Man Creates Frozen Waterfall on Side of Building After Leaving Tap Running

By Melissa Knowles | Trending Now

A man in Jilin City, China, has shown the world what can happen if you leave the water running too long. Wen Hsu has lived on the seventh floor of his apartment building for 35 years, and when developers moved into the area seeking to tear down the building and turn the area into a shopping center, he was the only tenant who held out on selling.

Hsu, who is 58 years old, would not budge, because he said the developers were not offering him enough money to allow him to get another place. Because he was the sole remaining person in the building, and cold temperatures were fast approaching, he feared that with no one else living in the building, running their water or heating devices, the uninsulated pipes might freeze, and then he would be left without running water. Hsu came up with a way that he hoped would keep the pipes in the building from freezing.

He diverted a stream of warm water to run down the side of the structure, unintentionally creating a frozen waterfall. Hsu said of the dramatic effect, "The weather is warmer now, so there is no danger of the pipes freezing -- although I think it might take a while for the waterfall to melt." He may not have to wait long, because the sight of the frozen waterfall is drawing a lot of attention -- including from the developers, who the local government has urged to offer him more money to make this dispute melt away.

Hsu's response to the possibility of a better offer: "I hope so. It is very lonely here in my apartment with nobody else around."

Rare McLaren F1 for sale with zero miles on the odometer: Update

By Justin Hyde | Motoramic

Nearly 15 years after the last copy rolled out of McLaren's factory, the 618-hp F1 supercar remains one of the most sought-after vehicles among the world's sporting billionaires. Only 106 were built, and in recent years a regular model McLaren F1 at auction could fetch bids of $5 million, while one with a racing pedigree commanded $13 million last year. This F1 in Japan supposedly holds another singular distinction: it's never been driven, and its odometer shows zero miles after 17 years of ownership — which suggests the owner has more money than sense.

According to the Japanese site found by DailyAutoFix listing the 1994 McLaren F1 for sale, the car was never even registered, and all of its official documents along with the vehicle itself has been kept in climate-controlled storage since purchase. Given the restraint necessary to keep such a machine untouched, one can likely assume the car itself was started and serviced in those 17 years; the picture above suggests a no-expense-spared level of care.

In an era where classic car prices have soared to as much as $35 million, a surprising number of collectors insist on keeping their valuables not just in running order but occasionally on the road. That's the point, for most: enjoying the aural and visceral delights of a Ferrari 250 GTB or a Duesenberg can deliver at full throttle makes ownership more than just typing numbers on a spreadsheet. Yet there's a subset of collectors and builders who see cars as furniture that needs preservation rather than speed, with the ultimate example provided by Bugatti and its porcelain-encrusted Veyron L'Or Blanc. Oh wait — even its owner has taken it for a drive on public streets.

I'd contend having zero miles on the odometer adds as much value to this F1 as throwing in a new set of wiper blades. Supercars aren't blocks of cheddar that get better with a few years in cold storage; they need driving not just for enjoyment but upkeep, to know which parts need work. If my Powerball numbers float up, I'd buy this, cover it in GoPros and make the most of its first mile.

UPDATE: Turns out those first miles were spent long ago. Someone who's familiar with the 106 F1s around world estimates the one for sale in Japan has about 186 miles (or 300 km) on it, and that even if the owner refused to drive it, McLaren mechanics dispatched to service F1s wherever they're parked would have driven it to ensure the car's pieces were in working order. That said, it's still one of only two painted yellow at the factory — and should still fetch top dollar.

Mysterious Stone Structure Discovered Beneath Sea of Galilee

By Owen Jarus, LiveScience Contributor | LiveScience.com

A giant "monumental" stone structure discovered beneath the waters of the Sea of Galilee in Israel has archaeologists puzzled as to its purpose and even how long ago it was built.

The mysterious structure is cone shaped, made of "unhewn basalt cobbles and boulders," and weighs an estimated 60,000 tons the researchers said. That makes it heavier than most modern-day warships.

Rising nearly 32 feet (10 meters) high, it has a diameter of about 230 feet (70 meters). To put that in perspective, the outer stone circle of Stonehenge has a diameter just half that with its tallest stones not reaching that height.

It appears to be a giant cairn, rocks piled on top of each other. Structures like this are known from elsewhere in the world and are sometimes used to mark burials. Researchers do not know if the newly discovered structure was used for this purpose.

The structure was first detected in the summer of 2003 during a sonar survey of the southwest portion of the sea. Divers have since been down to investigate, they write in the latest issue of the International Journal of Nautical Archaeology.

"Close inspection by scuba diving revealed that the structure is made of basalt boulders up to 1 m (3.2 feet) long with no apparent construction pattern," the researchers write in their journal article. "The boulders have natural faces with no signs of cutting or chiselling. Similarly, we did not find any sign of arrangement or walls that delineate this structure."

They say it is definitely human-made and probably was built on land, only later to be covered by the Sea of Galilee as the water level rose. "The shape and composition of the submerged structure does not resemble any natural feature. We therefore conclude that it is man-made and might be termed a cairn," the researchers write.

More than 4,000 years old?

Underwater archaeological excavation is needed so scientists can find associated artifacts and determine the structure's date and purpose, the researchers said.

Researcher Yitzhak Paz, of the Israel Antiquities Authority and Ben-Gurion University, believes it could date back more than 4,000 years. "The more logical possibility is that it belongs to the third millennium B.C., because there are other megalithic phenomena [from that time] that are found close by," Paz told LiveScience in an interview, noting that those sites are associated with fortified settlements.

The researchers list several examples of megalithic structures found close to the Sea of Galilee that are more than 4,000 years-old. One example is the monumental site of Khirbet Beteiha, located some 19 miles (30 kilometers) north-east of the submerged stone structure, the researchers write. It "comprises three concentric stone circles, the largest of which is 56 m [184 feet] in diameter."

An ancient city

If the third-millennium B.C. date idea proves correct it would put the structure about a mile to the north of a city that researchers call "Bet Yerah" or "Khirbet Kerak."

During the third millennium B.C. the city was one of the biggest sites in the region, Paz said. "It's the most powerful and fortified town in this region and, as a matter of fact, in the whole of Israel."

Archaeologist Raphael Greenberg describes it in a chapter of the book "Daily Life, Materiality, and Complexity in Early Urban Communities of the Southern Levant" (Eisenbrauns, 2011) as being a heavily fortified 74-acre (30 hectares) site with up to 5,000 inhabitants.

With paved streets and towering defenses its people were clearly well organized. "They also indicate the existence of some kind of municipal authority able to maintain public structures ..." Greenberg writes.

The research team says that, like the leaders of Bet Yerah, whoever built the newly discovered Sea of Galilee structure needed sophisticated organization and planning skills to construct it. The "effort invested in such an enterprise is indicative of a complex, well-organized society, with planning skills and economic ability," they write in their journal paper.

Paz added that "in order to build such a structure a lot of working hours were required" in an organized community effort.

Future exploration

Paz said that he hopes soon that an underwater archaeological expedition will set out to excavate the structure. They can search for artifacts and try to determine its date with certainty.

He said that the Israel Antiquities Authority has a research branch capable of excavating it. "We will try to do it in the near future, I hope, but it depends on a lot of factors."