The tornadoes that ripped through Lee County, Alabama, on Sunday evening, tearing homes apart like a half-mile-wide buzzsaw, are being blamed for at least 23 fatalities.
Why it matters: This death toll makes Sunday the deadliest tornado day in the U.S. since an EF-5 tornado struck Moore, Oklahoma, in May 2013, killing 24.
At least 23 people were killed and several others injured in Alabama, as twisters struck across the Southeast Sunday.
The big picture: Tornadoes were also reported in Georgia and Florida, but the hardest-hit area was in Beauregard in Lee County, Alabama, AP reports. The county's sheriff, Jay Jones, said there would be an organized search Monday morning for people still missing, according to WSFA. The storms were part of a larger weather system bringing heavy snow to New York and Boston overnight.
For the first time, a commercially built and operated spacecraft designed to carry a human crew has docked at the International Space Station from U.S. soil. The Crew Dragon spacecraft launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral at 2:49 a.m. ET Saturday.
Why it matters: The launch, known as the "Demo-1 mission," brings the U.S. closer to restoring human spaceflight capabilities through NASA's Commercial Crew program. Under this $6.8 billion program, the Elon Musk-founded SpaceX and Boeing are building and testing the next generation of space taxis and cargo carriers to the ISS. Saturday's launch marks the first time a crew-capable spacecraft blasted off under this program in a mission aimed at demonstrating and testing its capabilities.
The uncrewed Crew Dragon capsule from SpaceX successfully docked with the International Space Station Sunday morning, following a milestone launch into space for testing commercial space travel, AP reports.
Why it matters: The Crew Dragon capsule from SpaceX was the first commercially built spacecraft specifically designed for carrying humans to automatically dock with the ISS. If declared a successful mission, SpaceX could launch two astronauts this summer under NASA's commercial crew program.
