A solar-powered airplane finished crossing the United States on Saturday, landing in New York City after flying over the Statue of Liberty during its historic bid to circle the globe, the project team said. The spindly, single-seat experimental aircraft, dubbed Solar Impulse 2, arrived at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at about 4 a.m. local time after it took off about five hours beforehand at Lehigh Valley International Airport in Pennsylvania, the team reported on the airplane's website. Such a pleasure to land in New York! For the 14th time we celebrate sustainability," said the project's co-founder Andre Borschberg on Twitter after flying over the city and the Statue of Liberty during the 14th leg of the trip around the globe. The Swiss team flying the aircraft in a campaign to build support for clean energy technologies hopes eventually to complete its circumnavigation in Abu Dhabi, where the journey began in March 2015. The solar cr...
The warm start to 2014 boosted the number of some butterflies, including the critically endangered High Brown Fritillary, a survey has found.More than half of 56 species studied saw their numbers rise compared with the previous year, according to the UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme.The High Brown Fritillary also benefited from schemes to restore habitat, said Butterfly Conservation.But others - such as the cabbage white - struggled in high summer.
Cooler conditions later in the year meant the butterfly season peaked early, the study by Butterfly Conservation and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology found.Known for its black and orange wings and swift flight, the High Brown Fritillary was once widespread across England and Wales but numbers have declined massively since the 1970s.
It is now down to a single colony in Wales and only two remaining strongholds in England, around Morecambe Bay and on Dartmoor.The survey found the butterfly recorded its best year for a decade.This was due to both the warm, wet spring, which was good for emerging caterpillars, and wildlife-friendly farming schemes to restore the woodland and moorland slopes where it breeds, said Butterfly Conservation.
Its head of monitoring, Dr Tom Brereton, said the butterfly was on the road to recovery but there was still a long way to go."The High Brown Fritillary is one of only two butterflies classed as critically endangered in the UK so it is fantastic news that numbers are at their highest level for more than a decade," he said."A huge amount of work coordinated by Butterfly Conservation has been put into conserving this butterfly in recent years, especially through wildlife-friendly farming schemes, so the results will come as a welcome boost to all involved.
Source: bbcnews
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