Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 16 August 2015

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 16 August 2015

China nearly lost its supercomputer in the blast at port of Tianjin this week. It was the appropriate decision taken by the authorities to shut down the supercomputer Tianhe-1A that saved the massive loss.
The building of the national computer center in which the supercomputer was kept suffered damages. Now insurance company Eurasia is estimating the total amount of loss by the series of explosions.
Eurasia said that losses from such disasters are usually very high and often costs more than 100 million dollars.
Thus, a reliable insurance company should be chosen that can bear such heavy losses. Due to this, company owners often look at the past records including payment history before choosing the insurance company.
Today, Eurasia, one of the few companies in the CIS insurance market, which has sufficient experience in the insurance, claims settlement of this scale and financial capacity to participate in major international projects,” the Company said.
The blast was so strong that China was forced to disconnect supercomputer Tianhe-1A. The building of the national computer center in which it is placed, suffered injuries.
It is noted that the computing system itself was not damaged, but has been disabled for security reasons,” the Company emphasized.

India's exports contracted for the eighth consecutive month in July. Exports were down 10.3% to $23.13 billion, owing to a worldwide slowdown, and six-and-a-half year low oil prices that has affected the price of petroleum products. The last time exports expanded was in November, when shipments were up 7.27%.
Oil products form about 31% of the total exports, while petroleum products account for 18% of the total exports.
In the first four months of FY16, exports have declined by 15.04% to $89.82 billion, so have imports (down by 12.01%), resulting in a trade deficit of $45 billion.
At a time when India's exports continue to remain a concern, China also devalued its currency by nearly 6% in three tranches last week, to make its own products more competitive in the global market.
Effects of the yuan devaluation were felt world wide, with the dollar firming, gold gaining some ground as safe-haven again, and Asian currencies tanking against the greenback.
Post the currency devaluation, Indian manufacturers and exporters are concerns about two things:
-- their exports to China and the rest of the world declining
-- dumping of cheaper imports from China
Engineering and textile exports from India are expected to take a major hit with Chinese goods becoming more competitive, while steel firms fear that cheap imports from the neighbouring country could intensify further.

Nasa has performed a nearly 9-minute-long test of the engine at the heart of the US space agency’s next-generation megarocket that will take astronauts to asteroids, Mars and other deep-space missions.
The agency successfully tested an RS-25 engine at Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. Four RS-25s will power the core stage of the Space Launch System (SLS) megarocket that will launch astronauts in the Orion spacecraft on missions to deep space and eventually on the journey to Mars.
The RS-25 blazed on the test stand for 535 seconds - the same amount of time the core engines will fire during an actual SLS launch.
The seven-test series is “designed to put the upgraded former space shuttle main engines through the rigorous temperature and pressure conditions they will experience during a launch,”
SLS and Orion are scheduled to blast off together for the first time in 2018, on a flight known as Exploration Mission 1 (EM-1). The seven-day EM-1 will send an unmanned Orion on a journey around the Moon, to test out many of the capsule’s key systems.

Abhishek Verma gave India a perfect Independence Day gift by clinching the gold medal in the compound men's individual section to open their account in the Archery World Cup Stage 3 here on Saturday.
Having failed as a team in the bronze play-off earlier in the day, the world number 18 was at his best in the individual final as he held on to his lead to wrap up the issue 148-145 against Esmaeil Ebadi of Iran.
The Asian Games silver medalist thus avenged his defeat to Ebadi at the Incheon 2014 in style.
Verma had 13 perfect 10s, including five arrows closest to the centre from 15 arrows, in an extraordinary exhibition of shooting in the summit clash.

Indian badminton ace Saina Nehwal came out with a sensational performance to enter her maiden women's singles semi-final at the World Championships and assure herself of at least a bronze medal.
In a marathon match that lasted for an hour and 12 minutes at the 9,000-seater Istora Senayan, the second seeded Hyderabadi defeated former World Champion Wang Yihan of China 21-15, 19-21, 21-19 to advance to the last four for the first time at the World meet.