(instrumental music plays) - [Rick] Coming up next on NewsDepth.

There's a new Justice in town, and she's a history-maker, Move over, Easter eggs, we learn about Ukrainian pysanka, It's a new season, with a new name, for Cleveland baseball.

And to celebrate Earth Day, we're talkin' trash.

NewsDepth is now!

(guitar music plays) The Supreme Court makes room for a historic new Justice.

Hello everybody!

I'm Rick Jackson.

We're back from break and feeling fresh as a spring daisy.

We might have only taken a week off, but boy it a busy one.

So let's take a look at what we missed, while we were out.

On Capitol Hill, the Senate voted to confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.

It was a close vote of 53 to 47.

Senators erupted in cheers at the news.

Following the vote, Judge Jackson spoke before a small crowd on the South Lawn of the White House, acknowledging that the path to her historic confirmation had been paved by generations of Black Americans forcing change in the country.

- It has taken 232 years and 115 prior appointments for a Black woman to be selected to serve on the Supreme Court of the United States.

(crowd cheers) But we've made it.

- [Rick] Judge Jackson will be sworn in when Justice Stephen Breyer retires this summer.

It will be the first time with 4 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices being women.

While Washington D.C. celebrated the newest Justice, many of us were taking a well-deserved spring break.

Maybe some of you took the opportunity to travel.

Well, here's a spring break trip that's literally out of this world.

In a big leap for the budding space tourism industry, a SpaceX Crew Dragon safely delivered four private citizens to the International Space Station.

It marked the first time that NASA has assisted in arranging a space tourism visit.

Of course, it cost a little more than a trip to Disney World.

Seats for the 10-day trip came with a steep 55 million dollar price tag.

I think I'll stick to riding Space Mountain for now.

Back here on Earth, Russia's brutal invasion of Ukraine continues, and much of the rest of the world is finding ways to punish and isolate Russia.

While we were out, the United Nations General Assembly voted to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council.

The United Nations, often called the UN, is an organization of countries established to promote international cooperation.

It was founded after World War II, to prevent future conflict.

The UN began with 51 member nations in 1945, it has since grown to 193 members.

The United Nations Human Rights Council is a smaller, elected group of 47 countries within the UN, whose mission is to promote and protect human rights around the world.

Both the US and Russia were elected to serve on the council, but as Russia wages war on Ukraine, harming innocent civilians in the process, members of the Human Rights Council, including U-S ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, began to question Russia's participation, - Not only is it the height of hypocrisy, it is dangerous, Russia is using its membership on the Human Rights Council as a platform for propaganda, to suggest Russia has a legitimate concern for human rights.

- The vote to suspend Russia from the council, received the required two-thirds majority.

93 countries, including the United States, voted in favor of the suspension, 24 countries including China, voted against it.

The remaining 58 nations abstained from the process.

Abstain means to choose not to do something.

In this case, these 58 countries formally declined to vote.

So countries around the world chose to hold Moscow accountable for violations of human rights.

As western countries unite behind Ukraine, we've also begun to take a closer look at the country's unique cultural traditions.

One of those spring traditions involves eggs, but we're not talking about the brightly-dyed eggs the Easter bunny hides every year, those are great too, but Ukrainian pysanka are a dazzling display of folk art, with roots in pagan traditions.

Pagan is a blanket term, for a religion that is outside of accepted Western religions, like Christianity and Judaism.

The term is often used to describe ancient, pre-Christian religions.

In ancient Ukraine, pagans believed that the egg had magical qualities.

It symbolized rebirth and abundance in springtime festivals.

Of course, the egg was also adopted later on by Christians in Ukraine, and around the world, as a symbol of rebirth.

Up next, we meet a group of Ohioans keeping the Ukrainian tradition of pysanka alive, with an egg-celent exhibit.

- The eggs are folk art.

They're not just centuries old, millennia old.

They go back to pagan times.

- Pagans in the area that would eventually become Ukraine, decorated eggs as part of spring rituals with the idea that they symbolized rebirth and renewal.

The completed egg is called a pysanka and that comes from the verb pysate which means to write.

- Everybody comes up to me at shows and say, "Oh, you painted all of those eggs."

And I said, "No, I don't paint."

I said I write.

And actually writing a design with beeswax so I have a tool to write with.

This is a tool called a kistka.

- It's basically a metal funnel, attached to a wooden or a plastic handle, and you scrape wax into the wide end of the funnel, you heat it by a candle, and as the wax melts, it comes out of the narrow end of the funnel and that's what you draw onto the egg.

You're creating the design in reverse, so you start with a clean white egg and you cover the parts of the egg that you want to stay white.

The wax seals off that part of the egg and the dye can't get in, and so then, you use the lightest color dye that you plan on using, usually yellow.

- What I want to do next, is in the center of the star, I'm gonna do teardrops.

I do designs that can take me anywhere from 3 to 5 hours, to 8 hours, to 14 hours on a simple chicken egg.

Now I'm gonna do a few feather lines.

It then goes into the red, red dye's right over the orange.

And now we're gonna cover the entire star with wax.

It can be a little messy here.

And then it's ready to go into the final color, which is black.

And voila, this is what it looks like (chuckles) when it's done.

Okay, it looks like really nothing.

You hold the egg close to the flame, there's the white lines, the yellow teardrops, the orange feather lines and the red star.

- There are such a wide variety of different symbols that are used and styles and techniques and all of that, but it's such a uniquely Ukrainian thing.

This egg has a periwinkle pattern to it.

Periwinkle has a special place in Ukrainian folklore because the green vine of the periwinkle stays green for such a long time even after the first snow, you can see how green the periwinkle vine is and for that reason it has developed a significance of perseverance and persistence which is kind of a lovely thought.

The Ukrainian Easter egg was always included in the Ukrainian Easter basket so it's part of our Easter celebration.

- [Man] It's something that I grew up with, you know, we had them around the house, we have them at home, it's part of tradition, it's part of who we are, as a people.

- Wow, those pysanka were egg-ceptional, I'm not yolking.

But springtime isn't just about eggs or questionable egg puns, this month also marks the start of America's pastime.

That's right, baseball is back.

The season might have just started, but history has already been made.

In San Francisco, Giants assistant, Alyssa Nakken became the first woman to coach on-field in major league baseball history, after she replaced coach Antoan Richardson at first base.

By the way, Nakken and the Giants went on to defeat the San Diego Padres that night by a score of 13 to 2.

Meanwhile, down in the Queen City, where professional baseball was born in 1869, the Cincinnati Reds hosted the newly-renamed Cleveland Guardians for an Opening Day Battle of Ohio at Great American Ball Park.

The Guardians swept the two-game series, and returned home for their own Opening Day at Progressive Field.

There, Cleveland baseball played their first home game as the "Guardians," A different team name, for the first time since 1915.

The Guardians, that's a nod to the 43-foot "Guardians of Traffic" that have towered over Hope Memorial Bridge since 1932.

These iconic sculptures are meant to symbolize progress, a concept that Clevelanders hope rub off on their team, since they lost their home opener to those very same San Francisco Giants.

Well, with two major league baseball teams in our state, team loyalties in Ohio tend to fall along geographic lines, according to informal polls, much of the northern part of Ohio supports Cleveland baseball, the southern part is in the "Reds" zone.

Of course, there are some Ohioans supporting other teams, they live on the border, so, teams like the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the Detroit Tigers have fans.

And so, for this week's poll, we've got our own "Battle of Ohio" for ya.

We want to know, "Which Major League Baseball team do you root for?"

You can choose between the Cincinnati Reds, the Cleveland Guardians, a different baseball team, or you can put "I don't follow baseball."

And last week we asked we asked, "Which art do you prefer to use to express yourself?

And from the looks of it, we've got some budding Picassos out there.

That's because 57% of you said you like to paint or draw, followed by 24% of you, who express yourself through music, 11% of you picked dance as your art of choice, and lastly, 8% of you chose writing.

But, art can be more than just a way to express yourself.

In fact, many artists use their work to change minds and make a difference in the world.

Up next, reporter Steve Minich introduces us to an eco-artist in Maine, who's using her captivating work to promote an environmentally-friendly message.

- [Mariah] Usually on beaches, it's like buoys, or little chunks of plastic.

- [Narrator] Mariah reading scours some of the most spectacular scenery anywhere but like here at Acadia's sand beach, she's not searching for beauty, but instead.

- (chuckles) For trash.

- [Narrator] She gets almost giddy over trash.

You see all that litter Mariah picks up, she transforms into painted landscapes.

It's her canvas, you might say.

- Plastic water bottles, rope is a big thing.

But I've also found like shoes and pj pants, just like draped on the side of trees like, "where did those come from?"

- [Narrator] It's all part of what Mariah calls her Eco Art.

Often painting the very spot where she picked up a particular piece of trash.

- Then just trying to kind of grasp the colors that I see around me.

- [Narrator] While her Eco Art can be on the lighter side, Mariah does consider herself a serious artist, with an even more serious message.

As much as she enjoys her trash collecting, all this junk, she says, only helps illustrate the ongoing environmental challenges facing the planet.

- Eco art is this new form of art that kind of uses art as a tool to display climate change and pollution.

- [Narrator] Since beginning this project, Mariah has traveled the country, combing dozens of beaches, searching through hundreds of miles of forest.

- [Mariah] I hope that when people see my art they are excited to make small steps in their own lives to become more sustainable and can kind of see their habits reflected in either the plastic water bottle or the location of where it was found.

- Thanks you Steve.

Well, now is as good a time as ever to think of ways to preserve our blue planet, that's because April 22nd marks Earth Day, a global event to demonstrate support for environmental protection.

Some celebrate Earth Day by taking part in activities like picking up litter and planting trees, others just try to be more conscious of their impact on the environment and commit to recycling or saving energy, and as you just saw, some creative people have found ways to spread an environmental message through art.

Now, we want to know, how are you celebrating Earth Day?

Let us know what you're doing to preserve and appreciate our environment.

Now, last week we also asked you, "What would you write to a Ukrainian student?"

Let's see what you had to say by opening up our inbox.

Caley from Buckeye Intermediate starts us off, she writes, "Dear Friend, I live in America and I and many other people are here for you and your family.

We all understand that you are going through a lot but we hope you are keeping a smile on your face."

Jayden from North Ridgeville Academic Center thinks it would be best to keep it light, writing, "What I would write to a Ukrainian student wouldn't have anything to do with the war.

I'd write something to keep their mind off it, like asking questions such as "What's your name?"

or "What's your favorite food?"

I don't think they would want letters mentioning the war since they're probably terrified, and sad.

I'd try to give them someone to talk to, and share their interests too."

Kelise from Monticello Middle School would impress their penpal with facts about Ukraine, "Dear Ukrainian Student, I feel so sorry for what you are going through.

In social studies we have been learning about your amazing country.

Today we learned about how your country produces the largest amount of sunflower seeds and also a lot of bread, not only for your country but for others too.

I know it might be scary but everything has an end.

Keep safe and stay positive."

Eve from Edison Elementary would send positive vibes in her letter, "If I had to write to a Ukrainian student I would write, "I want you to know that I will be by your side in this war.

I know you are going through hard things right now and I hope you are safe.

Try to stay calm and stay positive because I have a feeling that you are going to win this war."

And Vera from Ayer Elementary would emphasize that there is light at the end of the tunnel, she says, "I would tell the Ukrainian student that even though everything seems scary and dark, there is hope.

I would also say that people all over the world, not just in the US, are cheering you on through this scary time.

Finally I would tell them to think of happy things and try to avoid the worry and parts that make you sad.

I would hope this makes them feel less worried and more hopeful in this war."

Wow, thank you all your thoughtful letters.

You all demonstrated real compassion for a group of kids who we know are going through some tough time, keep it up!

Earlier we told you about an artist turning trash into art, but that's not all trash is good for.

The average American tosses 4.9 pounds of trash away, every day, which adds up to more than 292 million tons of waste every year.

All this waste goes to landfills, where it naturally releases a greenhouse gas called methane.

A greenhouse gas is a gas that can trap heat in the Earth's atmosphere, contributing to climate change.

But a Las Vegas landfill has taken a gamble on a new system that harnesses the methane released from trash, and turns it into energy, to power Sin City.

Natalia Garcia has the story.

- [Natalia] One man's trash is another man's, power source?

This Las Vegas landfill, called Apex is currently producing enough gas to power 11,000 homes in the area every single day.

As the world's largest landfill by area, Apex takes in over 8,000 tons of garbage a day.

But instead of just letting it sit and rot, crews from a company called Republic Services, cover the waste and install wells to extract gas from the landfill.

After being sent to a bio-plant to be cleaned, the gas goes to a power plant where combustion turbines turn the gas into power.

They have 155 wells doing the dirty work to provide residents with clean energy.

- Thank you, Natalia.

As we mentioned earlier, the large amount of waste Americans produce can contribute to climate change.

You may have heard about some of the disastrous impacts of climate change, melting ice caps, wildfires, severe storms, but one impact you might not have heard about is the spread of invasive species.

An invasive species, is an organism that is not native to a particular area, it can become overpopulated, often harming its new environment.

Scientists believe climate change helps these species spread further and faster.

One example, the Joro spider.

Native to Southeast Asia, the Joro made its first US appearance in Georgia in 2013.

It has now since spread up the east coast.

Experts say the invasive arachnids could even spread as far north as Ohio.

But, although they're invading, the Joro spider is nothing to fear.

Jeremy Roth tells us more.

- [Jeremy] You may have heard news recently of a giant, venomous, spider species that has invaded the South East and could spread to other parts of the US.

Well although all of that is true, experts say, you needn't worry about the Joro spider.

- [Nancy] Joro spiders have no interest in biting a human.

In all the times that I've handled Joro spiders, I've never been bitten.

- [Jeremy] University of Georgia entomology professor, Dr. Nancy Hinkle says, the big and brightly colored Joro doesn't pose a threat to humans or animals, in fact, quite the opposite.

Native to Asia, the species inexplicably showed up in the South Eastern US in roughly 2013 and has since thrived.

In fact the Joro is one of the few creatures that prey on stink bugs, a significant problem for Southern crops.

- [Nancy] It constructs a huge web.

And this web, incidentally collects, just about anything that flies around it.

Which means they are no longer presenting a threat to our crops - [Jeremy] Policing its environment and doing it, Hinkle says, with style.

- [Rick] The golden silk produced by Joro spiders is one of their most exquisite features.

Glittering in the sunlight, it is just beautiful.

- [Jeremy] The species vivid looks and imposing size will likely continue to inspire the heebie-jeebies, but experts like Hinkle say, its pros outweigh its cons.

Good thing, because it sounds like the Joro, is here to stay.

- Thanks Jeremy.

While the east coast deals with a peaceful spider invasion, an ongoing drought has dampened spirits on the west coast.

In California, the water in sinks and hoses, comes from melted snow, trickling down from the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and from aquifers.

An aquifer, is an underground layer of rock that holds groundwater, but for the last three years, those water sources have dried up, and California has had to cut back on its water usage.

Up next, Mike Nicco takes us to the Sierra Nevada Mountains, where snowpack measurements are painting a stormy picture for what's to come.

- [Mike] While snowpack measurements are sending a sobering message to California, a new study is painting a broader, and perhaps even more urgent picture.

Kaitlyn Weber is a researcher with the weather non-profit, Climate Central.

She helped analyze data, about the on-going drought in the Western United States, and the effect it's having on snowpack, reservoir and ground water levels.

- [Kaitlyn] Across most of the West, we're seeing aquifers are really depleted.

They're very dried up, and we haven't had them on precipitation to really recharge those aquifers.

So the conditions are really dire.

- [Mike] She says the driest of those readings show up as a wide splattering of red, stretching from the Colorado River basin, through Arizona and California, and into the Northwest.

But just as concerning is the evidence showing the acceleration at which the snowpacks are melting.

- [Kaitlyn] You notice that snowpack, peak snowpack is coming a lot earlier in the year, which means that it's melting faster, it's melting sooner in the year, meaning it's going to be harder to stretch that water supply out to the end of the full dry season.

- [Mike] The data in the Climate Central report, comes from a NASA satellite project known as GRACE-FO, which calculates moisture levels over a broad area by measuring surface gravity.

- [Matt] And we can do things like look at the amount of water stored in the Sierra Nevadas, or in aquifers around the world.

Look at how they've been changing over time, their ups and downs.

- [Mike] And with snowpack contributing to more than half the water supply in the Western US, they say pressure on water systems shared by multiple states is likely to increase dramatically during summer months.

- So we're going to have less of it when we get to the end of the dry season when we really need it the most.

- Thanks, Mike.

While Californians rely on melted snow and aquifers for their water, here in Ohio, we're lucky enough to border the largest fresh water supply in the world, the Great Lakes, and specifically for us, Lake Erie.

Up next, Mary Fecteau tells us all about Erie in this week's, Know Ohio.

(instrumental music plays) - Today, we're gonna take a dive into one of Ohio's most treasured natural resources, our own Great Lake Erie.

Ohio's North Coast is a great place to swim, fish, and sail, it's also part of the reason Cleveland and Toledo exist, as the waterway connects these cities to other large cities.

And in the 1800s, before planes, trains, and automobiles, ships and boats were the fastest and most efficient mode of transportation.

Even today, Lake Erie provides an important shipping route, which spans all the way to the Atlantic Ocean.

Erie is the smallest of the great lakes, which as a whole, it contains the largest supply of freshwater on the planet.

In fact, 90% of the freshwater in the United States is located in these five lakes.

But they weren't always so splashy.

20,000 years ago these lakes looked like this.

Mind you, it was the Ice Age, so much of the northern United States and Canada were covered in these large chunks of ice, called glaciers.

And when I say large I mean huge.

The glacier that formed the Great Lakes was two miles thick, Key Tower, Cleveland's tallest building, would have been dwarfed by this massive glacier.

As the Ice Age came to an end, and things started warming up, the glaciers spent over 10,000 years melting into what are now the Great Lakes.

Lake Erie, as the southernmost lake, was the first one formed.

Its spooky name comes from some of the earliest human inhabitants along its shores.

The Erie people were Native Americans, who farmed and hunted among fearsome predators like Mountain Lions.

In their native tongue, Erie is short for Erielhonan, which means roughly, long tail, a reference to the wild cats they lived among.

As White settlers arrived and cities around the lake grew, unregulated industries began polluting the lake.

The pollution became so bad that in the 1960's environmental activists even declared the lake dead.

Since then, the US government stepped in to stop the pollution, by passing the Clean Water Act.

Although the lake still struggles with a man-made algae problem, it's come back to life, which is a good thing, considering over 11 million people now get their drinking water from Lake Erie.

- Thanks, Mary.

From a great lake, we turn to a great Ohioan, making waves in her community.

Alphonsine Camara, is an 11th grader at St. Joseph's Academy in Cleveland, she was born in Guinea, which is on the coast of west Africa, and moved to Ohio with her family in 2019.

Since arriving, she has excelled in the classroom, joined the bowling and basketball teams, and became a community volunteer at a Social Service center in Cleveland, helping to teach senior citizens how to use computers.

So this week's A+ Award goes to Alphonsine Camara.

Alphonsine is a great example of the old saying that hard work pays off.

When she first moved to Ohio, she was determined to get the most out of growing up in America.

Through hard work, she was able to make both the basketball team at her church and the bowling team at her high school.

She told us that playing sports was a great way for her to make new friends and to have fun.

Her hard work though doesn't stop there.

Alphonsine, who speaks both French and English, is a leader in the classroom.

She excels in math, english, and science.

She told us that her secret to success is paying attention, and making sure you do your homework.

Somehow, between all of her studies and athletics, Alphonsine also finds time to give back.

She spends several hours a month at the May Dugan Center, on Cleveland's west side, helping immigrants learn to use computers.

She told us that it's important to find ways to give back to your community because the stronger your community is, the happier life will be.

We asked Alphonsine what advice she would give to students who watch NewsDepth.

And she told us that taking the time to make sure you focus on your dreams will help you understand the path you have to take to get there.

So join me in congratulating Alphonsine as this week's A+ Award winner for moving to a new country and being a community, academic, and athletic leader in her new school and new city.

Now to a cat who earned an A plus, in napping.

Let's see what our favorite feline has for us in this week's Petting Zoo.

(cat purrs) Well this is a surprise.

NewsCat's already hard at work, oh, I see, she's got her claws in a special Earth Day story, it's about some hungry ladybugs providing eco-friendly pest control.

To find out how these lucky ladies ended up at a resort in Las Vegas, click the Petting Zoo button on our website!

Thank you NewsCat.

And now we want to hear from you.

And there are plenty of ways to stay in touch.

Send a letter, we're at 1375 Euclid Avenue, Downtown Cleveland, Ohio, our Zip code is 44115.

You can email us, newsdepth@ideastream.org, or you can Tweet us, our handle is @NewsDepthOhio.

Thanks for joining us.

I'm Rick Jackson, We'll see you right back here next week.

- [Kid] NewsDepth is made possible by a grant from the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation.