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Month: December 2024

Chang’e-6: First Moon Mission to Collect Rocks from the Far side of the Moon and Land Back on Earth

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China’s Chang’e-6 lunar probe has safely landed on Earth after a two-month journey to the far side of the Moon and back. The unmanned spacecraft touched down in the Inner Mongolia desert on June 25. It contains some very rare rock and soil samples that were collected after Chang’e-6 landed on the unexplored far side of the Moon. 

According to the China National Space Administration, Chang’e-6 used a computer system to check for any obstacles that would be in the way of landing, before touching down on the Moon’s South Pole-Aitken Basin. This is a crater on the side of the Moon that always faces away from Earth, an area that’s hard to reach because it’s really far away and doesn’t have many flat surfaces that are easy to land on. It’s hoped that the Moon rocks will allow scientists to uncover more secrets about how planets are formed.

Mexico Elects Its First Woman President: Claudia Sheinbaum

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Claudia Sheinbaum has been elected as Mexico’s first woman president in an historic landslide win. She is a climate scientist and former mayor of Mexico City. She won over her main rival Xóchitl Gálvez with approximately 58.3-60.7% of the vote. 

Claudia Sheinbaum will replace the outgoing President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, on October 1. In 2018, Claudia Sheinbaum became the first female mayor of Mexico City, a post she held until 2023, when she stepped down to run for president.

India’s Outstanting Performance at the 2024 World Para Athletics Championships

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The Indian contingent finished their 2024 World Para Athletics Championships in Kobe, Japan with 17 medals. India was placed sixth in the overall medal tally. The Indian team won a total of six gold medals, five silver medals, and six bronze medals to register their best-ever performance at the World Para Athletics Championships. The previous record for India stood at 10 medals, which included three gold medals, at the 2023 World Para Athletics Championships in Paris. China finished as the most successful country in the competition this year with a total of 87 medals. 

Some Incredible Victories by Indian Para Athletes are described below:

Indian Para Athlete Smashes World Record 

Twenty-year-old Deepthi Jeevanji from Telangana, has created history at the World Para Athletics Championships. With a time of 55.07 seconds, she won gold in the women’s 400m T20 event, smashing the previous record. She has also qualified for the Paris 2024 Paralympics. 

The T20 category is meant for athletes with intellectual impairment.

Sprinter Simran Sharma Wins Gold

Simran Sharma won the gold medal in women’s 200m T12 event with a personal best time of 24.95 seconds on the final day of competitions. Her remarkable performance saw her improve her previous best of 25.16 seconds to win the gold.

 The T12 category is meant for athletes who have vision impairment.

Spectacular Performance by Mariyappan Thangavelu

Two-time Paralympics medallist Mariyappan Thangavelu won his maiden gold medal at the World Para Athletics Championships by leaping 1.88m in the men’s T63 high jump event. The mark also helped him breach the championships record, which was held by Sharad Kumar at 1.83m.

The T63 category is meant for athletes with a leg amputation, who compete with prosthetics in a standing position.

India’s other gold medal winners were Sumit Antil (Men’s Javelin Throw F64), Sachin Khilari (Men’s Shot Put F46), and Ekta Bhyana (Women’s Club Throw F51)

Venezuela Lost All its Glaciers

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The last remaining glacier of Venezuela is lost, after it shrunk so much that it has been reclassified as an ice field by the scientists. Venezuela was home to six glaciers in the Sierra Nevada de Mérida mountain range, which lies at about 5,000m above sea level. Five of the glaciers had disappeared by 2011, leaving just the Humboldt glacier, also known as La Corona, close to the country’s second highest mountain, Pico Humboldt. 

Venezuela is believed to be the first country in recent history to lose all its glaciers. “The loss of La Corona marks the loss of much more than the ice itself, it also marks the loss of the many ecosystem services that glaciers provide, from unique microbial habitats to environments of significant cultural value”, said Caroline Clason, a glaciologist and assistant professor at Durham University.

Word Check

According to NASA, a glacier is a large area of thick ice that remains frozen from one year to the next. They form when lots of snow falls in one location for many years. Over time–decades or centuries–the snow on the bottom gets squished down by the weight of falling new snow. This compressed snow becomes ice, forming a glacier.

Youngest and Oldest Indian Women to Scale Mount Everest

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Sixteen-year-old Kaamya Karthikeyan has become the youngest Indian mountaineer to scale Mt. Everest from the Nepal side. She also became the second youngest girl in the world to achieve this great feat. 

Kaamya Karthikeyan is a class 12 student at Navy Children School, Mumbai. On May 20, she successfully summited Mt. Everest, along with her father S. Karthikeyan who is in the Indian Navy. She has completed six milestones in her mission to summit the highest peak of all seven continents. Kaamya Karthikeyan is now aiming to climb Mt. Vinson Massif in Antarctica this December to become the youngest girl to accomplish the ‘7 summits challenge’.

Did You Know?

In 1984, Bachendri Pal became the first Indian woman to climb Mt. Everest.

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