Author: thaobh.leo@gmail.com

Officials at the U.S. Forest Service knew gear worn by wildland firefighters contained potentially dangerous “forever chemicals” years before the agency publicly acknowledged the issue, according to internal correspondence obtained by ProPublica.Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS, have been linked to negative health impacts, including certain cancers and delayed development in children. For years, PFAS chemicals were commonly used to treat the heavy gear worn by municipal firefighters to help it repel water and oil.Federal agencies have said little about whether the compounds were also found in the lighter heat-resistant clothing worn by wildland firefighters. In February 2024,…

Iran Press TV Tuesday, 10 February 2026 9:17 AM Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman has advised the United States to avoid “destructive” Israeli influence as Washington engages in indirect nuclear negotiations with Tehran, citing the drawn-out history of Tel Aviv-manufactured regional crises. Esmaeil Baghaei made the remarks during a press conference in Tehran on Tuesday, identifying the US as Iran’s sole negotiating counterpart that had to decide whether it was willing to act independently of Israel’s “destructive” pressures that harmed regional stability and even contradicted Washington’s own interests. Baghaei said one of the main challenges in US foreign policy in the…

Iran Press TV Tuesday, 10 February 2026 5:35 AM Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Larijani has arrived in Muscat, the capital of Oman, for high-level talks, amid preparations for further indirect nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington Larijani, who left Tehran early Tuesday, is scheduled to hold talks with senior Omani officials, including Sultan Haitham bin Tariq and Foreign Minister Badr bin Hamad Al Busaidi. Discussions will focus on the latest regional and international developments, as well as ways to strengthen bilateral cooperation between the two countries. On Friday, Iran and the United States held a…

Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia – February 11th 2026: SAMI Land Company, a subsidiary of Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI), a PIF company, unveiled the HEET Program introducing a new generation of advanced wheeled armored vehicles during the third edition of World Defense Show 2026. Developed with full Saudi intellectual property and indigenous design, the program will be entirely manufactured within the Kingdom by Saudi talent, representing a significant step forward in strengthening operational readiness and advancing national defense industrial capabilities. The HEET Program will be produced at the SAMI Land Industrial Complex, the largest fully integrated facility of its kind in the…

Bottom lines up front WASHINGTON—The Forum on Resource Geostrategic Engagement (FORGE), announced last week at the inaugural Critical Minerals Ministerial in Washington, DC, marked the opening salvo of the Trump administration’s 2026 critical minerals agenda. Coming on the heels of a frenetic year of executive actions, bilateral dealmaking, and the launch of the twelve-billion-dollar Project Vault stockpiling initiative, FORGE is the Trump administration’s clearest attempt yet to translate its sizeable ambitions around critical minerals into a functional architecture. At its core, FORGE reflects a belief that the hardest challenges in the minerals markets are better addressed with partners. Collaboration is…

The changes described across this series do not point to a sudden transformation of procure-to-pay (P2P) platforms. They point to a gradual but consequential shift in how limitations are revealed and how expectations should be recalibrated. AI has altered how work is surfaced, prioritized and assisted, but it has not overturned the foundational design of most P2P systems. This last article focuses on what that reality practically means for the organizations operating these platforms and the teams building them, by translating observed behavior into implications rather than roadmaps or prescriptions. For practitioners, the first implication is expectation management AI does…

Karate Combat surprised the martial arts world with an unusual booking for Friday night’s event in Miami, signing top-ranked UFC heavyweight Valter Walker to grapple against Zion Clark, a man who has found success in wrestling competition despite the fact he was born with no legs due to a rare condition called caudal regression syndrome.Clark and Walker will enter the Karate Combat pit at the Telemundo Center in Miami, Fla., for a 2-round, 5-minute openweight grappling match. They will go for an extra round in case of a draw.The idea for the match came in the aftermath of Walker’s fourth…

WEST 2026 — The first Columbia-class submarine is expected for delivery in 2028, and full-rate construction of the vessel is expected in the early 2030s, according to Program Executive Officer Strategic Submarines Rear Adm. Todd Weeks.  “With Columbia, we’ve been on a steady ramp-up to full-rate construction,” Weeks said here at the annual WEST 2026 conference Wednesday in San Diego. “We will hit full-rate construction in 2031. “On the lead ship, the District of Columbia, she is about 65, 66 percent complete,” Weeks continued. “This time last year, we sat down with our shipbuilding partners, and we realized we were…

The Pentagon allowed U.S. Customs and Border Protection to use an anti-drone laser earlier this week, leading the Federal Aviation Administration to suddenly close the airspace over El Paso, Texas, on Wednesday, according to two people familiar with the situation who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.The confusing arc of events began as the FAA announced it was shutting down all flight traffic over the city on the U.S.-Mexico border for 10 days, stranding some travelers, but the closure ended up only lasting a few hours. The Trump administration said it stemmed from the FAA and…

SUFFOLK, Va. – The Naval Information Forces (NAVIFOR) command announced the winners of the first 2025 Information Warfare (IW) Battle Efficiency (Battle “E”) awards, recognizing commands that have demonstrated sustained, superior performance and strengthened warfighting readiness in the IW domain. The Battle “E” award program was recently expanded by the Chief of Naval Operations to include the Information Warfare community, acknowledging the critical warfighting capabilities IW provides to the fleet. The winning commands represent the top ten percent of all IW commands, selected based on their performance throughout 2025. “The competition was exceptionally demanding, with those nominated demonstrating sustained superior…