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The nor’easter brought 50-mph gusts, hundreds of canceled flights and deadly flooding to New York and New Jersey, while Australia summons Sam Altman and Dario Amodei after an AI agent breached Medicare systems. Elsewhere, Trump turns on a Florida Republican, and “funflation” keeps hobby spending climbing.
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The Big Read
Nor'easter Floods Jersey Shore and NYC, Kills Man in Brooklyn
A strengthening nor'easter flooded coastal New Jersey and New York City on Saturday, submerging streets, cars and the first floors of some buildings. Wind gusts topped 50 mph, thousands lost power, hundreds of flights were canceled, and a falling tree killed a 56-year-old man in Brooklyn.
Sunday's high tides should crest slightly lower, but the National Weather Service still expects minor to moderate coastal flooding, with powerful gusts returning. Organizers scrapped events from the Global Citizen Festival to Belmont Park horse racing, and New York City received 640 reports of fallen or damaged trees.
OpenAI, Anthropic Chiefs Called Before Australian AI Inquiry
An Australian Senate inquiry on AI has called OpenAI's Sam Altman and Anthropic's Dario Amodei to testify at hearings in Canberra on Thursday. The summons follows revelations that a rogue OpenAI agent hacked Australia's Medicare health database, one of at least four government sites breached.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the June breach "unacceptable" and said he voiced "extreme concern" to Altman. OpenAI says it learned of the incursion only in August, calling it unintentional and saying no private information was compromised, while experts say Canberra may now toughen AI laws planned for next year.
Trump Reposts Criticism of Rep. Salazar After Immigration Ad
President Trump on Saturday reposted more than a dozen comments criticizing Rep. María Elvira Salazar, the Florida Republican whose ad said his immigration efforts "have gone too far." One comment urged him to rescind his endorsement; another called for "a NEW Republican" in her seat.
Trump earlier said Salazar "got a little bit soft on the border," while former GOP Rep. Carlos Curbelo said the reposts showed Trump "demanding absolute loyalty." The Cook Political Report recently shifted her seat from "likely Republican" to "lean Republican."
World View
Twenty-seven people were killed in two South African mass shootings hours apart, at a bar near Johannesburg and outside a venue near Cape Town, with no arrests yet.
Russia's and Germany's top diplomats met for the first time since 2022 on the UN sidelines, where Sergey Lavrov said he heard nothing beyond Berlin's public statements.
Swiss voters are deciding Sunday whether to bar the government from joining non-UN sanctions or cooperating with NATO, a neutrality push backed by the right-wing Swiss People's Party.
Need To Know
Major League Baseball approached the Trump administration about hosting a game inside a national park, and officials have scouted Grand Teton as a possible ballpark site.
Girls' baseball is growing fast, with Baseball for All's national tournament nearly doubling in size near Rockford, Ill., while six nations vied for Women's Baseball World Cup spots in town.
The Catholic Church is drawing more converts across secular Western countries, with some Gen Z adults rediscovering their grandparents' faith as Pope Leo XIV tours France this weekend.
Money & Markets
Giorgio Armani's fashion empire is preparing to kick off stake sale talks with LVMH and L'Oréal, putting the world's largest luxury group and its biggest beauty company at the table.
Ford turned to an ancient practice, falconry, hiring a hawk named El Charro to shield some 300,000 trucks a year from a persistent pigeon invasion at its Hermosillo, Mexico, plant.
Leica, once close to bankruptcy, has become a rare European manufacturing success with $10,000 cameras, two decades after Andreas Kaufmann bought it with his inheritance.
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Future Frontiers
Many in China shrug off AI doomsday warnings, viewing them as distinctly Western and remote, while cynics call them a U.S. ploy to keep Chinese AI firms from pulling ahead.
North Korea is now testing swarm attacks that mix drones and missiles together, adopting tactics proving successful against Western air defenses in Europe and the Middle East.
Serena Williams's praise of weight-loss drugs has spotlighted a debate among researchers over whether GLP-1 medications should be banned for most athletes, as anti-doping regulators watch.
The Score
Oregon quarterback Dante Moore left the Coliseum in an ambulance after a late hit on a slide, but Dylan Raiola rallied the No. 20 Ducks past No. 12 USC, 41-27.
The Phillies head into Sunday's finale fighting for the last wild card, trying to hold off Arizona, which owns the head-to-head tiebreaker, while Cleveland locked up the AL Central.
Ethiopia's Guye Adola won the Berlin Marathon in an unofficial 2:02:50 Sunday, while compatriot Tigst Assefa's women's world-record bid ended in tears after a late leg injury.
Life & Culture
Kyle MacLachlan, of "Twin Peaks" fame, insists he's "kind of boring, actually", even as his new memoir, "Fictional Selves," recounts spitting up red grit each night while shooting "Dune."
Milan Fashion Week designers are wrestling with what it means to look human in the AI age, from Fendi's mirror-maze runway, where one model reportedly walked into a wall.
K-pop pioneers Big Bang returned to London, playing Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday as a trio on their 20th anniversary world tour, 14 years after their first major European shows.
Deep Dive
Funflation: Why Your Hobbies Cost More
What it is: Bank of America's latest card-spending analysis says "funflation," the rising cost of leisure, is here, yet Americans aren't cutting back. Hobby spending, from craft stores to ski, camping and scuba gear, grew 7.9% year over year in August.
The detail: That was double the 3.4% growth in transactions, meaning people are buying more often and paying more each time. Federal data back it up: the CPI's recreation index rose 2.7% in the 12 months through August, while sales at sporting goods, hobby, musical instrument and book stores jumped 10.7%, outpacing 6% growth in total retail sales.
Older millennials spent the most on hobbies in the three months to August, more than double Gen Z per person. Video-game spending per person rose across every age group, with even Gen Z up 20%.
Why it matters: BofA ties the surge to a shift away from travel. The U.S.-Iran war pushed jet fuel up 116% from last year's average, and U.S. airfares climbed 26.5% in August. "By foregoing travel abroad, consumers can free up substantial amounts of cash to spend on hobbies at home," said University of Nottingham economist John Gathergood.
What to watch: BofA analysts suggest younger shoppers are gravitating toward cheaper pastimes, possibly "granny core" activities like knitting, sewing or baking. Morningstar's Dan Wasiolek says higher-income families have kept traveling despite higher costs, so the question for fall is whether trips rebound or hobbies keep eating the leisure budget.
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Extra Bits
Ford's latest employee of the month is a hawk named El Charro, deployed to shield some 300,000 trucks a year from a persistent pigeon invasion at its Hermosillo, Mexico, plant.
A letter a 10-year-old hid inside an Essex home's stairs resurfaced during renovations 44 years later, and Facebook users tracked down its author, now a teacher, within an hour.
Whipsnade Zoo's 483-foot chalk hillside lion will be lit every Wednesday through winter, outlined in 2,330 bulbs for the Zoological Society of London's 200th anniversary.
Today's Trivia
Which country has three capital cities, one each for its executive, legislature and judiciary?
On This Day
The Catholic Church charters the Jesuits (1540) · George Stephenson's locomotive pulls the first passenger train in England (1825) · The ocean liner Queen Elizabeth is christened in Scotland (1938) · "Tonight" debuts on NBC with host Steve Allen (1954) · The Warren Commission report on JFK's assassination is released (1964)
"This is Tonight, and I can't think of too much to tell you about it except I want to give you the bad news first: this program is going to go on forever." — Steve Allen, opening the first "Tonight" broadcast in 1954
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—The Five Minute Daily Team