USA | Extreme athlete Potter dies in Yosemite BASE jumping accident

Dean Potter, renowned for his daring and sometimes rogue climbs and BASE jumps, was one of two men killed after jumping from a 2,290-meter promontory called Taft Point in Yosemite National Park. Someone called for help late Saturday after losing contact with Potter, 43, and his climbing partner, Graham Hunt, 29. Park ranger Scott Gediman said a search-and-rescue team looked for the men overnight but couldn’t find them. On Sunday morning, a helicopter crew spotted their bodies in Yosemite Valley. The men wore wingsuits — skin-tight suits with batwing sleeves and a flap between their legs — to help them glide. However, parachutes designed to slow their descent had not been deployed, Gediman said. BASE stands for buildings, antennas, spans (such as bridges), and Earth (such as cliffs and mountaintops) that jumpers can parachute from. The sport is illegal in all national parks, and it was possible the men jumped at dusk or at night to avoid being caught by park rangers.

Nigeria | 10 Boko Haram camps destroyed in forest

Nigeria’s military says it has destroyed 10 Boko Haram camps, killed many militants and captured heavy weaponry in the northeastern Sambisa Forest. This comes after a surge in attacks by the Islamic extremists including suicide bombings, assaults on a business school and villages and a repelled night-time raid by hundreds of fighters on the biggest military base in northeast Nigeria. One soldier was killed by a land mine and two were wounded when troops overran 10 Boko Haram camps on Saturday, said the Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Chris Olukolade, in a statement Sunday night. Olukolade and other Nigerian officials had said Boko Haram’s main fighting force was trapped in the vast Sambisa Forest following a 14-week multinational offensive that drove them out of dozens of towns and villages where they had declared an Islamic caliphate.

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