OGN Wednesday
Mid-week collection of positive news nuggets from around the globe.
After Two Millennia
Ancient Rome’s largest fresco and mosaic complex, featuring depictions of a mysterious maritime city, has opened to the public for the first time in 2,000 years. The massive artworks, hidden underground and created in the first century C.E., were discovered in the 1990s during excavations of the Baths of Trajan (not far from the Colosseum) and have since been extensively restored. The mosaic is massive, measuring 33 feet high and 52 feet wide - and counting. “We think it’s the biggest wall mosaic ever found in the Roman world, and we are still digging to find where it stops,” says Francesco Pacetti, one of the archaeologists who excavated the finds. The artworks were initially discovered during excavations of the sprawling Baths of Trajan, spanning roughly 15 acres, forming the largest bath complex in the world at the time. Archaeologists think the complex was more than just a place to bathe; they believe it was also the setting for exercise, socializing and cultural activities.
Rumours Confirmed
After 2025’s wildly lucrative reunion (the most profitable run of gigs in British history), Oasis have finally confirmed new tour dates for 2027. “Start the celebrations!”, the band said in a statement. “After a period of reflection, The Most Damaging Pop Cultural Force in Recent British History” - a quote from a media opinion piece about the band - “has declared itself fit for purpose and will once again return to lift the spirits of the people. Come witness the fitness. It shall be a sight to behold.” Titled Oasis Live 27, the dates encompass the UK, Ireland, mainland Europe and the US, beginning in Glasgow on 21 May, and ending with four nights at Knebworth in September.
Good News For Nabarleks
By day, the species stays hidden from predators, and by night, it comes out to feed. This secretive and rarely seen creature, called the nabarlek, is endangered, but in a ray of hope for the marsupial, Australian conservationists recently captured the species on camera at two sites in Western Australia where it had not been scientifically recorded before. Both lie in a remote region where the nabarlek had not been documented for 50 years. “This is very exciting and great news for the species,” Larissa Potter, a senior field ecologist with the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, says in a statement. “It’s also reassuring, as it indicates that this threatened wallaby is persisting … in places we didn’t previously know about.”
Planning Ahead
Mexico’s door-to-door health workers have reached 10.9 million people in the last year. The Health House by House programme logged 22.8 million home visits between July 2025 and June 2026, with over 21,000 workers checking blood pressure, updating vaccinations and referring roughly 900,000 people to specialist care. As well as providing care, they’re building the data backbone for the country’s planned 2027 rollout of a universal health service, with 2.25 million people already registered.
A World-First
Eliminating carbon-intensive concrete and steel beams, an architecture studio and engineer just completed construction on the world’s first high-rise building held up by a thousand tonnes of volcanic rock. Aptly called Petra Heights, it’s the latest step in the studio’s ongoing efforts to make stone a viable, low-carbon alternative to steel and concrete. It claims that load-bearing stone is the second-most sustainable building material, after carbon-sequestering timber and can cut a building structure’s carbon footprint by as much as 95 percent if sourced domestically. Together, concrete and steel make up 16 percent of humanity’s carbon emissions - about four or five times as much as global aviation.
No Thank You
Going against the wishes of the Trump administration, New Mexico has banned uranium mining on 13 million acres of state land. The state land commissioner - Stephanie Garcia Richard - signed an executive order that bans all new uranium mining projects, saying that the long-lasting environmental and public health impacts of uranium contamination outweigh any potential revenues to state coffers.
"To be able to look back upon ones life in satisfaction, is to live twice." Kahlil Gibran
On This Day
16 September 1965: British singer Davie Jones changes his stage name to David Bowie to avoid being confused with Davy Jones, the lead singer of The Monkees.
Today's Articles
Spiaggina: Loved by Jackie O and Princess Grace, the cute Fiat 500 from the 1950s and 60s is primed to return.
Sugar Rationing: New study shows that sugar rationing for under-twos - and even unborn babies - may ward off cognitive decline in old age.
It Started Badly, But... The greatest land restoration project of all time that you have probably never heard of.
Mood Boosting Video
A Shire horse enters the record books as the world's tallest living horse.
