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Artist's impression of Galileo's arrival at Jupiter
Artist's impression of Galileo's arrival at Jupiter

The Galileo project was an American robotic space program that studied Jupiter and its moons (including Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto), as well as several other Solar System bodies. Named after the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei, the Galileo spacecraft consisted of an orbiter and an atmospheric entry probe. It was launched in 1989 by the Space Shuttle Atlantis on the STS-34 mission. Despite suffering major antenna problems, Galileo achieved the first asteroid flyby (of 951 Gaspra), discovered the first asteroid moon (Dactyl, around 243 Ida), and observed Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9's collision with Jupiter. After gravity-assisted flybys of Venus and Earth, Galileo became the first spacecraft to orbit Jupiter. It then launched the first probe to directly measure Jupiter's atmosphere. In 2003, the mission was terminated by sending the orbiter into Jupiter's atmosphere to eliminate the possibility of contaminating the Jovian moons with terrestrial bacteria. (Full article...)

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Yahya Sinwar in 2011
Yahya Sinwar

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October 18: Alaska Day (1867)

Bob Beamon
Bob Beamon
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Mercedes-Benz EQC
Mercedes-Benz EQC

The German carmaker Mercedes-Benz entered the battery electric-vehicle market with the unveiling of the Generation EQ, a concept car, at the 2016 Paris Motor Show. At the same show, Mercedes-Benz also announced the creation of a sub-brand called Mercedes-EQ. Mercedes-Benz debuted the EQA concept at the 2017 International Motor Show Germany. The production version of the Generation EQ concept, and the first car in the Mercedes-EQ series, debuted publicly at the 2018 Paris Motor Show in the form of the EQC (pictured). Mercedes-Benz unveiled the EQV at the Geneva Motor Show in 2018. As well as production vehicles, Mercedes-Benz has also produced several concept cars in the series, including the EQXX and the EQ Silver Arrow. (Full list...)

Krishna's Butterball

Krishna's Butterball is a large granite balancing rock that rests on a short incline in the coastal resort town of Mamallapuram in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is approximately six metres (20 ft) high and five metres (16 ft) wide, with a mass of around 250 tonnes. It is balanced on a slope on top of a 1.2-metre-high (4 ft) plinth that is a naturally eroded hill. Krishna's Butterball is part of the Group of Monuments at Mahabalipuram, a UNESCO World Heritage Site built during the 7th and 8th centuries as Hindu religious monuments by the Pallava dynasty. It is now a popular tourist attraction.

Photograph credit: Timothy A. Gonsalves

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