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You think you’ve been in a bad traffic jam? You haven’t been in a bad traffic jam. This is a bad traffic jam, a traffic jam that takes up 50 lanes of a motorway. That was the scene outside Beijing, China yesterday as thousands of motorists returned after a holiday. Or at least tried to.Media Platforms Design TeamThe reason behind the G4 Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau Expressway’s massive congestion is simple: too many drivers and one new checkpoint....

Translucent solar panels are all the rage right now, but why not also use them to accomplish other goals? Like, say, functioning as noise barriers along highways.That’s the current goal of a practical test being run along the A2 highway, which is located near the city of Den Bosch in the Netherlands. The panels, dubbed “luminescent solar concentrators” (LSCs) and developed by Eindhoven University of Technology researcher Michael Debije, even come in a lovely variety of colors....

High-Stakes Laser TagBy Erik Sofge The Airborne Laser (ABL) sounds like something out of a very bad action movie–a laser turret mounted on the nose of a 747-400F. This isn’t a laser designator or a low-power beam that dazzles enemy pilots and sensors, but rather a megawatt-class chemical laser designed to shatter ballistic missiles in flight from hundreds of miles away. The ABL is a $3.6 billion part of the United States’ emerging missile defense network, funded by the Air Force and the Missile Defense Agency, and developed by Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman....

Russell Klimas, a Colorado-based light painter has created his own Baby Yoda in the night sky with the help of a drone, a camera, Google Earth, and an autonomous flight app.The image was created without the use of Photoshop and has been added to Klimas’ repertoire of light paintings created with a drone.Few things have the ability to bring people together like Baby Yoda. The star of the Disney+ original series, The Mandalorian, became a beloved cultural icon overnight and inspired fans everywhere....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe quiet, ultraefficient General Electric GEnx is one of two engine options on the 787. (The other is Rolls-Royce’s Trent 1000.) The GEnx uses an all-composite fan case and blades, as well as nozzles that spin a fuel/air mixture into the engine core, producing thrust at lower temperatures with fewer hydrocarbon emissions.The company that ushered in the age of affordable commercial flight with the 707 in 1957 is trying to revolutionize the industry again....

A new simulation shows that viable coral sites will virtually all be gone by 2100.Scientists are racing to preserve and restore coral reefs in the face of climate change.Rising ocean temperature and acidification must be combated with climate action.Researchers say the potential death of all coral reefs around the world could come as early as 2100 without meaningful and dramatic intervention. The problem is twofold, with rising ocean temperatures and increasing acidity each contributing to an inhospitable place for corals to live....

When Marque Cornblatt last went to burning man in Nevada’s Black Rock desert, he built a rig that he knew would be the envy of the show. “I thought, ‘What an extreme luxury it would be to be able to swim in the middle of the desert,’” Cornblatt says. So he did what any wild tinkerer and part-time scuba diver would do: He built a giant water-tight suit, connected a breathing apparatus, filled it up and carted it out to the desert....

Media Platforms Design TeamWhat got you interested in writing a book about the AK-47?Several different interests and threads in my life came together as I set out: my experience as an infantry officer in the Marines, where I studied military history and tactics while I commanded an infantry platoon and a company; my years covering terror and conflict for The New York Times; my assignment to Moscow as a newspaper correspondent....

Owner: Bobby JohnsonLocation: Deatsville, AlabamaFound: CraigslistPurchase price: $1,700Years owned: ThreeI was stationed at Travis Air Force Base in California and wanted something to work on, then sell. I bought this Camaro because it had drivetrain and transmission upgrades, which I could advertise. But it needed work. It didn’t run, the paint was faded, interior pieces were missing, the carburetor needed to be rebuilt, and there was no exhaust. The original sticker with the model name was ripped off the console, but I know it’s an ’88 Camaro....

The outdoor industry has come along way since wool coats and wooden skis reigned supreme. Decades ago, today’s vacuum-insulated coolers or ultra-premium waterproof technology were nothing more than figments of the imagination. So what’s on the horizon to become the next big thing? During January’s Outdoor Retailer trade show, we saw, heard about, and even tested some pretty sweet new gear. We also spotted six innovative technologies likely to spark new trends in the outdoor world that we couldn’t help but geek out on....

Physics simulations show that living organisms could not have made it from Mars to Jupiter aboard asteroids.Europa in particular is on NASA’s radar for finding life—it has a watery, potentially hospitable surface.One ton of small Mars rocks hit Earth every year.New research suggests that any life we find in certain places in our solar system represents a new branch on the tree of life, not just Earth leftovers that made it to space....

Welcome back to Popular Mechanics’ Riddle of the Week. I have been excited about posting this riddle since we started the weekly series, but let me warn you, it is not uncommon for people to hear the solution and still refuse to believe it. Welcome to a godforsaken spit of land in the middle of the ocean, where 100 people have blue eyes and 100 have brown.ProblemOn an otherwise deserted and isolated island, 200 perfect logicians are stranded....

Rocket Lab, a spaceflight company with assets in New Zealand and the U.S., today announced the launch window for the second Electron rocket flight called “Still Testing.” A ten-day launch window will begin on Friday, December 8, and each day the company will shoot for a window that opens at 2:30 p.m. NZT, which is 8:30 p.m. the previous day in Eastern Standard Time. Rocket Lab will livestream the launch attempt, the first time the company will broadcast a launch video, which you can watch on its website (the video should begin about 15 minutes prior to a launch attempt)....

Two Russian Tu-95MS “Bear” bombers flew near U.S. territory two days in a row, at one point coming within 36 miles of the Alaskan coastline. The planes were detected by the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) and in both cases U.S. Air Force aircraft were dispatched to intercept.Monday’s incident saw two Tu-95MS bombers fly within the U.S. Air Defense Identification Zone over Alaska and the Aleutian islands. The bombers flew within 100 miles of the Kodiak islands....

Media Platforms Design TeamSheep may not be the best camera operators capturing this year’s Tour de France, but they certainly are some of the funniest-looking (and most adorable). Last weekend, as the bike race started up in the U.K. before moving to France, Sony put five British sheep to work filming the first stage of the race that ended in Harrogate, England—their hometown. Each animal wore a modified dog harness that held the sheep cams to their backs....

As space missions have increased in length, astronauts began to notice something troubling: their time in space seemed to be causing their eyesight to deteriorate. This wasn’t a minor effect. John Phillips, who spent more than six months on the International Space Station, found his eyesight had gone from 20/20 to 20/100 after his mission. Phillips wasn’t the only one. It’s now believed that 80% of astronauts suffer from what scientists are calling visual impairment intracranial pressure syndrome (VIIP)....

The long-awaited flyoff between the F-35 and A-10 could start this spring. The joint strike fighter is gearing up for a major review of its performance in September, initial operational test and evaluation, or IOT&E, and the stealthy jet will be performing a number of tests leading up to that review. One of those tests will be an assessment of close-air support (CAS) capabilities at Edwards Air Force Base in April, part of “increment two” of testing, according to Defense News....

The telescope element of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the largest space telescope ever constructed, stands completed in an enormous clean room at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. JWST will now go through a series of rigorous tests, including shaking and noise tests to simulate launch conditions, and cryogenic tests to make sure it can stand up to the frigid conditions of space. This telescope element of JWST includes the optical components and science instruments....

Laser weapons can strike at the speed of light, and they’re quickly deploying to every possible fighting domain, whether on land, in the air, and at sea. But what about under the sea?Open-source budget documents, the earliest of which date back to 2011, show the Navy’s plans to arm Virginia-class nuclear subs with high-energy laser weapons. It’s a strange idea seeing as laser weapons definitely do not work underwater. Submarines are also quiet recluses by design, rarely popping their heads above waterBut despite these glaring contradictions, experts talking to Popular Mechanics say a laser sub makes more sense than you might think....

The U.S. Army has officially selected the Brugger and Thomet APC9K to outfit its Personal Security Details. The APC9K is the first new submachine gun for the U.S. Army since the M3 “Greasegun” of World War II. The service will buy 350 of the compact automatic weapons for $2.5 million, with an option to buy 1,000 more. The B&T APC9K beat out guns from more than ten other companies, including Colt and Heckler and Koch, as well as guns based on the M-16 and MP-5 weapons platforms....