Thursday, October 1, 2026
World Brief Now

News and commentary: world, White House and the Supreme Court, six times a day. Facts sourced. Analysis labeled.

5 PM CT update·Thursday, October 1, 2026

Dual SpaceX launches; UAE opens Flydubai terror probe; Trump hits Texas trail as Iran talks stall

Crew-13 and Transporter-18 both fly Thursday. UAE prosecutors probe the foiled Flydubai cockpit attack. Trump campaigns in Denton; Houthis hit a Medina power station; SCOTUS hears Suncor Monday.

5 PM CT video brief · 2:25Presenter voice and image generated with AI tools.
Read transcript

I'm Nora Vale with your Evening Update for Thursday, October 1. SpaceX flies Crew-13 from Florida and Transporter-18 from California; both boosters land. UAE opens Flydubai terror probe; Saudi transfers suspect to Abu Dhabi. Trump: more Iran bombing possible after midterms; Hormuz talks stalled. Trump visits Denton Peterbilt, then Durant rally; Vance stumps in Florida. SCOTUS hears Suncor climate case Monday; Alito not participating. In national weather, from the National Weather Service: Tropical Storm Nolo, with top winds near 60 mph, may bring impacts to parts of Hawaii. Excessive rainfall potential lingers over the Southern Plains through Friday before shifting into the Southeast and Gulf Coast this weekend. Our opinion. Dual Falcon 9s show free-enterprise space leadership. Probe Flydubai as terrorism. Nuclear limits before Hormuz relief. Climate policy belongs to voters and Congress, not local courts. That's your Evening Update. I'm Nora Vale. See you at 9.

In this update

  1. SpaceX flies Crew-13 from Florida and Transporter-18 from California on the same day
  2. Update: UAE opens terrorism probe after Flydubai cockpit attack; Saudi transfers suspect
  3. Update: Trump says more Iran bombing ‘possible’ after midterms as Hormuz talks stall
  4. Saudi-led coalition says Houthis attacked Medina power station supplying Prophet’s Mosque
  5. Trump visits Peterbilt plant in Denton, Texas, then rallies in Durant, Oklahoma
  6. Supreme Court opens term Monday with Suncor climate-liability arguments; Alito not participating

Published · Updated 5:19 PM CT
6 stories · 13 linked sources

World3 stories

Middle East5 PM CT

Update: UAE opens terrorism probe after Flydubai cockpit attack; Saudi transfers suspect

The United Arab Emirates’ chief prosecutor on Thursday ordered an investigation into Wednesday’s alleged cockpit attack on Flydubai flight FZ1073 from Dubai to Tel Aviv, seeking to determine whether it was linked to “terrorist activity or intent” or involved prior planning, Deutsche Welle reported citing the state news agency WAM. Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry said the suspected Omani co-pilot and the wounded Indian captain, Smit Machchhar, were transferred to Abu Dhabi on Thursday morning with an Emirati security team after medical clearance. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Fox News the suspect appeared to have undergone “Islamist radical indoctrination,” based on personal information gathered in questioning, while saying it was “too early to say” if Iran was involved; CBS News reported 174 people were aboard and that Saudi authorities had held the co-pilot before the transfer.

Sources
Iran5 PM CT

Update: Trump says more Iran bombing ‘possible’ after midterms as Hormuz talks stall

President Donald Trump, asked in a Time interview whether he would “ramp up bombing after the midterms,” replied “Possible,” and said the U.S. military had been “stocking up for the last six months,” Fox News reported Thursday. The comments came after Secretary of State Marco Rubio ordered Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and his U.N. delegation to leave New York when weekend mediator talks stalled; Iran disputed that account and said its departure was pre-scheduled. Talks remain stuck on sequencing for a seven-day confidence-building plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and restart nuclear negotiations, with Qatar mediating; Fox cited Brent crude above $103 a barrel Wednesday and a U.S. national average for regular gasoline near $4.43 a gallon.

Sources
Middle East5 PM CT

Saudi-led coalition says Houthis attacked Medina power station supplying Prophet’s Mosque

The Saudi-led coalition fighting Yemen’s Houthis said Thursday that the Iran-aligned group attacked a power distribution station in Medina this week, putting one transformer out of service without affecting the electricity network, Reuters reported. The coalition said drone wreckage confirmed Houthi involvement in planning and carrying out Tuesday’s attack and that the station supplies electricity to the Prophet’s Mosque, one of Islam’s holiest sites; a Houthi military source denied the accusation as a “lie.” Hostilities have resumed this year after the Houthis declared a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia in July; the Houthis later claimed Saudi strikes on Sanaa and other provinces, without immediate Saudi confirmation of those reports.

Sources

White House / President1 story

White House5 PM CT

Trump visits Peterbilt plant in Denton, Texas, then rallies in Durant, Oklahoma

President Donald Trump visited the Peterbilt Motors plant in Denton, Texas, on Thursday to tout his economic agenda, then headed to an evening campaign rally in Durant, Oklahoma, about 85 miles north of Dallas, CBS Texas and the Associated Press reported. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Republican Senate nominee trailing Democrat James Talarico in recent polls, was planning to join Trump in Denton; in Oklahoma, Trump campaigns with Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Mazzei against Democrat Cyndi Munson. The trip opens what Trump called a 32-day midterm blitz before Nov. 3; Vice President JD Vance campaigned the same day with Florida gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds in Lakeland while White House chief of staff Susie Wiles has described a near-daily presidential schedule through Election Day.

Sources

Supreme Court1 story

Supreme Court5 PM CT

Supreme Court opens term Monday with Suncor climate-liability arguments; Alito not participating

The Supreme Court on Monday, Oct. 5, will hear oral argument in Suncor Energy Inc. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County, a dispute over whether federal law bars state-law climate-damages suits against energy companies, SCOTUSblog reported in an Oct. 1 case preview. Boulder sued Suncor and ExxonMobil in Colorado state court seeking compensation tied to alleged climate harms; the Colorado Supreme Court allowed the claims to proceed, and the U.S. Supreme Court granted review. Justice Samuel Alito announced Sept. 28 he will not participate, creating the possibility of a 4-4 tie that would leave the Colorado ruling in place without a nationwide precedent; the Trump administration filed a brief supporting the companies. Separately, after the Court on Wednesday vacated a Sixth Circuit stay in Nelsen v. Pike, Tennessee’s attempted execution of Christa Pike failed and Gov. Bill Lee paused remaining 2026 executions.

Sources

SpaceX & Launches1 story

SpaceX5 PM CT

SpaceX flies Crew-13 from Florida and Transporter-18 from California on the same day

SpaceX lofted NASA’s Crew-13 mission from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Base, Florida, at 10:10 a.m. CT Thursday, sending Crew Dragon Grace toward the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney, Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov; booster B1101 landed on Landing Zone 40 about eight minutes later, NPR and Launch Library 2 reported. Later Thursday, Falcon 9 lofted Transporter-18 from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, at 1:32 p.m. CT (11:32 a.m. PDT) with 130 smallsat rideshare payloads; booster B1082, on its 25th flight, landed on Landing Zone 4 about seven and a half minutes later, NASASpaceFlight reported. Payload deployments for Transporter-18 continued about an hour after liftoff and included Google’s Project Suncatcher M1 AI/TPU prototype, Starfish Space’s Otter servicing vehicle, and NASA’s SPRITE CubeSat.

Sources

How we report

Read our sources & methodology →