storks — after all, “birds of a feather flock together.”
Rakocevic ’20 impresses at ITA regional meet
Not only was Lara Rakocevic the Engineer’s top performer in singles, she was also the only player from the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) to reach the final eight.
Sports Blitz
Football (1-3) claimed its first win of the season away at Maine Maritime 30-13. QB Udgam Goyal ’19 went 13-21, 229 yards, 2 TD, 0 INT. WR Eddie Garcia-Montes ’19 had 170 receiving yards with a TD.
Freshmen lead the way as cross country shines in Purple Valley Classic
The MIT men’s and women’s cross country (XC) teams got off to good starts last weekend in the Purple Valley Classic at Williams College. Competing against many of the top teams in the country, the women finished in second place overall while the men finished in third.
Virtual reality zombies in Berlin
The highlight of my summer was using the mobile EEG, which allowed me to take a glimpse into other people’s brains while they moved and interacted with space.
Too far to grieve
I had watched the scene unfold twice before. In the busy shuffle between classes and club meetings, the phone call comes. My friends learn that someone they loved has died, and by physical proximity, I am the first outsider to know.
