meet the family working together to grow a giant pumpkin worthy of dollywood "early today" starts right now good morning, i'm frances rivera >> i'm jessica layton. amidst a fight over government funding that could lead to a government shoutdown, the ukrainian president will head to washington to try to make the case to our nation's leaders to continue the fight against russia >> how did the federal funding fight tie into the war in ukraine? >> reporter: good morning jessica, frances as part of his trip to the u.s. which already included speaking at this week's general assembly, he is headed to washington, d.c. today ahead of his meeting with president biden at the white house later this afternoon, sl zelenskyy will meet with lloyd austin and members of the senate at the u.s. capitol. both parties will confront the issue of continued u.s. support for ukraine as the war with russia enters its 19th month the biden administration is urging congress to approve rther military aid for ukraine. however, in the race to pass spending bills and prevent a government shutdown by the end of september

. >> at dolly parton's dollywood theme park in tennessee.amily grew the gourds say they have used forklifts to get them off their land to the park. one of the pumpkins say named godzilla 1048 pounds. but that's less than the record pumpkin at the half moon bay festival. i just looked it up and do your research. 2500 plus pounds. so happen. bay has a lot bigger pumpkins and dollywood. >> many pumpkin pies you can get out of that one. >> that's a that's a yeah, a figure that one out in the braking pumpkin spice can cost a lot more to that. it that it will. >> that wraps up is that tonight? ♪ ♪ >> announcer: did he assassinate the cop. speak of the victim is the third-generation of his family to serve as a deputy shaver. ♪az

each are are dropped off each year by forklift at the dolly parton theme park as part of dollywood'sfestival out of the 8 giant pumpkins delivered. the largest is named godzilla. weighs a little more than 1000 pounds. 8 others will join 19 colossal pumpkins already living at the park. the question is just how many pumpkin pies you could make with pumpkins that big olivia horton is standing by now for live in the bay. olivia, sometimes those pumpkins that get that back, i feel like they're fake like papier-mache are some i know i'm just kind of waiting for

there there's a whole lot of traffic right now, you have people leaving the great smokey mountains, dollywood, pigeon forge, very popular tourist destinations. everyone has a same idea right now and that's to get out. fortunately, though, things are sort of going to be lightening up later on this evening. 95 million americans are choosing to get behind the wheel driving to their destinations and choosing to either go back home today or tomorrow. according to aaa, before you head out, a good idea to check your vehicle, because they're estimating roughly 300,000 stranded motorists by the end of this holiday weekend, so check those tires, also those batteries and remember to have a spare key handy, there are a lot of lockouts as well, so something to keep in mind if you do plan on heading out the door, getting behind the wheel, but as you mentioned airports are also dealing with a lot of passengers as well, 14 million passengers expected to be screened by the end of this holiday weekend. if you do have to head out to the airport also plan to get there early because you'll be joined by a lot of c

also dollywood just a few minutes away as well. so you have a lot of visitors trying to get out.all have the same idea, so you can probably see behind me. basically the gridlock here, and right here in the foreground, this is a traffic actually trying to get out of the largest gas station in the world. you might have heard of it, bucky's. so we are told from some of the drivers here, it's taking roughly an hour just to get out of the gas station, and then once they get out, they're dealing with the inner state traffic as well. so this is a scene that's really playing out all across the country. roughly 100 million americans are getting behind the wheel. they drove to their holiday destinations, and many of them, millions are headed home today or even tomorrow, and earlier this morning, we had a chance to speak with several people, visiting from all across the country, and here's how they plan on tackling the day. take a listen. >> we got kind of delayed coming here. there was a couple of bad wrecks, saw a car on fire, so it was a rough trip coming in. >> are you mentally preparin