Young man who lived in the Siberian forest for 16 years

There have been number of stories about people abandoning the society and going to live in the forest for ages. And the latest of these unusual news stories comes from a town called Belokirika, close to the Russia’s Siberian forest area. Dubbed as the” forest boy” or the “Siberian Mowgli” after the main character in Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, this young man born in 1993 had lived in the forest since 1997. when his family decided to leave society.

Siberian Mowgli ... The young man who lived in a Siberian forest for 16 years

Russian authorities had found him living alone in a Siberian forest after having apparently spent most of his life living there in a hut with his parents, local officials said.

His parents left him alone in the hut in May before he finally went to a nearby village to ask for help when the summer ended, the authorities said.

The local prosecutor's office, alarmed that the man may have to spend the Siberian winter in a forest by himself, appealed in court to have his identification documents re-established so that he can seek state support, prosecutor Roman Fomin said. He said that the man's family went to live in the wild as a conscious decision, but apparently not out of religious reasons.

Fomin said that a local woman had brought the young man to the prosecutors out of fear that he may need help through the cold winter, but the man then had gone back to his hiding place in the forest.

Belokurikha is a well-known resort area in Russia's picturesque Altai region in south Siberia, known for mineral springs, health spas, and skiing.

A see-through snail!

You may have seen a number of snails of different sizes and with different colours but can you imagine a snail with a translucent or a see-through shell!

Different views of the living specimen (solid border) and empty shell (dotted border).

The new snail completely lacks eyes and shell pigmentation. Neither would serve a purpose in the complete darkness of the cave.

It was an unbelievable find even to the team of cavers and biologists with the Croatian Biospeleological Society who discovered Zospeum tholussum in the Lukina Jama-Trojama cave systems of western Croatia - one of the 20 deepest cave systems in the world - on an expedition to determine the cave's depth. The team collected all animal specimens found along the way, since deep cave crevices are often promising places to find new species, and happened upon one live sample of the new snail, along with eight empty shells. It was discovered more than 3,000 feet (914 metres) underground .

The team presented the elegant snail to taxonomist Alexander Weigand at Goethe-University in Frankfurt, Germany, for help in identification. Weigand determined that this particular species had never before been found, but that it is related to other known species.

The new snail and other related species are particularly slow-moving, even by snail standards.

“They only creep a few millimeters or centimeters a week, and mainly in circles, grazing at one point where they live,” Weigand said.

Daredevil act on a 84ft-high gas tower

Risk: Walking around huge 84-ft-high gas tower

If you are suffering from acrophobia - fear of heights - don’t ever think of following James Kingston, the thrill-seeking free runner from Romsey, Hampshire,UK.

Daredevil James Kingston, 23, who climbed this 84ft-tower then walked around the foot-wide rim said: “I had always wanted to scale the gas tower.

“I walked around the rim twice. It was amazing. The view was incredible. Seeing the sunrise was amazing.” But James’s dawn antics at the gasometer in Northam, Southampton, didn’t go down well with police.

A spokesman said: “He could have easily died if he’d fallen. Witnesses could be affected or hurt if he fell.” Earlier this year the daredevil filmed himself climbing a 250ft-high crane, then hanging from it with just one hand. He pulled off the death-defying stunt in Southampton without the aid of any visible safety equipment.

Everyone witnessing the daring spectacle were aghast when he dropped one hand and clung on with only five fingers. Thrill-seeker James said: “I didn’t go up there to die. I went up there to live.”

Jonathan Trappe failed in his helium filled balloon attempt

Balloon trip ends in failure

Jonathan Trappe, powered by 300-helium-filled balloons intended to reach “somewhere in Europe” - maybe France to be the first to cross the Atlantic in this type of modified vehicle. He left Caribou, Maine in the US and after being in the he had to experience technical difficulties and had to land his balloon craft near the Gulf of Lawrence in New Foundland. Canada.

Announcing the end of his mission he said: ‘Hmm, this doesn’t look like France.’

Trappe, from North Carolina, said air conditions would dictate whether he succeeded or failed, remarking beforehand: ‘But it’s a double-edged sword. It’s the only thing that will carry me across, but bad conditions could also ruin the attempt or endanger my life.’