ACTUALLY THE CUSTODIAN RUNS THE BUILDING

“I Don’t Think You Know Who I Am, Boy. I Run This Building.” | Steve Addazio Out At Colorado State After Failed Two Seasons, 2020 Racist Remark To Black Custodian

By Devon POV Mason
-December 4, 2021

Photo: Getty Images

Steve Addazio arrived at Colorado State fresh off of seven subpar seasons as the head coach in Chestnut Hill coaching the Boston College Eagles.

In his first season as leader of the Rams there was controversy. Team members spoke out against alleged racially insensitive remarks, unacceptable practices and incidents of breaking COVID-19 protocols. Following what the school called a thorough investigation, there were no findings substantiating racial harassment claims.

But there was enough smoke to create a firestorm, as Addazio and staff would be placed under the watchful eye of CSU President Joyce McConnell and athletics director Joe Parker.

In October 2020, Addazio reportedly made racially derogatory comments toward a custodian.

He also reportedly threatened the job of the custodian during an altercation. The custodian says he was talked down to and berated and called “boy.”

According to Yahoo.com:

“The custodian told the investigator that prior to the altercation he was cleaning a restroom in CSU’s football facility, and part of the process requires chemicals that need to “dwell” for a certain period of time. During that time, the custodian blocked the bathroom with a cart while cleaning other areas of the office.

Upon returning to the restroom and beginning to clean the sink area, the custodian alleged that Addazio entered and prepared to use the restroom. The custodian said he told Addazio it was closed, to which the coach continued and said, “I guess I’m going to use it.”

The custodian, who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation when contacted by the Coloradoan, said he replied, “I guess my job doesn’t matter.”

He claims Addazio then turned and said, “What did you say to me, boy?” at which point the custodian again said, “I guess my job doesn’t matter.” The custodian told the investigator that Addazio then followed him out of the restroom and said, “I don’t think you know who I am, boy. I run this building.”

Now any white man with sense knows you can’t go aroung calling young Black men “boy.”

Addazio’s firing, while sort of surprising, is unfortunately part of a pattern that’s long been in place as pertains to Caucasian coaches mistreating Black players.

This situation is a bit different, as the target of Addazio’s racism was a custodian trying to make ends meet. Systemically, there’s no difference between the toxic environment Addazio was creating for his Black athletes and the way he addressed a university worker.

Urban Meyer Played A Huge Role In Addazio Being Hired By CSU

The good ol’ boy network has served Addazio well. His career head coaching record of 61-67 didn’t really have folks beating down his door to hire him after leaving BC.

Urban Meyer’s friendship and influence weighed heavily, as the Jacksonville Jaguars head coach was once a CSU assistant.

Meyer used that influence to help Addazio — who worked for him at Florida — land the job. Meyer is undoubtedly a great coach, but he has a borderline hideous record when it comes to making coaching hires. For that reason alone, the hire should have been more scrutinized.

Especially considering the fallout from Meyer’s decision to support Ohio State coach Zach Smith despite knowing that the guy was beating the heck out of his wife. That entire situation hit the fan in 2019, but Meyer escaped any real culpability.

In retrospect, Meyer hosed the Rams with the Addazio hiring.

Joe Parker Says Custodian Incident Didn’t Influence: Search For New Coach Begins Immediately

AD Parker says the firing of Addazio isn’t based on the October 2020 incident, but you have to believe that the 2020 allegations still played a role in his firing, although nothing came of them.

Addazio’s firing stems from losing 12 of his 16 games.

Addazio went 1-3 in a COVID-19 shortened 2020 season. After beginning the 2021 season 3-3 and pushing highly-ranked Iowa, the wheels came off as the Rams lost their remaining six games. Not what the administration anticipated when the school moved on from Mike Bobo in 2020 after he went 28-35.

After signing a six-year extension in April to play the Rocky Mountain Showdown against archrival Colorado until 2038, Colorado State is now looking for a leader to carry them into the next matchup beginning in 2023.

These games will be played on campus at Fort Collins and Boulder for the first time ever. The game has traditionally been played at the home of the Denver Broncos, Invesco Field at Mile High Stadium.

Now the search for a new coach begins immediately. Addazio was due to receive a $5M buyout but will receive just $3M as he was relieved of his duties. Don’t shed a tear for him. That’s a major come-up for Addazio and a small price for CSU to pay to get rid of a guy who stained the integrity of the institution with racism and disrespect.

Parker says he can control that part of it to an extent:

“That’s the one thing I can control, minimizing the financial impact of it. But it’s not a trivial number by any means and it will be stretched out over what the remainder of Addazio’s employment agreement was. So we’ve got three years to manage and mitigate it.”

Parker says they won’t necessarily be stuck on coaching experience during the search but rather someone who can lead, build and educate.

“I want to really approach this with an open mind and do our best to cast the net far and wide. I want someone who’s going to view themselves as a culture builder and a committed educator.”

The school needs a young, innovative coach who is comfortable dealing with people of color and isn’t stuck in the past.

ZIONIST CULURAL LOOTER GETS OFF SCOT-FREE

Hedge fund founder Steinhardt will return looted antiquities


NEW YORK (AP) — Billionaire hedge fund manager Michael Steinhardt has agreed to turn over $70 million worth of stolen antiquities and will be subject to an unprecedented lifetime ban on acquiring antiquities, the Manhattan district attorney announced Monday.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

In return, Steinhardt, a philanthropist who is chair of the Steinhardt Foundation for Jewish Life and co-founder of Birthright Israel, an organization that sends young Jews on free trips to Israel, will not face criminal charges for acquiring pieces that were illegally smuggled out of 11 countries including Egypt, Greece, Israel, Syria and Turkey, prosecutors said.

“For decades, Michael Steinhardt displayed a rapacious appetite for plundered artifacts without concern for the legality of his actions, the legitimacy of the pieces he bought and sold, or the grievous cultural damage he wrought across the globe,” District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said in a news release. “His pursuit of ‘new’ additions to showcase and sell knew no geographic or moral boundaries, as reflected in the sprawling underworld of antiquities traffickers, crime bosses, money launderers, and tomb raiders he relied upon to expand his collection."

Steinhardt said in a prepared statement issued by his attorneys that he was "pleased that the District Attorney’s years-long investigation has concluded without any charges, and that items wrongfully taken by others will be returned to their native countries.”

Attorneys Andrew J. Levander and Theodore V. Wells Jr. said that many of the dealers from whom Steinhardt bought the items “made specific representations as to the dealers’ lawful title to the items, and to their alleged provenance.”

According to prosecutors, while complaining about a subpoena requesting documentation for an antiquity in May 2017, Steinhardt pointed to an small chest from Greece and said to an investigator, “You see this piece? There’s no provenance for it. If I see a piece and I like it, then I buy it.”

Many of the pieces Steinhardt acquired were removed from their countries of origin during times of war or civil unrest, prosecutors said.

Steinhardt, who turns 81 on Tuesday, founded the hedge fund Steinhardt Partners in 1967 and closed it in 1995. He came out of retirement in 2004 to head Wisdom Tree Investments.

New York University named its Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development after Steinhardt in recognition of two $10 million donations.

Manhattan prosecutors began investigating Steinhardt's collection of ancient artifacts in 2017 and raided his office and his Manhattan home in 2018, seizing several artworks that investigators said had been looted.

The items surrendered by Steinhardt include a stag’s head in the form of a ceremonial vessel for libations, dating from to 400 B.C., which prosecutors say appeared without provenance on the international market after rampant looting in Milas, Turkey. The stag's head is valued at $3.5 million, the district attorney said.

There was also the chest for human remains from the Greek Island of Crete, called a larnax and dating from around 1300 B.C., which prosecutors said was purchased from a known antiquities trafficker.

Karen Matthews, The Associated Press

Britain Refuses to Return Sacred Religious Tablets to Ethiopia, Best Offer Is a Loan

Nyam Daniel
Mon, December 6, 2021


The British seized the plaques after defeating Emperor Tewodros II at the Battle of Maqdala in 1868, and they are now locked away in a vault in a British museum. Ethiopia has asked for the tabots to be returned, but the most the museum is willing to do is let Ethiopia borrow them for an extended time.

Ethiopian priests carrying some covered tabots on their heads during Timkat epiphany festival on January 19, 2017 in Lalibela, Ethiopia. (Photo by Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images)

The museum trustees said that law prohibits them from returning the items, but supporters argue there is a loophole that would allow them to do so.

“We believe that today the British Museum has a unique opportunity to build a lasting and meaningful bridge of friendship between Britain and Ethiopia by handing the tabots back to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church,” a group of supporters wrote in a letter to the museum trustees.

The 11 tabots, or altar tablets, are of huge spiritual significance. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church believes the tabots are the dwelling place of God on Earth or the Ark of Covenant. Priests use the tabots to sanctify and consecrate church buildings. By tradition, they are supposed to be kept in a private place, away from public view. Only priests are allowed to see them.

Eight of the tabots at the British Museum were acquired during the Battle of Maqdala. British soldiers reportedly took the tabots, jewelry and other precious items after Tewodros committed suicide instead of surrendering to British soldiers. More than 500 soldiers were killed in the battle. Some of the other items were returned to Ethiopia last month, but they are still negotiating the return of the tabots.

Supporters argue that since the tabots cannot and have not been exhibited, they should be returned to Ethiopia. Images of the tabots are not even made available on the museum’s website.

The museum argued that the British Museum Act of 1963 blocks them from permanently returning the items. Supporters, however, said the law allows the disposal of objects “unfit to be retained as long as they can be disposed “without detriment to the interests of students,” and the tabots have “no apparent use or relevance to the museum.”

However, the museum is still reluctant to release the items.

“These documents need to be reviewed and addressed with full consideration, and more time is required before this can be looked at by trustees,” The British Museum said in a recent statement to the Guardian.

Ethiopia announced the retrieval of a ceremonial crown, an imperial shield, a set of silver-embossed horn drinking cups, a handwritten prayer book, crosses and a necklace from the 1868 battle last week. Some other European countries have also returned items to countries they have looted.

Germany has returned a stone cross back to Namibia as restitution for its genocide of the Herero and Nama peoples in the early 1900s. German officials have also issued guidelines to public museums on the return of other colonial-era objects. French President Emmanuel Macron recently approved a plan to return some museum objects to France’s former colonies in Africa.

Elon Musk 'is making the rules' in space with rapid expansion of SpaceX's Starlink internet service, agency boss says

Kate Duffy
Mon, December 6, 2021


SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.Pool


Elon Musk is "making the rules" in space, European Space Agency boss told the Financial Times.


The ESA boss urged European countries to stop enabling Musk to dominate the space industry.


Governments in Europe should give equal opportunities to internet providers, he told the FT.

Rapid expansion of SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet service is letting CEO Elon Musk make the rules in the sector, the head of the European Space Agency said.

"You have one person owning half of the active satellites in the world. That's quite amazing. De facto, he is making the rules," Josef Aschbacher, the ESA's director-general, told the Financial Times Sunday. The rest of the world, including Europe, was not responding quick enough, he added.

SpaceX's Starlink, which beams internet from satellites in orbit to user terminals on Earth, now has more than 1,750 working satellites in orbit and serves around 140,000 users in 20 countries, according to a presentation filed by the company to the Federal Communications Commission dated November 10.

There are currently more than 4,000 active satellites in orbit, according to data from CelesTrak, cited in The Independent.

Aschbacher told the FT that the absence of government co-ordination and European countries' support for Starlink's expansion risked preventing European companies from competing in the commercial space industry and launching satellites into low earth orbit, where Starlink dominates.

Germany has applied to the International Telecommunications Union to request permission for Musk's Starlink to launch around 40,000 satellites, the FT reported. The satellite internet service was also given the green light by US regulators to launch more than 30,000 satellites, the paper added.

"Space will be much more restrictive [in terms of] frequencies and orbital slots," Aschbacher told the FT. He said that governments in Europe should support European internet providers by giving them equal opportunities in the market, the paper reported.

He told the FT that the rest of the world "is just not responding quick enough," adding that other competitors and regulators were struggling to catch up with Starlink due to its rapid expansion.

Aschbacher urged European governments to stop enabling Musk to dominate the space industry, the FT reported.

SpaceX didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider made outside of operating hours.

Starlink wants to deploy 200,000 user terminals in India by December 2022, as well as launch in the Philippines, Bloomberg reported.

FIRST HE STOLE THE ELECTION NOW...

Donald Trump Has a New Fear-Mongering Attack Ad Claiming Joe Biden 'Stole Christmas'

Kristyn Burtt
Mon, December 6, 2021


Donald Trump hasn’t officially confirmed he’s running for president in 2024, but it sure feels like it with a new anti-Biden ad that began running over the weekend. The former president decided that Christmas was the perfect time to attack the current president over supply chain issues.

The Twitter account, Trump’s War Room, posted the ad on its feed with the caption, “Sleepy Joe stole Christmas and broke our beautiful economy. SAD!” The 30-second spot starts with the headline, “Biden’s Nightmare Before Christmas” as the clip uses soundbites from a variety of newscasts talking about the various shortages around the country. It hits right at parents, who might find it a struggle to buy the coveted holiday toys for their kids — and at a higher price than usual, thanks to inflation. The fearmongering ad ends with one final ominous headline, “Joe Biden Stole Christmas.”



What the ad is missing is the fact that the supply-chain shortages began over a year ago due to an unfortunate series of events that snowballed at the start of the pandemic — and yes, under the Trump administration. Consumer demands also changed and patterns of how goods are purchased dramatically shifted to online creating “a rapid transition for the U.S. economy,” per The White House. So while it is Biden’s nightmare to figure out, it was under the 45th president’s watch that the crisis began. Trump probably doesn’t want to hear that he had a hand in all of this because he’s too busy shifting the blame with his distracting ad.

Click here to read the full article.

But this is likely a sign of more Trump campaign ads to come as he starts to throw his hat in the ring as a 2024 contender. He’s reminding his voter base that he’s here to stay and he’s not going to take his 2020 election disappointment quietly.

Nepal starts census of endangered Royal Bengal tigers

 Royal Bengal tiger walks in its enclosure at a zoo in Lalitpur, on the outskirts of Kathmandu (AFP/Prakash MATHEMA)

Mon, December 6, 2021,

Nepal started counting endangered Royal Bengal tigers in its vast forested southern plains, officials said Monday, as conservationists help the big cats claw their way back from near extinction.

Deforestation, habitat encroachment and poaching have devastated tiger populations across Asia, but Nepal and 12 other countries signed a pledge in 2010 to double their numbers by next year.

Technicians on Sunday began installing cameras in Chitwan National Park, the country's biggest tiger conservation area, with wildlife experts to identify individual animals by their unique stripes.


Nearly 4,000 motion-sensitive cameras will eventually be set up across more than 12,000 square kilometres (4,600 square miles) of protected areas and adjoining forests.

"The survey is aimed at getting information on the status of tigers which will help us to assess whether our strategies on safeguarding the tiger population have worked," Bed Kumar Dhakal of the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Department told AFP.

The 2010 Tiger Conservation Plan signed by Nepal is backed by celebrities including Leonardo DiCaprio.

The world's wild tiger population rose to 3,890 in 2016, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the Global Tiger Forum.

It was the first increase in more than a century and up from an all-time low of 3,200 at the start of that decade.

Nepal had 235 tigers in 2018, according to a survey, up nearly double from nine years earlier.

The results of the census are expected in July.

str/pm/gle/axn

The 'agricultural mafia' taking over Brazil's Amazon rainforest • FRANCE 24 English

 

Encouraged by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and local authorities who want to see the development of agribusiness, an "agricultural mafia" is taking over the Amazon rainforest. In the Brazilian state of Rondonia, organised groups set up camps for small farmers – sometimes the size of a city – within national forest parks that are supposed to be protected by law or on land stolen from indigenous peoples. Our reporters investigated this "agricultural mafia", from the small farmer who is promised a patch of land and a future, to the politicians pulling the strings.

Tearing the web: Invasive trout disrupt Glacier park's lakes


Susan Guynn, The Frederick News-Post, Md.
Sat, December 4, 2021

Dec. 4—GLACIER NATIONAL PARK, Mont. — In civilization, invaders change the language, diet and customs of the places they conquer. Invasive fish don't ride on chariots or tanks, but their disruption leaves almost warlike marks on the ecology.

That contest plays out right now between Montana's native bull trout and invasive lake trout in the Flathead River Basin. New research indicates that while the lakers have run like Genghis Khan, the bulls might hang on if they get help.

A new study from the University of Montana's Flathead Lake Biological Station shows just how big and permanent an impact invasive species have had on regional waterways.

"Once we get to a tipping point, things go bad quickly for bull trout," said Shawn Devlin, an aquatic ecologist at the Flathead Biological Station and co-author of the study.

"This work has showed if you give bulls a chance before that tipping point — before they're in a spiral they'll never come back from — they can be managed for conservation," he added. "And the good news is, these lakes were invaded a lot longer than anyone realized but it took longer than expected for the effects to take hold. It was a neat finding. That gives hope to managers, that there's more time below that tipping point than we realized."

Bull trout in lakes play the same ecological role as grizzly bears on land — the No. 1 predator in their native habitat. They eat other fish, grow large and reproduce slowly.

Lake trout fill a similar niche in their home waters of the Great Lakes and Midwest rivers. But they have a crucial spawning advantage.

Bull trout live a salmon-like life cycle of hatching in small creeks before reaching maturity in big rivers and lakes and then returning to spawn in that same creek they were born in. That makes them vulnerable to lots of other predators when young, as well as human threats like river dams, irrigation systems, and sedimentation from logging or road-building.

Lake trout spawn on deep-water rock outcrops. While grizzlies and eagles can harry bull trout in their shallow spawning streams, few competitors reach the lake trout egg deposits. And when they grow up, the lakers eat the same fish bull trout target.

Since they were artificially introduced into Flathead Lake in the early 20th century, lake trout have become a popular game fish because of their capacity to reach lunker size. Then a separate effort to enhance Swan Lake's artificial Kokanee salmon population by adding mysis shrimp had an unintended consequence. The tiny shrimp flowed down the Swan River into Flathead Lake, where they became a new food source for the lake trout. The laker population quickly expanded, sending ripples through the ecology of every other fish species in the system.

Such transformations are called "trophic cascades." In Flathead Lake's case, young lake trout outcompeted the Kokanee for zooplankton and other tiny organisms, while mature lakers ate the schools of Kokanee out of existence. They also preyed on the native cutthroat and bull trout, depleting both their populations and their food supplies.

And then the lake trout started spreading through the Flathead River network, invading the bull trout strongholds of Glacier National Park's west and south sides. Hungry Horse Dam prevented them from getting far into the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex to the south. But McDonald, Logging, Quartz, Bowman and Kintla lakes all saw their bull trout populations crash.

Study lead author Charles Wainright of the U.S. Geological Survey spent 49 days prowling 10 remote Montana lakes. That included Glacier Park battlegrounds like Quartz and Logging and Arrow lakes, as well as sites in the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex that still have undamaged bull trout habitat, such as Big Salmon Lake.

The bodies of water in the park comprise almost a third of the entire bull trout habitat in the Lower 48 States. Bull trout have "threatened" status under the federal Endangered Species Act.

"If we lose bull trout out of these lakes, the system will never shift back to what it looked like," Devlin said. What the study found was that one species doesn't just over-eat the other. Everything around them gets affected.

"The whole lake is important, not just the traditional food path of small things to big things," Devlin said. "Bull trout are not good at finding other food. When they can't get the large fish they used to eat in the middle of the lake, they're forced into the shallows and littoral zones with sub-optimal food. Then their growth rate gets stifled. Meanwhile, lake trout are growing like gangbusters."

That change also affects everything around the two trout species: the phytoplankton, insects, frogs, spiders and everything else that feeds from the lake or falls into it. As bull trout shift from eating other fish to eating bugs, that affects bug populations as well as other trout like cutthroat and rainbow that hunt bugs. The entire food web gets frazzled, and can fray apart.

Which brings up the other important finding of the study: the time factor.

By looking at both the ratios of invader fish to native fish, and what everything was eating, the study gave ways to gauge how far along — how close to permanent — an invasion had become. And it turned out, the process takes longer than most researchers expected.

That gives wildlife managers more options. Late-stage interventions might have to be as complicated as Glacier Park's effort to create bull trout sanctuaries while gillnetting infested lakes. An early invasion might fall to simple fishing regulations, like no-limit takes on lake trout in protected waters. Flathead Lake has passed that point.

'Rock snot' reaches Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Why it could be bad news for trout

Keith Matheny, Detroit Free Press
Mon, December 6, 2021, 

It's not as slimy as it sounds, but it could mean trouble for Michigan's prized trout fishery.

The Michigan departments of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy and Natural Resources on Monday announced the detection of "rock snot" — didymo, a freshwater alga — in the Lower Peninsula for the first time.

A person holds hands full of didymo alga, or rock snot, during a major bloom on the Duval River in Quebec, Canada in this 2013 photo.

The course, woolly textured alga was found in a portion of the Upper Manistee River in Kalkaska County. It has plagued streams in the western and eastern U.S., forming thick mats that cover river and stream bottoms, reducing the habitat for macroinvertebrates, the tiny organisms at the bottom of the food chain upon which small fish feed. Those small fish in turn provide food for Michigan's prized sports fish, such as trout.

Extensive mats of didymo were found on the Michigan side of the St. Marys River near Sault Ste. Marie in the Upper Peninsula in 2015.

"Didymo has potential to be a nasty nuisance species in Michigan’s cold-water fisheries," said Samuel Day, a water quality biologist with the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians. "Unlike the harmful algal blooms that plague areas of the Great Lakes due to warm temperatures and excess nutrients, didymo blooms form in cold, low-nutrient streams that most folks would generally consider pristine and great habitat for trout."

Fishermen play a role in the alga's spread — and can play a role in keeping it contained, said Bill Keiper, an aquatic biologist with EGLE’s Water Resources Division.

"Didymo can attach to fishing equipment, wading gear and other hard surfaces and be moved to new waterways," he said. "With each new detection, it becomes more important for people who fish, wade or boat to clean boats and equipment, including waders, after each use."

According to Michigan State University Extension, didymo is thought to be native to Lake Superior, parts of Canada and Northern Europe. Its invasive character was only recorded beginning in the late 1990s. It’s not known what conditions cause didymo to alter its native, non-invasive character and form dense invasive mats, but some speculate that climate change could be playing a role.

Didymo was found east of the Mississippi in 2005 in Tennessee, and west of the Mississippi in Montana, Utah, Colorado and South Dakota in 2004. It was even documented in New Zealand the same year.

QUIT FLUSHING GOLDFISH 

Photos show ridiculously large goldfish taking over Canadian harbour after being released into the wild

National Post 

Have you ever wondered what happens when an unwanted pet goldfish gets released into the wild?

© Provided by National Post

 “In large numbers, goldfish can destroy aquatic habitats by tearing up aquatic plants for food and clouding the waters.”

It turns out it grows and grows until it becomes a comically large version of its former self.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada posted photos to Facebook that show some of the humongous, large-bellied goldfish that were found in Ontario’s Hamilton Harbour.

“The ones my dad flushed 40 years ago must be as big as whales by now!” one person commented on the Facebook post. Others said they had seen bigger, adding that goldfish grow to adapt to their environment.

Don't want your goldfish anymore? Rehome it on Kijiji

Monster-sized goldfish are taking over Alberta city (2017)

But the giant goldfish are taking away key spawning sites from other native fish species, the ministry said.

Spawning is a mass method of fertilization. Female fish release their eggs into the water, and the males release sperm to fertilize them. Spawning sites are key to the reproduction of native species, including the Northern Pike.

Invasive goldfish are a “big problem,” Fisheries and Oceans Canada wrote in a Facebook post last week. “In large numbers, goldfish can destroy aquatic habitats by tearing up aquatic plants for food and clouding the waters, which means less sunlight and less food for our native species. They can also thrive on toxic blue-green algae and may even aid in toxic algal growth.”

Hamilton is tracking invasive goldfish using acoustic tags — small sound emitting devices that allow for remote tracking in aquatic environments, like the Hamilton Harbour. Officials have found that the goldfish in the harbour are rapidly reproducing, quickly becoming classified as an invasive species.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada has a few recommendations to prevent introducing invasive species to waterways: “Learning about them, including how to recognize them, cleaning, draining and drying any equipment used in the water before storing it or moving it to a different body of water, never moving species, organisms or water from one body of water to another and keeping any aquatic plant or animal, such as live bait or pets from aquariums, out of the natural environment or sewers.”

Norwegian archaeologists find late Iron Age longhouses

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Norwegian archaeologists said Monday they have found a cluster of longhouses, including one of the largest in Scandinavia, using ground-penetrating radar in the southeastern part of the country — in an area that researchers believe was a central place in the late Nordic Iron Age.


The longhouses — long and narrow, single-room buildings — were found in Gjellestad, 86 kilometers (53 miles) southeast of Oslo near where a Viking-era ship was found in 2018 close to the Swedish border.

“We have found several buildings, all typical Iron Age longhouses, north of the Gjellestad ship. The most striking discovery is a 60-meter (197-foot) long and 15-meter (49-foot) wide longhouse, a size that makes it one of the largest we know of in Scandinavia,” archaeologist Lars Gustavsen at Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research said in a statement.

The importance of Gjellestad during that time period wasn't immediately known. But the body, known by its Norwegian acronym NIKU, said it was working on finding that out.

This autumn, archaeologists covered 40 hectares (about 100 acres) south, east and north of were the Gjellestad ship was found with the radar system, and one of the next steps are archaeological excavations, NIKU said.

The surveys are the first part of a research project called “Viking Nativity: Gjellestad Across Borders” where archaeologists, historians and Viking age specialists have examined the development of the area during the Nordic Iron Age that began at around 500 B.C. and lasted until approximately A.D. 800 and the beginning of the Viking Age.

“We do not know how old the houses are or what function they had. Archaeological excavations and dating will help us get an answer to this,” said Sigrid Mannsaaker Gundersen, another archaeologist.

They have also found several ploughed-out burial mounds in nearby fields.

“We are not surprised to have found these burial mounds, as we already know there are several others in the surrounding area,” Gustavsen said. “ Still, these are important to know about to get a more complete picture of Gjellestad and its surroundings.”

The Associated Press