Places in News Current Affairs MCQs

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Three of six reactors at Gravelines Nuclear Power Station in Northern France were shut down. The shutdown was caused by a massive swarm of jellyfish clogging the cooling system. The plant is operated by Électricité de France (EDF). Jellyfish are gelatinous zooplankton belonging to the phylum Cnidaria. They are simple invertebrates with stinging tentacles and jet propulsion movement. They lack brains, blood, or hearts and are made of epidermis, mesoglea, and inner layer. Jellyfish blooms disrupt ecosystems by reducing biodiversity and collapsing fish populations.

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A Ukrainian drone attack recently caused a short-lived fire at the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant in Russia. Kursk region is located in the European part of Russia, bordering Ukraine to the west. It is historically famous for the Battle of Kursk in 1943, the largest tank battle in history and a turning point in World War II. The region lies within the basins of the Dnieper and Don rivers. Kursk hosts the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly, the world’s largest magnetic anomaly and one of the richest iron ore deposits. The incident raised concerns over nuclear safety in a strategically important region.

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India will provide training and equipment to enhance Fiji’s maritime security, Prime Minister said recently. Fiji is located in the South Pacific Ocean, northeast of New Zealand and southwest of Hawaii. It is an archipelago of around 300 islands and 540 islets, covering about 1,000,000 square miles (3,000,000 sq.km). Fiji does not share land borders with any country. Approximately 100 of the 300 islands are inhabited. The capital of Fiji is Suva, situated on the southeast coast of Viti Levu, the largest island.

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Ethiopia inaugurated the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), Africa’s largest hydroelectric project, calling it a “great achievement.” GERD is a megadam built for power generation and regional energy trade. It is constructed on the Blue Nile River, about 30 km upstream from Sudan in Guba, Ethiopia. The Blue Nile provides approximately 85% of Nile waters, making the dam geopolitically sensitive. Initiated in 2011, GERD symbolizes Ethiopia’s self-reliance, development, and regional influence.

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Recently, Tanzania stopped a large-scale soda ash mining project at Lake Natron to protect its ecosystem. Lake Natron is a salt lake on the Tanzania–Kenya border, part of the Great Rift Valley. It was designated as a Ramsar Site of International Importance in 2001. It is the only reliable breeding ground for Lesser Flamingos in Africa, hosting 75% of the world’s population. The proposed mining project by Ngaresero Valley Company threatened flamingos, fragile hydrology, and the livelihoods of 65,000 Maasai pastoralists. Government allowed only small-scale traditional soda ash collection and emphasized sustainable ecotourism as the future.

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Recently, India bagged an exploration contract from the International Seabed Authority (ISA) to explore polymetallic sulphides in the Carlsberg Ridge of the northwest Indian Ocean. This is the first such global licence, signed in Delhi on September 15, 2025, between ISA (Jamaica-based) and India. Polymetallic sulphides are deep ocean rocks rich in manganese, cobalt, nickel and copper. Carlsberg Ridge is a mid-oceanic ridge and a divergent plate boundary in the Indian Ocean. It extends from the triple junction of the African, Indian, and Australian plates (Mid-Indian Ridge) northwest to the Gulf of Aden. It separates the Arabian Sea in the northeast from the Somali Basin in the southwest.

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Three Russian MiG-31 fighter jets violated NATO member Estonia’s airspace over the Gulf of Finland for 12 minutes. The Gulf of Finland is the easternmost part of the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe, covering 30,000 sq.km. It extends 400 km east to west and 19–130 km north to south, bordered by Finland, Russia, and Estonia. Capitals Helsinki (Finland) and Tallinn (Estonia) lie on its shores, with St. Petersburg at the eastern end. The gulf is shallow, average depth 38 m, low salinity (6‰), and freezes 3–5 months in winter. It receives Neva and Narva rivers and the Saimaa Canal.

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Recently, environmentalists raised concerns over unchecked tourism and construction in the Mahendragiri Hills of Odisha, despite its Biodiversity Heritage Site status since 2022. It is located in Gajapati district at 1,501 meters elevation. It is part of the Eastern Ghats. The hills host 1,348 plant species and 388 animal species, including many endemic and threatened ones. Culturally, they are linked to the Ramayana and Mahabharata, and believed to be the site of Lord Parashurama’s penance.

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Recently, more than 1,200 earthquakes around Greece’s Santorini Island showed that Santorini and Kolumbo volcano share an underground magma reservoir. The Santorini and Kolumbo volcanoes are located in Greece, in the southern Aegean Sea, forming part of the Hellenic Volcanic Arc. Seismic and GPS data (2024–25) proved both volcanoes are interconnected through a common magma system. This is the first scientific evidence of their magmatic link, complicating eruption forecasting and highlighting the need for real-time monitoring. Both lie in the Hellenic Volcanic Arc, one of Europe’s most active volcanic zones, critical for global disaster management studies.

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A rare burst of winter rains in Chile’s Atacama Desert has triggered the “Desierto Florido” or flowering desert phenomenon. It transformed one of Earth’s driest landscapes into vast carpets of fuchsia wildflowers visible even from space. The Atacama Desert is the world’s driest non-polar desert, located in northern Chile. It stretches about 1,000–1,100 kilometres between the Pacific Ocean and the Andes Mountains. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and European Space Agency (ESA) use it as a Mars-like testing site due to its extreme dryness and high ultraviolet radiation. The bloom is caused by Cistanthe longiscapa, locally known as “pata de guanaco.” This annual herb lies dormant for years and blooms rapidly after rare rains.