The Washington Post - USA (2020-08-01)

A16 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.SATURDAY, AUGUST 1 , 2020

BY CHRISTIAN DAVENPORT

Despite Hurricane Isaias tar-
geting the east coast of Florida
this weekend, NASA and SpaceX
are continuing with plans to re-
turn a pair of American astro-
nauts from the International
Space Station, hoping Isaias will
miss at least some of the seven
designated landing sites on ei-
ther side of the Florida peninsula.
If all goes according to plan,
NASA astronauts Bob Behnken
and Doug Hurley will climb
aboard their SpaceX Dragon
spacecraft and undock from the
station about 7:34 p.m. Saturday
and splash down about 2:42 p.m.
Sunday, in the Atlantic Ocean or
the Gulf of Mexico.
Speaking to reporters from the
space station Friday morning, the
astronauts said they were watch-
ing the weather closely.
“ We won’t leave the space sta-
tion without some good landing
opportunities in front of us, good
splashdown weather in front of
us,” Behnken said.
With the storm predicted to
churn along Florida’s Atlantic
coast Sunday, just as the astro-
nauts would be heading home,
officials said a gulf splashdown
would be more likely if they did
proceed with a return. SpaceX
has identified two splashdown
sites off the Florida Panhandle
near Panama City and Pensacola
that could be targeted.
On Friday, Kathy Lueders, the
head of NASA’s human space-
flight program, wrote on Twitter
that the teams “have decided to
move forward” with the splash-
down Sunday but would “contin-
ue to monitor weather.” NASA has
said it and SpaceX would make a
decision on a primary splash-
down site about six hours before
the undocking.
There’s no rush to bring the
crew home, however, especially
since it would be the first time
NASA astronauts have splashed
down at sea since Apollo-Soyuz,
the joint U.S.-Soviet mission, in

mph and will hit Earth’s atmosphere with such force that flames will engulf the capsule, testing the heat shield. Inside Earth’s atmosphere, as it descends, two drogue parachutes will deploy, and then four main chutes are to guide the spacecraft down to the sea, where recovery crews will be standing by. In the case of an emergency, Air Force search and rescue teams as well as contractors from ManTech, a private security company, will be on standby with C- cargo aircraft to deploy to the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic. Another team is posted in Hawaii to respond if the vehicle goes way off course and lands in the Pa- cific. “If the spacecraft comes down where it is supposed to, in the condition expected, then SpaceX is 100 percent responsible for the recovery of the crew and the spacecraft,” said Mike McClure, a ManTech program manager who used to command the Air Force’s rescue detachment. “If, however, the spacecraft lands someplace else, or the condition of the spacecraft and the crew drives SpaceX or NASA to request [De- partment of Defense] assistance, then our team will spring into action.” Despite the many challenges of a water landing, Hurley and Behnken said they were not con- cerned. “Splashdown is closer than it was the last time we were asked questions about it,” Behnken said. “But I still don’t feel nervous about it. Really, we’re focused on the things that we’ll need to do to be as safe as possible as we come back.” The return flight will be fairly long, some 18 hours between undocking and splashdown. And the astronauts will be busy moni- toring the capsule’s systems. But they will have time to rest. “We’ll spend a good share of that sleeping,” Hurley said. [email protected]

Economy & Business

ENERGY

Exxon, Chevron report

weak performances

Exxon Mobil and Chevron
posted their worst losses in a
generation after the pandemic
and a global crude glut combined
to batter almost every part of
their businesses.
Exxon’s $1.1 billion second-
quarter loss was the deepest in
the company’s modern history. A
collapse in crude prices bled
Exxon’s production division,
while coronavirus shutdowns
lowered demand for everything
from jet fuel to plastic wrap,
hobbling the company’s refining
and chemical units.
Chevron recorded its weakest
performance in at least three
decades and warned that the
global pandemic wreaking havoc
upon energy markets may
continue to drag on earnings.
Shares of both explorers declined
in premarket trading.
Oil has become the poorest-
performing sector of U.S. equity
markets as a confluence of
economic, political and structural
threats coalesce to imperil the
very foundations of the
petroleum industry. Sweeping

layoffs, budget cuts and project cancellations haven’t been enough to arrest the industry’s decline as fleeing investors made energy the worst investment in the S&P 500 index this year. Without the massive trading operations that shielded European oil explorers such as Royal Dutch Shell and Total from losses, Chevron was exposed to the full force of this year’s oil price rout. Notably, Exxon’s nascent trading foray “experienced unfavorable mark- to-market derivative impacts,” the company said. — Bloomberg News

AUTO INDUSTRY

GM and partner will build charger network

General Motors is working with electric-vehicle charging operator EVgo to build a nationwide fast-charging infrastructure as the automaker prepares a major push into battery-powered models. The two companies will jointly invest in 2,750 fast chargers in cities and suburbs across the United States as GM moves to solve a chicken-and-egg problem

that comes with selling EVs: A sparse network of chargers has turned off some potential buyers, but utilities and charging companies have been loath to expand the infrastructure until more plug-ins are on the road. GM has three new electric models coming out in the next two years, starting with the Cadillac Lyriq crossover SUV, which will be shown to the public next week. In 2021, GM plans to sell the Chevrolet Bolt EUV, which is a larger version of the existing Bolt compact, and a GMC Hummer pickup. The automaker plans to spend $20 billion developing electric and autonomous vehicles over the next five years and has said it will have at least 20 EVs for sale globally by 2023. The United States has 31, charging stations with more than 96,000 connections, according to the Department of Energy website. Of those stations, 4, are fast chargers with almost 17,000 outlets. By comparison, there are about 122,000 gasoline stations in the United States, according to the National Association of Convenience Stores. — Bloomberg News

ALSO IN BUSINESS Trader Joe’s, which indicated earlier in July that it might change the names of some of its products after an online petition denounced them as racist, now says it will stick with labels like

Trader Jose’s and Trader Ming’s for Mexican and Asian food, respectively. “We want to be clear: we disagree that any of these labels are racist,” the popular grocery chain said in a statement posted on its website. It added, “We do not make decisions based

on petitions.” The petition posted on change.org by a high school student claims the names create “a narrative of exoticism that perpetuates harmful stereotypes.”

Image-sharing company Pinterest said advertising demand began to improve in May as it reported better-than- expected quarterly results. More people turned to Pinterest’s platform for content to keep themselves entertained during coronavirus shutdowns, leading to a 39 percent jump in monthly active users to 416 million.

Cargill, the top privately owned company in America, paid its family owners a record dividend in its 2020 fiscal year after profit surged on the back of volatile agricultural markets. The world’s largest agricultural commodity trader reported net income of $3 billion in its fiscal year through May, up 17 percent, according to audited accounts reviewed by Bloomberg News. Cargill has been able to make money from volatile markets buffeted by the U.S.-China trade war and the pandemic. — From news services

DIGEST

CHRIS RATCLIFFE/BLOOMBERG Piglets suckle on their mother in a farrowing pen Friday at a farm in Driffield, England. Britain’s farming industry sends about two-thirds of its exports to the European Union, and those goods would be subject to steep tariffs under a no-deal Brexit.

of their accounts completely if they tried to change their pass- words. It took Twitter days to fully restore access to those accounts. The hack drew concern from lawmakers and others about the strength of Twitter’s cybersecurity system and triggered an FBI inves- tigation. Cybersecurity experts have said it was fortunate that hackers appeared interested only in scamming people for money and were not, for example, at- tempting to compromise national security. Many politicians, including President Trump, use Twitter as a main form of communication. CEO Jack Dorsey apologized for the hack last week during a company earnings call, saying Twitter “fell behind” in some security re- strictions. [email protected] [email protected]

of law enforcement.” The cyberattack that took down big parts of Twitter’s site involved manipulating employees over a rather old-school method: the phone. Hackers called a “small num- ber” of employees in a phone spearphishing scheme, Twitter tweeted from its support account. Phishing attacks are designed to fool people into thinking the send- er or caller is safe by imitating a company or trusted person. The hackers were able to access some internal tools from the initial targeted employees and then learned specifically who had access to account support controls and targeted them next. It took Twitter hours to regain control of the site, and the company had to temporarily lock all veri- fied accounts. Others lost control

England, according to a release from the U.S. attorney’s office for the Northern District of Califor- nia. According to complaints un- sealed Friday morning, Fazeli is accused of aiding and abetting the intentional access of a protected computer, and Sheppard faces ac- cusations of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and intentional access of a protected computer. It was unclear whether any of the accused had secured attorneys. FBI San Francisco Assistant Special Agent in Charge Sanjay Virmani said in a statement that the “arrests represent just the first step for law enforcement. Our in- vestigation will continue to identi- fy anyone else who may have been involved in these crimes.” In a tweet, Twitter expressed appreciation for the “swift actions

morning. He faces one count of organized fraud, one count of ac- cessing a computer or electronic device without authority, one count of fraudulent use of personal information, 10 counts of fraudulent use of personal information and 17 counts of communications fraud. “These crimes were perpetrat- ed using the names of famous people and celebrities, but they’re not the primary victims here,” Warren said in a news release. “This ‘Bit-Con’ was designed to steal money from regular Ameri- cans from all over the country, including here in Florida. This massive fraud was orchestrated right here in our backyard, and we will not stand for that.” Also charged Friday were Nima Fazeli, 22, of Orlando, and Mason Sheppard, 19, of Bognor Regis,

morning by FBI and Internal Rev- enue Service agents, Hillsborough State Attorney Andrew Warren said at a news conference. He faces 30 felony counts. “I guess I was surprised that it was someone so young,” Warren said of Clark, whom he called the hack’s mastermind, “but at the same time, we see a lot of people who are extremely sophisticated and savvy with computers at a young age.” The FBI and the U.S. Depart- ment of Justice will coordinate with the state attorney’s office in prosecuting Clark in Florida. The federal government cannot charge Clark as an adult, but Flori- da law allows minors to be charged as adults in certain cases of financial fraud, Warren said. Clark is expected to make his first court appearance Saturday

BY RACHEL LERMAN AND HANNAH DENHAM

Three people were charged Fri-
day, including a Florida teenager
dubbed “the mastermind,” in con-
nection with a massive security
breach targeting some of the most
prominent names on Twitter.
On July 15, hackers took over
about 130 high-profile accounts,
including those of former presi-
dent Barack Obama, Democratic
presidential candidate Joe Biden
and Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Hack-
ers then tweeted a fake bitcoin
deal from some of those accounts,
reaping more than 400 bitcoin
transfers worth in excess of
$100,000, the Hillsborough state
attorney’s office said.
Graham Ivan Clark, 17, of Tam-
pa was arrested “without inci-
dent” at his apartment Friday

3 charged in massive Twitter hack, including alleged teenage ‘mastermind’

Hurricane could complicate astronauts’ planned return

NASA’s Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley hope to move from the space station to the SpaceX Dragon capsule Saturday and splash down off Florida on Sunday

1975. The spacecraft can stay on the space station for up to about 120 days and is only about halfway through that time. “The systems on Dragon are doing very well,” Steve Stich, NASA’s commercial crew program manager, said this week. “The spacecraft is very healthy.” He that the spacecraft was inspected using a robotic arm and that engineers from NASA and SpaceX looked at the data. The “results were very favorable,” Stich said. “There were no areas

on the vehicle that were of any concern for reentry.” He said flight controllers would await the most desirable conditions, calm seas and gentle winds, ideally under 10 mph, before committing to a return. “We have plenty of opportunities here in August, and we’re in no hurry to come home,” he said. Behnken and Hurley, both vet- eran astronauts, said they were looking forward to getting home but would be patient. “We don’t control the weather, and we know we can stay up here

longer,” Behnken said. “There’s more chow. And I know the space station program has got more work we can do.” The spacecraft has three days’ worth of “consumables,” oxygen, food and water, in case the spacecraft undocks and then needs to stay in orbit before committing to a return, officials said. Behnken and Hurley lifted off on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center on May 30, the first flight of NASA astronauts from U.S. soil since the space shuttle fleet was retired

in 2011. It also was the first time a private company put astronauts into orbit. Along with Boeing, SpaceX is under contract from NASA to develop spacecraft capa- ble of flying people to the station. And this mission, known as Demo-2, is designed to test the Dragon spacecraft to ensure it operates properly before NASA allows the company to fly opera- tional missions of astronauts to the station. Like the launch, the return journey is perilous. The spacecraft will be traveling at 17,

JONATHAN NEWTON/THE WASHINGTON POST U.S. astronauts Doug Hurley, left, and Bob Behnken o n their way to t he crew capsule atop SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket in Florida on May 30.

○

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S&P 500 3,271. UP 24.90, 0.8% ○

GOLD $1,985. UP $19.10, 1.0% ○

CRUDE OIL $40. UP $0.35, 0.9% ○

10-YEAR TREASURY UP $1.60 PER $1,000; 0.53% YIELD

CURRENCIES $1=105.92 Y EN, 0.85 EUROS

The Washington Post - USA (2020-08-01)

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