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CARL AZUZ: Hey, it's good to see you.
Thanks for making us part of your Thursday.
I'm Carl Azuz.
This is "CNN 10."
Northern Europe is where we're taking you first today.
Finland and Sweden have officially
applied to become part of the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Since the NATO alliance was established in 1949,
Sweden and Finland have stayed neutral.
They haven't joined many other nearby nations
in applying for NATO membership, which now includes 30 countries
in Europe and North America.
So what changed?
Russia invaded Ukraine, and Finland,
which shares a border with Russia,
and Sweden, which is right next to Finland,
became concerned about their own security.
So they decided to stop being neutral
and try to join the NATO alliance, which
is led by the United States.
A Swedish government official said,
now is the time when the democracies of Europe and North
America have to stand together against Russia's, quote,
"naked aggression against Ukraine."
When Finland started planning to do this,
Russia threatened the neighboring country,
saying its application would be a mistake
and that Russia would retaliate.
But experts say it looks like Russia's
backed down on that threat.
What's ironic about all of this is
that Russia said it invaded Ukraine in part to prevent
countries from joining NATO.
Russian President Vladimir Putin sees the alliance as a threat.
It was originally formed as a guard against the Soviet Union,
though it's been more focused on terrorism and peacekeeping
in recent decades.
Ukraine is not a NATO member, though it
had expressed interest in the past about joining.
But now, Finland and Sweden are moving toward NATO membership,
and if they're approved, they could
officially become part of the alliance in a matter of months.
NINA DOS SANTOS: After a busy day
of marathon parliamentary debates in Helsinki,
followed by a vote overwhelmingly in favor
of joining NATO, and here, in Stockholm in Sweden,
a visit, a state visit by the president of Finland to Sweden,
finally, these two Nordic nations
decided that they were going to sign their letters of intent
to apply to join NATO.
That turns their back on generations
worth of much cherished neutrality
and a military non-alignment.
However, in order to join the block,
they'll have to get a unanimous consensus
from all 30 NATO members.
Most NATO members are very enthusiastic about Sweden
and Finland joining the block.
They spend a lot on their military,
have very well trained armies, air forces, and navies,
and would be welcomed into the block
to shore up the security alliance in this part
of Northern Europe.
There is one member, though, that
is holding out for some concessions, at least
according to its president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
and that is Turkey.
And Russia appears to have backed down from earlier
assertions that it might respond militarily
or politically were these two countries
to apply to join NATO.
Instead, they've said, according to Russia's foreign minister,
that it makes no difference.
The president of Russia, though, Vladimir Putin,
has warned that if there are military installations
on this territory of Sweden or Finland, well,
that would certainly stoke a Russian response.
Well, now that the paperwork and letters of intent
have been signed, they're heading over to Brussels
to be submitted to the Secretary General of NATO,
Jens Stoltenberg, on Wednesday.
Then, in about a month and a half's time,
there'll be a big NATO summit taking place in Madrid.
But in the meantime, the leaders of these two countries
have received an expression of support
from the highest echelons of NATO, the most powerful member,
which is the United States, with an invitation by the US
President to visit Washington DC in the White House on Thursday.
Nina Dos Santos, CNN in Stockholm, Sweden.
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CARL AZUZ: 10-Second Trivia--
in the 1950s and 1960s, America's Project Blue Book
studied what?
Soviet espionage, gyres, automotive trends, or UFOs.
UFO studies were shut down in 1969,
partly because they found no aliens or threats
to US national security.
For the first time in more than 50 years,
the US Congress has held a hearing on refers.
Technically, what was discussed on Tuesday
were unidentified aerial phenomena.
And before we get too excited, a US
military report last year said it found no evidence of aliens.
So we're talking about objects in the sky
that are hard to identify.
The government is taking this more seriously than it did back
in the 1960s, though, in part because American pilots
and service members have reported 400 sightings
of unidentified aerial phenomena,
and some lawmakers worry they could be a threat
to US national security.
KRISTIN FISHER: The Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence,
Scott Bray, did confirm the authenticity of two videos
that have been floating around the internet
for quite some time.
It shows some close encounters between Navy pilots
and what the Pentagon describes as UAPs, or Unidentified Aerial
Phenomena.
Here's one of those videos.
SCOTT BRAY: What you see here is an aircraft
that is operating in a US Navy training
range that has observed spherical object in that area.
And as they fly by, they take a video.
ADAM SCHIFF: And is this one of the phenomena
that we can't explain?
SCOTT BRAY: I do not have an explanation for what this--
this specific object is.
CARL AZUZ: While there's not an explanation,
officials say they haven't found anything extraterrestrial.
UFOs have often turned out to be weather balloons
or new manmade technology.
But pilots are now being encouraged
to report anything suspicious.
Next, researchers at an Austrian University
have built a new kind of virtual reality attachment, one that
aims to restrict breathing.
It looks like a large, complex kind of snorkel.
We don't know how much it'll cost
or when people will be able to buy it.
Could this be dangerous?
Well, it reportedly has a valve that
automatically opens, letting you breathe normally
if the battery gets low.
Of course, there are limits to this hardware.
It could make the VR experience worse for people who think it's
uncomfortable to begin with.
What could it be used for?
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MARKUS TATZGERN: They can use reading as another input
modality for the virtual reality experience,
and then can naturally interact with the environment.
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They can blow out birthday candles.
They can blow up balloons.
So this improves the virtual reality experience.
If users walk through a scene where there's smoke or heat,
then the breathing gets harder, as you would expect.
So we manipulate the resistance a little bit more
so that they feel an effect on their virtual avatar,
which, on the other hand, then increases embodiment.
So they feel more connected to this virtual character.
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We are good at addressing vision.
We are good at addressing audio and hearing,
but what's missing to improve the experience,
which is not so easy to realize, is haptic feedback.
Everything you touch in virtual reality
is kind of-- it doesn't have a real-- a real object behind it.
So it's like you touched air.
You interact with air, basically.
And the more sensory input you provide for users,
the better the experience.
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There's a lot of potential of virtual reality
in training simulations, because they get more immersive.
You can experience things in a safe environment in a training
simulation and also make mistakes
and learn from those mistakes.
There can be fires that you perceive in virtual reality,
but they are not really a danger to yourself.
And, of course, there are applications in psychotherapy
and therapy, in general, that can create more immersive
scenarios that are maybe more enjoyable
for users so that they stick to their training regimens.
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CARL AZUZ: Paper airplane contests have come a long way
from my middle school gym.
Take, for example, the Red Bull Paper Wings World
Final, which was held in an Austrian airplane hangar
last weekend.
171 students from 57 countries made it here.
Finalists could only use a standardized piece of paper
and only fold it-- no cutting, tearing, stapling,
gluing, or funny business.
The winner for longest distance flew 200 feet.
The winner for longest air time flew almost 15 seconds,
and the winner for aerobatics delivered
an engaging artistic performance and also
proposed to his girlfriend with a paper airplane.
Of course, paper is supposed to be for the first anniversary,
but that doesn't mean they should fold.
When a craft project landed them in Europe
and love was on the wing, maybe it
was time to increase their commitment,
smooth out the edges, get a good grip,
and take flight to keep their hearts aloft.
I'm Carl Azuz.
Montford North Star Academy gets today's shoutout.
Thanks to our viewers in Asheville,
North Carolina for subscribing and commenting
on our YouTube channel.
Tomorrow is Friday.
You're only a day away.
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