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I'm not too surprised most of the passengers were of Iranian descent - I think most people would be too scared to go to Iran unless they were Iranian. Especially lately, as in the months before this there were massive widespread protests in Tehran and other big cities... that got suppressed pretty brutally. But these were people who headed back to see their families when they had time off, and they know if you just keep your head down and don't get involved in any political shite while you're in Iran - you'll likely have no problems at all. Unless your a man of conscription age... then you might have to bribe someone on your way into the country. And yeah, the fact the pilots couldn't sound out a distress signal indicates that the plane's transponder immediately stopped working. And one reason that'd happen is because the plane was struck by a missile and the transponder was destroyed. It's a total tragedy. I'm not so sure that the government will flat out deny it was shot down - the Ukrainian embassy in Tehran was the first to report it was due to technical failures & Reuters reported that it was Iranian officials to ask them to retract that statement. Considering how pissed off Iran still is about the US shooting down one of their commercial airliners in the 80s... this has to be hugely embarrassing for the regime. Iran really can't afford to be further isolated from the world community - which a flat denial would likely cause. If that happens, all of this domestic unity they've managed to foster after Soleimani's death likely goes out the window as more countries impose sanctions on Iran and the economic condition (which is already really really bad) worsens and they'll have more massive anti-government demonstrations to deal with. It's insane that the government didn't put any flight restrictions on commercial flights when they knew they would be at high alert as they responded. It's such an avoidable tragedy that happened, just because of the sabre rattling between two countries that haven't had good relations since 1979 and have reached an all time low in the last few years. If the world community does unite against Iran though, that may be the sort of pressure needed to get Iran to come back to the negotiating table and re-enter some kind of agreement with similar terms to the JCPOA. Because as things stand, I can't see the Iranian government ever willingly going back to negotiate with the US regarding nuclear power - it's been demonstrated that what one administration might commit to, the other might immediately pull out of. And for the deal to have any meaning beyond one US presidential administration, which any nuclear deal with Iran would, it'd need to be able to guarantee that the US's commitments can't suddenly end with one administration. It'd need to be an official treaty that the US Congress ratifies... and US politics is so split right now, I can't see that happening anytime soon. People hoping for regime change in Iran should be hoping for it through non-violent methods. Iran's not China - it's not a place where generations of people have had "I must remain apolitical and support my government" - it's a place with an incredibly high voter turnout where people, even living under theocratic repression, will pretty freely speak about politics - and pretty freely talk about what exactly they dislike about living under the IRI's rule. Opening Iran up to the rest of the international community means more Iranians can study abroad again, like they used to, they can get visas and travel to other countries more freely... and then they'll see a lot of the propaganda the IRI feeds them is a load of shit. And they'll remember that when they take to the polls. The JCPOA was a great starting point to start putting more pressure on Iran through diplomacy. Taking a nuclear IRI off the table, and keeping Iran obligated to allow inspectors in upon demand of any of the parties to the agreement (so the UN security council nations + the EU) is the first step in engaging Iran in negotiations for things like: ending support for Hezbollah, ending the conflict in Yemen. And in return, Iran wants to be more involved in the global economy. Which in turn means Iran will open up to the rest of the world and ordinary Iranians will get more of a chance to see what life is like outside of an authoritarian theocracy. The slow burn approach to reforming Iran is imo the best approach to regime change in Iran - because as I've stated here, Iran has the framework for a real and effective democracy - they just need to remove the roadblocks to having a real democracy in the Supreme Leader position shouldn't be around & neither should the Guardians Council. An approach using western military intervention (aka an invasion of Iran) is likely to give us the same result as Iraq... but with a far greater cost, as it's a more populated country with a much harsher terrain, and with a larger military than Saddam's Iraq. So I hope ultimately, at the end of the day, Iran is pushed back to the negotiating table and something to prevent the IRI from having a nuclear weapon (and thus probably being the government in place in Iran for as long as we are alive) and we go back to having that starting point to put pressure on Iran to stop doing the shitty things it does do. But it's a real tragedy those people died in that plane. These tensions escalating since the end of US involvement in the JCPOA and the resumption of US sanctions on Iran were needless and have set back US-Iran relations decades... and the ultimate effect so far of all of this has been: 1.) Iranians getting shot for protesting the shitty economic condition these sanctions made worse, 2.) a plane full of innocent people being shot down, 3.) a top level IRGC is dead - which weakens the IRI... but has also created more unity around a government that was feeling extreme domestic pressure. It's been a bad few years, but especially a bad week, for the Iranian people.

The 14 missiles weren't shot anywhere near Tehran & were surface to surface missiles that fly pretty low (so they can get passed the US Patriot anti-missile defense system). So the missiles that were headed to those Iraqi bases with US forces weren't the same as the one that struck the plane. So yeah, the most likely answer is some inexperienced soldier panicked and fired a surface to air missile when he saw a plane fly overhead. It's possible there was something wrong with the plane's IFF (Identify Friend or Foe system) - the technology that exists so commercial airliners aren't mistaken for military aircraft and constantly shot down, according to some pilot on the news this morning. In any case, it's an absolute tragedy - because these victims are the real victims of the recent escalation in tensions. A few families, parents & their kids, were dead in moments. A lot of the people were Iranian international students in Canada that had been visiting their families over their uni's winter break. It's completely mental that Iran didn't put flight restrictions out the night they'd just responded to the tension by firing missiles at the US and they were obviously on high alert for any sort of military response from the US - delaying all departing flights out of Tehran for a few hours seems like it would have been completely reasonable to avoid the risk of innocent people dying. But instead they didn't and they took that risk... and a lot of innocent people died. Tbh when I first saw the video of it on twitter - I thought it was a missile that struck the plane and not a technical error. Just because it was a plane going down in a ball of flames.

Life is escapism for me away from here

This is randomly amazing

I'd play Vardy ahead of Rashford to be honest.

I think that will be flavour of the criticism from at least democratic politicians. Frustration at a collateral damage outcome from a conflict that was needlessly escalated.

from left to right : Iran's flag, Revolutionary Guards, RG Airforce, Hezbollah Lebanese proxy, Houthis Yemeni proxy, Hashd al Sha'abi Iraqi proxy, Hamas not proxy but allies, Fatemiyoun Afghan proxy, Zainabiyoun Pakistani proxy

Do it! Season 1 has some holes but it holds your interest because Pirates! seasons 2, 3 and 4 it seems to get better and better.

More speculation and reports now that the airline could have been shot down accidentally. The chances of an engine failure at the exact time missiles were being fired seemed suspect at best when it was first reported. I imagine we'll hear more about this.

@Dan @Harvsky @Rafa Beneathus

Fair enough but here it is the link. 5 days per week and 30 minutes per workout. Rest of videos are below the link or you can search for them. Is 4 weeks with a one week break then the final 4 weeks.

Yeah and look where that got him

Apparently we’ve offered Young a 1 year extension. Fuck this club.

Untold levels of boss

So reportedly we have reached an agreement with Felix Agu for a free transfer next summer; potentially he might even join during this transfer window already if we're willing to pay Osnabrück around 400k to let him leave now.

Sure we had Soleimani on loan from Leicester here a couple of seasons ago

I just started watching Black Sails again from the beginning as I borrowed the discs off my brother. Two episodes in and I love it all over again, shows great. If you havent seen it I highly recommend.

As promised that's a £10 ner whacked in for whatever (running costs/prizes etc)

Found this and made me think of @MUFC