Its been a hard week for any news that isn't based on American politics to break through, but there have been a few interesting science stories turning up if you scroll down far enough....
This from the BBC and elsewhere is both fascinating and awful: a giant iceberg heading towards the Island of South Georgia. The BBC tells us that: 'it poses a grave threat to local penguins and seals.
The animals' normal foraging routes could be blocked, preventing them from feeding their young properly. And it goes without saying that all creatures living on the seafloor would be crushed where A68a touched down - a disturbance that would take a very long time to reverse.'
All of which is undoubtedly serious, and leaves me feeling bad that my first response was to think I could put together a really good exam question from this. Something involving specific latent heats, and density, and maybe stretching to a little Archimedes principle.
Another story relating to Polar Ice came from RTE, reminding us of their accelerated melting. Usually its a good news story when a time capsule is found. This one isn't so pleasing ( and reminds me of burying a time capsule under the deck I built in the back garden thinking of future generations - and then retrieving it less than two years later when the deck began to fall apart...)
But at least climate change is something we take seriously and all the major nations on earth are now members of the Paris Accord, or are they? Or are they going to be.....
I found this from the Guardian interesting: unexplained bursts of radio waves coming from space are finally explained - and it (sadly) turns out not to have been aliens looking for attention: