Society

Archaeologists in northern Peru have unearthed a 3,000-year-old tomb which they believe might have honored an elite religious leader in the Andean country some three millennia ago. Archaeologists of the Pacopampa Archaeological Project work on the site of a 3,000-year-old tomb which they believe might have honored an elite religious leader in the Andean country some three millennia ago, in Pacopampa, Peru August 26, 2023. Photo: Ministry of Culture of Peru/Handout via Reuters Dubbed the "Priest of Pacopampa," referring to the highland archaeological zone where the tomb was found, the priest was buried under six layers of ash mixed with black earth, with decorated ceramic bowls and seals indicating ancient ritual body paint used for people of elite standing, Peru's Culture Ministry said in a statement on Saturday. Two seals were also found along the upper edges of the tomb, one with an anthropomorphic face looking east and another with a jaguar design facing west. Project...

Child gun deaths in the United States have hit a record high, according to a new study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics. Students of Oxford High School and other schools in the area, along with community members, gather for a candlelight prayer vigil at Bridgewood Church to pray for the community, a day after a deadly shooting at Oxford High School in Oxford, Michigan, in Clarkston, Michigan, U.S., December 1, 2021. Photo: Reuters Using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's mortality database, the study published on Monday in the AAP's journal Pediatrics found that 4,752 children died from gun-related injuries in 2021, the latest year for which data was available, up from 4,368 in 2020 and 3,390 in 2019. Gun violence has been the number one cause of death for children in the United States since 2020. The study was published as Tennessee lawmakers opened a special session on public safety after a Nashville school shooting earlier this year that killed t...

India's space agency is attempting to land a spacecraft on the moon's south pole, a mission that could advance India's space ambitions and expand knowledge of lunar water ice, potentially one of the moon's most valuable resources. A view of the moon as viewed by the Chandrayaan-3 lander during Lunar Orbit Insertion on August 5, 2023 in this screengrab from a video released August 6, 2023. Photo: ISRO/Handout via Reuters/File Photo Here's what's known about the presence of frozen water on the moon - and why space agencies and private companies see it as a key to a moon colony, lunar mining and potential missions to Mars. How did scientists find water on the moon? As early as the 1960s, before the first Apollo landing, scientists had speculated that water could exist on the moon. Samples the Apollo crews returned for analysis in the late 1960s and early 1970s appeared to be dry. In 2008, Brown University researchers revisited those lunar samples with new technolog...

Using a powerful torch, Aliki Buhayer-Mach momentarily drenches a nearby mountain top in light, straining to see if wolves are lurking in the shadows. Swiss NGO OPPAL has enlisted hundreds of volunteers this summer to chase predatory wolves away from grazing livestock. Photo: AFP If the predator were to get past the electric wires stretched around this high-altitude pasture in the Swiss Alps, the 57-year-old biologist knows "it would be a massacre". She and her 60-year-old husband Francois Mach-Buhayer -- a leading Swiss cardiologist -- have settled in to spend the night watching over some 480 sheep grazing in the remote mountains near the Italian border. The pair of unlikely herders are among several hundred people volunteering this summer through OPPAL, a Swiss NGO seeking a novel way to protect wolves, by helping chase them away from grazing livestock. "Our goal is that by the end of the summer season, the livestock are still alive... and the wolves too," OPPAL d...

Forest fires in Canada's western province of British Columbia intensified on Saturday, with the number of people under evacuation orders doubling from a day earlier, as authorities warned of difficult days ahead. The McDougall Creek wildfire burns next to houses in the Okanagan community of West Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada, August 19, 2023. Photo: Reuters The province declared a state of emergency on Friday to access temporary authoritative powers to tackle fire-related risks, as out-of-control fires ripped through interior British Columbia, partially shutting some sections of a key highway between the Pacific coast and the rest of western Canada, and destroying many properties. "The current situation is grim," Premier Daniel Eby told reporters on Saturday, saying some 35,000 people were under an evacuation order, and a further 30,000 were under an evacuation alert. Eby said the province is in dire need of shelter for evacuees and firefighters and ordered a ban on n...

Japan braced for Typhoon Lan to make landfall, with airlines and railways cancelling services in central areas of the country's main island, where it is expected to strike on Tuesday. Heavy rain during Typhoon Lan as it passes over Chichijima Island in Ogasawara, Tokyo Prefecture, Japan August 11, 2023 in this screen grab obtained from a social media video. Lan, the seventh tropical storm of the season, was over the Pacific Ocean near central Japan, headed northwest at 15 kilometres per hour (9.3 miles per hour) on Monday, with a maximum wind speed of 139 kph and gusts of up to 195 kph, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said. The outer edge of the storm is forecast to reach the coast of Wakayama prefecture around 9 a.m. (0000 GMT), then head north over the major population centres of Osaka and Kyoto. The JMA warned of heavy rain and winds, and the risk of floods and landslides. Japan Airlines and ANA Holdings cancelled many flights in the path of the storm. West Japan Railway ...