Ripped from the Headlines: January 2025: This Week in Words: Current Events Vocab for January 12–January 18, 2025

The Philadelphia 76ers abandoned a plan to build a new arena in a struggling area of the city and will instead remain in South Philly. The Sixers currently play home games at the Wells Fargo Center sports complex in a neighborhood that's home to venues where the Eagles and Phillies play. After a controversial proposal for a new arena in City Center was approved last month, city leaders were surprised when the team announced the new facility will be built in the stadium district.

According to a new study, the Roman Empire had so much airborne lead pollution that it likely caused widespread cognitive decline. Researchers looked at the process ancient Romans used to mine silver, which was made into coins. Extracting silver from ore released huge clouds of lead dust — enough to lower a typical child's IQ. by approximately three points. Some scientists speculate that lead poisoning, and reduced brain power, contributed to the fall of the Roman Empire.

A week after several wildfires ignited across Los Angeles County, five of them were still not fully contained. Two of the conflagrations, the Eaton and Palisades fires, are considered among the most destructive in the state's history. The two blazes have killed at least 25 people, with dozens more missing and thousands of homes and structures destroyed. Conflagration derives from the Latin conflagrare, "to burn up," and its root, which means "to shine or burn."

About 35 million Hindus gathered to celebrate India's 45-day Maha Kumbh festival, which is held every 12 years at the confluence of three sacred rivers. Known as the world's largest religious gathering, Maha Kumbh takes place at the point where the Ganges and Yamuna Rivers meet, and where the mythical Saraswati River is said to have flowed. Devotees bathe in the waters there as part of a sacred ritual. The Latin confluere, "flow together," is the root of confluence.

Meta announced it would end its employee diversity and equity programs. The company, which owns Facebook and Instagram, will discontinue its long-standing goals of increasing the number of women and other underrepresented groups in leadership positions and requiring a diverse pool of candidates for job openings. About 65 percent of Meta's employees are men. Equity, "the quality of being equal or fair," is from the Latin aequus, "just or equal."

China's exports hit a record high in the weeks before Donald Trump's inauguration. The flow of Chinese goods into the United States was seen as a reaction to the threat of tariffs, which the new administration plans to impose on items imported into the United States from China. Americans stockpiling Chinese-made products helped increase China's exports more than 10 percent in December. The Latin root of export, exportare, means "to carry out."

A baby gorilla was rescued from the cargo hold of a Turkish Airlines plane that was traveling from Nigeria to Thailand. The five-month-old endangered primate was discovered by customs officials during a stopover in Istanbul. Authorities said that while the young ape was very thin and seemed traumatized by the experience, he quickly began to recover at an Istanbul zoo, where he was given the name Zeytin, Turkish for "olive."

New research may explain why dozens of kangaroo species went extinct tens of thousands of years ago. Paleontologists studied the teeth and diets of ancient and modern kangaroos, looking for clues about why some of the large, jumping marsupials survived and others didn't. One study strongly suggests that rather than natural changes in climate and vegetation, it was the arrival of humans in Australia that most likely caused the extinction of some kangaroos.

The Mexican Rodeo Extravaganza celebrated its 30th anniversary this week in Denver, Colorado. The show highlights Mexican-style choreographed bull riding and trick roping of cattle, set to mariachi music. The tradition, which dates back to the 16th century when Spanish colonizers introduced horses to North America, is strongly influenced by the Indigenous Mexicans who worked as ranchers. Rodeo originally meant "cattle roundup," from the Spanish rodear, "go around."

A manufacturing error caused a temporary doughnut shortage this week at Dunkin' locations in states including Nebraska and New Mexico. The company, which dropped the "Donut" from its name in 2018, typically stocks its stores with dozens of different doughnut flavors. While some franchises bake their own, others rely on outside suppliers; the stores with a dearth of doughnuts reported receiving (and throwing away) substandard baked goods, leading to the doughnut shortage.

Archaeologists discovered the 4,100-year-old tomb of an ancient Egyptian conjurer, dentist, and physician to the pharaohs. The underground burial chamber, which was decorated with artwork and intricate carvings, contained a stone sarcophagus marked with the name "Tetinebefou," and the titles "director of medicinal plants" and "chief dentist." Tomb is derived from the Greek tymbos, "burial mound."

A California veterinarian opened her shuttered animal hospital to take in pets displaced by the L.A. wildfires. Annie Harvilicz, who runs two Los Angeles-area veterinary clinics, had just moved one of them into a new space when the fires ignited last week. After she offered to house evacuated dogs and cats in the newly empty building, Harvilicz began getting requests from dozens of desperate pet owners — as well as a flood of community members who volunteered to help with the animals.