India's Koneru Humpy grabs historic Rapid chess world title for the second time
New York (PTI): India’s Koneru Humpy bagged an epochal second World Rapid Chess Championship title, beating Irene Sukandar of Indonesia here on Sunday.
Humpy had won the event back in 2019 at Georgia and the Indian No 1 is only the second player after China’s Ju Wenjun to clinch the title more than once.
The 37-year-old Humpy finished the tournament with 8.5 out of 11 points.
“I’m very excited and I feel very happy. In fact, I expected it to be a very tough day, like some sort of tie-break. But when I finished the game, I only got to know when the arbitrator told me, and it was a tense moment for me,” said Humpy, who began with black pieces, after her victory.
“So, this is quite unexpected because the whole year I have been struggling a lot and I had very bad tournaments where I just ended up in last place. So, this came as a surprise,” she added.
Humpy’s achievement capped a sensational year for Indian chess after D Gukesh defeated China’s Ding Liren to emerge champion in the classical format World Championship recently in Singapore. In September, India had won its first-ever gold medals in Open and Women's categories in the Chess Olympiad in Budapest.
The seasoned Humpy admitted that she was not thinking about the title after her first-round defeat here.
“I think, after the first round loss, I was nowhere thinking about the title, but things turned out well, especially yesterday winning the four games in a row helped me,” she said.
However, Humpy faced some challenges off the board too as well because of the big time-gap between India and the USA.
“Yeah, off the board, it was very difficult for me because of the time difference. I was lacking sleep. Literally, I haven't slept properly since coming here. So, it wasn't easy to play restlessly, but I'm happy that I managed to do it,” she added.
Humpy has always excelled in the Rapid worlds as she had won a bronze medal in the 2012 edition of the event held in Moscow, while finished with a silver last year at Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
Humpy said her victory will now prompt other Indians to take up chess.
“I think it's high time for India. We also have Gukesh as world champion and now I got the second world title in the rapid event. So, I think this will motivate a lot of youngsters to take up chess professionally,” she concluded.
Murzin wins men’s title
Later, the 18-year-old Volodar Murzin of Russia bagged the corresponding title in the men's section.
Murzin is the the second-youngest FIDE World Rapid Champion, after Nodirbek Abdusattorov, who claimed the title at 17.
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Engine issue forces SWISS Delhi flight to abort takeoff; six passengers injured
New Delhi (PTI): A Zurich-bound Swiss International Air Lines' flight carrying 232 passengers aborted take off at the Delhi airport early Sunday due to an engine issue, sources said.
Six passengers are undergoing medical evaluation, an airline spokesperson said without elaborating.
Smoke was observed from the port side of one of the landing gears of the A330 aircraft that was operating the flight LX147 to Zurich. The flight crew aborted the take off and full emergency response was initiated, the sources said.
In a detailed statement, an airline spokesperson said there were 228 passengers and four infants on board.
"Shortly after takeoff, just after 1:00 am. local time in India, an issue occurred with one of the engines. The crew rejected the takeoff and, following an assessment of the situation, decided as a precaution to evacuate the aircraft," the spokesperson said.
Six passengers were receiving medical attention, the spokesperson added.
"All passengers and crew evacuated the aircraft via the emergency slides.Six passengers are currently undergoing medical evaluation. For a small number of individuals who were unable to use the slides, stairs were provided," the spokesperson said.
According to the spokesperson, Swiss technical specialists will travel to Delhi to inspect the aircraft and initiate the next steps.
The airline is known as Swiss.
At the same time, the spokesperson said the airline was working intensively to find a swift and suitable onward travel solutions for all passengers.
