Diana Nyad

Diana Nyad, born August 22, 1949 in New York City is a former world record-holding American swimmer and public radio contributor.

Over two days in 1979, Nyad swam from Bimini to Florida, setting a distance record for non-stop swimming without a wetsuit that still stands today. She broke numerous world records, including the 45-year-old mark for circling Manhattan Island (7 hrs, 57 min) in 1975. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1986. Nyad was honored with her induction in the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 2003.

She currently provides a weekly five-minute radio piece on sports for KCRW called The Score (heard during KCRW's broadcast of NPR's "All Things Considered"), as well as for the Marketplace radio program. She formerly hosted the public radio program "The Savvy Traveler.

Nyad graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Lake Forest College in 1973.

Nyad told a reporter, that today -- in contrast to her youth -- her drive is no longer propelled by attempts to work through the anger manifest from sexual abuse she suffered as a teenager.

On 8 July 2011, the U.S. gay sports website CompleteNetwork.com reported on her plans for the 2011 Cuba swim, writing that "(the) amazing Diana Nyad is a living legend in the Swim World, and a role model for the GBLT community, being openly lesbian.

Swimming accomplishments

Born in New York City in August 1949 to stockbroker William Sneed and his wife Lucy Curtis. Her father died when she was three and her mother soon remarried to Aristotle Nyad, a Greek land developer, who adopted Diana. The family then moved to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, where she grew up and began swimming seriously in grade seven. She was enrolled at the elite Pine Crest School in the mid-1960s, swimming under the tutelage of Olympian (and Hall of Fame) coach Jack Nelson. Before graduating she won three Florida state high school championships in the Backstroke (at 100 and 200 yards). She dreamed of swimming in the 1968 Summer Olympics, but in 1966 she spent three months in bed with endocarditis, an infection of the heart, and when she began swimming again she had lost her speed.

After graduating Pine Crest School in 1967 she entered Emory University but was thrown out of school for jumping out a fourth-floor dormitory window wearing a parachute. She then enrolled at Lake Forest College in Illinois, where she played tennis for the Foresters and resumed swimming, concentrating on distance events. She soon came to the attention of Buck Dawson, director of the International Swimming Hall of Fame in Florida, who introduced her to marathon swimming. She began training at his Camp Ak-O-Mak in Ontario, Canada and set a woman's world record of 4 hours and 22 minutes in her first race, a 10-mile swim in Lake Ontario in July 1970 (finishing 10th overall). After graduating Lake Forest College (with degrees in English and French), Nyad returned to south Florida to continue training with Dawson.

Diana Nyad was inducted into the United States' National Women’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1986, and in 2003 she was honored with her induction in the International Swimming Hall of Fame. According to her "Speaker Bio" posted for the Gold Star Speakers Bureau in 2006, she is also a Hall of Famer at both her college, Lake Forest College in Illinois (where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa) and at her (private) high school, Pine Crest School in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida).

Previous distance swims

1970: At age 20, Nyad's marathon swimming career began in July 1970, when she set the women's world record for the 10-mile swim across Lake Ontario, in four hours and 22 minutes.

1974: In June 1974 flew to Italy and entered the 22-mile Bay of Naples race, setting another women's record of 8 hours, 11 minutes.

1975: At age 26, Nyad made national headlines by swimming 28 miles around the island of Manhattan (New York City) in just under 8 hours (7 hours 57 minutes.) An account of her swim, published the next day, stated Nyad was "5 feet six inches tall" and weighed 128 pounds.

1978: At age 28 she first attempted to swim from Havana, Cuba to Key West. Diving into the ocean at 2PM on Sunday 13 August from Ortegosa Beach (50 miles west of Havana), she swam inside a 20 X 40 foot steel shark cage for nearly 42 hours, before team doctors removed her during the 7 o'clock hour on the morning of Tuesday 15 August due to strong Westerly winds and 8-foot swells that were slamming her against the cage and pushing her off-course towards Texas. She had covered about 76 miles, but not in a straight line.

1979: In what was to be her last "competitive" swim on her 30th birthday (21-22 August 1979), she set a world record for distance swimming (both men and women) over open water by swimming 102 miles from North Bimini Island, Bahamas, to Juno Beach, Florida (without the use of protective shark cage). Thanks to favorable winds and a following sea she averaged 3.7 miles per hour and completed the swim in 27 and one-half hours.

Cuba-to-Florida swim

By early January 2010 Nyad determined to begin working out for a summer attempt to swim from Cuba-to-Florida. Taking up residence in the Caribbean island of St. Maarten, from January through June she began doing 8-, 10-, 12- and 14-hour swims every other week. Then she moved her training to Key west and, while waiting for favorable weather conditions she embarked on a 24-hour swim. On 10 July she charted a 35-foot fishing vessel to take her 40 miles out to sea. At 8:19 AM she jumped overboard and began swimming back towards Key West, with the boat following her. At 8:19 AM the next day her handlers helped her back onboard, still about 10 miles from land: she said she felt "tired and dehydrated" but still "strong" and "easily able to swim another 20 hours without any problem.

On July 10, 2010, at the age of 60, she began open water training for a 60-hour, 103-mile swim from Cuba to Florida, a task she had failed to finish thirty years previously. When asked her motivation, she replied, "Because I'd like to prove to the other 60-year-olds that it is never too late to start your dreams." She was scheduled to make the swim in August/September 2010, but bad weather forced her to cancel; she now plans to do the swim in July 2011. In a 15 October 2010 interview with CNN, Nyad said she was trained and ready to swim by July 23, but a record stretch of high winds and dropping water temperatures prevented her from making the attempt.

Nyad’s second attempt (in 2011) to complete this swim has gained the attention of thousands of supporters, including the official sponsorship by Secret Deodorant, which has created an entire social platform on Facebook for fans to share encouraging messages and support. While training in St. Maarten, she sat for an interview that was published 25 March 2011 by the island's online news agency, The Daily Herald, and explained: "We're aiming to be ready for July 1; that means all the preparation done, and all the crew waiting in Key West," Diana states. "It's a large operation, like an expedition. We've got about 25 people, navigators, managers, boat crew, weather routers, medical people, shark experts, you name it. That's the time also when the water starts to get to its hottest. 

Physical challenges

At age 61, Nyad has been described by her coach as a "swimming machine", able to swim hour after hour while maintaining a metronomic stroke rate of 54 strokes per minute, which results in a speed of 1.5 miles per hour. This is down, slightly, from her pace of about 60 strokes per minute when she in her 20s. At her current SOA (speed of advance), the 103 miles from Cuba to Florida will take a minimum of 60 hours. And any significant "push" to the east by the Gulf Stream current could add miles, and hours, to the swim. In July 2010, while in Florida waiting for ideal weather conditions for the Cuba swim, she completed a 24-hour marathon swim and her trainer noted that her stroke rate was practically unchanged from beginning to end.

Nyad moved her training site from the Caribbean island of St. Maarten to Key West, Florida, in June 2011, and she was joined by key members of her support team on 28 June, to wait for ideal weather conditions that typically occur only during the summer doldrums in July and August. For the marathon swim to be feasible two main weather conditions must come together at the same time: a combination of low-to-light winds (to minimize sea chop) and water temperatures in the high 80s. These relatively "high" water temperatures will produce a twin challenge: in the first half of her swim the warm water will dehydrate her body, while in the second half her body temperature will drop and she will face potential Hypothermia. Nyad has bulked up her physique to about 150 pounds (15 pounds more than she weighed in 2010) to help counter the loss of body mass during her grueling swim.

While swimming, Nyad's expenditure of energy will require her to maintain a steady intake of food and liquids. Nutritionists estimate she will need to take in about one liter of water (actually, energy drinks) per hour, as well as 1,000 calories of food per hour (mostly in the form of easily digestible energy gels and food pastes.) In various news interviews Nyad has said she plans to swim for 90-minute intervals before stopping to eat and drink. Marathon swimmers, particularly those in warm salt-water, have experienced problems trying to swallow sufficient amounts of liquids and food after their lips and tongue begin to swell from hours of immersion in salt-water. Under the rules established for competitive long-distance swims, Nyad may not hold on to any object (such as the side of the boat) nor have the aid of a flotation device while resting and eating: she can only tread water. However, it is permitted for trainers to lower drinking (and feeding) tubes to her mouth, and to apply protective cream as needed.

To help fend-off possible attacks by sharks, Nyad will be "escorted" by a paddler in a kayak equipped with an electronic shark-repellent Protective Oceanic Device.

To keep Nyad swimming in a straight line, her specially designed, slow-moving catamaran support boat will deploy a 3-meter (18-20 feet) streamer: a long pole keeps the streamer several yards away from the boat, and the streamer is designed to remain about 5 feet underwater, so that Nyad can swim above it, much like following a lane line in a swimming pool. At night, the white streamer will be replaced by a string of red LED lights. 

Support team

Nyad has assembled a team of 25 persons to support her during the swim. The people responsible for selecting the date to begin the swim are husband-and-wife scientists Dane and Jenifer Clark (from Annapolis, Maryland): Dane is a meteorologist and Jenifer is a satellite oceanographer and they are acknowledged as experts on Gulf Stream conditions. The Clarks will analyze satellite weather and ocean data to select the best 3-day "window of opportunity" to find the right combination of favorable winds and the warmest water temperatures. Nyad wrote in her blog that Gulf water temperatures had been rising steadily through early July 2011, but that as of 11 July had tapered off at 84 degrees, and she required a minimum of 86 degrees - with even warmer water inside the Gulf Stream current - to begin her swim.

Professional writing and speaking career

Diana Nyad has written three books, Other Shores (Random House: September 1978) about her life and distance swimming, Basic Training for Women (Harmony Books: 1981), and in 1999 she wrote a biography of an NFL wide-receiver Boss of Me: The Keyshawn Johnson Story. She has also written for The New York Times, Newsweek magazine, and other publications. Diana and her best friend Bonnie Stoll (former #3 in the world on the Pro Racquetball Tour) have formed a company called BravaBody which is aimed at providing online exercise advice to women over 40, with the two world-class athletes giving direct inspiration and custom-made work-outs. As of 2006, she also delivered motivational talks to groups through the Gold Star speakers agency, for a fee of between $10,000 to $15,000. As of 2006, she was a (long-time) weekly contributor to National Public Radio's afternoon news show All Things Considered (appearing on Thursdays), as well as the "business of sport" commentator for NPR's Marketplace business news. She was also a regular contributor to the CBS News television show Sunday Morning.

In her 1978 autobiography Nyad described marathon swimming as a battle for survival against a brutal foe - the sea - and the only victory possible is to "touch the other shore.

Tropical wave south of Cuba slightly better organized

Stubborn ridge of high pressure over the middle of the Lower 48 hasn’t moved much in the last three weeks, and today is no different. That means the ridge will still crank out the heat over the Mid Mississippi Valley and parts of the Midwest. I’ll show you the temperatures, but it's safe to say Dallas will reach 102 today (at DFW) making it the 26th consecutive day of 100 or better. There may be some relief for the Lone Star State, though, with a developing tropical system near Cuba. There is a good chance this will turn into at least a tropical depression, and maybe a tropical storm. All the tracking models take this thing into Northern Mexico or Texas by late Friday or over the weekend. I expect it to bring good rain and cooler temperatures to Eastern/Central Texas... I just hope it doesn’t blow up into a full-blown hurricane. I’ll keep you posted.

Storms are aligning themselves now in the Upper Midwest, and this trend will continue throughout the day. Severe storms are possible over the Wisconsin, Iowa, and Nebraska area today as the frontal boundary slides eastward. but it'll be drier in the Northeast after the tough round of storms yesterday. Look for more rain along the Gulf Coast, too.

Additional slow development of this system is possible during the next couple of days as it moves toward the west-northwest at near 15 mph.

This system has a medium chance, 30 percent, of becoming a tropical cyclone during the next 48 hours.

Elsewhere, tropical cyclone formation is not expected during the next 48 hours.

Swimmer Plans On Electronics To Shake Sharks

Recent news reports have raised the issue of sharks and how Diana Nyad and her team will react if sharks come near as she attempts to swim from Cuba to Key West, Florida. CNN , following Nyad's preparations for over a year, asked her about her shark plan and how she intended to deal with predators she might encounter in her oceanic journey. Here is Nyad's response:

Sharks have made news in recent weeks, from attacks near U.S. beaches to how they were treated by the team of a fellow ocean swimmer. There were some reports - denied by those involved - that sharks were harmed when Penny Palfrey swam in the Caymans.

I just want to be crystal clear about how my team will handle sharks on our upcoming attempt to make history in swimming the 103 miles from Cuba to Florida: No shark will be harmed at any time during our event.

Sharks worldwide are in crisis.

Tens of millions of them are killed each year just for their fins, often in a disturbing, cruel manner. At this rate, we will lose our ocean sharks within the next decade.

Agreed, our team has worked hard toward this world record. But it is of paramount importance to us that we achieve the dream in perfect harmony with all the creatures of the sea we encounter . In some regard, I am humbly asking the sharks of this particular ocean to allow me to skim across the surface of their home for about three days. I am duly respectful of them, their habits and their habitat, as is every individual on the Xtreme Dream Team.

Instead of a cage this time, she'll rely on something called Shark Shield to keep her safe during what's expected to be 60-hour swim. Sharks hunt their prey by detecting nerve impulses emitted by other living things. Shark Shield, made by a company with the same name, includes two electrodes placed in the water to create an eight-meter conductive field around the person using the device. If a shark enters the field, its sensory receptors become agitated, discouraging the shark from coming any closer.

Police and commercial divers throughout Australia use Shark Shield as part of their safety equipment. Of course, no technology is foolproof and the company that makes Shark Shield recommends that all sharks be treated with respect and caution, at all times. You don't have to tell me twice. Or even once.

Nearly 30 Groups Have Been Authorized To Bring Tourists To Cuba

Since the Obama administration loosened restrictions on Cuba travel, nearly 30 groups have been authorized to offer people-to-people exchanges. The first trips leave in August.

BY MIMI WHITEFIELD.MiamiHerald.com. Travel providers and other groups are scrambling to secure licenses and organize people-to-people exchanges in Cuba after the U.S. government relaxed restrictions and decided to allow a wider variety of Americans to visit the Caribbean island for the first time in 7 1/2 years.

So far, the Treasury Department has issued nearly 30 licenses to organizations that say they will provide “purposeful travel,’’ which will allow Americans to reach out to everyday Cubans in “support of their desire to freely determine their country’s future.’’

Although Cuba-Americans can now travel freely to the island if they receive a visa from Cuba and travel is allowed for other Americans who fall into a limited number of categories, the United States has barred people-to-people visits since the end of 2003 when former President George W. Bush reversed a policy begun during the Clinton administration.

Insight Cuba, a company that ran people-to-people exchanges prior to the rollback on such travel, looks like it will be first with the new people-to-people exchanges. It plans to send its first four groups to Cuba on August 11. A clock on its website ticks down the days, hours, minutes and seconds to departure.

Groups ranging from the Harvard Alumni Association to luxury travel provider Abercrombie & Kent — it pitches its trip as “Cuba: The Forbidden Isle Revealed’’ — to Witness for Peace also are ready for Cuba travel.

Cuban-Americans and others with a Cuban visa have been able to travel to the communist island since 2003 when president Bush repealed a Clinton policy allowing more open travel, but for everyone else this is a trip they've had to wait until now to make.

There are no shortage of people lining up to make the trip.

The Oct. 26-Nov. 1 Harvard trip, which promises to “unravel the richness of Cuban culture” and includes a stop at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana to discuss U.S.-Cuba relations, is waiting list only. A&K, which will be working with the Foundation for Caribbean Studies — the nonprofit that actually holds the license — began advertising last week for 13 trips it plans between September and next April. All have already sold out.

“We knew there would be interest, but this is incredible,’’ said Jean Fawcett, an A&K spokeswoman. “We’re taking names for a wait list and are planning to add more trips in 2012.

Venezuela’s Chavez Seen on TV First Time Since Return to Cuba for Treatment

Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez said he may become bald as he begins a second round of cancer treatment in Cuba.

Chavez said chemotherapy may make him lose his hair “for a few months” and that he’ll end up looking like the Russian-born Hollywood actor Yul Brynner, star of movies from the 1950s through 1970s such as “The King and I” and “The Ten Commandments.”

“In a few days you will surely see Chavez bald,” the former paratrooper said in a phone call broadcast on state television yesterday. “Do you remember Yul Brynner? I’ll be Yul Chavez.”

Chavez underwent surgery in Cuba on June 20 to remove a baseball-sized tumor discovered by doctors during a June 11 operation on an abscess. The socialist returned from a second trip to Cuba on July 23, saying tests hadn’t shown any signs of more cancerous cells and that he would need further treatment.

Chavez, 56, said he was subjected to “intense studies” and received several sessions of chemotherapy throughout the week.

The body is the seat of life, one has to take care of it from the hair to the fingernails, without exaggerating of course,” Chavez said in good spirits. While being filmed he spent much of the time telling stories about his life as a cadet.

The president also stressed the importance of OPEC’s confirmation this week that Venezuela has the biggest oil reserves of any nation in the world with almost 300 billion barrels.

“It’s important that the Venezuelan people understand that thanks to the great efforts of our petroleum industry...the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries has just acknowledged the great petroleum reserve of the Orinoco Belt,” Chavez said.

The video footage was aired hours after Chavez announced in a statement over the phone Friday to Venezuelan state television that “the first bombardment” of chemotherapy “ended successfully” and that the cancer is not terminal.

“I want to tell you that, because I see there are still people saying...Yesterday someone wrote, giving me four months to live. Those out there who have bad wishes, may they not be on the receiving end of them,” he said.

At the meeting on video, Chavez is seen with Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez, Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro, Science and Technology Minister Ricardo Mendez, along with the vice presidents of the state-owned oil company Petroleos de Venezuela S.A., Eulogio Del Pino and Asdrubal Chavez.

Also on Saturday, Chavez thanked Argentine soccer legend Diego Armando Maradona for his visit to Havana.

“I give thanks to Diego Armando Maradona for his brotherly visit this afternoon. We were with Fidel. Thanks Pibe! We will live!” Chavez wrote on his Twitter account @chavezcandanga.

Maradona, an acknowledged “Chavista” who visited the president several times in Venezuela, has been following the progress of president’s treatment, according to comments from Chavez himself and his foreign minister, Nicolas Maduro.

The 56-year-old socialist president complained of abdominal pain during an official visit to Cuba early last month. Emergency surgery to remove an abscess led to the discovery of a cancerous tumor that was excised in a subsequent operation, also in Havana.

He returned to Venezuela on July 4 and made several public appearances before leaving again for Cuba last weekend to begin chemotherapy.

Cuba marks revolution with promises of more freedom

Strong historical and cultural relationships have existed between Cuba and the Dominican Republic. A part of the Cuban national legacy is in some way related to the DR, and Dominicans always remember that it was Cubans who restarted their sugar production in the 19th century.

Cubans from the east of the island have surprising cultural and linguistic likenesses to the people of the Dominican Republic. In fact when Francisco Henriquez y Carvajal (the brother of Federico and the father of Camila, Pedro and Max) was named president in 1916, he was teaching at a school in Santiago de Cuba. He had to head back to his country at full speed before the arrival of the US Marines, who ultimately occupied the DR a few months later and remained there for eight subsequent years.

Few people will recall that the largest national political organization, the Revolutionary Party of the Dominican Republic, was founded in Havana and owed its name to its affinity to the Cuban Revolutionary Party (authentic). It was founded by Juan Bosch, who lived in our country for several years, married a Cuban and left us an excellent book titled La isla fascinante, whose reading a few years ago helped me to better understand who I was.

All told, it’s understandable that Cubans and Dominicans continue being ingredients of one sole pot, a fact that they proclaim with pride. Intellectual exchanges continue to take place to the benefit of both societies, and these have been quite intense in the last few years under the government of Dominican President Leonel Fernandez.

The plan would create a large “non-state” sector in agriculture, retail services, construction and transportation in a land where the government has monopolized all economic activity.

The Cuban state would also move from subsidizing just about everything to targeted welfare and loosen its grip on state companies.

President Raul Castro announced at the April Congress plans to establish term limits and in other ways try to improve the political system.

“You can be sure we are going forward without haste or pause, working systematically and in an coordinated fashion,” Machado said in the central province of Ciego de Avila, where festivities for “The Day of the Rebel” were held.

Cubans are pressing for quick adoption of measures allowing them to buy and sell homes and cars for the first time in 50 years and improving food production and distribution, but not others that would eliminate gratuities such as a food ration and cut the state labor force by 20%.

“SOLUTIONS TO OLD PROBLEMS”

But Machado urged patience due to the long-term implications of reform. “We are not taking half measures nor improvising, but looking for definitive solutions to old problems,” he said.

Machado, 81, repeatedly called on Cubans to work harder and in a more organized manner to overcome the economic crisis gripping the country.

He also urged workers and administrators to eliminate “labor and social indiscipline, deficient accounting, poor use of resources and bureaucratic attitudes,” among other ills affecting economic activity.

“The mentality of doing nothing, of waiting for something to come down from above, has to be definitively broken,” he said, apparently referring to the bureaucratic malaise affecting the country.

For a second consecutive year, President Raul Castro, 80, dressed in a white Guayabera and dark slacks, and with a straw hat atop his brow, did not speak at the event.

Castro is expected to deliver a major speech to the National Assembly next week.

The July 26, 1953, assault on the Moncada barracks failed and many young rebels were killed. But it marked the beginning of the end for the government of U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista, who fled the country on Jan. 1, 1959.

Fidel Castro choose July 26 as the annual date to deliver what amounted to a State of the Union speech, emphasizing the revolution and role of the Communist Party.

He was hospitalized after delivering two long speeches on the anniversary in 2006 and ceded power to his brother Raul a dew days later.

American contractor appeals 15-year sentence in Cuba

U.S. aid contractor sentenced to 15 years in a Cuban prison after he was caught distributing communications gear on the Communist island testified here Friday at an appeal hearing before Cuba's supreme court, which is expected to issue its ruling in the coming days, official media said.

"Alan Phillip Gross ... outlined the criteria he considered pertinent and expressed gratitude for the chance to personally explain them before the judges of the People's Supreme Tribunal," according to a note on the government Web site Cubadebate.

Gross was represented at the hearing by Cuban public defender Nuris Piñeiro, while diplomats from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana observed the closed-door proceedings.

Now 61, Gross was arrested Dec. 3, 2009, in possession of satellite communications equipment he said he was planning to distribute among Cuba's Jewish community. Havana says he was illegally aiding dissidents and inciting subversion on the island.

Early this year, Gross, a sub-contractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, was formally accused by the Cuban government of "acts against the independence and territorial integrity" of the country.

He was convicted in March and sentenced to 15 years behind bars.

The U.S. government has insisted from the beginning that Gross is innocent. Washington blasted his conviction as "unjust" and is demanding his "immediate and unconditional" release.

U.S. officials have categorically dismissed suggestions that Washington offer to trade five imprisoned Cuban spies for Gross.

The five Cubans were arrested in 1998 and convicted three years later by a federal jury in Miami.

A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta overturned the spies' convictions in 2005, citing the "prejudices" of Miami's anti-Castro Cubans.

But the full court later nixed the spies' bid for a new trial and reinstated the original convictions. In 2008, another three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit again refused to overturn the convictions.

Havana acknowledges that Gerardo Hernandez, Rene Gonzalez, Ramon Labañino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando Gonzalez are intelligence agents, but says they were spying on Miami's Cuban exile community, not the U.S. government.

Cuban officials say Gross smuggled satellite equipment into the country aimed at setting up an Internet network for dissidents.

Gross says he was trying to help connect the Jewish community to the Web.

"Friday's hearing affords Alan another opportunity to reiterate, through his Cuban counsel, that his actions on the island were never intended to be -- and in fact never were -- a threat to the Cuban government," Gross's U.S.-based attorney, Peter J. Kahn, said in a written statement.

The case chilled U.S.-Cuba relations after signs of thawing when President Barack Obama took office. The State Department has said no progress will be made until Gross is released.

Former President Jimmy Carter visited Cuba earlier this year and tried to secure the aid worker's release on humanitarian grounds, arguing that Gross' mother and daughter are battling cancer. But he went home empty-handed.

The appeals hearing is the final legal recourse for Gross.

According to Cuban state media, a decision will be announced "within days."

U.S. officials say they expect he will be found guilty, but once the trial is over it will clear the way for the government to consider releasing Gross on humanitarian grounds.