Regulator says bringing emergency runway into operation would boost competition and passenger choice
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Gatwick airport’s expansion has received the backing of the UK’s aviation regulator, which argued it would bring “benefits to consumers” even with the prospect of a third runway at Heathrow.
The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) announced its support for the West Sussex airport’s proposed new commitments for the next four years, saying they would increase choice for passengers.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
02/25/2025 - 07:28
02/25/2025 - 07:00
Protesters who tried to disrupt completion of Mountain Valley pipeline to defend themselves in Virginia court
Climate activists who tried to disrupt the completion of a fossil-fuel pipeline through Appalachian forests will appear in court in Virginia on Tuesday to face serious criminal charges that they vehemently deny.
The Mountain Valley pipeline (MVP) was pushed through by the Biden administration in mid-2023 – overriding court orders, regulatory blocks and widespread opposition to the 300-mile (480km) fossil fuel project. Biden’s decision triggered a wave of non-violent protests and civil disobedience against the pipeline in Virginia and West Virginia as work crews rushed to finish construction of the pipeline through sensitive waterways and protected forests.
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02/25/2025 - 04:00
For more than 20 years, scientists have followed the animals in Norway’s Arctic archipelago to understand how they may adapt to changing threats as the ice they depend on melts
When Rolf-Arne Ølberg is hanging out of a helicopter with a gun, he needs to be able to assess from a distance of about 10 metres the sex and approximate weight of the moving animal he is aiming at, as well as how fat or muscular it is and whether it is in any distress. Only then can he dart it with the correct amount of sedative. Luckily, he says, polar bears are “quite good anaesthetic patients”.
Ølberg is a vet working with the Norwegian Polar Institute, the body responsible for the monitoring of polar bears in Svalbard, an archipelago that lies between mainland Norway and the north pole. Every year he and his colleagues track the bears by helicopter, collect blood, fat and hair samples from them and fit electronic tracking collars.
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02/25/2025 - 03:45
Each spring since 2003, Jon Aars, senior scientist at the Norwegian Polar Institute, and his team have conducted an annual polar bear monitoring program on Svalbard - collaring, capturing and taking samples from as many bears as they can across several weeks.By studying polar bears they get a better understanding of what is happening in this part of the Arctic environment. The bears roam over large distances and, being apex predators, provide lots of information about what is happening lower in the food chain and across different Arctic species.The Guardian accompanied Aars on an expedition to the southern end of Spitsbergen island, the largest in the Svalbard archipelago.
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02/25/2025 - 02:00
After last year’s Cop16 biodiversity talks in Cali left key issues unresolved, the extra summit will attempt to seek consensus, especially over funding
Global talks to halt the loss of nature will reopen today in Rome, amid “loss of trust” in the United Nations-led process and concerns that countries will not turn up for the meeting. Delegates are due to meet at Cop16, the UN’s biodiversity conference, to discuss global targets to stop nature loss by 2030.
The additional meeting in Rome was called after talks were suspended in confusion in the Colombian city of Cali in November when they overran and delegates left to catch flights home.
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02/25/2025 - 01:53
In today’s newsletter: The government is refusing to back down over its changes to inheritance tax breaks for farmers – here’s why the issue is still rumbling on
Good morning. It’s a time-honoured tradition: the minister arriving to speak to a conference hall full of people who absolutely hate him, and getting roundly pilloried as he sticks to the government line. Today, it might be the environment secretary Steve Reed’s turn. His adversaries: a large number of implacably angry farmers.
Whether or not they bring pitchforks, the attendees who listen to his speech at the National Farmers’ Union conference are up in arms because of the government’s refusal to back down over its changes to inheritance tax breaks for farmers. And while Reed is coming with policy changes that he says will be to the benefit of British farmers, like a five-year extension of the seasonal farm workers’ scheme, they are unlikely to be enough to earn him a warm welcome.
Ukraine | Donald Trump has said the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, would accept European peacekeepers in Ukraine as part of a potential deal to end the three-year war. After meeting with Trump, Emmanuel Macron stressed that peace “must not mean a surrender of Ukraine or ceasefire without guarantees”.
House of Lords | One in 10 members of the House of Lords have been hired to give political or policy advice, according to their own declarations, and others do paid work for companies that could conflict with their role as legislators. The findings in a Guardian investigation raise questions over lobbying rules in the second chamber.
Gaza | At least 160 healthcare workers from Gaza, including more than 20 doctors, are believed to still be inside Israeli detention facilities as the World Health Organisation expressed deep concern about their wellbeing and safety. The detained group includes some of the most senior physicians in Gaza.
Politics | Mike Amesbury, the MP for Runcorn and Helsby, has been sentenced to 10 weeks in prison for punching a man to the ground. Amesbury, who was suspended by the Labour party after an investigation, last month admitted a single charge of section 39 assault in relation to the incident.
AI | More than 1,000 musicians, including Kate Bush, Damon Albarn and Annie Lennox, have released a silent album in protest against UK government plans to let artificial intelligence companies use copyright-protected work without permission.
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02/25/2025 - 01:00
Environment secretary will hope move can reset relations with farmers after inheritance tax row
The environment secretary, Steve Reed, is to announce a five-year extension of the seasonal farm worker scheme in an attempt to reset relations with farmers after fury over inheritance tax.
Making his pitch to farmers at the National Farmers’ Union conference in central London on Tuesday, Reed will also announce the opening of a new national biosecurity centre to tackle diseases including foot-and-mouth and bluetongue.
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02/25/2025 - 01:00
Dog walker’s close encounter prompts debate over whether the animals, once native to UK, should remain
Sightings of wild boar on Dartmoor have raised suspicions a guerrilla rewilder has been releasing them – and prompted a debate over whether they should be allowed to remain.
Videos of a group of boar on the moors in Devon were posted online earlier this month, and a dog walker has recently complained of a close encounter with one of them, which frightened his pet.
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02/23/2025 - 00:00
npj Ocean Sustainability, Published online: 23 February 2025; doi:10.1038/s44183-024-00090-6
Scaling biocultural initiatives can support nature, food, and culture from summit to sea
World Ocean Explorer Wins Gold Medal Serious Simulation Award from Serious Play Annual International Competition
10/26/2023 - 14:35
For Immediate Release October 19, 2023
Sedgwick, Maine USA World Ocean Explorer, a 3D virtual aquarium and educational simulation, was recently cited for excellence, winning a Gold Medal Award in the 2023 International Serious Play Awards Program.
World Ocean Explorer is an innovative 3D virtual aquarium designed for educational exploration of the world’s oceans. With interactive exhibits and a lobby space, visitors can immerse themselves in realistic marine environments, including a DEEP SEA exhibit funded by Schmidt Ocean Institute, showcasing unprecedented deep-sea discoveries off Australia. Targeted at 3rd graders and beyond, this immersive experience offers a range of perspectives on the ocean environment and can be explored through guided tours or user-controlled interfaces. Visit DEEP SEA at worldoceanexplorer.org/deep-sea-aquarium.html.
Serious Play Conference brings together professionals who are exploring the use of game-based learning, sharing their experience, and working together to shape the future of training and education. For more information on Serious Play Award Program visit seriousplayconf.com/international-serious-play-award-programs.
World Ocean Explorer is a transformative virtual aquarium designed to deepen understanding of the world ocean and amplify connection for young people worldwide. Organized around the principles of Ocean Literacy and the Next Gen Science Standards, World Ocean Explorer brings the wonder and knowledge of ocean species and systems to students in formal and informal classrooms, absolutely free to anyone with a good Internet connection. As an advocate for the ocean through communications, World Ocean Observatory believes there is no better investment in the future of the sustainable ocean than through a new approach to educational engagement that excites, informs, and motivates students to explore the wonders of our marine world and to understand the pervasive connection and implication for our future, inherent in the protection and conservation of all aspects of our ocean world.
World Ocean Explorer presents an astonishing 3-dimensional simulated aquarium visit, organized to reveal the wonders of undersea life, with layers of detailed data and information to augment the emotional connection made to the astonishing beauty and complexity of the dynamic ocean. Within each of the virtual exhibits, students visit exemplary theme-based sites with myriad opportunities to understand the larger perspectives of scientific knowledge as organized and visualized to dramatize the impact and change on ocean life as a result of natural and human-generated events. Through immersion among displays, mixed media and 3D models, the experience of an aquarium visit will be brought into classrooms or home school environments as a free, accessible, always available opportunity for teaching and learning. All of this will be available to a world audience without physical limitation or cost. World Ocean Explorer, a project of the World Ocean Observatory, receives support from the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, Visual Solutions Lab, the Climate Change Institute, the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation, and The Fram Museum Oslo. To learn more about the current and future exhibits of World Ocean Explorer, visit worldoceanexplorer.org.
media contact
Trisha Badger, Managing Director, World Ocean Observatory | [email protected] +12077011069
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