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Media Platforms Design TeamTourists taking photos in the glass ledges of Chicago’s Willis Tower, which hang 103 stories above the street below, got a hell of scare this week when it looked like the transparent floor beneath them was about to collapse. A protective coating covering the 1.5-inch-thick, 1500-pound glass panel cracked, leading those standing on the The Ledge at the time to believe the entire glass structure was breaking.The visitors to the observation deck were in no danger....

The federal government may soon stop accepting state-issued IDs from six different states as a way to gain access to federal facilities or board commercial airliners. So if you live in Illinois, Missouri, New Mexico, Washington, Minnesota, or California, you might need to bring another form of ID to the airport in 2016.The regulations come from a law passed in 2005 called the Real ID Act, which requires states to meet a specific list of requirements to ensure the legal residency of applicants before they issue identification cards....

Media Platforms Design TeamMuch has been made of Google’s moral compass since the “Don’t be evil” company started censoring search results at the request of the Chinese government. Then yesterday Google announced that Gmail accounts of Chinese dissidents had been hacked as part of a broad spying operation apparently tied to the Chinese government, and the company decided that it would no longer censor its search results, even if that meant pulling out of the Chinese market altogether....

Media Platforms Design TeamOn-Sale Date: Now Base Price: $61,920 to $68,920Competitors: Audi A8, BMW 7 Series, Cadillac XTS, Lexus LS, Mercedes-Benz S-ClassPowertrains: 5.0-liter V-8, 429 hp, 376 lb-ft; 8-speed automatic, RWD EPA Fuel Economy (city/hwy): 15/23 What’s New: The top-of-the-line Hyundai comes due for a mid-cycle refresh. Outside, most of the chrome is gone from the front and rear bumpers, and both front and rear lights get new styling, including LED daytime running lamps....

2015 Volkswagen Golf TSIAvailable: NowPrice: $19,815/$20,915MPG (City/Hwy): 26/37 Manual; 23/30 AutomaticVolkswagen has suffered an identity crisis over the past few years. Within a single showroom, you have beautifully wrought overachievers like the CC and Eos parked beside shoddier Jettas, Passats, and Golfs, their prices slashed along with amenities in search of a wider audience. But lately VW has tiptoed back toward its old upscale aspirations, and the 2015 Golf indicates that the experiment is over....

Fantasy author Terry Pratchett, whose Discworld series delighted fans with liberal doses of imaginative storytelling and off-beat humor, has died at age 66. Pratchett waged a very public battle with Alzheimer’s Disease, the disease that took his memories and life. He was diagnosed in 2007, later becoming an advocate for euthanasia, telling the Telegraph in one of his last interviews, “Knowing that you can doesn’t mean that you will. The knowledge that you could stop this, if you really wanted, is predicated on you saying, ‘No, tomorrow’s going to be pretty OK, and the next day’....

Yes, it has Mickey Mouse watch faces and a slew of wrist-based applications, but perhaps the coolest feature of the Apple Watch is the way it can tap you on the wrist as a way to get your attention. But there’s a problem: It seems like the Taptic Engine is not as reliable as you might hope, and The Wall Street Journal reports that shoddy units coming off assembly lines in China are slowing down the rollout of Apple’s new watch....

Popular Mechanics contributing editor Jeff Wise, a private pilot and long-time aviation writer, takes on his biggest challenge yet: Flying without an engine. No matter how experienced the pilot, getting a glider license is no easy sail.The first drops of rain started to fall as I pulled to a stop at Freehold Airport. It was nine o’clock in the morning, and I was scheduled to meet my instructor, Jeff, for our second consecutive day of intensive training in preparation for my glider-license check ride....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe Specs: 4.0-liter, supercharged, DOHC, 24-valve V6, 390 hp, five-speed automatic, AWDThe Mission: This December 14, one hundred years to the day when the great polar explorer Roald Amundsen and his four-man team made the first successful crossing to the South Pole, a team of three 21st-century explorers are hoping to set a new world record for an overland motorized crossing to the Pole. The Thomson Reuters Eikon team consists of polar explorer and team leader Jason De Carteret, Lotus engineer Kieron Bradley and Canadian copywriter Jason Thomas (who won an online competition for that third seat)....

Media Platforms Design TeamPatching Damaged Hearts Early attempts to grow heart-repair patches with embryonic stem cells kept running into a glitch: because oxygen and nutrients only penetrated the outer edges of the patch, cells in the center died. Researchers at the University of Washington tested a novel strategy, mixing stem cell-derived vascular cells with heart-muscle cells that were also created from stem cells. The resulting cardiac-tissue patches formed networks of blood vessels that kept them alive and nourished....

Media Platforms Design TeamLast month PayPal told the world about PayPal Galactic, a proposal to create a payment system for space purchases. Along with the announcement came a series of fantastic of an extraterrestrial life of leisure, perhaps depicting some of the good life upon which you’d be spending your space bucks. John Spencer, the president of the Los Angeles–based Space Tourism Society, made those illustrations. And Spencer is doing more than drawing pictures that look like Norman Rockwell meets the Jetsons....

Flashing A ChimneyThe brick chimney in my house projects through the roof surface. I would like some advice on how to install flashing around the joint between the chimney and the roof deck.BILL WILLIAMSEAST HARTFORD, CTChimney flashing, which is usually made of copper or aluminum, seals the joint between the chimney and the roof. It protects the joint against leakage from rain or melting snow. If constructed properly, it accommodates slight movement between the chimney and the roof....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe Next Big Thing? Screenshot of a ChaCha.com guided search session.What’s the big idea?Algorithmic search engines, such as Google and Yahoo, have redefined how we gather information and made possible the Web as we use it. But critics believe that, for some subjects, no machine’s computational analysis can replace good old-fashioned human thinkin’. Not yet, anyway. The new ChaCha.com search engine, therefore, relies on “expert” human guides who interact with searchers via real-time chat....

Media Platforms Design TeamLuxury is about image as much as quality. You don’t just want to experience the finer side of life—you want to be seen wearing it or driving it, too. This is part of a luxury carmaker’s allure, but for companies trying to make inroads into the luxury market, the lack of any previous luxury association can be a formidable challenge.So consider the plight of Hyundai, which for years has been doing an excellent job of cleaning up its once-derided brand name here in the U....

Media Platforms Design Team"Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is the Alaska Ranger. 5, 3, 5, 3 North, 1, 6, 9, 5, 8 West… We are flooding, taking on water in our rudder room.“It was 2:52 am on March 23, Easter morning, when Coast Guard Station Kodiak picked up the distress call from a point almost 800 miles west, in Alaska’s frigid Bering Sea.“Roger. Good copy on position… Request to know number onboard, over....

North Korean scientists and engineers have made several major recent improvements to the KN-08 intercontinental ballistic missile that point to a simpler design with greater reliability, analysts at the website 38 North report. The authors say that physical changes made between 2012 and 2015 will give the North Koreans a better missile, but one that won’t be ready before 2020. The improved missile is expected to be more reliable but still vulnerable to being shot down by missile defenses....

If you’re going to play a game online, you might as well do it in the name of science.The ways in which Earth creatures use camouflage, or crypsis, to hide from either predators or prey is fairly well understood. They make themselves look like something else so as to avoid detection. What’s not as well understood is exactly how high-contrast patterns, like those found on zebra, help animals stay alive. That’s where an online game called The Dazzle Bug comes in....

CHICAGO — Pontiac unveils a show version of its upcoming 2008 G8 performance sedan at the Chicago auto show. The show G8 differs only slightly from the production model G8 that will be introduced in Pontiac dealerships “early next year.” The “performance” label on the show car relies on a number of mechanical features, including: 20-in. performance tires1/2-in. lower ride heighthigh-performance brake rotorsV8 engine rated at 362 hp from 6.0-liter displacementsix-speed automatic transmissionrear-wheel drive....

In one of the most awful near misses we’ve heard about in some time, it seems that the SpaceShipTwo crash last fall could’ve been a whole lot worse. According to a report from the LA Times , the explosion sent debris raining over Los Angeles, and some came within inches of hitting bystanders.One cited report put a piece of the craft’s cockpit on the same road as two trucks; the vehicles missed being hit by just about 30 to 40 seconds in a crash that caused a nine-foot crater on impact....

Media Platforms Design TeamGarmin’s new smartwatch, the Vivoactive, is a GPS running watch that adds a smattering of cool new features. There’s a color touchscreen, interchangeable bands, and your pick of customizable faces. The watch will link to other devices, like heart rate sensors, and give a readout of your pace and distance on a run. GPS-less smartwatches like the Apple Watch need a paired phone to do that kind of location tracking....