The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket successfully took off Friday night from NASA 's Kennedy Space Center .

It is on a mission to deliver four new astronauts to the International Space Station .

The new team is scheduled to arrive at the station on Saturday .

Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore will finally be able to return to Earth at some point on or shortly after March 19 .

The pair have been stranded in orbit since June 5 , with many claiming Williams and Wilmore were left on the ISS for political reasons.

Doctors this week said the 88-year-old pope was no longer in critical, life-threatening condition, but have continued to emphasize that his condition remained complex due to his age, lack of mobility and the loss of part of a lung as a young man.

Vatican announced Friday that it would provide medical updates less frequently, in what it called a positive development.

Doctors have not indicated how much longer Francis will be hospitalized.

James Webb Space Telescope is a collaboration of NASA and the European and Canadian space agencies.

A new paper proposes a new way for astronomers to look for signs of life on planets beyond the solar system.

Scientists think the gases may show up in higher concentrations around worlds with hydrogen-thick atmospheres, a type Webb scientists are hunting for.

The crowds waved Syrian flags and chanted in celebration of the rebel victory that ended the Assad family's five-decade rule.

“ Today , helicopters are gifting you hope instead of pain, peace instead of fear,” read a poster carried by a man at Damascus ’ Umayyad Square .

Half a million people have been killed and more than 5 million left the country as refugees.

The mural of Anthony S. Fauci hung in the halls of the National Institutes of Health , greeting passersby with an inspirational quote from the retired official.

The quote was cut out of the mural in the first weeks of the Trump administration, three current NIH staffers said.

The move is of a piece with other recent actions that the new Trump administration has taken toward the longtime infectious-disease expert.

Fauci 's high profile proved to be two -sided as backlash to the nation’s covid response steadily grew.

Republicans such as Sen. Rand Paul ( Kentucky ) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis vowed to investigate and potentially prosecute him.

Other Americans grew frustrated with school shutdowns and other pandemic-era policies that remained in place for months or even years , sometimes with little evidence to support their implementation.

Some scientists, physicians and other experts who previously spoke up to defend Fauci demurred when approached by The Post .

Others said they were worried of drawing scrutiny from the Trump administration at a moment when NIH funding has been imperiled.

Regardless of the cause, there is now a notable divide in views between Democrats and Republicans , where he is scorned.

A woman gave birth in a Lubbock , Texas , hospital in the middle of a measles outbreak.

Doctors didn’t realize until the woman had been admitted and in labor that she was infected.

By that time, other new moms, newborn babies and their families had unknowingly been exposed to the virus.

West Texas remains the epicenter of the outbreak that began last month .

Mixue Bingcheng is capitalizing on region-wide sweet tooth with affordable offerings of ice cream, coffee and bubble tea drinks.

Mixue Group had over 45,000 stores carrying its Mixue tea drinks, ice creams and Lucky Cup coffee products.

Other market stars include hotpot giant Haidilao , Fish With You sauerkraut fish restaurants, well-known beverage brands such as Luckin Coffee , Heytea and Chagee .

If Chinese food brands exploded worldwide, they might have that influence, he says.

“ China does have an uphill struggle to obtain soft power, but it’s doing an excellent job with its products,” he says. “It does have to be very careful to keep soft power in China ,’ he adds.

Federal immigration agents have arrested two foreigners — one of them a student — who protested last year at Columbia University .

They've revoked the visa of another student, who fled the U.S. this week .

Some Columbia students and faculty are afraid to voice opinions or stand out on campus for fear of getting kicked out of the country.

At the University of California, Davis , the Global Affairs Program has updated its website with guidance on the First Amendment and advice on free speech for non-U.S. citizens.

Leqaa Kordia , a Palestinian from the West Bank , was arrested by immigration officers for overstaying her student visa.

Ranjani Srinivasan , an Indian citizen and doctoral student at Columbia University , was allegedly “advocating for violence and terrorism”.

The Cape and Islands High School All-Star Basketball Games will take place this Sunday at the Hyannis Youth and Community Center in Hyannis .

The games will feature top players from the area, including six 1,000 -point scorers.

The girls' game starts at 1:15 p.m. , followed by the boys' game at 3:30p.m . There will be games and prizes throughout the event.

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An oil tanker carrying jet fuel was hit by a cargo ship while at anchor 13 miles off the east coast of England .

This set off a series of large explosions and a huge plume of black smoke, while a still unknown quantity of jet fuel has spilled into the sea.

It's too early to say exactly what the consequences will be, says marine ecologists at the University of Hull .

We still don’t know how much fuel was spilled, its chemical composition and toxicity, how it behaved once it hit the sea, where it will end up, and how long it will last. All these factors will be important if we are to understand how this incident will affect the environment..