“SpaceShipOne was a suborbital air-launched spaceplane that completed the first manned private spaceflight in 2004. That same year, it won the US$10 million Ansari X Prize and was immediately retired from active service. Its mothership was named “White Knight”. Both craft were developed and flown by Mojave Aerospace Ventures, which was a joint venture between Paul Allen and Scaled Composites, Burt Rutan's aviation company. Allen provided the funding of approximately US$25 million”. – Wikipedia

Photo: A chase plane follows SpaceShipOne after it reached a height of 62 miles in the first non-governmental flight to leave the Earth's atmosphere on June 21, 2004 in Mojave, California. SpaceShipOne spacecraft was carried to a height of 50,000 by the twin-turbojet high-altitude research aircraft, “White Knight”, where it was launched for its final climb. The space effort was funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and headed by aerospace engineer Burt Rutan. (Photo by Jim Campbell-Pool/Getty Images)

In this November 18, 2014 photo, Murshida, 12, sits on the lap of her mother Marjina as the train leaves for their village in West Bengal, at a railway station in New Delhi, India. Six months ago, Marjina stepped off a train in New Delhi with her two children, hoping to find a better life after her husband abandoned them without so much as a goodbye. The family spent their days at a landfill picking through other people’s garbage to find salvageable bits to resell or recycle. After six months of poverty, illness and shame, they returned to that train station in New Delhi, headed back to an uncertain future to their hometown in West Bengal. (Photo by Altaf Qadri/AP Photo)

A dancer lets a Russian tourist practice the traditional tannoura dance at a cafe in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt November 10, 2015. The fallout from the crash of a Russian Metrojet passenger plane in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula could slash tourism income from Sharm al-Sheikh by half, the head of the region's travel agents' association said on Tuesday. Several airlines have suspended flights to the Red Sea resort since the Oct. 31 crash, which investigators and Western governments believe was likely to have been caused by a bomb. Thousands of Russian and British tourists have been flown home. (Photo by Asmaa Waguih/Reuters)

It's that time of year again when dogs with unusually large heads, hairless bodies and other oddities compete to be the World's Ugliest Dog. This year's winner? A 2-year-old mutt named Peanut, whose wild white and brown hair, bulging eyes and protruding teeth belie his sweet, energetic personality. Peanut's owner, Holly Chandler of Greenville, North Carolina, says he was seriously burned as a puppy and she wants to use her pet to raise awareness about animal abuse. She plans to use the $1,500 prize to pay for other animals' veterinary bills. The contest, held at the Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds in Petaluma, California, is in its 26 year. The dogs are scored by a three-judge panel in several categories, including special or unusual attributes, personality and natural ugliness.

During a jungle survival program February 20, 2013 taught by Royal Thai Special Forces in Sannapit, Thailand, U.S. Marines learned to catch cobras and drink their fresh blood, not to mention eat forest insects and pull the heads off of chicken. The training was part of Operation Cobra Gold 13, the 32nd edition of international military exercises hosted by the Thai. According to a U.S. Marines press release, Cobra Gold is the largest exercise of its kind in Asia and incorporates troops from five other nations in addition to the U.S. and Thailand. The Daily Mail reports that the Marines were invited to experience the local custom of drinking cobra blood after being taught to catch and kill cobras in the wild. As CNN notes, Cobra blood is believed to be a panacea and aphrodiasic in parts of Southeast Asia. In Jakarta, vendors can earn over $100 a night selling shots of cobra blood mixed with liquor. (Photo by Pornchai Kittiwongsakul/AFP Photo)

Nestled among the cocoa plantations of western Ivory Coast is a gold mine that does not feature on any official maps. It is not run by an industrial mining company, nor does it pay taxes to the central government. The unlicensed mine is a key part of a lucrative business empire headed by the deputy commander of the West African nation's elite Republican Guard, United Nations investigators allege. Here: A gold prospector sits and eats close to a soldier at a gold mine near the village of Gamina, in western Ivory Coast, March 18, 2015. (Photo by Luc Gnago/Reuters)

Cool rider Ace on the back on the motorbike, on January 12, 2015, in Surabaya, Indonesia. A pair of dogs enjoy a bit of bark-and-ride – as they weave through Indonesiaís traffic on the back of a motorcycle. Wearing red-framed sunglasses and a helmet the two golden retrievers happily sandwich their owner on the fast bike. Unsurprisingly, the sight of the docile dogs hitching a fast ride in Surabaya, Indonesia, attracts a lot of attention from onlookers. Ace and Armani have been riding since they were just a few months old and now at the age of three the pair jump onto the bike whenever they think their owner is heading out. (Photo by Jefta Images/Barcroft Media/ABACAPress)

“Getting to see girls’ bedrooms must have been a teenage obsession for the members of the all-male photographic collective Riverboom. Now that they have more or less grown up, they have decided to transform that dream into a reality. Riverboom’s Gabriele Galimberti and Edoardo Delille are traveling the five continents to see where girls, between the ages of 18 and 30, sleep. They have discovered that girls’ bedrooms are much more then just places where they lay down their heads – they are the places where girls read, love, dream, work and play”. – Gabriele Galimberti. Photo: Katerinai, 27 – Athens, Greece. (Photo by Gabriele Galimberti/Riverboom Ltd)