mu, and i-i really can't wait to see what's gonna happen with this business. we're really gonna take over the world with potatoes. i really believe it. they were not released or rescued. they escaped i'm shepard. this is "the news" on cnbc terror inside a texas synagogue. a hero rabbi speaks out about the dramatic escape from a hostage taker. >> when your life is threatened, you need to do whatever you can to get to safety >> what he did that saved lives. and the new arrest just made millions of americans hit hard by a winter storm >> there's a lethal mix of a lot of stuff >> heavy snow, ice, even tornadoes. homes destroyed. power out.

tennis star novak djokovic back home in serbia. why his refusal to vaccinate could cost him another high profile tournament an apparent fentanyl overdose inside a middle school. a 13-year-old is dead. what authorities uncovered in the school that has parents and local officials stunned. inside a fight to preserve martin luther king, jr.'s legacy fallout from a massive underwater volcano eruption. earth's close encount we are an astroid live from cnbc, the facts, the truth, "the news with shepard smith. >> good evening. a rabbi is revealing how he and two other hostages escaped from a gunman after an intense 11-hour standoff inside a synagogue near dallas. he says the final hour was terrifying and the situation seemed to be deteriorating because, as he put it, the hostage taker wasn't get

twhag he wanted. so when he saw an opportunity, the rabbi told the other hostages to bolt for the exit. >> i told them to go i threw a chair at the gunman, and i headed for the door. and all three of us were able to get out without even a shot being fired. >> a photographer for the local television station wfaa captured the moment the hostages burst out that door. new tonight, a senior law enforcement official tells nbc news, the fbi hostage rescue team shot and killed the gunman. he did not kill himself. the fbi is calling the incident terrorism related. investigators have identified the gunman as a british national he was demanding the release of a pakistani woman, jailed in ft. worth, convicted of trying to kill american soldiers in afghanistan. nbc's sam brock is at the synagogue in collieville, texas, on our top story tonight >> reporter: with each passing hour, we're learning more about the background of the man who

was at the very center of the hostage situation here in texas, his family apologizing to those impacted is now delving more deeply into malik's history of mental illness this has been going on years in terms of his struggle with mental health. there's been a growing gap with the family and they can't understand how akram was awho youed to fly to the united states, how he even obtained a visa he did fly on december 29 to jfk. a matter of weeks later, he was armed and holding four people hostage right there. the fbi says that this community was, in fact, targeted because of its jewish faith, this congregation specifically. the fbi initially said it had nothing to do with anything, and the demands were to free a federal prisoner who had been convicted of trying to kill u.s. security personnel

they are lauding the efforts of the rabbi here, whose bravery likely saved lives a nonprofit security organization that works with temples and churches, was right here on august 22, just months before this all happened it's possible that very training could have led to the peaceful outcome that we saw. shep >> sam brock, thank you. a deadly winter storm slamming the east coast, spurring tornados, heavy snow, freezing cold temperatures officials in north carolina say two people died yesterday when their car veered off i-95 and hit several trees. tens of thousands still without power, according to poweroutage.us that's down from 200,000 this morning. right now, the tomorrow is pummeling the northeast. the buffalo airport shattered its previous daily snowfall record the airport had gotten more than

16 inches of snow, nearly double the previous record. the storm started friday in the midwest, moved south and east. tens of millions of americans facing dangerous winter weather. it forced airlines to cancel thousands of flights between yesterday and tuesday. and in florida, the system spawned several tornadoes yesterday. officials there say the twisters destroyed more than two dozen homes in an around ft. myers adam dell rosa is tracking the storm. adam, this one had a little bit of everything. >> it really does. a variety along the east coast we'll start on the cold side with some of the heaviest snowfall amounts around the great lakes. ashtabula, ohio, 27 inches just under two feet. and rapids, new york, just east of niagara falls overall, things starting to quiet down notice a couple of spotty snow showers here this evening, especially the closer you get to the lakes.

we'll keep some of that going through the first part of tonight, another one to three inches for spots like syracuse overault, we'll have quieter weather shaping up along the east coast for our day tomorrow. big story tonight, the temperatures, lows down into the carolinas, in the low 20s for charlotte. upper 20s for atlanta. it's going to be feeling colder than that. so where we have those power outages, it's going to be a challenge to stay warm. temperatures to kick off our tuesday into the teens and s single digits. look, another arctic blast moving in on thursday and friday, with another cold front which will be bringing a couple of storms back to the southeast. moe on that in a couple of seconds. you can see the temperature dropoff in the upper midwest the twin cities, 2 below for a high on thursday

ak w accu weather real-feel temperatures 40s in new york city before going to the 20s for a high on friday those severe storms across florida spawning tornadoes around the ft. myers area. an ef-2, the strongest one, doing quite a bit of damage with winds estimated 120 miles per hour here comes the next one on wednesday. there's going to be a couple of storms, so download the accuweather app. we're talking more snow and ice in the tennessee valley. >> adam, thank you if you think air travel is bad during the severe weather and the covid sickouts, wait until 5g is deployed wednesday that is the new message from the ceos of america's top airlines. we reported on this for weeks, but this new letter sent to the administration just today takes it up a notch. it warns of catastrophic disruptions. every one of the passenger and cargo carriers will be

struggling to get people, shipments, planes and crews where they need to be. to be blunt, the nation's commerce will grind to a halt. that warning issued less than 48 hours before the wireless carriers are set to deploy the new high-speed 5g service. in their letter, the ceo specifically asked to not have it within two miles of major airports, that the faa says could be effected. the 5g ground stations can cause major problems for navigation systems. and generalize safety, especially in bad weather. we're joined now from the contributing editor to "flying" magazine and author of "paper wings. les, thank you so much we keep hearing about this, but what do the 5g ground stations risk disrupting and how? >> somewhat it disrupts, shepard, is an instrument called a radio altimeter. that is what measures the altitude above the ground for

pilots and other systems on the airplane it's different than the barometric altimeter which gives you pressure altitude when set appropriately by the pilot that's where all the problems lie. it's either systems or the fact that this interference by 5g is going to take away that radio altimeter's accuracy >> nbc is reporting the faa is prohibiting pilots from using them during landing at more than 80 airports near 5g sites. is that a good short-term solution or no >> absolutely not. it amazes me it's come to a head when these cellular companies want to roll out this system 5g has been in existence or at least been in the developmental stage since 2016 i mean, this isn't a surprise to anybody. so the faa should have been working on this issue long before we ever got to this point in our concerns. >> we are at kind of a

loggerheads, because the wireless carriers say 5g is safe they point to europe where 35g h -- 5g hasn't disrupted flights at all couldn't the airlines plan for this in advance? >> yeah, i absolutely agree with that i don't know why there wasn't enough planning in advance there's enough technology to do all sorts of testing but these systems are very important. it's not only low visibility approaches that are going to be affected and grant it, it's not a total catastrophe can, because these -- let me assure the flying public that most approaches are done in visual conditions and they don't require the procedures and i hav - and instrumentations but if the radio altimeter is being interfered with, these approaches no longer are safe approaches >> les, thank you.

the reverend dr. martin luther king, jr.'s family marked the holiday today by demanding action on voting rights legislation, which at the very moment is essentially doomed on capitol hill king's family members led a march, calling on the senate to bypass the filibuster rule, and push back on new election laws the senate is set to debate the bills tomorrow and mlk's 13-year-old granddaughter had a special message for two senators in particular >> senator sinema, senator manchin, our future hinges on your decision and history will remember what choice you make. >> of course, democrats need all 50 democratic senators on board to pass the legislation. without any republican support, and they have none but last week, senator sinema announced he would not support changing the filibuster rule the chinese government

keeping a tighter grip on hong kong media outlets closed new election rules we'll hear from someone who lived and worked there before being banned from the country. a 13-year-old is dead after being exposed to fentanyl at his middle school. two more students sent to the hospital what officials discovered when they searched the building and free at-home covid tests from the government. while the request line doesn't open until wednesday, the problems may already be lining up thanks for bringing me with you guys today, mr. and mrs. lopez. not a problem, josh. hey, you two. check out all these camera views in my silverado i can see in front of me, behind me, on either side of me. and it has this cam, so i can see if there's any funny business going on. you see any funny business going on? no, sir. let's have a great day!

the chevy silverado offers eight cameras with up to 15 different views. find new views. find new roads. chevrolet. you could wait... all night... for an email response from steve, who will sign back in at 9 am tomorrow morning. orrrr... you could find the answer right now in slack. and give steve a break. slack. where the future works. america's opioid crisis has hit a middle school in conne connecticut. a 7th grader in hartford has died after overdosing. it happened thursday at the sports and medical sciences academy.

the boy was 13 he was hospitalized that day and died two days later on saturday. police say two other students also got sick, but were treated at a hospital and released officials searched the school and say they found, get this, nearly 40 bags of fentanyl an investigation now launched into how the lethal drugs got there. cnbc's perry russham is in hartford tonight with a community in shock >> these are young kids. what's going through their head? i don't know >> reporter: police in connecticut say the bags of fentanyl were found in three parts of the school, two classrooms and the gym >> in powder form. packaged in what you would see in street level sales. >> reporter: the 7th grader two overdosed and died is not being named. two more boys were sent to the hospital and released. police say they believe one of the three brought the drugs to school >> we did execute a search warrant at the victim's home i didn't get into the investigative -- what we found over there or where we're going

in that case >> the school superintendent believes the boy who died ingested the drug. he later collapsed in the gym. the dea says fentanyl is 80 to 100 times stronger than morphine students had to be desanitized as they walked out >> school is supposed to be a safe place >> i'm at a loss of words. >> reporter: there are new calls to put narkacan in schools >> we need to have a conversation across the country about where else we need to make sure that folks are trained and equipped to nouse narcan >> reporter: the superintendent says they cleaned the areas where the drugs were found on thursday and friday. but they are still finding traces of the drug inside. so now school is canceled tomorrow >> perry russham, live in

hartford one of the last surviving tuskegee airmen who flew combat missions in three different wars has died charles mcgee was among the group of airmen who battled racism at home and proved black men could be elite fighter pilots during world war ii after completing flight training in rural alabama, he flew with the 332nd fighter group, known as the red tails they escorted bombers over europe he also flew combat missions in korea and vietnam. he died in his sleep at his home in maryland. charles mcgee, war hero, was 102 years old. new body camera video in the shooting of a black man by an off-duty sheriff's deputy. and the victim's father now backs up a key detail of the deputy's story a price increase for peloton and oranges. how much and why coming up.

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north korea fired off more missiles today its fourth missile test of the month. japan's defense minister says the short-range ballistic missiles flew about 186 milts off the coast. there was no threat to the united states, its territories or allies. experts suspect these recent launches are in response to sanctions that the biden administration imposed last week a spokesperson for north korea

says the sanctions are aimed at isolating and stifling north korea. the biden administration said it's open to talks with that country at any time without preconditions. china increasingly influenced hong kong the city is embracing beijing's zero covid approach. hong kong was transferred to china in '97 after more than 150 years under british control. the move blurred the lines between the mainland and the island in 2020, a controversial national security law took effect it enabled crackdowns on free speech, and gave the chinese communist party greater control in hong kong that loss spurred massive protests, and since then, activists have been arrested, school curriculums rewritten, and newspaper editors detained benedict rogers now, he lived and worked in hong kong as a journalist in the '90s and

co-founded hong kong watch den benedict, thanks how much change since you left and where are we headed? >> enormous change hong kong has gone from being one of the freest and most open cities in asia, and now the most oppressed city under china >> in 2017, you were denied entry into the country for being a vocal critic of the chinese government do you expect more foreigners to be denied enry to hong kong coming up? >> i do. i think that foreign activists, any foreigner who has been critical of the regime in beijing or the hong kong government and indeed, i think foreign journalists will increasingly face more and more difficulties. the economists correspondent had her visa renewal denied and we may see more than that >> a lot of business has been done through hong kong because

of the situation with the main ln mainland there seems to be less and less of that. is that accurate >> yes i think confidence in hong kong, because of the erosion of freedoms, threats to the rule of law, the loss of transparency and autonomy, i think business confidence in hong kong will continue to decline. hong kong economically probably will continue to do well because of the role of what's called red capital communist party linked capital in the city. but that will replace what has been the international trading status of hong kong. >> do you see a time when hong kong and the mainland have no discernible differences, that they're ruled the same way and if not, where does this go from here? >> i think the trajectory that hong kong is on at the moment will lead to something along those lines. hong kong may keep some semblance of autonomy, its own

government, but it's a puppet government reporting to beijing, it's own currency, it may keep some of those things but politically, it is very much heading towards just becoming another chinese city >> benedict rogers from hong kong watch, thanks for the time. appreciate it. police have released some of the body cam video from officers who responded to the shooting of a black man by an off duty sheriff's deppy in fayetteville, north carolina the can videos are edited and blurred by police. the deputy said he shot jason walker after walker ran into the street and jumped on to the hood of his truck in the body cam video, a man who identifies himself as walker's father corroborates that story

>> in the body cam video, walker's father does not give a reason why his son ran into the street and jumped on the stranger's pickup truck. the shooting remains under investigation, and the deputy is currently on administrative leave. the largest volcano eruption in three decades has sent ash 100,000 feet into the sky. now an entire island nation is virtually cut off. the struggle tonight to assess the damage in tonga. bitcoin millionaires packing up and moving to a place that offers them some serious tax breaks where they're headed and new warnings that this week's rollout of free rapid covid tests could be chaotic the details, after the bottom of the hour and the top of the news the hour and the top of the news on cnbc.

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one of the largest bitcoin gatherings in the world is the north american bitcoin conference it kicked off today in miami the city has become kind of a crypto hub, and while crypto and tech entrepreneurs are move thing to set up shop, another crypto boom is happening south of miami in puerto rico. our tech reporter has a new article on this phenomenon, and joins us now

why puerto rico, mckenzie? >> reporter: a couple of things. year-around tropical weather, beach front property, and the island has become a tax haven for the wealthy. no capital gains tax, and then for those running their own company, the corporate tax rate drops from 21% to 4%, if they export their services. and because it's an american territory, you don't have to give up your u.s. passport for these perks. the only catch, you have to spend at least half a year on the island shep >> six months plus a day any numbers on how many people are making this move and how much economic impact they're having on the island >> reporter: yeah, great question last year, applications for these tax breaks nearly tripled. more than 1200 people specifically went for that capital gains tax break. but it's unclear whether the tax scheme is helping to pull the island out of bankruptcy some experts are skeptical of the economic benefits. but we have seen some job

creation one report showed the tax beneficiaries created north of 40,000 jobs between 2015 and 2019 >> you know, not everybody is happy about these tax breaks, right? it leaves locals out >> reporter: right so life-long islanders don't qualify for the xaempexemption. and it doesn't help that the influx of people has drive bn up the cost of real estate. it's all uphillin the cost of some home exercise equipment. peloton shifting gears on prices in two weeks, the company will charge up to $350 more for delivery and setup of its original bike. peloton citing inflation and supply chain pain. it's been a rough ride for the company of late. a huge surge in demand during the pandemic has slowed, and its

stock, that's down 80% over the past year. orange juice lovers are about to get squeezed, with prices already on the rise, government data shows florida's orange crop will shrink to its smallest size since the end of world war ii the reason, citrus greening. it's a disease that's plagued florida's grows. it causes the fruit to shrivel and fall off the trees prematurely. orange juice futures surged to their highest level in three years. a diamond that's out of this world, a 555-carat black diamond is set to be auctioned off next month. the rock was likely formed from an astroid or meteorite colliding with aeearth. it's expected to go for about $7 million. i'm shepard smith on cnbc. it's the bottom of the hour. time for the top of the news walking in the footsteps of

martin luther king, jr. from a tobacco farm in connecticut. novak djokovic deported from australia, back in serbia. now another major tournament could be on the line and america averaging more than 776,000 covid cases per day. that's up more than 500% over the past month according to johns hopkins. but based on the chart, it looks like infections are beginning to plateau. that's being seen in some parts of the country, especially in the northeast, both new york and massachusetts reported a drop in koichd case covid cases the past week. but the omicron surge has not yet peaked warps the nation's surgeon general. >> the challenge is that the entire country is not moving at the same pace. the omicron wave started later in other parts of the country. so we sthe next few week also b

tough. >> the biden administration will deliver free tests to every household. americans can begin ordering them online wednesday, but the white house is facing obstacles. dr. ja, thank you. some areas haven't peaked, others have. when does omicron get better >> great question, shepard and thanks for having me back. the way i'm looking at this right now, about 800,000 infections a day, i expect that to climb nationally. but as you reported, new york, massachusetts, new jersey, florida probably, has peaked, and those numbers are going to start going down stand next week or two we'll see other places peak and come down. so by the end of january, first week of january, cases will be coming down. the one challenge is hospitalizations, which always lag. there you'll probably have to wait another week or two before

we see hospitalizations take a substantial decline. >> dr. fauci spoke at a world economic forum event today he said it's too soon to prevent whether the omicron variant will spend the end of the pandemic itself do you agree >> yeah, i do. but i guess i look at it differently. will there be future pandemics almost surely there will be. i'm hoping omicron gives us the lessons we need to manage the rest of this pandemic, however long it lasts. and move to a new normal, where we treat this virus much more as an endemic thing so i'm hope thing is the transition variant that gets us into a different footing for future variants and lets us manage them more effectively >> restrictions are still in place to reenter the u.s., including a requirement for a recent negative test are restrictions like that one unnecessary, considering it's everywhere in the country already? >> yeah, it's a great question if you've got 800,000 infections

happening a day, does it make sense to keep it out by travelers? look, i think it's reasonable to do certain things, like a vaccine requirement that says we don't necessarily need a lot more unvaccinated people bringing in more virus that's fine. but these kind of general testing schemes that a lot of countries are using, they're not going to be effective for the long run, because there's so much spread across the world >> what are we not doing that we should be doing? because we clearly -- we're a mess we're the biggest mess in the world from this virus. >> yeah. there are two things going on, shep one is the near amount of misinformation and really that is what's killing us we still have a large chunk of the country not vaccinated, not boosted. that's who is filling up the hospital so the mess in the hospitals is driven almost completely by unvaccinated or high-risk people not boosted. we, and i think the administration didn't do enough on having enough testing available. we still fight over masks and

crowded indoor spaces. there's some basic simple things to do to get through the surge, get back to our lives, and we fight about every single one of them, even place where is the data and evidence is quite clear. >> we have known for weeks, even months, that a kn95 mask is what you need because the cloth mask doesn't do anything. but that simple message can't come from our leaders. it's baffling, mind boggling >> yeah, look, we have really good scientists working for the government great agencies those agencies were developed and really built for a different time they were built for peacetime, where they're slow and deliberate and take time to develop guidance that just doesn't work in the middle of a fast-moving pandemic so no question, even when the evidence is clear that higher quality masks matter, our agencies have not been able to get around to delivering that message. >> do we need to rethink the

agencies, especially in times of emergency, which clearly this is >> yeah. one of the simple but wrong kind of theorys is, well, these agencies have just gotten politicized. that's the wang way to look at it i know the scientists in these places, they're the best in the country. but the agencies are not designed to handle a crisis like this so we have to look at the u.s. government, state agencies, and ask how do we build better institutions to manage a crisis like this? >> we've had crises prior where the head of the cdc is out there every couple of days and having a measured, constant update sort of situation for the american public through two administrations here, we've not had that this time i mean, does there need to be a messenger in chief who is missing? >> well, what i would say is dr. walenski, who is the head of the cdc, she's done a -- she's got a

very difficult job to do, but she should be out there more so if i was giving advice to the administration, which is i would say get her out there every day, every other day as you suggested, talking to the media and people saying what she thinks and explaining to people what we need to be doing right now i think that would be enormously helpful. she's a terrific director, i think, of the cdc, but we need to hear more from her. >> dr. jha, thank you. >> thank you kayla, the white house efforts to ramp up testing, late in coming, and already hitting snags. >> reporter: that's right. wednesday, households can order up to four rapid tests from a white house website. start thing past saturday, americans with health insurance could begin submitting their own receipts from rapid test purchases for reimbursements on a cold friday with the centers for medicare and

medicaid services, which wrote the rules for those reimbursements, retail farm sis warn of a chaotic rollout according to sources with rampant confusion with customers, tests in short supply and stores already short staffed. a spokesman saying the companies had six weeks to prepare, say goe goal is to remove financial barriers and expand testing. >> reporter: the kaiser family foundation found that tests were available just during 9% of 480 retail searches conducted. >> we certainly have morewe need to do on testing. that's a message very clear to him and to his team that we need to pull every lever possible that's why you have seen so many

additional al spigots open. >> reporter: 2/3 of respondents in a new poll say joe biden is handling the pandemic badly, and the top source of ire, confusing guidance on testing, quarantine, and masks. this week, shep, joe biden is set to shift the message on masks again, announcing a new program to send higher quality masks across the country shep >> the very ones we were talking about. thank you so much. the australian open kicked off without the world's number one men's tennis player. novak djokovic is back home in serbia australian officials deported him yesterday, so he is banned from entering australia for the next three years but the australian prime minister says he's leaving the door open for djokovic to return

next year. in a statement djokovic wrote in part -- >> for now, the australian open scandal may be behind him, but there are new doubts whether he can play in the next grand slam. yesterday, french lawmakers passed more koichdcovid restrics through parliament under their law, only vaccinated people can enter public yast that means s djokovic would be banned from competing at roland geragos. the french open is scheduled to begin in may in 1944, a group of students traveled from georgia to connecticut to work on a tobacco farm one of them, a teenager named

martin luther king, jr historians say that trip away from the segregated south would change martin luther king's life, and they're pushing to protect the land that helped spark a dream. plus, the winter olympics just weeks away. and now a new decision about who can and who cannot attend. hey lily, i need a new wireless plan for my business, but all my employees need something different. oh, we can help with that. okay, imagine this. your mover, rob, he's on the scene and needs a plan with a mobile hotspot. we cut to downtown, your sales rep lisa has to send some files, like asap! so basically i can pick the right plan for each employee. yeah i should've just led with that. with at&t business.

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the island nation of tonga has lost virtually all contact with the rest of the world after a massive underwater volcano erupted and triggered tsunamis all across the pacific take a look at this video off the shore of tonga an underwater volcano erupted on saturday it sent massive plumes of ash into the sky the eruption so big, look at this, there it is from satellite images from outer space. it spent shockwaves across the pacific.

tsunami warnings issued as far away as south america. in peru, two people drown after high waves struck there. tsunami advisories were also issued on the west coast of the united states from alaska to california this is the moment the tsunami hit new zealand. the waves swept through an entire neighborhood of the capital city of wellington today, crews found the body of a british woman who got caught in the tsunami. her brother says she drowned after she tried to save some dogs from her animal shelter australia and new zealand have deployed military planes to assess the scale of the damage and australia's foreign minister announced a million dollars in aid will go to the island nation tonight, we honor the civil rights icon dr. martin luther king, jr more than 50 years after he died in his famous i have a dream speech, dr. king said his dream was for everyone to be treated equally.

though he spoke of freedom ringing from the mountain tops, his first glimpse of that possibility was from this valley in connecticut here's cnbc's valley castro. >> reporter: once a week, students gather at this library to talk about dr. martin luther king, jr.'s time as a teenager in their small connecticut town, and how to share that story with others >> he came here in the summers of '44 and '47 >> he worked over the summer at the toe backbacco fields >> reporter: students started researching king's time here more than a decade ago >> we wanted to find out what brought him to this area in the 1940s, and what the work was like that he was engaged in when he was here. we found an audiotape of a speech that he gave in 1959 at the university of hartford we didn't know it existed. >> reporter: the speech was the

first time researchers heard king speak about coming to connecticut in his own words >> reporter: their discoveries led to a student produced documentary film that turned their community's attention to this tobacco field where king worked to earn money for schools. >> we are walking in the footsteps of history >> reporter: walker holmes is the connecticut state director for the trust for public land. >> this is 285 acres of newly protected land we got involved in 2019. >> reporter: in the past, there were plans to turn this property into a residential community but the trust for public land,

the town of simsbury, and others came together to save it >> it took $6.5 million to protect this property. and that became official at the end of september this year >> when you heard about the history of this place, was it an med like, this is something that we have to preserve and save >> absolutely. according to the african american cultural heritage action fund, only 2% of the sites on the national register of historic places are focused on the experience of black americans. and that is a collective oversight that prevents all of us from really having a full understanding of the history of our country. >> reporter: work to preserve these historic structures is already underway >> this is a structure that's 100 years old. this is where the tobacco would have been hung to dry. if you look carefully, you can see that it was somewhat of a

tradition for the folks who worked on the farm to sign their name on the walls. >> so there must be dozens of signatures in here >> reporter: as for king's experience working on the farm, there's still a lot of research to be done but mlk historians say his time in connecticut had a significant impact >> the experience of leaving the south to go to work at the tobacco farm in connecticut was eye opening. and we are, as you know, we are a mosaic of all the experiences that we have this was an experience that helped shape him, and helped to influence the person that he would become >> reporter: and the civil rights leader has clearly influenced the many students dedicated to preserving and sharing his story. >> i think it's definitely had an impact on me personally how i see things and how i approach things in life >> it's cool that i can help continue his mission and share his story.

>> reporter: now that the land is protected thanks to the work of those students, it's likely to be added to the connecticut freedom trail that is a network of more than 145 sites, including schools, homes, churches, and a battlefield, all associated with black history across the state shep >> valerie, thank you. celebrations for betty white as the golden girls star and animal rights activist would have been 100 years old today. fans in oak park, illinois, celebrated her birthday saturday with some of her favorite things, red licorice and pet adoptions. the los angeles zoo honoring her with a white rose memorial garden, located in the alan luden plaza. and the betty white challenge is trending today and nbc will air a special honoring the tv icon,

celebrating betty white, america's golden girl, january 31st, 10:00, 9:00, and streaming on peacock the following day astroid 7482 scientists say it's well nope and they've been researching it for decades. tomorrow they will get a good look at that rock, because it's headed our way plus, what do you do when both of your sons have football games on the same day? that was the dilemma for this woman. the first game was in tampa, the second in kansas city. her wild card trip, next you are an electric vehicle. electricity powers your heart. want to feel your heart beat faster? drive an electric car. made by a company whose evs have gone five billion miles. for every highway... every driveway... ...and every speedway. and where the loudest sound...

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an enormous space rock is set to zoom by rock in a matter of hours we have a live look at the nasa tracker of astroid 7482. and there it is. it's expected to make its closest approach to earth at about 4:51 eastern time tomorrow afternoon. nasa says that astroid is nearly 3500 feet wide it's projected to come within 1.2 million miles of earth which they say is relatively close by galactic standards. we're joined now by a professor of theoretical physics at the university of new york nothing to worry about here, professor, but anything to learn? >> well, yes, there's a killer astroid headed our way, and where is bruce willis?

we need him the most it will miss the earth, thank goodness but if it were to hit the earth, it would be what is called a nation buster, capable of taking out switzerland or a good chunk of germany so we are sitting ducks to a hypothetical impact. >> how far in advance might we know before something like that were to actually hit us, if that was going to happen? >> well, we tracked 28,000 near-earth objects that would take centuries to hit us, so we don't have to worry about them we have to worry about objects the size of a football field, because we don't really track them, and there are millions of objects smaller than a football field. and some of these objects hit us every day, and we have no warning. we are blissfully unaware of the fact that we live in a cosmic shooting gallery there are meteors and astroids

hitting us all the time, very small. but once in a smile, an object the size of an apartment building hits us, and then it makes the evening newspaper. >> we don't even track items oh of that size at all? >> no, smaller than a football field is very difficult to track. and these objects could be the size of an apartment building, like what happened russia twice in the last century. people were caught off guard when that thing sailed over just a few years ago. because it was the size of an apartment building, smaller than a football field, and we don't track those objects. theye o small. >> do we have the capability with lasers or anything else to stop astroids that might be planning to hit us >> no. some people say what about the space shuttle? it cannot reach deep space at all. the last year nasa sent d.a.r.t. into place, it's the first time in world history that we have sent a rocket to nudge, nudge an astroid out of the way

so this is an experiment the first time in history that we have decided to move a celestial object, preparing for the day that one of these days a killer rock will have our name on it. >> when is the nudge experiment, and what are you expecting of it >> it was launched last year, and it will take about a year to reach a distant astroid. by impact, it will impact on an astroid. and we hope to nunldge it a litl bit. bruce willis would talk about a hydrogen bomb. that's the last thing you want to do, because then you have lots of baby astroids coming at you, which can do more damage than one mother rock coming at you. so you want to nudge it out of the way, and that's what nasa is doing with the d.a.r.t. rocket the first attempt by us to nudge one of these out of the way. >> i'm out of time thank you so much. appreciate it. tickets to the beijing winter olympics will not be sold

to the general public after all. the olympic organizer committee made that decision only selected spectators will be permitted to attend. these people are ones who live in mainland china and meet covid requirements as for the games, the openinger is mope -- ceremony just 18 day away during the nfl playoff games over the weekend, one mom was in a competition all her own. dona kelce, she has two sons, one for philadelphia, the other for kansas city. both had playoff games yesterday. two sons in two different playoff games on the same day. and donna kelce didn't miss a minute she started in tampa bay, a disappointing game for her family watching the eagles lose

31-15, but she left the stadium in florida and hit a snag. she had to hop on a rick shaw, so she could make her uber to the airport, prompting the nfl's twitter account to ask for the kansas city mayor for a police escort but she 345made it to the next plane, and her flight was delayed because of rain. the nfl posting this picture of her in the car on the way to the stadium. at the stadium itself, she was there just in time to see her son travis to throw his first nfl touchdown pass and see the chiefs beat the steelers 42-21 the chiefs, even inviting her to their son's postgame press conference to check in on him. look >> it's your mom >> what's up, mom? glad you made it >> yeah, i know. >> i'm glad i could put a smile on your face love you, mom. >> love you, too >> she's the best, man

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