Long-time GSS readers may recall the story of Bennie the Dinosaur, who we originally spotted way back in February 2006.

Bennie was originally employed as the mascot for a now-defunct chain of cigarette shops and in his lifetime had moved around a bit, even changing sex along the way.

The last we’d heard of Bennie was that he’d been moved to the garden of a former employee of the company, but that garden was not covered on Google Earth.

That garden is now visible, but in that time there’s been some shocking developments, and all that we can see are Bennie’s charred remains:

The official word is that Bennie died during a forest fire, but with the dinosaur’s well-publicised past involvement in cigarette advertising it’s hard to accept that story.

A much more likely explanation is that, as with a staggering 800 people in the US each year, Bennie died as a result of carelessness with his cigarettes.

Thanks to Glenn Rice.

As the Street View car passed Google’s California head offices, the Googleplex, hundreds and hundreds of Google Employees came out to form a huge welcoming committee for the passing camera car.

There’s loads of things to see, as many employees have clearly prepared for the event! For example, here’s a life-size yellow Street View guy:

Elsewhere, in a clear nod to our very own discovery of a fight on Street View, a couple of Googlers are engaged in a slight altercation.

In another self-referential move, a couple of people are taking part in a tiny Tour-de-France!

The in-jokes don’t stop there either – one Googler took the opportunity to make a “Web 2.0″ marriage proposal! See his website to find out if she accepted.

There’s tons more silliness all up and down the street, as it seems the entire Googleplex came out for the event – so have a browse and share your best finds in the comments!

Thanks to GmapsMania.

It’s commonly quoted as fact that in nature, no food or vegetable is naturally blue.

This information was again disputed recently by the re-introduction of blue Smarties¹, this time using 100% natural seaweed extract to create the blue colour.

Additional support for the “blue-in-nature” brigade comes in the form of blue trees spotted on Google Earth. Firstly, in Australia’s Mount Annan Botanic Garden there’s a strikingly-blue tree.

The Garden’s website explains that the tree has been dead for many years, but is home to various types of termites and slaters.

So, it’s the termites that make the tree blue? Well, no. Further investigation reveals that the tree was in actual fact painted blue. For no particular reason.

Perhaps we’ll have better luck with this blurry shot of a blue tree in Northern California.

Unfortunately, this isn’t natural either. It’s the work of artist Claude Cormier, who decorated a perfectly normal tree with 70,000 blue Christmas baubles. Again, for no particular reason it would seem.

So perhaps natural blue is restricted to seaweed after all!

See a ground level pictures of the Australian tree and the American one on Flickr.

Thanks to Felippo, Logan and James.

It’s been a whole year since Google first launched their controversial Street View service, and we posted our first Street View sight. Since then we’ve seen the rate of discovery of the most bizarre and unusual finds increase as Google has added more and more US cities to the roster.

With the service due to launch soon in Canada, Italy, Spain, Australia and Japan, we thought we’d mark the one year anniversary with a roundup of the best 10 Street View discoveries that we haven’t already posted to the site.

10) Google camera gets stuck in tree

Yes, this driver forgot he had a giant camera stuck to the top of his car, and drove it into a low-hanging tree.

9) The giant finger of doom

Arrgh! The giant finger of doom! Actually, if you pan round you can see that this is actually an image of a normal-sized man with the world’s biggest hand.

8) Working girls, working

Well, not actually in flagrante, but rather hanging around waiting to possibly um… service some customers?

7) Scuba diver on city street

Well he isn’t a Scuba diver unless he’s in the water. Walking along the road like this just makes him a bit of an idiot.

6) Segway convoy

Rubby ducky rubber ducky, come in, this is ageing geek! We got ourselves a convoy!

5) Usin publik transport: ur doin it rong

Is this the cab’s driver, or a passenger in need of some assistance? Perhaps this person has been subjected to a particularly lethal LOLcat attack?

4) Having to explain the enormously suspicious camera on the top of your car to a police officer

“Yes officer that’s right, taking photos to put on the internet!” *Click*.

3) Man with giant head stomps all over Street View car

A relative of the man with the world’s biggest hand, this man must surely have the largest head on the planet.

2) Post-it attack!

A couple of teenage girls take brilliantly surreal revenge upon somebody, and don’t blink as a car passes recording their actions forever…

1) How not to get IN a car

We’re stunned, we have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on here. Brilliantly bizarre and a worthy winner of the top spot!

Yesterday a large fire tore through the Universal Studios backlot, injuring 3 people and destroying numerous sets.

Thankfully no-one was seriously injured, but the fire did destroy a key piece of movie history: Courthouse Square.

Courthouse Square has been used in numerous films and TV shows, including Gremlins, Bruce Almighty, Knight Rider and, most recognisably, Back to the Future.

As you can see from the aerial shot, the square looks just like it did in the 1985 film, including the clock tower to the East of the square. Initial reports of the fire starting when the famous clock tower was struck by lightning have been denied.

“It looked like a disaster film” said Los Angeles City Councilman Tom LaBonge, which isn’t surprising as most of Universal studios looks like a disaster film; scroll South a bit and there’s the wreckage of a plane crash as featured in War of the Worlds.

More on the story from the BBC or explore more Back to the Future filming locations.