Compact archive October 6, 2008

Czech Press Photo: Attractive Accident

Monday 06 October 2008 17:18

The best Czech journalist photo of 2007? The massive collision on D1 from Prague to Brno by David W. Černý, Reuters. The mass accident was caused by inadequate speed of drivers. At that time in March, over two hundreds of vehicles crashed into each other, forming the biggest Czech car accident. It was a miracle nobody died there.

Back to the photo; the international commission selected the one from 4300 sent photographs by almost 400 authors. The selected winner impressed by symbolizing danger of mankind, hidden in automobiles. The couple on the photo is surrounded by carcass and they realize in shock, they survived completely by accident. They hug under blue blanket, and blue is the color of hope. The photography shows one of the biggest dangers of our lives. The winning photo is here

Designblok in Prague

Monday 06 October 2008 15:46

Designblok celebrates it’s 10th Birthday, introduces over 200 authors. What is Designblok? An annual action showing newest trends in the area of design, design of past years and inspiration from the present; a kind of design chart.

77 best shops with design, interior and mode, 37 mode designers and hundred of design studios, designers, schools – you can meet all these in this year’s Designblok, taking place from 7th to 12th October. The total number of Designblok participants is really record-breaking, it presents 202 of them.

The centres of supporting programme are Superstudio Corso and Superstudio Dox, located in old industrial quarters of of Holesovice and Karlin, which, step by step from the floods in 2001, slowly become a favorite location for art and design.

If you are interested in the history of design or present trends, Designblok is the event, which you don’t want to miss.

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Road-toll in Prague silently coming nearer

Monday 06 October 2008 13:38

tiny old town Nobody doubts the road-toll introduction in Prague center will be introduced. In one year the pilot project, where the councillors establish a few streets in the centre as testing ones, starts. Few months later, they start to collect in the area of large part of Prague 1.

The Prague Mayor Bem stated from the beginning that it is a tool for disabling the drivers to thicken the traffic. With the same arguments he defends the sum of 55 millions czk, which the Prague citizens pay for the devices and others. But the money will soon return – the road-toll system is expected to bring significant profits as well.

The toll is primary for preservation of the historical core of Old Prague, which was build for pedestrians 500 years ago and it suffers heavily by everyday traffic jams.

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Stock theft worth 300 millions

Monday 06 October 2008 11:34

It is the second biggest theft in the history of the very Czech Republic. Thieves have stolen from hotel Olympic a strongbox with stocks of Hotel Olympik in total value over 300 millions czk. In addition, they took cash in various currencies worth over 1 million czk.

“The stocks are not digitally coded, they are only in its paper form” the leader of the company Sos described for MF Dnes. According to him the funds are worthless for thieves. Sos also appealed to to the potential investors not to buy the stolen stocks.

The thieves got into the hotel at about 10 o’clock. Opened the doors of the manager’s office and took the strongbox, and carried it out in a blanket or a sheet. The employees took notice of them and even seize d one of them. The police took information from his ID, but because he wasn’t carrying anything they released him.

They quite probably didn’t know about the stocks, and the theft wasn’t anything like the Czech theft of the century, where they took 564 Millions CZK (20,14 millions €) cash, leaving no track.

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Czech Logistic problems in Afghanistan

Monday 06 October 2008 10:06

The main car used in Afghanistan by the Czech Army is Dingo. The German armored vehicle with a machine gun on its roof costs 1,1 million € and has problems with going up a hill. The official name of the machine is Dingo 2 CZ 4×4 LOV and it should provide Czech soldiers in Afghanistan higher security. But until now, it only makes them angry, or it can even put them in danger.

Lidove noviny informed about the problems the army live through every day – the Dingo struggles with low performance, plus it is hard for it to keep up in a convoy going 60 km/h. Everyone, who work with Dingos, either complain about its low performance or high sensibility at oil kinds.

Put simply, Dingos have problem with going on the diesel which is available on the base, and which is normally used by the US army and on which the Humvee cars, South African RG-31 or Cougar cars go.

The Czech ministry of defence have ordered tests, whether the Dingos need more quality oil to run. In that case it would be much complicated than to take oil from the Americans.

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