News Bytes

Crown of the Statue of Liberty re-opened

On time for American Independence Day on July 4, the crown of the Statue of Liberty is being re-opened for visitors. The 335 feet high New York landmark had been closed to visitors for security reasons after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Currently, only the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty can be visited. Visitors must climb a 168-step spiral staircase to get to the crown. Accompanied by a Ranger of the National Park Service, ten visitors at a time may climb up to the crown. From there, they have nice view of the Manhattan skyline. The statue on Liberty Island and nearby Ellis Island are open to visitors every day between 9am and 5pm. To visit the Statue of Liberty, you must reserve a ticket first. The ticket includes a free tour. Ferry tickets from and to Battery Park are available for about $12 (€8.50).

Barack Obama saves girl trouble in school

US president Obama wrote ten-year-old Kennedy Corpus a note for missing school. The girl was attending one of his town-hall style meetings on health care. Her father started off his question to the president by mentioning that he had brought his daughter, who was missing school to be there and he hoped she wouldn’t get in trouble. Obama asked: “Do you need me to write a note?” “I’ll take you up on that, actually, Mr. President,” the surprised father replied. And Obama actually did write a note, with the words: “Please excuse Kennedy’s absence. She’s with me. Barack Obama.”

Germany: cheaper sim cards for US

Good news for all Germans who have ever complained about high roaming charges for phone calls in the US: CallCompany in Berlin now offers the Cellion USA sim card. You can get the card free of charge without base rate or minimum charge. If you have an older cell phone without tri-band or quad-band, you can buy an American cell phone at a favorable price. While you are charged between € 2-3 per minute for phone calls from the US with a German sim card, with the Cellion sim card you can make your calls for € 0.39. Receiving calls is much cheaper as well. Instead of € 1.50 to € 3 per minute for an incoming call, with the Cellion card you only pay € 0.29. In addition, you get your own American phone number. Callers from Germany can call this number for a few cents per minute, and Americans will, of course, prefer calling an American number to calling an expensive German one. Especially for doing business in the US, this can be a real advantage.

US airlines cut flight capacity

Delta Air Lines has announced plans to cut flight capacity. Reasons are low demand and rising jet fuel prices. Compared to the year 2008, flight capacity will be cut by 10% from September 2009. International capacity will be cut 15%. In Germany, only Frankfurt to Cincinnati is concerned, a Delta spokeswoman said. Berlin to New York, for example, will not be affected. American Airlines also wants to make more cuts than originally planned. Jet fuel prices rose ten percent since the beginning of this year.