Wikipedia:Main Page history/2015 July 14

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From today's featured article

Pluto photographed by the New Horizons spacecraft on 11 July 2015

Pluto is a dwarf planet orbiting the Sun, with about a sixth of the mass of the Moon and a third of its volume. Like other Kuiper belt objects, which are generally outside Neptune's orbit, Pluto is primarily rock and ice. It has an elongated and highly inclined orbit that takes it from 49 astronomical units (7.4 billion km) away from the Sun down to 30, closer than Neptune. Light from the Sun takes about 5.5 hours to reach it at its average distance. Since its discovery in 1930, it had been considered the ninth planet, but the International Astronomical Union came up with a new definition for planets in 2006 that excluded Pluto after many other similar icy objects were found, including Chiron and Eris. Pluto has five known moons: Charon (about half as wide as Pluto), Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra. On 14 July 2015, a spacecraft is visiting the dwarf planet and its moons for the first time: the New Horizons probe is performing a flyby and attempting to take detailed measurements and images. NASA has invited the general public to suggest names for surface features that will be discovered on Pluto and Charon. (Full article...)

Part of the Dwarf planets series, one of Wikipedia's featured topics.

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Did you know...

... that the Godavari Maha Pushkaram festival (Godavari River pictured), being held from 14 July 2015, takes place once every 144 years?
... that locusts are the swarming phase of certain species of short-horned grasshoppers?
... that the merchant ship Portmar was a victim of both the first Japanese air attack and last Japanese submarine attack in Australian territory?
... that the tiki is a common figure in Marquesan wood carving?
... that Grateful Dead Meet-Up at the Movies presents annual screenings of Grateful Dead concerts in theaters across the United States?
... that Eliza Meek, the part-Hawaiian daughter of Captain John Meek, was the mistress of the bachelor King Lunalilo?
... that Callender Gap Creek is a coldwater fishery despite being impaired by abandoned mine drainage?
... that musician Craig Taborn, winner of a Doris Duke Artist Award worth up to $275,000, does not have, or want, his own website?

In the news

In tennis, Novak Djokovic and Serena Williams (pictured) win the Wimbledon singles titles.
Drug lord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán escapes from a Mexican federal prison for the second time, resulting in a manhunt.
In association football, the Women's World Cup concludes with the United States defeating Japan in the final, and the Copa América concludes with Chile defeating Argentina in the final.
Nicholas Winton, dubbed the "British Schindler" for saving more than 600 children – the majority Jewish – from the Nazis, dies at the age of 106.
More than 140 people are killed when a Lockheed C-130 Hercules crashes into a residential area of Medan, Indonesia.
Hisham Barakat, Egypt's prosecutor general, is assassinated in a car bombing.

Ongoing events:
- Greek debt crisis
Recent deaths:

On this day...

July 14: Bastille Day in France (1789); National Day of Commemoration in Ireland (2015)

1223 – Louis VIII became King of France to begin a three-year reign.
1769 – Spanish soldier Gaspar de Portolá (pictured) led the first European land expedition to present-day California.
1865 – A seven-man team made the first ascent of the Matterhorn, marking the end of the golden age of alpinism.
1950 – In an early battle of the Korean War, North Korean troops began attacking the headquarters of the American 24th Infantry Division in Taejon, South Korea.
1987 – Over 100 mm (3.9 in) of rain fell in a two-and-a-half-hour period in Montreal, causing severe flooding and over CA$220 million in damages.

More anniversaries:

Today's featured picture

Bucket-wheel excavators (BWEs) are heavy equipment used in surface mining. The primary function of a BWE is to act as a continuous digging machine in large-scale open pit mining operations. These BWEs were photographed at the Garzweiler surface mine in Germany.

Photograph: Raimond Spekking

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