Motorists taking State Route 16 through Licking County, Ohio, could be forgiven for thinking they've been at the wheel too long when they spot a giant shopping basket looming over the horizon. This is no highway-induced hallucination however: it's the…

If you're a nervous flier, you'd do well to avoid Luzamba airport in northern Angola1. It's not so much that lots of aircraft crash here (although it seems it's hardly a rare occurence) — more the fact that the wrecked…

It’s Island Week 4 here at GSS, which means we’ll mostly be posting about Islands. For about a week. GSS Reader Reg Coppicus from Canada thinks Isla San Felix might be "the crappiest posting ever". Fortunately for us, he's talking…

It’s Island Week 4 here at GSS, which means we’ll mostly be posting about Islands. For about a week. Far out in the South Atlantic, more than 2,500km from the coast of South Africa, Bouvet Island is the loneliest chunk…

High up in the Italian Dolomite mountains, 90km north of Venice, the Vajont Dam was the scene of one of the 20th century's worst engineering disasters. The tallest dam in the world when it was completed in 1959, at 262m,…

For centuries, the source of the mighty River Nile was shrouded in mystery in the dark heart of Africa. In Roman times, the phrase caput Nili quærere, "to search for the head of the Nile", was used as a metaphor…