Before going up to Mauna Kea's summit on Hawaii's Big Island, Heather Kaluna makes an offering to Poliahu, the snow goddess of the mountain. She holds it sacred, as do other Native Hawaiians.

The mountain holds another important place in her life: Poised to be the first Native Hawaiian to get an astronomy doctorate from the University of Hawaii, she uses the mountain to gaze at the stars.

Belize is considering new offshore drilling regulations that could open up nearly the entire coast to exploration and exploitation, environmental groups have warned, calling it a threat to vital reefs, fisheries and tourism concerns.

The proposal recently made public by the Ministry of Energy would even allow drilling in the vicinity of the Great Blue Hole, a world-famous diving destination that can be seen from space and looks just like what its name suggests, the U.S.-based activist group Oceana said.

An unmanned Russian supply ship disintegrated as it plummeted to Earth on Friday after suffering a communications failure on its way to the International Space Station, in a fiery end to a mission to deliver oxygen, water and supplies.

Though the ISS crew of six international astronauts is not in immediate danger of running out of essentials, the crash marks the latest in a series of problems suffered by Russia exposing shortcomings in its space program.

Russia said an unmanned supply ship set for the International Space Station will fall back to Earth Friday and burn up in the atmosphere, after the spacecraft suffered a communications failure.

The Progress supply ship is expected to "end its existence on May 8" between 12:45 am and 06:36 am, Moscow time (21:45 GMT Thursday and 03:36 GMT Friday)," the Russian space agency said in a statement released Thursday.

Astronomers have located the most distant galaxy ever measured in the universe, and it looks like a bright blue mass of stars some 13.1 billion light-years from Earth.

The galaxy, called EGS-zs8-1, is "one of the brightest and most massive objects in the early universe," according to a statement from Yale University.

Seattle's mayor and environmentalists have vowed to block Royal Dutch Shell PLC from parking two Arctic offshore drilling rigs on Seattle's waterfront, an effort to thwart the new frontier in oil exploration and spark a national debate about fossil fuels and climate change.

WHAT'S AT STAKE?

Large amounts of water may exist on numerous deep space bodies, said a study Thursday that raises the theoretical odds of another planet like Earth sporting the life-giving resource.

The findings, published by the Royal Astronomical Society, are based on the discovery of "a large quantity" of hydrogen and oxygen, the two chemical ingredients of water, in the atmosphere of a white dwarf star. 

Oil-rich United Arab Emirates said Wednesday it was pressing ahead with plans to send the first Arab unmanned probe to Mars by 2021, naming it "Hope".

The probe will leave Earth in 2020 on a mission "designed to complement the science work of other missions and fill important gaps in human knowledge," the Gulf state said in a statement.

Russia said an unmanned supply ship set for the International Space Station will fall back to Earth Friday and burn up in the atmosphere, after the spacecraft suffered a communications failure.

The Progress supply ship is expected to "end its existence on May 8," between 1:23 a.m. and 9.55 p.m, Moscow time (2223 GMT Thursday and 0655 GMT Friday)," the Russian space agency said in a statement released Wednesday.

Residents of the tiny village of Fanalei in the Solomon Islands killed more than 1,600 dolphins in 2013 for their teeth, a local currency and popular adornment, researchers said Wednesday.

The overall recorded tally from 1976-2013 was more than 15,400, according to research published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.