A man has been jailed for 12 years for killing his five-week-old daughter and attempting to murder a baby boy.

Ian Ruddock repeatedly shook baby Olivia at their home in Clarkston, East Renfrewshire, in 2011, causing her to suffer fatal injuries.
He was accused of murdering the infant but a jury convicted him of a reduced charge of culpable homicide.
The 34-year-old was also found guilty of the attempted murder of a baby boy in Glasgow in 2013.
Jailing Ruddock at the High Court in Glasgow, judge Lord Bannatyne told him: "The offences which you have been convicted of are of very significant gravity.
"You committed both these offences when both children were babies. It is difficult to think of more a vulnerable victim than a baby."
The judge then told Ruddock: "You had all the advantages of a good happy upbringing. You were someone who was materially comfortable. You are not someone who had an unhappy upbringing nor were you someone who had significant problems."
As the sentence was imposed, members of Ruddock's family sat weeping in the public benches. He showed no emotion as he was led away to begin his sentence.
Ruddock, from the Shawlands area of Glasgow, had denied the charges against him during a seven-week trial at the High Court in Edinburgh but was convicted by a majority verdict.
The court heard that on various occasions between January and March 2011, Ruddock repeatedly shook his daughter, causing her to suffer extensive rib and head injuries.
Foul play was not suspected when she died at Glasgow's Yorkhill Hospital on 6 March 2011 and Ruddock went on to carry out attacks another child at an address in Glasgow in 2013.
He caused the boy to suffer a fractured skull and fractured ribs during attacks which prosecutors treated as attempted murder.
Ruddock was finally caught after police, tipped off by medics, launched an investigation shortly after the second infant's injuries were discovered.
Police looked back through Ruddock's past and discovered medical evidence about what happened to Olivia.
During the trial, the court heard that Ruddock had got up from bed in the early hours of 6 March 2011 to feed Olivia, who had become unwell.
The infant was taken to Glasgow's Victoria Infirmary and later transferred to Yorkhill Hospital where she died.
Doctors at that time concluded that Olivia died from bronchial pneumonia.
Ruddock told the court that he shouted for his wife Wendy, 37, when he discovered his daughter was unwell.
He said that he held Olivia and shook her as he tried to wake her before feeling "sheer panic".
Asked whether he believed he had harmed his daughter, Ruddock replied: "I don't believe for a minute that I've caused her death. It's not even remotely possible."
Ruddock's claim of innocence was supported by his sister, Susan Drennan, 35, and his wife, who both gave evidence.
Mrs Ruddock told the court: "I don't believe he would hurt children - never, no way."
Ruddock's defence team highlighted that some medics still did not share Dr Irwin's views about Olivia's injuries.
The evidence, however, was enough to persuade a majority of jurors of his guilt.


The big decisions on financing the NHS over the next few years are likely to come in the autumn with the departmental spending review.

Beyond a restatement of the commitment to an extra £8 billion in 2020, the Chancellor's Budget is likely to focus on welfare spending rather than the protected departments like health.
But, for what will be one of the most important domestic policy decisions made by this Government, detailed analysis of the financial needs of the NHS in England is underway.
Department of Health and Treasury officials are poring over projections for health demand. They need to be sure that the £8 billion identified by NHS chiefs is realistic. That figure was reached after assuming highly ambitious efficiency savings of £22 billion by 2020. Ministers want to be assured that figure is achievable.
The last thing the Government wants is to announce a spending review with plans for the NHS over this parliament, only for the service to demand more investment as the election gets closer. The word from Whitehall, and indeed NHS England, is that the much-repeated £8 billion and £22 billion were broad, initial estimates. A fair amount of stress-testing and re-appraisal of the numbers is now taking place.
As work on the spending review progresses, covering the next few years, the debate on NHS finances this year is intensifying.
There is always scepticism in Whitehall when hospital trust leaders call for more cash. This early in the financial year, the Chancellor is hardly likely to heed the siren voices warning of another looming deficit. But those voices are becoming louder.
Last week the Kings Fund think tank warned that financial problems were now "endemic" with even the best-run hospitals forecasting deficits this year. The Fund has added its voice to those predicting that NHS providers could slip further into the red. This followed hard on the heels of the Healthcare Financial Management Association talking of a "bleak financial outlook" with nearly four-fifths of trust finance directors expecting to be in a worse position at the end of this year than last.
The Government line is that hospitals and other health trusts should strive for the most efficient use of resources and that there is no scope for another injection of cash this year, especially when other departments are being squeezed so hard.  But the response of NHS insiders is that long-term productivity improvements will take time and there is a serious danger that the allocated budget ceiling will be breached because of inexorably rising patient demand.
It's a familiar argument - does the NHS need more money or should it become more efficient with its budget?
The latest figures from the OECD club of advanced economies provide new perspective in this debate. In 2013, the latest year for which comparable data is available, the UK's total health spending (public and private) as a proportion of national income of 8.5% was below the OECD average of 8.9%.
The OECD figures show the UK below Greece and Portugal for health spending on this basis, though the latter two spend more on private healthcare and rather less on public provision. The Government-funded proportion of total healthcare in the UK is one of the highest in the OECD.
The data from the OECD provide ammunition to those who argue for higher public spending on health in the UK.  But at a time of austerity in Whitehall, such a demand seems unlikely to gain much traction.
Getting the right balance between the requirements of the health service in the face of a rising population with more complex needs and the need to keep a tight rein on spending may cause a few sleepless nights for ministers between now and the autumn.


Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC has been dealt a big blow in its legal battle with Apple involving patent infringement claims.

The US International Trade Commission (ITC) has ruled that Apple did not violate patents as claimed by HTC in a complaint lodged last year.
HTC had asked the court to ban imports of several Apple products in to the US citing patent infringements.
HTC's shares fell as much as 6% after the ruling.
The case involved four patents held by HTC related to protecting data, storing contact information and managing the phone's power supply.
The judgement is another setback for HTC which is involved in a long and bitter battle with Apple.
In July this year, the Taiwanese phonemaker was found to have infringed two iPhone patents in a case brought by Apple at the ITC.
However, HTC said that despite the judgement, it was sticking to its claims.
"This is only one step of many in these legal proceedings. We are confident we have a strong case for the ITC appeals process and are fully prepared to protect our intellectual property," said Grace Lei, HTC's general counsel.
"We look forward to resolving this case, so we can continue creating the most innovative mobile experiences for consumers."
A full commission of the ITC is expected to decide in February, whether to uphold or reject the judge's decision.


David Cameron has long since learned, like other prime ministers before him, to tread warily in dealing with the miasma of constitutional, electoral and strategic issues which comprise the body politic in Scotland.

So it was again today when he met Nicola Sturgeon in Bute House. And yet there is caution too on the first minister's side.
Why so? Competing mandates - and sundry thoughts as to how those mandates are most effectively exercised.
Both leaders took pains to describe today's talks as constructive.  Yet both leaders retain distinctly different visions as to the final constitutional construct which could emerge.
Mr Cameron has, behind him, an overall Commons majority. He has the votes in the House. He could, if he chooses, wield that majority to legislate on Scotland as he chooses.
But he knows - and Nicola Sturgeon gently but firmly reminds him - that Scotland tends to prefer discussion to diktat. He is reluctant to resort to an early, overt rebuff in the light of the sweeping gains made by the SNP last week in the UK elections.
And so the prime minister offers to listen. He offers to consider ideas advanced by Ms Sturgeon as to further powers - beyond the Smith Commission agreement - which might usefully be devolved to Holyrood.
There is, to be clear, little evident enthusiasm in that offer. Mr Cameron makes clear that his preference, his primary concern, is to implement the Smith package in full, through legislation in the Commons.
Which is where the divisions lie. Ms Sturgeon wants to go considerably beyond Smith.
She wants devolved control of employment, the minimum wage, National Insurance, substantial welfare powers and equality policy - in addition to the control of income tax rates and bands plus a limited share of welfare featured in Smith.
And she wants discussion on these matters to proceed via debate within civic and political Scotland - as well as in the Commons.  The two leaders, therefore, differ on substance and process too.
Apart, of course, from the small matter that, ultimately, Ms Sturgeon wants to end the Union which Mr Cameron strives to defend.
But Nicola Sturgeon is cautious too. She has disavowed gesture politics. She says the people of Scotland want and deserve mature representation by their elected tribunes.
Given that, she is unwilling to precipitate a crisis in the talks - at least too speedily. The issue here is exit strategy. She can cajole, she can persuade, she can demand.  But, if the PM says no, what then?  He has the votes in the Commons.
Again, down the line, Nicola Sturgeon could appeal once more for popular support in Scotland, citing claims that Westminster has neglected Scottish demands.
Equally, if not handled carefully, an early collapse of this renewed process might simply demonstrate that the SNP presence in the Commons - huge and vocal though it is - remains a UK minority, part of the opposition.
So Ms Sturgeon will seek to obtain what she can by consensus, by co-operation, by persuasion.  Cautiously.


A Labour government would renationalise the railways by regaining control of franchises as they expire, new leader Jeremy Corbyn is expected to reveal.

The party is to set up a task force that will consider how to implement the plans - expected to be outlined at the party conference next week.
Mr Corbyn told the Independent on Sunday there was "overwhelming support for a People's Railway".
But the Conservatives dismissed the plan as an "ideological joyride".
International Development Secretary Justine Greening warned it would waste millions of pounds of taxpayers' money at a time when the railways were enjoying record levels of investment on schemes like HS2.
She told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show it was important to "get on with the plan we have in place".
But shadow foreign secretary Hilary Benn told the same programme it was the Conservatives that were being "ideological" and the recently re-privatised East Coast line had shown that publicly-owned rail could work.
He said Britain needed an "integrated transport system" without passengers having to buy different tickets for different lines.
In other developments:
Mr Corbyn has previously said the railways should be renationalised along with Royal Mail and has opposed the high speed railway line HS2.
The Labour leader said: "We know there is overwhelming support from the British people for a People's Railway, better and more efficient services, proper integration and fairer fares.
"On this issue, it won't work to have a nearly-but-not-quite position. Labour will commit to a clear plan for a fully integrated railway in public ownership."
The incremental renationalisation policy is expected to leave around two thirds of lines privately run after the first term of a future Labour government.
Its task force will also consider rail reforms such as simplified ticketing and better integration of services with other modes of transport.
The Independent on Sunday said Mr Corbyn would make rail renationalisation Labour policy at the party's conference in Brighton on Sunday 27 September.
Labour argues an incremental approach to renationalisation, advocated by Mr Corbyn's leadership rival Andy Burnham, would be a cost-effective solution.
But Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said Labour's approach was "a backwards-looking policy which would cost billions of pounds and leave less money to spend on improving services".
John Major's government split British Rail up into franchises 20 years ago.
Since then the number of passengers travelling on the railways has doubled, but the public subsidy has risen.


A sister of a 17-year-old girl shot dead in disputed circumstances in 1972 has been describing the horror of the night she was killed.

Marian Brown was pregnant when she was shot and fatally wounded while walking back to her sister's house along Roden Street in West Belfast in June 1972.
Her sister, Teresa, told a new inquest into her death that a few days later two bullets in an envelope were posted through her letter box.
She was with Marion when she was shot.
She described hearing a burst of gunfire and man shouting at them: "Hit the dirt!"
When the shooting was over, she went over to her sister who was lying on her back with her boyfriend lying across her.
She grabbed Marian's wrists and she said that she knew she was dead.
The Brown family believed at the time that Marian had been killed by loyalist gunmen firing down Roden Street. However,  it later emerged that soldiers had opened fire during the incident.
A fresh inquest was ordered after questions were raised over the velocity of the bullet that killed her.
Last week, Marian's older brother, Richard, said he "felt ashamed that he couldn't do anything" to help her and he was angry that whoever fired the shot "took her life and robbed us of a sister, a daughter and a friend".
Mr Brown said the 17-year-old "never got to bloom".
The inquest is being heard in Belfast by Judge David McFarland.


A man died when he was involved in a three-vehicle crash in Cumbria.

The collision, on the A66 near the village of Warcop, happened shortly after 16:00 BST on Sunday, involving two cars and a goods vehicle.
One of the car drivers died at the scene, and the other is being treated at Carlisle's Cumberland Infirmary, where he is in a stable condition.
The man who died has not been formally identified, but was from North Yorkshire, the force said.


WASHINGTON: The past week has been a wretched one for the US National Security Agency (NSA), with revelations of large-scale trawling of phone call data in France and Spain, as well as of eavesdropping on German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

During these months, since thousands of files copied by former NSA contactor turned whistleblower Edward Snowden started leaking into the public domain, the US has been compared to an Orwellian Big Brother state.
But I cannot help wondering, if the NSA is as powerful as its critics have claimed, why has it been so useless at protecting its secrets?
Where are the worm viruses unleashed into the computer systems of newspapers that have published US secrets? The court orders to prevent additional disclosures? And, if you enjoy spy fiction, the deniable operators climbing over balconies in Brazil or Hong Kong to steal laptops or indeed terminate their owners?
The American system of official secrecy has for years operated on the basis of targeting the leaker "pour decourager les autres".
In August, the trial of Private Bradley Manning ended with a 35 year sentence for passing classified material to Wikileaks.
As for this latest bout of revelation, involving information about phone and internet spying that is much more highly classified than anything Pte Manning had access to, on the surface it seems only the British authorities have acted in an attempt to stop further publication.
British intelligence officers have watched journalists destroying some computers at the Guardian newspapers.
'Aspects of incompetence'
And David Miranda, the partner of one of the journalists holding the largest amount of Snowden files, was also stopped in August as he changed planes at Heathrow airport, questioned and had memory devices confiscated.
Indeed, the Miranda episode is pretty much the only one since the publication of the Snowden stories that suggests some kind of joined up response aimed at frustrating further publication.
It had the hint, with its foreknowledge of Mr Miranda's travel plans and the fact that he was carrying these files, of an operation based on precisely the kind of intelligence gathering that Mr Snowden has warned of.
In the US though there has been pretty much nothing. And this is despite the fact that it is common journalistic knowledge that the Guardian journalists sitting on a great many more files, drip feeding them into the public domain, have been operating in New York.
There are aspects of incompetence to it.
Mr Snowden was part of an army of more than 800,000 people with clearance to access such damaging material, and was able to get it again when working with a contractor despite concerns having been expressed at the CIA about his motives.
Some "lessons learned" studies have been launched within the intelligence community, but not yet with any result in terms of cutting the numbers given access to such secrets, or barring from similar work the contractor that employed him.
As for the media, well this crisis should put to bed the idea that that a call from the White House to the editor of the Washington Post or New York Times can simply squash a story like this.
There have been no US legal attempts to force journalists to destroy or turn over what they have, and in the UK a DA Notice on the subject has been widely ignored.
Even the PR response has been limited and ill co-ordinated. Monday's New York Times comments that "the administration has seemed uncertain about how to handle the reports", concerned the interception of the German leader's mobile phone. Last week, the attempts of one former NSA director to fight back turned into farce when his briefings to journalists by phone were overheard by a fellow passenger on a train who started tweeting updates.
Spying allegations
The latest revelations, about tapping world leaders phone calls, also leave one wondering what use the content of Ms Merkel's calls were to US policy makers?
The White House has tied itself in knots over whether to admit the president was actually briefed on what she was saying, but it can hardly be said that it gave the US some amazing advantage in the bilateral relationship with Germany.
Some in Washington have detected in the president's unwillingness to take stronger action in defence of the NSA, a desire to see the vast intelligence bureaucracies that grew up after 9/11 cut down to size.
Whether or not that is the case, any attempt to halt the revelations by legal action would inevitably have brought accusations of an assault on cherished constitutional freedoms.
So the leaks continue and today we discover that the NSA recorded the call data (ie the numbers dialled and duration, rather than the actual content) of 60m Spanish calls during one month.
Perhaps Kafka rather than Orwell provides the better literary template for this ongoing story.
The NSA has grown into a huge data-mining bureaucracy driven by its own organisational imperatives.
It pursues ever greater coverage, storage of data, staff and budget.
In many cases it does things because it can, rather than because somebody has asked whether the information is useful, whether it is worth the potential price if discovered, or whether the activity can actually be prevented from coming into the public domain.


Two people are in hospital with serious injuries following a crash on the A499 near Pwllheli in Gwynedd.

The incident involving a Ford Transit minibus and a Saab car happened at about 22:15 BST on Wednesday.
The woman driver of the minibus and the male driver of the car were taken to Bangor's Ysbyty Gwynedd.
The road reopened in the early hours following an initial investigation, said North Wales Police.


Prof Stephen Hawking has launched a new effort to answer the question of whether there is life elsewhere in space.

The venture is said to be the biggest yet in support of the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence.
The 10-year effort will listen for broadcast signals from a million of the stars closest to Earth.
The Â£64m ($100m) initiative was launched by the Breakthrough Initiatives group at the Royal Society in London.
Speaking at the launch, Prof Hawking said: "Somewhere in the cosmos, perhaps, intelligent life may be watching these lights of ours, aware of what they mean.
"Or do our lights wander a lifeless cosmos - unseen beacons, announcing that here, on one rock, the Universe discovered its existence. Either way, there is no bigger question. It's time to commit to finding the answer - to search for life beyond Earth.
"We are alive. We are intelligent. We must know."
Those behind the initiative claim it to be the biggest scientific search ever undertaken for signs of intelligent life beyond Earth. They plan to cover 10 times more of the sky than previous programmes and scan five times more of the radio spectrum, 100 times faster.
It will involve access to two of the world's most powerful telescopes. - the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia and the Parkes Telescope in New South Wales, Australia.
Among those involved in the search is Lord Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal.
"The search for extra-terrestrial life is the most exciting quest in 21st-century science. The Breakthrough Initiatives aim to put it on the same level as the other ultimate scientific questions," he said.
The public will be invited to participate in efforts to find a signal from another world through the SETI@home project.
Yuri Milner, a high tech US based-billionaire and founder of the initiative said technology had developed to a point where it was possible to put listening for signs of extra-terrestrial intelligence on a proper scientific footing.
He said: "Current technology gives us a real chance to answer one of humanity's biggest questions: Are we alone?
"With Breakthrough Listen, we're committed to bringing the Silicon Valley approach to the search for intelligent life in the Universe. Our approach to data will be open and taking advantage of the problem-solving power of social networks.
Prof Hawking added that he believed the search was one of humanity's most important scientific endeavours.
"To understand the Universe, you must know about atoms - about the forces that bind them, the contours of space and time, the birth and death of stars, the dance of galaxies, the secrets of black holes," he explained.
"But that is not enough. These ideas cannot explain everything. They can explain the light of stars, but not the lights that shine from planet Earth.
"To understand these lights, you must know about life. About minds."
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People who live in social housing in Wales must be given clear information about plans to end the right to buy their homes, a report has said.

Legal changes scrapping the scheme are currently going through the Welsh Assembly.
Right to Buy was introduced in 1980 but has led to pressures on the Welsh social housing stock, which has reduced by 45% in that time.
It is hoped ending the policy will help ease housing shortages.
A cross-party group of AMs has been looking at the issue.
Committee chair John Griffiths called on ministers to "take the lead in promoting understanding" of the change.
Ministers said the Bill had "strong provisions" ensuring tenants were made aware of the law and its implications.
Some 139,000 council and housing association homes have been sold since Right to Buy was introduced in 1980.
The Welsh Government hopes ending the policy will reduce pressure on social housing but the Conservatives say Labour ministers have caused the shortages by not increasing the supply of housing.
Tenants will have at least one year to apply to buy homes under the old rules after the bill, promised by Labour at the 2016 assembly election, becomes law.
The ban is expected to come into effect before the next election, in 2021.
Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee chair Mr Griffiths said: "We want the Welsh Government to specify in the Bill exactly what information landlords will be required to provide to their tenants about the changes, and to ensure that it is produced in accessible formats that meets their needs.
"The abolition of the Right to Buy is a significant change in public policy, and the Welsh Government must take the lead in promoting understanding amongst the people who will be affected by this change.
"This means ensuring the right information is provided to tenants when they need it."
A Welsh Government spokesperson welcomed the committee's "support for the general principles of the bill".
"The Bill contains strong provisions to ensure that tenants are made aware of the legislation and its implications at an early stage during the year following royal assent before abolition takes place," the spokesperson said.
"We have developed guidance to go to all tenants to communicate what these changes mean and this will be published for wider consultation."
Communities Secretary Carl Sargeant is due to respond in more detail to the report in an assembly debate later in July.


First-time buyers in Scotland were key to helping increase activity in the housing market during 2014, according to industry figures.

However, the level of mortgages being agreed fell away in the second half of the year.
Lenders advanced 27,700 loans to first-time buyers over the 12 months, totalling £2.9bn.
This was 16% up in volume, compared to the previous year, and 23% up in value.
The average first-time buyer's loan was 2.9 times gross income, of nearly £34,000, compared with a UK average of 3.4 times.
In the fourth quarter of the year, the average first-time buyer loan was £97,400. With interest rates low, the cost of servicing that averaged 17% of gross income.
With other lending seeing slower growth, house price activity was up by 6.6% of all UK activity, down from a 6.9% share in 2013.
Within that, home movers in Scotland - selling and then buying homes - took out 31,800 loans, 5% more than the previous year. The value of these loans was up £4.6bn, or 10%.
This was 2.6 times average £51,000 gross earnings for those taking out loans, whereas the UK average was 3 times.
There were 23,400 loans for re-mortgaging homes during last year, totalling £2.6bn. This was 14% down on 2013 by volume of transactions, and 9% down by value.
Linda Docherty, chair of Council of Mortgage Lenders in Scotland, commented: "More people bought a home in Scotland last year than in any year since 2008, with a pronounced increase in first-time buyer activity in particular.
"As in the UK overall, there was a quarter-on-quarter dip in activity in the final quarter of the year. However, with inflation being low, employment increasing and there being signs of growth in household income, we believe there are grounds for optimism for continuing growth, albeit at a likely slower rate.
"The introduction in Scotland of Land and Buildings Transaction Tax, replacing stamp duty from April, should help provide a boost to the housing market, which could see half of new borrowers paying no tax when purchasing a home."
Meanwhile, Homes for Scotland, the construction industry body, called on the Scottish government to follow the example of the Welsh Assembly administration, in extending the Help to Buy shared equity scheme, which quickly ran out of funds last year due to the level of demand.
Chief executive Philip Hogg said more than 4,000 properties have been purchased through the Scottish Help to Buy scheme since it was launched, boosting the construction industry.
"The lending slowdown in the last six months of 2014 matches with our concerns regarding the impact the interruption in Help to Buy funding has had on the home building industry and our projections that total new housing output will have been chiefly flat over the last calendar year," Mr Hogg explained.
"With the need to ensure we have enough homes in the right locations to meet Scotland's diverse housing needs fundamental to the First Minister's objective of improving opportunity for all, we therefore keenly await the next Scottish Government housing statistics which are due to be published shortly."


Spiralling social care costs cannot be met by increasing council taxes in Wales, ministers have ruled.

Councils in England are being allowed to raise the tax by 6% over two years to plug a care funding gap.
But Wales' Social Services Minister Rebecca Evans told BBC Wales that increasing the tax was not "fair" and "not an approach we're taking".
The Welsh Local Government Association has warned councils face a Â£92m social care "black hole" in 2017-18.
Leading experts say the cost of providing care could double to Â£2.3bn by 2030.
Speaking on The Wales Report on Wednesday, Ms Evans said: "Some parts of Wales have a much larger proportion of older people than others.
"And obviously if we were to put the burden on local authorities to raise council tax to pay for that, it would disproportionately affect some parts of Wales more than others."
Ms Evans said Welsh ministers wanted to take a longer term approach towards social care but "we do need the UK government to help us with this".
"We don't know what our long-term funding is going to be from the UK government," she said.
"So these are issues that are beyond our control, but within our control we're certainly doing everything we can to make social care good quality and fair across Wales in terms of paying for care as well."
"I'm under no illusion how fragile the sector is in Wales, and the fact that Welsh Government does need to support it," she added.
Mario Kreft, chair of Care Forum Wales which represents independent care providers, said that in a "relatively mild winter we're seeing huge pressures" in Wales and across the UK.
"This should be no surprise to anybody," he said.
"The reality is that we are a million miles away from where we need to be, where we could've been, and we need a wake up call."
The Wales Report is on BBC One Wales at 22:40 GMT on Wednesday 8 February.


A US court has ruled people affected by faulty ignition switches in General Motors cars can sue the company.

The potential lawsuits over the defect that led to hundreds of injuries and deaths could lead to billions of dollars in charges for the carmaker.
Wednesday's ruling overturns part of GM's 2009 bankruptcy agreement that protected the carmaker from claims stemming from earlier crashes.
The defect resulted in the recall of 2.6 million vehicles in 2014.
In 2015, a judge ruled that once GM emerged from bankruptcy it was a new company and not liable for pre-bankruptcy charges.
James Cain, a spokesman for GM, said the company was still "digesting its options".
"The [court's] ruling neither addresses nor decides the merits of any claims," Mr Cain said.
Robert Hilliard, an attorney representing the victims, estimates the cases could lead to billions in payouts by GM and said the ruling gave victims their day in court.
"The [court] in a sound and substantive way, called GM out for its cover-up, its lies and its attempts to use bankruptcy as a way to hide from the victims," he said.
The judges on the appeals court ruled the 40-days it took for GM to go through the bankruptcy process, did give victims sufficient time to bring their cases.
"Due process applies even in a company's moment of crisis," they wrote in the court's decision.


People with learning disabilities in England are being kept in hospitals far from home for too long, a review says.

The report, written by Sir Stephen Bubb, recommends introducing a charter of rights and more community facilities for people with learning disabilities.
It also says some "inappropriate" in-patient facilities should be closed.
The report comes after abuse was exposed at Winterbourne View care home in Bristol in 2011.
Sir Stephen, chief executive of the Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations (ACEVO), was asked by NHS England how to address "serious shortcomings" in support for those with learning disabilities.
The report - Winterbourne View - Time for Change - offers 10 recommendations for the NHS, local government, regulators and the government.
Phill Wills, whose son Josh has a learning disability and severe autism, has to travel 300 miles from Cornwall to see him at a treatment hospital in Birmingham.
He told BBC News he has "fought tooth and nail" to have Josh's care provided nearer to his home.
"When we felt that we weren't being listened to, it felt like Josh wasn't being listened to," he said.
Leo Andrade, whose 19-year-old-son Steven also has severe autism and lives in a hospital in Northampton, welcomed the report.
Mrs Andrade lives in London and spends up to four hours travelling to see her son. She said she has "no trust whatsoever in the system".
"I do not want my son again in any other institution," she said. "I also find the idea that having my son away from us is robbing us of having a family."
Other recommendations include a framework to support people with learning disabilities and autism move out of hospitals and into the community.
Its other recommendations include:
Sir Stephen said the Winterbourne View "scandal" had "shocked the nation" and that had led to pressure to prevent such a case from happening again.
Neglect and abuse of patients by staff at the Winterbourne View private hospital, near Bristol, was uncovered by BBC Panorama. Six people were jailed in 2012 and five given suspended sentences.
Sir Stephen said: "We urge immediate action, to close all Winterbourne-style institutions and ramp up community provision.
"We need a new charter of rights to empower people with learning disabilities and their families, and give them the right to challenge the system. We need that system to have the courage to act on these recommendations, and not to promise another false dawn.
"The time for talk is over. It's time for people with learning disabilities or autism and their families to be put first."
Prime Minister David Cameron said: "We have got to do more to get people out of hospitals and into loving and caring homes in the community."
Labour leader Ed Miliband said there were still more people with learning disabilities moving into care than leaving.
Gary Bourlet from advocacy group People First England, who has a learning disability, said: "The report is full of good words. But there's not much here that hasn't been said before.
"We need someone to take charge of making change happen. And that person should be working alongside someone with a learning disability. We call that co-working. And we need a timetable as well."
NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens has called for "radical changes" in care for those with learning disabilities, saying it would mean "challenging legacy models of institutional care".
"NHS England's recent work with people with learning disabilities, and this new report, all now prove that radical changes are needed in NHS and social care," he said.
Jane Cummings, chief nursing officer for England, said: "This report asks every part of the system to respond. We are committed to playing a full and active role in the implementation of the recommendations and call on others to do the same."
She said work was already being done to introduce the recommendations and that the number of people being discharged from hospital was increasing. But she admitted more needed to be done to stop people being admitted.
NHS England said all local NHS leaders must now have a register of inpatients with learning disabilities and autism to create informed local care plans.
It is also carrying out care and treatment reviews, which looks at whether a patient is receiving the right care in the right place and takes into account the patient's requests.
NHS England expects about 1,000 reviews, which are supported by clinicians as well as NHS and local authority commissioners, to have taken place by the end of the year.


Forwards coach Dan McFarland says Glasgow Warriors are "not afraid" as they prepare to face defending European champions Saracens.

Warriors take part in their first Champions Cup quarter-final at Allianz Park on Sunday.
"They're just one step ahead of most of the teams, if not all the teams, in their league and as a consequence we're going to need to be one step ahead.
"That challenge is a fantastic one but not a daunting one," said McFarland.
"It's certainly the most significant game since I've been here. It's a quarter-final in Europe, playing probably the best team in Europe.
"Challenging is the way I'd like to put it. Daunting sort of adds an element of fear. We're not afraid. It's a great challenge and we relish that challenge.
"Why wouldn't you want to play the best team in Europe? Why wouldn't you want to test yourself? As a coaching team, that's what we feel and I know the players are of the same mindset."
McFarland highlighted driven mauls as one of Saracens' strengths but takes heart from some of Glasgow's performances this season.
"They played Bath at the weekend, they scored two driving maul tries," McFarland said.
"They're not out of the blue. They score the most driving maul tries in the Premiership. I think after this weekend, they had scored the most tries in the Premiership.
"That is a strength of their game, not just five metres from the try line but all over the park, it's the way they launch their play, it's the way that they attempt to earn penalties off the opposition.
"They try and do the same with their set piece, their scrum, which has traditionally been a strength of theirs. They're extremely good and efficient at things like lineout and lineout defence with some great athletes in there. For us, we've got to be on the money in those areas.
"We'd be confident as well because we faced Leicester already, we faced Racing and we faced Munster in the league - all three of whom are very strong in those areas.
"To have gone to Racing and to have gone to Leicester and put in winning performances certainly gives us confidence. This is another level up. I think playing Munster was another level up and I think playing Saracens is another level up as well."
Glasgow centre Nick Grigg added: "There's a buzz. History made, making the quarter-finals for the first time ever but we're not just wanting to stop there. We want to create even bigger history and go on to the final and win that.
"If we play well and everything goes to plan on the day, we can do it."


A scheme that involves life-size cutouts of police officers being placed at the roadside to deter drivers from speeding could be extended.

Officers in Fife have been using so-called Pop-up Bob for two years to try to cut offending.
Officers in Tayside are now considering introducing the "officers".
Police Scotland said the life-size figures were not intended to replace "genuine resources" but act as a visual reminder to those tempted to speed.
The glass-fibre models show an officer from Cowdenbeath holding a speed camera.
The force said that the "Bobs" were designed to serve as a "prevention technique" to passing motorists.
Insp Tom Brown from Levenmouth Police Station said: "We utilise a life-size image of a police officer, which provides a visual reminder to motorists to ensure they drive in an appropriate manner.
"This prop is never used in place of genuine resources, and has previously been well-received by the local community."
Police Scotland said it had been "difficult to gauge" how effective the Bobs had been at preventing speeding.
However, similar attempts by officers in England to reduce crimes such as shoplifting using cutout officers have proved unsuccessful.
Douglas Pover from Perth and Kinross Council , who served as a police officer for 30 years, said any initiative that could bring down the number of accidents in the region was worth a try.
He said: "We've asked the police for a full evaluation to see if it's something that works as a deterrent.
"We're not advocating using it in place of real police officers, but if it can be seen to be worthwhile then we'll give it a go.
"We have the A9 and A90, as well as some rural roads where accident statistics can be quite high, and so if this is an effective way of stopping that then so be it."


Black and South Asian people in England are less aware of the warning signs of cancer than white people, according to research led by King's College London.

The study of nearly 50,000 people found those with a black ethnic background were least likely to recognise a persistent cough as a possible symptom.
And South Asians reported more than others that embarrassment could stop them seeking medical help.
The research was presented at England's largest cancer conference.
People across England were asked a series of face-to-face or telephone questions about the signs and symptoms of cancer and how likely they were to speak to doctors if they had concerns.
Questions included:
A team of researchers from eight English universities found black, South Asian and people who identified themselves as 'other ethnic group' were less likely to recognise all cancer symptoms included in the questionnaire than white respondents.
While 93% of white participants said a change in the appearance of a mole could indicate the presence of cancer, just 72% of black people and 70% of South Asians recognised this as a potential sign.
And black and South Asian groups were four times less likely to recognise an unexpected lump or swelling as a possible warning of cancer.
In terms of barriers to seeking help, a  quarter of white people said they would be worried about wasting a doctor's time, compared to 19% of South Asians and 16% in the black ethnic group.
Sara Hiom at Cancer Research UK said: "Thousands of people beat cancer every year and treatment is more likely to be successful when cancer is diagnosed in the earliest stages.
"Getting to know your body and what's normal for you will help you spot anything unusual or persistent."
Lead researcher, Maja Niksic, said: "Evidence suggests people of minority ethnic backgrounds have poorer survival rates for certain cancers and they are more likely to present when the tumour is advanced.
"We need to find ways to present the right health messages to target different needs and different gaps in awareness to give people the same chance of beating cancer regardless of ethnic background."
The authors say previous studies suggested poverty and employment levels could contribute to lower awareness among certain groups.
But when they took socioeconomic status, age, education, employment and gender into account, the results did not change.
Participants were asked to choose from the following categories: black (included black African, black Caribbean, black other), white (white British, white Irish and any other white), South Asian (Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and other South Asian) and other (Chinese and mixed ethnicities).
The research was presented at the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Cancer Conference.


A police force is to axe its mounted unit in order to cut costs.

Humberside Police said disbanding the unit, based in Walkington, by March 2014 would save it Â£500,000 a year.
The force said the saving would allow it to maintain frontline services as it faces making savings of Â£30m by 2016.
Chief Constable Tim Hollis said the force would buy in mounted officers from other forces when needed for operational purposes.
The Humberside unit has only six horses and is one of the smallest mounted units in England.
Mr Hollis said: "I realise, of course, that the public and many officers and police staff, serving and retired, will regret the loss of a mounted section which has been an integral part of policing across Humberside for so many years.
"Personally, I share that sadness but we are in a period when sentiment has come up against austerity and hard decisions must be made."
He said the base at Walkington in East Yorkshire would be sold after the unit's disbandment.


The takeover of Bradford Bulls by Omar Khan's consortium has been ratified by the Rugby Football League.

The governing body took the decision to switch the club's membership to OK Bulls Ltd after Khan's group bought the club from the administrators in August.
Bradford's membership was suspended in June when they entered administration.
"The board's decision closes the door on much of the uncertainty that has surrounded the Bulls in recent months," RFL director Blake Solly said.
"The club's new owners have co-operated fully with the RFL throughout this necessarily extensive process and we look forward to working with Mr Khan and Mr Sutcliffe in the months and years ahead.
"The decision to grant membership is an important step that will help the board to determine which competition Bradford Bulls will compete in from 2013."
No decision has yet been reached on what division the Bulls will compete in next season but an announcement is expected by the end of the week on how that decision will be reached.
Bradford finished ninth in Super League this season, three points outside the play-offs, having been deducted six points for entering administration.


Alastair Cook had become "drained" as England Test captain, says England's director of cricket Andrew Strauss.

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Cook stepped down on Monday after a record 59 matches in charge.
"He was getting drained by the relentlessness of being England captain," Strauss told the BBC's sports editor Dan Roan.
Strauss added that vice-captain Joe Root would be a strong candidate to take over but refused "to rule anyone in or out of the role".
Cook is England's highest run-scorer in Test cricket with 11,057, while his 140 Test appearances and 30 centuries are also national records.
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But the Essex batsman had been considering his future as captain after his side suffered a 4-0 Test series defeat in India last year.
And Strauss said the 32-year-old had taken time to come to his decision.
"We know it has been a tough winter and it was an obvious time for him to step back and reflect and consider and have thoughts about what was right for the team moving forwards," he said.
"In my conversations with him in January it became clear that Alastair felt a huge amount of energy, drive and determination was needed to drive the team forward over the next 12 months.
"You are the only one who knows how much gas you have left in the tank and how much the many demands of being England captain are taking out of you.
"He feels it is time for new blood, new impetus and fresh thinking and allow someone else to take over and do that."
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Strauss said he did not attempt to make Cook change his mind, and explained: "Once it became obvious how clear his thinking was, it was his decision to make. It would have been wrong to persuade him otherwise."
The Yorkshire batsman, who was appointed England vice-captain before the 2015 Ashes Series is seen as the favourite for the job.
But Strauss, while praising his qualities, says that there is a process to go through before Cook's successor is announced.
England's next Test series will be against South Africa with the first game of the four-match series due to start at Lord's on 6 July.
After that, they will host the West Indies in three Tests in August and September before travelling to Australia for the Ashes in November.
"Joe has leadership experience and is a phenomenal cricketer and an influential figure in the dressing room, and there is no reason why he wouldn't be a strong candidate," said Strauss.
"But I don't want to rule anyone out or in at this stage.
"There are conversations that need to take place, both between myself and the selectors and the coach, but also among some of the senior players to make sure I understand how best to take the team forward so that when we announce the captain he is the right man for the job."
Cook's first job after taking over from Strauss in 2012 was to manage the return of batsman Kevin Pietersen, who had been left out of the England side over allegations he had sent derogatory text messages about Strauss to members of the South Africa team.
But Cook also played an influential role in the decision to end Pietersen's international career in February 2014 when he was part of a three-man panel who met the batsman to tell him of their decision.
When asked if that incident could overshadow Cook's legacy as captain, Strauss said: "I think the fact he was able to get through that episode at a very tough time for him and others and come out the other side and keep scoring runs and winning matches and keep a degree of sanity at a difficult time speaks volumes for him."
BBC cricket correspondent Jonathan Agnew
The most difficult time for Cook as England captain was in 2014, which began with the Ashes whitewash down under, moved on to the Kevin Pietersen saga and was followed by a home series defeat by Sri Lanka.
His 2013 Ashes win as skipper is a highlight of his reign. So too, the triumph in South Africa in 2015-16 and the historic win in India in 2012.
Cook's winning percentage of 40.67 is only the fourth best of the six captains to have led England in more than 40 Tests. It has been an up-and-down ride.
The extended period of time taken to mull over his future shows that Cook has made the right decision for him. He will be incredibly comfortable with what lies ahead. That is likely to be scoring many more runs for England.
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US arrests of suspected illegal immigrants rose by 38% in the first 100 days of Donald Trump's presidency, according to government data.

Detentions by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency jumped to 41,318 between January 22 of this year and the end of April.
That was up from 30,028 arrests in about the same period last year.
The dragnet follows presidential orders widening the scope of who can be targeted for immigration violations.
Almost two-thirds of those arrested this year had criminal convictions, said ICE.
But more than half the increase in arrests was of immigrants who had committed no crime other than being in the US without permission.
President Donald Trump has stepped up immigration enforcement to target such undocumented immigrants.
Acting director of ICE Thomas Homan said on a call on Wednesday with reporters that immigrants who pose a threat to national security or have criminal records are still a priority for his agency.
But he added: "There is no category of aliens off the table."
ICE will continue to target people who have been issued a final order of removal by an immigration judge, even if they have not committed another crime, he vowed.
"Those that enter the country illegally, they do violate the law, that is a criminal act," acting director of ICE Thomas Homan said on the call.
"When a federal judge makes a decision and issues an order that order needs to mean something," Mr Homan said.
President Barack Obama was also criticised for deporting a large number of immigrants, but most of them were recent illegal border crossers.
President Trump's signature campaign pledge to build an expanded wall on the US-Mexico border is in limbo after Congress denied funding for it in a recent budget deal.
But his tough rhetoric on border security appears to be having an impact on immigration enforcement.
The number of people caught crossing the border with Mexico is down significantly since the beginning of the year, according US Customs and Border Protection data.
Immigration advocates have raised concerns about the stepped up enforcement in the interior of the country.


Essex will "support the majority" after a new city-based eight-team Twenty20 tournament was given the go-ahead to start in 2020.

Essex and Middlesex voted against the proposals, while Kent abstained as 38 of the 41 England and Wales Cricket Board members approved them.
Fifteen first-class counties were in support of the competition.
"Essex County Cricket Club would like it to be known that it fully respects the outcome," an Essex statement read.
"(Essex) will support all efforts to grow the game across Essex and at a national level.
"The view of Essex and its membership was made clear by not voting in favour of the proposed changes. However, with the amendments being approved, the club would like to confirm that it will now support the majority and the proposal going forward."
The ECB needed 31 members to vote in favour of the tournament which will be played alongside the existing T20 Blast.
It is not yet known which cities will have sides and where the matches will be played.
ECB chairman Colin Graves said he wanted the new tournament to "sit alongside the IPL and Big Bash League".


An arts festival in the Lincolnshire resort of Skegness has been labelled "a total waste of ratepayers' money".

East Lindsey District Council plans to spend about Â£350,000 on its events programme, which includes the So Festival.
The authority said it delivered direct economic benefit of over Â£1m to the area.
But Andrew Leonard, councillor in nearby Louth, said the event did not attract any new visitors.
Mr Leonard said: "You've got to be realistic about this - if you look at an event like Glastonbury, it's pulling thousands of people into the area.
"This isn't Glastonbury - this is Skegness.
"The people who are going to the SO Festival are already in Skegness having a holiday - they are not coming from further afield."
He added: "If they want to stage it, make it self-sufficient and don't ask the ratepayers to cough up money to pay for it."
Mr Leonard also accused the council of overlooking places likes Louth and wasting money funding "nonentity" events as part of the festival.
He said: "You've got things like Wolds Words Festival - two or three people sat at these meetings - that doesn't justify big expenditure and it's an absolute waste of money."
East Lindsey District Council said the SO Festival was a district-wide event which provided a boost for the local economy and raised the area's profile as a visitor destination.
The authority said the money also supported a number of other events, including Wolds Words and Mablethorpe Illuminations.
The funding is part of the council's proposed budget, which has been approved for consultation by the executive board, and will be considered by council later this month.
ELDC needs to find Â£1.6m to balance its books in 2013-14.
This year's SO Festival is due to be held from 28 June to 7 July.


Pupils at two Belfast grammar schools have received warnings or sanctions after an investigation into an alleged leak of details from an A-level exam.

Nine students at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (RBAI) and Methodist College (MCB) are affected, the BBC understands.
The investigation concerned the CCEA A2 business studies paper that candidates sat on the afternoon of Monday 12 June.
It is believed that some details from the exam were shared on social media.
The BBC understands two pupils will not receive their A-level grade as a result, but can re-sit the exam in the next school year.
However, the BBC also understands that most of the students involved received a warning - the lowest level of sanction - and will still receive their A-level result next week.
It is unclear how the alleged malpractice came to light.
The Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) - Northern Ireland's exam-setting and qualifications body - subsequently investigated the allegations.
The schools and pupils involved were informed of the outcome of the investigation this week.
In a statement, a CCEA spokesperson confirmed: "Following an allegation of examination malpractice at two Belfast schools, a full investigation has been carried out regarding the GCE Business Studies examination sat on 12 June."
"From the findings of the investigation, the CCEA malpractice committee has applied a range of penalties to candidates at both centres."
"CCEA will not make any further comment in regards to the investigation or outcome of the investigation, in order to protect the identity of the young people involved."
"For any suspected cases of malpractice, we thoroughly investigate the incident to ensure that no individual sitting a CCEA examination has an unfair advantage.
The number of malpractice cases "remain small in number", it added.
"Our advice to any student who comes across any suspicious examination content is to report it immediately to their teacher, principal or CCEA."
MCB said it had fully cooperated with the CCEA investigation, which came after it had passed information to the board following its own formal investigation.
"This is a deeply regrettable incident for all those involved," said a spokesperson for the school.
"All pupils at Methody are given clear guidance on how to conduct themselves during external examinations, including the requirement to report immediately to a member of staff, the principal or CCEA any incidence of the leaking of information about the content of an exam."
The BBC contacted RBAI, which said it had fully co-operated with CCEA on the matter.


After 146 years, Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus are holding its final performances.

The American institution that was slowly brought to its knees by a combination of evolving cultural tastes, bad luck and political enemies that left it no longer financially viable.
For the performers, it also means the end of a tight-knit community that travelled and lived on a train in between shows.
TAP HERE to read and watch how performers are dealing with the end of the circus.


A man who fatally stabbed a customer in a Poundland store has pleaded guilty to manslaughter.

Trevor Joyce, 36, of Franklyn Close, Abingdon, attacked Justin Skrebowski with a knife from the store in the town in Oxfordshire on 7 December.
The 61-year-old had been buying balloons for his wife's birthday.
Joyce was charged with murder, but admitted the lesser charge on the grounds of diminished responsibility.
He also pleaded guilty to two counts of making threats to kill, one count of causing actual bodily harm and one count of making threats with offensive weapons.
Mr Skrebowski's wife, Gulsen Alkan, said: "The killing of Justin has left me and my two children with a devastating emotional burden and a daunting financial future which I now have to deal with alone".
Thames Valley Police said Mr Skrebowski was fatally injured in a "completely random and unprovoked attack".
Det Insp Stuart Blaik said: "[Mr Skrebowski was] an innocent member of the public, which is all the more difficult to comprehend."
Joyce was remanded in custody and will be sentenced at the Old Bailey in London on 6 June.


A "deep clean" of the custody suite and criminal court rooms at Belfast's Laganside Court is taking place after an infestation of lice at a police station.

In a statement, the court service said two magistrates' courts scheduled to sit on Thursday would be relocated to Antrim to facilitate the cleaning.
They said the action was a precautionary measure following an infestation at Musgrave police station.


Jenny Meadows has had her 800m silver medal at the 2011 European Indoor Championships upgraded to gold after Yevgenia Zinurova was one of three Russian athletes banned for doping.

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Marathon runner Nailiya Yulamanova and 800m specialists Zinurova and Svetlana Klyuka have received two-year bans from the Russian Athletics Federation.
All three will now miss London 2012.
Meadows will also miss this summer's Olympics after not being selected in Team GB's athletics squad.
The 31-year-old, who just lost out to Zinurova in Paris in 2011 when the Russian passed her in the home straight, had indicated before Tuesday's team announcement that she would appeal if not selected but has decided not to fight the decision.
As well as the doping charges, Russian trio Yulamanova, Zinurova and Klyuka were also suspended for "abnormal indexes in their biometric passports", the first time Russian athletes have been banned for such offences.
Yulamanova, 31, finished second in the marathon at the 2010 European Championships in Barcelona.
But she was awarded the gold medal after the original winner, Lithuania's Zivile Balciunaite, was disqualified and banned for using steroids.
Yulamanova also finished eighth in the marathon at the 2009 World Championships in Berlin.
Both Yulamanova's and Klyuka's suspensions have been backdated from February 2012, while 800m indoor European champion Zinurova's ban began in September 2011.
Their suspensions mean all three are ineligible to compete at this week's Russian championships in Cheboksary, and therefore cannot compete at London 2012.
"This is the first time athletes have been suspended in Russia because of abnormality of their biometric passports," said Russian Athletics Federation president Valentin Balakhnichyov.
"We know such practice has been widely used in cycling but unfortunately it's now been the case with our athletes as well.
"It's a huge loss for our team but their guilt has been proven beyond doubt."


An 85-year-old Nepali man who was attempting to become the oldest person to climb Mount Everest has died at base camp, Nepali officials say.

Min Bahadur Sherchan, a former British Gurkha soldier, was trying to reclaim the record from Japan's Yuichiro Miura, who climbed Everest aged 80 in 2013.
Mr Miura broke Mr Sherchan's own record set as a 76-year-old in 2008.
It comes a week after Swiss climber Ueli Steck, 40, died as he prepared to climb the mountain.
Mr Sherchan died at base camp on Saturday afternoon, officials at Nepal's tourism office said. Doctors suspect he suffered a heart attack, the Kathmandu Post newspaper reported.
His long rivalry with Mr Miura - a year his junior - included a 2013 attempt to reclaim the record aged 81 that had to be abandoned after late spring weather conditions worsened.
In 2015 he was on his way to base camp for another attempt when a devastating earthquake struck the country, forcing him and many other climbers to abandon their plans.
"I want to climb Everest to set a record so that it will inspire people to dream big," he told German news agency DPA in March. "This will instil a sense of pride among old people like me."
"My climb will demonstrate that age doesn't stop you from realising your goal."
Mr Sherchan began climbing in 1960, when he ascended Mount Dhaulagiri, the world's seventh-highest mountain at 8,167m (26,795 ft), the Telegraph newspaper reported.
However he was already 72 when he thought about climbing Mount Everest. To prepare, he walked 1,200km (745 miles) across Nepal in 2003, DPA said.
He told DPA that his inspirations were famous Nepali Sherpas Tenzing Norgay - who first reached the top of Mount Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary in 1953 - and Apa Sherpa, who has climbed the mountain the most times.
Mr Sherchan's guide, Shiva Sapkota, told DPA that he had been in good physical health but had not spent time at high altitude since 2015.


A model of a David Bowie statue planned for the town where his Ziggy Stardust persona was first performed has been revealed.

The bronze sculpture, named Earthly Messenger, will be unveiled later this year in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire.
It will be installed under the arches in Market Square, referenced by Bowie in the song Five Years.
The work features a likeness of Bowie in 2002 looking down at Ziggy, alongside of some of his other looks.
LIVE: Updates on this story and other Buckinghamshire news
Funds for the statue, designed by sculptor Andrew Sinclair, have been raised through a Â£100,000 crowdfunding appeal, plus grants.
When completed, speakers mounted above the life size artwork will play one of 2,000 tracks every hour.
Some changes are expected to the design before the finished product is officially unveiled in March.
Bowie unveiled two albums and his Stardust persona during gigs at the Friars venue in the early 1970s.
He played a gig there in September 1971 where he gave the town the world debut of his album Hunky Dory.
Four months later he played the venue again where the majority of the set was made up of songs which featured on the Ziggy Stardust album.


Singer-songwriter Yusuf, formerly known as Cat Stevens, has said the harrowing death of Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi inspired his latest song.

The musician penned the haunting track, He Was Alone, after spending time at a refugee camp in southern Turkey on the Turkish/Syrian border.
"We see this human disaster and we see numbers in millions and we're trying to make sense of it," he told the BBC.
"We've forgotten how to understand the human story behind this."
Three-year-old Syrian boy Kurdi made headlines around the world in September when he washed up on a Turkish beach.
"What I came to realise is that it's the reductionism which has caused much of the problem," said Yusuf. "That we've forgotten how to understand the human story behind this and so it's that young soul that I visualised in my head when I wrote this this song."
He said that, when the shocking pictures of Kurdi appeared in the press and on TV in 2015, "suddenly people woke up a bit for a while and said, 'Oh God, that looks like my little nephew or my little son', and so that came to my mind."
But he also lamented any initial public galvanisation over the humanitarian crisis in the West, saying it had long since dissipated.
"It's kind of, 'Well that's news today and tomorrow it's old - and people move on and politics gets involved. It is quite sad that this happens and it is the politics which I think interferes with it."
Proceeds from the new record will go toward the #YouAreNotAlone campaign and Save The Children.


Roston Chase became the first man since Sir Garfield Sobers to score a century and take five wickets in the same Test for West Indies.

Starting the final day of the second Test against India in Kingston on 48-4, the hosts still needed 246 to make their opponents bat again.
Chase, 24, in only his second Test, hit an unbeaten 137 to steer the hosts to 388-6 in Jamaica and seal a draw.
India lead the four-match series 1-0, the third Test starting on 9 August.


The first major decommissioning project in the North Sea has been completed with the removal of the Brent Delta platform from its legs.

It has been lifted on to a huge purpose-built ship which will transport it to England to be scrapped. Shell wants to leave the legs in place.
The 24,000 tonne Brent Delta platform topsides sat on a three-legged gravity-based structure in 140 metres of water.
The platform lies 115 miles north east of Shetland.
It is one of four which is due to be removed from the field in the coming years.
Unusually for a platform, the legs of Brent Delta are made of concrete which makes it much more difficult to decommission than one with steel legs.
Allseas, the company which operates the decommissioning vessel Pioneering Spirit, said it had set a world lifting record with the removal of the platform.
The topsides have now been sea-fastened on board the vessel for transportation to Teesside.
Brent Delta was one of the first platforms to be built in the very early days of Britain's oil and gas industry.
It sits about 115 miles (185km) north-east of Shetland in a cluster of four platforms which make up the Brent field. Its sister, Brent Bravo, produced its first oil in 1976.
At its peak, in 1982, the four platforms were producing more than half a million barrels of oil a day.
Being one of the first, it's now at the end of its life and has to be removed.
Brent Delta is the first major piece of infrastructure to be decommissioned in the North Sea.
More than 100 platforms are forecast to be completely or partially removed over the next decade in the waters of the UK and Norway.


The leader of Lincolnshire County Council has branded elements of a plan to downgrade some local A&E services "unacceptable".

The sustainability and transformation report, suggests A&E services at Grantham hospital could end and be replaced with an urgent care centre.
It also includes proposals to centralise some maternity services.
Health bosses said they would consult on the proposals and take feedback into account when making any decisions.
Every health trust in England has been asked by the government to come up with a five-year plan to transform health services.
Martin Hill, leader of the county council, said while he welcomed some of the proposals in the report, there were parts which were unacceptable.
He said: "Living in a large rural county, Lincolnshire residents have a right to expect three 24-hour hospitals operating in the county delivering appropriate emergency access and services.
"We do not support the permanent downgrading of Grantham hospital and do not believe that the maternity proposals at Boston would be safe for unforeseen emergencies in the eastern part of the county."
The report suggests consultant-led maternity services could be centralised in Lincoln due to a shortage of trained staff across the two sites.
The idea was first reported in April.
Talking about the proposals, Andrew Morgan, chief executive of Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust, said: "It has not been an easy process and we have had to make some difficult choices about how to prioritise spending in order to maximise the benefit to our whole population."
He said although no final decisions had been taken, future healthcare needed to be sustainable.
Mr Morgan said: "What we are setting out is better ways of providing services - a stronger focus on care closer to home - more investment in general practice - and not having as many people referred to hospital."
A consultation will take place in 2017.


Joseph Biden's foreign policy expertise and blue-collar appeal made him an astute addition to Barack Obama's ticket in 2008.

And in the years since, he has been a trusted adviser - and occasional pain in the neck - to the president.
Now he has passed on a final run for the presidency himself.
A vice-president's first job is to get the ticket elected. And Mr Biden was chosen for the 2008 Democratic ticket to fill two gaps in Mr Obama's political repertoire.
Mr Biden, a veteran Delaware senator, was selected for his supposed folksy appeal to white working-class and middle-class voters.
And as a long-standing senior member of the Senate foreign relations committee, he could defend the ticket against Republican criticism that Mr Obama was ill-equipped for the role of commander-in-chief.
The two men complement each other in several other ways. While Mr Obama comes across as cool and collected, Mr Biden can be lively and combative in his attacks on opponents.
Mr Biden also relishes the old-fashioned politics of glad-handing and party networking that Mr Obama appears to dislike.
But Mr Biden has also earned a reputation as a loose-lipped gaffe machine, offering fodder to the conservative media, distracting the cable news nets and knocking the White House off message.
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr was born in 1942 in Scranton, Pennsylvania, one of four children in an Irish-Catholic family. In American political code, hailing from that blue-collar town gives a politician credibility with middle America, and not least with the news media.
The family later moved to the small north-east state of Delaware, where Mr Biden attended the University of Delaware. He went to law school at Syracuse University in New York state.
He was elected to the US Senate in 1972 at age 29, and took office weeks later aged 30, the minimum age to enter the Senate.
But before he could take office, his family was devastated by tragedy. His wife and infant daughter were killed in a winter car accident.
At a recent 9/11 commemoration, Mr Biden spoke of his pain.
"No matter how many anniversaries you experience," he said, "for at least an instant, the terror of that moment returns; the lingering echo of that phone call; that sense of total disbelief that envelops you, where you feel like you're being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest."
Mr Biden ran for the presidency in 1988 but withdrew after he admitted plagiarising a speech by the then leader of the British Labour Party, Neil Kinnock.
He spent the next years rising through the Senate ranks, ultimately becoming chairman of the judiciary and foreign relations committees.
In 2008 he ran again for president but failed to gain traction and dropped out in January.
Mr Biden's reputation as an able politician has been marred by his loose tongue.
In 2007, he described Barack Obama as "the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy".
Shortly after the pair took office in early 2009, Mr Biden said in a speech that no matter how hard he and Mr Obama tried to get things right, they still ran a 30% chance of fouling up.
Asked about the remark at a press conference, Mr Obama chuckled.  "I don't remember exactly what Joe was referring to," he said. "Not surprisingly."
In 2012 one of Mr Biden's off-message comments significantly altered White House policy.
Mr Biden told an interviewer that he supported same-sex marriage, though Mr Obama had said for years his own position was "evolving".
White House aides were said to be furious, but within days, Mr Obama said he had come around and now supported legalising same sex marriage. The political fall-out has been negligible.
"Thank you for being the best vice-president I could ever hope for," Mr Obama said at the Democratic Convention in September 2012.
In 2015, tragedy stuck the Biden family again when Mr Biden's son, Beau, died of brain cancer at age 46.
The death son of his son weighed on him heavily as he considered a third and final run for the presidency.
"The most relevant factor in my decision is whether my family and I have the emotional energy to run. The factor is, can I do it? The honest to God answer is I just don't know," he said in September.
After an extended period of speculation, the vice-president announced in a Rose Garden statement in October 2015 the "window had closed" on mounting a successful bid.
But true to form, Mr Biden said while he would "not be a candidate,  I will not be a silent. I intend to speak out clearly and forcefully on where we stand as a party and where we need to go as a nation."


The Polish government has put forward its own candidate to rival Donald Tusk, the EU's Polish leader who is seeking a new 30-month term later this week.

Such national hostility to a fellow countryman is highly unusual in EU politics. But Mr Tusk is still expected to get enough support to keep his post.
As European Council president, Mr Tusk looks set to play a major role in the UK's Brexit negotiations.
A top Tusk ally rejected the candidacy of Polish rival Jacek Saryusz-Wolski.
German MEP Manfred Weber heads the main conservative bloc in the EU, the European People's Party (EPP). He said the EPP would expel Mr Saryusz-Wolski if he did not give up his bid to thwart Mr Tusk.
The European Council brings together the heads of state and government of the 28 EU member states. Jointly they set the EU's strategic direction in key areas, such as reform of the eurozone, the Greek debt crisis, the migrant challenge and relations with Russia.
The Council president aims to achieve consensus - deploying all his diplomatic skills - on these tricky issues, where national tensions often dictate how leaders behave.
Mr Tusk took charge in late 2014 and his term ends on 31 May. If his fellow leaders back him on Thursday, he will have another 30-month term, lasting until 30 November 2019. That period coincides with the expected two-year Brexit talks on UK withdrawal from the EU.
Malta, currently chairing EU business, is likely to seek approval of Mr Tusk by consensus. Poland's hostility might push it to a vote - but then Mr Tusk is still likely to win by a qualified majority.
Mr Tusk was Polish prime minister in 2007-2014. As leader of centre-right Civic Platform, his chief rival then was the nationalist Law and Justice Party (PiS), which is now in power.
PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski holds Mr Tusk politically responsible for the 2010 plane crash in Russia which killed his twin Lech Kaczynski, and all other 95 people on board.
The plane crashed in dense fog. Official investigations ruled pilot error was the principal cause.
In 2012, Jaroslaw Kaczynski told Mr Tusk in parliament: "In the political sense you bear 100% responsibility for the catastrophe in Smolensk."
Many Poles believe Mr Tusk's government did not do enough to explain the causes of the crash. Critics say Mr Tusk should not have allowed the Russians to conduct the first crash investigation.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski also said Mr Tusk "favours solutions that are extremely harmful to Poland".
The European Commission has clashed with the PiS government over Poland's refusal to take in refugees - a move that would ease the burden on Greece and Italy. The Commission is also investigating the party's changes to Poland's constitutional court and media, suspecting that they violate EU rule of law principles.


The Scottish government will receive a £350m funding boost as a result of measures announced in his budget, the chancellor has said.

The additional Barnett formula money will come from increased UK government spending on areas such as education.
Mr Hammond told the House of Commons that the additional funding demonstrated that "we are stronger together in this great United Kingdom".
He also confirmed additional help for the North Sea oil and gas industry.
The Treasury said the Scottish government would see its resource budget boosted by £260m over the next three years, and its capital budget by £90m over the period to 2021.
It said the money would be in addition to the £800m of additional Barnett funds announced by the chancellor in last year's Autumn Statement.
The Scottish government said the "limited increases" in Barnett consequentials meant the Scottish budget was still facing cuts of £2.9bn over the next decade.
Its finance secretary, Derek Mackay, said: "The real elephant in the room in this budget was Brexit. There was no mention of the UK government's plans to protect and grow the UK economy as the prime minister gets ready to trigger Article 50.
"This is simply not acceptable. Brexit is a real threat to people across Scotland in so many ways. The chancellor must tell us his plans."
£350m
Over four years to 2021
£260m Resource budget
£90m Capital budget
But Mr Hammond insisted his budget would "equip our economy and our people for the future - while dealing with the challenges we face as one nation".
He added: "Benefitting from £350m of extra investment, the Scottish government can take further steps to strengthen Scotland's economy and make sure that Scottish people, of all background and no matter where they live, feel the benefits of economic growth."
The Barnett formula is used to calculate public expenditure allocated to the devolved nations.
The additional money will largely be the result of increased UK government spending in social care, health and education in England - but the Scottish government will be free to spend it however it wants.
The chancellor also confirmed that a panel of experts would be set up to examine how to boost sales of late life oil and gas fields - so they can keep producing for longer.
The SNP benches proved stubbornly immune to Phil the Funster. He announced that there would be £350m extra for the Scottish government to spend.
There then followed a showbiz moment: the Tories cheered and the chancellor grinned broadly while repeatedly gesturing towards the SNP benches, inviting them to join in the general hilarity.
The Nationalists, entirely understandably, declined to participate, sitting silent upon a peak in Darien or, rather, upon their benches in the Commons.
Both at Westminster and Holyrood, the SNP subsequently noted that the cash available, while welcome, was spread over three years and failed to compensate wholly for what they said were more substantial reductions over the past ten years.
There was precious little jollity, either, surrounding the issue of oil. The chancellor announced a review of North Sea taxation in an effort to bolster this late phase in the history of the black, black oil.
Scottish ministers say action is needed - rather than a further review.
Read more from Brian
The Treasury said "good progress" was being being made towards a City Deal with Edinburgh, while negotiations on a City Deal for Stirling have been opened.
And it said the UK government was also "looking forward" to considering proposals for a Tay Cities Deal in the near future.
Mr Hammond opened his budget statement by saying that, although the UK economy "continued to confound the commentators with robust growth", the UK's deficit was still high, and productivity "stubbornly low".
He also said the Office for Budget Responsibility had revised up its growth forecasts from 1.4% to 2% for 2017, and that borrowing would be £16.8bn lower than previously forecast.
The chancellor also announced an increase in National Insurance rates for self-employed people, saying the disparity with the amount paid by employees "undermines the fairness of our tax system".
Class 4 National Insurance contributions will go up to 10% from 9% and to 11% in April 2019, he told MPs.
Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale said: "This was billed as a budget that would be upbeat but what we got instead was an insight into the devastating impact a chaotic Tory Brexit will have on families across the UK.
"The Chancellor could have brought an end to seven years of damaging Tory austerity but instead he doubled down by imposing cuts to public services and welfare".
Scottish Greens co-convener Patrick Harvie said: "The £350m in capital funds coming to the Scottish government is a drop in the ocean after years of cuts, but it's vital that Scottish ministers use this cash to invest in the kind of physical and social infrastructure we really need."


The SDLP has rejected Sinn Féin's call for a general election pact after Northern Ireland's two biggest unionist parties agreed to support a single candidate in four constituencies.

Sinn Féin's North Belfast MLA Gerry Kelly said a pact with the SDLP would be about "progressive politics".
SDLP leader Alasdair McDonnell said his party had "no interest whatsoever in a pact with Sinn Féin"
He said he was "deeply disappointed" at the two unionist parties' pact.
"We believe these cynical political moves are designed with the sole purpose of circumventing democracy," he said.
"Pacts are not about getting the best candidates to represent people - this is about pitting one community against another."
Earlier, SDLP MLA Alban Maginness said Sinn Féin's proposal was a mirror image of what unionists had done.
"Our position is very clear, we don't enter into sectarian pacts," he said.
"We are not going to do it in this situation."
Mr Maginness, a candidate for North Belfast, said the pact was "depressingly predictable, sad and disappointing" and amounted to "a sectarian carve-up".
"Progressive politics is about trying to tackle sectarianism, not to embolden sectarianism or to entrench sectarianism," he said.
Mr Kelly said "if the accusation is that we are looking for a sectarian pact then it ignores the fact that we are for religious freedom, for anti-racism laws for LGBT, for the civic forum which they are against and for the Single Equality Act".
"Is Alban Maginness saying that that is not good reason to come together and bring forward candidates who are for all those progressive policies?" he said.
"It is no coincidence that the [unionist] pacts are in the three areas where Sinn Féin are strong. In other areas they have not made pacts.
"The Ulster Unionists are going to diminish their vote and go down further. The Ulster Unionists have given a leg up to the DUP."
The deal between the Democratic Unionist Party and Ulster Unionist Party means there will be a single candidate from the two main unionist parties in four constituencies.
The DUP will step aside in Fermanagh and South Tyrone and Newry and Armagh.
The UUP will step aside in East Belfast and North Belfast.


Homeowners living in retirement villages face unfair charges of thousands of pounds each, the Law Commission has found.

After a two-year investigation the Commission said there was "real potential for abuse" in the charging of event or transfer fees.
When residents move out, or need a carer to move in, they can be charged up to 30% of their property's value.
Some rogue operators keep such charges hidden in the small print, it said.
The money is supposed to cover running costs and service charges in retirement communities, which are becoming increasingly popular in the UK, having started in the US.
The Commission stopped short of banning the fees, saying instead that they should be more transparent.
And it did not go as far as the Office of Fair Trading, which said in an earlier report that exit fees were likely to constitute an unfair contract term.
Ken Ward, from Rayleigh in Essex, said he was unaware of such fees when his father in law, Bert Elley, moved out of a retirement home shortly before he died last year.
In addition to service charges, and losses on the value of the property itself, the family had to pay an extra Â£1,725 for administration.
"They fleeced him. The whole thing has not been a good experience," he told the BBC.
"I asked them to justify the fees. It just seemed so wrong that they took all this money."
Nevertheless the Law Commission said exit fees worked well for many people, by deferring bills until after they sell their home.
"But, in the worst cases, a few unscrupulous landlords are getting away with very high hidden fees buried deep in the small print of a long and complicated lease," said the Law Commissioner, Stephen Lewis.
"We'd urge the government to crack down on rogue landlords by regulating the sector, and making sure that before consumers sign on the dotted line, they have already been told exactly what's being provided for their money."
He also wants a 10% cap on fees charged for sub-letting or change of occupancy.
Retirement Villages: What's the catch?
The Leasehold Knowledge Partnership (LKP), which represents the interests of leaseholders, was highly critical of the report.
It said the Law Commission had given the green light to exit fees.
However the industry welcomed the report, saying that it wanted more regulation of the sector, not less.
The Association of Retirement Community Operators (ARCO) said event fees were used to cross-subsidise running costs.
"In other countries, event fees are a well-established mechanism that enable older people to use their housing equity to "enjoy now and pay later", for example by reducing their service charge or deferring some of the costs of building communal facilities," said Michael Voges, ARCO's executive director.
There are now about 160,000 retirement properties of this type in the UK.


A 16-year-old boy who was found unresponsive in his prison cell died of natural causes, a coroner has concluded.

Daniel Adewole suffered a sudden unexpected death in epilepsy at Cookham Wood jail in Kent in 2015.
The inquest in Maidstone heard that despite repeated attempts to rouse him by kicking his locked door, officers did not enter the cell for 38 minutes.
They assumed he was asleep on the floor, hidden by his bed cover.
One officer went for a cigarette in between checking on him, the inquest heard, and another did not use her emergency key because she feared she might be attacked.
Medical experts told the hearing it was likely Daniel had been dead for any time between half an hour and several hours before he was found.
Senior coroner Patricia Harding said she was not satisfied Daniel's death could have been prevented had his cell been entered earlier.
Giving her conclusion, she said the events were of "significant concern", but she had received information from the prison estate that changes had been made to prevent similar cases.
After the hearing, a Ministry of Justice spokeswoman said: "Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Mr Adewole and we will carefully consider the findings of the inquest."


Ukraine's acting President Olexander Turchynov has reinstated military conscription to deal with deteriorating security in the east of the country.

The move, announced in a decree, came as pro-Russia militants seized the regional prosecutor's office in the eastern city of Donetsk.
Ukraine blames Russia for organising the seizures of a number of offices in the east, a claim Moscow denies.
Some 40,000 Russian troops are stationed near the Ukrainian border.
By David SternBBC News, Kiev
The questions that immediately arise after Mr Turchynov's announcement are how many people will be called up and how quickly will they be deployed?
Also, how will this contribute to Ukraine's ability to fight what has up to now been a losing battle?
Russia may not invade. If President Putin's final goal is, as many people here believe, to dismember Ukraine and render what remains of the country forever impotent in the face of Russian power - then he is currently accomplishing this without the need for a single soldier to cross the border.
The coming days will indicate whether restoring conscription is a serious move or just the latest attempt by Ukrainian officials to be seen doing something, when in fact nothing can be done.
Mr Turchynov admitted on Wednesday that his forces were "helpless" to quell the unrest in some parts of the east, saying the goal was now to prevent it from spreading.
He also said Ukraine was on "full combat alert", amid fears that Russian troops could invade.
On Thursday, his office said in a statement that conscription was being introduced "given the deteriorating situation in the east and the south... the rising force of armed pro-Russian units and the taking of public administration buildings... which threaten territorial integrity".
BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus says Kiev's decision is, in the short-term at least, a symbolic step as the Ukrainian military has been starved of cash for years and is no match for what Russia has on its borders.
The real battle for control of Ukrainian territory is already under way and Kiev is losing ground, he adds.
Analysts say Ukraine has 130,000 personnel in its armed forces that could be boosted to about one million with reservists.
Kiev scrapped compulsory military service for young men in late 2013 under a law introduced by then President Viktor Yanukovych.
At the time, Mr Yanukovych said Ukraine would introduce military reforms to create "a professional army".
In Donetsk on Thursday, pro-Russian militants attacked the prosecutor's office, accusing those inside of siding with the government in Kiev.
The crowd later forced its way into the building, stripping weapons and shields from police officers and raising the flag of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic.
Many attackers chanted "Fascists! Fascists!". There were reports of injuries on both sides.
One policeman running away from the prosecutor's office told the BBC's Steve Rosenberg: "How on earth can we deal with this kind of thing?"
Donetsk, an industrial hub, has seen a number of government offices seized in recent weeks.
Eastern Ukraine has a large Russian-speaking population and was a stronghold for Mr Yanukovych before he was overthrown by protesters in February.
Russia then annexed the Crimean peninsula - part of Ukraine but with a Russian-speaking majority - in a move that provoked international outrage.
The crisis has plunged East-West relations to their lowest point since the Cold War.
On Thursday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked Russia in a phone call to President Vladimir Putin to help free foreign monitors held in eastern Ukraine.
The military observers were seized by pro-Russia separatists at a checkpoint in the flashpoint town of Sloviansk last Friday.
For his part, Mr Putin reiterated his call for Kiev to withdraw troops from the south-east to open the way for a national dialogue.
Mrs Merkel is due to meet US President Barack Obama in Washington on Friday to discuss the crisis in Ukraine.


One hundred and one years ago this month, the first ship sailed through the Panama Canal which links the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

The 77km-long (48 mile) waterway has been called one of the seven wonders of the modern world but a century after its inauguration it is now too small to take the world's largest container ships.
A new lane is being built to allow ships which can carry more than double the current cargo to pass through the isthmus.
Work on the expansion began in September 2007 and was originally set to finish in 2014.
Following delays caused by construction workers' strikes and disputes over cost overruns, the date for completion was pushed back to April 2016.
Standing at the base of the upper chamber of one of the new locks peering up at the first gate you get to appreciate the vast scale of this $5.2bn-project (£3.2bn).
Executive Vice-President for Engineering Ilya Espino de Marotta rattles off the figures.
The chamber is 55m (180ft) wide.
Gate number one, the smallest, is 33m high and weighs a whopping 2,300 tonnes.
It can be operated by a single person and will only take four to five minutes to open, she says.
There is another key difference in the way the new locks will operate.
Currently tugboats help guide ships through the narrow waterway.
In the existing locks, ships are also tethered to electric locomotives, called mules, which run along the dock walls and help align the ships correctly.
A large vessel may have up to eight mules guiding it, with two on each side at the bow and stern.
In the new locks, there will be no mules.
The lack of mules is something which worries tugboat captains, says Ivan de la Guardia, General Secretary of the Union of Tugboat Captains and Deck Officers of the Panama Canal.
Capt de la Guardia fears the responsibility for guiding ships safely through the new locks will lie  squarely with the tugboat captains.
He says that so far, the canal administration has not given them any guidance and has failed to include them in the relevant technical committee.
"We haven't had any training or any briefing by anyone from the canal administration on how they plan to do this," he says.
"This raises a big red flag because there are obvious safety concerns."
Panama Canal Administrator Jorge Luis Quijano says that the role of the tugboat captains will be different in the new locks, but denies that responsibility for steering the ships will lie solely with them.
He says that there will be a "combined responsibility" between the tugboat captains and the pilots who board the vessels and who will give instructions to the tugboats.
Mr Quijano is adamant that the canal administration is going to extraordinary lengths to provide training, even building a scaled model of the canal and two ships at a cost of $6m.
"We're building two little lakes and locks in the Culebra Cut so that they can try [the 1:25-scale ships] there."
Moreover, he says, there are two bridge simulators and a tugboat simulator for pilots and tugboat captains to practise on.
But Capt de la Guardia says scale models and simulators are not good enough.
"What we need is real hands-on training on how to manoeuvre real ships, to see how we are going to put the lines up, the speed at which we can do this, and how many ship lengths we need to stop the ship."
"Because if we can't stop the ship in the canal, we have a big problem."
Mr Quijano insists the models and simulators are just the first step and that he himself proposed that the Panama Canal Administration charter a full-sized container ship.
"We plan to have that vessel here by January and it's in the budget," he says.
He adds that this will give everyone involved in steering ships through the new locks three months to practise under real-life conditions.
"We have the plan and we will execute the plan," he says.


Burnley have signed Chelsea's Nathaniel Chalobah and Manchester United's Michael Keane on loan until January.

Midfielder Chalobah, 19, has yet to make a Premier League appearance, while 21-year-old Keane has made one top-flight substitute outing for United.
Chalobah won the 2010 Under-19 European Championship with England and has 18 Under-21 caps to his name.
The pair are the ninth and 10th signings of the summer transfer window by Burnley.
Chalobah came through the Chelsea youth ranks and has regularly captained their reserve and youth sides.
He was an unused substitute for the Blues' Carling Cup third-round tie with Newcastle in 2010 at the age of 15.
Last season, he spent the first half of the campaign on loan at Nottingham Forest, where he made 12 appearances and scored twice, before joining Middlesbrough in a temporary deal in January and making a further 19 appearances.
The season before he made 42 appearances for Watford, scoring five goals to help the club reach the play-off final, where they were beaten by Crystal Palace.
Keane began his career at Old Trafford before signing professional terms in 2011.
He made his debut for United in the League Cup against Aldershot Town in the same year and, after several more appearances in the competition, finally made his first Premier League appearance for United against Sunderland last month.
Burnley are bottom of the Premier League table, with one point from their first three games.