CHINA has built a twenty-story-tall nuclear space engine to power a mission to Mars.

Boffins have reportedly been tasked with “innovating” the project “or dying” as the country paves the way for a new era in the global space race.

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After a collaboration of more than ten research institutes and universities, China believes it has made tremendous progress in interplanetary travel.

According to a report from the South China Morning MailThe research team has confirmed that the prototype lithium-cooled nuclear reactor system has passed initial ground tests.

The 1.5-megawatt-class fission reactor, which is seven times more powerful than a competing system being built by NASA, has shrunk to an unprecedented size.

An article published by the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ peer-reviewed journal Scientia Sinica Technologica explains how the lithium-cooled system is also designed to dramatically expand in space.

By using liquid lithium, they can also make the reactor smaller, thanks to the element’s high thermal conductivity and low weight.

Starting as a container-sized volume, once fully deployed the structure can grow to the size of a 20-story building, including the 1.5-megawatt reactor’s heat sink.

But on the ground it folds neatly into a container-sized volume that weighs less than eight tons, the paper said.

Additionally, the design will allow the reactor system to be “easily loaded and launched by rocket,” while also being able to maintain stable operations for extended periods in the harsh conditions of space.

The article adds that the Chinese reactor will generate up to 1,276 degrees Celsius from the fission of uranium fuel, which is much higher than the operating temperature of most commercial nuclear power plants.

The intense heat then expands liquid forms of the inert elements helium and xenon into gases, driving a generator.

The paper adds that high-mass return transport will be possible for both crewed and cargo spaceflights.

As a result, the powerful energy source will pave the way for China’s large-scale exploration of the moon and Mars.

China’s determination to lead the race for nuclear-powered spaceflight is further implemented with a slogan hanging above the reactor prototype that reads: “Innovate or perish. No excuses.”

While spacecraft like the Starship, which is being developed by US company SpaceX, could take at least seven months to reach Mars, China’s nuclear-powered spacecraft could complete a round trip in just three months.

The Starship rocket is central to NASA’s plans to land astronauts on the moon later this decade, as well as SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s hopes to colonize Mars.

But even a single trip to the red planet requires a massive life support system.

NASA confirmed that the first Blue Origin New Glenn rocket will send two scientific spacecraft to Mars in late 2024, while Musk sees 2026 as the earliest year SpaceX will launch its own unmanned mission.

The new timeline comes after Musk’s Starship mega-rocket – the spacecraft he hopes will land on the moon and eventually Mars – exploded during a second launch attempt.

NASA has also called for volunteers to live in a simulated Mars colony for an entire year to boost preparations for future life on the red planet.

The Earth mission will launch in early 2025 and will see a crew of four living in a 1,700-square-foot facility – just like one would be built on Mars.

NASA says it “simulates a realistic Martian habitat” with the aim of supporting long-duration space exploration missions.

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Banksy has confirmed he is behind the artwork which appeared overnight on the side of a building near Finsbury Park in London.

The artwork shows a splattering of green which has been painted behind a bare tree to look like foliage, with a stencil of a person holding what appears to be a pressure hose next to it.

It appeared on Sunday after being completed overnight.

Residents said they are ‘proud and delighted’ at the thought of the anonymous artist choosing their street for his latest mural.

They were delighted when the secretive artist’s social media channels confirmed the Finsbury Park painting at 11.13am on Monday.

It has racked up 160,000 likes on Instagram in just 20 minutes. 

Banksy, who has 12.3million followers on Instagram, always confirms an artwork is his by posting a picture of it.

Prior to the offical announcement, the artwork had already been gathering Banksy fans to the location on Hornsey Road in north London.

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn told PA he is ‘delighted’ to see the artwork in his Islington North constituency.

‘Banksy’s come to Finsbury Park with a bit of greenery in a place that needs a bit more greenery. We’re the most densely populated constituency in the country and I’m just delighted,’ the MP said.

‘It gives the idea that we could do with much more greenery everywhere and I think that’s a really nice message.’

James Peak, who created the BBC Radio 4 series The Banksy Story, rushed to the scene yesterday after receiving a tip-off.

Prior to the announcement he was already sure it was a Banksy.

Mr Peak said the artwork had the hallmarks of a Banksy due to its clear message that nature is struggling and it is up to us to get it back.

He said another clue was the fact it was done with minimum effort but still looked really cool.

Banksy’s eye for detail could also be on display as the colour of the paint matches the one used for street signs by Islington Council.

The lack of leaves, despite it being Spring, could also have inspired Banksy to make the painting.

Pictures from the scene one year ago, in March 2023, showed the tree looking similarly bare with no greenery.

But in July 2022 the tree was pictured with a lot more green foliage.

The Banksy has delighted many residents of Islington who took to social media to celebrate the artwork. 

Wanja Sellers, a Hornsey Road resident who lives a few doors down from the mural, said: ‘We’re so proud and delighted that Banksy chose our road and chose Finsbury Park for his work.

‘The bright green colours represent Islington, which is lovely, and also, of course, St Patrick’s Day, which is nice and festive.

‘Choosing the colours of our borough just makes it feel like a personal message to us residents. We just feel so proud.’

Lidia Guerra, another Hornsey Road resident, said: ‘The way it’s been done, with the paint spraying down, reminds me of a weeping willow, so there’s perhaps a message about the struggle of nature with the dead tree in front.

‘It’s just great – when we read about it last night, we knew we had to come and see it as soon as possible.

 ‘We feel so proud to think he chose our street.’

Chris Beskin, another resident of Hornsey Road, told PA he welcomes the mural, saying it is a ‘great thing to have in our area’.

‘I’m absolutely delighted to see this on our street – I think it’s great and sends a strong message, I’d like to see more of it, to be honest, the more the merrier,’ he said.

‘I think it’s probably one of his biggest pieces in a while – and the fact he’s done it on the wall means it can’t just be stolen or easily removed.’

Mr Beskin went to see the mural with his neighbours on Monday morning.

Fellow resident Carolyn told PA: ‘It’s just lovely to see how this piece of art has brought everyone together.

‘People have come out to chat in the streets and came out early this morning to speculate together. It’s brought the community together, which has been really nice to see.’

Paul Drinot wrote on social media: ‘If this is a Banksy, it’s the best thing that’s happened to the Hornsey Road in years.’

One social media user was left puzzled after the artist seemed to have left zip ties at the scene – posting a picture of several black ones in a bunch. 

The Banksy mania could even see the building’s value rise.

One local joked on social media: ‘Banksy came overnight and now my rent will skyrocket.’ 

The reveal of the Islington mural comes after the last time Banksy’s art was revealed in London, it ended in scandal.

Two men were arrested and were bailed for allegedly using bolt cutters to steal the artwork which pictured a stop sign featuring three military drones.

Once Banksy announced on social media the artwork belonged to him in an Instagram post shortly after midday on December 23, two men allegedly appeared at the scene and cut down the artwork before running off.

Police have yet to recover the peice of art, but one gallery owner told the BBC at the time it could be worth up to £500,000.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Mr Peak said, that Banky’s incorporation of the tree into his Islington artwork would make it impossible to steal.

He said: ‘I don’t think anyone is going to be able to nick this… how are you going to steal a tree?’

The stop sign artwork was widely interpreted by followers of the artist as calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. 

The Instagram revelation led to a stream of locals descending on the site and taking photos of the installation on their phones.

But at around 12.30pm, the peaceful scene was shattered by the arrival of two men, one of whom balanced precariously on an Lime e-bike while hurriedly hacking the sign down with bolt cutters. 

Banksy did not comment on the drama of the theft, but had been warned by a social media user: ‘The sign will be snatched pronto.’ 

Pieces by the rogue artist have previously been sold for millions of pounds. 

The drones on the piece resembled those on another artwork, Civilian Drone Strike, which depicted them destroying a house while a little girl and her dog watch on in horror. 

It was sold for £200,000 to raise funds in opposition to a London arms fair. 

Banksy’s real identity has never been fully confirmed – and speculation continues to surround the mysterious artist.

His career began in the 90s, and he is known by millions of people thanks to the appearance of dozens of iconic artworks in unexpected locations around the world, with many having gone on to sell for millions.

For years his identity has been a hot topic, with names such as Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja and Gorillaz founder Jamie Hewlett being floated around.

Also suggested is public schoolboy Robin Gunningham, who was ‘unmasked’ as Banksy by the Mail On Sunday in 2008 after an investigation into his past.

Regardless of who he his, Banksy’s works are hot property on the art market.

In 2021, his ‘Love is in the Bin’ work was bought for more than £18million, with its value having been boosted after a shredder hidden in its frame cut it to pieces moments after it was sold for the first time in 2018.

The work, previously known as ‘Girl with Balloon’, was just one of more than a dozen of Banksy’s creations that have sold for more than £2million.

Banksy uses art as a form of activism, regularly making societal and political statements with their works.

Having also sprayed his tag across Bristol, Banksy then evolved with the times and began creating more sophisticated pieces, whilst always keeping his identity hidden. 

One of Banksy’s earliest works is the The Mild Mild West.

The large mural was painted in 1999 in Bristol’s Stokes Croft and shows a teddy bear throwing a Molotov cocktail at three riot police.

It was painted by the artist over three days in broad daylight and is still in the city today, among some of Banksy’s other works.

The exhaustive MoS investigation into Banksy’s identity heard from dozens of friends, former colleagues, enemies, flatmates and even family members.

The search began with an image of a man in Jamaica at work with his stencils and cans of spray paint.

Although Banksy denied the image showed him, the Mail’s investigation was later backed by researchers at Queen Mary University.

They used ‘geographic profiling’ – a technique more often used to catch criminals or track outbreaks of disease – to plot the locations of 192 of Banksy’s presumed artworks.

The sites indicated ‘hot spots’ which were narrowed down to pinpoint an individual. Peaks within these clusters were found to correlate to a pub, playing fields and residential addresses closely linked to Mr Gunningham and his friends and family.

Mr Gunningham attended Bristol Cathedral School and was born in July 1973. A school photo of him bore a striking resemblance to the man in the Jamaica photograph.

A former school friend described him as being ‘extremely talented’ at art and admitted he would ‘not be at all surprised’ if he was Banksy.

In anonymous interviews he has done, Banksy has said he first became interested in graffiti at school.

And a fellow artist he was living with in Bristol in 1998, Luke Egan, went on to exhibit with Banksy at Santa’s Ghetto, an art store in London’s West End.

However, Mr Gunningham’s family denied that he was Banksy and the link was never explicitly confirmed.

A suspected Banksy artwork has appeared overnight on the side of a building near Finsbury Park in London.

The artwork shows a splattering of green which has been painted behind a bare tree to look like foliage, with a stencil of a person holding what appears to be a pressure hose next to it.

The artwork has already been gathering Banksy fans to the location on Hornsey Road in north London as they inspect it to see if it could be the real thing.

James Peak, who created the BBC Radio 4 series The Banksy Story, rushed to the scene after receiving a tip-off.

He told the BBC: ‘To my mind it looks like a dead cert.

‘But as ever with Banksy – you never quite know, until he fesses up by posting it on his website.’

Banksy fans have been keeping a careful watch on the secretive artist’s social media channels to see if the Finsbury Park painting, which appeared on Sunday, gets confirmed.

Mr Peak said the artwork had the hallmarks of a Banksy due to its clear message that nature is struggling and it is up to us to get it back.

He said another clue was the fact it was done with minimum effort but still looked really cool.

Banksy’s eye for detail could also be on display as the colour of the paint matches the one used for street signs by Islington Council.

The lack of leaves, despite it being Spring, could also have inspired Banksy to make the painting.

Local Islington Labour councillor Flora Williamson wrote on Twitter/X: ‘By far the most exciting thing to happen on todays canvass session on hornsey road was seeing that Banksy had come to Tollington over night. 

‘Lots of local interest – I’m a fan of it.’

A resident of the area Amy wrote on Twitter: ‘Proud new caretakers of an apparent new #Banksy piece in Finsbury Park… Woke up this morning to it on the side of flat. You can just about see us smiling proudly on our balcony.’

One local joked on social media: ‘Banksy came overnight and now my rent will skyrocket.’

Paul Drinot wrote on social media: ‘If this is a Banksy, it’s the best thing that’s happened to the Hornsey Road in years.’

The possible reveal of a new Banksy comes after the last time his art was revealed in London ended in scandal.

Two men were arrested and were bailed for allegedly using bolt cutters to steal the artwork which pictured a stop sign featuring three military drones.

Once Banksy announced on social media the artwork belonged to him in an Instagram post shortly after midday on December 23, two men appeared at the scene and cut down the artwork before running off.

Police have yet to recover the peice of art, but one gallery owner told the BBC at the time it could be worth up to £500,000.

It was widely interpreted by followers of the artist as calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. 

The Instagram revelation led to a stream of locals descending on the site and taking photos of the installation on their phones.

But at around 12.30pm, the peaceful scene was shattered by the arrival of two men, one of whom balanced precariously on an Lime e-bike while hurriedly hacking the sign down with bolt cutters. 

Pieces by the rogue artist have previously been sold for millions of pounds.

Banksy did not comment on the drama of the theft, but had been warned by a social media user: ‘The sign will be snatched pronto.’ 

The drones on the piece resembled those on another artwork, Civilian Drone Strike, which depicted them destroying a house while a little girl and her dog watch on in horror.

It was sold for £200,000 to raise funds in opposition to a London arms fair.

Banksy, whose career began in the 90s, is known by millions of people thanks to the appearance of dozens of iconic artworks in unexpected locations around the world, with many having gone on to sell for millions.

For years his identity has been a hot topic, with names such as Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja and Gorillaz founder Jamie Hewlett being floated around.

Also suggested is public schoolboy Robin Gunningham, who was ‘unmasked’ as Banksy by the Mail On Sunday in 2008 after an investigation into his past.

Regardless of who he his, Banksy’s works are hot property on the art market.

In 2021, his ‘Love is in the Bin’ work was bought for more than £18million, with its value having been boosted after a shredder hidden in its frame cut it to pieces moments after it was sold for the first time in 2018.

The work, previously known as ‘Girl with Balloon’, was just one of more than a dozen of Banksy’s creations that have sold for more than £2million.

Banksy uses art as a form of activism, regularly making societal and political statements with their works.

Having also sprayed his tag across Bristol, Banksy then evolved with the times and began creating more sophisticated pieces, whilst always keeping his identity hidden. 

One of Banksy’s earliest works is the The Mild Mild West.

The large mural was painted in 1999 in Bristol’s Stokes Croft and shows a teddy bear throwing a Molotov cocktail at three riot police.

It was painted by the artist over three days in broad daylight and is still in the city today, among some of Banksy’s other works.

The exhaustive MoS investigation into Banksy’s identity heard from dozens of friends, former colleagues, enemies, flatmates and even family members.

The search began with an image of a man in Jamaica at work with his stencils and cans of spray paint.

Although Banksy denied the image showed him, the Mail’s investigation was later backed by researchers at Queen Mary University.

They used ‘geographic profiling’ – a technique more often used to catch criminals or track outbreaks of disease – to plot the locations of 192 of Banksy’s presumed artworks.

The sites indicated ‘hot spots’ which were narrowed down to pinpoint an individual. Peaks within these clusters were found to correlate to a pub, playing fields and residential addresses closely linked to Mr Gunningham and his friends and family.

Mr Gunningham attended Bristol Cathedral School and was born in July 1973. A school photo of him bore a striking resemblance to the man in the Jamaica photograph.

A former school friend described him as being ‘extremely talented’ at art and admitted he would ‘not be at all surprised’ if he was Banksy.

In anonymous interviews he has done, Banksy has said he first became interested in graffiti at school.

And a fellow artist he was living with in Bristol in 1998, Luke Egan, went on to exhibit with Banksy at Santa’s Ghetto, an art store in London’s West End.

However, Mr Gunningham’s family denied that he was Banksy and the link was never explicitly confirmed.

NEIGHBORS are furious after a council spent £100,000 building a 60 meter wall around a family’s home.

Locals in Norwich have condemned the six-foot gorge as “ridiculous” and a “disgusting” waste of taxpayers’ money.

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The wall was built around the home of Mike Baxter, 44, and wife Jo, 38, in St Williams Way after they sold the land to the council.

Norfolk County Council bought the strip as part of their ongoing £4.4 million project to redevelop a roundabout.

Although the Baxters love the wall, it has infuriated locals as it cost £100,000 to build and is much taller than any other wall in the area.

The Eastern Daily Press reported that the £100,000 cost of building the wall, which the council owns, emerged at a council meeting.

Patricia Cleaver, 86, who lives almost opposite, said: “I think it’s disgusting to spend £100,000 of public money on a wall.

“As far as I’m concerned, they’ve gone over the top. It’s just ridiculous. I don’t see the point in it.”

Cleaver also said she was fed up with the traffic chaos caused by the roundabout construction work.

She added: “The council made it clear that it was an accident.

“But I have lived here since 1985 and have only had three accidents. They should have left it alone.”

The Baxters previously had a row of giant conifers and shrubs marking the front boundary of their detached house – which they bought for £440,000 in 2020.

But council chiefs bought the strip of land surrounding the entire curved facade of their home after deciding they needed more space for pedestrians and a cycle path.

The council cut back all vegetation and built a brand new wall for the family so they could enjoy a degree of privacy.

Benas Vitkauskas, 40, whose house faces the wall, is also far from impressed.

The builder who specializes in loft conversions said: “It’s huge and it seems very expensive. I’m sure I could have built it for a third of the price.”

Vitkauskas said he was also unhappy because he was refused planning permission to increase the size of his own 90cm high garden wall by just 30cm.

He said: “They rejected my application because it didn’t meet the regulations, but they still built this other wall almost 2 meters high.”

Clockmaker Eric Wickenden, 86, who lives nearby, said: “Everyone has low walls. Why does it have to be twice as big?

“I know it gives the family who live there more privacy, so it’s great for them, especially because they got it for free.”

Matthew Moore, service manager at Number One Motor Company garage next to the roundabout, said work on the road project started on September 11 last year.

It should be ready by the end of March, but he has been told that contractors want an extra four to five weeks.

Currently, traffic lights are controlling traffic with only one lane open around the roadworks – but locals have been warned that the roundabout may need to be closed completely for the final phase of the works.

Moore said: “They started on the wall as soon as the project started, and it took ages to build it. As a wall it is very impressive, but the cost is simply staggering and incredible.

“Locals are very concerned about the traffic plan and want to know who pushed for the roundabout to be changed because none of the local businesses wanted it.”

Jonathan Mott, director of Yellow Brick Wills and Estate Planning, sarcastically joked about the £100,000 cost of the wall.

He said: ‘It’s nice to know my council tax is going towards something valuable.

“If it is true that it cost £100,000 and was built to prevent overhanging branches from falling on pedestrians, then the world we live in has gone mad.

“The wall is not really characteristic of the house. It doesn’t offend me, but was it necessary.”

Other business owners, including Ozgul Balcimer, owner of Hartlands fish and chip shop, have questioned how the council spent so much on the wall without paying compensation for the disruption caused by the roundabout works.

Anne Martin, 50, owner of the Great Eastern Model Railways shop, said: “The roadworks are a complete nightmare. Most people say we simply don’t need these improvements.

‘They built the wall because it was part of the agreement that the municipality would buy part of the land from this couple.

“It’s a beautiful wall and for £100,000 you’d want that, but as a taxpayer I don’t want to foot the bill.

“My overall concern is how long this plan will last. It deters people from coming to the area because they are warned to stay away, but in reality the robberies are not that bad.”

Lewis Craddock, the manager of nearby Hunts Pharmacy, said: “Lots of customers come in and talk about the wall.

“But I’m more concerned about the time it took to build it and complete the roundabout.

“It has been going on for ages and many businesses are complaining because traffic delays keep people away.

“Because we are a pharmacy, people generally still make an effort to come in for prescriptions, but passing traffic for other things we sell has decreased.”

Mother-of-two Baxter, a physiotherapist, confirmed that she and her bar owner husband had requested the wall be built as part of an agreement for the council to buy some of their land.

She said: “We wanted it to be of significant size to compensate for the loss of our trees, which were as tall as the lampposts.

“We are all happy with it. The work consisted of removing all the shrubs that took up a large part of the garden, so we now actually have more space.

“It took them about four to five months to complete the wall. It was a significant amount of time. They told us there were enough bricks for three houses.”

Baxter refused to reveal what the council had paid for their land, saying: “It was a negotiation. The church started low and we started high.”

Norfolk County Council decided it was necessary to purchase some of the Baxter’s land in “a private arrangement” to provide “additional space for those walking and cycling around the intersection”.

As part of the deal, it was agreed with the landowner that a six-foot wall would be built “to provide privacy as the previous boundary consisted of tall, dense foliage.”

The council felt the wall was also necessary to accommodate drainage and changes in level of the path while providing “a strong, secure boundary in close proximity to a busy pedestrian and cycle path”.

Graham Plant, cabinet member for highways, infrastructure and transport, said: “The purchase of land from a private owner to deliver important infrastructure is very different to the issue of providing compensation to commercial companies.

“Feedback from our consultation on improvements to the Heartsease roundabout told us that many people cycling and walking through the area would prefer more space with segregated facilities and that we could not have delivered this on the corner of St Williams Way without to secure the country.

“As a result, we have pursued the purchase of the necessary land, rather than offering the shared use path within a limited space in the original proposals.

“I understand that this may seem like a significant cost, but the overall project remains within budget and I am pleased that we have been able to deliver a better outcome for people traveling on foot and by bike.

“The main aim of this project is to improve the currently very poor safety performance of the roundabout, especially for cyclists. The presence of a separate path for them is a huge asset to the final plan.”

Steve Morphew, leader of the council’s Labor group, said: ‘It’s mind-boggling that Graham Plant can justify £100,000 for a huge wall to replace a low wooden fence and some shrubs, but nothing for the businesses on the edge because of an exceedance plan. that was way too long anyway.

“No wonder people are furious about the way Norfolk Tories are splashing our money around.”

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Instead of traveling to Disneyland, a Californian architect has built the happiest place on earth in his own backyard – and he’s letting visitors in for free.

David Sheegog, 65, has spent 25 years creating a miniature replica of a Disneyland railway in his modest backyard in the Anaheim Hills suburb, calling it Castle Peak and Thunder Railroad.

Sheegog grew up just steps from Disneyland watching the fireworks shows from his front yard with his parents, and when he had his own children he was inspired to create a magical experience for them.

He started with a model on his dining room table, but over the years he expanded to cover every inch of his garden, including Snow White’s house, Splash Mountain and Sleeping Beauty Castle.

He told DailyMail.com: ‘My favorite thing isn’t something we’ve built, it’s seeing people enjoy it. When we have open days and I see families interacting, sometimes I just sit on the couch and watch the people.”

A trained architect, Sheegog approached his dream with a meticulous, planned approach.

His first step was to ask his wife Frances if he could take over their backyard.

She agreed and instituted one rule: there had to be space in the middle for their now grown children to play.

Permission granted, he began designing.

He said: ‘We were homeschooling our children and I thought the railway might interest them and be something they would want to pursue.

“As they got older, I thought they might be interested in electronics or gardening. It was intended as a kind of living laboratory.

“But it turned out they were all more interested in playing with their friends, so it became Dad’s project.”

He told the Orange County Register, “I built a model of the whole thing that took up our dining room for a year. We had to eat in the kitchen.’

Luckily, the entire Sheegog family is obsessed with Disney. Sheegog once worked at Disneyland on Davy Crockett’s Explorer Canoes and the couple even named their daughter after Ariel from The Little Mermaid.

Initially, Sheegog started with a commercially produced model train set, which he modified to create detailed miniatures of all five Disneyland trains.

He was so obsessed with details that he even color-matched the paint samples to the real trains.

Sheegog had high ambitions for his designs, he said The LA times: ‘Most garden railways I’d seen, people had bought ready-made kits of little plastic buildings that were all about 12 inches by 8 inches.

‘They look like ready-made little buildings, like a barber shop. No.’

He added: ‘I wanted to build this from scratch and wanted them to be impressive, about six feet wide and four feet high. Or in the case of one of our castles, 2 meters high.

“I had to plan these and determine where the main buildings would be.”

He started construction in 1999 and showed the first version to his friends and family in 2000.

As the project has expanded over the years, its techniques have become increasingly high-tech.

Some features he built from sets, others he created from scratch, and some he 3D printed in recent years.

He added Sleeping Beauty Castle, the Haunted Mansion, Splash Mountain and Snow White’s village, as well as references to almost every Disney or Pixar film from 1937 to 2021.

The couple don’t like to discuss the cost of construction, but estimate it came to about the same price as installing a swimming pool.

He told the LA Times, “We’re not rich people here, and I’m trying to find a way to retire because there’s no way to do that right now.”

Occasionally visitors ask how much it would cost to hire him to build a Sleeping Beauty Castle for them.

He said, “They think you can do it for $300 or $400, and I say, ‘It’ll probably cost about $70,000 to rebuild that thing.’ It takes someone six months of their life to build that.”

In 2015, Sheegog and his wife began opening their garden to the public for a few weekends a year, with tickets selling out almost immediately.

Admission is free, partly because the family does not want to attract the attention of corporate lawyers.

He told the LA Times: ‘There was a woman here once, and she was almost a hundred. She worked at the park on opening day, when Walt Disney was there, and worked at the park her entire life.

“She had a whole crowd around her just listening to stories about what it was like. She started to cry. While she was talking, she relived her life when she was twenty years old, her first love, where she met her husband.

“All these memories are coming back, and a lot of people who come here are like that because we’re in Anaheim.”

Although Sheegog hopes to retire this year, he has no plans to halt the project’s expansion.

He designs two interactive experiences, complete with laser shows, hologram animations and live actors.

He said: ‘We grew up with the park and it has a certain sentimental place in your psyche. People just want to be there, and our place provides an outlet for that.”

EXCLUSIVE

A heartbroken family has been told they ‘should be grateful’ to property developers in Malaysia who covered up the discovery of an Adelaide woman’s buried remains. 

Greg Jenkins, 44, has spent the last six years on a quest for justice after his mother Anna Jenkins, 65, went missing while on a trip to the island of Penang in 2017. 

Mr Jenkins said the comment – made this month by a Malaysian High Court judge as she threw out a negligence case against local police he alleges failed to properly investigate – ‘highlights the disrespect’ his family have consistently encountered. 

Mr Jenkins said the judge told his family they should be grateful that construction workers involved the police when his mother was found but he alleges they only did so after he put pressure on them. 

After his mother disappeared, Mr Jenkins, a member of Australia’s Defence Force, got leave from his post in Hawaii. He flew back to his home in Adelaide before making 34 trips to Malaysia at a cost of more than $300,000 in an effort to track her.

His persistence paid off when a construction worker in 2020 replied to a missing persons flyer he posted saying his mother’s body had been found during works on a building site and it had been quietly moved nearby to not disrupt the development. 

The last call Ms Jenkins made from Penang’s main city of Georgetown indicated she was being followed by men after her passport and her family believe she was robbed, murdered and left at the building site – which at that point was still jungle. 

Mr Jenkins has received the backing of SA-Best MLC Frank Pangello who also accompanied him to Malaysia for the recent ruling.

Mr Pangello said the Jenkins family, who just want someone to answer for what happened to Anna, have been repeatedly brushed aside by Malaysian authorities. 

Ms Jenkins had dual citizenship because she had lived in Australia since the early 1970s, raising a family in Adelaide after she married RAAF serviceman Frank Jenkins as a young woman.

‘It’s high time the Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, made strong representations to the Malaysian Government about the treatment of the Jenkins family,’ Mr Pangello said.

Her son Greg said none has been held to account after a project manager and landscape contractor who were working on the housing development moved his mother’s remains in a deliberate effort to cover up the body.

‘We have proof they found and reburied mum’s remains,’ Mr Jenkins told Daily Mail Australia.

‘How is tampering with evidence and contaminating a crime scene not a criminal offence in any Commonwealth country?’ he said.

‘Instead the judge absolved them and said we should be thanking them that they brought the police in – which they only did because of the amount of pressure I put on the construction worker.’

‘They at first didn’t do anything and the police refused to go there until we forced their hand because it was getting some local media coverage and I said I would go to the foreign minister.’

A 2023 coronial inquiry into Ms Jenkin’s death was declared an ‘open verdict’ due to a ‘lack of evidence’.

Anna’s daughter and Greg’s sister, Jen Bowen, said she felt authorities ‘did not care’ for her mother and didn’t want to help.

The housing development was aimed at wealthy Chinese buyers – and traditionally they can’t buy a home anywhere that’s had human remains on it.

‘This development cost over $100million to build but the selling price of the luxury villas made it worth more than a billion – so everyone just hushed it all up,’ Mr Jenkins said.

‘They didn’t want word leaking out that dead bodies had been found there as it’s taboo and could have killed off the market for Chinese buyers.

‘So they moved my mother’s bones off to the side to an area which was going to be a water feature in parkland, and wouldn’t be residential land.

‘We found 34 bones from my mother but the police and deputy public prosecutor called the search off. They said the excavation equipment could destroy any more remains which is ridiculous.

‘When I first went to the site the Chief of Police told me we were not allowed to tell the press we were going or post it on social media.

‘The developer has put a lot of money into Penang and they don’t want anything putting that at stake.

‘They are setting the profits of this developer above a kidnapping and murder investigation.’

Mr Jenkins said during his investigations he found out that an Australian passport is worth $100,000USD on the black market in Malaysia as they are used by transnational criminal groups.

‘Someone holding an Australian passport can access 129 countries without a visa, which is very valuable to these people.’

There is no suggestion the construction workers had anything to do with Ms Jenkins’ disappearance, only that her remains where later found at the building site.

Despite the fact Ms Jenkins was an Australian citizen her case has largely gone under the radar at home.

‘If this had been a younger blonde Australian woman there would be outrage.

‘That just crushes my heart, my mother was the most beautiful person.

‘She was a Christian woman who dedicated her life to helping others. She helped the homeless and refugees in Adelaide through her charity work and an Aboriginal group through the church.

‘It’s just indicative of the person she was.’

Mr Jenkins said the Malaysian High Court judge won’t accept an appeal until he pays the legal costs of the defendants – the government, the police, the land developers, the project manager and a landscape worker.

‘They just want me to drop the case but I haven’t let this go for six years and I’m not going to let an unjust system deter us.’

The quest to find Anna and the legal case has cost the family about $600,000 and the Australian government has provided little in the way of help.

‘Anthony Albanese goes out of his way to send a text about David Warner’s missing baggy green, yet there’s been an Australian citizen go missing overseas and we’ve had no assistance at all.’

Whether it’s splashing flowers or preparing a delicious meal, everyone has their own way of impressing a potential partner.

But for these house-proud penguins, it’s all about the chicest bachelor pad.

As mating season approaches, Edinburgh Zoo’s gentoo penguins are busy getting their nests in good condition.

Using nesting rings and a collection of pebbles provided by the zookeepers, male penguins carefully selected the perfect stones to lure a loved one.

But there can be trouble in paradise, as penguins often skimp to get the best stones for themselves.

Edinburgh Zoo is home to the largest outdoor penguin pool in Europe with three different species and more than 100 individuals.

A large number of these are gentoo penguins, a small species native to Antarctica.

In the wild, these characterful birds make their nests on the rocky shores, where they collect the smooth pebbles to build nests.

And just like people, these penguins also propose by giving each other a nice shiny stone.

Male penguins select the smoothest pebble from their nest to present to their potential mate.

When she thinks the offering is good enough, the female takes the stone and places it on the nest.

The couple then work together to build a nest, in which the female lays two spherical eggs.

Gentoo penguins are devoted parents and often form long-lasting bonds.

During the incubation period of 33 to 35 days, the parents take turns keeping the egg warm while the others look for food.

This year the first eggs should be laid in April and we should see the first chicks hatch in May.

After about three to four months, these chicks are old enough to leave the nest and join a large nursery with other chicks, where they learn to swim and eat.

To help the penguins find their perfect mate, Edinburgh Zoo has provided the penguins with a collection of painted pebbles this year.

The rocks were painted by children supported by Edinburgh Children’s Hospital Charity at the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People.

But these pebbles are so important to the males’ chances of finding a mate that it sometimes leads to arguments.

Materials for building nests can be difficult to find on the frozen coastlines of Antarctica.

Some penguins even dive to the seabed to find pebbles, meaning it can take days, if not weeks, to build the right nest.

Faced with this daunting task, some penguins will turn to a life of crime and try to steal the best pebbles from their rivals’ nests.

Criminal couples may even try to hijack another couple’s nest altogether if it is left unattended for too long.

But this isn’t just a matter of aesthetic choices or neighborly jealousy.

Without twigs, branches or leaves to build their nests from, pebbles are all the gentoo penguins can use to keep their eggs safe.

A sturdy base of pebbles keeps the egg above the icy ground and snow so it can survive incubation.

Choosing the right pebbles will allow water or snow to drain from the nest instead of accumulating on the surface.

This means that building a good, sturdy nest can be the difference between successfully raising a chick or the egg not hatching.

So while the eggs are unlikely to freeze in the Scottish spring, arguments and fights are common among zoo residents as the breeding season approaches.