The United Nations aid chief warns that roughly 50 million people could face heightened hunger as the current El niño reaches unprecedented strength, according to the World Meteorological Organization head. Flooding linked to the phenomenon has killed two people and displaced over 2,000 in Argentina, while European natural‑gas futures hover near 90 euros per megawatt‑hour amid broader energy disruptions. In the United States, the National Weather Service projects a warmer‑than‑average winter with above‑average precipitation across several regions.
NASA's daily Astronomy Picture of the Day series has recently featured two skywatching images. On 28 Oct, the agency published a picture titled The Mutual Occultation of Ganymede and Io. On 29 Oct, it followed with The Horns of Venus. Both entries are part of NASA's routine daily astronomy image series, which posts a new picture each day with an accompanying explanation.
The European Space Agency's Hera spacecraft has resolved the Didymos binary into two distinct asteroids for the first time, from about 197 million km away. The probe imaged Didymos and its moon Dimorphos on the evening of 18 Oct, from 1,280 km. Earlier in October, two thruster firings a week apart slowed Hera to 20 m/s relative to the pair. Didymos measures 780 m across and Dimorphos 151 m, orbiting roughly 1.15 km apart. The mission follows NASA's DART impact on Dimorphos in September 2022. The first detailed images of Dimorphos are due for release on 25 Nov.