A pupil arrives on the first day of school at Yas American Academy in Abu Dhabi in the last decade of August 2025. (Photo by Victor Besa/The National)

British designer Kim Jones (C) walks the runway to greet the audience after the show of the Spring/Summer 2025 Menswear Collection for Dior fashion house during the Paris Fashion Week, in Paris, France, 21 June 2024. The presentation of the Men's collections runs from 18 to 23 June. (Photo by Andre Pain/EPA/EFE)

A pelican investigates a fallen ketchup bottle outside a cafe in St James’s Park in London, England on October 9, 2025. The species has lived there for hundreds of years and remain a popular sight for visitors. Introduced in 1664 as a gift from the Russian ambassador, about 40 pelicans have since made the park their home. The bottle was safely retrieved from the pelican. (Photo by Stephen Chung/Alamy Live News)

“The Mikoyan MiG-31 (NATO reporting name: Foxhound) is a supersonic interceptor aircraft developed to replace the MiG-25 “Foxbat”. The MiG-31 was designed by the Mikoyan design bureau based on the MiG-25”. – Wikipedia

Photos: The Mikoyan MiG-31 “Foxhound”. Russia, April 2012. (Photo by Alexandr Pak; Source: LiveJournal)

China has sent its first woman into space on a mission to dock with an orbiting station, the latest step in an ambitious programme to go to the moon and on to Mars.

Photo: China's first female astronaut Liu Yang, waves during a sending off ceremony before she departs for the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft rocket launch pad at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Jiuquan, China, Saturday, June 16, 2012. China will send its first woman and two other astronauts into space Saturday to work on a temporary space station for about a week, in a key step toward becoming only the third nation to set up a permanent base in orbit. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)

A polar bear fast asleep at London Zoo. (Photo by Fox Photos/Getty Images). 1961

“A small British company with a dream of building a re-usable space plane has won an important endorsement from the European Space Agency (ESA) after completing key tests on its novel engine technology. Reaction Engines Ltd believes its Sabre engine, which would operate like a jet engine in the atmosphere and a rocket in space, could displace rockets for space access and transform air travel by bringing any destination on Earth to no more than four hours away”. – Chris Wickham via Reuters. Photo: Artist's impression of Skylon. (Photo by Reaction Engines Ltd)