• Two employees of the US Department of Agriculture were placed on paid leave of absence amid the agency’s investigation of the largest meat recall in US history. Some 143 million pounds of beef – roughly enough for two hamburgers for each man, woman, and child in the country – were recalled about two weeks prior after a California slaughterhouse was accused of slaughtering unhealthy cows. Although there were no reported illnesses or deaths from the contaminated meat, the beef was pulled from shelves because the slaughterhouse violated federal regulations.
• The British Ministry of Defense announced that Prince Harry, then 23, would have to come home from Afghanistan after details of his location were reported by the Drudge Report. Harry had been expected to remain in Helmand Province in Afghanistan with his home unit in the British Army for only a few more weeks, until, according to the Household Cavalry Regiment Battlegroup, “the situation ha[d] now clearly changed” and made it too risky for him to stay there.
• Northrop Grumman, an aerospace company, and the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS) won a $35 billion contract with the US Air Force to build a new refueling plane. The deal shut out Boeing, the Pentagon’s one-time sole supplier of aerial tankers. The Air Force said it planned to buy 179 tanker aircraft over the next 15 years to replace its KC-135 tankers. In a surprise twist, the Air Force said only months later that it would award the $35 billion to Boeing rather than Northrop Grumman and the EADS.
