The BBC was given another reminder of the strength of support behind Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson when a million-strong petition calling for his reinstatement was delivered to its headquarters – by tank.
The vehicle, apparently driven by the motoring show’s enigmatic professional driver, The Stig, made its way from Westminster, through central London and towards New Broadcasting House near Oxford Street.
Long-running Top Gear host Clarkson has been suspended since it emerged he was involved in what the corporation called “a fracas’’ with one of the show’s producers. A petition, organised by political blog Guido Fawkes, has attracted nearly one million signatures calling for Clarkson’s reinstatement since its launch a week ago.
Have a break – thieving worker did
A thieving worker would have a break and a KitKat – before stealing small bundles of cash he hid inside the empty chocolate wrappers.
CCTV caught Peter Mills, 68, hiding £50 notes in empty KitKat wrappers up to three times a day at the cash handling depot where he worked. Police said Mills would then conceal the KitKat wrappers on his body and had smuggled out more than £20,000 from Vaultex Limited in Tonbridge, Kent.
Mills, of Burma Way, Chatham, pleaded guilty to four counts of theft, amounting to a total of £20,350, and was jailed for 21 months at Maidstone Crown Court.
Sanskrit versions of rock classics
Indian music lovers are revelling in a Sanskrit language version of Eric Clapton’s old favourite, Layla.
Over the last few days, Indian music users have shared Krish Ashok’s adaptation of Layla, called Leela, on various social media sites, NDTV news website reports.
Ashok, who calls himself an “amateur multi-instrumentalist” mixing the “ridiculous and sublime”, posted Leela on his Soundcloud page, where it clocked nearly 15,000 plays within seven days. He’s also recorded a Sanskrit cover of Black Sabbath’s Iron Man.
Toddler’s rescue an ‘act of God’
A toddler who fell into an icy creek was brought back to life after an hour and 41 minutes of CPR.
Gardell Martin was playing with his two brothers when he fell into the stream running through his family’s five-acre property near Mifflinburg, Pennsylvania.
A neighbour found him nearly quarter of a mile downstream.
Janet Weis Children’s Hospital in Danville said the 22-month-old was brought back to life by a team of about 50 people in a “stunning” recovery. He is now home from hospital, having made a full recovery, and his mother Rose called it “an act of God”.
Seafood spill on Maine highway
A lorry hauling 30,000lb of live Canadian lobsters overturned on a major road in Maine.
Truck driver Horst Puff, of Greenfield, Nova Scotia, said he swerved to avoid a car that had spun out in front of him on snowy Interstate 95 in Benton. The truck ended up on its side in the central reservation, but he was not hurt.
A crane was dispatched to hoist the truck upright so the cargo could be inspected. State police spokesman Steve McCausland said the lobsters survived and continued their journey to New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
Zoo’s bear didn’t have necessities
The Phoenix Zoo has confessed to an “embarrassing” mistake regarding one of its animals.
Officials said they were planning to transfer Luka to a zoo in Nashville, Tennessee, when they discovered that the two-year-old Andean bear is a female, not a male as previously thought.
According to the zoo, Andean bear cubs’ genitalia are highly undeveloped before the age of two, making it difficult to determine their gender.