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Today's Distraction: A Moment Of Cute With Cheetah Cubs

The cheetah cubs at two days old.
National Zoo
The cheetah cubs at two days old.

Sometimes we all need a break from the serious news. There's no better way to accomplish that today than to tell you that two cheetah cubs are making their public debut at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.

As the National Zoo reports, their journey is an improbable one. They were born April 23 by C-section and were abandoned by their mother. But they were hand-raised by zoo staff and today, they were out for world to see them.

The cubs don't have names yet, but they will named after the fastest Americans in the Olympic 100-yard dash.

Here are two pictures: one of them as babies and the other taken in their enclosure today.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Three-month-old cheetah cubs make their public debut at the Smithsonian National Zoo on Tuesday in Washington, D.C.
T.J. Kirkpatrick / Getty Images
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Getty Images
Three-month-old cheetah cubs make their public debut at the Smithsonian National Zoo on Tuesday in Washington, D.C.

Eyder Peralta is NPR's East Africa correspondent based in Nairobi, Kenya.