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A donkey is used to take ballot boxes to inaccessible polling stations
The latest underwater phase of the hunt for missing flight MH370 is a "desperate move" with limited chance of success, experts have claimed.
Marine salvage and radar experts laid out the scale of the challenge facing search teams, after Australian Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston announced plans to use black box pinger locators deep in the southern Indian Ocean.
Speaking on Sky News, radar expert Professor David Stupples said the pinger locators would be able to cover just 150 square miles a day, in an overall search area of around 87,000 square miles.
A pinger locator can detect signals from the flight recorder Marine salvage expert John Noble told Sky's Ian Woods the latest phase suggested authorities were getting "desperate" in their search for the plane.
He said: "It's a desperate last-minute move because they know the pinger is going to run out within the next few days and if they don't give it a go now they'll never find it using these techniques."
As the extensive search wears on, Malaysia's opposition leader has accused the government of deliberately concealing information about the missing plane.
A pinger locator being towed by Australia's Ocean Shield vessel In an interview with Sky News, Anwar Ibrahim, who personally knew the pilot of the missing plane, cast doubt on official accounts coming from Malaysian authorities.
The hunt for wreckage is relying on the plane's black box recorders emitting pings that can be detected by equipment on board the ships.
But the battery-powered recorders stop transmitting about 30 days after a crash.
With the clock ticking down since MH370 went missing on March 8, Mr Houston acknowledged time is running out for search crews.
He said: "The locater beacon will last about a month before it ceases its transmissions - so we're now getting pretty close to the time when it might expire."
Locating the data recorders and wreckage after the devices stop working is possible, but incredibly difficult.
The area the ships are searching was chosen based on hourly satellite pings the aircraft gave off after it vanished from radar on its route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.
That information, combined with data on the estimated speed and performance of the aircraft, had led them to that specific part of the ocean, Mr Houston said.
Ships with helicopters on board have been helping with the search Because the US Navy's pinger locator can pick up black box signals up to a depth of 6,100m (20,000ft), it should be able to hear the devices even if they are lying in the deepest part of the search zone - about 5,800m (19,000 ft) below the surface - if it gets within range of the black boxes.
Royal Navy submarine HMS Tireless is assisting with the search and has powerful equipment that could detect a black box at up to 10 miles away - but it can only operate to a depth of around 400m.
Finding floating wreckage is key to narrowing the search area, as officials can then use data on ocean currents to try and backtrack to the spot where the Boeing 777 entered the water - and where the data recorders may be.
For relatives of passengers on flight MH370, the agonising wait goes on Despite weeks of fruitless searching, Mr Houston said he hadn't given up hope something would be found.
"I think there's still a great possibility of finding something on the surface," he said. "There's lots of things in aircraft that float."
The search area has shifted each day, as the investigative team continues to analyse available radar and satellite data while factoring in where any debris may have drifted due to ocean currents and weather.
Although Australia is coordinating the ocean search, the investigation into the plane's disappearance ultimately remains Malaysia's responsibility.
Paramedics say they have seen a rise in the number of patients with breathing problems, as record levels of air pollution lead to warnings about exercising outdoors.
London Ambulance Service said it had received 14% more 999 calls from people with asthma, lung problems and heart conditions, while West Midlands Ambulance Service confirmed it had experienced a noticeable spike in emergency calls.
A poll of asthmatics by the charity Asthma UK also found about a third had suffered an attack as a result of the smog, while 84% had used their blue reliever inhaler more often than usual.
Air quality is expected to improve on Friday and Saturday. Pic: Defra During the day, air pollution levels were "very high" (the highest on a scale of 1-10) in London and the South-East and "high" elsewhere including East Anglia, the Midlands, and Yorkshire and Humberside.
The pollution reached record levels in Harrow, northwest London, and Rochester, Kent.
Public Health England has advised adults and children with lung problems, as well as adults with heart conditions, to consider reducing strenuous physical exercise, especially outdoors.
However the situation is expected to ease on Friday and into the weekend as a change in wind direction will bring in cleaner air from the Atlantic.
The smog has shrouded many of Britain's most famous landmarks Sky weather producer Joanna Robinson said: "Air pollution has been a big concern across England and Wales over the last few days, with some locations in the south-east reporting very high levels.
"To really improve the air quality we need a change in air mass and the arrival of lower pressure, which will help disperse the pollutants into the higher atmosphere.
"Thankfully, we'll see that change on Friday. South-westerly winds will develop, bringing in cleaner air from the Atlantic, but it may take some time for eastern England to see the effects.
"Overall there'll be improvements in the air quality going into the weekend, with just low levels of pollution forecast by Sunday."
Air pollution reached record levels in parts of London and the South East The poor air quality is due, in part, to dust from the Saharan desert whipped up by a large storm in north Africa.
Some of the dust has appeared as red speckles on car windscreens and other outdoor surfaces after being deposited by rain.
However, many of the health fears surround particulates - the tiny chemical particles emitted by diesel-powered cars and industry that can be inhaled deep into the lungs.
Combined with other pollutants including nitrogen dioxide and ozone, these can cause breathing difficulties.
Karen Lytton is treated by a doctor at Solihull's Acute Medical Unit Asthma sufferers and patients with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), a condition which inflames the airways, are particularly vulnerable and may notice their symptoms get worse.
Even those without breathing problems say they have been coughing, wheezing or suffering with sore eyes.
Doctors at the Acute Medical Unit in Solihull, near Birmingham, told Sky News there had been a "slight increase" in the number of people coming to them with respiratory problems.
They include Jason Irving, who suffered an asthma attack and was receiving treatment at the unit.
People with respiratory problems have been urged to avoid outdoor exercise He told Sky News: "I travelled into work as normal this morning and as I was walking in, my chest and my throat were tightening and I was struggling for breath.
"I sat down and occupational health at work had to call an ambulance. I think it could well be to do with the poor air quality."
Karen Lytton, a COPD patient who was also receiving treatment at the centre, added: "It's like when you hold your breath until you can't hold it any longer and then try to breathe again."
The effects of the smog have been felt beyond London, including in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, where a haze hung over the seafront.
Cyclist Karina Da Silva said she was worried about the impact the pollution could have on her health.
"It's odd because I can't see the sea. It's impossible," she said.
"My daughter says her eyes are very itchy and she coughed a little in the morning."
It is not just people whose health is affected by the pollution, with fears contamination may affect penguins at the town's Sea Life Centre.
Christine Pitcher, who helped empty, scrub and refill the animals' enclosure, said: "The penguins have quite delicate air sacs which is how they breathe and any bit of dust or debris on those can make them a little bit sick.
"Obviously we don't want that to happen, especially as we have a couple who are nesting at the moment."
Updated: 2:01pm UK, Wednesday 02 April 2014
A Royal Navy submarine has joined the search for flight MH370 in the Indian Ocean - as Malaysia's police chief said the investigation was focusing on the pilots and cabin crew.
Khalid Abu Bakar said criminal investigations were continuing to focus on four possibilities: hijacking, sabotage and personal or psychological problems of those on board.
He said all 227 passengers had been "cleared" of any possible involvement.
Though authorities had not ruled out the possibility the jet may have suffered mechanical problems, the evidence suggested the aircraft was deliberately diverted from its planned flight path, he said.
Mr Bakar also warned the cause of the tragedy may never come to light.
"We have to clear every little thing," he said.
"At the end of the investigations, we may not even know the real cause. We may not even know the reason for this incident."
The cargo and the food served on the plane are also being looked at to eliminate possible sabotage, he added.
As the clock counts down on the battery life of the black box's locator beacon, the search has been bolstered by British submarine HMS Tireless, which has now arrived in the Indian Ocean.
The Trafalgar Class submarine is expected to try to detect the all-important device, which could hold the key to unravelling the mystery.
Royal Navy survey ship HMS Echo is also due to join the international search operation later. Nine planes and nine other ships are also still involved in the hunt 930 miles west of Perth, Western Australia.
A defence source said: "A Royal Navy Trafalgar Class submarine has recently arrived in the area and is conducting search operations for the flight recorders.
"HMS Tireless holds advanced search capabilities, but the task in hand remains a tall order and the search area is immense."
Flight MH370 went missing on March 8 with 239 people on board. The aircraft took off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, bound for Beijing.
The three-week search operation has repeatedly shifted its focus as experts analyse radar and satellite data on the plane's movements.
Relatives of the passengers were meeting airline and Malaysian government representatives at a closed-doors meeting in Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday.
Family members have repeatedly accused the authorities of lying to them and holding back information.
Multiple sightings of possible debris have so far failed to turn up any sign of the aircraft, which investigators say - beyond reasonable doubt - went down in the Indian Ocean.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott called the disappearance "one of the great mysteries of our time" and again promised to continue the hunt for as long as needed.
The Australian premier is also set to meet Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in Perth later.
"We owe it to the world, we owe it to those families to do whatever we reasonably can get to the bottom of this," Mr Abbot said.
A health warning remains in force for millions of vulnerable people as the country prepares for a third day of record air pollution levels.
High levels of smog are forecast today for East Anglia, the Midlands, Lincolnshire, the Wirral and the north coast of Wales.
Parts of England are experiencing the highest level of air pollution ever recorded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), in part due to dust from the Sahara.
The elderly, people with asthma, and those with lung and heart conditions are being told to take precautions as forecasters say the smog will not clear until Friday.
Forecast for April 2, 3, 4. Dark red, purple are highest levels. Pic: Defra Pollution from Europe, low southeasterly winds and domestic pollution have also contributed to the plummeting air quality.
Public Health England (PHE), Asthma UK and Defra have all issued warnings.
Sotiris Vardoulakis from PHE said: "On occasions where levels are high, adults and children with lung problems, and adults with heart problems, should reduce strenuous physical exertion, particularly outdoors, and particularly if they experience symptoms.
"Anyone experiencing discomfort such as sore eyes, coughing or sore throat should consider reducing activity, particularly outdoors."
A view of London's Canary Wharf on Wednesday Moderate pollution levels are also likely to affect the northwest coast of England, southwest Scotland and the northeast coast of Northern Ireland.
The UK's 3.6 million asthmatics are being advised to use their blue reliever inhalers more often.
Kay Boycott, chief executive of Asthma UK, said: "The two-thirds of people with asthma who find that air pollution makes their asthma worse will be at an increased risk of an attack following the alarming Defra warning of high pollution levels around the country."
Saharan dust gets blown over to Britain several times a year. This latest episode has been caused by a large wind storm in North Africa.
Some commuters have taken to wearing face masks Cars in some areas of the country have been covered with speckles of the dust.
The World Health Organisation estimates seven million premature deaths annually are linked to air pollution.
The UK is not the only place to be hit by increased smog levels. Last month, Paris imposed a day-long driving ban after pollution particles in the air exceeded safe levels for five straight days.
Four people are dead after a US soldier opened fire at Fort Hood military base in Texas.
The soldier, who was being treated for psychiatric problems including depression and anxiety, is among the dead after shooting himself in the head.
Sixteen others have been injured, Lieutenant General Mark Milley told a press conference.
All those hit by the soldier's recently purchased 45-calibre semi-automatic weapon were in the military, Lt Gen Milley said.
The soldier, who served four months in Iraq in 2011, could have been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. He was married and had a family.
Fort Hood is home to 45,000 soldiers and 9,000 civilians No link to terrorism is currently being made.
President Barack Obama says he is "heartbroken" that the base - where 13 people died in a shooting in 2009 - had suffered again.
"I want to assure everyone we are going to get to the bottom of what happened," said Mr Obama.
"Any shooting is troubling. Obviously this reopens the pain of what happened at Fort Hood five years ago. We know these families; we know their incredible service to this country and the sacrifices they make.
A Twitter alert posted by Fort Hood to implement a lockdown "Our thoughts and prayers are with the entire community and we're going to do everything we can to make sure the community at Fort Hood has what it needs to deal with the current situation and any potential aftermath.
"We're heartbroken that something like this might have happened again."
One hospital taking patients is Scott and White. Four people have arrived with gunshot wounds to the neck, chest and abdomen and two more are expected. Their conditions range from "stable to quite critical".
Fort Hood is the biggest military base in the US All-clear sirens have now sounded at Fort Hood after several hours of lockdown. Personnel had been told to take shelter and stay away from doors and windows.
Outside the base, relatives of soldiers are waiting for news about their loved ones.
Tayra DeHart, 33, spoke to her husband, who is in the base, several hours ago. He was safe, but she has heard nothing since.
Poilce arrive at the scene "The last two hours have been the most nerve-wracking I've ever felt," Mrs DeHart said. "I know God is here protecting me and all the soldiers, but I have my phone in my hand just hoping it will ring and it will be my husband."
The shooter was reported to be in the Medical Brigade Building.
Sky's US correspondent Amanda Walker said: "It was 4.30pm local time this happened. It's a huge military base. Around 45,000 soldiers are based there and 9,000 civilians.
"We saw helicopters and ambulances pretty much straight away. You would expect that, and past events have heightened that security.
Patients have been flown to hospital "We don't know how the gunman got into the base.
"It is absolutely astonishing this has happened again at a secure military base that has had a terrible history with the previous shooting."
Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel called the shootings a "terrible tragedy".
The base endured a shooting five years ago, which left 13 people dead and 30 injured.
Major Nidal Hasan faces the death sentence following the 2009 shooting Asked whether security improvements made since the tragedy have been adequate, Mr Hagel said: "Obviously when we have these kinds of tragedies on our bases, something's not working."
Army psychiatrist Major Nidal Hasan faces the death penalty for the 2009 killing spree.
In statements to the judge the American-born Muslim suggested he believed the attack was justified as a jihad against the US military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The base is the biggest in the US, covering 340 square miles.
More follows...
Updated: 12:36pm UK, Tuesday 01 April 2014
A transcript of the final conversations between the control tower and Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has been released.
MAS 370 (Kuala Lumpur to Beijing)
PILOT-ATC RADIOTELEPHONY TRANSCRIPT
Departure from KLIA: 8 March 2014
ATC DELIVERY
12:25:53 MAS 370 Delivery MAS 370 Good Morning
12:26:02 ATC MAS 370 Standby and Malaysia Six is cleared to Frankfurt via AGOSA Alpha Departure six thousand feet squawk two one zero six
12:26:19 ATC ... MAS 370 request level
12:26:21 MAS 370 MAS 370 we are ready requesting flight level three five zero to Beijing
12:26:39 ATC MAS 370 is cleared to Beijing via PIBOS A Departure Six Thousand Feet squawk two one five seven
12:26:45 MAS 370 Beijing PIBOS A Six Thousand Squawk two one five seven, MAS 370 Thank You
12:26:53 ATC MAS 370 Welcome over to ground
12:26:55 MAS 370 Good Day
LUMPUR GROUND
12:27:27 MAS 370 Ground MAS370 Good morning Charlie One Requesting push and start
12:27:34 ATC MAS370 Lumpur Ground Morning Push back and start approved Runway 32 Right Exit via Sierra 4.
12:27:40 MAS 370 Push back and start approved 32 Right Exit via Sierra 4 POB 239 Mike Romeo Oscar
12:27:45 ATC Copied
12:32:13 MAS 370 MAS377 request taxi.
12:32:26 ATC MAS37..... (garbled) ... standard route. Hold short Bravo
12:32:30 MAS 370 Ground, MAS370. You are unreadable. Say again.
12:32:38 ATC MAS370 taxi to holding point Alfa 11 Runway 32 Right via standard route. Hold short of Bravo.
12:32:42 MAS 370 Alfa 11 Standard route Hold short Bravo MAS370.
12:35:53 ATC MAS 370 Tower
12:36:19 ATC (garbled) ... Tower ... (garbled)
MAS 370 1188 MAS370 Thank you
LUMPUR TOWER
12:36:30 MAS 370 Tower MAS370 Morning
12:36:38 ATC MAS370 good morning. Lumpur Tower. Holding point..[garbled]..10 32 Right
12:36:50 MAS 370 Alfa 10 MAS370
12:38:43 ATC 370 line up 32 Right Alfa 10. MAS 370 Line up 32 Right Alfa 10 MAS370.
12:40:38 ATC 370 32 Right Cleared for take-off. Good night.
MAS 370 32 Right Cleared for take-off MAS370. Thank you Bye.
LUMPUR APPROACH
12:42:05 MAS 370 Departure Malaysian Three Seven Zero
12:42:10 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero selamat pagi identified. Climb flight level one eight zero cancel SID turn right direct to IGARI
12:42:48 MAS 370 Okay level one eight zero direct IGARI Malaysian one err Three Seven Zero
12:42:52 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero contact Lumpur Radar One Three Two Six good night MAS 370 Night One Three Two Six Malaysian Three Seven Zero
LUMPUR RADAR (AREA)
12:46:51 MAS 370 Lumpur Control Malaysian Three Seven Zero
12:46:51 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero Lumpur radar Good Morning climb flight level two five zero
12:46:54 MAS370 Morning level two five zero Malaysian Three Seven Zero
12:50:06 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero climb flight level three five zero
12:50:09 MAS370 Flight level three five zero Malaysian Three Seven Zero
01:01:14 MAS370 Malaysian Three Seven Zero maintaining level three five zero
01:01:19 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero
01:07:55 MAS370 Malaysian...Three Seven Zero maintaining level three five zero
01:08:00 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero
01:19:24 ATC Malaysian Three Seven Zero contact Ho Chi Minh 120 decimal 9 Good Night
01:19:29 MAS370 Good Night Malaysian Three Seven Zero
A tsunami has been triggered after a magnitude-8.2 earthquake struck off the coast of Chile.
The Chilean navy says some areas in the north of the country were hit by waves 45 minutes after the quake was felt. Waves have been measured at more than six feet.
The tsunami alert will remain in place until at least 9.30am BST, officials in Chile have said.
Chile has requested the "preventative evacuation" of its coastline, but this is being hampered by landslides which have blocked roads.
Chilean journalist Jorge Garreton told Sky News: "The evacuation is proceeding normally. Northern Chile has been expecting an earthquake. There were a number of exercises in the recent past. People know where they have to go to the safety zones.
"The northern cities are low-lying so they have to go up to the mountains. They have been advised not to take vehicles but to walk."
Authorities in Peru have also started evacuating communities in the southern coastal region of Ica.
Chilean TV shows geological data from the magnitude-8.2 tremor The huge tremor occurred at 6.46pm local time (10.46pm BST) on Tuesday. So far only minor injuries have been reported and there is no serious damage to infrastructure.
The warning initially placed the entire Pacific Coast of Latin America on alert but has now been downgraded to just Chile and Peru.
"An earthquake of this size has the potential to generate a destructive tsunami that can strike coastlines near the epicenter within minutes and more distant coastlines within hours," the US Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) said.
The quake hit 62 miles (99km) northwest of the mining town of Iquique.
It happened just 12.5 miles (20.1 km) below the seabed - making it feel even more powerful.
The tremor shook buildings in parts of the nearby nations of Bolivia and Peru.
At least eight strong aftershocks followed in the first few hours, including a 6.2 tremor.
Residents of Chile's northern coastline evacuating More aftershocks and even a larger quake could not be ruled out, according to seismologist Mario Pardo at the University of Chile.
The area has been rocked by several quakes in the last two weeks. A magnitude-6.7 quake on March 16 prompted more than 100,000 people to briefly evacuate low-lying areas.
US officials say there is no imminent threat of a tsunami along the coasts of Hawaii, Alaska, California, Oregon or Washington.
A 8.8-magnitude quake caused a tsunami that killed more than 500 people in Chile in February 2010.
Sky News's Greg Milam said: "They learnt a lot of lessons from the quake in 2010 about the need not only of getting the warnings out but also about giving people somewhere to go.
"They won't have supplies sitting in the shelters day by day but they will have capabilities to get those supplies there.
"There was an evacuation a couple of weeks ago. There was no tsunami on that occasion but that would have been a wake-up call, as the earthquakes here over the past few weeks have been a wake-up call about the need to be prepared."
More follows...
Taxpayers lost out due to the Government's low valuation of Royal Mail shares during its privatisation, the National Audit Office has found.
The public spending watchdog concluded ministers showed "deep caution" when pricing the shares last year.
The Government sold £2bn-worth of shares in October, amounting to 60% of the company.
The NAO points out that on the first day of trading alone, Royal Mail's new shareholders benefited to the tune of £750m - money which could have gone to the public purse.
Twelve priority investors sold all or some of their holdings within the first few weeks of trading.
Royal Mail shares are now trading more than two-thirds higher than the price at which they were sold by the Government.
Business Secretary Vince Cable has defended the sale Amyas Morse, head of the NAO, said: "The department was very keen to achieve its objective of selling Royal Mail, and was successful in getting the company listed on the FTSE 100. Its approach, however, was marked by deep caution, the price of which was borne by the taxpayer.
"The Government retained 30% of the company. It could have retained even more and allowed the taxpayer to participate further in the rapidly increasing share price and thus limit the cost to the taxpayer."
Business Secretary Vince Cable is the minister under scrutiny and the report does partly vindicate his approach to the sale.
It says he was right to reject bankers' gold-plated valuations of Royal Mail of more than £9bn.
Mr Cable said: "Achieving the highest price possible at any cost and whatever the risk was never the aim of the sale.
"The report concludes there was a real risk of a failed sale attached to pushing the price too high, and a failed sale would have been the worst outcome for taxpayers and jeopardised the operation of Royal Mail going forward.
The price of a first-class stamp rose 2p to 62p this week "The report also comprehensively demolishes the argument that the government should have relied on the price valuations of some banks who were pitching for the contract to sell Royal Mail.
"The NAO confirms we have protected taxpayers from the risk of needing to offer ongoing support to the company as well as safeguarding the vital six-day-a-week service that customers and businesses around the country rely on."
Critics of the sale have seized on the axing of 1,300 jobs and a hike in stamp prices in recent days as evidence of the folly of privatisation.
Unite national officer Brian Scott said: "This report is startling proof that the Government sold off the country's family silver on the cheap.
"The privatisation of Royal Mail was wrong in every way. The loser is the UK taxpayer and the tragedy is that money that should be flowing into the Treasury for schools and hospitals is going into the pockets of private investors."
Some 10% of Royal Mail was handed free to employees during the privatisation.
Taxpayers were left with a 30% stake that is now worth about £1.6bn.
By Anushka Asthana, Political Correspondent
More than one in three offenders sentenced in the year up to September 2013 had 10 or more previous convictions, Sky News can reveal.
Figures released by the Ministry of Justice lay bare the scale of career criminality across England and Wales.
Of the 177,597 people with prior convictions running into double figures, 14,646 had more than 50.
Sky News was given exclusive access to Wormwood Scrubs in London, where one prisoner explained he had 20 convictions and 10 prison sentences behind him at the age of 34.
Chris Grayling, the Justice Secretary, said prisoners released into society had a huge "temptation" to turn to alcohol or drugs and slip back into the lifestyle that landed them in jail in the first place.
Sky's Anushka Asthana talks to a prisoner inside Wormwood Scrubs He said one of the problems was that people who carried out short jail sentences of under 12 months were released with no support whatsoever.
Today's figures show that over a six-year period - up to 2011 - huge numbers of crimes were committed by people who had been let out of prison just months earlier.
There were 84,564 thefts including burglary, 11,751 violent crimes and 901 sexual offences committed within a year of a short sentence ending.
The MoJ is hoping to reduce such crimes by a change this June that will see the vast majority of offenders, including those on short sentences, face supervision for a year after release.
The prisoner - who asked not to be named - said he repeatedly slipped back into a cycle of committing commercial burglaries.
One of the biggest problems was a lack of housing when he left prison, leaving him surrounded by the "wrong people" who encouraged the criminal behaviour.
He said his family were devastated as they were hard working and had brought him up the right way.
"It breaks (my mum's) heart, and that breaks my heart," he said.
Prisoners 'are at a crossroads when they walk out of jail' Locked up alongside him in the prison's "C-wing" were the same faces again and again, he added, calling it a "revolving door".
He said he hoped that a mentoring scheme at the prison, which will see him met at the gates by a volunteer, will help place him on a better path.
David Redhouse, the deputy governor at Wormwood Scrubs, said the important thing was to try to get prisoners through the first few months as that was when reoffending rates were highest.
He said the men in C-wing were at a crossroads when they walked out - and needed support to encourage them not to return to criminality.
Mr Redhouse described how the prison used vocational training - with painting courses, job sessions, welfare support and IT classes. There was also a programme through which prisoners come face-to-face with victims.
Updated: 9:23am UK, Saturday 29 March 2014
By Ian Woods, Senior Correspondent
The small consolation that should come with every airline crash is that the knowledge gained from the tragedy should help prevent it happening again.
But if that were true, we might already know more about what happened to flight MH370.
After the Air France accident of 2009, in which 228 people died when their flight from Brazil plunged into the Atlantic, 120 representatives of the international aviation industry got together to recommend ways to make it easier to find aircraft which crash into the sea.
None has been implemented.
They suggested that the flight data recorders - the black boxes - should have larger batteries so they would carry on transmitting a beacon for 90 rather than 30 days.
But bigger batteries mean extra weight and extra cost for the airlines to install them.
They also suggested the recorders should be designed to break away and float to the surface, rather than sink to the sea floor along with the rest of the fuselage.
And that the frequency of the transmission should be altered to boost how far away it can be heard, beyond its current 2,000 metre maximum.
Salvage expert David Mearns, from Blue Water Recoveries, told Sky News: "If you reduce that frequency, the lower the frequency, the greater the range.
"You go from 37.5khz , to say, 8.8khz as recommended, I think that would increase the range to over 10,000 metres.
"So that's a five times increase in your detectable range and that would help the teams out there now looking for these black boxes."
As for why the recommendations weren't acted upon?
"It's a very big industry. It's an international industry," said Mr Mears.
"It takes a lot of time for these things to work themselves through the regulations; how they would operate, how the pilots would be trained to use them; they have to be implemented on the aircraft, so it takes years for these things to be done."
In an age when we can all track most passenger aircraft on our smartphones and computers, how can a plane still go missing?
Most, but not all, areas of the world are now covered by the Acars ADS-B system, allowing them to be constantly tracked. Although smaller, older aircraft are not equipped.
There are new regulations being introduced around the world compelling airlines to fit them in all passenger aircraft.
But in some places the deadline is 2020.
Mikael Robertsson, the founder of Flightradar24.com, told Sky: "Maybe authorities in these countries don't want to rush or I guess it costs quite a lot of money for airlines to upgrade their equipment on board."
In any case, it appears the system on MH370 was switched off.
One current 777 pilot told Sky he could not think of a good reason why he would do such a thing.
And with so many flights criss-crossing vast expanses of water, knowing the plane's last position is crucial to a swift recovery.
Mr Robertsson said: "I think this is something that should be discussed: How much pilots should be able to turn off, and how easy it should be to turn some systems off?"
The backgrounds of the pilots have been scrutinised to assess the likelihood of criminal or suicidal behaviour.
Professor Robert Bor is a clinical psychologist who has studied those who fly, and was specifically asked to review an incident involving an American Jet Blue pilot who had a psychotic episode while flying from New York to Las Vegas.
Captain Clayton Osbon left the cockpit and screamed at passengers before being subdued by some of those on board.
His co-pilot landed the plane safely in Texas.
Prof Bor and others concluded there were no warning signs beforehand which could have prevented the incident.
"Every year an airline pilot will have at least two formal medical checks which address not just their physical health but their mental health. Every time they are doing the job they are scrutinised by people."
Pilot suicide is not unheard of, and is considered the most likely explanation for the crash of an Indonesian SilkAir flight in 1997.
The pilot was heavily in debt - 104 passengers and crew were killed.
Airlines may also be studying how Malaysia Airlines has handled the disaster from a public relations perspective.
The families of the passengers have gone from grieving to protesting, angry at being kept waiting for news, furious about misinformation, and the final indignity - some of them were told the plane had crashed by text message.
Crisis management expert Raine Marcus told Sky News: "The communications with the families didn't inspire trust from the beginning.
"If you don't build up trust and goodwill right from the beginning, that has a direct impact afterwards on communications with the families and also directly on your business."
In the months and years ahead, as details emerge of what happened to MH370, there will undoubtedly be calls for lessons to be learned.
And in the meantime millions of us will continue to fly, hoping that our flight will not be one of the very rare ones, which does not have a safe landing.
The "extraordinarily difficult" search for the missing Malaysia Airlines plane will go on for as long as possible, Australia's Prime Minister Tony Abbott has said.
He said the best brains in the world are trying to solve the mystery of what happened to flight MH370, which vanished more than three weeks ago with 239 people on board.
Twenty aircraft and ships will be searching the ocean 1,200 miles (2,000km) off the western coast of Australia on Monday for debris from the Boeing 777, which was travelling from Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia to the Chinese capital Beijing.
Speaking at Pearce air base in Perth, which is the home for search teams scouring the southern Indian Ocean for debris, Mr Abbott said crews were "well, well short" of any point where they would scale back their efforts.
People light candles during a vigil to remember passengers of flight MH370 Mr Abbott pledged: "If this mystery is solvable, we will solve it."
He told journalists at a news conference: "I'm certainly not putting a time limit on it. We can keep searching for quite some time to come and we will keep searching for quite some time to come."
"The intensity of our search and the magnitude of operations is increasing, not decreasing."
Mr Abbott rejected suggestions his Malaysian counterpart had been too quick to say the plane had crashed into the ocean.
"No, the accumulation of evidence is that the aircraft has been lost and it has been lost somewhere in the south of the Indian Ocean," he said.
Najib Razak said last week that based on satellite evidence the plane had crashed in the southern Indian Ocean. Malaysian authorities believe the flight was deliberately diverted off course.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott on his visit to the base The majority of the passengers on board were Chinese, and Beijing has been critical of Malaysia's handling of the investigation.
But the official China Daily newspaper said in an editorial on Monday it was understandable that not all sensitive information could be made public.
It comes as Chinese relatives of passengers fly to Malaysia to demand an apology, accusing officials there of "delays and deception".
"Although the Malaysian government's handling of the crisis has been quite clumsy, we need to understand that this is perhaps the most bizarre incident in Asia civil aviation history," the editorial said.
"Public opinion should not blame the Malaysian authorities for deliberately covering up information in the absence of hard evidence."
The search area is close to an area of the Indian Ocean where the currents drag rubbish and flotsam.
A number of objects have been spotted, but none of those retrieved so far have been from the plane.
One of the vessels due to join the search in the coming days is an Australian defence force ship that has been fitted with a US black box locator and underwater drone.
Updated: 9:23am UK, Saturday 29 March 2014
By Ian Woods, Senior Correspondent
The small consolation that should come with every airline crash is that the knowledge gained from the tragedy should help prevent it happening again.
But if that were true, we might already know more about what happened to flight MH370.
After the Air France accident of 2009, in which 228 people died when their flight from Brazil plunged into the Atlantic, 120 representatives of the international aviation industry got together to recommend ways to make it easier to find aircraft which crash into the sea.
None has been implemented.
They suggested that the flight data recorders - the black boxes - should have larger batteries so they would carry on transmitting a beacon for 90 rather than 30 days.
But bigger batteries mean extra weight and extra cost for the airlines to install them.
They also suggested the recorders should be designed to break away and float to the surface, rather than sink to the sea floor along with the rest of the fuselage.
And that the frequency of the transmission should be altered to boost how far away it can be heard, beyond its current 2,000 metre maximum.
Salvage expert David Mearns, from Blue Water Recoveries, told Sky News: "If you reduce that frequency, the lower the frequency, the greater the range.
"You go from 37.5khz , to say, 8.8khz as recommended, I think that would increase the range to over 10,000 metres.
"So that's a five times increase in your detectable range and that would help the teams out there now looking for these black boxes."
As for why the recommendations weren't acted upon?
"It's a very big industry. It's an international industry," said Mr Mears.
"It takes a lot of time for these things to work themselves through the regulations; how they would operate, how the pilots would be trained to use them; they have to be implemented on the aircraft, so it takes years for these things to be done."
In an age when we can all track most passenger aircraft on our smartphones and computers, how can a plane still go missing?
Most, but not all, areas of the world are now covered by the Acars ADS-B system, allowing them to be constantly tracked. Although smaller, older aircraft are not equipped.
There are new regulations being introduced around the world compelling airlines to fit them in all passenger aircraft.
But in some places the deadline is 2020.
Mikael Robertsson, the founder of Flightradar24.com, told Sky: "Maybe authorities in these countries don't want to rush or I guess it costs quite a lot of money for airlines to upgrade their equipment on board."
In any case, it appears the system on MH370 was switched off.
One current 777 pilot told Sky he could not think of a good reason why he would do such a thing.
And with so many flights criss-crossing vast expanses of water, knowing the plane's last position is crucial to a swift recovery.
Mr Robertsson said: "I think this is something that should be discussed: How much pilots should be able to turn off, and how easy it should be to turn some systems off?"
The backgrounds of the pilots have been scrutinised to assess the likelihood of criminal or suicidal behaviour.
Professor Robert Bor is a clinical psychologist who has studied those who fly, and was specifically asked to review an incident involving an American Jet Blue pilot who had a psychotic episode while flying from New York to Las Vegas.
Captain Clayton Osbon left the cockpit and screamed at passengers before being subdued by some of those on board.
His co-pilot landed the plane safely in Texas.
Prof Bor and others concluded there were no warning signs beforehand which could have prevented the incident.
"Every year an airline pilot will have at least two formal medical checks which address not just their physical health but their mental health. Every time they are doing the job they are scrutinised by people."
Pilot suicide is not unheard of, and is considered the most likely explanation for the crash of an Indonesian SilkAir flight in 1997.
The pilot was heavily in debt - 104 passengers and crew were killed.
Airlines may also be studying how Malaysia Airlines has handled the disaster from a public relations perspective.
The families of the passengers have gone from grieving to protesting, angry at being kept waiting for news, furious about misinformation, and the final indignity - some of them were told the plane had crashed by text message.
Crisis management expert Raine Marcus told Sky News: "The communications with the families didn't inspire trust from the beginning.
"If you don't build up trust and goodwill right from the beginning, that has a direct impact afterwards on communications with the families and also directly on your business."
In the months and years ahead, as details emerge of what happened to MH370, there will undoubtedly be calls for lessons to be learned.
And in the meantime millions of us will continue to fly, hoping that our flight will not be one of the very rare ones, which does not have a safe landing.
Updated: 9:23am UK, Saturday 29 March 2014
By Ian Woods, Senior Correspondent
The small consolation that should come with every airline crash is that the knowledge gained from the tragedy should help prevent it happening again.
But if that were true, we might already know more about what happened to flight MH370.
After the Air France accident of 2009, in which 228 people died when their flight from Brazil plunged into the Atlantic, 120 representatives of the international aviation industry got together to recommend ways to make it easier to find aircraft which crash into the sea.
None has been implemented.
They suggested that the flight data recorders - the black boxes - should have larger batteries so they would carry on transmitting a beacon for 90 rather than 30 days.
But bigger batteries mean extra weight and extra cost for the airlines to install them.
They also suggested the recorders should be designed to break away and float to the surface, rather than sink to the sea floor along with the rest of the fuselage.
And that the frequency of the transmission should be altered to boost how far away it can be heard, beyond its current 2,000 metre maximum.
Salvage expert David Mearns, from Blue Water Recoveries, told Sky News: "If you reduce that frequency, the lower the frequency, the greater the range.
"You go from 37.5khz , to say, 8.8khz as recommended, I think that would increase the range to over 10,000 metres.
"So that's a five times increase in your detectable range and that would help the teams out there now looking for these black boxes."
As for why the recommendations weren't acted upon?
"It's a very big industry. It's an international industry," said Mr Mears.
"It takes a lot of time for these things to work themselves through the regulations; how they would operate, how the pilots would be trained to use them; they have to be implemented on the aircraft, so it takes years for these things to be done."
In an age when we can all track most passenger aircraft on our smartphones and computers, how can a plane still go missing?
Most, but not all, areas of the world are now covered by the Acars ADS-B system, allowing them to be constantly tracked. Although smaller, older aircraft are not equipped.
There are new regulations being introduced around the world compelling airlines to fit them in all passenger aircraft.
But in some places the deadline is 2020.
Mikael Robertsson, the founder of Flightradar24.com, told Sky: "Maybe authorities in these countries don't want to rush or I guess it costs quite a lot of money for airlines to upgrade their equipment on board."
In any case, it appears the system on MH370 was switched off.
One current 777 pilot told Sky he could not think of a good reason why he would do such a thing.
And with so many flights criss-crossing vast expanses of water, knowing the plane's last position is crucial to a swift recovery.
Mr Robertsson said: "I think this is something that should be discussed: How much pilots should be able to turn off, and how easy it should be to turn some systems off?"
The backgrounds of the pilots have been scrutinised to assess the likelihood of criminal or suicidal behaviour.
Professor Robert Bor is a clinical psychologist who has studied those who fly, and was specifically asked to review an incident involving an American Jet Blue pilot who had a psychotic episode while flying from New York to Las Vegas.
Captain Clayton Osbon left the cockpit and screamed at passengers before being subdued by some of those on board.
His co-pilot landed the plane safely in Texas.
Prof Bor and others concluded there were no warning signs beforehand which could have prevented the incident.
"Every year an airline pilot will have at least two formal medical checks which address not just their physical health but their mental health. Every time they are doing the job they are scrutinised by people."
Pilot suicide is not unheard of, and is considered the most likely explanation for the crash of an Indonesian SilkAir flight in 1997.
The pilot was heavily in debt - 104 passengers and crew were killed.
Airlines may also be studying how Malaysia Airlines has handled the disaster from a public relations perspective.
The families of the passengers have gone from grieving to protesting, angry at being kept waiting for news, furious about misinformation, and the final indignity - some of them were told the plane had crashed by text message.
Crisis management expert Raine Marcus told Sky News: "The communications with the families didn't inspire trust from the beginning.
"If you don't build up trust and goodwill right from the beginning, that has a direct impact afterwards on communications with the families and also directly on your business."
In the months and years ahead, as details emerge of what happened to MH370, there will undoubtedly be calls for lessons to be learned.
And in the meantime millions of us will continue to fly, hoping that our flight will not be one of the very rare ones, which does not have a safe landing.
