Space Shuttle Discovery Launch

Space shuttle Discovery is on pace for a Sunday launch after NASA engineers repaired a leaky gas venting system. The leak had canceled a planned launch on Wednesday. NASA is hoping that the seven-member crew can take off around 7:40 p.m. Sunday on a mission to the international space station, where they will deliver supplies needed to expand the station's crew to six people. The shuttle crew will be delivering the final parts needed for an expanded solar energy power system that will allow the station to double its crew to six people. The crew will also be dropping off Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, who will replace NASA's Sandy Magnus on the space station. The shuttle also will carry a replacement for a failed unit in a system that converts urine to drinkable water. The crew, led by commander Lee Archambault, is expected to board Discovery at Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, at about 4:30 p.m. Sunday.

Coast Guard ending search tonight

The search for Oakland Raiders linebacker Marquis Cooper, NFL free agent Corey Smith and former college football player William Bleakley is to be called off tonight after unsucessful eforts in finding them. Nick Schuyler, was found alive and sitting atop an overturned boat about 40 miles west of Florida's Gulf Coast on Monday afternoon. He is the only man out of the four that went on a fishing trip together that has been found. Schuyler, who, like Bleakley, was a former University of South Florida football player, told his Coast Guard rescuers that the boat they were in was anchored Saturday evening when waves overturned it. Schuyler told rescuers that all four men clung to the boat for a time but then became separated. Schuyler says that he last saw his three friends at 2 a.m. Monday and says that him and the three others were all wearing life vests. After days of searching and about 24,000 square miles of ocean scanned, the search is scheduled to be called off at sundown Tuesday, or around 6:30 p.m. ET.

Automakers ask for more federal help

General Motors and Chrysler LLC said Tuesday they could need an additional $21.6 billion in federal loans between them because of worsening demand for their cars and trucks. GM said that by 2011 it could need a total of $30 billion, which includes the $13.4 billion in Treasury loans it has already received. GM will for sure need $9.1 billion in additional loans and could require another $7.5 billion in the next two years if auto sales don't improve. Chrysler said it now needs a total of $9 billion, up from the $4 billion Treasury loan it received in December. GM also said that it would eliminate 47,000 jobs over the course of 2009. The company said it would cut about 20,000 jobs in the United States, or nearly 22% of its left over U.S. staff. The company said it plans to close another five additional U.S. plants by 2012, in addition to the 12 planned closings announced in December. The plants that will be closed have not yet been identified. Experts have said that the request for additional money is not a surprise, given how bad auto sales have been since the December plea for help.

Gender Roles/Issues

Around 300 women held at immigration detention centers in Arizona face dangerous delays in health care and widespread mistreatment, according to a new study by the University of Arizona, the latest report to criticize conditions at such centers throughout the United States.
Researchers examined the conditions facing women while in the process of deporting them at three federal immigration centers in Arizona. An estimated 3,000 women are being held nationwide.The study concluded that immigration authorities were too aggressive in detaining the women, and as a result, they experienced severe hardships, including a lack of prenatal care, treatment for cancer, ovarian cysts and other serious medical conditions.

Pilot and five passengers missing after plane crash

The airplane took off from Casa de Campo International Airport in the Dominican Republic and was supposed to land at the Luis Muñoz Marin International Airport in Carolina to clear U.S. Customs before going on to the Isla Grande Airport in San Juan crashed on Sunday night.
A 911 emergency operator notified the Coast Guard at 6:51 p.m. Sunday that it had crashed into the waters off Quebradillas. Three male and two female passengers were returning to Puerto Rico after spending the weekend in the Dominican Republic, said Noemi Corporan, service manager for Tropical Aviation Corp. All five passengers and the pilot of the small, single-engine plane are still missing as of today. Rescue teams are still searching for the missing passengers and the missing pilot.

Arrested for Starting Rumors

Rumors regarding Monday's destructive earthquake in China's mountainous Sichuan Province have been started by chinese bloggers in online chat rooms. According to some of them, there were many signs that nature gave that could have saved thousands of people if the government had taken serious consideration to them. Ponds inexplicably drained, cows flung themselves against their enclosures and swarms of toads invaded the streets of a town that was later decimated by the quake. One online writer asked “Why did the government ignore the signs? Did they not care?” The Chinese government has been arresting people who started such "rumors" and said they would punish them. However, the government did not say what the punishments would be.

Bitter Cold Will Last

Freezing air gripped cities from the Canadian border to Florida on Wednesday, with some cities posting record lows. Snow in some southern states had rush hour traffic at a near standstill. Records were posted in the Michigan cities of Flint, at 19 below, and Saginaw, 10 below. Places like Hot Springs and Monticello, Arkansas, were in the low 20s. Minneapolis, Minnesota, posted a reading of 19 below zero, and it was 14 below in Fargo, North Dakota, where the wind chill made it feel like 31 below, said CNN meteorologist Chad Myers. Forecasters have predicted dangerously cold conditions through Friday morning in Wisconsin and Minnesota.