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Airlines brace for mass layoffs

DETROIT — The worries are growing for United Airlines flight attendant Jordy Comeaux. In a few days, he’ll be among roughly 40,000 airline workers whose jobs are likely to evaporate in an industry decimated by the coronavirus pandemic. Unless Congress acts to help for a second time, United will furlough Comeaux on Thursday, cutting off his income and health insurance. Unemployment and the money made by his husband, a home health nurse, won’t be enough to pay the bills including rent near Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. “I don’t have enough, unfortunately, to get by,” said Comeaux, 31, who has worked for United for four years. “No one knows what’s going to come next and how to prepare.” Since the pandemic hit, thousands of flight attendants, baggage handlers, gate agents and others have been getting at least partial pay through $25 billion in grants and loans to the nation’s airlines. To receive the aid, companies agreed not to lay off employees through Sept. 30. That “Payroll Support Program” helped many stay on, and keep health care and other benefits. It all runs out on Thursday. With air travel down about 70% from last year, many carriers including United and American say they’ll be forced to cut jobs without additional aid. Delta and Southwest, two other big carriers, tapped private capital markets and say they’ll avoid layoffs. Industry analysts say fear of air travel and businesses keeping employees close to home have brought an unprecedented crisis to the industry, resulting in cataclysmic losses. The four largest U.S. airlines — Delta, United, American and Southwest — together lost $10 billion in the second quarter alone.

Disney to lay off 28,000

ORLANDO, Fla. — Squeezed by limits on attendance at its theme parks and other restrictions due to the pandemic, The Walt Disney Co. said Tuesday it planned to lay off 28,000 workers in its parks division in California and Florida. Two-thirds of the planned layoffs involve part-time workers but they ranged from salaried employees to hourly workers, Disney officials said. Disney’s parks closed last spring as the pandemic started spreading in the U.S. The Florida parks reopened this summer, but the California parks have yet to reopen as the company awaits guidance from the state of California. In a letter to employees, Josh DAmaro, chairman of Disney Parks, Experience and Product, said California’s “unwillingness to lift restrictions that would allow Disneyland to reopen” exacerbated the situation for the company.

Alex Jones’ DUI charge dropped

AUSTIN, Texas — Prosecutors in Texas have rejected a drunken driving charge against conspiracy theorist and radio host Alex Jones, who was arrested in Austin earlier this year. The Travis County attorney’s office rejected the misdemeanor charge of driving while intoxicated against Jones on Sept. 18, records show. A Travis County sheriff’s deputy pulled Jones over on March 10 for going 5 mph above the speed limit. The deputy was responding to a call from the Infowars host’s then-wife, Kelly Morales, who reported that he was driving a black Dodge Charger and may have been drinking, according to an affidavit. Travis County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Kristen Dark said Jones had a “strong odor of alcohol” coming from him and that he was unable to complete field sobriety tests, losing his balance and failing to touch heel to toe. Jones’ blood-alcohol level was recorded at .076 and .079; the legal blood alcohol limit is .08 in Texas.

New palm recognition tech

SEATTLE — Amazon has introduced new palm recognition technology in a pair of Seattle stores and sees a broader potential audience in stadiums, offices and other gated or secured locations. Customers at the stores near Amazon’s campus in Washington can flash a palm for entry into secured areas and buy goods. The company chose palm recognition, according to Dilip Kumar, vice president of Physical Retail & Technology, because it’s more private than other biometric technology, and a person would be required to purposefully flash a palm at the Amazon One device to engage. “And it’s contactless, which we think customers will appreciate, especially in current times,” Kumar wrote in a blog post Tuesday. Like the human fingerprint, every palm is unique. Unlike fingerprints, the palm is not used for broader identification purposes because more body specific information is needed. Any palm image proffered for use is never stored on the Amazon One device, the company said, for security reasons. For now, the technology is being used only at two Amazon Go stores. Amazon Go is the company’s first cashier-less supermarket, introduced earlier this year, where shoppers can grab milk or eggs and walk out without waiting in line or ever opening their wallets.

Bill to combat doping in racing

WASHINGTON — The House approved a bill Tuesday to create national medication and safety standards for the horse racing industry as lawmakers move to clamp down on use of performance-enhancing drugs that can lead to horse injuries and deaths. The “Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act” comes after a series of doping scandals and a rash of horse fatalities in recent years. More than two dozen people were charged in March in what authorities described as a widespread international scheme to drug horses to make them run faster. Jason Servis, whose champion horse Maximum Security crossed the finish line first at the 2019 Kentucky Derby before being disqualified for interference, was among those charged. The Democrat-controlled House approved the bill by voice vote, sending it to the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, has co-sponsored similar legislation.

Flawed absentee ballots in NY

NEW YORK — Mail-in voting has gotten off to a rocky start in New York City, where election officials sent out nearly 100,000 absentee ballots with the wrong names and addresses printed on the return envelopes. The deluge of faulty ballots, sent to voters across Brooklyn, could result in ballots being voided if voters sign their own name on return envelopes bearing different names. The New York City Board of Elections blamed the problem on the company hired to print and mail the ballots. The faulty ballots are limited to one print run of ballots sent out to Brooklyn voters, the board’s director Michael Ryan said at a board meeting Tuesday. He didn’t say during the meeting how many ballots were printed, but told the news site Gothamist that 99,477 contained the error. All voters who got the bad ballots will receive new ones before the Nov. 3 election, with the vendor covering the cost, Ryan said. He said the move will “make certain that absolutely no disenfranchisement occurs in Brooklyn.”

UAE plans spacecraft to moon

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The United Arab Emirates plans to send an unmanned spacecraft to the moon in 2024, a top Emirati official said Tuesday, the latest gamble in the stars by the oil-rich nation that could see it become only the fourth nation on Earth to accomplish that goal. The announcement by Dubai’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who also serves as the vice president and prime minister of the hereditarily ruled UAE, shows the rapid expansion of the space program that bears his name. Already, an Emirati space probe is hurtling through space on its way to Mars while last year it sent its first astronaut to the International Space Station. “It will be an Emirati-made lunar rover that will land on the surface of the moon in 2024 in areas that have not been explored previously by human missions,” Sheikh Mohammed wrote on Twitter. He did not elaborate on the location that the UAE planned to explore, nor how they would launch the rover into space. The launch of its Amal, or “Hope,” probe to Mars took place at Japan’s Tanegashima Space Center in July. The Emirati rover will study the lunar surface, mobility on the moon’s surface and how different surfaces interact with lunar particles, the government later said. The 10-kilogram (22-pound) rover will carry two high-resolution cameras, a microscopic camera, a thermal imagery camera, a probe and other devices, it said. Sheikh Mohammed said the rover would be named “Rashid,” the same name of his late father, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum. Sheikh Rashid was one of the original founding rulers of the United Arab Emirates, a federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula.

Tried to grab Montana’s grandkid

LOS ANGELES — A 39-year-old woman was charged Tuesday in what authorities say was an attempted kidnapping of the 9-month-old granddaughter of Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana from his Southern California home. Sodsai Predpring Dalzell of Los Angeles pleaded not guilty to felony counts of attempted kidnapping of a child under 14 and burglary. “Miss Dalzell is extremely apologetic and is very well concerned about the well-being of the family,” Dalzell’s attorney Ayinde Jones said outside of court. “She understands the harm that this has caused the family, friends and also fans of the Montana family. So our heart goes out to them.” The 64-year-old Montana told sheriff’s deputies the girl was asleep Saturday in a playpen in his house in Malibu when a woman he did not know entered and picked up the child. Montana and his wife, Jennifer, confronted her, tried to deescalate the situation and asked her to give back the baby. After a brief struggle, Jennifer Montana pried the girl away, and Dalzell fled. She was later arrested nearby. No one was hurt. Jones said he plans to present a credible defense, “focused on ensuring that Miss Dalzell gets the help that she may need.” The attorney said he has “no hindsight, no clue as yet on why she did what she did, only that she is very apologetic. She has told me over and over again that she understands the harm that she has caused. As a parent myself, I can only imagine the pain that it has caused the Montana family.”

Allegedly tried to kill Trumpers

LOS ANGELES — The organizer of a Southern California rally against racism was charged with attempted murder Tuesday for driving her car into a crowd of counterprotesters. Orange County prosecutors said Tatiana Turner deliberately drove into a crowd of President Donald Trump’s supporters with the intent to kill a woman, whose head she drove over, and seriously injured another man who broke a leg. A defense lawyer said Turner tried unsuccessfully to get help from deputies after her group protesting police brutality Saturday in Yorba Linda was overwhelmed by hostile counterprotesters. Turner feared for her life when she got into her car surrounded by Trump supporters and was trying to get away from the crowd and didn’t intend to hit anyone, attorney Ludlow Creary II said. Turner, 40, who has a felony record for drug sales and domestic violence, is also charged with six counts of assault with a deadly weapon, including one count for causing great bodily injury, mayhem, and two counts of the use of pepper spray by a felon.

Wakeup call on space station

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A small air leak at the International Space Station finally has been traced to the Russian side, following a middle-of-the-night search by astronauts. NASA said Tuesday that the two Russians and one American on board were awakened late Monday to hurriedly seal hatches between compartments and search for the ongoing leak, which appeared to be getting worse. It was the third time in just over a month that the crew had to isolate themselves on the Russian side, in an attempt to find the growing leak. It turns out instead of the leak getting bigger this time, a temporary temperature change caused the erroneous cabin air pressure reading, according to NASA. The leak was first spotted a year ago. NASA officials stress that the leak remains small and poses no danger. The astronauts will now use leak detectors to try to pinpoint the leak in Russia’s main living and working compartment, called Zvezda, Russian for Star. Space station deputy program manager Kenny Todd said the good news is that “instead of a bunch of haystacks, we’re down to maybe one haystack.” But he added: “It’s still a needle we’re looking for.” NASA is sending up extra air supply tanks on its next space station delivery, scheduled for a Thursday departure from Virginia. As long as the leak does not worsen, Todd said, the space station should be fine through next spring.

Union, NBC settle dispute

LOS ANGELES — Gabrielle Union and NBC said Tuesday that they have settled their differences in their dispute over her firing as a judge on “America’s Got Talent,” which she said was retaliation for her complaints that the show tolerated racism on the set. “We’ve reached an amicable resolution,” Union and the network said in a joint statement. “NBC Entertainment appreciates the important concerns raised by Gabrielle Union and remains committed to ensuring an inclusive and supportive working environment where people of all backgrounds are treated with respect.” Both sides declined further comment, and would not give further details.

Kuwait ruler dies at age 91

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah, the ruler of Kuwait who drew on his decades as the oil-rich nation’s top diplomat to push for closer ties to Iraq after the 1990 Gulf War and solutions to other regional crises, died Tuesday. He was 91. In a Middle East replete with elderly rulers, Sheikh Sabah stood out for his efforts at pushing for diplomacy to resolve a bitter dispute between Qatar and other Arab nations that continues to this day. His 2006 ascension in Kuwait, a staunch U.S. ally since the American-led war that expelled occupying Iraqi troops, came after parliament voted unanimously to oust his predecessor, the ailing Sheikh Saad Al Abdullah Al Sabah, just nine days into his rule. Yet as Kuwait’s ruling emir, he struggled with internal political disputes, the fallout of the 2011 Arab Spring protests and seesawing crude oil prices that chewed into a national budget providing cradle-to-grave subsidies. “He represents the older generation of Gulf leaders who valued discretion and moderation and the importance of personal ties amongst fellow monarchs,” said Kristin Diwan, a senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington who studies Kuwait. “No question he has suffered from the lack of deference and respect shown by the younger and more brash young princes holding power today.” Kuwait’s Cabinet later announced that Sheikh Sabah had been succeeded by his half brother, the crown prince Sheikh Nawaf Al Ahmad Al Sabah. Sheikh Sabah had fallen ill in July 2020, leading to and surgery in Kuwait City, then time spent at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota.

Wine country faces fire fatigue

NAPA, Calif. — Will Abrams and his family packed their pickup truck with laptops, clothes, sleeping bags and a tent and quickly left their rental home in California’s wine country after seeing flames on a hill about a quarter-mile away Monday morning. It was their third hurried fire evacuation in as many years. In 2017, Abrams woke up to find their Santa Rosa home on fire and cleared burning branches from the driveway so he could get his wife and children to safety. Their home was destroyed. Then last year, the family evacuated as another wildfire bore down on Sonoma County. They were terrified to cross into the San Francisco Bay Area amid smaller grassland fires sparked by power lines falling in the midst of strong, hot winds. “This time we hurried up and packed up the car, and we were in gridlock traffic on (Highway) 12 while the flames were approaching from behind,” Abrams said Tuesday. He and his wife tried to entertain the kids by making conversation so they wouldn’t panic. “It was just obviously traumatic on a personal level, but also just that so little has changed since the fires of 2017 in terms of preparedness and prevention.” They have been told this home is still standing. But with the Glass Fire still completely uncontained, the Abrams and their 12-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter are staying in Berkeley until they are allowed to return. “I’m trying to prepare my kids and let them know that climate change is part of life and they’re going to have to deal with it as they get older and also trying to provide them a sense of safety and security. It’s not easy. But we should not accept this is the way it’s going to be,” he said. The Abrams family is among thousands of weary wine country residents confronting another devastating wildfire. The Glass Fire, which started Sunday, has scorched more than 66 square miles and destroyed about 95 structures. It’s the fourth major fire there in three years and comes ahead of the third anniversary of a 2017 wildfire that killed 22 people. Three fires, driven by gusty winds and high temperatures, merged into one on Sunday, tearing into vineyards and mountain areas, including part of the city of Santa Rosa. About 70,000 people were under evacuation orders, including the entire 5,000-plus population of Calistoga in Napa County.

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