Spy agencies brief people in power. We brief you. Each week we’ll bring you one story that matters, plus a few that don’t!
Your Brief for July 18, 2024: The magnificent Welbike, lava tubes on the moon, a buried temple, a science mystery and more!
News
Lava Tubes On The Moon
An international team of scientists recently discovered a potential build site for lunar bases... inside a lava tube beneath the moon's surface! This is the first time lava tubes have been confirmed to be in the subsurface. The tubes form when molten lava flows beneath a solidified layer, creating a tunnel as the lava drains. The team has identified at least 200 pits on the moon, with at least 16 suspected to contain lava tubes. In 2010 a camera onboard the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured images of pits that scientists thought may lead to tunnels. Researchers Lorenzo Bruzzone and Leonardo Carrer, from the University of Trento in Italy, have reanalyzed the shots taken by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to identify areas of interest and then used radar to penetrate the lunar surface. The cave pictured was discovered in the Mare Tranquillitatis, a large area on the visible side of the moon, about 500 feet below the surface. It's approximately 150 feet wide and 260 feet long. In comparison, lava tubes on Earth typically have diameters ranging from 33 to 98 feet. The lunar lava tube could offer natural protection from the moon's harsh environment: including extreme temperatures, cosmic rays, and solar radiation.
Image Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
Nature
A Record-Breaking Fossil
How much does a record-breaking dinosaur fossil cost?
A 161-million-year-old stegosaurus fossil, named Apex, sold at Sotheby's in New York yesterday as part of their Geek Week series, fetching a staggering $44.6 million! The highest price ever paid for a fossil which also happens to be the largest ever discovered. The nearly complete fossil stands at 11 feet and is 27 feet long - twice the size of Sophie, the previously most complete stegosaurus currently housed at London's Natural History Museum. Apex was discovered in May 2022 by a commercial paleontologist on private land near Dinosaur, Colorado, close to the Dinosaur National Monument. Stegosaurus are identifiable by their iconic pointy dorsal plates and Apex is reported to show signs of arthritis, suggesting the dinosaur lived to old age. Fossils previously sold at auction include the T. rex, Stan, which fetched $31.8 million in 2020, and the T. rex, Sue, acquired by Chicago's Field Museum for $8.4 million in 1997.
Image Credit: Natural History Museum
True Spies
The Pyramid Scheme
How do you steal a fighter jet?
Cairo, Egypt, the late 1970s. In the dark black stillness of a September evening, a covert operation is underway… An unlit military transport plane makes a wary descent into the city’s international airport. Under cover of darkness, it’s loaded with a precious consignment - an artifact that the USA has gone to great lengths to procure. Not a cursed relic, or crystal skill - but the MiG-23, a cutting-edge Russian fighter jet! The US knows almost nothing about Russia's new weapon but they know they must get their hands on one as it’s seen as the greatest threat to America's latest series of fighters. The CIA, eager to fill the gap in missing intelligence, devises a mission that falls on the shoulders of one man! If the plan is to succeed their man will require strong nerves, charm, diplomacy, and perfect timing. Who do they call? Decorated CIA Operative Jim Fees…
Listen to Jim’s only daughter, alongside historian and aviation expert Steve Davies, in this week's podcast selection ‘How to Steal a MiG’ to find out how agent Fees snuck a top secret weapon out from under the nose of the Soviet Union in the late 1970s.
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Spy Objects
The Magnificent Welbike
What would you need to go it alone behind enemy lines?
For agents of the notoriously brave Special Operations Executive (SEO) in World War II, a select toolkit of spy gadgets represented the difference between life and death. The SOE was formed in secret by the British Army at the outbreak of the war and was responsible for deploying agents and supplies to aid the resistance in occupied Europe and subsequently to help parachute landings in occupied territory.
The SOE had a remit to deploy special forces behind enemy lines with the explicit purpose of causing as much chaos as possible, and deployed agents had scores of helpers on home soil assisting in any way they could. One such division was based out of a stately home once known as Frythe house, in Welwyn, about an hour north of London. The SOE called it Station IX, a secret research and development center and somewhat of a real-life Q lab! At Station IX the line between design, innovation, and espionage was blurred, a series of groundbreaking devices were invented in the mansion with each one bearing a reference to its town of creation.
When SOE parachutists dropped in the enemy might spot them and try to reach their landing sites. The operatives therefore needed a means of quick escape. So what does Station IX do? Build a motorbike that could be thrown from a moving plane alongside an operative! The Welbike, devised in 1942, can be folded to fit inside a canister!
Join Design Museum CEO Tim Marlow in this podcast selection to learn about the groundbreaking motorcycle that accompanied SEO operatives on their thrilling missions into war-torn Europe - and continues to influence engineering and design up to the present day.
What does it take to break a supposedly unbreakable code and change the course of history?
During World War II the Allied powers were desperate to decipher the Nazi's Enigma code, a seemingly impenetrable cipher that held the key to Allied victory. The Germans encrypted their communications using a rotor-based scrambling device called the Enigma Machine. Every day the German military would set new encryption settings on the Enigma; meanwhile at Bletchley Park, an estate in the English countryside home to the Government Code and Cypher School, a brilliant team led by the remarkable Alan Turing was in a race against time building a machine capable of deciphering the code! Want to discover how they cracked it?
The Imitation Game, directed by Morten Tyldum, tells the story of Alan Turing's time at Bletchley Park. Despite his monumental contributions, Turing's achievements remained classified for years after the war. Follow Turing as he and his team of codebreakers make history using their electro-mechanical invention, the Bombe, a machine capable of cracking the Enigma code! It enhanced the Allies' ability to anticipate German operations, leading to crucial victories in the Atlantic and beyond.
History
A Buried Temple
What treasures lay hidden beneath the surface?
Last June, authorities in Peru reported looting at La Otra Banda, Cerro Las Animas, an area in the northern town of Zaña, prompting an archaeological team from the Field Museum of Chicago to visit the site. Waiting just below the surface was a surprise…
The archeologists, alongside local institutions, have unearthed a 4,000-year-old temple and theater, one of the oldest man-made structures in the country! Six feet down the team discovered walls made of mud and clay. As they extended their survey deeper they uncovered what appears to be a theater, with a platform resembling a stage. Adding to the excitement, the lucky dig unearthed carved stone slabs with intricate bird designs. The carvings appear typical of slabs dating from 2,000 BCE to 900 BCE. “It was so surprising that these very ancient structures were so close to the modern surface,” exclaimed Luis Muro Ynoñán, the lead research scientist at the Field Museum.
Image Credit: Ucupe Cultural Landscape Archaeological Project
Puzzles
A Science Mystery
Could a change of perspective help solve a puzzle?
Fossils of Essexella, dating back to the Carboniferous period, have puzzled scientists for decades. The fossils, discovered in the Mazon Creek fossil beds in Illinois, resemble strange creatures entombed in ironstone nodules. Initially argued to be jellyfish, Essexella fossils feature a textured, barrel-shaped region and a smooth bulb, which scientists thought represented tentacles and bells. This wasn't a widely supported theory as no living jellyfish have similar structures.
Dr. Roy Plotnick, professor at the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and his colleague, James Hagadorn, sought a new answer to the puzzle by examining a vast collection of Essexella specimens at the Field Museum in Chicago. In viewing the fossils from different angles, Dr. Plotnick realized that the supposed jellyfish features resembled the anatomy of sea anemones! The rounded region, thought to be a jellyfish bell, was identified as an anemone’s burrowing base, while the textured barrel was the anemone's body. Published in Papers in Palaeontology, the study reclassified Essexella as an ancient sea anemone.
Can you solve a puzzle? Puzzle maker Lynn Watson has prepared the crossword 'Exposed' for you to tackle.
Image Credit: James Hagadorn, Graham Young, and Roy Plotnick
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