Details have emerged of the extraordinary security involved in shipping two fossilized skeletons from Ethiopia to the Czech Republic.

A specially charted plane, complete with an armed police escort, was used to transport the remains with a publicity black-out only lifted when its wheels were safely on the ground in Prague.

The skeletons in question are called Lucy, a member of an early human species that lived in Africa about 3.2 million years ago, and Selam which is the fossil of a baby believed to be around 100,000 years older.

It is only the second time Lucy has left Ethiopia since being discovered in 1974. It is so fragile a replica is normally on show at the Ethiopian Natural History Museum in Addis Ababa.

Both fossils will be shown side by side at the Czech National Museum in Prague for around two months. The museum said it will extend its opening hours and issue timed-entry tickets to cope with expected demand.

Around 30 staff have lost their jobs at New York's School of Visual Arts.

The job losses were confirmed by its president David Rhodes who said the school, whose alumni include Keith Haring and Sarah Sze, was facing "financial challenges".

In an email seen by the website Hyperallergic, he said the school had to "weather these very challenging times in higher education".

The job cuts come after a drive by staff to form a union.

September 25 was Mark Rothko's birthday but it is the museum set up in his name getting the presents.

The Rothko Museum in Daugavpils, the Latvian city where he was born in 1903, is celebrating the event on September 17 when the artist's daughter, Kate Rothko Prizel, is guest of honor and will donate two of his drawings to its collection.

A sculpture of the artist, who emigrated to the US in 1913 and died in New York in 1970, will also be unveiled.

1 - The unveiling of a 11-foot-high bronze statue of Martin Luther King in the city of Winter Park near Orlando, Florida, has caused controversy. Sculptor Andrew Luy has been criticized for making its shoes, head and one arm slightly enlarged with some locals saying it looks like a caricature of the US civil rights leader who was murdered in 1968.

2 - A survey of 56 commercial galleries found worries about the future of art fairs with 83% saying they were concerned about the high costs of taking part. The report by London-based firm First Thursday found 46% of those surveyed spent more than $40,000 to attend a single fair with 24% saying they spent even more.

3 - Film poster designer Joe Caroff, who created the James Bond logo, died in New York on Sunday a day before his 104th birthday. His design, which merges the numbers 007 with the outline of a gun, was created for the first film, 1962's Dr No, and is still used today.