[Fivetide]

Virginia man finds stolen 1969 Camaro after 17 years


Virginia man Tommy Cook was reunited with his 1969 Camaro when he spotted it in a
Maryland garage 17 years after it was stolen. Cook said the vehicle had been painted
green and given a fraudulent VIN to disguise it. Photo by Bruno/Wikimedia Commons

A Virginia man whose 1969 Camaro was stolen 17 years ago was reunited with the vehicle after spotting it in a garage while helping a friend buy another vehicle.

Tommy Cook said the Hugger Orange Camaro was stolen from his auto repair lot in Woodbridge in 2003, and after reporting it stolen he kept renewing the vehicle's missing status with Prince William County police through the mail in the ensuing years.

"I never wrote that car off," Cook told The Free Lance-Star newspaper. "I knew there would be a day and a time when I would get that car back. I didn't know where, but I knew it was out there somewhere."

Cook said he had no leads until 17 years later, when a friend considering the purchase of a 1968 Camaro asked him to take a look at a vehicle listed for sale online by a Maryland man near La Plata.

Cook said he arrived at the auto shop to look at the 1968 Camaro, but his attention was grabbed by a hoodless 1969 Camaro in the corner of the garage.

The man told Cook the green car had originally been painted Hugger Orange, the color of his stolen car. Cook said he took a look at the dashboard VIN and thought it seemed suspicious, so he checked the VIN in another spot under the hood -- and it matched his missing car.

The Charles County Sheriff's Office in Maryland had the Camaro towed to a storage lot, and Cook then had it towed to his new shop in Spotsylvania.

Cook said the car has received some upgrades since he last owned it -- including an engine being installed in the formerly-engineless vehicle. He said the car had apparently changed hands four times since it was stolen in 2003.

"Some people had put money into it," Cook said. "It was better than it was when it was stolen, but it's still an ugly green."

Police in France solved a missing vehicle case after an even longer amount of time had elapsed in 2017. Chalons-en-Champagne police said a property owner called authorities to report a muddy pond had receded amid drought conditions, revealing a the top of a Peugeot 104 buried in the muck.

Police determined the car had been reported stolen from its third owner in 1979 -- 38 years before it was found in the swamp.

[goldie0608]

Sealed With a Wave: Young Pup Gives Photographer a Moment to Remember While Lounging on the Beach



An adorable photo will forever mark the moment a seal pup appeared to give a big wave to the camera as it lounged on an English beach.

The picture was taken recently on the golden sands of Horsey Beach in Norfolk.

Photographer Wayne Havenhand says the seal’s gesture felt like “a personal moment” between himself and the animal.

“It’s such a cute photo,” said the wildlife photography enthusiast from Bedlington, Northumberland. “The seal definitely looks like it is smiling.”

“It looks like it’s saying, ‘Me sir, me sir!’.”

It was lying there on the quiet beach for about half an hour.

“It kept dozing off, and then waking up and waving its flipper in the air at me.”

“It seemed to be really comfortable with me lying in the sand taking photos. It was quite a nice moment between the two of us.”

[HogwartsExpress]

New Zealand village turns off street lights to stop birds crash-landing on to roads



In an attempt to save a rare bird species, a New Zealand village is trialling an innovative strategy: it is switching off all its street lights to stop baby birds becoming confused and crash landing on to the road.

Westland petrels, which are blackish-brown with ivory beaks, breed only along an 8km stretch of coastal forest in the foothills near Punakaiki, a South Island town of fewer than 100 people and popular with tourists for its pancake rock formations and gushing ocean blowholes.

The 6,000 breeding pairs arrive from South America each March, an event celebrated by locals with a festival.

The fledglings are born in burrows dug into the hillsides and emerge to feed in preparation for the long journey back to South America. But some, believed to be disoriented by lights, crash on to the road, where they are often struck by cars or eaten by predators.



Local bird watchers believe the problem was worsened by the introduction of blue-white LED lights in the town last year.

But in what is believed to be a first for New Zealand, the local transport authority has agreed to a localised blackout, with 15 streetlights turned off along a 3.4km stretch of highway.

Local bird watchers have been enthusiastic about the move.

“It’s been great,” says Bruce Stuart-Menteath, who chairs the Westland Petrel Conservation Trust and has for many years helped relaunch disoriented birds and protect their habitat. “I’ve picked up only one this year. Typically a dozen would be the norm.”

The Department of Conservation (DoC), the agency responsible for wildlife, reported that just 10 Westland petrels had crash landed in the town this year compared to the usual 15 to 25.

Meanwhile, the fledgling seabirds have been crash landing on roads in much greater numbers in Greymouth, the biggest town on the west coast, 44km to the south.



“This year there were 22, compared to 10 being the highest number previously - and for the first time we are getting them in the CBD,” said Darrell Haworth, the DoC’s senior biodiversity ranger in Greymouth.

Lighting is a documented cause of seabird fledgling “fallout” in many species, according to Haworth. “This is particularly an issue in Punakaiki, as it is close to the breeding colony and is why the street lights have been turned off this year.

“Whether lighting is the direct cause of all the Greymouth birds crash landing is not clear, however, most cases can be linked to lighting in the area, including lights on businesses and other private properties.

“Where petrels have come down in Greymouth we have talked with property owners and others with lights in the area to ask about lights being turned off, where possible.”

LED streetlights were introduced in Greymouth last year. But a spokesperson for the district council said it was looking into whether it was possible to turn the lights down or change the colour tone to orange.

Stuart-Menteath said the blue tinge of the LED lights could be confusing the birds as they feed on bioluminescent fish. “They fly over the sea and when they see a blue light they dive,” he said.

With only one breeding colony of Westland petrels in the world, DoC says every fledgling is needed for the species to survive.

While some Punakaiki locals were concerned about the hazard presented by walking on rough footpaths without lighting – transport authorities recommend they carry a dim torch – most supported the move, Stuart-Menteath said.

source
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... n-to-roads

[johngriffen]

I sometimes get REALLY DEPRESSED reviewing the news these days.
It's always about a global pandemic threatening life as we know it,
protests around the world, stupid politicians, natural disasters,
or some other really bad story.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH

Welcome to The mobi weekly news magazine
IN OTHER NEWS
TUESDAY DECEMBER 29
What is it?
Here is your chance to become an "ACE REPORTER" for our weekly news magazine.
It is your job to fine weird, funny or "good feel" stories from around the world and share them with our readers in our weekly magazine

How do you play?
Just post a story that you have come across that made you smile, laugh, feel good...
BUT NOTHING DEPRESSING

EXAMPLE POST

​Naked sunbather chases wild boar through park after it steals his laptop bag

A naked sunbather was seen chasing wild boar through a park after it stole his laptop bag.
Amusing photographs from Germany show the man running after the animal to try and claim the plastic bag back.
But the cheeky boar and its two piglets appear to be too quick for the sunbather, who can't keep up with their speedy little trotters.
As the incident unfolds, groups of friends and family sat on the grass watch on and laugh.
Heads are seen turning in surprise and amusement in the hilarious photographs.
The incident happened at Teufelssee Lake - a bathing spot in the Grunwell Forest in Berlin, Germany.

Rules:
Each Edition of IN OTHER NEWS will be open for 7 days...
You may post One Story in any 24 hour period
So in other words, you can enter only once a day
Each news day will start when I post announcing it
OR at:
9:00 AM CHICAGO TIME (UTC -6)
3:00 PM GMT (UTC -0)
on those days I space out and forget to post or can't due to Real Life
Stories may be accompanied with images - but No big images, please! 800x800 pixels wide maximum
Videos are allowed, but please keep them to under a minute, and post a short summary for those that don't like to click on videos
No Duplicate stories - Where a post has been edited resulting in duplicates, then the last one in time gets disallowed.
And please limit this to reasonably family friendly stories

Reward:
Each news story posted that I feel is acceptable (must be a real story, too few words or simply a headline are not considered acceptable) will earn you 50 WRZ$
If you post multiple stories on any given day, you will only earn 50 WRZ$ for the first story of the Day
Special Bonus - Each week I will award "The Pulitzer Prize" for the best story of the week
The weekly winner of the "The Pulitzer Prize" will receive a 100 WRZ$ bonus
It's just my personal opinion, so my judgement is final

So help bring GOOD news to the members of mobi, and join our reporting team...

IN OTHER NEWS

[BigGlen]

7 Strangest New Year Traditions Around The World

From grape eating contests to fortune telling underwear, check out this list of 7 of the strangest New Year traditions around the world.



1 Scarecrow Burning - Ecuador
To banish any ill fortune or bad things that happened in the past year, Ecuadorians set fire to scarecrows filled with paper at midnight on New Year’s Eve. They also burn photographs of things that represent the past year, which leads us to believe that New Year is just a thinly veiled excuse for Ecuadorian pyromaniacs to set things on fire.

2 Round Things - Philippines
In the Philippines New Year is about one thing, and one thing only; cold hard cash. Hoping to bring prosperity and wealth for the year ahead, Filipino people try to use as many round things as possible to represent coins and wealth. Round clothes, round food, you name it; if it’s round, they want in.

3 Broken Plates – Denmark
If you’re ever in Denmark and wake up to find a pile of smashed crockery outside your door, it’s probably New Year’s Eve. Unused plates are saved up all year, until the 31st of December when they are hurled at the front doors of your friends and family in a strangely vandalistic display of affection.

4 Eating 12 Grapes - Spain
As the clock counts down to 12 and people around the world are preparing to watch fireworks and drunkenly kiss each other, Spaniards are staring at bunches of grapes with a steely gaze. This challenge involves stuffing your face with 12 grapes, one for every ring of the bell. Succeed and you’ve got good luck for the year ahead.

5 Takanakuy Festival – Peru
This annual Peruvian festival held at the end of December is all about people beating the living daylights out of each other. Competitors face off in a ring for a round of bare-knuckle brawling, which is overseen by local policemen. Takanakuy literally means ‘when the blood is boiling’, but apparently all of the fights are friendly, and represent a fresh start for the year.

6 108 Rings - Japan
Think the countdown of 12 rings takes too long? Try 108 on for size. In Japan bells are rang 108 times in a Buddhist tradition that is believed to banish all human sins. It’s also good luck to be smiling or laughing going into the New Year, but who knows how you can be in a good mood after having to sit through that prolonged ringing.

7 Coloured Underwear – South America
In South American countries such as Mexico, Bolivia and Brazil, your fortunes for the year ahead are all decided by your underpants. Those who want to find love wear red underwear for New Year, whilst gold diggers should opt for yellow, which brings wealth and luck. If you’re just after a bit of peace for the New Year, some white pants should do the trick nicely.

[Fatima99]

Bucking the trend: the Scottish reindeer offering hope for an imperilled species



Arctic reindeer are at risk due to the climate crisis, but in the Highlands of Scotland the UK’s only free-range herd is thriving. We talk to one young herder about life among these majestic animals

On a snowy winter morning, Lotti Papastavrou Brooks, 23, can normally be found somewhere in the Cairngorm mountains looking for reindeer. She’ll probably have a 15kg sack of food with her – filled with hay, garlic, barley sugar beet and dark grain – as she ventures uphill through the snow searching for the stately, antlered animals. It could be an hour or so before she finds them roaming somewhere on the mountainside, but she’s confident the prospect of breakfast will entice them in when she does.

Brooks doesn’t have a typical graduate job. She is one of the UK’s only free-range reindeer herders, at the Cairngorm Reindeer Centre, near Aviemore in the Highlands of Scotland.

Reindeer are believed to be native to Scotland, but became extinct around 800 years ago due to over-hunting. In 1952, the site in the Cairngorms became the first place in the UK in which the animals were reintroduced, after Swedish herder Mikel Utsi visited with his wife and thought the area would make a good home for them. Since then, the herd has grown from eight to 150 and is looked after by a team of 10 full-time herders.

Brooks, who is originally from Bristol, first volunteered at the centre during the school holidays aged 14, and started working full time with the animals around a year ago. “I had visited as a child and knew the family who run the reindeer centre fairly well,” she explains. “I had always loved the reindeer and the area, and was keen to get more involved.”

The job changes with the seasons. In winter, she heads out early in the morning, trekking into the blustery mountains to find the herd. “It’s not unusual for it to be -15 degrees and quite deep snow,” she says. It can take a while; the reindeer are free to roam around 10,000 acres.

Once the animals have been found, she moves them closer to the centre, so they can take tours out later in the day. “They’re really greedy, so they’ll follow us whenever we have a bag of food,” Brooks laughs.

The centre is run as a visitor attraction – none of the animals are killed for meat, culled or sold on. People come from all over the world to see the reindeer throughout the year, including enthusiasts from Sweden or Norway, as well as people who have never seen deer before. The animals are gentle and good natured with everyone, Brooks says. “You can easily walk among them, even though they have big antlers on their heads. You’d be surprised how relaxing it is.”

Spring is the calving season so the herders bring pregnant females into a 1,200-acre hill enclosure to keep an eye on them. Each year, Brooks and her colleagues name the newborn reindeer after a new theme. Parmesan, Camembert, and Mozzarella were born one year, while in 2019, calves were named after European cities. The herd now includes Athens, Oslo, Florence and Bordeaux.

The team of herders can work out who’s who straight away, Brooks says. The animals all have very different faces – some have white noses, others are light brown or dark – and they have distinct personalities. “Some love to be around people, others are more shy,” Brooks observes. “You can even see the characteristics go down family lines.”

Retired Couple Make 1,400 Toys for Children in Need This Christmas: ’People need hope’

Anyone who believes Christmas comes but once a year has obviously never met Mike and Judy Sullivan. The couple, who recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, spend most days making toys in the workshop of their Desert Hot Springs, California home that they then donate to local charities each holiday season.



When Mike, a 72-year-old, 26-year army vet retired, he and Judy signed up for a woodworking club. It started as a hobby, but after witnessing the yuletide happiness their handmade playthings brought local families, it became their new vocation. Seven years on, the pair continues to churn out toys at a pace that would give Santa’s elves a run for their money.

Mike is in charge of toy production while Judy handles decoration and quality control. Their 15 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren serve as testers and focus groups.

Mike Sullivan’s love of woodworking is something of a family tradition. Sullivan grew up in Montana. His dad was a miner. The family didn’t have a lot of money, but both his elder brothers were carpenters, so many of the Christmas presents he received as a child were homemade.

“Most of the things I got were handmade toys. They were wonderful toys, I know how much I enjoyed them and just hope that kids that get them now still do,” he told CNN.

This year, the pandemic meant many families didn’t have funds to cover non-essentials, which made the Sullivans’ mission more important than ever. Mike and Judy embraced the challenge, creating and distributing close to 1,400 toys that included animal figures, puzzles, and trucks, to name just a few.

COVID-19 also meant they had to be mindful of social distancing, masking, and scheduling, but the couple persevered.



The Sullivans’ toys made their way to a local kindergarten class, Coachella Valley Rescue Mission, a food pantry, and other charitable organizations—all of them free of charge (including postage for items sent out of state as far as Indiana and Texas).

With their out of pocket costs estimated at close to $19,000 last year, the Sullivans launched a GoFundMe page to ensure they’d be able to keep the flow of toys coming. (Mike’s hoping to purchase a 3-D laser printer so he can kick production into a higher gear.)

Mike and Judy say they plan to continue making toys as long as they’re able. “We’re both in good health and are able to be out here six to seven days a week for eight to 10 hours,” Sullivan told CNN. “It’s so much fun, it feels like home here in the shop working things out.”

Mike admits that while they very rarely get a chance to see the kids as they receive their gifts, just knowing a family’s Christmas will be much merrier thanks to their efforts makes it all worthwhile.

“It makes me feel very very warm inside. I love it,” Judy told KESQ-TV News 3. “I wouldn’t change anything for the world.”

https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/couple- ... tmas-2020/

[PennySerenade]

Halle Berry gives shout out to Montreal West Island pub's hot wings

MONTREAL -- Academy Award-winning actress Halle Berry took to Instagram to bestow her own bit of adjudication of best in a particular category on Saturday when she named the hot wings from Cunninghams Pub in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue on Montreal's West Island "some the best damn hot wings I've ever tasted."

"I am eating one of my favourite things, and that is the hot wing," she said in her post on Christmas Day. "There is no food I love more than a good hot wing."

Berry then said that when working on the film "Moonfall" in Montreal, she and stunt coordinator Patrick Kerton were chatting about food, and he said the wings at the pub he co-owns - Cunninghams Pub - were the best in the city.

"I was like, 'What? That is a big statement,'" said Berry. "I said, 'Well OK. If you've got the best hot wings in all of Montreal, then I'm going to need to try that because I am the best connoisseur in Montreal of hot wings right now so let me try them."



Kerston has introduced other film stars to Cunninghams' wings. He posted an Instagram photo in 2018 with a tray of wings while he was on the set of "X-Men: Dark Pheonix." No word on what Sophie Turner or any of the stars of that film thought of them.

Berry, however, said Kerton wasn't lying.

"Patrick was telling the damn truth," she said. "He does have some the best damn hot wings I've ever tasted in my whole life, and I know about the hot wings."

Cunninghams, like all restaurants and pubs on the island, is closed due to COVID-19 restrictions but is open for delivery or pickup.

"If you're within 100 miles of Montreal, please go try Cunninghams," said Berry. "Do yourself a favour."

"Moonfall" is scheduled for release in 2021.

I enjoyed these wings last January while in Montreal with my son...they're everything Ms. Berry says they are!

Frozen carcass of extinct woolly rhino found in Ice Age necropolis with hair intact
Scientists discovered the extraordinary hazel-coloured juvenile extinct woolly rhinoceros with its teeth in place in Siberia, Russia - it could be up to 50,000 years old


The species once roamed across modern Europe and Russia

The frozen carcass of an extinct woolly rhinoceros has been found in an Ice Age necropolis in Siberia.
The extraordinary carcass is 80 per cent intact and is estimated to be between 20,000 and 50,000 years old although its age is still to be confirmed.
Scientists discovered the hazel-coloured juvenile beast with its teeth in place close to the site where the world’s only baby woolly rhino called Sasha was dug out in 2014.
A horn was also discovered close to the rhino, reports said.
Two extinct cave lion cubs were also found in the Abyisky district of Yakutia last year close to a tributary of the remote Tirekhtyakh River.
Evidence of the last meal of the new rhino remains in its insides.



Scientist Dr Albert Protopopov said: “According to preliminary estimates, the rhino is three or four years old and is a very young individual.
“Most likely, it drowned in the river.
“The carcass is very well preserved.
“Among other things, part of the internal organs are preserved, which in the future will make it possible to study in more detail how the species ate and lived.”



The gender of the Pleistocene creature - preserved in the Siberian permafrost - has not yet been revealed.
Baby rhino Sasha located nearby was earlier dated at 34,000 years, but the new one could be between 20,000 and 50,000 years old.
“The Abyisky rhinoceros can already be called the only one of its kind in the world,” he said.
“Earlier, not even the bone remains of individuals of this age were found, not to mention the preserved carcasses of animals.
“As a rule, these were either cubs or adults.”



The find is being preserved in a glacier pending a move to Yakutsk where the beast will be presented to the scientific community.

Dr Valery Plotnikov, a researcher with the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), said the age of the new find is between 20,000 and 50,000 years old.
“But we have not yet done radiocarbon analysis.”
Local entrepreneur Pavel Yefimov who was behind the discovery is presenting the animal to the Academy of Sciences.
It was originally found by a local resident Alexei Savvin.
Sasha - seven months old when it died - was found to have strawberry blond curls.
This colouring means the creature had a markedly different look to the slate grey rhinos of Africa.
But Sasha’s discovery - showing the stubs of two horns - also suggested the species was distinctly larger than the modern-day rhinoceros.
The species once roamed across modern Europe and Russia, and were present in southern England.
Dr Plotnikov said of Sasha: “We have learned that woolly rhinoceroses were covered in very thick hair.
“Previously, we could judge this only from rock paintings discovered in France.
“Now, judging by the thick coat with the undercoat, we can conclude that the rhinoceroses were fully adapted to the cold climate very much from a young age.”

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-new ... o-23235057

[krazny9]

Paw-dorable! Man Turns TV Sets To Homes For Dogs




A 32-year-old Abhijit Dowarah has turned discarded television sets to shelter boxes for the four-legged furry friends—making the best out of waste.

The biting cold has been cited as one of the reasons for a toll on the lives of stray animals. The health of such animals takes a hit since they are unable to find adequate food and water during the winters, making them vulnerable to cold conditions. "Pets enjoy all comforts but stray dogs suffer from lack of food and shelter. I thought I must do something for them in whatever little way possible. This led to the creation of the shelters," said Abhijit.

Abhijit shared that he developed a liking for the furry animals after his brother had brought one home, a few years ago. Calling the home as 'Baator Ghor' which means street home for dogs, he said that he invested several nights to find out how and where they survived. He later reworked on the tv sets to transform them into comfort spaces by laying a sack on the kennel's floor, spreading a cotton cloth and painting them. The words about this initiative spread quickly and a number of people stepped up to extend support to him and join the cause.

Abhijit has a knack for recycling old, used and discarded materials into something that can be put to use.
" There were old TV sets lying at my two-room residence in Sivasagar's Phukan Nagar. I thought if I can turn these into the stray dogs' shelters, they can beat the winter chill," said Abhijit.

[Fivetide]

12 siblings earn Guinness record with combined age of 1,042 years


The 12 siblings in the D'Cruz family earned a Guinness World Record when their combined
ages were confirmed to total more than 1,042 years. Photo courtesy of Guinness World Records.

A family of 12 siblings earned a Guinness World Record when their combined ages added up to more than 1,042 years.

Guinness said the siblings from the D'Cruz family ranges in age from 75 to 97 years old, and they were awarded the world record for highest combined age, with 12 living siblings, on Dec. 15, when their combined ages totaled 1,042 years, 315 days.

Genia Carter, 75, of London, Ontario, is the youngest in the family, but she said even her oldest siblings still are in good health.

"It doesn't seem real. I always think of Guinness records as the tallest or shortest person or something like that. It was a surprise they even count this," Carter told The London Free Press. "But it's exciting. I'm grateful to have all these siblings still alive."

Carter and her siblings grew up in Pakistan and their oldest brother was the first to move to Canada, where he worked to raise money to bring the rest of the family to the country. She said one sibling now lives in California and another lives in Switzerland, but the rest still are in Canada.

Carter said the family remains close-knit and her siblings have a daily video call every day at 11 a.m. to keep in touch.

"I can't remember any of us ever having a fight where we would not speak to each other. We're all very close. We would do anything for each other," she said.

[hija]

The natural detective: meet the forensic ecologist who uses nature to solve crimes



Recording every step we take, nature is the ultimate witness to human activity. For forensic ecologist and botanist Prof Patricia Wiltshire, who analyses microscopic traces of pollen and spores, nature has been the key to solving some of the UK’s highest-profile crimes

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe,” said the nature writer John Muir. His words also ring true for the work of forensic ecologist Prof Patricia Wiltshire. But while Muir was musing on the interconnectedness of nature, Wiltshire’s work is starkly – literally – down to earth.

For more than 40 years, she has been helping UK police to solve high-profile criminal cases – from murders to abductions – by examining tiny particles of pollen, plants and fungi under her microscope. Wiltshire knows better than most how nature marks every step we take, how the landscapes that we pass through leave imprints and how these clues can unravel criminal mysteries.

“Nowadays it is fashionable to say that we live in a surveillance society, but your movements can be tracked by more than cameras,” writes Wiltshire in her memoir, Traces. A short walk in woodland, she explains, becomes registered on a person’s clothes and body: a coat rubbing against trees collects the tiny spores and pollen lodged in the bark; boots gather soil smears and crumbs in which are locked minute elements from recent days to past seasons; and hair brushing past twigs and leaves picks up whatever trace material has fallen on their surfaces.

Now 78, Wiltshire lives in Surrey with husband David and cat Maudie, and counts needlework, painting and gardening among her hobbies. Coupled with her soft Welsh accent and 5ft stature, these details don’t shout tough, trailblazing crimefighter.

But she is. Wiltshire has worked on more than 250 cases, including some of the most notorious of the last 25 years. She was involved in the Milly Dowler, Sarah Payne and Ipswich sex worker murder investigations, and helped secure the conviction of Ian Huntley for the Soham murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, giving evidence at his trial.

It wasn’t until her 50s that she even began this kind of work. As a child, Wiltshire dreamed of being a ballet dancer or concert pianist, before enlisting at King’s College London at the age of 28 to study botany and geology. She lectured there and at University College London, before receiving a phone call that would send her career in a fresh direction. A detective from Hertfordshire Constabulary asked if she could help in a murder case. A body had been found in a field ditch in rural Hertfordshire; a Chinese Triad-related murder. Proving the suspects’ involvement hinged around being able to show that their car had been into that field. Could Wiltshire do this?

She set about meticulously scrubbing the car, sieving and decanting the silty washings so that they could be centrifuged down to concentrated pellets. Acids were then used to remove background elements of the soil – quartz, clay and so on – from the pellets, leaving only the ‘palynomorphs’, minute fossils of pollen or spores. They were then stained and embedded in jelly on glass, before Wiltshire began poring over the samples.

“I was looking at the vegetation that had been growing,” reflects Wiltshire. “The number of tree and shrub pollen types I found probably meant that it was an ancient hedge.” In her mind’s eye formed an image of a species-rich hedge bordering an arable field. She picked up the phone to the police.

When officers took Wiltshire to visit the scene, they offered to show her where the body had been discovered. Instead, she asked if she could try telling them. Wandering around the huge field, “the hedgerow was wrong, wrong, wrong – and then suddenly it was right”.

On the slides she had spotted field maple, hawthorn, flowering ivy, woundwort, docks, goosefoot and nettle. The offenders had trodden in all of these and carried them back to their car. Wiltshire knew this was the place, and the astonished officers confirmed it. “The hedge and bank had witnessed them setting his body alight and making their getaway. It was informing on them now,” she writes.

Her evidence became an important element in the trial and the subsequent convictions. As she took on more cases, the dismissive attitudes she saw in some officers at first were replaced with admiration for what she was able to uncover. “Gradually,” she tells Positive News, “there was more confidence put in it.”

Wiltshire has now worked with every police force in the UK. She has calculated ‘time since death’, helped pinpoint human remains and even earned the nickname ‘the snot lady’, after collecting pollen grains from the nasal cavities of dead bodies. When confronted with the strength of Wiltshire’s evidence, many criminals have confessed, saving the cost of lengthy trials.

Often, it has been Wiltshire’s knowledge of botany, amassed over years of painstaking fieldwork, that has helped make sense of the clues. “I like solving puzzles, and there’s always a puzzle,” she explains. “It’s quite nice when it’s all been to court and finished with, but I don’t really feel some great noble idea of putting criminals away. A puzzle comes along, I solve it and then move on to the next.”

Despite her resolutely scientific approach, Wiltshire mentions a few occasions when she has been particularly emotionally impacted by the crimes she has helped to solve. One was a 22-year-old sex worker and mother of three, who had been murdered.

“She was a prostitute to fuel her drug habit and support her pimp,” recalls Wiltshire. “She was chucked out by her parents, she had the most awful, abusive life, and yet she had fought and fought to keep her children. My heart broke for her. How could you not admire someone like that?”

Wiltshire does not hear often from the families of loved ones whose mysteries she has helped to solve. But she mentions a letter she received from the mother of Joanne Nelson, who was murdered by her boyfriend in 2005. Though Paul Dyson admitted he had killed Nelson, he couldn’t remember where he had put her body. With access to his car, trainers and a garden fork, Wiltshire was able to describe the place, even predicting that Nelson would not be buried, but lying in a hollow covered with birch twigs. Police found her in a situation just as Wiltshire had described.

“Her mother wrote to me – it’s usually the mothers who write,” says Wiltshire. “She thanked me for getting her daughter back. She wasn’t able to get closure without being able to bury the body. It was very moving.”

Despite the often grisly nature of the work, Wiltshire – who is still working today – is passionate about learning and about the natural world. “Nature is unbelievably complicated. Every bit of research just shows more of its complexity, and I love that.”

She is cautiously enthusiastic about technological developments, such as forensics’ use of raman spectroscopy (a chemical analysis technique that provides detailed information about the makeup of materials). “I’m thrilled when things develop.”

She has even managed to remain optimistic about human nature – just. Her Twitter bio reads: “Forensic ecologist. Loves babies and other animals, plants, fungi, bacteria, and some people.”

Despite the clear value of the science that she has trailblazed, there are few people working in similar ways, she notes. “It requires a real persistence, an awful lot of fieldwork; you have to be robust enough to cope with difficult police officers, encountering rotting corpses and so on, being torn to shreds in court; you have to be strong in many ways.”

And while she cannot help but invite comparisons to eccentric TV detectives (a passage in a previous book describes her proving guilt in an Albanian gang murder before going home to make beans on toast and cuddle her cat), she is undoubtedly a force to be reckoned with.

“I have single-mindedness,” she says. “I work very hard and I’m confident in my data. Once I have confidence in my work, I’m not frightened of anybody.”

[goldie0608]

Amazing Walk-Through Holiday Village With Lights Borrowed from Disney Set to Raise Millions for Critically Ill Children



An incredible Florida display featuring 89-acres of holiday lights is helping kids with critical illnesses this winter.

The sets include a giant mushroom, an ice-cream palace spaceship, and a giant upside down toy box. They all illuminate the night sky in Kissimmee as a part of ‘Night of a Million Lights’—a walk-through show made up of, in fact, over 3.2 million lights.

Give Kids The World, a non-profit resort that provides vacations for sick children and their families, opened the dazzling display in November—and the proceeds will be used to support the granting of children’s wishes when the village reopens in January 2021.

“It’s just taking advantage of all of the whimsical things we have and bringing them to life with color and lights,” said Pamela Landwirth, President and CEO of Give Kids The World.

A 150-foot tunnel, a gingerbread arch, and an entire mini-golf course are part of the 45 villas that have been lit up with lights donated by the Walt Disney World Resort.



Launched in 1986, the charity normally serves over 8,000 families from all 50 states and over 70 countries in a year.

After having to temporarily close their doors in March due to COVID-19, they began thinking of ways to continue to bring joy to people.

Since its opening, nearly every night of the socially distanced light event has been sold out.

The show is projected to gross more than $3 million in charitable proceeds, with 90 cents of every dollar going to directly fulfil the wishes of critically ill children during their stay at the Village.

Tickets and more information can be found here at the non-profit’s website. The show continues until January 3, 2021.

“We look forward to sharing some holiday joy with the community,” said Pamela, “while making it possible for future wish children to have their wishes fulfilled.”

[HogwartsExpress]

Japan to create first wooden satellites that completely burn up on re-entry to eliminate space junk




Japan may soon be producing the world's first wooden satellites which would burn up when they plunge back to Earth without releasing harmful substances into the atmosphere, in an effort to reduce space trash.

Sumitomo Forestry, a Japan-based wood processing company, said they have begun researching on an ideal wood material for space and will carry out research in partnership with Kyoto University and test the material in extreme environment on earth. They announced that the satellite can be ready by 2023.

The partnership says the problem of space debris will eventually affect the environment of the earth. Quoted by BBC, Taka Doi, an astronaut and professor at Kyoto University said: “We are very concerned with the fact that all the satellites which re-enter the Earth's atmosphere burn and create tiny alumina particles which will float in the upper atmosphere for many years.”

The wooden satellites would burn up on re-entry without raining debris on the ground.

Space junk, also called space pollution, comprises human-generated objects, such as pieces of spacecraft, tiny flecks of paint from a spacecraft, parts of rockets, satellites that are no longer working, or explosions of objects in orbit flying around in space at high speeds, according to Nasa.

As of October 2019, the US space surveillance network reported nearly 20,000 artificial objects in orbit above the Earth, including 2,218 operational satellites.

Experts have warned that increasing the number of satellites in space requires more efforts from all countries to control the problem of space junk. Several companies like SpaceX and Amazon plan to launch thousands of satellites to achieve global satellite internet coverage.

In October this year, two large pieces of space junk nearly collided with each other in what experts said could have been a ‘high-risk’ situation. According to National Geographic, the two objects were a defunct Russian navigation satellite launched in 1989 and a spent Chinese rocket part from a 2009 launch and if they had collided, the smashup would have created a cloud of debris that would jeopardise other satellites and spacecraft for decades.


source
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... 79829.html

[HogwartsExpress]

Bell stolen by Nazis to be returned to Poland



A church bell that dates back to 1555 will be returned to its home in Poland, 77 years after it was plundered by the Nazis in World War Two.

Parishioners at Slawiecice in southern Poland began searching for the church's old bell two years ago.

They were in luck because, as the Münster diocese in Germany explained, the Nazis melted down some 80,000 bells to make weapons or ammunition.

The bell was eventually tracked down to Münster by the Polish church's pastor.

According to the diocese, Marian Bednarek found the 400kg (880lb) bell listed in a book. It had been sitting for decades unnoticed with two other bells in a courtyard at the city's Catholic Church court.

After the war, some bells that had not been melted down for their metal content were returned but 1,300 bells that had been seized in eastern territories such as Poland were kept initially in a bell cemetery in Hamburg and photos of them were kept in an archive in Nuremberg.

The diocese said that British military authorities had banned the return of bells to the east, and instead they were loaned out to parishes across the old West Germany.

The bell will not be sent back to its original home just yet because of the coronavirus pandemic.

When it does finally arrive at St Catherine's church, it will be on permanent loan as officially it is now owned by the German government.

"After 77 years, waiting another month or so doesn't really matter," Hans Manek, a former resident of Slawiecice, told the Catholic Church in Münster.

source
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55474030