Новости за 28.09.2023

Florida's high-speed passenger train service has suffered its first fatality on its new extension to Orlando. St. Lucie County Sheriff Ken Mascara said a 25-year-old stepped in front of a Brightline train on Thursday morning near Fort Pierce. He said it appeared the man was committing suicide. Brightline opened its extension that connects Miami and Orlando last week. Since 2017, Brightline has been operating trains between Miami and West Palm Beach. This was the 99th death involving a Brightline train. Читать дальше...

Arizona and Utah will keep the iconic national parks in those states open if a federal government shutdown cuts off funding nationwide. People can keep visiting Arizona’s orange-striped Grand Canyon and the sheer red cliffs of Utah’s Zion Valley. Most importantly for state budgets, visitors can keep spending their money near the parks. A cutoff could come Sunday. The economic impact of the national parks is so important that Arizona’s Democratic governor and Utah’s Republican governor have decided to invest state funds in keeping Grand Canyon... Читать дальше...

The National Security Agency is starting an artificial intelligence security center — a crucial mission as AI capabilities are increasingly acquired, developed and integrated into U.S. defense and intelligence systems. The agency's outgoing director, Army Gen. Paul Nakasone, made the announcement Thursday at the National Press Club. He said the center would be incorporated into the NSA’s Cybersecurity Collaboration Center, where the agency works with private industry and international partners to... Читать дальше...

An appeals court has rejected Donald Trump’s bid to delay a civil trial in a lawsuit brought by New York’s attorney general. Thursday’s decision by the state’s intermediate appellate court allows the case to proceed days after a judge ruled the former president committed years of fraud and stripped him of some companies as punishment. The decision clears the way for Judge Arthur Engoron to preside over a non-jury trial starting Monday in Manhattan in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ civil lawsuit. Читать дальше...

Lebanese police say that a food delivery driver who opened fire outside the U.S. Embassy in Beirut last week allegedly did so because of a personal grudge against the guards at the compound. The police said they had arrested the suspected shooter on Monday, identifying him only by his initials M.K. and that he later confessed to the shooting. They cited an alleged confession by him saying he was upset as the guards had insulted him two months earlier, when he came to deliver an order. No one was... Читать дальше...

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans on Thursday are holding the first hearing of their impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden and their effort to tie the him to the business dealings to his son Hunter.

A former director of an Ohio memory-loss clinic accused by dozens of patients of falsely diagnosing them with Alzheimer’s disease has been sentenced on federal fraud charges, along with her physician husband. Sherry-Ann Jenkins received nearly six years in prison on Tuesday, while Oliver Jenkins got a 41-month sentence. The couple was convicted in March on conspiracy, mail fraud, wire fraud and health- care fraud charges after being indicted in May 2020. The U.S. Justice Department has said Sherry-Ann... Читать дальше...

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is digging in on his refusal to take up Senate legislation designed to keep the federal government fully running beyond midnight Saturday. He's also acknowledging that stark divisions within his own conference hamper that chamber’s ability to do its job. Congress is at a crossroads days before a disruptive federal shutdown. It would halt paychecks for millions of federal workers, including 2 million active-duty military troops and reservists, and close down many federal offices.

United Airlines is making changes for passengers with wheelchairs after a government investigation into a complaint by a disability-rights advocate. United and the Transportation Department said Thursday that the airline will add a tool on its website to help consumers find flights that can accommodate their wheelchairs. Cargo doors on some planes are too small to load a motorized wheelchair or scooter. The agreement stems from a complaint by Engracia Figueroa. Her lawyer says she died from injuries... Читать дальше...

Home loan borrowing costs climbed again this week, pushing the average long-term U.S. mortgage rate to its highest level in nearly 23 years, another blow to prospective homebuyers facing an increasingly less affordable housing market. The average rate on the benchmark 30-year home loan rose to 7.31% from 7.19% last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. A year ago, the rate averaged 6.70%. High rates can add hundreds of dollars a month in costs for borrowers, limiting how much they can afford... Читать дальше...

The Hong Kong stock exchange says trading of shares of heavily indebted Chinese property developer China Evergrande Group has been suspended. China Evergrande said in a notice on Thursday night that authorities had informed the firm that its chairman Hui Ka Yan had been subjected to “mandatory measures in accordance with the law due to suspicion of illegal crimes” and said that trading in the firm’s shares was suspended until further notice. The company didn’t elaborate on the crimes that Hui was suspected of. Читать дальше...

Police say a man wanted in the killing of a Baltimore tech entrepreneur has been arrested. Baltimore police early Thursday didn’t release any details of the circumstances surrounding the arrest of 32-year-old Jason Billingsley, but planned a news conference later in the morning. Baltimore police found 26-year-old Pava LaPere dead Monday with signs of blunt force trauma in her apartment complex after she was reported missing. The Johns Hopkins University graduate founded the tech startup EcoMap Technologies while she was still a college student.

House Republicans plan to make their case for pursuing an inquiry against President Joe Biden at their first hearing. It will be a soft launch of sorts Thursday with testimony from outside experts in tax law, criminal investigations and constitutional legal theory. It’s a high-stakes opening act for Republicans as they begin a process that can lead to the ultimate penalty for a president, punishment for what the Constitution describes as “high crimes and misdemeanors.” This is all while they face... Читать дальше...

Global shares are mostly lower in subdued trading on looming worries about China property woes. Shares fell early Thursday in France, Germany and Britain. Trading in shares of heavily indebted Chinese property developer China Evergrande Group was suspended in Hong Kong. The market was closed in South Korea for a holiday. In Asia, benchmarks fell in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Sydney, while rising in Shanghai. Evergrande is the world’s most heavily indebted real estate developer and is at the center of a... Читать дальше...

The American soldier who sprinted into North Korea across the heavily fortified border between the Koreas two months ago has arrived back in the U.S. in San Antonio, Texas early Thursday, local affiliate video appeared to show. Pvt. Travis King’s release was secured with the help of ally Sweden and rival China, the White House said Wednesday, North Korea said it would expel King earlier the same day.

Taiwan’s president has launched the island’s first domestically made submarine for testing. The submarine, if successful in its tests, will be a major breakthrough for Taiwan in shipbuilding and design. President Tsai Ing-wen said a domestically made submarine had seemed impossible in the past. Taiwan began the expensive and time-consuming task of building its own submarines after China prevented it from purchasing such craft from abroad through the use of economic and diplomatic threats. After years of design and construction... Читать дальше...

Chinese-owned app TikTok says it regrets the Indonesian government’s decision to ban e-commerce transactions on social media platforms and particularly the impact it would have on the millions of sellers who use TikTok Shop. But TikTok Indonesia said in a statement it will respect the regulations and laws that apply in Indonesia and “will take a constructive path forward.” Indonesia banned goods transactions on social media platforms such as TikTok in a bid to protect small businesses from e-commerce competition... Читать дальше...

A Swiss Academy of Sciences panel is reporting a dramatic acceleration of glacier melt in the Alpine country, which has lost 10% of its ice volume in just two years after high summer heat and low snow volumes in winter. The academy says Switzerland — home to the most glaciers of any country in Europe — has seen 4% of its total glacier volume disappear in 2023, the second-biggest decline in a single year on top of a 6% drop in 2022, the biggest thaw since measurements began.

The man accused of killing 10 people at a Colorado supermarket in 2021 said during a mental health evaluation that he bought firearms to carry out a mass shooting and wanted police to kill him. That’s according to a psychologist who testified Wednesday during a hearing to determine if Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa is fit to stand trial. The expert says he made the comments in August. Alissa was found mentally competent by experts in late August. But his defense attorney asked for the determination to be debated in court. Читать дальше...

Just over two months after he sprinted into North Korea across the inter-Korean border, Pvt. Travis King is being flown back to America after the North Koreans expelled him. His release quick by the standards of North Korea, which has held recent American detainees for periods over a year. There had been speculation that the North would try to use him as a bargaining chip to coax concessions from Washington. Analysts say the 23-year-old’s legal troubles could have limited his appeal to North Korea as a propaganda tool... Читать дальше...

An estimated $850 million Powerball jackpot is up for grabs if players are willing to brave incredibly long odds. 

The U.S. West Coast produces over 90% of America’s wine, but it’s also prone to wildfires — a combustible combination that spelled disaster in 2020 for the wine industry and one that scientists are scrambling to neutralize. Sample a good wine and you might get notes of oak or red fruit. But sip on wine made from grapes that were penetrated by smoke, and it will likely taste like someone dumped an ashtray into your glass. Wine experts from three West Coast universities are working to meet the threat... Читать дальше...

Hawaii’s top public utility officials and the president of Hawaiian Electric are expected to testify in a congressional hearing about the role the electrical grid played in last month’s deadly Maui wildfire. Members of a U.S. House Energy and Commerce subcommittee will ask Thursday about how the fire started, and whether the electrical grid in Lahaina was safe and properly maintained. It was the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century and killed at least 97 people. It erupted on Aug. 8, when... Читать дальше...

New York Attorney General Letitia James is no stranger to picking fights with powerful targets. Just ask Donald Trump. James, who has sued the former president dozens of times, is now behind a lawsuit in which a judge this week ruled that Trump committed fraud for years to inflate his real estate empire. The case marks the latest legal victory for James, a Democrat who has also taken on the National Rifle Association, the Catholic church and Andrew Cuomo during her time as the state’s top prosecutor.

Authorities say investigators have found the remains of a Colorado mom who went for a bike ride on Mother's Day 2020 and never returned. Agents with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation found the remains of 49-year-old Suzanne Morphew on Friday near a small town in southern Colorado. Authorities said her remains were positively identified Wednesday. Morphew’s husband, Barry Morphew, was previously charged with murder and other crimes in connection with her disappearance. But prosecutors dropped those... Читать дальше...