Rolls-Royce is testing new technology in Derby to protect its jet engines from sand and dust damage commonly faced by airlines in the Middle East. The company has introduced new heat-resistant metals and redesigned coolant holes, increasing engine lifespan by up to 60% so far. This work, part of a £1bn durability programme, is expected to double engine life by 2028 for models such as the Trent XWB-97.

Recent outages at Cloudflare, Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure disrupted millions of users worldwide, highlighting growing dependence on a few major cloud providers. Cloudflare said its incident stemmed from a configuration file bug that caused a system crash, while experts note these issues are common despite advanced infrastructure. Though outages aren’t occurring more frequently, their impact feels larger because more websites and apps rely on the same providers.