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Astronauts Face Final Leg of SpaceX Test Flight: Coming Home

Victoria Records Three Deaths, 397 New Virus Cases on August 1

Victoria has recorded three more deaths from COVID-19, taking the national death toll above 200, as the state considers whether further measures are needed to contain the virus. Another 397 new cases of COVID-19 were reported in Victoria on Saturday, and while it’s a significant drop from Thursday’s peak of 723, the state has now had 116 deaths. The deaths of a man and woman in their 80s and a woman in her 90s were linked to aged care, where 1008 cases are currently active. There are 49 new “mystery” cases, taking suspected community transmission to nearly 2000 cases. Victoria’s aged care facilities have been among those hardest hit by the virus, with all residents from St Basil’s at suburban Faulkner relocated to hospitals as staff were ordered into self-isolation.…

Astronauts Face Final Leg of SpaceX Test Flight: Coming Home

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.—A pair of NASA astronauts face the final and most important part of their SpaceX test flight: returning to Earth with a rare splashdown.

Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken took part in a farewell ceremony Saturday at the International Space Station, several hours ahead of their planned departure on a SpaceX Dragon capsule.

Despite approaching Hurricane Isaias, NASA said the weather looks favorable for a Sunday afternoon splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico near Pensacola, Florida, the new prime site. It will be the first splashdown for astronauts in 45 years. The last time was following the joint U.S.-Soviet mission in 1975 known as Apollo-Soyuz.

The astronauts’ homecoming will cap a two-month mission that ended a prolonged launch drought in the United States, which has relied on Russian rockets to ferry astronauts to the space station since the end of the shuttle era.

In launching Hurley and Behnken from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on May 30, SpaceX became the first private company to send people into orbit. Now SpaceX is on the verge of becoming the first company to bring people back from orbit.

“The hardest part was getting us launched, but the most important is bringing us home,” Behnken said.

A successful splashdown, Behnken said, will bring U.S.-crew launching capability “full circle.”

Space station commander Chris Cassidy, who will remain on board with two Russians until October, presented Hurley with the small U.S. flag left behind by the previous astronauts to launch to the space station from U.S. soil, in July 2011. Hurley was the pilot of that final shuttle mission.

The flag—which also flew on the first shuttle flight in 1981—became a prize for the company that launched astronauts first.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX easily beat Boeing, which isn’t expected to launch its first crew until next year and will land in the U.S. Southwest. The flag has one more flight after this one: to the moon on NASA’s Artemis program in the next few years.

“We’re a little sad to see them go,” Cassidy said, “but very excited for what it means to our international space program to add this capability” of commercial crew capsules. The next SpaceX crew flight is targeted for the end of September.

Hurley and Behnken also are bringing back a sparkly blue and purple dinosaur named Tremor. Their young sons chose the toy to accompany their fathers on the historic mission.

Focus News: Astronauts Face Final Leg of SpaceX Test Flight: Coming Home

Australia Recorded the First Deflation in 22 Years

The latest data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) on July 29 reveals that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) has suffered its most significant quarterly fall in the statistics history causing deflation for only the third time on record. The聽Chief Economist for the ABS, Bruce Hockman noted that the CPI dropped by 1.9 percent, which ABS data indicates is the “largest quarterly fall in the 72-year history of the CPI.” “Since 1949, this was only the third time annual inflation has been negative,” Hockman said. “The previous times were in 1962 and 1997-98,” he noted. Created through the costing of items such as food, clothing, housing, transportation, communication, education and insurance services, the ABS explains that CPI is essentially a measure of the usual quarterly household expenditure in…