2012, like any other year, took us through a roller coaster of emotions. It was a year that saw revolution, war, natural disasters and tragedy. But it also took us to new heights, reaffirmed current leaders and gave us a few new ones. What was your most memorable moment of 2012? If there is one thing that took place this year, that people will be talking about 50 years from now, what do you think it will be?

Nine people injured when a gunman opened fire at the midnight premiere of “The Dark Knight Rises” in Aurora, Colo., in July have filed a lawsuit alleging the theater, its parent company and several employees negligently failed to prevent the shooting.

 “The gravamen of the complaint is the lack of security provided by Cinemark Theaters,” according to the plaintiffs’ attorney Marc Bern of Napoli Bern Ripka Shkolnik LLP in New York. 

(Westlaw users: Click here for more stories from Westlaw Journal Entertainment Industry.) (more…)

Tragedy struck the community of Aurora, Colorado early today, when a masked gunman opened fire on a crowded movie theater.  As people, shocked and stunned, reacted to the shooting, police arrested the perpetrator outside the theater, where he surrendered without a fight.  As the Reuters article explains, the suspect also booby-trapped his apartment, causing severe problems for law-enforcement officials.  Also, see the live news coverage, provided by Reuters.

See some more of our Reuters Pictures, and other photos of the tragedy in Colorado.

Also, follow @ReutersPictures on Twitter and Reuters on Facebook

Sailors and sports fans should stay near the television set on Friday evening, Nov 4, when the Thomson-Reuters sponsored 66-foot ocean racer  Aurora will be featured in one of  three ESPN sailing programs produced by sailing legend Gary Jobson, a regular on Aurora as helmsman and tactician. 

Whether you are a yacht racer, a cruising sailor or recreate on a Sunfish,  you will enjoy exciting footage from Aurora’s 2011 season of racing in the Atlantic Ocean off the east coast of the United States and Canada.  Thanks to the seamanship and dedication of a mostly non-professional crew,  the Aurora sailing program collected numerous trophies this year, radiated good karma and sportsmanship, and established Thomson Reuters as a premier sponsor of world class sailing events. New Thomson Reuters ads featuring the stunning Aurora under sail will also be aired for the first time during the three-hours of prime-time sailing on ESPN Classic, which  starts at 7 p.m. EDT (2300 GMT.)  The programing details:

ESPN Classic, Friday Nov. 4:

7:00pm Best of One Design Racing

8:00pm New York Yacht Club World Invitational Cup

9:00pm Racing for an Ocean Record (this is the show on Aurora)

– Alden Bentley 

 

Aurora, USA 50095

Skipper’s log

Leukemia Cup

09/11/11

The following is a note from Owner/Skipper Gus Carlson after Aurora placed first in division in the Leukemia Cup hosted by Larchmont Yacht Club on Saturday:

We were proud to sail Aurora in the distance race event of the Leukemia Cup to support such a great cause. We thank the Larchmont Yacht Club and the Race Committee for staging a great race, and the Westchester County chapter of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society for a fantastic fund-raising effort.  So many of us, our families and friends have been touched by cancer, including my own family experience with lymphoma, and to participate in this event is an important way for us to continue the fight against the disease.  It is also an honor for us to support our fellow Aurora crewman, Gary Jobson, a cancer survivor and national regatta chairman of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s sailing program. And while Gary was not aboard for the race yesterday, he was with us in spirit.  We did, however, have another special guest aboard — Stirling Winder.  For the last two years, we have sailed in support of Stirling’s efforts to raise funds for cancer research.  A cancer survivor herself, Stirling has become an inspiration the Aurora crew and we were thrilled to have her aboard yesterday.  She brought us very good fortune.  Thank you, Stirling.

As for the race itself, the conditions were light, with winds consistently in the 8-11 knot range, with only a brief period on the upwind leg where we saw puffs to 12-14 knots, and then fading late in the race.  The competition was fierce, with a number of very fast well-sailed boats in our division.  And while we were certainly the biggest boat, the talent and capabilities aboard our rivals made it essential for us to sail a near-perfect race to cover our time on them, especially on a relatively short 30-mile course.  Thanks to great crew work, some thoughful strategic decisions, and a little help from mother nature, who turned down the fan late in the race, we were able to hold on to win on corrected time.  Kudos to our Aurora crew for an almost flawless performance.  But also kudos to our competitors, who sailed well and made it an interesting and fun race — and all for a good cause.

One interesting note.  For those of you who have been following the A-blog this summer, you know that Aurora suffered some damage in the Vineyard Race on Labor Day weekend when we hit a half-submerged log after dark while sailing in eastern Long Island Sound.  The debris in the Sound left over from Hurricane Irene the week presented a significant hazard to the Vineyard fleet, and many boats suffered damage, including one that broke her rudder on a submerged object.  In Aurora’s case, the collision with the log left a softball-sized ding on her bow, right at the waterline — not structural, but it could have caused issues had it not been looked after immediately.  Thanks to the heroic efforts of Dave Jurkowski, Brook West, the crew at Brewer’s Yacht Haven Marina in Stamford, CT, and others, Aurora was hauled, repaired, and relaunched in 48 hours, ready to be on the starting line for the Leukemia Cup.  She doesnt look as pretty as usual — she bears a big white carbon fibre band-aid on her bow — but she is sound and sure.  Thanks to the repair team for their quick work and solid craftsmanship.

The Leukemia Cup is the last official race for Aurora in the Northeastern US this season.  I want to thank the crew, our dedicated shore support team and all the friends of the Aurora program for making this a sensational season.  I also want to thank the various clubs and organizing authorities for their hard work in staging the events in which we sailed.  Special thanks, of course, to Thomson Reuters for its continued support of the Aurora program and the sport of competitive sailing.  To Eileen Lynch and Mindy Whang of the TR marketing department, a big thank you.  We couldn’t have done it without.    Aurora is proud to sail under the Thomson Reuters colors.

A final thought.  Before Aurora leaves the dock to go sailing, I remind our crew that I have three objectives for them — to sail safely, to learn, and to have fun.  My belief is that if we do those three things well, the boat will perform and we will win our fair share of silverware.  I think we made great strides in 2011 on all our objectives — our seamanship has improved, our knowledge of how to sail Aurora faster and more efficiently is much better, and we have created a collegial “karma” aboard that enables people to enjoy our adventures, which have taken us over 2,000 miles in the last 14 months aboard Aurora.  And while I don’t measure our success simply by the silverware we collect, I’m delighted to say that our results in the 2011 season bear out my broader belief on winning our share of glory.  As I write this in my den, I am looking at the awards we won in 2011 for our performane in the Marblehead-Halifax Race, the Vineyard Race, the Stamford Overnight Race, and our combined placing in the 2010 Newport-Bermuda Race and the 2011 Annapolis-Newport Race.  More important, I am also looking at photographs of the smiling faces of the Aurora crew, who each own a very special piece of every trophy we have won.  It is truly amazing and gratifying for me to see what a Corinthian crew, made up of local club sailors, and tutored by some of the world’s best, like Gary Jobson and Steve Benjamin, have accomplished in such a short time on a boat that celebrates its 18th birthday next year.  I am so proud of everyone involved in the Aurora program, on and off the water, and I thank them for giving me such a wonderful gift — another great year doing what I love most.

Thank you,

Gus

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Aurora, USA 50095

Vineyard Race log

09/03/11, 1937 GMT

We’re 25 nautical miles from The Cows, then a right turn and 3/4 mile leg to the finish off  the Stamford breakwater. We were without cell phone signal for hours this morning and I had several failed and frustrating attempts to publish my overnight blogs. Anyway we’re on port tack almost close hauled making 9.12 knots sailing 246, SW, on the rhumb line to the Cows. We’ve gained considerably on Blue Yankee in the last two hours. Latest fleet positioning puts them about 14 miles ahead of us. Decision is 11 miles back and it looks like we’ve gained about 7 miles on them … maybe they sailed into a hole closer to the north shore of Long Island. The wind speed just built from less than 10 kts to almost 17 and we had to change headsails to the medium No. 1 genoa. Next is to change down to the No. 2 genoa. It’s still too close to guess how we’re doing on a handicap basis. But if this is the ride home, we could be back at the dock for dinner.

Read more on the SYC’s race blog: http://vineyardrace.wordpress.com/ 

– Alden Bentley, Reuters

Aurora, USA 50095

Vineyard Race log

09/03/11, 0600 GMT

The floating debris in the Sound from Hurricane Irene was unbelievable – Trees, tires and telephone-pole-sized logs floating in wide patches. We had to steer clear of a large split tree with root system sticking up like an unkempt octopus reaching for us as we sailed by. Then the sun set and as we navigated the lumpy seas in the dark, trying to escape The Race before the tide turned foul, Rich du Moulin yelled “head up.” Gary quickly steered the bow toward the wind, missing a 10-foot log  sweeping along the port side by three feet … disaster averted. We sent Ellen Quinn forward to the bow with flashlight to keep watch for the “growlers”  that could punch a hole in us. We steered up and down to dodge a couple more. Then we felt the unpleasant thud of striking something hard, but not enough to stop us … it scraped along the hull/keel. We checked for water coming in but all safe and dry below. The branch or whatever did gouge a ding out of the bow at the waterline  … Hazards at sea …

Another big hazard for mariners … The beacon at Buzzards Bay Tower, our turning point, was off. We could not make it out until we were 200 yards away. Expert navigation by Rando put us right on it to round safely in complete darkness except for the stars. Rich du Moulin, one of the winningest skippers in these waters on his boat Laura Ann,  says that  in 33 Vineyard races he has never seen Buzzards Bay Tower unlit … perhaps more hurricane fallout.  Bit of a problem when we tacked to round it. A loose line got sucked into the primary winch when we were bringing the jib across,  which prevented us from completing a clean maneuver until we could rig a new jib sheet to the other primary and take load off the tangled mess. Not a glorious moment but the crew work is usually flawless. Stuff happens in big boat racing. 

Read more on the SYC’s race blog: http://vineyardrace.wordpress.com/ 

– Alden Bentley, Reuters

 Aurora, USA 50095

Vineyard Race log

09/02/11, 1928 GMT

Glorious sailing! Clear skies, flat water and moderate breeze. Two hours into the 77th Vineyard Race we are making good time and remain in visual distance of the two other boats in our IRC-zero class — Blue Yankee, which owes us about 2 hours over 24 hours and the TP 52 Decision, who we owe about one hour per day to.  It was cool to be rafted up with the new Blue Yankee at Yacht Haven. Alden Winder took this cool picture of the new and old R/P 66 designs from the top of Aurora’s mast.

Wind conditions are not going according to forecast.  Our heading has been about 90 degrees (due east.) With the wind coming from about 50 degrees at 9 knots or so we are hitting our target speeds around 8.5 kts close hauled on port tack heading close to the shortest-line course to either of the two possible exits from Long Island Sound. The wind appears to be backing more easterly (70 degrees) and slackening slightly. It could continue to shift right and weaken into the evening. It probably means a tack onto starboard soon and definitely means we will have to think hard before commiting either to Plum Island Gut near the north fork of Long Island about 40 miles away, or The Race about 50 miles distant. The trick will be getting through into Block Island Sound before the tide starts to flood hard this evening, making passage into the stiff current very difficult in the lighter air we might see by then. Right now the tide is slack turning to ebb which will push us toward our destination.

Gary Jobson just returned the helm to Gus, after steering the start and taking a bite out of the first leg. We were about 30 seconds late to the line at the starting gun after Decision used right-of-way racing rules to pin us above the committee boat with less than minute to go. So we jibed around and tacked again to cross “scary” close  (at least to Brook West) to the committee boat ( picture Aurora’s 66 feet swishing at 7 knots by the anchored 40ish-foot cabin cruiser a bit more than arms length away.) 

Navigator Randy (Rando) Needham has a pool going on finish times … $1 each. I chose 0215 EDT Sunday. I gather there are a lot of bets clustered around mine.

– Alden Bentley, Reuters

 

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