Warning issued to travellers over phone mistake that could cost thousands

Travel

While many may have planned for roaming mobile and data tariffs in other countries, they may not be aware of the huge costs of little-known maritime networks, which can easily be activated while on ferries and cruise ships.

UK travellers have been reported to rack up huge phone bills when abroad as they have forgotten to turn on ‘airplane mode’ on their device when connected to WIFI. Their phones have then connected to an offshore marine mobile telephone network, which can charge hundreds of pounds for a short ferry trip, or thousands for a cruise.

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A recent video went viral on social media, revealing a traveller on a cruise received a £1,050 ($1,300) phone bill for data roaming after not realising their data roaming was turned on in the background. 

Users have left comments expressing how costly this mistake is saying “Expensive lesson”, and another user shared, “$1,300 would pay for another cruise”.

With this in mind, experts at eSIM travel company, Airalo, have revealed how this simple mistake is made, and how travellers can avoid making this potential mistake in the future.

Travelling by sea this summer?! Beware of mobile data charges!If you’re travelling by ferry or going on a cruise this summer, using your mobile phone can lead to very large bills. When you’re at sea, your phone will connect to the maritime network. https://t.co/3iELG56YzN pic.twitter.com/0Cb9okmGWr
— HJS Technology Ltd (@hjstechnology) July 19, 2022

How to avoid getting caught out at sea:

Switch off your data roaming, and just use your phone for its camera etc

If you think you’ll need to use your phone at sea, check with your provider before you travel how much it will cost via a satellite connection. Brace yourself, it’s not cheap.

Lots of ferry companies have free wifi or bundles that can be bought cheaply. If it’s not free, it’ll probably be cheaper than the satellite service

Experts at eSIM travel company, Airalo have advised travellers to take extra care when planning trips.

 “Travellers should be wary of background data usage on their devices, even when connected to WIFI networks when travelling as costs can significantly stack up and create an extravagant bill,” they say.

“Customers have been left shocked at data roaming charges when travelling, so it’s recommended to avoid staggering bills and extra charges abroad to download an eSIM for cheaper and effective roaming.”

Or, turn your phone off and enjoy some screen-free time.

 

 

Tourism’s Impact on the Economy; Experts Recommend Using the Albanian Lek Instead of Foreign Currency

Travel

Tourism has become one of the most important and rapidly growing sectors of Albania’s economy in recent years. Antoneta Polo highlighted that tourism has played a key role in boosting the country’s economic well-being.
“Tourism was one of the main factors driving the country’s economic growth. Along with the construction sector, foreign direct investments, and tourism, it significantly contributed to Albania’s economic development,” said Polo.
She also noted that while tourism will continue to grow, it is crucial to place greater focus on tourism-related advertising to further strengthen the Albanian economy.
“We need to pay closer attention to tourism advertising. As economists suggest, if we want to strengthen the Lek, all advertisements should be made in Lek, not in Euro. This way, tourists visiting Albania will be more likely to use the Lek instead of the Euro. This will help mitigate the depreciation of the Euro against Lek,” Polo explained.
Albania is increasingly offering vibrant cultural tourism, with a wealth of resources from its archaeological and historical heritage. At the same time, the government is providing significant support to natural and rural tourism sectors.
/a.p./

Climate science must look ahead

Science and Health

As 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming is reached, climate science must look to the future, writes Aditi Mukherji, director of CGIAR’s Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Impact Action Platform and IPCC author.
[NAIROBI] By the time the world’s leading climate scientists publish their next report in 2028-29, the world will already have possibly breached 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial era for a few years and the deadline for the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals will be on the horizon.
The threshold set by the 2015 Paris Agreement to reduce the impacts of climate change was passed for the first time in 2024, the EU’s climate change service, Copernicus, confirmed last week (10 January).
So, as the next assessment of climate science from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) gets under way, it’s vital that we answer the questions that will serve us in the future. Navigating the challenges of tomorrow requires forward-looking science today and in the months ahead.
Central to our mission to limit climate change are the communities and sectors most vulnerable to its impacts, especially agriculture and smallholder farmers, who play a critical role in feeding the world yet are particularly exposed to the effects of climate change.
The next cycle of climate science must therefore fill the gaps in evidence and solutions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture while also ensuring farming remains viable in a warmer, less predictable world.
We know that food systems are a major contributor to climate change, accounting for about a third of global greenhouse gas emissions. The sector clearly needs to transition to more sustainable means of food production, consumption, and disposal to support global emissions reductions.
However, food systems are also vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Agricultural losses from climate-related disasters totalled US$3.8 trillion in the past 30 years, with the highest relative losses in the poorest countries. A 2 degrees Celsius increase in temperatures will worsen already serious long-term food insecurity in many countries, putting up to 80 million people at risk of hunger by 2050.
Burning questions
This coming cycle of IPCC assessments must answer at least three core questions related to the agri-food systems and climate change to help the world move from understanding the climate crisis to tackling it with utmost urgency.
The first question for climate scientists is how to make best use of existing technologies that help farmers combat and cope with climate change—and increase their adoption and use.
Innovations to help farmers adapt to new conditions, such as digital climate information services and climate-resilient crops, already exist along with developments like solar-powered irrigation pumps and low-emission forages, or feeds, that reduce farming’s carbon footprint. But they are not reaching farmers at the scale needed to make a difference.
How to more effectively channel climate finance, resources and support from wealthier countries to roll out these innovations in low- and middle-income countries is a science question.
Similarly, we also need to assess which tools and technologies will enable farmers to adapt to warmer conditions in the future. Previous IPCC research cycles have shown that the ability to adapt to climate change becomes increasingly difficult as temperatures continue to rise. Scientists need to investigate which crop, livestock, or fishery adaptations will remain viable at 1.5 degrees Celsius or beyond.
The second question for climate scientists is how to make low-emissions technologies cost-effective and accessible.
For farmers to have the best chance of adapting and avoiding future losses, it’s crucial that global temperatures stabilise and this requires emissions to come down, including those from agriculture.
However, unlike the energy sector, which has benefited from research and innovation into renewable sources like solar energy, the agriculture sector has lagged on investments into research and development for low-emission technologies.
We urgently need to identify emerging and promising fields of research as well as the policies, infrastructure and governance needed to make clean technologies affordable and widely available.
Finally, scientists need to tackle the question of how to accelerate carbon dioxide removal to complement emissions reductions.
As temperatures rise, the natural ability of land and oceans to sequester carbon weakens, intensifying the need for human-led carbon dioxide removal (CDR). However, interventions like afforestation could reduce agricultural land, particularly in lower-income countries, posing risks to food security. Climate scientists must map the impacts of both higher temperatures and large-scale CDR efforts on food systems and livelihoods to chart a course that does not jeopardise food security.
Future-facing science
The decisions shaped by the IPCC’s reports will define how the world navigates the unprecedented challenges of a rapidly warming planet, especially as it approaches the conclusion of this pivotal decade.
As IPCC report authors, our role extends beyond delivering insights; we must provide actionable, evidence-based, future-facing science to empower governments to act decisively and effectively. This includes equipping innovators and policymakers to harness climate finance, tailor solutions to local contexts, and prepare for future temperature rises.
Most of all, we must not forget climate justice as the guiding principle of this green transition. Ensuring that the most vulnerable — often also the least responsible — remain front and centre of our plans can help to achieve an inclusive future where no one is left behind.
This piece was produced by SciDev.Net’s Global desk.
Aditi Mukherji is director of CGIAR’s Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Impact Action Platform and a contributor to reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Climate science must look ahead

Science and Health

As 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming is reached, climate science must look to the future, writes Aditi Mukherji, director of CGIAR’s Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Impact Action Platform and IPCC author.
[NAIROBI] By the time the world’s leading climate scientists publish their next report in 2028-29, the world will already have possibly breached 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial era for a few years and the deadline for the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals will be on the horizon.
The threshold set by the 2015 Paris Agreement to reduce the impacts of climate change was passed for the first time in 2024, the EU’s climate change service, Copernicus, confirmed last week (10 January).
So, as the next assessment of climate science from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) gets under way, it’s vital that we answer the questions that will serve us in the future. Navigating the challenges of tomorrow requires forward-looking science today and in the months ahead.
Central to our mission to limit climate change are the communities and sectors most vulnerable to its impacts, especially agriculture and smallholder farmers, who play a critical role in feeding the world yet are particularly exposed to the effects of climate change.
The next cycle of climate science must therefore fill the gaps in evidence and solutions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture while also ensuring farming remains viable in a warmer, less predictable world.
We know that food systems are a major contributor to climate change, accounting for about a third of global greenhouse gas emissions. The sector clearly needs to transition to more sustainable means of food production, consumption, and disposal to support global emissions reductions.
However, food systems are also vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Agricultural losses from climate-related disasters totalled US$3.8 trillion in the past 30 years, with the highest relative losses in the poorest countries. A 2 degrees Celsius increase in temperatures will worsen already serious long-term food insecurity in many countries, putting up to 80 million people at risk of hunger by 2050.
Burning questions
This coming cycle of IPCC assessments must answer at least three core questions related to the agri-food systems and climate change to help the world move from understanding the climate crisis to tackling it with utmost urgency.
The first question for climate scientists is how to make best use of existing technologies that help farmers combat and cope with climate change—and increase their adoption and use.
Innovations to help farmers adapt to new conditions, such as digital climate information services and climate-resilient crops, already exist along with developments like solar-powered irrigation pumps and low-emission forages, or feeds, that reduce farming’s carbon footprint. But they are not reaching farmers at the scale needed to make a difference.
How to more effectively channel climate finance, resources and support from wealthier countries to roll out these innovations in low- and middle-income countries is a science question.
Similarly, we also need to assess which tools and technologies will enable farmers to adapt to warmer conditions in the future. Previous IPCC research cycles have shown that the ability to adapt to climate change becomes increasingly difficult as temperatures continue to rise. Scientists need to investigate which crop, livestock, or fishery adaptations will remain viable at 1.5 degrees Celsius or beyond.
The second question for climate scientists is how to make low-emissions technologies cost-effective and accessible.
For farmers to have the best chance of adapting and avoiding future losses, it’s crucial that global temperatures stabilise and this requires emissions to come down, including those from agriculture.
However, unlike the energy sector, which has benefited from research and innovation into renewable sources like solar energy, the agriculture sector has lagged on investments into research and development for low-emission technologies.
We urgently need to identify emerging and promising fields of research as well as the policies, infrastructure and governance needed to make clean technologies affordable and widely available.
Finally, scientists need to tackle the question of how to accelerate carbon dioxide removal to complement emissions reductions.
As temperatures rise, the natural ability of land and oceans to sequester carbon weakens, intensifying the need for human-led carbon dioxide removal (CDR). However, interventions like afforestation could reduce agricultural land, particularly in lower-income countries, posing risks to food security. Climate scientists must map the impacts of both higher temperatures and large-scale CDR efforts on food systems and livelihoods to chart a course that does not jeopardise food security.
Future-facing science
The decisions shaped by the IPCC’s reports will define how the world navigates the unprecedented challenges of a rapidly warming planet, especially as it approaches the conclusion of this pivotal decade.
As IPCC report authors, our role extends beyond delivering insights; we must provide actionable, evidence-based, future-facing science to empower governments to act decisively and effectively. This includes equipping innovators and policymakers to harness climate finance, tailor solutions to local contexts, and prepare for future temperature rises.
Most of all, we must not forget climate justice as the guiding principle of this green transition. Ensuring that the most vulnerable — often also the least responsible — remain front and centre of our plans can help to achieve an inclusive future where no one is left behind.
This piece was produced by SciDev.Net’s Global desk.
Aditi Mukherji is director of CGIAR’s Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Impact Action Platform and a contributor to reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Airtel Business to launch sovereign AI cloud with Google in “next few months”

Business News

Bharti Airtel’s Airtel Business is working on a sovereign AI cloud offering with Google.The companies laid out plans at a recent roundtable with Airtel Business, Google Cloud, and ObserveNow.As reported by TelecomTalk and citing Airtel’s CEO Sharat Sinha, Airtel’s “Own Cloud” offering will be launched in the next few months.

Head of customer engineering, public sector, and education for Google Cloud India, Pankaj Shukla added that the offering will combine hyperscale capabilities with robust compliance, including offering artificial intelligence (AI) services, and would be tailored for government organizations.During Bharti Airtel’s Q2 2025 earnings call, managing director Gopal Vittal said: “We have made an investment to develop our own cloud. We are one of the largest cloud players for our own private needs. We have now signed off an investment, which is underway, which we will take to market in the next few months where we will be able to solve the problems of workloads that may not need such elastic requirements as the public cloud offers but to do it in a way that is more economical. I think we will have a full proposition around the cloud.”Airtel and Google Cloud announced they were teaming up to bring cloud and AI products to Indian business in May 2024. Google has previously invested in Airtel, committing $1 billion to the Indian carrier in 2022.Google has partnered with other companies globally on sovereign cloud offerings. It has worked with Thales in France on a sovereign cloud, and throughout 2024 Google signed deals with Indosat in Indonesia, DNeX in Malaysia, and Gulf Edge in Thailand.Airtel operates multiple data centers across India through its Nxtra unit. The company is developing facilities in Noida, Pune, Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru.

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Buy banned books

Arts & Culture, Books

Editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes just resigned from her position at the Washington Post after a drawing was unilaterally rejected by the newspaper. The cartoon, which shows Jeff Bezos and other tech gurus bowing before a gigantic statue of Donald Trump, was apparently considered too controversial for publication. Cartoonists have always been at the forefront of freedom of speech; but the case of Telnaes is not reassuring for what is to come in 2025.
2024 was a bleak year for writers, journalists and all those whose jobs consist of discussing ideas. Numbers show a steady increase in censorship over the last few years; one reliable indicator is the American Library Association’s yearly report on challenged books. In 2023, Maia Kobabe’s comic book Gender Queer: A Memoir was challenged 106 times. This means 106 libraries were asked to remove the book from their shelves, as the content was considered offensive. An autobiographic comic book, Gender Queer tells the true story of a girl who discovers that she identifies as non-binary. I personally found the book a bit dull, but apparently that’s just me: some people were so upset by its sheer existence, they found it worth spending hours trying to ban the book from public libraries. This may look like an anecdotal case involving a few obsessional conservatives, but banning books is never benign. As Heinrich Heine said: “Where you burn books, you end up burning people.”

Great minds think alike, especially those obsessed with censorship

Having your books banned or destroyed, however, is nowhere near the worst that can happen to writers these days. In 2023, Dmitry Glukhovsky, author of worldwide bestseller Metro 2033 (Have you read it? Read it now. It’s mind blowing), was sentenced to 15 years in prison by Russian courts. His crime: speaking out against the war in Ukraine. Glukhovsky, who had moved to Western Europe before he was convicted, is no longer welcome in his home country. Authoritarian regimes offer writers a choice between self-censorship, exile and prison.
And not all of them are able to escape their sentence by finding refuge abroad. The latest example is French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal, who has been incarcerated since November 2024 for political activism. In Iran, writer, journalist and Nobel Prize-winner Narges Mohammadi has now spent a total of 26 years in prison. As she suffers from serious health issues, Iranian authorities repeatedly offered to take her to hospital, if only she would wear a headscarf. She refused. While she has been walking free since December 2024, she is liable to be arrested again at any moment. She makes use of her freedom by giving out interviews, including one with Margaret Atwood – whose book The Handmaid’s Tale, as it happens, was repeatedly banned in the US in 2024. Great minds think alike, especially those obsessed with censorship.
There are those who will say that, after all, maybe these writers and artists simply went too far. It is particularly striking in the case of Sansal. His incarceration sparked widespread outrage in intellectual circles, but some argued that, while imprisoning people is wrong, Sansal really should have avoided saying certain things. The trouble is, in authoritarian regimes, the cursor of things that should be left unsaid can be moved until nothing but silence is allowed. In modern-day Russia, “anything at all can be labelled as propaganda”. 
It is a striking coincidence that Telnaes should resign on the 10th anniversary of the Charlie Hebdo killings. After all these years, not only have things not improved; they have clearly worsened, and it looks like censorship is threatening almost every field of literary and artistic creation. Even a cartoon as benign as Telnae’s, which can hardly be suspected of hurting anyone’s feelings (except maybe Mickey Mouse’s), is labelled as dangerously edgy. Censorship is now something we take into account when expressing ourselves, no matter how unconsciously.
It is unlikely 2025 will be the year freedom of speech hits back. But, as the situation worsens for artists and writers, there is no shortage of courageous intellectuals who are unafraid of standing their ground no matter what. From Narges Mohammadi to Dmitry Glukhovsky, and from Maria Ressa to Margaret Atwood, they show us how to renounce self-censorship and stop fearing those in power. In an increasingly crappy world, we find hope in their courage.
Your New Year resolution as a writer: be unapologetically free. As a reader: buy banned books.
Reading list
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret AtwoodMetro 2033 by Dmitry Glukhovsky,Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia KobabeDisturbance: Surviving Charlie Hebdo by Philippe Lançon White Torture: Interviews with Iranian women prisoners by Narges MohammadiHow to Stand Up to a Dictator by Maria RessaThe Satanic Verses by Salman RushdieAn Unfinished Business by Boualem SansalHumor’s Edge: Cartoons by Ann Telnaes

Najib admits asking UAE crown prince to help clear moviemaker stepson Riza Aziz of 1MDB money claims

Arts & Culture, Film & TV

PUTRAJAYA, Jan 15 — Datuk Seri Najib Razak today admitted in the High Court that he did ask the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) then crown prince to help make paperwork arrangements that would clear Najib’s filmmaker stepson Riza Shahriz Abdul Aziz of allegations involving 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) money.After being shown the transcripts of two audio recordings of alleged phone conversations between Najib and the then crown prince Sheikh Mohamed Zayed Al-Nahyan in 2016, Najib agreed that he did make a “personal request” in the second phone conversation regarding Riza Aziz.In this audio clip’s transcript, Najib was said to have referred to the US Department of Justice’s (DoJ) July 2016 filing of a forfeiture suit on 1MDB as having happened “yesterday”. Today, he confirmed he was aware of the DoJ suit at the time it was filed.The prosecution asked Najib to confirm he had requested the crown prince to arrange for a loan agreement to be signed with Riza Aziz with a repayment schedule to show that the money that the latter had received to make movies was “legitimate”.Najib agreed to this, saying that this was because Riza Aziz “was promised contributions from Aabar and the crown prince himself, that’s why I asked him to solve it.”While saying that he did not really recall if he had said the loan agreement was intended to show money received by Riza Aziz was a “legitimate financing packaging” and not “money laundering”, Najib said this would be what he had said if it was based on the transcript.Najib confirmed that the transcript had shown him referring to Riza Aziz being under a bit of pressure in the US then.Deputy public prosecutor Ahmad Akram Gharib then continued to read from the transcript, where Najib was said to have expressed worry that Riza Aziz would be made a scapegoat and asking for the agreement to be signed quickly.Najib then said this was because Riza Aziz wanted to pay the money back as soon as possible.Akram then continued reading from the transcript, where Najib had said Riza Aziz was not aware where the money came from when he received it as the banks had cleared the source of the money, and with Najib saying that he did not want his stepson to be a victim when he was unaware and genuinely believed the money was from Aabar and under Sheikh Mansour’s instructions.Naijb’s wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor, who was sitting in the public gallery, was seen nodding her head along to this part of the transcript.Akram then suggested Najib knew where the money that Riza Aziz received came from, with Rosmah seen shaking her head at this.Najib then said: “No, when Riza received the money, he was told it’s from Aabar and from Sheikh Mansour. Then when there was expose, then only we got to know there was a possibility it was not from Aabar. That’s why I asked for the agreement to make sure everything was in order, that’s all lah.”Akram then suggested this meant Najib himself knew where the money came from, but the former prime minister stressed: “No, I don’t know where the money came from!”Akram also referred to another part of the transcript, where Najib had told the crown prince that Riza Aziz was innocent and only wanted to make movies and that the attempts to connect his stepson to 1MDB money came as a shock to the latter.Based on these excerpts in the transcript, Akram suggested that Najib actually knew that the money Riza Aziz received came from 1MDB. But Najib disagreed.Although Najib said he could not verify if these audio recordings were fully authentic, he also confirmed to Akram that the “Your Highness” who he is alleged to have addressed in the first phone conversation was referring to the then crown prince of UAE.He also said there were elements in the first transcript that looked familiar to him, but he could not confirm the whole transcript as he did not recall what he had said exactly in several past conversations with the then crown prince.Najib also said he could not verify if the second transcript was of his phone conversation with the then crown prince, but later said the the two voices in the audio recording were “most likely” his voice and the crown prince’s voice. This was the recording where Riza Aziz’s name was mentioned.Previously in his written witness statement in the 1MDB trial, Najib had questioned whether nine audio recordings — including today’s two audio clips — were authentic, but had at the same time said these nine clips are “exculpatory” or would clear him of wrongdoing in the 1MDB case.Najib’s 1MDB trial before judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah resumes tomorrow morning.

Scientists discover new ‘unusually large’ species of one of world’s deadliest spiders

Science and Health

Your support helps us to tell the storyFrom reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.Your support makes all the difference.Read moreScientists in Australia say a group of “unusually large” funnel-web spiders is actually a new species in its own right.Researchers say they used anatomical and DNA comparisons to study different populations of the Sydney funnel-web spider – one of the world’s deadliest spiders – and found there were three species, only two of which were previously known to science. The study revealed the “hidden diversity among funnel-web spiders”, said arachnologist Stephanie Loria from the Leibniz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity Change in Germany.The “classic” Sydney funnel-web spider, Atrax robustus, is found from the Central Coast to the Sydney Basin; the Southern Sydney funnel-web, Atrax montanus, is common in the Blue Mountains south and west of Sydney; and the Newcastle funnel-web, which has now been dubbed the “Big Boy” for being the largest of the three, inhabits the city of Newcastle.“The Newcastle funnel-web, Atrax christenseni – ‘Big Boy’ – is a totally new species. The ‘true’ Sydney funnel-web, Atrax robustus, centres on the North Shore of Sydney and the Central Coast while the Southern Sydney funnel-web is a resurrected species name from 1914,” Dr Loria said.Big Boy funnel-web spider Atrax christenseni

Scientists discover new ‘unusually large’ species of one of world’s deadliest spiders

Science and Health

Your support helps us to tell the storyFrom reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.Your support makes all the difference.Read moreScientists in Australia say a group of “unusually large” funnel-web spiders is actually a new species in its own right.Researchers say they used anatomical and DNA comparisons to study different populations of the Sydney funnel-web spider – one of the world’s deadliest spiders – and found there were three species, only two of which were previously known to science. The study revealed the “hidden diversity among funnel-web spiders”, said arachnologist Stephanie Loria from the Leibniz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity Change in Germany.The “classic” Sydney funnel-web spider, Atrax robustus, is found from the Central Coast to the Sydney Basin; the Southern Sydney funnel-web, Atrax montanus, is common in the Blue Mountains south and west of Sydney; and the Newcastle funnel-web, which has now been dubbed the “Big Boy” for being the largest of the three, inhabits the city of Newcastle.“The Newcastle funnel-web, Atrax christenseni – ‘Big Boy’ – is a totally new species. The ‘true’ Sydney funnel-web, Atrax robustus, centres on the North Shore of Sydney and the Central Coast while the Southern Sydney funnel-web is a resurrected species name from 1914,” Dr Loria said.Big Boy funnel-web spider Atrax christenseni

Plea for tourists to revive bushfire-stricken town as business losses reach millions

Business News

Businesses in the Grampians are compelling visitors to return to the Victorian tourist hotspot, after fierce bushfires shut down consecutive peak seasons.Operators have lost up to a quarter of a million dollars since the bushfires raged through the Wimmera for 21 days over Christmas and New Years.But now the heart of the Grampians, Halls Gap, is again opening its arms to out-of-towners, hoping to return the town to a hive of activity.Businesses in the Grampians are compelling visitors to return to the Victorian tourist hotspot, after fierce bushfires shut down consecutive peak seasons.