A home on Billy Joel’s longtime Long Island estate just changed hands for $7 million, the New York Post reports. The news of the sale comes days after the Grammy-winning musician canceled all of his scheduled concert dates to undergo physical therapy for normal pressure hydrocephalus, a brain disorder that affects hearing, vision, and balance.Spanning five acres, the parcel was part of Joel’s 26-acre Centre Island compound, dubbed Middlesea, which he began assembling in 2002. The recently sold beachfront dwelling is referred to as Middlesea’s gatehouse—though it is much more impressive than that humble name connotes. The 5,565-square-foot structure comprises a historic gatehouse and a carriage house that were combined to form the five-bedroom, four-bathroom residence that stands there today. Two kitchens, two primary suites, and a heated gunite swimming pool are among the home’s impressive amenities. A spacious pergola-shaded outdoor dining area looks out at the water, as does a screened-in patio equipped with a built-in barbecue area.Billy Joel’s Houses: Inside the Musician’s Impressive Real Estate PortfolioThe “New York State of Mind” singer recently purchased a sprawling Hamptons estateThe “Piano Man” listed his entire Middlesea estate in 2023 with a $49 million price tag. According to the Post, the remainder of the compound will drop in price to $39.9 million following the sale of the gatehouse. The property’s recently renovated main house is a 20,000-square-foot manse complete with a bowling alley, an indoor pool, a wine cellar, a spa, and a salon area. An additional guesthouse, a helipad, a floating dock, and acres of surrounding land round out the impressive compound, which boasts 2,000 feet of Oyster Bay Harbor water frontage. The property is not far from where the singer grew up in the nearby Oyster Bay hamlet of Hicksville.Join NowAD PRO members enjoy exclusive benefits. Get a year of unlimited access for $25 $20 per month.ArrowThe musician, who “hopes to be able to resume performing as his recovery progresses,” as a source told People, also owns properties in East Hampton and South Florida.

A US M1A1 Abrams tank. Spc. Christian Carrillo/US Army 2025-05-22T18:51:39Z Save Saved Read in app This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now. Have an account? Nearly 30 M1A1 Abrams tanks will roll down Constitution Ave. in DC for the Army's 250th birthday. The service is finalizing plans to prevent the heavy 70-ton tanks from damaging the road. Engineers will use steel plates and track pads to protect roads during the parade. The powerful M1A1 Abrams tank, with its heavy armor and 120mm cannon, is a massive hulk of steel, and dozens are set to hit the streets in the nation's capital next month.Nearly 30 of the tanks are expected to rumble down Constitution Avenue as part of the US Army's 250th anniversary celebration on June 14, set to coincide with President Donald Trump's birthday.The street, which runs parallel to the National Mall and serves as a major route for city traffic, isn't built to easily accommodate each tank's nearly 70-ton frame. Most cars weigh only about two tons.So how is the Army going to keep its tanks from chewing up Constitution Avenue? The service's engineers are putting the finishing touches on plans to protect the busy street's pavement from biting tracks.Officials aren't too concerned with the straight path down Constitution, which will likely see a single file of tanks. It's turning points that will be the most vulnerable to tears from the heavy tracked vehicles."We are targeting those areas that we have concerns," said Army Col. Jesse Curry, Executive Officer for the Army's Chief of Engineers, during a media roundtable with reporters on Wednesday. "Particularly the areas where the surface of the pavement would typically, you know, receive an exaggerated level of stress." US M1A1 Abrams tanks arrive via rail at Grafenwoehr, Germany. Staff Sgt. Christopher Stewart/U.S. Army To prevent such stress, military engineers are figuring out which turn points will be layered with steel plates at least one inch thick.Such large plates are commonly seen on city streets where heavy equipment is used, Curry said, adding that equipment staging areas and the parade route were specially chosen to minimize weight-related damage.Heavy tracked vehicles like the M1A1 often make turns by using differential steering — one side will roll forward while the other reverses, or the tracks will operate at a different speed. That can cause tracks to "pinch," a problem for asphalt.Inbound parade tanks will also don new "track pads," rubber components that create some separation between the metal tracks and the pavement, Curry told reporters.Additional measures to prevent damage are still being examined, with help from DC's Department of Transportation, the National Park Service (which oversees maintenance of the National Mall), and the Federal Highway Administration.The tanks and other vehicles, such as Bradley fighting vehicles and Strykers, will arrive in the DC area via rail and will then depart to parade staging areas via heavy-duty trailers, similar to those used to move houses down highways. An M1A1 Abrams is loaded onto a heavy equipment movement truck at Fort Cavazos, Texas. Spc. Alejandro L. Carrasquel/ US Army Troops will not be conducting any full-scale rehearsals for the parade, a notable deviation from typical military planning. Normally, complete rehearsals are an important part of any military mission, including small unit ceremonies. Officials said Wednesday that while the Army has been planning a major 250th birthday event for two years, the idea to include heavy vehicles like tanks and other armored vehicles in a parade only arrived this year. The officials did not specify how the idea originated.Even moving at a slow parade pace, any military activity using heavy equipment and vehicles is fraught with concerns that require meticulous planning for safety precautions, especially when it comes to the equipment offloads required to stage for such a parade. Large vehicles must rely on ground guides to ensure no one is inadvertently run over.Officials said Wednesday that Hercules wreckers will be available to recover any tanks that break down. How roads might handle the behemoth 70-ton M88 Hercules recovery vehicle with a downed tank on its trailer bed is unclear.

Something to look forward to: Nintendo has officially revealed the technical specifications for the highly anticipated Switch 2, offering a glimpse into the console's architecture. Digital Foundry notes that the details remain somewhat "selective" but provide a clearer understanding of the hardware developers have at their disposal. Nintendo has conceded the console arms race to Sony and Microsoft but positions the Switch 2 to balance power, portability, and efficiency in the handheld market. When Nintendo unveiled the Switch 2, it offered virtually zero details on the CPU, simply calling it a "custom processor made by Nvidia." Nvidia followed up with a similarly vague description of the chip. With the release just weeks away, Nintendo has finally confirmed some solid specs. At the heart of the Switch 2 is a custom Nvidia Ampere chip, designated T239 – a clear upgrade from the original Tegra X1. It features an Arm Cortex-A78C CPU, offering significant gains over the older A57 cores. The chip runs at 998MHz while docked and 1.1GHz in mobile mode, with a potential 1.7GHz ceiling under specific conditions. Its 8-core CPU, with six cores available to developers, enables better performance for demanding games. The Switch 2's Ampere-based GPU delivers a substantial boost in visual performance. It includes 1,536 CUDA cores reaching up to 1.71 teraflops in handheld mode, scaling to 3.072 teraflops while docked. Teraflop metrics can be misleading, so the hands-on gaming experience will better reflect the hardware's capabilities. The system also supports Nvidia's DLSS for enhanced anti-aliasing and performance scaling, along with ray tracing – though limited resources mean ray tracing will play a minimal role at launch. The Switch 2 includes 12GB of LPDDR5X memory – a substantial upgrade from the original's 4GB. Developers can access 9GB, with the remaining 3GB reserved for system functions. The boosted memory supports smoother multitasking and more demanding games, with bandwidth peaking at 102GB/s in performance mode (docked) and 68GB/s in handheld mode. Switch 2: Nvidia T239 Switch 1: Nvidia Tegra X1 Architecture 8x ARM Cortex A78C 4x ARM Cortex A57 CPU Speed 998MHz (docked), 1101MHz (mobile), Max 1.7GHz1020 MHz (docked/mobile), Max 1.785GHz CPU System Reservation 2 cores (6 available to devs)1 core (3 available to devs) GPU Architecture Ampere Maxwell CUDA Cores 1536 256 GPU Clocks 1007MHz (docked), 561MHz (mobile), Max 1.4GHz768MHz (docked), up to 460MHz (mobile), Max 921MHz Memory/Interface 128-bit/LPDDR5 64-bit/LPDDR4 Memory Bandwidth 102GB/s (docked), 68GB/s (mobile)25.6GB/s (docked), 21.3GB/s (mobile) Memory System Reservation 3GB (9GB available for games)0.8GB (3.2GB available for games) Source: Digital Foundry // Related Stories The Switch 2 sports 256GB of UFS storage, expandable via microSD Express cards up to 2TB. A custom file decompression engine offloads processing from the CPU, accelerating load times and improving overall efficiency. The 7.9-inch display boasts 1080p resolution with HDR10 support and variable refresh rate (VRR) up to 120Hz in handheld mode. Unfortunately, the dock's HDMI conversion doesn't support VRR, which may be a limiting factor for those expecting smoother gameplay on larger screens. The Switch 2 could struggle with some innovative features, like Game Chat. Developers have raised concerns about the resource demands of active voice chat during gameplay. In response, Nintendo included an API in the SDK that simulates latency and system load so developers can test the functionality under varying conditions. However, the impact on performance has yet to be determined. Ultimately, the proof will be in the pudding when the Switch 2 launches on June 5. With early criticism over pricing, Nintendo is depending on developers delivering games that justify the expense – regardless of its specs.