Indian-American eight-grader Harini Logan crowned 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee champion
Houston, Jun 3: Harini Logan, a 14-year-old Indian-American eighth-grader from Texas, spelled 21 words correctly to win the prestigious 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee, beating Vikram Raju in a marathon, first-of-its-kind spell-off, a format that tested the contestants on how many words they could correctly spell within 90 seconds.
Logan, who took home the USD 50,000 cash prize and Scripps Cup trophy on top of awards from Merriam-Webster and Encyclopedia Britannica, spelled 21 out of 26 words correctly, while Raju, a 12-year-old boy from Denver, got 15 out of 19 words right.
The final two competitors had trouble deciphering their words between rounds 13 and 18. At that point, judges opted to institute the first spell-off, 90 seconds to spell as many words as possible correctly.
Logan nearly did not advance past the word meaning round on Thursday after her answer for "pullulation" was rejected.
"I was like 'Wow, I'm out. This is it,' " Logan said after she was reinstated in the final round.
However, the judges conferred during a break and ruled that the answer she gave could be correct, since it could mean "to breed" or "to swarm."
Head judge Mary Brooks explained the ruling and Logan, who only minutes earlier had learned of her reversed fortunes, returned to her seat on the stage, USA Today reported.
"There was a few minutes in between that were frantic," Logan was quoted as saying.
"Our 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee Champion Speller231 Harini Logan draws inspiration from VP @KamalaHarris. After tonight, Harini is inspiring a new generation of spellers everywhere. She says it takes a village to build up a speller. Hers is happy tonight, Scripps National Spelling Bee said in a tweet.
"Just so surreal, it's my fourth time at the Bee. This is such a dream, this is my fourth bee and I'm just so overwhelmed," said Logan on stage holding the trophy.
Of the first-ever spell-off, she said: "At first I was a little uneasy and I decided to take it in stride ... I just had to take a deep breath and tell myself to go out there and do my best and whatever happens, happens."
Vihaan Sibal, a 13-year-old from Texas, finished third while Saharsh Vuppala, a 13-year-old eighth-grader from Washington, was fourth.
The Spelling Bee, which features elementary and middle school students spelling words that would cause most adults to stumble, has had a tumultuous few years. The National Spelling Bee was launched in 1925.
Owing to the Covid-19 pandemic, the competition was canceled in 2020, a significant shake-up for what is billed as the US' largest and longest-running educational programme, CNN reported.
The Bee returned last year, but with a few changes. The event featured three rounds completed virtually, rather than in-person, with 209 contestants - down from 562 in 2019. The finals were then held in person at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Florida, rather than in the National Harbor in Maryland, where the event had typically been held in recent years.
Though still down from pre-pandemic numbers, this year began with 234 contestants, an increase from last year. Of those who started, only 12 participated in Thursday's final competition.
Another big change this year was the televised broadcast of the Bee. Despite almost three decades on ESPN, the competion aired on ION and Bounce. ESPN has been the home of the Scripps National Spelling Bee since 1994, longer than any of the current contestants have been alive.
This year's host was LeVar Burton. The Emmy and Grammy-award winner hosted the semifinal and the final round of the event.
To discourage the strict memorisation of words and emphasise a wholistic approach to language, the Bee began incorporating multiple-choice "word meaning" rounds last year. Competitors aren't asked to spell; instead, they are given a word with three definitions and they must choose the correct one.
The lone word-meaning round on Thursday proved to be a litmus test, as it was for all of the 234 spellers who travelled to Maryland for the finals. Half of the remaining field bowed out.
Harini Logan's final winning word: moorhen. Part of speech: noun. Def: the female of the red grouse. Language of origin: This word is originally English. Sentence: The hunter took aim at the moorhen after the beaters had flushed it from the heather, Scripps National Spelling Bee said in a tweet.
The National Bee is a high-profile, high-pressure endurance test as much as a nerd spelling match and spellers spend months preparing for it. Over the past 20 years, Indian-Americans have been dominating the Spelling Bee contest even though they comprise only about 1 per cent of the US population.
The US Spelling Bee reflects the dominance young kids from the small ethnic community have had on this prestigious test for more than a decade now.
By correctly spelling 22 words in the Spell-off, the 2022 Scripps National Spelling Bee Champion is #Speller231 Harini Logan! #spellingbee pic.twitter.com/pl0NTznYVr
— Scripps National Spelling Bee (@ScrippsBee) June 3, 2022
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Iran reimposes restrictions on Strait of Hormuz, accusing US of violating deal to reopen it
Cairo (AP): Iran swiftly reversed course on reopening the Strait of Hormuz, reimposing restrictions on the critical waterway on Saturday after the US said it would not end its blockade of Iran-linked shipping.
Iran's joint military command said on Saturday that “control of the Strait of Hormuz has returned to its previous state ... under strict management and control of the armed forces.” It warned that it would continue to block transit through the strait as long as the US blockade of Iranian ports remained in effect.
The announcement came the morning after US President Donald Trump said that even after Iran announced the strait's reopening on Friday, the American blockade “will remain in full force” until Tehran reaches a deal with the US, including on its nuclear programme.
The conflict over the chokepoint threatened to deepen the energy crisis roiling the global economy after oil prices began to fall again on Friday on hopes the US and Iran were drawing closer to an agreement. Roughly one-fifth of the world's oil passes through the strait, and further limits would squeeze already constrained supply, driving prices higher once again.
Control over the strait has proven to be one of Iran's main points of leverage and prompted the United States to deploy forces and initiate a blockade on Iranian ports as part of an effort to force Iran to accept a Pakistan-brokered ceasefire to end almost seven weeks of war that has raged between Israel, the US and Iran.
Iran said it fully reopened the Strait of Hormuz to commercial vessels after a 10-day truce was announced between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon. But after Trump said the blockade would continue, top Iranian officials said his announcement violated last week's ceasefire agreement between Iran and the US and warned the strait would not stay open if the US blockade remained in effect.
A data firm, Kpler, said movement through the strait remained confined to corridors requiring Iran's approval.
US forces have sent 21 ships back to Iran since the blockade began on Monday, US Central Command said on X.
Truce in Lebanon could help US-Iran peace efforts
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The ceasefire in Lebanon could clear one major obstacle to an agreement. But it was unclear to what extent Hezbollah would abide by a deal it did not play a role in negotiating, and which will leave Israeli troops occupying a stretch of southern Lebanon.
Trump said in another post that Israel is “prohibited” by the US from further strikes on Lebanon and that “enough is enough” in the Israel-Hezbollah war.
The State Department said the prohibition applies only to offensive attacks and not to actions taken in self-defence.
Shortly before Trump's post, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel agreed to the ceasefire in Lebanon “at the request of my friend President Trump,” but that the campaign against Hezbollah is not complete.
He claimed Israel had destroyed about 90 per cent of Hezbollah's missile and rocket stockpiles and added that Israeli forces “have not finished yet” with the dismantling of the group.
In Beirut, displaced families began moving toward southern Lebanon and Beirut's southern suburbs despite warnings by officials not to return to their homes until it became clear whether the ceasefire would hold.
The Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers in southern Lebanon reported sporadic artillery shelling in some parts of southern Lebanon in the hours after the ceasefire took effect.
An end to Israel's war with Hezbollah was a key demand of Iranian negotiators, who previously accused Israel of breaking last week's ceasefire with strikes on Lebanon. Israel had said that the deal did not cover Lebanon.
The fighting has killed at least 3,000 people in Iran, more than 2,290 in Lebanon, 23 in Israel and more than a dozen in Gulf Arab states. Thirteen US service members have also been killed.
