Sunday, February 9, 2014


News Clips For The Day


Danish zoo kills healthy giraffe, feeds it to carnivores – CBS
AP February 9, 2014

COPENHAGEN, Denmark - Copenhagen Zoo turned down offers from other zoos and 500,000 euros ($680,000) from a private individual to save the life of a healthy giraffe before killing and slaughtering it Sunday to follow inbreeding recommendations made by a European association.

The 2-year-old male giraffe, named Marius, was put down using a bolt pistol and its meat will be fed to carnivores at the zoo, spokesman Tobias Stenbaek Bro said. Visitors, including children, were invited to watch while the giraffe was dissected.
Marius' plight triggered a wave of online protests and renewed debate about the conditions of zoo animals. Before the giraffe was killed, an online petition to save it had received more than 20,000 signatures.

Stenbaek Bro said the zoo, which now has seven giraffes left, was recommended to put down Marius by the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria because there were already a lot of giraffes with similar genes in the organization's breeding program.
The Amsterdam-based EAZA has 347 members, including many large zoos in European capitals, and works to conserve global biodiversity and to achieve the highest standards of care and breeding for animals.

Stenbaek Bro said EAZA membership isn't mandatory, but most responsible zoos are members of the organization.

Stenbaek Bro said Copenhagen Zoo turned down an offer from a private individual who wanted to buy Marius for 500,000 euros ($680,000). Stenbaek Bro said a significant part of EAZA membership is that the zoos don't own the animals themselves, but govern them, and therefore can't sell them to anyone outside the organization that don't follow the same set of rules.

He said that is important for the breeding programs to work.
When asked if other zoos had offered to take in Marius, the spokesman said yes but didn't specify numbers or which ones.

The zoo's scientific director Bengt Holst said the giraffe breeding program is similar to those used in deer parks, where red deer and fallow deer are culled to keep populations healthy.

"The most important factor must be that the animals are healthy physically and behaviorally and that they have a good life while they are living whether this life is long or short. This is something that Copenhagen Zoo believes strongly in," he said in a statement.

Holst said the zoo doesn't give the giraffes contraceptives because they have "a number of unwanted side effects on the internal organs" and the zoo believes parental care is an important part of the animal's natural behavior.
The organization Animal Rights Sweden said the case simply highlights what they believe zoos do to animals regularly.

"It is no secret that animals are killed when there is no longer space, or if the animals don't have genes that are interesting enough," the organization said in a statement. "The only way to stop this is to not visit zoos."

It pointed out some zoos work to preserve species of animals, but never individuals.
"When the cute animal babies that attract visitors grow up they are not as interesting anymore," it said.


Given the fact that some animals are going to be extinct in the wild within the foreseeable future, I have to agree with the Zoo's policy, because the captive populations will become gradually more and more unhealthy if inbreeding is allowed to continue without restraint. In nature the herbivores fall prey to carnivores, so what happened here is not as horrible as it looks. I do think that allowing children to watch the dissection was not a good thing. They don't need to see that. They can be very impressionable.

Of course, there is always the harvesting of farm animals which, in the old days or currently on small farms, the children witnessed the procedure and learned how to do it themselves from their fathers. Farm life doesn't protect young people from the realities of life, and in earlier and more poverty stricken circumstances it was essential that they learn how to do the necessary things. That was life before the middle of the nineteen hundreds in the US, and in other parts of the world where the modern age had not brought its changes.





Iran to explain “nuclear detonators” to U.N. as part of international agreement
CBS/ReutersFebruary 9, 2014

VIENNA - Iran has agreed to give the U.N. nuclear agency information and explanations about so-called exploding bridge wire detonators, the IAEA said on Sunday, as part of its investigation into suspicions Tehran may have carried out atomic bomb research.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a statement that seven steps that Iran had agreed to implement by May 15 also included inspector access to the Saghand uranium mine. 

The seven further steps came about under a deal with the U.N. atomic watchdog meant to help allay international concern about Tehran's nuclear program. These are happening in concert with ongoing talks with international powers over the fate of the country's nuclear ambitions.

A diplomatic source said one of the measures is related to a long-stalled investigation by the U.N. nuclear agency into possible military dimensions to Iran's atomic activities. Iran has repeatedly denied any such ambitions.

That would be a potentially significant step forward as the probe into suspected atomic bomb research has been deadlocked for years because of what the West sees as Iranian stonewalling of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
It could also send a positive signal to separate, high-stakes negotiations between Iran and six world powers which are due to start on Feb. 18,  aimed at reaching a broader diplomatic settlement of the decade-old dispute over Tehran's nuclear work.
The IAEA had hoped to persuade Iran in the talks that started in Tehran on Saturday to finally start addressing suspicions that it may have worked on designing an atomic bomb.

Iran has rejected Western and Israeli accusations that is working to develop nuclear weapons as baseless and said it will cooperate with the IAEA to clear up any “ambiguities".

A joint statement by Iran and the IAEA issued after the two-day meeting did not give details on the new measures agreed under a framework cooperation accord signed in November.

It said the two sides held “constructive technical meetings” in the Iranian capital and that Iran had implemented six previous, initial steps agreed three months ago, including access to two nuclear-related facilities.

“Iran has taken the initial practical measures that were foreseen,” the statement, posted on the IAEA's website, said, adding that they had agreed on seven new measures to be implemented by Iran by May 15.

Details of the new steps would be reported by IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano to the U.N. agency's 35-nation governing board shortly, the statement added.
Behrouz Kamalvandi, a spokesman for Iran's Atomic Energy Organisation, was quoted by the official IRNA news agency as saying: “Given the nature of the information provided in the spirit of cooperation, we expect that we will witness a positive report to the board of governors.”

He added: “The IAEA inspectors are not supposed to have any visits with Iranian (nuclear) scientists ... our emphasis is and has always been on managed access.”
The statement did not elaborate on what he meant by “managed access” but it may be a reference to a term under which the timing and conditions for the IAEA's access to sites of interest should be agreed between the two sides. 




This looks like Iran is cooperating, even though slowly and with caution, concerning it's nuclear activities, and I see the situation as becoming clarified gradually. I hope Iran does come out of the darkness of a closed Islamic society to become a nation that could eventually be an ally to the West, though our current relationship with Saudi Arabia might be damaged by that, since I understand they are rivals. We need peaceful relations in the Middle East more than any other part of the world. We get along better with China and Russia now than with most Middle Eastern countries. There has been much progress in world peace since the 1960's when I first began watching the news, and I feel fairly sure that there are very few if any nations now which would purposely set off a nuclear war, which used to be my greatest fear. If we can't have complete peace, maybe we can at least have a reign of common sense and progress for women, democracy and the poor.





Mutts win place alongside purebreds at country's oldest dog show – CBS
By Elaine Quijano February 8, 2014

NEW YORK - Score one for the mutts.

The Westminster Dog Show -- the nation's oldest and most important dog show -- is breaking with a 138-year tradition.

Saturday evening mixed-breed dogs were allowed to compete for the very first time.
Picture-perfect images of purebred show dogs are most closely associated with Westminster, but for the first time since its earliest years, the Westminster Kennel Club is making a place for mixed-breed dogs like seven-year-old Alfie.
 
Owner Irene Palmerini stumbled across the poodle-terrier mix in a pet store at the mall.

"And he was in his cage with a big sign and a big red $99 on clearance," she said. "I just couldn't resist him. He had a sad little face. And he looked like he needed a home and for $99 who could resist that bargain."
Alfie the clearance dog is now getting the chance to clear hurdles in Westminster's new agility competition.
 
David Frei has served as co-host of Westminster's purebred show for more than 20 years.

"It's the hottest growing canine sport out there, and you can see how excited the dogs are, how excited the handlers are," he said.

Agility competitions feature an obstacle course, where dogs are judged on speed and the preciseness of their movements through each obstacle.

"The difference between a show dog and a non-show dog can be pretty subtle sometimes - maybe their tail's a little off or maybe their eye color isn't right or whatever," Frei said. "But with agility that doesn't matter. They're having fun. They're having fun. It doesn't matter if you win or don't win, the dogs are having a great time."
 
Westminster received more than 600 entries of top-performing agility dogs; 225 spots were given out at random. Sixteen of them went to mixed-breed dogs, or as Westminster calls them, "All-Americans."

A successful run requires a close bond between dog and human. The pressure is intense. Handlers receive a map of the course ahead of time, but the dogs don't get to run it until the competition.

In suburban New Jersey, Palmerini takes Alfie to a trainer twice a week and runs her own drills in the backyard.

For her, being selected for Westminster is an honor.
"I'm representing everybody who sits at home with their dog on the couch and loves them just because they're their pet," she said.

In the end, Alfie did not advance to the final round, but that made no difference to Palmerini. She still sees her marked-down mutt as a winner.




As pets, mixed breed dogs can be better than purebreds, since many purebred dogs are inbred, causing genetic flaws. I wouldn't pay $99.00 for a mixed breed dog, though. I would just go to the nearest city pound and take one of those dogs, because if they aren't adopted they may be “put to sleep,” and taking them home is the most humane thing to do. There are generally rules like a requirement to have a female spayed and there may be an adoption fee, but it is usually no more than $20.00 or so. Think of saving a life. Dogs and cats are almost like people to me. They are affectionate and fun to be around, with a surprising amount of intelligence if you work with them. I would rather have a medium sized dog of a gentle but intelligent breed like a collie than a gun for protection. Their instincts will usually take over if you have a prowler, so that they will bark and even bite if needed, causing most burglars to go away and try to prey on some other household.





The drug dealers next door: How NYC heroin mills are blending in – CBS
AP, February 8, 2014

NEW YORK - In a major drug bust that drew little attention just a week before Philip Seymour Hoffman's death, authorities found a sophisticated heroin packaging and distribution operation in an apartment in the Bronx.

There, workers with coffee grinders, scoops and scales toiled around the clock to break down bricks of the drug into thousands of tiny, hit-size baggies, bearing such stamped brands as "Government Shutdown" and, in a nod to the Super Bowl, "NFL."

California widens access to drug that can reverse heroin overdose

Actor Hoffman's fatal heroin overdose puts focus on dealers

The seizure of $8 million worth of heroin was the result of the latest raid on heroin mills located behind the doors of New York homes, which authorities say are a sign of a well-oiled distribution network that caters to more mainstream, middle- and upper-class customers like the Oscar-winning Hoffman.
 
Deadly mix of heroin and powerful painkiller hits streets
A dangerous mixture of heroin and the powerful painkiller Fentanyl has caused nearly 100 deaths over the past year …

 Heroin dealers want to find customers with ready cash "who are going to be with them until they die," said city Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan. "That's the attitude."

Tests are continuing to try to pinpoint how Hoffman died, but his body was found with a syringe in his arm and dozens of packets of heroin nearby. Where he got his drugs remains uncertain, but the arrests of drug suspects identified during the investigation suggest he might have visited a lower Manhattan apartment building where a supplier lived.

There's no evidence that the Bronx operation provided any heroin Hoffman might have bought. But New York has long been known as the nation's capital of smack, regularly accounting for about 20 percent of the heroin the federal Drug Enforcement Administration seizes every year.

Those seizures have grown by 67 percent in the state over the last five years, a trend Brennan attributes in part to high-volume heroin mills invisible to most New Yorkers but capable of churning out hundreds of thousands of packets within days after a big shipment arrives.

The pipeline starts in Mexico, where cartels traffic Colombian-produced heroin by the kilogram. The wholesalers smuggle the drugs into the United States concealed in trucks, through tunnels dug under the southwest border and, in one recent case, by molding and coloring the heroin to look like coffee beans and shipping it via UPS to a private postal box in Queens.
 
Heroin use in U.S. soaring to new heights

The number of heroin users in the U.S. has doubled since 2002 to 335,000 people, and deaths related to drug have jumped 44 percent in just five years...

 In the Northeast, the cartels have increasingly supplied Dominican middlemen who rely on a business model for heroin mills that emphasizes discipline, quality control and an absence of violence.

The retailers favor residential settings in safe neighborhoods as a means of cover. Raids by Brennan's office and the DEA in recent years have found them in a newly renovated apartment in midtown Manhattan that rented for $3,800 a month and in a two-story, red-brick home in the New York City suburb of Fort Lee, N.J.

A mill found in an 18th-floor apartment in upper Manhattan had a sign that read, "Clean Up After Yourselves - The Management." At another discovered across the street from Manhattan College in a Bronx, immigrant workers wore school sweatshirts to try to blend in.

Workers can make up to $5,000 a week. They're also given meals and toiletries to help make it through 12-hour shifts.

The mill operators and workers go out of their way not to disturb neighbors, who might report them to police, or to draw the attention of other criminals who wt to rob them. They leave the apartments empty when not working, and sometimes change locations long before their leases are up as a cost of doing business, said James J. Hunt, the acting head of the DEA's New York office.

"Drug dealers are very wary," Hunt said. "They wouldn't want word to get out on the street about a mill. They want anonymity."

The economics are addictive: The heroin flooding the region carries an average wholesale price of about $60,000 per kilo. The retailers can cut a kilo to a 50 percent purity level using powdered vitamin B or other nontoxic substances. That provides enough drugs to fill 25,000 single-dose glassine envelopes that would be sold for $5 each to street-level dealers, who in turn charge customers $10 to $15. After subtracting the cost of the kilo, wages and other expenses, the mill operator would turn a $70,000 profit per kilo.

In the Bronx takedown on Jan. 30, investigators conducting surveillance at a building there stopped a man making an apparent delivery of drugs before seeing another man try to flee out the fire escape of a fifth-floor apartment. Inside, they found 33 pounds of heroin, 18 coffee grinders used to cut the heroin with baking soda, folding tables and chairs where it was packaged and stamps with various brand names.
Once exposed, mills like the Bronx one can be a touchy subject for property owners and their tenants.

There was no response to a phone message left with the landlord of the building. Linda Johnson, who lived in a one-bedroom apartment there until a few months ago, said she never noticed anything suspicious.

"I saw people coming and going in the elevator and nobody bothered me," said Johnson, 61. "If it was happening, you'd know it, right?"

Separate operations distribute the drugs to users in the city and beyond. New York City brands have turned up in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and smaller cities in Connecticut, Hunt said.

The distributors offer customer service intended to remove the fear and stigma from bygone eras. In one case, a dealer riding a three-wheeled motorcycle and a helmet emblazoned with the heroin brand name "Sin City" would direct customers to an exact block in a middle-class Brooklyn neighborhood - code-named "the office" - then pull up alongside their cars and exchange glassines for cash.

Dealers and users in New York and elsewhere often connect on social media sites with a degree of anonymity, authorities say. Phone numbers are exchanged and meeting spots are arranged through texting. Sometimes there's home delivery.

Elizabeth Thompson, a recovering addict who got hooked on heroin and relied on home delivery while going to law school in Philadelphia, described the delivery men who came to her door at an apartment building there as prompt and courteous.
"I never felt unsafe with them," said the 30-year-old Thompson, now policy coordinator with the New Jersey Drug Policy Alliance. "They wanted the business. And I was a good customer for a long time."

Downstream, "it's hand to hand - the dealer's hands to the buyer's hands," Brennan said. "That has to go on no matter what. There's no anonymity at that point."



This article is both depressing and deeply interesting. The trade in heroin described here has become as slick and sophisticated as a high-end boutique. I think that's because the customers are wealthy people rather than the poor and they will pay for the personal services. I'll bet if they don't pay their bill on time the relationship will become dirty and dangerous fairly quickly, though. It's a slippery slope to make too much money, because after awhile you start looking for something to spend it on, and a heroin experience sounds cool until it becomes a craving. Thank God for treatment centers and 12 Step Programs.




Federal government to expand recognition of same-sex marriages – CBS
AP, February 8, 2014

WASHINGTON -- In an assertion of same-sex marriage rights, Attorney General Eric Holder is applying a landmark Supreme Court ruling to the Justice Department, announcing Saturday that same-sex spouses cannot be compelled to testify against each other, should be eligible to file for bankruptcy jointly and are entitled to the same rights and privileges as federal prison inmates in opposite-sex marriages.

The Justice Department runs a number of benefits programs, and Holder says same-sex couples will qualify for them. They include the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund and benefits to surviving spouses of public safety officers who suffer catastrophic or fatal injuries in the line of duty.

"In every courthouse, in every proceeding and in every place where a member of the Department of Justice stands on behalf of the United States, they will strive to ensure that same-sex marriages receive the same privileges, protections and rights as opposite-sex marriages under federal law," Holder said in prepared remarks to the Human Rights Campaign in New York. The advocacy group works on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equal rights.

Just as in the civil rights struggles of the 1960s, the stakes in the current generation over same-sex marriage rights "could not be higher," said Holder.
"The Justice Department's role in confronting discrimination must be as aggressive today as it was in Robert Kennedy's time," Holder said of the attorney general who played a leadership role in advancing civil rights.

On Monday, the Justice Department will issue a policy memo to its employees instructing them to give lawful same-sex marriages full and equal recognition, to the greatest extent possible under the law.

Holder's address is the latest application of a Supreme Court ruling that struck down a provision in the Defense of Marriage Act defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The decision applies to legally married same-sex couples seeking federal benefits.

Court strikes down DOMA; sends Prop 8 back to Calif.
 After the Supreme Court decision last June, the Treasury Department and the IRS said that all legally married gay couples may file joint federal tax returns, even if they reside in states that do not recognize same-sex marriages. The Defense Department said it would grant military spousal benefits to same-sex couples. The Health and Human Services Department said the Defense of Marriage Act is no longer a bar to states recognizing same-sex marriages under state Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Programs. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management said it is now able to extend benefits to legally married same-sex spouses of federal employees and annuitants.

Holder told his audience:
-The Justice Department will recognize that same-sex spouses of individuals involved in civil and criminal cases should have the same legal rights as all other married couples, including the right to decline to give testimony that might incriminate their spouse. Prosecutors traditionally have various legal challenges that they can bring to an assertion of the spousal privilege. But the attorney general's speech made clear that the government will not bring a challenge on the ground that the marriage is not recognized in the state where the couple lives.

-The U.S. Trustee Program will take the position that same-sex married couples should be eligible to file for bankruptcy jointly and that domestic support obligations should include debts such as alimony owed to a former same-sex spouse.

- Federal prisoners in same-sex marriages will be entitled to visitation by a spouse, inmate furloughs during a crisis involving a spouse, escorted trips to attend a spouse's funeral, correspondence with a spouse and compassionate release or reduction in sentence based on an inmate's spouse being incapacitated.




This article is very thorough and informational. I never knew there were so many privileges of marriage that were involved in this issue. I had heard that in visiting someone in an intensive care ward of a hospital, only the next of kin can be admitted to the room, and in the past, of course, a gay partner would not be considered next of kin. They didn't mention that one in this article.

I feel empathy for gay people, because I have always been interested in some things that used to be considered "for boys" myself. By the time I came along, though, a tomboy was accepted in the family as much as a more “feminine” girl. I have always been straight rather than gay, but I fully respect people wanting to form a permanent bond with their gay partner rather than trying to pretend an interest in the opposite sex. That would be like being in a prison within your own body. Our church, the Unitarian Universalist faith, welcomes all LGBT people, as well as other races and even other religions if the people want to attend. I'm glad to see the laws of the land coming around to the stance of backing equal rights of LGBTs. Now we just have to get some more states to step up to the plate.




­
Oldest 'Out Of Africa' Human Footprints Found On British Coast – NPR
by Scott Neuman
­
The oldest human ancestors to have walked on the British Isles left nothing except footprints. But they've made quite an impression on the world of science.
Researchers say 50 or so prints found on a beach near the village of Happisburg in Norfolk are the oldest known human footprints outside Africa. They were discovered last spring by a team of experts from the British Museum, the Natural History Museum and Queen Mary University of London.

The footprints are thought to be those of Homo antecessor, or Pioneer Man. The findings are published in the latest issue of PLOS ONE.

It's thought that the impressions were made by a group of at least two large adult males, two or three adult females or teenagers and at least three or four children. The early humans would have gazed out at the north entrance to the English Channel as they strolled along the shore sometime between 800,000 and 1 million years ago.
The footprints represent "one of the most important archaeological discoveries ever made in Britain," The Independent writes.

They were discovered in a 430-foot-square area of shoreline at low tide, as heavy waves briefly washed away the silt to expose the prints.

The newspaper says:
"Archaeologists are now analysing detailed 3D images of the prints to try to work out the approximate composition of the group. Of the 50 or so examples recorded, only around a dozen were reasonably complete — and only two showed the toes in detail. Tragically, although a full photogrammetric and photographic record has been made, all but one of the prints were rapidly destroyed by incoming tides before they could be physically lifted. ...

"Archaeologists are now trying to determine the precise age of the footprints. They have so far succeeded in narrowing it down to two possible dates — around 850,000 years ago or 950,000 years ago. Only intense further study will reveal which of those two alternatives is the correct one."

[Add at 1:10 p.m. ET: It appears that the prints were not in fossilized rock but instead in hard-packed estuary mud, which would explain how they were washed away. In the PLOS ONE abstract, it's described as "laminated sediment."]

British Museum archaeologist Nick Ashton was quoted in the journal saying the fossilized footprints are "a tangible link to our earliest human relatives."
University of Southampton archaeology professor Clive Gamble, who was not involved in the project, called the discovery "tremendously significant," according to The Associated Press.

"This is the closest we've got to seeing the people," he told the AP.
"When I heard about it, it was like hearing the first line of [William Blake's hymn] 'Jerusalem' — 'And did those feet, in ancient time, walk upon England's mountains green?' Well, they walked upon its muddy estuary."


Homo antecessor
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Homo antecessor is an extinct human species (or subspecies) dating from 800,000 to 1.2 million years ago, that was discovered by Eudald Carbonell, Juan Luis Arsuaga and J. M. Bermúdez de Castro. H. antecessor is one of the earliest known human species in Europe.

Various archaeologists and anthropologists have debated how H. antecessor relates to other Homo species in Europe, with suggestions that it was an evolutionary link between H. ergaster and H. heidelbergensis, although Richard Klein thinks that it was instead a separate species that evolved from H. ergaster.[1] Some scientists consider H. antecessor to be the same species as H. heidelbergensis, who inhabited Europe from 250,000 to 600,000 years ago in the Pleistocene.

The best-preserved fossil is a maxilla that belonged to a ten-year-old individual found in Spain. Based on palaeomagnetic measurements, it is thought to be older than 780–857 ka.[2] The average brain was 1,000 cm³ in volume. In 1994 and 1995, 80 fossils of six individuals who may have belonged to the species were found in Atapuerca, Spain. At the site were numerous examples of cuts where the flesh had been flensed from the bones, which indicates that H. antecessor may have practiced cannibalism.[3]

Footprints presumed to be from H. antecessor — they were around 800,000 years old — have been found at Happisburgh on the coast of Norfolk, England.[4][5][6][7]

Physiology

Model of a female Homo antecessor of Atapuerca practicing cannibalism (Ibeas Museum, Burgos, Spain).

H. antecessor was about 1.6-1.8 m (5½-6 feet) tall, and males weighed roughly 90 kg (200 pounds). Their brain sizes were roughly 1,000–1,150 cm³, smaller than the 1,350 cm³ average of modern humans. Due to fossil scarcity, very little more is known about the physiology of H. antecessor, yet it was likely to have been more robust than H. heidelbergensis.[8]

According to Juan Luis Arsuaga, one of the co-directors of the excavation in Burgos, H. antecessor might have been right-handed, a trait that makes the species different from the other apes. This hypothesis is based on tomography techniques. Arsuaga also claims that the frequency range of audition is similar to H. sapiens, which makes him suspect that H. antecessor used a symbolic language and was able to reason.[8] Arsuaga's team is currently pursuing a DNA map of H. antecessor after elucidating that of a bear that lived in northern Spain some 500,000 years ago.

The only known fossils of H. antecessor are from two sites in the Sierra de Atapuerca region of northern Spain (Gran Dolina and Sima del Elefante). Other sites yielding fossil evidence of this hominid have been discovered in the United Kingdom and France. Some of the remains are almost indistinguishable from the fossil attributable to the 1.5 million year old Turkana Boy, belonging to H. ergaster.

Gran Dolina[edit]
Archaeologist Eudald Carbonell i Roura of the Universidad Rovira i Virgili in Tarragona, Spain and palaeoanthropologist Juan Luis Arsuaga Ferreras of the Complutense University of Madrid discovered Homo antecessor remains at the Gran Dolina site in the Sierra de Atapuerca, east of Burgos in what now is Spain. The H. antecessor remains have been found in level 6 (TF6) of the Gran Dolina site.
More than 80 bone fragments from six individuals were uncovered in 1994 and 1995. The site also had included approximately 200 stone tools and 300 animal bones. Stone tools including a stone carved knife were found along with the ancient hominin remains. All these remains were dated at least 900,000 years old.[9] The best-preserved remains are a maxilla (upper jawbone) and a frontal bone of an individual who died at the age of 10–11.

Sima del Elefante[edit]
On June 29, 2007, Spanish researchers working at the Sima del Elefante site in the Atapuerca Mountains of Spain announced that they had recovered a molar dated to 1.1–1.2 million years ago. The molar was described as "well worn" and from an individual between 20 and 25 years of age. Additional findings announced on 27 March 2008 included the discovery of a mandible fragment, stone flakes, and evidence of animal bone processing.[10]

Suffolk, England[edit]
In 2005 flint tools and teeth from the water vole Mimomys savini, a key dating species, were found in the cliffs at Pakefield near Lowestoft in Suffolk. This suggests that hominins can be dated in England to 700,000 years ago, potentially a cross between Homo antecessor and Homo heidelbergensis.[11][12][13][14][15]
Norfolk, England[edit]

In 2010 stone tool finds were reported in Happisburgh, Norfolk, England,[16][17] thought to have been used by H. antecessor, suggesting that the early hominin species also lived in England about 950,000 years ago – the earliest known population of the genus Homo in Northern Europe.

In May 2013 sets of fossilized footprints were discovered in an estuary at Happisburgh.[18] They are thought to date from 800,000 years ago and are theorized to have been left by a small group of people, including several children and one adult male. The tracks are considered to be the oldest human footprints outside Africa and the first direct evidence of humans in this time period in the UK or northern Europe, previously known only by their stone tools.[19] Within two weeks the tracks had been eroded by the tide, but scientists were able to make 3D photogrammetric images of the prints, and attributed them to H. antecessor.[5]"



Concerning the land bridge between England and France, Wikipedia says the following: “The Channel is of geologically recent origins, having been dry land for most of the Pleistocene period. It is thought to have been created between 450,000 and 180,000 years ago by two catastrophic glacial lake outburst floods caused by the breaching of the Weald–Artois anticline, a ridge that held back a large proglacial lake in the Doggerland region, now submerged under the North Sea.”

It's a shame no tools or bones were found with these footprints. I wonder how the archaeologists can be so sure the prints are from the same sub-species as that found at Gran Dolina, where they did find a good many solid pieces of evidence, unless they found footprints there at Gran Dolina, too. Maybe the size and shape of the foot can be compared with the bones found in Spain sufficiently well to make a determination. DNA from bones would be much better evidence, though. I think this is why archaeologists argue among themselves so much.

Still, even though I have doubts, I will read anything I can find on the subject – it's like a real life mystery to me and I'm always hunting for new clues and theories. It all started with finding Indian arrowheads and pottery in North Carolina when I was young and talking to an archaeologist once who was busy digging beside the road. I have never forgotten meeting him and his being willing to talk to us.