By Elizabeth Kingsley

NATURE STRIKES BACK!

Gender-bending fish invade Washington

Male smallmouth bass in the Potomac River are becoming feminised to the point of producing eggs, according to National Geographic. Scientists from the US Geological Survey believe that exposure to chemical contaminants is to blame for the occurrence, which has left up to 79% of male bass exhibiting sexual abnormalities. In a rare event, the intersex phenomenon appears to have been caused by domestic, rather than industrial, sewerage: effluent containing hormones and urine from both humans and livestock, and pharmaceutical waste including birth control bills, has been recovered from the Potomac.

More serious still, claim scientists, is the apparent result of effluent containing a mixture of sexual and growth hormones. Two field researchers are today recovering in hospital after being abducted and abused by man-sized creatures that, they claim, bore features of both Homo sapiens and a species of fish. “They walked upright,” one of the victims, whose name has not been released, said, “but they had scales and fins. And they were female – definitely female, if you know what I mean.” Asked about their ordeal, the men went on to describe the horrific treatment inflicted by their captors. “There were these rooms. The first one had this incredible home theatre system, everything you could possibly want, only all the buttons on the remote had been locked down so you couldn’t change the channel or the volume. And the other room -- a torture chamber! Nothing but wet towels and toilets! And it was Pick up the towels! and Put down the seat!, hour after hour after hour….”

A source indicated today that the men, still under psychiatric care, are doing “as well as can be expected”, but added that, “After an ordeal like that, full recovery might take years.”

IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE

UFO explodes over China

An unidentified flying object passed across the large north-western Chinese city of Lanzhou and apparently exploded in the suburbs, the China Times said. The unusual sighting of two bright trails of light, reported by several witnesses, took place Saturday shortly before midnight. A taxi driver told the paper he was in his car when everything suddenly became “as bright as day.” When he pulled over, he saw a fireball with a tail of about three metres darting across the sky, he said. One witness who was on the late shift at his company reported the courtyard outside his office was suddenly bathed in a ghostly red light as the object passed overhead. Others said they heard a huge explosion and felt as if an earthquake had struck.

Police, working on the theory that it was a meteorite, went to investigate the matter, and located debris that has since been the subject of intensive investigation. “This is, of course, not the first time that the remains of a UFO have been found on Earth,” commented the head of the research team. “The events at Roswell have been widely misinterpreted. The absurd weather balloon story was credible only because the material found resembled that from which such things are made. We must remember that we are dealing with a much higher level of intelligence than our own.”

Although no outsiders were permitted to view the recovered debris from Lanzhou, it is understood that it consisted of a substance similar to paper, a thin, almost foil-like metal, and some thin wires. “Imagine, interplanetary flight possible with such materials!” marvelled the chief scientist. “Only a genius could conceive of such a thing!”

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