Man detained after sneaking into 30 Rock looking for ‘Today’ show host: Police
People walk by the Comcast building which houses NBC Studios in Manhattan on June 29, 2026 in New York City. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — A man is in custody after he allegedly snuck into an NBC building at New York City’s Rockefeller Center on Thursday morning, authorities said.
The suspect said he was looking for “Today” show weather anchor Al Roker, and he allegedly repeatedly uttered a racial slur, police said.
He also made other statements that lead police to believe he is emotionally disturbed, police said.
The man was detained by an NYPD officer working a paid detail, police said.
Charges are pending, police said.
ABC News has reached out to NBC for comment.
NBC News told Variety in a statement, “An individual entered an unauthorized area in a vestibule near Studio 1A. The person approached anchor Craig Melvin, who alerted security.”
“The individual was detained and taken into custody by law enforcement without further incident. There was no altercation, and no one was injured,” NBC said.
NBC said it takes “the safety and security of our employees, talent, staff and guests extremely seriously. We are reviewing the incident and our security protocols and remain committed to providing a safe and secure environment for everyone who works at and visits our studios.”
Relentless rain and flash flooding have inundated parts of Kentucky over the weekend and left at least four dead, Gov. Andy Beshear said. (Richmond Police Department)
(NEW YORK) — A woman was killed on Sunday in Tennessee as she attempted to rescue her son, who had been swept away in high waters, a local sheriff’s office said, as a flash flood threat was in effect for parts of Tennessee and Kentucky, where four other deaths were recorded.
The Grainger County Sheriff’s Department in Tennessee said Mary Evelyn Nicole Manning-Kellione, 39, was killed on Sunday after she went to rescue her son after rising water carried him into a culvert.
“The son was able to surface at the other end and came to safety when he realized his mother was in the water,” the office said in a statement. “Rescue personnel located the individual lodged inside the culvert.”
The National Weather Service (NWS) Prediction Center had upgraded the flood threat on Sunday for parts of Kentucky and Tennessee to a level 3 out of 4 “moderate risk.”
Kentucky residents had been bracing for another round of relentless rain, a day after flash flooding killed at least four people and the governor declared a state of emergency.
The heaviest rain had been expected in southeast Kentucky and parts of Tennessee, including Owensboro and Somerset, Kentucky, and Knoxville, Tennessee.
Rainfall rates of 2 to 3 inches per hour are possible, according to the NWS, and daily totals could reach up to five inches in some parts.
Several flash-flood warnings were issued on Sunday morning as ongoing heavy rain and flooding were reported in southern Indiana and northeast Tennessee. A flash flood emergency has been issued for Metcalf, Cumberland and Clinton counties for ongoing life-threatening flooding, according to the NWS. Between 2.6 and 8 inches of rain have reportedly fallen over these areas.
There have been reports of multiple water rescues with some evacuations and homes flooded in Clinton County. Clinton County and the City of Albany, Kentucky, have issued states of emergency due to ongoing flooding.
Northwest North Carolina, which was hit by flash floods over the weekend, is also at an “elevated risk” of flash flooding on Sunday, according to the NWS.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear provided an update early Sunday afternoon in a video posted to X, saying in part that nine counties in all had declared states of emergency, some of which “got hit with record or almost record amounts of rain in very short periods of time,” he said. Search and rescue efforts remain underway, he said.
Beshear advised residents to stay off of the roads if they can. “Bridges have been wiped out, entire roads have been wiped away and there is still standing and moving water,” he said. He added that he’d activated the state’s price-gouging laws to prevent merchants from increasing prices on essential goods, and had also signed an emergency order “so pharmacies in areas that are hit can go ahead and fill people’s prescriptions that have been washed away or are no longer safe to take.”
The severe weather comes after a weekend of deadly flash flooding that occurred in Kentucky.
More than 10 inches of rain fell on Saturday in parts of the state, prompting flash flooding and deaths.
Beshear announced late Saturday that four people were killed in floods that hit central Kentucky and spread into northeast Tennessee and northwest North Carolina.
“Kentucky, I have some tough news to share,” the governor wrote in a social media post on Saturday, announcing the deaths.
Three fatalities occurred in Madison County, Kentucky, and one flood-related death happened in Jackson County, Beshear said.
According to the Madison County Coroner, of the three fatalities in the county, two of the deaths, one adult male and one adult female, occurred at a residence in Richmond.
The third death was an adult male who was swept away in his vehicle on Tates Creek Road in Madison County, the coroner said.
Beshear declared a statewide state of emergency on Saturday.
“This is a serious flooding event, where teams have already had to conduct multiple water rescues from vehicles and homes across the commonwealth,” Beshear said.
As crews from Kentucky to North Carolina clean up from the storms, a prolonged spell of extreme heat is forecast to settle in across the Midwest and Northeast this week.
Heat alerts have been issued across the Plains to the Ohio Valley and south to the Tennessee and Mississippi Valleys.
An excessive heat warning has been posted for Kansas City, Missouri, through Thursday night.
Temperatures in Kansas City are expected to climb into the 90s on Sunday.
On Monday, widespread highs in the 90s are forecast across the country’s midsection, but high humidity will make it feel hotter.
Excessive heat watches are expected to go into effect for Minneapolis and Chicago on Monday, with the temperature feeling like the triple digits during the afternoon hours.
In Minneapolis, the temperature could feel like 110 on Monday afternoon.
-ABC News’ Ahmad Hemingway contributed to this report.
SpaceX’s mega rocket Starship lifts off on a test flight from Starbase, Texas, Sept. 28, 2026. (SpaceX)
(NEW YORK) — SpaceX on Monday launched the world’s largest and most powerful rocket and spacecraft on a mission that marks the first time the spacecraft achieved orbit.
Starship splashed down in the Pacific, north of Hawaii, just before noon ET. Although the mission ended some seven hours earlier than planned, with the company choosing to return to Earth during the first scheduled mission checkpoint, SpaceX is calling flight 14 a success because it achieved both of its primary objectives: getting Starship into orbit for the first time and successfully adding Starlink satellites to its orbital constellation.
Starship’s 14th test flight was also the first Starship mission to make money for SpaceX; the company successfully deployed 26 Starlink satellites into orbit to build out its satellite internet division, SpaceX’s primary revenue generator.
Overall, this is the first time the Starship vehicle has reached orbit, deployed a revenue-generating payload and returned to Earth. While the company had some issues with two engines on the Super Heavy booster and one on the Starship spacecraft, the flight demonstrated that SpaceX is making significant progress with the Starship program, even if there is still work to be done.
The flight lifted off at 8:50 a.m. ET from SpaceX’s Starbase in Cameron County, Texas. The launch was initially scheduled for 8:15 a.m. ET but that was pushed Monday morning to 8:48 a.m. ET. Flight controllers had a 75-minute launch window to get the spacecraft off the pad.
Despite the spacecraft losing one engine during the ascent to space, which was not needed to achieve orbit, it successfully executed its orbital insertion burn.
Just over a half-hour into the mission, Starship began deploying its payload of 26 Starlink V3 satellites, marking the first time that the Starlink satellites have been placed into orbit for ongoing use. Previous missions deployed either Starlink simulators or satellites that burned up in the atmosphere.
The mission was scheduled to last just under 10 hours, with SpaceX is aiming for about six orbits, traveling at about 17,500 mph more than 170 miles above Earth. However, SpaceX decided to take advantage of their first scheduled checkpoint and ended the mission early, following the successful deployment of the Starlink satellites, making to total mission duration about three hours from launch to splashdown.
The company did not say what factored into their decision but pointed out that this is the longest SpaceX mission to date.
Starship lifted off atop the vehicle’s Super Heavy booster, which separated from from the spacecraft after launch and performed a boostback burn, designed to change its direction so it can return to Earth. After the landing burn, the booster successfully splashed down in the Gulf.
Starship started its flight on what SpaceX calls a “passively safe” suborbital/free-return path. This is the same trajectory the company used for previous missions.
The flight plan included regular vehicle health checks during the flight. SpaceX says Starship has more than 500 sensors that measure things such as temperature, pressure and acceleration during the mission. In addition, the vehicle provides flight controllers with continuous telemetry data.
At the end of the mission, Starship performed a deorbit burn using a single Raptor sea-level engine to prepare to reenter Earth’s atmosphere.
Scheduled to open in 2031, 2 World Trade Center will be the global headquarters of American Express as seen in this rendering of the building. (Foster + Partners/WTC)
(NEW YORK) — Twenty-five years after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, left a gaping void in Lower Manhattan, American Express broke ground Thursday on its new headquarters, a tiered glass and steel tower at 2 World Trade Center.
The 55-story, 2 million square foot building with more than an acre of outdoor terraces and gardens is the last commercial development in the footprint of the fallen twin towers of the World Trade Center.
The skyscraper is scheduled to be completed in 2031 and rise 1,226 feet.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said the project will create 3,200 jobs and inject $6 billion into the city’s economy.
“We are standing today on hallowed ground,” Mamdani said.
“This has been a long journey,” said Lisa Silverstein of Silverstein Properties, the developer of the site since 2001. “This is the capstone for the World Trade Center.”
