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CNN Headlines: Naval Aviators Safe After In-Flight Collision At Idaho Show; Voting Rights Rally Held Outside Alabama State Capitol; North Korean Soccer Team Makes Rare Visit To South Korea. Aired 5:30- 6a ET
Aired May 18, 2026 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[05:30:07]
BRAD SMITH, CNN ANCHOR: It is half past the hour. Let's hit the refresh button on our top stories.
Parts of the central U.S. are in the middle of a multiday tornado threat -- this one caught on camera Sunday near Palmer, Nebraska. That's a couple of hours outside of Omaha here. More dangerous storms are possible today from Texas all the way to the Great Lakes.
And today jury selection gets underway in the trial of a former assistant principal at a Virginia elementary school where a teacher was shot by a 6-year-old in 2023. That former principal faces charges stemming from allegations that she failed to prevent the shooting despite warning signs.
And this morning four naval aviators are safe after ejecting from their fighter jets when they collided in-flight during an air show in Idaho. CNN's Reed Benyon has more on what happened during the moment of impact.
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REED BENYON (voiceover): A road closure, a smoking field, and a massive burn scar -- the aftermath of a fiery crash during an air show in Idaho Sunday about two miles from Mountain Home Air Force Base, roughly 50 miles southeast of Boise. That explosion on the ground occurring moments after two fighter jets collided in the sky.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were actually watching two planes right in front of us doing, you know, the air show and watching them for quite a while.
BENYON (voiceover): The mid-air crash happened on the second day of the Gunfighter Skies air show.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We didn't actually see the collision happen, um, but we did see, you know, the aftermath. We, of course, started looking at the road and that's when we saw that big, black plume -- a plume of smoke behind us. BENYON (voiceover): Officials say all four crew members involved in the crash ejected and were able to parachute to safety. First responders mounted a swift response to the fiery aftermath of the crash. The base went on lockdown after the incident. And according to the Mountain Home Police Department the remainder of the air show was canceled.
The Mountain Home Air Force Base Gunfighters released a statement confirming emergency responders were on scene. According to the statement "An investigation is underway and more details will be released as they become available."
I'm Reed Benyon reporting.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SMITH: Thank you, Reed.
We return back to the severe storms as this is including tornadoes ripping through parts of the Central U.S. right now. Forecasters -- they're actually expecting today to be worse. And Sunday saw incredible -- drone video captured this scene of a rescue in progress.
At least two men and a dog saved from the rubble of a collapsed home. A witness says that they were in the basement when the storm brought the house down around them. This happened in a small town about 150 miles west of Omaha.
Meteorologists say that over a dozen tornadoes were reported across Nebraska and Iowa the same day with more possible today.
Two shipping giants are suspending services to and from Cuba in the ongoing blockade by the U.S. Together they handle as much as 60 percent of Cuba's shipping traffic. The two companies cited President Trump's executive order that was issued earlier this month and it broadened sanctions on companies and individuals providing assistance to Cuba.
As the U.S. blockade against Cuba continues the island's energy crisis is worsening. The population struggles with blackouts, and it has led to social unrest in some places.
Well, we're looking ahead to a big week in U.S. politics. Several states are holding primary elections on Tuesday, including Pennsylvania, Alabama, and Kentucky.
Georgia U.S. House and Senate primaries will set the stakes for some key midterm races. Five Republicans are competing to take on incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in November. President Trump has not endorsed a candidate yet.
The Georgia Secretary of State says more than a million people in Georgia have already cast their ballots early. Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy's loss in a primary for his seat in Louisiana proves that trump still has a stronghold on the Republican Party. The lawmaker is the first GOP senator to lose renomination in nearly a decade. Cassidy's loss comes five years after he voted to impeach the president over the January 6 insurrection.
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SEN. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): It is the welfare of my people, and my state, and my country, and our Constitution to which I am loyal. And if someone doesn't understand that and attempts to control others through using the levers of power, they are about serving themselves. They are not about serving us, and that person is not qualified to be a leader.
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SMITH: The next test of Trump's support Tuesday in Kentucky. Voters will head to the polls where Trump critic and congressman Thomas Massie is up for re-election.
This weekend a national rally supporting voting rights. It actually took place in Montgomery, Alabama. Advocates and leaders -- they gathered outside of the state's capitol in response to recently advanced redistricting measures in several states.
[05:35:05]
CNN's Rafael Romo was there.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RAFAEL ROMO, CNN SENIOR LATIN AMERICAN AFFAIRS EDITOR, CNN WORLDWIDE: The rally started at 1:30 p.m. Central time and it lasted several hours here in Montgomery at the steps of the Alabama state capitol where thousands of people gathered to express deep concern because they say their voting rights are being diluted, especially after the landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court less than three weeks ago.
This day of action, called "All Roads Lead to the South," started in historic Selma at nine in the morning local time with a prayer service at Tabernacle Baptist Church, followed by a silent march across the iconic Edmund Pettus Bridge, the site of the Bloody Sunday police assault on unarmed protesters in 1965. Around 600 people had been expected to march there.
Here at the rally in front of the capitol, political leaders, including Democratic Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, and Raphael Warnock of Georgia delivered speeches, as well as New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Senator Booker told CNN this movement is not only about voting rights for Black people but protecting democracy for all Americans.
And let's remember that on April 29, the U.S. Supreme Court in a landmark ruling made it easier for Republicans to disassemble the majority-minority districts that are about all Democrats today have in the Deep South.
(END VIDEOTAPE) SMITH: Well, caught on camera in some intensive video, the moment a train collided with a truck in Virginia last week. Take a look.
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Train colliding with truck.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Holy shit!
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SMITH: The truck appears to be a septic truck, and you can see the liquid pouring out of the tank. We've got to bleep that.
Officials say that there was no danger to the public. Police say that one person was injured with life-threatening injuries. Investigators say that the truck did not follow a posted stop sign.
Now on to Buzz Express.
The Academy of Country Music Awards took place last night. Singer Ella Langley won all seven awards she was nominated for last night at the 2026 ceremony, including Female Artist of the Year. Cody Johnson snagged the top prize of Entertainer of the Year and also won Male Artist of the Year. And country superstar Shania Twain took over the role of hosting the event after repeat host Reba McEntire hosted the past two years.
And at the movies this weekend the Michael Jackson biopic is back in familiar territory at the box office bringing in $26.1 million. In second place, "The Devil Wears Prada 2" brought in $18 million bringing its three-week box office total to $175.9 million. And in third place you've got that psychological horror flick "Obsession" debuting with $16.1 million.
Audemars Piguet and Swatch -- they released this rare and unexpected collaboration pocket watch collection. Police even had to use what appears to be pepper spray on a large crowd of people waiting for the collaboration release in Long Island, a few miles east in New York City. Now one person was arrested on charges of resisting arrest, inciting a riot, and obstruction of governmental operations.
CNN talked to people who camped out for days to snag one of the timepieces.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think I've been outside four or five days.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been here 72 hours.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think we're about four days in and I've got three days left.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On Saturday, it will be five days. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is a new collaboration between Audemars Piguet and Swatch group. It's kind of this juxtaposition of high-low. And you have Swatch, which makes relatively affordable, fun watches for the masses and Audemars Piguet who excel at making really fine timepieces that typically start in the mid-five figures and go up to multiple millions of dollars.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For AP to collaborate with Swatch watch, wow. T
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is something unique. It's like kind of history if you ask me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's two models and I believe they are $400 and $420 each. Audemars Piguet is such a prestigious name in the world of watches and even to have that association with a relatively reasonably priced product, you know, is something cool. It opens the brand up to a lot of other people who typically would not be customers.
I would expect these things, you know, in the beginning probably on eBay to be fetching double, triple what people pay for them. And I think the profit motive and also the excitement around it is -- are both contributing factors to why, you know, people are camping out.
[05:40:02]
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you know what you're going to do with your watch once you buy it?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Um, sell it to the highest bidder.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I hope for $5,000. Shoot for the stars.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And it's really interesting that they are partnering with another brand -- it's actually a rival if you will -- to do something like this. And, you know, it's very unexpected and people didn't expect that AP would be doing something like this, but here we are today.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SMITH: Straight ahead on CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS, Americans are leaving the U.S. for good in record numbers. Coming up, what's driving the escape to other countries.
And Arizona, the latest state dealing with a measles outbreak with dozens of cases reported. We've got those details coming up when CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS comes right back.
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[05:45:10]
SMITH: Some of the world's top divers have begun a new, dangerous recovery mission in the Maldives. They join the ongoing search for the remains of four Italian tourists who died in a scuba accident last week. The body of the group's dive instructor was found soon after the disaster. A rescue diver died in a previous attempt.
Let's go around the globe starting in Italy. A large crowd gathered in a show of solidarity after a car-ramming attack in the northern Italian town of Modena. Now, police are saying that a 31-year-old Italian man rammed a car into a crowd of other people. At least eight were hurt.
Police say that the driver got out holding a knife. Four bystanders stepped in tackling and holding the man until police arrived. He's accused of stabbing one of them. Italy's prime minister and president met with victims at a local hospital. And authorities are investigating a motive behind the attack.
We have a heartbreaking update here on "Timmy the Whale" who captured the world's attention after getting stuck. Sadly, officials have confirmed that Timmy has died. His body was found off of the coast of Denmark. The whale's health deteriorated as it became stranded in shallow waters, prompting several rescue attempts. The last attempt had directed Timmy to swim into a barge before shipping the whale into the open sea. However, scientists had warned that the whale was too weak to survive.
And Iran says it wants to charge tech companies for using undersea internet cables in the Strait of Hormuz. Those cables carry critical data between Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. State-linked media vaguely threatened that traffic could be disrupted if companies do not pay. It's unclear if the cables even run through Iranian waters or how the government could enforce payment under U.S. sanctions. But any threat to those lines could impact global internet traffic and billions in data flow worldwide.
Meanwhile, Iranian state media claims that European countries are in talks with Iran over safe passage through the strait. The report did not mention specific countries in Europe and there has been no response to the claim.
A renowned mountaineer has smashed his own record by scaling Mount Everest for the 32nd time. Kami Rita Sherpa reached the highest peak in the world on Sunday. The 56-year-old Nepali sherpa was guiding clients from the 14 Peaks Expedition Company at the time. He has climbed to the summit nearly every year since 1994. What have you done in that time?
South Korea's annual Lotus Lantern Festival honored Buddha's upcoming birthday with a futuristic flair over the weekend. Four humanoid robots that have recently become Buddhist monks joined in to lead Saturday's celebratory parade through the streets of Seoul. One person described Buddhism as a very tolerant religion after seeing the way it's embracing new technology.
Pope Leo getting down with his latest trends here and the latest trend that the pope is getting in on -- check out this video. The pope doing the popular 6-7 gesture going viral on TikTok where a video was posted of Pope Leo at the Vatican interacting with children there and connecting with them by doing the hand motion gesture. For the first time in more than seven years, South Korea is hosting North Korean athletes. The North Korean women's soccer team -- they're there for the Asia Club Cup despite strained relations between the two nations as Kim Jong Un continues to harden his stance against the south.
CNN's Will Ripley has more.
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WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: On Wednesday, millions of Koreans in the north and south may be watching the same soccer game but they'll be living in two completely different realities.
And those worlds collided during the arrival of Pyongyang's Naegohyang women's soccer team over the weekend, creating a massive media frenzy at the airport in Seoul. Crowds turned out to cheer on the North Korean delegation of more than three dozen players and staff. The athletes certainly stood out in their matching dark blazers and skirts and heels, and lapel pins featuring the faces of North Korea's late leaders.
The players carefully followed protocol, avoiding interaction with cheering crowds as they moved quickly and quietly past the cameras. The two Koreas are technically still at war, so the team had to fly through Beijing because direct inter-Korean flights remain banned. Instead of a one-hour flight, the trip took closer to half a day.
The bus carrying the team left the airport under police escort. South Korea approved a special entry exemption for the delegation while civic groups organized so-called peace cheering events for both sides.
[05:50:00]
Officially, both governments insist this is about sports, not diplomacy -- but sports on the Korean Peninsula almost always never -- really, it's just about sports. The last major thaw in inter-Korean diplomacy helped pave the way for the historic 2018 summits involving Kim Jong Un, South Korean leaders, and President Donald Trump.
Still, experts caution against reading too much into this moment. Relations between the north and south remain deeply strained. Kim Jong Un has abandoned decades of official policy, favoring peaceful reunification while North Korea continues weapons testing and increasingly close military ties with Russia.
Naegohyang means "my hometown" in Korean. And women's soccer has become one of North Korea's biggest sources of national pride. Kim Jong Un reportedly treats these players like national heroes.
Will Ripley, CNN, Taipei.
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SMITH: All right. Thank you so much, Will. Still to come on CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS, a crew of whale watchers -- they had to come to the rescue of two fishermen whose boat capsized off the coast of California.
And an organic ice cream sold in several states being recalled. Details on that and more coming up.
Stay with us. You're watching CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS.
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[05:55:27]
SMITH: Seven women at Spelman College making history. There are seven co-valedictorians all -- a first for the all-female, historically Black college.
Leondra Head, from CNN affiliate WUPA, has their story.
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CORI'ANNA WHITE, VALEDICTORIAN, SPELMAN COLLEGE: I think of something that we say at Spelman, which is to be educated. We are that.
LEONDRA HEAD, REPORTER, WUPA-TV, ATLANTA (voiceover): Meet Cori'Anna White, one of seven of Spelman's valedictorians this year.
WHITE: Being able to embrace this moment with six fellow valedictorians is an experience that I can't compare to anything else.
HEAD (voiceover): All seven entered Spelman together in the fall of 2022 and are all finishing up with perfect 4.0 grade point averages.
WHITE: For me, I knew that it was staying up late to study, sometimes only getting two hours of sleep.
HEAD (voiceover): Alyssa Richardson has been aiming for this achievement since high school.
ALYSSA RICHARDSON, VALEDICTORIAN. SPELMAN COLLEGE: It's such a full circle moment. In high school I graduated at the top of my class and so to be here doing the same alongside my Spelman sisters is honestly just to amazing.
HEAD (voiceover): Now this isn't the first time that Spelman has had more than one valedictorian. Last year, Spelman had four valedictorians. And in 2022, Spelman had five valedictorians.
Both White and Richardson have huge goals after graduation.
WHITE: In the fall of 2026, I'll be matriculating to Columbia Law School. I definitely do see myself being an attorney.
RICHARDSON: After graduation I'll be attending UPenn for medical school on a full ride scholarship, and I'm going to be training to become a physician. (END VIDEOTAPE)
SMITH: In today's Money Express, oil prices pushing over $100 a barrel after President Trump gave a stark warming to Iran over the weekend.
Mariel Aber has been tracking it for us all. Maribel, what do we know?
MARIBEL ABER, CNN CORRESPONDENT, MONEY MATTERS: Brad -- so, global oil prices remain close to $110 a barrel after President Trump posted on Truth Social that "The clock is ticking for Iran." So U.S. crude is also trading within a couple of dollars of that mark this morning. I'm seeing $106.
The president met with his national security team over the weekend to discuss next steps on the Iran war.
Average gas prices are holding around $4.51 a gallon nationwide. That's according to AAA. It's up a penny from a week ago.
A record number of Americans are leaving the U.S. New research by the Brookings Institution shows the country saw negative migration last year, marking the first reversal in half a century. Researchers estimate between 210,000 and 405,000 voluntarily left the country. Immigration policies and deportation efforts were cited among the factors driving departures. Companies helping Americans relocate overseas also report growing demand. Expatsi, which offers relocation tours, reports that U.S. client attendance has doubled over the past 12 months.
Organic ice cream sold in more than a dozen states is being recalled over concerns it could contain metal fragments. The FDA says multiple premium varieties made by Straus Family creamy are affected and flavors include vanilla, cookie dough, mint chip, and Dutch chocolate. No injuries have been reported so far but listen to this. The company is asking customers not to return the product to stores. Instead, refund details and batch information can be found on the FDA's website -- Brad.
SMITH: All right. It perhaps goes without saying but I love my ice cream without metal fragments.
Maribel Aber, thank you so much. Appreciate it.
Let's take a look at other stories making news across the country.
We start in Arizona, which is currently experiencing a measles outbreak. At last check 94 cases already this year, according to state data. No deaths have been reported. Health officials -- they urge people exposed to measles to be on the lookout for symptoms for 21 days.
To the north. In Minnesota, evacuations are still underway as crews fight the Stewart Trail fire, which burned more than 355 acres over the weekend. The fire is about 30 percent contained. Authorities say more than 30 buildings have been destroyed and shifting winds could make the fight even tougher. Now to California where a whale-watch crew raced to rescue two men after their boat capsized off Monterey Bay all caught on camera. Take a look at this.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. Let me get you a little closer here. A little closer here.
(Dog barking)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. This ladder is sitting here.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Neutral! Neutral!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. You're going to -- once you get up on the top, we're here to help you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[06:00:00]
SMITH: The pair had been in the water for about 40 minutes when the crew found them. Rescuers say they got there just in time as conditions at sea were quickly getting worse. Just in time, indeed. I wonder if they saw any whales up close and personal?
That does it for CNN HEADLINE EXPRESS. I'm Brad Smith. "CNN THIS MORNING WITH AUDIE CORNISH" starts right now.
