Indie rockers The Charlatans are to play a one-off gig on a tiny fort in the middle of the sea as a festival warm-up.
Tim Burgess and Mark Collins will perform on privately owned Spitbank Fort, about one mile from the coast of Portsmouth. The show is a warm-up for the Isle of Wight Festival and to celebrate 15 years since The Charlatans released their Tellin’ Stories album. The gig on June 21 is organised by Absolute Radio which will broadcast the event and interviews with the band.
Spitbank Fort took 11 years to build and was completed in 1878. It was one of three forts built in The Solent – the water between the mainland and the island – to repel a possible invasion by Napoleon in revenge for defeat at Waterloo.
The fort, which can only be reached by boat, is now a luxury venue featuring Champagne bars, a roof-top hot tub and sauna.
Fiat offers cut-price fuel
Italian vehicle company Fiat offered new car buyers yesterday the chance to purchase fuel at one euro a litre for up to three years. The offer, running through June and July, only applies to Fiat cars bought in Italy, and does not apply to other brands owned by the group.
Under the deal, buyers are to receive a smart card enabling them to buy a quantity of petrol or diesel at the cut price, depending on the model purchased.
The transport ministry said new car sales have dropped by 14.26 per cent, a reflection of the recession that has gripped the third-biggest eurozone economy.
Sheep rain down on cars
Sheep plunged onto cars on a busy Australian highway after a truck carrying 400 livestock crashed while crossing an overpass, spilling its cargo into the path of terrified motorists below.
The dramatic accident, late on Thursday near Melbourne, saw dead and injured sheep fall onto at least two moving cars and into the paths of others. Police said one of the vehicles rolled numerous times but the occupants were not injured.
“A number of sheep have fallen to the road below, hitting two vehicles,” police said in a statement.
Snake bite kills preacher in Virgina
A US preacher who handled snakes for years to prove faith in God has died of what witnesses say was a rattlesnake bite.
Mark Randall “Mack” Wolford was a pastor at Apostolic House of the Lord Jesus in West Virginia.
A photographer and a relative told media he was bitten during a service at Panther State Forest.
He died in hospital. Funeral home officials said his family had asked that the cause of death be withheld.
Butterfly numbers ‘fall by a fifth’
Butterfly numbers fell by more than a fifth across the UK countryside last year, a study has revealed.
The 22 per cent drop in butterflies in 2011 is thought to be the result of an unusually cold summer and the ongoing deterioration of suitable habitat for the insects.
The “wider countryside butterfly survey” involves counting butterflies in more than 700 random one kilometre squares across the UK landscape. The results are a 22 per cent decrease on the 2010 figures and 41 per cent down on 2009.
The survey is run by Butterfly Conservation, the British Trust for Ornithology and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology as part of the UK butterfly monitoring scheme.