A Boeing 737 barely cleared the runway in an incident in the UK.
The pilots didn't notice they set the thrust too low, but the autothrottle also had a fault.
According to investigators, Boeing said the auto-throttle has "a long history of nuisance disconnects."
A Boeing 737 barely managed to clear a runway following a software glitch, according to the UK's Air Accidents Investigation Branch.
On May 30, the AAIB released a preliminary report about the "serious incident" that took place in March.
Taking off from Bristol Airport, the TUI Airways 737 was only 10 feet in the air — the same height as a basketball hoop — when it crossed the end of the runway. The 737 then overflew a major road next to the airport by less than 100 feet, per the report.
An analysis of the incident by TUI found that the 737 had accelerated at a slower rate than 99.7% of other takeoffs at Bristol.
The AAIB said the pilots didn't notice they had set the thrust "significantly below" the required level. Then, it said, the autothrottle disengaged as they selected the takeoff mode. This was due to a fault with the system.
According to the AAIB's report, Boeing said the 737's autothrottle has "a long history of nuisance disconnects during takeoff mode engagements."
The jet used an older model of the autothrottle, although Boeing had detailed this issue back in 2021.
Boeing is experiencing a crisis, which has led to CEO Dave Calhoun announcing his resignation. It is trying to regain the trust of customers and passengers following January's Alaska Airlines blowout. That incident involved a 737 Max, whereas the Bristol Airport one involved the previous generation, the 737 NG.
"Boeing is supporting the Air Accidents Investigation Branch with its investigation," the planemaker said in a statement shared with Business Insider.
"As a party to that investigation, we're not able to comment and will refer you to the AAIB for any information."
In a statement sent to Business Insider, TUI said: "We have worked closely with the authorities to provide all available information.
"The AAIB recommendations and learnings resulting from this take-off will support the whole aviation sector and other airlines. The safety of our passengers and crew is always our highest priority."
The Chevy Equinox is reportedly one of the EVs available through Costco's Auto Program.
Chevrolet
General Motors is turning to Costco's Auto Program to help it sell more EVs.
The wholesaler partners with automakers and dealers to offer discounted vehicle prices for members.
An executive told CNBC selling EVs to Costco's 50 million members was a "huge opportunity" for GM.
General Motors is turning to Costco to help it sell more EVs.
According to a CNBC report, the Detroit automaker is selling its electric vehicles through Costco's Auto Program, which allows members to buy cars at discounted prices.
GM North America President Marissa West told CNBC she saw a "huge opportunity" to sell EVs to Costco's 50 million-plus US membership base and that GM was exploring new ways to build its partnership with the wholesaler.
"We have a great partnership with Costco, and I'm really bullish on Costco because I like their brand," said West.
Business Insider contacted GM and Costco for comment but didn't immediately hear back.
Costco Auto Program general manager Jay Maxwell, meanwhile, told CNBC the company had seen an uptick in interest in EVs among its members, with around 7% of member requests for vehicles to Costco Auto in 2023 relating to electric vehicles.
Costco Auto does not sell cars directly. It partners with dealers and automakers to allow members to buy vehicles for discounted prices.
The partnership with Costco comes at a crucial time for GM as it gears up to release a range of new affordable electric models in the coming years.
Until then, Costco members will certainly see the benefits. The wholesale club recently announced that members will be able to get $1,000 off a selection of electric vehicles this summer, including models from Cadillac, Chevy, and Volvo.
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The bot can access the internet through a new update, allowing it to trawl job sites.
I tested ChatGPT's recruiting skills. It sped up the job-hunting process but did make some mistakes.
ChatGPT now looks like a very useful tool if you're trying to find a job.
Not only can the bot write convincing cover letters and spruce up a CV — but a new update means the AI assistant can also do your job hunting for you.
As companies advertise on various platforms and job boards, finding the right role can mean trawling through multiple websites and monitoring company careers pages.
While sites such as LinkedIn draw from many of these sources, it can still feel like you risk missing the perfect role by not covering all your bases.
This is where the updated version of ChatGPT can be very helpful.
OpenAI recently rolled out a version of the bot equipped with its new flagship model, GPT-4o, which can access the internet. The company's previous GPT-4 model could also link up with Bing but was only available to ChatGPT Plus subscribers.
Job seekers sick of wading through hiring boards may turn to recruiters to cut out the leg work. Armed with a new update, ChatGPT can now act as your free personal recruiter.
Job hunting
I decided to put ChatGPT's recruiting skills to the test.
I told the bot what sort of role I was looking for, explained my experience, and sent it on its way.
The bot returned with six opportunities, all matching the experience listed on the CV I supplied. It also helpfully summarized each role's main features, including location, salary, a short description of the responsibilities, and the date the ad was posted.
The results were largely accurate, although the salary on one job was slightly misstated.
ChatGPT searching for journalism jobs in London.
OpenAI
It also provided a few helpful tips on applying for the roles, suggesting I tailor my CV to the role and find people from the company to connect with on networking sites like LinkedIn.
After identifying my favorite job opportunity, I asked the bot to run another search for who I should contact at the company during my application progress.
The bot came back with five managers and recruiters in the correct department and even wrote me a short LinkedIn message I could send to follow up on my application.
The bot did get confused by its own hallucinations once or twice. In an earlier test, ChatGPT sent me one job that I couldn't track down. After some probing, the bot acknowledged that the bot role probably wasn't real.
I found that asking the bot to send full hyperlinks to the jobs I could copy and paste helped keep it focused on providing genuine opportunities. Still, it underlined the importance of treating the results skeptically before putting any work into an application.
Applying
It's not news that ChatGPT can help job seekers write a killer cover letter, but the new update allows for some more specific back and forth.
The bot can also crawl the web to find out who else is on the team and suggest where to direct follow-up messages.
ChatGPT even wrote me an analysis of how well my experience aligns with a job's requirements, evaluated my likelihood of landing the role, and gave me some tips on how to increase my chances.
Armed with my CV and the job description, I asked ChatGPT to tailor my CV to the role and write a quick cover letter.
Within about half an hour, I'd found a job and had an application ready to go.
While I didn't submit it, I know exactly what to do next time I am in the market for a new gig.
Have you used GPT-4o to find a job? Contact this reporter at bea.nolan@businessinsider.com
Last month, Biden said that Ukraine could fire US weapons against targets on Russian soil, in limited circumstances.
The change in policy came after Ukraine's European allies, including the UK, lifted bans on their weapons being used to strike Russia directly.
However, the Institute for the Study of War, a US think tank, said in its daily report that, under the rules, Ukraine could only strike around 16% of Russian territory within the range of weapons supplied by the US.
"US policy restricting Ukraine's usage of US-provided weapons has effectively created a vast sanctuary – territory in range of US-provided weapons but that Ukrainian forces are not allowed to strike with US-provided weapons – which Russia exploits to shield its combat forces, command and control, logistics, and rear area support services that the Russian military uses to conduct its military operations in Ukraine," said the ISW.
Biden's directive allows for US-supplied weapons to be used to strike military targets inside Russia that are attacking or preparing to attack Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city.
However, according to the ISW, because a large number of Russian military targets remain off-limits, Ukraine is still unable to disrupt Russian military operations significantly.
"ISW assesses that the West maintains the ability to substantially disrupt Russian operations at scale by allowing Ukraine to use Western-provided weapons to strike Russia's operational rear and deep rear areas in Russian territory," said the ISW.
Biden has taken a cautious approach to how much support the US should give Ukraine, fearing an escalation of the conflict that could pull in NATO powers.
Russia had exploited the restrictions placed on Ukraine to launch devastating attacks from its territory on Kharkiv, which is around 12 miles from the Russian border.
A Ukrainian officer walks amid the devastation caused by a Russian glide bomb that landed in the village of Petropavlivka on Feb. 13, 2024.
Photo by Scott Peterson/Getty Images
Ukraine is now making glide bombs of its own.
Russia has used the bombs, which can be fired out of reach of air defenses, to devastating effect.
The US has given Ukraine some, but they have reportedly struggled with Russian jamming.
Ukraine is making its own glide bombs, trying to match the Russian weapon that is causing so much damage.
The hope is that they will be more effective than the ones it has so far received from the West.
Brigadier General Serhii Holubtsov, chief of aircraft of the Air Force Command of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, said Ukraine will start testing the domestically made bombs in the next few weeks.
"We are now working on converting and producing our own corrected bombs based on conventional freefall bombs," he said in a radio interview, according to a translation by Ukrainian Pravda.
The bombs, otherwise known as glide bombs, have guidance systems that allow them to be launched at a distance.
This means that many have missed their targets, three sources told Reuters.
Holubtsov said there are many complex decisions to be made regarding Ukraine's homemade bombs, including "picking the appropriate wing, GPS module, and control module."
"In a few weeks, we should begin testing the first batches of these bombs, which are Ukrainian-made," he said.
In 2023, there were 71,041 complaints about noise from the airport, with monthly numbers ranging from around 4,000 to 9,000.
Of those complaints, 60,490 came from just 10 people, meaning that 0.5% of complainants were responsible for 85% of complaints.
An even smaller number of people appear to be responsible for the bulk of that 60,000. The airport notes that only five people complained more than 1,280 times.
About half of the complaints were in the category of loud aircraft, and a quarter were for low aircraft.
Similar statistics continued into the first quarter of 2024, when the top 10 complainers filed 15,062 complaints. One person appears to have complained over 6,000 times in those three months, an average of around 60 complaints per day, over two per hour.
Research compiled by the UK Civil Aviation Authority shows how noise pollution from planes can disrupt sleep quality, increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, and impede children's performance in school.
To help people living nearby, Heathrow operates a "runway alternation" system, which says "provides predictable periods of noise relief."
It means one runway is used for takeoffs and the other for landings before switching around halfway through the day.
However, noise complaints from a small number of locals have still persisted.
Along with environmental activists, noise complaints have played a role in impeding controversial plans to build a third runway at Heathrow.
A similarly huge number of complaints was found in Australia. One person living under a flight path in Perth was responsible for almost half the country's aircraft noise complaints.
Companies are axing middle management positions, but this may be short-sighted.
Middle managers provide mentorship and support to junior employees, and soft skills are key.
A manager shouldn't be let go just because they have a "faulty toolbox."
Middle managers have been the punching bag of the workplace for some time, with employees increasingly seeing their direct superiors as meddlesome, obsolete, and taking credit for their work.
But it shouldn't be a matter of axing middle management entirely, Koma Gandy, the VP of business and leadership at the corporate training platform Skillsoft, told Business Insider.
Rather, we need to remember what makes a middle manager valuable.
The answer, Gandy said, lies in developing better soft "power" skills.
With improved communication and listening, more empathy, and emotional intelligence, middle managers could save themselves from the "great unbossing," Gandy said.
But that requires leaders to take note and start investing in managers to help them nurture these skills as well.
"I would say, why don't we lean into that cohort rather than thinking about how can we eliminate that cohort?" Gandy said.
For starters, middle managers provide mentorship to junior employees and graduate staffers.
Zoomers entering the workforce prioritize their own mental health and work-life balance, and a good manager is someone who also makes these things a primary concern, Gandy argued.
"Some of the things that Gen Z is demanding from the workplace can be uniquely facilitated by the very people that the trend is trying to eliminate, which are these middle managers," Gandy said.
A lack of training
Good middle managers need training and guidance, which is severely lacking in current workplaces, Gandy said.
Many people, a few years into their careers, will fall into management positions almost by default. They are often expected to know how to effectively do the job without much support.
"It's just congratulations and good luck," Gandy said. "But wait, aren't you going to teach me how to lead a meeting? Aren't you going to teach me how to communicate to a team?"
Key skills for managers to develop include active listening and effective communication, which makes their employees feel valued, that their work matters, and that they are being recognized as whole human beings.
If somebody on the team is underperforming, for example, it could be for a myriad of reasons — something is going on at home, they're feeling unsure about what their job is, or where they fit into the company.
"If you don't build up that emotional intelligence to be able to tease out what's happening in that person's environment, you're never going to unlock and unleash the potential that they can bring to their teams," Gandy said.
A team that has a manager who has developed strong soft skills, "then you're going to see ripple effects throughout the organization," Gandy said.
A faulty toolbox
But when these skills are underdeveloped, "it creates a lot of mistrust" among team members, Gandy said.
"Nobody wants to be micromanaged. Nobody wants to have somebody sitting over their shoulder," she said.
Micromanaging often doesn't happen in a vacuum. It may be that a manager doesn't know any different, Gandy said, because that's how they were managed when they were more junior.
This manager shouldn't be let go, Gandy said, just because they have a "faulty toolbox." No manager comes to work striving to underperform or wanting their team to feel devalued and burned out, she said.
"That's a training deficiency. That is a behavior that can be changed," she said.
"If you're not supporting and nurturing them and giving them the tools to develop themselves, then, of course, it might seem attractive to eliminate that cohort."
Middle managers are easy to pick on, Gandy said, but it'll be a lot more cost-effective in the long run for companies to invest in training them in these skills.
"I really think it's a matter of, how do we intentionally develop and expose middle managers to the types of skills and the type of training that they need to be successful," she said. "Rather than throwing that entire cohort away to the detriment of an organization."
Consumers are limiting their spending and visiting less frequently, Jim Holthouser said.
Milko/Getty Images
Diners are cutting back on weekday meals out and spending more on the weekends instead, the CEO of GoTo Foods said.
Consumers are limiting their spending and visiting less frequently, Jim Holthouser said.
Other restaurant chains are also feeling the hit of cash-strapped diners.
Diners are cutting back on meals out during the week and saving the money for the weekends instead, a restaurant executive says.
Jim Holthouser, CEO of GoTo Foods, formerly known as Focus Brands, said that some diners had been limiting their spending. GoTo Foods owns Cinnabon, Auntie Anne's, Jamba, Moe's Southwest Grill, McAlister's Deli, Schlotzsky's, and Carvel.
Customers are "coming a little bit less frequently" and "cutting back, it looks like, during the week, saving their discretionary dollars more for the weekends," Holthouser told Business Insider, referring to data from GoTo Foods' loyalty programs.
Data from payments company Square suggests that diners are visiting restaurants on the weekends more frequently than they were pre-pandemic, while weekday lunch spending has taken a hit, likely due to hybrid work. The data only compares restaurant spending in 2019 and 2023, and doesn't show how this has changed in recent months.
Holthouser said that the most frequent customers of GoTo Foods' brands were "hanging in there" but that overall the average number of items per transaction was "down a little bit."
"Consumers are getting a little more conservative, definitely tightening their belts, and they're pulling back a little bit as they feel the pinch of inflation," Holthouser said, adding that restaurants had to deal with "a bit of a skittish consumer who doesn't quite know how to feel."
Fast-food chains raised prices significantly during the pandemic. Grocery prices also shot up but have almost returned to pre-pandemic levels, while restaurant inflation still remains elevated.
Holthouser said that GoTo Foods' portfolio — which includes seven brands in the US, as well as locations overseas and a licensing business — meant it had a range of revenue streams that would help offset its core domestic business if growth was flat.
Its licensing business includes selling its products in grocery stores — like Cinnabon pastries and Carvel ice-cream cakes — as well as its current collaboration with Subway to sell foot-long Cinnabon churros and Auntie Anne's pretzels, which Holthouser said was a "huge success."
Estimated retail sales from GoTo Foods' licensing partners totaled about $1.5 billion in 2023, or just over a quarter of total sales across its brand portfolio.
Rep. Gabe Vasquez of New Mexico is running for reelection in a battleground House district.
Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images
The Democratic National Committee is furthering its commitment to state parties in the 2024 cycle.
National Democrats have set aside funding for organizational efforts to aid down-ballot candidates.
The national party is making key investments in a range of states, from Indiana to Texas.
The Democratic National Committee is spending nearly $2 million in additional targeted state investments to boost down-ballot candidates and fund critical voter registration efforts ahead of November.
The latest round of funding is part of the $20 million in investments the DNC has made in state parties this election cycle. This is a priority for President Joe Biden and party chair Jaime Harrison, even as the commander in chief faces a tough reelection fight against former President Donald Trump.
"Everywhere Democrats are on the ballot this November — from the school board to the White House — we're fighting to win," Harrison said in a statement.
Indiana and South Dakota are both controlled by Republicans at the statewide level, but the DNC sees them as prime targets for the party's latest investments.
In Indiana, the national party is making a five-figure investment to enhance the state party's organizing infrastructure — as local Democrats work to flip four legislative seats and crack the GOP supermajority in the state House of Representatives. As it stands, Democrats hold 30 of 100 seats in the lower chamber.
So far, the DNC has given $535,000 to Indiana Democrats this cycle.
In South Dakota, national Democrats are investing $70,000 in a critical voter registration program to boost turnout among Native Americans. The investment in the state now totals $477,000.
The DNC is also investing additional money for state parties in Colorado, Kansas, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, and Washington State.
Some of the key down-ballot races the national party will target with the funding are the Maryland Senate contest between Democrat Angela Alsobrooks and former GOP Gov. Larry Hogan and the New Mexico 2nd Congressional District matchup between Democratic Rep. Gabe Vasquez and ex-GOP Rep. Yvette Herrell.
In Texas, the national party will spend an additional $45,000 on organizing efforts to boost voter registration before the fall. Republicans continue to retain their long-standing grip on Texas politics, and Democrats are looking to cultivate support among young and minority voters to counter the GOP edge in the state. Such an effort could prove especially critical in the fall as Democrats see an opportunity in Rep. Colin Allred's Senate candidacy against incumbent Ted Cruz.
The Trump campaign announced that it raised $141 million in May alongside the Republican National Committee, with tens of millions of dollars coming in after the former president's criminal conviction in his Manhattan hush-money trial. For much of this year, the RNC was largely strapped for cash, but it remained committed to important down-ballot Senate races in states like Montana and Ohio.
It's unclear at this stage how the RNC will respond to Democratic investments in non-presidential battlegrounds, but party leaders largely view Hogan's race as one of their best chances to run a competitive race in a deeply blue state.