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United States
500 Million Free Tests
President Biden announced on Tuesday he will be making 500 million COVID tests available to Americans, free of charge. With many people traveling both domestically and internationally, free at-home COVID tests could save Americans time, resources and protect them from being exposed in long testing lines. Rising cases for the new Omicron variant have sparked a new wave of COVID. The pledge of half a billion hard-to-find COVID tests has yet to come to fruition however, as the president has not signed any contracts to purchase tests from manufacturers. Purchasing the tests could take the government weeks to finalize as the new variant surges across the country and across the world.
This map depicts the hotspots of COVID-19 in the United States. Click on the map to learn more.
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Graphic Source: New York Times
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Netherlands
MH17 Prosecution Requests Life
Dutch prosecutors are demanding the imposition of life sentences for three Russians and a Ukrainian for the July 2014 attack on Malaysia Airlines MH17 in July 2014. The defendants, Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinsky, Oleg Pulatov, and Leonid Kharchenko, all participants in a Russian-backed insurgency in Ukraine’s Donbass region, are believed to be responsible for ordering the firing of a Buk missile they obtained, killing all 298 people on board. The prosecutors claim communications and social media records show the men thought they were targeting a Ukrainian military aircraft. The four men are being tried in absentia in a Dutch court, given that the majority of victims on the Malaysia-bound flight were Dutch citizens.
This map depicts the flight path of MH17 and where it was shot down, along with information about the weapon and impact that destroyed the plane, killing all 298 passengers and crew.
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Space
NASA Releases Ganymede Audio
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently released an audio clip recorded from Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon. On June 7, 2021, the Juno spacecraft passed through Ganymede’s magnetosphere, where it collected data on the moon’s electric and magnetic radio waves. These waves were then converted to audio by NASA scientists. The Juno spacecraft was launched in August, 2011 and reached Jupiter’s orbit in July 2016. At the beginning of 2021, Juno, NASA’s most distant planetary orbiter, had its mission extended to observe Jupiter and its moons until September 2025. After multiple flybys of Ganymede, Juno will progress to take readings from Europa and Io.
This map depicts the planned trajectory of the Juno spacecraft’s multiple orbits as the probe continues its extended mission to collect information about Jupiter and its moons Ganymede, Europa, and Io.
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Q: What is the name of the famous hiking trail that starts from the border of Mexico in California and extends 2,650 miles (4,265 km) to the border of Canada in Washington state?
A: The Pacific Crest Trail
The Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) is a wilderness footpath and trail in the western United States. The trail follows the Cascade and Sierra Nevada ranges through California, Oregon, and Washington, and passes through 7 national parks. The trail was authorized by Congress in 1968 with the passage of the National Trails Act, and in 1993, the route was officially completed. The full hike can take anywhere from 3 to 6 months to complete, depending on weather conditions and other factors — if all goes well, hikers walk an average of 18 miles (29 km) per day. Typically, a few hundred people each year hike the entire PCT, but thousands more hike some portion of it on less lengthy backpacking trips.
Source
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Q: In which country does every person who mails a letter to Santa receive a letter in response and has a recognized postal code for children to send letters to during the holiday season?
Stay tuned for the answer to today’s question in Monday’s DailyGeo.
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