Litterbugs Stoop to New Depths

Thousands of feet under the surface of the Atlantic Ocean, scientists salvaging $450 million in gold from a 19th-Century shipwreck also found some not-so-precious metals: old beer and soft drink cans. The chief scientist, Charles Herdendorf, said the discovery was disgusting. “We’re working a mile and a half deep, 200 miles at sea,” he told the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “That shows the extent of ocean pollution.” Although the “Central American Project,” based in Columbus, Ohio, is recovering gold from the Central American, a steamship, the project’s main mission is science, Herdendorf said, and he is curious about what the discarded cans may reveal about ocean currents and marine biology, besides pollution. “I’m anxious to recover some of the cans to see if any creatures use them for habitat,” he said.

--New York’s Metropolitan Opera announced that Luciano Pavarotti has withdrawn from six performances in Amilcare Ponchielli’s “La Gioconda” scheduled for January. Pavarotti’s manager, Herbert Breslin, said the singer had to cancel the performances so he could undergo scheduled treatments for sciatica, a painful condition in the hips and thighs. A Met spokesman said there are no plans to ban Pavarotti, as Chicago’s Lyric Opera did recently because of a series of cancellations there. Pavarotti will sing at the Met in “Rigoletto” in November and February. Nicola Martinucci will replace Pavarotti for the first two performances of “La Gioconda,” with casting for the other shows to be announced.

--Walter H. Annenberg, a former publisher and ambassador to Britain, has given $5 million to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the museum said. Annenberg, a friend of former President Ronald Reagan, also gave $15 million to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and $5 million to the National Gallery of Art, with all three gifts to be used to expand the museums’ collections, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. “This is something we not only weren’t expecting, we weren’t even asking for,” Philadelphia Museum of Art President Robert Montgomery Scott said. Annenberg had just given the Philadelphia museum $5 million in June.

--A Dallas third-grader landed a Cessna 210 at New York’s La Guardia Airport, taking the record as the youngest pilot to fly across the country. Matthew McLendon, 8, had left Los Angeles on Monday and traveled 2,700 miles, stopping in 13 cities. Rick Barber, Matt’s flight instructor, sat as co-pilot but Matt insisted that he not touch any controls.