Our 9 Favorite Feature Stories This Week: Taxi Drivers, Voiceovers, And A Radioactive Theft

This week for BuzzFeed features, Mary Cuddehe travels to Mexico to find out how concerned we should be about radioactive materials falling into the wrong hands. Read that and these other great stories from BuzzFeed and around the web.

1. What Happens When a Truck Carrying Radioactive Materials Gets Robbed in Mexico? — BuzzFeed News

Illustration by Adam Setala for BuzzFeed

Last December, a truck containing potentially lethal radioactive cobalt-60 was stolen outside Mexico City, briefly causing an international panic. Then, almost immediately, the story quietly disappeared — but the questions surrounding it didn’t. Read it at BuzzFeed News.

2. How A Disgraced College Chain Trapped Its Students In Poverty — BuzzFeed News

Photograph by Molly Hensley-Clancy for BuzzFeed News

Corinthian Colleges lured students to its high-priced courses with the promise of an escape from poverty. But, Molly Hensley-Clancy reports, mired in tens of thousands of dollars of debt they will likely never be able to repay, many now feel more stuck than ever. Read it at BuzzFeed News.

3. Unprotected — Outside

Photograph by Jesse Burke for Outside

A must-read investigation by Rachel Sturtz into USA Swimming and its appalling history of covering for coaches who've sexually abused swimmers. "Many critics of USA Swimming think the apology is too little, too late, and that the organization can never really be reformed until there’s a change at the top." Read it at Outside.

4. This Battered Woman Wants To Get Out Of Prison — BuzzFeed News

Courtesy of Tondalo Hall

In this follow-up to his investigation into laws that imprison battered women for their abuser's crimes, Alex Campbell tells the story of Tondalo Hall. She was sentenced to 30 years in prison for allowing child abuse — while the actual abuser got only two years. Read it at BuzzFeed News.

5. How Detroit Was Reborn — The Detroit Free Press

freep.com

In June 2013, Detroit became the largest city in U.S. history to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy. Nathan Bomey, John Gallagher, and Mark Stryker tell the story of the men and women who helped save the city from an even bigger crisis. Read it at The Detroit Free Press.

6. The Two Michael Sams — BuzzFeed News

Photograph by Dylan Hollingsworth for BuzzFeed

Michael Sam Jr. doesn’t talk to his father, who has been caricatured in the press as an anti-gay man who abandoned his family. But, as Joel Anderson found out, there’s a lot more to the story. Read it at BuzzFeed News.

7. The Knowledge, London’s Legendary Taxi-Driver Test, Puts Up a Fight in the Age of GPS — The New York Times Style Magazine

McCabeCredit Rory Van Millingen

An in-depth look by Jody Rosen at the hopefuls who spend thousands of hours memorizing the entirety of London in order to try to become taxi drivers. Should the notoriously arduous task be reconsidered in the age of Uber and GPS? Read it at The New York Times Style Magazine.

8. The Invisible Stars Who Make Hollywood French — Matter

Photograph by Thibault Montamat for Matter

Mac McClelland introduces the characters of the robust French voiceover industry, which is now threatened by Netflix. "This, as long as the voiceover actors  —  and writers, translators, transcribers, sound engineers, directors, and everyone else involved in this process —  are given the time and money to make it, is Art." Read it at Matter.

9. Bonfire of the Inanities — The Awl

Courtesy NYPL / Via theawl.com

Jacqui Shine unpacks the Times Styles section: "The Styles section may well be pretty stupid sometimes. It’s also a richer and more complex entity than any of us would like to believe." Read it at The Awl.

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