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SpaceX launches billionaire to conduct the first private spacewalk

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SpaceX launches billionaire to conduct the first private spacewalk

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A daredevil billionaire rocketed back into orbit Tuesday, aiming to perform the first private spacewalk and venture farther than anyone since NASA’s Apollo moonshots.

Unlike his previous chartered flight, tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman shared the cost with SpaceX this time around, which included developing and testing brand new spacesuits to see how they’ll hold up in the harsh vacuum.

If all goes as planned, it will be the first time private citizens conduct a spacewalk, but they won’t venture away from the capsule. Considered one of the most riskiest parts of spaceflight, spacewalks have been the sole realm of professional astronauts since the former Soviet Union popped open the hatch in 1965, closely followed by the U.S. Today, they are routinely done at the International Space Station.

Isaacman, along with a pair of SpaceX engineers and a former Air Force Thunderbirds pilot, launched before dawn aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Florida. The spacewalk is scheduled for late Wednesday or Thursday, midway through the five-day flight.

But first the passengers are shooting for way beyond the International Space Station — an altitude of 870 miles (1,400 kilometers), which would surpass the Earth-lapping record set during NASA’s Project Gemini in 1966. Only the 24 Apollo astronauts who flew to the moon have ventured farther.

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The plan is to spend 10 hours at that height — filled with extreme radiation and riddled with debris — before reducing the oval-shaped orbit by half. Even at this lower 435 miles (700 kilometers), the orbit would eclipse the space station and even the Hubble Space Telescope, the highest shuttle astronauts flew.

All four wore SpaceX’s spacewalking suits because the entire Dragon capsule will be depressurized for the two-hour spacewalk, exposing everyone to the dangerous environment.

Isaacman and SpaceX’s Sarah Gillis will take turns briefly popping out of the hatch. They’ll test their white and black-trimmed custom suits by twisting their bodies. Both will always have a hand or foot touching the capsule or attached support structure that resembles the top of a pool ladder. There will be no dangling at the end of their 12-foot (3.6-meter) tethers and no jetpack showboating. Only NASA’s suits at the space station come equipped with jetpacks, for emergency use only.

Pilot Scott “Kidd” Poteet and SpaceX’s Anna Menon will monitor the spacewalk from inside. Like SpaceX’s previous astronaut flights, this one will end with a splashdown off the Florida coast.

“We’re sending you hugs from the ground,” Launch Control radioed after the crew reached orbit. “May you make history and come home safely.”

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Isaacman replied: “We wouldn’t be on this journey without all 14,000 of you back at SpaceX.”

At a preflight news conference, Isaacman — CEO and founder of the credit card processing company Shift4 — refused to say how much he invested in the flight. “Not a chance,” he said.

SpaceX teamed up with Isaacman to pay for spacesuit development and associated costs, said William Gerstenmaier, a SpaceX vice president who once headed space mission operations for NASA.

“We’re really starting to push the frontiers with the private sector,” Gerstenmaier said.

It’s the first of three trips that Isaacman bought from Elon Musk 2 1/2 years ago, soon after returning from his first private SpaceX spaceflight in 2021. Isaacman bankrolled that tourist ride for an undisclosed sum, taking along contest winners and a childhood cancer survivor. The trip raised hundreds of millions for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

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Spacesuit development took longer than anticipated, delaying this first so-called Polaris Dawn flight until now. Training was extensive; Poteet said it rivaled anything he experienced during his Air Force flying career.

As SpaceX astronaut trainers, Gillis and Menon helped Isaacman and his previous team — as well as NASA’s professional crews — prepare for their rides.

“I wasn’t alive when humans walked on the moon. I’d certainly like my kids to see humans walking on the moon and Mars, and venturing out and exploring our solar system,” the 41-year-old Isaacman said before liftoff.

Poor weather caused a two-week delay. The crew needed favorable forecasts not only for launch, but for splashdown days later. With limited supplies and no ability to reach the space station, they had no choice but to wait for conditions to improve.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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UAE cuts funding for citizens studying at UK universities over campus radicalization fears: report

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UAE cuts funding for citizens studying at UK universities over campus radicalization fears: report

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The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is removing funding for its citizens to study in the United Kingdom, citing concerns they could be radicalized abroad. 

The move means the UAE has removed British universities from a list of higher education institutions eligible for state scholarships amid growing tensions over London’s decision not to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, The Financial Times reported. 

“[The UAE] don’t want their kids to be radicalized on campus,” a person directly involved with the decision told the outlet. 

UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA ORDERED TO REINSTATE LAW STUDENT WHO WAS EXPELLED AFTER ANTI-JEWISH COMMENTS

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A “Welcome to the People’s University for Palestine” banner at King’s College at the University of Cambridge May 11, 2024, in Cambridge, U.K.  (Mark Kerrison/In Pictures via Getty Images)

Since then, Emirati students who have applied to their government for scholarships to study in the U.K. have been denied. 

The move also means that the UAE will not recognize qualifications from academic institutions that are not on its accredited list, rendering degrees from U.K. universities less valuable than others, according to the report. 

NYC STUDENTS EXPOSE ‘EXTREMIST’ PROFESSORS FOSTERING CAMPUS ANTISEMITISM AT MAJOR UNIVERSITIES

The skyline in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, where funding for its citizens to study in the United Kingdom has been halted.  (Vidhyaa Chandramohan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

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“All forms of extremism have absolutely no place in our society, and we will stamp them out wherever they are found,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said in a statement. “We offer one of the best education systems in the world and maintain stringent measures on student welfare and on-campus safety.”

The UAE has taken a hardline approach to Islamist movements abroad and at home. 

During the 2023-24 school year, 70 students at U.K. universities were reported for possible referral to the government’s deradicalization program, the report states. 

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UAE President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan has repeatedly questioned the U.K.’s decision to declare the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. 

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Starmer’s administration last year said the matter was under “close review.”

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Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 1,416

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Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 1,416

These are the key developments from day 1,416 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

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Here is where things stand on Saturday, January 10:

Fighting:

  • The death toll from a massive Russian attack on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv that began on Thursday night has risen to four, the Ukrainian State Emergency Service wrote in an update shared on Facebook on Friday. At least 25 people were also injured, including five rescuers, the service added.
  • The attack left thousands of Kyiv apartments without heat, electricity and water as temperatures fell to minus 10 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) on Friday, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko and other local officials said.
  • Klitschko called on people to temporarily leave the city, saying on Telegram that “half of apartment buildings in Kyiv – nearly 6,000 – are currently without heating because the capital’s critical infrastructure was damaged by the enemy’s massive attack”.
  • Russian forces shelled a hospital in the Ukrainian city of Kherson just after midday on Friday, damaging the intensive care unit and injuring three nurses, the regional prosecutor’s office wrote on Telegram.
  • “As a result of the attack, three nurses aged 21, 49, and 52 were wounded. At the time of the shelling, the women were inside the medical facility,” the office said in a statement.
  • The head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, condemned attacks on healthcare in Ukraine in a statement shared on X, saying that there had been nine attacks since the beginning of 2026, killing one patient, one medic and injuring 11 others, including healthcare workers and patients.
  • Tedros said that the attacks further “complicated the delivery of health care during the winter period” and called for “the protection of health care facilities, patients and health workers”.
  • Russian forces attacked two foreign-flagged civilian vessels with drones in Ukraine’s southern Odesa region, killing a Syrian national and injuring another, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Kuleba and other officials said on Friday.
  • A Ukrainian drone attack on a bus in Russia’s Belgorod region injured four people, the regional task force reported, according to Russia’s TASS state news agency.
  • Russian forces seized five settlements in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region, including Zelenoye, the Russian Ministry of Defence said, according to TASS.
  • Ukrainian battlefield monitoring site DeepState said on Friday that Russian forces advanced in Huliaipole and Prymorske in the Zaporizhia region, but did not report any further changes.
  • Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday that Russia’s Oreshnik missile strike late on Thursday was “demonstratively” close to Ukraine’s border with the European Union.
  • The International Atomic Energy Agency has begun consultations to establish a temporary ceasefire zone near Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant after military activity damaged one of two high-voltage power lines, Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in a statement on Friday.

Sanctions

  • US forces seized the Olina oil tanker and forced it to return to Venezuela so its oil could be sold “through the GREAT Energy Deal”, United States President Donald Trump said in a post on Truth Social on Friday. According to The Associated Press news agency, US government records showed that the Olina had been sanctioned for moving Russian oil under its prior name, Minerva M.
  • Ukraine’s ambassador to the US, Olha Stefanishyna, said that Ukrainian nationals were among members of the crew of the Russian-flagged tanker Marinera seized earlier this week by US forces over its links to Venezuela, according to Interfax Ukraine news agency.
  • The Russian Foreign Ministry separately said on Friday that the US had released two Russian crewmembers from the Marinera, expressing gratitude to Washington for the decision and pledging to ensure the return home of crewmembers.

Politics and diplomacy

  • Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed “deep regret” over damage to its embassy in Kyiv, confirming that no diplomats or staff were hurt, in a statement on Friday. The ministry underscored the importance of protecting diplomatic buildings and reiterated its call for a “resolution to the Russian-Ukrainian crisis through dialogue and peaceful means”.
  • British Defence Secretary John Healey said that the United Kingdom was allocating 200 million pounds ($270m) to fund preparations for the possible deployment of troops to Ukraine, during a visit to Kyiv on Friday.
  • The leaders of Britain, France and Germany described Russia’s use of an Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile in western Ukraine as “escalatory and unacceptable”, according to a readout of their call released by Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office on Friday.
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Some flu measures decline, but it’s not clear this severe season has peaked

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Some flu measures decline, but it’s not clear this severe season has peaked

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. flu infections showed signs of a slight decline last week, but health officials say it is not clear that this severe flu season has peaked.

New government data posted Friday — for flu activity through last week — showed declines in medical office visits due to flu-like illness and in the number of states reporting high flu activity.

However, some measures show this season is already surpassing the flu epidemic of last winter, one of the harshest in recent history. And experts believe there is more suffering ahead.

“This is going to be a long, hard flu season,” New York State Health Commissioner Dr. James McDonald said, in a statement Friday.

One type of flu virus, called A H3N2, historically has caused the most hospitalizations and deaths in older people. So far this season, that is the type most frequently reported. Even more concerning, more than 91% of the H3N2 infections analyzed were a new version — known as the subclade K variant — that differs from the strain in this year’s flu shots.

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The last flu season saw the highest overall flu hospitalization rate since the H1N1 flu pandemic 15 years ago. And child flu deaths reached 289, the worst recorded for any U.S. flu season this century — including that H1N1 “swine flu” pandemic of 2009-2010.

So far this season, there have been at least 15 million flu illnesses and 180,000 hospitalizations, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates. It also estimates there have been 7,400 deaths, including the deaths of at least 17 children.

Last week, 44 states reported high flu activity, down slightly from the week before. However, flu deaths and hospitalizations rose.

Determining exactly how flu season is going can be particularly tricky around the holidays. Schools are closed, and many people are traveling. Some people may be less likely to see a doctor, deciding to just suffer at home. Others may be more likely to go.

Also, some seasons see a surge in cases, then a decline, and then a second surge.

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For years, federal health officials joined doctors’ groups in recommending that everyone 6 months and older get an annual influenza vaccine. The shots may not prevent all symptoms but can prevent many infections from becoming severe, experts say.

But federal health officials on Monday announced they will no longer recommend flu vaccinations for U.S. children, saying it is a decision parents and patients should make in consultation with their doctors.

“I can’t begin to express how concerned we are about the future health of the children in this country, who already have been unnecessarily dying from the flu — a vaccine preventable disease,” said Michele Slafkosky, executive director of an advocacy organization called Families Fighting Flu.

“Now, with added confusion for parents and health care providers about childhood vaccines, I fear that flu seasons to come could be even more deadly for our youngest and most vulnerable,” she said in a statement.

Flu is just one of a group of viruses that tend to strike more often in the winter. Hospitalizations from COVID-19 and RSV, or respiratory syncytial virus, also have been rising in recent weeks — though were not diagnosed nearly as often as flu infections, according to other federal data.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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