Recipe for perfect sandcastle

A lesson learned by centuries of beachcombers has been distilled to a physicist's formula: to make the perfect sandcastle, use eight parts sand to one part water.

The physicists' study, released on Wednesday before publication in the journal Nature Physics, is entitled, rather grandly, "Maximum angle of stability of a wet granular pile."

And while it deals with sandcastles, it could also help determine the stability of retaining walls and the material they hold back, one of its authors said.

This study and those that follow on this subject might have implications for those preparing for or recovering from a watery disaster like a hurricane, physicist Arshad Kudrolli said in a telephone interview.

"Our study is the first step, in some sense, in trying to understand what's the most stable angle that one can build, say, a retaining wall," he said. "And if it fails, where would the material end up? How much part of the land will give way?"

Inspired by childhood memories of the seaside, the study's authors worked on a simple model of what makes for the most stable construction involving liquid and particles.

In the case of a sandcastle, builders need to use roughly one-eighth the water to the amount of sand, though Kudrolli said there is a range of possibilities that would work.

"You need a mix of the two to get it right," Kudrolli said in a telephone interview. "It could be more than that, or less than that would be just fine.

"It's very forgiving, so that's why we succeed, I guess," he said with a laugh.

Despite the playful nature of the sandcastle example, Kudrolli noted that their model for what keeps a sandpile from disintegrating could lay the groundwork for questions about what kind of retaining walls would be most stable.

Even though engineers have designed such structures for hundreds of years, the science behind them is not very well developed, Kudrolli said.

The study used "idealized sand" -- glass beads the size of sand grains -- and water, seeing how the piles would stack up and when they would topple.

In an even simpler example of a pile of particles and liquid, Kudrolli and his colleagues envisioned four baseballs, stacked in a pyramid, with three on the bottom and one on top, bonded with "liquid bridges," bits of water that got between and among the baseballs and helped bond them together.

Hungary drivers to get lemons and apples

Bad drivers in eastern Hungary will be left with a sour taste in their mouths next month when school students will accompany traffic police and hand out pieces of lemon along with a fine.

Good drivers will be rewarded with an apple during the month-long campaign in Szabolcs-Szatmar-Bereg county, state news agency MTI reported Thursday.

"A penalty coming from a kid for breaking rules generates a stronger feeling of guilt among adults than a simple fine", county police spokesman Gergely Fulop said.

Szabolcs-Szatmar-Bereg, about 200 km (125 miles) from Budapest, is the center of Hungary's fruit industry.

Fake plane emergency lets Gambians see match

A plane carrying Gambian soccer fans to Peru made an unauthorized detour and faked a fuel emergency to land in time for the West African nation's game in a world youth tournament, officials said Wednesday.

The Rum Air plane carrying 289 fans bypassed immigration formalities in Lima by landing in the northern city of Piura about two hours before the African youth champions kicked off against Qatar in the World Under-17 Championship Tuesday.

The apparent emergency sparked a red alert in the coastal city with fire fighters and police racing to the airport and hospitals were told to prepare for an emergency.

"They faked an emergency to land in Piura. They were coming from Brazil and the should have landed in Lima first," Ramon Caminate, a tournament organizer in Piura, told Reuters.

Piura newspaper El Tiempo quoted one fan as saying Gambia's President Yahya Jammeh had chartered the plane.

Long Tambong Tamba, apparently a government official traveling on board, told reporters: "The president gave me the responsibility to lead the team (of fans) here."

A spokeswoman for CORPAC, the state body that runs Peru's airports, said the Tri-Star L1011 plane with 12 crew on board had raised the alarm, saying it did not have enough fuel to fly to Lima and would have to land in Piura instead.

CORPAC said it would issue a statement later on the incident. It was not immediately clear what penalties the airline could face.

Caminate said residents were astonished to see such a large plane. Piura's little airport is for domestic routes only and all international flights to Peru go to Lima.

Immigration officials checked documents in Piura and the fans went straight to the stadium to see their team beat Qatar 3-1 and qualify for the quarter-finals.

Some fans wore just tunics and trunks in the national colors of red, blue and green stripes separated by white bands, and had their faces painted.

The fans later took over five hotels in the small city while the plane was impounded at the airport.

Local prosecutor Carolina Neyra told reporters the stop in Piura was not authorized.

The final of the 16-nation tournament is on October 2 in Lima.

Low-caste man chained up for two years

A low-caste Hindu man in India has been chained to the verandah of his house for more than two years after fellow villagers declared him insane, The Times of India newspaper reported Tuesday.

Upendra Naik, 32, was declared mentally unsound in July 2003 after villagers said he stole a trident from a temple in their village, near the town of Kendrapara in the eastern state of Orissa. They also said he was violent and often hit residents.

"I am an innocent person," Naik, a Dalit -- as Hinduism's lowest "untouchable" caste is now known -- was quoted as saying. "But some unscrupulous villagers have chained my legs."

Naik's wife, after failing to get him freed, has moved back to her parents' house, and Naik's father now brings him meals in the verandah, which is regularly drenched by monsoon rains.

Authorities said they had tried to take Naik to a hospital for a check-up but were stopped by villagers.

"Nobody is ready to accompany Upendra to the hospital," social welfare officer Anjali Das was quoted as saying.

Villagers in India often dish out their own brand of justice, even if it goes against the country's secular and liberal constitution, and Dalits are often the victims.

In May, a government school in impoverished Bihar state stopped serving lunch to its students because Dalit women were cooking the desserts before two Yadavs, a cow-herd caste, objected.

Well, if you can't even trust a hitman..

A Japanese woman called in the police after a hitman she paid to kill her lover's wife failed to carry out the job.

The 32-year-old Tokyo woman was arrested Wednesday for incitement to murder, the Daily Yomiuri newspaper said Friday.

The woman contacted a private detective through a Web site last November and paid him 1 million yen in cash to murder her love rival, the paper said.

The 40-year-old detective accepted the money and suggested he could carry out the job by chasing the victim on a motorcycle and spraying her with a biological agent in a tunnel.

Police also arrested the private detective and found the alleged target safe and well, the paper said.

Rock star burgled during mega-concert

It was billed as one of Italy's biggest ever rock concerts and it seemed as though the whole city had turned out to see Luciano Ligabue play in front of 200,000 fans Saturday night.

Unfortunately for him, at least a handful of people in the northern town of Reggio Emilia decided not to attend the gig. Instead, knowing he was not at home, they opted to burgle the rock star's house.

"The burglary happened while he was at the concert," a police official told Reuters.

The burglars made off with two computers, a video projector, a flat-screen TV and even a Renault Clio parked in the 45-year-old rock star's garage, ANSA newswire reported.

Ligabue began making records in the early 1990s and is one of Italy's best known pop performers. He recently played the Rome leg of the global Live 8 event.

Apparent Hunter S. Thompson suicide note published

Renegade author Hunter S. Thompson lamented the onset of old age and his physical limits, then concluded, "Relax -- This won't hurt," in an apparent suicide note published on Thursday by Rolling Stone magazine, his literary springboard.

The scrawled words -- perhaps the last he ever committed to paper -- were written on February 16, four days before the self-described "gonzo" journalist shot himself to death at his secluded home near Aspen, Colorado, the magazine said.

Thompson was 67, and at the time friends and family said he had been in pain from hip replacement surgery, back surgery and a recently broken leg. Those close to him said Thompson had contemplated suicide for years.

The content of the note was first revealed by Thompson's biographer and literary executor, Douglas Brinkley, in a Rolling Stone article recounting the August 20 memorial service in which Thompson's cremated remains were blasted out of a cannon.

Brinkley said Thompson had left the farewell note for his wife, Anita, but "Hunter was really talking to himself" as he sank into the despair of what was for him gloomiest time of year -- the month of February.

The brief message, scrawled in black marker and titled "Football Season Is Over" (an apparent reference to the end of the NFL season he avidly followed as fan), reads as follows:

"No More Games. No More bombs. No More Walking. No More Fun. No More Swimming. 67. That is 17 years past 50. 17 more than I needed or wanted. Boring. I am always bitchy. No Fun -- for anybody. 67. You are getting Greedy. Act your old age. Relax -- This won't hurt."

At the bottom of the page, Brinkley said, Thompson drew a "happy heart," the kind found on Valentine's Day cards.

The article did not say how or when the note was discovered.

It was through his work for Rolling Stone that Thompson developed his presence as a counterculture literary figure who turned his drug- and alcohol-fueled clashes with authority into a central theme of his writing.

The most famous of his books, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," was adapted from a two-part article written for the magazine in 1971.

L.A. nabs one fugitive gator, one still on the lam

"Little Reggie," the smaller of two alligators at large in Los Angeles, was behind bars on Friday after firefighters ended a tense standoff by hauling the thrashing reptile from a drainage canal.

A much larger alligator, dubbed "Reggie," has eluded an exhaustive, month-long hunt and was believed to be holed up in a grimy city lake not far from where Little Reggie was taken into custody.

"It was simply a matter of timing, training, teamwork and tenacity that allowed us to bring Little Reggie into the adoptive care of animal services," Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphreys said. "There were no injuries."

Humphreys said more than a dozen firefighters and an Urban Search and Rescue team on Thursday night converged on the channel where Little Reggie had been spotted, using an aerial ladder truck and several nets to box him in.

"The alligator became somewhat tired and less combative and we were able to ensnare the alligator and wrapped its muzzle in some duct tape," he said.

Little Reggie was booked by Animal Services officers and transported to a local holding facility to await his ultimate transfer to a zoo.

"They took him straight up into the air. He was thrashing and you could see his mouth chomping," said 19-year-old Haley Reagan, whose father discovered the reptile. "All the kids were lined up on the fence and everyone was clapping."

Reggie has been at large for more than a month and presumed still lurking below the murky surface of Lake Machado.

In August, police arrested two men for releasing Reggie into the lake, saying he was purchased as a pet and then set free when he grew too large, possibly as long as 10 feet (3 metres).

Gimme another shot of this beer..

A German brewer has concocted what he says is the world's strongest beer, a potent drink with an alcohol content of 25.4 percent that is served in a shot glass.

"Everyone who has tried it is enthusiastic. It tastes like a quirky mixture of beer and sherry," said Bavarian brewer Harald Schneider.

Schneider, who lives in southern Germany where beer is a tradition, said his beer fermented for 12 weeks for an alcohol content twice that of Germany's other strongest beers.

"People will only be able to drink two or three glasses, otherwise they'll drop like flies," he said.

Schneider expects the holders of the world's strongest beer, the Boston Beer Company, to put up a fight.

"I'm pretty sure the Americans have something up their sleeve."

Scientist disproves town's strange luck

It's official -- scientists have proved that the people of the small Irish town of Skibbereen do not have unnaturally good fortune. But they do seem pretty happy anyway.

The picturesque town near Ireland's southern coast earned a reputation as the country's luckiest after a series of lottery wins.

But Professor Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire in England told a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in Dublin that he had proved there was nothing particularly lucky about the place.

He bought 50 lottery tickets in Skibbereen and another 50 in Dublin. He didn't fare any better in the country town than in the capital, proving with statistical precision that its luck is little more than a myth.

But that didn't dampen the spirits of the locals.

"They didn't strike me as very superstitious, they struck me as very outgoing and optimistic," he said. "But it (Skibbereen) is imbued with this idea of being a very lucky place."

"I suspect what's happening is that, by chance, somewhere has to do well and it happens to be Skibbereen," he said.

Optimism can be a blessing. Studies show that a positive outlook improves the chances of cancer sufferers, he said. Positive people, who cross their fingers rather than avoiding ladders, perhaps make their own 'luck'.

"It maintains an optimistic world view which can then become a self-fulfilling prophecy."

But he said an irrational belief in good luck can be a very dangerous thing for the hardened gambler who turns negatives into positives so that losses become 'near-misses'.

"When applied to a situation like gambling it can actually be very, very negative."

Thief nabbed after online sale to victim

A German thief stole a man's in-car navigation system and unwittingly auctioned it online back to his victim, who had police arrest him, authorities said Wednesday.

Police in Berlin said the 26-year-old victim spotted the device on an Internet auction site and quickly re-acquired what he had reported stolen from his car some two weeks previously.

He informed police, who went to the thief's house posing as the buyers and then arrested the 21-year-old.

"I think the thief got a bit of a surprise," said a Berlin police spokesman, adding the man confessed to the theft.

Forensic TV shows help criminals escape police?

Television shows like CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, depicting forensic scientists at work, are helping criminals avoid identification, New Scientist magazine said on Wednesday.

Not only are the criminals getting detailed insights into police detection methods and how to avoid them, but the shows have led juries to expect too much certainty from scientific witnesses.

"Jurors who watch CSI believe that those scenarios, where forensic scientists are always right, are really what happens,"

the magazine quoted forensic sedimentologist Peter Bull from Oxford University as saying.

His view was echoed by Jim Fraser, director of the Center for Forensic Studies at the University of Strathclyde in Scotland. He said the CSI effect had placed extra burdens on the painstaking work of the forensic scientists.

"Oversimplification of interpretations on CSI has led to false expectations, especially about the speed of delivery of forensic evidence," he told the magazine.

Shows which pride themselves on closely following real police practice are giving criminals valuable tips.

"People are forensically aware," said Guy Rutty from the Forensic Pathology unit at Leicester University.

Burglars were wearing gloves during break-ins and rapists were using condoms to avoid leaving DNA evidence.

Car thieves had even taken to leaving cigarette butts from bins in stolen cars to muddy the forensic trail.

"Suddenly the police have 20 potential people in the car," Rutty said.

Inspired by wheelbarrow, BIC sells 100 billionth pen

It started as an answer to leaky pens carried by American soldiers during World War Two, was perfected and made popular by an Italian-born baron and has written its way into history as the world's biggest-selling pen.

More than half a century after honing a cheap version of the ballpoint pen, Bic, the French firm which built an empire out of making things to be thrown away, said Thursday it had sold its 100 billionth -- 100,000,000,000th --- disposable ballpoint.

The group started small after the war and now has annual revenues of around 1.4 billion euros, including sales of razors and lighters. It reported the milestone along with first-half profits.

"The pens have been sold on average 57 times a second since 1950," BIC said.

Its founder Baron Marcel Bich originally planned to make fountain pen parts when he bought a factory with his partner Edouard Buffard outside Paris at the end of World War II.

But a chance encounter with a wheelbarrow changed all that, recalls his son Bruno Bich, who now runs the company.

"My father told me that one day he was pushing a wheelbarrow when it dawned on him that the ball was a multi-faceted wheel and this was the best way to convey ink," he told Reuters.

"So he put all his investment into the ballpoint. He was the first to use very precise production techniques," he added.

Ballpoint pens had been sold before the war for the then luxurious sum of $5 and were brought to Europe by American GI soldiers, Bich said. Only they leaked.

Looking for a catchy name for his new product, the baron shortened his own to BIC and snapped up patents including Laszlo Biro's design for a non-disposable pen with a rotating ball.

KEEP IT SIMPLE

Marketing experts say BIC helped to pioneer what has since become a mainstay of modern mass-produced commerce -- well designed products, using good technology and made accessible to everyone at cheap prices and then sold across the world.

"It was a triumph for the concept of keeping it simple. Bich was in many ways the inventor of 'low-cost', offering cheap and effective solutions to consumers rather than bowing to a market dictated by sophistication," said Stephane Dieutre, who teaches marketing and innovation at Sorbonne University, Paris.

"It was also one of the first examples of globalization. You can find these pens everywhere because Bich had a modern concept of low-cost, global marketing. They invented or adopted many of the principles we talk about now, but at a very early stage."

Known in some countries as the biro after the patent snapped up by BIC's founder, the 'Cristal' see-through ballpoint has a landmark design which the company has broadly stuck with over the years -- another reason for its success, says Bich.

"The idea was that there should be nothing superfluous and you could see how it works and how much ink is left," he said.

BIC's innovations have not always been successful, however.

Its idea for disposable underwear ended up in a book called Brand Failures. And a foray into perfume flopped when consumers turned up their noses at BIC's disposable, unluxurious image.

Drunk woman dies in cemetery accident

An inebriated Belgian woman died in a freak accident when she ended up beneath a heavy grave stone at a cemetery, local news agency Belga said Wednesday.

The 33-year-old was on her way home from a bar in the Belgian town of Pulle in the early hours of Saturday when she took a short cut through the cemetery.

But she urgently needed to relieve herself and crouched down between two gravestones. As she lost her balance, she grabbed one of the stones which gave way and landed on top of her.

The public prosecutor's office said she died of suffocation as she was unable to lift the heavy stone.

DNA evidence traps spitter

Britain's much abused and derided traffic wardens have a new weapon in their struggle with irate car drivers -- DNA evidence.

British car-parking firm NCP is to issue one pound DNA "spit kits" to its staff after a man who spat at a traffic warden pleaded guilty to assault when his saliva was identified.

Dennis Samms, 42, of Manchester in northwest England, will be sentenced Thursday.

"This is the first successful prosecution in Britain of the assault of a traffic warden due to DNA evidence," a spokesman for NCP, the company that employed the traffic warden, said.

"The DNA evidence did not come out in court, but that is because the man knew he was guilty."

NCP, which manages off-street parking for various local authorities, supplying traffic warden and vehicle-clamping services, began a trial of the "spit kit" in March and now plans to make the kit more widely available to its wardens.

"Nobody should have to be spat at while they go about their work. The 'spit kit' will be a powerful deterrent against the small minority who think they can spit at traffic wardens," said the spokesman.

Traces of explosive on his socks..

A British Muslim convert charged with plotting acts of terrorism had socks with traces of explosive in his luggage when he was arrested in France, prosecutors told a court Tuesday.

Andrew Rowe, 34, who denies the charges, had been under surveillance by British police for about a year before they asked their French colleagues to hold him in Calais in October 2003 on his way back from a trip to Frankfurt.

A search of his luggage revealed two socks rolled up into balls that had traces of explosive, the prosecutors told the Old Bailey criminal court in London. The socks were connected by a length of cord.

The prosecutors said the traces of explosive were of a sort likely to be found in mortar shells or other military ordnance.

Police found a notebook with instructions in his handwriting at his London home on how to operate mortars. At his estranged wife's home in the central English city of Birmingham they found secret codes that identified airports, airline crew, army bases, weapons, explosives and counties in England.

"He was in possession of three separate things of the kind likely to be useful for the planning or preparation of an act of terrorism," said prosecutor Mark Ellison.

The prosecution told the court Rowe was also found to have videos and literature promoting jihad, or holy war, including a video praising the actions of the September 11, 2001 attackers.

Rowe converted to Islam in the 1990s and took the name Yusef Abdullah.

In 1995 he traveled to a war zone in Croatia during the Balkan conflict and received shrapnel injuries from a mortar shell. He later married and lived in west London.

The trial continues...

UN reassures New Yorkers over summit traffic jams

The United Nations unveiled a multimedia advertising campaign on Tuesday to reassure nervous New Yorkers that a world summit opening in Manhattan next week will be worth the huge traffic jams.

In one television spot, a fictional New Yorker invited to address the 191-nation U.N. General Assembly states that half the world lives in poverty, "so you should fix that."

"Also, if there is any way you could avoid Second Avenue when you come here, that would be great, because you are really messing up my commute," he adds.

The three-day world summit opening September 14 at U.N. headquarters on Manhattan's East Side will be the world's largest gathering of world leaders ever, with more than 170 presidents and prime ministers attending, including President Bush.

Accompanying them will be closed streets, traffic-stopping motorcades, choked sidewalks, packed restaurants and security precautions that can paralyze entire neighborhoods.

Five different TV spots, intended to convince New Yorkers that "everyone's a delegate because the outcome affects us all," are to appear in rotation on local broadcast and cable stations, some during donated time and some in slots purchased by the world body at a discount.

Similar appeals are to appear in 1,000 city buses, 1,000 subway cars, 75 telephone kiosks, 250 area commuter rail stations and the three New York airports, said Shashi Tharoor, the U.N. undersecretary-general for public information.

The campaign was created at no cost by McCann Erickson Worldwide and funded by the United Nations and the U.N. Foundation. Tharoor put its value at $3.5 million to $4 million but said the United Nations got it at a tenth of its cost due to the donated creative work and television time.

"The U.N. believes in New York, belongs to New York, and we are very happy that if we matter to New York, that New York also matters to us, and that is something we would like to convey through this campaign," he said.

The U.N. presence in New York contributes $3.2 billion to the economy of the city "after the deduction of unpaid parking tickets," he said, referring to a common cause of friction between New York officials and U.N. diplomats.

Style-conscious city flags down bald cabbies

In a bid to spruce up the city's image, authorities in China's Nanjing are banning taxi drivers who are bald, wear their hair too long, have moustaches or wear too much make-up, media said Tuesday.

The new rules are part of a 10-point plan to smarten up Nanjing, capital of eastern Jiangsu province, ahead of October's 10th National Games which will draw viewers from across the country, the Chinese news Web site www.sina.com.cn said Tuesday, citing the Nanjing Morning Post.

"Male taxi drivers cannot have long hair or strange hairstyles, cannot be bald and cannot grow moustaches or goatees," the report said.

"Women drivers must not use too much make-up and should wear appropriate clothes."

The report did not mention penalties for drivers that break the rules, but did say that cabbies who refused to pick up passengers could be kept off the streets for up to 15 days.

The strict code comes at a time when middle-class Chinese are embracing all kinds of fashion thanks to two decades of market reforms that have rendered the Mao suit a relic of the past.

So, don't accept chocolates from a Nazi..

Luckily, the exploding Smedley's English Red Plums in Heavy Syrup were intercepted in Turkey before anyone got killed.

But what of the hand grenade disguised as a chocolate bar? Or the incendiary Vichy pastille sweets?

A secret file from the archives of Britain's spy services released this week shows ingenious methods, conjured up by Germans during World War Two, for disguising bombs.

Britain's Security Service began opening its records this year under the country's new Freedom of Information Act.

Among the files declassified by the National Archive was a treasure trove of nifty exploding gadgets, labeled "Camouflages for sabotage equipment used by the German sabotage services."

The drawing of the design for the chocolate bar grenade says it is made from steel coated with real chocolate, and activated by breaking off a bit at one end. It doesn't say whether the grenade was ever actually manufactured or used.

The file also includes photos of the incendiary pastille sweets, and bombs hidden in anything from oil cans and food tins to a lump of coal.

Man survives snooze under moving train

Even a freight train rumbling over a Russian man's head failed to spoil his peaceful slumber between the tracks, Interfax news agency reported Monday.

The engineer saw somebody on the line and braked sharply. Rescuers tried to pull the drunken sleeper from underneath the carriages, but failed, and the train had to continue driving to free him.

"The young man lying between the rails did not wake up ... which apparently saved his life," said railway policeman Vladimir Slaby.

Love-struck man faces jail over terror hoax

A love-struck Pakistani faces up to three years in jail for falsely accusing a brother and a cousin of the woman he hoped to marry of planning a suicide attack on the U.S. consulate in Karachi, police said Monday.

Jobless laborer Mohammad Imran sparked a security scare when he made the allegations in a telephone call to the U.S. embassy in Islamabad last month after the relatives ordered him not to see or speak to his would-be bride, police said.

Investigating officer Sadaullah Bangash said Imran, 22, had told police he got the idea after news of a spate of arrests of militant suspects in Pakistan after the July 7 London bombings.

Bangash said police had questioned the relatives, who appeared to be ordinary people with no connection to terrorism.

Imran is due in court in Karachi Wednesday and faces up to three years' jail if convicted of making false accusations, he said.

"It appears to be a case of a man infatuated by a girl going to extremes to realize his dream of marrying her one day."

A spokesman for the U.S. consulate in Karachi, which was the target of a suicide bombing in 2002 that killed 12 people, said it was not its policy to comment on security matters.

Mystery of lost prime minister put to rest at last

Australia's most enduring political mystery came to an end Friday when authorities ruled that the prime minister who disappeared almost 40 years ago had drowned and was not assassinated or taken by a Chinese submarine.

Harold Holt disappeared while swimming in heavy seas at a surf beach in the southern state of Victoria on December 17, 1967, after serving almost two years as prime minister.

His body was never found, sparking a wave of rumors and often crackpot theories about his fate, including that he was killed by American assassins.

A book on 59-year-old Holt's disappearance even said he had been a spy and was picked up by a Chinese submarine and taken to Beijing.

But Victorian state coroner Graeme Johnstone said in a formal ruling Friday that Holt had drowned in rough seas at Cheviot Beach, south of Melbourne.

"Simply put, Mr. Holt took an unnecessary risk and drowned in rough water off Cheviot Beach," Johnstone ruled.

Johnstone's finding came after inquiries with Australia's chief spy agency, the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), and after reviewing evidence and witness statements from those at the beach when Holt disappeared.

Until 1985, the coroner was not allowed to hold inquests in cases when a body was not found. Johnstone's belated finding came as part of a wider investigation into 85 drownings in Victoria where bodies were not found.

CHARISMATIC LEADER

Holt, a charismatic politician who loved sport and outdoor activities and who was popular with women, became leader of the conservative government in January 1966 after the retirement of his Liberal Party founder, Sir Robert Menzies.

Holt's government oversaw an historic referendum in 1967 which resulted in indigenous Aborigines being counted in the national population census for the first time.

But he drew criticism for his close ties with the United States, which sparked violent protests during a visit by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and his decision to increase Australia's military commitment to the Vietnam war.

Johnstone's inquiry examined a range of theories surrounding Holt's death, including suggestions he had been taken by a shark, that he had been a paid Chinese spy since 1929 and that he committed suicide.

Another theory suggested he had been picked up in a boat by his bodyguard and went to live in Geneva with his lover.

It was also suggested that Holt had wanted to pull Australian troops out of Vietnam, prompting American secret agents to go to Australia to assassinate him or force him to commit suicide.

But Johnstone said all those theories were "fanciful."

"It is sad that, over the years, all of these fanciful or unusual theories about Mr. Holt's disappearance should receive public ventilation, overshadow his life and require an explanation," Johnstone said.

Sales up in Japan of cheese insulted by politician

The popularity of a certain type of French cheese has soared in Japan after a leading ruling party politician called it "hard and dry" last month.

The incident took place in early August when Yoshiro Mori, a former prime minister, met with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in a last-ditch effort to persuade him not to dissolve parliament and call snap elections.

Following the evening meeting at Koizumi's official residence, Mori told reporters that Koizumi had given him only beer and simple snacks while they talked, disregarding long-standing Japanese customs of political hospitality that mandated a more lavish welcome.

"He gave me foreign beer and some dried out cheese, so hard you couldn't bite into it," an obviously miffed Mori said in widely televised remarks, displaying a crumpled beer can and thin slice of orange-brown cheese.

Cheese cognoscenti, however, recognized Mimolette, a firm French cheese whose flavor increases as it ages and hardens. Aficionados say that the harder it gets, the tastier it is, with older cheeses commanding a higher price.

Now the scorned cheese is enjoying brisk sales at Japanese gourmet food and department stores, with sales three times as strong as usual. Some more aged varieties have even sold out.

"Sales of Mimolette have really taken off," said a spokeswoman at a downtown Tokyo branch of Takashimaya, a major department store. "We did not expect this at all."

Mori's visit to Koizumi turned out to be in vain. Koizumi called snap elections several days later, and there were rumors that relations between the two long-time political allies had markedly chilled.

The demands of the election campaign, however, have forced the two to mend fences, Kyodo news agency reported.

Koizumi has even promised to treat Mori to dinner and a full selection of cheeses at an expensive restaurant, it added.

Wannabe sweepers try to outrun poverty

Daniele Nascimento ran 1.2 miles barefoot on a sun-scorched asphalt runway in the hope of getting a coveted job as municipal garbage collector in Rio de Janeiro.

The unemployed 19-year-old woman, who lives in a shack in a hillside slum, had lost her only pair of running shoes. But she chose to compete in the endurance test along with thousands of other contenders anyway.

The job description is hardly enticing and the test is hard but it is their chance to outrun poverty and unemployment in Latin America's largest country.

"I depend on getting this job very, very, very much," said Nascimento, who has a daughter of nearly two years. "I don't think it's fair to have such a tough physical exam for this job, but I have to do it."

Around 385,000 people had applied to compete in this year's municipal contest, which offers just 1,200 openings with a monthly salary of about $210, transport coupons, food stamps, a healthcare plan -- and a distinctive orange uniform.

With a third of Brazilians, or about 60 million people, living on $1 a day, that is a golden opportunity. Nearly 10 percent of Brazilians are unemployed.

The job is one of the most hotly disputed in Brazil's second-biggest city, where slums overlook the dwellings of the rich and famous.

The previous such contest two years ago caused a stampede and police had to use tear gas against eager applicants but this time authorities managed to avoid disorder.

TOUGH PHYSICAL CONTEST

"We've taken most of the applications via the Internet and by telephone. About half of the applicants gave up after learning about the physical tests ahead," said Andre Lemos, a spokesman for Comlurb garbage removal service.

The first phase where the candidates' size was considered eliminated all but 7,000 aspiring trash collectors as the rest were deemed too thin or too fat to do the job. Preference was given to younger applicants.

Comlurb officials insist it is important that garbage collectors are healthy and can endure great physical effort.

A paramedic crew was busy attending 20 people who suffered from respiratory and other problems on the first day alone.

The ambulance rushed to pick up Sueli Carvalho dos Santos who collapsed on the runway. Half an hour later she regained her breath.

"The body just got weak, it was very tiring," she said. "I'll try to keep fighting for this job," she added, but a monitor standing behind her shook his head, making clear she wouldn't pass to the next stage.

Dos Santos, 19, has a four-year-old daughter to look after.

Milton Rocha, a fit young man from the suburbs, completed the run on time and expects to get the job which would allow him to get his mother on a healthcare plan and stash away some money for college.

"I need this job, but there are older people with kids who need it more than I do. This test is unfair," he said.

ABC halts promotion of hurricane TV drama

Citing sensitivity over the real-life disaster unfolding on the U.S. Gulf Coast, broadcaster ABC has pulled its promotions for a drama series about a family coping with a fictional hurricane.

ABC executives decided that hurricane references in promotions for "Invasion," set to premiere on September 21, might be upsetting or offensive to viewers because of the devastation wreaked by Hurricane Katrina, a network spokesman said on Thursday.

"The promos were pulled for sensitivity reasons. The plan is to put them back on when it feels appropriate to do so," the network spokesman said.

He said delaying launch of the show was still possible but for now ABC plans to debut it as scheduled this month.

The series opens with a powerful hurricane that hits the town of Homestead, Florida, ushering in a series of unexplained phenomenon that suggest the storm may have been a smokescreen for some type of alien invasion.

Homestead was the real-life community leveled in August 1992 by Hurricane Andrew, which before Katrina ranked as the most costly disaster in U.S. history.

One reason to say yes to lap dancing..

An angry San Diego topless dancer pulled out a knife and stabbed a customer after he refused a lap dance, police said on Thursday.

Lawanda Dixon, 24, was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon shortly after the altercation with 33-year-old Melik Jordan at the Dream Girls Cabaret early on Wednesday, San Diego police Det. Gary Hassen said.

"He was in the club with some friends watching the shows when she came up and asked if he wanted a lap dance," Hassen said. "He said no, she got upset about it, they argued back and forth. She pulled knife out of her bag and stabbed him."

Dixon was taken into custody and police found methamphetamine in a small metal container in Dixon's bag, Hassen said, adding that she may face drug charges. Officers also confiscated a small folding knife.

Jordan was treated for his injuries and released by a local hospital.

Well, at least the spiders are gone..

A German woman laid waste to her family home by setting fire to it as she tried to kill spiders in a garage with a can of hairspray and a cigarette lighter.

Police in the western town of Zuelpich said that when the aerosol failed to finish them off, the 34-year-old woman tried to burn them with the lighter. However, this set the area she had just sprayed on fire and the blaze spread to a hedge.

"It was a series of unfortunate events which led to the damage," a police spokesman said Thursday.

"She tried to put the fire out with a garden hose, but couldn't. Instead her semi-detached house next to the hedge caught fire. It's now uninhabitable."

Firefighters managed to extinguish the blaze and save the neighboring house, which sustained broken windows and some charring. The spokesman estimated the total cost of the damage at well over 100,000 euros. No one was hurt.

"The family have had to look for somewhere else to stay," he said. "The spiders are gone though -- that problem was solved."

Hooligans kept at home by voice verification

Dutch hooligans will be kept in check by voice verification software which will ensure they are at home rather than supporting their favorite team.

The Dutch ministry of Justice wants to guarantee that fans do not break stadium bans imposed for bad behavior.

A computer with voice verification software, developed by the Israeli firm Dmatec, will call banned fans on their home phones when the match is about to kick off.

The fans have to say sentences which have been agreed in advance and the computer is able to tell if the call has been put through to a mobile phone, the ministry says.

The trial will start soon in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Arnhem for fans of the Ajax, Feyenoord and Vitesse clubs.

Sleepy air traffic controller delays plane landing

A Qantas Airways domestic flight was forced to delay its landing in Australia's capital after an air traffic controller overslept and failed to report for duty on time.

The plane from the western city of Perth circled over Canberra for 20 minutes until the senior controller who was due to start work on the day's first shift at 5.30 a.m. Wednesday arrived.

His co-worker, a middle-ranking controller, arrived on time but was unable to open the control tower without his senior colleague, a spokesman for Airservices Australia said on Thursday.

He said the rosters had now been changed.

Anti-rape condom aims to stop attacks

A South African inventor unveiled a new anti-rape female condom on Wednesday that hooks onto an attacker's penis and aims to cut one of the highest rates of sexual assault in the world.

"Nothing has ever been done to help a woman so that she does not get raped and I thought it was high time," Sonette Ehlers, 57, said of the "rapex," a device worn like a tampon that has sparked controversy in a country used to daily reports of violent crime.

Police statistics show more than 50,000 rapes are reported every year, while experts say the real figure could be four times that as they say most rapes of acquaintances or children are never reported.

Ehlers said the "rapex" hooks onto the rapist's skin, allowing the victim time to escape and helping to identify perpetrators.

"He will obviously be too pre-occupied at this stage," she told reporters in Kleinmond, a small holiday village about 100km (60 miles) east of Cape Town. "I promise you he is going to be too sore. He will go straight to hospital."

The device, made of latex and held firm by shafts of sharp barbs, can only be removed from the man through surgery which will alert hospital staff, and ultimately, the police, she said.

It also reduces the chances of a woman falling pregnant or contracting AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases from the attacker by acting in the same way as a female condom.

South Africa has more people with HIV/AIDS than any other country, with one in nine of its 45 million population infected.

Ehlers, who showed off a prototype on Wednesday, said women had tried it for comfort and it had been tested on a plastic male model but not yet on a live man. Production was planned to start next year.

But the "rapex" has raised fears amongst anti-rape activists that it could escalate violence against women.

"If a victim is wearing such a device it may enrage the attacker further and possibly result in more harm being caused," said Sam Waterhouse, advocacy coordinator for Rape Crisis.

Other critics say the condom is medieval and barbaric -- an accusation Ehlers says should be directed rather at the act of rape.

"This is not about vengeance ... but the deed, that is what I hate," she said.