PHOENIX: Geologist Eugene Shoemaker, whose expertise in asteroid impact helped discover the comet that slammed into Jupiter in 1994, has been killed in a car accident, a colleague said. He was 69. Shoemaker died in the two-car accident on Friday afternoon near Alice Springs, Australia. Shoemaker was perhaps best known for helping to discover comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, which broke up and spectacularly slammed into Jupiter. A geologist by training, Shoemaker was also a leading expert on craters and the interplanetary collisions that caused them. He was also involved in several US space missions, including the Apollo missions to the moon.Lifer for soldierCAIRO: A Jordanian soldier, who shot dead seven Israeli school children picnicking on the Jordan river in March, has been sentenced to life imprisonment by a military court. Life in prison is 25 years in Jordan.The soldier, Ahmed Dkamseh, was convicted by a Jordanian military court which gave him life in prison after finding him mentally unstable. The soldier could have been awarded the death penalty. Dakamseh, who pleaded innocent, said he opened fire on the schoolgirls because they had disturbed him as he prayed.Reactor leakageTOKYO: The new reactor at the world's largest nuclear power plant has leaked a small amount of radioactivity, in its second glitch in four days, the operator of the Japanese plant said on Saturday. But there was no radioactive leakage outside the facility and no one was exposed to radiation following the accident on Friday, the Tokyo Electric Power Company said. Vapour containing radioactive substances leaked from a gauge inside the unit that houses a turbine.
