Mashable: The terrifying moment a shark breaks into a cage with a diver inside.
Outfits routinely bait to bring in sharks. Everyone was lucky ... this time. So, want to still sit in a shark cage? NAH.
NY Times: New Jersey Transit, a Cautionary Tale of Neglect.
“In the 1990s, New Jersey Transit was riding high. Its ridership was increasing, and its trains were new and running on time.” Who comes up with this stuff? Um ... NO. Not new. Not running on time. I stopped commuting in the mid-‘90’s. Overcrowded, miserable. It was better at the turn from ‘80’s to ‘90’s. The tracks were always in terrible shape. The bridges around Newark, an embarrassment. The concrete ties would shatter if the Amtraks went too fast, so they had a speed limit. The wooden ties, you could pull the spikes out with your bare hands. Some had probably been there since the turn of the last century. NJ Transit *always* needed a ‘sugar daddy’. Christie pulled it away, in good Republican fashion, and now you’ve got people dead. This isn’t hard to figure out.
Guardian.UK: Jacques Cousteau sails again in new film.
A towering figurehead of the last century. How I miss him.
Metafilter: It’s balloon fiesta time!
That’s the definitive FPP. Good work, filthy light thief.
Dissent: How Tax Havens Make Us Poor.
Haaretz: Monumental forgotten gardens of Petra rediscovered after 2,000 years.
“Now archaeologists are discovering the Nabataean capital, situated in the southwestern deserts of Jordan, once was adorned with an exquisite, artificially irrigated garden. It featured paths likely shaded by vines, trees and date palms, and grasses, which were cultivated next to a huge, 44-meter wide swimming pool.” Not bad. Indiana Jones’ fictional Grail knight sat around for decades in a paradise.
Guardian.UK: Donald Trump attacks Hillary Clinton over links with Denis O’Brien.
O’Brien sounds like Trump himself. So what’s the problem?
Guardian.UK: New Jersey train crash - critical injuries reported in Hoboken – live updates.
Train never stopped, apparently hit end-of-track bumper in the station at cruising speed. Only worse situation would be a head-on, or a head-on in a tunnel. I cringe to think of it, after riding the rails to NYC for thirteen years.
DYT: Teens In Britain Are Taking Driving Lessons In BMW Supercars.
Hope she took the shoes off. Otherwise, fail.
Open Culture: Mark Twain’s 60 American Comfort Foods He Missed While Abroad.
Underlines the paucity of our modern mass-produced diets. We think we have more variety, more choice. We don’t.
Telegraph.UK: Another car park, another King.
“Archaeologists have discovered what could be King Henry I’s remains languishing beneath a Ministry of Justice car park on the site of Reading prison.” The dead never get to rest, it seems. They just idle.
Riveted: The Re-Dedication of Naay I’waans (the Chief Son-I-Hat Whale House).
Simply wonderful photoset. Thanks, Wiredfool!
Dazed: A British artist is stranded on a boat in the open Pacific.
One of the more bizarre stories you’ll read this month. Make some time. Nothing really earthshattering, but still ... an artificial ‘connected’ no-(wo)man’s-land. It must be like suspended animation.
Atlas Obscura: The World’s Oldest Snowshoe Sat in an Italian Cartographer’s Office for 12 Years.
Guardian.UK: Ship found in Arctic 168 years after doomed Northwest Passage attempt.
Wowowowowow. They’ve found the second ship. Long way away from the previous. Right up my interest-alley. THANK YOU EVELYN for the link.
BBC: MH370 search - New debris in Madagascar includes ‘burnt parts’.
Another opportunity to show us the same old maps again. And to reiterate, it’s worse than trying to find a needle in a haystack.
c|net: Porsche’s 2017 Panamera 4 E-Hybrid plug-in rocks 31 miles of EV range.
“Rocks”?!! *Cough*. That won’t even take me food shopping on an average day, much less get to a client location and check my PO box.
SciAm: Ecuador Begins Drilling Oil in a Pristine Corner of the Amazon.
“This is the worst imaginable place to be drilling for oil.” With oil prices where they are, insane. Humankind continues to operate as parasite on this poor planet.
Italian Ways: Giovanni Patrone’s Italian ocean liners.
Ocean liners are some of my fave vintage posters.
LOTR, anyone?
I could tell you where this is, but then I’d have to snuff you.
NY Times: Air Force, Running Low on Drone Pilots, Turns to Contractors in Terror Fight.
You mean Flight Simulator’s not enough?
DYT: Mindblowing Photographs Of The World’s Most Fascinating Indigenous Tribes.
Mostly staged. We don’t live in a ‘60’s National Geographic world anymore. I look at these, and wonder who of these subjects is actually manning a food cart at the local market, looking unremarkable. I mean, great photos and all ... but I smell a substantially significant amount of hyperbole.
Youtube: Airlander 10 crashing into the ground cardington shed airship.
Bounce, more like. Doesn’t look like the cockpit/passenger section ever contacts the ground, just the blimp nose. Inexperienced pilot, methinks. I suppose it responds even more slowly than a conventional blimp ... though I saw no last-minute recovery attitude adjustments.
Guardian.UK: Thomas Hardy altarpiece discovered in Windsor church.
“The discovery shows it did exist, but that it had been covered over some time in the 1920s.” Totally rad.
