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Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Wednesday.

1. The U.S. is on track to add nearly $19 trillion to the national debt over the next decade.

The projection, released today by Congress’s nonpartisan budget scorekeeper, is $3 trillion more than it previously forecast — the result of rising costs for interest payments, veterans’ health care, the military and other government spending. This year alone, the government is slated to spend $1.4 trillion more than it takes in from tax revenues.

Deficits over the next decade are expected to average $2 trillion annually, as tax receipts fail to keep pace with the rising costs of Social Security and Medicare benefits for retiring baby boomers. Earlier this month, President Biden essentially forced Republican leaders to profess that they would not seek cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

The new projections could add fuel to the debate between the White House and House Republicans over the debt limit. The budget office said in a separate report that the U.S. would be forced to default on its debt as soon as July, causing a likely financial crisis, if Congress does not authorize the nation to borrow more cash. Republicans have said they would only do if Biden agreed to cut government spending.

2. In the Ohio town where a train derailed, anxiety and distrust run deep.

In East Palestine, where a train carrying toxic chemicals derailed earlier this month and ignited a fire, schools are back in session, businesses are open and many people have returned to their homes.

But many residents remain worried that their health is in jeopardy. Green-white shoals of fish and frogs floated in creeks belly up. The smell lingered, reminding some of a tire fire, others of burning plastic, mixed with model airplane glue or nail polish remover.

Federal authorities said that initial tests suggested that the air and water were at safe levels, but confusing and seemingly shifting messages from government and railroad officials have frayed the local trust.

For more: Here are the chemicals that people might have been exposed to in the disaster.

3. Heavy losses have renewed questions about Russia’s offensive.

Russia’s military has stepped up its attacks on the city of Vuhledar, a Ukrainian stronghold, in what is seen as an opening move of President Vladimir Putin’s spring offensive. But weeks of failed attacks there have left two elite Russian brigades in tatters, Ukrainian and Western officials say, raising doubts about Moscow’s ability to maintain a sustained ground assault.

The Ukrainian General Staff estimated that Russia lost at least 130 armored vehicles in just one week, including 36 tanks. That estimate has been supported by accounts from Russian military bloggers as well as drone footage.

For more: A bleak Russian cemetery near the Black Sea offers a view of the war’s true toll on the country.

4. In a surprise move, Scotland’s leader resigned.

Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s longest-serving first minister and a fiery supporter of independence from the United Kingdom, said today she would step down, citing the “brutality” of political life.

Sturgeon had in recent weeks become embroiled in a dispute over gender recognition; Britain’s Parliament last month rejected Scottish legislation that would make it easier for people to change their gender.

She is now the second high-profile leader in less than a month to say that exhaustion contributed to a decision to step down, after Jacinda Ardern’s unexpected resignation as prime minister of New Zealand.

5. The Covid wave in China may have been far more deadly than the government suggested.

The coronavirus rapidly spread and overwhelmed hospitals and crematories around the country after it ended its strict “zero Covid” measures in December. Yet China’s official Covid death toll for the pandemic remains strikingly low: 83,150 people as of last week.

Experts believe the government tally is a vast undercount. To better measure the toll, four separate academic teams used different methods to come up with informed guesses. All suggested that between 1 and 1.5 million people are likely to have died from Covid in China.

In related news, we talked to experts about who should get a Covid booster now.

6. Scientists took a look beneath an Antarctic ice shelf to forecast the risk of melting.

Researchers deployed an underwater robot beneath the Thwaites ice shelf, one of the fastest receding and least stable in Antarctica, as part of an ambitious effort to project long-term sea-level rise.

In papers published today, the researchers said that overall melting of the underside of the shelf was less than expected from estimates derived from computer models. But they also discovered that rapid melting was occurring in unexpected places: a series of terraces and crevasses that extended up into the ice.

7. Raquel Welch, whose sex appeal shot her to fame in the 1960s, died at 82.

Shortly after the death of Marilyn Monroe, Welch caught the eye of the American public, becoming the first major sex symbol of the ’60s and maintaining that image for a half-century in show business.

Her Hollywood success began as much with a poster as with the film it publicized. Starring in “One Million Years B.C.” at age 26, she posed in a rocky prehistoric landscape wearing a tattered doeskin bikini, grabbing the spotlight.

Critics of Welch’s acting work were often unkind, but they were more admiring of her comic touch. She won a Golden Globe for her portrayal of a hopelessly klutzy 17th-century Frenchwoman in a 1973 adaptation of “The Three Musketeers.”

8. This could soon become the most expensive book ever sold.

The oldest nearly complete version of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Codex Sassoon, is set to be auctioned in May. The book, which contains roughly 400 parchment sheets and weighs 26 pounds, is believed to have been written about 1,100 years ago in present-day Israel or Syria.

Estimates for the Bible range from $30 million to $50 million. The most expensive book ever sold is the Codex Leicester, a Leonardo da Vinci manuscript bought in 1994 for $30.8 million — surpassed in the broader category only by a printing of the U.S. Constitution purchased in 2021 for $43.2 million.

9. The Webb telescope spotted a distant galaxy eerily similar to our own.

The photograph above, which was recently released by the European Space Agency, shows a small snippet of the unfathomable size of the observable universe. At the lower center of the image is a spiral galaxy a billion light-years away known as LEDA 2046648 — a dead ringer for the Milky Way.

When the light from this image was emitted, the first multicellular organisms on Earth were beginning to work their way up the evolutionary ladder. It’s hard not to wonder whether microbes or something else were making a similar go of it there, my colleague Dennis Overbye writes, and whether we will ever know.

10. And finally, if you need help falling asleep, try tuning into the BBC Shipping Forecast.

The nearly century-old radio program is just what it sounds like: a series of weather reports that narrate the gales and tides around the British Isles. “Bailey,” a British voice says in a subdued tone, identifying the region, “cyclonic, becoming southwest later, four or five, showers, good, occasionally moderate.”

Perhaps because of the indecipherable language, compilations of the forecast have become a reliable sleeping tool — a poetic and hypnotic voice to offer comfort as you doze off. Take a listen for yourself.

And have a soothing night.

Elizabeth Bristow compiled photos for this briefing.

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