[music] What's up, sunshine?

Happy your word Wednesday.

One of you helped us write today's show.

I'm Ky Wire with your CNN 10 minutes of news.

We tell you the what so you can decide what to think.

We've got democracy, some glowing creatures, a trip to Australia, and so much love.

Rise up.

The midterm elections are over, but the counting, not necessarily.

Ever watch a candidate lead on election night and then suddenly fall behind?

Is something wrong?

Not necessarily.

Here's why.

Different states count mailin, early, and election day ballots at different times.

So, the numbers can shift as new batches are added.

And here's your democracy knowledge bomb.

When CNN projects a winner, that's a newsroom decision based on the votes counted and those still outstanding.

But official results, those come from election officials after verification and certification, which can take days.

Bottom line, in an election, the goal isn't to be the first to finish.

It's to get the count right.

Our Alex Michaelson has more on what goes into all of the counting, sorting, and predicting.

Different states have different rules for voting by mail.

And because of those rules in the different states, it could take a lot longer to actually count and figure out who won the election.

For example, in Florida, where they count perhaps the fastest, you've got to request a mail-in ballot and you have to return it by the day of the election.

In California, where I am, where it could be the slowest, everybody is sent a mail-in ballot, and you have to postmark it by election day, which means it can be received up to 7 days after the election.

Other states have other rules.

and sample in Pennsylvania, uh, they cannot open up the ballots and process them until the day of the election, where in Florida they can do it weeks before.

That slows things down.

In Alaska, they do rank choice voting, which means it takes longer to count uh than it would in other states.

Bottom line here, different states, different rules, all of them legal uh but different potential timelines for when we'll know who won the election.

Papua's hot shot.

Mud puppies, hellbenders, and water dogs are all a type of what animal?

Snake, toad, lizard, or salamander.

If you said salamander, you stay on point even when I ask a lot of questions.

Salamanders are the second largest group of amphibians with more than 800 known species.

And they have some seriously surreal traits from breathing through their skin to even regenerating lost limbs.

[music] Talk about a glow up.

Scientists have discovered Europe's black and yellow fire salamander's new superpower.

They can glow green and blue.

The process is called biofllororesence, where organisms absorb light and release it as a different color, unlike bioluminescence, where organisms like fireflies produce their own light.

The glow comes from their glands that can continue to glow for more than 24 hours after released.

Although researchers don't know where it comes from, looks like these creatures are getting their chance to shine.

Now to our penultimate story of the day in Australia, where scientists are searching for one of the world's cutest and most elusive tree dwelling animals, koalas.

They can sleep around 18 to 24 hours a day.

High-end eucalyptus trees, making them really tough to spot.

So researchers are turning to drones adapted from tools used to track sharks to find the nation's fragile endangered species.

You can't protect what you can't find.

More now from our Linda Concaid for CNN's Call to Earth supported by the Rolex Perpetual Planet Initiative.

In Australia's Northeast on Magnetic Island, a team of drone pilots [music] take to the sky as part of a pioneering initiative.

They're searching for one of the country's most iconic and elusive species.

>> So, that didn't take long.

Yeah.

Wow.

Using drones equipped with cuttingedge imaging technology, [music] the Great Magnetic Island Koala Count aims to complete the most comprehensive survey of the island's koala population ever undertaken.

>> We've now completed phase one of that project uh and detected 46 koalas um in a specific area and a really um important area for the research.

Ripper Corp originally designed their drones for identifying threats to swimmers [music] as well as for search and rescue efforts at sea.

As their technology advanced, so too did their opportunity to aid conservation efforts.

>> We started out in in looking for sharks and and crocodiles uh and use that technology to move into the bush.

So looking for endangered species, especially koalas.

>> In Queensland, the Australian government has listed koalas as endangered since 2022.

Oh wow, little Joey on its back.

>> The koalas that roam these canopies were introduced to the island back in the early 20th century to protect them from threats on the mainland.

But the island's terrain, combined with the difficulty in spotting individuals from the ground, can make population counts challenging [music] and expensive.

>> People often say, "Oh, there's a couple of koalas up in the hill or there's a few koalas there." Uh but yeah, with our drones, we're able to really count how many are there, provide their exact GPS location, um and take some great imagery of the koalas without disturbing them in any way.

Dr.

Ali B of the Magnetic Island Koala Hospital, which is a partner of the survey initiative, rescues sick or injured koalas.

>> [music] >> This is Axel when he first started having difficulty breathing.

>> She sees promise in the drone's capability to also monitor and track the population after treatment, [music] especially the joeies.

>> For me, when we release the handraised babies or releasing any of them, it's good to track them where they go after that.

Um, it's watching that they can also disperse properly um into safe areas.

working alongside her daughter Izzy.

They're also collecting genetic information to provide crucial insight about the island's koala population.

And they believe the drone surveys will be critical to their research.

>> To track the genetic health, we need to know the numbers.

>> A previous ground survey taken more than 10 years ago placed the population between 600 to 800.

But after more than 20 years working here, Alli believes the total today is much [music] higher.

>> We've had an awful lot of them in.

if that's the case.

We've had nearly 500 in care and a lot of those aren't repeat offenders.

So, um yeah, I I think there's a far more accurate way of doing it and I think the drone is the way to go.

>> I think truly knowing how many are there to begin with um and then providing that information beyond uh universities and research groups and getting it [music] out uh to government agencies.

so they can make better decisions certainly around development sites or adjustments to roads and again that research and the data around where the koalas or other animals are are feeding or or are living um can make better choices around the rehabilitation programs as well.

And uh there's another koala just relaxing having [music] a sleep in the tree.

Today's story getting a 10 out of 10.

A community coming together to save a marching band's big season, one stitch at a time.

The Lake View South High School marching band season was hanging by a thread after their custom uniform order fell through just days before their biggest competition.

So, visual director Melissa Nielsen did what anyone would.

She called her mom who happens to run Minnesota's largest charity quilting group.

>> I said, I need the quilters.

>> I was thinking, you know, 20 or 30.

>> This is 110 band uniforms that we need to put together.

>> And I went, okay.

[laughter] >> But there was no quit in these quilters.

Mom pulled together an assembly line of volunteers from expert seamstresses to any parent who knew how to sew a button.

After two days of roundthe-clock work, they were able to finish all 110 uniforms just in time for the big band show.

They went on to place third at regionals and mom was even able to take in the band's last show and see their custom uniforms on full display.

>> It brought tears and I'm not a crier.

>> And get this, the theme for this year's show, rise.

That's what I call banding together and rising to the challenge.

Bravo.

All right, sunshine.

Congrats to our your word Wednesday winners, Mrs.

Humphrey and friends at the Edward Stone Middle School in Burlington, Iowa for penultimate, an adjective that means second to last in a sequence or series.

Actually, they submitted preeant penultimate, which means fourth to last, but that's tough to use in a sentence.

Thank you for boosting our vocab today.

We have another shout out today going to Mr.

Fenton, Brooks, Keith Wolf Woods, and Mrs.

Lehu at [clears throat] Castile Junior High School in Queen Creek, Arizona.

and all 600 of you who signed this shirt.

I see you, Aiden.

Now, we're going to wear this shirt with pride.

Thank you so much.

Look at this shirt.

Look at today's show.

See what happens when people come together.

One person brings an idea, another brings a skill, maybe a helping hand.

Before you know it, we have magic.

Be somebody's missing piece today.

Help somebody rise up.

I'm Koi Wire.

We are CNN 10.