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SpaceX Launches a Second Test Flight of the Most Powerful Rocket Ever Built; New Delhi, Top of the List of the Most Polluted Cities in the World Last Week; Why You`re Seeing More $50 Bills. Aired 4-4:10a ET
Aired November 20, 2023 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
COY WIRE, CNN 10 ANCHOR: What`s up sunshine. Hope you had an awesome weekend. I`m Coy Wire. This is CNN 10, the best 10 minutes in news because
of you. It`s November 20th. And we start today with the perfect story for this motivation Monday. You know, American inventor, Thomas Edison once
said, "Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time."
And here`s a good example of one company that`s not given up. SpaceX`s Starship spacecraft sat atop the most powerful rocket ever built. And it
lifted off on Saturday morning from Boca Chica, Texas, but not everything went according to play. The deep space rocket mission ended early with an
explosion and a loss of signal several minutes after liftoff. SpaceX, the company that made the 232-foot-tall rocket and the spacecraft spent months
rebuilding them after a previous explosive initial launch, back in April.
The root cause of the Starship rocket`s failure this time around wasn`t immediately clear. SpaceX said in a test like this, success comes from what
they learn and they can learn how to build a better rocket more quickly by flying and occasionally exploding early prototypes rather than only relying
on ground testing and computer modeling. For more on the launch in SpaceX`s bigger goal for Starship to carry up to 100 humans to Mars, here`s CNN`s
Kristin Fisher.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KRISTIN FISHER, CNN SPACE AND DEFENSE CORRESPONDENT: Engineers at SpaceX will spend the next several days and weeks pouring over all of this data,
trying to figure out what exactly went wrong. But this is what SpaceX likes to do. They like to push their rockets and their spacecrafts all the way to
the point of failure, because that`s how they learn. They`ve done that with all of their older, successful rockets and spacecrafts, and now they`re
trying to do it with Starship, the biggest, most powerful rocket to ever fly. And someday, the ultimate goal is for this rocket to allow and carry
up to 100 humans to the surface of Mars and ultimately colonize Mars and make humanity multi-planetary. That`s the goal.
But first, SpaceX has to get this thing up into orbit. And the test flight on Saturday was a success in that 33 engines did fire, all of them. The
launch pad survived. There was successful stage separation between the booster and the spacecraft on top. And it did make it up far past where it
flew on its first failed flight test back in April. It made it all the way up to the edge of space. But then something happened, and that`s why this
test flight was also a failure. There were two explosions. Both the booster and the spacecraft exploded after separating, and the spacecraft, if all
had gone according to plan, was supposed to make almost a complete lap of planet Earth and then splash down in the Pacific Ocean. That is what`s
characterized as a mishap by the FAA. They are now investigating a mishap with SpaceX. It`s an investigation that SpaceX will lead, but it`s now
unclear exactly how long that will take before SpaceX is given the green light to fly again.
But NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, who needs the Starship spacecraft in order to land NASA astronauts on the surface of the moon as part of its
Artemis program, congratulated SpaceX yesterday and said that Saturday`s test flight was a sign of real progress.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: For our next story, let`s go to New Delhi, the capital of India, which was ranked the world`s most polluted city last week by the tech
company IQAir, which tracks air quality around the globe. Primary schools were forced to close. Road traffic was restricted and construction was put
on hold because of a dense smog over New Delhi. CNN`s Vedika Sud has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VEDIKA SUD, CNN REPORTER: What you see around me is a thick, dense layer of pollution. The air outside is so toxic that even with a mask on, I can
taste it. If you`re out for too long, the eyes begin to burn and the throat hurts. Around this time, every year, this smog shrouds India`s capital city
obscuring the skyline and putting more than 20 million people at risk.
On a bad day, New Delhi`s pollution levels are nearly 80 times the limit recommended by the World Health Organization. So why is Delhi one of the
most polluted cities in the world? One major factor is crop burning, which can be better understood from above. Satellite images shared by NASA show
thousands of fire set by farmers over the last few weeks in Delhi`s neighboring states. They do this annually to clear the fields after harvest
for the next year`s crops. That`s from roads and construction sites, vehicle emissions and industrial pollution are also major contributors to
Delhi`s toxic care.
As winter approaches, the cold air acts as a blanket covering the ground trapping air pollutants. And as for the geography, deli is a landlord city,
limiting options to flush out polluted air. With multiple causes and no one solution, this pollution crisis will not be easy to solve.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: Did you know that among jellyfish, there is one species that may be immortal. When threatened sick or old, these jellyfish start to create
younger versions of themselves that will grow up into an adult identical version. I`m a little bit jellous. how about you? Well, a jellyfish boom is
now happening in the U.K. and Ireland, according to the Marine Conservation Society, we asked its data expert Angus Jackson, to explain the why.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There`s a jellyfish boom in the U.K. and Ireland, according to a new report. The Marine conservation society has revealed a
32% increase in jellyfish sightings compared to last year. The charity`s annual report is based on data sent in by the public. Those sightings are
then analyzed for interesting patterns, such as changes in species or long- term trends in population sizes. So what`s behind the rise of jellyfish sightings?
DR. ANGUS JACKSON, SEASEARCH DATA OFFICER: As waters warm in springtime, jellyfish start to grow and reproduce. And when the conditions are really
good, when the water`s warm, when there`s lots of food available, that reproduction can happen really very, very quickly. Under those conditions,
the numbers of jellyfish at sea can get to be very large. If that coincide with storms or onshore winds, these blooms of jellyfish are blown in
towards the coast where they accumulate and appear even more dense. If the public happened to be there at that time, that`s when there are more and
more observations.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This year, ocean temperatures have reached record levels with some parts experiencing intense and unprecedented heat waves,
but experts say we can`t solely attribute the jellyfish boom to climate change.
JACKSON: Whether we can say the large numbers this year are a consequence of climate change, I wouldn`t want to do that simply because there are so
many other variables that contribute to that large reproduction if we see increasing temperatures into the future, it wouldn`t be surprising if the
numbers are jellyfish increased as a consequence.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: Ten second trivia.
For U.S. currency, who is pictured on the $50 bill?
Ulysses S. Grant, Benjamin Franklin, Andrew Jackson, or Alexander Hamilton?
Answer is the 18th President of the United States, Ulysses S. Grant. That`s the $50 dude.
The United States government printed a record number of $50 bills last year. Did you know? And it has nothing to do with inflation when the money
supply grows and the currency begins losing its purchasing power. What happened with this somewhat unpopular denomination is the federal reserve
discovered that during the pandemic people started hoarding cash and it`s easier to squirrel away, bigger bills.
So the Fed ordered a big uptick in fifties and printed more than 750 million of them. That was the highest total in 40 years. Before the
pandemic, the $50 bill had been one of the rarest bills, perhaps one reason there`s an old superstition that because President Ulysses S. Grant is on
the face of this denomination and he notoriously went bankrupt, perhaps the bills are jinx. But some other reasons people might avoid them are because
these bills sometimes get confused with $5 bills. And a lot of stores don`t even accept bills larger than a 20.
For today`s story getting a 10 out of 10, Australian surfer, Laura Enever breaking a world record, riding a giant wave. You got to check this out.
The wave she faced was over 43 feet or 13 meters high, no other female surfer had ever even paddled into a wave that large. Laura`s feet has now
been certified by Guinness World Records and the World Surf League. That`s a swell achievement. Well done.
That`s it for the first of our two shows this week. After tomorrow`s show, we`re going to take a small break for Thanksgiving and be right back here
with you next week. We had so many inspiring stories about resilience today. We hope they lifted you up, up, up.
It is shout out time now. Shout out to Mill Pond School in Westboro, Massachusetts, keep shining, superstars. And shout out to Rooftop Middle
School in San Francisco, California, rise up. See you tomorrow lovely people. I`m Coy Wire and we are CNN 10.
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