Photos of the Week: Jan. 3-9, 2015
A security officer directs released hostages after police stormed a kosher market to end a hostage situation in Paris Jan. 9, 2015.
Washington, D.C.
Members of the press, including NBC's Evan Dixon, face the blowing snow caused by Marine One as it landed on the South Lawn before picking up U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House in Washington, Jan. 7, 2015. Obama was departing for a two-day trip to Michigan and Arizona.
Great Britain
A lone life ring hangs by a rope from the listing hull of the stricken vessel 'Hoegh Osaka' after it ran aground on a sand bank in the Solent on England's southern coast, Jan. 4, 2015.
The cargo ship ran aground on Bramble Bank after leaving Southampton bound for Germany. All 25 crew members were rescued overnight.
Australia
The outfit of an Elvis tribute artist is seen as he waits for the Elvis Express headed to the 2015 Parkes Elvis Festival to depart from Central Station in Sydney, Australia, Jan. 6, 2015.
The Parkes Elvis Festival is held annually over five days, timed to coincide with Elvis Priestly's birthday in January. Over 1300 attendees are expected at this festival to celebrate Elvis's 80th birthday.
Afghanistan
A door rests on the floor of a tent that has been dismantled as part of areas being demolished on the massive Bagram Air Field in the Parwan province of Afghanistan, Jan. 2, 2015.
The base is being shrunk by demolishing large swaths of housing in order to hold roughly 13,000 foreign troops, mostly Americans, who will remain in the country under a new two-year mission named "Resolute Support" to train Afghan troops.
Indonesia
Caskets containing the remains of passengers from AirAsia QZ8501 are carried into an Indonesian military cargo plane to be transported back to Surabaya where the flight originated, at the airport in Pangkalan Bun, Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, Jan. 3, 2015.
Ships searching for the wreck of an AirAsia passenger jet that crashed with 162 people on board have pinpointed two "big objects" on the sea floor, the head of Indonesia's search and rescue agency said on Saturday. The Airbus A320-200 plunged into the Java Sea on December 28, 2014 while en route from Indonesia's second-biggest city Surabaya to Singapore. No survivors have been found.
Indonesia
A Muslim cleric pauses as he reads a book of Koran verses during a prayer for the victims of AirAsia flight QZ 8501, inside an Indonesian Air Force NAS 332 Super Puma helicopter flying over the Java Sea off Pangkalan Bun, Jan. 6, 2015. Search teams including divers took advantage of a let-up in bad weather on Tuesday to try to reach the wreckage of an AirAsia jet that crashed nine days ago, and to recover bodies and find its black box flight recorders. Indonesian officials believe they may have located the tail and parts of the fuselage of the Airbus A320-200 at the bottom of the Java Sea, but strong currents, high winds and big waves have hindered attempts to investigate the debris.
Austria
Michael Hayboeck from Austria soars through the air during the practice for the fourth jumping of the 63rd four-hills ski jumping tournament in Bischofshofen, Austria, Jan. 5, 2015.
New York
A limo for family members is seen following the funeral of slain New York Police Department officer Wenjian Liu's in Brooklyn, New York, Jan. 4, 2015.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio appealed for reconciliation on Sunday in his eulogy for the second of two police officers murdered last month, two deaths that led to accusations the mayor had contributed to an anti-police climate.
Maryland
A crew member stands in the door of Air Force One waiting for the passenger stairs, upon the arrival of U.S. President Barack Obama at Joint Base Andrews in Washington, Jan. 8, 2015.
Obama returned from a two-day trip to Michigan and Arizona.
Australia
Embers glow against the smoke-filled sunset near Gumeracha in the Adelaide Hills, Jan. 3, 2015. Houses were lost as an intense bushfire raged out of control in South Australia on on January 3, as authorities warned the state faced its worst wildfire danger since deadly 1983 blazes.
Ukraine
Ukrainian servicemen sit atop armoured personnel carriers (APC) during a ceremony to hand over weapons, military equipment and aircrafts to the army at a firing range outside Zhytomyr, Ukraine, Jan. 5, 2015.
Spain
A rider rears up on his horse during the traditional Epiphany parade in Malaga, southern Spain, Jan. 5, 2015.
Traditionally, children in Spain receive their presents delivered by the Three Wise Men on the morning of January 6 during the Christian holiday of the Epiphany.
China
Beluga whales and their trainers present "The heart of Ocean" show at the Harbin Polarland in the northern city of Harbin, Heilongjiang province, China, Jan. 6, 2015. The polar land themed park combining animal shows and polar land sights has had increased visitors during the annual Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival, the park said.
India
A plain-clothes policeman, left, escorts two men who were arrested in connection with the alleged abduction and gang-rape of a Japanese tourist, outside a court in Kolkata, India, Jan. 3, 2015.
Indian police have arrested five men in connection with the alleged abduction and gang-rape of a 23-year-old Japanese tourist, officials said on Saturday. The woman had filed a complaint through the Japanese consulate in the eastern Indian city of Kolkata saying she had been staying in a budget hotel in the city in November when three local men who spoke Japanese befriended her and took her to the seaside resort of Digha in the state of West Bengal.
Bulgaria
Men jump into the waters of a lake in an attempt to grab a wooden cross on Epiphany Day in Sofia, Bulgaria, Jan. 6, 2015.
Orthodox priests throughout the country bless the waters by throwing a cross into it as worshippers try to retrieve it. It is strongly believed that catching the cross brings health and prosperity to the person who captures it.
New York
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo comforts his mother Matilda outside the St. Ignatius Loyola Church after funeral service for his late father, former Governor Mario Cuomo, in the Manhattan borough of New York, Jan. 6, 2015.
Mario Cuomo, the three-time governor of New York and a leading voice of the Democratic Party's liberal wing who turned down several invitations to seek the U.S. presidency, died on January 1 at his home in Manhattan. He was 82.
Washington, D.C.
U.S. House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), right, kisses House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), as he holds the gavel after being re-elected speaker on the House floor at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Jan. 6, 2015.
Washington, D.C.
Rep. Kevin Yoder (R-KS) , center, holds his daughter Caroline Lucille Yoder while reciting the Pledge of Allegiance during the opening session of the 114th Congress inside the House of Representatives chamber at the U.S. Capitol, Jan. 6, 2015
Republicans now control both the House and Senate.
Russia
Russian Cossacks, dressed in a traditional uniform, guard the territory outside the Kazan Cathedral, where an Orthodox Christmas service is held, under a heavy snowfall in Stavropol, southern Russia, Jan. 7, 2015.
Most Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas according to the Julian calendar on January 7, two weeks after most western Christian churches that abide by the Gregorian calendar.
Great Britain
Onlookers watch from a harbour wall as the largest container ship in world, CSCL Globe, docks during its maiden voyage, at the port of Felixstowe in south east England, Jan. 7, 2015. The 400-meter-long vessel with a capacity of around 19,000 containers, owned by China Shipping Container Line, and built in South Korea, is the first of five similar sized vessels which will sail the Asia-Europe trade route, according to a news release by the Port of Felixstowe.
The Hubble Telescope
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has revisited the famous Pillars of Creation, revealing a sharper and wider view of the structures in this visible-light image.
Astronomers combined several Hubble exposures to assemble the wider view. The towering pillars are about 5 light-years tall. The dark, finger-like feature at bottom right may be a smaller version of the giant pillars. The new image was taken with Hubble's versatile and sharp-eyed Wide Field Camera 3.
The pillars are bathed in ultraviolet light from a grouping of young, massive stars located off the top of the image. Streamers of gas can be seen bleeding off the pillars as the intense radiation heats and evaporates it into space. Denser regions of the pillars are shadowing material beneath them from the powerful radiation. Stars are being born deep inside the pillars, which are made of cold hydrogen gas laced with dust. The pillars are part of a small region of the Eagle Nebula, a vast star-forming region 6,500 light-years from Earth.
The colors in the image highlight emission from several chemical elements. Oxygen emission is blue, sulfur is orange, and hydrogen and nitrogen are green.
India
Indian soldiers are silhouetted against a traffic signal light as they rehearse for the Republic Day parade on a foggy winter morning in New Delhi, Jan. 8, 2015.
India will celebrate its annual Republic Day on January 26.
Chile
A worker monitors a process inside the plant at the copper refinery of Codelco Ventanas in Ventanas city, Chile, northwest of Santiago, Jan. 7, 2015.
France
An image from video posted online shows masked gunmen just before one shooting a Paris police officer at close range, following an attack on the office of weekly newspaper Charlie Hebdo, Jan. 7, 2015, in Paris, France.
Masked gunmen stormed the Paris offices of a weekly newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad, killing at least 12 people, including the editor, before escaping in a car. It was France's deadliest postwar terrorist attack.
France
Thousands of people gather for a moment of silence to pay their respects to the victims of the deadly attack at the Paris offices of French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, in Lyon, central France, Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2015.
Masked gunmen stormed the Paris offices of a weekly newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad, killing at least 12 people, including the editor, before escaping in a car. It was France's deadliest postwar terrorist attack.
New York
People gather at Union Square in reaction to the terrorist attack on French newspaper Charlie Hebdo in New York City, Jan. 07, 2015.
France
French gendarmes secure the roundabout near the scene of a hostage taking at an industrial zone in Dammartin-en-Goele, northeast of Paris, Jan. 9, 2015.
The two main suspects in the weekly satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo killings were sighted on Friday in the northern French town of Dammartin-en-Goele where at least one person had been taken hostage, a police source said.
France
People are led away from the scene as Police mobilize with reports of a hostage situation at Port de Vincennes in Paris, France, Jan. 9, 2015.
According to reports at least five people have been taken hostage in a kosher deli in the Port de Vincennes area of Paris.
New York
A woman walks down a snowy sidewalk in New York City, Jan. 6, 2015. The city was hit by its first snowstorm of the winter season.
Lebanon
Residents enjoy snow in front of the ruins of the Roman Temples of Bacchus at the historical ruins of Baalbek in eastern Lebanon, Jan. 8, 2015.
A storm buffeted the Middle East with blizzards, rain and strong winds on Wednesday, keeping people at home across the region and raising concerns for Syrian refugees facing freezing temperatures in flimsy shelters.
Illinois
Ice builds up along North Avenue Pier while temperatures hovered around zero degrees Fahrenheit in Chicago, Ill., Jan. 7, 2015.
Most of the city's schools were cancelled as wind chill temperatures were expected to exceed -30 F.
Maine
A fisherman works aboard a trawler passing House Island in Casco Bay of Portland, Maine, where the temperature at dawn was minus-9 degrees, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2014. Sea smoke is a fog formed by extremely cold air moving across warmer water.
Ukraine
Men wearing traditional Hutsul clothing take part in Orthodox Christmas celebrations at Holy Trinity Church in Iltsi, Ukraine, Jan. 7, 2015.
The men gather in groups and march around the church three times before spending twelve days traveling house to house singing songs until they've visited every home in the village.
Syria
Civilians and members of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent play with snow in the Duma neighborhood of Damascus, Jan. 7, 2015.
Syria
Snow covers Qasion Mountain behind theDuma neighborhood of Damascus, Jan. 8, 2015.
Nobody was reported killed in fighting in Syria on Wednesday, the first day without casualties in three years, after a fierce winter storm quelled violence, a group that monitors the war said on Thursday.