World
A Flydubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv diverted to Tabuk in Saudi Arabia after the captain was stabbed and, according to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the other pilot apparently tried to crash the aircraft. Flight FZ1073 carried 174 people. Passengers and crew overpowered the attacker and tied him up, and two crew members landed the plane. The captain, Indian national Smit Machchhar, was taken to hospital and is in stable condition. Israel's defence minister called it an attempted jihadist terror attack, while no official motive has been given. A repatriation flight carried the mostly Israeli passengers home on Wednesday.
BBC News / Al Jazeera / The Times
Politics
US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced six new programmes in a speech at Marine Corps Base Quantico, telling mid-ranking officers and NCOs to carry them out at ground level. The centrepiece is the Autonomous Warfare Command, which the department says will become a four-star functional combatant command by 1 October 2027. Project Agincourt will lead work on uncrewed systems. Other initiatives include FORTRESS America, a readiness and supply programme aimed at cutting reliance on foreign rare earths and microchips, America's Corps of Cadets at five partner universities, the Next Great American Base project, an Office of Religious Affairs and Project Meridian.
U.S. Department of War
Business
Hapag-Lloyd has raised its 2026 earnings outlook for the second time, pointing to strong demand and higher spot freight rates, and has submitted an improved offer for Israel's ZIM Integrated Shipping Services as it seeks approval for a US$4.2 billion takeover. The upgrade lands as container shipping enters its busiest stretch, with Chinese Golden Week from 1 to 7 October tightening capacity. The Panama Canal will lift daily Neopanamax transits to ten vessels from 15 October. Not all signals are positive: gate congestion at DP World's Melbourne terminal is adding costs for hauliers, forwarders and shippers.
WorldCargo News / Hapag-Lloyd
Technology
High-bandwidth memory is expected to take close to 30% of DRAM makers' total wafer capacity in 2027, up from roughly 20% now, as suppliers shift lines toward chips used in AI accelerators. SK Hynix said it validated HBM5 with TSMC packaging while HBM4 begins entering Nvidia's next platform. Memory prices are feeding into the wider economy: chips made up nearly half of South Korea's September exports, and Morgan Stanley analysts have called the squeeze part of chipflation. Suppliers are responding with heavy investment, from ChangXin Memory Technologies to Micron and Samsung.
DIGITIMES / TrendForce / CNBC
Science
NASA and SpaceX are targeting 1 October for the launch of Crew-13 from Cape Canaveral. The Falcon 9 will carry four astronauts in a Dragon capsule that could reach the International Space Station in about seven hours and 50 minutes, which would be the fastest US crewed trip to the outpost on record. Docking is expected around 7 p.m. EDT. The mission was pushed back from September after engineers found an oxidiser leak in Dragon's propulsion system; teams replaced an oxidiser valve and completed readiness reviews.
NASA / ScienceDaily / SpaceX
Sports
The New York Yankees began their American League Wild Card Series against the Boston Red Sox without captain Aaron Judge, left off the 26-man roster because of a grade two right calf strain. Judge had been aiming to play and said the team was doing everything to speed his recovery. Giancarlo Stanton, out since 24 April with strained calf muscles in both legs, was included, along with centre fielder Trent Grisham. Elsewhere, the Houston Astros are favoured over the Chicago White Sox, and the Atlanta Braves are slight favourites against the Philadelphia Phillies.
MLB.com / AP / FOX Sports
Health
Structural changes in the brain can be seen on MRI scans at least seven years before the amyloid plaques linked to Alzheimer's disease become detectable, according to a study in Nature Neuroscience. Researchers compared longitudinal MRI data from cognitively healthy older adults with amyloid-PET results and found that thickening of the cortex preceded high amyloid levels. Most recent drug approvals target amyloid, and the finding suggests other processes are already at work. Authors say the result supports work on treatments that act on mechanisms other than amyloid.
Nature Neuroscience / Science News
Environment
The long dry spell across the south-western United States may last longer than current climate models suggest, according to new research covered in the 1 October issue of Science News. The work, co-authored by Victoria Todd of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, examined how past droughts ended and how that compares with the present event. The Colorado River basin faces cuts of up to 40% for California, Arizona and Nevada under a ten-year federal blueprint, and the April 2026 Arizona water supply outlook showed another weak snowpack year.
Science News / NCAR / USDA NRCS