Hurricane Fiona closes in on Bermuda as Category 4 storm; Thousands in Puerto Rico still without power
CBSN
After causing major destruction in Puerto Rico — and then hitting the Dominican Republic and Turks and Caicos Islands — Hurricane Fiona was scheduled to pass close to Bermuda late Thursday as a Category 4 storm. Bermudan authorities were opening shelters and announced schools and offices would be closed Friday.
As of Thursday evening, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Fiona had maximum sustained winds of 130 mph. It was centered about 305 miles southwest of Bermuda, heading northeast at 20 mph.
Hurricane-force winds extended outward up to 70 miles from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extended outward up to 275 miles.
London — As authorities clamp down on fentanyl distribution and the amount of heroin produced in Afghanistan decreases under the Taliban, criminal enterprises have turned to a deadly alternative. Some health agencies in Europe are reporting a rise in deaths and overdoses from a type of synthetic opioid that can reportedly be hundreds of times stronger than heroin and up to forty times stronger than fentanyl.
Vaughan Gething was elected as the new first minister of Wales on Wednesday, becoming the first Black leader of a government in the U.K. Gething was elected to lead the government by members of the Welsh parliament in Cardiff, four days after winning the contest to be leader of Wales' governing Labour Party. He secured 27 of 51 votes in the legislature, the Senedd, where Labour is the biggest party.
Errekunda, Gambia — Lawmakers in Gambia will vote Monday on legislation that seeks to repeal a ban on female genital mutilation, or FGM, which would make the West African nation the first country anywhere to make that reversal. The procedure, which also has been called female genital cutting, includes the partial or full removal of external genitalia, often by traditional community practitioners with tools such as razor blades or at times by health workers.