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The HMCS Ottawa has been making its way through the South China SeaRoyal Canadian Navy/Canadian Armed ForcesAboard HMCS OttawaCNN — 

A Chinese warplane fired flares in front of a Canadian military helicopter over international waters of the South China Sea last Sunday, an operation that Canadian military officers said was reckless and could have resulted in the downing of the aircraft.

“The risk to a helicopter in that instance is the flares moving into the rotor blades or the engines so this was categorized as both unsafe and non-standard, unprofessional,” said Maj. Rob Millen, air officer aboard the Royal Canadian Navy frigate HMCS Ottawa, the warship from which the Sikorsky Cyclone helicopter was flying.

The incident was the second of two encounters the Ottawa’s helicopter had with Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy J-11 fighter jets over international waters on October 29, which saw the fighters get as close as 100 feet from the helicopter, Millen told CNN in an interview aboard the warship.

He said that Canada and other nations have seen Chinese aircraft get close to fixed-wing aircraft on numerous occasions, but it was rare to see such action taken against a helicopter.

The first incident was over international waters outside of 34 miles from the Paracel Island chain in the northern part of the South China Sea. The second was also over international waters outside of 23 miles from the Paracels. The warship was operating in international waters 100 miles (160 kilometers) east of the Paracels at the time.

The Canadian helicopter was searching for a previously detected submarine when the incidents occurred, officers aboard the Ottawa said.

Millen said he was piloting the Canadian helicopter earlier in the day, when Chinese J-11s intercepted it at close range while it flew straight and level at 3,000 feet above the water back toward the Ottawa, a signal to the Chinese that it had no hostile intent.

A Canadian military Sikorsky CH-148 Cyclone conducts test flights with HMCS Montreal in Halifax harbour on Thursday, April 1, 2010.Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press/AP/File

In that earlier encounter, Millen said the Chinese fighters flew in circles around his helicopter.

“When the intercepting aircraft was closer and closer, at a certain point it became unsafe,” he said.

His helicopter experienced turbulence coming off the Chinese jets, also posing a danger to the copter, Millen said.

“I certainly am not as comfortable as you can be based on the fragility of the rotor system,” he said.

Millen said he ended that encounter by descending to 200 feet, an area where the helicopter can operate but is “very uncomfortable for fast air fighter jets.”

The Canadian air force major said his military’s air crews train on how to respond to such intercepts as occurred on Sunday and will continue to fly over the international waters of the South China Sea.

Asked about the interception at a regular press briefing on Friday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin replied: “I’m not aware of the situation you mentioned.”

“We have reiterated many times our firm position on Canadian warplanes conducting reconnaissance near China’s territorial airspace,” he told reporters. “We hope Canada will refrain from its inappropriate behavior to avoid the situation from becoming more complicated.”

CNN has also reached to China’s Defense Ministry for comment.

China claims historic jurisdiction over almost the entirety of the vast South China Sea, and since 2014 has built up tiny reefs and sandbars into artificial islands heavily fortified with missiles, runways and weapons systems – sparking outcry from the other claimants. The Paracels, called the Xisha Islands by China, are in the northern part of the South China Sea, east of Da Nang, Vietnam, and south of China’s Hainan Island.

Tensions are flaring once more in the South China Sea. Here’s why it matters for the world

The 1.3-million-square-mile waterway is vital to international trade, with an estimated third of global shipping worth trillions of dollars passing through each year. It’s also home to vast fertile fishing grounds upon which many lives and livelihoods depend.

In 2016, an international tribunal in The Hague concluded that China has no legal basis to claim historic rights to the bulk of the South China Sea. China has ignored the ruling.

Freedom of navigation

Major western powers frequently conduct passage across the sea in order to assert that the region is international waters, sparking Beijing’s ire.

The Ottawa had been patrolling the waterway since last Monday, at times operating with United States, Australian, Japanese and New Zealand naval vessels and aircraft in a multinational exercise dubbed Noble Caribou. However, it was operating alone when the encounters with the Chinese jets.

The Ottawa and the US Navy destroyer USS Rafael Peralta overnight Wednesday into Thursday local time continued their deployment into the Taiwan Strait, another international waterway and vital shipping channel that has seen tense
encounters between PLA and allied vessels.

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See how close Chinese fighter jet came to US bomber

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Last June, the US Navy reported a close encounter between the destroyer USS Chung-Hoon and a Chinese warship during a Taiwan Strait transit, in which the US warship slowed down to avoid colliding with the Chinese navy vessel that cut in front of it. The Canadian frigate HMCS Montreal was accompanying the US ship at the time, and a news crew aboard it recorded the incident.

Then Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu blamed the US for ratcheting up tensions in the region when questioned by reporters at a defense conference in Singapore.

“They are not here for innocent passage, they are here for provocation,” Li said of US warships.

Li said if the US and other foreign powers did not want confrontation, they should not send their military assets near China.

“Mind your own business,” Li said, adding, “Why did all these incidents happen in areas near China, not in areas near other countries?”

This week’s passage of the allied warships through the strait was uneventful, however, with no contact reported.

A Chinese Navy J-11 fighter jet is recorded https://mauapalagi.com flying close to a U.S. Air Force RC-135 aircraft in international airspace over the South China Sea, according to the U.S. military, in a still image from video taken December 21, 2022.U.S. INDO-PACIFIC COMMAND/Reuters/File

Sunday’s incidents come after other reports of unsafe intercepts of allied aircraft in the recent days.

On Tuesday, a PLA fighter jet came within 10 feet of a US Air Force B-52 bomber flying over the South China Sea, the US military said.

And earlier in October, a Chinese fighter jet came within five meters (16 feet) of a Canadian CP-140 reconnaissance and surveillance plane over the East China Sea.

That incident was recorded by news crews aboard the Canadian aircraft and witnessed by Maj. Gen. Iain Huddleston, the commander of Canada’s 1st Air Division, who was also on the plane.

Huddleston called the intercept “unprofessional” and “very aggressive” in a report from Radio Canada, which was on the plane.

“The Canadian aircraft was subject to multiple close-proximity manoeuvres by a PLAAF aircraft that put the safety of all personnel at risk,” Canada’s Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Exclusive: Philippine defense secretary vows to stand up to ‘bully’ China

China’s Foreign Ministry said the Canadian plane illegally entered Chinese airspace and accused the Canadian military of sending “warplanes halfway around the world to stir up trouble and make provocations at China’s doorsteps.”

In February, in an incident witnessed by a CNN crew, a Chinese fighter jet came within 500 feet of a US Navy reconnaissance plane flying at 21,500 feet about 30 miles from the Paracels.

Earlier this month, the Pentagon’s top official in charge of security in the Indo-Pacific, Ely Ratner, said that the US has seen more instances of “coercive and risky” behavior from Chinese pilots against US aircraft in the last two years over the East and South China Seas than in the entire decade before that.

“Since the fall of 2021, we have seen more than 180 such incidents,” Ratner said. “It’s a centralized and concerted campaign to perform these risky behaviors in order to coerce a change in lawful US operational activity.”

A fire breaks out in Rakhine State’s Mrauk-U township in western Myanmar in 2020, before the ceasefire between the Myanmar Armed Forces and the Arakan Army.Myanmar Army/APCNN — 

Renewed hostilities between the Myanmar military and ethnic minority armed group the Arakan Army (AA) have spread to various townships in western Myanmar, including Pauktaw, where civilians have been caught in the crossfire as fighting escalates.

A former member of parliament from Pauktaw township, who asked not to be identified due to safety concerns, told CNN on Saturday that he had lost contact with people from the town and did not know what is happening.

“I left the town the day the fighting broke out. But there are elderly people, sick people and families with young children left as they could not make haste,” he said.

“It’s raining and a storm is coming too. It’s a devastating situation. It breaks my heart to see people in such a situation.”

Ongoing clashes between the Arakan Army and the military began in the Rathedaung township on November 13 and have since spread to the townships of Maungdaw, Kyauktaw, Minbya, Pauktaw, Ponnagyun, and Paletwa, according to a statement from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) on Friday.

The renewed fighting has displaced more than 26,000 people in the country’s western Rakhine state since Monday, according to UNOCHA.

The two parties had previously established an informal ceasefire in November 2022, according to the UN, but fighting broke out after the Arakan Army reportedly attacked two border posts.

In a statement released on Friday, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) said the latest figures brought the total number of internally displaced people due to the conflict between the two sides to approximately 90,000. It added that there had been reports of military shelling in Arakan Army-controlled areas.

Myanmar’s military had also conducted at least one operation backed by air and naval support, UNOCHA said.

Myanmar military spokesperson Zaw Min Tun said during a briefing Friday that the Myanmar army and police force had retaken the Pauktaw police station and that the town “was already under control” of the military.

Most humanitarian activities have been suspended due to the resurgence of the conflict and “virtually all roads and waterways” between townships in Rakhine have been blocked, according to OCHA.

Battles between the military and resistance groups have unfolded almost daily across Myanmar since army general Min Aung Hlaing seized power in February 2021, plunging the country into economic chaos and fresh civil war.

Airstrikes and ground attacks on what the Myanmar military calls “terrorist” targets have been occurred regularly since 2021 and have killed thousands of civilians to date, including children, according to monitoring groups.

Renewed fighting in Myanmar has displaced 26,000 people since Monday, UN says

Whole villages have been burned down by junta soldiers and schools, clinics and hospitals destroyed.

The son of a man from Pauktow who was killed as a result of the latest hostilities, told CNN that his father had been “hit by pieces of artillery at a meditation center” after Myanmar’s State Administration Council (SAC) soldiers started shooting at him “constantly.”

“I was told he was crying out of pain, I can’t imagine how he would be suffering in a pool of blood. The next morning, I got a call that he passed away at night,” the man said.

A family’s plight

U Nan Diya, Chaung Suak village’s abbot monk, https://caridimanaka.com told CNN that he had been assisting three fellow villagers – a father sick with heart disease, accompanied by his daughter and son-in-law.

Despite the family reaching a hospital two days before hostilities resumed, they remained stranded in a house in Pauktaw after the town “turned into a war zone,” U Nan Diya said.

The sick man’s daughter had attempted to look for a boat to return to their village but was arrested by soldiers on Friday, he added.

U Nan Diya said the 60-year-old man with heart disease was getting worse without medication. “(His) family wants him at their home instead of letting him die at a stranger’s house but nobody can go out or use the water route because the military navy is stationed in the sea, shooting everyone they see,” he said.

“The sick man can’t die peacefully.”

Members of rescue teams stand at the entrance of a tunnel where road workers are trapped after a portion of the tunnel collapsed in Uttarakhand, India.Shankar Prasad Nautiyal/ReutersNew DelhiCNN — 

Indian authorities are exploring new ways to rescue 40 construction workers trapped underground for more than a week.

The workers became stranded when a highway tunnel they were building partially collapsed in the northern state of Uttarakhand last Sunday.

Although they are being supplied with food and water, a doctor said some of the men were getting ill, and had been vomiting and getting headaches.

State authorities have approved buying equipment and more manpower to implement options such as constructing escape tunnels from the left and right sides of the tunnel, officials said.

Drilling vertically from the upper hill – which is already being implemented – still remains a consideration.

Rescue teams had been drilling non-stop to reach the stranded workers since acquiring a high-powered drilling machine on Thursday, but given the fragile mountain terrain, there were concerns of more debris falling and further complicating the rescue efforts.

“We have decided to go with a pause-and-go approach to maintain the equilibrium,” Anshu Manish Khalkho, director of state-run highway management company National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL) said Friday.

Authorities in India previously revealed they had contacted the specialist teams in Norway and Thailand behind the successful rescue of 12 boys and their soccer coach from a flooded cave in northern Thailand in 2018.

In an emailed reply to CNN, officials from the Norwegian Geotechnical Institute (NGI) said their Indian partner, Indian Railways (RVNL) was currently on the ground and assisting with the rescue operation, but confirmed that members of the NGI were not involved at present.

Rescuers had drilled around one-third of the way to the trapped workers on November 17.AFP/Getty Images

Khalkho told reporters that rescuers, with the help of the high-powered drilling machine, have so far drilled about 25 meters (82 feet) inside the collapsed Uttarkashi tunnel – that’s about one-third of the way to the trapped workers.

The rescuers have 60 meters of debris between themselves and the trapped men. According to Khalkho, pipes designed for the rescue mission have been successfully inserted into approximately 25 meters (82 feet) of the debris. However, there remains an additional stretch to cover before reaching the 40 workers.

Pipes are being inserted into the freshly drilled hole and being welded together, Khalkho explained.

These interconnected pipes will provide an escape passage for the stranded men, enabling them to move beyond the section of the tunnel that has collapsed.

“It may look easy from the outside, but on-site we have to factor in the effects of the drilling vibrations on the fragile terrain,” Khalkho told reporters when questioned on the duration of the rescue mission, which entered its seventh day on Saturday.

Rescuers scramble to reach up to 40 workers trapped in Himalayan tunnel collapse

He also confirmed that a backup drilling https://sisipkan.com machine is being airlifted from Indore city in the central state of Madhya Pradesh in India, to assist in the rescue operations. Reuters reported Saturday that the initial drilling machine broke on Friday and needed to be replaced.

Separately, Uttarakhand’s Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami also assured the press that the rescue work is on track with the “engineers and experts from NHIDCL working relentlessly,” and that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is “reviewing the situation.”

In an update Sunday, Dhami told Indian news agency ANI that “saving everyone’s life is our first priority…the state government is ready to give all the help required to all the agencies,” adding that expert teams are working on all the possibilities available to rescue the men.

Dhami later visited the site to “conduct on-site inspection and review of the ongoing relief and rescue work,” according to his post on X on Sunday. He was joined by India’s Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari.

A special team from the Prime Minister’s office arrived at the tunnel collapse site to review the situation on Saturday.

The tunnel is part of Modi’s ambitious Himalayan Char Dham Highway project, a multimillion-dollar infrastructure plan to improve connectivity in the state of Uttarakhand and better access to important pilgrimage locations.

Royal Australian Navy vessel, HMAS Toowoomba, is docked at Changi Naval Base at the display of warships during IMDEX Asia 2023, a maritime defence exhibition in Singapore, on May 4, 2023.Caroline Chia/Reuters/FileCNN — 

Australia’s prime minister has accused the Chinese navy of “dangerous, unsafe and unprofessional” conduct after an incident in international waters near Japan, marking a potential friction point with Beijing weeks after he visited the Chinese capital to stabilize relations.

Australian divers aboard the long-range frigate HMAS Toowoomba were trying to clear fishing nets from its propellers on November 14 when a Chinese destroyer approached, Australia’s Defense Minister Richard Marles said in a statement Saturday.

Despite being warned that a diving operation was underway, the Chinese destroyer operated its sonar in a manner that “posed a risk to the safety of the Australian divers who were forced to exit the water,” the statement said.

Medical assessments found the divers had sustained minor injuries, the statement added.

In an interview with CNN affiliate Sky News Monday, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he was “very concerned” by the incident, adding that “one person suffered an injury as a result of the actions of China.”

Albanese refused to confirm whether he raised the incident with Chinese leader Xi Jinping when they met at the APEC summit in San Fransisco last Thursday.

“I can assure you that we raised these issues in the appropriate way and very clearly, unequivocally. And China, there’s no misunderstanding as to Australia’s view on this,” he said.

China’s Defense Ministry on Monday dismissed Australia’s accusations as “completely inconsistent with the facts.”

Wu Qian, a ministry spokesperson, said the Chinese destroyer, Ningbo, had been tracking and monitoring the Australian frigate in accordance with international laws and regulations.

“The Chinese ship maintained a safe distance from the Australian ship and didn’t engage in any activities that might affect the Australian diving operations,” Wu said in a statement.

“We urge Australia to respect the facts, stop making reckless and irresponsible accusations against China, and do more things that are conducive to enhancing the accumulation of mutual trust between two sides.”

Asked about the incident at a regular news briefing on Monday, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said: “We hope relevant parties can stop causing troubles at China’s doorstep and work with China to jointly safeguard the momentum of improving China-Australia relations.”

The incident took place a week after Albanese paid a landmark visit to Beijing – the first trip by an Australian leader in seven years – to stabilize rocky bilateral ties after years of economic tension.

In the Sky News interview, Albanese sidestepped a question on whether the incident will make bilateral relations “look shaky” now.

“Well, what I said when I was in China is that we will cooperate where we can but disagree where we must. And this is one of those times where we disagree with the action of China,” Albanese said.

“We’ve made it clear that we disagree with what occurred, that we have the strongest possible objection, and that this sort of event should not occur.”

‘Unsafe and unprofessional’ interaction

In his statement Saturday, Marles said the Australian government had expressed “serious concerns” to the Chinese government over what it called an “unsafe and unprofessional” interaction with a People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLA Navy) destroyer.

Medical assessments found the divers had sustained minor injuries, “likely due to being subjected to the sonar pulses from the Chinese destroyer,” the statement said.

Military ships use sonar to detect and locate objects in the water. Divers exposed to high levels of underwater sound can suffer from “dizziness, hearing damage or other injuries to other sensitive organs,” depending on the frequency and intensity of the sound, according to the London-based Diving Medical Advisory Committee.

The HMAS Toowoomba had been in Japan’s exclusive economic zone conducting operations in support of United Nations sanctions enforcement and was enroute to commence a scheduled port visit to Japan, according to Marles’ statement.

“Australia expects all countries, including China, to operate their militaries in a professional and safe manner,” Marles said.

“Defense has for decades undertaken maritime surveillance activities in the region and does so in accordance with international law, exercising the right to freedom of navigation and overflight in international waters and airspace.”

China’s navy and air forces have been accused of unsafe practices by US and Canadian militaries in multiple close encounters in the East and South China seas in recent months.

Earlier this month, the Canadian military https://kasikan12.com said a Chinese warplane fired flares in front of its helicopter over international waters of the South China Sea on October 29, an operation it said was reckless and could have resulted in the downing of the aircraft.

In response, China blamed Canada for carrying out “malicious and provocative” actions in the South China Sea.

Ray Powell, director of SeaLight at the Gordian Knot Center for National Security Innovation at Stanford University, said it will likely never be known if the order to use the sonar came from commanders in Beijing or at a lower level, maybe the Chinese destroyer captain himself.

“Either is disturbing, as the former would indicate mendacity at very senior levels, while the latter would demonstrate a mendacious military culture,” said Powell, a former US Air Force officer.

“Were the roles reversed, it seems clear to me that an Australian naval commander who did the same thing would be relieved of command, or worse. Yet nobody believes such action is even being considered by Beijing,” Powell said.

As a member of the NBA’s Hall of Fame — and arguably the greatest player in it — Michael Jordan is no stranger to exclusive clubs. In 2019, the Chicago Bulls icon opened another: The Grove XXIII, his personal, invite-only golf club in Hobe Sound, Florida. Scroll through the gallery to see more.Design by Nichols Architects / Photo by Mike Butler

Grove XXIII: Inside Michael Jordan’s ultra-exclusive golf club

1 of 12PrevNextCNN — 

There’s one small corner of the world that Michael Jordan cherishes more than any other — his own personal haven of sporting bliss.

But it’s not in Chicago. In fact, there isn’t a basketball court or hoop in sight.

Even as he was staking his claim in the 1990s as the greatest player the NBA has ever seen, the Bulls icon was a regular guest on the golf course. These days, though, he hosts.

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The Grove XXIII – a nod to his signature No. 23 jersey — is Jordan’s very own golf paradise, a private club tucked away on the outskirts of Hobe Sound, Florida. Ultra-exclusive, few have seen it, and even fewer have played it.

The main clubhouse entrance to The Grove XXIII.Design by Nichols Architects / Photo by Mike Butler

First contact

For Bobby Weed, it was at once the most straightforward and most difficult brief he had ever received: “Build me the best golf course. Build me the best driving range.”

And there had been plenty of briefs before. A protégé, then close friend, of legendary course designer Pete Dye, the South Carolinian served as the PGA Tour’s chief architect before launching his own course design company in 1994.

Almost three decades on, Bobby Weed Golf Design has sculpted more than 20 courses from the ground up – from Stillwater, Minnesota, to Mito, Japan — and renovated many more, including Hobe Sound’s Medalist Golf Club in 2015.

With Tiger Woods headlining a member’s list that reads like a who’s who of the game’s elite, the Medalist is a private club that attracts a star-studded cohort of visitors. Among them was Jordan, a keen admirer of the revamp and who, in late 2017, was on the hunt for a course architect.

The Medalist is a popular site for PGA Tour players.Cliff Hawkins / Getty Images

A meeting later, Weed’s team was signed on to construct a golf kingdom fit for “His Airness.” As one of history’s most famous athletes, and with a net worth edging towards the $2 billion mark, according to Forbes, Jordan was a special category of client.

“I knew that it would get a lot of attention because of MJ,” Weed, 68, told CNN.

“I knew that there was some fanfare associated with it and I didn’t want to let him down.”

The land was secured soon after, some 200-plus acres of former citrus grove, next to Atlantic Ridge State Park. As he often does for projects, Weed lived on site, making the 265-mile switch across the state from Ponte Vedra Beach.

Weed was all-in, and encouraged Jordan to be as engaged as he wanted to be in developments, inviting him to come out once weekly to track the progress. Jordan often visited multiple times a week.

Jordan, pictured in March 2023, has a well-documented love of golf.Jacob Kupferman/Getty Images

Weed likens his role as course architect to that of a quarterback: calling plays for a large roster of consultants. Watching Jordan in discussion with the team during one early meeting, he got the impression of a coach interacting with his players.

“I think one of his qualities is he was such a good listener, and he absorbed everything that you were discussing,” Weed said.

“He didn’t come out and say ‘do this or do that.’ He came out and observed and was a great listener, and he let me do my job.”

Weed evaluates his plan for the course.Bobby Weed Golf Design

“Slaughterhouse 23”

Weed had his two pillars for a great golf course — an engaged owner and a good piece of property, though the latter would require some polishing.

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Turning a flat, “featureless” site – bordered by two long drainage canals – into a cross between the manicured, parkland style of Augusta National and the rustic layout of Pine Valley represented the greatest challenge to him and his team.

Dirt was excavated from lagoons to build the course and its features, fixing the flatness issue and leaving behind six large lakes – the same number of NBA Championships Jordan won. It was a coincidence, but ultimately fit the theme of a course tuned to the finest degree to its owner’s style.

Jordan wanted firm and fast, a course that could both excite and challenge its members, many of whom would be among the PGA Tour’s current stars. A double-helix layout, with a “crossover” at the 5th and 14th holes, offers the flexibility to play continual internal circuits in three, six, or nine-hole loops – ideal for Jordan’s busy schedule.

Two irrigation canals border the site. https://juswortele.com Bobby Weed Golf Design

The course didn’t just need to suit the playstyle of its owner, though, it needed to enhance it.

“You don’t think I’m going to spend this much money and not have a little bit of an advantage do you?” Weed recalled Jordan saying.

Add to that the five-time MVP’s penchant for wagers, which will be familiar to viewers of docuseries “The Last Dance,” and the course has earned a new name among some members: “Slaughterhouse 23.”

“It’s his golf course, so it’s set up very well for him,” former world No. 1 Rickie Fowler told the Subpar podcast in 2020.

Weed, too, got drawn into the wagers, even during construction.

“I can remember us being out there hitting shots and doing a little gambling while we were just playing in the dirt. It was just great fun and interaction,” he said.

“It’s hard not to go out there and play a round with MJ without having a friendly wager.”

Jordan and Weed during the course’s construction.Bobby Weed Golf Design

To meet the second requirement of Jordan’s brief, Weed’s team set aside 20 acres to construct a state-of-the-art practice facility that the designer believes has no equal.

Two 400-yard, double-sided driving lanes can be maintained for specific conditions, such as US Open or PGA Tour style fairways, with “target greens” in 25-yard increments. Each green has built-in pods that can track swathes of shot information, incorporating the PGA Tour’s ShotLink data.

The putting green is split into four quadrants, with incremental slopes ranging from 0-1% to 3-4% inclines. Even the grass on the tees is customizable, with different types to mimic warm or cool seasons.

“It’s a Tour player’s haven to work on their game,” said Weed.

Jordan wanted an elite practice facility.Bobby Weed Golf Design

Taking a swing

Compared to Bobby Weed Golf Design, Nichols Architects had considerably less experience in golf courses, but it did have one key advantage in its efforts to beat other bids to build The Grove XXIII’s clubhouse.

Specializing in hospitality, residential, and commercial design, the firm had worked on the W South Beach in Miami — the favorite hotel of Jordan’s wife Yvette Prieto.

The team pulled no punches with its pitch to Jordan. “You’re not going to confuse this clubhouse with a clubhouse down the road or anything like that, and that’s what we’re selling you,” planning and design partner Igor Reyes told CNN of the pitching process, likening it to that depicted in the “Air” movie, where Nike must lure a rookie Jordan away from a deal with Adidas.

“You’ve really got to make an architectural iconic shape, and a shape that you could almost immediately feel was swinging across the landscape. Hopefully you can almost read the concept without anybody having to tell you,” Reyes said.

The deal clincher — outlined to Jordan in a pitch video — was that clubhouse shape, inspired by the smooth, “almost machine-like” perfection of a golf swing.

An early concept of the swing-inspired clubhouse shape.Nichols Architects

Reyes said his team had heard of Jordan’s purported early struggles with his swing, and, in the video, set up a column grid to map the building’s structure onto Tiger Woods’ club trajectory. Jordan was captivated, and told the firm there and then that it would get the contract.

“The first time you walk into the room with him, you don’t want to get too close or anything like that, it was kind of an odd thing,” Reyes said. “But by the second or third meeting we were just talking to him like a ‘regular’ client with a huge amount of respect.

“There was a really a sense of, ‘This isn’t just a guy with a lot of money that wants to do something. This guy knows what he’s doing, he knows what he likes, and how to get to it.’”

Nichols Architects was determined to create an iconic design.Design by Nichols Architects / Photo by Mike Butler

The elephant in the roof

Inside, 15,000 square feet of space leaves ample room for men’s and women’s lockers, indoor and outdoor lounge areas, kitchen and dining facilities, and even a shop. Hospitality was a priority, with a below-ground level meaning all service, as well as golf cart storage, can be managed from underneath.

Like the course, Jordan’s identity was stamped all over. Columns were set further inside below an overhanging roof to mimic the hang-time that inspired the “Air Jordan” tag, while an elephant print used on some of his shoes was incorporated into the fritted-glass roof, casting the print across the floor when the sun shines through.

Customization goes all the way down to Air Jordan logos on the ice cubes, as PGA Tour pro Jimmy Walker shared to Instagram after a round at the course in March 2021.

Jimmy Walker shared an image of Jordan’s personalized ice cubes.jimmywalkerpga/Instagram

Like Weed, Reyes believes his job was made easier by an engaged client.

“He was involved with a lot of the decisions … we didn’t change a color without him knowing,” Reyes said.

“We have had work with other celebrity people and they won’t talk to you, it’s ‘I just want this’ and sort of like, ‘get out of the way.’ But he realized there was a lot of creativity going on and he wanted to be a part of it.”

“No other place I’d rather be”

Given Jordan’s regular on-site visits, there was no big reveal for the owner when the Grove XXIII officially opened in the fall of 2019, but there was a revelation when Weed joined him for his very first round.

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When play finished, the architect found himself wrapped in a 6-foot, 6-inch bear hug.

“He looked at me and said, ‘I’m fortunate enough I can be anywhere in the world, but there’s no other place I’d rather be than right here,’” Weed recalled.

“That’s like the ultimate compliment … to have his own golf course and to shape and mold that golf course for him and his friends, it’s just where he wants to be. It’s just a great spot and evolved into something fantastic.

“He’s going to enjoy it as long as he’s playing and then it’s going to get passed along to the next generation — it’s just one of the great things about golf and why it has sustained itself over centuries.”

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella (R) greets OpenAI CEO Sam Altman during the OpenAI DevDay event on November 06, 2023 in San Francisco, California. Altman delivered the keynote address at the first-ever Open AI DevDay conference.Justin Sullivan/Getty ImagesCNN — 

The leadership crisis that engulfed OpenAI for nearly a week ended almost as abruptly as it began: With a terse, cryptic announcement by the company that would have enormous ramifications for its future.

In some ways, the outcome was a return to the status quo: Sam Altman would be restored as CEO, with the company’s deep and lucrative business partnership with Microsoft, which took a $13 billion stake in the company even as it ramps up its own AI research efforts,  left intact.

But in other ways, the agreement is still a watershed moment for OpenAI and the artificial intelligence field writ large.

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The tumultuous week seems to have resulted in a big victory for Altman personally; proponents of widespread AI adoption; and some of the country’s most established elites. And it came at the expense of AI skeptics who, by many accounts, bungled an attempt to make a principled stand for caution about the technology’s long-term risks.

Who came out on top

Sam Altman A clear winner in the whole debacle is, of course, Altman himself. Unceremoniously ejected from his post on Friday, Altman quickly rallied support from the vast majority of OpenAI’s staff, who signed what was essentially a loyalty pledge underscoring the deep rift between himself and the board. His return to OpenAI, in triumph over the board that summarily fired him, reflects a kind of personal vindication that’s only likely to bolster, for better or for worse, his carefully and intentionally constructed image as a charismatic visionary who is single-handedly unlocking the secrets of the universe.

Microsoft Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has sought to downplay the tech giant’s part in the crisis, insisting on Monday — before Altman’s reappointment — that whatever happens with OpenAI, “nothing changes.” Microsoft’s priority, Nadella said, was to ensure uninterrupted delivery of AI technology to its own customers, whether that meant Altman being hired by Microsoft or his reinstallation at OpenAI.

But Microsoft is hardly a disinterested party, having committed billions to OpenAI in a multi-year partnership that’s led to the tech giant integrating ChatGPT into Bing search and other Microsoft products. Now, Microsoft is poised to gain even more influence. Nadella hinted at this reality on Monday, signaling that if Altman were to return as OpenAI’s CEO, Microsoft would have a very strong opinion on how the AI startup is governed.

“One thing I’ll be very, very clear [about] is, we’re never going to get back into a situation where we get surprised like this ever again,” Nadella said. “If we go back to operating like on Friday, we will make sure we are very, very clear that the governance gets fixed in a way that we really have more surety and guarantee that we don’t have surprises.”

Whether that could mean having a board observer or a full-fledged seat on OpenAI’s board, he said, is a bridge “we’ll cross… if it happens.”

New board members In naming ex-Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers to OpenAI’s board, the agreement stands to align the company even more closely with the country’s wealthiest and most influential elite.

Left: Bret Taylor; right: Larry Summers.Nathan Laine/Hollie Adams/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Taylor isn’t just a former CEO of one of the tech industry’s biggest companies. He’s a former chief technology officer of Facebook, and in 2022, as the chair of Twitter, successfully forced Elon Musk to follow through with his $44 billion acquisition of the social media company, in a momentous bit of corporate maneuvering.

Summers, meanwhile, is the former president of Harvard University who has attracted controversy for suggesting that “innate differences” are the reason for women’s underrepresentation in scientific professions. The remark was widely criticized as sexist and Summers subsequently apologized.

Who came out on bottom

The push to slow AI development In the same way that the deal breathes new life into Altman’s mythos, so does it give a tailwind to the ideology he represents: a belief in the rapid commercialization of generative AI. With some of the apparent architects of Altman’s ouster being pushed out themselves, a casualty of the affair may be the perspectives that those board members espoused. That seems to include a deep fear about the long-term, potentially even existential risks of AI.

In the letter signed by hundreds of OpenAI staffers threatening to quit, employees reported that board members claimed allowing the company to be destroyed “would be consistent with the mission” of OpenAI, which is to “ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.”

The OpenAI website on a laptop computer arranged https://darsalas.com in the Brooklyn borough of New York, US, on Thursday, Jan. 12, 2023.Gabby Jones/Bloomberg/Getty Images

That OpenAI’s board apparently believed the company’s destruction would benefit society reflects the concerns of a vocal camp in the AI field that has called for pauses in AI development, more research to “align” AI with human-centered values, and concerns about the unchecked power of a truly sentient super-intelligence. Emmett Shear, whom the board named OpenAI’s interim CEO for all of two days, has also expressed similar worries. In the fallout of the leadership crisis, some have argued that the outcome is also a defeat for effective altruism, the movement with which some OpenAI board members are said to be affiliated.

OpenAI does not appear to be on the brink of an all-out AI sprint that disregards risk entirely. Summers has been vocal about AI’s near-term impacts on labor. And after having wowed US lawmakers by calling for AI regulation, Altman will likely continue to be a prominent figure in the global debate over rules for artificial intelligence.

Still, deserved or not, the dispute appears to have done long-term damage to the credibility of certain deep skeptics of AI, and lifted the fortunes of the Microsofts and Altmans of the world who are pushing to get artificial intelligence into the hands of the public. And that may have untold ripple effects for AI development for years to come.

The orbits of the six planets revolving around a star called HD110067 create a geometric pattern due to their resonance.Thibaut Roger/NCCR PlanetS

Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more.CNN — 

Astronomers have used two different exoplanet-detecting satellites to solve a cosmic mystery and reveal a rare family of six planets located about 100 light-years from Earth. The discovery could help scientists unlock the secrets of planet formation.

The six exoplanets orbit a bright star similar to the sun named HD110067, which is located in the Coma Berenices constellation in the northern sky. Larger than Earth but smaller than Neptune, the planets are in a little-understood class called sub-Neptunes commonly found orbiting sunlike stars in the Milky Way. And the planets, labeled b through g, revolve around the star in a celestial dance known as orbital resonance.

There are discernible patterns as the planets complete their orbits and exert gravitational forces on one another, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal Nature. For every six orbits completed by planet b, the closest planet to the star, the outermost planet g completes one.

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As planet c makes three revolutions around the star, planet d does two, and when planet e completes four orbits, planet f does three.

This harmonic rhythm creates a resonant chain, with all six planets aligning every few orbits.

What makes this planetary family an unusual find is that little has changed since the system formed more than 1 billion years ago, and the revelation could shed light on the evolution of planets and the origin of prevalent sub-Neptunes in our home galaxy.

Detecting a mystery

Researchers first took notice of the star system in 2020 when NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS, detected dips in the brightness of HD110067. A dip in starlight often suggests the presence of a planet that’s passing between its host star and an observing satellite as the planet travels along its orbital path. Detecting these dips in luminosity, known as the transit method, is one of the main strategies used by scientists to identify exoplanets via ground and space-based telescopes.

Astronomers determined the orbital periods of two planets around the star from that 2020 data. Two years later, TESS observed the star again, and the evidence suggested different orbital periods for those planets.

When the data sets didn’t add up, astronomer and lead study author Rafael Luque and some of his colleagues decided to take another look at the star using a different satellite — the European Space Agency’s CHaracterising ExOPlanet Satellite, or Cheops. While TESS is used to observe fractions of the night sky for short observations, Cheops observes one star at a time.

This artist’s illustration shows Cheops in orbit around Earth as it searches for exoplanets.ESA/ATG medialab

“We went fishing for signals among all the potential periods that those planets could have,” said Luque, a postdoctoral scholar in the University of Chicago’s department of astronomy and astrophysics.

The data collected by Cheops helped the team solve the “detective story” started by TESS, he said. Cheops was able to determine the presence of a third planet in the system, which was crucial to confirming the orbital periods of the other two planets, as well as their rhythmic resonance.

As the team matched up the rest of the unexplained TESS data with the Cheops observations, they discovered the other three planets orbiting the star. Follow-up observations with ground-based telescopes confirmed the presence of the planets.

The dedicated time Cheops spent observing the star helped astronomers iron out the mixed signals from the TESS data to determine how many planets were crossing in front of the star and the resonance of their orbits.

“Cheops gave us this resonant configuration that allowed us to predict all the other periods. Without that detection from Cheops, it would have been impossible,” Luque said.

The closest planet takes just over nine Earth days to complete an orbit around the star, and the most distant takes about 55 days. All of the planets have quicker revolutions around their star than Mercury, which takes 88 days to complete one lap around the sun.

Given how close they are to HD110067, the planets likely have blistering average temperatures similar to Mercury and Venus, ranging between 332 degrees Fahrenheit and 980 degrees Fahrenheit (167 degrees Celsius and 527 degrees Celsius).

Why planetary rhythm matters

The formation of planetary systems, like our own solar system, can be a violent process. While astronomers believe that planets tend to initially form in resonance around stars, the gravitational influence of massive planets, a graze with a passing star or a collision with another celestial body can upset the harmonic balance.

Most planetary systems are not in resonance, and those with multiple planets that have preserved their initial rhythmic orbits are rare, which is why astronomers want to study HD110067 and its planets as a “rare fossil” in detail, Luque said.

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“We think only about one percent of all systems stay in resonance,” Luque said in a statement. “It shows us the pristine configuration of a planetary system that has survived untouched.”

The discovery is the second time Cheops has helped reveal a planetary system with orbital resonance. The first one, known as TOI-178, was announced in 2021.

“As our science team puts it: Cheops is making outstanding discoveries sound ordinary. Out of only three known six-planet resonant systems, this is now the second one found by Cheops, and in only three years of operations,” said Maximilian Günther, ESA Cheops project scientist, in a statement.

A perfect observation target

The system can also be used to study https://surinamecop.com how sub-Neptunes form, the study authors said.

While sub-Neptunes are common in the Milky Way galaxy, they don’t exist in our own solar system. And there is little agreement among astronomers about how these planets form and what they’re made of — so an entire system consisting of sub-Neptunes could help scientists determine more about their origin, Luque said.

Many exoplanets have been found orbiting dwarf stars that are much cooler and smaller than our sun, such as the famed TRAPPIST-1 system and its seven planets, announced in 2017. While the TRAPPIST-1 system also has a resonant chain, the faintness of the host star makes observations difficult.

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But HD110067, which has 80% the mass of our sun, is the brightest known star with more than four planets in orbit, so observing the system is much easier.

Initial detections of the mass of the planets suggest that some of them have puffy hydrogen-rich atmospheres, which makes them ideal targets of study for the James Webb Space Telescope. As starlight filters through the planets’ atmospheres, Webb can be used to determine the composition of each world.

“The sub-Neptune planets of the HD110067 system appear to have low masses, suggesting they may be gas- or water-rich. Future observations, for example with the James Webb Space Telescope, of these planetary atmospheres could determine whether the planets have rocky or water-rich interior structures,” said study coauthor Jo Ann Egger, doctoral student in astrophysics at the University of Bern in Switzerland, in a statement.

There was a nautical theme at Pharrell Williams‘ second Louis Vuitton fashion show, this time presented in Hong Kong.Louise Delmotte/APHong KongCNN — 

Louis Vuitton’s creative director for menswear Pharrell Williams signaled the label’s ambitions in Asia on Thursday evening, staging a playful show under the lights of Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour.

The American musician and designer, who in June shut down Paris’ Pont Neuf bridge to showcase his debut collection for the label, continued his high-profile tenure at the brand by unveiling its latest looks against one of the world’s most iconic skylines.

The event saw models walking an outdoor runway at the Avenue of Stars — Hong Kong’s answer to the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Cantopop singer Anson Lo, Chinese boy band TNT and South Korean actor Song Joong-ki were among the celebrities in attendance.

Drones took to the air to spell out the brand’s LVERS logo as models walked the catwalk.Shutterstock

The show was themed on travel, everywhere from “Hawaii to Hong Kong,” said Williams. Speaking to CNN just hours before, he described the collection as having “a very hyper focus on dandy” — expressed through its “sailor side” and “resort side,” he added.

In a nod to what the brand described as the city’s seafaring history, the runway’s maritime theme saw musicians in sailor hats strumming ukuleles and a catwalk covered in sand and digital displays screening lapping waves.

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Models — who included members of Hawaii’s surf communities — swept along the harborfront in striped suits, sailing jackets, fisherman-style sandals and tropical floral prints, with Williams’ relaxed silhouettes and embellishments giving some outfits the feel of elevated beachwear. Many of the looks were completed with naval accessories, like raffia bucket hats and a Louis Vuitton Keepall 25 bag hand-embrodiered with seashells.

Musician Ma Siwei and actor Dylan Wang at the Louis Vuitton Men’s fashion show in Hong Kong, China.Billy H.C. Kwok/Getty Images

The sky then filled with dozens of drones, taking on forms including the brand’s LVERS logo — a combination of the classic LV monogram with the word lovers, a philosophy at the heart of Williams’ practice, according to the show notes — before he emerged to take a bow.

“It’s a luxury house, but this luxury house was founded on the traveler — the world traveler,” he told CNN. “And here it’s landed us in Hong Kong.”

The French label appointed Williams in February following the death of his predecessor, Virgil Abloh. As well as putting on a spectacular show at Paris Men’s Fashion Week, complete with an orchestra and gospel choir, Williams has already reimagined some of the brand’s classics — such as a version of its Speedy bag in crocodile leather, a design only available to select customers and priced at $1 million (giving the bag its nickname, the “Millionaire Speedy”).

Williams has a growing reputation for successfully reimagining the Vuitton classics.Louise Delmotte/AP

When asked to reflect on the pressures accompanying one of fashion’s top jobs, Williams told CNN, “Oh the pleasure is amazing. You said pressure, I said pleasure. What’s hard about pleasure?”

Allure of the city

Thursday’s event marked Louis Vuitton’s first ever pre-fall menswear show. And while pre-fall collections are not considered as prestigious as labels’ Spring-Summer or Fall-Winter lines, the move nonetheless demonstrated the importance of Hong Kong — and Asia at large — to the French fashion house’s expansion plans.

Louis Vuitton opened its first boutique in Hong Kong in 1979. The city’s residents now spend more on luxury goods, per capita, than anywhere else in the world, according to market research firm Euromonitor. It has also traditionally been a popular destination for the wider region’s luxury shoppers, thanks to the absence of sales tax in the territory.

A Louis Vuitton-branded junkboat sailed through Victoria Harbour as part of the show. The brand opened their first store in the city in 1979.Billy H.C. Kwok/Getty Images

Earlier this week, Dior, which is owned by Louis Vuitton’s parent company LVMH, announced that it too will unveil its men’s pre-fall collection in Hong Kong, at a undisclosed venue, early next year.

This can also be considered something of a coup for Hong Kong, which is working to restore its international reputation as a go-to destination following years of some of the world’s strictest Covid-19 travel restrictions and the introduction of a controversial National Security Law that critics say threaten political freedoms and civil liberties.

Recent months have seen officials attempt to lure tourists back to the city with its “Hello Hong Kong” campaign, which included a giveaway of 500,000 free airline tickets. In a brief statement published Tuesday, the Hong Kong Tourism Board described the Louis Vuitton event as “making fashion history.”

Creative director Pharrell Williams https://clasicccop.com/ on the Avenue of Stars promenade. The event marked Louis Vuitton’s first ever fashion show in Hong Kong.Lam Yik/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Organized alongside K11 Group, which operates a mall beside the Avenue of Stars and the area’s wider art and design district Victoria Dockside, the runway was also livestreamed around Hong Kong via digital billboards.

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The show also marked a continuation of Louis Vuitton’s attempts to court lucrative Asian markets. Although LVMH does not disclose the performance of individual brands, the French conglomerate’s rebound in profits was partly fueled by resumed Chinese spending after China’s post-Covid reopening.

In 2020, during the height of pandemic, the label’s menswear division eschewed a digital edition of Paris Men’s Fashion Week to instead debut its newest collection in mainland China. Then under Abloh’s leadership, the brand showed formal garments, animal-themed streetwear and bright block colors on the banks of the Huangpu River in Shanghai.

Models walked the runway to the soundtrack featuring a Ukulele version of a song by Williams titled “Airplane Tickets.”Louise Delmotte/AP

Louis Vuitton’s womenswear division, meanwhile, hosted its first major show in South Korea this past April, when it transformed Seoul’s Jamsugyo Bridge into a striking runway.

But beyond the region’s strategic importance, the choice of Hong Kong was, for Williams, personal. The 50-year-old said he had felt “incredibly supported” by the city in the past, and has held a number of collaborations and events there in recent years, including a private sale launched by his digital auction platform Joopiter and jeweler Lorraine Schwartz back in March. “I definitely knew I wanted Hong Kong to be my second stop after Paris,” he said of his Louis Vuitton show schedule.

The show was also livestreamed around the city via digital billboards.Lam Yik/Bloomberg/Getty Images

And after years living with the pandemic, the Asian city feels like it’s “back in the business,” Williams added.

“The slingshot is pulled back as far as it can go, and (it’s) about to let go… from a deep serious ebbing into a very serious energic flow,” he said. “You’re going to see it across business and all the different sectors, from fashion all the way to finance.

“I think it’s very serendipitous that we get to come here right when things are just about to transform.”

Underwater art: Dreamed up by British sculptor and ecologist Jason deCaires Taylor in 2006, the Molinere Bay Underwater Sculpture Park in Grenada has just gotten bigger.Jason deCaires Taylor/underwatersculpture.com

Pictures: New carnival exhbition at Grenada’s underwater sculpture park

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The world’s first underwater sculpture park has just gotten a lot bigger.

Created by British sculptor and ecologist Jason deCaires Taylor in 2006, the Molinere Bay Underwater Sculpture Park in Grenada is now one of the Caribbean country’s most popular underwater attractions.

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The captivating installation recently expanded significantly, with 31 new sculptures added to the site, situated in a marine protected area off the west coast of the island.

Among the new additions is “Coral Carnival,” a sculpture series based on Spicemas, Grenada’s hugely popular carnival that showcases iconic masqueraders such as the “Jab Jab,” a character with chains who is a symbol of freedom for Grenadians.

Underwater attraction

The Molinere Bay Underwater Sculpture Park in Grenada has expanded, with the addition of 31 new sculptures.Jason deCaires Taylor/underwatersculpture.com

Commissioned by the Grenadian Ministry of Implementation and Tourism, the project aims to showcase Grenada’s culture and history.

“The carnival is obviously a very, very strong part of Grenada’s culture and history, so they wanted to tell that story,” deCaires Taylor tells CNN Travel.

“It’s been quite interesting learning about all the different masqueraders and the history behind them.”

Each of the sculptures, which were partly constructed in the UK, are based on real life people, who posed as models for the artists.

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The majority of the new pieces were created by deCaires Taylor, who worked in collaboration with various local artists to make sure that they “were representative of the characters.”

Meanwhile, Grenadian artist Troy Lewis created four of the new sculptures, including the Christ of the Deep, a replica of the statue given to the Grenadian people in recognition of the help provided to the crew and passengers of the ‘Bianca C,’ which sank on the island in 1961.

Natural transformation

“Coral Carnival,” a sculpture series based on Grenada’s annual carnival, is among the new works on display at the site off the west coast of Grenada.Jason deCaires Taylor/underwatersculpture.com

Made with high-grade stainless steel and pH-neutral marine cement, the sculptures are designed to act as artificial coral reefs, with holes and shelters to attract marine life such as octopuses and lobsters, creating a rather spectacular looking habitat.

According to deCaires Taylor, marine life had already made itself at home within the sculptures days after they were installed.

“There was an octopus that moved into the base of one of them, which is really nice to see,” he says, before going on to describe how a family of crabs had also moved into the base of one of the sculptures, while a stingray could be found in another.

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“What’s quite interesting about these characters is the silhouettes are really, really strong,” he adds.

“They’re so unique that the silhouettes are quite striking from a distance. I haven’t seen that before.”

This also marks the first time deCaires Taylor has introduced color into his underwater sculptures.

“Normally, they’re very gray,” he notes. “This time we used natural pigments to actually paint the sculptures.

“So I’m quite interested to see how those change and whether they’ll be colonized in any different way. Marine life is very influenced by color.”

Aquatic installations

Four of the new sculptures are the work of Grenadian artist Troy Lewis.Jason deCaires Taylor/underwatersculpture.com

The exhibition was first displayed on dry land at Grenada’s Prickly Bay Marina for four weeks earlier this year – a first for deCaires Taylor, whose sculptures normally only show underwater. Visitors included Dickon Mitchell, the country’s prime minister.

“It’s something that I haven’t done in the past, and it wasn’t planned to be fair,” deCaires Taylor admits, explaining that it came about because the deployment company wasn’t available for a while.

“But actually, I think it’s quite a good idea to make it more accessible before it [the exhibition] goes in. I might start factoring it into all future works as sort of a longer public exhibit.”

The sculptures were painstakingly installed underwater in late October with the help of a crane, as well as some divers.

According to deCaires Taylor, the crane capacity is lower on the island than some of the other destinations he’s worked in, so the process of fitting the sculptures took longer.

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“I spent eight hours underwater the other day, which is a bit of a record for me,” he recalls.

Coral Carnival, which is accessible via boat, has been open to the public since late October.

The new sculptures are installed at depths of between three to seven meters, and can be viewed by both divers and snorkelers, as well as those on glass bottom boats, provided visibility is good

The underwater sculpture park was originally dreamed up both as a conservation effort to help renew the marine life damaged by Hurricane Ivan in 2004, and a means to ease pressure on some of the more congested underwater areas on the island.

“I’d had this idea of creating something underwater for a long time,” deCaires Taylor says. “I just thought it would be such an interesting place to do something, and maybe it would draw tourists away from the other sites. And it would also sort of become a platform for marine life.”

“It’s been one of my favorite projects,” he admits. “And actually, some of the marine life that colonizes these sculptures is some of the best I’ve seen in all the different regions.

While deCaires Taylor went on to launch several underwater galleries, including the Museum of Underwater Art in Australia and the Museum of Underwater Sculpture Ayia Napa in Cyprus, the Molinere Bay Underwater Sculpture Park has remained hugely special to him.

Promoting ocean conservation

The sculptures are made https://masurip.org/ of high-grade stainless steel and pH-neutral marine cement.Jason deCaires Taylor/underwatersculpture.com

“That was what got me excited in the first place, seeing how they colonized and the artistry of nature really, supplanting what the human hand can do.”

DeCaires Taylor’s projects are largely centered around promoting ocean conservation, and he admits to being stunned by the changes to the sculptures, particularly in recent months.

“This year has been one of the hottest that’s ever been in Grenada and the sea is really suffering,” he explains.

“So there’s huge bleaching on some of the reefs. And it’s the first time I’ve seen bleaching on sculptures as well. So it’s exciting [to witness the colonization], but it’s also quite sad seeing what’s going on.”

He’s currently in talks to create a smaller park in Carriacou, Grenada’s sister island, with the focus on these particular issues once again.

“I’m very concerned about rising seas, especially on some of these small island nations. So I certainly want to talk about that.

“How sea temperatures are changing, and how fragile some of these places are.”

While deCaires Taylor is currently working on further projects in the UK, he’s already looking forward to returning to Molinere Bay to witness nature taking over this human creation further in the coming years.

“The one thing that’s slightly different with these particular pieces is there are loads of sort of elevations,” he says. “Horns, feathers and areas that kind of go up into the water columns. “

“So I’m really excited to come back in a couple of years time. Because I think there will be lots of filter feeding in sponges and corals, which should attach to them. So that will be good.”

The logo of the social media platform TikTok is displayed on a mobile phone in Hanoi on October 6, 2023. (Photo by Nhac NGUYEN / AFP) (Photo by NHAC NGUYEN/AFP via Getty Images)Nhac Nguyen/AFP/Getty ImagesCNN — 

A judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by the state of Indiana against TikTok accusing the company of making false claims about the safety of user data and age-appropriate content.

Judge Jennifer DeGroote of Allen County Superior Court in Fort Wayne, Indiana, said the court “lacks personal jurisdiction” over TikTok and that downloading an app at no cost does not constitute a “consumer transaction” under the Indiana Deceptive Consumer Sales Act, according to court documents. The ruling was first reported by the Associated Press.

The lawsuit, which was filed in December 2022 originally as two lawsuits and later consolidated, was the first serious action taken by a state against the social media platform. Similar lawsuits now remain active in other states including Arkansas and Utah.

The office of Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita told CNN in a statement the state respects the ruling but “we also disagree with it on various points and are considering appellate options at this time.”

“We were the first state to file suit against TikTok, but not the last, and it’s reassuring to see others take up this ongoing fight against a foreign Big Tech threat, in any jurisdiction,” the statement said.

At the time of the filing, Rokita called TikTok a “malicious and menacing threat unleashed on unsuspecting Indiana consumers by a Chinese company that knows full well the harms it inflicts on users.”

TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The lawsuit alleged TikTok attracts young people to its platform under the pretense that it’s safe yet still exposes them to inappropriate content including drug and alcohol use, nudity and profanity. It also claimed the company collects sensitive data and personal information about consumers in Indiana and that the company, owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance, “has deceived those consumers to believe that this information is protected from the Chinese government and Communist Party.”

Last month, Indiana joined dozens of states in a lawsuit against Instagram-parent Meta over concerns that its features are addictive and can harm young users’ mental health.

The heightened attention around these issues follows the 2021 https://sayurkana.com release of tens of thousands of internal company documents by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen that revealed the company knew its products could have negative impacts on young people’s mental health.

Indiana was also one of the first states that ordered TikTok to be banned on government-issued devices, citing the threat of “gaining access to critical U.S. information and infrastructure.”

– CNN’s Clare Duffy contributed to this report