In other news: Police find remains of girl snatched by a crocodile in Australia; The oldest inhabited termite mounds have been active for 34,000 years

Published 12:00 am Saturday, July 6, 2024

Police find remains of girl snatched by a crocodile while swimming in northern Australia

Police have found remains of a 12-year-old girl two days after she was snatched by a crocodile while swimming in a creek in remote northern Australia. Police say the remains were found on Thursday in the river system near where the girl vanished at the Indigenous community of Palumpa, southwest of the Northern Territory capital Darwin. Injuries confirmed a crocodile attack. Efforts were continuing to trap the killer crocodile. Saltwater crocodiles are territorial and the killer is likely to remain in nearby waterways. The girl’s disappearance triggered an intense 36-hour land, water and air search.

The oldest inhabited termite mounds have been active for 34,000 years

Scientists in South Africa have been stunned to discover that termite mounds that are still inhabited in an arid region of the country are 34,000 years old, meaning they are the oldest known active termite hills. The mounds existed while saber-toothed cats and woolly mammoths roamed other parts of the Earth and large swathes of Europe and Asia were covered in ice. They predate some of the earliest cave paintings in Europe. Evidence shows they have been consistently inhabited by termite colonies. The researchers urge more study of termite mounds for the lessons they offer on climate change, sustaining ecosystems and perhaps even for improving agricultural practices.

Afghanistan has been through everything. Now it wants to dust off its postal service and modernize

In parts of Afghanistan where there are no street names or house numbers, utility companies and their customers have adopted a creative approach for connecting. They use mosques as drop points for bills and cash, a “pay and pray” system. Now the national postal service wants to phase this out by putting mailboxes on every street across the country, part of a plan to modernize a service long challenged by bureaucracy and war. It will be a leap in a country where most of the population is unbanked, air cargo is in its infancy and international courier companies don’t deliver even to Kabul.