Today's Show Transcript

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COY WIRE, CNN 10 ANCHOR: What's up, sunshine? I'm Coy Wire here with your news for Thursday, March 12th. I am so excited to bring you another fresh episode of the best 10 minutes in news because of you.
Let's get to it. We begin in Cuba, which is enduring a critical energy crisis amid an ongoing oil embargo. The embargo, or government-sanctioned trade restriction, was implemented by U.S. President Donald Trump earlier this year. It's the latest chapter in a long-running series of tensions between the U.S. and Cuban governments dating back to the Cold War. The move has largely cut off sources of gasoline and fuel to the Caribbean island nation, dramatically reducing electricity generation, causing days-long power blackouts, and without electricity, the country's economy is at a standstill. Cuban residents are feeling desperate and outraged.
Some have taken to the streets to burn garbage and bang pots in protest of the conditions. University students in the capital of Havana staged a sit-in to bring attention to how these blackouts have impacted their education. Our shas more from Cuba.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So, this would be a pretty unremarkable scene anywhere else in the world, a group of students doing a sit in at a university demanding better conditions.
In Cuba, this kind of thing is just simply not allowed. And so around us, there's a lot of university officials, government officials, people who are quite clearly plain, close police. Only about 20 some students here wouldn't be a big deal, except the Cuban government knows that in other countries when you've had moments of tension like we're experiencing right now, all you need -- all you need is a spark.
And so, these students at this moment say that they can't study because the power is out so often, that the Internet has become so expensive and so unreliable. And those are among the many complaints that many of the people on this island share at the moment.
We've seen protests at night taking place. People bring out pots and pans, beating those pots and pans to get the lights back on. And so that is a situation that is happening right now in Cuba. The government, of course, blames the problems here on the Trump administration's increased sanctions on this island. But there are people here who feel the government has a role to play that can make things better, and they are demanding those changes.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WIRE: For many people, a day at the beach might mean a dip in the sea and sand between your toes. But for many people with disabilities, accessing the shoreline isn't always so simple. In Rio de Janeiro, one project is helping to change that. At Brazil's famous Copacabana Beach, volunteers with the Beach for All project are helping people with disabilities experience the ocean, some for the very first time.
Using specialized wheelchairs designed to roll across sand and float in water, participants are guided safely into the sea. The program launched in 2008. It provides accessible equipment, ramps, and trained volunteers to help participants swim and enjoy the beach.
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VITOR HUGO JARDIM MUNIZ, VOLUNTEER: It's a free project. We're here to offer the welcoming and receptive environment that people with disabilities deserve to have a complete and quality beach experience.
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WIRE: The program is about more than a swim. It's about inclusion and making sure everyone can experience the ocean.
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ALICE OLIVIA MARTINS BAIETA NEVES, RETIRED TEACHER (through translator): Before the accident, I lived at the beach. And after the accident, I went a year without the beach. The first time I saw it, I cried. It's really good. Really, really good.
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WIRE: Scientists are getting some welcome news about an asteroid once thought to be on a collision course with our moon. The huge space rock known as YR4 is about the size of a 15-story building and was discovered at the end of 2024. It was initially given a 3.1 percent chance of hitting Earth. Subsequent observations ruled that scenario out, but scientists worried it may slam into our moon instead, giving it roughly four percent chance to happen late in 2032. While that collision wouldn't have put our planet in danger, they feared it could impact potential lunar bases or put communication satellites at risk.
Astronomers didn't expect to get an update on this path until the asteroid came back into our field of view in 2028. But thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope, the most powerful one ever built, they were able to catch a glimpse earlier than expected. They've determined that the moon is safe and YR4 will pass by at a relatively close distance at about 14,000 miles. While that may sound close in space terms, it's about three and a half times longer than the total distance of the Amazon River.
Pop quiz hot shot, what was the first text message ever sent?
Did it say, who is this? Hello, Merry Christmas, or test, test.
If you said Merry Christmas, put yourself on the nice list. It was sent by software engineer Neil Papworth on December 3rd, 1992, from a computer to a mobile phone on the Vodafone network in the United Kingdom. It was sent to Richard Jarvis, his boss, who was attending the Vodafone Christmas Party.
If a picture is worth a thousand words, emojis might be worth a whole vibe. I'm a big fan of the ten hands. Apple is about to expand their emoji vocabulary. According to Emojipedia, the company's latest developer is previewing eight new emojis, including a highly anticipated distorted face, a cartoon-style fight cloud, and even a Bigfoot-looking legend ready to make large footprints in our texts. Those new icons come from Unicode's Emoji 17.0 list, approved in September 2025 by the Unicode Consortium. It's an organization that standardizes characters across devices and reviews proposals for new emojis. Yes, this is a thing.
Did you know that emojis themselves date back to two major Japanese telecommunications companies in the late 1990s? The most famous set was created by designer Shigetaka Kurita in 1999, kickstarting our emoji-nations. These early symbols included icons for weather, time, transportation, and they had some simple face and hand expressions as well, laying the groundwork for the thousands of characters we know today. Since then, emojis have exploded into a global form of communication.
Remember in 2015 when the laughing crying emoji became Oxford Dictionary's Word of the Year? Yes, an image winning a Word Award for the first time. The new designs are currently in beta testing, but they could reach our smartphones later this spring, giving us a few more ways to say exactly how we feel without saying a word.
Rush Hour is about to take on a whole new look on the streets of Washington, D.C. Officials unveiled the track for the IndyCar Freedom 250 Grand Prix, the new race planned for August in the nation's capital as part of the grand celebrations being rolled out for America's 250th anniversary. The first ever street race on the National Mall will be 1.7 miles long, featuring seven turns around some of the country's most iconic landmarks.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEAN DUFFY, TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: Congress usually isn't in session, and we're going to bring throngs of Americans into our capital city, and we are going to celebrate our birthday with a free, awesome IndyCar race, 190 miles an hour. Last time we did this, 1801, we had horses racing the capital.
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WIRE: The Freedom 250 Grand Prix is one of many planned events. A UFC event is also set to be held on the South Lawn of the White House on June 14th.
Today's story getting a 10 out of 10, takes the saying, give a dog a bone to a prehistoric level.
While out for a run with his owner on a New Jersey beach, Charlie Brown, the German short-haired pointer, made the discovery of a lifetime, a pristine prehistoric fossil.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MATT GREGG, CHARLIE'S OWNER: Charlie was chewing on the bone. He's a dog. He gets in trouble a lot, and he brings a lot of things back to me.
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WIRE: Charlie's family thought it might be from a giant ground sloth. Talk about a slow reveal. But dinosaur mega-fan Matt decided to dig deeper, using his dad's email to reach out to a local museum for answers. Turns out it belonged to an ancient walrus that roamed New Jersey's icy coastlines more than 10,000 years ago.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ZACHARY M. BOLES, PALEONTOLOGIST: This is the head of the femur, which would fit into the hip sockets, and then this would be the knee joint right here.
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WIRE: The piece was put on display at the museum, but not before Matt got to bring it to school for a show-and-tell that really had some backbone to it. The family says the find has given them fossil fever, and they are hoping Charlie Brown can sniff out another bona fide treasure.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GREGG: It made me feel like I was a kid again. It was pretty neat.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thousands of people could look at it and say, this is really cool.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: All right, everyone, time for the best part of the day, you. Mr. Laporte at Altoona Middle School in Altoona, Wisconsin. Your student, Molly, wrote to us to tell us how much she and her friends enjoy your history class. Thank you for tuning in in Altoona.
And this shout-out goes to our friends at Mt. Pleasant Middle School in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. They sent us a friend. This is Opie, a talking buddy, who they use a form of this to help designate whose turn it is to speak during tough discussions or even lighthearted discussions.
And, yes, I can see how this would, like, calm the nerves a bit, take away some of that stress and anxiety. I love it. Thank you so much. Thank you for making our day.
Hope you all have an awesome one. It is almost Friday. I'm Coy Wire, and we are CNN 10.

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