Students toss water balloons for Guinness World Record

More than 1,000 students threw more than 700 balloons in a water balloon toss event at an US high school to break a Guinness World Record.

Officials at Omaha Central High School, Nebraska, said students were arranged into pairs on the school’s football field and played a round of water balloon toss, which involves the participants throwing the balloon back and forth and stepping back after each successful throw until the balloon bursts.

They qualified to participate by meeting academic, attendance and behaviour goals. The previous record of 902 participants was set by students at Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts in 2014.

Pilot finds cobra under his seat

A pilot in South Africa made a hasty emergency landing after discovering a highly venomous cobra hiding under his seat.

Rudolf Erasmus had four passengers on board the light aircraft during a flight when he felt “something cold” slide across his lower back. He glanced down to see the head of a fairly large cape cobra “receding back under the seat,” he said.

After taking a moment to compose himself, he informed his passengers of the slippery stowaway.

“There was a moment of stunned silence,” he said. Everyone stayed cool, especially the pilot.

Erasmus called air traffic control for permission to make an emergency landing in the town of Welkom, in central South Africa. Emergency responders and a snake handler met the plane at the airport.

Researchers teach parrots to make video calls

In a study involving parrots learning to ring a bell, a caretaker would bring them a tablet. The birds then used their beaks to select a photo of another bird on the screen, and a video call was then initiated.

The parrots displayed behaviours during the calls that mimic the behaviours of birds in the wild, the team from Northeastern University said.

The researchers said the parrots started to develop friendships through the video calls, showing preferences for repeatedly placing video calls to the same long-distance companions.

The study suggests bird-to-bird video calls can improve the behaviour and well-being of parrots kept as pets, especially those who are the only parrots in their homes.

Robotic dog re-joins New York police

New York City officials unveiled three new high-tech policing devices, including a robotic dog that critics called creepy when it first joined the police pack two and a half years ago.

The new devices, which also include a GPS tracker for stolen cars and a cone-shaped security robot, will be rolled out in a manner that is “transparent, consistent and always done in close collaboration with the people we serve,” said police Commissioner Keechant Sewell, at a Times Square press conference where the security robot and the mechanical canine nicknamed Digidog were displayed.

The remote-controlled, 70-pound (32-kilogramme) Digidog will be deployed in risky situations like hostage standoffs starting this summer.

Published in Dawn, Young World, May 6th, 2023