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CARL AZUZ: Hi, I'm Carl Azuz welcoming
viewers worldwide to CNN 10.
Before Russia invaded the neighboring country of Ukraine,
inflation in the United States was at its highest
level in decades.
This is when prices go up and the dollar buys less.
And now, a week after the war began,
the skyrocketing price of oil is expected
to drive inflation even higher.
It's not just about higher gasoline prices.
The crude oil is the biggest factor in those.
They've increased $0.07 per gallon over the past week
and are expected to get more expensive.
This could increase the cost of travel as jet fuel prices rise.
It could increase the cost of transporting
the food and goods we buy.
There are countless products made from petroleum.
Things like, ink, tires, tape, toothpaste,
glasses, vitamins, soap--
anything plastic, all of them could get more expensive.
One controversial part of the sanctions,
the international penalties placed on Russia's economy,
is that they don't include a ban on Russian oil,
at least, not yet.
Russia's one of the biggest suppliers of the world's oil.
It's an important part of the Russian economy.
Sanctions on that could seriously damage that economy.
But they could also increase inflation for the countries
that buy that oil from Russia.
And those include the United States.
Still, there's a bipartisan effort in the US congress
to ban oil imports from Russia.
And if that happens, some lawmakers
have proposed suspending a federal gasoline tax to help
slow down the rise in prices.
In explaining the reasons behind the Russian invasion,
we've talked about how Russia's government
wants to limit Western influence near its Western border.
We've talked about how Russian President Vladimir Putin has
been fiercely criticized and accused of trying to illegally
redraw the borders of Europe to make Russia's
position more powerful.
But experts say there's more to the invasion
than borders and influence.
TIM MARSHALL: To better understand
the tensions between NATO and Russia over Ukraine,
it's worth a glance at history and a good look at a map.
In the cold war, Europe was split more or less in two.
The NATO countries in the west, Warsaw Pact under Moscow's
dominance in the east.
But post-cold war, country after country wanted to join NATO.
And it's moved up to Russia's borders.
To understand why Russia feels nervous about that,
a topographical map is useful.
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There's a mountain range running across Europe,
the Carpathian Mountains.
Now, from the Baltic Sea here to where the Carpathians start
there, this is flat ground.
And through that flat ground have
come Napoleon and the French, Hitler and the Germans,
and many others who've invaded Russia from that direction.
And that makes Russia very nervous.
Therefore, it seeks to either plug that gap by occupying it.
Or if not, where the ground opens up into flat ground,
it wants to at the very least dominate it.
In 2014, its reaction was to occupy and then annex Crimea,
part of Ukraine, and its warm water
Port of Sevastopol which gives the Russian fleet access out
of the Black Sea into the Mediterranean, and from there,
onto the great ocean lanes of the world.
It also fomented civil war in the Donbas Region
in order to create a small mini buffer zone.
To understand Russia's strategy towards Ukraine,
it's not just about the military aspects
and the political aspects.
It's important to understand the place
that Ukraine has in Russia's hearts or in its psychology.
Russian culture began in Kyiv.
And it's where what eventually became Russia was founded.
I mean, it moved eastwards across to Moscow.
But they still know in their collective imagination
that the root of their culture is in the heart of Ukraine.
And Putin wrote an essay pretty much
about this in which he doesn't recognize these lines
on the map, these borders.
Because as far as he's concerned,
Ukraine is part of mother Russia.
And that is a psychology that goes
quite deep into the Russian collective memory.
Large parts of the country are Russian-speaking.
There's the Slavic connection.
And there's also the fact that many people
are Russian Orthodox in their religious belief.
So while, of course, great power politics and Russia's position
vis-a-vis Western Europe, NATO, and the Americans,
and all the rest of it comes into this,
this is from the heart.
And it actually does play a role in Russian thinking.
CARL AZUZ: 10-second Trivia.
What has the greatest influence on the tides of the oceans?
The seasons, the sun, the moon, or gyres?
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The gravitational pull of the moon
is responsible for earth's high and low tides.
For the first time, as far as scientists know,
a chunk of manmade junk has gone thunk unintentionally
on the surface of the moon.
The rubble that caused trouble is believed
to have been spinning around in space
for more than seven years.
Experts estimated the trash would smash into the moon
at 5,500 miles per hour, its bash creating a flash.
The bust causing dust and debris to blow
out for 100 of kilometers.
But unfortunately, people couldn't see it.
The impact was expected to take place
on the far side of the moon, which
is hidden from telescopes.
Astronomers have said space agencies like NASA
need to do more to monitor pieces of deep space junk
like this.
Who identified it in the first place?
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BILL GRAY: When I looked closer, I saw that it
was going to hit the moon.
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This particular piece of junk happened to have
a fairly close fly by the moon.
After [inaudible] was observed, I updated its orbit
and ran into a problem.
A software basically objected to it.
And when I looked closer, I saw that it was because on March
4 at a little bit after noon, Greenwich time,
it was going to hit the moon.
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There are about maybe a dozen or two dozen pieces of junk
that I keep track of that are in unusually
high orbits for space junk.
As far as I know, I am the only person who is keeping
an eye on these objects.
But I've sort of been hoping for one
to hit the moon because at just the moon, you got a crater,
and you learn something from it.
If it hits the Earth, you don't learn anything.
And if it goes into orbit around the sun, it's just wrong.
This is the preferred outcome.
And yeah, I was quite happy when I figured out
that that was going to happen.
Major thing that we'll wind up getting
is a very nice fresh impact crater.
It will turn up a little bit of lunar soil
from underneath probably a meter or two down
and a part of the moon that we currently
don't know very much about.
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If you're going to hit the moon, it
should be with something that is biologically fairly sterile.
It's usually there's an effort not to contaminate the moon.
There are different arguments as to where that junk should go,
but having a plan for it rather than
just leaving it floating around at random
would probably be a good idea.
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CARL AZUZ: A lot of folks want to get giant at the gym.
But if you're talking about a high bar giant in gymnastics,
you're talking about this.
And you're looking at the man who
holds the Guinness world record for the most done at one time.
A high bar giant is a full 360 with a slight pause at the top.
And Roman Sahradyan of Armenia has been
verified as the reigning champ.
Over a time of 28 minutes, he completed 1,001 rotations.
To say that sets a new high bar is kind of low-hanging fruit.
But if anyone ever told that dude to get a grip,
hold on, hold tight, hold the line,
hang out, reach for the sky, put your hands up, go for a spin,
swing back around, circle back, or come back later,
well, they might have been thrown for a loop
when they saw him flip out.
Fridays are awesome.
Today's shoutout takes this to Shawe Memorial High School.
Want to give a big hello to our viewers
watching from Madison, Indiana.
I'm Carl Azuz for CNN.
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