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Saudi Coffee Tops Heritage Components in Celebrations of Founding Day

File photo: A Saudi farmer and his son harvest Khawlani coffee beans at a coffee farm in the southwestern region of Jazan on January 26, 2022. (AFP)
File photo: A Saudi farmer and his son harvest Khawlani coffee beans at a coffee farm in the southwestern region of Jazan on January 26, 2022. (AFP)
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Saudi Coffee Tops Heritage Components in Celebrations of Founding Day

File photo: A Saudi farmer and his son harvest Khawlani coffee beans at a coffee farm in the southwestern region of Jazan on January 26, 2022. (AFP)
File photo: A Saudi farmer and his son harvest Khawlani coffee beans at a coffee farm in the southwestern region of Jazan on January 26, 2022. (AFP)

A heritage corner was set up during Saudi Arabia’s Founding Day celebrations at the Ministry of Islamic Affairs branch in the Al-Baha region, SPA said on Friday.
It showcased ideas through which the participants expressed their pride in their values, heritage, and the historical depth of their country that spans three centuries. The corner featured popular foods, arts and crafts, textiles, and tools used in ancient times.
As a well-established tradition of Saudi hospitality, Saudi coffee was served in the local style.
The corner contained the most famous and distinguished types of Saudi coffee grown on the Al-Bahah region's mountain terraces.
The region includes over 200 farms and 22,000 trees of the finest types of Arabian coffee.

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Soviet-Era Spacecraft Is Expected to Plummet to Earth This Weekend after 53 Years

This photo provided by researcher Jane Greaves shows the planet Venus, seen from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Akatsuki probe in May 2016. (J. Greaves/Cardiff University/JAXA via AP)
This photo provided by researcher Jane Greaves shows the planet Venus, seen from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Akatsuki probe in May 2016. (J. Greaves/Cardiff University/JAXA via AP)
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Soviet-Era Spacecraft Is Expected to Plummet to Earth This Weekend after 53 Years

This photo provided by researcher Jane Greaves shows the planet Venus, seen from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Akatsuki probe in May 2016. (J. Greaves/Cardiff University/JAXA via AP)
This photo provided by researcher Jane Greaves shows the planet Venus, seen from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Akatsuki probe in May 2016. (J. Greaves/Cardiff University/JAXA via AP)

A half-ton Soviet spacecraft that never made it to Venus 53 years ago is expected to fall back to Earth this weekend.

Built to land on the solar system's hottest planet, the titanium-covered spacecraft may survive its fiery, uncontrolled plunge through Earth's atmosphere, predicted to occur on Saturday. But experts said it likely would come down over water, covering most of the world, or a desolate region.

The odds of it slamming into a populated area are “infinitesimally small,” said University of Colorado Boulder scientist Marcin Pilinski.

“While we can anticipate that most of this object will not burn up in the atmosphere during reentry, it may be severely damaged on impact,” Pilinski said in an email.

By Friday, all indications pointed to a reentry early Saturday morning, US Eastern Time, give or take several hours. While space debris trackers around the world converged in their forecasts, it was still too soon to know exactly when and where the spacecraft known as Kosmos 482 would come down. That uncertainty was due to potential solar activity and the spacecraft’s old condition. Its parachutes were expected to be useless by now and its batteries long dead.

Dutch scientist Marco Langbroek estimated the impact speed at 150 mph (242 kph) if the spacecraft remains intact.

The Soviets launched Kosmos 482 in 1972, intending to send it to Venus to join other spacecraft in their Venera program. But a rocket malfunction left this one stuck in orbit around Earth. Gravity kept tugging on it and was expected to finally cause its doom.

Spherical in shape, the spacecraft — 3-foot (1-meter) across and packing more than 1,000 pounds (495 kilograms) — will be the last piece of Kosmos 482 to fall from the sky. All the other parts plummeted within a decade.

Any surviving wreckage will belong to Russia under a United Nations treaty.