Three things for September 16
1. Yellowstone breaks August visitor record
On Tuesday, Sept. 14, Yellowstone National Park announced this August brought the most visitors for any August in the history of the park with 921,844 visits. The National Park Service says this is a 4.5% increase from 2020 with 881,829 visits.
The previous title of most visits in August went to 2017 with 916,166 visits, according to the NPS. The New York Times reports many of the visits happened during the solar eclipse.
In total, the national park has hosted over 3.5 million visits so far this year, and the NPS encourages future visitors to “plan ahead, expect crowding and recreate responsibly to protect yourself and the park.”
2. First all-civilian space crew launches into orbit
On Wednesday, Sept. 15, SpaceX sent the first all-civilian space crew to orbit Earth.
The crew consists of Shift4 Payments CEO and founder Jared Issacman, St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital physician assistant Hayley Arceneaux, aerospace data engineer Chris Sembroski and pilot and geoscientist Sian Proctor, reports NPR.
According to SpaceX, the crew, named Inspiration4, will ride on the spacecraft Dragon to orbit Earth and land in Florida approximately three days after the initial launch.
During the flight, the crew hopes to accomplish Issacman’s goal of raising $200 million for St. Jude’s and performing research related to the human body and health, SpaceX says.
3. Biden administration plans to review protections on gray wolves
After new laws passed in Montana and Idaho made it easier to track and kill wolves, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service announced on Wednesday that it will be reviewing whether gray wolves would need to be given government protections, reports Courthouse News.
“The Service finds that the petitions present substantial, credible information indicating that a listing action may be warranted and will initiate a comprehensive status review of the gray wolf in the western U.S.,” said the Fish and Wildlife Service in a statement regarding concern for the wolves’ status.
Originally, protections were in place to help wolves grow their population, but former president Donald Trump’s administration removed those protections in his final days as president, reports NPR.
