Bright ideas: The East Valley Tribune reported in April that the Police Department in Mesa, Ariz., was still awaiting word about its $100,000 federal grant request to buy and train a capuchin monkey for its SWAT team. Capuchins are now used as assistance animals for the disabled, in that they can be taught to fetch things off of shelves, and the police want to see if one can be trained to unlock doors and search buildings on command. The Pentagon's visionary research agency, DARPA, is considering the proposal.

Air-travel blues: In March, a woman suffered a midflight heart attack, leading the KLM pilot to emergency-land at Heathrow Airport in London, but she died before an ambulance could arrive. Six months earlier, Heathrow officials had eliminated costly standby ambulances, resulting in the woman's plane being met by a paramedic on a bicycle (which carried some emergency equipment but not nearly as much as an ambulance).

- Compiled

by Chuck Shepherd