A Florida tour boat captain lost a hand in the Everglades on Tuesday after enticing an alligator with fish and marshmallows. Airboat guide Wallace "Wally" Weatherholt, 63, intended to give the six tourists on board a thrilling photo by baiting nearby alligators. As he slapped the water, a nine-foot gator lunged from the water and bit off Weatherholt's left hand, swallowing it whole. Authorities euthanized the alligator and were able to retrieve the hand from its stomach, but efforts to reattac... Read More
U.S. track and field athletes will wear uniforms at the 2012 London Olympics that Nike says can shave up to 0.023 seconds off 100-meter sprint times. The speedsuits, unveiled Thursday evening in New York, are designed with dimples that mimic the aerodynamic efficiency of a golf ball. Nike said the gear's tests showed an unexpectedly big advantage in sprint times. "We couldn't believe the numbers," said Martin Lotti, Nike's Olympics creative director. "That's not just the difference between fir... Read More
A young man who showed up a Berlin's city hall last fall claiming to have spent five years living in the wilderness is really a 20-year-old Dutch man, German police say. Robin Van Helsum, of Hengelo, Netherlands, told authorities that he had lived in the woods with his father until the older man died in August. Investigators began to doubt his story after failing to find his father's grave and noticing that Van Helsum's backpack and tent looked suspiciously new. A former girlfriend in th... Read More
On Wednesday, Berlin Police released a photo and statement asking for help identifying an English-speaking boy who appeared in the city last September claiming to have lived in the forest with his father for five years. Police spokesman Thomas Neuendorf said officials had launched an extensive investigation, including DNA testing, since the boy appeared September 5, 2011, but had been unable to identify him. The teenager told authorities that he had no recollection of life before his years in ... Read More
The National Park Service announced Thursday that it will permanently close parts of Yosemite Valley's Curry Village, including 18 popular cabins that lie in the path of potential rockfall from Glacier Point. A U.S. Geological Survey study indicates that the iconic 3,000-foot Glacier Point, which rises above Curry Village, is susceptible to rock avalanches that threaten visitors. A 2008 rockfall that heaved 570 dump-truck loads of rubble onto 17 cabins in the village prompted the new study, th... Read More
