title: Stereolithography

text: One of the advantages of stereolithography is its speed; functional parts can be manufactured within a day. The length of time it takes to produce a single part depends upon the complexity of the design and the size. Printing time can last anywhere from hours to more than a day. Prototypes and designs made with stereolithography are strong enough to be machined and can also be used to make master patterns for injection molding or various metal casting processes.


title: Stereolithography

text: Although stereolithography can be used to produce virtually any synthetic design, it is often costly, though the price is coming down. Since 2012, however, public interest in 3D printing has inspired the design of several consumer SLA machines which can cost considerably less.


title: Stereolithography

text: Beginning in 2016, substitution of the SLA and DLP methods using a high resolution, high contrast LCD panel has brought prices down to below 200. The layers are created in their entirety since the entire layer is displayed on the LCD screen and is exposed using UV LEDs that lie below. Resolutions of .01mm are attainable.


title: Stereolithography

text: Another disadvantage is that the photopolymers are sticky, messy, and need to be handled with care. Newly made parts need to be washed, further cured, and dried. The environmental impact of all these processes requires more study to be understood, but in general SLA technologies have not created any biodegradable or compostable forms of resin, while other 3-D printing methods offer some compostable PLA options.


title: West Slavic languages

text: The West Slavic languages are a subdivision of the Slavic language group. They include Polish, Czech, Slovak, Kashubian, Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian. The languages have traditionally been spoken across a mostly continuous region encompassing the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, the westernmost regions of Ukraine and Belarus, and a bit of eastern Lithuania. In addition, there are several language islands such as the Sorbian areas in Lusatia in Germany, and Slovak areas in Hungary and elsewhere.


title: West Slavic languages

text: West Slavic is usually divided into three subgroups—Czecho-Slovak, Lechitic and Sorbian—based on similarity and degree of mutual intelligibility. The groupings are as follows:


title: West Slavic languages

text: Some linguists include Upper and Lower Sorbian in the Lechitic branch, but other linguists regard it as a separate branch. The reason for this is that 'the Sorbian dialects are extremely diverse, and there are virtually no linguistic features common to all Sorbian dialects which distinguish them as a group from the other Slavic languages' (Sussex & Cubberly 2006). Czech and Slovak are more closely related to each other than to the other West Slavic languages, and also closer to each other than Polish and Sorbian are. Czecho-Slovak (Slovak in particular) shares certain features with other Slavic languages, such as Slovene and BCMS.


title: West Slavic languages

text: Some distinctive features of the West Slavic languages, as from when they split from the East Slavic and South Slavic branches around the 3rd to 6th centuries AD (alternatively, between the 6th and 10th centuries), are as follows:


title: West Slavic languages

text: Although influences from other language families have contributed a lot of loanwords, and to a lesser extent to verb morphology and syntax, the Slavic languages retained a distinctly Slavic character, with clear roots in Indo-European.


title: West Slavic languages

text: The West Slavic languages are all written in the Latin script, while the East Slavic branch uses Cyrillic and the South Slavic branch is mixed.


title: West Slavic languages

text: The early Slavic expansion reached Central Europe in c. the 7th century, and the West Slavic dialects diverged from Common Slavic over the following centuries. West Slavic polities of the 9th century include the Principality of Nitra and Great Moravia. The West Slavic tribes settled on the eastern fringes of the Carolingian Empire, along the ". The Obotrites were given territories by Charlemagne in exchange for their support in his war against the Saxons.


title: West Slavic languages

text: In the high medieval period, the West Slavic tribes were again pushed to the east by the incipient German "", decisively so following the Wendish Crusade in the 11th century. The Sorbs and other Polabian Slavs like Obodrites and Veleti came under the domination of the Holy Roman Empire and were strongly Germanized.


title: West Slavic languages

text: The Bohemians established the Duchy of Bohemia in the 9th century, which was incorporated into the Holy Roman Empire in the early 11th century. At the end of the 12th century the duchy was raised to the status of kingdom, which was legally recognized in 1212 in the Golden Bull of Sicily. Lusatia, the homeland of the remaining Sorbs, became a crown land of Bohemia in the 11th century, and Silesia followed suit in 1335. The Slovaks, on the other hand, never became part of the Holy Roman Empire, being incorporated into the Kingdom of Hungary. Hungary fell under Habsburg rule alongside Austria and Bohemia in the 16th century, thus uniting the Bohemians, Moravians, Slovaks, and Silesians under a single ruler. While Lusatia was lost to Saxony in 1635 and most of Silesia was lost to Prussia in 1740, the remaining West Slavic Habsburg dominions remained part of the Austrian Empire and then Austria-Hungary, and after that remained united until 1992 in the form of Czechoslovakia.


title: West Slavic languages

text: Over the past century, there have been efforts by some to standardize and to recognize Silesian, Lachian, and Moravian as separate languages.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram Rajaram Vankudre (18 November 1901 – 30 October 1990), referred to as V. Shantaram or Shantaram Bapu, was an Indian filmmaker, film producer, and actor known for his work in Hindi and Marathi films. He is most known for films such as "Dr. Kotnis Ki Amar Kahani" (1946), "Amar Bhoopali" (1951), "Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje" (1955), "Do Aankhen Barah Haath" (1957), "Navrang" (1959), "Duniya Na Mane" (1937), "Pinjara" (1972), "Chani", "Iye Marathiche Nagari" and "Zunj".


title: V. Shantaram

text: V. Shantaram started his film career doing odd jobs in Maharashtra Film Co. owned by Baburao Painter at Kolhapur. He went on to debut as an actor in the silent film "Surekha Haran" in 1921.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram, fondly known as "Annasaheb", had an illustrious career as a filmmaker for almost seven decades. He was one of the early filmmakers to realize the efficacy of the film medium as an instrument of social change and used it successfully to advocate humanism on one hand and expose bigotry and injustice on the other. V. Shantaram had a very keen interest in music. It is said that he "ghost wrote" music for many of his music directors, and took a very active part in the creation of music. Some of his songs had to rehearsed several times before they were approved by V. Shantaram.


title: V. Shantaram

text: He directed his first film "Netaji Palkar", in 1927. In 1929, he founded the Prabhat Film Company along with Vishnupant Damle, K.R. Dhaiber, S. Fatelal and S.B. Kulkarni, which made "Ayodhyecha Raja", the first Marathi language film in 1932 under his direction. He left Prabhat co. in 1942 to form "Rajkamal Kalamandir" in Mumbai. In time, "Rajkamal" became one of the most sophisticated studios of the country.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram introduced his daughter Rajshree (his daughter with Jayashree) and Jeetendra in the 1964 film "Geet Gaya Patharon Ne". That was the debut film for both of them. He also introduced his second wife Sandhya's niece Ranjana Deshmukh into the Marathi film industry through "Chandanachi Choli Ang Ang Jaali", directed by his son Kiran Shantaram in 1975. Ranjana dominated the Marathi silver screen in the 70s and 80s.


title: V. Shantaram

text: The Dadasaheb Phalke Award was conferred on him in 1985. He was posthumously awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 1992.


title: V. Shantaram

text: The V. Shantaram Award was constituted by Central Government and Maharashtra State Government. The V. Shantaram Motion Picture Scientific Research and Cultural Foundation, established in 1993, offers various awards to film-makers. The award is presented annually on 18 November. A postage stamp dedicated to Shantaram was released by India Post on 17 November 2001.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram was born in 1901 at Kolhapur to a Marathi family with a Jain Kasar father and Hindu mother. In 1921, aged 20, he married 12-year-old Vimalabai in a match arranged by their families. He had four children with Vimalabai, Prabhat Kumar (after whom Shantaram named his movie company) and daughters Saroj, Madhura and Charusheela. Saroj, the eldest daughter, is married to Soli Engineer, a Parsi gentleman, and they run the Valley View Grand Resort at Panhala near Kolhapur, built on Shantaram's farmhouse, which was inherited by Saroj. Shantaram's second daughter, Madhura, is the wife of Pandit Jasraj and mother of music director Shaarang Dev Pandit and of TV personality Durga Jasraj. Shantaram's third daughter, Charusheela, is the mother of Hindi and Marathi actor Sushant Ray a.k.a. Siddharth Ray.


title: V. Shantaram

text: In 1941, Shantaram married the actress Jayashree (née Kamulkar), with whom he had worked together in several films, including "Shakuntala" (1942). He had three children with Jayashree: a son, the Marathi film director and producer Kiran Shantaram, and two daughters, the actress Rajshree and Tejashree.


title: V. Shantaram

text: In 1956, just before the law was changed to prohibit polygamy for Hindus (but not for Muslims), Shantaram married another of his leading ladies, the actress Sandhya (née Vijaya Deshmukh), who had already starred in his films "Amar Bhoopali" and "Parchaiyan" and would go on to star in many of his future films like "Do Aankhen Barah Haath," "Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje," "Navrang," "Jal Bin Machhli Nritya Bin Bijli" and "Sehra." They did not have any children together, but Sandhya bonded strongly with Vimalabai and her children, and she lives with them as a respected mother.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram died on 30 October 1990 in Mumbai. He was survived by his three wives and his seven children.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Vimalabai died in 1996 after being bedridden for four years. Jayashree died peacefully in her sleep in 2003.


title: V. Shantaram

text: Shantaram used to live at Panhala near Kolhapur in Maharashtra state. His daughter Saroj has maintained his house and has converted the rest of the property into a hotel named Valley View Grand.


title: V. Shantaram

text: V. Shantaram's family moved from Kholapur to Hubbbali also known as Hubli in Karnataka in 1917 facing tough time financially. Shantaram a teenager then joined as a fitter in the railway workshop at Hubballi, for a salary of 8 annas (50 paise) per day, impressed by his hard work his salary was raised to 12 annas per day.


title: V. Shantaram

text: In the evenings he worked as a door keeper at NEW Deccan Cinema Theatre at Hubballi. Though he was not paid for this job, he was allowed to watch all movies free. There he watched movies of Dadasaheb Phalke, father of Indian Cinema, and developed passion for the movies. He learnt photography and sign board painting in Hubballi. He said later that the first time he touched camera he instantly connected to it.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski Godard (; born 3 October 1938), also known simply as PPK (), is a Peruvian economist, politician and public administrator who served as President of Peru from 2016 to 2018. He served as the Prime Minister of Peru and Minister of Economy and Finance during the presidency of Alejandro Toledo. Kuczynski resigned from the presidency on 23 March 2018, following a successful impeachment vote and days before a probable conviction vote. Since 10 April 2019 he has been in pretrial detention, due to an ongoing investigation on corruption, money laundering, and connections to Odebrecht, a public works company accused of paying bribes.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski was born in the Miraflores District of Lima to parents who fled from Germany after the Nazis came to power. Kuczynski worked in the United States before entering Peruvian politics. He held positions at both the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund before being designated as the general manager of Peru's Central Reserve Bank. He later served as Minister of Energy and Mines in the early 1980s under President Fernando Belaúnde Terry, and as Minister of Economy and Finance and Prime Minister under President Alejandro Toledo in the 2000s. Kuczynski was a presidential candidate in the 2011 presidential election, placing third. His opponents Ollanta Humala and Keiko Fujimori went on to the 5 June 2011 runoff election, in which Humala was elected. Kuczynski went on to stand in the 2016 election, where he narrowly defeated Fujimori in the second round. He was sworn in as president on 28 July 2016.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On 15 December 2017, the Congress of Peru, which was controlled by the opposition Popular Force, initiated impeachment proceedings against Kuczynski, after he was accused of lying about receiving payments from the scandal-hit Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht in the mid-2000s. However, on 21 December 2017, the Peruvian Congress lacked the majority of votes needed to impeach Kuczynski. After further scandals and facing a second impeachment vote, Kuczynski resigned from the presidency on 21 March 2018 following the release of videos showing alleged acts of vote buying, presenting his resignation to the Council of Ministers. He was succeeded as president by his First Vice President Martín Vizcarra. On 28 April 2019, Kuczynski was sentenced to three years of house arrest due to poor health while under investigation for allegedly taking bribes from Odebrecht.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski was born in Miraflores, Lima, Peru, as the first son of Madeleine (née Godard) and Maxime Hans Kuczyński, one of the earliest public health leaders in Peru. He is a cousin of the French film director and critic Jean-Luc Godard.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: His parents fled Germany in 1933 to escape from Nazism. His father, born in Berlin, then capital city of the German Empire, was a German Jew of distant Polish origin, and his mother was Protestant, of Swiss-French descent. Entering Peru in 1936, Maxime Kuczyński sent his son to receive his early education at Markham College in Lima, and the Rossall School (Lancashire, England), where he was a pupil in the Maltese Cross House between 1953 and 1956. He won a foundation scholarship to study at Exeter College, Oxford, and graduated with a degree in politics, philosophy and economics in 1960. Later, he received the John Parker Compton fellowship to study public affairs at Princeton University in the United States, where he received a master's degree in 1961. He began his career at the World Bank in 1961 as a regional economist for six countries in Central America, Haiti and the Dominican Republic.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 1967, Kuczynski returned to Peru to work at the country's central bank during the presidency of Fernando Belaúnde. Kuczynski went into exile in the United States in 1969 due to political persecution after Belaunde's government fell to the military dictatorship of General Juan Velasco Alvarado in a coup d'état. The newly installed government accused Kuczynski of funnelling about $18 million (equivalent to $115 million in 2016) to Nelson Rockefeller’s International Petroleum Company. He joined the World Bank as the chief economist managing the northern countries of Latin America, moving on to become Chief of Policy Planning.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: From 1973 to 1975, he was a partner of Kuhn, Loeb & Co., the international investment bank headquartered in New York City. In 1975, he returned to Washington, D.C. to become chief economist for the International Finance Corporation, the private finance arm of the World Bank. Subsequently, he was appointed President of Halco Mining in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, an international consortium mining company with operations in West Africa.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: From 1983 to 1992, he was co-chairman of First Boston in New York City, an international investment bank. In 1992, he founded, with six other partners, the Latin American Enterprise Fund (LAEF) in Miami, Florida, a private equity firm that focused on investments in Mexico, Central and South America. The institutional investors in LAEF included more than 15 of the world's largest university endowments, foundations, and pension funds. in 1983, he was a founding member of the Inter-American Dialogue and remained a member until 1997.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 1980, following the election of Fernando Belaúnde Terry as president, Kuczynski was invited to return to Peru to serve as Minister of Energy and Mines. In this position, he sponsored law 23231 which, through tax exemptions and other incentives, promoted oil and gas exploration and exploitation after a period of relative neglect. Kuczynski resigned in 1982 and returned to the private sector in the United States. During the second round of the 2016 presidential campaign, he claimed that he had left Peru due to the threats and attacks from the Shining Path insurgent group: "Let's remember that the terrorists not only hung my effigy on the "zanjón" (a local denomination for Paseo de La República avenue in Lima) and in San Martín square, but they attacked my apartment. Just as 3 million Peruvians, I left the country". This was in response to an attack by election opponent Keiko Fujimori (daughter of then-imprisoned former president Alberto Fujimori and main rival of PPK in the second round of elections) who claimed that Kuczynski did not "have moral authority to speak of terrorism".


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: During the rest of the 1980s and 1990s, Kuczynski was mainly involved in the private-equity fund-management business in the United States. He made small personal donations to the presidential campaigns of George H. W. Bush and of George W. Bush and to the state-senator campaign of his wife's cousin in Wisconsin. He additionally made donations to New York Senator Chuck Schumer and New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 2000, Kuczynski joined the presidential campaign of Alejandro Toledo, then an economics professor at the ESAN University in Lima. After Toledo was elected president in the 2001 Peruvian general election, Kuczynski served as Minister of Economy and Finance from July 2001 to July 2002, and again from February 2004 to August 2005. In August 2005, he was appointed as Prime Minister, a position he held until the end of Toledo's presidential term in 2006.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 2007, Manuel Dammert, a sociologist and politician, alleged that Kuczynski was involved in facilitating the activities, in various projects in Peru, of a financial entity known as First Capital Partners, in particular in relation to the Olmos diversion project, the Jorge Chávez International Airport, the Transportadora de Gas, and the Conrisa consortium. Former partners of Kuczynski in the Latin American Enterprise Fund had reportedly inaccurately listed Kuczynski as a founding partner of First Capital but corrected the error shortly afterwards. In consequence, Kuczynski sued Dammert for defamation and falsification of documents. Kuczynski prevailed at the first and second instance, but, on appeal, Peru's Supreme Court upheld Dammert's right to ask questions on matters of public interest, without ruling on the merits of Dammert's claims. These claims have been denied extensively by Kuczynski.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: After working with the Toledo administration, Kuczynski founded Agua Limpia, a Peruvian non-governmental organization that provides drinking water systems to communities in Peru. Agua Limpia is supported by the Inter-American Development Bank, Scotia Bank of Canada and others.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: He ran unsuccessfully for president in 2011, but later went on to win the 2016 Peruvian general election against Keiko Fujimori, becoming the 66th President of Peru until March 2018.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski returned to Peru in 1966 to support the government of Fernando Belaúnde Terry, as an economic adviser. He was appointed manager of the Central Reserve Bank of Peru. After the coup d'état against President Belaúnde on 3 October 1968, BCR managers Carlos Rodríguez Pastor Mendoza, Richard Webb Duarte and Pedro Pablo Kuczynski were accused of granting foreign currency certificates to the International Petroleum Company, allowing this company to remit $115 million of current profits to Standard Oil, its parent company in the United States. Due to this Kuczynski was forced to take refuge in the United States. After a judicial process that lasted eight years, the Supreme Court of Justice of Peru acquitted Kuczynski, and other BCR officials, of all charges.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 1980, Kuczynski returned to Peru and collaborated in the election campaign of Belaúnde Terry, who was elected at his second and last non-consecutive term, and appointed Kuczynski as the Minister of Energy and Mines. As Minister, he promoted Law No. 23231, which promoted energy and oil exploitation; However, the so-called Kuczynski Law was not exempt from controversy because of the tax exemptions granted to foreign oil companies. In December 1985 it was repealed.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: During the presidential campaign of Alejandro Toledo, Kuczynski worked as the head of government planning team. He was later appointed as the Minister of Economy and Finance. As such, he made numerous agreements with the International Monetary Fund to help fulfill the goals in the neoliberal economic policies outlined by Peru. However, he was criticized on countless occasions by Alan García, the main leader of opposition to the government.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: After the increase in social protests in Arequipa due to the privatization of electric companies, he resigned on 11 July 2002. He returned to office on 16 February 2004, and was appointed as the Prime Minister of Peru on 16 August 2005, following the resignation of Carlos Ferrero Costa.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In a cabinet reshuffle, Kuczynski appointed Óscar Maúrtua as the Minister of Foreign Relations in replacement of Fernando Olivera, and Fernando Zavala as the Minister of Economy and Finance, his previous post. His premiership lasted through the end of Toledo's presidency in July 2006.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On 1 December 2010, Kuczynski announced that he would stand as a candidate for President of Peru in the upcoming elections.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski ran for President of Peru in the general election, though he did not pass into the run-off as head of the Alianza por el Gran Cambio (Alliance for the Great Change), formed by the Christian People's Party, the Alliance for Progress, the Humanist Party and the National Restoration Party. He took third place in the vote, his opponents Ollanta Humala and Keiko Fujimori went to the second round of elections on 5 June 2011, in which Humala was elected president of the country.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In 2015, he announced that he would again be running for president, but now with a political party which he had built himself (Peruanos Por el Kambio, PPK).


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski won 21% of the popular vote in Peru's general elections on April 10, 2016, to qualify for a runoff vote against Keiko Fujimori, in which he narrowly triumphed with 50.12% of the vote to Fujimori's 49.88%, a margin of just thirty-nine thousand votes out of nearly eighteen million cast. Barely a week before the second round of voting, when trailing Keiko, Kuczynski received an important endorsement from third-place finisher Verónika Mendoza (18.82%), Peru's leading left-wing candidate, in an effort to defeat Fujimori.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Keiko's party, Fuerza Popular, has an absolute majority in Congress with 73 of the 130 seats; PPK trails with 18.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski was sworn in as president on 28 July 2016. At age 77, he was the oldest President to take office.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: As part of the recent push in Peru to recognize and integrate indigenous peoples into national life, Kuczynski's government supported the use of indigenous languages in Peru, with the state-run TV station starting to broadcast in December 2016 a daily news program in Quechua and in April 2017 one in Aymara. The President's state-of-the-union address was simultaneously translated into Quechua in July 2017.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Almost immediately after winning the election, Kuczynski, despite previous public statements in support of social conservatism, appointed nearly all his ministers from the left (including many of Toledo's ex-ministers), and his government quickly became known for its promotion of feminism, abortion rights, and LGBT rights. This did not please the conservatives who had previously supported him, which led to the censure of two of his education ministers by the opposition-controlled congress, and a no-confidence vote for his entire cabinet in 2017.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski opposed the government of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela, and welcomed Venezuelan expatriates. Nearly 200,000 Venezuelans settled in Peru, others moved to Peru, then later to Chile or Argentina. Kuczynski was one of the first leaders of the Latin American faction that asks for the democratization of Venezuela. Peru revoked Venezuela's invitation to the 8th Summit of the Americas because of Maduro's plan to hold an early presidential election, as the major opposing parties were banned from it.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On 15 December 2017, the Congress of the Republic initiated impeachment proceedings against Kuczynski, with the congressional opposition stating that he had lost the ″moral capacity″ to lead the country after he admitted receiving advisory fees from scandal-hit Brazilian construction company Odebrecht while he was Peru's Minister of Economy and Finance between 2004 and 2005. Kuczynski had previously denied receiving any payments from Odebrecht, but later confessed that his company, Westfield Capital Ltd, had been receiving money from Odebrecht for advisory services, while still denying that irregularities existed in the payments.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On 24 December 2017, three days after surviving the impeachment vote, Kuczynski pardoned former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: After further scandals broke out surrounding Kuczynski, a second impeachment vote was to be held on 22 March 2018. Two days before the vote, Kuczynski stated that he would not resign and decided to face the impeachment process for a second time. The next day on 21 March 2018, a video was released of Kuczynski allies, including his lawyer and Kenji Fujimori, attempting to buy a vote against impeachment from one official.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Following the release of the video, Kuczynski presented himself before congress and officially submitted his resignation to the Congress of the Republic. Kuczynski's first vice president, Martín Vizcarra, was later named President of Peru on 23 March 2018.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: This came in result of the dissemination of videos and audios, known as "Kenjivideos", that evidenced collusion between the executive and the legislature in order to give privileges and illicit profits to MPs in order to knock down the second impeachment process against Kuczynski. The resignation was accepted on 23 March 2018 by the Peruvian Congress and First Vice President Martín Vizcarra took oath immediately before the Congress.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Other presidents of Peru who have resigned are Guillermo Billinghurst (forced resignation), Andrés Avelino Cáceres and Alberto Fujimori. The current Peruvian Constitution of 1993 establishes in its article 113 that the Presidency of the Republic is vacated by:


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On March 23 it was approved to accept the resignation of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski and declare the presidential vacancy with 105 votes in favor, 12 votes against and four abstentions.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On April 10, 2019, he was arrested along with his secretary Gloria Kisic Wagner and his ex-driver José Luis Bernaola for an alleged crime of money laundering in the Odebrecht case. In turn, he authorized the Prosecutor's Office to search for 48 hours the homes linked to their surroundings in search of documents related to that case.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On April 19, 2019, Judge Jorge Chávez issued three years of preventive detention against Kuczynski, who received the news at a clinic in Lima where he was hospitalized for a cardiac intervention derived from a hypertension crisis. For Gloria Kisic Wagner and José Luis Bernaola, the judge rejected preventive detention and ordered that both serve a restricted appearance.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: On May 2, 2019, he left the clinic where he was hospitalized and was transferred to his home where he is currently serving 36 months of house arrest.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: In the Pandora Papers leak of 3 October 2021, Kuczynski was named in the revealed documents. The leak allegedly showed that when Kuczynski was Minister of the Economy in July 2004, he created Dorado Asset Management LTD with the help of OMC Group in the British Virgin Islands. Kuczynski's attorney responded to the Pandora documents saying "Dorado was conceived exclusively as a legal mechanism for patrimonial protection; it was used only for two properties acquired with money of lawful origin".


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: His father, Maxime Hans Kuczynski, was born in Berlin, then part of the German Empire. He was a bacteriologist who served in the German Army during World War I on the Balkan front. He was a renowned pathologist and tropical disease specialist, in particular expert on "Verruga peruana" or Carrion's disease. He trained at the Universities of Rostock and Berlin, where he was professor of pathology. His father was an officer in the German Army on the Eastern and Turkish fronts in the First World War, and he traveled widely in Russia, China, West Africa, and Brazil. Maxime Hans Kuczynski left Germany in 1933 due to his persecution for his Jewish roots, and he was invited to Peru in 1936 by President Óscar R. Benavides to set up the public health service in the interior of the country. Maxime Hans Kuczynski reformed the San Pablo leprosarium on the Amazon at the Brazilian frontier, set up a public health colony on the Perene river, and was later professor of tropical medicine at National University of San Marcos in Lima.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski has been married twice, first to Jane Dudley Casey, the daughter of Joseph E. Casey, a former member of the United States House of Representatives for the 3rd district of Massachusetts. Their children are businesswoman Carolina Madeleine Kuczynski, the New York Times journalist Alex Kuczynski, and John-Michael Kuczynski. Kuczynski and Casey divorced in 1995.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski's second wife is Nancy Lange, an American and the First Lady of Peru until Kuczynski's resignation in 2018. The couple, who married in 1996, have one daughter, Suzanne Kuczynski Lange, a biology graduate.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski's younger brother, Miguel Jorge Kuczynski Godard, is a fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge. Kuczynski's brother-in-law Harold Varmus was a Nobel Laureate for Medicine for cancer research in 1989.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski is a first cousin of French film director Jean-Luc Godard by his mother, Madeleine Godard, who was the aunt of the film director.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: He held U.S. citizenship until November 2015; he renounced it to be able to run for Peru's presidency.


title: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

text: Kuczynski is a polyglot. Aside from his native Spanish, Kuczynski also speaks English and French fluently, and is proficient in German.


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: Tomb of the Mutilated is the third studio album by American death metal band Cannibal Corpse. It was released in 1992 through Metal Blade Records and is the last record with the band's original lineup, as founding guitarist Bob Rusay was fired after the album's release.


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: The opening track "Hammer Smashed Face" quickly became the band's signature song. The track was featured during the band's cameo appearance in the 1994 comedy film "", as well as downloadable content for the video game "Rock Band" video game series. The song "I Cum Blood" is also featured in the video game "".


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: Reviewers Jack Murray and Connur Joyce have both stated their belief that "Tomb of the Mutilated" is a high-concept album concerned with extreme necrophilia and sadism. Murray said "It's a very clever idea concerning the rape and murder of a young girl with a large knife, and continuing to rape the corpse until orgasm. This theme is particularly present in the last four tracks on the album", while Joyce announced in Finnish metal magazine "Mutilate", "The album has heavy connotations throughout. It's definitely linked; especially in the last three tracks. The explicit nature in which Barnes grunts his way through the increasingly morbid lyrics certainly demonstrates the theme running through the album, that is to say the increasingly deteriorating mental state of the protagonist."


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: Chris Barnes stated on page 71 of the June 2008 issue of "Decibel" that "Entrails Ripped from a Virgin's Cunt" was based on two brothers, one of whom was semi-disabled, that were serving a life prison sentence. Barnes stated "They captured some girl, and the semi-retarded brother was talked into putting a coat hanger up her pussy to pull out her intestines."


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: Because the liner notes on "Butchered at Birth" feature quotations from American serial killer Albert Fish, he is often incorrectly credited with being the voice at the beginning of "Addicted to Vaginal Skin". However, the taped confession heard at the beginning of the song most likely belongs to the "Genesee River Killer" Arthur Shawcross.


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: Reviewers praised the album. Heavy metal webzine "Kicked in the Face" stated, "I loved every second of it. This is a must have for any Cannibal Corpse fan. ... It would be hard to pick out the good or the bad tracks on this one because, well, they're all pretty damn good."


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: "Metal Storm" announced "the music here is a little more complex and better elaborated, the effort is shown in songs like 'Hammer Smashed Face' with maddening and unforgettable riffs, a crushing bass playing, and incredibly fast drumming, and 'I Cum Blood' showing incredible pulsations ... a high-quality album in general, really one of the greatest albums in Cannibal Corpse history and maybe in Death Metal history too".


title: Tomb of the Mutilated

text: In 2005, "Tomb of the Mutilated" was ranked number 278 in "Rock Hard" magazine's book of "The 500 Greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time".


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: Andrew Youakim (born 5 December 1946), known professionally as Andy Kim, is a Canadian pop rock singer and songwriter. He grew up in Montreal, Quebec. He is known for hits that he released in the late 1960s and 1970s: the international hit "Baby, I Love You" in 1969, and "Rock Me Gently", which topped the U.S. singles chart in 1974. He co-wrote "Sugar, Sugar" in 1968 and sang on the recording as part of the Archies; it was #1 for four weeks and was "Record of the Year" for 1969.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: He has recorded under the stage name Baron Longfellow since 1978 or just as Longfellow in the early 1990s. He continues to perform under his original recording name of Andy Kim.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: Kim was born Andy Youakim on 5 December 1946 in Montreal, the third of four sons of Lebanese immigrants. In his teens, he moved to New York's Brill Building to pursue a career in music. He recorded as "Andy Kim", using the different last name as a way to obscure his Lebanese ethnicity, though on his earliest releases he used the name "Youakim" in the writing credits.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In 1968, after minor recording successes over the previous few years, Kim released the single "How'd We Ever Get This Way?" on the Steed label; it just missed the U.S. Top 20, reaching #21. He also co-wrote, with Jeff Barry, "Sugar, Sugar" which was a hit single for the Archies, reaching #1 on the U.S. "Billboard" Hot 100 and ultimately becoming the RIAA Record of the Year. Kim and Barry wrote more songs for the Archies, and also for the Monkees' album "Changes" in 1970, which Barry produced.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In 1969, Kim had two hit singles, "Rainbow Ride", which made the US Top 50, and "Baby, I Love You", which got to #9 in the US and #1 in Canada; it was so popular in Canada, it earned him a Gold Leaf (Juno) Award in 1970 as his country's Best Male Vocalist. "Baby, I Love You" sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the R.I.A.A. in October 1969.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: Over the next few years, Kim recorded a few minor hits, including "Be My Baby" and "It's Your Life" (in 1970) and toured North America extensively. In the spring of 1974, he released the self-penned "Rock Me Gently", which went to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and to #2 on the UK Singles Chart. "Rock Me Gently" sold three million copies globally, earning Kim his second gold disc.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: Kim had shied away from touring for years before then, when he was working with the Steed label. He has said that he had created a person in his music in the vein of a white blond surfer and that fans were shocked to see his dark skin colour and appearance. As well, he had altered his voice on his earlier records to sound younger.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In 1976, Kim altered the spelling of his pseudonym to Andy Kimm, and released a few singles under that name on his own Ice Records label in 1976 and '77. Shortly thereafter, he adopted the stage name Baron Longfellow and issued the first single ("Shady Hollow Dreamer") under that name in 1978. It was followed by a self-titled album "Baron Longfellow" with the hit single "Amour" in 1980 and, also under the same pseudonym, in 1984 released "Prisoner by Design". Both of these albums met with moderate success. In 1991, Kim again went by Longfellow and recorded the single "Powerdrive", which received radio airplay on several radio stations across Canada.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In 1995, Kim played at the Kumbaya Festival, at which the Barenaked Ladies were also performing. Nearly a decade later, the band's Ed Robertson convinced Kim to come out of retirement. Robertson co-wrote the song "I Forgot to Mention" with him and offered to produce the track. The single was released on a 5-track EP in 2004 which included a re-recording of "Powerdrive".


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In March 2005, Kim received the annual "Indie Award" for Favorite Solo Artist during Canadian Music Week. The music video for "Love Is...", released in the summer of 2005, reached #1 at Bravo.ca. In 2005, he co-wrote "What Ever Happened to Christmas" with Ron Sexsmith. The same year, he established the Andy Kim Christmas Show – a live concert at the Mod Club Theatre in Toronto in which a variety of artists were invited to perform mostly Christmas music. Kim's band acted as house band for the artists, who donated their time for the show. Proceeds were donated to the CHUM/CITY Christmas Wish. The show repeated in 2006, with a similar lineup. Proceeds from the show went to support the Children's Aid Foundation, and the edited show was aired on Mix 99.9 on Christmas Eve and Day. The Andy Kim Christmas show became an annual tradition. The annual show either took place at the Mod Club or Phoenix Concert Theatre in Toronto, with proceeds from the evening donated to a different children's charity each year.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: More recently, Kim's music has again come into the public eye, as "Rock Me Gently" was sped up slightly and used by Jeep for their Jeep Liberty commercial ("Pouring In"). His name can be seen on the radio display near the beginning of the commercial.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: In 2014, he collaborated with Kevin Drew on the album "It's Decided", released on 24 February 2015 on Arts & Crafts.


title: Andy Kim (singer)

text: On 23 July 2018, Canada's Walk of Fame included Andy Kim on its list of 2018 inductees. He became part of the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2019.


title: Sioux Falls Skyforce

text: The Sioux Falls Skyforce are an American professional basketball team of the NBA G League based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and are affiliated with the Miami Heat. The team plays their home games in the Sanford Pentagon, a place they have called home since the 2013–14 season. The Sioux Falls Skyforce is the longest-running minor-league basketball team in the United States.


title: Sioux Falls Skyforce

text: The Skyforce began in the Continental Basketball Association (CBA) in 1989. They played their home games at Sioux Falls Arena from then until the move to the Pentagon in 2013. They participated in four CBA championship finals, winning the championship trophy in 1996 (defeating the Fort Wayne Fury, four games to one) and 2005 (defeating the Rockford Lightning three games to one).


title: Sioux Falls Skyforce

text: The team's name was chosen from two entries in a contest to name the team in 1989 which yielded 1,045 suggestions. The names "Sky" and "Force" were combined to create the "Skyforce".


title: Sioux Falls Skyforce

text: In 2006, the Skyforce joined the D-League. In their first two seasons in the D-League, they were playoff contenders. In 2009, they suffered a 2–1 series loss in the first round to the Tulsa 66ers. In 2014, they fared a bit better, sweeping the Canton Charge in the first round before being swept by the eventual champion Fort Wayne Mad Ants in the semifinals. In 2016, the Skyforce won their first D-League championship, defeating the Los Angeles D-Fenders 2 games to 1. The Skyforce also finished the 2016 season 40–10, the winningest regular season record in D-League history.


title: Sioux Falls Skyforce

text: On June 10, 2013, the Miami Heat announced that they had entered into a single affiliation partnership with the Skyforce, beginning with the 2013–14 season. The Miami Heat signature red/yellow color scheme was adopted into the Skyforce's jerseys, logo, and merchandise following this announcement. On June 1, 2017, the Heat purchased a controlling interest in the Skyforce with the Heineman family retaining their minority share. The former ownership group of Bob Correa, Greg Heineman, Roger Larsen and Tom Walsh had purchased the Skyforce from the Kemper Lesnik Organization in May 1993.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The flag of North Macedonia is the national flag of the Republic of North Macedonia and depicts a stylized yellow sun on a red field, with eight broadening rays extending from the center to the edge of the field. It was created by Miroslav Grčev and was adopted on 5 October 1995.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The eight-rayed sun represents the "new sun of Liberty" referred to in "Denes nad Makedonija" ("Today over Macedonia"), the national anthem of North Macedonia.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The first post-Yugoslav flag of the country, adopted in 1992, known as the Kutlesh Flag, featured the Vergina Sun, a symbol that had been discovered at Aigai, the first capital and burial ground of the ancient kings of Macedon. Greece considers the Vergina Sun to be a Greek symbol and imposed a year-long economic embargo in order to persuade the then "Republic of Macedonia" to remove it from its flag, resulting in the current design.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: In 1944, the Independent Macedonia, a short-lived puppet state of Nazi Germany, used the flag of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization, which was divided horizontally into two stripes of equal height that were: red and black.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The modern Macedonian state was proclaimed underground on 2 August 1944 by the Anti-Fascist Assembly of the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM), the state's supreme legislative and executive body until 1946. The state was originally known as Democratic Federal Macedonia and was renamed the People's Republic of Macedonia in 1945. The ASNOM became operational in December, shortly after the German retreat. The flag was adopted during ASNOM's second plenary session in December. The first version of the flag depicted a gold-edged five-pointed red star centred on a red field.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: Between December 1946 and September 1991, the Socialist Republic of Macedonia (known as the People's Republic of Macedonia until 1963) was one of the six constituent republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It was the only Yugoslav republic not to use the Pan-Slavic colours on its flag. Macedonia instead adopted an amended version of its previous flag, depicting a gold-edged five-pointed red star in the canton against a red field in a design similar to the flags of the Soviet Union or the People's Republic of China. This flag was adopted on 31 December 1946 under Article 4 of the Constitution of the People's Republic of Macedonia and remained in use until well after Macedonia's independence from Yugoslavia in September 1991, due to lack of agreement about what should replace it.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: In 1991, Todor Petrov, president of the nationalist organization World Macedonian Congress, who supports the controversial antiquization-policy, designated and proposed the Vergina Sun as the national symbol of the then "Republic of Macedonia". On 11 August 1992, the newly independent Republic of Macedonia adopted the new flag to replace the old Communist "red star" insignia. The flag depicted the "Vergina Sun" symbol, a stylised yellow sun centred on a red field with eight main and eight secondary rays emanating from the sun, tapering to a point. This ancient symbol was named after the Greek town where it had been discovered in archaeological excavations of the ancient Macedonian city of Aigai.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The Vergina Sun was regarded by Greece as a symbol of continuity between ancient Macedonia and modern Greek culture, and in particular as a symbol of the Argead dynasty of Philip II of Macedon and his son Alexander the Great. From the late 1970s it had also been adopted by many both in Greece and the then Socialist Republic of Macedonia to symbolise historical connections with ancient Macedonia and had been paraded in demonstrations by Greeks and ethnic Macedonians at home and abroad.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: The flag, the new state's constitution and its name all became the focus of a dispute between the two countries, during which Greece imposed an economic blockade on the Republic from February 1994. In July 1995, Greece lodged a request with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) for exclusive trademark protection to the Vergina Sun.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: Greek objections also prevented the flag from being flown at the United Nations Headquarters building in New York City. The blockade was lifted in October 1995 when an agreement was reached to change the flag, modify the constitution and resolve the naming dispute through United Nations-sponsored negotiations. The change of the flag was at first not accepted by conservative Macedonians, nationalists, and Greek patriots. In the first years after the change, both flags were officially flown for a long time. Between 1995 and 1998, in the municipalities where then-opposition party VMRO-DPMNE ruled, only the old flag was flown from institution buildings. Popular opinion was divided about the merits of changing the flag. As part of the Prespa agreement (article 8) of 2018, which resolved the naming dispute, the government of North Macedonia committed to removing the Vergina Sun from all public spaces and from public use, including its use in flags. It started removing the symbol since 12 August 2019.


title: Flag of North Macedonia

text: Toni Deskoski, Macedonian professor of International Law, argues that the Vergina Sun is not a Macedonian symbol but a Greek symbol that is used by ethnic Macedonians in the nationalist context of Macedonism and that the ethnic Macedonians need to get rid of it.


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu Ge (, born 20 September 1982), also known as Hugh Hu, is a Chinese actor and singer. While studying at the Shanghai Theater Academy, he was invited to play the leading role Li Xiaoyao in the 2005 television series "Chinese Paladin", and immediately skyrocketed to fame as one of China's most popular actors. Since then, he has starred in several iconic historical television series; such as "The Little Fairy" (2006), "The Young Warriors" (2006), "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" (2008), "Chinese Paladin 3" (2009), "The Myth" (2010), "" (2012) and "Sound of the Desert" (2014).


title: Hu Ge

text: In September 2012, he was nominated for Best Newcomer at the 31st Hundred Flowers Awards for his role as Lin Juemin in Chinese historical film "1911" (2012).


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu gained widespread acclaim with his roles as Ming Tai in the spy drama "The Disguiser" (2015) and Mei Changsu in the wuxia drama "Nirvana in Fire", for which he received the Best Actor Award at the 22nd Magnolia Awards and the Golden Eagle Awards. He ranked 24th on the Forbes China Celebrity 100 List for 2020.


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu Ge was born in Shanghai on 20 September 1982. He received his first training in performing arts in Little Stars Performing Arts School run by Shanghai Media Group (SMG). Hu Ge attended Shanghai Xiang Yang Elementary School (1989–94) and Shanghai No.2 High School (1994–2001), both known for their educational rigor.


title: Hu Ge

text: In addition to excellent academic work, Hu Ge's talents in a variety of extracurricular endeavors were also recognized. At age 14, Hu Ge started to host a popular TV show "Sunshine Youth" on Shanghai TV Education Channel for three years. Meanwhile, he was also selected to host a program in East Radio Shanghai. Hu Ge began his acting career by appearing in TV commercials, which helped him gain financial independence before graduating from high school.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2001, Hu Ge was admitted to two prestigious art institutes in China: the Central Academy of Drama and Shanghai Theatre Academy. Hu Ge decided to attend the latter, particularly attracted by its strong major in acting.


title: Hu Ge

text: While he was still studying, Hu Ge was recommended by his friend to Chinese Entertainment Shanghai (now known as Tangren Media) where he acted as a voice dub actor for the 2002 drama "The Book and the Sword" (书剑恩仇录). Following which, he signed on with the company. After appearing in numerous commercials, Hu starred in the film "Pretend There's No Feeling" (假裝沒感覺) with a minor role. His first television role was in the romance drama "Dandelion" (蒲公英).


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu rose to prominence in 2005 when he played Li Xiaoyao in "Chinese Paladin", a TV adaptation of the action RPG "The Legend of Sword and Fairy". The television series was a major hit in China and launched Hu to instant fame. The theme song sung by him, "June Rain" was also widely popular. The same year, he also portrayed Ning Caichen in the television series "Strange Tales of Liao Zhai".


title: Hu Ge

text: After "Chinese Paladin", Hu Ge embarked on a number of other TV projects, most of which had a "historical" theme, most notably as Dong Yong in "The Little Fairy" (2006); based on the Chinese folktale "Tian Xian Pei" and as Yang Yanzhao in "The Young Warriors" (2006); based on the play "The Generals of the Yang Family". He then starred in the horror film "The 601st Phone Call" (2006), where he received rave reviews for his performance.


title: Hu Ge

text: In October 2006, Hu made his debut as a singer with the release of his first EP, titled "Treasure" (珍惜).


title: Hu Ge

text: After a hiatus, Hu returned to the screen, reuniting with co-star, Ariel Lin, from The Little Fairy and starred as Guo Jing in "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" (2008), adapted from Louis Cha's novel of the same title., and was highly praised for his portrayal, along with co-star Ariel Lin. He also co-starred with Wu Chun and Charlene Choi in "The Butterfly Lovers" (2008), based on the famous Chinese legend Butterfly Lovers.


title: Hu Ge

text: On 15 May 2008, Hu released his second album, "Start" (出發), and embarked on his first solo concert in Shanghai.


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu then reprised his role as Li Xiaoyao "Chinese Paladin 3" (2009) while simultaneously acting as three other characters. The series achieved high ratings and was awarded the Ratings Contribution award at the Sichuan Festival.


title: Hu Ge

text: He next starred as the male protagonist in "The Myth" (2010), based on the 2005 Hong Kong film of the same title. The drama acquired very high viewership ratings, and boosted Hu's popularity to a new high. Hu won the Popularity award at the 1st China Student Television Festival, and Best Actor in the fantasy genre at the 2010 Huading Awards.


title: Hu Ge

text: To avoid being typecast, Hu subsequently stopped accepting any role in period dramas after he finished filming "The Myth". He took on leading roles in modern dramas; "Bitter Coffee" (苦咖啡, 2011), "Modern People" (摩登新人类, 2012) and "Unbeatable" (无懈可击之高手如林, 2012), as well as war drama "Shangri-La" (香格里拉, 2012). He also starred in the 2011 historical film "1911", playing Lin Juemin, and was nominated as Best New Actor at the 31st Hundred Flowers Awards.


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu returned to period drama in "", adapted from the video game of the same name, where he also acted as the series' producer. His excellent portrayal of his character's paradoxical personality earned him another Best Actor in the fantasy genre at the 2012 Huading Awards, as well as the Most Popular Actor award at the 4th China TV Drama Awards. The same year, he participated in CES's nano-movie "Refresh 3+7". He wrote the script for one of the stories "Lights from the City", and starred in 4 out of the 10 stories.


title: Hu Ge

text: 2013 has often been referred to as Hu Ge's year of Theatre plays. He acted as "Patient No.5" in Stan Lai's "A Dream Like a Dream", which served as the opening act at the 1st Wuzhen Theatre Festival. Hu's performance in "A Dream Like A Dream" especially surprised many theatre critics, and garnered positive reviews all round. He won the Best Actor award at the 2nd Denny Awards for his performance.


title: Hu Ge

text: He then starred as Xu Zhuang Tu in "Forever Yin Xueyan", a play based on Pai Hsien-yung's novel of the same title performed in the Shanghai dialect. He won the Most Popular Actor award at the Shanghai Culture Center, and the Most Popular Theater Actor of the Year at the BQ Magazine Popular Artists Ceremony.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2014, Hu Ge starred in modern drama "Life Revelations" alongside Yan Ni, and won the People's Choice award at the 9th Seoul International Drama Awards for his performance. He then starred in historical romance drama "Sound of the Desert", based on the novel "Ballad of the Desert" written by Tong Hua. Originally cast in the role of the leading male role, Hu decided to take on the role of the second male lead instead, as it was a type of character he has never played before. The same year, he garnered a Best Supporting Actor nomination at the 21st Shanghai Television Festival for his performance in acclaimed war drama, "Forty Nine Days: Memorial". With three successful dramas, Hu won the Most Popular Actor award at the 6th China TV Drama Awards.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2015, Hu starred in espionage drama "The Disguiser", which was popular with viewers and received considerably high ratings, with a market share above 8%. This was followed by "Nirvana in Fire", a turning point in Hu's acting career, and a commercial and critical success in its own right. Hu Ge won awards at two of the most prestigious television awards in China for his role in "Nirvana in Fire". He won Best Actor at the 22nd Shanghai Television Festival; and snagged a double victory by claiming both the Best Actor award and the Most Popular Actor award at the 28th China TV Golden Eagle Award.


title: Hu Ge

text: He then starred in modern drama "Good Times" (大好时光), written by "Life Revelations" writer Wang Liping. All three of his dramas in 2015 were listed under the "2015 China TV Drama Selection" by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2016, Hu starred in sports drama "Go! Goal! Fighting!" as a soccer coach. He returned to the big screen in December 2016, starring as an antagonist in the crime suspense film "Cherry Returns". The same year, "CBN Weekly" crowned him the most commercially valuable actor in China.


title: Hu Ge

text: The unprecedented surge in popularity in 2015 brought immense pressure. Hu admitted at the end of that year that he wished to take a break from acting. That wish was eventually fulfilled in the spring of 2017. He disappeared from the public eye for much of the year. In 2017, Hu starred in "Game of Hunting", a drama produced by critically acclaimed director and screenwriter Jiang Wei. The series was filmed back in 2015 and premiered on Hunan TV in November 2017. Hu was later nominated for the Best Actor award at the Shanghai Television Festival for his role as a headhunter.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2018, Hu was cast in Diao Yinan's drama film "The Wild Goose Lake". It was selected to compete for the Palme d'Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. The same year, Hu made a guest appearance in romance film "Last Letter" directed by Shunji Iwai.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2019, Hu was cast as the male lead in the sports biographic film about tennis player Li Na, directed by Peter Chan. The same year, he was cast in the adventure drama film "The Climbers" .


title: Hu Ge

text: In the winter of 2019, cast in the lead male role (zhu, Shaoyu), Hu joined co-star Wen Qi in "A Touch of Warm,” a crime film directed by Kang Bo. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, filming was suspended until the winter of 2020. The almost one-year gap rendered many of the finished scenes unusable and had to be re-shot. It wrapped on February 22, 2021, and is currently in post-production.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2020, Hu announced his return to the small screen with period drama "Blossoms Shanghai" directed by Wong Kar-wai, based on the award-winning novel "Blossoms by Jin Yucheng".


title: Hu Ge

text: Hu Ge was involved in a car accident on 29 August 2006 while traveling from Hengdian to Shanghai on the highway. He survived with severe injuries while his assistant died. Hu had to undergo surgery and the entire healing process took approximately one year. The filming of "The Legend of the Condor Heroes", which he was working on then, was temporarily halted due to his injury, in addition to being unable to complete promoting his finished project "The Young Warriors" with his fellow cast members. Hu Ge expresses how he felt of the incident through the performance of his single "Dare to Love", and filmed a music video with his co-star from the two series and friend Cecilia Liu.


title: Hu Ge

text: Soon after the accident, he also published a book "Scavenger of Happiness", filled with his thoughts on the accident and post events, interesting childhood events, well wishes from good friends and previously unexposed pictures. This book documented in detail the process of how Hu Ge changed from a young idol with a smooth career path into an increasingly mature actor who could truthfully face life's problems as a scavenger of happiness.


title: Hu Ge

text: Following his surge in popularity and public awareness, Hu has also been appointed the Shanghai Tourism Ambassador in 2015. Professional designers from Madame Tussauds Shanghai took measurements from Hu to make two wax figures of him; one of himself and one of his character Mei Changsu from "Nirvana in Fire", which was unveiled in September 2016.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2016, Hu Ge was named brand ambassador of Emporio Armani in China and Asia Pacific. In the same year, he also became brand ambassadors for Piaget Chanel Perfume and Cosmetics, and EF Education First.


title: Hu Ge

text: In 2020, Hu Ge was promoted from regional ambassador to global ambassador of Giorgio Armani, the first actor to hold such a title.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The United Kingdom operated the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II as one of its principal combat aircraft from 1968 to 1992. The UK was the first export customer for the Phantom, which was ordered in the context of political and economic difficulties around British designs for the roles that it eventually undertook. The Phantom was procured to serve in both the Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm (FAA) and the Royal Air Force in several roles including air defence, close air support, low-level strike and tactical reconnaissance.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Although assembled in the United States, the UK's early Phantoms were a special batch built separately with a significant amount of British technology as a means of easing the pressure on the domestic aerospace industry in the wake of major project cancellations. Two variants were initially built for the UK: the F-4K variant was designed from the outset as an air defence interceptor to be operated by the FAA from the Royal Navy's aircraft carriers, and the F-4M version was procured for the RAF to serve in the tactical strike and reconnaissance roles. In the mid-1980s, a third Phantom variant was obtained when 15 second-hand F-4J aircraft were purchased to augment the UK's air defences following the Falklands War.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The Phantom entered service with both the FAA and the RAF in 1969. In FAA service, it had a secondary strike role, while in the RAF it was soon replaced in the strike role by other aircraft designed specifically for strike and close air support. By the mid-1970s, the Phantom had become the UK's principal interceptor, a role in which it continued until the early 1990s.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In the late 1950s, the British Government began the process of replacing its early second-generation jet combat aircraft in service with the Royal Air Force (RAF) and Fleet Air Arm (FAA). At the time, the British aerospace industry was still the major provider of aircraft to the British armed forces, and designs from several companies were in service. The 1957 Defence White Paper precipitated a significant change in the industry as the Government compelled major aerospace manufacturers to amalgamate using new aircraft contracts as an incentive. As a result two large groups emerged; The British Aircraft Corporation was formed by the merger of English Electric, Vickers-Armstrongs, Bristol and Hunting, and Hawker Siddeley was formed from the merger of Hawker Siddeley Aviation, Folland, de Havilland and Blackburn.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: At this time, the RAF wished to replace the English Electric Canberra light bomber in the long-range interdictor role, and the Hawker Hunter in the close air support role, while the Royal Navy (RN) sought an aircraft to assume the fleet air defence role from the de Havilland Sea Vixen. BAC, through its English Electric subsidiary, had begun developing a new high-performance strike aircraft, the TSR-2, which was intended for long-range, low-level strike missions with conventional and tactical nuclear weapons, as well as tactical reconnaissance. Hawker Siddeley was also developing the P.1154, a proposed supersonic version of its P.1127 V/STOL demonstrator, that could be marketed to both the RAF and RN to fulfil a number of roles: close air support, air superiority and fleet air defence.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: During the early 1960s, aircraft development became increasingly expensive, resulting in major projects often becoming mired in political and economic concerns. The TSR-2 project experienced increasing cost overruns. The P.1154 was subject to the ongoing inter-service rivalry between the RN and RAF, which led to two wildly differing specifications being submitted for the aircraft that were impossible to fulfil with a single airframe.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In February 1964, the RN withdrew from the P.1154 project, and moved to procure a new fleet air defence interceptor. It eventually selected the McDonnell F-4 Phantom, then in service with the United States Navy (USN) as its primary air defence aircraft, intended to be operated from both existing and planned aircraft carriers. This better suited the RN, as the Phantom had two engines (providing redundancy in the event of an engine failure), was cheaper than the P.1154, and was available immediately. In October the same year, the general election brought the Labour Party back into power. The new government undertook a defence review, which led to the publication in February 1966 of a white paper that cancelled several projects, including both the P.1154 and the TSR-2. As a consequence, the government had to find alternatives to replace the Canberra and Hunter for the RAF. To replace the Canberra in the long-range role (which was intended for the TSR-2), the F-111 was selected, with plans for a redesigned variant, while the roles undertaken by the Hunter (for which P.1154 was to be procured) would be undertaken by a further purchase of F-4 Phantoms.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The RN was happy with the choice of the aircraft as its Sea Vixen replacement, given that the type had been operational in the fleet air defence role with the USN since 1961. US aircraft had also successfully undertaken touch-and-go landings on both and . The RAF was less enthusiastic, as the Phantom was not optimised for the close air support role, and had been selected as its Hunter replacement more as a way of decreasing the per-unit cost of the overall UK order.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Partly as a means of maintaining employment in the British aerospace industry, agreement was reached that major portions of the UK's Phantoms would be built domestically. Hawker Siddeley Aviation was appointed as McDonnell's primary UK partner in January 1965, to be responsible for repair, maintenance, design and modification work on Phantoms for the RAF and RN at Brough Aerodrome. Further work was delegated to both BAC, at its Warton facility, and Short Brothers in Belfast.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The F-4J variant, which was then the primary version in service with the USN, was taken as the basis for the UK aircraft, subject to major redesign. The most significant change was the use of the larger and more powerful Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan in place of the GE J79 turbojet to allow operations from the RN's smaller carriers. To accommodate the larger engines, BAC redesigned and built the entire rear fuselage section. The Westinghouse AN/AWG-10 radar carried by the F-4J was to be procured and built under licence by Ferranti. In total, approximately half of the structure and equipment of the UK's Phantoms was produced by British manufacturers, with all of the components then shipped for assembly by McDonnell in St Louis. The changes to the aircraft led to the two variants being given their own separate series letters, with the FAA version being designated as the F-4K and the RAF version as the F-4M.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Initially, there was an intention to procure up to 400 aircraft for the RN and the RAF, but the development cost for the changes to accommodate the new engines meant that the per-unit price eventually ended up three times the price of an F-4J. Due to government policy the budget for the Phantom procurement was fixed, therefore these costs could not be evened out by a large production run and only 170 were ordered.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The British Government ordered four prototypes (two F-4K and two F-4M), together with a pair of pre-production F-4K aircraft. The first UK Phantom, a prototype F-4K (designated YF-4K), first flew on 27 June 1966 at the McDonnell plant in St. Louis. The second made its first flight on 30 August 1966. The two pre-production F-4K aircraft were constructed alongside the prototypes, and were initially used for fit check trials of the various systems to be fitted. The first was used for catapult/arrestor and deck landing trials, and the second was primarily for testing the radar and missile systems. All four were delivered to the UK from 1969 to 1970 for continued test work by the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE), Ministry of Defence Procurement Executive, Rolls-Royce and BAC (and later its successor, British Aerospace). The first F-4M prototype (designated YF-4M) first flew on 17 February 1967, and was also used for fit checks before delivery to the UK.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In 1964, the Phantom was ordered for the FAA to serve as the RN's primary fleet air defence aircraft, with a secondary strike capability. It was intended that these aircraft would operate from the decks of four aircraft carriers; and , which would be rebuilt to enable the operation of the aircraft, and two planned new ships.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The requirements for the intended force of four carriers meant that five squadrons of Phantoms would be needed. However, in its 1966 Defence White Paper, the Government decided to cancel the two new carriers, and begin a gradual rundown of fixed-wing aviation in the RN, which led to a reduction in the total order from 140 to just 48, with options for another seven. The intention was to form a pair of front-line squadrons, each of twelve aircraft, that would operate from the two remaining, heavily modernised fleet carriers. The remaining 24 aircraft were to be used to form a training unit, and to provide a reserve pool in the event of aircraft losses.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The RN received its first F-4K Phantoms, which carried the British designation FG.1, in April 1968. These were assigned to 700P Naval Air Squadron (NAS), which was to serve as the Intensive Flying Trials Unit. Upon completion of the successful flight trials, 767 Naval Air Squadron was commissioned in January 1969 as the FAA's training squadron. This was followed at the end of March 1969 by 892 Naval Air Squadron, which was commissioned as the RN's first operational Phantom unit. During 892 NAS's initial work up, three of its aircraft were entered in the Daily Mail Trans-Atlantic Air Race, a competition to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first trans-Atlantic flight. One aircraft set a record of four hours and 46 minutes for the west to east crossing between Floyd Bennett Field in New York City and Wisley Airfield outside London, a record that stood for five years.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: At the same time as the FAA was receiving its first aircraft, the A&AEE had three FG.1s delivered to its 'C' Squadron for flight deck trials aboard "Eagle". Two sets of trials were successfully carried out in March and June 1969; the first comprised approaches and touch-and-go landings, while the second set of trials involved full catapult launch and arrested recovery. As a result of the reheat from the Spey turbofans, the ship's jet blast deflectors (JBD) were not used; instead a steel plate was fixed to the deck to absorb the heat of the engines building to launch, and fire hoses were used after each launch to prevent them melting.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: "Ark Royal" had entered refit to accommodate the Phantom in 1967; this involved a major reconstruction, including several elements to allow the ship to operate the aircraft – the flight deck was increased in area and fully angled to 8½°, the arresting gear was replaced with a new water-spray system to accommodate the Phantom's higher weight and landing speed, and bridle catchers and water-cooled JBDs were fitted to the catapults. Once this work was complete, "Eagle" was scheduled to undergo a similar modernisation. But, in 1968, the government announced plans to completely phase-out fixed-wing aviation in the RN, decommissioning all of its aircraft carriers by 1972. This led to the intended refit of "Eagle" being cancelled, with the options for seven additional FG.1s not taken up. As a consequence, it was decided to further reduce the FAA's Phantom fleet to just 28 aircraft.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The 1970 change of government led to a reprieve for the Fleet Air Arm, as it was decided that the cost of refitting "Ark Royal" was too much for a further two years of use, which led to it being decided to retain the ship in service as the RN's sole aircraft carrier. But, because it was believed that 892 NAS would be the final carrier-based fixed-wing squadron to be commissioned into the FAA, their Phantoms each a capital Omega (Ω) letter on their tailfins, intended to symbolise their place at the end of the RN's era of fixed-wing aviation.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: "Ark Royal" embarked 892 NAS as part of her air group for the first time in 1970, with a total of 12 aircraft. The first operational use of the RN's Phantoms had come in 1969, when 892 NAS had embarked for training with the US aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean, and had undertaken air defence missions alongside the ship's own F-4Js. This deployment showed the necessity for the modifications fitted to "Ark Royal". During the initial launches from "Saratoga", the heat from the afterburners caused the deck plates to distort, leading to subsequent catapult launches being undertaken at reduced weight without the use of re-heat.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: During "Ark Royal"'s first three-year commission, 892 NAS, which had initially used RNAS Yeovilton in Somerset as its home base, moved to RAF Leuchars in Fife where, during the periods when it was not embarked, it undertook Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) duties alongside the RAF's 43 Squadron. At the same time, 767 NAS was disbanded as the RN's Phantom training unit - the squadron had been the joint training unit for both the FAA and the RAF in using the FG.1. In its place, an RAF-operated Phantom Training Flight was established at RAF Leuchars in August 1972.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The Phantom served in the FAA until 1978, when "Ark Royal" was withdrawn from service, leaving no ship in the RN capable of operating the type. The final catapult launch from "Ark Royal" was a Phantom of 892 NAS on 27 November 1978 during the disembarkation of the air group; the squadron's aircraft were delivered to RAF St Athan in Wales, where they were handed over to the RAF. During the type's service with the RN, 10 of the total FAA fleet of 28 were lost in crashes.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Following the cancellation of the planned refit of HMS "Eagle" to allow her to operate the Phantom, a total of 20 airframes that had originally been ordered for the FAA were diverted to the RAF to serve in the air defence role. At the time, the RAF's primary interceptor was the English Electric Lightning, which had comparatively poor range, loiter time and weapons fit. These limitations hampered its effectiveness, especially in long interceptions of Soviet Air Forces and Soviet Naval Aviation bombers and reconnaissance aircraft over the North Sea and North Atlantic. A new Phantom squadron was formed at RAF Leuchars, the UK's most northerly air defence base at the time, to take advantage of the improvements that the Phantom provided over the Lightning – it could carry more fuel, and had consequently better range and endurance; it was fitted with a more powerful radar; and it could carry more missiles (up to 8, compared to 2 for the Lightning). On 1 September 1969, 43 Squadron was formed at Leuchars, operating as part of the UK's northern QRA zone alongside the Lightnings of 11 Squadron and 23 Squadron. In 1972, when 11 Squadron was redeployed to join 5 Squadron at RAF Binbrook, it was replaced at Leuchars by the RN Phantoms of 892 NAS.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Upon the withdrawal of HMS "Ark Royal" in 1978, the Phantoms of the FAA were handed over to the RAF and used to form a second squadron at Leuchars. At the time, 111 Squadron was stationed there operating the FGR.2 version of the Phantom, having been there since 1975. In 1979, to save costs resulting from the differences between the FG.1 and FGR.2, the squadron converted to the ex-Navy aircraft and the FGR.2 airframes were distributed to other Phantom units. Upon 111 Squadron's conversion to the FG.1, the Phantom Training Flight, which had been resident at Leuchars since 1972, was disbanded, and responsibility for all Phantom conversion training turned over to 228 Operational Conversion Unit.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Both 43 and 111 Squadrons retained the FG.1 until 1989, when they converted to the new Tornado F.3. Following the standing down of the two operational squadrons and the final withdrawal of the type from service, the bulk of the RAF's FG.1 Phantoms were scrapped. The RAF lost eight of their FG.1s in crashes throughout the type's twenty year service.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Following the cancellation of both the TSR-2 and P.1154 programmes, the RAF was still left with a requirement for aircraft in the long-range strike, close air support and reconnaissance roles. This resulted in orders for two aircraft types, the General Dynamics F-111K, intended for the long-range interdiction role, and the F-4M Phantom, which would be used for close air support; both aircraft were to be fitted for reconnaissance. The F-111K was cancelled within a year of being ordered, but the order for 150 Phantoms went ahead alongside the Phantom order for the RN; the final 32 units of the RAF order were eventually cancelled. The RAF Phantom, given the designation FGR.2, was broadly similar to the naval version, with some minor variations in terms of engines, avionics and structure, relating to its use as a land-based, rather than carrier-based aircraft.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The first RAF Phantom unit was 228 Operational Conversion Unit, which was stood up in August 1968. The Phantom entered operational service as part of Strike Command in May 1969, when 6 Squadron was formed at RAF Coningsby in the tactical strike role. 54 Squadron was formed in September the same year, followed by 41 Squadron in 1972 as a tactical reconnaissance unit. A further four squadrons were formed under RAF Germany in 1970 and 1971: 2, 14, 17 and 31 Squadrons, all at RAF Brüggen.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Along with their conventional strike role, 14, 17 and 31 Squadrons were assigned a tactical nuclear strike role by SACEUR, using weapons supplied by the United States. After initial work-up, 2 Squadron operated from RAF Laarbruch in the tactical reconnaissance role. The aircraft assigned to the two tactical reconnaissance units were fitted with a pod containing four optical cameras, an infrared linescan and a sideways looking radar.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: During the 1970s, France and the UK were developing a new aircraft which could fill the RAF tactical strike and reconnaissance missions: the SEPECAT Jaguar was introduced into service in 1974, and led to a re-think of the Phantom's role as, at the same time, the limitations of the Lightning as an interceptor were becoming more apparent. The conversion of the RAF's FGR.2 squadrons to operate the Jaguar, combined with its use of the Blackburn Buccaneer, meant that it was possible to begin transferring Phantoms to operate purely as interceptors in the air defence role.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In October 1974, 111 Squadron converted from the Lightning to the Phantom FGR.2, becoming the first unit to operate the type in the air defence role (notwithstanding 43 Squadron, which had used the FG.1 version since 1969). As more Jaguars were delivered, Phantoms were released enabling existing Lightning squadrons to be converted; 19 Squadron and 92 Squadron, the forward deployed air defence units in Germany, converted in 1976 and 1977 respectively, at the same time moving from RAF Gütersloh, which was the closest RAF base to the East German border, to RAF Wildenrath, taking advantage of the Phantom's superior range over the Lightning. Three further UK based squadrons, 23, 29 and 56, were also converted between 1974 and 1976. 111 Squadron, which had been the first unit to use the FGR.2 as an interceptor, converted to the FG.1 version in 1979 following the transfer of the RN's remaining airframes to the RAF. The Phantom subsequently served as the RAF's primary interceptor for over a decade until the introduction into service of the Panavia Tornado F.3 in 1987.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: When Phantoms were first delivered to interceptor squadrons, they remained in the grey-green camouflage colour scheme more associated with the strike and close air support missions they had undertaken. During the late 1970s, the RAF began experimenting with new colours for its air defence units, with 56 Squadron tasked with trialling proposed new schemes. In October 1978, a Phantom FGR.2 of 56 Squadron became the first to be painted in the new air superiority grey colour, combined with small, low visibility roundels and markings. However, although the roundel remained in low visibility colours, individual squadron markings eventually returned to more observable sizes and colours.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In May 1982, three Phantoms from 29 Squadron were forward deployed to RAF Wideawake on Ascension Island to provide air cover for the RAF's operations during the Falklands War, replacing Harriers of 1 Squadron, which were transiting to the war zone. In October 1982, following the end of the conflict and the reconstruction of the runway, 29 Squadron detached nine of its aircraft to RAF Stanley to provide air defence for the Falkland Islands. In March 1983 23 Squadron took up the role, remaining stationed there until October 1988, when they were replaced by 1435 Flight.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Initially, it was intended that Phantoms and Tornados would serve alongside each other. A total of 152 Tornado F.3s were ordered for the RAF, enough to convert four squadrons of Phantoms and two of Lightnings, but insufficient to completely convert every air defence squadron. The intention was to retain a pair of UK based Phantom squadrons at RAF Wattisham, alongside a pair of Tornado units at RAF Coningsby to provide air defence cover for the southern half of the UK Air Defence Region. Another two squadrons stationed in Germany would also be retained.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: However the end of the Cold War saw the Phantom withdrawn from service under the Options for Change defence review. This saw the disbanding of 228 Operational Conversion Unit in January 1991, with the Phantom Training Flight, which had previously operated FG.1 training between 1972 and 1978, re-established for twelve months to run refresher courses on the type. As part of the gradual run down of the RAF's presence in Germany, the two forward based units were to be disbanded, while there would also be a reduction in the number of air defence squadrons leading to the two UK based units being disbanded in late 1992. However, just prior to the final withdrawal of the Phantom, it was recalled operationally as a result of Operation Granby, the UK's participation in the First Gulf War, when aircraft from 19 and 92 Squadrons were forward deployed to provide air defence cover at RAF Akrotiri; this was to replace the Tornados that had been originally deployed there on exercise, and were subsequently sent to the Gulf region.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Following their final withdrawal from service, with a few exceptions, the bulk of the RAF's FGR.2 fleet was scrapped. Over its service life, 37 FGR.2s were lost to crashes.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In 1984, following the deployment of a squadron of Phantoms to the Falkland Islands, the government decided that the resulting gap in the UK's air defences needed to be filled, and so sought to purchase another squadron of Phantoms. Because the aircraft in RAF service were a special production batch built to UK specifications, it would not be possible to obtain identical aircraft, so 15 airframes were procured from among the best of the ex-USN F-4Js stored at the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center at Davis–Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona. The F-4J was chosen because it was the variant from which the RAF's F-4Ks and F-4Ms were developed, and was thus the closest available to the British aircraft. The 15 that were selected were extensively refurbished at the Naval Air Rework Facility at NAS North Island and brought to a standard almost equivalent to the F-4S, which was the last variant in service with the USN, the only differences being the absence of leading-edge slats and a helmet gun sight.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The major difference between the F-4J and the British Phantoms was the absence of the Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan, the former being fitted with the General Electric J79-10B turbojet. Initially capable of carrying the AIM-7 Sparrow and AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles (AAM), they were soon made compatible with the Skyflash and SUU-23A gun pod, bringing them into line with the rest of the RAF's Phantoms. Despite modifications to allow them to operate with the rest of the fleet, the F-4Js retained the vast bulk of the equipment they were originally fitted with, even requiring their crews to use American flying helmets.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Although the new Phantoms were assigned a British designation as the F.3, they were generally referred to as the F-4J(UK). They were assigned to 74 Squadron at RAF Wattisham, which stood up in October 1984, two months after the first flight. The aircraft remained in service through the transition to the Tornado, which began entering service in 1987. In 1990, thanks to the conversion of F-4M squadrons to the Tornado, the RAF were able to transfer the best of its remaining FGR.2s to 74 Squadron, which meant that the F.3 was able to be withdrawn in January 1991. With a couple of exceptions, all of the RAF's F-4Js were broken up for scrap. One of the 15 airframes was lost in a crash in 1987, killing both crew members.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The Phantom FG.1 and FGR.2 as built were similar, being fitted with broadly the same engines and avionics, although there were minor differences. The FG.1 was initially fitted with the Mark 201 version of the Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan, while the FGR.2 had the Mark 202; the Mark 201 had an unacceptable time lag between throttle movement and engine response, which was remedied in the 202. The 201 was eventually upgraded to the Mark 203 version, which had a modified control system for the afterburner, allowing it to light faster and enable power to be applied quickly in the event of a bolter on the small decks of the RN's aircraft carriers. Both variants were fitted with a version of the same avionics package; the FG.1 was fitted with the AN/AWG-11, which differed primarily in having a nose radome that was hinged and able to fold backwards against the aircraft's fuselage to allow for storage in the hangar of an aircraft carrier; the system was designed to be integrated with both the AGM-12 Bullpup missile and WE.177 free-fall nuclear weapon as required. The AN/AWG-12 fitted to the FGR.2 was not foldable, and featured a better ground mapping mode, to take into account the strike role for which the type was originally procured; allied to this was a Ferranti inertial navigation/attack system (removed when the type converted to the air defence role). It was also configured to be able to control the SUU-23/A gun pod; FG.1s used by the RAF were also able to use the gun pod, but the RN's FG.1s lacked this capability.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Although there were minor differences between the two types of Phantom built for the UK, there were many significant ones between the British Phantoms and those built for the United States. The most obvious was the substitution of the Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan for the General Electric J79 turbojet. The Spey was shorter but wider than the J79, which meant that the British Phantoms' intakes had to be redesigned for a higher airflow, making them 20% larger (with a consequent increase in drag), while the fuselage was widened by . The position of the afterburner also meant that the rear of the fuselage had to be made deeper. Auxiliary intake doors were fitted on the rear fuselage.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Performance estimates of the British Phantom compared to its American equivalent indicated that the former had a 30% shorter take-off distance, 20% faster climb to altitude, higher top speed and longer range. The Spey was more efficient at lower altitudes, and had better acceleration at low speed, giving British Phantoms better range and acceleration, which was shown during the deployment of 892 NAS to the Mediterranean aboard USS "Saratoga" in 1969, when the F-4K was repeatedly quicker off the deck than the F-4J used by the Americans. It was less efficient at higher altitudes, the British Phantoms lacking speed compared to J79-powered versions owing to the increased drag of the re-designed fuselage. This discrepancy became apparent when the F-4J was obtained by the UK in 1984; it was regarded as being the best of the three variants to serve in the RAF.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The small size of the aircraft carriers "Eagle" and "Ark Royal", from which the RN's Phantoms were intended to operate, compared to the USN carriers of the period, meant that the F-4K version required significant structural changes compared to the F-4J, from which it was descended, and which performed a similar role. As well as the folding nose radome to allow for storage in the smaller hangars of the British ships, it had to have a significantly strengthened undercarriage to account for the higher landing weight (British policy was to bring back unused ordnance). The F-4J featured a nosewheel oleo that extended by to provide the correct attitude for launch from American catapults. The F-4K's nosewheel oleo extended by to increase the take-off attitude (the extension of the nosewheel put the Phantom at a 9° attitude) due to the shorter and less powerful British catapults. It was also fitted with drooping ailerons, enlarged leading edge flaps and a slotted tailplane, and increased flap and leading edge blowing, all to improve the lift and handling characteristics of operation from the much smaller carriers of the RN.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: As the Phantom continued in service, other changes were made, most notably the Marconi ARI.18228 Radar Warning Receiver (RWR) fitted on top of the vertical stabiliser of FG.1 and FGR.2 Phantoms in the mid-1970s, but not to the F.3. From 1978, the Skyflash AAM, derived from the AIM-7 Sparrow, began to be delivered to RAF Phantom units, and was used concurrently with the Sparrow; all three UK Phantom variants were eventually fitted to operate the Skyflash.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: The first batch of Phantoms produced for the UK received serials in the XT range, with a total of 44 production models (20 FG.1s and 24 FGR.2s), as well as the four prototypes and two pre-production models being given XT serial numbers. The bulk of the UK's specially built Phantoms were delivered with XV serials (94 FGR.2s and 28 FG.1s), while the two cancelled sets of airframes (32 FGR.2 and 7 FG.1) also received XV numbers. The second-hand examples (15 F.3) obtained in 1984 received serials in the ZE range.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Although the Phantom was ordered in 1966, the variants that were eventually constructed were not the first to be offered to the UK. McDonnell Aircraft had been conducting studies into the possibility of the Royal Navy using the Phantom on its carriers since 1959.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: McDonnell concluded that more power was needed than the J79 turbojet could provide to operate from the smaller decks of British carriers and as a result consulted Rolls-Royce about whether the RB-168 Spey turbofan, then in development for use in the Blackburn Buccaneer, could be fitted to the aircraft. In 1960, McDonnell approached the RAF with its model number 98CJ, which was an F4H-1 (later F-4B) with various modifications, including the installation of the Spey Mk.101 turbofan. McDonnell continued studies, proposing afterburning Mk.101 engines in 1962, while trials of an F-4B fitted with an extendable nosewheel oleo took place aboard in 1963. In 1964, the company proposed the model 98FC, which was identical to the F-4D variant but would have been fitted with the RB.168-25R.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: A further proposal came after the order for the F-4M was being finalised, and was a result of the UK's need for an aircraft to perform the tactical reconnaissance role. For this, McDonnell offered two options:


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Although the RF-4M would have had some advantages, it was discounted as the cost would have been greater, with consequently fewer aircraft purchased, while only those that had been modified would have been able to undertake the reconnaissance mission. Ultimately, the RAF chose the standard F-4M and external pod, which allowed all of its aircraft to perform all designated roles.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: Another McDonnell proposal was a variation of the carrier-based Phantom, with the goal of improving catapult performance and lowering approach speeds. The F-4(HL), also known as Model 98HL, was planned as a Spey-powered aircraft with a longer fuselage and wingspan, less sweep, stabilators with increased area and air intakes with auxiliary blow-in doors to increase airflow at low speeds. This proposal was not taken forward.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In the early 1970s, the RAF issued an Air Staff Requirement for the development of a new interceptor intended to replace both the Phantom and the Lightning. An early proposal was McDonnell Douglas's plan for a Phantom with a variable-geometry wing. This was rejected by the RAF owing to the fact that there was little apparent improvement in performance over the existing Phantom, and that it might affect the development of the "Multi-Role Combat Aircraft" (MRCA). An alternative idea was to take the MRCA, which evolved into the Panavia Tornado, and develop an interceptor version. The UK's partners in the MRCA project displayed no enthusiasm for this air defence version of the Tornado, so the UK alone began the process, and the authorisation for what came to be known as the Tornado Air Defence Variant (ADV) was issued in March 1976. The initial plan was for the Tornado to replace the remaining two squadrons of Lightnings, as well as all seven squadrons of Phantoms.


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: While the Tornado was in development, the RAF looked at interim measures to replace the Phantom, which had been in service for over a decade by 1980, and was beginning to suffer from fatigue; one proposal was the lease or purchase of F-15 Eagles to re-equip 19 and 92 Squadrons, the units stationed in Germany. Further suggestions were that up to 80 F-15s be procured, to replace the Phantom and Lightning squadrons then in service, or even cancel the Tornado entirely and purchase the F-15 with UK adaptations (specifically fitting of the AI.24 Foxhunter radar developed for the Tornado, and the Skyflash air-to-air missile).


title: McDonnell Douglas Phantom in UK service

text: In the end, the F-15 option was not seriously considered, as it was felt there would not be time or cost savings over the Tornado ADV. The Tornado ultimately replaced the Phantom in four squadrons - the two FG.1 units plus two FGR.2 units (23 and 29 Squadrons), while 56 and 74 Squadrons, and the two Germany based units (19 and 92 Squadrons) retained the Phantom.