With Debt Climbing, Japan Debates A Tax Hike

By NAPAT KONGSAWAD (Associated Press) BANGKOK — Aviation investigators arrived in Bangkok Wednesday to learn how and why severe turbulence sent a Singapore Airlines plane into a sudden dive that tossed passengers and crew around the cabin, leaving a British man dead and dozens others injured. Twenty people remained in intensive care in hospital after Flight SQ321, which was flying from London’s Heathrow airport to Singapore, hit the turbulence Tuesday over the Andaman Sea.

By TAMMY WEBBER (Associated Press) As Texas wildfires burned toward the nation’s primary nuclear weapons facility, workers hurried to ensure nothing flammable was around buildings and storage areas. When the fires showed no sign of slowing, Pantex Plant officials urgently called on local contractors, who arrived within minutes with bulldozers to dig trenches and enlarge fire breaks for the sprawling complex where nuclear weapons are assembled and disassembled and dangerous plutonium pits — hollow spheres that trigger nuclear warheads and bombs — are stored. “The winds can pick up really (quickly) here and can move really fast,” said Jason Armstrong, the federal field office manager at Pantex, outside Amarillo, who was awake 40 hours straight monitoring the risks.

Denver’s City Council learned last week that the city has all the green plastic compost bins it needs and enough employees to begin picking up food waste and yard debris for commercial composting. So what’s the hold-up in delivering services that were promised to residents almost two years ago with a hefty new trash fee? According to reporting by Catie Cheshire at Westword, City Councilman Paul Kashmann got the answer during a recent update to the Council.

Moon Alert: There are no restrictions to shopping or important decisions today. The Moon is in Scorpio. Happy Birthday for Wednesday, May 22, 2024: You are intelligent and have an extremely focused mind that allows you to go after what you want. You completely embrace whatever interests you. This is a successful year for you because you will reap rewards of your past efforts.

Dear Amy: I’m in my 40s. I have grandchildren, and also my own toddler at home. I feel very blessed to have had a baby at my age, but something that has eluded me is female friendships. I live in a rural area, but I know that’s not really the problem. I long to have a trustworthy friend. My only friend died over two years ago, and since then I’ve been fooled by women who later turned on me. I’ve always had more guy friends than women friends, but most of those friendships with guys never worked out, as they had ulterior motives. Are there any online sites I could look to for friends? I’m warm, friendly, and caring. I know social media glamorizes people’s lives, but I see women every day with loving and close friendships. It makes me feel even more like an outsider. Are some of us made to have few or zero friendships? – Friendless Dear Friendless: Modern media meant to celebrate women’s friendships tends to characterize gal pals as bonding over cocktails and sharing late-night confessionals, but most actual human beings do not behave in such tidy and agreeable ways.

By HANNAH FINGERHUT, SCOTT McFETRIDGE and MARGERY A. BECK (Associated Press) GREENFIELD, Iowa — Multiple people were killed when a tornado tore through a small town in Iowa and left a wide swath of obliterated homes and crumpled cars, while the howling winds also twisted and toppled wind turbines. After devastating Greenfield, a town of 2,000, on Tuesday the storms moved eastward to pummel parts of Illinois and Wisconsin, knocking out power to tens of thousands of customers in the two states. Greenfield’s hospital was among the buildings that were damaged in the town, which meant that at least a dozen people who were hurt had to be taken to facilities elsewhere, according to Iowa State Patrol Sgt.