Strange stories from around the world, some of which might be true...
- The South African Civil Aviation Authority has ruled that a helicopter crash in January was caused by a penguin. The bird was in a cardboard box held on
the lap of the person in the passenger seat, and slid off shortly after takeoff, hitting the cyclic control stick causing the helicopter to roll on its side
and rapidly drop from a height of 49' (15m). On impact the main rotor blades hit the ground and broke off, wrecking the aircraft. Nobody on board - penguin
included - was injured. The incident took place, appropriately enough, on Bird Island. ● The RSPB are warning that significantly fewer starlings are
being seen in UK gardens. Its recent Big Garden Birdwatch recorded the lowest number of the birds since the first survey in 1979. Known for their mass
formations, or murmurations, the decline in numbers is being blamed on the use of pesticides, which kill the insects they eat, and the lack of 'natural'
gardens with wildflowers and mixed grasses.
- Astronomers have created a 3D model of asteroid 2024 YR4, the potential "city killer" once thought a risk to the Earth, then a low probability
risk to the Moon. Using the Gemini South telescope in Chile in February they imaged the asteroid in different wavelengths of light and measured how light
reflected from it over time to build up its shape, orbit and composition. The asteroid is rich in silicates and shaped somewhat like an ice hockey puck,
rotating backwards once every 20 minutes. It probably originated in the main asteroid belt, between Mars and Jupiter, and was likely thrown out of the
belt by the gravity of Jupiter. ● Singer Katy Perry, CBS presenter Gayle King, Lauren Sánchez, fiancée of Amazon owner Jeff Bezos and
three other women have made an 11-minute suborbital flight on one of Blue Origin's (Bezos' space company) New Shepherd rockets, spending a few minutes above the Karman
Line, taken by many to mark the edge of outer space, 62 miles (100km) above the Earth, supposedly to "inspire women" while women who actually work
for NASA are being fired because of Felon47's anti-science policies. Perhaps the most memorable moment was Bezos tripping and landing on his face rushing to
greet Sánchez when they landed. [Because billionaires have to spend the money they don't pay in taxes somewhere - like with their own companies... -Ed]
- A partial jawbone dredged up in a fishing net off Taiwan almost 20 years ago has been tentatively identified as belonging to a Denisovan, one of a group
of early humans who coexisted with Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens, but about whom almost nothing is known. Only a few fragments of Denisovan skeletons have
been found so far, primarily jawbones, teeth and a finger bone in caves in Siberia and Tibet. ● Moyse's Hall Museum in Bury St Edmunds is to put an
unusual book on display after it was discovered in one of the museum's offices. The book is partly bound in the tanned skin of William Corder, executed for the
murder of Maria Martin in 1827, an incident known as the Red Barn Murder. It will be displayed alongside another book wholly bound in Corder's skin, which has
been on display for 92 years. The practice of binding books in human skin, anthropodermic bibliopegy, was occasionally performed in the 19th
Century as a way of punishing criminals even after their execution, or to make keepsakes, but can be seen today as controversial; in 2024 Harvard University
replaced the binding from such a book after determining the skin had been taken from a female patient of the doctor who had had it bound. ● Scientists
might have solved the mystery of a 3,500-year-old "screaming" Egyptian mummy. The female mummy, her face stuck in what appears to be a scream, was
discovered in 1935 and the expression put down to poor mummification practices, but new research has shown that she was embalmed with expensive materials
and the expression more likely due to a cadaveric scream, that is, she died screaming and was mummified before rigor mortis wore off. Not all scientists
agree with the idea of cadaveric spasm, however, but for now it seems the most likely explanation. ● Analysis of rocks discovered in Iceland has
added to evidence for the Late Antique Little Ice Age, a period of intense cooling between 580 and 800 CE, which is thought to have contributed to the final
death of the Roman Empire. The rocks originated in Greenland and would have been carried to Iceland by icebergs. ● Computer users of a certain vintage
might remember this sound [YouTube video]; it is the Windows 95 startup music
composed by Brian Eno. The US Library of Congress has now added it to their list of nationally significant recordings as "[Windows 95] brought more
of the computer's operation under a graphical user interface (GUI), making a home computer more accessible to a non-specialist audience of consumers."
● A pocket watch found on the body of Hans Christensen Givard, a 27-year-old Danish victim of the Titanic disaster is to be auctioned. It has
been estimated at up to £50,000 ($66,000). The watch and other possessions found on him were returned to his family, and it is they who are selling it.
Givard was buried in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
- Four men - two Belgians, a Vietnamese and a Kenyan - have pleaded guilty in a Kenyan court to charges of attempting to smuggle hundreds of ants out of
the country. The ants were destined for the exotic pet market and included giant African harvester ants (Messor cephalotes), the largest known species
of ant, growing up to 0.8" (20mm), or slightly larger for queens. ● Last month two Metropolitan Police officers managed to arrest two men for illegal
gambling on Westminster Bridge. Knowing that the men were aware of their patrol route and uniforms the officers had to don disguises, but not just any
disguises, as Inspector Darren Watson told reporters - "I remembered that I had Batman and Robin costumes to hand which could come in useful".
With PC Osman (first name not given) as Robin, 'Batman' Watson managed to get close enought to the wary criminals to arrest them. ● Pennsylvania
resident Taryn Dixon has been arrested for theft by unlawful taking, unlawful use of a computer and criminal mischief for making more than 400 hotel room
reservations but not showing up, under false names including that of a former county prosecutor who died last year and her local Police Chief... ●
Four men have been convicted and jailed for attempting to smuggle cocaine worth around £8m ($10.6m) worth of cocaine into the UK hidden in a shipment
of foie gras and duck breasts, which was such an unusual consignment that it attracted the interest of customs officers. ● Police in Cologne have
arrested five people trying to climb the city's cathedral in the middle of the night. The group had picked the locks of several doors to gain access to
the building. ● A Bangladesh arrest warrant has been issued for British Labour MP Tulip Siddiq, on corruption charges relating to a plot of land in
Dhaka she allegedly received from her aunt, Sheikh Hasina's government before it was overthrown. Siddiq, MP for Hampstead and Highgate was City Minister,
responsible for tackling corruption within the finance industry until she resigned from the post in January after it emerged that she had been living at
a number of properties in London linked to allies of her aunt. She denies all charges. ● Craig Williams, a former Conservative MP and aide to
then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Laura Saunders, a Conservative parliamentary candidate in the last election, her partner Anthony Lee, a former director of
campaigning for the Conservatives and twelve other people have been charged with betting offences in connection with bets placed on the timing of the 2024
general election.
- Elon Musk's Starlink satellite constellation is not just blighting the lives of Earthbound astronomers, it could also be directly harming the planet.
There are, at present, about 6,500 Starlink satellites in orbit, with approval being sought for 30,000 more (as well as satellite constellations planned
by other companies such as Blue Origin/Amazon). Because they are in low-Earth orbit the satellites typically have a lifespan of around 5 years, unless
deorbited earlier. Research published last year suggests that each 550lb (250kg) satellite contains about 66lb (30kg) of aluminium oxide particles, so
by the time the constellations are fully deployed falling satellites will be injecting 360 tonnes (354 imperial tons) of aluminium oxide into the upper
atmosphere every year. Aluminium oxide is a catalyst for chemical reactions that wear away the ozone layer. ● Authorities in Chile have issued an alert for
the Laguna del Maule volcanic field, close to the Argentine border, after 160 low-intensity earthquakes hit the area in two hours last week.
IN BRIEF: Fans of 90's boyband The Backstreet Boys might want to listen carefully to "The Call". Band member AJ McLean has revealed
in an interview to mark the 20th anniversary of their debut album that the song contains a hidden fart, by bandmate Howie Dorough while recording
a vocal "dun, dun" - not only in time, but in tune, apparently. Producer Max Martin mixed it into the bass... ● Professional saxophonist
David Wilkinson has had a ban on practicing his instrument at home - served after a dispute with a neighbour - lifted after his lawyer pointed out that it
had been "counterintuitive" for Bradford Council to regulate the playing of music while celebrating its year as the UK City of Culture. ●
The Zest Choir, set up in South Gloucestershire for people who consider themselves tone deaf has proved so popular that extra sessions have been added.
● Scientists at King's College London have developed a technique to grow a human tooth under laboratory conditions which could be a first step
towards dental implants being created from the patient's own cells rather than from ceramics or other materials. ● Graeme Bowman, an advertising
copywriter from Walthamstow, went viral online recently with his supermarket receipt listing 26 items, one for each letter of the alphabet, in A-Z order.
● There is a meadow outside the village of Fischerhude, near Bremen in Germany, where a regular loud "whump" thudding sound, seemingly
originating underground, has been heard for decades. Nobody has been able to explain what is causing it. ● Forty-five years after the film The
Shining was released, New York Times journalist Alec Toler and academic Alasdair Spark have tracked down the original photograph that was
shown at the end of the film, edited to include Jack Nicholson's character Jack Torrance. Following a brief mention in a book that it was from an archive
and Spark's recognising of 1920s jazz dancer and instructor Santos Casani in the picture, wearing a prostetic nose, which enabled them to narrow down the
date, they went through "maybe thousands" of archive pages before finding the picture in the BBC Hulton Archive, later purchased by Getty. The
photograph is from a 1921 Valentine's Day dance at the Empress Ballroom in London's Royal Palace Hotel. ● Adam and Amy Harper, from Sandwell, met
each other while scuba diving. They recently got married at a registry office in West Bromwich then affirmed their vows underwater in the diving pool at Sandwell
Aquatic Centre, with friends and family all in scuba gear. ● We did not think we could top last week's giant 99lb (45kg) Cadbury's Creme Egg, but
Strood chocolatiers Cocoba have claimed to have created the UK's largest Easter egg. It weighs 661lb (300kg), stands around 7' (2.1m) high, with a diameter
of more than 4' (1.2m) and has a shell 3.1" (8cm) thick. It had to be moulded including a base to stand on, smoothed with melted chocolate and sprayed
with several layers of cocoa butter. The egg took five members of staff five days to make, not including the first attempt which broke when taken out of its
mould. After Easter the egg will be broken up and melted down to make 3,000 regular-sized chocolate bars which will be sold, with profits going to charities.
● The new highest bridge in the world will open in June. The Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge in China stretches two miles across a canyon and stands
2,050' (624m) above the bottom.
UPDATES: Camilla Hempleman-Adams has apologised unreservedly for claiming to have been the first woman to cross Baffin Island solo, as reported in
TFIr#812, after criticism from the native Inuit population who have travelled the same route for generations, both solo and in groups.
Little Jennifer and her parents were at a birthday picnic for the wife of her father's boss. Everyone had brought food. Little
Jennifer watched as the hostess took a bite out of a slice of the cake her mother had made. "Is that nice, Mrs Trenton?" she asked.
"Yes, it is, it's delicious,"
Little Jennifer looked puzzled, then smiled as only she could. "That's funny, the other day Daddy came back from dinner at
your house and said that you and your husband had no taste!"
