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These tourist attractions could vanish in your lifetime

1. Machu Picchu Located in southern Peru, Machu Picchu is the remains of a huge stone citadel that was built during the 15th century. These incredible Incan ruins are widely considered one of the must-see spots in South America. Unfortunately, this has backfired in a way. The site has been a victim of over-tourism, seeing the detrimental effects of the surge of tourists it gets as they wear down the structures. In addition, the area surrounding Machu Picchu has seen rampant urbanisation, as well as mudslides and fires, in recent years, leading UNESCO to work for its preservation. 2. Portobelo-San Lorenzo forts While not as ancient as some of the other sites mentioned here, these fortifications on the Panama coast are considered historically significant. The Portobelo-San Lorenzo forts were constructed by the Spanish in Panama in efforts to protect trade routes; they were built over two centuries, starting in the 1590s. They demonstrate a wide range of architectural styles, featuring everything from medieval-style castles to neo-classical 18th-century redresses. The forts face a couple of challenges, urbanisation has encroached upon them on land, and a shrinking coastline and erosion present natural threats on the coastal side. Maintenance has also fallen by the wayside. They were listed as endangered in 2012. 3. Hatra These grand ruins stand in the Al-Jazīrah region of Baghdad, Iraq. As the capital of the first Arab Kingdom, Araba, Hatra is a site of massive historical significance. It withstood Roman military force in the second century CE. It was the king of the Sāsānian Empire, an early Iranian regime, who eventually destroyed it in the third century. The ruins went undiscovered until the 1830s; German archaeologists only began excavating it in the early 1900s. In addition to becoming a UNESCO world heritage site, Hatra was also immortalised as the temple featured in The Exorcist. Sadly, it became a target of ISIS in 2015. Militants assailed the structures with bullets and destroyed statues, seeking to dismantle remnants of polytheism. It was after this that UNESCO gave it an endangered status. 4. Nan Madol This remarkable architectural jewel of the ancient world dates back to the 1200s. It spans more than 100 islands and islets surrounding the Federated States of Micronesia, to the northeast of Papua New Guinea. Throughout the 1200s to the 1500s, indigenous people from the island of Pohnpei built an expansive ‘city on water’, constructing more than 100 man-made islets out of coral boulders and basalt. The stunning expanse, untouched for hundreds of years, is a testament to the ingenuity and skill of ancient Pacific Islander peoples. However, it’s the forces of nature this time that pose a danger to it as plants, storms and water damage encroach upon the impressive structures. It has been on UNESCO’s endangered sites list since 2016. How to help There are plenty of resources you can use to help preserve endangered spots like these. For starters, you could donate to <a href="https://whc.unesco.org/en/donation">UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre</a>. UNESCO also gives citizens an option to report threats to protected sites (<a href="https://whc.unesco.org/en/158/">scroll to the bottom of this page</a> for contact information. And if you choose to visit these spots, treat them with the utmost care! Be respectful, don’t touch anything you’re not explicitly allowed to touch, and do your part to keep the area clean. Written by Meghan Jones. This article first appeared in <a href="https://www.readersdigest.com.au/travel/travel-hints-tips/10-top-tourist-attractions-that-could-disappear-in-your-lifetime">Reader’s Digest</a>. For more of what you love from the world’s best-loved magazine, <a href="http://readersdigest.innovations.com.au/c/readersdigestemailsubscribe?utm_source=over60&utm_medium=articles&utm_campaign=RDSUB&keycode=WRA93V">here’s our best subscription offer.</a>

International Travel

“On the brink of extinction”: The iconic Aussie animal set to vanish within 50 years

Australia’s beloved platypus is now feared to be on the “brink of extinction”. Researchers at the University of New South Wales say the number of platypuses in the wild could drop by 66 per cent by 2070 due to climate change and other environment threats. According to researchers, increasing temperatures across the country, the intense drought and land clearing are all contributing to the species’ decline. Director for UNSW’s Centre for Ecosystem Science, Richard Kingsford said the future for the animal was “grim”. “This is impacting their ability to survive during these extended dry periods and increased demand for water,” Mr Kingsford said in the journal article, Biological Conservation. “If we lost the platypus from Australian rivers, you would say, ‘What sort of government policies or care allow that to happen?’” The study’s lead author, Gilad Bino said the growing threat of climate change could hinder the platypus’s ability to repopulate, which in turn would result in “extinction”. “We are not monitoring what we assume to be a common species. And then we may wake up and realise it’s too late,” said Dr Bino. The platypus is currently listed as “near-threatened” under the IUCN Red List of threatened species but Dr Bino says the government needs to assess how much the animal is at risk. The Victorian Environment Department said they were working with the federal government over whether the platypus’ status needed to be changed to “threatened”.

Home & Garden

Heartbroken family of 71-year-old man watch footage of him vanishing in Sydney shopping centre

Retired barber Bernard Gore, 71, was on a three-week trip to Sydney with his wife of 50 years, Angela, to visit one of their three adult children in December 2016. The couple were staying in their daughter’s apartment in Woollahra, in the city’s east and planned to return to his home in Tasmania on January 11, 2017. However on January 6, 2017, Mr Gore set off for a day trip to Westfield Bondi Junction at 12:30 Pm. His final moments were recorded on CCTV footage, which showed him on his 15- minute walk past a number of shops along Oxford St before he went into the shopping centre. Footage from inside the shopping centre shows him walking inside at 12.48pm, up the incline of level four and through door L407 at 12.50pm. This footage has been shown to his family for the first time, with Mr Gore’s daughter, Melinda, beginning to cry as she saw her father disappear from sight on the TV screens in the NSW Coroners Court in Lidcombe on Monday morning. “There is no further CCTV footage of Bernard after the time Bernard entered the fire stairs,” counsel assisting the coroner, Anna Mitchelmore SC, said. When Mr Gore initially disappeared, his wife searched through the areas they usually visited before returning home at 2pm. His family became “increasingly worried” as it got darker and reported him missing to police at 8pm. Later that night they also reported him missing to Woolworths and Westfield security. “Tragically, (it was) not until around 8 am on January 27, 2017, that Bernard was found deceased in the fire stairs,” Ms Mitchelmore said. “His body was found by a maintenance worker at the bottom of the stairwell he had entered.” She said it had been “immensely distressing for his family” who had wondered for weeks where their beloved family member was gone. “Only for him to be found at the place for which he had set off on January 6,” Ms Mitchelmore said. She said the 71-year-old was found lying in a “semi-kneeling position” in the stairwell. “It appears that he had been sitting on a chair that was found near his body, and at some stage he had fallen forward and off the chair.” He was found along with his white hat, a handkerchief, dentures, glasses case and a $5 note. The court was told Mr Gore had gone missing once before in Hobart. His son, Mark, had bought him a watch which had a GPS tracking device but Mr Gore hadn’t worn it on the day he went missing as it wasn’t working. His daughter, Melinda, had also given him a copy of her address and contact details on that day. Records obtained from the shopping centre showed the push-button exit door at the bottom of the stairwell was not opened once in the three-week period between when Mr Gore went missing and when his body was discovered. No alarm was activated. He was taking medication for hypertension and a mild cognitive impairment at the time of his death. The married couple had “more or less had a routine when they attended Westfield,” Ms Mitchelmore said. Deputy State Coroner Derek Lee is this week overseeing a five-day inquest into Mr Gore’s death. A forensic entomologist analysed data that “indicated to him Bernard died a minimum of one to two weeks before his body was found,” according to Ms Mitchelmore. The issues due to be explored are the adequacy of the review of CCTV footage, the physical searches conducted by Westfield security and police, and the signage – both painted and illuminated – in the stairwell. Ms Mitchelmore said she anticipates the inquest will hear there was no ‘Code Grey’ - the centre’s missing person procedure - called on January 6 or 7. “It’s likely that it was a more informal search as opposed to a search ... by a Code Grey.” The inquest will also investigate why police and security formed the view in the early stages of their investigation that Mr Gore had never arrived at Westfield. “The intention is to always conduct a coronial investigation in a thorough and comprehensive way,” Mr Lee said. “It’s also the aim to identify whether there have been any shortcomings or deficiencies. “Not for the purpose of assigning blame or fault (but) whether some important lessons can be learned from an otherwise traumatic event.”

News

The Amazon is burning: 4 essential reads on Brazil’s vanishing rainforest

Nearly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/21/world/americas/amazon-rainforest.html">40,000 fires</a> are incinerating Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, the latest outbreak in an overactive fire season that has charred 1,330 square miles of the rainforest this year. Don’t blame dry weather for the swift destruction of the world’s largest tropical forest, say environmentalists. These Amazonian wildfires are a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/22/americas/amazon-fires-humans-intl-hnk-trnd/index.html">human-made disaster</a>, set by loggers and cattle ranchers who use a “slash and burn” method to clear land. Feeding off very dry conditions, some of those fires have spread out of control. Brazil has long struggled to preserve the Amazon, sometimes called the “lungs of the world” because it <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/the-amazon-is-burning-at-a-record-rate-and-parts-were-intentionally-set-alight">produces 20% of the world’s oxygen</a>. Despite the increasingly strict environmental protections of recent decades, about a quarter of this massive rainforest is already gone – an area the size of Texas. While climate change <a href="https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2780/nasa-finds-amazon-drought-leaves-long-legacy-of-damage/">endangers the Amazon</a>, bringing hotter weather and longer droughts, <a href="https://www.thedialogue.org/analysis/nearing-the-tipping-point-drivers-of-deforestation-in-the-amazon-region/">development may be the greatest threat</a> facing the rainforest. Here, environmental researchers explain how farming, big infrastructure projects and roads drive the deforestation that’s slowly killing the Amazon. 1. Farming in the jungle “Deforestation is largely due to <a href="https://theconversation.com/strict-amazon-protections-made-brazilian-farmers-more-productive-new-research-shows-105789">land clearing for agricultural purposes</a>, particularly cattle ranching but also soybean production,” writes Rachel Garrett, a professor at Boston University who studies land use in Brazil. Since farmers need “a massive amount of land for grazing,” Garrett says, they are driven to “continuously clear forest – illegally – to expand pastureland.” Twelve percent of what was once Amazonian forest – about 93 million acres – is now farmland. Deforestation in the Amazon has spiked since the election last year of the far-right President Jair Bolsonaro. Arguing that federal conservation zones and hefty fines for cutting down trees hinder economic growth, Bolsonaro has slashed Brazil’s strict environmental regulations. There’s no evidence to support Bolsonaro’s view, Garrett says. “Food production in the Amazon has substantially increased since 2004,” Garrett says. The increased production has been pushed by federal policies meant to discourage land clearing, such as hefty fines for deforestation and low-interest loans for investing in sustainable agricultural practices. Farmers are now planting and harvesting two crops – mostly soybean and corn – each year, rather than just one. Brazilian environmental regulations helped Amazonian ranchers, too. Garrett’s research found that improved pasture management in line with stricter federal land use policies led the number of cattle slaughtered annually per acre to double. “Farmers are producing more meat – and therefore earning more money – with their land,” she writes. 2. Infrastructure development and deforestation President Bolsonaro is also pushing forward an ambitious infrastructure development plan that would turn the Amazon’s many waterways into electricity generators. The Brazilian government has long wanted to build a series of big new hydroelectric dams, including on the Tapajós River, the Amazon’s only remaining undammed river. But the indigenous Munduruku people, who live near around the Tapajós River, have stridently opposed this idea. “The Munduruku have until now successfully slowed down and seemingly halted many efforts to profit off the Tapajós,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/amazon-deforestation-already-rising-may-spike-under-bolsonaro-109940">writes Robert T. Walker</a>, a University of Florida professor who has conducted environmental research in the Amazon for 25 years. But Bolsonaro’s government is less likely than his predecessors to respect indigenous rights. One of his first moves in office was to transfer responsibilities for demarcating indigenous lands from the Brazilian Ministry of Justice to the decidedly pro-development Ministry of Agriculture. And, Walker notes, Bolsonaro’s Amazon development plans are part of a broader South American project, conceived in 2000, to build continental infrastructure that provides electricity for industrialization and facilitates trade across the region. For the Brazilian Amazon, that means not just new dams but also “webs of waterways, rail lines, ports and roads” that will get products like soybeans, corn and beef to market, according to Walker. “This plan is far more ambitious than earlier infrastructure projects” that damaged the Amazon, Walker writes. If Bolsonaro’s plan moves forward, he estimates that fully 40% of the Amazon could be deforested. 3. Road-choked streams Roads, most of them dirt, already criss-cross the Amazon. That came as a surprise to Cecilia Gontijo Leal, a Brazilian researcher who studies tropical fish habitats. “I imagined that my field work would be all boat rides on immense rivers and long jungle hikes,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/amazonian-dirt-roads-are-choking-brazils-tropical-streams-89226">she writes</a>. “In fact, all my research team needed was a car.” Traveling on rutted mud roads to take water samples from streams across Brazil’s Pará state, Leal realized that the informal “bridges” of this locally built transportation network must be impacting Amazonian waterways. So she decided to study that, too. “We found that makeshift road crossings cause both shore erosion and silt buildup in streams. This worsens water quality, hurting the fish that thrive in this delicately balanced habitat,” she writes. The ill-designed road crossings – which feature perched culverts that disrupt water flow – also act as barriers to movement, preventing fish from finding places to feed, breed and take shelter. 4. Rewilding tropical forests The fires now consuming vast swaths of the Amazon are the latest repercussion of development in the Amazon. Set by farmers likely emboldened by their president’s anti-conservation stance, the blazes emit so much smoke that on Aug. 20 it blotted out the midday sun in the city of São Paulo, 1,700 miles away. The fires are still multiplying, and peak dry season is still a month away Apocalyptic as this sounds, science suggests it’s not too late to save the Amazon. Tropical forests destroyed by fire, logging, land-clearing and roads <a href="https://theconversation.com/high-value-opportunities-exist-to-restore-tropical-rainforests-around-the-world-heres-how-we-mapped-them-119508">can be replanted</a>, say ecologists Robin Chazdon and Pedro Brancalion. Using satellite imagery and the latest peer-reviewed research on biodiversity, climate change and water security, Chazdon and Brancalion identified 385,000 square miles of “restoration hotspots” – areas where restoring tropical forests would be most beneficial, least costly and lowest risk. “Although these second-growth forests will never perfectly replace the older forests that have been lost,” Chazon writes, “planting carefully selected trees and assisting natural recovery processes can restore many of their former properties and functions.” The five countries with the most tropical restoration potential are Brazil, Indonesia, India, Madagascar and Colombia. Written by Catesby Holmes. Republished with permission of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-amazon-is-burning-4-essential-reads-on-brazils-vanishing-rainforest-122288">The Conversation. </a>

Travel Tips

Vanished holiday-maker: Search called off for missing woman who fell off cruise ship

The search for a female passenger who reportedly fell overboard a cruise ship into the Mediterranean Sea has officially been called off. The cruise was heading from Cannes in France to Palma de Mallorca in Spain when a 63-year-old Korean passenger fell off the ship on Saturday morning, a cruise line spokesperson told <a rel="noopener" href="https://people.com/travel/female-passenger-falls-overboard-norwegian-cruise-search-called-off/" target="_blank">PEOPLE</a> in a statement. “As soon as the report was made, the authorities were notified and a search and rescue operation ensued,” the statement explained. “The search ceased after several hours, and sadly, the guest was not found. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the individual’s family during this difficult time.” According to reports, the passenger was last seen wearing pink pyjamas. The ship was due to arrive in Palma on Saturday but turned around to search for the missing woman, returning to where she was believed to have fallen off the ship before circling the area. “It took us two hours to get back to the place where they were last seen. We stopped there for four hours to try and find the person,” British passenger Claire Murphy told <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/9252958/missing-woman-cruise-ship-overboard-search-majorca/" target="_blank">The Sun</a>. “They asked everyone on board to help look for that person, so a lot of people were looking out of the windows or were on the edge of the ship but no one could see anything.” The incident added to the growing list of individuals disappearing after going overboard from cruises or ferries. According to a <a rel="noopener" href="http://www.cruisejunkie.com/Overboard.html" target="_blank">website</a> that collects information on missing cruise and ferry passengers and crew, there have been 340 known overboard cases since 2000, averaging to roughly 18 victims per year.

Travel Trouble

TV star vanishes from cruise ship

A massive search is underway for a German TV star and singer who has gone missing while on a cruise to Canada. The cruise operator, Aida Cruises, said there was reason to believe Daniel Kueblboeck may have jumped into the sea on Sunday morning. “That is our suspicion,” spokesman Hansjoerg Kunze said. Kueblboeck first entered stardom after appearing on Germany’s version of Pop Idol in 2003. However, the star’s disappearance follows a recent post the 33-year-old wrote about being bullied. Kueblboeck revealed on his official fan club page that he had suffered “months of bullying” as a child at school, that shook him “deeply”. “Dear fans. Unfortunately, I still do not feel better mentally and physically,” he wrote. “I have yet to cope with this pain of the past months.” <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/BgiiwEmjKKS/?utm_source=ig_embed_loading" data-instgrm-version="12"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BgiiwEmjKKS/?utm_source=ig_embed_loading" target="_blank">A post shared by Daniel Kaiser-Küblböck (@daniel_kaiserkueblboeck)</a> on Mar 20, 2018 at 2:18am PDT </div> </blockquote> Kueblboeck, who auditioned but was not selected as Germany’s Eurovision entry in 2014, was travelling to Newfoundland, Canada, with 2200 passengers. When Kueblboeck was found to be missing, Aida said the ship was stopped and returned to the spot off the coast of Newfoundland where it is believed he went overboard. The incident occurred 185km north of the city of St John’s, Newfoundland. The Canadian coastguard confirmed on Sunday that it was using a surveillance plane and helicopter to search the Labrador Sea for Kueblboeck. Two other cruise ships also reportedly assisted with the search. Kueblboeck, who was born in Bavaria, made his last major TV appearance in the eighth season of Let’s Dance in 2015 and was studying to be an actor at the European Theatre Institute Berlin. Kueblboeck's cruise ship disappearance comes months after an Australian woman died after she fell from an upper-level deck of the Pacific Dawn into the ocean off the coast of New Caledonia. Last month, a British cruise passenger was rescued after surviving 10 hours floating in the Adriatic Sea off Croatia. The 46-year-old claimed that she fell over the balcony, but passengers have since claimed that she jumped after a <a href="https://www.oversixty.com.au/travel/travel-trouble/bizarre-twist-in-case-of-woman-who-was-lost-at-sea-for-10-hours/">drunken argument</a> with her boyfriend.

Travel Trouble

Qantas passengers furious after frequent flyer points vanish

Qantas has been slammed by shocked passengers who claim their frequent flyer points have vanished from their accounts. People aren’t only angry about Qantas’s rule that sees frequent flyer points expire after 18 months of inactivity, others claim they are victims of the air carrier’s decision that they didn’t know about. Back in 2016, Qantas and Woolworths made a deal for the Woolworths Rewards program. Under the changes, the default option for Qantas passengers changed to earning discounts with the supermarket instead of frequent flyer points. People wishing to continue earning Qantas points while shopping at Woolworths needed to manually change their options in their account. Although Qantas maintains the change was well publicised at the time and they emailed all customers, some passengers say they weren’t informed or that the email had ended up in spam folder. They also questioned why Qantas didn’t call or text their customers. Instead passengers found out this year they had not been earning any points since the change and thus they had expired. For some people, they lost hundreds of thousands of points, worth thousands of dollars. One passenger wrote on the Qantas Facebook page of their loss: “Qantas wiped 360,000 points from me, all accumulated from fifo work, only contacted by email when they wiped my account, very disappointed Qantas.” Another said: “Qantas the reason most people lost their points was when Woolworths stop(ped) their rewards points system. If Qantas was reasonable they would do the right thing by these people.” Qantas has repeatedly told customers they don’t give back expired points. A spokesperson said: “It’s really easy to stay active in the Qantas Frequent Flyer program — it’s as simple as earning or redeeming one Qantas Point within 18 months. “Even if members aren’t flying regularly there are a variety of ways to earn or use points on the ground through everyday spend using a Qantas Points-earning credit cards, buying a burger or watching a movie at the cinema.”

Travel Trouble

Why this airline is set to "vanish" overnight

It’s one of the world’s most beloved airlines – but today the airline has taken its last flight ever. Ranked as one of the US’s favourite airlines, Virgin America is no more after being taken over by Alaska Air as part of a $US2.6 billion deal. Today, all check-in counters, kiosks, signs and gate areas branded as Virgin America will be removed from 29 airports around the US and Mexico. <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 658px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media"> <div style="padding: 8px;"> <div style="background: #F8F8F8; line-height: 0; margin-top: 40px; padding: 50.0% 0; text-align: center; width: 100%;"> <div style="background: url(data:image/png; base64,ivborw0kggoaaaansuheugaaacwaaaascamaaaapwqozaaaabgdbtueaalgpc/xhbqaaaafzukdcak7ohokaaaamuexurczmzpf399fx1+bm5mzy9amaaadisurbvdjlvzxbesmgces5/p8/t9furvcrmu73jwlzosgsiizurcjo/ad+eqjjb4hv8bft+idpqocx1wjosbfhh2xssxeiyn3uli/6mnree07uiwjev8ueowds88ly97kqytlijkktuybbruayvh5wohixmpi5we58ek028czwyuqdlkpg1bkb4nnm+veanfhqn1k4+gpt6ugqcvu2h2ovuif/gwufyy8owepdyzsa3avcqpvovvzzz2vtnn2wu8qzvjddeto90gsy9mvlqtgysy231mxry6i2ggqjrty0l8fxcxfcbbhwrsyyaaaaaelftksuqmcc); display: block; height: 44px; margin: 0 auto -44px; position: relative; top: -22px; width: 44px;"></div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Bh_DstVg4nC/" target="_blank">A post shared by Brendan Hooley (@socalgecko)</a> on Apr 25, 2018 at 12:36am PDT </div> </blockquote> The two final flights bearing the Virgin America name were Virgin America Flight 1182 which departed San Francisco at 9.30pm, and Virgin America Flight 1948 which took off for Los Angeles at 9.32pm local time. The airline had a big celebration for those on-board the last flights. “We’re planning to delight our guests flying on these last two flights with a few surprises,” Alaska Airlines said. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> Today we say goodbye to Virgin America. Starting tomorrow, signage will be removed and operations will be moved to a unified passenger experience including one gate area, check-in counter and reservation system under <a href="https://twitter.com/AlaskaAir?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@AlaskaAir</a>. <a href="https://t.co/QaMApHspUu">pic.twitter.com/QaMApHspUu</a> — Orlando International Airport (@MCO) <a href="https://twitter.com/MCO/status/988900486932770816?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2018</a></blockquote> Super fans of the airlines have also planned their own celebrations. “We’ll be having a get-together in the gate area before the flight,” frequent flyer Nate Vallier, who owns an airline IT company, told <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/todayinthesky/2018/04/24/virgin-america-alaska-airlines-merger/546812002/" target="_blank">USA Today</a>. “We’ll have posters, memorabilia and other swag to hand out and, after the flight, we’ll be gathering in the Alaska Airlines lounge in LAX to toast to the sunset of the Virgin America brand.” Most airlines are in the news because of customer complaints, but not Virgin. The airline had a 7/10 rating on Skytrax and was famous for its safety video.

Travel Tips

Common payment method set to vanish completely in 2019

While there was once a time where you couldn’t manage your finances without them, cheques finally seem to be going the way of the dodo in Australia, with forecasts suggesting they could be completely extinct by the end of 2019. Comparison site <a href="https://www.finder.com.au/bank-accounts-with-cheque-books" target="_blank">Finder.com.au</a> analysed data from the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) which suggests if current usage trends continue, the once-popular payment method will disappear completely within two years. The average number of cheques processed in Australia has been steadily declining on a month-by-month basis for quite some time now, dropping from 45,900 cheques in January 2012 to a mere 6,549 cheques in October 2017. The RBA predicts total cheque circulation will fall to 3,000 in December 2018 and continue to decline until the payment method disappears entirely by the end of 2019. <a href="https://www.finder.com.au/bank-accounts-with-cheque-books" target="_blank">Finder.com.au’s money expert</a> Bessie Hassan spoke to <a href="http://www.news.com.au/" target="_blank">News.com.au</a> and said the findings were no surprises, as cheques had been experiencing a “slow death” in recent years. “It’s possible that the slow death of cheques will be extended slightly longer, with some users holding out and numbers continuing to dwindle,” she said. “However, once cheques become increasingly rare, we would expect businesses to stop accepting them completely. “Generation Z, which covers all children currently in primary and secondary education, will likely grow up to not recognise a paper cheque at all.” Cheques, which take an average of three business days to clear, have fallen out of favour with Australian consumers in recent years, who have become used to electronic payments that can be made almost instantly. What are your thoughts? Will you be sad to see cheques go? Or have you stopped using them?

Retirement Income

The town where women keep vanishing

Multiple women have died or gone missing in the past six months in one rural North Carolina town in the US. The bodies of Christina Bennett, 32, and mother-of-five Rhonda Jones, 36, were both found on April 18. Ms Bennett’s decomposed remains were found in an abandoned house and Ms Jones’ body was discovered in a nearby rubbish container. A day later, Ms Jones’s friend Megan Oxendine <a href="http://wncn.com/2017/06/07/lumberton-police-id-3rd-woman-found-dead-in-same-neighborhood/">was interviewed about her friend’s death </a>by CBS North Carolina but in a shocking twist Ms Oxendine was found dead three weeks later – less than 200m from where the other two women were found. Disturbingly, at least two other women from town – Abby Patterson, 20, and Cynthia Jacobs, 41 – have disappeared from town. They have been missing for at least a month with nobody aware of their whereabouts. Police have not released details on how each of the women died and have stopped short of linking the multiple deaths and disappearances, despite evidence all five were known to share a common trait – drug addiction. The reluctance to connect the cases in an official statement by investigators has drawn the ire of residents, who have set up Facebook groups and blogs to conduct their own amateur sleuthing. Many believe there’s a serial killer preying on vulnerable women in the small community of 21,000 people. The latest disappearance of 20-year-old Abby Patterson has created waves in the small community as police refuse to link it to the other cases. Young and attractive, Ms Patterson had been recently discharged from a drug rehabilitation and came to town to visit her mother but soon vanished. Captain Terry Parker of the Lumberton Police told CBS News' Crimesider that investigators do not think that Ms Patterson's disappearance is related the deaths of the three other women in town. He called the case an "active missing person" investigation and said they have "no information, not even a rumour" that Patterson is deceased. The FBI is assisting in the investigation into the women's deaths.

Legal

Why so many people disappear on cruise ships

When we hear about people going missing at sea, our minds flood with hundreds of possible explanations. Did they fall? Did they jump? Were they pushed? And while it might seem like a rare occurrence, it’s believed around 200 people have vanished from cruise ships since the year 2000 alone. The shocking statistic was released by industry expert and author of Cruise Ship Blues: The Underside of the Cruise Ship Industry, Dr Ross Klein, after the parents of a British nanny who disappeared at sea ramp up the search for their daughter. Rebecca Coriam, 24, vanished six years ago while working as a nanny on a Disney cruise. Her parents, Mike and Ann, believe their daughter’s death was not an accident, claiming she was murdered, and that Disney bosses covered up the tragic incident to protect the company’s reputation. <img width="497" height="280" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/38536/image__497x280.jpg" alt="Image_ (362)" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"/> According to Dr Klein, however, many of the 200 missing from cruise ships appear to be passengers who drank too much on the last night of their cruise, falling overboard and drowning. But alcohol has been ruled out as a factor in Rebecca’s disappearance. Instead, it is claimed she was the victim of an attack. The “shambles” investigation into the incident, carried out by a single Bahamian police officer, has only added to the uncertainty into what really happened to Rebecca. Even her local MP, Chris Matheson, who has done extensive research into the matter, described the investigation as “very seriously flawed”. “There has been a whole wealth of contradictory evidence,” he told The Sun last year. “I think a crime has been committed here and I want justice for my constituents.”

Cruising

Kraft about to vanish from Australia

One of the world’s biggest brands is being phased out of Australia and New Zealand. Kraft has been part of Australian households for nearly a century. Although born in Chicago, it’s part and parcel of Australian culture, first arriving to our shores in 1926. In every household you’ll find a Kraft product, whether that’s Mac & Cheese or Vegemite. But despite it being worth more than Nestle or Kellogs – it’s worth 12 billion globally according to Forbes – Kraft will disappear from our shelves by the end of the year. But don’t fret, the products will remain, it’s the Kraft name that will disappear. This month, Kraft Singles was replaced by UK brand “Dairylea Slices”. And that hallmark Kraft Peanut Butter jar? Australia will soon get “The Good Nut” spreads. “The Kraft name symbolises familiarity. When shoppers go to the chiller it has that recognition,” University of Adelaide marketing expert Dr Dean Wilkie told news.com.au. “Removing the Kraft name runs the risk that many people will not hear about the change. In a perfect world you’d keep it.” In Australia, Kraft products have been through a series of takeovers and mergers that has left the brand in a strange position – Kraft products aren't even owned by Kraft here. And by the end of the year, it won’t matter, there’ll no longer be Kraft in our households.

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