Rat Island becomes rat free, and more

Rat Island becomes rat free

After 229 years, Alaska’s Rat Island is rat free. The 10-square-mile speck of land in the Aleutians has been infested with rats since 1780, when a Japanese shipwreck spilled them there. But last fall, at a cost of $2.5 million, the federal government and two wildlife groups joined forces to bombard the island with poison. Since then, there has been no sign of the rodents, and several of the bird species they had devastated have begun to return. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will continue to monitor Rat Island for vermin for at least two more years.

George H.W. Bush celebrates his 85th

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President George H.W. Bush celebrated his 85th birthday last week by skydiving from 10,500 feet over Maine. Bush, who took the tandem tumble with a member of the U.S. Army Parachute Team, had previously jumped for his 75th and 80th birthdays, as well as for a 2007 event at his presidential library. “It still feels good,” he said. “Just because you’re old, that doesn’t mean you can’t do fun stuff. And you don’t want to sit around drooling in the corner. And so it’s a wonderful release.” Bush said he plans to take the plunge again when he turns 90.

Antique marble column returned to Israel

A 46-pound chunk of an eighth-century marble column has been returned to Israel after 12 years. The Israeli Antiquities Authority said it received the stone from a New York clergyman, along with a note from

a member of his congregation. The parishioner said he had obtained the fragment as a souvenir from a tour guide while visiting Jerusalem’s Old City in 1997. He later came to suspect it had been stolen, and his guilty feelings finally got the better of him. “For the past 12 years, rather than remind me of the prayer for Jerusalem, I am reminded of the mistake I made when I removed the stone,” he wrote. “I am asking your forgiveness.”