It wasn’t all bad

An 83-year-old Japanese sailor has become the oldest person to sail solo non-stop across the Pacific. Kenichi Horie – known as “Japan’s most famous yachtsman” – left San Francisco in his 19ft aluminium vessel on 27 March, and arrived in western Japan last Saturday. It was not the first time he has crossed the Pacific: aged 23, he became the first person to make the solo crossing; since then, he has made the journey in a range of vessels, including one made from beer barrels.

Relatives of the “skateboard hero” of the 2017 London Bridge attack are receiving support from the Catholic Church in their efforts to have him canonised. Ignacio Echeverría, a 39-yearold banker, was passing through Borough Market when he saw a woman coming under attack. Echeverría, a devout Catholic, rushed forward and struck her attacker with his skateboard, diverting the knifeman so that several people could get to safety. But while tackling a second terrorist, he was stabbed in the back. In Britain, he was awarded a posthumous George Medal, and in Spain, several skateparks have been named after him.

Staff at a restaurant in Stockholm are wearing aprons that absorb CO₂ from the atmosphere, in a trial of a technique being sponsored by the clothing giant H&M. The fashion industry has a huge carbon footprint, and is under pressure to tackle it. The cotton aprons are coated in a solution which makes the fabric attract and capture carbon dioxide. One apron is said to absorb about 30% of the CO₂ that a tree absorbs in a day. Later, the aprons are heated in a greenhouse where the gas is released and taken up by plants.