Monday, August 30 top stories
It is Monday, August 30. I’m back in the studio. Thank you to Kriston Lee Pumphrey for covering last week’s top stories! Here are today’s top stories.
Hurricane Ida hit Port Fourchon, Louisiana on Sunday as a Category 4 storm with winds of 150 mph. The storm surge and strong winds actually stopped the flow of parts of the Mississippi River near New Orleans and forced it to reverse.
One person was killed from a fallen tree. A million people in the New Orleans region are without power. There are search and rescue teams throughout impacted areas, so the death toll may increase. Many 911 call centers in Louisiana went down.
There are concerns about those who are stranded in their homes with rising floodwaters, about how levee systems will handle the influx of water, and how long electricity will be out.
The European Union voted today to recommend banning non-essential travel from the U.S. because of its high Covid-19 infection rates. The EU removed the U.S. from its list of “safe” countries. Axios explained that the council’s vote is non-binding and that each individual EU member country has the power to decide whether to implement the ban.
There is a large wildfire that is nearing the waters of South Lake Tahoe in California. The fire’s name is the Caldor Fire and it has been burning since August 14, more than two weeks. The fire is difficult to control because of rough terrain and hot summer temperatures.
There are over 12 different large fires across California with over 15,000 firefighters involved in battling the flames.
CNET said in a report that Apple’s iPhone 13 may have satellite communication connectivity that will enable users to make calls and send texts in areas without cellular coverage. The phones may have hardware that would allow it to connect with low Earth orbit satellites. This would benefit users who live in areas without great cell phone service or for those who travel and need to have “always available” communications.
The Department of Education announced today it is investigating five Republican-led states over its ban of mask mandates in schools. The five states are Iowa, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Utah. The Biden administration said the bans may discriminate against students with disabilities or students with pre-existing medical conditions.
Axios explained that there are four states with similar bans on mask mandates that are not facing investigations by the Education Department because they have been struck down by the courts or are not enforced: Florida, Texas, Arkansas, and Arizona.
[Sponsored Video from Sorenson: www.sorenson.com]
[Advertisement] CaringWorks, Inc (located in Atlanta, GA) has a job posting for ASL Case Manager, it's a professional work, which involves planning, coordinating and providing case management services for clients who present a wide range of psychosocial problems. APPLY TODAY! https://bit.ly/3DsSllR
Here are updates from Afghanistan.
The U.S. military said on Sunday, it used a drone strike to destroy a vehicle that was full of explosives that posed a threat to Kabul’s airport.
The U.S. military said members of the ISIS-K, an Afghan affiliate of ISIS, were the ones who loaded the car with explosives. ISIS-K is short for Islamic State Khorasan Province. ISIS-K claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. troops and over 170 civilians outside of Kabul’s airport on Thursday.
The New York Times reported that the U.S. drone strike on Sunday killed 10 civilians, including seven children. The U.S. military said they would investigate.
The U.S. military is supposed to withdraw completely from Kabul by Tuesday. There are still thousands of people being evacuated from the airport. There are about 300 American citizens who are still in Afghanistan.
President Joe Biden attended Dover Air Force Base in Delaware on Sunday to honor the arrival of the flag-draped caskets of the bodies of the 13 U.S. troops who died in the Kabul suicide bombing.
The New York Post released the images and names of all 13 U.S. troops who died. Their ages ranged from 20 to 31.
A commander with the U.S. Marines, Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, posted a Facebook video on Thursday to criticize his generals for deciding to evacuate from Afghan bases without first evacuating others and for failing to take responsibility for messing up things. News reports said Scheller was fired after the video, but he said he is resigning.
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) said both presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden are to blame for failures in Afghanistan. Romney said Trump shouldn’t have negotiated with the Taliban and freed up a prison with 5,000 members of the Taliban. Romney also said the Biden administration shouldn’t have let the situation at the Kabul airport happen, saying it is a “stain” that America left behind its citizens and Afghan friends.
That is all the top stories for today. Check out our other videos. See you tomorrow and stay with the light.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/29/weather/mississippi-river-hurricane-ida/index.html
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/29/us/hurricane-ida-live-updates-new-orleans-louisiana
https://www.axios.com/eu-travel-restrictions-us-6f8f73f7-af1e-4614-a73e-46404ee0b085.html
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/lake-tahoe-threatened-massive-fire-more-ordered-flee-n1277952
https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/apple-iphone-13-reportedly-feature-satellite-connectivity/
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/30/world/afghanistan-news
https://www.npr.org/2021/08/30/1032367184/rockets-kabul-airport-deadline-us-troops-bomb
https://nypost.com/2021/08/27/these-are-the-us-service-members-killed-in-kabul-airport-attack/