Quote:A Feat of Engineering Transports the World’s Best-Preserved Viking Ship to Its New Home

Kate Mothes

September 16, 2025

All images courtesy of the Museum of the Viking Age, shared with permission

In 1903, on a farm in southeastern Norway, a once-in-a-lifetime discovery emerged from within a large yet unassuming mound in a field. When the spot was excavated in 1904, the mound revealed an entire Viking longship that had been interred in its entirety as a burial containing the remains of two women, several animals, and a wide array of elaborately decorated objects.

Known as the Oseberg Viking Ship after the name of the farm where it was discovered, the vessel is thought to have been built around 820 and buried around 834. Reconstructions over the past several decades have suggested that the ship was indeed built to sail, rather than having been designed specifically as a burial—a practice reserved for high-status individuals, for whom the ship provided passage into the afterlife. Nestled deep in the wet earth, the wood was remarkably preserved for more than 1,000 years, although much of it was crushed and degraded.

Excavation of the Oseberg ship was lead by Professor Gabriel Gustafson (third from left) in 1904

Initial restoration efforts of the Oseberg took more than 20 years, and experts tried to preserve as much of the structure as possible through the use of oils and resin to prevent the wood from crumbling. Today, around 90 percent of the ship’s composition is original, making it the best-preserved example in the world.

A feat of engineering and careful planning recently moved the Oseberg Viking Ship to a new permanent home, with the same relocation planned for two additional longships, the Gokstad and the Tune. For more than two years, the Oseberg has been encased in a steel framework that weighs more than 50 tons, allowing it to stay on site during construction of a new museum.

The ship has been on display at the Viking Ship Museum at the University of Oslo for almost a century. Over time, the combination of unstable restoration methods, lack of humidity control, and weakening supports began causing stress on the vessel, making it vulnerable to more damage if left in place.

In 2014, the government-backed Saving Oseberg project kicked off a 10-plus-year mission to not only further protect one of the most important Viking discoveries in the world, but make sure it could be enjoyed and studied for generations to come. In early 2023, construction commenced on a new space connected to the Viking Ship Museum’s original building, now renamed the Museum of the Viking Age. The expanded campus is slated to open in 2027. 

A steel framework protects the Oseberg Viking Ship as it’s lowered onto its new platform

On September 10, the 71-foot-long Oseberg ship, contained in its vibration-resistant steel crate, was lifted onto a steel track that conveyed it through a long hall and into its new exhibition space. The process took about 10 hours to move the ship 350 feet, with a maximum speed of around 10 inches per minute.

Director Aud V. Tønnessen celebrated the historic move, saying, “It is a ship that has been part of so much and has an afterlife that gives me chills to think about.” Tønnessen also told Norwegian news agency NTB, “I actually find it quite moving to think that it is now going on its final voyage.”

Learn more, and follow the progress of the Gokstad and the Tune, on the museum’s website and YouTube.
Oseberg Viking Ship in its former home at the Viking Ship Museum
Detail of the woodwork and replica serpent’s head detail
A steel framework is constructed about the ship

Quote:Radioactive Wasp Nest Found in Decommissioned Nuclear Weapons Plant

Workers discovered a radioactive wasp nest near tanks storing liquid nuclear waste. Officials say there’s no need to panic, but watchdog groups are skeptical.
Gayoung LeePublished July 31, 2025
A radioactive wasp nest was found nearby nuclear waste tanks at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, South Carolina. Credit: Department of Energy

Update: August 1, 5:00 p.m. ET: In an emailed statement sent to Gizmodo, the Savannah River Site contractor noted the discovery of three more wasp nests at the site. Here’s what they had to say about the (apparently) unfolding situation:

Quote:“The U.S. Department of Energy is managing the discovery of four wasp nests with very low levels of radioactive contamination that have been found at the Savannah River Site (SRS),” said Manager of Savannah River Site Office,  Office of Environmental Management, Edwin Deshong. “The nests do not pose a health risk to SRS workers, the community, or the environment. Work will continue at the SRS where we are fully committed to ensuring the health and safety of the workers and the community.”

We’re now left wondering if the potential leak was more extensive than originally thought. We’ll be following this story as it continues to unfold.
Original article follows.

As if wasps couldn’t get any scarier, a chilling discovery near Aiken, South Carolina, suggests they’re comfortable making their nest in a former nuclear bomb facility. 

On July 3, employees conducting a regular checkup of radiation levels at the Savannah River Site (SRS)—a former nuclear weapons production facility dating back to the 1950s—found themselves staring down at something that probably should not have been there. That something was a wasp nest measuring more than 10 times the federally permitted radiation limit. 

Nearly three weeks after this bizarre discovery, Department of Energy (DOE) officials published a report on the incident, in which they assured local residents that no new leaks had been found in the waste tanks. Rather, the nest likely became radioactive from leftover contamination dating back to when the site was fully operational. “The wasp nest was sprayed to kill wasps, then bagged as radiological waste,” the report stated, adding that the “ground and [surrounding] area did not have any contamination.”
“The delay in reporting was to allow time for reviewing previous wildlife contamination for consistency in reporting criteria,” officials said. “No further action was required in the field. There is no impact from [the] event on other activities and operations.”

The SRS was built in the early 1950s to produce tritium and plutonium-239 for the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Close to the turn of the century, the U.S. government transitioned the plant from a weapons manufacturer to a producer of fuel for nuclear plants, in addition to cleaning up decommissioned structures.
Overall, DOE and its contractor Savannah River Mission Completion (SRMC), which manages the site, concluded that the incident, while understandably unsettling, shouldn’t be of significant concern to the public.
“Upon discovery of the contaminated nest, the immediate area was secured and surveyed; no contamination was found in the area,” SRMC told the Aiken Standard. “There were no impacts to workers, the environment, or the public.”

The company also said that further surveys of the nest revealed there weren’t any wasps left on the nest, adding that even if there were, the individual insects “would have significantly lower levels of contamination.” This statement about no wasps being found on the nest stands in contrast with the report; we have reached out to the contractor for clarification. 
Watchdogs of the site aren’t so impressed by the official explanations. Savannah River Site Watch criticized the report for being incomplete, failing to address where the contamination came from, how the wasps encountered the radiation, and, most importantly, whether a yet-uncovered leak could have left another radioactive wasp nest in the vicinity. 

“I’m as mad as a hornet that SRS didn’t explain where the radioactive waste came from or if there is some kind of leak from the waste tanks that the public should be aware of,” Tom Clements, executive director of Savannah River Watch, told CBS News. 

Identifying the type of wasp nest could have revealed the source of the contamination, Clements said, since some wasps build nests from dirt while others use materials that can point to specific locations. It’s unclear, however, whether this apparent lack of effort reflects ignorance or negligence on the part of the officials.
Correction: A previous version of this article mistakenly noted the collection of dead bees. We obviously meant wasps. We also updated this article to make note of the contradictory reports of wasps being on the nest. 

Quote:Like David Byrne (From Byrne Himself)






This is an absolute delight: a pair of videos of David Byrne teaching us how to do a few dance moves. The first video shows more moves; the second one was recorded for “a social distance dance club”during the pandemic:

Quote:The dance club was open for 2 weeks in April 2021 and allowed for people to come together to dance however they wanted while masked and a safe distance from each other. It played a variety of music (including a couple of David Byrne and Talking Heads songs), and people who signed up to attend were encouraged to use this video to learn this routine in advance so that everybody could dance in sync for the final song of each hour session.

Ayun Halliday wrote a great post for Open Culture about Byrne’s dancing.

Quote:Bobik and ZIB[b]Edit[/b]

[b]Bobik[/b] (Бобик, common Russian name for a small dog) ran away just days before his flight was scheduled to take place on 15 September 1951.[2] A replacement named [b]ZIB[/b] (ЗИБ, a Russian acronym for [i]"Substitute for Missing Bobik"[/i], "Замена Исчезнувшему Бобику" [i]Zamena Ischeznuvshemu Bobiku[/i]), who was an untrained street dog found running around the barracks, was quickly located and made a successful flight to 100km and back.[8][2]

Quote:Belka and Strelka[b]Edit[/b]

Belka

Strelka

[b]Belka[/b] (Белка, literally, "squirrel", or alternatively "Whitey") and [b]Strelka[/b](Стрелка, "little arrow") spent a day in space aboard Korabl-Sputnik 2(Sputnik 5) on 19 August 1960 before safely returning to Earth.[9]They are the first higher living organisms to survive orbit in outer space.
They were accompanied by a grey rabbit, 42 mice, two rats, flies and several plants and fungi. All passengers survived. They were the first Earth-born creatures to go into orbit and return alive.[14]

Belka and Strelka in graffiti. 2008
Strelka went on to have six puppies with a male dog named [b]Pushok[/b] who participated in many ground-based space experiments, but never made it into space.[15] One of the puppies was named [i]Pushinka[/i] (Пушинка, "Fluffy") and was presented to President John F. Kennedy by Nikita Khrushchev in 1961. A Cold War romance bloomed between Pushinka and a Kennedy dog named Charlie, resulting in the birth of four puppies that JFK referred to jokingly as [i]pupniks[/i].[16] Two of their puppies, [b]Butterfly[/b] and [b]Streaker[/b], were given away to children in the Midwest. The other two puppies, [b]White Tips[/b] and [b]Blackie[/b], stayed at the Kennedy home on Squaw Island but were eventually given away to family friends.[15] Pushinka's descendants were still living at least as of 2015.[17] A photo of descendants of some of the Space Dogs is on display at the Zvezda Museum in Tomilinooutside Moscow.[18]
A Russian animated feature film called [i]Belka and Strelka: Star Dogs[/i](English title: [i]Space Dogs[/i]) was released in 2010.

(03-07-2022, 08:10 AM)Greg Wrote: Stop asking if it can get worse.

Quote:AI Is Learning How To Manipulate Us
[color=var(--body-font-color)]sodiumnami[/color]
[img=375x0]https://uploads.neatorama.com/images/posts/553/120/120553/AI-Is-Learning-How-To-Manipulate-Us_0-x.jpg[/img]
This is scary. Artificial intelligence (AI) can be taught how to persuade people to make decisions that benefit its creators or owners. This technological marvel can only do so through huge amounts of data from other people obtained by private companies. AI can convince people to do a lot of things, such as buying something, sharing a post, or even voting for a candidate! 

In a study conducted by a team of experts from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Australia’s federal scientific and research agency, it was discovered that AI could locate and exploit weaknesses in human decision-making, and use that to guide people toward certain decisions. “The implications of this research are potentially quite staggering,” Amir Dezfouli, an expert in machine learning at CSIRO and lead researcher on the study, said in a press release.  

Quote:Amazon’s Alexa device tells 10-year-old to touch a penny to a live plug socket

The child had asked the Echo smart speaker for a challenge, prompting her mother to post the response on Twitter




Maya Yang
Wed 29 Dec 2021

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Virtual assistants can set timers for people, play music, control smart home devices, respond to voice commands and set up reminders. As of Sunday, they have also proven their ability to challenge children to lethal dares.

Alexa, Amazon’s virtual assistant, recently advised a 10-year-old girl to touch a penny to a live plug socket after she asked the Echo smart speaker for a challenge.

“My 10 year old just asked Alexa on our Echo for a challenge and this is what she said,” said user Kristin Livdahl in a [url=https://twitter.com/klivdahl/status/1475220450598924297]tweet on Sunday. She accompanied the caption with a screenshot of Alexa’s response.

“Here’s something I found on the web. According to ourcommunitynow.com: The challenge is simple: plug in a phone charger about halfway into a wall outlet, then touch a penny to the exposed prongs,” read Alexa’s response.

The challenge began circulating on TikTok around a year ago and often results in the person getting an electric shock, along with potential fires and serious lifelong injuries.

Users were quick to express their shock and dismay at the tweet, which has since garnered 17,000 likes and more than 3,000 retweets.

One user tweeted, “Omg that’s horrible.”

Others poked fun at the incident, with one saying, “Clearly AMZN’s algorithm realize that by suggesting this challenge customers will later have to buy a lot of stuff to replace everything after the house burned down.”
Another user said, “What did you expect when you outsourced parenting to an AI.”

Amazon said they have since resolved the issue, with a spokesperson telling CNN, “Customer trust is at the center of everything we do and Alexa is designed to provide accurate, relevant, and helpful information to customers.”

“As soon as we became aware of this error, we quickly fixed it, and will continue to advance our systems to help prevent similar responses in the future.”