WILBUR-BY-THE-SEA, Fla. (AP) — Tropical Storm Nicole has weakened to a tropical depression as it crosses the Florida Panhandle on its way north into Georgia. The storm had sent Florida homes toppling into the Atlantic Ocean earlier Thursday and threatened a row of high-rise condominiums in places where Hurricane Ian washed away the beach and destroyed seawalls only weeks ago. Nicole made landfall as a hurricane early Thursday near Vero Beach but the brunt of the damage was along the East Coast well north of there.

WILBUR-BY-THE-SEA, Fla. (AP) — Tropical Storm Nicole has sent multiple homes collapsing into the Atlantic Ocean. Nicole made landfall as a hurricane early Thursday near Vero Beach, Florida, but the brunt of the damage was along the East Coast well north of there, in the Daytona Beach area. Its damaging coastal surge was hitting beachfront properties in Daytona Beach Shores that lost their last protections during Hurricane Ian.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A large section of the destroyed space shuttle Challenger has been found buried in sand at the bottom of the Atlantic. NASA's Kennedy Space Center announced the discovery Thursday. Divers for a TV documentary crew spotted the piece in March, and NASA recently verified that it was part of the shuttle that broke apart during liftoff in 1986.

A toddler is thriving after doctors used a novel technique to treat her for a rare genetic disease before she was born. The girl, now 16 months, began receiving the critical protein her body can't make while still in the womb. The treatment was delivered through a needle inserted through the mother’s abdomen and guided into a vein in the umbilical cord.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Tropical Storm Nicole made landfall as a hurricane early Thursday near Vero Beach, Florida. It's such a sprawling storm that it has covered nearly the entire peninsula while reaching into Georgia and South Carolina. Weather-weary central Florida is still getting strong winds and heavy rain, with a damaging coastal surge in places like Daytona Beach Shores. The rare November hurricane led officials to shut down airports and theme parks and order evacuations.

MIAMI (AP) — A Florida-bound storm has strengthened into Hurricane Nicole after pounding the Bahamas and state officials ordered evacuations that included former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club. It’s a rare November hurricane for storm-weary Florida, where only two hurricanes have made landfall since recordkeeping began in 1853.

MIAMI (AP) — Crews evacuated dozens of people from vulnerable locations in the northwestern Bahamas as Tropical Storm Nicole approached and residents of Florida braced for the storm, which could strengthen to a rare November hurricane. Nicole is the first storm to hit the Bahamas since Hurricane Dorian, a devastating Category 5 storm that hit in 2019. Nicole is then expected to strike storm-weary Florida on Wednesday night and move into Georgia on Thursday.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — Former White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has been elected Arkansas governor and will be the first woman to lead the state. Sanders on Tuesday defeated Democratic nominee Chris Jones in the race for governor in her predominantly Republican home state. Sanders will succeed fellow Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who is barred by term limits from seeking reelection.

MIAMI (AP) — Subtropical Storm Nicole began strengthening and transitioning into a tropical storm as it churns toward the northwestern Bahamas and Florida’s Atlantic coastline. Jack Bevin, a senior forecaster at the Miami-based National Hurricane Center, says Nicole could become a “full-blown tropical storm" later Tuesday. A range of warnings and watches remain in place throughout the region.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — A newly launched cargo capsule has run into trouble with a solar panel after liftoff. Only one of the two solar panels on the Northrop Grumman capsule opened successfully following Monday's predawn liftoff. NASA officials say the company has assured them there's enough power for Wednesday's rendezvous with the International Space Station. But NASA was still assessing the situation.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — Hurricane watches have been posted for the northwestern Bahamas and Florida's Atlantic Coast as Subtropical Storm Nicole approaches, threatening to bring a “prolonged period of hazardous weather." The National Hurricane Center is now expecting Nicole to reach hurricane strength “given how warm the waters are." Hurricane specialist Phillippe Papin told The Associated Press that Nicole will still be far enough offshore Tuesday to avoid impacting Florida's Election Day voting.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — This week's total lunar eclipse is the last one for three years. Tuesday's total lunar eclipse will be visible throughout North America in the predawn hours. Asia, Australia and the rest of the Pacific can catch it after sunset. Totality will last nearly 1 1/2 hours as Earth passes directly between the moon and sun. The so-called blood moon will appear red from the light of Earth's sunsets and sunrises.

IDABEL, Okla. (AP) — Residents in southeastern Oklahoma and northeastern Texas began assessing weather damage Saturday, working to recover and thankful to have survived after a storm stretching from Dallas to northwest Arkansas spawned tornadoes and produced flash flooding, killing at least two people, injuring others and leaving homes and buildings in ruins.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A transition is coming this weekend across most of the United States, and it has nothing to do with the election: Daylight saving time is out, standard time is in this weekend. Standard time begins at 2 a.m. local time Sunday and lasts until March 12. Relish the chance to catch up on sleep and remember to set clocks back an hour before going to bed Saturday night. The time change means darkness will arrive earlier in the evening but it will be lighter earlier in the morning than now.

NEW YORK (AP) — The rate of deaths that can be directly attributed to alcohol rose nearly 30% in the U.S. during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new government data. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had already said the overall number of such deaths rose in 2020 and 2021. Two reports from the CDC this week provided further details on which groups have the highest death rates and which states are seeing the largest numbers.

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. officials say Army investigators have launched a broad review of at least 1,900 National Guard and Reserve soldiers who were swept up in a recruiting bonus scandal up to a decade ago. Investigators are seeking to correct the records of individuals who were wrongly blamed and punished.

Two of the largest U.S pharmacy chains have agreed in principle to pay a total of about $10 billion to settle lawsuits over the toll of powerful prescription opioids. In addition to the deals with CVS Health and Walgreens, a lawyer for local governments said Wednesday that settlement talks continue with Walmart. If completed, these could be the last huge settlements announced in years of litigation between government entities and drugmakers, distributors and pharmacies over opioids.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — SpaceX has scored another set of double booster landings following a Florida launch for the military. Elon Musk's company launched its mega Falcon Heavy rocket for the first time in more than three years. Thick fog shrouded NASA's Kennedy Space Center as the rocket blasted off at midmorning. After peeling away two minutes into the flight, both side boosters flew back to Cape Canaveral, landing just a few seconds apart.

Research in Africa has found a one-time dose of an experimental drug protected adults against malaria for at least six months. The drug is a lab-made antibody. It works by breaking the life cycle of the parasite that causes malaria, which is spreads through mosquito bites. The antibody targets the parasites before they enter the liver where they can mature and multiply.

CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago police say as many as 15 people, including three children, were injured in a drive-by shooting Halloween night. The shooting happened about 9:30 p.m. in the city’s Garfield Park neighborhood. Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown says the victims include a 3-year-old, an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old, as well as nearly a dozen adults. He said some are in critical condition.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Steve Douglass, former president of Cru/Campus Crusade for Christ International, died Saturday due to complications with cancer. He was 77.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Members of the Supreme Court are questioning the continued use of affirmative action in higher education. In lengthy arguments Monday, the justices wrestled with persistent, difficult questions of race. The justices heard from six different lawyers in challenges to policies at the University of North Carolina and Harvard.

BREMERTON, Wash. (BP) – A high school football coach whose right to pray at midfield following games was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court after he was removed from his job is to be reinstated by next spring.

BROKEN ARROW, Okla. (AP) — Family members say an Oklahoma couple considered “primary suspects” in last week’s killings of their six children faced growing financial pressures and the husband experienced recurring pain from a workplace head injury. Broken Arrow police on Sunday identified the two adults as Brian and Brittney Nelson but provided no new information on whether both adults were involved in the killings of the children, who ranged in age from 1 to 13.

Researchers say they have solved a decades-old riddle by finding remnants of the stockade and therefore the site of a prison camp in York, Pennsylvania, that housed British soldiers for nearly two years during the American Revolutionary War. The location of Camp Security was thought to have been somewhere on land acquired by the local government nearly a decade ago.