A hostage situation is unfolding in London's Leicester Square

Parts of London's Leicester Square are on lockdown as a hostage situation is reportedly unfolding in a restaurant, according to several reports on Twitter.

Police appear to have cordoned off the streets outside Bella Italia restaurant, where the situation isreportedly taking place.

According to the BBC, a man who claims to have a knife is holding a woman hostage inside the restaurant. Two other people are reportedly inside.

London police have confirmed that the situation is not terror-related. 

Jose Mourinho vs Ryan Giggs: Manchester United fans vote for who they want as their next manager

Candidates: Mourinho and Giggs are in the running to replace Louis van Gaal

Manchester United's supporters have voted overwhelmingly in favour of Jose Mourinho becoming the club's next manager ahead of Ryan Giggs, the Manchester Evening News report.

Louis van Gaal is expected to leave the club at the end of the season - 12 months before his three-year contract at Old Trafford ends.

Mourinho and Giggs are the two most likely candidates to replace him, with Ed Woodward keen on appointing Mourinho, and Sir Bobby Charlton and Sir Alex Ferguson in favour of Giggs.

The knights, though, are in the minority. On the Red Issue, United We Stand and Red News fanzine websites, Giggs has scored incredibly low with supporters in 'next manager' polls.

Robotic third arm turns musician into cyborg drummer

After an accident fused a quartet of robotic limbs to his body, nuclear physicist Dr. Otto Octavius devoted himself to a life of crime and fighting Spider-Man. However, villainy isn't the only option for people either blessed or cured with extra mechanical appendages—they can also choose to rock.

Researchers at Georgia Tech's Center for Music Technology have created a robotic arm that attaches to a drummer's body and improvises drum parts based on what the human drummer is playing.

Gil Weinberg, the director of the Center for Music Technology, says in a video about the project that music is an ideal challenge for researchers working in the area of integrating robotic limbs into human movement. “Music is something that is very timely," said Weinberg, who also led the project. "You really need to do things on the right millisecond. It's also very spacial. You need to go to the right places.

This lightweight robotic exoskeleton is getting paralyzed people on their feet once again

"I am not the robot, I wear the robot," Steven Sanchez said of the Phoenix robotic exoskeleton that is helping paralyzed people walk again. The Phoenix, developed by SuitX, is a modular robotic device that enables people with limited mobility walk with the fluidity of natural movement.

Sanchez, now 28-years-old, was paralyzed 11 years ago in a BMX accident. He was casually playing around with fellow high schoolers on his bike when an accident left him immobile from the waist down.

For the last four years he's been working with SuitX on the development, design, and technical execution of the lightweight machinery that's helped him regain mobility. Sanchez, a machinist by trade, is one of the first people in the world to walk with the Phoenix skeleton equipped. 

Cabin smoke forces evacuation from JAL plane in snowstorm

More than 150 passengers used escape slides to evacuate from a Japan Airlines jet after engine trouble apparently caused smoke to flow into the cabin during a snowstorm, the airline said.

Flight 3512, a Boeing 737, was preparing to depart from New Chitose Airport serving near Sapporo to Fukuoka when the incident occurred around 3 p.m. Tuesday, the airline said.

According to a JAL spokesman, the aircraft was heading to the runway when it was ordered back to the terminal due to heavy snow.

Kesha fans want to crowdfund $2 million to pay out the rest of her Sony contract

A New York judge may have denied Kesha’s request to circumvent the terms of her recording contract last week, but the setback has only ignited her fans’ creativity for ways of showing support.

The pop singer and songwriter’s career has been in limbo since she accused longtime collaborator Lukasz Gottwald (aka Dr. Luke) with sexual assault and battery and he fired back with a countersuit. Sony, the label both of them have been working under, has remained silent on the issue, leaving Kesha’s ability to record or release any new music in limbo.

Nigerian navy kills pirate, storms, rescues thrice-hijacked oil tanker

LAGOS – Nigerian sailors rescued a hijacked oil tanker in a dramatic night-time rescue in which they killed one pirate, the Nigerian navy announced as it escorted the ship into Lagos harbor Monday.

The Panama-flagged Maximus, owned by a company in the United Arab Emirates and on lease to a South Korean shipping company, steamed in with four captured hijackers from Nigeria and Ghana and the crew of 18 from India, Pakistan, China, South Korea, Sudan and Ghana, said Rear Adm. Henry Babalola.

He said the navy is still searching for two crew taken hostage by two hijackers who escaped in a pirate vessel. The Indian defense attache, Capt. Gautam Marwaha, said one hostage is Indian and the other is believed to be Pakistani. He said they have received no ransom demand.