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News Update
LONDON: A British man was on Tuesday officially certified by Guinness World Records as the first person to have run around the world.
Robert Garside, 40, said he was “so happy and relieved” after receiving his certificate in London as it had taken him nearly four years to fight claims that he had exaggerated his feat.
The self-described “Run-ningman” ran 56,000 kilometres across 30 countries, taking five years and eight months to complete his unprecedented journey.
Garside got more than just blisters and a certificate to show for his efforts.
“I met my wife on the run in Venezuela and she has been very supportive,” he said. Since finishing in June 2003, the Briton has faced accusations that he was exaggerating his achievements and has spent the years since compiling evidence.
Marco Frigatti, Guinness’s head of records, was convinced that Garside followed the rules.
His team ploughed though video footage, local news reports, credit card receipts and statements from witnesses saying Garside ran the route.
“It is genuine,” Frigatti confirmed. “I have approved many records and this record had an astronomical amount of evidence and it could be cross-checked so we are happy and satisfied.” During his journey, Garside slept in the snow in the Himalayas, and at a monastery in Tibet, and also had to out-run thieves in Mexico and hot-foot it from gunmen in Panama.
In December 1996, Garside set out from Piccadilly Circus in the heart of London on his first attempt to jog around the world. That attempt had to be abandoned when war broke out in Afghanistan.
It was only on his fourth try — beginning at India Gate in New Delhi the following year — that he succeeded, ending up back in the Indian capital in June 2003. —AFP
STOCKHOLM: Scientists have moved one step closer to understanding how stars are formed after the discovery of molecular oxygen in interstellar space, the Swedish Space Corporation said on Tuesday.
The discovery “is important for understanding the chemistry in large interstellar clouds where new stars are formed, and the processes behind star formation,” it said in a statement.
All previous attempts to detect molecular oxygen in interstellar space, from both observatories on Earth and in space, had failed. —AFP
PARIS: The cane toad, a poisonous species introduced to north-eastern Australia 72 years ago to control sugar-cane pests, has adapted so well that it may eventually spread around three-quarters of the country’s coastline, biologists say.
Bufo marinus is one of the world’s most notorious examples of an unwanted, invasive critter, for its relentless spread has devastated populations of toads and frogs and other native species.
Australian biologists say that the unwanted anuran’s empire has expanded to 1.2 million sq km in a swathe across Queensland and the Northern Territory. It now occupies regions where the minimum monthly temperature falls below 5.0 C and the maximum monthly temperature 37.0 C, and has colonised areas where, by all expectations, it should have died from lack of moisture. This shows it has the capability of living in coastal Western Australia and coastal southern Australia, says the paper.
“We predict that cane toads now have the potential to inhabit over two million square kilometres of the continent,” it says.
“If the cane toad’s advance continues, this prolific and problematic species is likely to cause further harm to Australia's unique wildlife and economy.” The authors suggest the toads' expansion is down to evolution, the lack of predators and the fabulous niche they found in Australia’s habitat. —AFP
LOS ANGELES: Three young movie stars who played the trio of teen wizards in the first two “Harry Potter” films have signed on to continue their roles in the last two big-screen instalments, reports said Monday.
Daniel Radcliffe, who plays the bespectacled wizard, and his cohorts Rupert Grint and Emma Watson signed on despite speculation they may outgrow their child characters by the time the movies are made, the Hollywood Reporter said.
“It would be inconceivable to imagine anyone else in the roles with which they have become so identified,” said Warner Brothers Pictures’ chief of production Jeff Robinov.
Radcliffe, who began playing Harry at age 12, will turn 18 in July. Wat-son is 16, and Grint is 18.
The trio has been in the series since its first instalment in 2001, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.” —AFP
A mass of ice broken off from the Upsala glacier (back) floats on the waters of Lago Argentino in the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares, southwest of Argentina, on March 27. The Upsala glacier, one of the largest in the southern hemisphere, has a wall of ice of more than 60 metres above the water surface, is 60 km long and has a total surface of 595 square km. According to Argentine scientist, Jorge Rabassa, the Patagonian glaciers are being affected by climate change and probably by 2020 and 2030, most of them will be gone.
—Reuters
An Irrawaddy dolphin is seen at Chilika Lagoon in the eastern Indian state of Orissa February 25, 2006. Hope is rising that the endangered Irrawaddy dolphin can be saved in India after a survey showed more of the animals than before in a vast, brackish lagoon in the east of the country.
—Reuters|
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