Latest news with #MikeBenton
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Memorial Day celebrations in DC, Maryland, Virginia
WASHINGTON () — With the unofficial start of summer just days away, several events are taking place across the D.C. area this Memorial Day weekend to pay respects to the country's armed service members. DC News Now compiled a list of events across the DMV to honor those who have served the country, as well as other events to help kick off the summer season. At D.C.'s National Memorial Day Parade, visitors will be able to experience the story of American service and sacrifice from the country's nearly 250-year history. The parade will march along Constitution Avenue to honor those who have served in the military. It will feature live music, performances, marches, special celebrity guests and more. Before the parade, musical performances will get things rolling starting at 1 p.m. Can't make it in person? Don't worry, the patriotic commemoration will be live-streamed The annual concert, held on the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol, features musical performances that honor the country's veterans, service members and their families. The event is free and open to the public. In addition to the music, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Joint Chiefs of Staff also participate, offering their perspective on the value of military service and highlighting the challenges veterans often face. To learn more about the concert, click Dive into summer! Pools, splash pads to open in Prince George's County Memorial Day weekend The annual festival incorporates family fun into a traditional Memorial Day celebration. This year's ceremony will celebrate the theme 'Honoring Heroes and Celebrating Freedom' and will feature special guest speakers Mayor Mike Benton of North Beach and Calvert County Sheriff Ricky Cox. The festivities include live music from the U.S. Naval Academy Brass Quintet and the U.S. Navy Band Country Current, a movie screening at North Beach, war memorabilia and more. The ceremony will be held at Chesapeake Beach Veterans Memorial Park, with family fun to follow at Kellan's Field. To learn more about the fun, click The City of Bowie's patriotic parade will recognize service members and pay respects to those who have lost their lives with marching bands, performers and floats. The rain or shine parade will kick off at 11 a.m. from the Belair Annex on Belair Drive. It will then march down Belair Drive, turn right onto Sussex Lane, and end at the corner of Sussex Lane and Stonybrook Drive. Organizers note that there are great places to view the parade along the route; however, bleachers will also be available next to the reviewing stand on Sussex Lane, near the intersection with Stonybrook Drive. Spectators are encouraged to park at Bowie High School. For more information, click This Memorial Day, Marylanders can honor those who have served in the heart of the state's capital. The City of Annapolis Memorial Day Parade, deemed one of Maryland's largest Memorial Day parades, will start at Amos Garrett Boulevard and West Street. It will then go down West Street to Church Circle, and down Main Street to City Dock. Following the parade of live music and floats, guests can Memorial Day Ceremony at Susan Campbell Park. The City of Falls Church is gearing up to host its 43rd annual Memorial Day Parade and Festival, which will encapsulate a full day of family-friendly fun, all while honoring our nation's heroes. The day will commence with the Beyer Memorial Day 3k Fun Run, starting at 9 a.m. Participants should arrive before the race at the intersection of Little Falls and Great Falls streets. However, registration is not required. Following the race, the will host a memorial ceremony at 11 a.m. During the day's festivities, festival-goers will also have the opportunity to give back by donating blood through, which will run until 3 p.m. The festival's parade will cap off the celebration at 2 p.m. on Park Avenue. For road closures and parking, click Visitors can pay respects to fallen service members at the Arlington National Cemetery, which will host its fourth annual Flowers of Remembrance Day on the eve of Memorial Day. During the commemoration, visitors will be able to place a flower at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Flowers will be provided, so guests don't need to bring their own. At 9:30 a.m., guests will also have the chance to 'Meet a Sentinel' in the outdoor bowl of the Memorial Amphitheater. From there, at 10 a.m., cemetery historians will offer a public program on the history of Memorial Day, previously known as Decoration Day, followed by a walking tour to the Arlington House. The cemetery that anyone over 18 who drives onto cemetery property should be ready to present a REAL ID at the security checkpoint. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Boston Globe
03-04-2025
- Science
- Boston Globe
Footprints show carnivorous dinosaurs shared watering hole with prey
'It was kind of the service station for the Middle Jurassic,' said Blakesley. 'The dinosaurs would have come down from the surrounding land masses, drop down for a drink, move on. This was very much a transient spot.' Advertisement The footprints at Prince Charles's Point, on the island's northern peninsula, were first discovered in 2019 by a local couple who had observed some odd impressions while kayaking along the shoreline. Blakesley, who had just finished his freshman year at the time, inspected the area at the couple's behest and found a three-toed dinosaur footprint in the sandstone. 'It was slightly raised and looked weathered, but it was really crisp and sharp,' Blakesley said. 'You could see the toes, the claw marks.' In the years that followed, Blakesley and researchers with the University of Edinburgh uncovered dozens more footprints in the area -- he estimated between 150 and 200 -- and analyzed 131 for their study. They determined that some of the prints, such as the first three-toed one that Blakesley uncovered, were made by carnivore theropods, likely Megalosauruses, an ancestor of the formidable Tyrannosaurus rex. Other rounded prints were likely made by herbivore sauropods such as the Cetiosaurus, the precursor to the brontosaurus. Advertisement From the footprints, which ranged 9.8 to 23.6 inches in length, the researchers were able to estimate the dinosaurs' hip height and length of strides. The three-toed theropods were likely about the size of a jeep, Blakesley said, and moved at what humans would consider a jog, about 5 miles per hour. The large sauropods were likely the height of two to three elephants and moved at half the walking speed of a human, about 1.5 miles an hour. Both types of dinosaurs would have had to have enough weight to leave behind such footprints, sinking through the sand to the hardened mud below, and that could last until this day. Blakesley likened the analysis of the footprints to reading a page in a book. 'It tells us a great deal about the dinosaurs that live along the prehistoric lagoonal shoreline,' he said. It also requires a bit of imagination, he said. During the Middle Jurassic Period, the area would have had a warm, humid tropical climate, rather than the chilled wind and rain that define Scottish weather today. The picturesque, mountainous landscape of Skye would have been flatter and dotted with similar freshwater lagoons. The tracks found at Skye never head southeast, raising questions of what was there while the dinosaurs were alive. 'Every time I go down to these footprints, I like to put my hand in the sole of these footprints,' Blakesley said. 'You close your eyes and just feel the tide going out and the mountains rising and falling, the cacophony of a million birdsongs gone by and you're back in this wild, exotic time, surrounded by these beasts.' Advertisement Mike Benton, a professor of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Bristol, said in an email that these footprints provide important insight into life during the Middle Jurassic Period, 'a time when we don't know much about dinosaurs and other land animals anywhere in the world.' 'They are really important because they represent fossilized behavior,' said Benton, who was not involved in the study. 'In other words, each example shows us exactly what a dinosaur was doing so many million years ago.' Last summer, scientists unearthed some 200 dinosaur footprints in southern England that researchers dubbed the 'dinosaur highway.' The footprints were believed to have been left behind by at least five dinosaurs, four Cetiosauruses and one Megalasaurus also from the Middle Jurassic Period, and showed some of them moving north. The footprints discovered on Skye are in the coastal area made famous by Bonnie Prince Charlie, the grandson of King James VII of Scotland who led a failed rising against the British throne. Prince Charles's Point was where he hid in 1746 while on the run from British troops following his side's defeat at the Battle of Culloden. 'It's a very surreal story and to think that Bonnie Prince Charlie may have seen these footprints, he may have run across them and wondered what they were,' Blakesley said. 'The footprints and the Bonnie Prince Charlie story, together they enrich Skye's local heritage.'
