Business

Bodies Found in the Landing Gear

Straight out of a spy novel and into JetBlues wheels.

2024 was a tough year for airlines, specifically when it came to safety. 2025 hasn’t started much better… as it was announced this week that two people were found dead in the wheel well of a JetBlue plane after it landed at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on Monday.

The bodies were discovered during a post-flight maintenance inspection, following the flight from New York City to south Florida. Their identities are unknown, as are “the circumstances surrounding how they accessed the aircraft” - which is currently under investigation.

“A gate technician in the landing gear area noticed two males who appear to be Signal 7, advised they are not moving in the landing gear area,” an unidentified person said on Broward County Sheriff’s Office radio at 11:26 PM Monday night, 16 minutes after the flight had reportedly landed. The passengers on the flight had already deplaned at that point, according to the airport’s spokesperson. 

“The individuals who (are) deceased are both males. Beyond that, their identities at this time are unknown,” said Carey Codd, spokesperson for the Broward County Sheriff’s Office.

An autopsy will be performed to determine the causes of death for both individuals. However, according to a law enforcement official, the bodies had been badly decomposed. 

In the meantime, this investigation is not affecting any other (future) operations at the airport, as things are continuing to run as normal. 

“This is a heartbreaking situation, and we are committed to working closely with authorities to support their efforts to understand how this occurred,” JetBlue said in a statement. 

The National Transportation Safety Board told CNN it is not investigating this incident because it “had no involvement of the flight crew or operation of the airplane.”

This discovery came two weeks after a body was found in the wheel bay of a United Airlines flight from Chicago to Maui. 

The landing gear compartment is often used by stowaways, who don’t realize how little space is actually available. The ones who aren’t crushed, often end up losing consciousness for lack of oxygen or freezing once the plane is at cruising altitude. 

According to an FAA report, nearly 80% of people who attempt to fly in the wheel well, or another external compartment of an aircraft, die.

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Tech

Free Speech or Slurs, Meta Loosens Guidance

They now allow users to say Gay and Trans people have “Mental Illness”. 

It’s always interesting to see how certain companies, or public figures, sway, depending on the political climate/who’s in office/what’s en vogue. Now that Donald Trump is set to become president once again, we’ve seen companies roll back their DEI policies for example. Well, now Meta is reversing course as well. (“Makes you wonder what it was all for…” - Cosmo Kramer)

The company announced a series of major updates to its content moderation policies this week, including ending its fact-checking partnerships and “getting rid” of restrictions on speech about “topics like immigration, gender identity and gender” that the company describes as frequent subjects of political discourse and debate. 

“It's not right that things can be said on TV or the floor of Congress, but not on our platforms,” Meta’s chief global affairs officer, Joel Kaplan, explained. Hmm, interesting how that suddenly has become the case…

Mark Zuckerber, Meta’s CEO, said that the company will use a user-generated “community notes,” similar to what Elon Musk installed at X (formerly known as Twitter). This comes after long suggestions of Musk ruining his social media app and not having a clue of what he was doing. 

“Fact checkers have been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created,” Zuckerberg explained. Regardless of which side of the aisle you are on, we should all be able to acknowledge the problems that would arise with biased decision making over the content that is allowed to be released to the public. It doesn’t stray too far from propagandists. 

Meta also announced that Trump ally, and UFC CEO, Dana White would join its board. This all comes after Meta had announced it would donate $1 million to Trump;s inaugural fund. Zuckerbeg has also said he would like to play an “active role” in tech policy discussions under the incoming administration.

Kaplan acknowledged that the announcement this week IS directly related to the changing administration. So, at least they’re being transparent about it.

“No question that there has been a change over the last four years. We saw a lot of societal and political pressure, all in the direction of more content moderation, more censorship. … Now, we’ve got a new administration, and a new president coming in, who are big defenders of free expression, and that makes a difference,” admitted Kaplan.

Meta gave Trump’s team an advanced heads up on the incoming policy changes. Trump said after the announcement that Meta has “come a long way.”

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Economy

Nvidia Raises the Bar

Other stocks dip, but Nvidia shows out at CES 2025.

Despite some positive announcements from Nvidia, its stock still fell this week. Nvidia provided a positive update on its Blackwell launch, introduced new products, and outlined the path to “physical AI” in a speech at CES 2025 this week. The company even got positive reviews from Wall Street analysts. 

And yet, the stock still sank 6.2% to close at 140.14. Now, to put this in perspective, we do need to acknowledge that prior to this - the stock had spiked to a record high of 153.13. So it’s all relative. But still interesting to see a decline after what seemed like such an impressive day for Nvidia.

“This was a major ‘flex the muscles’ moment for Nvidia,” Wedbush Securities analyst Daniel Ives said. “We walked out of [the] event feeling even more bullish about Nvidia and the overall AI Revolution.”

The CEO Jensen Huang received what was described as a rock star welcome from the 6,000+ attendees. Huang announced that Blackwell, the company’s latest generation AI processor series, is now in full production. Analysts had previously been concerned about production issues with Blackwell. Overall, Huang spoke for 90 minutes about positive things for the company. And yet, a rare drop in stock for Nvidia nonetheless…

Medical Debt Off the Credit Report

The Biden Admin finalizes a rule removing medical debt from credit reports.

Good news! U.S. consumers will no longer have medical debt appear on their credit reports under a new rule the Biden administration just finalized on Tuesday. 

This might seem like an after effect of the assassination of United Healthcare’s CEO last month (as we scrutinize the healthcare industry), but this change was actually proposed over the summer. It is set to take effect in March, which means that $49 billion(!) in medical bills will be struck from the credit reports of about 15 million Americans. 

Lenders will also be prohibited from using medical information in their lending decisions. 

We have all seen, or known of, a story about someone’s entire life getting flipped upside down from an illness, or an emergency procedure, due to medical debt. In fact, 1 in 12 adults in this country do have some sort of medical debt.

“People who get sick shouldn’t have their financial future upended,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a statement. “The CFPB’s final rule will close a special carveout that has allowed debt collectors to abuse the credit reporting system to coerce people into paying medical bills they may not even owe.” 

This comes after a previous change in 2023 that kept any medical debts of less than $500 from appearing on credit reports. It also makes you ponder… what will be the point in ever paying back medical debts in the future?

It’s a band-aid that doesn’t address the real issues in fixing in the healthcare industry in this country. 

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Politics

Bye Justin

Canada’s Prime Minister calls it quits.

The people have gotten what they wanted: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on Monday that he intends to step down, leaving office once a new ruling party leader is chosen.

Canada’s parliament will now be suspended until March 24th while a new leader is chosen. Trudeau had been the leader of the Liberal Party for 11 years and prime minister for the last nine. However, things had gotten off the rails recently - from President-elect Donald Trump’s tariff threats to the resignation of key allies and disastrous polling numbers too.

However, on his way out, Trudeau warned that his opposition leader’s vision is “not the right one for Canadians.” He also said that over the past nine years he had “fought for this country, for you.”

He did admit his one regret is with the country’s election process: “I do wish we’d been able to change the way we elect our governments in this country so that people could simply choose a second choice, or a third choice, on the same ballot.”

Congestion Pricing New York, Are You Kidding Me?

Only New York would celebrate congestion pricing.

New York City has introduced congestion pricing in the new year. What does that mean? Well, motorists will now pay a $9 base toll when they enter Manhattan during the “peak” hours between 5 AM and 9 PM on weekdays, and 9 AM to 9 PM on weekends. The toll rate drops to $2.25 during off-peak hours.

A 400% increase for those who have to drive to work in Manhattan. And while $9 doesn’t sound like a ton - it adds up over the course of paying that five times a week for 52 weeks a year ($2,340 a year just to drive to work…. Which doesn’t include other expenses or weekend trips).

Many New Yorkers are, unsurprisingly, upset with this change. But also believe that the city is being greedy, pointing out that while London has a similar set up, their peak hours do not begin until 7 AM, and end by 6 PM - 5 hours fewer per day than NYC. 

The good news is, if you have E-ZPass you will be able to pay 50% less than the normal congestion price toll. If you do not have an E-ZPass, the Metro Transportation Authority (MTA) will toll you via mail. The MTA installed 1,400 cameras at over 100 detection points throughout the city to be able to monitor traffic entering the “congested” area. 

There used to be an old NYC commercial, “Dick Lewis is Watching.” Well, now it’s the MTA - and they’re ready to bill you.

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