A space shuttle is no tinker toy. But is it the most complex machine ever built?

Curiosity about the complexity of the reusable spacecraft inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news. And the question led NASA to rethink the way it describes the shuttle program.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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We’ve read that the FDIC, which insures depositors’ bank accounts, is currently out of money and operating in the red. What is the status of the finances of the National Credit Union Administration, which insures credit unions?

Fred Clark
Albuquerque, N.M.
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The National Credit Union Administration, like the FDIC, has an insurance fund financed by fees paid by the institutions. A new fee was assessed this year, and the fund stands at around $8 billion. As is the case with banks, regular deposit accounts in the 7,800 or so federally insured credit unions are covered up to $250,000.

Credit unions are cooperatives that are owned by their members. Twenty-three credit unions have failed so far this year, compared with 18 in 2008, and failures are expected to increase again next year. In March, the NCUA seized control of two large corporate credit unions in Kansas and California that provide wholesale financing for “regular” credit unions – a move the agency said was needed to stabilize the credit union system.

The NCUA last December made more than $40 billion available to support several corporate credit unions with new borrowing from the Treasury Department and provided another $2 billion to help struggling homeowners. The NCUA says most credit unions are vibrant despite the deep recession and its financial condition is strong.

Some experts, though, are more skeptical. A taxpayer bailout of the agency probably won’t be needed, says Bert Ely, a banking industry consultant based in Alexandria, Va., but “I wouldn’t want to swear to it.”

Marcy Gordon
AP Business Writer
Washington

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NASA claims, on its Web site and its iPhone app, that the space shuttle is the most complex machine ever built. Is that really true, even though it was designed over 30 years ago? What about newer machines like the Large Hadron Collider – the world’s largest atom smasher?

Jokton Strealy
Los Angeles

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Thanks to your query, NASA is backing off its claim that the space shuttle is the most complex machine ever built.

NASA spokesman Mike Curie said a more accurate statement is that the space shuttle is one of the most complex machines ever built, right up there with the International Space Station and the Saturn V rocket that carried men to the moon in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Curie assured AP that the NASA web site will be updated, at some point, to reflect this change in wording.

“It would be hard to compare it (the shuttle) to a collider,” Curie said from the Kennedy Space Center.

As for other space marvels, Curie said, “Certainly, the station is one of the most amazing engineering achievements ever – to assemble something as long as a football field with the capacity to generate its own power, recycle water and to be an environment for people to live and work 365 days a year, it’s an amazing accomplishment.”

But he noted: “It doesn’t generate 7 million pounds of thrust.”

Trying to ascertain which is the most complex – the shuttle, station or Saturn V – would entail “a really good discussion with experts for about an hour,” Curie said.

Marcia Dunn
AP Aerospace Writer
Cape Canaveral, Fla.

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I have a question about the priest sex abuse lawsuits against the Bridgeport Diocese. A Connecticut court was supposed to decide Nov. 9 how to release trial records related to the case to the press. What happened?

V. Reil
Queens, N.Y.

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On Nov. 10, Waterbury Superior Court Judge Barry Stevens ordered the release of thousands of documents connected to sexual abuse lawsuits involving Bridgeport’s Roman Catholic Diocese. Stevens ruled that the diocese should release the sealed documents by Dec. 1.

The files consist of more than 12,000 pages from 23 lawsuits against six priests settled by the diocese in 2001. The U.S. Supreme Court earlier this month refused to hear the diocese’s appeal of a Connecticut Supreme Court decision ordering release of the documents.

The records, which include depositions, affidavits and motions, have been under seal since the diocese settled the cases in 2001. They could shed light on how recently retired New York Cardinal Edward Egan handled the allegations when he was Bridgeport bishop.

John Christoffersen
Associated Press Writer
New Haven, Conn.

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

A lot of the sunniest parts of the U.S. – like Florida and the Gulf Coast – are also prime hurricane country.

If you decide to take advantage of those rays by putting solar panels on your roof, is there a chance they could be ripped off in a storm?

Curiosity about solar panels and hurricanes inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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I’m a citizen of Uzbekistan and I read an article of yours that mentioned the number of U.S. deaths in the war in Afghanistan. It said this:

“As of Sunday, Nov. 8, 2009, at least 833 members of the U.S. military had died in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Uzbekistan as a result of the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001, according to the Defense Department. The department last updated its figures Friday at 10 a.m. EDT. Of those, the military reports 640 were killed by hostile action.”

This gave the impression that members of the U.S. military had died in Uzbekistan. But how could this be? There is no military action in Uzbekistan, and I have never heard that any American has died here.

Zukhriddin Ibragimov
Tashkent, Uzbekistan

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AP maintains information on all U.S. troop casualties reported by the Department of Defense as part of the Afghanistan War effort. This includes service members who have died under non-hostile circumstances and deaths that have occurred outside Afghanistan.

While there have been no combat actions in Uzbekistan, one U.S. soldier, Pvt. Giovanny Maria, 19, of Camden, N.J., died in the country on Nov. 29, 2001, from what the Defense Department described as a “non-hostile gunshot wound.” Maria was among 1,000 soldiers providing security at an air base in southern Uzbekistan, which borders Afghanistan.

The day before his death, about two dozen soldiers from his group, the 10th Mountain Division, were being moved from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan.

According to officials at the time, their mission was to serve as a quick-reaction force in case of renewed Taliban resistance.

Details about Maria’s death and his assignment in Uzbekistan – including whether he was about to go to Afghanistan at the time of his death – are unclear. The Defense Department referred calls to the Army, and Army officials said they would look into Maria’s case but weren’t immediately able to provide more information.

Monika Mathur
AP News Research Center
New York

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I’d like to use solar power on my buildings in Lake Charles, La., but I’m concerned that hurricanes would destroy the equipment. Is there a risk of this?

Harvey Adams
Lake Charles, La.
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There’s certainly a risk. But solar panels should be able to withstand most of the weather that comes your way – even in Hurricane Alley. Unlike roof tiles, solar panels are designed to be bolted to the rafters so they’ll hold in strong weather. Some brands are even engineered to endure 140 mph winds.

Richard Smith, president of Superior Solar Systems in Longwood, Fla., said his company has installed 18,000 solar systems in the Southeast since 1984, and only a handful have blown off in a storm.

“The roof may come off, but the solar panel should not,” Smith said. “When it happens, it’s typically due to debris like a tree limb or something hitting it.”

Before buying solar panels, it’s a good idea to make sure the installer will fasten the panels to the roof rafters instead of the plywood surface. Also make sure there’s a warranty. Many installers will replace solar panels that pop off in a storm as a result of an installation error.

It also may be a good idea to keep nearby trees neatly trimmed, minimizing the chance that one of them will snap off in a storm and take a solar panel with it.

Chris Kahn
AP Energy Writer
New York

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How much money does the federal government owe the Social Security trust funds? And how much interest does the federal government pay on the money it has borrowed every year?

Jim Durham
Chillicothe, Mo.

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The Social Security trust funds have a balance of about $2.5 trillion. Over the years, the federal government has borrowed all of that money to spend on other government programs. In return, the Treasury Department has issued Social Security special bonds – think of them as IOUs, backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government.

Twice a year, the Treasury Department makes interest payments to the trust funds, though it is little more than an accounting exercise. No money changes hands, but the interest payments are added to the balance of the trust funds. In 2008, the trust funds earned $116.3 billion in interest, according to the 2009 annual report by the Social Security trustees.

Stephen Ohlemacher
Associated Press Writer
Washington

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

By The Associated Press

Instead of figuring out where to put nuclear waste, why can’t we just find a way to neutralize it so it’s no longer hazardous?

Curiosity about what to do with nuclear waste inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

You can also find Ask AP on AP Mobile, a multimedia news portal available on Internet-enabled mobile devices. Go to http://www.apnews.com/ to learn more.

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How can animals not only drink and live in but even thrive in water that is so contaminated that it would make humans very sick, or kill them, if consumed? I don’t mean fish but mammals, reptiles and amphibians that can survive on water in polluted lakes, canals, rivers and ponds that are unsafe for human consumption.

Jeff Vanderslice
Plantation, Fla.

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Actually, animals often don’t thrive in polluted waters, said Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the National Toxicology Program.

Seals near Central Asia’s Aral Sea and whales near the St. Lawrence Seaway along the U.S.-Canada border have had problems because of pollution, and mink near Lake Michigan don’t reproduce because of dioxin and PCBs, or polychlorinated vinyls, Birnbaum said. Amphibians are disappearing all over the world, for a combination of various and sometimes still unknown reasons.

The real issue, though, is that science looks at animals and people differently. In animals, we look for immediate events, like mass fish die-offs. In people, we look at the long-term chronic effects, like cancer. Rarely do we study cancer or other chronic effects in wild mammals, Birnbaum said.

It’s also worth noting that different species have different tolerances to toxicity.

Seth Borenstein
AP Science Writer
Washington

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How come, with all our technology and great scientific brains, we can’t figure out how to neutralize nuclear waste? What is the problem (in terms a layman can understand)?

Margaret Tabar
Pontiac, Mich.

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The federal government and the nuclear industry figure it will take decades to create the kind of technology that would reduce the volume and radio-toxicity of high-level nuclear waste so that it can be recycled to obtain more energy and improve waste disposal, according to Steve Kraft, senior director of used fuel management at the Nuclear Energy Institute.

The reason no plan has been developed to take care of waste? “It’s extremely complicated,” said Ed Lyman, senior staff scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists.

“Nuclear waste is a mixture of many different radioactive isotopes, all with specific properties. No one-size-fits-all solution exists to convert those into less hazardous materials,” he said.

Lyman said the problem with reprocessing spent nuclear fuel is that it can be hazardous, expensive and time-consuming – taking thousands of years to fully recycle the waste. And there’s another big potential problem, Lyman said: Plutonium that can be generated by the process can be used to make a nuclear bomb.

Kraft said that, for now, waste can be safely stored at nuclear power plant sites or central facilities. And no matter what technology is developed in the future, there always will be material that will have to be disposed of in a repository.

Mark Williams
AP Energy Writer
Columbus, Ohio

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The NFL seems to issue thousands of dollars in fines to its players every week for various infractions. What happens to that money?

Pedro Rivas
Chicago

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Player fines collected by the league are used in part to support the Players Assistance Trust, an organization that provides assistance to retired players who are in financial distress. They also go to charitable initiatives supporting youth and education programs and sports-related medical research.

Barry Wilner
AP Football Writer
New York

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

By The Associated Press

What ever happened to the hole in the ozone layer?

A decade or two ago, alarm bells were sounding about this growing environmental worry. But you don’t hear so much about it these days. Is it less of a problem than it used to be? Did it go away entirely?

Curiosity about the ozone layer inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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Rep. Joe Sestak was elected to Congress in 2007 after retiring from the Navy as an admiral. There have been several generals who have been elected president, but how many military officers with at least one star – brigadier general or rear admiral – have served in Congress after their military careers were over?

Chad Steenerson
Terre Haute, Ind.

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Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa., served in the Navy for 31 years and rose to the rank of three-star admiral. He is the only three-star officer to be elected to the House, according to the Office of the House Historian.

It’s unclear how many military officers with at least one star have served in the House. There does not seem to be an authoritative log, and the Office of the House Historian does not have a comprehensive list. Those elected to the House with at least one star include the late Rep. Sonny Montgomery, D-Miss., who was a two-star officer. Andrew Jackson, also a two-star officer, served in both chambers of Congress.

At least 91 senators, including Jackson, have had at least one star, according to the Senate Historical Office. Sens. Barry Goldwater, R-Ariz., and Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., were among those who were two-star officers.

Ann Sanner
Associated Press Writer
Washington

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A number of years ago, the biggest environmental problem was the hole in the ozone layer. Has that hole completely gone away? If so, how was that problem fixed?

Daniel Lippman
Washington

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The “hole” is actually a huge area of depleted ozone high in the stratosphere over the South Pole. It forms every year because of airborne man-made chemicals. Ozone shields Earth from harmful ultraviolet rays, so its depletion is hazardous.

In 1987, 193 nations agreed to cut emissions of ozone-eating chemicals called chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs. That began a slow-motion fix of the problem that’s still ongoing. That’s probably why you don’t hear as much about the ozone layer as you used to.

Earlier this year, a NASA study used computer modeling to look at what would have happened if the release of CFCs hadn’t been curtailed. In that scenario, two-thirds of the ozone layer would have vanished by 2065 and the hole in the layer would have covered the Earth, NASA atmospheric scientist Paul Newman said. This would have pushed the world’s temperature up an extra 4 degrees, Newman said.

While cutting CFC emissions helped, the problem hasn’t gone away – the hole still appears every August or so, growing to its maximum size in September or October before breaking up. You can track the latest ozone hole data at http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/index.html

Malcolm Ritter
AP Science Writer
New York

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I’m curious if anyone has ever challenged the legal right of a credit bureau to collect and sell private and financial information about a consumer. What gives a company the right to assemble my information and resell it for a profit? It should be up to me to decide what creditors I provide as a credit reference when applying for loans, credit cards and jobs.

Much of the information they collect seems to be incorrect and nearly impossible to rectify.

And who decided that computers should generate a score to determine a person’s creditworthiness?

Sheryl Smith
Madeira Beach, Fla.

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There have been numerous suits filed against credit reporting agencies regarding the accuracy of their information, but challenging their right to operate would be futile.

The reason: The Fair Credit Reporting Act, first passed in 1970 and amended several times since, includes a congressional finding that the agencies “have assumed a vital role in assembling and evaluating consumer credit and other information on consumers.” The idea is that the banking system depends on this information to evaluate credit worthiness, and that credit is a vital part of the economy.

This law does, however, require these companies to maintain accurate records and respect consumers’ privacy rights, and it restricts access to medical information. It also spells out a consumer’s right to access his credit reports and dispute inaccurate information.

These agencies use the information they collect to calculate your “credit score,” a number that ranks a person’s credit worthiness. FICO, a company formerly known as Fair Isaac, developed the first and most commonly used scoring system.

The systems are designed to examine factors like payment history and credit usage to predict how likely you are to pay back loans. More recently, some employers have started using credit reports as one way to evaluate potential workers.

Eileen AJ Connelly
AP Personal Finance Writer
New York

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

By The Associated Press

Any cop in the U.S. who makes an arrest must also read the suspect his Miranda rights, those famous few lines beginning: “You have the right to remain silent.” How about overseas? When U.S. authorities arrest a terror suspect, must that person also be read his rights?

Curiosity about the boundaries of American judicial principles inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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Can you tell me the difference in designation among the American troops deployed throughout the world – i.e., NATO, coalition, UN peacekeepers, etc.?

Kimberly Bush
Springfield, Ill.

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The United States has more than 500,000 forces stationed overseas. They serve under three broad headings. By far the largest is the combatant command system, a geographic designation. U.S. Central Command, for example, covers countries in the Middle East and North Africa. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan fall under Centcom’s jurisdiction. The other broad headings are NATO missions and United Nations missions. In both cases, U.S. forces serve alongside those of other nations. Sometimes that means U.S. forces serve in the same place but under different jurisdictions. In Afghanistan, about 31,000 of the current 65,000 U.S. forces serve under the NATO banner.

Anne Gearan
AP National Security Writer
Washington, D.C.

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What is the current U.S. policy regarding the reading of Miranda rights to captured terrorist suspects? Are Miranda rights reserved for U.S. citizens, or are these warnings given to anyone who might be tried in U.S. courts or U.S. military tribunals? Did our policy change when the administrations changed?

Rowland Driskell
Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

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The Obama administration insists there has been no policy change whatsoever regarding the use of Miranda warnings to terror suspects overseas. The policy is this: there is no need to give Miranda warnings to the vast majority of terror suspects overseas because in most cases there is no expectation such a suspect will be brought to the United States for trial. In those relatively few cases where career agents and prosecutors believe they may want to bring that person to trial in the U.S., then Miranda warnings are to be read.

The administration says that of the thousands of terror suspect detainees interviewed in Afghanistan, only a handful have been Mirandized, and most of those warnings were given during the previous Bush administration. The issue became a political argument after conservatives accused the Obama administration of fostering a new policy that favors criminal prosecution of terror suspects, which could, in theory, lead to more suspects overseas getting Miranda warnings.

Devlin Barrett
AP Justice Department Writer
Washington, D.C.

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In the Oct. 4 edition of Boston Globe Magazine, an article on breast cancer stated that numerous studies have shown a link between the artificial growth hormone rBGH and breast cancer. If this is true, why do products that claim they do not contain rBGH need to display the disclaimer, “FDA states: No significant difference in milk from cows treated with the artificial growth hormone (rBGH)”?

Joanne Quirk
Westfield, Mass.

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Both humans and cows naturally produce growth hormone. The artificial hormone rBGH is a synthetic version of the bovine, or cow, growth hormone that some farmers use to stimulate milk production.

The concern about a possible breast cancer link arose because this first hormone increases the cows’ production of a second natural hormone – IGF-1 – that at very high levels is thought to play a role in certain tumors.

How big a role IGF-1 plays remains a scientific question. But the government concluded that any increase in a person’s body from drinking milk from an rBGH-treated cow would be too small to matter. The Food and Drug Administration required the disclaimer, contending that labeling something “rBGH-free” wrongly implied that it was better.

The American Cancer Society reviewed the controversy earlier this year. The organization took no formal position on the use of rBGH and encouraged more research, but concluded: “To date, there is no evidence that drinking milk produced using rBGH adds substantively to circulating IGF-1 levels in humans or to the risk of developing cancer.”

But the Cancer Society also pointed out a different concern: Cows are given antibiotics to treat rBGH-linked infections, and it’s unclear if that contributes to antibiotic-resistant germs in people.

Lauran Neergaard
AP Medical Writer
Washington, D.C.

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

One natural resource the United States has a lot of is natural gas. So why not just start using it in place of oil, to reduce the nation’s dependence on imported energy?

Curiosity about the potential of natural gas to become America’s fuel of choice inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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How are NFL players paid? Do they just get regular paychecks during the football season, or is their pay spread throughout the year? Do they get paid separately for preseason activities, training camps and postseason play, or is that all included in their overall salary?

What if they have incentive clauses in their contracts – is that money paid as it is earned, or in a lump sum at the end of the season?

Tom Jeffs
Edison, N.J.

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Typically, a player gets paid his whole annual salary during the 17 weeks that make up the regular season, according to the NFL. That doesn’t cover what they do with the team before and after the season – they get separate compensation for those activities.

As for signing and other bonuses: They can be paid as a lump sum or spread out over multiple weeks, depending on the terms of a player’s contract. And if an athlete earns incentive payments – say, by playing a certain number of games or achieving other goals specified in his contract – he usually has to wait until the season ends to cash in.

Barry Wilner
AP Football Writer
New York

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There was an op-ed piece in the Albuquerque Journal by Rep. Harry Teague and energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens that said the solution for our dependence on imported oil is natural gas, which is clean and plentiful enough in the U.S. to last 118 years.

What would it take for us to start using natural gas in place of oil? If we have so much natural gas, why haven’t we been using it all along?

Judy Crane
Tijeras, N.M.

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We do use natural gas extensively. Half the country’s homes are heated with gas. Industries that make steel, plastics and chemicals also count on gas. Utilities’ reliance on gas to make electricity has gone up more than 50 percent over the past 10 years or so, with gas now used to make more than a fifth of the nation’s electricity.

More energy-efficient homes, businesses and appliances, coupled with declining industrial consumption, has kept the use of natural gas at relatively flat levels recently. At the same time, new estimates of U.S. reserves are 35 percent higher than just two years ago, thanks to new technology that has allowed drillers to get gas from shale rock.

The American Clean Skies Foundation, which is backed by the natural gas industry, said a year ago that the U.S. has a 118-year supply of natural gas at 2007 production levels.

The use of gas as a transportation fuel has grown, but still makes up just a tiny part of overall consumption. Quite simply, promoters have not been able to get gas to catch on as a key transportation fuel beyond use in corporate fleets, city buses, trash collection trucks and other government vehicles.

Lack of refueling stations is one problem. Extremely volatile and unpredictable pricing is another. Still, there has been some progress in making equipment that could refuel natural gas vehicles at home.

Using gas as a transportation fuel is “clearly doable,” said Chris McGill of the American Gas Association.

“It’s not a technological issue. It’s a choice issue.”

Mark Williams
AP Energy Writer
Columbus, Ohio

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One of your readers sent you a question regarding fewer veterans, and you said there are 1.4 million people in the active-duty, all-volunteer Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force. What about the Coast Guard, also one of the armed services?

Lowell Gibbs
Albuquerque, N.M.

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The Coast Guard has 42,000 active-duty volunteers, agency spokesman Tony Russell says. That number has gone up slightly each year over the past few years, he says.

The Coast Guard, while a military service, is part of the Homeland Security Department. In times of war, the Coast Guard may be transferred to the Department of the Navy.

Eileen Sullivan
AP Homeland Security Writer
Washington

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

By The Associated Press

Capt. Chesley Sullenberger officially returned to the skies this week, eight months after he gained fame by guiding his crippled jetliner into the Hudson River in New York City without the loss of a single life. But what about the damaged US Airways jet? Has that been returned to service?

Curiosity about the pilot’s aircraft inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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For a while now I have not heard anything about ships being hijacked off Somalia’s coast. Have there been so many that it’s not worth reporting, or has there been a large downturn? If so, is it because of the patrols, or the fact it is just ending winter in the Southern Hemisphere?

Jeff Gordon
Chattanooga, Tenn.

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There was a lull in Somali pirate attacks from the end of June until September, when monsoons made it hard for pirate skiffs to operate on rough seas off the Horn of Africa. However, the weather is improving and authorities expect attacks to increase. Over the past two weeks, there has been a slight pickup in attacks with the latest involving a Spanish tuna trawler Friday in the Indian Ocean.

Piracy experts attribute the failure of those assaults to better vigilance aboard commercial ships as well as increased patrols and fast response times by international navies in the Gulf of Aden. The International Maritime Bureau, which monitors piracy, applauds the positive development but says navies are bracing for a “surge” in attacks in the gulf and off the east coast of Somalia.

Christopher C. Torchia
AP Chief of Bureau, Istanbul

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Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger famously landed his US Airways jet on the Hudson River on Jan. 15 after it was disabled by birds flying into the engines. Whatever happened to the plane? Was it repaired and is it now flying again?
Daniel Lippman
Washington

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After the emergency splashdown, the Airbus A320 slowly drifted south in the frigid Hudson. Only about half of the tail fin and rudder were above water when a Fire Department boat tugged the plane to the southern tip of Manhattan and docked it there. Both engines broke off, settling into muck and thick sediment 30 to 50 feet down.

After a recovery mission, the National Transportation Safety Board directed a teardown of the plane’s engines and found bird remains. The aircraft was moved to a Kearny, N.J. salvage yard. It is expected to remain there while the NTSB completes its investigation, which could take 12 to 18 months.

Once the NTSB concludes its investigation, the disassembled plane will be sold for salvage. It will not be repaired and will not fly again, according to Chartis, the company that insured the aircraft.

The 58-year-old Sullenberger officially returned to the skies Thursday to pilot a flight from New York’s LaGuardia Airport to Charlotte, N.C. – the same planned route as the ill-fated January flight.

Anabelle Garay
AP Writer, Dallas

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An e-mail that’s circulating widely says that Medicare premiums will go up again this year and the next, while Social Security payments remain unchanged. It also says that Congress accepted the annual automatic pay raise while freezing Social Security and other pensions. Is this correct?

Joseph Benham
Kerrville, Texas

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Social Security recipients are not expected to get a cost-of-living increase in 2010 because the government index on which the annual adjustments are based showed no inflation this year. Several bills have been introduced to increase benefits anyway, or at least provide an extra one-time payment.
Congress provided a one-time bonus payment of $250 to Social Security recipients in 2009 as part of an economic stimulus package. That was in addition to a 5.8 percent automatic cost-of-living increase Social Security beneficiaries got last January.

Congress voted in March to reject an automatic cost-of-living pay increase for its members in 2010. Senators and representatives got a 2.8 percent – $4,700 a year – cost-of-living boost in January, the same month Social Security benefits were increased.

By law, Medicare Part B premiums covering physician visits do not increase for the vast majority of seniors if there is no increase in Social Security payments. The House voted last week (9/24) to eliminate premium increases for those who would face them. The bill is now before the Senate.
Congress voted last December to let businesses stretch out paying billions of dollars in required contributions to their employee pension plans after many companies said they needed the cash to stay afloat because of the recession.

It took no action regarding pension payments to retirees by defined benefit pension plans.

Stephen Ohlemacher
AP Writer, Washington, D.C.

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

By The Associated Press

Wind power has its fans, but the turbines that turn breezes into energy are also generating concerns: Some worry that the huge contraptions might put wildlife at risk.

So has anyone considered illuminating them with floodlights or painting them hot pink, so animals know to stay away?

Curiosity about more wildlife-friendly wind farms inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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Where do the funds for my unemployment check come from?

Javier Gamez
Pico Rivera, Calif.

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Unemployment insurance is funded by a combination of state and federal taxes levied on employers. The federal tax is equivalent to 0.8 percent of the first $7,000 of wages, or a maximum of $56 per employee, according to the Labor Department. State taxes vary.

The federal taxes pay for the administration of the program and have also been paying for emergency extended benefits, as Congress has added up to 53 weeks of extra benefits on top of the 26 weeks provided by most states. State taxes pay for the first 26 weeks.

But those taxes haven’t been able to keep up with the record number of Americans receiving unemployment insurance, as joblessness has soared during the current recession to a 26-year high of 9.7 percent. As a result, extended benefits are now being paid out of federal income tax revenue.

Many states are also borrowing from the federal government as their unemployment insurance trust funds have been depleted – another cost ultimately being borne by the taxpayer.

Christopher S. Rugaber
AP Economics Writer
Washington

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Following up on the issue of wind farms potentially harming birds and sea life, from a previous Ask AP:

Have the makers of wind turbines done anything with their designs to try to prevent this? Such as by using sounds, bright fluorescent paint or floodlights that might keep animals safe? It seems like this might reduce opposition to these projects.

Bob Enger
Los Angeles

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Turbine manufacturers and wind farm developers are experimenting with techniques to try to reduce bird and other wildlife injuries.

One idea is to determine wildlife migratory patterns before work is started so turbines can be located outside those pathways. Another is to shut down turbines temporarily when birds are migrating through the area.

Some companies are testing radar to detect the presence of birds and then tilt turbine blades to allow for safer passage. Others have painted blades and adjusted blade speeds, but the jury is still out whether those steps have been successful, said Dave Stout of the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Manufacturers have designed turbines with fewer places for birds to nest, and towers that are 200 feet or taller also have been fitted with lights to comply with a Federal Aviation Administration regulation.

Stout heads a committee of industry, environmental and academic groups that is drafting recommendations for protecting wildlife at wind farms. The proposal will be sent to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar next month for review.

Sandy Shore
AP Energy Writer
Denver

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Will the proposals in Congress for health care reform reduce or eliminate costs related to workers’ compensation claims? And will they reduce costs for Veterans’ Administration and federal employee health care?

Rowland Driskell
Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

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First of all, workers’ compensation is largely handled by the states, not by the federal government. And there’s nothing in the health care bills in Congress that would affect the federal employee health plan.

As for veterans, President Barack Obama has said the proposed health care overhaul would not change how they get their VA medical services. He’s told veterans that there’s no discussion in Washington that involves taking away veterans’ health benefits.

Republicans and some veterans organizations, however, have expressed concern that veterans could be subjected to a 2.5 percent tax targeting individuals who don’t have acceptable health insurance, unless it is specifically written into legislation that health care from the VA would be considered acceptable.

Donna Cassata
AP Health Care Policy Editor
and
Kimberly Hefling
AP Veterans’ Affairs Writer
Washington

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.

We’ve been getting a few phone calls and emails at the station, asking us to air the Vikings-Lions game this Sunday, but due to the NFL’s rules, we can’t.

There are a variety of rules governing the broadcasts, which network they are on and which games can be shown.

One of those states, basically, that when a team is playing at home on one network, another network can’t air a different game at the same time.

Which is brings us to this Sunday.

A) The Packers are at home against Cincinnati at noon. For AFC vs. NFC games, the game is assigned to the network of the visiting team. In this case, CBS gets the game.

B) The Vikings play at Detroit at noon. Both are NFC teams, so the game is on FOX.

C) It is a CBS doubleheader Sunday, meaning FOX stations can only air one game.

D) Because the Packers are at home, we can’t air any of the noon NFC games. (The other choices, incidentally, are New Orleans vs. Philadelphia, St. Louis vs. Washington, Carolina vs. Atlanta, and Arizona vs. Jacksonville)

E) FOX 11 is airing the Seattle vs. San Francisco game at 3 pm. The other possibility would be Tampa Bay vs. Buffalo, but we were assigned the other game by FOX.

F) The rules governing broadcast stations do not affect the NFL Sunday Ticket package (in terms of out-of-town teams), so you might be able to find a sports bar showing the Vikings & Lions.

I hope that helps explain the situation this Sunday.

As for getting to watch the Vikings or Lions, there are several games we plan to air. Assignments change based on records, etc. and the NFL’s flexible scheduling rules kick in for the last seven weeks (but that’s another column). Our initial schedule this week had us airing the Tampa-Buffalo game, for example, but then changed this week.

Here’s the tentative list of games on FOX 11 for the rest of the season, but – and I can’t stress this enough – these are not written in stone for the non-Packers games.

WEEK 3 Sunday 09/27/09
Noon – Green Bay @ St. Louis

WEEK 4 Sunday 10/04/09
Noon – Detroit @ Chicago
3PM – Dallas @ Denver

WEEK 5 Sunday 10/11/09
Noon – Minnesota @ St. Louis

WEEK 6 Sunday 10/18/09
Noon – Detroit @ Green Bay

WEEK 7 Sunday 10/25/09
Noon – Green Bay @ Cleveland
3PM – Atlanta @ Dallas

WEEK 8 Sunday 11/01/09
Noon – Minnesota @ Green Bay
3PM – NY Giants @ Philadelphia

WEEK 9 Sunday 11/08/09
Noon – Green Bay @ Tampa Bay

WEEK 10 Sunday 11/15/09
Noon – Detroit @ Minnesota
3PM – Dallas @ Green Bay

WEEK 11 Sunday 11/22/09
Noon – San Francisco @ Green Bay

WEEK 12- Thursday 11/26/09
11:30AM – Green Bay @ Detroit

WEEK 12 Sunday 11/29/09
Noon – Chicago @ Minnesota
3PM – Game assignment is TBD due to Flexible Scheduling

WEEK 13 Sunday 12/06/09
Noon – St. Louis @ Chicago
3PM – Minnesota at Arizona

WEEK 14 Sunday 12/13/09
Noon – Green Bay @ Chicago

WEEK 15 Sunday 12/20/09
Noon – Green Bay @ Pittsburgh
3PM – Game assignment is TBD due to Flexible Scheduling

WEEK 16 Sunday 12/27/09
Noon – Seattle @ Green Bay

WEEK 17 Sunday 01/03/10
Noon – Game assignment is TBD due to Flexible Scheduling
3:15PM- Green Bay @ Arizona

And, finally, if you are curious about game distribution, here’s a link you might be interested in. A fan creates national maps based on the network assignments. It gives you an idea of who is seeing which game.

http://the506.com/nflmaps/

As always, if you have any questions, please let me know.

When it comes to producing a tsunami, does it matter if an earthquake is moving the seafloor up, down or side to side?

Curiosity about what sorts of seaquakes would set off a tsunami alert inspired one of the questions in this edition of “Ask AP,” a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers’ questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you’d like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with “Ask AP” in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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When was the last time the federal budget was balanced at $0.00, and under what president?

Richard A. Stanley
Greenfield, Ind.

—
The budget has never been balanced at exactly zero, though Woodrow Wilson came close in 1913 and 1914, when the deficit was less than $1 million.

Given the size of the economy, the deficit fluctuates a lot and it’s impossible to predict what it will be with any certainty, mostly because tax collections depend a lot on the economy and how the stock market is doing.

For four years from 1998 to 2001, under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, the U.S. government ran surpluses ranging from $69 billion to $236 billion. Those surpluses went away with the recession of 2001, the popping of the stock market bubble and a wave of spending in the wake of 9/11. Tax cuts also contributed to the returning deficit.

In 2001, Bush supposedly inherited surpluses projected at $5.6 trillion over 10 years. But those guesses were way off as they were based on revenue models that turned out to be very flawed.

Andrew Taylor
Associated Press Writer covering the federal budget
Washington

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Recent news reports of earthquakes at sea have been a mixed bag in terms of whether a tsunami alert was sounded.

As I understand it, tsunamis only result from earthquakes that cause the sea floor to drop, not from quakes involving lateral plate movement. Is there something in seismic readings that indicates an earthquake’s origin, and thus whether a tsunami alert is needed?

Michael Buerger
Bowling Green, Ohio

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Seismologist Paul Richard of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University says the main reasons for issuing an alert are the size and location of an earthquake. The question is whether the quake is located in an area that has been associated with tsunamis in the past, and whether it is powerful enough to cause another one.

A tsunami can be caused by movement of the seafloor up or down, and it is also possible for a lateral quake to generate one if it results in an underwater landslide. Thus a calculation that seismic movement was lateral would not be sufficient to deny a warning, he said.

“Just the size of the earthquake is usually enough to set the ball rolling,” Richard said.

Randolph E. Schmid
AP Science Writer
Washington

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Included in General Motors’ effort to restructure itself is getting rid of its Saturn division. There had been talk of it being sold to a group run by Penske. What is the current state of Saturn?

Stephan Vertal
Forest Grove, Ore.

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As part of its government-backed reorganization, GM is shedding four brands: Hummer, Saab, Pontiac and Saturn. In June, GM announced a tentative agreement to sell Saturn to the dealership chain Penske Automotive Group Inc., owned by auto racing magnate Roger Penske.

GM and Penske are still ironing out the final details of the sale, which is expected to close in the coming months. For now, the agreement calls for Penske to get the rights to the Saturn brand as well as all 350 Saturn dealerships in the U.S. The division has about 13,000 employees, which Penske said he would retain at least in the near term.

Saturns are built alongside other GM vehicles at several factories across North America. Initially, GM will continue to supply Saturns for Penske on a contract basis, although Penske has said he is in talks with other car manufacturers about building Saturn cars in the future.

Dan Strumpf
AP Auto Writer
New York

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.