A Brooklyn company's breakthrough technology for immobile patients, supersonic passenger planes mis

the tightest of tensions in the Middle East after the assassination of hamas's top political leader and the region steps up to the brink of allout War a big breakthrough new technology giving a paralyzed patient the gift of movement using nothing but his mind and 20 years after the last flight of the Concord new hopes supersonic travel could take off again from ABC7 New York this is Eyewitness News extra time and good evening I'm Josh aner thanks for joining us this Wednesday night and we begin with the crisis in the Middle East a region seemingly on the brink of allout War not one but two deadly strikes leading this region to this point right now one attack was in the Iranian city of tan the capital city a top Hamas leader was killed and just hours earlier another attack in lebanon's capital Beirut killed a Hezbollah leader The Fallout has been immediate Hamas now calling ceasefire meaningless and Iran is threatening a fierce retaliation tonight Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned his nation of challenging days ahead and as eyewitness news reporter Lauren glasberg shows us the region and the world are on edge these are chent days from beut there are threats we are ready for any scenario we are prepared the Israeli Prime Minister urged Israelis to be patient in spite of tensions being very [Music] high in Iran they chanted death to Israel but Israel hasn't claimed responsibility for the overnight murder of Ismael Hanah the political leader of Hamas he was in tyan for the inauguration of the new Iranian president when he was killed Iran backs both Hamas and Hezbollah Israel is claiming responsibility for the targeted attack of a key member of Hezbollah on Tuesday in Beirut that attack was in retaliation for the rocket attack in the Golan Heights that left 12 dead but attacks in Lebanon and Iran compiled with the war in Gaza may lead to Greater destabilization and it's not clear how this could impact a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas it's always been a complicated process I mean my goodness how many times have we talked about it in the last few months and even in just the last few weeks I think it's too soon to know what any of these reported events uh could mean for the ceasefire deal um but if I could add two points one is that doesn't mean we're going to stop working on it in fact we have a team in the region right now as we speak uh to try to continue to work with our counterparts to move this forward because it's that important um and number two as I kind of alluded to earlier it's always been complicated work 115 hostages are still being held by Hamas and Palestinians are facing a humanitarian crisis as the war in Gaza continues and as there are threats and counter threats in the Middle East other countries are urging calm in The Newsroom Lauren glassberg Channel 7 Eyewitness News but will there be calm the assassinations immediately call into question the fate of more than a 100 hostages still being held by Hamas eight of them American tomorrow will Mark 300 days since the October 7th attacks 300 days of torture for family members desperate for a deal that could bring their loved ones home John and Rachel Poland have been among the most outs spoken family members their 23-year-old son hirs was taken captive at the Nova Music Festival on the 7th today's parents told me they still have reason to hope for a deal I have trouble kind of understanding personally how frustrating this all must be for for you guys I mean we're said to be inside the 10 yard line according to the US of a of an actual Global deal and then comes this rocket on the soccer field and now the retaliation for that and now Iran is saber rattling again I mean how could this possibly augur good news for a deal I would say that well first of all you know there's the expression that that war is the failure of diplomacy or something like that um and so with all of the best efforts of the mediators something has just continued to go wrong here repeatedly um that being said you're right that secretary blinkin said recently that we're we're within the 10 yard line we're hearing cause for optimism from multiple parties at the mediation table and all we can do now is hope that while this is probably unavoidably a step backwards hopefully it's that one step backwards three step forwards that sometimes happens in diplomacy and we just have to continue to find optimism and uh hope hope that we're getting closer I know there's been wor from Hamas you know camps that you know even though the this the the the individual who was assassinated in Iran was sort of key to the talks that it that does not necessarily mean they're not interested in continuing them I mean have you been hearing that does that make sense to you it actually does make sense the reality is there is so much suffering and pain as you well know in our entire region and I think that all leaders all around are becoming more and more aware that the status quo is no long excuse me no longer sustainable in any way shape or form it hasn't been sustainable from day one but at this point um obviously the hostage families we are all broken and um you know in in intense Agony but hundreds of thousands of Gins are also suffering horrible and the humanitarian situation is so desperate there and everyone needs this to come to an end so I think that no matter what is happening and what we have learned is there is always there are always conversations going on even when things seem at their most Bleak and I would pray that those people in those rooms are still having those conversations and that they are somehow able to be having some movement forward it's impossible not to remark on the fact that you're about to roll over into 300 days um how do you reflect on that tonight into tomorrow and and you know on the one hand it's obviously horrific and shameful um that it has gotten to this round number and on the other hand to us every single day is its own form of torture and it's just day by day by day by day and it doesn't really the number 300 is a horrible number it's a lot of roundness but I think it will feel like today except we'll be in different clothes the round numbers are significant for symbolic reasons and I guess the big thing is just we need to make sure that this is the last symbolic round number that we get to we need to make sure that the push and the optimism and what we're hearing not only from the US and from Israel but from other mediation parties is that hopefully despite the last 24 hours we are getting closer and closer to Bringing Home 115 Souls who have been suffering there and at the same time diminishing or solving the suffering of the millions of innocent Goins also who are just caught up in this there's probably no one who who you know explains this as effectively as you guys so so thank you for for that and thank you for your time learning on the job thank you for the opportunity and uh we are just praying for a reduction of the unbearable suffering in this entire region there's so much attention there's so much pain there's such a surplus of Agony and it is time from all directions and all angles for that to stop it's just one of 115 families still going through this at as we speak right now stay with Eyewitness News and ABC News as we monitor the latest developments in the Middle East including how the latest attacks will impact unrest in the region and as we continue with Eyewitness News extra time this Wednesday night the power of the Mind merging with technology the brain implant that lets people control devices with their minds [Music] next it sounds like science fiction but it is very much fact new technology that can mean everything for people living with disabilities a chip implanted in a patient's brain has allowed him to control an apple Vision Pro device with only his mind the tech firm synchron says the 64-year-old ALS patient in the United States was able to use the device with his thoughts rather than hand or voice commands he was able to play solitire watch Apple TV and he sent text messages synchron's chip was implanted in a blood vessel on his brain's surface and works by detecting and then wirelessly transmitting motor intent out of the brain and into that device Tom Oxley is the CEO of synchron which is based in Brooklyn Tom it's a pleasure to meet you thanks for joining us tonight thanks for having me so you know when I think of a chip implanted in the brain I think of the TV show Severance but this is obviously something that you're using for for good can how significant is this when it comes to people who are are dealing with disabilities 8 million people in the US have paralysis from some cause stroke ALS uh multiple sclerosis a range of conditions stop your body from working and often in those people the brain is still working so the concept with this technology is you can record information from the the brain detect when you're trying to move and then use that as a control over Bluetooth to control technology where you normally would need to use your hands to do that but I mean you know it's it's it is I just read it works by detecting and wirelessly transmitting motor intent out of the brain I don't actually know what any of that means so could you talk to me for like 60 seconds like I don't know what I'm talking about how does this work 10% of your brain is like a command center it it uh command center for the control of movement of your face of your mouth of your arms of your legs and so there's like you know the brain is a bunch of uh nerve cells that fire when you activate thinking so your Consciousness your thinking um so when you try to move I'm moving my hands right now there's a very um uh clearly distinguished part of my brain that's doing that and if you put a microphone right on top of it you can see when the brain's doing that you bring that information out and then send it over Bluetooth to Take Over Control of a cursor to make selections on the screen so it means that people who are paralyzed can um overcome the failed Body by using their brain to directly control technologies that they couldn't do like the Vision Pro as an example of that it sounds amazingly complicated technically speaking what were the challenges you faced in developing this uh 12year Journey um company started in Australia we I moved to New York in 2015 um it's been a very long process the field of implantable brain computer interfaces is starting to emerge there are some very famous people working in this space as well um the way that we do it is by trying to avoid cutting open the skull to get into the brain by using a catheter to deliver much like a stent the catheter goes up into the brain opens up a stent which is the sensor and then there's an implant that has the electronics and that's able to send out your um what we're calling gestures from the brain to um over Bluetooth to so now you've got the mouse you've got the keyboard um you've got ey tracking and now there's a BCI brain computer interface that uses Bluetooth to control devices what has this this gentleman that we showed in the video I guess his name is Mark what has his experience been using the the The Vision Pro combined with this technology me his what feedback has he given you uh well he loves The Vision Pro um he couldn't use it before so we because he can't use his hand so the Vision Pro um it looks at your hand gestures you do things like you can point or you can pinch or you can you know drag it uses the eyes to move the mouse around the screen so we're sending gestures directly from the brain to take over what the hand normally does so um it's quite new he's Mark's incredible he's been pioneering this work but he's laying the foundation for this to be made available and it's really made possible from Apple's accessibility platform which we think is best in class and in particular in the accessibility platform there's a thing called Assistive Touch which is the um feature and accessibility that the BCI uses to control the system what other applications does this have I mean so he's texting um you know he's doing things that are that are important and probably unlock a huge Universe for him that he couldn't do before but it seems to me like there's so much more out there yeah that Universe we we call activities of daily living so I think we all know that feeling when you lose your phone you can't find your phone or the battery dies and you're like ah I can't function now the things that we take for Grant Ed texting emailing finances shopping uh transport uh information retrieval Health Care access that's all in your phone but you need your hands to use it so for people who are paralyzed the ambition here is that you can get an implant um uh you will then have restored ability to conduct your activities of daily living independently so you don't depend on other people for those core things in your day-to-day that we take for granted because our hands can do them for us amazing technology Tom Oxley CEO of synchron based here in Brooklyn it's a pleasure to meet you thanks for joining us and thanks for for doing this work thank you thank you and as we continue tonight with Eyewitness News extra time the future of flight could recapture the excitement of the past a company on a mission to bring back supersonic flight it was the epitome of the romance of travel supersonic passenger travel and it could once again become an everyday reality a new prototype passenger jet could one day succeed the retired supersonic airliner that was known as the Concord Concord made its final flight in November 2003 but in its day it served as a revolution for Aviation the passenger jet could cross the Atlantic at twice the speed of sound cutting travel times in half but low demand Uber expensive tickets and a crash in 2000 led to the retirement of that iconic aircraft now more than two decades since concord's final flight the American firm boom supersonic says it's time to revive the spirit of SuperSonic air travel Overture is the name of boom's proposed supersonic airliner joining us now to talk more about Overture is Blake scha he's the CEO of Boom supersonic he's live joins us now from the company headquarters in Denver Blake thanks for joining us thanks for having me it's great to be here so you know I'm fascinated by this in in large part because Concord failed many people say because it was too expensive to operate and the fairs were prohibitively expensive and it just simply didn't work from an economic standpoint how does your concept changed that I think that's right I mean I don't know anybody who wants to spend more time on airplanes it has to come at the right safety profile and the right cost profile Concord was a $20,000 ticket just just too much and that was a 1960s technology airplane fast forward to today we're going to be able to do supersonic flight for a business class fair so more like $5,000 and ultimately there's going to be an overture 2 an overture 3 we're going to get supersonic flight to the point where it's affordable for everybody how has the materials and the aerodynamics the efficiency and the design evolved so that you can make this an economic Venture because it it wasn't before yeah I mean we've changed everything about airplanes in the last 50 years except how fast they fly and I think it's never been more obvious than it is today with you know watching the struggles at at Boeing and at Airbus which haven't developed a single new product uh in 20 years that there's an opportunity here to restart some Innovation so we've got new materials like carbon fiber composits we've got a new kind of engine called a turbo fan that's cleaner quieter vastly more fuel efficient with the ability to design and optimize the airplane in software not just with drafting paper slide rules wind tunnels and everything electronic has gotten better it's gotten lighter so we've gotten all these new technologies that we can bring to bear on building a new generation supersonic airplane that can be significantly more efficient therefore a lot more affordable to passengers and we see an opportunity for this not just to carry across say New York to London but San Francisco to Tokyo Seattle to Shanghai LA to Sydney there are hundreds of routes around the world where we're going to be able to give passengers a big speed up at fair is pretty similar to what they're already paying today in business class so I have to say as a as a as an aviation geek myself as someone who looks at sort of message boards of people who talk about this kind of stuff there's a lot of skepticism that this is ever going to happen I know you have orders from United and American Japan air what is the um likelihood of success here well there's no question that what we're doing here is really hard in fact there are a lot of comparisons to to Tesla which was the first new car company in 95 years we're the First new airliner company in about a hundred years since Douglas aircraft in 1921 and you know supersonic ainer is not exactly the easiest thing to go do uh on the other hand there's a lot of Tailwinds here uh we've already built and flown the xb1 uh that's the airplane you're looking at right there uh on the model uh that's history's first independently developed supersonic jet it flew for the first time in March and it's going to break the sound barrier later this year that's a really big deal we've proven we can build a supersonic jet uh people said we never able to get Airlines to buy it well guess what United American Japan a L have all placed orders uh for Overture we've got 26 billion of overtures and orders and pre-orders it's going to take us years to build all those airplanes um we have uh people said that the traditional Aerospace supply chain would never get behind a startup well guess what Honeywell Collins GE saffron uh Leonardo people who are the best suppliers to Bing an Airbus have joined forces with boom and are helping us build our airplane so we've still got a lot of work to do here uh but nothing nothing's impossible we don't need fundamentally new technology we don't need new regulations we don't need to break or change any rules we just need to execute about 30% better than what was done in the 1960s on Concord well let me ask you about that execution question and you you brought up the problems that Boeing has been having and you know they're they're they seem hobbled from what they used to be if it's not Boeing I'm not going and now a lot of people are afraid to fly on brand new Boeing products how do you maintain quality control through this Venture I I it's most important thing and I I believe uh that the it starts with culture and we've put a lot of effort into our safety culture boom it's one of the reasons we made our xb1 prototype human piloted is we wanted to cut our teeth and learn how to do that right and the most important thing in safety culture is how you treat people when they find a problem and uh boom we're building a culture when someone finds a problem which by the way that's going to happen there are going to be problems but we want to hear about them we start by saying thank you and reward people who uh say hey I found something and then they're part of the team that addresses it that's how that's the foundation of how you get this right it's about how leadership responds uh when there is a problem Blake scha is CEO of Boom supersonic it sounds fascinating I believe 2029 is when you think you're gonna have your first flight yeah well 2029 actually 2028 will be in the air 2029 we'll be ready for passengers so I'm looking forward to having board in about five years hope to see you then Blake thanks so much for joining us and good luck to you and as we continue tonight with Eyewitness News extra time let's take a live look outside we're here to join up with Danny beom for a look at the exclusive ACU weather forecast a steamy day could lead to a stormy night here's meteorologist Danny beom with the exclusive ACA weather forecast right now mostly cloudy air quality is moderate tomorrow hot and hazy heat index values 995 to 100 by Friday still feeling steamy we'll start to back off high temperature a touch but the tradeoff is more of a storm chance and this weekend shaping up to be a wet one active days both Saturday and Sunday right now air temperature at 88 in the park but still seeing 90s in parts of New Jersey 90 degrees in Morristown 91 for Somerville 88 in Belmar 81 for ielp and we are still tracking a few spotty storms I want to start north of the city it looks like a nice complex of Thunder stor activity in parts of Sullivan and Orange County from Crawford over through Mount Hope up through Highland we're seeing Heavy Rain there were a few lightning strikes those seem to have started to back off spotty storms exiting east of Fairfield County looks like right near Hempstead a little downpour developing and Edison got a nice shower drifting through Trenton still dealing with the rain and this thunderstorm activity moving through Stafford that's going to exit into the Atlantic a marine uh a marine message a marine warning there due to the thunderstorm activity moving over to the Open Water okay what is this brought in by a trough that's swinging through behind this slightly drier air that's what's dropping dupoint tomorrow but it is not going to help us in terms of how it feels because air temperature is hotter heat advisory in effect until 8:00 p.m. tomorrow it's already in effect it began earli this afternoon for the five burrows for Nassau County and the majority of state of New Jersey this indicating that the heat can be dangerous if you're not prepped for it and if you don't take the proper precautions with heat and disase 95 to 100 plus if you don't limit that time outside stay hydrated you could be in the realm of possibility for heat related illnesses so let's talk about tomorrow we are backing off in terms of moisture but upping the temperature tonight some spotty storms continue to slide through through about dinner time but once the sun sets radar activity should back off and even cloud cover clears which means we're starting with Sunshine tomorrow and more Sunshine expected tomorrow in general spot storms can't be eliminated in the afternoon but any activity should be very hit or miss not nearly as widespread as today so the forecast Focus going to be on the heat tomorrow rather than the storms and anything that does develop should settle down during the afternoon and evening even with more Sunshine expected at times it'll look a little hazy we have some Wildfire smoke in the upper levels of the atmosphere that will give a great tinge to the sky uh we don't expect it to impact air quality it's too high in the atmosphere to do that but it's something else to watch so tonight still some spotty thunderstorms out there we start to taper off that storm chance in the next few hours and then we'll start with Sunshine tomorrow morning it will feel sticky right from the start forecast highs tomorrow low to mid 90s heat IND Dees 95 to 100 that's what you should prep for because that's what your body's actually reading and then we'll up that moisture again heading into the weekend which means temperatures Trend cooler to start August all right Danny thank you so much it is now 2 in the morning in the Middle East the region sleeping restlessly as it waits to see what happens next the latest tonight on Eyewitness News at 11:00 but for now that wraps up this edition of eyewitness news extra time thanks so much for joining us I'm Josh aniger have a great night [Music]

2024-08-04 11:31

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