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First look inside tech oligarch Mark Zuckerberg’s remote Irish castle: The jaw-dropping feature that wouldn’t look out of place in a JAMES BOND villain’s lair – and the sinister ‘murder hole’ that forms part of its dark past…
Tech billionaire Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, have completed the purchase of Strancally Castle, a gothic 19th-century estate near Knockanore in Co. Waterford, Ireland. The Meta CEO, reportedly the world’s seventh-richest person, is understood to have paid between €20 million and €30 million for the 200-year-old castle and its 440-acre grounds, which include…
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Volkswagen workers boo chief executive over restructuring plans
Volkswagen’s chief executive, Oliver Blume, was booed by more than 10,000 workers at the company’s Wolfsburg headquarters after urging staff to “pull together” amid plans for a sweeping restructuring that could involve widespread job losses and factory closures. The confrontation, his first public appearance since details of the cuts emerged, underscores the depth of anger…
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John Irvin obituary
John Irvin, the British film-maker best known for directing the BBC’s acclaimed adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, has died aged 86. His career spanned an eclectic range of genres and collaborators, from war reportage and cold war espionage to Hollywood horror and action films, working with figures as varied as Harold Pinter and Arnold…
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Pacific Fusion’s next fusion machine could clear a key hurdle to commercial power
Pacific Fusion has broken ground on a demonstration facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico, aiming to become the first US project to achieve “net facility gain” — generating as much energy as the whole plant consumes, rather than just the fusion reaction itself. The milestone, targeted for 2030, would mark a significant step towards commercial fusion…
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Jill Gomez obituary
Jill Gomez, the soprano celebrated for her lustrous voice and vivid stage presence, has died aged 83. She rose to prominence in the early 1970s and became a fixture at Glyndebourne, Covent Garden and English National Opera, praised for performances including the Governess in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw and Anne Trulove in Stravinsky’s…
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CIA chief in Moscow for unannounced talks, US media reports
The director of the US Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, has travelled to Moscow for unannounced talks, according to reporting by the BBC’s US partner CBS. Neither Washington nor Moscow has confirmed who he met or what the visit concerned, but face-to-face meetings between senior American and Russian officials remain rare, making the trip notable…
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Couple are mercilessly rammed down by speeding G-Wagon stolen by four teens who led police on hours-long chase, cops say
A married couple were killed in New Jersey after a Mercedes G-Wagon, allegedly stolen and driven by four teenagers fleeing police, crossed the centre line and smashed head-on into their car. Alice Stilwell, 67, and Robert Barr Jr, 54, died in the crash near Mays Landing, roughly 18 miles from Atlantic City, in a case…
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Woke Boston mayor goes on fever-pitched hunt to track down and threaten business owners renting parking spots to ICE agents in her city: ‘This is unhinged’
Boston Mayor Michelle Wu has clashed publicly with the US Department of Homeland Security after urging local business owners not to rent parking spaces to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The row began after a federal procurement notice showed ICE seeking 249 consecutive parking spaces in the city’s central business district, prompting Wu to write…
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Hugo Weaving stars in bingeable airport chaplain drama
Netflix’s new eight-part series The Airport Chaplain stars Hugo Weaving as Tobias Wallace, a real-life-inspired airport chaplain who inserts himself into virtually every crisis at his airport, from lost luggage to domestic violence and grief counselling. Reviewer Michael Sun praises the pacy, “moreish” show, co-created by Elise McCredie and Jude Troy, for being thoroughly bingeable,…