Global Pulse

标签： Oceania

大洋洲

  • LIV Golf to lay off majority of staff

    LIV Golf to lay off majority of staff

    The breakaway professional golf circuit LIV Golf is set to implement sweeping layoffs affecting most of its employees starting next week, a company spokesperson confirmed Wednesday. The drastic restructuring move comes as the tour enters a period of deep uncertainty following the sudden termination of massive backing from Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), the deep-pocketed backer that poured an estimated $5 billion into the league over multiple years to poach top-tier talent from the established PGA Tour.

    PIF’s funding commitment wrapped up immediately after LIV wrapped its 2024 regular season at the Indianapolis season finale last weekend. In an official statement, the LIV spokesperson outlined that the organization is scaling back its current operations as it transitions toward a planned rebranded “LIV 2.0” iteration set to launch under new ownership next season.

    “The funding commitment announced by PIF earlier this year will reach its conclusion. As a result, we are scaling back operations as we transition to the next chapter of LIV Golf and work toward making LIV 2.0 a reality,” the spokesperson said. “This week, we informed many of our colleagues that their employment under LIV 1.0 will end in the first week of September. We are grateful to our employees for their hard work and dedication in building LIV Golf, and we remain committed to supporting those affected through this transition.”

    LIV’s leadership says it has already secured a preliminary agreement with an unnamed prospective lead investor, and has offered top players substantial equity stakes in the reorganized league to incentivize them to stay. The circuit is also actively seeking additional minority investors, targeting a finalized restructuring deal by the end of October. A source familiar with the internal plans told Agence France-Presse that only a small core team will be retained through the transition period, and the organization hopes to rehire many laid-off employees if the new investment deal is successfully completed.

    Despite these tentative plans, the very survival of the reimagined tour hinges entirely on one critical factor: whether LIV can convince its biggest drawing card players to remain on the roster. Currently, the league’s lineup includes major champions and fan favorites such as Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm, and Sergio Garcia, none of whom have publicly confirmed they will stay with the circuit through the transition.

    Multiple industry reports have suggested several top LIV stars are in informal talks about a potential return to the PGA Tour, though PGA Tour officials confirmed this week that they currently have no formal pathway in place to allow LIV players to rejoin the established tour. Speaking at the Indianapolis season finale Sunday, DeChambeau struck an optimistic tone, saying he was “proud” of what LIV had built and that he held “great thoughts about what could happen next year.” Just one day later, however, the 2020 U.S. Open champion posted a cryptic message to Instagram: a photo gallery of his biggest LIV victories paired with the caption “It was a good run,” leaving fans and analysts speculating about his next move.

  • Mbappe hits treble as Real Madrid thrash Real Sociedad

    Mbappe hits treble as Real Madrid thrash Real Sociedad

    Just 30 minutes after the final whistle dropped at the Santiago Bernabeu, La Liga fans are still buzzing from a masterclass performance that delivered Jose Mourinho his first home victory since returning to Real Madrid’s dugout. The headline act on the night? French superstar Kylian Mbappe, who bagged a stunning hat-trick to anchor the Los Blancos to a dominant 4-1 thrashing of Copa del Rey holders Real Sociedad, extending their perfect start to the new campaign with two wins from two opening matches.

    Mourinho made a bold call ahead of kickoff, sticking with the exact starting XI that earned a dramatic late 2-1 away win over Espanyol in his first match in charge last weekend. The Portuguese veteran had previously acknowledged that getting his three global superstars — Mbappe, Vinicius Junior and Jude Bellingham — firing at full capacity at the same time would be a tricky challenge, but not an impossible one. Saturday’s fixture proved he is already moving in the right direction, as the star trio combined to tear apart the Basque visitors, with Bellingham notching two assists and Vinicius adding a fourth goal to wrap up the result.

    The opening 40 minutes of the match was a tightly contested end-to-end affair, with both sides creating clear-cut chances. Vinicius fired over the crossbar early on, while Real Sociedad keeper Alex Remiro made a sharp low save to deny Mbappe at his near post. At the opposite end, Real Madrid keeper Thibaut Courtois pulled off a brilliant reflex stop to keep out Mikel Oyarzabal, and Sociedad’s Sergio Gomez sent a flying volley just inches wide of the far post.

    The breakthrough finally came five minutes before halftime, when Uruguayan midfielder Federico Valverde threaded a perfect through ball to Mbappe. The two-time defending La Liga top scorer took a clever first touch to shake off his marker before burying a blistering strike into the top corner, opening his goal account for the new campaign.

    Real Madrid could not hold onto their lead through to halftime, however. A misplaced turnover from Job Ochieng led to a blocked shot that fell kindly into the path of Luka Sucic, who fired home the equaliser via a deflection off Alvaro Carreras, sending the sides into the break level at 1-1.

    After the interval, Valverde revealed after the match that Madrid adjusted their pressing strategy, and the tweak immediately paid dividends. Early in the second half, Remiro pulled off another save to deny Mbappe after a clever pass from Arda Guler, but he could do nothing to stop the Frenchman’s second strike. A smooth build-up between Valverde and Bellingham ended with Bellingham playing Mbappe through on goal, and the former Paris Saint-Germain forward calmly slotted home to restore Madrid’s lead.

    Madrid’s third goal came from Vinicius, who had been relatively quiet for most of the match until that point, and it was Bellingham’s tenacity that created the chance. The English midfielder’s initial shot was blocked, but he fought to win back possession in the penalty area before squaring the ball for an unmarked Vinicius to tap into an empty net.

    Buoyed by his goal, Vinicius turned provider for Mbappe’s third just minutes later, playing a perfectly weighted through ball that put the striker one-on-one with Remiro. Mbappe lifted a delicate chip over the onrushing keeper that bounced into the net, capping his hat-trick with what many observers are already calling the goal of the match.

    In a small moment that carried bigger off-pitch significance, Vinicius was substituted with seven minutes left to play for new signing Yan Diomande, and he left the pitch all smiles while embracing Mourinho. That stands in stark contrast to last season, when the Brazilian forward openly showed anger after being substituted by former coach Xabi Alonso during a Clasico win over Barcelona in October. The 2024-25 season already looks different for Vinicius, who recently signed a contract extension with Real Madrid keeping him at the club until 2032.

    After the final whistle, Mourinho was full of praise for his side and for Mbappe in particular. “This guy is incredible,” he said of the French forward. “I see him really hungry to make history with Real Madrid, and I see a team where, despite Kylian being Kylian, it’s hard for me not to talk about the team.”

    The Portuguese coach added that he was happy with every aspect of his side’s performance, even the patchy first half. “I liked everything, and you might tell me the second half was good and the first half wasn’t, but I liked the team even when it wasn’t good,” he said. “I’m really happy that the players ended up content, winning at home, smiling, and tomorrow — training — because on Sunday comes Malaga.”

    Valverde echoed his coach’s praise for Mbappe, telling Real Madrid TV after the match: “It’s spectacular, incredible (to have Mbappe), we have to enjoy Mbappe and make the most of him as possible. We have to give him a thousand balls so he is comfortable, he can score goals, and he’s happy.”

    Looking ahead to the rest of the matchweek, Spanish champions Barcelona will host Athletic Bilbao on Thursday, with new high-profile signing Rodri expected to make his debut from the bench under new manager Hansi Flick.

  • Bunnings and Kmart sales grow as shoppers hunt for lower prices

    Bunnings and Kmart sales grow as shoppers hunt for lower prices

    Against the backdrop of a widespread cost-of-living squeeze hitting households across Australia, retail giant Wesfarmers has delivered an unexpectedly resilient full-year financial performance, with its two flagship discount-focused brands Bunnings and Kmart attracting growing numbers of budget-conscious shoppers. The Perth-based conglomerate, which operates across multiple retail and industrial segments, released its full-year earnings report on Thursday, revealing a net profit of $2.87 billion — a marginal 1.8% decline from the prior financial year.
    Wesfarmers Managing Director Rob Scott attributed the company’s solid performance to its deliberate long-term strategy of prioritizing everyday low prices, a positioning that has resonated strongly with consumers navigating rising inflation and stagnant wage growth. “Bunnings and Kmart Group’s everyday low prices continued to drive sales and earnings growth,” Scott stated in the company’s official release. “Disciplined execution of strategies helped offset broad-based cost pressures and delivered operating leverage across both businesses.”
    Heading into future trading periods, Scott confirmed that price competitiveness will remain a core strategic pillar, as the company acknowledges that persistent inflation continues to stretch household and business budgets across the country. “While Australian consumer demand remains resilient, cost-of-living pressures continue to affect many households across the economy,” he added. “Uncertainty regarding the outlook for inflation, house prices, interest rates and tax settings are affecting consumer sentiment, while higher costs of doing business are weighing on business confidence and spending.”
    Breaking down segment performance, Bunnings, Wesfarmers’ home improvement and outdoor living retail chain, once again carried the bulk of the group’s earnings growth, posting a 5.1% rise in earnings to reach $2.455 billion for the 12 months ending June 30. Discount department store chain Kmart Group matched that momentum, with earnings climbing 6% to hit $1.11 billion, while total sales for the brand rose 2.8% to $11.7 billion.
    The strong results from Bunnings and Kmart were partially offset by a sharp downturn at office supplies retailer Officeworks, where earnings fell 22.2% to just $165 million, reflecting softer business and consumer demand for office goods post-pandemic. Across the entire Wesfarmers group, total annual revenue rose 3.4% year-on-year to $47.27 billion. Excluding one-off significant items, earnings before interest and tax increased by 7.3% to $4.49 billion.
    In a positive signal to shareholders, the company confirmed it will issue a fully franked final dividend of $1.20 per share, payable to investors on October 7.

  • AFL 2026: Western Bulldogs coach addresses Tim English’s selection, future at the club

    AFL 2026: Western Bulldogs coach addresses Tim English’s selection, future at the club

    As the AFL finals race reaches a fever pitch, the Western Bulldogs have delivered a major boost to their premiership hopes, confirming star big men Aaron Naughton and Tim English are on track to take the field against Collingwood in Friday night’s do-or-die blockbuster clash. The announcement comes amid swirling off-season speculation linking English to an interstate move, but Bulldogs head coach Luke Beveridge has moved to ease fan fears, insisting the club is confident the ruckman will see out his contract and remain at the Whitten Oval beyond this campaign.

    English has been sidelined since sustaining a knee injury in round 22 of the regular season, while Naughton was forced to cut short his round 24 outing against Melbourne after an existing ankle injury flared up. Both stars completed a full training session this week, and Beveridge confirmed their fitness has progressed far better than expected ahead of the high-stakes encounter.

    The coach noted that the club will carefully manage English’s game time to avoid aggravating his still-healing knee, but the outfit is targeting 70 percent game time for the key ruckman. “They both got through training yesterday, and all signs point to them being available to play,” Beveridge told reporters ahead of the clash. “We’re already short on tall personnel down the spine, so losing either of these two would have forced us to get creative with our line-up, like we had to do last week. Ryan Gardner stepped up really well in that fill-in role, even with limited minutes, and that was a great outcome for the whole group.”

    Beveridge added that Collingwood’s relatively undersized forward line and midfield eases some of the immediate pressure on the Bulldogs’ ruck division, even with English coming off a layoff. “Collingwood aren’t a side stacked with elite height across the park, so that takes some of the sting out of any potential disadvantage,” he said. “That said, the ruck contest is always a critical battle every week. Tim has had a few weeks off to recover, so there’s no question he’ll be a little underdone coming into this game. We’ll work through his minutes step by step, but right now it looks like he’ll get through, and we’re hoping he can spend at least 70 percent of the match on the field.”

    Beyond the immediate on-field preparation, Beveridge addressed rampant off-season speculation that English could request a trade to GWS at the end of the 2024 season, following his partner Rudi Ellis’s recent signing with Sydney-based Super Netball club the NSW Swifts. The coach pushed back on the rumours, saying the club has not received any internal indication that English wants to leave.

    “We’re pretty secure in the fact that Tim will be here next year, and for a fair bit longer beyond that,” Beveridge said. “We haven’t seen or heard anything internally that gives any of this speculation any credence. I fully expect him to see out his current contract. He hasn’t given any hint that he’s unhappy here, and he’s been an incredible servant of this club for a long time.”

    Beveridge added that he has no interest in entertaining hypotheticals about player movement during the finals campaign, with the club’s full focus fixed on this week’s cutthroat clash. “It’s probably not a time to be dealing in hypotheticals, and I’d rather not speculate on what might happen after the season,” he said. “All this silly season talk is not something we want to get wrapped up in right now. We’ll deal with those questions when we have to, but right now every bit of our energy is going towards preparing for this game.”

  • Qantas profit slumps $330m as US-Iran war doubles fuel prices

    Qantas profit slumps $330m as US-Iran war doubles fuel prices

    The ongoing US-Iran conflict has sent global jet fuel prices skyrocketing, delivering a severe financial hit to Australia’s largest air carrier Qantas that has forced the company to trim domestic flight capacity and put a planned $150 million share buyback on hold, the airline confirmed in its latest market update.

    In the report released this week, Qantas detailed that its underlying annual profits have fallen 13.1% year-on-year to $2.06 billion, representing a $330 million drop from the same 12-month period last year. Statutory after-tax profits saw an even steeper decline, dropping 19.7% to $1.289 billion. The airline directly attributed much of this downturn to the market volatility triggered by the US-Iran conflict, noting that the conflict has pushed jet fuel prices to more than double their levels from February, adding more than $420 million in unplanned costs to the company’s balance sheet.

    Qantas executives note that the final $610 million in total cost impacts would have been realized without swift intervention. To offset these rising expenses, the carrier has already implemented a series of adjustments, including raising passenger fares, reallocating aircraft to high-demand international routes, and cutting underperforming domestic capacity to match shifting travel demand.

    Despite the major headwinds from fuel costs, the airline reported stronger-than-expected revenue growth across both its Qantas mainline and low-cost Jetstar brands, driven by resilient customer travel demand. Underlying earnings before interest and taxes rose to $1.44 billion in the reporting period, outperforming some analyst projections.

    Qantas Chief Executive Vanessa Hudson framed the company’s current operating landscape as split between two vastly different economic environments: the stable, high-demand period before the outbreak of the US-Iran conflict, and the uncertain climate that has followed. “The final four months of the year saw business and consumer confidence fall as the conflict and broader economic headwinds created widespread uncertainty,” Hudson explained in the update. “Some large corporates and government agencies responded by managing their costs more tightly, which directly reduced demand for premium business travel.”

    “In response to the surge in fuel prices, we quickly adjusted fares and capacity and redeployed aircraft to give customers more options to fly to Europe, where demand for leisure travel remains strong,” Hudson added.

    In addition to capacity cuts, Qantas confirmed it is pausing the $150 million share buyback program first announced in April, as the company prioritizes preserving cash to buffer ongoing fuel price volatility. The airline’s board has approved a final dividend of 19.8 cents per share for shareholders, a payout that reflects the company’s continued effort to balance investor returns with cost stability amid global uncertainty.

  • What scientists know so far about Nepal’s deadly floods

    What scientists know so far about Nepal’s deadly floods

    On Wednesday morning, a catastrophic disaster of flash floods and landslides struck the Nepal-Tibet border region, leaving at least 160 people dead and hundreds unaccounted for, as experts work to untangle the causes of the event and unpack what it signals about growing hazard risks in the Himalayan highlands.

    Footage captured from the Chinese side of the border captures the devastating force of the surge: a towering, churning wall of mud and debris slammed into a multi-story building, swallowing the structure whole and sweeping away buses and private vehicles as if they were lightweight children’s toys. In Nepal’s Nuwakot district, residents have been forced to navigate streets coated in thick, clinging mud in the disaster’s aftermath.

    Initial reports suggested a 4.4-magnitude earthquake had triggered a landslide that blocked a mountain river, with the flood unleashed when the natural dam eventually burst. That account was put forward by Nepal’s Foreign Minister Shishir Khanal, but new analysis from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) has revised that narrative. USGS experts found that the seismic activity initially recorded was not caused by an earthquake, but rather by the massive movement of the landslide itself.

    Preliminary findings from the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), an intergovernmental organization based in Kathmandu, have ruled out any unusual activity originating on the Chinese side of the border. According to Sarthak Shrestha, a remote sensing and geo-information analyst at ICIMOD, the most likely sequence is that a rock-ice avalanche occurred on Nepal’s side of the border, which blocked the Lhende River and set off the cascading flood that swept through downstream communities.

    One of the most alarming details experts have highlighted is that the disaster struck with almost no warning. Hatim Sharif, a hydrologist at the University of Texas San Antonio, noted that there was no heavy rainfall in the region ahead of the flood — a detail that renders most operational global early warning systems useless for this type of event.

    By the time a fast-moving mud surge like this is visible to people in its path, it is already too late to escape by running or even by car, Sharif explained. The mixture of water and rock debris moves at high speed and becomes dense enough to act like “liquid concrete,” making escape along flat ground impossible. Sharif’s guidance is that the only chance of survival is to immediately climb to high ground of at least six meters (20 feet) above the river level.

    Looking ahead, Sharif said that one viable long-term adaptation is to install real-time river level monitoring gauges across high-risk Himalayan river systems. While this would not prevent the disaster, it could give vulnerable communities 20 to 30 minutes of advance warning to evacuate to safe ground.

    Dorothy Heinrich, a climate and hazard researcher at the University of Reading in the United Kingdom, explained the unique geographic factors that make these blockage-induced floods so dangerous in mountain regions. “In these mountain environments, the rivers can be quite narrow in areas,” she noted. When any kind of landslide or avalanche blocks a narrow river channel, water rapidly accumulates behind the natural obstruction, and the eventual breach releases an incredibly fast, powerful surge downstream.

    ICIMOD head of climate and environmental risks Qianggong Zhang has warned that the risk is not yet over: an upstream blockage remains in place, raising the possibility of a second destructive flood in the coming days.

    While it is too early to draw a direct, definitive link between this disaster and human-caused climate change, scientists say well-documented environmental shifts across the Himalayas — often called the “Roof of the World” — have already increased the likelihood of similar events. Nepal is particularly vulnerable to glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs), catastrophic events that occur when glacial melt leads to a sudden breach of a natural glacial lake dam, releasing billions of liters of water downstream. A major GLOF event originating in China’s Gyirong County hit Nepal’s Rasuwa District just last July, though investigators have not yet confirmed a GLOF caused the latest disaster.

    In the coming weeks, climate scientists around the world will conduct event attribution studies to examine what role climate change may have played, comparing the probability of such an event occurring in today’s fossil fuel-warmed climate versus the climate of the pre-industrial era. Heinrich noted that researchers already have high confidence that climate change is driving major shifts across the Himalayas: rising temperatures, more frequent heatwaves, widespread glacial retreat, and permafrost thaw, all of which increase the frequency and severity of landslides, avalanches, and outburst floods. Still, she emphasized that a definitive connection to this specific disaster can only be confirmed through formal attribution analysis.

  • Brazil sues Discord over child safety measures, demands $100 mln in damages

    Brazil sues Discord over child safety measures, demands $100 mln in damages

    Brazilian federal authorities have launched a major legal action against communication platform Discord, pushing for sweeping changes to the company’s child protection systems and demanding nearly $100 million in compensation for collective harm, after a 13-year-old girl was coerced into dying by suicide during a live broadcast on the service.

    The lawsuit, filed Wednesday by Brazilian government bodies, comes after weeks of failed regulatory negotiations, during which Discord’s proposed safety adjustments were labeled inadequate to mitigate documented threats to young users. The move marks the latest escalation in Brazil’s aggressive crackdown on global social media and digital platforms that fail to meet strict new online child protection requirements.

    The crisis that prompted the latest legal action unfolded in July, when a 13-year-old girl from a small town in central-western Brazil was targeted during a livestream held on Discord. According to Brazilian Justice Ministry cyber intelligence officials from Ciberlab, a group of participants taunted and pressured the girl for more than 45 minutes: first forcing her to attempt to kill an animal, then urging her to take her own life when she refused the initial demand. Six people, including five teenagers—one just 14 years old—and one adult, have been arrested in connection with the girl’s death.

    In early August, Brazil’s National Data Protection Agency (ANPD), the country’s top digital regulator, ordered Discord to immediately halt all livestreaming services within the country’s borders. On August 17, the platform, which boasts over 90 million daily active users globally, complied with the order, issuing a public statement saying it was actively working to “make Discord safer for teens.” But Brazilian regulators argue that the platform has not fixed fundamental gaps in its age verification and user protection frameworks, leaving minors and other vulnerable users exposed to severe harm.

    Government officials clarified that the lawsuit has two core goals: first, to compel Discord to implement comprehensive, effective safety measures that protect children, adolescents, and women from harm in the platform’s digital space; second, to force the company to pay 500 million Brazilian reals, equivalent to roughly $97 million, in collective moral damages.

    This legal action against Discord is not an isolated move, but part of a broader regulatory push by Brazil to hold digital platforms accountable for online child safety. Just one day before the Discord lawsuit was filed, ANPD imposed a nearly $30 million fine on ByteDance-owned short-video platform TikTok for its own failures to meet child protection obligations. Regulators called that fine a “powerful signal” to all platforms operating in Brazil that non-compliance will not be tolerated.

    ANPD director Lorena Giuberti Coutinho confirmed last week that the agency has opened compliance reviews for 22 major social media networks and digital platforms, to check alignment with a new national law enacted this year that strengthens protections for children and teenagers online. She told reporters that users and companies should prepare for far more aggressive enforcement actions from the regulator in the coming months.

    Brazil has already implemented sweeping rules for digital platforms, including mandates that require all user accounts for people under 16 to be linked to a parent or legal guardian’s account, alongside broad crackdowns on the spread of disinformation across digital services.

  • At Dollywood, superfans honor the late singer and local hero

    At Dollywood, superfans honor the late singer and local hero

    In the rolling hills of eastern Tennessee, thousands of fans and local community members have flocked to Dollywood, the iconic theme park built by country music star Dolly Parton, to pay their respects to the legendary entertainer who passed away earlier this week at the age of 80.

    For many long-time admirers, showing up at the park immediately after news of Parton’s death was not just a choice — it was a promise kept. Rebekah Donchatz, a 35-year-old mortgage processor from Asheville, North Carolina, traveled to Pigeon Forge with her sister to honor a decades-old pact. “Years and years ago, my sister and I made a pact that when Dolly died we’d come to Dollywood immediately,” Donchatz said. “We just needed to be here.”

    Since opening its gates in 1986, Dollywood has grown far beyond a standard leisure destination. What started as a small regional attraction has expanded to a 150+ acre complex featuring more than 50 rides, a dedicated museum, adjacent water parks, resort hotels, and daily live performances that celebrate Appalachian culture. Today, the park draws 4 million annual visitors and supports more than 4,000 local jobs, injecting much-needed economic vitality into the historically underserved communities of the Appalachian Mountains.

    At the heart of the park stands a full-scale replica of the humble two-room log cabin in Locust Ridge, outside Sevierville, where Parton grew up alongside 11 siblings. Walking through the tiny space, Donchatz paused to examine the original family heirlooms on display, reflecting on what Parton meant to her and people across the region. “I think growing up in Appalachia, she’s always been my hero,” Donchatz said. “She made me proud to be Appalachian. She put us on the map a little bit — a lot.”

    Parton remained deeply involved with the park throughout her life, making regular visits to check on operations and connect with guests as the property expanded. For local business owners, Dollywood’s presence has been life-changing. Laurie Blanton Faulkner, co-owner of the family-owned Pottery House Cafe just steps from the park’s entrance, said the attraction has transformed the entire regional economy. “It’s been a huge impact, for not just our business but the whole community” in Sevier County and beyond, Faulkner said from her bustling dining room. “Having them at the back door has been such a blessing for us.”

    That impact extends across the entire state. Eugene Naughton, president of Dollywood Parks & Resorts who worked closely with Parton for many years, told AFP the park generates approximately $2 billion in annual economic activity for Tennessee. He added that Parton’s core values guided every decision made at the park over its 38-year history. “Family, faith and doing good in the community where we live and work” have been key commitments that Parton and her partners have strived for over the past four decades, Naughton said.

    Long-time visitors say they have watched the region transform alongside the park. Retirees Ray and Patti White, who have traveled to Pigeon Forge from their South Carolina home every year since 1989, rolled through the park’s shaded paths on mobility scooters this week, reflecting on how much has changed. “It’s grown immensely because of Dollywood,” the 77-year-old Ray White said, noting the widespread positive economic ripple effects of Parton’s project.

    Beyond economic growth, one of Dollywood’s most enduring draws is its work to preserve and celebrate Appalachian mountain culture, a way of life that has gradually faded from mainstream American life. Guests can wander through working blacksmith shops and historic corn mills, sample local specialties like Dollywood’s famous cinnamon bread, and find quiet reflection in an authentic on-site Appalachian chapel. For fans near and far, the park will remain a living legacy to the girl from a log cabin who lifted up an entire region.

  • How narwhal ‘scientists’ track Arctic warming

    How narwhal ‘scientists’ track Arctic warming

    The global battle against climate change has gained an unexpected, tusked contributor: the Arctic narwhal, often nicknamed the “unicorns of the sea.” A groundbreaking study published Wednesday in *Science Advances* outlines how researchers turned these elusive deep-diving whales into citizen scientists of sorts, outfitting six individuals with custom satellite transmitters to collect data in one of the planet’s most inaccessible regions: remote East Greenland fjords.

    Between 2017 and 2020, these non-traditional research partners gathered more than 2,000 high-quality measurements of ocean temperature and salinity. The data they collected has filled a critical gap in scientific understanding, revealing how masses of warm Atlantic water are pushing deep into East Greenland’s fjord systems and accelerating the melt of marine-terminating glaciers. This glacial melt does not stay confined to the Arctic: it carries wide-reaching consequences for global ocean circulation and weather patterns that impact communities across the Northern Hemisphere.

    “We have used a completely novel technique,” explained Mads Peter Heide-Jorgensen, professor at the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources and lead author of the study, in an interview with AFP. Unlike traditional research methods that require scientists to brave the region’s harsh conditions, “we can sit at our warm offices and drink coffee while the data comes in,” he added.

    ### Global Climate Impacts at Stake
    Meltwater from East Greenland’s glaciers flows into the coastal shelf and fjords before feeding into two major Arctic ocean currents. One of these, the East Greenland Current, acts as a foundational regulator for the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC)—a vast, planet-scale system of ocean currents that distributes heat across the globe. Climate researchers have warned that a complete collapse of the AMOC, which is increasingly likely as Arctic warming accelerates, could trigger severe winter cooling across Europe, plunging much of the continent into prolonged deep freezes and disrupting agricultural and economic activity.

    Despite the urgency of understanding this process, studying the “Atlantification” of East Greenland waters has long been a major challenge. The region’s remote location, frigid temperatures, and thick year-round ice make traditional research dangerous, logistically complex, and prohibitively expensive. For decades, the only data available came from research ship crews that manually sampled water columns as they navigated open waters. In recent years, fixed electronic sensors have been deployed, but these are limited to summer months when ice cover retreats enough to allow installation. Icebreakers, the only vessels capable of navigating year-round ice, are rare and cost prohibitive to operate for extended research missions, and crews face constant risk from glacial calving events that release massive ice chunks capable of damaging or capsizing ships.

    Narwhals, however, are perfectly adapted to this harsh environment, making them ideal research partners. These deep-diving mammals regularly descend to more than 1,500 meters below the ocean surface, allowing them to collect continuous data across entire water columns. The transmitters attached to their backs record temperature, salinity, depth, and geographic location, which researchers then use to calculate water density and distinguish between warm Atlantic-origin water and colder polar-origin water.

    One of the study’s most striking findings was the detection of Atlantic-origin water deep beneath glaciers in the Scoresby Sound fjord complex, more than 350 kilometers inland from the open coast. This confirms that warm water is penetrating much farther into glacial systems than previously documented, explaining the faster-than-expected melt rates scientists have observed in the region in recent years.

    ### Reluctant But Invaluable Partners
    While researchers have experimented with using other marine mammals including seals, beluga whales, and bowhead whales for data collection, narwhals offer a unique advantage: they exhibit strong site fidelity, returning to the same locations year after year. This allows scientists to collect consistent, repeated measurements over time, a core requirement for tracking long-term changes in ocean conditions.

    The research team grew fond of their four-legged (well, flippered) collaborators, even naming individual narwhals after ancient Nordic deities including Freya and Balder—though the whales did not earn co-authorship on the paper. For their part, the narwhals are far from enthusiastic partners. “I wouldn’t say they enjoy interacting with humans,” Heide-Jorgensen noted, adding “they do it under protest.”

    Capturing narwhals in nets and fitting the non-invasive tags takes roughly 20 minutes, a short stressful interruption after which the animals quickly return to their normal behavior. The tags are designed to detach from the whales’ skin naturally after several months, leaving the animals unharmed.

    The study team emphasized that this successful partnership showcases how creative, unconventional approaches can revolutionize oceanographic research in regions that are nearly inaccessible to human scientists. Even as narwhals help us track the impacts of climate change, however, they are among the species most vulnerable to a warming Arctic. As Heide-Jorgensen pointed out, narwhals are ultimately “losers in the climate game”: rising ocean temperatures are shrinking their cold-water habitat, and climate projections indicate the species will be forced to shift their range hundreds of kilometers further north to survive in the coming decades.

  • ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ star Tim Curry dead at 80

    ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ star Tim Curry dead at 80

    Veteran British character actor Tim Curry, whose decades-long career spanned West End theater, Broadway, and iconic film and television roles anchored by his legendary turn as Dr. Frank-N-Furter in the cult classic *The Rocky Horror Picture Show*, has passed away at his Los Angeles home at the age of 80.

    Per TMZ reports citing anonymous industry sources, Curry’s death followed more than 15 years of ongoing health challenges after he suffered a severely debilitating stroke that impacted his mobility in 2012.

    Curry launched his professional acting career in the 1960s on London’s iconic West End, cutting his teeth at prestigious venues including the Royal Court Theatre and Citizens Theatre. He built a reputation as a versatile stage performer, taking on complex roles from the works of William Shakespeare, Bertolt Brecht and Tom Stoppard, earning nominations for both the Olivier Award in London and the Tony Award on Broadway for his theatrical work. One of his most lauded later stage roles was King Arthur in the hit musical *Monty Python’s Spamalot*, a stage adaptation of *Monty Python and the Holy Grail*, which earned him a Tony nomination in 2005.

    It was his 1973 originating performance as the flamboyant, gender-bending mad scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter in Richard O’Brien’s experimental stage production *The Rocky Horror Show* that catapulted him to cult fame, a role he reprised for the 1975 big-screen adaptation *The Rocky Horror Picture Show*. Though the film underperformed commercially during its initial theatrical run, it found an enduring second life as a staple of midnight movie screenings around the world, a tradition that continues more than 50 years later. Fans regularly attend screenings in costume, sing along to every track, and participate in interactive audience rituals like throwing props at the screen.

    In a 1970s television interview, Curry reflected on the role’s risk and legacy, noting he had initially worried that the iconic part would typecast him permanently. “I was hesitant in that, if it worked, it might be a difficult image to shake off,” he said. “But really, I’ve often thought that it wasn’t worth doing unless you took a risk.”

    Beyond *Rocky Horror*, Curry built a diverse and memorable career across film and television, showing off his range as a performer from menacing villains to sharp comedic foils. He became instantly recognizable to a new generation of horror fans for his iconic portrayal of the sinister, shape-shifting clown Pennywise in the 1990 television miniseries adaptation of Stephen King’s *It*. His other notable film credits include 1982’s *Annie*, where he played scheming con artist Rooster Hannigan; 1985’s *Clue*, where he led the ensemble cast as the mysterious butler Wadsworth; a supporting role opposite Sean Connery in the 1990 political thriller *The Hunt for Red October*; the villainous pirate Long John Silver in 1996’s *Muppet Treasure Island*; a memorable cameo as a scheming concierge in 1992’s *Home Alone 2: Lost in New York*; and the villainous Rod Slocum in 2000’s *Charlie’s Angels*.

    With his distinctive charm, ability to lean into camp humor and dramatic presence, Curry became one of the most beloved character actors of his generation, leaving an enduring legacy on stage and screen.