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Hurricane Florence is weakening but will still remain a powerful storm. Florence has downgraded to a category 3 hurricane. Its category 4 winds of 130mph dropped to 115mph. The storm is supposed to weaken during the next few days and carry out till early next week. There are no watches or warnings for the u.s currently. On Friday there is predicted to be life treating surf and rip currents in the Bermuda.

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

According to the National Hurricane Center, Florence's sustained winds dropped to 115 miles per hours-down from its Category 4-level winds of 130 mph on Wednesday. Additional weakening was forecast throughout Thursday.

The agency said Florence was moving northwest at 12 mph and was forecast to turn west-northwest. The storm was 1,170 miles east-southeast of Bermuda overnight Thursday.

While forecasters expect Florence to weaken over the next several days, the storm is predicted to remain a powerful hurricane through early next week.

The National Hurricane Center said that swells generated by Florence will begin to affect Bermuda onFriday and will reach portions of the U.S. East Coast over the weekend. It said that "swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions."

There are no watches or warnings currently in effect for the U.S.

While Florence continued on its path in the Atlantic, the remains of Tropical Depression Gordon spread bands of heavy rain across parts of the South as it swirled over Mississippi Wednesday.

Rain spun around the storm's center in the Jackson, Mississippi, area Wednesday afternoon. And bands swept up from the Gulf, dropping more rain on northwest Florida - where 10.48 inches already had fallen at Florida's Pensacola International Airport by Wednesday morning - through the center of Alabama and into Tennessee.

What's left of Gordon is forecast to head northeast into Arkansas. By Saturday, what's left of the storm was forecast to hook to the north, then northeast on a path toward the Great Lakes.

National Weather Service offices in Missouri and Oklahoma said Gordon's remnants could add to the rain caused by a frontal boundary already causing heavy rains in parts of the Midwest. Flash flood watches stretched from the Florida panhandle, through parts of southwest Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa and Illinois.
Fox News' Sam Chamberlain and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Hurricane Florence weakening, but will remain powerful storm, forecasters say

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

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Nike will be doing an ad for the NFL of Colin Kaepernick who is the Qb who began the knee protest for the national anthem to raise awareness for racial inequality. Trump had his opinion and made a statement on it basically calling them unloyal citizens. Some are even boycotting Nike for supporting Kaepernick.

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Colin Kaepernick will be back on television this football season.

The quarterback who inspired the NFL player protest movement stars in a new commercial for Nike, which this week made him a face of its 30th anniversary "Just Do It" campaign.

Nike says the ad will air this week during the US Open, Major League Baseball games and college football - as well as Thursday night's NFL opener between the Atlanta Falcons and the Philadelphia Eagles.

It's an awkward juxtaposition for the league. The NFL is still grappling with the firestorm that Kaepernick started two years ago when he sat and later knelt during the National Anthem to protest police brutality and racial injustice.

The backlash returned this week after Nike announced the ad campaign. People threatened a boycott on social media, and the company's stock fell almost 3%.

President Donald Trump took another swipe in a tweet Wednesday that claimed Nike was "getting absolutely killed with anger and boycotts."

The TV campaign, called "Dream Crazy," shows Nike is ready to go even bigger with Kaepernick.

Jay Rosenstein, a former CBS Sports executive and an adjunct professor at New York University's Tisch Center for Sports Management, said he's not surprised by what Nike is doing. Boldness has long been part of the brand.

"This is what Nike does," he said. "This is what they love to do."

Rosenstein also said he didn't expect the ad to make or break a viewer's decision to tune in this fall. Although some critics have blamed last year's flagging NFL ratings on the protests, Rosenstein pointed to high-profile player injuries and weak matchups.

Nike said a 90-second version of the ad will air mostly on TV. A 30-second version will also include Kaepernick.

The quarterback posted a two-minute version on Twitter, in which his voice is heard over images of other prominent athletes, including LeBron James and Serena Williams. He implores the listener: "Don't ask if your dreams are crazy, ask if they're crazy enough."

The version posted to Twitter touches on the protests. At one point, Kaepernick appears on camera, and his voice reads a slogan he and Nike have been promoting this week: "Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything."

Kaepernick has not played in the NFL since the 2016 season. He's suing the league, alleging he was blacklisted because of the protests.

NFL owners voted earlier this year to require that players either stand during the Anthem or wait in the locker room. That policy also says teams will be fined if players are on the field and "do not stand and show respect for the flag and the Anthem."

Those rules are on hold while the league and the players union negotiate.

The NFL did not respond to a request for comment about the commercial. Earlier this week, the league said in a statement that it "believes in dialogue, understanding and unity."

CNNMoney (New York) First published September 5, 2018: 6:48 PM ET

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Nike will run a Colin Kaepernick ad during the NFL season opener

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The quarterback who inspired the NFL player protest movement stars in a new commercial for Nike, which this week made him a face of its 30th anniversary "Just Do It" campaign. Nike says the ad will air this week during the US Open, Major League Baseball games and college football - as well as Thursday night's NFL opener between the Atlanta Falcons and the Philadelphia Eagles.

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On day 2 of Kavanaugh hearings, capitol police arrest 73 people. 66 people were removed from the room and charged with disorderly conduct, 1 was arrested and charged with resisting arrest and "crowding, obstructing, or incommoding", and 6 were charged with "unlawful demonstration activities." Similar protests have been occurring since the beginning of the week.

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capitol police arrest 73 on day two of kavanaugh hearings - cnnpolitics

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Capitol Police arrest 73 on day two of Kavanaugh hearings

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US Capitol Police said they had arrested 73 people in the Senate office buildings by the end of the second day of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings.

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Five arrested over gang rape and murder of 9-year-old girl in India

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Five arrested over gang rape and murder of 9-year-old girl in India | CNN

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Five suspects have been arrested in connection with the brutal rape and murder of a nine-year-old girl who fell victim to a family feud in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, police said.

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A senior official in the White House released an unsigned opinion column in The New York Times yesterday, where they bashed the current administration's competency. They also mentioned a resistance movement among other key members. The op-ed also mentioned talks between cabinet members, of enacting the 25th amendment. President Trump questioned whether it was treason in a tweet reacting.

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President Trump and his aides reacted with indignation Wednesday to an unsigned opinion column from a senior official blasting the president's "amorality" and launched a frantic hunt for the author, who claims to be part of a secret "resistance" inside the government protecting the nation from its commander in chief.

The extraordinary column, published anonymously in the New York Times, surfaced one day after the first excerpts emerged from Bob Woodward's new book, in which Trump's top advisers painted a devastating portrait of the president and described a "crazytown" atmosphere inside the White House.

Taken together, they landed like a thunder clap, portraying Trump as a danger to the country that elected him and feeding the president's paranoia about who around him he can trust.

Trump reacted to the column with "volcanic" anger and was "absolutely livid" over what he considered a treasonous act of disloyalty, and told confidants he suspects the official works on national security issues or in the Justice Department, according to two people familiar with his private discussions.

Trump questioned on Twitter whether the official was a "phony source," and wrote that if "the GUTLESS anonymous person does indeed exist, the Times must, for National Security purposes, turn him/her over to government at once!"

In a column titled, "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration," the person whom The Times identifies only as a "senior official"describes Trump's leadership style as "impetuous" and accuses him of acting recklessly "in a manner that is detrimental to the health of our republic."

[Top appointees are 'thwarting' Trump, says 'senior official' in New York Times opinion piece]
The official writes that Cabinet members witnessed enough instability by their boss that there were "early whispers" of invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office, but decided instead to avoid a constitutional crisis and work within the administration to contain him.

"Many Trump appointees have vowed to do what we can to preserve our democratic institutions while thwarting Mr. Trump's more misguided impulses until he is out of office," the official writes.

The column, which published midafternoon Wednesday, sent tremors through the West Wing and launched a frantic guessing game. Startled aides canceled meetings and huddled behind closed doors to strategize a response. Aides were analyzing language patterns to try to discern author's identity, or at a minimum the part of the administration where the author works.

"The problem for the president is it could be so many people," said one administration official, who like many others interviewed for this story spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid. "You can't rule it down to one person. Everyone is trying, but it's impossible."

The phrase, "The sleeper cells have awoken," circulated on text messages among aides and outside allies.

"It's like the horror movies when everyone realizes the call is coming from inside the house," said one former White House official in close contact with former co-workers.

The stark and anonymous warning was a breathtaking event without precedent in modern presidential history.

"For somebody within the belly of the White House to be saying there are a group of us running a resistance, making sure the president of the United States doesn't do irrational and dangerous things, it is a mind-boggling moment," historian Douglas Brinkley said.

The column added to the evolving narrative of Trump's presidency, based on daily news reporting and books like Woodward's that rely on candid accounts of anonymous administration officials.

"This is what all of us have understood to be the situation from Day One," Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) told reporters. He added, "That's why I think all of us encourage the good people around the president to stay."
[President Trump slams 'gutless' New York Times 'resistance' op-ed]
Trump was the first to speak for the administration and lashed out at the Times for its decision to publish the column.

"The failing New York Times has an anonymous editorial - can you believe it? - anonymous, meaning gutless, a gutless editorial," Trump told reporters during an event with sheriffs in the East Room of the White House.

The president went on to brag about his popularity, although nearly all public polls show that more Americans disapprove of his job performance than approve of it. "Our poll numbers are great, and guess what? Nobody's going to come even close to beating me in 2020," Trump said, as the sheriffs assembled behind him burst into applause.

The president later tweeted a single word alleging a possible crime: "TREASON?"

In the Times column, the official writes about the late senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) in heroic terms, describing him as "a lodestar for restoring honor to public life and our national dialogue."

This invocation angered Trump, who in his private talks with advisers and friends expressed particular dismay because he has long viewed McCain as a personal enemy, according to people familiar with the president's thinking. The column reignited Trump's frustration with last week's remembrances of McCain and the widespread adulation of his life.

The president was already feeling especially vulnerable - and a deep "sense of paranoia," in the words of one confidant - in the wake of his devastating portrayal in Woodward's book. He was upset that so many in his orbit seemed to have spoken with the veteran Washington Post investigative journalist, and had begun peppering staffers with questions about who Woodward's sources were.

Trump already felt that he had a dwindling circle of people who he could trust, a senior administration official said. According to one Trump friend, he fretted after Wednesday's op-ed that he could only trust his children.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also denounced the opinion column in a ferociously-worded statement that channeled her boss's rage and echoed some of his favorite attacks on the media.

Her statement began by invoking Trump's 2016 election victory and noting, "None of them voted for a gutless, anonymous source to the failing New York Times." Sanders went on to demand that the paper apologize for what she called the "pathetic, reckless, and selfish op-ed," and urged the anonymous author to leave the White House.

"The individual behind this piece has chosen to deceive, rather than support, the duly elected President of the United States," she said in her statement. "He is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people. This coward should do the right thing and resign."
[The Fix: Another hostage in the White House comes forward]
There were immediate calls from Trump critics for the author to step forward and share more information with the public, including perhaps testifying before Congress, about Trump's fitness for office.

Both inside the White House and in Trump's broader orbit, aides and confidants scrambled to identify the anonymous official, windmilling in all directions; within just hours of publication, they privately offered up roughly a dozen different theories and suggested traitors.

One aide, for example, suggested a staffer seeking glory and secretly hoping to get caught, while another mused that the official was likely a low-level staffer in a peripheral agency. Others wondered aloud just what constituted a "senior official in the Trump administration."

A spokeswoman for the Times said she was unable to provide any additional clarity on how the newspaper defines a senior administration official.

Times editorial-page editor James Bennet declined to provide further information about the writer's position or identity, but said the newspaper received the article before news about Woodward's book broke on Tuesday. He said the newspaper "would not have been able to publish" the article if it had not granted anonymity to its author.

"We thought it was an important perspective to get out," Bennet said. "Our preference is not to publish anonymously and we seldom do it. The question is, do we think the piece was important enough to make an exception? We feel strongly that it was."

The outing of the op-ed's author is virtually inevitable, according to forensic linguists, who work in both academia and private industry, figuring out the authors of anonymous texts in lawsuits, plagiarism cases and historical puzzles.

"We take the questioned document and compare it to known exemplars," said Robert Leonard, a linguist at Hofstra University who is often retained by defendants and prosecutors in criminal cases involving threats, plagiarism and libel.

But although many people immediately launched into amateur forensic investigations after publication of the Times piece, Leonard cautioned that "a problem with public people is that a lot of their published work is edited, so it's like mixing fingerprints or DNA. You don't always know who the real author is."

Brinkley said the most analogous example of disloyalty and advisers disregarding the president's wishes was in Richard Nixon's final year as president. He explained that Nixon would "bark crazy orders" to aides that they intentionally disregarded.

"You'd have to go back to Hans Christian Andersen, 'The Emperor Has No Clothes,' to see this syndrome where the president's reality happens to be so different from his own senior advisers," Brinkley said.

Paul Farhi and Marc Fisher contributed to this report.

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'The sleeper cells have awoken': Trump and aides shaken by 'resistance' op-ed

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President Trump and his aides reacted with indignation Wednesday to an unsigned opinion column from a senior official blasting the president's "amorality" and launched a frantic hunt for the author, who claims to be part of a secret "resistance" inside the government protecting the nation from its commander in chief.

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Seven crew members and three passengers fell ill on a flight from Dubai to New York City.

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An Emirates Airlines flight from Dubai is being isolated at a New York City airport after reports that as many as 100 people on board could be sick, officials said.

Emirates Airlines Flight EK203 landed safely at John F. Kennedy airport Wednesday morning. The pilot reported that two male passengers have extremely high fevers and about 100 passengers are "coughing non-stop," preliminary information indicates.

@LarryCoben/Twitter

A total of 521 passengers are on board. The plane is currently being kept away from the airport's terminal. The illness has not been confirmed, but authorities are investigating.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Customs and Border Protection have been notified.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey declined to discuss the matter further as the situation is ongoing.

Spencer Platt/Getty Images, FILE

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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Authorities investigating reports of flight with up to 100 ill people at NYC airport

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An Emirates Airlines flight from Dubai is being isolated at a New York City airport after reports that as many as 100 people on board could be sick, officials said. Emirates Airlines Flight EK203 landed safely at John F. Kennedy airport Wednesday morning. The pilot reported that two male...

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An anonymous senior white house official has published an Op Ed in the New York Times about the resistance that even Trump's employees are putting up.

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Several days ago a senior official in the Trump administration used an intermediary to contact New York Times op-ed page editor Jim Dao.

Through the go-between, the senior official expressed interest in writing an explosive piece for the paper, describing a "resistance" to President Trump within the government that works overtime to protect the United States from the president's worst impulses.

The result, published on the New York Times' website on Wednesday, prompted speculation all across Washington about who the official is.

Dao, of course, isn't saying. In a telephone interview, he was careful not to share any identifying details, even the person's gender.

"The person contacted me through an intermediary," he said.

Dao said it happened "several days ago," declining to be more specific.

Many officials within the administration can be considered "senior," even if they do not work in the West Wing or interact directly with Trump.

Dao declined to characterize just how "senior" the whistleblower is. He said the Times did speak to the author directly, but wouldn't say how so.

"We were simply trying to abide by the standard that the Times in general would use when referring to someone who's not named," he said.

Dao reports to editorial page editor James Bennet, who in turn reports to the Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger. The opinion section is separate from the newsroom.

Dao said there are only a "very small number of people within the Times who know this person's identity," but he declined to name them.

He said "we have taken a number of special precautions to protect the person's identity."

Face to face meetings? Encrypted messaging? The speculation will continue, but Dao would not go into any detail.

He said there was no special effort to disguise the person's writing style, for example by rewriting the piece in some fashion.

"There's editing in everything we do," he said, but it's based on making the person's views "clearer" and adhering to style standards.

Despite the extraordinary nature of the op-ed, Dao said, his initial response to the intermediary was the same as it would be for anyone else.

The op-ed came on the same week that the excerpts from Bob Woodward's book "Fear" have revived conversations about Trump's behavior and fitness for office.

Dao said that as far as he knows, "this is a coincidence," meaning the senior official's outreach was not related to the Woodward book.

Major newspapers almost never publish unnamed op-ed pieces. At The Times, it is very rare, but not quite unprecedented.

Dao said he had published a few other anonymous pieces during his tenure as op-ed editor, which began in early 2016. The most recent example was a piece in June by an unnamed asylum seeker from El Salvador.

In this case, The Times said it granted anonymity "at the request of the author" because the person's job "would be jeopardized by its disclosure."

Dao declined to say whether he pressed the person to speak on the record.

He said, "we felt it was a very strong piece written by someone who had something important to say and who's speaking from a place of their own sense of personal ethics and conscience. That was our main focus."

He said he couldn't talk about the fact-checking process in detail, but "we do make an effort to check the facts for all the pieces."

Dao did not rule out publishing another op-ed from the senior official in the future.

CNNMoney (New York) First published September 5, 2018: 7:00 PM ET

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The story behind the New York Times' anonymous op-ed blasting Trump

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Through the go-between, the senior official expressed interest in writing an explosive piece for the paper, describing a "resistance" to President Trump within the government that works overtime to protect the United States from the president's worst impulses. The result, published on the New York Times' website on Wednesday, prompted speculation all across Washington about who the official is.

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Hurricane Gordon hit some Southern States that are on the Gulf of Mexico. The Storm will then be coming up through the Midwest and we should be getting lots of rain.

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Almost 10 inches of rain has fallen near Pensacola, Florida, over the last two days, as parts of Alabama have seen more than 7 inches as a result of Gordon's making landfall.

Interested in Hurricanes?

Add Hurricanes as an interest to stay up to date on the latest Hurricanes news, video, and analysis from ABC News.

The remnants from Gordon, which is now officially a depression, are continuing into Arkansas this morning. Flood watches have been issued after parts of Kansas saw severe flooding on Wednesday. Parts of Iowa have seen more than 10 inches over the last few days.

ABC News

As what's left of Gordon continues north and east into early next week, some areas will see another 8 inches, with more precipitation expected in the Northeast Monday and Tuesday.

ABC News

New tropical systems are developing in the Atlantic Ocean that could become threatening in the coming weeks.

Hurricane Florence is a Category 3, with 115 mph winds, and it's moving northwest at about 12 mph. It briefly reached Category 4 status, with 130 mph winds, on Wednesday. Another tropical wave behind Florence could be the next major storm. It's name? Helene.

ABC News

Florence likely will approach Bermuda on Monday or Tuesday, and the storm system could approach the East Coast as soon as the middle of next week.

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Remnants from Gordon lead to flooding as Florence threatens Bermuda

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Almost 10 inches of rain has fallen near Pensacola, Florida, over the last two days, as parts of Alabama have seen more than 7 inches as a result of Gordon's making landfall. Add Hurricanes as an interest to stay up to date on the latest Hurricanes news, video, and analysis from ABC News.

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Hurricane Florence was a Category 4 hurricane, but it was got down graded to a Category 3. It will affect Bermuda on Friday and make its way up to the east coast. Hurricane Gordon is around Jackson Mississippi and in Pensacola it was rained 10.48 inches. By this weekend Hurricane Gordon is going to make its way towards the Great Lakes.

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

According to the National Hurricane Center, Florence's sustained winds dropped to 115 miles per hours-down from its Category 4-level winds of 130 mph on Wednesday. Additional weakening was forecast throughout Thursday.

The agency said Florence was moving northwest at 12 mph and was forecast to turn west-northwest. The storm was 1,170 miles east-southeast of Bermuda overnight Thursday.

While forecasters expect Florence to weaken over the next several days, the storm is predicted to remain a powerful hurricane through early next week.

The National Hurricane Center said that swells generated by Florence will begin to affect Bermuda onFriday and will reach portions of the U.S. East Coast over the weekend. It said that "swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions."

There are no watches or warnings currently in effect for the U.S.

While Florence continued on its path in the Atlantic, the remains of Tropical Depression Gordon spread bands of heavy rain across parts of the South as it swirled over Mississippi Wednesday.

Rain spun around the storm's center in the Jackson, Mississippi, area Wednesday afternoon. And bands swept up from the Gulf, dropping more rain on northwest Florida - where 10.48 inches already had fallen at Florida's Pensacola International Airport by Wednesday morning - through the center of Alabama and into Tennessee.

What's left of Gordon is forecast to head northeast into Arkansas. By Saturday, what's left of the storm was forecast to hook to the north, then northeast on a path toward the Great Lakes.

National Weather Service offices in Missouri and Oklahoma said Gordon's remnants could add to the rain caused by a frontal boundary already causing heavy rains in parts of the Midwest. Flash flood watches stretched from the Florida panhandle, through parts of southwest Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa and Illinois.
Fox News' Sam Chamberlain and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Hurricane Florence weakening, but will remain powerful storm, forecasters say

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

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An Israeli teen was visiting Yosemite National Park, and when he took a picture, he slipped and fell 800 feet to his death.

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An Israeli teen visiting Yosemite National Park fell to his death Wednesday while trying to take a selfie, a report said.

Tomer Frankfurter, 18, a resident of Jerusalem, had been on a two-month trip to the United States when he died, according to Israeli news reports. He apparently died after plunging more than 800 feet after he slipped off a cliff, The San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Frankfurter's mother confirmed her son's death with Israeli's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Times of Israel reported.

The ministry said Wednesday that the teen's body was being brought back to Israel for burial.

Yosemite National Park is no stranger to rock climbing-related deaths.

In June, two climbers died while scaling Yosemite's iconic El Capitan rock formation while simu-climbing, a technique where climbers move simultaneously while tied to the same rope.

Another hiker died in May while climbing the picturesque Half Dome peak above Yosemite Valley.

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Israeli teen plunges 800 feet to his death at Yosemite, report says

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An Israeli teen visiting Yosemite National Park fell to his death Wednesday while trying to take a selfie, a report said.

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73 people were arrested for disorderly conduct by the second day of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's hearing.

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capitol police arrest 73 on day two of kavanaugh hearings - cnnpolitics

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Capitol Police arrest 73 on day two of Kavanaugh hearings

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US Capitol Police said they had arrested 73 people in the Senate office buildings by the end of the second day of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings.

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Hurricane Florence is weakening but will remain powerful. It was down graded to a category 3 storm instead of category 4, with winds of 115 mph.

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

According to the National Hurricane Center, Florence's sustained winds dropped to 115 miles per hours-down from its Category 4-level winds of 130 mph on Wednesday. Additional weakening was forecast throughout Thursday.

The agency said Florence was moving northwest at 12 mph and was forecast to turn west-northwest. The storm was 1,170 miles east-southeast of Bermuda overnight Thursday.

While forecasters expect Florence to weaken over the next several days, the storm is predicted to remain a powerful hurricane through early next week.

The National Hurricane Center said that swells generated by Florence will begin to affect Bermuda onFriday and will reach portions of the U.S. East Coast over the weekend. It said that "swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions."

There are no watches or warnings currently in effect for the U.S.

While Florence continued on its path in the Atlantic, the remains of Tropical Depression Gordon spread bands of heavy rain across parts of the South as it swirled over Mississippi Wednesday.

Rain spun around the storm's center in the Jackson, Mississippi, area Wednesday afternoon. And bands swept up from the Gulf, dropping more rain on northwest Florida - where 10.48 inches already had fallen at Florida's Pensacola International Airport by Wednesday morning - through the center of Alabama and into Tennessee.

What's left of Gordon is forecast to head northeast into Arkansas. By Saturday, what's left of the storm was forecast to hook to the north, then northeast on a path toward the Great Lakes.

National Weather Service offices in Missouri and Oklahoma said Gordon's remnants could add to the rain caused by a frontal boundary already causing heavy rains in parts of the Midwest. Flash flood watches stretched from the Florida panhandle, through parts of southwest Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa and Illinois.
Fox News' Sam Chamberlain and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Hurricane Florence weakening, but will remain powerful storm, forecasters say

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Florence was downgraded to a Category 3 storm as it weakened along its path in the Atlantic overnight Thursday, though forecasters say the storm "is expected to remain a strong hurricane for the next several days."

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An Israeli teen on a two month trip to the United States was vising Yosemite National Park and attempted to take a selfie but slipped and fell off a cliff and fell roughly 800 feet to his death.

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An Israeli teen visiting Yosemite National Park fell to his death Wednesday while trying to take a selfie, a report said.

Tomer Frankfurter, 18, a resident of Jerusalem, had been on a two-month trip to the United States when he died, according to Israeli news reports. He apparently died after plunging more than 800 feet after he slipped off a cliff, The San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Frankfurter's mother confirmed her son's death with Israeli's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Times of Israel reported.

The ministry said Wednesday that the teen's body was being brought back to Israel for burial.

Yosemite National Park is no stranger to rock climbing-related deaths.

In June, two climbers died while scaling Yosemite's iconic El Capitan rock formation while simu-climbing, a technique where climbers move simultaneously while tied to the same rope.

Another hiker died in May while climbing the picturesque Half Dome peak above Yosemite Valley.

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Israeli teen plunges 800 feet to his death at Yosemite, report says

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An Israeli teen visiting Yosemite National Park fell to his death Wednesday while trying to take a selfie, a report said.

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A one-handed player, drafted this past draft by the Seattle Seahawks, is set to start in the home opener in the 2018-19 NFL season. He is the first one-handed player in the Modern Era NFL.

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Shaquem Griffin, one-handed NFL player, to start in season opener | CNN

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Shaquem Griffin out of the University of Central Florida was drafted in the fifth round, 141st overall. He'll likely start alongside his twin brother.

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Japan's northern island of Hokkaido has been hit by a powerful earthquake, triggering landslides that engulfed houses.

At least eight people have been killed and about 40 are missing

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Japan hit by deadly earthquake and mudslides

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Days after a typhoon lashed Japan's west, the country's north is hit by another natural disaster.

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North Korea has agreed to denuclerization  of North Korea. Chung, a North Korean envoy, said that Kim jong un has never talked bad about Donald Trump and he has faith in him.

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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reaffirmed his commitment to a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula amid a growing standoff with the United States, his state-controlled media reported Thursday after a South Korean delegation met him to set up an inter-Korean summit.

The statement from the Korean Central News Agency wasn't new information - Kim has repeatedly declared similar intentions before - but allows hopes to rise that diplomacy can get back on track after the recriminations that followed Kim's meeting in June with U.S. President Donald Trump in Singapore. The impasse between North Korea and the United States, with neither side seemingly willing to make any substantive move, has generated widespread skepticism over Trump's claims that Kim is intent on dismantling his nuclear weapons program.

The South Korean envoys who met Kim on Wednesday finalized the dates for a summit later this month between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, the driving force behind the current diplomacy. Moon is seen as eager to keep the nuclear talks alive in part so that he can advance his ambitious engagement with the North, which would need U.S. backing to succeed. The date of the talks, which will come on the eve of a gathering of world leaders at the U.N. at the end of September, was to be released later Thursday.

Kim was paraphrased in the statement by his propaganda specialists as saying that it was "his will to completely remove the danger of armed conflict and horror of war from the Korean peninsula and turn it into the cradle of peace without nuclear weapons and free from nuclear threat."

KCNA said Kim and the South Korean envoys reached a "satisfactory agreement" over his planned summit with Moon.

Moon, who discussed his plans with President Donald Trump by telephone on Tuesday, said his envoys had a crucial task that could determine the prospects for lasting peace.

While pushing ahead with summits and inter-Korean engagement, Seoul is trying to persuade Washington and Pyongyang to proceed with peace and denuclearization processes at the same time so they can overcome a growing dispute over the sequencing of the diplomacy.

Seoul also wants a trilateral summit among the countries, or a four-nation meeting that also includes Beijing, to declare a formal end to the 1950-53 Korean War. The U.N. General Assembly in late September would be an ideal date for Seoul, but many analysts see that possibility as low, considering the complications of the process and how far apart the parties currently are.

U.S. officials have insisted that a peace declaration, which many see as a precursor to the North eventually calling for the removal of all U.S. troops from the Korean Peninsula, cannot come before North Korea takes more concrete action toward abandoning its nuclear weapons. Such steps may include providing an account of the components of its nuclear program, allowing outside inspections and giving up a certain number of its nuclear weapons during the early stages of the negotiations.

While an end-of-war declaration wouldn't imply a legally binding peace treaty, experts say it could create political momentum that would make it easier for North Korea to steer the discussions toward a peace regime, diplomatic recognition, economic benefits and security concessions.

North Korea has accused the United States of making "unilateral and gangster-like" demands for denuclearization and holding back on the end-of-war declaration. North Korea's Foreign Ministry on Tuesday published a lengthy statement on its website saying that an end-of-war declaration would be a necessary trust-building step between the wartime foes that would "manifest the political will to establish the lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula."

South Korean officials said an end-of-war declaration would be among the issues discussed in the meetings between the South Korean envoys and North Korean officials.

"Our government believes that an end-of-war declaration is very much needed while we enter a process toward stabilizing peace in the Korean Peninsula through complete denuclearization," said Chung Eui-yong, Moon's national security adviser and the head of the South Korean delegation to Pyongyang, in a news conference on Tuesday.

"We will continue to put in efforts so that an end-of-war declaration can be reached by the end of the year. We are always maintaining close communication with the United States."

After their June summit in Singapore, Trump and Kim issued a vague statement about a nuclear-free peninsula without describing when and how it would occur. Post-summit nuclear negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang were rocky and quickly settled into a stalemate.

While the United States maintains that efforts to improve relations between the Koreas should move in tandem with efforts to denuclearize North Korea, Moon has recently said inter-Korean engagement could take the lead.

"If needed, we should pull forward the negotiations for the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula with the development in relations between the South and North," Chung said.

Any progress could depend on whether Moon's envoys were able to coax a stronger verbal commitment from North Korea on denuclearization to help put the nuclear talks between the United States and Pyongyang back on track.

Trump called off a planned visit to North Korea by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo last month, citing insufficient progress in denuclearization. The resumption of U.S.-North Korea talks sometime before the next inter-Korean summit, which will likely take place in mid-September, could give Moon more to work with when he arrives in Pyongyang.

The two past inter-Korean summits in April and May removed war fears and initiated a global diplomatic push that culminated with the meeting between Kim and Trump in June. But Moon faces tougher challenges heading into his third meeting with Kim with the stalemate in nuclear negotiations between Pyongyang and Washington raising fundamental questions about Kim's supposed willingness to abandon his nuclear weapons.

The Korean War ended with an armistice, leaving the peninsula technically still at war. Moon has made an end-of-war declaration an important premise of his peace agenda with North Korea.

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North Korea's Kim Jong Un reaffirms commitment to nuclear-free peninsula

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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reaffirmed his commitment to a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula amid a growing standoff with the United States, his state-controlled media reported Thursday after a South Korean delegation met him to set up an inter-Korean summit.