US not at war with North Korea, such a suggestion is absurd: White House

The White House today rejected claims that the United States has declared war on North Korea as "absurd" in the latest exchange of barbs and insults between the two nuclear powers.

"We have not declared war on North Korea and frankly the suggestion of that is absurd'" said White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

North Korea's foreign minister today accused US President Donald Trump of declaring war against his country and said Pyongyang was ready to defend itself by shooting down US bombers.

The latest threats stoked a week-long war of words that began when the American leader threatened in his address to the United Nations General Assembly to "totally destroy" North Korea if it launches an attack.

Sanders also took issue with the suggestion that Pyongyang would have the right to shoot down US planes near North Korean airspace.

"It's never appropriate for a country to shoot down another country's aircraft when it's over international waters," she said.
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Skoda Octavia RS launched at Rs 24.62 lakh

Skoda on Friday launched its fastest car in India, the Octavia RS. RS is the performance version of the regular Octavia but clocks triple digit speeds in just 6.8 seconds which keeps its performance aligned with some of the previous cars like the Jaguar XF and Mercedes C-Class.

Skoda has replaced the 1.8 litre mill in the Octavia RS with a 2.0-liter TSI turbocharged petrol engine which produces 227 hp at 6200 rpm and 350 Nm of peak torque at 4,600 rpm. This power-unit comes mated to a six-Speed DSG transmission. The car can reach a restricted top-speed of 250 kmph and that makes it the fastest Skoda sold in India.

Since the car is based on the standard Octavia, in flesh it will appear the same with similar dimensions. That said, the suspension set-up of the Octavia RS has been remapped and with a sport chassis it makes the car sit 15 mm low than the standard iteration. Moreover, elements like sporty body kits, blacked 17-inch alloy wheels and RS bagging all around gives the car a far more aggressive stance.

On the inside, the layout of the interior will again seem familiar and that is a good thing as the ergonomics here work really well and the cabin still looks elegant and uncluttered. RS gets Alcantra sports seats in front, which keeps your body well bolstered even while cornering hard. On top, you get RS badging on the front seats and the door sills. When all these falls in amalgamation, they to a great extent complements the sporty characteristics of the car, thus justifying the RS badge.
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SpaceX's successful Friday launch opens weekend doubleheader

The year’s not half over, and Elon Musk’s Space Exploration Technologies is about to launch more missions than it completed in all of 2016.

SpaceX successfully fired up a Falcon 9 rocket for the eighth time this year on Friday, matching its flight total for all of last year. Its next launch is scheduled just two days later, with the ramped-up cadence putting the company on track to achieve the 20 to 24 total missions it’s targeting for the year.

The quickening pace of launches illustrates how SpaceX has bounced back after one of its rockets and a customer’s satellite blew up on a Florida launch pad in September. The company was grounded for four months in the midst of an investigation into the incident before returning to flight in January. By racking up more successful launches, the closely held company has positioned itself again as a driving force in the new-age space race.

The rocket that took off Friday carried BulgariaSat-1, a communications satellite destined for geostationary orbit. It launched from the historic 39A pad at NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where Neil Armstrong left from before landing on the moon in 1969.

The launch used a “flight proven” Falcon 9 rocket booster, which means it’s flown to space previously and been returned and refurbished. SpaceX Chief Executive Officer Musk has championed reusability — once derided as a crazy idea — to drive down launch costs and win a growing roster of customers, including the US military. Friday marked the second time it’s used a pre-flown booster. “It’s starting to feel kinda normal to reuse rockets. Good. That’s how it is for cars and airplanes and how it should be for rockets,” Musk tweeted earlier this month.

SpaceX successfully recovered the booster from this mission on an unmanned drone ship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean, though it had been bracing for a less favourable outcome.
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Tata Motors launches Hexa at Rs 12 lakh

Latest News - Tata Motors, struggling with its passenger car business for many years now, on Wednesday launched the much-awaited SUV, the Hexa, positioning it as a lifestyle off- roader with an attractive pricing of Rs 12.08 lakh and upwards.

Given the introductory pricing that goes up to Rs 17.43 lakh for the top-end automatic version, the all new Hexa, which has been in the making for the past two years, is set to give a tough fight to the likes of the industry leader Innova, Mahindra XUV 500, Maruti's Ertgia among others.

The Hexa, mounted on 2.2 liter diesel engine and being produced from Tata Motors' flagship Pune plant, comes in six variants - three each in manual and automatic options and offers an ARAI-certified fuel efficiency of 14.4 kmpl.

Launching the seven-seater mean machine, Tata Motors Managing Director and Chief Executive Guenter Butschek described the Hexa as(Read More)