The Week Junior - USA (2021-11-19)

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That’s unbelievable!

November 19, 2021 •The Week Junior

Runaway donkey

returned to owners

After four months, a donkey on the run in

Rhode Island was reunited with her

owners. The animal had just arrived at

her new home in June when she

escaped. Her owners hadn’t even had

time to name her yet. She was finally

caught after a local farmer spotted her

and used a bale of hay to coax her into a

goat pen. The owners said they are now

considering names for her, including

Traveling Jane and Runaround Sue.

Squid steals the show

Scientists from a group called OceanX

got a double surprise while studying the

bottom of the Red Sea, in the Middle

East, using a remotely operated vehicle.

They found a sunken shipwreck, and just

as they were getting a first glimpse of it,

a giant purpleback flying squid swam

toward them, then swerved away. “We

got photobombed by the giant

purpleback,” said one scientist.

*Real! The researchers also used the technology to make fi lters out of tree

ce paper. “The materials...are totally natural leaves, crab shells, and even offi

[and] sustainable,” the scientist leading the study said.

Manure makes seawater sippable

Scientists at Northeastern University in Massachusetts have come up with an

ingenious way of making salty seawater drinkable: Just add cow poop. First they

took cow manure from farms and fields, then heated it to more than 3,000° F to

get rid of bacteria. The heat caused the poop to break down into a carbon

powder, which the scientists converted into a foam that floated on the surface of

seawater in their lab. When sunlight hit the foam, the water underneath turned

to steam and rose through the foam, which acted as a kind of filter to remove

salt from the seawater. Is this story real, or is it flush with falsehoods?*

Brothers make hair art

Two brothers in India are turning haircuts into works of art. Rajwinder

Singh Sidhu and Gurwinder Singh Sidhu, both barbers, are using their

creative skills to make detailed portraits on people’s heads. Their work so

far includes everything from Mickey Mouse to the Taj Mahal, India’s most

famous and elaborate building. “With this [haircut], I will stand out from

the crowd,” one customer said. The brothers, who charge between $20

and $30 per cut, plan to take their business out of India in the future.

He has a knack for stacking

A restaurant manager in Manchester, England, has broken the Guinness World

Record for chair stacking. In April, Jay Ehsan carefully placed chairs one on top of the

other, reaching a height of about 17 feet. The process took 45 minutes, including

several failed attempts as the chairs fell and broke. Not satisfi ed with simply

breaking the record, Ehsan used the stunt to raise more than $2,000 to help

homeless people. This wasn’t his first stacking-related achievement. In 2018, he set

a world record for stacking tortillas. (That record has since been broken, though.)

Real

OR

fake?

Mickey Mouse

makes an appearance.

The squid was

about 6 feet long.

ON THIS PAGE: GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS; SHUTTERSTOCK; REUTERS; OCEANX; GETTY IMAGES; ON LEFT PAGE: SHUTTERSTOCK; GETTY IMAGES

Jay Ehsan’s

stack of chairs

Was cow poop

used to make

drinking water?