NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Aine Quinn holds a picture of herself as La Belle Ferronniere by Leonardo Da Vinci, as part of an exhibition at Athy Library Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

• Four people were killed in separate incidents on the country’s roads, including a nine-year-old child in Donegal, a competitor in a motor rally in Clare, a motorcyclist in Dublin and a pedestrian in Kerry.
• It emerged that the so-called Women in the Home referendum, originally due to take place this November, will not be held until at least next year.
• Children’s Minister Roderic O’Gorman said that a planned three-day strike by childcare providers this week is not “warranted”.
• The Journal reported that sand extracted from Lough Neagh, a process contributing to the lake’s ongoing problems, is being sold for use at GAA grounds across the country.
• Ceann Comhairle Seán Ó Fearghaíl said that politicians must bear some responsibility for the far-right protest that took place outside Leinster House on Wednesday – though he also described the event as an “attack on democracy”.

INTERNATIONAL

A helicopter delivers a space capsule carrying NASA's first asteroid samples to a temporary clean room in Utah Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

#MISSION ACCOMPLISHED: The largest asteroid samples ever collected have arrived back on Earth, after NASA’s Osiris-Rex sample capsule touched down in the US state of Utah.

#KOSOVO: Skirmishes broke out between gunmen and authorities in northern Kosovo after a police officer was killed when a patrol was hit during an ambush.

#CONFLICT: Armenia called on the United Nations to send a mission to the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region to ensure the safety of ethnic Armenians there. 

PARTING SHOT

After a seven-year space voyage, the NASA capsule Osiris-Rex finally returned to Earth with its asteroid samples from Bennu.

The probe collected what NASA estimated is roughly 250 grammes of dust from the asteroid’s rocky surface, in the hope that it could provide a better understanding of the formation of our solar system and how Earth became habitable.

Here’s the moment the capsule made it back to Earth:

TOUCHDOWN! The #OSIRISREx sample capsule landed at the Utah Test and Training Range at 10:52am ET (1452 UTC) after a 3.86-billion mile journey. This marks the US's first sample return mission of its kind and will open a time capsule to the beginnings of our solar system. pic.twitter.com/N8fun14Plt

— NASA (@NASA) September 24, 2023

If you want more, NASA’s feed on X (formerly Twitter) has loads of asteroid-related content for the day that’s in it.

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