A heavy rainstorm has been sweeping across the island of Crete on Thursday with tons of water flooding homes, businesses and agricultural land, damaging roads and bridges, causing the life of one person and putting at risk the lives of thousands. Most affected are the regions of Heraklion, Lasithi and Rethymnon. Thye bad weather is […]
The U.S. government set off conventional explosives inside a tunnel deep in the Nevada desert this week in a test designed to replicate a so-called “decoupled” nuclear detonation. Data collected is now being used to help improve methods for detecting this kind of nuclear testing. Just earlier this year, American authorities accused China of using decoupling to conceal new nuclear tests despite the country’s stated moratorium on such activities.
The test, which involved the use of chemical high-explosives and radiotracers, was conducted yesterday inside P Tunnel in Area 12 of the Nevada National Security Site (NNSA), according to a press release from the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The NNSS, which is situated within the boundaries of the U.S. Air Force’s Nevada Test and Training Range (NTTR), is used for a wide variety of testing purposes today. An agency under the Department of Energy, NNSA’s main jobs are to oversee the development and production of nuclear weapons, as well as manage America’s nuclear deterrent stockpile.
A map giving the general sense of the location of the NNSS with the NTTR. Center for Radiological Nuclear TrainingAnother map showing the specific testing areas within the NNSS. Area 12 is at the northern end of the complex. United States Geological Survey
“This experiment is especially focused on further enhancing the U.S. capabilities to detect a ‘decoupled’ explosion,” per NNSA’s release. “Data collected from the experiment will be used to validate scientific models and refine algorithms that are critical to U.S. nuclear explosion detection efforts.”
“Just as a stealth aircraft looks smaller on radar, decoupling can greatly muffle the signals detected by nuclear detection sensors, making a large explosion appear smaller,” the release explains. “In a conventional, or ‘coupled,’ underground nuclear test, a device is placed deep in a hole in close contact with the rock, allowing much of the explosion’s shockwave to reach sensors. In a decoupled test, by contrast, the device is detonated inside a large underground chamber, substantially reducing the explosion’s seismic signature.”
“In this experiment, researchers gathered measurements using a broad suite of advanced sensors, including accelerometers, seismometers, infrasound sensors, electromagnetic sensors, chemical and radiotracer samplers, and meteorological sensors,” it adds. ”Together, these measurements will improve scientists’ understanding of the signatures produced by underground explosions and strengthen the United States’ ability to detect and characterize nuclear explosive events.”
The U.S. already maintains a U.S. Atomic Energy Detection Systems (USAEDS) network, which is overseen by the U.S. Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC). USAEDS is made up of more than 3,600 sensors positioned around the world. USAEDS is also tied in with the International Monitoring System (IMS), which is managed by the organization responsible for overseeing the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). AFTAC also supports the mission to monitor for potential nuclear testing globally using a fleet of specially configured WC-135R Constant Phoenix aircraft. In addition, those planes are used to help keep watch for unusual spikes in atmospheric radiation that could point to nuclear or radiological accidents or other incidents leading to the spread of potentially dangerous radioactive material.
With regard to the USAEDS network specifically, “once a disturbance is detected underground, underwater, in the atmosphere or in space, the event is analyzed for nuclear identification, and the findings are reported to command authorities,” according to AFTAC’s website.
As mentioned, the U.S. government has accused its Chinese counterparts of using decoupling to conceal new nuclear testing, and NNSA’s press release draws explicit attention to these allegations. At the annual Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, Switzerland, in February, Thomas DiNanno, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, said that China had conducted at least one such test at Lop Nur on June 22, 2020. The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) subsequently said the IMS had not detected an event matching that description at that location on that date. For its part, the Chinese government has denied the accusation.
The social media posts below include satellite imagery showing activity at Lop Nur that could point to new nuclear testing activities in recent years.
参考 Satellite Imagery Analysis of China’s Alleged 2020 Nuclear Test at Lop Nurhttps://t.co/aafvU5Szh7 CSIS 20260213 ROLES SAT ANALYSIS No.7 中国に核実験実施の動き ー Lop Nur核実験場の画像分析 ーhttps://t.co/n66yYk0hLg ROLES 20250522
While China is a signatory to the CTBT, the country has never ratified it. The Chinese government last acknowledged a critical-level nuclear test in 1996, after which a self-imposed moratorium was put in place, at least publicly. As an aside, the United States has also signed, but never ratified, the CTBT, and has a similar self-imposed moratorium on nuclear testing since 1992. It is worth noting that the treaty does not ban so-called sub-critical testing, which involves fissile material, but does not result in a full-fledged nuclear reaction.
Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump administration has been holding new talks with the Chinese government regarding various aspects of the country’s massively and rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal, including the testing allegations. That story immediately preceded a state visit by China’s President Xi Jinping to Washington, D.C., to meet with Trump.
President Donald Trump (at left) and President Xi Jinping (at right) walk together at the White House last week. White House/Joyce N. Boghosian
“The discussions between American and Chinese officials have centered on measures to reduce nuclear risks and haven’t been aimed at negotiating a formal arms-control pact, an effort Beijing has sharply rebuffed in the past,” according to that report. “The Trump administration has begun to highlight the possibility of implementing new verification measures.”
“Independent experts say seismic instruments might be placed on or near test sites,” The Journal‘s story also noted. “Another possibility, which was floated during the Biden administration, is to install radiation-detection equipment at test sites.”
NNSA’s announcement about the test at the Nevada National Security Site is certainly an example of the development underway already of new means of verification that could be deployed at sites around the world.
The Russian government has said it is ready to conduct new nuclear tests if the United States pursues this course of action. The last official nuclear test in Russia came in 1990 right before the fall of the Soviet Union.
“It takes nuclear expertise to detect nuclear activities and experiments like these [to] ensure America remains unmatched in detection,” NNSA Administrator Brandon Williams said in a statement yesterday in light of the test in Nevada. “The Trump Administration has made it clear that the United States will lead from a position of strength. You cannot evade American innovation. With this experiment, we are sending a clear message: under this administration, America will never be outmatched.”
In this tense, riveting first-person excerpt from his new book This Cursed Beautiful Land: A Russian Story, Evan Gershkovich recounts the harrowing months he spent as a prisoner in Russia, leading up to his eventual release in a complex, multi-country prisoner exchange. Even in the darkness, Gershkovich offers rays of light: care packages from friends, letters by the hundred, and a cautiously blossoming love with a friend in Berlin. We may know the ending, but the details of these days reveal what it takes to get there.
A few hours after my arrival, I heard a cart rolling down the hallway. A guard opened a kormushka — a feeder window in the door about the size of a human head. A man in a chef’s uniform filled my bowl with porridge, placed a piece of rancid-smelling boiled fish on my plate and gave me some weak tea. The reality of my new surroundings slammed into me.
Thoughts ricocheted inside my head. Earlier in the day I’d had a comforting one: they’ve taken me for a swap, I told myself. That’s all this is.
Now, curled up on the bed in my 12ft by 8ft cell, knees pulled to my chest, I thought, what if the FSB really does think I’m a spy and wants to make an example out of me? Maybe they don’t want to swap me at all. Maybe I really will spend 20 years here.
A powerful reflection on the pull of nostalgia, on learning to accept that a past life is gone even as you tentatively reach back for it. Tiffany Huang captures the ache of lost opportunities and regretted paths, of staying a course out of duty and responsibility even as your sense of home erodes. It’s a gorgeous, bittersweet read about what it means to move on long before you’ve fully let go.
You unmasked for the first time, revealing smooth cheeks, a sharp chin, and a long nose. You talked about your book, in progress for several years now, about a Hong Kong man drifting aimlessly around the world. I asked you how you felt about the protests and noted the resignation in your tone. You wanted to write a book about what it meant to be a man from Hong Kong; if Hong Kong disappeared, what would happen to the man? You told me about your family, and it was clear we were not meeting to talk about writing anymore. When you spoke, you chose your words carefully. You didn’t ask me about my boyfriend, only how I felt about returning to America. When I hesitated, you did not ask why, and when I spoke, you listened instead of interrupting me. I didn’t want to leave.
The global bond markets are a sensitive lot. And they’ve been having a particularly tricky time lately. Spooked by high inflation, high interest rates and high levels of government debt across the world, those markets have become less stable over the summer. The prices of government bonds – what governments sell to investors – have gone down. […]
Diesel in the US has climbed to more than US$6.50 a gallon, up about 75% from a year ago, and Asia is likely to pay for it in the form of higher interest rates. Expensive diesel keeps American inflation elevated, which gives the Federal Reserve reason to keep raising interest rates. Higher US rates lift […]
During one of his son’s hockey games, Nick Paumgarten watches as his eight-year-old is hit from behind, only to rise to his feet and use his stick to hit the side of his opponent’s head. Alongside his concern for his son’s head and neck, Paumgarten, who has written about his own hockey-related concussions, rapidly processes the outcomes of the exchange: a game-deciding penalty, his own reflexive rationalization, and the evaluation of other parents who “held me in some way responsible, as both father and coach, for the violence and loss of self-control.” Paumgarten’s essay is rich with such moments of parent-coach double-consciousness, and sensitive to the numerous ways, some of them awful, in which those two identities intrude upon each other.
That Sunday, it wasn’t yet 8 A.M. when a Rye player shoved James from behind into the boards. James went down awkwardly and stayed prone a moment, then leaped up and, with an implausible ferocity, cross-checked the other kid in the ear. The Rye boy collapsed to the ice, and the other kids poured in and began grappling with one another, while parents shouted and pointed. Soon there was a pile of mites, with the two referees pulling players off and flinging them aside like puppies. Through the windows, you could see that the sun had risen over the Long Island Sound. I thought of my son’s fellow second graders back in the city, likely still asleep or watching cartoons in their pajamas or getting dressed for church or whatever the unrinked got up to on weekend mornings, but here at Playland my boy had instigated a munchkin brawl.
TOKYO — Anyone betting that inflation risks are fading should look at the US Treasury market. The sharp selloff in Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) suggests the world’s biggest bond market is growing less convinced that price pressures are contained. Investors are rethinking the inflation outlook, with implications for Federal Reserve policy, real rates and stock […]
The European Investment Bank and BNP Paribas have agreed a €700 million guarantee programme designed to expand financing for European companies producing equipment for electricity grids.
The agreement targets a growing bottleneck in Europe’s energy system: manufacturers of transformers, cables, switchgear and other components are being asked to increase production while utilities and governments accelerate investment in transmission and distribution networks.
Under the deal, the EIB will provide up to €350 million in counter-guarantees, while BNP Paribas will commit an equivalent amount. The resulting €700 million portfolio of bank guarantees is expected to support companies investing in additional production capacity and supply contracts.
The European Investment Bank said the arrangement could stimulate as much as €2.8 billion in investment in the real economy.
The initiative is backed by the EU’s InvestEU programme and forms part of the EIB’s €1.5 billion Pan-EU Power Grid package. Guarantees are particularly important for infrastructure suppliers because large electricity projects often require manufacturers to provide financial guarantees before receiving contracts.
Those commitments can consume bank credit lines that companies might otherwise use to build factories, purchase machinery or finance working capital.
By sharing the risk with BNP Paribas, the EIB intends to increase the volume of guarantees available without requiring manufacturers to commit equivalent amounts of their own financing capacity.
The programme arrives as grid investment becomes one of the central constraints on European energy policy.
The EU is simultaneously attempting to expand renewable generation, electrify transport and industry, increase cross-border electricity trading and reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels.
European manufacturers face lengthy order books for some high-voltage equipment, particularly large transformers and specialised cables. Supply constraints can delay renewable projects and interconnectors even when planning permission and financing are available.
The EIB says its guarantee programme is intended to give manufacturers greater financial capacity to respond. The arrangement follows a similar partnership between the bank and BNP Paribas covering wind-energy manufacturing.
In February 2025, the two institutions agreed a €1 billion guarantee portfolio intended to support investment in the European wind industry. The EIB has subsequently expanded its focus from generation equipment to the networks required to transport electricity.
In 2025, the EIB Group invested €33 billion in energy projects worldwide, including €11.6 billion in grids and storage, according to the institution.
European energy policy has increasingly recognised that adding generating capacity without expanding grids can create congestion, delays and periods in which renewable electricity cannot reach consumers.
Political disagreements remain over how new infrastructure should be planned and financed.
Financing institutions are meanwhile moving ahead with programmes intended to expand the underlying industrial capacity.
For manufacturers, the EIB–BNP Paribas scheme does not provide €2.8 billion of direct public spending. Instead, public guarantees are being used to increase the volume of private financing available, with the EIB assuming part of the risk.
The distinction is central to InvestEU, which uses EU budget guarantees and EIB financing to attract additional private capital.
Europe’s electricity transition is increasingly dependent on this less visible part of the energy system. New wind farms, solar installations, nuclear reactors and industrial electrification projects ultimately require the same infrastructure: sufficient cables, substations, transformers and transmission capacity to move electricity from producers to users.
Rafael Grossi has turned a UN technical body into Washington’s political weapon, and the visa scandal in Vienna has laid bare the cynicism of the Western bloc. From Technical Body to Political Weapon The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was created as an impartial technical body meant to guarantee the peaceful use of atomic energy. […]
Durante o Portugal Football Summit foi divulgado o novo livro do algarvio Tiago Guadalupe, funcionário da Câmara Municipal de Loulé e colonista no jornal A Bola.
“Capitão João Matos – Liderar, vencer e inspirar” é a mais recente obra de Tiago Guadalupe e será apresentada a 9 de outubro, na Cidade do Futebol, numa iniciativa da Federação Portuguesa de Futebol.
Com a chancela Portugal Legends, a obra nasce de um projeto desenvolvido pela editora 21Books e pela agência whynote.pt, em parceria oficial com a Decathlon e a União das Freguesias de Carnaxide e Queijas.
Mais do que uma biografia desportiva, o livro parte do percurso de João Matos para propor uma reflexão sobre liderança pelo exemplo, disciplina, consistência, resiliência, comunicação, gestão de equipas, egos e conflitos, tomada de decisão, capacidade de adaptação, inovação, equilíbrio pessoal e legado, procurando transportar as experiências e aprendizagens construídas no desporto de alto rendimento para outros contextos da vida pessoal e profissional.
Ao longo de mais de duas décadas ao mais alto nível, João Matos construiu uma carreira marcada pela longevidade, consistência e liderança. Mais de 40 títulos, mais de 200 internacionalizações, um Campeonato do Mundo e dois Campeonatos da Europa ao serviço de Portugal, além de três títulos europeus pelo Sporting CP, fazem parte de um percurso que o tornou uma referência do futsal português e internacional.
Contudo, são sobretudo as experiências e aprendizagens construídas ao longo desse caminho que constituem o centro da obra. O objetivo passa por transportar princípios provenientes do desporto de alto rendimento para outros contextos, tornando o livro relevante para atletas e treinadores, mas também para gestores, professores, estudantes, empreendedores, dirigentes e líderes de equipas.
“Capitão João Matos – Liderar, vencer e inspirar” reúne ainda diferentes perspetivas sobre o jogador e capitão. Pedro Proença assina a introdução, Frederico Varandas o prefácio e Jorge Braz o posfácio, juntando-se ao livro contributos e reflexões de personalidades como Nuno Dias, Sebastián Coates, Nani, Rui Miguel Nabeiro e Pedro Dias, entre outras.
Frederico Varandas resume uma das ideias centrais da obra ao afirmar que «o seu legado não se mede apenas no que conquistou, mas sobretudo no que inspirou». Pedro Proença considera que João Matos deixa «o Futsal muito melhor do que aquele que encontrou», enquanto Jorge Braz reconhece: «O João ajudou-me a ser melhor treinador.»
O livro inclui igualmente o capítulo “Cocriar para inspirar”, com Tiago Valadas, Diretor de Marketing da Decathlon Portugal, dedicado à relação entre João Matos e a marca e à evolução dessa ligação para um processo de cocriação.
As reflexões reunidas na obra procuram mostrar que muitas das questões enfrentadas no desporto são comuns a organizações e equipas de diferentes áreas: como construir uma cultura vencedora, liderar sem depender de um cargo, reagir ao erro, gerir conflitos, manter a exigência depois do sucesso e preparar o final de um ciclo.
Para Tiago Guadalupe, é precisamente na influência exercida sobre os outros que se encontra uma das principais mensagens do livro:
«Os grandes atletas deixam resultados. Os grandes capitães deixam uma cultura. Os grandes líderes deixam pessoas melhores.»
Some 2,500 years ago, Babylon trained the sons of its wealthiest families without a single weekly hour devoted to the gods. There was no textbook that worked as a Bible either. Religion was everywhere and in no particular subject, spread through sign lists, writing exercises and arithmetic drills. A study published in the journal Iraq […]
Thousands gathered at Baiturrahman Grand Mosque in Banda Aceh on August 15, 2026, to commemorate 21 years of peace between Indonesia and the separatist Free Aceh Movement, or GAM. Some participants raised GAM’s red, black and white crescent-star flag and chanted “Free Aceh,” while others lowered Indonesia’s national flag and replaced it with the former […]
Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities has announced the discovery of a Roman-period tomb whose architecture, according to the country’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, has no exact parallel elsewhere in the cemetery where it was found. The tomb sits at Bir al-Shaghala, a site in the Dakhla Oasis, about 750 kilometers (roughly 465 miles) southwest […]
An 18-year-old woman has been gang raped and beaten by up to ten different men, many of them with a Syrian background, in the Dutch city of Dordrecht. Although the rape occurred in May 2025, the suspects are only now being arrested. In response to the rape, political leader Geert Wilders wrote that the Netherlands also has Islamic grooming gangs and called for all the perpetrators to be removed from the country along with their families.
Six suspects have now been arrested, aged 20 to 23. During the incident, the girl, who lived in a residential group home, was driven to two different parking lots and raped by several men, some of whom filmed the assault and shared it on Snapchat. Police say the woman was humiliated and beaten.
“A bruise on the cheek, a tooth through the lip and a swelling on the knee,” described one source. “It is a very serious criminal offense where all boundaries have been crossed and the victim has been treated very disrespectfully. As if she were an object that everyone could use.”
The incident has already attracted attention from politicians in the Netherlands, including PVV leader Geert Wilders.
“Teen victim of gang rape by Syrians. Raped by ten boys at different parking lots. The Netherlands also has Islamic grooming gangs. The Netherlands needs an unprecedented cleanup. All that scum out. With their families. No mercy,” he wrote on X.
Tiener slachtoffer groepsverkrachting Syriërs. Verkracht door tien jongens op verschillende parkeerplaatsen.
Ook Nederland heeft islamitische grooming gangs. Nederland heeft een ongekend grote schoonmaak nodig. Al dat tuig eruit. Met hun familie.
The first introductory court hearing took place on Sept. 23, 2026. Only 23-year-old S.S., described by the prosecutor as having played a leading role, and identified in court reporting as Syrian-born, was required to appear. Of the other five suspects, two of them are S.S.’s brother and cousin, who were arrested that Wednesday morning.
The investigation by the Rotterdam police Sexual Offences Team is still open, and prosecutors believe as many as ten men were involved.
According to the prosecution, the young woman accepted a lift to a train station from three strangers but they never brought her there. She was taken first to one parking lot, where S.S. raped her, and then to a second parking lot where, prosecutors say other men also raped her.
The Public Prosecution Service also told the court that the suspects “discussed and coordinated their statements in detail.” Even so, the accounts given by S.S. diverge from those of the others. His lawyer said that was because he did not want to inform against his brother and cousin.
S.S. himself told the judges the girl got into the car of her own accord.
“We didn’t force her to do anything,” he told police.
He is requesting to be released while his court trial is pending.
“I don’t want to ruin my future. If I stay stuck, all I’m going to be in debt,” he said.
The court refused. Judges said the images, the statements, and conversations overheard by police were enough to keep him in custody for now. He is due back for another introductory hearing in early December.
Remarkably, there was already a case in 2025 involving gang rape in the Netherlands involving ten suspects and a 15-year-old girl, mostly Syrians. Geert Wilders had also called attention to the case, writing: “50 percent of all suspects of sexual offenses are of foreign origin. Only the PVV will throw that criminal scum out of the country and immediately implement an asylum stop.”
Roughly 315,000 years ago, a group of early humans lived in what is now Morocco. Their remains, unearthed at a site called Jebel Irhoud, are the oldest fossils ever attributed to our species, Homo sapiens. Now, an international team of researchers has digitally reconstructed the face of one of these individuals, building a composite skull […]
L’Europa è un’area di trasformazione industriale con scarse risorse energetiche e minerarie proprie. Senza un approvvigionamento esterno è condannata a diventare terzo mondo.
Ma questa strada suicida è esattamente quella presa. Perché?
Due interpretazioni possibili.
La prima è l’integrale asservimento agli USA. Una compagine di venduti ai vertici UE+UK avrebbe accondisceso alle provocazioni sul fronte russo sfociate nella guerra, all’incendio americano del Medio Oriente, all’appropriazione brigantesca delle risorse petrolifere del Venezuela, sacrificando il vecchio continente.
I media a gettone avrebbero indorato la pillola canticchiando il solito tormentone sulla “difesa dei diritti umani” per giustificare qualunque barbarie.
La seconda è che la guerra sul fronte russo sia stata non tollerata, ma proprio pianificata, con la prospettiva di dare una spallata alla Russia, destabilizzarne il regime, ricondurla al periodo Eltsin, a stazione di rifornimento e terra di conquista per imprenditori senza scrupoli. Un rapido collasso economico, via sanzioni, avrebbe trasformato i ricchi giacimenti russi in disponibilità perenni e incondizionate.
Ma quale che sia l’interpretazione giusta, entrambi gli scenari portano allo stesso esito. Quanto più grave la situazione, quanto più pesante l’indebitamento, quanto più stretto il vicolo cieco in cui ci si è cacciati, tanto più ai dirigenti europei un ritorno sui propri passi appare impossibile. Come il giocatore d’azzardo che oramai si è giocato la macchina, la casa e un rene, uscire dal gioco sancirebbe semplicemente la rovina e dunque non gli resta che giocarsi anche l’altro rene e con ciò la vita in un’ultima scommessa del tutto per tutto. E la scommessa è la guerra, e il suo azzardo è che essa resti guerra di logoramento, un po’ ibrida, un po’ per procura, comunque convenzionale. In una guerra convenzionale a basso voltaggio e lunga durata l’UE+UK sperano di contare su maggiori risorse di uomini e denari.
Così, quel quadro che sembra folle, controintuitivo e perciò ancora implausibile a molti, il quadro di una guerra diretta con la Russia, sembra essere oramai l’unica direzione cui le oligarchie UE possono condurci.
Duncan is a longtime friend of Max Daly, and a drug addict caught up in “cuckooing,” where dealers take over people’s homes as drug bases in exchange for product. Daly offers a sympathetic portrait of Duncan’s spiralling life, while opening a window onto a bizarre world where the most vulnerable exploit each other—and sometimes even form bonds.
Over the 2000s and 2010s, wave after wave of gangs fanned out from Britain’s drug supply hubs – London, Liverpool and Birmingham – to set up shop in smaller towns and cities across the country. They took over the homes of drug users and young women who had been groomed by older male gang members. As early as 2008 Suffolk constabulary reported that more than a third of Class A drug dealers arrested in Suffolk were under 21, and the majority were from London. (Before this period, most crack and heroin dealers in towns and smaller cities were “user-dealers”, addicted heroin users in their 30s or older, who were not as “professionalised” as the big city drug gangs.) Gangs often used sex workers, who targeted male tenants and moved in, bringing the young dealers with them. Community safety teams, who rescued 80 tenants in London in 2005, were the first to call the tactic “cuckooing”.
For a brief time, Sacha Jafri was both the creator of the world’s largest painting and one of the world’s most expensive living artists, after his 17,000‑square‑foot work The Journey of Humanity was theatrically “sold” for $62 million at a Dubai charity auction. The buyer, French “crypto billionaire” André Abdoune, never paid a cent and, given his history as a serial fraudster, almost certainly never will—meaning no money ever reached the charities that were promised the proceeds. So what was the real story: a giant painting, or a giant scam?
Many of Jafri’s other claims do not stand up to scrutiny. He is often touted as an artist whose work sells in the millions, but publicly available commercial auction records are more modest. His most expensive painting before The Journey Of Humanity was a piece called Dance of the Midnight Samurai, which sold in 2019 for approximately $70,000. The previous year, another work, Dreamscape II, went unsold at two auctions, before eventually being acquired for $893. Newspaper articles document purchases by Kevin Spacey and Guy Ritchie, but there are no reports of sales to Bill Gates, Leonardo DiCaprio, Barack Obama or Bill Clinton. No pictures exist of their red-printed hands.
I had never heard of the delightfully named Hudsonian godwit before this piece—yet, given their achievements, they deserve global fame. These slight, mudflat-loving shorebirds hold the record for the longest nonstop flight, clocking journeys of seven thousand miles or more that one scientist deems “technically impossible.” Rivka Galchen follows researchers from Patagonian mudflats to Alaskan bogs as they try to understand the biology behind these incredible flights. Along the way, she even gets to hold one of our little celebrities, an “otherworldly and wondrous” experience.
Migratory shorebirds are usually not a person’s first bird crush. They lack the supernatural aura of the resplendent quetzal, and they don’t go in for outlandish mating displays like that of the prairie chicken. As the Princeton University biology professor and shorebird-lover David Wilcove put it, migratory shorebirds can give an impression of being “little brown guys, buzzing around in the mud, not too big and not too small, and, whether one is a stint or a phalarope or a knot or a godwit, they’re just kind of there.” And yet, Wilcove told me, they are a birder’s kind of bird. Once people get to know them, they tend to fall in love.
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