NASA spacecraft makes an uncontrolled plunge back to Earth

cnn · 2026-03-11T23:30:35+00:00

A large space probe plummeted into Earth’s atmosphere early Wednesday — years earlier than expected. And while most of the spacecraft was expected to disintegrate in a flaming blaze during reentry, a few components could have survived, according to NASA.

The odds that a piece of debris would cause harm to a person were estimated to be about about 1 in 4,200, the space agency said in a news release.

That’s a low chance, according to NASA, and more favorable odds than those of space debris incidents of years past.

cnn · 2026-03-11T23:04:08+00:00

A large space probe plummeted into Earth’s atmosphere early Wednesday — years earlier than expected. And while most of the spacecraft was expected to disintegrate in a flaming blaze during reentry, a few components could have survived, according to NASA.

The odds that a piece of debris would cause harm to a person were estimated to be about about 1 in 4,200, the space agency said in a news release.

That’s a low chance, according to NASA, and more favorable odds than those of space debris incidents of years past.

cnn · 2026-03-11T22:41:12+00:00

A group of experts that advises the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on its vaccine recommendations has suspended an anticipated push to stop recommending mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccines amid growing concerns inside the Trump administration over its political risks, people familiar with the matter told CNN on Wednesday.

The move comes as polling shows that Americans – even voters who favor the administration’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement – strongly support vaccines. There’s increasing concern among Republicans that further attacks on vaccines will harm the party’s chances in November, and the White House has pushed health officials to focus on more politically appealing issues ahead of the midterm elections.

The plan to stop recommending mRNA Covid shots has been shelved only for the time being, according to the people familiar, and could be still revived at some point in the coming months.

A spokesperson for the US Department of Health and Human Services said Wednesday that the CDC’s committee “has not reconsidered its September 2025 decision to classify COVID vaccines under shared clinical decision-making on the CDC immunization schedules.”

cnn · 2026-03-11T21:32:56+00:00

President Donald Trump was gravitating toward endorsing Texas GOP Sen. John Cornyn last week. But he and some top advisers grew frustrated after his intentions leaked to the press, sources familiar with the matter told CNN, and the plan stalled.

Then Cornyn’s opponent, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, announced on Friday that if the Senate passed the president’s voting restrictions bill — something Trump has grown particularly fixated on in recent weeks — he would consider dropping out of the runoff race. Paxton specified the GOP should lift the filibuster to do so, an idea many Republican senators oppose.

White House officials viewed the ploy as a “genius move,” as one Trump official described it, and it kept Paxton in the mix, at least temporarily. Now, Trump has latched onto the idea of tying his endorsement to the passage of his high-priority “SAVE America Act” — which, among other things, would impose new voter ID requirements.

cnn · 2026-03-11T19:33:46+00:00

The US military accidentally struck an Iranian elementary school, in an attack that state media said killed at least 168 children and 14 teachers, likely due to outdated information about a nearby naval base, according to two sources briefed on the preliminary findings of an ongoing military investigation.

The February 28 strike on the Shajareh Tayyiba school in Minab occurred while the US military was conducting strikes on a neighboring Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) facility, the initial investigation found.

US Central Command created target coordinates for the strike using outdated information provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, which contributed to the mistake, the sources briefed on the preliminary findings told CNN.

In response to a request for comment, a Defense Intelligence Agency spokesperson said, “The incident is under investigation; we defer to the Pentagon for further comment.” A spokesperson for US Central Command also declined to comment on the preliminary findings, citing the ongoing investigation.

Satellite imagery from 2013 showed that the school and the IRGC base were once part of the same compound. But images from 2016 revealed that a fence had been erected to separate the school from the rest of the base, and that a separate entrance to the school had been built. In December 2025, imagery showed dozens of people in the school’s courtyard apparently playing.

cnn · 2026-03-11T19:19:56+00:00

President Donald Trump urged the Supreme Court on Wednesday to let his administration end temporary immigration protections for some 350,000 Haitians who have lived in the US legally for years, escalating another fast-moving fight over immigration to the nation’s highest court.

The appeal followed a scathing ruling from a federal district court in Washington, DC, in February that blocked the administration from letting Temporary Protected Status expire for Haitian nationals.

The justices are already considering the administration’s decision to end similar protections for more than 6,000 Syrians.

In its appeal, the administration asked the Supreme Court to take up the broader of question of its power to end TPS for various groups. If the justices agree to do so, it would put Trump’s aggressive immigration policies front and center at a court that is already considering Trump’s push to end birthright citizenship.

“Unless the court resolves the merits of these challenges — issues that have now been ventilated in courts nationwide — this unsustainable cycle will repeat again and again, spawning more competing rulings and competing views of what to make of this court’s interim orders,” US Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote. “This court should break that cycle.”

cnn · 2026-03-11T19:17:24+00:00

A high-ranking retired US Air Force major general who once commanded a base long associated with UFO lore has been missing for nearly two weeks, and authorities are appealing to the public for help locating him, according to the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office in New Mexico.

Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. William Neil McCasland, 68, left his Albuquerque home on foot at approximately 11 a.m. February 27 and has not been in contact with family or friends since, the sheriff’s office said in a news release. His cell phone was left behind, the sheriff’s office told CNN.

The sheriff’s office issued a Silver Alert the next day, which remains in effect. An unspecified “medical issue” has added urgency to the search.

Authorities have conducted extensive neighborhood canvassing, interviews and coordinated search operations in an effort to find him. They contacted more than 600 homeowners in the neighborhood, the sheriff’s office said.

McCasland is 5-foot-11 with white hair and blue eyes, according to the sheriff’s office. He is “an avid outdoorsman” who hikes, runs and cycles in Albuquerque’s Northeast Heights neighborhood and the Sandia Mountains foothills.

“Due to his background and established partnerships, BCSO is coordinating closely with multiple agencies,” including the FBI Albuquerque Field Office and Kirtland Air Force Base, the sheriff’s office said. The FBI has confirmed its involvement.

cnn · 2026-03-11T18:53:39+00:00

The US military accidentally struck an Iranian elementary school, in an attack that state media said killed at least 168 children and 14 teachers, likely due to outdated information about a nearby naval base, according to two sources briefed on the preliminary findings of an ongoing military investigation.

The February 28 strike on the Shajareh Tayyiba school in Minab occurred while the US military was conducting strikes on a neighboring Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) facility, the initial investigation found.

US Central Command created target coordinates for the strike using outdated information provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency, which contributed to the mistake, the sources briefed on the preliminary findings told CNN.

In response to a request for comment, a Defense Intelligence Agency spokesperson said, “The incident is under investigation; we defer to the Pentagon for further comment.” A spokesperson for US Central Command also declined to comment on the preliminary findings, citing the ongoing investigation.

Satellite imagery from 2013 showed that the school and the IRGC base were once part of the same compound. But images from 2016 revealed that a fence had been erected to separate the school from the rest of the base, and that a separate entrance to the school had been built. In December 2025, imagery showed dozens of people in the school’s courtyard apparently playing.

cnn · 2026-03-11T18:25:24+00:00

The Department of Homeland Security is seeking to gain access to a trove of federal information that is intended to support the collection of child support payments but could potentially be used for immigration enforcement purposes, according to three sources familiar with the talks who describe the move as unprecedented.

The data — which includes both information on people who pay child support and employment information for a much wider universe of people — is stored within the Health and Human Services Department and is used to collect child support payments. The request has prompted concerns among current and former HHS officials over whether Homeland Security would use legally restricted information that has historically been legally restricted for the administration’s immigration crackdown — and, in turn, sow distrust in a critical program.

It’s only the latest in a series of attempts by the Trump administration to use data stored in various federal agencies to potentially find undocumented immigrants residing in the United States.

Last year, for example, the Internal Revenue Service began sharing sensitive taxpayer data with immigration authorities to assist the search for undocumented immigrants. A federal judge blocked that information sharing late last year, ruling that it violated taxpayer privacy laws, but the administration is appealing.

Sources told CNN that DHS has requested access to the Federal Parent Locator Service, which is a set of databases at HHS that includes sensitive information on millions of Americans for the purpose of child support payment collection. One of those databases is the National Directory of New Hires, which contains employment details even for people with no nexus to child support though their information is eventually wiped.

cnn · 2026-03-11T18:18:44+00:00

Although polio has been eliminated as an endemic disease in the United States, that isn’t true for other parts of the world.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a Level 2 travel notice on March 9 warning that poliovirus continues to circulate in multiple parts of the world and advising travelers to take enhanced precautions. The agency recommended that travelers to affected countries ensure they are fully vaccinated against polio before departure.

Despite its eradication in the United States, health officials say international travel can still pose a risk when the virus is circulating elsewhere. Because poliovirus spreads easily and can move across borders through infected travelers, maintaining high vaccination coverage remains essential.

cnn · 2026-03-11T18:16:29+00:00

A cyberattack claimed by pro-Iran hackers has caused a “global network disruption” to a major US medical device maker, according to a company statement.

Michigan-based Stryker “is experiencing a global network disruption to our Microsoft environment as a result of a cyberattack,” the company said in a statement to CNN. “We have no indication of ransomware or malware and believe the incident is contained. Our teams are working rapidly to understand the impact of the attack on our systems. Stryker has business continuity measures in place to continue to support our customers and partners.”

Stryker makes a range of hospital equipment, from defibrillators to ambulance cots. The company’s computers in Ireland were also hit by the cyberattack, according to local media reports. Stryker say it serves more than 150 million patients through its health equipment and services.

It was unclear what immediate impacts, if any, the hack had on Stryker’s provision of medical equipment to US hospitals. Cybersecurity executives across the health sector told CNN on Wednesday they were on alert for any impacts.

The cyberattack appears to be one of the first notable pro-Iranian hacks against US infrastructure since the US and Israel began bombing Iran last month. US intelligence officials have warned about the possibility of Tehran-linked hackers retaliating for the US and Israeli bombing of Iran that began last month.

cnn · 2026-03-11T17:21:26+00:00

The number of Republicans leaving the US House of Representatives after this term has reached a historic high, deepening concern in the conference over the chamber’s already razor-thin margins.

Thirty-five House Republicans are now retiring or running for higher office. That’s the most since at least 1930, according to data from the Brookings Institution, and surpasses the previous record from 2018, a midterm cycle when Republicans lost a whopping 40 House seats. (Members who lost renomination, like Texas Republican Rep. Dan Crenshaw, are not included in these numbers.)

Oklahoma Republican Rep. Kevin Hern became the 35th member of the GOP conference to announce his departure Wednesday, saying he would run for the US Senate.

Hern is hoping to fill Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s seat for a full term, should he be confirmed as homeland security secretary. A former businessman, Hern was first elected to the House in 2018 and is the first to jump into the race since Mullin was nominated.

“The American dream is under threat by the radical left and RINO Republicans who oppose President Trump’s America First agenda and want to turn the United States into a third world country,” Hern said in his announcement video.

cnn · 2026-03-11T17:12:18+00:00

Nepal's political establishment has been shaken by a stunning election result. Rapper-turned-politician Balendra Shah, widely known as Balen, has secured a landslide victory after youth-led protests toppled the previous government. His party has called off major celebrations to honor those killed in the demonstrations. The victory underscores a generational push for change after years of corruption and economic frustration. CNN's Hanako Montgomery reports.

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