In Chicago, protesters linked arms and blocked lanes of Interstate 190 leading into O’Hare International Airport around 7 a.m. in a demonstration they said was part of a global “economic blockade to free Palestine,” according to Rifqa Falaneh, one of the organizers.

Traffic in the San Francisco Bay Area was snarled for hours as demonstrators shut down all vehicle, pedestrian and bike traffic on the Golden Gate Bridge and chained themselves to 55-gallon drums filled with cement across Interstate 880 in Oakland. Protesters marching into Brooklyn blocked Manhattan-bound traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge. In Eugene, Oregon, protesters blocked Interstate 5, shutting down traffic on the major highway for about 45 minutes.

O’Hare warned travelers on the social platform X to take alternative forms of transportation with car travel “substantially delayed this morning due to protest activity.”

Some travelers stuck in standstill traffic left their cars and walked the final leg to the airport along the freeway, trailing their luggage behind them.

Among them was Madeline Hannan from suburban Chicago. She was headed to O’Hare for a work trip to Florida when her and her husband’s car ended up stalled for 20 minutes. She got out and “both ran and speed walked” more than a mile (1.6 kilometers). She said she made it to the gate on time, but barely.

“This was an inconvenience,” she said in a telephone interview from Florida. “But in the grand scheme of things going on overseas, it’s a minor inconvenience.”

While individual travelers may have been affected, operations at the airport appeared near normal with delays of under 15 minutes, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.

Inbound traffic toward O’Hare resumed around 9 a.m.

Near Seattle, the Washington State Department of Transportation said a demonstration closed the main road to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Social media posts showed people holding a banner and waving Palestinian flags while standing on the highway. State authorities urged people to use light rail instead.

About 20 protesters were arrested at the Golden Gate Bridge demonstration and traffic resumed shortly after noon, according to the California Highway Patrol. The agency said officers were making arrests at two points on the interstate, including one spot where roughly 300 protesters refused orders to disperse,

“Attempting to block or shut down a freeway or state highway to protest is unlawful, dangerous, and prevents motorists from safely reaching their destinations,” the agency said in a statement.

Oregon State Police said 52 protestors were were arrested for disorderly conduct following the Interstate 5 protest in Eugene, Oregon, about 110 miles (177 kilometers) south of Portland. Six vehicles were towed from the scene.

New York Police made numerous arrests, saying 150 protesters were initially involved in the march around 3:15 p.m., but that number quickly grew. The bridge was fully reopened by 5 p.m.

In Chicago, dozens of protesters were arrested, according to Falaneh. Chicago police said Monday that “multiple people” were taken into custody after a protest where people obstructed traffic, but they did not have a detailed count.

Protesters say they chose the location, in part, because O’Hare is one of the largest airports. Among other things, they’ve called for an immediate cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hamas.

Anti- war protesters have demonstrated in Chicago near daily since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel that killed around 1,200 people. Israeli warplanes and ground troops have conducted a scorched-earth campaign on the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli offensive has killed more than 33,700 Palestinians, according to the Gaza health ministry. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count but says women and children make up two-thirds of the dead.

Police arrested a 15-year-old boy Tuesday after the attack at Christ the Good Shepherd Church. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was stabbed during a live-streamed sermon, and another priest was also injured.

Both are expected to survive.

New South Wales Police Commissioner Karen Webb says the suspect’s comments pointed to a religious motive for the attack.

Live-streamed video showed a person dressed in black approach the bishop and stab him multiple times in the head and upper body at the altar. People screamed and ran toward the bishop.

THIS IS BREAKING NEWS. The previous story is below:

Horrified worshippers watched online and in person as a 15-year-old boy stabbed a bishop and a priest during a church service in Sydney on Monday evening before the congregation overpowered him, police said.

A crowd of hundreds seeking revenge gathered outside the Orthodox Assyrian church, hurling bricks and bottles, injuring police officers and preventing police from taking the teen outside, officials said.

There were no life-threatening injuries. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel and priest Isaac Royel, the teen and at least two police officers were hospitalized, Acting Assistant Police Commissioner Andrew Holland told journalists.

The church in a message on social media said the bishop and priest were in stable condition and asked for people’s prayers. “It is the bishop’s and father’s wishes that you also pray for the perpetrator,” the statement said.

The Christ the Good Shepherd in suburban Wakeley streams sermons online. A video on social media shows a male dressed in black approaching the bishop at the altar and stabbing him repeatedly in the head and upper body. Members of the congregation scream and rush to stop it.

Holland commended the congregation for subduing the teen before calling police. When asked if the teen’s fingers had been severed, he said the hand injuries were “severe.”

More than 100 police reinforcements arrived before the teen was taken from the church in the hourslong incident. Several police vehicles were damaged, Holland said.

“A number of houses have been damaged. They’ve broken into a number of houses to gain weapons to throw at the police. They’ve thrown weapons and items at the church itself. There were obviously people who wanted to get access to the young person who caused the injuries to the clergy people,” he said.

Authorities did not immediately report a motive for the attack. Australians were still in shock after a lone assailant stabbed six people to death in a Sydney shopping mall on Saturday and injured more than a dozen others.

Holland suggested the weekend attack heightened the community’s response to the church stabbing.

“Given that there has been incidents in Sydney the last few days with knives involved, obviously there’s concerns,” he said. “We’ve asked for everyone to think rationally at this stage. We spoke to community leaders and members of the community to speak to their local people, to try and keep people calm.”

The premier of New South Wales, Chris Minns, described the scenes as “disturbing” on social media and urged the community to remain calm and “stick together.” Religious leaders expressed shock and condolences.

Fairfield Mayor Frank Carbone, leader of the neighboring municipal government, described the bishop as a community leader. “This is a very emotional situation. Obviously the community is very upset,” Carbone told Sky News.

Christ the Good Shepherd had been preparing for Palm Sunday later this month.

The bishop, described in local media as a figure sometimes seen as divisive on issues such as COVID-19 restrictions, was in national news last year with comments about gender.

A video posted in May 2023 by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation about a campaign targeting the LGBTQ+ community showed the bishop in a sermon saying that “when a man calls himself a woman, he is neither a man nor a woman, you are not a human, then you are an it. Now, since you are an it, I will not address you as a human anymore because it is not my choosing, it your choosing.”

The justices’ order Monday allows the state to put in a place a 2023 law that subjects physicians to up to 10 years in prison if they provide hormones, puberty blockers or other gender-affirming care to people under age 18. Under the court’s order, the two transgender teens who sued to challenge the law still will be able to obtain care.

The court’s three liberal justices would have kept the law on hold.

A federal judge in Idaho had blocked the law in its entirety after determining that it was necessary to do so to protect the teens, who are identified under pseudonyms in court papers.

Opponents of the law have said it will likely increase suicide rates among teens. The law’s backers have said it is necessary to “protect children” from medical or surgical treatments for gender dysphoria, though there’s little indication that gender-affirming surgeries are being performed on transgender youth in Idaho.

Gender-affirming care for youth is supported by every major medical organization, including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychiatric Association.

Medical professionals define gender dysphoria as severe psychological distress experienced by those whose gender identity differs from their sex assigned at birth.

The action comes as the justices also may soon consider whether to take up bans in Kentucky and Tennessee that an appeals court allowed to be enforced in the midst of legal fights.

At least 23 states have enacted laws restricting or banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors, and most of those states face lawsuits. A federal judge struck down Arkansas’ ban as unconstitutional. Montana’s ban also is temporarily on hold.

The states that have enacted laws restricting or banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors are Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and West Virginia.

“I did not hear you take accountability in your allocution. You said you were sorry, but not (that) you were sorry for what you did,” Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer said in announcing the sentence.

“You alone turned a safe weapon into a lethal weapon,” the judge said. “But for you, Ms. Hutchins would be alive, a husband would have his partner, and a little boy would have his mother.”

Gutierrez Reed, 26, had no visible reaction to the sentence. She was taken from the courtroom after the sentence was announced.

The verdict comes more than two years after Hutchins, 42, was killed by a live round of ammunition fired from a prop gun held by actor Alec Baldwin on October 21, 2021. The film’s director was also injured in the shooting.

As the armorer, Gutierrez Reed was responsible for firearm safety and storage on set. She became the first person to stand trial and be convicted in the case, which has captured national attention for more than two years.

At trial, prosecutors argued she repeatedly violated safety protocol and acted without caution in performing her duties, leading to Hutchins’ death. Her defense attorney argued the 26-year-old has been scapegoated for the safety failures of film set management and other crew members. Gutierrez Reed did not testify.

After hearing from more than 30 witnesses and deliberating for nearly three hours, jurors found Gutierrez Reed guilty of involuntary manslaughter on March 6. She was acquitted of a separate charge of evidence tampering.

Prosecutors had asked she be sentenced to the maximum prison time, citing a “complete and total failure to accept responsibility for her actions.” In contrast, the defense had asked she be released on probation, arguing she has no prior criminal history and has a “record of prior good works and positive things.”

She has been in custody since her conviction. Her defense attorney Jason Bowles told CNN they plan to appeal.

Baldwin, the actor and celebrity, has also been charged with involuntary manslaughter and is expected to stand trial in July. He has pleaded not guilty and has maintained he did not pull the firearm’s trigger.

A judge is currently considering a motion filed by Baldwin’s legal team to dismiss his indictment, citing alleged impropriety by the government – a motion prosecutors vehemently slammed in a rebuttal filing of their own.

Former armorer says ‘my heart aches’

Prior to the sentence, Hutchins’ family in Ukraine and friends spoke Monday about what Hutchins meant to them.

“The day of her death ruined my entire life,” her mother, Olga Solovey, said in a video with translated subtitles. “It’s heart-wrenching to see her child grow without his mother.”

Joel Souza, the “Rust” director and screenwriter who was also shot in the incident, acknowledged the physical and emotional pain he has felt in the two-and-a-half years since the shooting.

“One day the world made sense, and the next day it didn’t, and it still doesn’t, and I’m not sure it ever will again,” he said.

He described Hutchins as a great talent. “She was a touchstone for all who knew her, and those of us who were lucky enough to have shared in her fleeting time on this planet are better for it,” he said.

Gutierrez Reed, wearing a beige jail uniform, spoke in court and offered her condolences to those affected by Hutchins’ death.

“First and foremost, my heart aches for Hutchins’ family and friends and colleagues as well and it has since the day this tragedy occurred,” she said. “Halyna has been and always will be an inspiration to me. I understand she was taken too soon and I pray that you all find peace.”

She asked the judge to sentence her to probation.

“Your honor, when I took on Rust I was young and I was naïve, but I took my job as seriously as I knew how to. Despite not having proper time, resources and staffing, when things got tough I just did my best to handle it.”

“The jury has found me in part at fault for this godawful tragedy, but that doesn’t make me a monster, that makes me human,” she said.

In a sentencing memo dated April 10, Gutierrez Reed’s defense team requested she be released on probation with conditions set by the judge and undergo counseling and rehabilitative efforts. She feels “incredibly saddened and heart broken by what happened on that tragic day on the Rust set,” the memo said.

In an April 12 court filing responding to the defense memo, prosecutors requested Gutierrez Reed be sentenced to 18 months in prison, arguing she “continues to deny responsibility and blame others.” Prosecutors also cited jail calls in which Gutierrez Reed allegedly complained “about the negative affects this incident has had on her life” and called jurors derogatory names.

A native of Ukraine, Hutchins obtained a graduate degree in international journalism from Kyiv National University and worked as an investigative journalist with British documentary productions in Europe. She later moved to Los Angeles and discovered a love of cinematography.

She was credited with involvement in the production of 49 film, TV and video titles during her career, according to IMDB. She worked on movies including “Archenemy,” starring Joe Manganiello, which was released in 2020, and was named a rising star by American Cinematographer magazine in 2019.

What happened in the trial

The fatal shooting took place during a break in the filming of the Western movie “Rust” at the Bonanza Creek Ranch outside of Santa Fe.

Baldwin had been practicing for a scene and was drawing and pointing a revolver with guidance from Hutchins and Souza, according to a 2023 probable cause statement.

Baldwin drew the revolver, pointed it at Hutchins and fired the weapon shortly before 2 p.m., striking her in the chest and injuring Souza, prosecutors said in the probable cause statement. Hutchins was pronounced dead just after 3:30 p.m.

In the trial, prosecutors alleged Gutierrez Reed repeatedly violated safety protocols and neglected her responsibilities leading up to the shooting. She failed to perform safety checks on the prop weapon and the ammunition she loaded it with, handed it to a staff member who should not have been handling weapons on set and then departed the area when Baldwin ultimately fired the fatal round, prosecutors said.

“This is not a case where Hannah Gutierrez made one mistake and that one mistake was accidentally putting a live round into that gun,” Morrissey said during closing arguments. “This case is about constant, never-ending safety failures that resulted in the death of a human being and nearly killed another.”

Morrissey said Gutierrez Reed’s repeated failures allowed six live rounds to make their way onto the set and said she did not conduct safety checks that would have caught them.

“She had six, six live rounds on that movie set, the earliest date that I can track them for you is October 10, (2021),” the prosecutor said. “Six, and she failed to ferret them out for 12 days. What that means is that she wasn’t shaking any dummy rounds, she wasn’t testing anything.”

“Dummy” rounds refer to ammunition that contains no explosive elements but looks as if it was a real bullet when fired.

Bowles, the defense attorney, placed the blame elsewhere. He questioned how the live ammunition made it on set and alleged the production team created a chaotic and unsafe environment that put Gutierrez Reed under “really tough conditions to keep up with.” He also said Baldwin did not follow common-sense gun safety rules on set when he handled the firearm and acted unpredictably when he pointed the weapon at Hutchins.

“(Gutierrez Reed) could not anticipate what Baldwin would do. It was not in the script, it was not foreseeable,” he said in closing arguments. “Management was responsible for safety failures and not Hannah.”

During the armorer’s trial, assistant film director David Halls admitted he was “negligent” in checking the gun and did not properly look through all the rounds in the gun’s chamber when Gutierrez Reed presented it to him. He yelled “cold gun” before handing the weapon to Baldwin, a remark meant to indicate the firearm did not have live rounds, according to a court document.

Halls took a plea deal in 2023 for his role in the shooting, pleading no contest to one count of negligent use of a deadly weapon. He was sentenced to six months of unsupervised probation, a $500 fine, had to participate in a firearms safety class, complete 24 hours of community service and not use drugs or alcohol.

The Iranian attack on Saturday came in response to a suspected Israeli strike two weeks earlier on an Iranian consular building in the Syrian capital of Damascus that killed two Iranian generals. It marked the first time Iran has launched a direct military assault on Israel despite decades of enmity dating back to the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Iran launched hundreds of drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles at Israel in the attack. The Israeli military said that 99% of the drones and missiles were intercepted, by Israel’s own air defenses and warplanes and in coordination with a U.S.-led coalition of partners.

Israeli military chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said Monday that Israel is considering its next steps but that the Iranian strike “will be met with a response.”

Halevi gave no details. The army’s spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said Israel will respond “at the time that we choose.”

Both men spoke at the Nevatim air base in southern Israel, which Hagari said suffered only light damage in the Iranian attack.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been huddling with top officials to discuss a possible response. For a second straight day, the government made no announcements on any decisions.

In a conversation with U.S. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Netanyahu said that “Israel will do whatever is required to defend itself,” the prime minister’s office announced.

While Israeli leaders have hinted at retaliation, the government is under heavy international pressure not to further escalate the conflict — especially after the Iranian strike caused such little damage.

The U.S. has urged Israel to show restraint as it seeks to build a broad diplomatic response.

While Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, said any response is up to Israel to decide, he added: “We don’t want to see escalation, but we obviously will take necessary measures to protect our forces in the region.”

Pressed at a briefing about whether such a response would jeopardize stability in the region, Ryder said the U.S. will “stay in close consultation with our Israeli partners, as we have done throughout the weekend. Again, we don’t seek wider regional conflict.”

The U.S. also has been working in recent years to strengthen ties between Israel and moderate Arab states in an alliance to counter Iran.

Much of that cooperation has been under the umbrella of the U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East. Centcom works closely with militaries across the region, including Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries.

The U.S., Britain and Jordan — a key American ally in the region — have all said their air forces helped intercept the Iranian missiles and drones. Halevi said France and “other partners” were involved, and he noted that “Iran’s attack has created new opportunities for cooperation in the Middle East.”

The Iranian weapons also flew through Saudi skies, according to a map released by the Israeli military. Israel says most of the interceptions took place outside of Israeli airspace, indicating at least tacit cooperation with the Saudis.

A unilateral Israeli strike could strain these behind-the-scenes contacts, particularly with countries like Saudi Arabia that do not have official diplomatic relations with Israel. It also could risk opening a new front with Iran at a time when Israel is bogged down in a six-month war inside Gaza against Hamas militants.

Israel and Iran have been on a collision course throughout the Gaza war. The war erupted after Hamas and Islamic Jihad, two militant groups backed by Iran, carried out a devastating cross-border attack on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 250 others.

Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed over 33,700 Palestinians, according to local health officials, and caused widespread devastation.

Throughout the war, Israel has traded fire across its northern border with Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group, while Iranian-backed militias in Iraq and Yemen have also attacked Israel. The friction has kept up fears of a potentially destructive all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah, or a broader direct confrontation between Israel and Iran.

World leaders pressed Israel not to strike Iran.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said “all sides must show restraint” to avoid a rising spiral of violence in the Middle East. French President Emmanuel Macron said Paris will try to “convince Israel that we must not respond by escalating.”

In Washington, U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby declined to say Monday whether the U.S. had been or expects to be briefed on any Israeli response plans. “We will let the Israelis speak to that,” he said.

“We are not involved in their decision-making process about a potential response,” Kirby said.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. doesn’t seek escalation but said it would continue to support Israel’s security. He pledged to step up the diplomatic efforts against Iran.

“Strength and wisdom need to be different sides of the same coin,” he said.

More than 54% of the world’s coral reef areas have experienced bleaching in the past year, affecting at least 53 countries and territories including large swaths of the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, a joint statement from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and The International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI) said.

“It is likely that this event will surpass the previous peak of 56.1% soon,” Derek Manzello, the coordinator for NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch program, said in an email to CNN. “The percentage of reef areas experiencing bleaching-level heat stress has been increasing by roughly 1% per week.”

When corals are exposed to stress from marine heatwaves, they spit out the algae living within their tissue, which provides them with both their color and most of their energy. If ocean temperatures don’t return to normal, bleaching can lead to mass coral death, threatening the species and food chains that rely on them with collapse.

This marks the world’s fourth global bleaching event, and the second in the past decade – with previous periods in 1998, 2010, and between 2014-2017.

In the past year, mass bleaching has been confirmed in regions including Florida and the wider Caribbean, Mexico, Brazil, Australia, the South Pacific, the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf, Indonesia, and the Indian Ocean including the east coast of Africa and the Seychelles.

Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, a climate scientist specializing in coral reefs based at the University of Queensland in Australia, predicted this mass bleaching event months ago.

“We knew sea temperatures were increasing rapidly, but not at this speed,” Hoegh-Guldberg told CNN on Monday. “The worrying issue is that we don’t know how long this massive temperature change is likely to last.”

The last 12 months have been the planet’s warmest on record and ocean temperatures have been surging off the charts. Global sea surface temperatures hit record highs in February and again in March, according to data from the European Commission’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

In February, scientists at the Coral Reef Watch program at NOAA added three new alert levels to the coral bleaching alert maps, to enable scientists to assess the new scale of underwater warming.

Will La Niña bring relief?

El Niño, a natural climate pattern that originates in the Pacific Ocean along the equator and tends to push up global temperatures, has helped drive the unprecedented ocean heat.

NOAA predicts La Niña, El Niño’s cooler counterpart, could arrive between June and August this year, which provides “a nugget of hope” for coral reefs, NOAA’s Manzello said.

But, he added, bleaching events have still occurred during La Niña in the past few years.

“I am becoming increasingly concerned about the 2024 summer for the wider Caribbean and Florida,” Manzello said. “When we roll into summer and the bleaching season for Florida and the Caribbean, it won’t take much additional seasonal warming to push temperatures past the bleaching threshold.”

In mid-February, CNN witnessed extensive coral bleaching on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef – the world’s largest coral reef system – on five different reefs spanning the northern and southern areas. A mass bleaching event was officially confirmed there last month after aerial and underwater surveys by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority.

“The increasing frequency and extremity of marine heatwaves driven by climate change, is testing the tolerance levels of coral reefs,” said Selina Stead, the CEO of AIMS. “Climate change is the biggest threat to coral reefs worldwide and this global confirmation illustrates just how extensive its impact has been across the last 12 months.”

“That is why it is critical the world works to reduce carbon emissions,” Stead added. “It is also important to ensure coral reefs are well managed at local and regional levels.”

The UN Environment Programme has warned that if the world fails to aggressively lower its emissions, the planet is heading towards nearly 3 degrees Celsius of warming above pre-industrial levels this century.

Scientists predict that even at 2 degrees of warming — which the world could reach around 2050 — approximately 99% of corals on Earth would die.

As well as being an essential habitat for marine life, coral reefs are crucial for the world’s coastal communities — they act as a vital defense system against the threat of flooding from storms and sea level rise, and also provide livelihoods and a vital food source for an estimated billion people globally.

David Ritter, CEO of Greenpeace Australia, said reefs were facing “existential danger” and that blame lies “squarely with the main culprits fueling global warming: fossil fuel companies, and the governments who prop up this industry.”

“We are running out of runway to avoid irreversible climate disaster,” he added, “and must act quickly to ensure an immediate end to new fossil fuels.”

But in the U.S., the ethos of grinding and pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps is ubiquitous, both in the country’s beginnings and our current environment of always-on technology and work hours. And getting enough sleep can seem like a dream.

The Gallup poll, released Monday, found 57% of Americans say they would feel better if they could get more sleep, while only 42% say they are getting as much sleep as they need. That’s a first in Gallup polling since 2001; in 2013, when Americans were last asked, it was just about the reverse — 56% saying they got the needed sleep and 43% saying they didn’t.

Younger women, under the age of 50, were especially likely to report they aren’t getting enough rest.

The poll also asked respondents to report how many hours of sleep they usually get per night: Only 26% said they got eight or more hours, which is around the amount that sleep experts say is recommended for health and mental well-being. Just over half, 53%, reported getting six to seven hours. And 20% said they got five hours or less, a jump from the 14% who reported getting the least amount of sleep in 2013.

(And just to make you feel even more tired, in 1942, the vast majority of Americans were sleeping more. Some 59% said they slept eight or more hours, while 33% said they slept six to seven hours. What even IS that?)

THE REASONS AREN’T EXACTLY CLEAR

The poll doesn’t get into reasons WHY Americans aren’t getting the sleep they need, and since Gallup last asked the question in 2013, there’s no data breaking down the particular impact of the last four years and the pandemic era.

But what’s notable, says Sarah Fioroni, senior researcher at Gallup, is the shift in the last decade toward more Americans thinking they would benefit from more sleep and particularly the jump in the number of those saying they get five or less hours.

“That five hours or less category … was almost not really heard of in 1942,” Fioroni said. “There’s almost nobody that said they slept five hours or less.”

In modern American life, there also has been “this pervasive belief about how sleep was unnecessary — that it was this period of inactivity where little to nothing was actually happening and that took up time that could have been better used,” said Joseph Dzierzewski, vice president for research and scientific affairs at the National Sleep Foundation.

It’s only relatively recently that the importance of sleep to physical, mental and emotional health has started to percolate more in the general population, he said.

And there’s still a long way to go. For some Americans, like Justine Broughal, 31, a self-employed event planner with two small children, there simply aren’t enough hours in the day. So even though she recognizes the importance of sleep, it often comes in below other priorities like her 4-month-old son, who still wakes up throughout the night, or her 3-year-old daughter.

“I really treasure being able to spend time with (my children),” Broughal says. “Part of the benefit of being self-employed is that I get a more flexible schedule, but it’s definitely often at the expense of my own care.”

THERE’S A CULTURAL BACKDROP TO ALL THIS, TOO

So why are we awake all the time? One likely reason for Americans’ sleeplessness is cultural — a longstanding emphasis on industriousness and productivity.

Some of the context is much older than the shift documented in the poll. It includes the Protestants from European countries who colonized the country, said Claude Fischer, a professor of sociology at the graduate school of the University of California, Berkeley. Their belief system included the idea that working hard and being rewarded with success was evidence of divine favor.

“It has been a core part of American culture for centuries,” he said. “You could make the argument that it … in the secularized form over the centuries becomes just a general principle that the morally correct person is somebody who doesn’t waste their time.”

Jennifer Sherman has seen that in action. In her research in rural American communities over the years, the sociology professor at Washington State University says a common theme among people she interviewed was the importance of having a solid work ethic. That applied not only to paid labor but unpaid labor as well, like making sure the house was clean.

A through line of American cultural mythology is the idea of being “individually responsible for creating our own destinies,” she said. “And that does suggest that if you’re wasting too much of your time … that you are responsible for your own failure.”

“The other side of the coin is a massive amount of disdain for people considered lazy,” she added.

Broughal says she thinks that as parents, her generation is able to let go of some of those expectations. “I prioritize … spending time with my kids, over keeping my house pristine,” she said.

But with two little ones to care for, she said, making peace with a messier house doesn’t mean more time to rest: “We’re spending family time until, you know, (my 3-year-old) goes to bed at eight and then we’re resetting the house, right?”

THE TRADEOFFS OF MORE SLEEP

While the poll only shows a broad shift over the past decade, living through the COVID-19 pandemic may have affected people’s sleep patterns. Also discussed in post-COVID life is “revenge bedtime procrastination,” in which people put off sleeping and instead scroll on social media or binge a show as a way of trying to handle stress.

Liz Meshel is familiar with that. The 30-year-old American is temporarily living in Bulgaria on a research grant, but also works a part-time job on U.S. hours to make ends meet.

On the nights when her work schedule stretches to 10 p.m., Meshel finds herself in a “revenge procrastination” cycle. She wants some time to herself to decompress before going to sleep and ends up sacrificing sleeping hours to make it happen.

“That applies to bedtime as well, where I’m like, ’Well, I didn’t have any me time during the day, and it is now 10 p.m., so I am going to feel totally fine and justified watching X number of episodes of TV, spending this much time on Instagram, as my way to decompress,” she said. “Which obviously will always make the problem worse.”

The Dali left Baltimore’s port early on March 26 laden with cargo destined for Sri Lanka when it struck one of the Francis Scott Key Bridge’s supports, causing the span to collapse into the Patapsco River and sending six members of a roadwork crew plummeting to their deaths. Three of their bodies have been recovered.

The Dali experienced apparent electrical issues before leaving port, according to someone with knowledge of the situation. The person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to comment, said alarms went off on the ship’s refrigerated containers while it was still docked in Baltimore, likely indicating an inconsistent power supply.

The ship’s crew was aware of the issues and indicated they would be addressed, according to the person.

Officials with the National Transportation Safety Board have said their investigation will include an inquiry into whether the ship experienced power issues before starting its voyage.

Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said last week that the investigation is focused on the ship’s electrical system generally. The ship experienced power issues moments before the crash, as is evident in videos that show its lights going out and coming back on.

Homendy said information gleaned from the vessel’s voyage data recorder is relatively basic, “so that information in the engine room will help us tremendously.”

The FBI said Monday that it is conducting a criminal investigation into the bridge collapse that is focused on the circumstances leading up to it and whether all federal laws were followed, according to a different person familiar with the matter. The person wasn’t authorized to discuss details of the investigation publicly and spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymity.

FBI agents were aboard the cargo ship on Monday conducting court-authorized law enforcement activity, the agency said in a statement. It didn’t elaborate and said it wouldn’t comment further on the investigation, which was first reported by The Washington Post.

Meanwhile, Mayor Brandon Scott issued a statement Monday announcing a partnership with two law firms to “launch legal action to hold the wrongdoers responsible” and mitigate harm to the people of Baltimore.

Scott said the city “will take decisive action to hold responsible all entities accountable for the Key Bridge tragedy, including the owner, charterer, manager/operator, and the manufacturer of the M/V Dali, as well as any other potentially liable third parties.”

He said with the ship’s owner already seeking to limit the company’s liability, the city needs to act quickly to protect its own interests.

The Dali is managed by Synergy Marine Group and owned by Grace Ocean Private Ltd., both of Singapore. Danish shipping giant Maersk chartered the Dali.

“Due to the magnitude of the incident, there are various government agencies conducting investigations, in which we are fully participating,” Synergy Marine spokesperson Darrell Wilson said in a statement Monday. “Out of respect for these investigations and any future legal proceedings, it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time.”

The investigation comes amid concerns about the safety of thousands of U.S. bridges and days after more than two dozen river barges broke loose and struck a closed span in Pittsburgh.

Two bodies were recovered in rural Oklahoma, a day after the arrests of four people in the case.

Authorities say 27-year-old Veronica Butler and 39-year-old Jilian Kelley, of Hugoton, Kansas, were driving through the Oklahoma panhandle to pick up Butler’s children for a March 30 birthday party in Kansas. They never showed up, and their vehicle was found later that day, abandoned on a rural highway near the Oklahoma-Kansas state line, with evidence of foul play.

The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation on Monday described an intense effort to find the women, protect the children and arrest suspects without violence.

“This case did not end the way we had hoped. It’s certainly been a tragedy for everyone involved,” OSBI Director Aungela Spurlock said.

OSBI spokesman Hunter McKee said Butler and Kelley are dead, and that the four defendants were responsible for the women going missing, but would not confirm that the bodies found were identified as the missing Kansas women, pending a report from the Medical Examiner’s Office.

On Saturday, Oklahoma authorities said they arrested and charged four people with two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of kidnapping and one count of conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree: Tad Bert Cullum, 43; Tifany Machel Adams, 54; Cole Earl Twombly, 50, and Cora Twombly, 44. Court records don’t indicate whether any of the four defendants have an attorney who could speak on their behalf.

Authorities announced the next day that two bodies were recovered in Texas County. The Medical Examiner’s Office would determine their identification and cause of death, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation said in a statement Sunday night.

All four suspects are being held without bond in the Texas County Jail and are scheduled to make an initial court appearance Wednesday morning, said Texas County Court Clerk Renee Ellis.

“This is a dark day for Syracuse. This is our worst nightmare come true. And our thoughts right now are with the families of those two officers, those heroes,” Mayor Ben Walsh said at a news conference.

The police deaths add to the at least 38 law enforcement officers who have died in the line of duty so far this year, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page. Last year, 136 officers died in the line of duty across the US, according to a report from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, a 39% decrease from 224 deaths in 2022.

The incident in upstate New York began just after 7 p.m., when two Syracuse Police Department officers tried to pull over a suspicious vehicle, Chief Joseph Cecile said at the news conference. The driver didn’t stop and the officers lost sight of the vehicle, Cecile said, but they used the license plate to link it to a home in nearby Liverpool.

The officers asked for assistance from the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office after learning the person driving the vehicle may be armed, Cecile said. Members of each department arrived at the home around the same time.

“While they were inspecting the vehicle and saw what looked to be guns inside, they heard what sounded like someone manipulating a firearm from inside the residence,” Cecile said. “Moments later, there was an exchange of gunfire between at least one suspect and the officers and the deputies.”

An officer, a deputy and the suspect were all shot and pronounced dead at a hospital, Cecile said, noting the investigation is ongoing.

The identities of the fallen officers and the suspect haven’t been released.

The officer had been on the job for about three years, Cecile said. Onondaga County Sheriff Toby Shelley described the deputy as “seasoned.”

“With the April deadline upon us, we’re seeing a flurry of tax returns coming in during the final hours. We’ve already received more than 100 million [returns] and tens of millions more returns are being filed in the final days,” IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel told reporters on Friday.

So if you’re a last-minute filer, you’re in good company — and even more so if you expect a refund. Werfel noted that the agency has already paid out more than $200 billion in refunds through early April. Overall, two in three filers are owed money back, he said.

Hereare some last-minute notes and tips to help you in your down-to-the-wire quest to file your federal return or to get an extension to file without incurring financial penalties. (Check your state’s tax revenue department site to see what to be mindful of when doing the same for your state return.)

Today may not be your actual filing deadline: Yes, April 15 is the big kahuna of tax-filing deadlines for most people. But millions of Americans don’t have to file today because they have been granted automatic extensions if, for instance, they live or do business in a federally declared disaster area or were affected by the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel. Or if they live in Massachusetts and Maine, which observe Patriots Day on April 15, or Washington, DC, which marks Emancipation Day on April 16. Americans living abroad automatically get an additional two months to file, until June 15. However, they must pay whatever they still owe the IRS for tax year 2023 by April 15. Members of the US military stationed abroad also get that two-month extension, plus they may qualify for other extensions – including extensions to pay – if they are in a combat zone.

File for an automatic extension: Can’t get your act together in time to file your form 1040 by 11:59 pm tonight? Then request an automatic six-month extension by filling out this form, which will push your filing deadline to October 15, 2024. Werfel estimates 19 million last-minute filers will be doing so.

Without that extension, if you simply file late and you still owe money to the IRS, you will be hit with a failure-to-file penalty plus interest on your outstanding balance.

Pay what you owe today, or at least some of it: Even if you secure an extension to file, most people are required to pay whatever they still owe the IRS for tax year 2023 by April 15.

So do your best to estimate what that amount will be and send in your payment — or at least a partial payment — tonight.Making a payment will help you avoid, or limit, the failure-to-pay penalty and interest you will be charged on your balance due. (Here are some tips for how to estimate what you still owe if you’re not filing a completed return yet.)

If that balance is unmanageable for you, there are options to work out a payment plan with the IRS to reduce your penalties and interest, which otherwise can compound quickly.

Double check your work: To prevent any delays in the processing of your return (or refund if you’re owed one), and to avoid any headache-inducing interactions with the IRS after you file, make sure you’re getting the basics right on your return.

Also make sure you answer the digital assets question on the first page of your 1040 and that you file the correct forms needed if, in fact, you had any taxable transactions with cryptocurrencies like bitcoin.

For instance, check that the following are correct: the spelling of your name, your address, your filing status, your Social Security number and your bank account number if you’re seeking direct deposit for a refund. Also double check your computations. Do all this even if you relied on a tax program or tax professional to prepare your return.

(Here are other last-minute tips and resources you can use from the IRS if you need help, have questions or want to file for free.)

Track your refund: If you’re among the majority of tax filers due a refund and you haven’t received it yet, you can track its status by using the IRS Where’s My Refund? tool online.

The average refund as of early April was $3,011, up $123 from a year ago. The turnaround time for the IRS to send them out can be fast.

“The IRS has done a great job of getting refunds out quickly this year. … In many cases people have been getting refunds in just over a week. That’s important because for many people, these are the biggest checks they see all the year,” Werfel said.

(Looking for some ideas for how to put your refund to good use? Here are a few.)

This group of people were the last to fly out of Israel before hundreds of drones and missiles launched toward its territory, early Sunday morning.

“It felt a little bit like getting the last chopper out of ‘Nam,” said traveler Julie Simonson.

Traveler Tony Raz said they departed in the nick of time.

“It was pretty scary when they said that they’d already released some of these mini-planes with bombs on them, and they were saying they were going to close the skies at 12:30 at night, 12:30 a.m. Our flight was scheduled to take off at 12:15,” he said. “We got on the plane, and it was maybe 10 minutes behind schedule. The skies were closed, but they let us get out.”

Their plane landing safely at Miami International Airport several hours later.

Some passengers told 7News they were still shaken up.

“I was scared, I start to cry,” said traveler Taly Raz. “I didn’t know if I’m going to see my kids, if we were going be flying, if we were going to get bombed while we were on the airplane.”

Many didn’t know whether they would take off or have to seek shelter at the airport.

“Just the whole plane was, like, really intense, people trying to figure out what’s going on,” said traveler Aryeh Levine. “It was a really surreal situation.”

Passengers watched everything unfold on their phone screens.

“We were on the plane, and everyone was connected to the Wi-Fi, so you could see it was like a fireworks display in the sky, just rockets coming in, and the iron dome intercepting all the rockets,” said Levine.

Maor Elbaz-Starinsky, the Consulate General of Israel on Miami, spoke about the attacks hours later.

“Iran should be held accountable for everything that they’ve been doing, for whatever they’ve done last night, and we know what they’ve done last night,” he said. “Iran will carry the consequences of such attack.”

Those on board the plane that landed at MIA hope this conflict doesn’t escalate into something worse.

“We want peace. We want everybody to be OK and healthy, and we don’t want to be attacked,” said Simonson.

Another flight from Tel Aviv is expected to land at MIA on Monday morning.

In other words: a familiar routine.

But inside the courtroom, which was closed to TV cameras, Trump was a different man — reserved and muted in a stark departure from his feisty approach to other legal troubles.

The contrast spoke to the gravity of his situation. Trump is now the first former president ever to stand trial on criminal charges and faces the prospect, if he loses, of becoming the first major American presidential candidate in history to run as a convicted felon.

Trump is accused in the case of falsifying business records to hide alleged hush money payments made to a porn star to keep her from going public during his 2016 campaign with allegations of an affair.

The trial is expected to last at least six weeks and Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is required to attend every day court is in session — a schedule that will dramatically alter his daily life and his ability to campaign in battleground states.

So Trump instead brought his campaign to the courthouse, delivering statements before and after the day’s proceedings, which he again cast as nothing more than a politically motivated effort by his rivals to hinder his campaign.

“This is political persecution,” he steamed after arriving with a phalanx of lawyers and several senior aides, but without his wife or other family members. “This is an assault on our country,” he went on.

Trump is already well practiced in the art of campaigning from the courtroom. In addition to appearances related to his four criminal trials, Trump this year voluntarily attended most days of his civil fraud trial as well as a defamation case brought by the writer E. Jean Carroll, who had accused Trump of rape.

Those two trials did not end well for Trump: The former president was found liable in both cases, and now owes over half a billion dollars, including interest.

During those hearings, Trump was often admonished by the judges, who instructed him to be quiet or answer questions more succinctly. At one point, the judge in the Carroll suit threatened to kick Trump out of the courtroom for speaking loudly. Another day he stormed out. Trump also openly sparred with the judge in his civil fraud case, including from the witness stand.

Such behavior would not be tolerated in a criminal courtroom and Judge Juan Merchan made clear Trump could be sent to jail and prosecuted separately if he were to engage in such disruptive behavior.

On Monday, Trump did not.

At times, he was seen whispering and passing notes with Todd Blanche, his lead attorney. But during other stretches, Trump slouched forward, casting his gaze toward the ceiling, or leaned back in his chair with his arms folded and his eyes closed.

Every movement was memorialized by a small pool of reporters inside. As he entered the courtroom, Trump “paused for a split second” and “licked his lips” before walking up the courtroom’s center aisle. When he was introduced as the defendant, Trump turned and gave prospective jurors “a little tight-lipped smirk.” Later, when he exited the courtroom for a break, Trump glared at a New York Times reporter who earlier had reported Trump had fallen asleep in his chair.

While his body language was carefully parsed, he was seen more than heard.

During the first day of his trial, Trump said just five words on the record — “Yes” once, and “Yes, sir” twice — as he was read his so-called “Parker warnings” informing him that his right to be present at the trial could be revoked if he acted out and that he could be sent to jail for disruptive behavior.

It remains unclear how long Trump’s restraint will last as the trial drags on.

The sterile, fluorescent-lit courtroom is a world away from the gilded Mar-a-Lago club where he has taken up residency in his post-presidential life. There he is surrounded by doting staff and ardent supporters who deliver standing ovations every night as he enters the dining room.

In the courtroom, Trump was introduced to jurors not as president — as his aides still call him — but “Mr. Donald J. Trump” — and faced restraints, including the prospect that he might not be granted permission to attend his youngest son’s high school graduation.

The judge has not ruled on the matter, but did bar Trump from traveling to Washington next Thursday, when the Supreme Court will take up his argument that, as a former president, he is immune from prosecution.

“We think that it is important for the court to remind Mr. Trump that he is a criminal defendant and that he is under the court’s supervision,” one prosecutor, Christopher Conroy, said.

With Trump stuck in New York for the foreseeable future, aides have been planning rallies and other political events on weekends and on Wednesdays, when court is not supposed to be in session. Merchan said Monday that Wednesdays could be added if he trial falls behind schedule.

Aides are also considering possible events around New York after court ends for the day. Trump has often talked about wanting to campaign in his home state, even though New York remains overwhelmingly Democratic.

He is also expected continue to speak from the courthouse and hold press conferences to spin each day’s proceedings, as he has in his other trials.

While Trump has complained about being taken off the campaign trail, he has been keeping a relatively light schedule of public events since he locked up the GOP nomination last month, with most of his rallies scheduled on weekends anyway. Instead, he has been focused on fundraising as he tries to close the gap with his Democratic rival, President Joe Biden.

He is also expected to rely more heavily on surrogates. On Monday, allies including North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and Florida Rep. Byron Donalds — all potential vice presidential or cabinet picks — fanned out across cable networks to blast the case.

Trump’s indictments proved beneficial during the primaries, helping him rake in tens of millions of dollars from angry supporters and denying his GOP rivals the media spotlight as they were trying to gain traction.

It’s unclear, however, how a criminal trial and possible conviction resonate with the broader general election audience, which includes more moderate and independent voters that could decide the race.

Nearly half of registered voters, 46%, said in a recent NYT/Siena College poll that Trump “should be found guilty” in the New York trial. And about 6 in 10 said the charges were “very” or “somewhat” serious.

The details of the case are salacious — involving a porn star, tabloids and hush money payments. But the case is widely see as posing less of a legal risk to Trump than his other cases, which accuse him of conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election and of charges under the Espionage Act over his hoarding of classified documents that could lead to serious jail time.

But the hush money case could be the only one that makes it to trial before November’s vote.

Biden’s campaign, meanwhile, ignored Monday’s proceedings as his aides seek to avoid the appearance of judicial interference.

Campaign officials said Monday that they will instead focus on continuing to present a political split-screen between the two men, with the president focused on governing and Trump focused on himself.

That contrast was especially striking this weekend, as Iran launched an attack against Israel and Biden worked to prevent a wider Middle East escalation, speaking by phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Jordan’s King Abdullah II.

He’ll spend the week campaigning in battleground Pennsylvania, with events planned in Scranton, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, as Trump remains in court.

The University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index, released Friday in a preliminary version, slipped to 77.9 this month, down from March’s figure of 79.4. Sentiment is about halfway between its all-time low, reached in June 2022 when inflation peaked, and its pre-pandemic averages. The survey has been conducted since 1980.

“Consumers are reserving judgment about the economy in light of the upcoming election, which, in the view of many consumers, could have a substantial impact on the trajectory of the economy,” said Joanne Hsu, director of the consumer survey.

The index had dropped to 61.3 as recently as November before jumping in the following two months by the most in more than three decades. It has since moved mostly sideways.

Stronger consumer optimism can sometimes translate into more spending, which typically boosts the economy. Most economists expect consumer spending to remain healthy as long as the job market stays strong.

“Looking beyond the recent minor monthly volatility, sentiment remains on a rising trend,” Oren Klachkin, an economist at Nationwide, said in a research note. “It’s still a positive environment for the consumer.”

Among the respondents to the survey, sentiment fell the most among Republicans. Among independents, it edged down, and it rose slightly among Democrats. Americans’ economic views have become more driven by political partisanship in recent decades.

An increase in gas prices likely contributed to the decline in consumers’ outlook, according to Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics. The average national price of a gallon of gas has jumped about 7% from a month ago, according to AAA, to $3.63 a gallon.

Americans’ perceptions of future inflation also rose, probably reflecting still-high prices. Consumers expect inflation to be 3.1% a year from now, which would exceed the Federal Reserve’s 2% target. Still, that would be below the current level of 3.5%.

Inflation has tumbled from a peak of 9.1% in the summer of 2022 but has remained elevated so far this year. Prices excluding volatile food and energy costs, rose 3.8% in March from a year earlier, the same as in the previous month and well above the Fed’s target.

Witnesses say the man fired rounds from the roof and a balcony of a complex at Via Marina and Catamaran Street around 10:15 p.m. Saturday.

The shooter was allegedly armed with two AR-15-style rifles and a pistol and repeatedly reloaded while sheriff’s SWAT teams tried to deescalate the situation.

“It’s pretty terrifying . . .” said one resident. “We have never had any type of active shooter situation or anything at this level and it is all residential for the most part, it is very concerning.”

The suspect was later taken into custody. His identity has not been released. There are no reports of anyone hurt.

A motive for the shooting remains unclear. An investigation is ongoing.

But Israel’s War Cabinet met without making a decision on next steps, an official said, as a nervous world waited for any sign of further escalation of the former shadow war.

The military coalition, led by the United States, Britain and France and appearing to include a number of Middle Eastern countries, gave Israel support at a time when it finds itself isolated over its war against Hamas in Gaza. The coalition also could serve as a model for regional relations when that war ends.

“This was the first time that such a coalition worked together against the threat of Iran and its proxies in the Middle East,” said the Israeli military spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari.

One unknown is which of Israel’s neighbors participated in the shooting down of the vast majority of about 350 drones and missiles Iran launched. Israeli military officials and a key War Cabinet member noted additional “partners” without naming them. When pressed, White House national security spokesman John Kirby would not name them either.

But one appeared to be Jordan, which described its action as self-defense.

“There was an assessment that there was a real danger of Iranian marches and missiles falling on Jordan, and the armed forces dealt with this danger. And if this danger came from Israel, Jordan would take the same action,” Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safadi said in an interview on Al-Mamlaka state television. U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Jordan’s King Abdullah on Sunday.

The U.S. has long tried to forge a regionwide alliance against Iran as a way of integrating Israel and boosting ties with the Arab world. The effort has included the 2020 Abraham Accords, which established diplomatic relations between Israel and four Arab countries, and having Israel in the U.S. military’s Central Command, which oversees operations in the Middle East and works closely with the armies of moderate Arab states.

The U.S. had been working to establish full relations between Israel and regional heavyweight Saudi Arabia before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack sparked Israel’s war in Gaza. The war, which has claimed over 33,700 Palestinian lives, has frozen those efforts due to widespread outrage across the Arab world. But it appears that some behind-the-scenes cooperation has continued, and the White House has held out hopes of forging Israel-Saudi ties as part of a postwar plan.

Just ahead of Iran’s attack, the commander of CENTCOM, Gen. Erik Kurilla, visited Israel to map out a strategy.

Israel’s military chief, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, on Sunday thanked CENTCOM for the joint defensive effort. Both Jordan and Saudi Arabia are under the CENTCOM umbrella. While neither acknowledged involvement in intercepting Iran’s launches, the Israeli military released a map showing missiles traveling through the airspace of both nations.

“Arab countries came to the aid of Israel in stopping the attack because they understand that regional organizing is required against Iran, otherwise they will be next in line,” Amos Yadlin, a former head of Israel’s military intelligence, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, said he had spoken with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and that the cooperation “highlighted the opportunity to establish an international coalition and strategic alliance to counter the threat posed by Iran.”

The White House signaled that it hopes to build on the partnerships and urged Israel to think twice before striking Iran. U.S. officials said Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Washington would not participate in any offensive action against Iran.

Israel’s War Cabinet met late Sunday to discuss a possible response, but an Israeli official familiar with the talks said no decisions had been made. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was discussing confidential deliberations.

Asked about plans for retaliation, Hagari declined to comment directly. “We are at high readiness in all fronts,” he said.

“We will build a regional coalition and collect the price from Iran, in the way and at the time that suits us,” said a key War Cabinet member, Benny Gantz.

Iran launched the attack in response to a strike widely blamed on Israel that hit an Iranian consular building in Syria this month and killed two Iranian generals.

By Sunday morning, Iran said the attack was over, and Israel reopened its airspace. Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, claimed Iran had taught Israel a lesson and warned that “any new adventures against the interests of the Iranian nation would be met with a heavier and regretful response from the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The foes have been engaged in a shadow war for years, but Sunday’s assault was the first time Iran launched a direct military assault on Israel, despite decades of enmity dating back to the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Iran said it targeted Israeli facilities involved in the Damascus strike, and that it told the White House early Sunday that the operation would be “minimalistic.”

But U.S. officials said Iran’s intent was to “destroy and cause casualties” and that if successful, the strikes would have caused an “uncontrollable” escalation. At one point, at least 100 ballistic missiles were in the air with just minutes of flight time to Israel, the officials said.

Israel said more than 99% of what Iran fired was intercepted, with just a few missiles getting through. An Israeli airbase sustained minor damage.

Israel has over the years established — often with the help of the U.S. — a multilayered air-defense network that includes systems capable of intercepting a variety of threats, including long-range missiles, cruise missiles, drones and short-range rockets.

That system, along with collaboration with the U.S. and others, helped thwart what could have been a far more devastating assault at a time when Israel is already deeply engaged in Gaza as well as low-level fighting on its northern border with Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia. Both Hamas and Hezbollah are backed by Iran.

While thwarting the Iranian onslaught could help restore Israel’s image after the Hamas attack in October, what the Middle East’s best-equipped army does next will be closely watched in the region and in Western capitals — especially as Israel seeks to develop the coalition it praised Sunday.

In Washington, Biden pledged to convene allies to develop a unified response. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. would hold talks with allies. After an urgent meeting, the Group of Seven countries unanimously condemned Iran’s attack and said they stood ready to take “further measures.”

Israel and Iran have been on a collision course throughout Israel’s war in Gaza. In the Oct. 7 attack, militants from Hamas and Islamic Jihad, also backed by Iran, killed 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 250 others. Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed over 33,000 people, according to local health officials.

Hamas welcomed Iran’s attack, saying it was “a natural right and a deserved response” to the strike in Syria. It urged the Iran-backed groups in the region to continue to support Hamas in the war.

Hezbollah also welcomed the attack. Almost immediately after the war in Gaza erupted, Hezbollah began attacking Israel’s northern border. The two sides have been involved in daily exchanges of fire, while Iranian-backed groups in Iraq, Syria and Yemen have launched rockets and missiles toward Israel.

Baltimore police say the girl was shot Saturday afternoon at Mondawmin Mall. According to police, two groups at the mall got into an altercation, and an unidentified male fired a shot as he was running away that struck the girl in the upper body.

The girl, who was at the mall with her mother, was not the intended victim, officials said.

Police said she was taken to the hospital with multiple gunshot wounds and was in critical but stable condition Saturday evening.

Authorities were searching for the suspect Sunday.

In December, a man delivering packages at the mall was shot in the ankle at the mall’s parking lot when he became caught between two groups of boys who were shooting at each other.

Financial stress during tax season can manifest in different ways, whether that’s procrastinating on your tax return until the last minute or experiencing intense stress about filing incorrectly. If you’re dealing with financial stress right now, you’re not alone.

“Many Americans experience high stress during tax times, and many Americans are dealing with financial stress,” financial wellness expert Joyce Marter said.

You might think emotions and money don’t go together, but they often affect each other, said Lindsay Bryan-Podvin, financial therapist and founder of Mind Money Balance.

“Our money and mental health intersect because they’re two parts of our overall wellness,” said Bryan-Podvin.

Here are recommendations from experts to reduce financial stress during tax season while still getting your return done by the deadline:

Don’t avoid, plan

Financial stress can happen all year long. While tax season is only a window of time, it comes with something that can be daunting: a deadline. Some might find a deadline motivates them to get things done, while others can feel paralyzed by it, said Dr. Tanya Farber, psychologist at McLean Hospital, a mental health facility in Massachusetts.

“If we’re overwhelmed by our anxiety, that’s where it may lead us to avoid thinking about finances or trying to avoid thinking about taxes,” Farber said.

Although you do have an option of filing for an extension, Farber doesn’t recommend prolonging the period when you have to worry about taxes. Instead, a good first step is to make a detailed plan to tackle them.

Farber recommends you break down all of the steps and start completing them one by one. A key step is to start gathering all of your documents, such as your W-2 or 1099 forms, savings and investment records, eligible deductions and tax credits, ahead of sitting down to file your taxes. Once you have a list of steps, scheduling times to complete the tasks will make it easier to build momentum.

While the required documents might depend on your individual case, here is a general list of what everyone needs:

If you need help making a plan, search for tax checklists, which can be a great tool to make sure you have everything you need.

Face your fears

For many, anxiety over filing taxes comes from fear, Farber said. Whether it’s fear of making a mistake in your return or unexpectedly owing thousands of dollars, these fears can overwhelm you to the point of avoiding even looking at your taxes.

If you identify that fear is what’s stopping you from filing, Farber recommends that you ask yourself if whatever you’re afraid of is likely to happen.

“When we have fears, they’re possible, probable or definite,” Farber said. “And oftentimes anxiety is the highest when we’re assuming the worst-case scenario.”

If thinking about your fears by yourself is not helping, Bryan-Podvin recommends you discuss them with a friend or a family member. In many cases, talking with someone else might help you focus on what might actually happen rather than focusing on the worst-case scenarios.

Focus on self-care

If tax season brings a lot of financial stress for you, Bryan-Podvin recommends that you increase the amount of self-care activities you’re doing. Activities such as taking a walk, spending time with your dog or getting enough sleep can help soothe stress.

“We are going to be doing things that are difficult and depleting and anxiety-provoking so doing more things that are restorative can help us balance that,” Farber said.

Doing restorative activities can work as a toolbox of coping skills when you’re in the middle of a stressful situation, like filing taxes.

Ask for support

You might feel like you’ll be judged if you talk about money, but that’s often not the case. Talking about finances with your friends or family can be a moment to receive support, she said.

“Talking with others is going to give you access to more information and resources and also helps remove the shame and stigma because you’re not alone,” Marter said.

Whether it’s talking with a tax professional or reaching out to your most tax-savvy family member, proactively seeking support will help you avoid being stressed if you’re filing very close to the deadline.

Additionally, if you are experiencing mental health struggles, there are several resources you can use to find professional help.

In the U.S., you can dial 211 to speak with a mental health expert, confidentially and for free.

Other mental health resources include:

Veterans Crisis Line: call 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

Crisis Text Line: Text the word ‘Home’ to 741-741

The Trevor Lifeline for LGBTQ Youth: 1-866-488-7386

The Trans Lifeline: 1-877-565-8860

Dave Duell was on his normal long-haul trucking route along Interstate 5 South when a 40-to-50-pound turkey flew into the roadway.

Emily-Jean Duell, the trucker’s daughter, said while the incident left her father with some pretty serious injuries the initial surprise left her feeling lighthearted.

“Laughing,” she said. “Lots of laughing. I had shown him the second I got it, the picture of the turkey looking down the barrel of the dashcam and at his windshield. Even with his broken rib, he was laughing at it. He thought it was hilarious.”

Emily said it wasn’t all a laughing matter when she got a phone call from a nurse, explaining to her that a bird had smashed through her father’s windshield and knocked him unconscious. The collision with the turkey sent his semi-hauling three trailers off the roadway in rural Oregon.

At first, all she knew was that a big bird had caused serious damage to the truck and her dad.

“I was thinking a hawk,” she said.

Emily nervously hit the road to look for her dad and found him at a Medford hospital.

She would eventually learn that it was a turkey that had flown into the roadway.

“They were cleaning his wounds and pulled out some turkey feathers,” she said.

She described her father as a goofy guy who doesn’t take anything too seriously.

He suffered a broken rib and tooth, a fractured jaw and a fractured vertebra in his neck. However, she said the worst of it is the bone around one of his eyes was shattered.

“They called it an orbital blowout,” which she said her father will need surgery for. “The entire bone behind his left eye is shattered.”

Despite the aftermath and what she describes as an emotional roller coaster, she said her father is lucky to have crossed paths with the bird and survive. She said one doctor shared with her that he could’ve easily been killed.

“It all could have been astronomically different,” she said. “The time to worry about him surviving is over and n

Between 2016 and 2020, a team of researchers fixed tags equipped with cameras onto tiger sharks so that they could view the ocean floor from a new perspective. The data they collected revealed what is the world’s largest known seagrass ecosystem, an area of up to 92,000 square kilometers (35,000 square miles) in the Bahamas. According to their study, published in 2022, this extends the total known global seagrass coverage by more than 40%.

This is significant as seagrasses trap and store massive amounts of carbon in the sediment and are therefore a vital tool in mitigating climate change.

Dr. Austin Gallagher, one of the report’s co-authors and founder and CEO of ocean research organization Beneath the Waves, believes that tiger sharks and other marine life can help scientists to map ocean ecosystems and lead to other significant discoveries. As guest editor for Call to Earth, he spoke to CNN about what it’s like collaborating with tiger sharks and the importance of protecting the ocean’s carbon sinks.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

CNN: When did the idea to put a camera on a tiger shark come about?

We’ve been putting cameras on animals for decades in the scientific community and we’ve been doing that in the field of sharks for many years now. So, it wasn’t completely novel, but we wanted to advance our work on tiger sharks to get a better understanding of what a day in the life of a tiger shark looked like. To do that, we needed to be able to see what the animals were seeing because we can infer all sorts of types of patterns based on their movement: where they go and how much time they spend in certain areas and habitats. When we did that, it opened a whole Pandora’s box of new questions and it eventually put us down a path of radical discovery here in The Bahamas.

CNN: What did you discover from the tiger shark data?

We knew that tiger sharks spend a lot of time over the shallow water carbonate banks here in The Bahamas and we knew that there is an expansive seagrass ecosystem here, but it wasn’t until we got the data back from those camera-equipped tiger sharks that we really saw how important and expansive the seagrass might be. It turned the light bulb on for the first time: that we need to map out how much seagrass is here.

We knew that we had to map it out from space, because while tiger sharks gave us a dozen or so good traces with those camera tags, we had to take Earth-orbiting satellites and a remote-sensing approach to map out how much was there. It would never be possible as humans, or as tiger sharks, to do the entire exclusive economic zone of The Bahamas. So we did that and we were able to map it out. We put divers in the water to validate all the predictions from space, we took pictures ourselves of the sea floor, and we then used more data from tiger sharks, including 360-degree camera tags that gave us a full comprehensive look at what the animals were seeing.

It ended up validating a prediction of up to 93,000 square kilometers (35,000 square miles) of seagrass ecosystem here in The Bahamas, which makes it by far the largest on Earth. It was hiding in plain sight.

CNN: What more is there to discover?

We’re just at the beginning of understanding how valuable and how important this seagrass asset is, and what role tiger sharks, sea turtles and other threatened biodiversity plays in that relationship. And let’s also not forget about humans and the role that we play in the future of preserving these ecosystems.

Mapping and discovering them is just one part of it. Then it’s creating new protections around them and working with governments and environmental decision makers to really put all these data into the right packages and submit them to the right bodies that will eventually issue things like carbon credits that can be used to leverage protections, but also create financial benefits and ultimately long-term financial returns for places like The Bahamas.

CNN: What is blue carbon and why is it so valuable?

Blue carbon is a term for all the carbon that ends up in the ocean. It happens naturally and it is stored and sequestered in the ocean in its various sediments, largely through plants – things like seagrasses, mangroves, salt marshes. These are what we call blue carbon ecosystems, and through natural processes like photosynthesis, these plants sequester and store massive amounts of carbon – significantly more than their terrestrial counterparts.

If we want to try and create new protections for the ocean, if we want to try and build resiliency, particularly in low-lying countries and small island developing states, we have a real objective to build resilience in the place of climate change. One of the ways that we can do that is by working in partnership with nature: seagrasses, mangroves, they are what we call a nature-based solution to climate change. If we want to try and enhance coastal protection and create benefits for communities and biodiversity, going out and quantifying how much carbon and what the extent of that looks like is incredibly important for ocean research.

CNN: What is the end goal of your scientific research and work?

The ultimate goal of the work that I’m doing is to create empathy for the ocean and to also preserve what we have for future generations. To live harmoniously with these ecosystems, to find ways to live harmoniously with sharks, to protect these ecosystems like seagrass. It’s creating marine protected areas, it’s enhancing existing conservation measures for threatened species like sharks, but it’s about making sure that the legacy of these incredible ecosystems remains as intact as possible for as long as possible.

Hackers gained access to user accounts through stolen login credentials, Roku said in a blog post. The security breach was discovered while Roku monitored account activity after a cyberattack affected 15,000 accounts earlier this year.

In each instance, fraudsters used a cyberattack method known as credential stuffing: Hackers try login and password information leaked in one data breach on a variety of users’ accounts, exploiting people who use the same credentials across different accounts. (Experts recommend people use different passwords for each of their online accounts.)

Credentials used to access Roku accounts were likely from a data breach on a different site, the company said in a statement.

“There is no indication that Roku was the source of the account credentials used in these attacks or that Roku’s systems were compromised in either incident,” the company said.

In fewer than 400 cases, hackers used Roku accounts to make purchases on streaming services and Roku products but did not gain access to sensitive financial information. Roku is reversing charges and refunding all affected accounts, the company said in a statement.

“These malicious actors were not able to access sensitive user information or full credit card information,” the company said.

User passwords have been automatically reset, and users affected by the security breach will be contacted by Roku, the company said in a statement.

Roku, a streaming giant, hosts more than 80 million users. The company announced it is implementing two-factor authentication across all Roku accounts. The two-step security confirmation prompts users on a second device whenever there’s an attempted log in.

“We sincerely regret that these incidents occurred and any disruption they may have caused. Your account security is a top priority, and we are committed to protecting your Roku account,” the company said in a statement.

The company’s stock is down nearly 3% since the security breach was announced.

Tips for securing your account

Users looking to protect their online accounts should create unique passwords that comprise a mix of letters, symbols and numbers at least eight characters long.

Be aware of internet scams, phishing emails and suspicious requests for login or financial information.

Roku users should contact customer support when in doubt and periodically log in to accounts to review purchases and subscriptions, the company said in a statement.

Police were called to Westfield Bondi Junction on Saturday afternoon local time following reports of multiple people stabbed. Witnesses described scenes of panic with some forced to hide in shops as the attack unfolded.

New South Wales (NSW) police commissioner Karen Webb said four women and a man died at the shopping mall, while another woman passed away at the hospital.

She said that eight people are currently being treated for injuries in hospitals around Sydney, including a nine-month-old infant who has been in surgery.

The suspect – who police said acted alone – was shot dead at the scene by a lone officer.

NSW’s Assistant Commissioner Anthony Cooke said a senior police inspector was nearby when the attack unfolded.

She arrived on the scene first and was alone when she engaged with the attacker. She shot the offender when he raised a knife at her.

“She discharged her firearm, and that person is now deceased,” Cooke said.

Webb told reporters that current elements do not point to a terror motive, but said that the investigation will be ongoing “for many, many days” and that it is “too early to say” what was behind the attack.

According to Webb, police believe that the suspect was a 40-year-old man but as background checks remain ongoing, she could not provide further identification details.

A law enforcement source briefed on the investigation told CNN the suspect had no prior contact with Australian counterterrorism officials, but had had at least one encounter with New South Wales Police in the past related to mental health issues.

The officer who shot him was also seen in videos on social media administering CPR to those who had been injured. Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the officer a hero who “no doubt saved lives.”

The suspect encountered nine people after he entered the mall at 3:10 pm local time, according to police. He left and reentered the mall at 3:20 pm before carrying out his attack.

‘Pandemonium’

Videos shared on social media show shoppers running from multiple exits of the shopping center, while police helicopters can be heard overhead.

CNN’s Australian affiliate, 9 News Sydney, spoke to an eyewitness who said people were running through the shopping center and falling over each other, describing the situation as “pandemonium.”

Two male eyewitnesses told 9 News they saw a baby and mother stabbed.

“We were holding the baby and trying to compress the baby,” one said. “Same with the mother, trying to compress the blood from stopping.”

Another witness described seeing a man in a green shirt stabbing others “indiscriminately.”

“[We just heard] screaming, screaming and it didn’t seem that long before we heard ‘boom boom boom’ of the gunshot and we thought, ‘We hope it’s the police,’” the witness told Australia’s state broadcaster ABC. “It was just carnage.”

In a televised address, Prime Minister Albanese said the attack was “beyond words or understanding.”

He continued: “Today Bondi Junction was the scene of shocking violence. But it was also witness to the humanity and the heroism of our fellow Australians.

“Our brave police, our first responders, and of course everyday people who could never have imagined they would face such a moment.”

Leaders and dignitaries from around the world expressed their shock at the attacks. Britain’s King Charles III, who is head of state in Australia, said he and his wife Queen Camilla are “utterly shocked and horrified” by the killings. Pope Francis said he was “deeply saddened,” according to a statement from the Vatican.

Mass casualty events are rare in Australia. At least four people were killed and one injured in a mass shooting in Darwin, northern Australia in 2019.

April 1996 saw a mass shooting which became known as the Port Arthur massacre – the deadliest in Australia’s modern history – when 35 people were killed in the tourist town in the state of Tasmania.

Officials at Lake Mead National Recreation Area said the damage happened during a recent weekend near the Redstone Dune Trail on the north side of the lake. The petrified red dunes found there make it one of the most popular hiking spots in the park.

A video shows two men shoving chunks of sandstone off the edge of an outcropping as a girl screams. Park officials called the behavior appalling, saying the damage can’t be fixed.

“It’s one of my favorite places in the park and they’re up there just destroying it. I don’t understand that,” John Haynes, public information officer at Lake Mead National Recreation Area, told television station KVVU.

Destruction like this at federally protected sites can result in felony charges that come along with potential fines and jail time, Haynes said.

Spanning 2,344 square miles (6,071 square kilometers) of mountains and desert canyons, the Lake Mead National Recreation Area just outside of Las Vegas draws around 6 million visitors every year. Officials said staffing levels mean park officials often rely on the public to also keep watch over resources within park boundaries.

Authorities said visitors can use their cellphones to capture any video or photos of suspicious activity if it’s safe to do so and to collect any information, such as a license plate, that might help to identify offenders. The National Park Service operates a tipline that receives thousands of submissions each year.

“It’s really important to let us know,” Haynes said.

There also have been others cases of vandalism on federal land across the West over the past decade, with visitors defacing petroglyphs, toppling rock features and pounding climbing bolts into centuries-old rock art.

The cruise port bus was dropping off people near a pier when a bystander informed the driver that the bus was moving forward. The driver jumped into the driver’s seat and tried to stop the bus, but pressed the gas pedal instead of the brakes, police said.

“Somebody screamed, and then I looked over and the bus hit into the crowd. It just kept going until it hit the wall there,” witness Janet Lightfoot told CNN affiliate KHNL/KGMB.

The bus struck concrete barriers and 11 people, five of whom were transported to hospitals for treatment, according to the police. One woman died from her injuries, while the others were listed in good condition, police said. Six people refused treatment.

Carnival Cruise Line said nine guests from the Carnival Miracle ship were among those involved in the accident, including the woman who died.

“She was traveling with her husband, who was also injured and is expected to recover,” the cruise line said.

Police said investigations are ongoing, but so far speed does not appear to be an issue in the accident. “It is unknown if drugs or alcohol were contributing factors to this collision,” the Honolulu Police Department said.

CNN has reached out to the shuttle bus company and is awaiting a response.

The Carnival Miracle is midway through a 15-day sailing journey that left Long Beach, California.

Calling the outcome “a very significant strategic success,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Iran fired 170 drones, more than 30 cruise missiles and more than 120 ballistic missiles. Of those, several ballistic missiles reached Israeli territory, causing minor damage to an air base.

Rescuers said a 7-year-old girl in a Bedouin Arab town was seriously wounded in southern Israel, apparently in a missile strike, though they said police were still investigating the circumstances of her injuries.

In Washington, President Joe Biden said U.S. forces helped Israel down “nearly all” the drones and missiles and pledged to convene allies to develop a unified response.

The Iranian attack, less than two weeks after a suspected Israeli strike in Syria that killed two Iranian generals in an Iranian consular building, marked the first time Iran has launched a direct military assault on Israel, despite decades of enmity dating back to the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Condemnation from the United Nations chief and others was swift, with France saying Iran “is risking a potential military escalation,” Britain calling the attack “reckless” and Germany saying Iran and its proxies “must stop it immediately.”

Hagari said the vast majority of the intercepts came outside Israel’s borders, including 10 cruise missiles that were intercepted by warplanes.

“A wide-scale attack by Iran is a major escalation,” he said. Asked whether Israel would respond, Hagari said only that the army “does and will do whatever is required to protect the security of the state of Israel.” He said the incident was not over, and dozens of Israeli warplanes remained in the skies.

Israel’s military said its Arrow system, which shoots down ballistic missiles outside the atmosphere, handled most interceptions and noted that “strategic partners” were involved.

“At my direction, to support the defense of Israel, the U.S. military moved aircraft and ballistic missile defense destroyers to the region over the course of the past week,” Biden said in a statement. “Thanks to these deployments and the extraordinary skill of our service members, we helped Israel take down nearly all of the incoming drones and missiles.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a separate statement that U.S. forces “intercepted dozens of missiles and UAVs en route to Israel, launched from Iran, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.”

Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke early Sunday, Israeli time, their governments said. Biden said in his statement that he reaffirmed “America’s ironclad commitment” to Israel’s security — a departure from his growing criticism of Israel’s conduct in its war on Hamas in Gaza.

Iran had vowed revenge since the April 1 airstrike in Syria, which Tehran accused Israel of being responsible for. Israel hasn’t commented on it.

Israel and Iran have been on a collision course throughout Israel’s six-month war against Hamas militants in Gaza. The war erupted after Hamas and Islamic Jihad, two militant groups backed by Iran, carried out a devastating cross-border attack on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 250 others. An Israeli offensive in Gaza has caused widespread devastation and killed over 33,000 people, according to local health officials.

Almost immediately after the war erupted, Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon, began attacking Israel’s northern border. The two sides have been involved in daily exchanges of fire, while Iranian-backed groups in Iraq, Syria and Yemen have launched rockets and missiles toward Israel.

In a statement carried late Saturday by Iran’s state-run IRNA news agency, the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard acknowledged launching “dozens of drones and missiles towards the occupied territories and positions of the Zionist regime.”

In a later statement, the Revolutionary Guard issued a direct warning to the U.S.: “The terrorist U.S. government is warned any support or participation in harming Iran’s interests will be followed by decisive and regretting response by Iran’s armed forces.”

IRNA also quoted an anonymous official saying ballistic missiles were part of the attack. A ballistic missile moves on an arch trajectory, heading up into space before gravity brings the weapon down at a speed several times faster than the speed of sound.

Israel has a multilayered air-defense network that includes systems capable of intercepting a variety of threats including long-range missiles, cruise missiles, drones and short-range rockets. However, in a massive attack involving multiple drones and missiles, the likelihood of a strike making it through is higher.

Iran has a vast arsenal of drones and missiles. Online videos shared by Iranian state television purported to show delta-wing-style drones resembling the Iranian Shahed-136s long used by Russia in its war on Ukraine. The slow-flying drones carry bombs. Ukraine has successfully used both surface-to-air missiles and ground fire to target them.

Some Israelis watched the interceptions light up the night sky.

Air raid sirens were reported in numerous places including northern Israel, southern Israel, the northern West Bank and the Dead Sea near the Jordanian border.

Israel’s army ordered residents in the Golan Heights — near the Syrian and Lebanese borders — as well as the southern towns of Nevatim and Dimona and the Red Sea resort of Eilat into protective spaces. Dimona is home to Israel’s main nuclear facility, and Nevatim has a major air base. Loud booms were heard in Jerusalem and northern and southern Israel.

The army’s Home Front Command canceled school Sunday and limited public gatherings to no more than 1,000 people. Israel and some other countries in the region closed their airspace.

Earlier, Netanyahu warned: “Whoever harms us, we will harm them.”

In Washington, Biden convened a principals meeting of the National Security Council to discuss the attack.

Gen. Erik Kurilla, the head of the U.S. military’s Central Command, was in Israel over the weekend consulting with Israeli defense officials. The Central Command oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations issued a warning to both Israel and the U.S. “Should the Israeli regime make another mistake, Iran’s response will be considerably more severe,” it wrote online. “It is a conflict between Iran and the rogue Israeli regime, from which the U.S. MUST STAY AWAY!”

For days, Iranian officials including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had threatened to “slap” Israel for the Syria strike.

In Iran’s capital, Tehran, witnesses saw long lines at gas stations early Sunday as people appeared worried about what may come next. Dozens of hard-liners demonstrated in support of the attack at Palestine Square.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported heavy Israeli airstrikes and shelling on multiple locations in south Lebanon following Iran’s launch of drones. The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah said it launched “dozens” of Katyusha rockets at an Israeli military site in the Golan Heights early Sunday. It was not immediately clear if there was any damage.

Iranian missiles or drones were intercepted in the sky above the Jordanian capital, Amman. In Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, and elsewhere in the country, residents reported seeing missiles in the sky and hearing explosions, likely from interceptions. In Syria, explosions were heard in the capital, Damascus, and elsewhere. Britain-based war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that Syrian air defenses tried to shoot down Israeli attempts to intercept Iranian missiles.

According to the police official, the abduction took place on Friday in Baluchistan province, which has long been the scene of an insurgency by separatists fighting for independence.

Deputy Commissioner Habibullah Mosakhail said the gunmen set up a blockade, then stopped the bus and went through the passengers’ ID cards. They took eight people with them, all from the eastern Punjab province, fleeing into the mountains, he said.

Police later recovered eight bodies under a bridge about 5 kilometers (3 miles) from the highway. Earlier on Friday, the same gunmen had opened fire at a vehicle that failed to stop for their blockade, killing two and wounding six.

A search for the perpetrators was underway, Mosakhail said. The bus was heading from the provincial capital of Quetta to Taftan, a town bordering Iran.

Abductions are rare in Baluchistan, where militants usually target police forces and soldiers or infrastructure.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the killings. Police said there was no ransom demand and no indication of a motive for the attacks.

The brush fire erupted earlier this week on Andros Island. Easterly winds carried smoke from the fire to Miami-Dade and Broward counties, even leading to an air quality alert in Fort Lauderdale.

While the fire continues to burn through a forest, firefighters said they’ve been able to keep it from spreading to populated areas.

Crews with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and the Ehattesaht First Nation made the decision Friday afternoon the orca calf was not ready to be moved and stood down from their rescue attempt, according to a news release from the department.

The calf became stranded in the Zeballos lagoon after its mother got trapped on a sandbar in the lagoon’s shallow waters and died on March 23. The mother was pregnant at the time of her death.

Crews tried several methods to coax the calf into the shallow area of the lagoon but she refused, the release said. Friday’s operation was the result of almost a week of planning and the work of 50 people, including six boats and 15 people in the water. Meanwhile, the whale has received an outpouring of love from the surrounding community as they hope for it to be reunited with its family.

“It is during efforts like this that many of us are truly humbled at the intelligence, adaptability and resilience of the orca,” department officials said in the statement. “No matter how much we study these amazing creatures the more we realize how little we know.”

Officials have been monitoring the calf daily and working to formulate the best plan to relocate the animal and reunite it with its family pod. The orca is still in good health and swimming well, according to veterinarians who assessed the animal.

Dr. Martin Haulena, a veterinarian with the Vancouver Aquarium, said the veterinary team got a closer look at the whale than they have in the past. The orca is “doing very well” and there are no critical animal health concerns, but its skin is turning a little white, which might have to do with the lagoon’s salinity, Haulena said. It is difficult to tell whether the calf is eating, though there are duck, seals and fish in the lagoon, so the immediate need is to provide her nutrition in some way.

“This is not a spot where she should normally be and she is not with the whales that she should normally be accompanied by. And she’s a very young whale that would normally still be very close to her mother and depending on her mother for things,” Haulena said at a news conference Friday. “In the long-term, this is not a great situation by any stretch.”

Crews are taking Friday afternoon to work on planning the next steps for the rescue operation. They have tried multiple methods to get the calf to leave the lagoon on its own, including “acoustic playbacks” – playing the sounds of other orca whales, but nothing worked, Paul Cottrell with Fisheries and Oceans Canada said earlier Thursday.

“Some of the techniques that we’ve been using in the past, they’re less effective, unfortunately, as we use them more,” Cottrell said at a news conference Friday. “So we are looking to change our approach going forward to maybe a different tactic and we’re gonna be working on that in the next while to see if we can implement that, some planning and logistic changes, to see if we can help this poor calf get back to its family.”

With the orca reluctant to leave the area, Cottrell said, they will have to work within the space to see if they can isolate the whale.

Officials initially planned to transport the calf using a helicopter, but pivoted to using a truck and boat to avoid stressing the animal. They hope to eventually lure the calf into an area where they can move it onto a truck then drive the animal and place it on a boat, which would bring it into a net pod, Ehattesaht First Nation Chief Simon John said. They plan to continue the rescue operation within a few days, John said Friday.

The orca, which locals have named “Little Brave Hunter” or “Kʷiisaḥiʔis” in the Ehattesaht First Nation language and writing system, will then wait in the net pen until its family passes by. It will hopefully be released and reunite with its relatives, John explained. The net pen is planned to be in Esperanza, southeast of Zeballos.

Officials hope they can implement the plan within the next week. “It’s a huge effort and we have a long way to go,” Cottrell said. “We’re hoping for the best possible outcome.”

The orca’s family pod was last spotted March 30.

“There’s a lot of eyes and ears that are looking out for the related pod,” Cottrell said Friday. “There’s a very high likelihood in a short amount of time there will be some sort of interaction or reunion and that’s what we’re hoping for.”

Bay Cetology, one of the organizations working to coordinate the rescue, told CNN the orca is “robust, showing no immediate signs of emaciation.” There have been attempts to feed the calf, but it’s unclear if it has eaten anything, according to the organization.

“This whale’s skin has just started to slough in sizable patches along the top of the head and base of the dorsal fin on each side perhaps due to the freshwater runoff into the lagoon it is in,” says the organization.

Moving the orca calf “will require a lot of patience as well as cooperation from the whale,” Bay Cetology added.

Orcas – also known as killer whales – are found in all the world’s oceans, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. They are highly social, living in family pods of up to 20 or more whales. Calves typically stay with their mothers for the first two years of life, according to the agency.

This is not the first time officials in Canada have strategized to rescue a solitary and stranded orca calf. In 2002, an orca calf who came to be named Springer was spotted alone in Puget Sound, prompting an extensive capture and relocation effort. She is considered the first orca in history to successfully rejoin a wild population after human intervention.

U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika’s ruling increases the prospect that Biden could face trial in the case as early as June, in the midst of his father’s reelection campaign. His efforts to scuttle the other criminal case he faces in California involving tax allegations have also failed.

Norieka denied several defense requests to dismiss the case charging Biden with lying about his drug use in October 2018 on a form to buy a gun that he kept for about 11 days.

His lawyers had argued the case was politically motivated and asserted that an immunity provision from an original plea deal that fell apart still holds. They had also challenged the appointment of Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss as special counsel to lead the prosecution.

Noreika, who was appointed to the bench by former President Donald Trump, has not yet ruled on a challenge to the constitutionality of the gun charges.

Biden has pleaded not guilty. A representative for his legal team didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

The president’s son has acknowledged struggling with an addiction to crack cocaine during that period in 2018, but his lawyers have said he didn’t break the law and another nonviolent, first-time offender would not have been charged.

The yearslong investigation had looked ready to wrap up with a plea deal last year, but the agreement imploded after a judge raised questions about it. Biden was subsequently indicted.

Under the deal, he would have gotten a plea deal in which he would have gotten two years’ probation after pleading guilty to misdemeanor tax charges. He also would have avoided prosecution on the gun charge if he stayed out of trouble. He was subsequently indicted.

Hunter Biden’s attorneys have argued that prosecutors bowed to political pressure to indict the president’s son amid heavy criticism of the plea deal from Trump and other Republicans.

Prosecutors countered the evidence against him was “overwhelming,” including cocaine residue found in the pouch where he stored his gun, and noted that charges had been filed during the presidency of his father, Joe Biden.

Norieka said in her ruling that Biden’s team provided “nothing concrete” to support a conclusion that anyone actually influenced the special counsel’s team.

“The pressure campaign from Congressional Republicans may have occurred around the time that Special Counsel decided to move forward with indictment instead of pretrial diversion, but the Court has been given nothing credible to suggest that the conduct of those lawmakers (or anyone else) had any impact on Special Counsel,” the judge wrote. “It is all speculation.”

Hunter Biden faces separate tax counts in Los Angeles alleging he failed to pay at least $1.4 million in taxes over three years while living an “extravagant lifestyle,” during his days of using drugs. The judge overseeing that case knocked down eight motions to dismiss those charges earlier this month. That trial is scheduled to begin in June.

The Border Patrol made 137,480 arrests of people entering from Mexico, down 2.3% from 140,638 arrests in February, the first time since 2017 that arrests fell in March from the previous month. Crossings typically rise as temperatures turn warmer.

Mexico detained migrants 240,000 times in the first two months of the year, more than triple from the same period of 2023, sending many deeper south into the country to discourage them from coming to the United States. While Mexico hasn’t released figures for March, U.S. officials have said Mexican enforcement is largely responsible for recent declines.

“Encounters at our southern border are lower right now, but we remain prepared for changes, continually managing operations to respond to ever-shifting transnational criminal activities and migration patterns,” said Troy Miller, acting commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The March arrest tally is one of the lowest of Joe Biden’s presidency after a record high of nearly 250,000 in December. While conditions quickly change, the decline is welcome news for the White House at a time when immigration has become a top voter concern in an election year. Biden said this month that he is still considering executive action to suspend asylum at the border if crossings hit a certain threshold.

Tucson, Arizona, was again the busiest of the Border Patrol’s nine sectors on the Mexican border in March, a position it has held since summer, followed by San Diego and El Paso, Texas. Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, the busiest corridor for illegal crossings for much of the last decade, is fifth busiest, signaling how quickly routes are changing.

The arrest tally excludes new and expanded paths to enter the country legally under presidential powers, known as parole, which allow people to stay temporarily and apply for work permits.

U.S. authorities granted entry to 44,000 people at land crossings with Mexico in March through an online appointment system, CBP One. More than 547,000 have been allowed in the country through CBP One since it was introduced in January, led by Venezuelans, Haitians and Mexicans.

More than 400,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela have been allowed to enter the U.S. through March after applying online with a financial sponsor and arriving at an airport, paying their way.

The violence was the latest in an escalation in the West Bank that has accompanied the war in the Gaza Strip. An Israeli rights group said the settlers were searching for a missing 14-year-old boy from their settlement. After the rampage, Israeli troops said they were still searching for the teen.

The killing came after an Israeli raid overnight killed two Palestinians, including a Hamas militant, in confrontation with Israeli forces.

Palestinian health officials say over 460 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces since the war erupted in October.

The Israeli human rights group Yesh Din said that settlers stormed into the village of al-Mughayyir late Friday, searching for the Israeli boy. The group said that settlers were shooting and setting houses on fire in the village.

Videos posted to X by the rights group showed dark clouds of smoke billowing from burning cars as gunshots rang out. A photo posted by the group showed what appeared to be a crowd of masked settlers.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said that one man was brought dead to a hospital and 25 were treated for wounds. The Palestine Red Crescent Society said eight of the injured were hit by live fire from settlers.

The deceased man was later identified by his family as 26-year-old Jehad Abu Alia. His father, Afif Abu Alia, said he was shot and killed but was unsure whether the fatal bullet was fired by an armed settler or an Israeli soldier.

“My son went with others to defend our land and honor, and this is what happened,” Afif Abu Alia said from a hospital in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where his son’s corpse had been transported.

The attack was condemned by Mohamed Mustafa, the new Palestinian prime minister.

The Israeli army said it was searching for the 14-year-old boy, and that forces had opened fire when stones were hurled at soldiers by Palestinians. It said “hits were identified,” and soldiers also cleared out Israeli settlers from the village.

“As of this moment, the violent riots have been dispersed and there are no Israeli civilians present within the town,” it said.

U.S. officials, including President Joe Biden, have repeatedly raised concerns about a surge in settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank since Israel’s war with the militant Hamas group in the Gaza Strip began. Rights groups have long accused the military of failing to halt settler violence or punish soldiers for wrongdoing.

Earlier on Friday, two Palestinians were killed in confrontations with Israeli forces in the northern West Bank, Palestinian medics and the military said. Hamas said one of those killed was a local commander.

The military said the target of the soldiers’ raid was Mohammed Daraghmeh, a local Hamas commander. It said Daraghmeh was killed in a shootout with Israeli soldiers who discovered weapons in his car. The army alleged that Daraghmeh had been planning attacks on Israeli targets but provided no evidence. It also said assailants hurled explosives at soldiers.

The Israel-Hamas war started on Oct. 7, when Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis, mostly civilians, in a surprise attack and incursion into southern Israel. Around 250 people were seized as hostages by the militants and taken to Gaza.

Israel said Friday it had opened a new crossing for aid trucks into hard-hit northern Gaza as ramps up aid deliveries to the besieged enclave. However, the United Nations says the surge of aid is not being felt in Gaza because of persistent distribution difficulties.

Six months of fighting in Gaza have pushed the tiny Palestinian territory into a humanitarian crisis, leaving more than 1 million people on the brink of starvation.

Israeli bombardments and ground offensives in Gaza have killed more than 33,600 Palestinians and wounded over 76,200, the Health Ministry says. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants in its tally, but says women and children make up two-thirds of the dead.

Israel says it has killed over 12,000 militants during the war, but it has not provided evidence to back up the claim.

The deal is significant, not just for the future of what is still a key US industry central to building everything from cars to appliances to roads and bridges, it is also at the center of election year politics and relations between the United States and Japan, a major ally.

The company announced that 98% of shares voted on the measure were in favor of the $14 billion deal.

“The overwhelming support from our stockholders is a clear endorsement that they recognize the compelling rationale for our transaction with Nippon Steel,” said US Steel CEO David Burritt. “This is an important milestone. This transaction truly represents the best path forward for all of US Steel’s stakeholders – union and non-union employees, customers, communities and stockholders – and for the United States.”

But the deal faces significant opposition from the United Steelworkers union and politicians on both sides of the aisle.

“We are not surprised by stockholders electing to cash in and sell out the iconic American company’s employees and retirees, along with the communities where we live and work,” said a statement from the USW. “Wall Street investors and U.S. Steel executives obviously stand to gain the most from Nippon … while leaving union members in the cold. Thankfully, today’s vote isn’t the end of the story: The decision ultimately isn’t simply up to shareholders and executives.”

For the deal to close, it needs approval from both the Justice Department, which enforces antitrust laws, and the normally low profile but powerful Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, made up of members of the President Joe Biden’s cabinet, including the secretaries of Treasury, Commerce, Defense, State, Homeland Security and the Attorney General.

And last month Biden came out publicly against the proposed deal.

“It is important that we maintain strong American steel companies powered by American steelworkers,” he said. “US Steel has been an iconic American steel company for more than a century, and it is vital for it to remain an American steel company that is domestically owned and operated.”

Experts said opposition from Biden and other politicians — both Republican and Democrats — make it unlikely the deal will win approval.

“It’s readily apparent … that electoral politics has overwhelmed any serious evaluation of this deal’s national security risk,” said Michael Leiter, head of the CFIUS and national security practices at law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. “That’s regrettable, but if you’re a US Steel shareholder it is impossible to ignore when evaluating the diminishing likelihood of a successful sale.”

Impact on US-Japanese relations

Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio, who is on a state visit to the United States this week, both dodged questions about the deal at a joint press conference Wednesday.

“We understand that discussions are underway between the parties,” said Kishida. “We hope that discussion will unfold in a direction that will be positive for both sides. Japan believes that appropriate procedures based on law is being implemented by the US government.”

“I stand by my commitment to American workers,” said Biden. “I’m a man of my word. I’m going to keep it. And in regards to that, I stand by our commitment to our alliance. This is exactly what we’re doing with a strong alliance as well.”

A senior administration official, in a briefing with journalists before the prime minister’s visit, said the administration’s opposition to the deal shouldn’t hurt relations between the countries.

“The relationship between the United States and Japan is far bigger and more significant than a single commercial deal,” said the official, who spoke on background. “Six weeks ago, the United States gave Mitsui, a Japanese company, a $20 billion deal to build a crane factory here in the United States and replace all our port cranes throughout the United States. Nothing says ‘trusted ally’ like a $20 billion contract with a Japanese company.

“Everybody understands where we are,” the senior official continued. “We’re in a different place fundamentally. And I just think that this single commercial transaction does not define not only the visit, but the relationship.”

Concern for union jobs

In his statement last month, Biden acknowledged that opposition to the deal by the United Steelworkers union was part of the reason for his decision.

“I told our steelworkers I have their backs, and I meant it,” he said.

And a week after Biden came out against the deal, the USW endorsed Biden for re-election.

It’s not just Biden opposing the deal. Numerous Republicans, including Ohio Senator JD Vance, have also denounced the deal, and this week charged that US Steel misled shareholders when seeking support for the deal because it failed “to accurately convey the significant political obstacles and regulatory risks the merger faces.”

Shares of US Steel stock plunged Thursday in the wake of Biden’s comment, closing 23% below Nippon’s $55 a share asking price. It made shareholder approval a virtual certainty ahead of the vote, said Phil Gibbs, steel analyst with KeyBanc, even if the deal is eventually blocked. Share were down nearly 3% in afternoon trading Friday even after the vote.

“The stock was trading at $20 a share not long ago. Of course they they think it’s a great deal,” he said.

What happens next?

If the deal ends up being blocked, it’s not clear what happens next.

The nation’s automakers wrote to the White House after Biden announced his opposition to the Nippon-US Steel deal to say a Cleveland Cliffs-US Steel deal would place 65% to 90% of steel used in vehicles under the control of a single company. It said it therefore supported the Nippon deal for US Steel instead.

US Steel rival Cleveland Cliffs, the nation’s other major unionized steelmaker, tried to buy US Steel last summer, only to have its $32.53 a share cash-and-stock offer rejected by the company. And Gibbs said despite the support such a deal would have from the USW, it’s not clear it would be able to win approval from antitrust regulators.

“American jobs … rely on a fair and competitive steel industry too,” the auto industry trade group said in its letter to the White House. “If the administration has concerns about the Nippon Steel deal, it must seriously consider alternative outcomes. One option that should not be on the table is an arrangement that creates a market concentration of domestic steel production in a single company.”

Different ways to make steel

Neither US Steel nor Cleveland Cliffs are the largest American steel company today. That would be Nucor, which makes steel with electric furnaces that melt scrap and other raw materials, rather than with the massive blast furnaces used by US Steel and Cleveland Cliffs.

Electric furnaces are more efficient, both in energy use and labor needed, than traditional integrated steel mills that use blast furnaces to make steel from raw materials like iron ore. But Nucor and other steelmakers using electric furnaces have been unable to produce the quality of steel needed by the auto industry — despite decades of trying — partly because their business model means its more profitable to make mass quantities of lower grade steel, said Gibbs.

“Auto steel is still a relatively niche product,” he said. “I think new mills are working in that direction. But it’s not something they can do overnight. Nucor has been working on this for a long time.”

He said Nucor could make automotive quality steel, but it just can’t make much money doing it.

“In this market, it hasn’t been a good use of their time,” he said.

US Steel has purchased its own electric furnaces to make steel in Arkansas, a nonunion operation that is valued more highly by Nippon in this deal than its unionized blast furnace operations, to which it has assigned relatively little value.

That’s a major reason the USW so strongly opposes the deal, the fear that Nippon would eventually close the blast furnaces operations that employ its members. Nippon insists it will honor US Steel’s contracts with the union should the deal go through.

US Steel still wants the deal

US Steel said last month in the wake of Biden’s comments that it is still hopeful the deal will be approved and close.

“The President said he has the backs of the steelworkers. So do we,” US Steel said in a statement. “As part of this investment to grow US Steel and the American steel market, it has been made clear that there will be no job losses, no plant closures and no transfer of production resulting from this transaction.”

“US Steel’s union commitments will be honored and benefit from increased financial strength. US Steel products, supported by significant capital investments from Nippon Steel, will remain mined, melted and made in America,” the company said. “We strongly believe this is the best path forward for employees, customers, stockholders and the United States.”

But the USW said there is nothing in the negotiation behind the deal that would lead it to trust either company to live up to its commitments. It said a letter it received last month from Nippon was “nothing more than another collection of empty promises and open-ended language that would enable it to skirt obligations to workers and retirees.”

“Essentially, the loss of critical natural resources and the loss of capital needed to produce it is a national security issue,” said KeyBanc’s Gibbs. “It’s a building block for anything you want to do from infrastructure to consumer durables.”

The national security concerns of the union and politicians opposed to the deal are legitimate, even if steel isn’t thought of as a military asset the way computer chips or other technology might be, according to Gibbs. The loss of the ability to make steel from raw materials — and have the workers trained to make that steel — would have a significant impact, he said.

And given the election year politics, the USW and its ally at Cleveland Cliffs have a fair amount of leverage in fighting this deal, said Gibbs.

“I don’t think the union has held this much leverage in a transaction like this. It’s decided it might as well use it,” he said.

The intentional crash into the single-story brick building off a highway in Brenham, a rural town outside of Houston, littered debris in the parking lot and left a gaping hole in the entrance. The crash damaged the front of the red semitrailer, which was hauling materials on a flatbed.

After crashing into the building the first time, the driver backed up the truck with the intention of smashing it again before being detained, Brenham Mayor Atwood Kenjura said.

“It’s unfortunate that we are here gathered for a really senseless tragedy,” Kenjura said.

The driver — identified as Clenard Parker, 42 — was pulled out of the truck by authorities at the Texas Department of Public Safety office. Authorities say Parker did not resist when he was taken into custody and would face multiple felonies, but did not specify the charges.

On Thursday, Parker was told by employees at the office that he would not be eligible to renew his commercial driver’s license, Texas Department of Public Safety Sgt. Justin Ruiz said. He did not elaborate as to why Parker’s renewal was rejected.

One employee in the building was trapped “for a period of time” after the crash but no one who worked at the driver’s license office suffered serious injuries, Republican state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst said.

It was unclear Friday afternoon where the person who was killed was located at the time of the crash.

Following the crash, two people were flown to a hospital in Bryan and another to Houston. Three people were transported to local hospitals but later released, and eight others were treated on the scene.

Parker, who lived in Chappell Hill about 10 miles (16 kilometers) east of the crash site, was being held without bail Friday in the Washington County jail in Brenham on two initial charges — suspicion of evading arrest causing serious bodily injury and unauthorized use of a vehicle.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Parker had a lawyer or would be appointed one at a future court appearance. The jail’s website didn’t list an attorney or pending court date.

Ruiz said he didn’t know if Parker had a criminal record. He said they were still investigating whether he was armed at the time of the crash. He said they also were investigating whether his actions might be considered an act of terrorism.

“We’re trying to figure that out,” Ruiz said. He said the FBI was assisting in the investigation.

A heavy presence of police surrounded the building and drivers were urged to steer clear of the area on Friday. Brenham, a city of about 19,000 residents, is about 80 miles (128 kilometers) miles west of Houston.

Kolkhorst and Kenjura said the quick response by law enforcement helped avert a greater tragedy.

“We’re blessed more weren’t injured in this act of violence,” Kolkhorst said.

Kenjura said a fire department official told him if Parker had “veered to the left” and succeeded in striking the building again, “there would have been a collapse of the building resulting in more injuries and possibly death.”

The Texas Department of Public Safety is a sprawling agency and one of the largest state law enforcement operations in the country. It includes troopers who are a central part of a massive border security operation on the U.S.-Mexico border as well as the Texas Rangers, the state’s top criminal investigators. But the department also has offices across the state that issue driver’s licenses.

The Texas Rangers were leading the investigation into the crash, Ruiz said.

During a two-month expedition, Gregory documented these flightless birds as they prepared for a critical rite of passage known as “Fledging.”

Fledging, the process where baby penguins take their first swim, typically involves smaller, less daunting jumps. But this recent footage revealed a group of emperor penguin chicks approaching the egde of a steep 50-foot cliff, which is an unusually high jump for these young birds.

The video captures the tense moments as the chicks cautiously inch toward the brink before plunging into the frigid Antarctic waters below.

The senior panda was diagnosed a few months ago after he began showing signs of lethargy. Since then, zookeepers have adjusted Moshu’s daily routine to ensure he receives the best care possible while continuing to enjoy his days.

“So Moshu gets up early, he is ready to go and eat his breakfast,” said a zookeeper at the facility. “We let Moshu do what he needs to do. And a lot of that is kind of exploring , eating snacks from his keepers throughout the day, and sleeping.”

The endangered mammal also undergoes laser therapy once a month.

According to PBS Nature, red pandas live about 8 to 10 years in the wild and up to 15 years when cared for by humans. According to a zoo spokesperson, the median life expectancy at AZA-accredited zoos is 10 to 12 years, though the oldest recorded red panda was nearly 22 years old.

A spokeswoman for Rice’s attorney confirmed to The Associated Press that Rice turned himself in at the Glenn Heights Police Department. Rice is being represented by Texas state Sen. Royce West.

Rice was booked into the Regional Jail in DeSoto, and West said he was released on bond Thursday night.

In an emailed statement, West emphasized what he called Rice’s “continued cooperation with law enforcement.”

“Mr. Rice acknowledges his actions and feels deeply for those injured as a result of this accident,” the lawyer said.

Rice said last week on Instagram that he was taking “full responsibility” for his part in the wreck.

On Wednesday, Dallas police said arrest warrants had been issued for Rice, 23, for one count of aggravated assault, one count of collision involving serious bodily injury and six counts of collision involving injury.

West said previously that Rice was driving a Lamborghini sport utility vehicle when the crash happened March 30.

Theodore Knox, 21, was driving the other speeding sports car, a Corvette, police said, and arrest warrants were issued for Knox on the same range of counts as for Rice. Dallas police said Thursday night that Knox was not currently in custody.

Southern Methodist University said earlier in the day that, after learning of the arrest warrant, Knox had been suspended from its football team. Knox’s attorney, Deandra Grant, said her client was cooperating with law enforcement.

Police have alleged that Rice and Knox were speeding in the far left lane when they lost control, and the Lamborghini traveled onto the shoulder and hit the center median wall, causing a chain collision.

Rice and Knox allegedly left following the crash without determining whether anyone needed medical attention or providing their information, according to police. Four people involved in the crash had minor injuries, police said.

Rice grew up in the Fort Worth suburb of North Richland Hills and played college football at nearby Southern Methodist, where a breakout senior season in 2022 put him on the radar of NFL teams.

The Chiefs selected him in the second round of last year’s draft, and he became one of the few dependable options in their passing game.

Archaeologists working at the world-famous site have uncovered a banqueting hall with black-painted walls covered with frescoes of mythological characters associated with the Trojan War.

The ornately decorated room provided an elegant setting for entertainment or conversation during banquets, the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, which oversees the site, said.

“The walls were painted black to prevent the smoke from the oil lamps being seen on the walls,” Gabriel Zuchtriegel, director of the archaeological park, said in a news release Thursday.

“People would meet to dine after sunset; the flickering light of the lamps had the effect of making the images appear to move, especially after a few glasses of good Campanian wine,” he continued.

One of the frescoes depicts a meeting between Helen and Paris, son of the Trojan king, Priam, identified by a Greek inscription of his other name, “Alexandros.” In Greek mythology, Paris’ abduction of Helen from her Greek husband, Menelaus, led to the Trojan War.

Another shows a downcast Cassandra, daughter of Priam, with the god Apollo.

As legend has it, Apollo promised Cassandra the gift of prophecy but, as she did not yield to his desires, punished her by also ordaining that her prophecies would never be believed. Her warning of the fall of Troy, for example, went unheeded.

The newly revealed dining room is about 15 meters long (49 feet) and six meters wide (20 feet) and opens onto a courtyard with a long staircase leading to the second floor, according to the release.

On the fresh plaster of the arches of the staircase, someone had used charcoal to draw two pairs of gladiators and what seems to be a huge, stylized phallus.

Beneath the arches, a large pile of building materials was found.

The ancient Greco-Roman city of Pompeii was buried under ash and volcanic glass during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 C.E. and since the 1700s, archeologists have been unearthing the city that’s been frozen in time.

The site contains 1,070 homes with more than 13,000 rooms, as well as public and sacred spaces, according to the archeological park. This latest discovery was made during a large, ongoing excavation.

Other finds revealed in the excavation area so far include two interconnected houses, a bakery, a laundry room and a beautifully frescoed living room.

Manuel Rocha, 73, will also pay a $500,000 fine and cooperate with authorities after pleading guilty to conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government. In exchange, prosecutors dismissed more than a dozen other counts, including wire fraud and making false statements.

“Your actions were a direct attack to our democracy and the safety of our citizens,” U.S. District Court Judge Beth Bloom told Rocha.

Rocha, dressed in a beige jail uniform, asked his friends and family for forgiveness. “I take full responsibility and accept the penalty,” he said.

The sentencing capped an exceptionally swift criminal case and averted a trial that would have shed new light on what, exactly, Rocha did to help Cuba even as he worked for two decades for the U.S. State Department.

Prosecutors said those details remain classified and would not even tell Bloom when the government determined Rocha was spying for Cuba.

Federal authorities have been conducting a confidential damage assessment that could take years to complete. The State Department said Friday it would continue working with the intelligence community “to fully assess the foreign policy and national security implications of these charges.”

Rocha’s sentence came less than six months after his shocking arrest at his Miami home on allegations he engaged in “clandestine activity” on Cuba’s behalf since at least 1981, the year he joined the U.S. foreign service.

The case underscored the sophistication of Cuba’s intelligence services, which have managed other damaging penetrations into high levels of U.S. government. Rocha’s double-crossing went undetected for years, prosecutors said, as the Ivy League-educated diplomat secretly met with Cuban operatives and provided false information to U.S. officials about his contacts.

But a recent Associated Press investigation found red flags overlooked along the way, including a warning that one longtime CIA operative received nearly two decades ago that Rocha was working as a double agent. Separate intelligence revealed the CIA had been aware as early as 1987 that Cuban leader Fidel Castro had a “super mole” burrowed deep inside the U.S. government, and some officials suspected it could have been Rocha, the AP reported.

Rocha’s prestigious career included stints as ambassador to Bolivia and top posts in Argentina, Mexico, the White House and the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

In 1973, the year he graduated from Yale, Rocha traveled to Chile, where prosecutors say he became a “great friend” of Cuba’s intelligence agency, the General Directorate of Intelligence, or DGI.

Rocha’s post-government career included time as a special adviser to the commander of the U.S. Southern Command and, more recently, as a tough-talking Donald Trump supporter and Cuba hardliner, a persona that friends and prosecutors said Rocha adopted to hide his true allegiances.

Among the unanswered questions is what prompted the FBI to open its investigation into Rocha so many years after he retired from the foreign service.

Rocha incriminated himself in a series of secretly recorded conversations with an undercover agent posing as a Cuban intelligence operative. The agent initially reached out to Rocha on WhatsApp, calling himself “Miguel” and saying he had a message “from your friends in Havana.”

Rocha praised Castro as “Comandante” in the conversations, branded the U.S. the “enemy” and boasted about his service for more than 40 years as a Cuban mole in the heart of U.S. foreign policy circles, prosecutors said in court records.

“What we have done … it’s enormous … more than a Grand Slam,” Rocha was quoted as saying.

Even before Friday’s sentencing, the plea agreement drew criticism in Miami’s Cuban exile community, with some legal observers worrying Rocha would be treated too leniently.

“Any sentence that allows him to see the light of day again would not be justice,” said Carlos Trujillo, a Miami attorney who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Organization of American States during the Trump administration. “He’s a spy for a foreign adversary who put American lives at risk.”

“As a Cuban I cannot forgive him,” added Isel Rodriguez, a 55-year-old Cuban-American woman who stood outside the federal courthouse Friday with a group of demonstrators waving American flags. “I feel completely betrayed.”

Simpson captivated the country when he rode down a Los Angeles interstate in one of the most-watched events in television history as many adults were glued to the screen when that happened.

But no one had their eye on the Bronco more than the photographer, whose video was being broadcasted live.

“And my first thought, certainly as an aerial photographer was, ‘Don’t mess this up. This is, this is an important shot to hang on to here,'” said photographer Jeff Mailes.

Mailes was one of the first to capture a live picture of Simpson as he took police on that slow speed chase in the infamous white Ford Bronco.

Initially, the call from police came out as a fugitive running from the law.

“And at that point, all of the news media helicopters in Los Angeles launched and were looking for that white Bronco,” Mailes said. “I came on at about 3 p.m. in the afternoon and we re-launched the helicopter, and we headed down to Orange County because there was speculation that O.J. had gone to Nicole’s graveside.”

“So, literally, every police officer and federal agent in California, and maybe even the country, were now looking for O.J. Simpson, as well as every reporter,” said Zoey Tur, helicopter pilot during the chase. “So I turned to my crew, we had our helicopter in downtown L.A. and I said that we’re going to go find him.”

Media and police were looking for Simpson on busy L.A. Roads.

Tur, along with her crew, were credited with being the first to find Simpson.

“We launched and flew every freeway in Los Angeles looking for a white Bronco,” he said. “We spotted a couple of them but it wasn’t his and then finally, in south Orange County, at the El Toro Y, we came upon the Bronco that was being followed, I believe at that point by one black and white car.”

Mailes worked for L.A. Television station K-Cal TV, and and it wasn’t long before his local picture went national.

“And as soon as we got the Bronco into our sites, our local station took it live and it was only moments later that we heard over the helicopter radio that ‘You guys keep your shot. CNN is gonna take you live’ and then that lasted for another hour and a half, all the way up to the Rockingham State,” he said.

Tur said that the live coverage changed the landscape for how news is reported.

“I think that news operations realized the power of the live coverage has and, especially with a news helicopter, so it changed the way television coverage happened,” Turr said. “The helicopter became a front line tool in breaking news.”

The live police pursuit of Simpson was watched by over 95 million people.

“I’ve got the door of the helicopter open. I’ve got my feet on the skids. I’m sitting on the floorboards, hand holding the camera and we’re, we’re, we’re going, ‘Hey, we’ve got, we’ve got OJ and the Bronco,” Mailes said.

With no cellphones at the time, people were glued to their radios and televisions as they watched the live coverage preempting regular programming, including the NBA Finals.

“It’s one of those events that you know exactly where you were when it happened,” Tur said. “The country stopped. The country ground to a halt to watch this surreal situation. People poured out to the freeways to watch this weird procession going by. Eighteen helicopters, two airplanes and dozens of sheriffs and highway patrol men all out to get O.J. Simpson.”

“So people were leaving their homes and their work and wherever they were, and they were racing to these overpasses and putting together makeshift banners and things like that,” Mailes said. “So it really began to morph into this celebration of ‘Go, O.J., go O.J.’ But that really when I saw that level of activity with people. That’s when it really struck me that, ‘Hey, this is something, something historical that’s happening right here.'”

Mailes has since retired but said that moment was one of the most significant of his career. As for Tur, she said she went from being somewhat well-known to being extremely well-known overnight.

The mission also unexpectedly turned into a family reunion.

The three men had been planning to fish the waters around the Pikelot Atoll, part of Micronesia, on March 31 when their 20-foot open skiff was caught by swells and its outboard motor was damaged, according to US Coast Guard officials.

They scrambled ashore on uninhabited Pikelot, but their radio ran out of battery power before they could call for help.

So the castaways gathered palm fronds from the 31-acre island, arranged them to spell out “HELP” on the beach, and waited, according to a Coast Guard statement.

The names of the stranded men have not been released by the Coast Guard, and CNN attempts to contact their relatives have not gotten replies.

For a week, the men lived off coconut meat, but they did have fresh water from a small well on the island, which is sometimes visited by fishers in the region, Coast Guard officials said.

The search for the men began on April 6, when one of their relatives called rescue officials in the US Pacific territory of Guam, saying they had not returned to Polowat Atoll, an island more than 100 miles away, where the three started their voyage on Easter Sunday.

It is difficult to overstate just how remote Piklelot is. The island is part of the Federated States of Micronesia, a Pacific nation between the Philippines and Hawaii that is made up of more than 600 islands scattered across about 2.5 million square kilometers of ocean.

The Coast Guard said a US Navy P-8A reconnaissance jet dispatched from Kadena Air Base on Okinawa, Japan, spotted the palm-frond “HELP” sign on the beach on April 7.

Lt. Chelsea Garcia, the search-and-rescue mission coordinator on the day the trio was located, said the sign was “crucial” to finding them in a search area that covered more than 103,000 square miles.

“This act of ingenuity was pivotal in guiding rescue efforts directly to their location,” Garcia said in a statement.

The Navy jet dropped survival packs to the three men and relayed their location to the rescue center.

A day later, a Coast Guard HC-130 flying from Air Station Barbers Point in Hawaii dropped a radio to the men, who were able to tell the crew they were in good shape and eager for help to get back to Polowat.

When the Coast Guard cutter Oliver Henry reached Pikelot on April 9, the story took another twist.

One of the first rescuers on the beach was Petty Officer 2nd Class Eugene Halishlius. The stranded men were surprised to see that Halishlius was Micronesian and spoke the local language.

“I could see on their faces, ‘Whoa! Who’s this guy pulling up that can speak our language?’” Halishlius told CNN in an interview from the Oliver Henry, which was at sea on Thursday after dropping the men off at Polowat.

When he gave his name to the first of the stranded men to reach the rescue boat, the castaway was stunned: they were related.

“It’s a crazy world, I actually found out I’m related to them!” Halishlius said.

“He couldn’t believe I’m with the Coast Guard trying to rescue them.”

The man was a third cousin, the others fourth cousins, he said.

Amazingly, this was not the first rescue of castaways from Pikelot.

In 2020, three other men traveling between two Micronesian atolls found themselves washed up there after their boat ran out of fuel during their voyage.

Those three spelled out “SOS” on the beach, a message that was spotted by the crew of a US Air Force tanker operating out of Andersen Air Force Base on Guam, which then directed Coast Guard, Micronesian and Australian naval units to get the men from the island.

How does this happen on the same island twice in four years?

“It could be coincidence,” said Chief Warrant Officer Sara Muir, public affairs officer for US Coast Guard Forces Micronesia.

“The people of Micronesia frequently travel island to island, and do so with a great deal of skill and experience,” she said.

But occasionally, accidents happen. And so do unexpected family reunions.

The family announced on Simpson’s official X account that Simpson died Wednesday after battling prostate cancer. Simpson’s attorney confirmed to TMZ he died in Las Vegas.

HOW HE MET NICOLE BROWN
She was a waitress at the trendy Beverly Hills restaurant, The Daisy. They met when he dined there and they quickly became inseparable. They married in 1985, had two children, Sydney and Justin, and divorced in 1992.

HIS SON’S EARLY DEATH
Simpson had three children by his first marriage to Marguerite Whitley: Arnelle, Jason and Aaren, who drowned at the age of 2 in a family swimming pool in 1979.

NFL CAREER HIGHLIGHTS
At the University of Southern California, Simpson won the Heisman Trophy in 1968 and was the first player chosen in the 1969 NFL draft. As a pro, Simpson was the first player to rush for more than 2,000 yards. He was NFL Player of the Year in 1972, 1973 and 1975 and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1985. Simpson played for the Buffalo Bills for nine years and for the San Francisco 49ers for two years.

HIS OVERWHELMING FAME
At the height of his football fame, polls indicated he was one of the top three most recognized faces in North America. In 1977, he became the first pro football player to make the cover of “Rolling Stone.” In 1978, he became the second professional athlete to host “Saturday Night Live.”

ACTOR SIMPSON’S MOVIES
He had roles in “The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!” (1988), “The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear” (1991) and “The Towering Inferno” (1974). He was considered for the title role in “The Terminator,” but producers feared he was “too nice” to be taken seriously as a cold-blooded killer. He was working on a film called “Frogmen” shortly before the killings.

COMMERCIALS HAD HIM RUNNING THROUGH AIRPORTS
He made a series of commercials for the Hertz rental car company, including the juggernaut ad that had him jumping over counters at an airport.

THE BRONCO CHASE
The infamous Bronco chase caused one television station to rearrange coverage of an NBA Finals game, featuring the chase on the main screen and the game as an inset. Nearly every network was broadcasting the chase as it headed toward the cemetery where his ex-wife was buried, then wound back to Simpson’s house. Cameras in helicopters showed Simpson holding a gun to his head as his friend Al Cowlings drove. Because the chase was so slow, huge crowds had time to gather on overpasses, where they cheered wildly when he drove by.

MOTHER’S MOMENT
Simpson’s frail 73-year-old mother left her wheelchair, hobbled to the witness stand and told jurors how her son had rickets as a child and had inherited rheumatoid arthritis from her, suggesting he was too crippled to kill anyone.

TWO BOOKS HE WROTE FOR MONEY
While in jail during his criminal trial, he wrote a book called “I Want to Tell You” with a collaborator. It helped finance his defense. In 2008, he collaborated on a hypothetical confession called, “If I Did It,” which stirred up so much controversy that it was withdrawn from publication. Simpson said he needed money to pay for his children’s education. He called the proceeds “blood money.”

JOHNNIE COCHRAN
Attorney Johnnie Cochran was not his first attorney. That was Robert Shapiro. Cochran was reluctant to take on the case but was eventually convinced after praying with his pastor. He had been a commentator on the trial before becoming a part of it. He instantly went from being a well-known local attorney to being world famous.

The family announced on Simpson’s official X account that he died Wednesday of prostate cancer. He died in Las Vegas, officials there said Thursday.

Simpson earned fame, fortune and adulation through football and show business, but his legacy was forever changed by the June 1994 knife slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles. He was later found liable for the deaths in a separate civil case, and then served nine years in prison on unrelated charges.

Live TV coverage of his arrest after a famous slow-speed chase marked a stunning fall from grace.

He had seemed to transcend racial barriers as the star Trojans tailback for college football’s powerful University of Southern California in the late 1960s, as a rental-car ad pitchman rushing through airports in the late 1970s, and as the husband of a blond and blue-eyed high school homecoming queen in the 1980s.

“I’m not Black, I’m O.J.,” he liked to tell friends.

His trial captured America’s attention on live TV. The case sparked debates on race, gender, domestic abuse, celebrity justice and police misconduct.

Evidence found at the scene seemed overwhelmingly against Simpson. Blood drops, bloody footprints and a glove were there. Another glove, smeared with blood, was found at his home.

Simpson didn’t testify, but the prosecution asked him to try on the gloves in court. He struggled to squeeze them onto his hands and spoke his only three words of the trial: “They’re too small.”

His attorney Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. told the jurors, “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.”

The jury found him not guilty of murder in 1995, but a separate civil trial jury found him liable in 1997 for the deaths and ordered him to pay $33.5 million to relatives of Brown and Goldman.

A decade later, still shadowed by the California wrongful death judgment, Simpson led five men he barely knew into a confrontation with two sports memorabilia dealers in a cramped Las Vegas hotel room. Two men with Simpson had guns. A jury convicted Simpson of armed robbery and other felonies.

Imprisoned at 61, he served nine years in a remote Nevada prison, including a stint as a gym janitor. He wasn’t contrite when he released on parole in October 2017. The parole board heard him insist yet again that he was only trying to retrieve memorabilia and heirlooms stolen from him after his Los Angeles criminal trial.

“I’ve basically spent a conflict-free life, you know,” said Simpson, whose parole ended in late 2021.

Public fascination with Simpson never faded. Many debated whether he had been punished in Las Vegas for his acquittal in Los Angeles. In 2016, he was the subject of an FX miniseries and a five-part ESPN documentary.

“I don’t think most of America believes I did it,” Simpson told The New York Times in 1995, a week after a jury determined he did not kill Brown and Goldman. “I’ve gotten thousands of letters and telegrams from people supporting me.”

Twelve years later, following an outpouring of public outrage, Rupert Murdoch canceled a planned book by the News Corp.-owned HarperCollins in which Simpson offered his hypothetical account of the killings. It was to be titled “If I Did It.”

Goldman’s family, still doggedly pursuing the multimillion-dollar wrongful death judgment, won control of the manuscript. They retitled the book “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer.”

“It’s all blood money, and unfortunately I had to join the jackals,” Simpson told The Associated Press at the time. He collected $880,000 in advance money for the book, paid through a third party.

“It helped me get out of debt and secure my homestead,” he said.

Less than two months after losing rights to the book, Simpson was arrested in Las Vegas.

David Cook, an attorney who has been seeking since 2008 to collect the civil judgment in the Goldman case, said he’d spoken with Ron’s father, Fred, on Thursday about Simpson’s death. Cook declined to say what Fred Goldman said or where he was.

“He died without penance,” Cook said of Simpson. “We don’t know what he has, where it is or who is in control. We will pick up where we are and keep going with it.”

Simpson played 11 NFL seasons, nine of them with the Buffalo Bills, where he became known as “The Juice” and ran behind an offensive line known as “The Electric Company.” He won four NFL rushing titles, rushed for 11,236 yards in his career, scored 76 touchdowns and played in five Pro Bowls. His best season was 1973, when he ran for 2,003 yards — the first running back to break the 2,000-yard rushing mark.

“I was part of the history of the game,” he said years later. “If I did nothing else in my life, I’d made my mark.”

Simpson’s football rise happened simultaneously with a television career. He signed a contract with ABC Sports the night he won the Heisman Trophy in 1968. That same year, he appeared on the NBC series “Dragnet” and “Ironside.” During his pro career, Simpson was a color commentator for a decade on ABC followed by a stint on NBC. In 1983, he joined ABC’s “Monday Night Football.”

Simpson became a charismatic pitchman. In 1975, Hertz made him the first Black man hired for a corporate national ad campaign. The commercials, featuring Simpson running through airports toward the Hertz desk and young girls chanting “Go, O.J., go!” were ubiquitous.

Simpson made his big-screen debut in 1974’s “The Klansman,” an exploitation film in which he starred alongside Lee Marvin and Richard Burton. The film flopped, but Simpson would go on to appear in several dozen films and TV series, including 1974’s “The Towering Inferno,” 1976’s “The Cassandra Crossing,” 1977’s “Roots” and 1977’s “Capricorn One.”

Most notable, perhaps, was 1988’s “The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad” and two sequels. Simpson played Detective Nordberg in the slapstick films, opposite Leslie Nielsen.

Of course, Simpson went on to other fame.

One of the artifacts of his murder trial, the tailored tan suit he wore when acquitted, was donated and displayed at the Newseum in Washington. Simpson had been told the suit would be in the hotel room in Las Vegas, but it wasn’t there.

Orenthal James Simpson was born July 9, 1947, in San Francisco, where he grew up in government-subsidized housing.

After graduating from high school, he enrolled at City College of San Francisco for a year and a half before transferring to the University of Southern California for the spring 1967 semester.

He married his first wife, Marguerite Whitley, on June 24, 1967, moving her to Los Angeles the next day so he could begin preparing for his first season with USC — which, in large part because of Simpson, won that year’s national championship.

On the day he accepted the Heisman Trophy, his first child, Arnelle, was born.

He had two sons, Jason and Aaren, with his first wife; one of those boys, Aaren, drowned as a toddler in a swimming pool accident in 1979, the same year he and Whitley divorced.

Simpson and Brown were married in 1985. They had two children, Justin and Sydney, and divorced in 1992. Two years later, Nicole Brown Simpson was found dead.

“We don’t need to go back and relive the worst day of our lives,” he told the AP 25 years after the double slayings. “The subject of the moment is the subject I will never revisit again. My family and I have moved on to what we call the ‘no negative zone.’ We focus on the positives.”

The rule aims to close a loophole that has allowed tens of thousands of guns to be sold every year by unlicensed dealers who don’t perform background checks to ensure the potential buyer is not legally prohibited from having a firearm.

It’s the administration’s latest effort to combat gun violence. But in a contentious election year, it’s also an effort to show voters — especially younger ones for whom gun violence deeply resonates — that the White House is trying to stop the deaths.

“This is going to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and felons,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. “And my administration is going to continue to do everything we possibly can to save lives. Congress needs to finish the job and pass universal background checks legislation now.”

The rule, which was finalized this week, makes clear that anyone who sells firearms predominantly to earn a profit must be federally licensed and conduct background checks, regardless of whether they are selling on the internet, at a gun show or at a brick-and-mortar store, Attorney General Merrick Garland told reporters.

Biden has made curtailing gun violence a major part of his administration and reelection campaign, creating the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention overseen by Vice President Kamala Harris. Biden also has urged Congress to ban so-called assault weapons — something Democrats shied from even just a few years ago.

But the rule is certain to prompt criticism from gun rights advocates who believe the Democratic president has been unfairly and unlawfully targeting gun owners.

The Biden administration first proposed the rule in August, after the passage of the most sweeping gun violence bill in decades, a bipartisan compromise in response to the massacre of 19 students and two teachers at a Uvalde, Texas elementary school.

That law expanded the definition of those who are “engaged in the business” of selling firearms, and are required to become licensed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and therefore run background checks. The rule, which implements the change in the law, will take effect 30 days after it is published in the Federal Register.

There are already roughly 80,000 federally licensed firearms dealers. Administration officials believe the new rule will impact more than 20,000 dealers who have gotten away with selling firearms without a license and performing background checks at places like gun shows and over the internet by claiming they aren’t “engaged in the business” of firearm sales.

“This final rule does not infringe on anyone’s Second Amendment rights, and it will not negatively impact the many law-abiding licensed firearms dealers in our nation,” ATF Director Steve Dettelbach said. “They are already playing by the rules.”

It comes a week after the ATF released new data that shows more than 68,000 illegally trafficked firearms in the U.S. came through unlicensed dealers who aren’t required to perform background checks over a five-year period. The ATF report also showed that guns trafficked through unlicensed dealers were used in nearly 370 shootings between 2017 and 2021.

Gun control advocates have praised the regulation as a big step toward their goal of universal background checks for gun buyers — a Democratic priority that has been blocked by Republicans in Congress.

“Expanding background checks and closing the gun seller loophole is a massive victory for safer communities — and it was made possible thanks to the tireless advocacy of our grassroots movement,” Angela Ferrell-Zabala, executive director of Moms Demand Action, said in an emailed statement.

But the rule is likely to be challenged in court by gun rights activists, who have previously sued over other ATF rule changes that they argue infringe on gun rights. The National Shooting Sports Foundation, an industry trade group, previously warned of a court challenge if the rule was finalized as written.

Biden administration officials said they are confident the rule — which drew more than 380,000 public comments — would withstand legal challenges.

That number runs very close with TSA interceptions in the first quarter of 2023, in which 1,508 firearms were intercepted, the agency said in a news release.  Overall, 2023 set a record for the number of firearms uncovered by officers at security checkpoints.

To help those numbers sink in, the 2024 interceptions come out to an average of 16.5 detections per day from January to March. For the first quarter of 2023, the interceptions came out to an average of 16.8 detections per day.

Even though the number of firearms discovered was nearly steady, that average first quarter rate was lower in 2024 because some 15 million more passengers were screened than the comparable period last year. More people plus roughly same number of firearms equals a lower rate.

But there’s a shocking stat that has stayed the same – in both time periods, 93% of those intercepted firearms were loaded with ammo.

“While it is certainly promising that the rate of passengers bringing firearms to the checkpoint has decreased, one firearm at the checkpoint is too many,” said TSA Administrator David Pekoske in the news release.

“The demand for air travel is as strong as ever and security is always our number one priority. Every time we discover a firearm at the checkpoint, the security screening process is slowed down for all.”

The rules of firearms and flying

People are allowed to ferry their firearms on flights, but they are “prohibited at security checkpoints, in the secure area of an airport and in the passenger cabin of an aircraft, even if a passenger has a concealed carry permit or is in a constitutional carry jurisdiction,” TSA said.

Instead, the firearm “must be packed properly as checked baggage and declared to the airline at the ticket counter,” Pekoske said.

TSA said passenger should follow these steps to lawfully shepherd a firearm through an airport:

• Secure the firearm in checked baggage
• Unload the firearm and lock it in a hard-sided case
• Declare the firearm to the airline when checking the bag at the ticket counter

Ammunition is not allowed in carry-ons, but it is allowed in checked baggage. But it must be properly stored and cannot be loaded in a firearm. Get more details here.

TSA said that it “does not confiscate or seize firearms. If a passenger brings a firearm to the security checkpoint on their person or in their carry-on luggage, the officer will contact local law enforcement to safely unload and take possession of the firearm.”

Stiff fines and arrest are possible if you’re discovered with a firearm at a security checkpoint.

“We always recommend passengers start with a clean bag when they pack to ensure no firearms, weapons or other prohibited items are present,” Pekoske said.

The state sentences did not add time to the federal prison terms the defendants had already received, but the victims’ supporters hailed the yearslong sentences, saying they took on unique importance in Mississippi, where local residents saw echoes of the state’s history of racist atrocities by people in authority.

The six former officers who attacked Michael Corey Jenkins and Eddie Terrell Parker in January 2023 were sentenced last month to federal prison terms ranging from about 10 to 40 years. U.S. District Judge Tom Lee called their actions “egregious and despicable” as he gave sentences near the top of the federal guidelines to five of the six men.

Rankin County Circuit Judge Steve Ratcliff on Wednesday gave the men yearslong state sentences that were shorter than the amount of time in federal prison they had already received, but longer than what state prosecutors had recommended. Time served for the state convictions will run concurrently, or at the same time, as the federal sentences, and the men will serve their time in federal penitentiaries.

After the hearing, Malik Shabazz, an attorney representing Jenkins and Parker, celebrated that the former law officers were held accountable in the same courthouse where they had testified against people.

“They all had to come and appear in a courtroom where they have created much mischief,” Shabazz said. “In this courtroom and in this courthouse, they have been given credibility to their statements. But today was dramatically different. Today, the judge in this circuit county court has given out justice.”

Shabazz had said the state criminal sentencing is important because “historically, the state of Mississippi has lagged behind or ignored racial crimes and police brutality against Blacks.” He applauded Ratcliff’s decision to reject state prosecutors’ recommendations for shorter sentences on the state charges.

Michelle Williams, a spokesperson for the Mississippi Attorney General’s Office, said the sentences handed down Wednesday were consistent with the plea agreement reached with federal prosecutors.

In a written statement, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch said the former officers’ crimes did grave harm to the victims and violated the trust of citizens they were supposed to protect.

“These criminal acts make a difficult job even harder and far more dangerous,” Fitch said. “And it is left to us all to commit ourselves to repairing that damage.”

The defendants include five former Rankin County sheriff’s deputies — Brett McAlpin, 53; Hunter Elward, 31; Christian Dedmon, 29; Jeffrey Middleton, 46; and Daniel Opdyke, 28 — and a former police officer from the city of Richland, Joshua Hartfield, 32, who was off duty during the assault.

All six of the former officers pleaded guilty to state charges of conspiracy to hinder prosecution. They were sentenced on multiple counts ranging from five to 20 years. Elward admitted to aggravated assault, and was sentenced to 20 years alongside punishments for burglary and conspiracy.

The charges followed an Associated Press investigation in March 2023 that linked some of the officers to at least four violent encounters since 2019 that left two Black men dead.

The terror began on Jan. 24, 2023, with a racist call for extrajudicial violence, according to federal prosecutors.

A white person phoned McAlpin and complained that two Black men were staying with a white woman at a house in Braxton, Mississippi. McAlpin told Dedmon, who texted a group of white deputies so willing to use excessive force they called themselves “The Goon Squad.”

Once inside, they handcuffed Jenkins and his friend Parker and poured milk, alcohol and chocolate syrup over their faces while mocking them with racial slurs. They forced them to strip naked and shower together to conceal the mess. They mocked the victims with racial slurs and assaulted them with sex objects.

In a mock execution gone awry, Elward shot Jenkins in the mouth, lacerating his tongue and breaking his jaw. The officers devised a coverup and agreed to plant drugs on Jenkins and Parker. False charges stood against the men for months.

McAlpin and Middleton, the oldest in the group, threatened to kill other officers if they spoke up, prosecutors said.

The only defendant who didn’t receive a federal prison term at the top of the sentencing guidelines was Hartfield, who did not work in a sheriff’s department with the others and was not a member of the “Goon Squad.”

In federal court, the deputies expressed remorse for their behavior and apologized to Jenkins and Parker. Several of their attorneys said their clients became ensnared in a culture of corruption that was encouraged by leaders in the sheriff’s office.

Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey revealed no details about his deputies’ actions when he announced they had been fired last June. After they pleaded guilty in August, Bailey said the officers had gone rogue and promised changes. Jenkins and Parker have called for his resignation and filed a $400 million civil lawsuit against the department.

In statements read by their attorneys in court Wednesday, Jenkins and Parker said their ordeal had been ingrained in their bodies and minds.

“Your honor, they killed me. I just didn’t die,” Jenkins said.

“Antarctica, a desert of ice, provides an ideal background for meteorite recovery — go to the right place, and any rock you find must have fallen from the sky,” said Valdes, who visited the region as part of an expedition team in late 2022 and early 2023 for her work at the museum’s Robert A. Pritzker Center for Meteoritics and Polar Studies. The international team found five meteorites.

“We stumbled across an enormous brown stone sitting by itself in the middle of an ice field. It was a little bit smaller than a bowling ball and quite heavy — 7.6 kg (about 17 pounds),” she said via email. “I had seen and handled so many meteorites in my career, but finding one yourself is such a different feeling.”

Formed from extraterrestrial bodies such as the moon, Mars or large asteroids, each meteorite tells a unique tale about the solar system and how it was formed. But the climate crisis threatens this trove of scientific information, according to a new study. Meteorites are disappearing into the ice, putting them out of the reach of scientists.

“As the climate continues to warm, Antarctic rocks are sinking into the ice at an increasing rate. Over time, this will make many meteorites inaccessible to scientists,” said Valdes, who wasn’t involved in the latest research. “We lose precious time capsules that hold clues to the history of our Solar System.”

As Earth warms, about 5,000 meteorites could disappear from the surface of melting ice sheets every year, according to the study published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change. To date, more than 48,000 meteorites have been discovered in Antarctica, accounting for about 60% of specimens found globally.

How to find a meteorite

Meteorites, lumps of rock that fall from space through Earth’s atmosphere randomly, do not fall in an evenly scattered pattern across the frozen continent. Concentrations emerge in certain locations because of geography and weather patterns, Valdes explained.

Meteorites are particularly plentiful in blue ice fields. In these areas, a combination of ice flow processes and local weather conditions remove layers of snow and ice from the surface, exposing meteorites that were once embedded in the ice. The windblown ice tends to look blue compared with the surrounding surface snow.

“Over significant stretches of time (tens or hundreds of thousands of years) phenomenal concentrations of meteorites can develop, as high as 1 per square meter in some locations,” she said.

Researchers have identified areas of meteorite-rich blue ice mostly by luck. However, to systematize the search, Veronica Tollenaar, a doctoral researcher at Université Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium, and her colleagues used a machine-learning algorithm to create a “treasure map” of probable meteorite-rich zones, based on factors including surface temperature, surface slope, surface cover and ice flow movement.

That research, published in January 2022 in the journal Science Advances, identified 600 zones and suggested that 300,000 meteorites are still present at the surface of the ice sheet. Valdes said in 2023 she and her colleagues used the information to help inform their decision on exactly where to search during their expedition.

“Our experience … indicates that so far, Tollenaar’s approach only works to a first order. Local parameters such as topography and wind directions that can redistribute meteorites from blue ice fields into local meteorite traps have to be considered as well,” Valdes said.

In the new study, co-lead author Tollenaar and her team projected the loss of meteorites under different climate change scenarios by combining climate modeling with their work from the 2022 paper.

The meteorites can sink into the ice even if temperatures are below zero degrees Celsius (32 Fahrenheit). The sun heats up the dark rock, which absorbs solar radiation more easily because of its color, which melts the surrounding ice. “With that heat, it can locally melt the ice and slowly disappear from the surface,” Tollenaar said.

Harry Zekollari, who was co-lead author along with Tollenaar on the new study, said that cold surface temperature was one of four factors linked to a potential meteorite cluster.

“It’s really important that it’s cold and if your surface temperature starts changing, even if it’s going from minus 12 C to minus 9 C, it’s crossing a magic threshold where you’re starting to lose meteorites,” said Zekollari, an associate professor of glaciology at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel.

Under current policies, which the study said may result in a warming of 2.6 degrees Celsius to 2.7 degrees Celsius (4.7 F to 4.9 F) above preindustrial levels, the researchers estimated that 28% to 30% of the meteorites in Antarctica could become inaccessible. Under a high-emission scenario, the estimate increased to 76%. Only at elevations above 2,500 meters (8,202 feet) will meteorites losses be less than 50%, the study said.

Matthias van Ginneken, a research associate at the University of Kent’s Centre for Astrophysics and Planetary Science in the UK, said the work “made a lot of sense considering how global warming seems to affect Antarctica.”

However, van Ginneken, who wasn’t involved in the study, said he wished the authors had talked more about uncertainties in their model and conducted lab experiments to simulate how global warming affects meteorites, which would support the results of the algorithm.

“It is certainly worrying, but there will still be thousands of meteorites to find per year,” he said via email.

“The main worry is the logistical aspect of searching for Antarctica meteorites, which is already difficult today due to the remoteness of Antarctica. Should the results of this study prove to be true, it will force scientists to explore new areas, potentially even further away from scientific bases than those that are commonly explored. It would make this treasure trove even more inaccessible and, thus, necessitate more funding and logistical support.”

What we’ve learned from Antarctic meteorites

Meteorites discovered in the southernmost reaches of the planet have taught us a lot, said Kevin Righter, a planetary scientist at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston in a commentary published alongside the research. He was not involved in the new study.

Scientists recognized meteorites collected in the region in 1979 and 1981 as originating from the moon, Righter noted. Before these finds, the only samples from the moon were from the Apollo and Luna landing sites. The meteorite samples have resulted in a more random and comprehensive sampling of the entire lunar surface. Other meteorites have been connected to Mars.

“All of this recent research history indicates that with continued collection, new meteorite types are likely to be found — including perhaps pieces of Mercury or Venus that might have been ejected from their surface following impacts.”

Righter, along with the study authors, called for collection efforts to be ramped up and prioritized. “If meteorites are not collected quickly enough, they will be a lost resource for present and future planetary science,” he added.

The survey, which was conducted by Gallup in conjunction with the Walton Family Foundation, collected data from more than 2,000 Americans from Generation Z (ages 12 to 26). It is one of a series of four surveys about Gen Z, said survey author Zach Hrynowski, a senior researcher at Gallup.

“What we’re trying to do is put together a complete picture of what does Gen Z’s life look like? What’s important to them? How do they project their futures?” he said.

Of the people surveyed, about 75% reported being at least somewhat happy, the data showed. The number went down significantly as the kids and teens reached adulthood, however.

Gen Z people who are 18- to 26-years-old are less likely to rate their lives positively than older generations when they were in that age range, Hrynowski said, noting this analysis didn’t do a direct comparison but used previous surveys to assess happiness levels of Gen Z and its predecessors.

Two factors were heavily correlated with Gen Z happiness: how much time they got for weekend sleep and relaxation, and even more important was their sense of purpose, he said.

Happiness was most predicted by a feeling of waking up each day and feeling like work or school is interesting and important, Hrynowski said.

“What is important to Gen Z is whether they feel like their life matters and they’re making a difference, more so than, ‘Am I going to work making a ton of money, getting a big promotion,’ things like that,” he added.

Purpose is more than chasing good feelings

Happiness is not made up of chasing as many positive emotions as possible, said Dr. Chloe Carmichael, a clinical psychologist in New York and author of “Nervous Energy: Harness the Power of Your Anxiety.”

It’s about having a purpose and understanding that there will be ups and downs as you pursue it, she added.

Purpose also means pursuing things that deeply connect with one’s sense of self, said Dr. Broderick Sawyer, a clinical psychologist in Louisville, Kentucky. Even if you aren’t in a place where you can directly pursue your purpose, practicing skills or gaining education toward it can make what you do feel purposeful, he said.

“In essence, developmental years need to feel like they are going somewhere, rather than useless, aimless, or aligned with social or parental expectations,” Sawyer said in an email.

Purpose doesn’t have to center around a job, either. It can be about causes you support or the relationships you form, Carmichael added. In those cases, responsibilities like your career can feel more fulfilling because they are helping you work toward that purpose in some way.

Making health a priority

Better sleep means better rizz (as her kids would call it), said Dr. Rachel Salas, professor of neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.

Insufficient or poor quality sleep can lead to lower mood and more irritability as well as issues with memory, concentration and focus, she said.

“Basically, (poor sleep) can affect their relationships and interactions with people around them which can affect their happiness,” Salas said.

You might not be able to add more hours into your day for sleep, but you can make it a priority, she said.

“Disconnect from your electronics (an) hour before bedtime, don’t sleep with your smart phone near you, limit screen time and be consistent with your bedtime and awakening time,” Salas said in an email.

Gen Z puts a lot of effort into skin care and mental health, but bad sleep means looking tired and feeling badly, Salas said.

“If you are serious about your health, prioritize it,” she said.

Lunchables developed two new versions of the snack kit specifically to be available nationally as part of school lunch programs for the first time last year. But a new report from Consumer Reports said it recently compared the nutritional profiles of two Lunchables kits served in schools and found they have even higher levels of sodium than the Lunchables kits consumers can buy in stores.

Consumer Reports said sodium levels in the store-bought lunch and snack kits it tested ranged from 460 to 740 milligrams per serving, or “nearly a quarter to half of a child’s daily recommended limit for sodium.” The group found that sodium levels in the turkey and cheddar school versions of Lunchables contained 930 mg of sodium compared to 740 mg in the store-bought version.

Consumer Reports said it tested 12 store-bought versions of Lunchables and similar ready-to-eat meal kits, including from Armour LunchMakers, Good & Gather, Greenfield Natural Meat Co. and Oscar Mayer, and also found lead, cadmium, or both in all, although none of the kits exceeded any federal limit. The testing also surfaced high levels of sodium in the other lunch kits.

Cadmium has been linked to kidney and bone disease and cancer, according to the World Health Organization.  As natural elements, heavy metals such as lead and cadmium are in the soil in which crops are grown and thus can’t be avoided. Some crop fields and regions, however, contain more toxic levels than others, partly due to the overuse of metal-containing pesticides and ongoing industrial pollution.

There is no safe level of lead for children, however, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Lead bio-accumulates in the body, which means it stays and builds up over time, so ongoing exposure, even at extremely low levels, can become toxic. Children, especially infants, are particularly vulnerable because a smaller dose of lead can have a larger health effect on them compared with adults.

Consumer Reports’ tests also detected at least one type of phthalate or phthalate replacement chemical in every kit it tested, except for Lunchables Extra Cheesy Pizza, it said. Lead and cadmium can cause developmental problems in children over time, even in small amounts.

Called “everywhere chemicals” because they are so common, studies have linked phthalates to childhood obesity, asthma, cardiovascular issues, cancer and reproductive problems such as genital malformations and undescended testes in baby boys and low sperm counts and testosterone levels in adult males.

The non-profit consumer group said it has petitioned the US Department of Agriculture, which oversees the federally assisted school meal program, to remove Lunchables food kits from school cafeterias, as a result.

“Lunchables are not a healthy option for kids and shouldn’t be allowed on the menu as part of the National School Lunch Program,” Brian Ronholm, director of food policy at Consumer Reports, said in a statement. “The Lunchables and similar lunch kits we tested contain concerning levels of sodium and harmful chemicals that can lead to serious health problems over time. The USDA should remove Lunchables from the National School Lunch Program and ensure that kids in schools have healthier options.”

Lunchables, made by Kraft Heinz, took its packaged ready-to-eat kids meals directly into K-12 school lunchrooms nationwide through the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) for the first time last year. The NSLP, established in 1946, provides lunch daily to nearly 30 million students in public and non-profit private schools and residential child care institutions.

But the company first had to re-formulate the ingredients to ensure the products met federal guidelines.

The rollout included two specially-created Lunchables options for schools (separate from Lunchables sold in grocery stores) – labeled “turkey and cheddar” and “extra cheesy pizza.” Kraft Heinz told CNN that the turkey and cheese option contains 6 grams of saturated fat and 930 milligrams of sodium while the extra cheesy variety contains 7 grams of saturated fat and 700 milligrams of sodium.

Kraft Heinz said both options were made using “a specialized recipe that incorporates more protein and whole grains to keep kids powered throughout the day, reduced saturated fat and sodium, and an increased serving size.”

The Lunchables pizza variety for schools (with 700 mg of sodium) compared to 510 mg in the store version. Eating foods with too much sodium can lead to high blood pressure and hypertension, Consumer Reports said.

The introduction of Lunchables in schools came amid proposed changes to school food guidelines by the USDA, which oversees the federally assisted school meal program. The proposed changes aimed to reduce added sugars and sodium levels in school-provided lunches. The standards would reduce sodium limits gradually over several school years.

The USDA in a statement to CNN late Tuesday said the agency “takes very seriously our responsibility to ensure school meals are of the highest nutritional quality.”

At the same time, it said the USDA doesn’t allow or disallow individual food items. “Our requirements address the overall content of meals – some of them on a daily basis and others on a weekly basis. So, the Lunchables described in the article would need to be paired with fruit, vegetables and milk. In addition, a school who wanted to serve a higher sodium product one day has to balance that with lower sodium items on others.”

Kraft Heinz told CNN in a statement Tuesday the company has taken steps to improve the nutrition profile of Lunchables. The effort, it said, includes launching Lunchables with fresh fruit, in partnership with Fresh Del Monte, and “reducing the sodium in all Lunchables crackers by 26%.”

“All our foods meet strict safety standards that we happily feed to our own families. We are proud of Lunchables and stand by the quality and integrity that goes into making them,” the company said.

Presence of additives

Consumer Reports also pointed to concerning additives included in many of the Lunchable products. Additives are ingredients added by manufacturers to stimulate appetite and extend shelf life.

The presence of additives is a key indicator of whether a food is ultraprocessed, said Carlos Monteiro, emeritus professor at the school of public health at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. In 2009 Monteiro created NOVA, a system of classifying food into categories from minimally processed to ultraprocessed.

“In terms of food processing, additives are essential to creating ultraprocessed foods,” Monteiro said. “Additives in ultraprocessed foods are those that use color, texture, flavor, and everything people like. So these products are made appealing not with real food, but with additives,” he said.

Such additives include preservatives to resist mold and bacteria; emulsifiers to keep incompatible ingredients from separating; artificial colorings and dyes; de-foaming, bulking and bleaching agents; and added or altered sugar, salt and fats intended to boost flavor to a “bliss point” that is hard to resist.

Food additives are considered “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS) by the US Food and Drug Administration, but not everyone agrees. Watchdog groups like the Center for Science in the Public Interest and the Environmental Working Group (EWG) provide lists of concerning chemicals found in food, as well as added sugars, salt and fats. A growing number of grocery stores and a few restaurants have also taken steps to ban worrisome chemicals from foods they sell.

According to ingredients listed on the Kraft-Heinz “Away from Home” website, CNN found the turkey and cheese Lunchables contains tertiary-butyl hydroquinone (TBHQ), a petroleum-based chemical found in pesticides. Studies have found TBHQ may lower immune response to flu and Covid-19 vaccines, may various roles in the development of cancer, and may even alter DNA.

The Lunchables also contains the pesticide sodium diacetate, which adds sourness and fights fungus and bacteria, carrageenan, which has been shown to create inflammation and digestive issues in animals, and sodium nitrate, a preservative used in cured deli meats, hot dogs, bacon and sausage that has been linked to cancer and other diseases.

The storm system, which has already been blamed for at least one death in Mississippi, demolished buildings and flooded streets in the New Orleans area Wednesday. It continued to spawn flash flood and tornado warnings in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina on Thursday.

More than 100,000 customers lacked power early Thursday nationwide. That included more than 30,000 in Georgia, where the bad weather was ongoing, according to PowerOutage.us.

Now, forecasters say parts of Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia will be near the bull’s-eye of a new area of concern Thursday. Those areas could see some tornadoes, damaging winds and large hail, according to the latest outlooks from the Storm Prediction Center.

At least a dozen counties in West Virginia dismissed public schools early Thursday due to the arriving storms. Southern West Virginia was hit by nine tornadoes April 2. It was a record for one day in the state and more than quadruple the number it gets in an average year.

In Augusta, Georgia, the start of the Masters golf tournament was delayed, tournament officials announced. Forecasters predict wind gusts as high as 45 mph (72 kph).

“Those wind speeds could easily knock down branches here and there,” said Brad Carlberg, a National Weather Service forecaster. “Just be aware of the weather and gusts, especially if you are near trees, because a branch could fall down at any time.”

Torrential rains early Thursday made roads impassable in Valdosta, Georgia, an emergency manager reported. In Tallahassee, Florida, storms toppled trees and caused significant street flooding, the weather service said.

Emergency responders Thursday afternoon were assessing damage from a “possible tornado touchdown” near St. Augustine, Florida. Photos shared by St. Johns County Fire Rescue showed fences ripped apart, but no immediate reports of any serious injuries from the possible twister that touched down in that area shortly before noon Thursday.

Storm damage has been reported from Texas to the Florida Panhandle.

A tornado struck Slidell, about 30 miles (48 kilometers) northeast of New Orleans, on Wednesday. It ripped roofs off buildings and partially collapsed others in and around the city of about 28,000. Authorities said first responders had to rescue people trapped in one apartment building.

Slidell Mayor Greg Cromer estimated at a news conference Wednesday night that about 75 homes and businesses were damaged. St. Tammany Parish President Mike Cooper estimated that hundreds more homes were damaged outside the city.

Police video showed tree limbs littering the streets and flooded yards that resembled swamps. Outside a McDonald’s restaurant, a car was on its side, power poles leaned, and large pieces of the trademark golden arches were strewn about.

“I’ve never talked to God so much before in my life,” Robin Marquez said after huddling with co-workers in a two-story building where the roof was ripped away and walls caved in.

There were no reports of deaths or critical injuries in Slidell. The weather service posted on social media Wednesday that initial surveys indicate the area was hit by an EF-1 tornado, with winds from 86 mph (138 kph) to 110 mph (177 kph).

Close to 8 inches (20 centimeters) of rain fell in parts of New Orleans. It came as the system of pipes and pumps that drains the city dealt with problems with its power generating system, forcing workers to divert power as needed.

“During intense rain, the mission sometimes shifts from keeping the streets dry to draining them as quickly as possible,” the New Orleans Sewerage and Water Board said in a statement.

A woman died in central Mississippi when a power outage shut down her oxygen machine, officials said. The Mississippi Emergency Management Agency said 72 homes were damaged.

In Texas, several people were rescued from homes and vehicles early Wednesday when flooding inundated parts of Jasper County, near the Louisiana line, authorities said.

In the Houston suburb of Katy, strong thunderstorms collapsed part of the roof of an auto repair shop. Storms also damaged businesses and cars in a strip mall, sending a large air conditioning unit on the roof crashing to the parking lot, officials said. Some of the damage was preliminarily determined to have been caused by a weak tornado, officials said.

“We were blessed that no lives were lost,” Harris County Fire Marshal Laurie Christensen said. Only minor injuries were reported.

The annual Eid al-Fitr event, held outside a large mosque in the city’s Parkside neighborhood, came to a sudden end when some 30 shots rang out at about 2:30 p.m., Philadelphia police said.

Five people were later taken into custody, including a 15-year-old boy who sustained leg and shoulder wounds when he was shot by police and was taken to the hospital by an officer, authorities said. Police said he was carrying a gun.

Additionally, one man was shot in the stomach and a juvenile victim had a wound to the hand, police said.

Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel confirmed at a news conference that a police vehicle responding to the 911 calls for help struck a 15-year-old girl who was fleeing the park. He said the child suffered a leg injury.

Witnesses described running to tents set up near the park, hiding behind trees and dropping to the pavement to avoid the gunfire, trying to shield children. Other attendees ran inside the nearby school and mosque and began frantically searching for their children and loved ones.

Authorities said nearly 1,000 people attended the event. Several witnesses said they came back to the park hours after the shooting to try to find their shoes or cellphones after running several streets away to safety.

“Ninety-nine percent of the people attending this event were good people who wanted to have a good time,” Bethel said, noting that city officials were offering their support to the Islamic community.

Police investigated the aftermath late Wednesday afternoon at Clara Muhammad Square, which was strewn with debris including blankets, strollers, coolers and a number of shoes, left behind by celebrants. A doll with a plastic wrapper nearby lay abandoned in the grass near a playground surrounded by police tape and guarded by officers. A few tables with aluminum containers of food to break the fast of Ramadan sat in the middle of the park, surrounded by yellow crime scene tape. Two tubs of melted bright red water ice were spilled onto the sidewalk.

Around 4 p.m., members of the Masjid began pushing large brooms to clean up the debris left in the street and on the sidewalk. A handful of young women dressed in bright colors picked up valuables — a bag, a cellphone, shoes — and set them aside for people to claim. Others waited for police to allow them to gather their purses or lawn chairs from the park.

Zania Weatherford had just gone to her car for a moment when she heard the gunfire and saw people running across the street. She called relatives at the event to make sure they were safe.

“Last year, someone set off firecrackers and scared everyone,” Weatherford said. “This is just a celebration of life for God to forgive us for our sins. There’s one month that God chains the devil down, so whoever did this can’t even blame the devil.”

Thomas Allen, who was at the Philadelphia Masjid located next the park, said the scene during the shooting was “pandemonium.”

“And we’re hearing that they were children, you know, they were children. And it’s a sad thing,” Allen said, referring to the suspects.

“All my years of living in Philadelphia, I’ve never seen nothing like this, especially at the masjid,” he said. “Just as much crime as it may be in Philadelphia. It was always separated from the masjid.”

The motive for the shooting was not immediately clear. The suspects include four males and a female, Bethel said.

Eid al-Fitr is an Islamic holiday marking the end of Ramadan, the month when devout Muslims fast daily from dawn to sunset. Ramadan is a time of increased worship, charity, and good deeds. Eid al-Fitr means the feast, or festival, of breaking the fast.