Election Updates: Polls Show Texas Senate Race Tightens; Trump to Rally in Arizona and Montana The New York TimesJames Talarico has Democrats dreaming big after decades of dashed hopes in Texas CNNNew poll finds Democrats leading in nearly every statewide contest Houston ChronicleDemocrats in several statewide Texas races narrowly lead Republicans AxiosTexas Senate, governor’s races diverge in new poll before early voting Yahoo
A small-business owner in Georgia has sued Flock and the Coweta County Sheriff’s Office over alleged retaliation using license plate cameras. “[The lawsuit] alleges illegal [license plate tracking] searches over many months without probable cause and unrelated to any specific investigation,” Hall & Lampros, attorneys for plaintiff Tyler Murkerson, wrote in a press release. “The lawsuit alleges that Flock also failed to put safeguards in place to prevent illegal surveillance by officers by accepting free-text-field entries instead of specific case numbers or investigations.” Murkerson’s saga began in February 2023, when he was arrested by sheriff’s deputies over an alleged seatbelt violation; those charges were dropped months later. In September 2024, Murkerson sued the department, accusing them of excessive force. The case was only recently settled.Read full article Comments
IMSA provided accommodation so Ars could attend the Petit Le Mans. Ars does not accept paid editorial content. The rising tide that has been the Drive to Survive effect has lifted more boats in motorsport than simply Formula 1’s. Sportscar racing is enjoying its own surge in popularity internationally at races like Le Mans in France, but also in North America in IMSA’s WeatherTech Sportscar Championship. For one thing, multi-hour, multi-class racing lends itself better to the age of streaming and second screens than it did linear broadcast TV, and fans are taking advantage of that: IMSA’s audience grew by more than a third domestically and almost a quarter internationally last year. Having some of the coolest-looking cars racing today certainly helps, whether that’s the (mostly) hybrid prototypes or the GTs, racing versions of road-going cars from Porsche, Ferrari, and others. And it definitely helps that fan access at the races is virtually unmatched, with open paddocks and grid walks that now see huge crowds get up close to the cars just before the start of each race. “I think we're just scratching the surface,” said IMSA President John Doonan. “I think besides the people that are here on the ground, the people watching, people engaging with us on social media, I'm seeing the passion come out more. Just on the grid walk, these fans coming up and being so excited to be here.” The series has certainly been making an effort, among other things getting local high school students exposed to the industry and starting a partnership to train more mechanics with ASE.Read full article Comments
Director Greta Gerwig could have made pretty much any movie she wanted after 2023's Barbie racked up nearly $1.5 billion at the box office. She chose to make Narnia: The Magician's Nephew for Netflix, an adaptation of C.S. Lewis' sixth novel in The Chronicles of Narnia series. Gerwig has said little publicly about the film, other than that she was inspired by 1960s-era David Bowie, although she said it would not be a musical. Netflix just released the trailer, set to "Stairway to Heaven," and it's quite the psychedelic ride. The first book in the series, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, was published in 1950, and Lewis did not initially intend to write any more Narnia adventures. But then an acquaintance asked how the London lamppost ended up in the middle of Narnia's woodland, and Lewis was intrigued enough by the question to start a prequel, The Magician's Nephew, in order to find an answer. Lewis found it difficult to finish the book, however, writing four other Narnia books first before completing The Magician's Nephew in 1955. There have been several adaptations, in various media, of The Chronicles of Narnia, most recently the early 2000s film franchise adapting the first three novels in the series. Those films showed diminishing returns, however, and by 2011 the film rights had expired. There were initial plans to adapt the fourth novel, The Silver Chair.Read full article Comments
A protein is a chain of amino acids held together by what are called peptide bonds. On their own, those bonds are extremely stable; they're estimated to have a half-life of several hundred years. But in Earth's environment, most proteins don't last nearly that long. That's because organisms have evolved a handful of ways to catalyze the break-up of peptide bonds, which have diversified into countless specialized protein-digesting enzymes. Proteases are everywhere and generally make short work of any proteins that find their way into the environment. Now, researchers have basically short-circuited the diversification process, using AI-based protein design tools to take the catalytic core of two types of protease and replace the entire rest of the protein. The resulting enzymes could be tuned to cut specific proteins in half, and the researchers demonstrated their effectiveness by using them to cut proteins associated with neurological diseases. Cutting proteins The basic peptide bond isn't especially interesting-looking—it's what you get when you link an amino group to an acid, releasing a water molecule in the process. As their name implies, amino acids have both an amino and an acid group, allowing them to form peptide bonds on two sides of the amino acid. This is critical for building up the long chains found in proteins. (The amino acids also have side chains with distinctive chemistry, which gives a backbone specific properties.)Read full article Comments
With the more than 2,200 comments filed to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration are overwhelmingly in favor of codifying current regulations on English Language Proficiency (ELP), the few urging caution tend to stick out. That is particularly true in the case of the Sikh Coalition, which is not a trucking-specific organization but one that given the large number of Sikh drivers on U.S. highways has taken particular interest in the ELP regulation. The Sikh Coalition, in its comments filed to FMCSA, described itself as a “nonprofit and nonpartisan organization dedicated to ensuring that members of the Sikh community in America are able to practice their faith without fear of discrimination or backlash.” Its description of the organization goes on to say that the group “(defends) the civil rights and civil liberties of Sikhs, including Sikh truck drivers, by providing direct legal services, advocating for legislative change, educating the public about Sikhs and Sikhi, and fostering civic engagement amongst Sikh Americans.” The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on ELP took comments through last Friday. The proposed rule “would make updates,” according to the NPRM, to various existing regulations to “reflect that noncompliance with ELP requirements will result in a driver being placed out of service.” The one exception would be truck traffic localized to the U.S.-Mexico border that wasn’t heading further inland. Supporters mount email campaign The largest source of comments submitted to FMCSA was through a campaign from an unknown organizer in support of the proposed rule. It manifested itself in the form of verbatim submissions by dozens of individuals that raised the story of Dalilah Coleman. Dalilah Coleman was five when she was injured in a 2024 crash in California involving a driver in the U.S. illegally. The email comments from that lobbying drive all opened with the same wording. “Dalilah’s story should not be the next in a saga of many others like it,” the emails said. “It should be the last one ever told. The illegal alien driving that truck should never have been allowed behind the wheel.” That crash led to the introduction of Dalilah’s Law in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Its provisions include ELP requirements. While the House of Representatives” Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure voted to advance the bill, it has not been taken up by the full House. Its Senate companion did not get a vote in the corresponding committee. Given the calendar, passage of Dalilah’s Law is unlikely to occur this year. It would need to be considered by the next Congress to become law. Concerns about discrimination In its comment to FMCSA, the Sikh Coalition said it “(agrees) there is a common-sense safety need for all drivers to understand a level of English as is already required by federal law.” But it added that “certain steps needed to be taken to mitigate the risk of discrimination during the course of or under the guise of ELP enforcement.” The Coalition said in earlier communications with the Department of Transportation, it had “raised concerns” about several issues, including what it said was “the lack of clear criteria for roadside inspectors to use to determine whether to subject drivers to ELP assessments, and the lack of any information as to what recourse is available to drivers rendered out of service (OOS) due to alleged ELP violations.” It cited a FMCSA decision from 2016 that the agency “had previously removed the requirement to place drivers out-of-service because the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance could not substantiate the safety impact of the requirement.” The Coalition also said it had communicated to FMCSA that the Sikhs’ analysis of FMCSA data on roadside inspections between 2021 and 2025 showed that just 0.19% “involved a driver’s inability to communicate in or understand English.” ELP was a Road Check focus However, this year’s Road Check Week resulted in EPL violations becoming a top 5 reason for inspectors to hand down an OOS order. ELP violations consisted of 9.1% of all OOS orders. “Our goal is to reduce the risk of any discrimination against truck drivers who could be profiled for their appearance and subject to disproportionate or discriminatory additional scrutiny during roadside inspections in the name of ELP enforcement,” the Sikh Coalition comments said. “It is critical that FMCSA establish clear, objective standards for roadside inspectors tasked with carrying out ELP enforcement to mitigate the risk of wrongful discrimination against Sikh or other commercial drivers.” The Coalition’s comments also raise the social media post posted last month by the Department of Homeland Security–later taken down–that made reference to Sikh drivers and declared “Get off our roads, you don’t know how to drive, Mr. Singh.” “FMCSA has consistently provided reason to believe that it is less interested in improving safety outcomes and more interested in removing certain drivers from the road because of where they come from,” the Coalition’s comments said. It wrapped up its comments by asking FMCSA to withdraw the NPRM, and “instead invest in tailored, evidence-based safety measures.” The key U.S. trucking organizations, in their comments, broadly backed the goals of the ELP rule. But there were recommendations for some changes. ATA’s concerns The American Trucking Associations, in a comment that seemed to indirectly echo the Sikh Coalition’s criticism that the ELP/OOS criteria could be vague, said the ATA “remains concerned that the current assessment process leaves room for subjective interpretation by individual enforcement officials.” “Without standardized scoring metrics or clearly defined evaluation criteria, ELP determinations may vary considerably from one roadside inspection to another,” the ATA said. “For example, a driver’s level of English proficiency may be deemed sufficient by one officer yet insufficient by another based on differing interpretations of the same interaction.” ATA called on FMCSA to work with the states issuing CDLs “to establish and build in a standardized ELP assessment as part of the CDL issuance and renewal process.” “Doing so would help evaluate and catch drivers with ELP deficiencies at ‘the front door’ – ensuring drivers are tested for ELP based on a consistent national standard before receiving a credential to operate, rather than relying primarily on roadside inspections to identify deficiencies after a driver has entered the workforce.” The Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association’s (OOIDA) comments had few recommendations and was more effusive in its praise than ATA. But it did add a history of earlier enforcement action. It said that CVSA removed an ELP requirement in 2015. After that, OOIDA wrote, “ELP violations went largely unenforced and unreported for a decade.” “In 2014, there were over 100,000 ELP violations at roadside; yet in 2024, there were just 9,700 ELP violations reported,” OOIDA said. “The lack of ELP enforcement, in conjunction with the growth of States issuing Non-Domiciled Commercial Driver s Licenses to foreign drivers during the same period, permitted hundreds of thousands of unqualified drivers to work on our nation’s roads. This needlessly resulted in numerous fatal crashes.” More articles by John Kingston FMCSA’s Elison: ‘weeks’ away from fixing Motus user experience Wall Street analysts positive on C.H. Robinson deal; S&P more cautious FMCSA split sleeper berth pilot program moves closer to launch The post English language rule’s comments bring criticism from Sikh organization appeared first on FreightWaves.
Waabi and Warrior Logistics announced a commercial partnership Wednesday to move routine customer freight on Waabi Driver-powered autonomous trucks between Dallas and Houston. Warrior, an asset-based carrier headquartered in Coppell, Texas, has added a fleet of Waabi’s trucks to its network to haul recurring shipments for food and beverage, consumer goods and other customers. The companies began commercial operations earlier this year. Routes completed by the autonomous trucks since then have produced 100% on-time pickup and delivery and zero safety incidents, according to Waabi. Neither company disclosed how many Waabi trucks Warrior runs or how many loads they have hauled. The carrier, founded in 2015, runs more than 200 trucks of its own, according to the companies’ release. It is using the Waabi trucks to add capacity and raise utilization across that broader fleet as customer demand grows. “Our customers want more capacity on our core lanes, and they want it to be consistent,” said Scott McFarlane, CEO of Warrior Logistics. “Our partnership with Waabi gives us the flexibility to deliver that. Waabi Driver-powered trucks complement our professional drivers, build density on our power lanes, and add capacity on the routes that are less desirable for our drivers.” McFarlane described a network where autonomous trucks and professional drivers run side by side. That mix lets Warrior take on more freight and keep its drivers on the lanes they want to run, he said. Why Warrior signed on Warrior began the partnership for three reasons, McFarlane said: a leadership team it trusts, technology he called truly innovative and a co-development approach that let the carrier see firsthand how safely the Waabi Driver performs. “The results on our own freight speak for themselves,” he said. “Warrior has helped shape our technology over the course of our partnership and the impact we’re seeing across their operations shows how we can help carriers take on more freight, serve more customers and grow their business,” said Lior Ron, COO of Waabi. Over the coming year, the two companies will jointly pick and develop the next lanes for the autonomous trucks across Warrior’s network. Waabi’s Dallas-Houston business The Warrior deal comes nine days after Waabi and Volvo Autonomous Solutions began hauling freight for Warp, their first customer operation together. Volvo VNL Autonomous trucks running the Waabi Driver move Warp freight directly to third-party facilities on the same corridor, with an observer in the driver’s seat. Commercial load volume on Waabi’s Dallas-Houston route has grown more than 80% this year, the company said. It did not give a baseline. Its first revenue loads on Interstate 45 between Dallas and Houston moved in September 2023, the week it announced a 10-year deal with Uber Freight. In July, Waabi said its software, trained only on a Peterbilt 579, drove a Volvo VNL Autonomous truck with no new data or fine-tuning. Waabi’s trucks are not yet driverless. Ron told FreightWaves in January the company will remove the driver only once the truck and its fully redundant platform are ready from the manufacturer. This month, he said Waabi is “fully on track for driverless next year, with Volvo as the first OEM platform.” The post Waabi signs Warrior Logistics for Dallas-Houston freight appeared first on FreightWaves.
#fwtv_7fO1qWfJPGg .fwtv-panel{border:1px solid #d0d0d0;padding:18px;border-radius:6px;line-height:1.6}#fwtv_7fO1qWfJPGg .fwtv-panel p{margin:0 0 12px}#fwtv_7fO1qWfJPGg .fwtv-note{font-style:italic;color:#666;margin-top:16px;padding-top:12px;border-top:1px solid #e0e0e0}Intermodal conversion is no longer an option but a necessity for shippers, driven by past supply chain chaos and persistent fuel costs. FreightWaves Finance Editor Todd Maiden breaks down J.B. Hunt’s strategic plays in intermodal and dedicated, revealing how major carriers are navigating current market headwinds and positioning for future growth. Learn which segments are poised to win in the coming quarters and why industrial activity will play a crucial role.J.B. Hunt Transport Services flagged a 5% to 10% sequential step-down in third-quarter earnings per share from the second quarter at a recent investor conference, putting the company roughly flat year over year. That disclosure, combined with headwinds from diesel cost run-ups and driver-related expenses, may have caught Wall Street off guard — but analysts tracking the stock say the market misread the story. While most truckload and intermodal carriers are only one quarter into their earnings recovery, J.B. Hunt began its turnaround in the third quarter of 2025, making this its fourth consecutive quarter of year-over-year improvement.The company launched a $100 million cost-reduction initiative roughly a year ago — a program that had already grown to more than $130 million as of last quarter. Headcount is being managed through natural attrition rather than layoffs, and AI-driven lean initiatives are in place. For the broader carrier universe, analysts are tracking roughly 20% average earnings growth per company this quarter, following 25% year-over-year growth across the space in the second quarter.Fuel was cited as a significant but transitory drag. Nine of the 13 weeks in the third quarter saw diesel prices step higher sequentially, causing carriers to chase costs even with fuel surcharges in place. Once prices stabilize, that headwind is expected to reverse. Driver additions in J.B. Hunt’s dedicated segment were described as growth-oriented spending — prefunding future capacity rather than a sign of structural cost pressure.“Modal conversion is no longer something we’ll contemplate. It’s really a necessity. But I think there’s some scars there from what it was in the past.”Intermodal’s October 1 bid season is the most closely watched near-term catalyst. Volumes are already up mid-single digits this quarter, even as drayage driver availability is acting as a ceiling on further growth. Contract pricing, which lagged through a soft 2023 and a flattish 2024, is expected to inflect materially this cycle. J.B. Hunt’s intermodal operating ratio has already improved from a trough of 93.6 to approximately 91, against a long-term target of 88 to 90 — and that progress has come without meaningful price increases. Key customers including Walmart, Amazon, and Home Depot require incremental, cycle-based rate negotiations rather than spot-market-style repricing, which limits how quickly rates can move.In LTL, public carriers including Old Dominion, XPO, and Saia weathered 3.5 years of industrial softness but maintained pricing power throughout. LTL tonnage inflected positive year over year in March and has continued to accelerate, coinciding with the ISM manufacturing PMI turning positive in January and remaining in growth territory for all nine months of the year. Carriers have been running at more than 30% excess door capacity while investing heavily in terminal networks; analysts expect that slack to begin absorbing, driving outsized margin gains given the sector’s high fixed-cost structure.Amazon’s stated ambitions in LTL drew skepticism. The overall LTL market is a $60 billion total addressable market — large in absolute terms but small relative to global parcel, where the TAM potentially exceeds $1 trillion. Amazon currently operates roughly 30 terminals configured primarily for inbound freight rather than the cross-dock, pickup-and-delivery, and linehaul infrastructure a national LTL network requires. Regional carriers, meanwhile, are said to be at or near capacity limits in their terminal networks, a dynamic that favors large national players sitting on substantial excess capacity.J.B. Hunt warned of a 5%-10% sequential EPS decline in Q3, but its cost-takeout program has grown from $100M to over $130M and its earnings recovery is four quarters old — a full year ahead of most peers.Intermodal volumes are up mid-single digits this quarter even as drayage driver shortages cap growth; October 1 bid season is seen as the critical test for whether contract rates can inflect materially after two soft years.LTL tonnage turned positive year over year in March and has accelerated alongside a manufacturing PMI that has been in growth territory all nine months of the year, with carriers running 30%-plus excess door capacity poised to leverage fixed-cost networks.This Summary is generated thanks to a transcription of the interview, for the full interview please enjoy the video above. The post Intermodal: Freight’s MUST-HAVE in Volatile Markets appeared first on FreightWaves.
#fwtv_ay2VAGc4UZg .fwtv-panel{border:1px solid #d0d0d0;padding:18px;border-radius:6px;line-height:1.6}#fwtv_ay2VAGc4UZg .fwtv-panel p{margin:0 0 12px}#fwtv_ay2VAGc4UZg .fwtv-note{font-style:italic;color:#666;margin-top:16px;padding-top:12px;border-top:1px solid #e0e0e0}US rail traffic is surging, with intermodal and carload volumes hitting new highs. This isn’t just a few bright spots; growth is broad-based across nearly all industrial sectors, driven by tight trucking capacity and high diesel prices. Find out what this means for the broader industrial economy and if this “renaissance” is here to stay.U.S. intermodal rail traffic jumped 10.4% year-over-year in week 40, while domestic carload volume rose 3.4%, producing an overall U.S. rail traffic increase of 7.2% compared to the same week in 2025, according to Association of American Railroads data cited by rail reporter Bill Stephens. North American figures were also positive, with carload volume up 2.6% and intermodal up 9.1% for a combined gain of 5.9%.The numbers matter for carriers and shippers because they reinforce a durable industrial expansion, not a short-term blip. The AAR’s September and third-quarter Rail Industry Overview, released the day before the weekly data, found that 17 of 20 carload categories posted year-over-year gains in September and that chemicals traffic — the second-largest carload commodity — set a September record and is on pace for a new annual record.Western railroads led intermodal growth, with BNSF up 12.5% and Union Pacific up 19.4% for the week, a performance Stephens attributed to record container volumes moving through the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and now pumping through the broader economy. Eastern carriers also posted solid gains: CSX was up 8.9% and Norfolk Southern up 5.4%.“It’s nothing but tailwinds for intermodal due to the cost savings, partly related to the surge in diesel price, the tight trucking capacity. And the third ingredient there is that rail service seems to be holding up for the most part despite this volume surge,” Stephens said.Motor vehicles and parts — a category that has lagged in 2025 — rebounded sharply, up 9.4% in week 40. Metallic ores and metals continued double-digit year-over-year growth, consistent with what the AAR described as manufacturing expansion that “took off at the start of the year” and “appears to be increasingly durable.” Excluding coal and grain, carload volume was up 5.6% for the week. Coal was down 2%, while grain edged up just 0.5%.The AAR flagged one risk: if diesel prices remain elevated long enough, consumer spending could soften. For now, consumer goods spending was up 2.7% in August, according to the AAR. Stephens noted that inflation data is beginning to broaden beyond gasoline into food prices, a trend worth watching for consumer-dependent freight segments.On the regulatory front, parties are filing their intent to participate with the Surface Transportation Board in the Union Pacific–Norfolk Southern merger review. Stephens said that STB board member Richard Kloster drew attention when the board accepted the merger application, calling for stronger data and better arguments — comments Stephens characterized as likely reflecting broader board sentiment rather than a political maneuver. Further detail is expected when both railroads hold earnings calls, with questions anticipated on conditions being sought by other railroads and on Kloster’s remarks.U.S. intermodal rail traffic rose 10.4% in week 40, led by BNSF (+12.5%) and Union Pacific (+19.4%) on record West Coast port volumes.AAR’s September report found 17 of 20 carload categories grew year-over-year, with chemicals traffic setting a September record and on pace for an annual record.Elevated diesel prices and tight trucking capacity are sustaining intermodal momentum, but railroads warn prolonged fuel inflation could eventually weigh on consumer spending.This Summary is generated thanks to a transcription of the interview, for the full interview please enjoy the video above. The post Why Rail Is Booming: Intermodal & Carload Growth Explained appeared first on FreightWaves.
Ice baths, massages, compression garments, and recovery supplements promise faster muscle recovery, but research suggests their benefits are often overstated, and some techniques may even undermine long-term gains. Scientists say the most effective recovery methods are far simpler and cheaper: getting enough sleep, eating well, and giving muscles time to rebuild.
Two unusually long-legged cats have helped scientists uncover the first genetically confirmed cases of Marfan syndrome in domestic felines. Researchers at Cornell University discovered that the brothers carried two altered copies of a gene linked to the rare connective tissue disorder, which can affect the eyes, heart, and blood vessels. Surprisingly, the cats survived into adulthood because their genetic mutation still allowed some normal function.
Exercise during childhood could have a surprising lifelong benefit, potentially making physical activity less exhausting in adulthood. In a study involving guinea fowl, researchers discovered that birds accustomed to carrying weights while growing up could carry those weights as adults without using extra energy, while untrained birds burned 23% more.
For decades, scientists have focused on amyloid beta as a major culprit behind Alzheimer’s disease, spending billions of dollars developing treatments that have often delivered disappointing results. Now, researchers at UC Santa Cruz are drawing attention to a largely overlooked peptide called P3 that could also play a role in the disease. Previously believed to be harmless, P3 can form harmful-looking protein clumps even faster than amyloid beta and may also damage brain cells.
"In an AI world, there's abundance and yet some assets remain scarce.Those assets include sports, beachfront property, and perhaps works of art. They’re finite," said Blackstone President Jonathan Gray explaining why the firm bought a stake in Royal Challen LinkedIn
Steenkamp’s brilliant 102 leads Namibia to six-wicket win against USA Staff Reporter NAMIBIA defeated the United States by six wickets in Dallas, successfully chasing down a target of 278 with nine balls to spare to finish the ICC Cricket World Cup League 2 Instagram
USA post 277 as Namibia face tough chase in Dallas Staff Reporter NAMIBIA will need 278 runs to defeat the United States in the final match of the ICC Cricket World Cup League 2 Tri-Nation Series in Dallas after the USA posted 277/7 in their 50 overs today. Instagram
Prince William stops traffic outside Buckingham Palace for a game of cricket ReutersAjinkya Rahane, Ganguly play tennis-ball cricket with Britain's Prince WIlliam outside Buckingham Palace The Times of IndiaPrince William Stuns Fans By Joining a Casual Game of Cricket in Front of Buckingham Palace YahooPrince William Surprises Tourists Outside Buckingham Palace with Street Cricket Game People.comPrince William Plays Cricket With Sourav Ganguly, Brian Lara, James Anderson In Front Of Buckingham Palace. Video NDTV SportsSporty Prince William joins stars for cricket game ahead of Prince Harry and Meghan's big return HELLO! MagazinePrince William grabs a bat for cricket match outside Buckingham Palace. See the video. USA Today
Enterprise Mobility is rapidly expanding opportunities for companies to enhance clients’ engagement levels and simplify and improve their interactions. Unfortunately,…
