lawmakers rush through some bills and bail on others ahead of the midterm election recess. big bang theory, the sci releaes chilling video of what might have happened if the times square bomber had skooet succeeded. and not too hot, not too gold. scitists discover a goldilos planet that they say y be able to support life. hlo and a good thursday morning to you. today we begin with congressional crowning. hoping to get a head start on their re-election campaigns, lawmaker necessary washington push through a slew of legislation from early adjournment yesterday. even the decision to adjourn was not without controver. back on the home front, already angry constituents may be most frustrated with what congress didn't get done.

tracie potts has more for us from washington. >> reporter: good morning, everyone. there was no decision on taxes, what to do about extending the bush tax cuts at the end of the year. democratic leaders had said they will not deal with that before the election. that's exactly what happened. but they barely got out of town without doing so in the house after a last-minute speech by republican leader john boehner that drew 39 democrats to his side. in the end, they agreed to adjourn without dealing with taxes by just one vote. but there was a flurry of activity before the house adjourned. they did approve several bills, including a stopgap spending measure so the government can continue to function for another two months. the fiscal year ends tomorrow. thealso approved a nasa bill that deals with the future of that program, extends both the space shuttle and the space station programs and ends the

bush era program that would have landed astronauts on the moon once again. finally, a 9/11 program was extended, as well, in fact, approved to provide health coverage for emergency workers who worked at ground zero. so a lot of work done. now they head home, veronica, to an angry electorate. >> tracie potts, thank you so much. meg whitman is facing a political firestorm after allegations that she knowingly employed an illegal immigrant. during a news coerence yesterday, it was said the candidate was alerted about her status in 2003 but didn't fire her until last year. whitman, who has specifically campaigned to holding those responsib claims sheonly found out about her

housekeeper's status last year, at which point she immediately fired the maid. across europe yesterday, tens of thousands protested massive government financial cuts. demonstrations in poland, portugal, greece, ireland and elsewhere. in spain, parts of the transportation system were brought to a stand still. this all came as the european commission imposed new fines on euro zone countries that fail to improve their finances. anwhile yesterday, police in europe had toeal with concerns about what's being described as a moonlight style terror plot aimed at engnd, spain and germany. security was beefed up at various landmarks, including buckingham palace. police say the plot originated in pakian. that country's border has seen a recent uptick in predator drone

attacks. nbc news is told there is no connection between the strike and the european threats. now here is a look at other stories making news early tod in america. in california, poli are looking for a robbery suspected wanted in a violent purse snatching attempt. a man reached from behind and grabbed her purse. when she refused to let go, the suspect dragged her on the ground and punching her several times before running away. the victim suffered minor cuts and bruises. a missouri man is behind bars after leading police on a high speed chase that at one point crossed over into kansas and back to missouri in a stole vehicle. the suspect can all caused yhem along the way, speeding through an intersection and colliding into two vehicles at 80 miles per hour. the suspect gave up when the vehicle's tires blew out. in ohio, a bizarre car accident resulted in a car going airborne, flipping several times and landing vertically on the

front porch of a house. everal tow trucks were required to remove the vehicle, but amazingly, the driver survived with nonlife threatening injies. just off the coast of florida, scientists are getting up close and psonal with the goliath grouper, a mystery fish which a decade ago were rarely ever seen. scientists hope to learn more about the speicesy which gather in this only known documented spot to mate. now here is bill karins with the weather channel forecast. good thursday morning to you, bill. >> good morning, veronica. lots to cover today. we have tropical storm nicole down in the caribbean adding moisture to this. it's a tropical hose taking a ton of moisture a throwing it up the eastern seaboard this morning. that's where all the travel trouble is. florida is now clearing out. the carolinas will be next. we have eastern carola getting

naid. virginia, delaware, pennsylvania, new jersey and soon up into areas of new england. take a closer look at the radar. you can see the moisture coming straight from the south. a little swirl here, maybe our area of low pressure crossing down from south carolina to north carolina, getting drenched from raleigh. wimington has had an incredible amount of rain the last few days, maybe the highest total ever. the moderates, the steady rainfall now over the area and that's extending now just into the philadelphia region. new york city, the rain is still probably another hour or two away. and you notice that new york is probably more scattered during the day today. i think new york city will get the heaviest rain later on tonight. here is the total we're thinking. anywhere in the yellow and oranges, 3 to 4 inches. along the coast, we could see 4 to 5, maybe 6 inches of rain. the rest of the united states looks fantastic. that's a look at your forecast. now here is a look at the weather outside yo window. sunshine in milwkee,

wisconsin. 67. really great weather out there. beautiful fall weather. leaves arehanging around the great lakes. dallas, more like it, 86 and sunny. denver, likes today at 80. we'll take a look at friday's forecast. the weekend is coming up here shortly, veronica. >> and it should get better, right? today is going to be the worst of it for t east coast? >> today examine tomorrow, yes. oil climbs, scary foreclosure numbers and mcdonald's befits? your early mning business headlines are straight ahead. plus, it's been quite a run for tina fey, but it gets even tter. you're watching "early today."

>> good morning, and welcome back to "early today." i'm veronica de la cruz. here are sme of your top

headlines this morning. newly released foage of tests shows the potentially deadly power of a bomb found inside an suv last may. had it not failed, it would have killed dozens. shazad faces sentencing next week for the attempted bombings. at today's meeting, the south korea demanded the north apologize for a deadly warship singing, but pyong yang refused to accept the findings that found them responsible. italian and croatian authorities are searching for a pair who have survival suits, life jackets a rafts in their balloons that went missing yesterday. astronomers say they have discovered the fir planet beyond our scholar system that

could have the right conditions to support life. the new planet, some 20 light years away from either is being referred toy scientists as a goldy locks planet since it's not too hot, not too cold, but just right for possible human habitation. >> and now here's a look at how wall street will kick off the day. the dow opens at 10,835 after losing 22 points yesterday. he s&p dipped 2 points and the nasdaq fell 3. taking a look at overseas trading this morning in tokyo, the nikkei fell 190 points while in tokyo the hang seng dropped 20. the dollar could get another dip yesterday thks to speculation from the fed. investors are convinced the federal reserve will poor more money backed away from the greenback sending the dollar to an eight-month low against the basket of other currencies. the price of gold was pushed to yet another fresh high, above

$1300 an owns. energy stocks got a boost after dwindling inventories fueled a rise on the price of crude. in washington, lawmakers passed a bill that would allow the u.s. to tax imports from china in response to keeping its currency artificially low against the dollar. today, the chinese call the legislation a breach against world trading policy. nearly one in every four homes sold in the second quarter was a foreclosed home. adding to the nation's foreclosure mess, jp morgan chase announced yesterday it would freeze foreclosures over paperwork flaws. experts warn it's a problemthat could exist industrywide. this morning's "wall street journal" reports mcdonald's could cut health care for 30,000 workers. mcdonald's claims it would be economically prohibitive. keep an eye on boeing today. shares were up in late trading

after the planemaker landed an eight year, nearly $12 billion deal with the usair force. finally, how the mighty have fallen. two years after lehman brothers filed for the biggest bankruptcy in u.s. history, the sign that once hung outside the company's london offices sold for almost $67,000 at auction yesterday. thas nearly 14 times its estimated price. the braves chop at their magic number. a wild walk-off win in tas and big papi fails at small ball. plus, the indians may be playing up a string, but that doesn't mean they aren't playing to win. your early morning sports headlines are just ahead. much of the country is looking at a gorgeous forecast. not the case, though. tropical downpours up and down the east cot. your early morning headlines are coming up. you're watching "early today."

good morning. if you're just waking up, this is "early today." in sports, the rays and yankees have clenched playoff spots, but the division race is still up for grabs. here's nbc's fred roggin with an early look at all your sports headlines. good morning. with every remaining game, it appears the a.l. east will come own to the final weekend of the season. in tampa, the rays gave away

20,000 tickets. the full house had little to cheer about. felix lined one into right. yankees and blue jays, they honored the manage fido ta at the end of the season. most of the guys took off their muss attaches when the game started, except for tras snyder. yanks remain half a game back in the east. now to atlanta, the magic number to clench the wild card is now two after a 5-1 win. great catch in the indians/tigers game. back, back, maybe off balance. definitely a catch worth kroeg about. grab gat by trevor. an unhea of ending between the mariners and rangers. nelson cruz struck out, but the ball got away from the catcher. cruz hustled down the line.

the throw to first was in the dirt. he was safe. play at the pte, and the score was safe. rangers won it, 6-5. funny moment in chicago, david ortiz layed down a bunt. yes, a bunt. no surprise he was thrown out by a mile. go morning, i'm meteorologist tom kierein we haveome very heavy rain now moving through the metro area. you see the areas of yellow and orange, we're getting the heaviest rains. and right now, we do have some very heavy rain that continues to move in from the south, out of the atlantic ocean. this is out ahead of what is left of tropical storm nicole. now, this has also produced what may be a tornado here in southern st. mary's county. this is an area of some perhaps

very heavy rain and there may be some circulation now being reporte on radar, it does appear there is me circulation here just to the north of prince frederick. that is traveling to the north. it's moving icklyand moving into southern anne arundel county here perhaps in another ten minutes or so. this is the heaviest downpour right nowhat's in the region. and this does show some circulation just now coming in from northern and eastern st. mary's county into southern, now calvert and central calvert counties. this continuing to move off to the north, and will continue to track into anne arundel county in the next few minutes. so definitely stay away from windows. get to an interior room. if you don't have a basement, get into a closet if you sense that there is strong wind coming towards you. but this is going to be affecting, again, northern st. mary's county where it meets the calvert county line, and across calvert county into anne arundel county over the next ten minutes

or so. this is a tornado warning. that means there is some circulation perhs now being detected on radar. don't have any reports, ground reports of any funnel clouds touching down. but we do have sense of circulation on the radar in this particular cell right now that is in calvert county, just now moving right across calvert county. in fact most of calvert county gettingome very, very heavy rain right now, and some perhaps damaging winds associated with this particular system. and maybe some thunder and lihtning, too. this is tracking again to the north. will be heading towards st. mary's county -- whether anne arundel county out of st. mary's and calvert into anne arundel over the next 15 minutes. elsewhere on the radar we have some very heavy rain that is falling, as well, continuing to fall, now in eastern howard county. that's heading off to the north. another pocket of someoderate to very heavy rain is falling into northern montgomery county. southern loudoun unty. western fairfax county. another pocket of very heavy rain is falling in southern

unty. all of this is traveling due north at a raid rate. all this associated, again, with this huge storm system that continues to circulate just off the atlantic sea board, and over the last three hours we've had this rain really pick up in intensity. we had light rain earlier in the eveng but just in the last couple of hours we've had a couple of waves of very heavy rain. likely many the small creeks and screams are going to become very full with water and maybe even overflow their banks in the next hour or two. right now we don't have any flood warnings but certainly there's some ponding of water on all of the roads, all around most of the entire region. this rain stretches not only from across our metro area but all the way to our west into the mountains of west virginia, and the foothills of the blue ridge are getting very heavy ins there. likely many of the creeks and streams around the foothills of the blue ridge will begin to overflow their banks, perhaps over the next half hour or so. meanwhile, closer to washington right now, we've got a little bit of a lull. there's some lighter rain

falling here in washington. now here's the wider view. this is all just an enormous conveyor belt of moisturehat's sweeping in off the atlantic, ahead of circulation. it's associated with the remnants of tropical storm nicole. it is a very strong tropical low right now, that the main circulation is moving in to eastern north carolina, and so out on te eastern de of this, the circulation is a lot of tropical moisture coming all the way up from the caribbean, and continuing to flow all the way in to eastern norh carolina, and all the way up into virginia, and now maryland, that's moving on up into pennsylvania, as well. now, once again, we have a tornado warning for calvert countynd anne arundel county. this is the cell that is continuing to produce some very heavy rain across most of calvert county now. this is going to be tracking up into anne arundel county in the next half hour or so and there is some indication of circulation in this particular cell that is showing us perhaps there may be a funnel cloud

touching down in calvert county. this is continuing to trackff to the north with very heavy rai that's going to be the main issue here, with flooding likely occurring in many locations now in calvert county that's going to track just about due north acoss anne arundel county here in the next few minutes. other pockets of heavy rain around the metro area, just to our north from northernrince george's county and across howard county and western montgomery county, from near poolesville up towards maryland there, veryeavy rain. also very heavy rain is falling around right near sterling and loudoun county. western fairfax county, and another pocket of very heavy rain now in faulkeer county. all of this is continuing on this conveyor belt of moisture. meanwhile the temperatures are in the 60s right now. kind of a balmy, humid morning. in the mid 70s on the eastern shore. and for the rest of the day we are going to continue to have this heavy rain from tme to time all the way through into the afternoon.

maybe with some thunder and lightning. a greater chance of thunr and lightning this afternoon into late afternoon hours. temperatures only reaching the mid 70s. flooding likely throughout the entire region throughout most of the day today. so if your basement is prone to flooding get any items you have off the floor of your basement, get them into a dry area, get them up to an upper floor of the house. you don't want to have any valuable items in your basement if it's prone to flooding. for the rest of the night this rain could taper off and end by dawn. it will be partly cloudy starting off by friday. we could have blustery winds along the eastern shore later today, gusting toround 40 miles an hour. and tomorrow we could have gusts around 25 to 30 out of the northwest as we dry out on friday, highs in the mid 70s, with partly cloudy skies. then into saturday and sunday, should be paly cloudy both days with morning lows in the 40s, afternoon highs in the 60s. so we'll continue to have a chance to dry out from this very, very heavy rain event. as we get into next week there is some uncertainty now about

what may happen next week, wel keep you posted. there is a possibility of showers maybe late monday and tuesday but we'll keep you posted on that. right now it does appear we'll have highs in the 60s and morning lows in the 70s. it's a dark morning and we have very heavy rain continuing to fall now. this is cansing south to north, and these bands, very heavy rain have picked up in intensity over just the last half hour to hour. right now the radar is showing some very heavy rain that's falling in frederick, just near prince frederick in calvert county. that is associated with a very strong cell that may be producing some circution. that particular cell may have a small tornado that may be touching down in calvert county and anne arundel county. this conveyor belt of moisture all associated with circulation now that's rotating over eastern north calina. but we're not done with this yet, and this is going to be a day-long event. this is n just only going to happennto the morning hours we're going to havewaves of heavy rain training through with

likely flooding here throughout the day today. now, the close-up view of the radar showingthat that cell that was perhaps producing a tornado is continuing to hold its strength. it does not appear to be babiening. right here where you see this little point of red right now just to the south of dunkirk, maryland, that is where there is a potential circulation, a potential funnel cloud, tornado warning in effect until 4:30 this morning. this may be extended in anne arundel county until 5:00. it does appear it is holding its strength. there is a tremendous amount of rain falling with this across calvertcounty moving into southern anne arundel county. again the circulation is right here, just about halfway between dunkirk and prin frederick and calvert county. huntingtown maryland right there just to the east of that. and it is continuing moving due north, tracking into anne arundel county in the next 15 or 20 minutes. again, other pockets of very heavy rain when you see the dark

greens and yellow just to the north of washington, howard county, northern montgomery ounty, western fairfax, pockets of very heavy rain continuing to fall. other pockets of very heavy rain farther to our south now. because of the terrain here with the hills and the foothills of virginia, that water just funnels into these creeks and streams in those deeper valleys. likely there's going to be flooded roads out here. maybe even washed out bridges as the morning progresses. if you see high water do not attempt to drive through any high water. turn around, te another route and definitely do not attempt to do that bause just a foot of water is enough to float a car away, and any time we have these major flooding events weave people stranded in their cars, especially in the morning hours, because now it's so dark you can't tell how deep the water is. when you do approach,what you may think is a little bit of water, that could be several feet deep.

do not attempt to drive through any high water. slow way down, too. you could be driving along going 55 or 60 miles an hour on the interstate and think you're fine and come into a huge pond of water, you could easily lose corol of your vehicle and spin out. so, please b very, very cautious this morning. again we have a tornado warnin in effect for calvert county now moving into anne arundel county. a very, very heavyell is advancing to the north from there. we'll keep you posted throughout the morning. "news 4 today" starts right now. 4:28 is your time right now and it is raining hard out there. a tornado warning is in effect for some areas. everyone is under a flood watch. tall has been showing you the radar. it is an absolute mess out there. good morning, i'm eun yang. >> good morning i'm joe krebs. welcome to "news 4 today" on this 30th and final day of september, 2010.

the weather is the big story this morning. it is raining out there right now. tom beenelling us about th progression of this rain into our area. >> we do have a tornado warning for those of you just tuning in for calvert and anne arundel counties. a tornado warning. that means there is the potential for funnel cloud to be touching down in anne arundel county, and northern now looks like calvert county. now just the latest update of the radar. it does appear that the storm is holding its strength there. all of this moisture coming in from the south, continuing to advance to the north from circulatioaround the remnants of tropical storm nicole, it's no longer a named tropical storm, but it is certainly having an enormous impact up and down the atlantic seaboard. now where you see that area of orange in calvert county, just to the southeast of washington, that is the area of heaviest rain right now. that's a band that stretches down into st. ry's county and there was circulation deteed on radar that, indeed, indicated that there was at least some