U.S. and world News for May 11

World News image by Hannah McKay/Reuters via CNN Newsource

Americans from hantavirus-hit cruise ship arrive in Nebraska

(CNN) — American passengers from the cruise ship at the center of the hantavirus outbreak, including at least one who tested positive, arrived in Nebraska early Monday for evaluation at a highly specialized quarantine unit. They will eventually continue on to their homes – and weeks of monitoring for symptoms of infection. The virus, typically associated with rodents, may have passed from human to human aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship, according to the World Health Organization. Since April 11, three people from the ship have died while a handful of others are sick. The plane landed at Eppley Airfield in Omaha shortly before 2:30 a.m. local time. Seventeen US citizens and one British national who lives in the US were on the flight, Spanish Health Minister Mónica García said.

Here’s what we know about the passengers’ journey back to the United States and what will happen next:

Presumed positive US case

One of the Americans has tested “mildly” positive for the virus and another has mild symptoms, the US Department of Health and Human Services said late Sunday. Both traveled in biocontainment units on the plane “out of an abundance of caution,” HHS said in a post on X.

The passenger who tested positive does not have symptoms but will be taken directly to the biocontainment unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the facility said late Sunday. The other passengers will go to the center’s National Quarantine Unit for assessment and monitoring.

Highly specialized facilities

The Omaha facility is “the only federally funded quarantine unit in the United States, designed specifically to safely house and monitor people who may have been exposed to high-consequence infectious diseases,” according to Nebraska Medicine. There are 20 single-person, 300-square-foot rooms fitted with negative air pressure systems to contain any possible viruses. Doctors there describe them like hotel rooms, designed with en-suite bathrooms, exercise equipment, food delivery and Wi-Fi for patients staying for long periods. A CDC official said earlier that the agency was not considering this a quarantine for the cruise ship passengers, but rather a brief visit to monitor their health. Once at the facility, the passengers will be checked for symptoms signaling the early stages of hantavirus, including fever, muscle aches and diarrhea, the interim chancellor of the hospital, Dr. H. Dele Davis, told CNN.

6 people found dead inside a boxcar in Texas, officials say

(CNN) — Six people were found dead inside a cargo train boxcar in a Texas city along the southern border on Sunday, officials said. The bodies were found in a Union Pacific train at a rail yard in Laredo, around 160 miles south of San Antonio, just after 3:30 p.m. local time, said Jose Espinoza, a public information officer with the Laredo Police Department. The circumstances of their deaths are unknown, said Laredo police spokesperson Joe Baeza, according to CNN affiliate KGNS, and an investigation is underway. Union Pacific operates across the border and is the only railroad that services all access points into Mexico, according to the freight company’s website. Temperatures on Sunday afternoon in Laredo were in the low-mid 90s, though it’s unclear whether heat was a factor. Union Pacific said it was saddened by the incident and is working closely with law enforcement to investigate. Laredo police said they received a call around 3 p.m. from an employee at the Union Pacific rail yard, KGNS reported. The bodies were discovered during a routine rail car inspection, police said. No survivors were found.

Multiple hikers killed, others rescued after volcano erupts in Indonesia

(CNN) — A volcanic eruption killed three people and triggered a rescue operation to get more than a dozen hikers stranded near the crater of Indonesia’s Mount Dukono to safety on Friday, officials said. Singapore nationals and an Indonesian citizen were among those killed when the volcano, on the island of Halmahera in North Maluku province, erupted, according to the island’s police chief and search and rescue officials. Nine foreigners and 11 local hikers were climbing Mount Dukono at the time of the eruption, North Halmahera Police Chief Erlichson Pasaribu told Indonesia’s Kompas TV. Seventeen of the 20 climbers were safely evacuated by Friday evening, search and rescue officials said. Survivors told police three people had died in the eruption, according to Pasaribu. Indonesia’s rescue agency had not confirmed their deaths but reported three people missing on Friday. On Saturday, authorities said two missing Singapore nationals had been found near the crater rim, though it was unclear if they were alive, Reuters news agency reported. A search operation, suspended overnight, had resumed Saturday morning, involving 100 rescuers, military and police personnel as well as two thermal drones.

It’s not just drivers who hate high gas prices. So do gas station owners

(CNN) — Chris Bambury’s family has been selling gas in Sonoma Valley, California, for more than 100 years, but never at prices like this. The price at his two stations was $6.29 for a gallon of regular gas last week, which is actually cheap for his part of California — AAA put the average price in his county at $6.36. Gas station owners are struggling with rising gas prices just as much as their customers. The overwhelming majority of gas stations are small businesses — not the big oil companies whose brands they sell — and the rise in the wholesale gas price they pay has cut deeply into their already thin profit margins. Wholesale gas prices aren’t the only rising cost putting the squeeze on station owners. Credit card fees and delivery charges for fuel are both higher than earlier this year. Labor costs are still up from the last gas spike in 2022. Bambury’s great-grandfather, August Bonneau, started selling gas back in 1922, before there were even paved roads in his part of California. Bambury started in the family business as a teenager doing entry-level jobs — such as pumping gas and cleaning bathrooms. Today, he has 37 employees between the two stores and a third location that doesn’t sell gas.

AI isn’t actually ‘taking’ your job. Here’s what’s happening instead

New York (CNN) — AI probably won’t take your job anytime soon. At least not all of it. Concerns about artificial intelligence replacing human workers have simmered over the past year as companies slash headcounts, AI models grow more capable of office work and businesses integrate AI more deeply into their operations. AI was the top reason companies cited for job cuts in April for the second month in a row, the executive outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said Thursday. “The anxiety around AI at work is real—from fears of job loss to the pressure to keep up with rapidly evolving technology,” Microsoft wrote in a report about how AI is changing jobs released last week. But the reality of AI in the workplace isn’t so black-and-white, experts say. Companies are using AI to automate certain parts of jobs rather than replace entire positions. Business leaders are figuring out what AI can and can’t do, recalibrating existing jobs around responsibilities that can only be done by a human. And thousands of jobs have been cut in the process, with web infrastructure company Cloudflare and cryptocurrency firm Coinbase among the latest to announce staff cuts. Nitin Seth, the cofounder of digital services and consulting firm Incedo, claims his company helps clients boost productivity using AI by at least 20% to 25% without reducing staff at the same scale. That’s because AI only handles certain parts of different roles. “You can’t take one quarter of Lisa, one quarter of Jessica, one quarter of Nitin and one quarter of somebody else and make it one person,” Seth said.