3 US Marines killed, 20 injured in an aircraft crash in Australia, officials say
Canberra (AP/PTI): A United States Marine Corps aircraft crashed on a north Australian island Sunday, killing three Marines and injuring 20 during a multi-nation training exercise, officials said.
Three had been confirmed dead on Melville Island and five of the 23 on board had been flown in serious conditions 80 kilometers (50 miles) to the mainland city of Darwin for hospital treatment after the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft crashed around 9:30 a.m. local time, a corps statement said.
"Recovery efforts are ongoing," the statement said, adding the cause of the crash was under investigation.
A United States Marines Corps aircraft crashed on a north Australian island Sunday, injuring 23 Marines, several critically, officials said.
Five of the injured were flown 80 kilometers (50 miles) from Melville Island to the mainland city of Darwin for hospital treatment, Northern Territory Police Commissioner Michael Murphy said around six hours after the crash.
Helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft had been deployed to return from the remote location with the rest of the injured, he said.
One of the injured was undergoing surgery at the Royal Darwin Hospital, Northern Territory Chief Minister Natasha Fyles said at a joint news conference with Murphy.
Some were critically injured and patients were being triaged on arrival at Darwin's airport, she said. No deaths were reported.
"We acknowledge that this is a terrible incident," Fyles said. "The Northern Territory government stands by to offer whatever assistance is required."
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said only Americans were injured when the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft crashed during Exercise Predators Run, which involves the militaries of the United States, Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines and East Timor.
"The initial reports suggest that the incident involves just U.S. defense force personnel," Albanese said.
"Our focus as a government and as the department of defense is very much on incident response and on making sure that every support and assistance is given at this difficult time," he added.
Melville is part of the Tiwi Islands, which along with Darwin are the focus of the exercise that involves 2,500 troops.
The Osprey that crashed was one of two that had flown from Darwin to Melville on Sunday, Murphy said.
Around 150 U.S. Marines are currently based in Darwin and up to 2,500 rotate through the city every year.
The U.S. military was also taking part in a mulitnation military exercise in July when four Australia personnel were killed in an army MRH-90 Taipan helicopter crash off the northeast Australian coast. (AP)
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After poll debacle, defeated MVA candidates to seek verification of EVM-VVPAT units
Mumbai(PTI): The Maha Vikas Aghadi candidates who faced defeat in the recent Maharashtra assembly polls have decided to seek verification of the EVM-Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trails (VVPATs) units in their segments, a leader of the opposition alliance said.
Many losing candidates of the opposition Shiv Sena (UBT) pointed fingers at the functioning of the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) during their interaction with party head Uddhav Thackeray on Tuesday.
Thackeray took stock of the lacklustre performance of his party at a meeting held at his residence in Mumbai.
The poll verdict last week saw the Mahayuti coalition, comprising the Shiv Sena, BJP, and NCP, retaining power with a massive mandate, pushing the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) to margins.
The Mahayuti won 230 seats and MVA only 46 in the 288-member House.
The Thackeray-led Sena (UBT) emerged as the largest party in the opposition camp by winning 20 seats, followed by Congress which bagged 16 constituencies, while the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) sits at the bottom with a tally of 10 seats.
Talking to PTI on Tuesday, Congress leader Arif Naseem Khan, who lost the election from Chandivali assembly constituency in Mumbai, said he held a discussion with Thackeray, who also said he has got complaints from his party workers that EVMs could have been tampered.
"We are getting complaints from different parts of the state expressing doubts over the results. In a democracy, complaints need to be verified and many of us, including myself, (who faced defeat) are in the process of applying for the verification," Khan said.
As per the Supreme Court's judgement on April 26 this year, the burnt memory/microcontroller in 5 per cent of the EVMs - the control unit, ballot unit and the VVPAT - per assembly constituency shall be checked and verified by a team of engineers from manufacturers of the EVMs, after the announcement of results, for any tampering or modification, he said.
A written request for this has to be made by candidates who are in the second or third position behind the highest polled candidate.
Such a request has to be made within seven days of declaration of the result, Khan said.
A candidate making the request will have to pay the expenses of Rs 41,000 which will be refunded in case the machine is found to be tampered with, he said.
The microcontroller is a one-time programmable chip embedded into the three units of EVM-Ballot Unit, Control Unit and the VVPAT - at the time of manufacturing, as per the SC.
A Sena (UBT) MLA from Mumbai has claimed there were discrepancies between the votes polled and the votes counted in the EVMs.
"Almost all candidates raised doubts over the EVMs," the legislator said.
