[clock ticking]
CARL AZUZ: Fridays are awesome.
Happy to have you watching.
My name is Carl Azuz.
Washington, DC, is our first destination today.
Just ahead of the one-year anniversary of his inauguration
date, US President Joe Biden gave a rare news
conference this week.
Wednesday's event lasted almost two hours
and covered a lot of subjects.
The president's first year has seen ups and downs concerning
the COVID-19 pandemic.
The US leader came into office with a promise of defeating
the virus, and he said Wednesday his administration
has overseen hundreds of millions
of vaccinations in America.
But despite that, coronavirus continued to spread
and claimed more lives in 2021 than it did in 2020,
and the Supreme Court recently struck down a Biden
administration requirement that 84 million
private workers be vaccinated.
Concerning the economy, the president
highlighted the addition of millions
of jobs over the past year and the drop
in the unemployment rate, the percentage of American workers
without jobs.
But he also acknowledged inflation
was a problem, the rise in prices of the goods we buy.
It's at its highest level in decades.
Legislatively, President Biden signed a $1.9 trillion
COVID relief bill and $1 trillion
infrastructure bill, which had bipartisan support in Congress.
But a more controversial social spending
plan he supported and a recent effort to overhaul voting
laws in America, both of those large-scale bills failed
in Congress.
President Biden suggested they could be broken up
into smaller pieces of legislation that may have
a better chance of passing.
Concerning the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan,
it was a troubled effort that saw evacuation problems,
a deadly terrorist attack, and a quick takeover
by Afghanistan's former rulers.
The president said there was no easy way to get Americans out
after 20 years of war in Afghanistan
and that he made no apologies.
But on another international front involving
a recent buildup of Russian troops near Ukraine,
something President Biden said caused
confusion in the US and abroad.
JEFF ZELENY: As he begins his second year in office,
President Biden bluntly predicting
that Russia will invade Ukraine, at least to some degree.
At a news conference here on Wednesday
on the final day of his first year in office,
the president said he does believe that Vladimir Putin
will, to some degree, invade Ukraine,
but he first said a minor incursion would
not necessarily be treated in the same way
as a larger invasion.
Well, less than an hour after this nearly two-hour news
conference, the White House quickly corrected that comment,
saying that any invasion, any crossing over the land barrier
would be considered an expanded invasion and tough sanctions
would follow.
Now, the president was defiant and defensive about his record
during his first year in office, talking about the jobs created,
some six million; talking about the economic recovery
after the COVID pandemic, which, of course, is still raging hot;
also talking about that infrastructure
law and other programs.
But he did acknowledge some shortcomings, particularly
in terms of COVID testing.
He said he wishes his team would have done more earlier on that.
But we also asked him if he has any sense of changing anything
during his second year, and he said he does plan
to stand by all of his White House staff,
but he said he would like to get out of the White House more.
He would like to break out of the presidential bubble more,
travel more across the country, take his case to voters.
He also said he does not want to be seen as a president senator,
acknowledging that too often he was--
sort of waded into these legislative debates
rather than being a leader.
So even after a half century in office,
the president still finding his footing here
as the 46th American president, but clearly making the case
defending his first year but knowing the country
wants to see him do better.
His poll results indicate that.
The question is, will the second year, this midterm
election year, be any stronger?
Jeff Zeleny, CNN, the White House.
CARL AZUZ: 10-second trivia--
what language's alphabet has the fewest number
of letters, Afrikaans, Hindi, Tahitian, or Nepali?
Of these options, Tahitian has only 13 letters,
the least of any language here.
And one thing they're talking about in Tahiti,
whether it's in Tahitian or the official language of French,
is the discovery of a previously unknown coral reef.
It was located in November.
It's almost two miles long.
It's reportedly in impeccable and unharmed condition.
Scientists say the fact that something so large and so
beautiful was just found indicates how little we
know about the world's oceans.
The reef is located in what's called
an oceanic twilight zone.
JENNIFER GRAY: Divers ready their breathing equipment,
and down they go.
An amazing discovery before their eyes, a rare and unique
coral-reef ecosystem found off the coast
of the French Polynesian island of Tahiti.
At three kilometers long, the reef
is one of the largest in the world to lie at the depths
of more than 30 meters.
The majority of the known coral reefs
are found at depths of up to 25 meters.
This area of ocean is unique.
It's middle ground between shallower waters
and the deep ocean floor but still has
enough light for coral to grow and reproduce.
These giant rose-shaped corals are
in pristine condition, some reaching
two meters in diameter.
Now the scientists are examining them in an effort to find out
if there could be other large reefs at the same depth
yet to be discovered, but it's not an easy task.
JULIAN BARBIERE: That may be one of a reason
why we don't find, you know, deep reefs, you know,
because, you know, the conditions for diving
there are quite complicated.
When you're going over 40 meters to 50 to 70 meters,
you cannot go there with your usual scuba gear.
You need some special apparatus.
JENNIFER GRAY: For this expedition led by UNESCO,
these divers are using state of the art
computer-controlled breathing equipment known as rebreathers.
The special helium-based gas mixture allows them to stay
down longer and go down deeper.
The divers take photos of the reef
during their mission while also measuring and taking
samples to study it further.
According to UNESCO, only 20% of the world's seabed
has been mapped.
JULIAN BARBIERE: You can only protect what you can measure.
And as we are trying to set targets for global ocean
conservation around the world, you know,
this is the basic information that you need to start,
you know, establishing marine protected areas in the world.
JENNIFER GRAY: This mission was only a first attempt.
More expeditions are planned in the coming months
to further investigate the reef.
JULIAN BARBIERE: Coral reefs is one
of the most studied ecosystems.
So when we discover a major new jewel in the crown,
it's quite unique.
JENNIFER GRAY: Jennifer Gray, CNN.
CARL AZUZ: Around the world in 155 days.
When 19-year-old pilot Zara Rutherford
arrived in Belgium Thursday, she landed
two Guinness World Records.
Rutherford's the youngest woman ever
to fly around the world solo, and
she's the first woman ever to do that in a microlight aircraft.
She took off from Belgium on August 18
and thought the trip would take around three months,
but bad weather and passport delays grounded her
in several countries, and various COVID
restrictions often kept her from sightseeing.
The hardest part of the journey, she said,
was in Siberia where it was 31 degrees below zero
and a forced landing could have been dangerous.
But Rutherford made it, and she made history.
Her trip was funded by airports and sponsors,
according to the "New York Times,"
and it raised money for two different charities.
[music playing]
Favorite snack in the world, but this popcorn story is nuts.
At Disney's EPCOT theme park in Florida,
there is an unofficial mascot named Figment.
The park recently released a commemorative popcorn bucket of
Figment, charging $25 for it.
But even though some people are listing it for $200 or more
on eBay, it's what they had to go through
to get it that's surprising.
Some folks waited seven hours in line
to buy a purple plastic popcorn bucket.
And you think I'm corny.
Now, some expected they'd have to line up in rows,
but they were still amazed the wait was that long.
Guess they figured since we already came "ear" to get it
and we've started waiting, we'll be the "stalk" of the town
even if some people "corn" us.
It shows there's more than a kernel of truth
to Disney's lore, that it's not just
a figment of the imagination.
I'm Carl Azuz.
Today's shoutout goes out to Jeremiah Burke High School.
It is located in Dorchester, Massachusetts.
Thank you and everyone else for watching,
and have a wonderful weekend.
This is CNN.
[music playing]