left-hand corner. we will zoom on it. we have a jam because of the police activity on the san francisco side. folks traveling to the treasure island side, and it's jammed because this activity had been going on since last night. avoid the bay bridge and the backup here. if you are north of the bay bridge, go across the richmond bridge, and south of the bay bridge, go across the san mateo bridge. you can also use bart to avoid the backup. a lot more has been happening. let's head over to bob redell. what is happening at the bay bridge, what are the latest and what are the details? >> reporter: since you last saw us about an hour ago, you can see there's now a tremendous backup at the bay bridge toll plaza. now here we are, and this backs up into oakland and along the

berkeley curve and this is because of what is happening on the eastern span of the upper deck which is the westbound direction of the bay bridge where there's an emergency that chp has been dealing with. number one and two lanes are open, but that's not enough to deal with this backlog of people who are trying to get into work inside san francisco. earlier in the evening, part of the western span was also shutdown. it's reopened, but it was shutdown because of a couple car crashes. around 11:15 last night, a car and suv collided and then as you can see in the video, there was a second crash that happened minutes later where a sedan rearended a big rig, and the driver of the sedan was killed, and so was another person. they have cleared the scene of that fatal accident so there's

no issue on the western span as far as lane closures, but there's still that other unrelated emergency once you get past treasure island which chp has been dealing with since around 10:00 last night, again, has the number three, four and five lanes shutdown on the western span which is the westbound direction into san francisco, the number one and two are open but that is not enough to deal with the bay area commute on this thursday morning. that's why you have the backup here at the toll plaza. unfortunately, once you get past the metering lights and on to the decline, there's no estimated time of when the unrelated emergency is going to be resolved. bob redell reporting for "today in the bay." >> if you have our free app, you were sent a update overnight. now time to get to more

breaking news for you this morning with meteorologist, kari hall. >> i want to jog your memory. this is the picture we got used to seeing for the past 20 or 22 years around california seeing a drought, and this is the way we started our water year with 16% of our state in exceptional drought. we have continued to see a lot of rainfall. last week we saw major improvements especially for parts of central california into the sierra. today we are no longer in a drought for the bay area. let's get a closer look as we are seeing some abnormally dry conditions for parts of our north bay counties, for napa and sonoma counties, and still a moderate drought persists for the sacramento valley on northward, and the water board reassesses things and they are

still advising we try to conserve water to about 15%, which is still a good practice even though we are once again seeing our reservoirs full. we have beautiful greenery around the bay area. we still have more rain in our forecast. definitely a major improvement here. good news as we go into our out look for the next week or so we still will have more rain on the way. we're going to talk more about this, how much we could see and what is ahead coming up in a few minutes. laura and marcus. >> that's fantastic news. thank you so much, kari. good to hear. 6:04. happening now, the man accused of attacking an elderly teacher will be back in court. the 68-year-old was attacked last month after she was leaving bart and walking to school. she says the 47-year-old steven breyer pushed her to the ground after trying to take her wallet. she's pushing for a larger police presence in the district.

if convicted, breyer faces up to 21 years in prison. and another man is due in court, the man accused of shooting and killing a mother of two last week. one student allegedly stabbed another student at sunrise middle school in san josé. police first responded to the scene around 12:00 p.m. yesterday. a student is now in custody and is expected to be booked into juvenile center. school is set to be open today. the school is holding a community meeting for parents and students tonight at 6:00. this was not the only scary situation for us at a bay area school yesterday. staff at a san francisco middle school responded as they found a gun on campus. this happened at jane denyman middle school. no shots were fired. the school was placed on lockdown.

the school will be open today. these two incidents follows a deadly stabbing at a santa rosa school earlier this month. this morning texas remains at the center of a national debate over abortion rights. a federal judge is deciding whether to ban a pill used to terminate a pregnancy. brie, yesterday the first public hearing was held on the case, and of course both sides are making their voices heard. >> that's right. good morning, laura. at the center of the latest debate, the abortion pill mifepristone, the restrictions could be made nationwide for the medication used for over decades. a group known as the alliance for hypocritic medicine said the government did not adequately evaluate the safety of the drug, and meanwhile those who support

a woman's right to choose says it could hinder abortion access nationwide. >> we are asking them to take these dangerous drugs offer the marketplace. >> we should all be incredibly concerned with what is happening and how they are using the court structure. >> any indication how the judge might rule? >> the district judge matthew kacsmaryk hearing the case, he has a history of supporting abortion restrictions, and was appointed by president trump. it's worth noting the fda says the plaintiff's claims are unsupported by any evidence. since being approved two decades

ago, the fda says more than 5 million women have taken mifepristone. >> interesting. we know you will continue to follow that today. brie jackson, thank you so much. here's a look at pg&e's outage map. as of last check at 10:00 last night, nearly 68,000 customers are waking up without power. the vast majority are in the south bay. about 34,000 there. most of the other outages are in the peninsula where there's nearly 19,000 people without power. recovery efforts are under way in pajaro after the latest atmospheric river flooded the city. governor newsom vowing to help and get federal funding to help the area. the governor toured the damage wednesday. that town flooded after a levee breach forcing many to evacuate. the levee system was built back in 1949. it could cost $400 million for a

solution. the flood has forced more than 1,700 people out of their homes. meanwhile, good news to tell you about. many who left are being reunited with their pets thanks to the fpca in monterey county. >> these rescued pets have been through a lot. they are coming to us hungry, a little bit thin. quite a lot of them are covered in very unpleasant water. we are trying to groom them and get them clean and get them fed. >> they are providing meals for more than 200 pets but it's running out of supplies quickly and is asking the public for donations. make sure you stick around because at 6:25, if your home was damaged by storms in january, a very important deadline is approaching. our consumer team breaks down all you need to know to get those funds. it's 6:09 on your thursday

morning. take a live look outside overlooking san josé. a dry start to our morning, which is welcome news to a lot of folks. all the wet weather that we have been having certainly helping when it comes to the drought, right, kari? >> yeah, so good to see the drought update this morning. we do need a chance to dry out after all of the rain, and it's also chilly. a lot of people still left without power this morning. it's a cold start as we are now in the upper 30s and low 40s for parts of the east bay. getting the kids up and out the door and ready for school in livermore, at drop-off time it will be 42 degrees. they are still wearing the jackets for the start of the day, but at pickup time they may be taking those off as sunshine continues and we head up to 62 degrees there. around the bay area we are looking at low to mid-60s. as we get our break in the rain, sunshine and slightly warmer temperatures for today, we will see it continue for a little longer before more changes ahead. mike, we have an update for the bay bridge now?

>> yes, there will be some improvement but nothing you can really see from this side. from the oakland side you will still see the massive backup. these folks are approaching the metering lights, and then what little movement you see is just until you get to the incline. very slow across the span. we continue with three lanes, not just two, three lanes are open but two right lanes are blocked by the police activity continuing since last night. the backup forms from berkeley, and jammed up off highway 24. richmond over to san rafael, the slowing there. bart is a good option if you want to get across the bay. san mateo bridge, we see more slowing heading down there to san leandro. back to you. >> thank you, mike. coming up next here on "today in the bay," the massive patch of seaweed heading straight towards florida

beaches. what is being done to protect vacation goers from potential illness. what if you showed up to work and there was nothing to do but they still paid you? would you like it or would it be difficult? looks like wall street will hang on to some of theosses l

good thursday morning. as you are getting ready to head out in san josé, it's 6:14. it's all clear. the temperature, 43 degrees. we have a lot of sunshine in today's forecast, but you may have the jacket on for most of the day. it will be a cool start but we are going to head towards milder weather. we will talk about when rain comes back, coming up in a few minutes. we will talk about when things improve on the bay bridge, but for now it's the place to avoid. the backup rippling back to the maze and the east shore freeway. westbound 92, we will show you the backup and we will try to get you alternates westbound across the bay. the situation over credit suisse seems to have

centralized. at one point the dow was down more than 700 points. treasury secretary, janet yellen, testifying in front of the senate about the budget but expect a lot of questions about silicon valley bank as well. and intel is to sell a lot of company real estate. the santa clara campus will stay, but almost an equally sized campus in san josé for sale. high-tech really has too much real estate. for a while it had too many people. you remember companies like meta said they over hired during the boom times. one employee i talked to said she didn't have anything to do there and felt like the company hired her so others wouldn't. >> they were treating us like pokemon, we were the best of the

best. some of the smartest people i know were being forced to not do anything. >> you would think that old cliché that hardly working would be fun, but she said showing up to work with nothing to do was really stressful. >> because of the nature that was really happening with other talks of layoffs, we wanted to do something. i wanted to show what impact i was having, and to be given no goal or matrix, nothing to rate me off of, i felt like i was being set up for failure. >> later this morning i will post her contact on twitter and facebook, and if you want to hire her, she wants to work. she wants to show up with stuff to do. >> she will land something. >> yes, she will. developing now, scientists are getting a look at giant seaweed blob in the atlantic.

it's estimated to be 5,500 miles long. scientists say it's not toxic but does carry a bad smell. you may remember, florida is also experiencing toxic algae bloom known as the red tide. a giant discovery of a fossil making many take a step back into the land before time. >> that's right. a long island scientists said a fossil shows one type of dinosaur had a neck as long as a school bus. they are studying three fossils found in china in the 1980s believed to be the neck vertebrae of this longest-neck

creature when it roamed the earth 162 million years ago. can you imagine going for a walk and seeing the huge long-necked creature coming your way? >> hey, buddy, want some? >> my goodness. >> land before time. >> long neck. >> yeah. >> all right. how's it looking out there? >> it's looking good. it's all good here. it has been a nice calm for us as we take a look now at our drought monitor. it was so great to see the update. let me show it to you. we are now not seeing a lot of yellows or oranges indicating most of california and the bay area are no longer in a drought after all the rain we have had recently. for the sacramento valley up further to the north, still a moderate drought does persist. we are once again taking a break

for a little while, but there will be more rain coming back as we head towards sunday. scattered showers moving in. first day of spring on monday, typically we start to see storm activity starting to wind down, but not this time around. we are still looking at more storms throughout next week, more sierra snow and more cold temperatures. you have probably already seen that at the bottom of the screen. it's not yet time to put the sweaters away or umbrellas because we are looking at additional rainfall going into next week. we are trying to let all that water soak into the ground we had recently, but we don't have a lot of time for that as we have another quarter to half inch of rain from parts of the north bay, and there could be another three quarters inch of rain or more. for the sierra, possibly several more feet of snow going into next week. we are still continuing with the very active storm pattern, but

we only have a couple days to enjoy the sunshine. we are hitting the upper 60s for today, tomorrow as well as saturday. notice on saturday there will be more clouds moving in. rain late in the evening, continuing into sunday as well as next week as the temperatures take a big dip once again. mike, you have been tracking breaking news across parts of the bay bridge. yeah, basically the ripple impact because the commute is kicking in around the bay. the san mateo bridge is slower than you may have anticipated unless you have been watching and know about the problems on the bay bridge in san francisco. avoid west 80, and the reason is because between hayward and the bay bridge itself, head south to highway 92. you see more slowing on 880 and across the span, and that's to avoid the bay bridge. we are starting to get that ripple impact because 80 is

jam-packed. the backup ripple towards the maze as well, and the live shot shows you the whole story. back over to you. >> wow. 6:21. coming up next on "today in the bay," "nbc bay area responds." >> more people are eligible for federal help cleaning up from the winter storms, but you have to apply. i am consumer

paper being crumpled more paper being crumpled music: “i wish” by skee-lo boom! sound of paper balls landing in bins office workers cheering music stops why do we shoot baskets with paper balls? for the same reason we play scratchers from the california lottery. because a little play can make your day. logo scratches on

6:24. here's news to know. with this winter's nonstop storm, if it damaged your home today is the deadline to apply for help. >> chris chmura has more with how you could get help. there's a qr for you to scan. often adding additional eligible families that could get up to $41,000 for repairs. if you looked previously and thought the feds left you out, look again. fema said if your home had storm-related damage and are uninsured or under insured, you could have help from fema to restore your home to a liveable condition. fema only makes things

inhabitable. the application is pretty straightforward. before you start it, fema recommends making a list of all your damage and snapping photos of it. after you submit your application, fema says an inspector could visit your home within ten days. next you will get a notice about possibly a payment. if you don't agree with fema's determination, you could appeal, but act fast because you have 60 days to appeal, and after that you should get a response within 90 days. 6:26 right now. we have another half hour of "today in the bay" ahead for you starting with breaking news. we are tracking this massive backup on the bay bridge this morning. you are looking live at what is going on there. mike inouye keeping track of what is going on and will have alternative routes for you to make that situation a little easier for you this morning. i am kris sanchez in the south bay where a number of schools are still without power, but school leaders are saying

drop the kids off anyway. we will tell you why and we will show you some of the other power outage impacts a

we have no power, no electricity. sorry. and no hot water. >> right now at 6:30, thousands across the bay area still without power this morning. this is days after the most recent storm. some of the students in the south bay will have to go to

class in the dark this morning. we are live with ongoing efforts to get power back on. plus, the massive backup continues on the bay bridge. we're tracking alternatives as this shows no signs of easing up anytime soon. this is "today in the bay" streaming live on roku, and, of course, online. 6:30 on your thursday morning. i am laura garcia. >> i am marcus washington. we have a lot to get to this morning. we want to start with the breaking news on the bay bridge, and mike inouye has been keeping track of it and it has not changed at all. >> no, but this is a moving picture. you can tell, this out of oakland, basically avoid this because of police activity over on the san francisco side. take you to the maps. you see the massive backup. the metering lights are cycling but are not really having an impact because the volume of traffic backs up through berkeley into san francisco.

only two lanes are blocked and that means only three lanes are open and that will not clear until the police activity clears. shifting traffic north towards the richmond bridge and towards the golden gate is one alternate. more traffic heading south across the golden gate bridge towards san francisco. kari, south of the bay bridge, you go to the san mateo bridge as an alternate. this in the last three minutes really started to crawl despite the fact that we have more pleasant weather, but we have a lot more traffic. it's not windy and no rain is coming down, and you can head out but expect it to be slower as a result of what mike was talking about. in san josé, it's all clear. we will have a beautiful sunrise in the east bay. clouds starting out in hayward at 44 degrees. and we will continue with sunshine today as we take a break with all of the wet weather and the storms, and our temperatures reach into the low and mid-60s this afternoon.

we will have more changes this weekend. we'll talk about that and all that is going on coming up in a few minutes. >> kari, thank you. more power outages continue across the bay area, and in the south bay a number of those schools will welcome schools back while they don't have electricity. >> many school leaders are asking students to come back to class. today in the bay's kris sanchez joins us in front of one school making that request. >> reporter: this school is part of the cupertino school district, and the lights are still out this morning. still school leaders are saying drop the kids off, this is the best place for them to be. the school district sent out a message to families saying it confirmed all campuses are safe for staff and students and have running water and flushing toilets, and can serve breakfast and lunch therefore all the

district schools will be open. a fremont union high school district closed five campuses including three high schools but should be back to normal with power today. the campbell union high school district is going to make a decision about whether or not to hold classes by 7:00 this morning, and that means prospect and westmont high school students still have their face up in the air. we visited simonds, and yesterday the teachers went old school, and if power is still out they will hold classes. the principal told us it's about learning and also supporting families, and if near normal attendance levels is any indication, families appreciate that option. >> this is the safest place for kids to be. families still have to go to

work even though we don't have power, and we want to make sure our kids have a safe place to be, and this is all that. >> imagine talking to a customer, mom, so-and-so hit me, mom -- like every few seconds, so i think it's wonderful. >> reporter: the students will be in the dark at school. a lot of families still in the dark at home as well, especially here in sunnyvale, and that could be the story through friday. people are depending on neighbors who have solar panels to keep their phones charged and things like that, and some businesses brought in backup power so they can serve dinner for people that can't cook at home. and burlingame, guests, they checked them into rooms but by lantern light, so things are interesting around the bay area. a lot of folks don't know how long they will be without power, and the pg&e website has wide

projections for here, it's at 10:00 p.m. tonight and the 26th, which is far out. >> that is really tough. >> yeah, it is. kris, thank you so much for that. happening today, former theranos executive sunny balwani set to report for his 13-year prison sentence in just a matter of hours. last july jurors convicted him on all 12 felony counts, and he's appealing but a judge struck down his request to remain free while that appeal plays out. in the meantime, ex-theranos ceo and founder, elizabeth holmes, is asking to delay her sentence after she gave birth to a trial. she's expected to report next month for her 11-year prison sentence. italy's highest court

ordered two teens from mill valley to be retried for the 2019 murder. authorities say the men who were teens at the time killed the undercover officer in a botched attempt to buy drugs. no word on when the new trials will start. san josé police responded to an assault with a deadly weapon on newport avenue near minnesota in willow glen just before 8:00 p.m. the suspect barricaded himself in his home for more than two hours. police say the man was taken into custody peacefully. now to a follow-up. a big change for homeowners and businesses. gas water heaters will soon be banned. in 2027, gas water heaters can no longer be sold or installed in the bay area. gas furnaces and homes will have to be replaced with electricity zero emission systems starting

in 2029. there are 2 million gas furnaces and water heaters across the bay area right now. the pollution rivals the emission coming from cars in the bay area. >> significantly impacts our air quality resulting in dozens of early deaths and a wide range of health impacts particularly in communities of color. >> many people are expressing concern about the expense of replacing gas appliances with new electric ones. the rules only apply to new alie appliances, not existing ones. look at that, palisades, tahoe. it's looking good this morning after tons of snow fell earlier in the week. chp is telling people today and tomorrow are the best days to travel to tahoe before another storm hits this weekend. >> meteorologist, kari hall, joining us with a look at what we can expect this weekend. >> i know a lot of people want

to get to those areas -- >> but how do you get back home? >> yeah. take a look at how much we have gotten. when we compare that with what is normal, the tahoe area is at more than double its normal amount of sierra snowpack. palisades they have over 220 inches of snow on the ground. can you even imagine that? as we take a look at our forecast, if you want to go and see for yourself, we are going to have a couple days of sunshine and warmer temperatures, but the rain starts on saturday, changes over to snow by late saturday evening. we are going to have a small window there before that snow is back. maybe you want to stay closer to home. napa valley is looking pleasant. highs in the mid-60s with chilly mornings. if you are going to southern california, the weather is about the same with mid to upper 60s for the weekend. in san francisco, there's a lot of events going on for st. patrick's day including the

public crawl. tomorrow evening it's going to be in the upper 50s. it's kind of chilly as we see more clouds moving in. mike, what is the update on the bay bridge? >> talking about st. patrick's day, we wish we had green but we do not. look at all this red. from powell all the way around here, this is the berkeley curve traveling down the southeast shore freeway, and off of 580 and 24, and look, it continues all the way across the span, solid. two lanes are blocked in san francisco because of police activity. there are flashing lights. only three lanes into san francisco causes this massive backup out of the east bay continuing since last night, between 10:00 and 11:00 last night is when it started and then we have had a series of crashes, and those have since cleared. off the span and off the maze and highway 24, and folks are shifting up. we see more traffic on the bridge out of san rafael, and more traffic on the golden gate

bridge. you can avoid all the bridges and take bart, and bart is moving smoothly under the span. ac transit goes across the span and those lines will be delayed as well because the buses are stuck in the backup as well. >> mike, you have been busy this morning. thank you for everything you are doing. prioritizing the mental health, and the generational gap employers are now seeing when it comes to meeting employees' needs. and the new video into the pentagon that shows who is telling the truth about that drone, the russians or americans? then an ocean-front pool is closer to rea

good thursday morning. right now at 6:43, as you are heading out in santa rosa, we are in the upper 30s right now and the sky is clear. we are going to see a lot of sunshine today but it takes a while for it to feel more comfortable. we are headed for the mid-60s later today. we will eventually see rain coming back. i will have more on that in the forecast coming up in a few minutes. we have more traffic, more backup. the east shore freeway out of berkeley and through berkeley across the span, slow off the maze, and we see more traffic across 101. we see more on highway 92. that incident on the bay bridge is rippling around the bay.

a new study is shining light on mental health in the workplace. it found just how different generations look at their well-being. financial services company found younger generations are more likely to value mental health benefits provided by employers, and nearly 95 gen zers say they use health benefits by their employers, but less than half of baby boomers took advantage of the benefits. and 65% of workers said their mental health would be extremely impacted if their financial health was not going well. experts say the way to keep employees is to make these benefits more available. >> employers are providing a safe place for those to access the benefits and for those to understand what those benefits are, and recruiting and retaining the young employees,

it's key more than ever before to make sure they have access to those benefits, and the new workers and the younger generations are expecting those things to be available. >> if the workers are feeling burned out from the pandemic workloads, and they say it's essential for employers to understand employee mental health needs and to make those services available to employees no matter the generation. the defense department releasing brand-new video showing collision between the u.s. drone and russian fighter jet. >> the russians claimed the jet never hit the drone. >> yeah, they must have known, laura, there would be a video recording, to paraphrase james comey, lordy, there are tapes. look at the video yourself. this is the point of view from the drone. one of the passing russian jets, here's the later pass, same

approach, and then the camera gets knocked off-line. later you can see there's damage to the drone's propeller, clearly the result of some sort of impact just like the u.s. said. russia says it will try and recover that drone even though it's our property. the pentagon says it sank in deep waters, but can you see how this may play out. if they go after the drone, we may have to send ships into the black sea as well. tiktok may not have much of a future here in the u.s., and the white house pressuring bytedance to show the social network to an american company soon. bytedance also pointing out, quite correctly, while the u.s. government says it's concerned about tiktok security and whether it's gathering information about americans, nobody has actually offered any specific proof that is

happening. more coming up on the "today" show. a pac that supports former president trump is suing florida governor ron desantis for not running for government. desantis has been touring the u.s. and showing up in some of the same places as trump, but he has not announced running for president. florida has a law where you can't run for one office when running for another. if he wants to run for president, he would have to leave the governor's office. former president obama picked his bracket, picking duke to win it all. his final four, houston, ucla, baylor and duke. laura said at 5:00 i can't put

northwestern in every bracket, and i changed it. mississippi state, i would add them but they already loss in a heartbreaker. >> come on. >> we will have to talk after the show. >> thanks, scott. let's talk basketball. st. mary's will be making it out of the first round. i think they will go really far this year. i am cheering them on once again, because i am a gale. this is them boarding the bus to go to new york. they are taking on the commonwealth university friday at 11:00 a.m. the coach says the team is taking the tournament one game at a time. >> it's one game, and we're approaching it as a four-team tournament and see if you can win, you know, win this weekend. you go one at a time, and then it's all about us being ready to

play against bcu, who has a very good program and a very good team and we're playing them on the east coast. it's a tough challenge. >> that's okay. we're taking them on and rooting them on. trending this morning, a new movement and a push to bring a swimming pool to san francisco's embarcadero. >> we have pictures for you. this is what it would look like. a state senator is proposing a bill, and due to its location, there needs to be approval from california lawmakers, and even if the bill passes it will need the city, state and other agencies to approve it. >> and clear all the fog, too. >> please let that pool be heated if anything. >> you want to go to the beach to go to the pool? >> only in california.

>> yeah. >> you might need to bundle up out there. yeah, we have been talking about how cold and rainy it has been all season long. let's take a look down memory lane. i want to show you what we got used to see, the drought monitor. october 1st, there was a lot of red and orange on here, and 16% of the state was in an exceptional drought. we have known it has been raining so many times and we have seen a major improvement in our drought status. even last week we saw the tahoe region, and parts of the central valley and down to the central coast were taken out of the drought status. it continues to expand this morning. the latest drought update shows more improvement. we are looking at this now with just some of our north bay counties in abnormally dry conditions, and then we see a moderate drought continue for the sacramento valley further on to the north. so even with the improvements

and no longer a drought status for the bay area, we are still being asked to conserve water which it's a good habit to stay in. what are we doing? watering your lawn? we have had so much rain, so we're conserving water. there are more storms out there in the pacific that will be coming in and heading into late saturday into sunday. the rain will be coming back with more snow in the sierra. we will see still more rain even as we officially start spring on monday. there's more storms that will be coming in throughout next week and also colder temperatures. you probably already noticed that at the bottom of the screen. as we take a look at our long-range rain estimate, it shows areas in yellow and oranges, it indicates we could see half an inch to three quarters of an inch of rain. this active weather pattern

continues, but we do have a chance to let all of that rain we had recently soak into the ground and give us a couple days of sunshine and milder weather before we are back to winter as we officially start spring. i know, it's backwards. mike, you are seeing huge delays across the bay bridge. >> that's not the surprise. the surprise is how huge the delay is across the span. still, barely moving in this shot. i do hear a word of activity over on the san francisco side. right now we still have the police activity blocking your two right lanes get into san francisco. no progress on that as far as any changes. again, there's chatter on the grid there about what may be going on with the backup. look at how huge the backup is. it's solid down the berkeley curve, and people are running out of gas and there are crashes. richmond bridge sees more traffic and so does the san mateo bridge, traffic down to 92

on 880 does move slower. back to you. >> thank you very much, mike. happening now, the newly selected police chief, she's the bay area native. for the past 20 years, the chief has been with the pleasanton police department rising to the ranks of lieutenant. her husband is also a police sergeant in the bay area. she takes over as chief next month. >> congratulations to her. we will continue to follow the breaking news for you on the bay bridge this morning. a massive backup as that morning commute hits its peak. several issues affect the busy route into the city including a deadly crash overnight. what we are learning about the investigatn, and anotherio

6:56. welcome back. we're moving you forward with a look at the top stories on "today in the bay," including a major backup at the bay bridge as you head out the door this morning. >> several lanes still closed because of police activity. bob redell is at the toll plaza this morning, and looks pretty much the same behind you, bob. >> reporter: it is. unfortunately, this is the backup at the toll plaza because of police activity taking place on the western span on the upper deck, which is the westbound direction into san francisco on the bay bridge. but within the past few moments, we know the police activity has ended. there were two lanes shutdown on the western span, but those have since reopened. as i mentioned, this just happened so you are still going to have a big visual back up of what you are looking at, here at the toll plaza, and i can see it expanding back to the berkeley

curve. this is video of an accident that took place on the eastern span overnight that since was cleared, and we are bringing it up because it was a serious accident. there was a second crash that happened several minutes later that involved a sedan that rear-ended a big rig. the driver of the sedan was killed as was another person, and the chp did issue a sig-alert and called out the coroner and that scene has since been cleared. back out here live, you can see the backup here at the plaza sz that extends well over the incline past treasure island where there was police activity, again, on the deck into san francisco, but that police activity has cleared and what you are dealing with is residual. for that on the residual, i will send it over to mike.

>> yeah, all lanes of westbound 80, you can see movement on the span itself. treasure island, back down the incline, this is the recovery that has to happen. movement visible but not where you want to go. avoid the bay bridge. if you don't have the app, download it because it's free. nbc bay area news app, and the updates get sent straight to your phone. we have the pg&e outage map. there are nearly 44,000 people in the dark in the south bay. most of the other outages are along the peninsula where there's nearly 19,000 in the dark this morning. >> the weather causing a lot of the power outages. how is the weather looking for us? >> it looks good, but it's chilly especially if you have

had days without power. rain is back on sunday. >> all right. thanks so much for starting your day with us. we will be back with a local news update in half an hour. >> there's good thursday morning. the race is on to avoid an even larger economic crisis. >> two more major banks now at risk. it is march 16th. this is "today." shaky ground. yet another u.s. bank teetering on the brink while overseas, one of the largest banks in the world forced to borrow billions to stay in business. all of it rattling wall street as the treasury secretary heads to capitol hill today to reassure lawmakers and a nervous nation. we'll break down everything you need to know. breaking overnight, moment of impact. new video just rse