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2. In an extraordinary shake-up, Air Force Chief of Staff General Michael Moseley and Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne are stepping down. It comes after a number of embarrassing setbacks over the past year.

3. Two astronauts are on a spacewalk to spruce up the international space station’s new Japanese lab. The Discovery crew members are setting up two TV cameras around the Kibo lab’s robotic arms. The third and final spacewalk is planned for this weekend.

4. And hundreds of spectators watched a French skyscraper³ climber scale the New York Times 52-storey building. The 45-year-old daredevil was taken into custody⁴ at the top. The stunt⁵ was supposed to draw attention to global warming.

WORDS IN THE NEWS

1.confessed adj. [only before noun]
having admitted publicly that you have done something

2.mastermind n.[singular]

someone who plans and organizes a complicated operation, especially a criminal operation

3.shake-up n.[countable]

a process by which an organization makes a lot of big changes in a short time to improve its effectiveness

4. spacewalk n.[countable]
the act of moving around outside a spacecraft while in space, or the time spent outside it

5.spruce up
to make yourself or something look neater and tidier

6.set up
to prepare the equipment that will be needed for an activity so that it is ready to be used

7.scale vt.
to climb to the top of something that is high and difficult to climb

8.daredevil n.[countable]
someone who likes doing dangerous things