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Vicente at peak intensity on October 20

Tropical Storm Vicente was a small tropical cyclone that made landfall as a tropical depression in the Mexican state of Michoacán on October 23, 2018, causing deadly mudslides. The 21st named storm of the 2018 Pacific hurricane season, it originated from a tropical wave that traveled westward from Africa's western coast across the Atlantic and entered the Eastern Pacific on October 17. The disturbance formed into a tropical depression early on October 19 and became Tropical Storm Vicente later that day. It peaked on October 20 with winds of 50 mph (85 km/h) and a minimum pressure of 1,002 mbar (29.59 inHg). After making landfall near Playa Azul on October 23, Vicente quickly lost organization and dissipated a few hours later. The storm caused torrential rainfall in the Mexican states of Michoacán, Oaxaca, Veracruz, Hidalgo, Jalisco, Guerrero, and Colima; the rainfall exceeded 12 inches (300 mm) in Oaxaca. The storm left 16 people dead. (This article is part of a featured topic: 2018 Pacific hurricane season.)

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Did you know ...

Chris Kreider

... that Chris Kreider (pictured) scored his first five NHL goals before ever playing a regular season game?
... that Der Bialistoker Shtern's unique spelling policy combined standard Soviet Yiddish orthography with the traditional final forms of Hebrew letters?
... that Geoff Bent, one of Manchester United's Busby Babes, saved a child from drowning in a canal?
... that A&E Networks filed a lawsuit against the producers of On Patrol: Live, alleging that it was a "blatant rip-off" of their show Live PD?
... that Zakir Husain was the first Muslim and the first governor of a state to be elected President of India?
... that the 1887 novel Bellona's Husband: A Romance by William James Roe "may be the earliest example of the time in reverse tale presented in full-fledged narrative form"?
... that the Republican Palace Museum in Khartoum was originally a cathedral?
... that after playing football for three different high schools, Matt Landers played for three different colleges?

In the news

Kakhovka Dam in 2006

In Ukraine, the Kakhovka Dam (pictured) is breached, causing flooding and prompting mass evacuations.
At least 275 people are killed and over 1,175 others injured in a collision involving three trains in Balasore, India.
In cricket, the Indian Premier League concludes with the Chennai Super Kings defeating the Gujarat Titans in the final.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is re-elected President of Turkey in a runoff.
In auto racing, Josef Newgarden wins the Indianapolis 500.

On this day

June 7

Mosaic of Aelia Eudocia

421 – Roman emperor Theodosius II married Aelia Eudocia (pictured), who later helped to protect Greek pagans and Jews from persecution.
1832 – The Reform Act, which is widely credited with launching modern democracy in the United Kingdom, received royal assent.
1892 – Homer Plessy, an "octoroon" from New Orleans, was arrested for refusing to leave his seat in the "whites-only" car of a train; he lost the resulting court case, Plessy v. Ferguson.
1981 – The Israeli Air Force attacked a nuclear reactor under the assumption that it was about to start producing plutonium to further an Iraqi nuclear-weapons program.
1998 – Three white supremacists murdered James Byrd Jr., an African American, by chaining him behind a pickup truck and dragging him along an asphalt road in Jasper, Texas.

Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr (d. 1618)
Chief Seattle (d. 1866)
Knud Rasmussen (b. 1879)
Alice Gray (b. 1914)

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Today's featured picture

Tenthredo scrophulariae, the figwort sawfly, is a species of insect in the family Tenthredinidae, found across Europe. The larvae are relatively large, with a length of 30 millimetres (1.2 in) and having 22 legs. They have a white body with black spots, and feed on mullein and figworts. They feed from August to September and emerge as adults in May the following year. This T. scrophulariae larva was photographed near Keila in north-western Estonia.

Photograph credit: Ivar Leidus

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