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Ernesto becomes hurricane again; dangerous conditions for East Coast beaches

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(NEW YORK) — Ernesto was upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane on Sunday night, with the National Hurricane Center warning of dangerous conditions for East Coast beaches.

The hurricane — which over the past week has caused major power outages and flooding in Puerto Rico and Bermuda — is out over the Atlantic, with maximum sustained winds up to 75 mph.

The NHC expects Ernesto to cross southeastern Newfoundland late Monday into Tuesday morning.

Ernesto is the fifth named storm and the third hurricane of this year’s Atlantic season. It made landfall in Bermuda early on Saturday, dumping 7 to 9 inches of rain and flooding parts of the island. The British Overseas Territory avoided major damage, and Ernesto is now some 200 miles northeast of Bermuda.

High surf and life-threatening rip currents are still anticipated over the next couple of days along the U.S. East Coast.

The entire Atlantic coast from Florida to Maine is under a high-risk rip current alert on Sunday.

“Life-threatening surf and rip current conditions are likely,” the National Hurricane Center warned, “which means life-threatening rip currents are likely, and dangerous for all levels of swimmers.”

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Local news National

August’s full moon will be a rare super blue moon: What to expect

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(NEW YORK) — On the heels of the Perseid meteor shower earlier this month, August is offering another great astronomical sight — the rare combination of a supermoon and blue moon.

Beginning on Aug. 19, the super blue moon will reach peak fullness at 2:26 p.m. ET. Since that’s daylight hours in the U.S., Americans will have to wait for the evening to see the moon slightly past its peak, while still being noticeably larger and brighter than a typical moon view.

The super blue moon will appear full for three days, according to NASA.

A supermoon coinciding with a blue moon is exceptionally rare, the space agency reports, with the next pairing happening in January and March 2037.

What is a supermoon?

Supermoons are the biggest and brightest lunar views of the year, they occur when the moon’s orbit is within 90% of its closest approach to Earth, according to NASA.

During the moon’s closest approach to Earth, it can appear approximately 14% larger and shine 30% brighter than when at its farthest point in the orbit, approximately 226,000 miles away.

The term “supermoon” was originally coined by astrologer Richard Nolle in 1979.

Supermoons appear three to four times annually and always appear consecutively, according to NASA, which notes starting this month, the next three full moons will be supermoons.

The next supermoons will occur on Sept. 17, Oct. 17 and Nov. 15.

What is a blue moon?

Despite its name, blue moons have little to do with color and everything to do with timeliness. There are two types of blue moons – seasonal and monthly – and the blue moon on Aug. 19 will be seasonal.

A seasonal blue moon is the third full moon in an astrological season with four full moons, while a monthly blue moon refers to the second of two full moons in the same month.

The next seasonal blue moon is expected in May 2027, according to NASA.

While the super blue moon Aug. 19 won’t be blue, on rare occasions the moon has appeared blue. NASA reports that this occurs when tiny particles in the air, typically of smoke or dust, scatter away red wavelengths of light and cause the moon to appear blue.

How rare is a super blue moon?

While supermoons and seasonal blue moons are more common in the night sky individually, the combination of the two is quite irregular, according to NASA.

The time between super blue moons can be as long as 20 years but 10 years is the average. However, 2023 also saw a super blue moon in August.

Following Aug. 19, the next super blue moons will occur in a pair, in January and March 2037.

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Business Local news

Egg prices continue to soar by nearly 20%, new inflation data shows

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(NEW YORK) — Slow and steady may win the race for a tortoise vs. a hare, according to Aesop’s Fables. However, in reality, this turn of phrase does not ring true when applied to the gradual climb of consumer prices, especially with the latest exorbitant cost increases on items like eggs.

Egg prices soar nearly 20% since last year

The latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed prices on some household staples rose slightly slower than the overall rate of inflation, but food prices once again spiked upwards in July by 2.2% compared to last year.

Despite a dip in prices for rice, flour, and fish, the cost of a carton of eggs has been steadily on the rise, with a 19% increase from July 2023.

Since June, the price of eggs shot up 5.5% month-over-month.

The consistent increases have been attributed to a combination of factors, largely including a supply-driven price spike as a result of avian flu outbreaks that have wreaked havoc on poultry farms nationwide.

Earlier this spring, with a resurgence of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in egg-laying flocks, the United States Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service reported that 13.64 million table egg-laying hens had been lost to the disease since the beginning of November.

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Local news Politics

Trump focuses partly on economy as he returns to campaign trail in North Carolina

Republican presidential nominee, former U.S. President Donald Trump, speaks at a rally at the Brick Breeden Fieldhouse at Montana State University on August 9, 2024, in Bozeman, Montana. (Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images)

(WASHINGTON) — Former President Donald Trump focused partly on the economy during a speech in North Carolina on Wednesday as his campaign works to reset his close fight against Vice President Kamala Harris.

Trump advocated mostly for broad reforms, though, while offering little in the way of specifics and he went off on familiar tangents, including hurling repeated insults at Harris.

“Now this is a little bit different day,” Trump said as he began. “We’re talking about a thing called the economy. They wanted to do a speech on the economy. A lot of people are very devastated by what’s happened with inflation and all of the other things. So, we’re doing this as an intellectual speech. You’re all intellectuals today.”

Proposals he made included directing Cabinet secretaries and agencies to work to “defeat inflation,” getting rid of job regulations that he said were costing jobs, and highlighting his call for “no tax on tips” and eliminating taxes on Social Security benefits for seniors. He also repeated “drill, baby, drill” as his key solution to solving economic issues, accusing Democrats of using the environment to stop the oil and gas industry.

“Inflation is destroying our country. It’s destroying our families. We will target everything from car affordability to housing affordability to insurance costs to supply chain issues … to the price of prescription drugs, I will instruct my Cabinet that I expect results within the first 100 days, or much sooner than that,” Trump said.

The economy has been one of the Trump campaign’s central election issues this cycle — the former president often spending considerable time discussing inflation, gas prices and the job market. His speech on Wednesday — specifically his attacks on the Biden-Harris administration — included falsehoods as he painted a better situation of the U.S. economy during his administration over the current one.

Trump falsely claimed that when he left office the economy was surging when in fact the unemployment rate was at 6.4% in January 2021. Now, it’s much lower at 4.3%.

He also said inflation has never been as high as it was under President Joe Biden; however, the annual inflation rate peaked at 9% in June 2022 under Biden, and it reached 15% in April 1980. Now, it’s at 2.9%.

Attacking Harris, Trump branded her as a complainer and argued that the policies she’s currently advocating for shouldn’t be taken seriously because she would have already accomplished them as vice president.

“Kamala has declared that tackling inflation will be a day one priority … But day one for Kamala was three and a half years ago. Why hasn’t she done it?” Trump said.

After Harris recently advocated for the same no tax on tips policy Trump had announced earlier in the summer, the Trump campaign called Harris “Copy Cat Kamala,” and Trump on stage said it was evidence that she would copy all of his economic policies.

“When Kamala lays out her fake economic plans this week, it will probably be a copy of my plan, because basically, that’s what she does,” he said ahead of Harris’s economic plan rollout set for Friday.

“She’s doing a plan. You know she’s going to announce it this week. Maybe she’s, she’s waiting for me to announce it so she can copy it,” he said.

“During what was billed as a speech about his economic vision, Donald Trump said he’s ‘not sure the economy is the most important topic’ – because when you’re running to slash taxes for rich donors and corporations it’s easy not to care about the working families and middle class Americans who get hurt as a result,” Harris campaign spokesperson Ammar Moussa said in a statement shared with ABC News.

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