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    Boot Found at Everest Could Be From Sandy Irvine, Who Vanished 100 Years Ago

    When Sandy Irvine went on a pioneering expedition to Mount Everest’s summit in 1924, he and his partner vanished. The recent discovery may shed light on the ill-fated adventure.A well-preserved boot found by a group of climbers on Mount Everest could be a clue to solving one of the most enduring adventure mysteries in the history of exploration of the world’s highest peak.The climbers who made the discovery in late September have reason to believe that it could contain some of the remains of Andrew Comyn Irvine, 22, whose ascent with an expert climber in an attempt to be the first to reach the summit in 1924 led to their disappearance.The recent explorers, from a National Geographic film crew, were on a glacier below the north face of Everest when they spotted a brown leather boot sticking out of the ice.Looking closer, they noticed a sock with a patch sewed to it that spelled “A.C. Irvine” in stitched red letters.“We just kind of walked around, like for a few minutes, being like, ‘Are you kidding me?’” Jimmy Chin, a mountaineer and filmmaker, said of the find. “We just stumbled upon one of the great discoveries of our time.”In April 1924, Mr. Irvine, a talented engineer but inexperienced climber from Birkenhead, England, who was better known as Sandy, joined George Mallory, a British mountaineer renowned for having reached 27,000 feet above sea level on Mount Everest in 1922.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Pinnacle Man’ Found Frozen Near Appalachian Trail Is Identified

    The man, Nicholas Paul Grubb, was found frozen near the Appalachian Trail in Pennsylvania in 1977. His identity remained a mystery until a state trooper found his fingerprints.For 47 years, he’s been known as the Pinnacle Man.On a brutally cold winter’s day on Jan. 16, 1977, two hikers found a man’s frozen body in a cave below the Pinnacle, a scenic viewpoint off the Appalachian Trail in Albany Township in eastern Pennsylvania, about 75 miles northwest of Philadelphia.The authorities performed an autopsy, took the victim’s fingerprints and determined that he was a male between 25 and 35 years old, with blue eyes and reddish curly long hair.There were no signs of foul play, and the authorities determined the death was suicide from a drug overdose.When no one came forward to claim him, the Pinnacle Man was buried in a potter’s field.At some point, the original fingerprints taken during the autopsy went missing, and the copies of those prints were too poor in quality to use for identification, the authorities said.More than four decades later, the man now has a name: Nicholas Paul Grubb, who was 27 and from Fort Washington, Pa.At a news conference last week, officials with the Berks County Coroner’s Office explained that a Pennsylvania state trooper tracked down the missing fingerprints to help identify Mr. Grubb.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    A Man Missing for 10 Days in a California Forest Is Found Alive

    Lukas McClish said he lost 30 pounds in 10 days but was rescued without any major injuries.On the morning of June 11, Lukas McClish stopped by the home of a friend who told him about a granite outcropping in the nearby woods that piqued his interest, so Mr. McClish set out on his own, shirtless, to explore the scenery.Mr. McClish, 34, of Boulder Creek, Calif., would not be seen or heard from for nine nights and 10 days. His disappearance into California’s Big Basin Redwoods State Park would prompt a search that involved about 300 people, emergency personnel from several agencies and ended with help from a dog.Mr. McClish, a hiker who does landscaping in forests that have been razed by wildfires, appeared to have been swallowed by the woods.“I was just so astounded by being lost,” he said in a telephone interview.The area where Mr. McClish was lost had been hard-hit by the C.Z.U. Lightning Complex fire in 2020 and “looks completely different from all of the other terrain,” he said.“That’s one thing that I didn’t take into consideration — when the fire comes through like that and decimates it, it turns into the desert, and you’re unable to find your bearings,” he said.Typical markers to gain a sense of direction, like deer trails or hiking paths, were gone. But Mr. McClish, an experienced backpacker who has traversed other rugged regions of the United States, took it as an opportunity to explore a part of his backyard that he was unfamiliar with.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Search Underway in Greece for British TV Doctor Michael Mosley

    Mr. Mosely, a popular science journalist, disappeared while on a walk on the Greek island of Symi. He was last seen at a bus stop on Wednesday afternoon.Greek authorities on Thursday said they were searching for Michael Mosley, a prominent British journalist and television presenter who had gone missing a day earlier while on a walk on the island of Symi.Mr. Mosley, 67, was reported missing by his wife, Clare Bailey, on Wednesday afternoon, according to Constantina Dimoglidou, a spokeswoman for the Greek police. The couple had arrived in Symi on Tuesday, planning to stay for a week.“We’re looking everywhere for him,” Ms. Dimoglidou said, adding that the local fire service and volunteers were involved in the search. The Greek fire service on Thursday said a team of six firefighters was looking for a missing foreign national on Symi, part of the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea, and said drones had been sent from the nearby island of Rhodes.Mr. Mosley told friends on Wednesday afternoon that he was going to walk about two miles from the Agios Nikolaos area back to the main town of Symi, where the couple was staying, according to Ms. Dimoglidou. He was last seen by a witness at a bus stop in Pedi, about halfway between the two locations, and did not have his cellphone on him when he disappeared, she said.It was possible, she said, that Mr. Mosley had become dizzy from the heat. Temperatures in Symi have hovered around 95 degrees Fahrenheit this week, and the weather authorities in Greece had urged vigilance over the risk of high heat.“It’s rugged terrain with high spots, so it’s possible that he fell,” Ms. Dimoglidou said. His disappearance also spurred a call for information in a local Facebook group, in which a post said that Mr. Mosley had set off at around 1:30 p.m. and never appeared at his accommodation.Mr. Mosley trained as a doctor before becoming a documentary maker and a science journalist who dispensed advice on diet, fasting and other health habits. He became famous for his myth-busting work on diet and is widely known as a proponent of intermittent fasting, writing several books on the subject. A longtime producer and presenter for the BBC, he is the host of the broadcaster’s “Just One Thing” health podcast, and was nominated in 2002 for an Emmy on “The Human Face,” a series examining the science behind beauty. More recently, he released two series with the British Channel 4 broadcaster investigating obesity in Britain and the nutrition behind the grocery shopping of everyday consumers. More

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    3 Bodies in Mexico Are Identified as Missing Australians and American

    Family members confirmed the identities of two Australian brothers and their American friend, who were found shot to death after going missing last month.Three bodies that were found in the Mexican state of Baja California last week have been identified as those of three tourists from Australia and the United States who had disappeared days earlier, the Mexican authorities said on Sunday.The bodies were confirmed to be those of Callum and Jake Robinson, two brothers from Perth, Australia, and Jack Carter Rhoad of San Diego, the Baja California attorney general’s office said in a statement. “The confirmation comes after the victims’ families were able to identify them, without the need for genetic testing,” the statement read.The Robinsons and Mr. Rhoad had been on vacation, surfing and camping along the coast near the Mexican city of Ensenada, when they disappeared on April 27. The Robinsons’ mother said in a social media post on Wednesday that they had never showed up at an Airbnb they had booked in another coastal town.Early on Friday, the Mexican authorities recovered the three bodies from a 50-foot-deep water hole near La Bocana beach. A fourth, yet unidentified male body, which prosecutors said had no relation to the case, was also found at the bottom of the hole.Each of the bodies later identified as those of the tourists had a gunshot wound to the head, said María Elena Andrade Ramírez, the state’s attorney general.Three suspects have been detained in connection with the killings. One has been charged with forced disappearance. Ms. Andrade Ramírez said he tried to rob the Robinson brothers and Mr. Carter of the pickup truck in which they were traveling. When they resisted, she said, he shot them and later disposed of their bodies. “Unfortunately, they stayed in an inhospitable place where there was no way to call for help,” Ms. Andrade Ramírez said at a news conference on Sunday.The other two people being detained have been charged with possession of methamphetamine, Ms. Andrade Ramírez said. She said that there might be more arrests, but that there was no indication that any of Mexico’s organized crime gangs had been involved in the killings. “The hypothesis so far is that they approached with the intent to seize the pickup truck and attacked the victims,” she said.Ms. Andrade Ramírez said a burned campsite had been discovered in a remote, isolated area south of Ensenada, about four miles from where the bodies were found. A single shell casing and blood stains were found at the site, and the tourists’ pickup truck, also burned, had been abandoned nearby, Ms. Andrade Ramírez said. More

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    3 People Found Dead in Baja California

    Mexican authorities recovered three bodies as a search went on for two Australian tourists and a U.S. citizen who disappeared while on vacation.A dayslong search for three missing tourists who disappeared near a surfing town close to the U.S.-Mexico border continued on Friday as the authorities said that they had located three bodies.Two Australian brothers and their friend, a U.S. citizen, had been on vacation surfing and camping along the coast near the Mexican city of Ensenada when they disappeared on Saturday.The state’s attorney general, María Elena Andrade Ramírez, said in a news conference on Thursday that prosecutors were investigating three people related to the case but that crucial time had passed since the disappearance of the three men.“Unfortunately, it wasn’t until the last few days that they were reported missing,” Ms. Andrade Ramírez told reporters. “So, that meant that important hours or time was lost.” A U.S. State Department spokesperson said on Friday that the authorities were aware of reports of a U.S. citizen missing in Baja California but declined to provide further details.Kira Boyd, a public affairs officer for the F.B.I.’s San Diego Field Office, confirmed in an email that three people were found dead near the town of Santo Tomás but did not specify whether they were the missing tourists.“We are assessing every tip,” Ms. Boyd said. “If credible, we will pursue those leads with rigor.”In 2022, 192 American citizens died in Mexico, State Department figures show, but most of those deaths were accidents or suicides. Only 46 were ruled as homicides.The big waves in Baja California have long attracted throngs of surfers and travelers, many of whom have dealt with rising crime rates for nearly two decades.But record levels of violence have hit the state in recent years. Government data shows that Baja California currently holds first place in vehicle theft and second place in homicides, most of which are related to drug dealing or organized crime, Mexico’s secretary of defense, Luis Cresencio Sandoval, said this year.An official familiar with the investigation who was not authorized to speak publicly said a white pickup truck that the missing tourists had been traveling in was found charred near La Bocana beach in Santo Tomás. Other belongings and pieces of evidence were also being analyzed, the official added.The swift effort to find the tourists was a rare exception in a country where nearly 100,000 people remain missing, according to the latest count provided by Mexican officials in March.A majority of cases remain unsolved. Family members and volunteers are left on their own to follow up on leads, but the presence of cartels and a lack of support from the authorities make searching a dangerous mission. More

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    Dozens of Children Kidnapped in Nigeria Are Released, Officials Say

    The military of the West African nation, which is plagued by kidnappings largely driven by demands for ransom payments, said 137 children had been freed in the country’s north.Dozens of Nigerian schoolchildren who were kidnapped this month have been released, officials said on Sunday. The Nigerian military said that 137 children had been freed by security forces in the northwest of the country.The children were abducted on March 7 from their school in Kuriga, a small town in the state of Kaduna, the latest in a long series of kidnappings that have plagued Africa’s most populous nation. The exact number of children taken from Kuriga remains murky.The state’s governor, Uba Sani, announced the return of the children, but he did not provide additional information on the circumstances of the abduction or of their release.Nigeria’s military said in a statement that 76 girls and 61 boys had been freed in the northern state of Zamfara, and were being taken back to Kaduna. The military did not confirm the total number of children abducted on March 7, or provide further details about the operation.Residents had told the local news media that armed men kidnapped the students just after they had finished their morning assembly and taken them into a nearby forest.The episode evoked memories of the 2014 abduction of 276 schoolgirls in the town of Chibok by Boko Haram, an Islamist armed group, which shocked the nation and prompted outrage abroad. Many of the girls were released, reportedly in exchange for ransoms, but 98 of them are still missing, according to Amnesty International.On Sunday, Nigeria’s president, Bola Tinubu, thanked the military for securing the children’s release and said that his administration was trying to ensure “that our schools remain safe sanctuaries of learning, not lairs for wanton abductions.”Days before the children were abducted, about 200 people were kidnapped in Nigeria’s Borno state, officials said. The state is at the center of the Boko Haram insurgency. The victims, who had ventured into the countryside to collect firewood when they were abducted, have not been returned yet.More than 3,600 people were reported kidnapped in Nigeria last year — the highest number in five years, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project. But the figure could be higher given that many abductions are not reported.The kidnappings are mainly driven by a quest for ransom payments, according to the Nigerian analysis firm SBM Intelligence, which can be paid in cash but also in food or medicine. They are a feature of all of the conflicts ravaging the West African nation, including Islamist insurgencies, separatists movements and piracy, SBM Intelligence said.“The scourge of banditry, kidnapping and other forms of insecurities must be decisively tackled to restore peace and stability to our beloved nation,” the Alumni Association of the National Institute, part of a Nigerian research center, said in a statement on Sunday. More

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    In Russia, Knowing That Her Son Is Dead, and Waiting for Him Anyway

    She watched, distressed, as Aleksei was sent off to war. Now, 14 months after he died in eastern Ukraine, Yulia Seleznyova holds a sliver of hope for a miracle.When Yulia Seleznyova walks around her home city in Russia, she scrutinizes everyone passing by in the hope that she will lock eyes with her son Aleksei.She last heard from him on New Year’s Eve 2022, when he sent holiday greetings from the school in eastern Ukraine that his unit of recently mobilized soldiers was using as a headquartersThe Ukrainian military hit the school with U.S.-supplied HIMARS rockets on New Year’s Day. Russian authorities acknowledged dozens of deaths, though pro-Russian military bloggers and Ukrainian authorities estimated that the real number was in the hundreds.Aleksei was not recognized in the official death toll because not a single fragment of his body was identified in the rubble after the strike. Ms. Seleznyova was left with nothing to bury, and, she says, no closure. But it has also left a small shred of hope for a miracle.“I still go around town sometimes, with my eyes wide open, thinking maybe he’s sitting somewhere, but he doesn’t remember us, but maybe we’re there in his subconscious mind,” Ms. Seleznyova said in an interview late last year in her one-room apartment in Tolyatti, an industrial city on the Volga River that is home to Russia’s largest car manufacturer.“Sometimes I think maybe he lost his memory and even got married somewhere in Ukraine, but he doesn’t remember us,” she said. “That he’s just shellshocked.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More