Posted: March 21, 2019

People in Asia get ready. The fall armyworms are coming!

Fall armyworms have made themselves pests in America for a long time. Now they munch their way around the globe. First they made a home in Africa. Now Asian farmers sound the alarm. They’re next!

Experts say the insect was first found outside the Americas in 2016. It was eating up to half of people’s maize, sorghum, and millet. And now it’s chewing its way through Yemen, South Asia, Thailand, and China.

The worms cause damage to corn crops. They do their worst when they’re about pinky-sized. These tiny monsters turn corn cobs to mush! Pesticides don’t always work against the worms. Besides, pesticides cost a lot and are toxic.

The armyworm is out of place. It belongs in places between Argentina and Northern Canada. Natural enemies—bacteria and viruses—help keep it in check in those places. But the bug may have fewer enemies in its new home.

Farmers in Asia must find a way to control the worms. Asia is mostly known for rice growing. But maize is an important staple crop too. (What’s a staple? Find out in Staple Sampler.) Poultry and livestock need lots of maize to eat.  

The worms are already busy in Kanchanaburi province in Thailand. In the cornfields in Kanchanaburi, farmers find armyworms in all stages of the crop. Seedlings have worms. Knee-high corn has worms. “Elephant’s eye”-high corn has worms.

Organic farmers don’t use the usual farm chemicals. So they can sell the waste corn stalks as cattle fodder. Spraying with biomaterials like fungi and thread worms that may be parasites of the worms can help. But some fields still lost about a third of the first baby corn harvest.

“We've never seen anything like this,” said one farmer, Sanae.

In another field, Thanwa, a younger farmer, had his fields sprayed using drones.

Scientists scramble through the fields. They peek into corn husks and pull apart damaged stalks. They collect worms and eggs for monitoring. Insect scientists hope they can find an insect enemy to fight the worms. But it seems likely the worms will spread. The worms' adult moths can fly more than 60 miles a night—and they’re hungry!

Did you know a person in the Bible was eaten by worms? Read the story in Acts 12!

A scientist holds a fall armyworm Tha Muang, Thailand. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

Posted: March 21, 2019

Will Hawaii become the first state to ban most plastics at restaurants? Some lawmakers hope so.

Plastic foam containers are already banned from restaurants in many U.S. cities. And Hawaiian lawmakers want to keep waste from going into the ocean. Plastic takes a long time to decompose. It shows up at sea in a huge spiral near the Hawaiian islands. People spot used plastic on beaches too. Hawaii has a history of trying to protect the environment. Officials there have already outlawed sunscreen with ingredients that harm coral. Now they suggest banning plastic from restaurants.

Some want to make another law too. This one applies to restaurants, stores, and other sellers. It would make it against the law to use other plastic items. Under this law, plastic drink bottles, utensils, stirring sticks, bags, and straws are all out!

Are the new laws a good idea? Not everyone agrees. Eric S.S. Wong co-owns two fast-food Hawaii restaurants. He says the new laws would make running a restaurant a lot more expensive. He would have to raise prices to cover the cost.

“Now all of the sudden, your family's $30 dining experience became $37 or $38,” he says. His Wiki Wiki Drive Inn takeout counter in Honolulu sells sandwiches, breakfast meals, and Hawaii favorites like Loco Moco. Loco Moco is white rice topped with a hamburger patty, fried egg, and gravy.

A package of 200 foam boxes costs Mr. Wong $23. He says the same number of biodegradable (easily broken down) boxes would cost $57.

Chris Yankowski is part of the Hawaii Restaurant Association. He says Hawaii lawmakers are trying to do “too much too fast.” Cutting down on plastic may be a good plan eventually. But he says people don’t have the right materials to replace it with right now. He also says there’s no organized place to get rid of biodegradable containers—even if restaurant owners could afford them.

People have another reason for standing against the second law. It bans plastic garbage bags. What would Hawaii look like without garbage bags in restaurants, homes, hospitals, and nursing homes? Garbage bag makers say the law could make people sick because there would not be a good way to get rid of trash anymore.

Belinda Lau, manager of the Wiki Wiki Drive Inn takeout restaurant in Honolulu, sprinkles cheese on an order of spaghetti in a styrofoam container on March 14. Will she and other restaurant workers soon be saying goodbye to plastic? (AP Photo/Audrey McAvoy)

Posted: March 20, 2019

Floodwaters wall off the city of Fremont, Nebraska. Water covers roads. Private pilots rush to help. These ‘angels of the sky’ give free flights to carry stranded people from place to place.

 In the city of Fremont, 26,000 people are stuck. They wait on an island in the middle of Nebraska farm country . . . exactly the kind of place an island shouldn’t be!

People in Fremont aren’t the only ones flooded. It rained hard all over the U.S. Midwest. Snow melted fast. Rivers swelled and overflowed. People in Fremont couldn’t use roads all weekend. Officials still don’t know when roads will reopen.

The flights helped Sue Ankersen. She lives in Fremont but couldn’t get home after babysitting her granddaughter in another city. Ms. Ankersen says she had never flown in a small plane before. But she worked up the courage to go. She was homesick. She also wanted to volunteer to help others.

“I call them angels of the sky,” she says. “I'm just so thankful for these guys doing this.”

At least 30 airplanes have flown more than 500 people since Friday. Moving people without roads has turned out to be a lot of work! Pilots have taken passengers out of town to get to medical appointments, funerals, and relatives who live elsewhere. They’ve also hauled water, food, toilet paper, and other supplies.

Herb Johansen, a pilot from Bennington, removed the back two seats from his Piper Saratoga plane. He packed the plane with water, diapers, clothing, and food. He hauled the supplies into town along with passengers.

Senator Ben Sasse lives in Fremont. He says he is working to get help from the U.S. government for Nebraska as quickly as possible. Mr. Sasse says he isn’t surprised so many pilots pitched in to help. He says, “This is just the way Nebraskans are.”

Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. ― Hebrews 13:16

Pilot Herb Johansen of Bennington, Nebraska, unloads supplies he volunteered to fly into the Fremont airport on March 18. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik)

Posted: March 20, 2019

One eagle camera in Washington, D.C., is full of drama―love and loss, mystery and suspense. The stars of the show are Liberty and Justice. They’re bald eagles who have been together for 14 years. You might think that after so many years the eagles’ show would be full of reruns. Not this year!

In early February, life was normal for the famous eagles. Liberty laid two eggs. As usual, Justice left Liberty sitting on the eggs while he flew off in search of food. She expected him to return to the nest like he always did. She waited . . . and waited. Liberty couldn’t leave her eggs or they would get cold. But she was hungry. Where in the world was Justice?

While she waited, a couple young male eagles flew by the nest. They wanted her attention. In spite of their wooing, she stayed in the nest, keeping her eggs warm.

Ten days after Justice left, Liberty began making short flights. Was she looking for him? She wasn’t gone long, but her absence made the temperature of the eggs too chilly. They wouldn’t be able to hatch. A few days later, Liberty left for two days. The very next day, guess who came back?

Liberty looked upset with Justice. (Her feathers were ruffled!) Soon, things were okay between them. But things weren’t okay in the nest. While the birds were away, a raccoon climbed up and ate both eggs. (The eggs were never going to hatch because they were cold.) The thief was caught on camera. It was a shock to viewers!

Since the raccoon invasion, things have settled down. Soon, Liberty will lay more eggs. Viewers hope Justice will stick around. (He continues to disappear from time to time. His last trip lasted five days.) Bald eagles are fiercely loyal. Most mate for life, and live around 30 years.

 Liberty and Justice’s latest drama isn’t the only eagle news in Washington. Another eagle cam in the city captures the drama of two eagles named Mr. President and The First Lady.

 For some reason, eagle escapades keep eagle-watchers around the globe glued to the screen. People find eagles fascinating. When you’re eagle-watching, you never know what will happen next!

Eagles are powerful, protective, and fiercely loyal. Deuteronomy 32:11 uses an eagle to describe God’s care for His people: “Like an eagle that stirs up its nest, that flutters over its young, spreading out its wings, catching them, bearing them on its pinions. . .”

Bald Eagles Liberty and Justice in their nest in Washington, D.C., on March 4 (Earth Conservation Corps via AP)

Posted: March 19, 2019

On Saturday, April the giraffe gave birth once again! It’s a boy!

More than 300,000 people watched live video of the birth around 12:45 p.m. on March 16. Officials at the Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, New York, say the newborn giraffe was on its feet by 1:27 p.m. By 1:51 p.m., it was nursing.

Animal park owner Jordan Patch says giraffe numbers are going down in the wild. “Every calf born counts,” he says. This is April’s fifth calf.

Fans will be able to see the little one face to face when Animal Adventure Park opens for the season on May 1. And his name? Fans will get to choose. The naming contest will start soon.

Meanwhile, officials at the Berlin Teirpark zoo are showing off a new polar bear cub. The three-month-old is cute. She’s playful. She could become the Berlin’s next animal celebrity.

The bear doesn’t have a name yet either. She was born December 1. She is developing well. On March 15, she ventured out of her indoor cage for the first time. She enjoyed romping around with her mother, Tonja. She swam in her enclosure’s chilly pond. Officials say the cub will be now be allowed out daily for all to see.

(You can read earlier stories about April’s baby and Germany’s polar cub in News Shorts.)

April the giraffe with her new male calf on Saturday, March 16, in Harpursville, New York (Animal Adventure Park via AP)

Posted: March 18, 2019

The city of Tel Aviv, Israel, has taken a small step toward protecting the lives of “smartphone zombies.”

You’ve seen “zombies” like the ones the city officials are worried about. They’re people looking down at their phones so much they don’t notice where they’re going!

Officials install sidewalk lights at a busy crosswalk. The lights send messages to even the most distracted walkers: STOP! GO!  Officials hope the new lights will prevent accidents between cars and distracted walkers.

Tomer Dror is head of the traffic management division at the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality. He says, “We cannot force them to take their eyes out of the smartphone and into the road. We need to find ways to put the road into their eyes.”

The striped lights turn green when it is safe to walk. They turn red when pedestrians (walkers) should halt.

For now, lights have been installed at only one intersection in central Tel Aviv. Will they do what officials hope? If they do, more will likely be added. People already use similar systems in Australia, Singapore, and the Netherlands.

So far, people seem to be welcoming the lights. “In my opinion, it's something amazing,” says Shai Levi. He lives in Tel Aviv. He says he is very attached to his phone and spends “all day long with his head glued on the screen.”

Haley Danino, another pedestrian, also called it a good idea that will save lives. “But it’s a bit sad, no? We all look down all the time.” And distracted walkers are missing out on some amazing things—people’s faces, trees, and the sky, to name a few! The Bible says “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.” (Psalm 19:1) But when they look down they’re seeing something else amazing. They see inventions—phones and street lights—that people made with the creativity God gave them.

Israeli pedestrians stand in front of embedded LED stoplights at a crosswalk in Tel Aviv, Israel, on March 13. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)

Posted: March 15, 2019

April the Giraffe shows every sign she’ll soon deliver her calf. Her fans watch for the good news on YouTube.

“April is eating, eating, eating, and eating,” says Jordan Patch. He owns Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, New York, where April lives. “It’s just a matter of when.”

Here are the signs April is almost ready. She holds her tail to the side. Her body makes milk for the coming baby giraffe. She lifts her legs and moves her weight back and forth. And you can spot the calf moving in her belly. April has been waiting to have a baby for a long time. Giraffes are pregnant for 15 months!

Mr. Patch announced on March 6 the baby would come soon.  Since then, tens of thousands of fans have been tuned into April's livestream. It’s just like what happened in 2017. That year, April drew more than 232 million YouTube live views during the seven weeks before the birth of Tajiri. Tajiri was April’s fifth calf.

But Mr. Patch doesn’t think people will get to watch that long this time. He thinks April will have her baby before April!

When he started livestreaming April’s pregnancy in 2017, Mr. Patch expected only locals to watch. But now people all over the world are learning about giraffes from the zoo’s videos. He says that at any moment, 50,000 to 60,000 people are watching the livestream and discussing giraffes. He hopes watching April will teach people that giraffes are in danger. Giraffe numbers in Africa have dropped by 40 percent over the last 30 years. Fewer than 100,000 exist today.

Female giraffes like April measure up to 17 feet tall. They weigh between 1,540 and 2,600 pounds. You can guess why. They have eight-foot necks that can weigh almost 500 pounds! April’s baby will be plenty tall at birth too—probably around six feet!

April the giraffe and her offspring Tajiri in their enclosure in Harpursville, New York (Animal Adventure Park via AP, File)

Posted: March 14, 2019

Venezuela just had its worst power outage ever. The “lights out’ made matters worse in a country already in a lot of trouble. With no power, hospital patients were in danger. Schools and businesses had to close. Phones, lights, and the internet stopped working. People could no longer communicate with their family and friends.

The historic blackout started on Thursday, March 7. Electricity came back to some parts of the capital city, Caracas, about 24 hours later. But many other busy cities stayed in the dark. “I’m desperate,” said Maria Isabel Garcia. She is a 39-year-old office worker. She hadn’t been able to buy food for her three young children because she couldn’t take money out of the bank. Even people who had food at home when the power went out were in trouble. Their fridges didn’t work!

Venezuela was once one of the richest countries in Latin America. But officials have misused resources there. (Find out what went wrong in Venezuela in Citizen Ship.) Because of this, almost everyone there is desperately poor. About one-tenth of Venezuelans have left their once-peaceful country to find a new life. Imagine what it would be like if one of every 10 people you knew moved to another country!

So why did the power go out? Venezuela gets most of its power from the Guri Dam. The dam gathers energy from flowing water and turns it into electricity. We don’t know exactly what went wrong with the dam. But some engineers say it doesn’t work as well as it used to because it has not been taken care of. They say a blackout has been on its way for a long time. This makes it worse: Many people who would normally know how to take care of a big dam have left the country! (Leaving Venezuela is not easy at all. People only do it if they absolutely have to in order to find a good life again. Read the story of one mother and daughter running away in Fleeing Venezuela.) Venezuela’s leader claims an enemy attacked the dam’s electronic system, making it fail. Engineers say that is almost impossible. Others think there may have been a fire at part of the dam that made the whole thing stop working.

Now many people in Venezuela have their power back. But some areas have gone without power for more than six days!

When the righteous increase, the people rejoice, but when the wicked rule, the people groan. ― Proverbs 29:2

People walk on a dark street during a power outage in Caracas, Venezuela, on March 7. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Posted: March 14, 2019

Oyster farmers in Mali Ston, Croatia, have a big problem this year. Their oysters are making people sick!

Oyster farming is the pride of this small town in the south of Croatia. But tasting the famous fancy food may not be a good idea at the moment. Authorities have found norovirus in parts of the Mali Ston bay where oysters are farmed. That virus is sure to make you lose your lunch. And unlike other viruses, you can’t just “cook it out” of seafood. It survives high temperatures. (And it doesn’t help that oysters are normally eaten raw!)

That’s bad news for oyster breeders. They had to cancel this year’s traditional March oyster-tasting feast. The local community harvests about three million oysters each year. But nobody wants to buy oysters that make people sick.

Experts say: Don’t blame the oysters! Blame people! They point their fingers at the nearby sewage system. They say it’s out of date. It can’t support all the tourists that keep coming to see the coast of Croatia. An overburdened sewer spreads disease.

People who live nearby are stunned that they have sickness-causing oysters. Their oysters have grown famous for quality. Oyster farmers move through oyster fields in small boats. They show visitors rows and rows of oyster-filled underwater farm beds. Until now, these tours have made them proud. Now just looking down into the water might make visitors’ stomachs churn!

God cares about people’s health. Anyone who farms or produces food has a responsibility to make sure it is safe to consume. But God cares about people’s financial needs too—including the needs of fishermen in Croatia.

Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. ― 3 John 1:2

Branko Radic, an oyster farmer, opens an oyster shell in Mali Ston, southern Croatia, on March 8. (AP Photo/Eldar Emric)

Posted: March 13, 2019

More and more wild horses are born in the American West. Government officials make a request: “Please! Give us more pastureland!”

Have you ever wanted to see a stomping, snorting, herd of horses from your living-room window? When people think of the American West, these wild horses often come to mind. Right now, there are too many horses for horse land to hold. So until May 3, government officials are looking for people they can pay to keep wild horses on their private land.

But here are some things to know before you say, “Pick me!” You can’t just keep wild horses in your backyard—or even on five whole acres of land. You need a lot of fenced-in land—enough to support between 200 and 5,000 horses. That will probably mean hundreds or even thousands of acres! The horses are usually left alone. They are not tame. But they still need lots of water. They need sheltering trees or a canyon. The land must have corrals to help with rounding up the horses occasionally.

Wild horses are protected by the U.S. government. But figuring out how to protect so many wild animals has become a big problem. Many think the best place for wild horses is in open pasture in the American West—where private land owners are eagerly saying, “Wild horses on my land? Sign me up!”

A wild horse jumps among others near Salt Lake City, Utah. Horses like these need new pasture. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, File)

Posted: March 13, 2019

A tornado spirals through Alabama, destroying neighborhoods. Rescue crews use heat-sensing drones to search ruins. The high tech drones tell rescuers: No one is hidden in the rubble here!

A drone is an unmanned aircraft. No one rides inside. Drone pilots stay put on the ground. Public safety agencies around the world use drones to help rescue people. They are used in manhunts, wildfires, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and other natural disasters.

Drones give an overhead view of hard-to-see areas. They take pictures from the sky. Some drones can sense heat. They are called thermal imaging drones. These drones send color-coded pictures of heat sources to their pilots. They sense heat in buildings, on the ground, and in water. They alert rescuers to heat sources like humans, animals, and flames.

Law enforcement officers call drones “tools” that protect and save lives. They are cheaper than manned aircraft like helicopters and planes. (Drones cost between $1,500 and $10,000.) They fit into tight spaces. They fly around uprooted trees, fallen power lines, and crumbled buildings. They are fast. It takes less time to search with a drone than to search with deputies and police dogs.

In China, Nepal, and Mexico, drones search rubble after earthquakes. In California, they map fires and search burned homes. (Drones send pictures to firefighters’ cell phones!) In North Carolina, heat-sensing drones found a missing girl lost in a thick forest. In Tennessee, drones rescued a man from swampy woods.

Is it surprising that there are rules about flying drones? In Florida, drones can be flown only with a court order or during an emergency. “We can’t put them in the air just to look at traffic flows or write traffic citations,” says Florida Sheriff Grady Judd. To have eyes in the sky is a big responsibility―one lawmakers take seriously.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No―it’s a sky sensor. And it can help save lives.

God is our help in our time of need. He keeps us safe. Psalm 46:1 tells us that “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”

A DJI drone with a thermal-imaging camera. Law enforcement officers use heat-seeking drones like this one. (Menlo Fire UAS/Drone Program via AP)

Posted: March 12, 2019

A space capsule splashes down into the Atlantic Ocean. Rescuers watch it land. Will people soon be riding inside a capsule like this? The capsule is built to carry people. For this trip, only a test dummy rides along.  

The Dragon capsule undocked from the International Space Station early on March 8. Six hours later, it was ready to land in Earth’s ocean. Its red and white parachutes popped open. SpaceX employees cheered as it landed in the water near Florida. It was the first time in 50 years that a capsule designed for astronauts returned from space by plopping into the Atlantic. Apollo 9 was the last to do that. (Apollo 9 orbited Earth to get ready for the Moon landings. It splashed down near the Bahamas on March 13, 1969. Later Apollo flights splashed down in the Pacific.) U.S. astronauts have not launched from their usual spot in Cape Canaveral, Florida, for eight years. Officials at NASA want to start launching them again. Right now, NASA has to pay Russia to send astronauts into space.

NASA officials plan to use a capsule like this to carry real astronauts. They may do it as soon as this summer! NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine is thrilled about the landing. He says the big splash is again “leading to a day where we are launching American astronauts on American rockets from American soil.”

A pair of ships waited nearby as the capsule landed. People helped lift the capsule from the water. The capsule had brown scorch marks from top to bottom. Otherwise, it looked fine.

Would you be willing to climb in a capsule like this and rocket to space?

SpaceX’s Dragon capsule carrying a test dummy splashes down into the Atlantic on March 8. (NASA via AP)

Posted: March 11, 2019

Boats speed to the rescue as a young humpback whale struggles, stuck in fishing gear off Hawaii.

People in a boat first spotted the humpback on March 6. Officials from the U.S. Coast Guard and the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale Sanctuary worked together. As they waited for officials to arrive, people driving private boats tracked the whale.

Ed Lyman works for the whale sanctuary. He helped cut the gear away from the whale. The whale was dragging a lot of junk—about 500 feet of it! Mr. Lyman says thick fishing line was “deeply embedded” in the whale’s mouth. When this happens, officials leave part of the line where it is to keep from hurting the whale more. The line usually falls out on its own once the rest of the heavy debris is removed from the whale.

The whale was skinny. It had light skin carpeted with whale lice. (Whale lice aren’t really lice. They’re tiny crustaceans that hitchhike on whales.)  Mr. Lyman says the whale’s color, lice, and thinness are big clues. They show that the whale has probably carried the fishing gear for months. The trap line attached to the whale is normally used to catch crabs and fish in the north Pacific. The whale may have towed it all the way from Alaska! Hawaiian humpbacks feed in the cool waters around Alaska in the summer. They come to Hawaii’s warm waters to mate and raise their young in the winter months.

About 10 whale entanglements are responded to in Hawaii every year. Will this whale make it? Mr. Lyman says it now has an “excellent chance of surviving.”  

So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. ― Genesis 1:21

An entangled young humpback whale that was freed of gear by a team of trained responders off Makena Beach, Hawaii (Ed Lyman/NOAA Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary via AP)

Posted: March 8, 2019

In this spot, George Washington’s army lived through a tough winter during the American Revolution. And now visitors come to see another piece of history here: fossilized dinosaur footprints!

The fossils can be found along a winding trail at Valley Forge National Historical Park in Pennsylvania. They are scattered on slabs of rock.

At least, they can be found if you know exactly what to look for. To most people, the fossils just look like bumps in the rock. The largest measures about nine inches long. Hikers, joggers, and dog walkers use the trail. Most people don’t notice the fossils at all.

But Tom Stack noticed. He started volunteering at the park in 2017. He has studied geology (rocks) and paleontology (dinosaurs). The tracks were left long ago in mud that has turned to rock. The prints show three-toed feet. Mr. Stack also found impressions from another animal, maybe a relative of a crocodile. People guess the biggest print-maker was a two-legged dinosaur. They think it was six to nine feet long and four to six feet tall.

Officials at the National Park Service want to help protect the rocks from being damaged or removed. They plan to tell visitors about the rocks—but not where to find them.

The newly-found dinosaur footprints are not unique. They don’t teach people anything new about dinosaurs. But people still love to see them. Some fear people may even want to steal them. Some suggest taking the fossils out of the park to keep them safer. Others want to keep them there to encourage people to learn about geology.

Did you know other American national park properties contain fossils? Fossils are even scattered in rocks used to build the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.!

Fossilized dinosaur footprints are shown on a paving stone at the Valley Forge National Historical Park in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Posted: March 7, 2019

Jerry Merryman helped invent something that makes math a lot easier—the calculator! He died on February 27. He was 86.  

Three men get the credit for inventing the hand-held calculator. They all worked at Texas Instruments in Dallas, Texas. Jack Kilby and James Van Tassel were the other two inventors. The team wanted to build a computing device. Mr. Kilby, the boss, told his team, “It would be nice if it were as small as this little book I have in my hand.” Mr. Merryman designed the circuits for the calculator in three days.

Mr. Merryman was born on June 17, 1932. He grew up in Central Texas. He was always good with technology. By the age of 11 or so, he had become the radio repairman for the town.

“He’d scrape together a few cents to go to the movies in the afternoons and evenings and the police would come get him out . . . because their radios would break and he had to fix them,” says Mr. Merryman’s wife, Phyllis.

Mr. Merryman went to Texas A&M University. But he didn’t finish. Afterward, he worked in ocean science weather science. He also worked in the Gulf of Mexico measuring the force of hurricane winds. He started at Texas Instruments in 1963. He was 30. His friends and family say he was always creating something. His daughter Melissa Merryman remembers him making his own tuning fork for their piano. She said she asked him how he made it out of that “hunk of metal.”  He told her: “It was easy. I just took away all the parts that were not an F sharp.” He also put a telescope in concrete and attached a motor to it. The motor would power the telescope to follow a planet through the night.

Mr. Merryman and the other inventors started working on the calculator in 1965. Thier invention changed the world. Technology used for the calculator made present-day computers possible! But Mr. Merryman was humble. People remember him for never boasting or bragging about himself. “He always said that he didn't care anything about being famous,” says his wife. “If his friends thought he did a good job, he was happy.”

God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. ― James 4:6

This 1997 photo shows Jack Kilby and Jerry Merryman, right, at the American Computer Museum in Bozeman, Montana. (Phyllis Merryman via AP)

Posted: March 7, 2019

An Israeli spacecraft has taken the ultimate selfie—on its way to the Moon!

The spacecraft launched a week and a half ago. Organizers for the space mission released the photo March 6. The selfie shows the spacecraft Beresheet. The craft is orbiting about 23,300 miles away. Earth is the photo’s stunning backdrop. Can you spy Australia in the photo? Beresheet is the Hebrew word for Genesis. Can you imagine God creating our incredible planet?

The spacecraft should land on the Moon on April 11. It rocketed from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on February 21. Since then it has been circling Earth in ever bigger loops.

Beresheet should be close enough to start circling the Moon in early April. Only four other countries have landed on the Moon: the Soviet Union, the United States, and China. Making a Moon landing can cause people to feel proud of their country. A plaque on the Israeli spaceship reads: “Small Country, Big Dreams” and “The people of Israel live.”

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth. ― Genesis 1:1

The Beresheet spacecraft with the Earth in the background on March 3 (SpaceIL, Israel Aerospace Industries via AP)