West Coast Wrap, Thursday 11/12/2026

And as soon as possible, so that we have a full understanding of the facts. Hours after stepping down as CEO of Silicon Valley tech giant NVIDIA. Jensen Huang has been called to testify on Capitol Hill. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to West Coast Wrap. I'm Alex Savage. Huang's departure from the A.I. chipmaker follows revelations about extramarital affairs with an alleged Chinese spy and reports that he also had affairs with two company employees. U.S. Senator Tim Scott sent a letter late today asking Jensen Huang and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick To testify on Capitol Hill. Let's bring in KTVU's Janet Katsuyama, who has the latest now on this growing scandal. It takes us from Silicon Valley all the way to Washington, D.C. Yes, we're really seeing the ripple effects here extend, Alex. And you mentioned that other person. Reuters today is reporting that two sources say Huang had a third affair involving another company employee. His actions are raising big questions about oversight and security. The announcement from NVIDIA headquarters in Santa Clara came early Thursday. NVIDIA posted a statement saying, quote, Jensen Huang has resigned as president, chief executive officer, and a member of the board, effective immediately. The board and the company thanked Jensen for his immeasurable contributions to the company and the industry. Jensen Wong, the founder of the AI chip-making company, became a prominent face not just of NVIDIA but the growing AI sector. But pressure has mounted after reports in a New York Times investigation that he had multiple extramarital affairs with an alleged spy for China and an NVIDIA employee, Kimberly Powell. Powell, seen here on the company's website, is listed as vice president of health care and has been an employee since 2008. I think that this was probably widely known within NVIDIA already, or at least within some circles within NVIDIA. And my interpretation is that it was released so that the board would have an excuse to get rid of him. Santa Clara University business professor Joellen Posner has studied NVIDIA's corporate structure. She says the appointment of Colette Kress, the chief financial officer, as interim CEO and CFO is a good move. She has a direct relationship with the board. As CFO, she would be reporting directly to the board, so she's a known quantity to that team. NVIDIA also announced its first-ever board chair, Harvey Jones. The fact that the board didn't have a chair for 33 years is really unusual, and it suggests that Jensen really had been in control of the board as well as the company itself. The professor says four of the ten board members had been on the board since NVIDIA's founding in 1993. She also says Wong's ties to President Trump raises questions about the U.S. government's oversight role in security matters, with a sensitive competition over AI chip supplies and development. It's very complicated, though, because NVIDIA has also given the White House a fraction of the revenue on all of its sales to China already. So there's a lot of entanglement between Washington and NVIDIA. Our goal is to get him in as soon as possible so that we have... A full understanding of the facts. And it wasn't just Republicans there. Democratic Representative-elect Scott Wiener said, quote, Congress needs to fully investigate Mr. Wang's actions, including his apparent lobbying of the president to authorize advanced chip sales to our top global rival, China. We did reach out to NVIDIA, but we have not heard back. And Alex, they are going to be facing their investors. Call is scheduled on their financial reporting for the third quarter next Tuesday. Wow. A company certainly in turmoil right now. OK, Jenna, thank you very much. We appreciate it. And shares of Nvidia fell by about 4% today on a choppy trading session on Wall Street. The shockwaves over the Jensen Huang scandal are raising investors' concerns about the future of the AI boom. However, the indexes did close out the day with only modest declines. The Dow down 189 points. The Nasdaq fell by 100 and the S&P 500 was down by 27 points. Rival chip makers did see some gains. That includes Silicon Valley's advanced micro devices, which was up by nearly 6% during the trading session today. Neighboring Broadcom was up by 5.5%. Let's talk more about what's going on here and what we can expect. San Jose State Technology Professor Ahmed Banafa. joins us live tonight with some perspective on the shakeup at NVIDIA and the broader implications here. Always appreciate the time, Ahmed. Good to have you on. So we saw NVIDIA shares down once again today as the controversy continues here. Obviously, its chips are essential to the overall AI industry and its finances really kind of intertwined with a lot of other AI companies. How do the problems at NVIDIA right now kind of ripple across the broader AI industry? Good talking to you, Alex. NVIDIA is a big name. NVIDIA is taking a lot of roles in the market. Sometimes it is the vendor, sometimes it's the customer, sometimes it's the investor. So you can see how it's really impacting so many things. And the startups in Silicon Valley and other places will be impacted by this because what NVIDIA is facing now is a crisis in leadership. And the board, what they have done, they try to, you know, to stop the bleeding by stabilizing the patient by saying, look, we're going to have somebody who's going to be interim. And she is the CFO. She knows everything about the money, because this is what is really all about making sure that everything has to do with their financials are stable now. The impact will be at multiple levels. I mean, Silicon Valley is going to feel it, and the company, and the employees, and the investors, and even anybody who has the 401k, and there is an investment in technology. Definitely, you're going to see that NVIDIA is one of those stocks. So this short-term uncertainty needs to end, and this is what the board is trying to do. Yeah. I mean, so talk about the way this company was structured and the implications. For sort of the next steps for NVIDIA leadership, because Jensen Huang ran NVIDIA in a very hands on fashion. And there was never really a clear successor to him that anyone could see. And so now we suddenly have, as you mentioned, NVIDIA's chief financial officer, Colette Kress, taking over as the interim CEO. How challenging is it going to be for her and others at the top to kind of steer the company through this crisis here, Given the way. Huang structured the company. It was really structured in a way which is a flat organization. 60 directors reporting to him. You know, he can see everything in the company. He hears from everybody. And it was good when he was there. But now we have this situation and nobody even talks about who will be replacing him because nobody thought about, you know, what happened this week. In three days, the planning of 33 years is gone. And that is really a problem, because if you have a company that has the value is over $4 trillion, that's basic. And you have to have plan B and C and D just in case something happened. Now, this kind of structure is going to create some kind of trouble or challenges for that. Interim CEO and for the permanent CEO. The interim CEO, she's not a technical person. So basically, she's trying to assure the investor that everything is going fine, that the call that you're going to have on Tuesday will be fine. Now they have to find somebody who has technical background to assure the 42,000 employees. Most of them are engineers. Yeah. And that technical background, I mean, obviously, Jensen Huang was, you know, really a remarkable mind when it came to making these computer chips. Let me ask you about the political questions here, the national security questions with all of this, because obviously we have Congress now calling on Jensen Huang to testify on Capitol Hill about his relationship in particular with this alleged Chinese spy. What do you think are the most important things that members of Congress are hoping to learn about that relationship? What, if any, information may have been passed along to China about the way NVIDIA operates? You're right about that political side of the story, which is translated into national security. That's the X factor. That can scale it up and make it a bigger problem. They're going to ask him straight forward. What did you tell her? Did she see anything on your phone? Did she took information from your phone? Did she hear you talking to somebody? Did you connect her with somebody important in the company or somebody important in the government that you can push some kind of agenda? It's going to be a really one of the most important list of questions that's going to give them how much is the damage. And how much China now knows about what's going on inside NVIDIA. And that's why it's important for him to be there. So he can just answer the questions and be honest about it. That this is how much he knows about me or about the company. All right. Yep. Obviously, that is going to be important testimony coming up here for Jensen Huang on Capitol Hill. We appreciate the perspective tonight. Always good to have you on. Our tech expert, Ahmed Banafa from San Jose State University. Great to see you. Thank you. Thank you, Alex. All right, let's shift now, and we'll talk about a major shift in the weather pattern here in the West that we're following tonight. With a series of storms headed our direction, we are seeing rough surf hitting the coast, and it's likely to continue for the next few days. Take a look at what's washing up on beaches in Washington. These images posted to social media show debris scattered along the coast in the community of Ocean Shores in western Washington. Mayor Frank L. Doohan. ...has declared a citywide state of emergency because of concerns about erosion and extended power outages here. Crews with heavy equipment have been in this area working to build barriers, trying to protect those homes and businesses near the water. Meantime, a beach hazard statement now is in place because of dangerous conditions along the Bay Area shoreline. According to the National Weather Service, the beach hazard statement is in effect until tomorrow night. Weather experts say it might be too dangerous for anyone to be in the water because of sneaker waves and strong rip currents with breaking waves up to 20 feet, expected waves that could be life-threatening, potentially. Let's talk more about the dangers here, and let's bring in KTVU Chief Meteorologist Mark DeMaio, who is tracking the rough surf and the conditions across These storms are really kind of packing a punch. And sort of the first wave of this is these large swells we're seeing along the coast. Humongous waves. You think about throwing a rock in the water, it creates those ripples. We have like a big wind field out there producing this swell. So you mentioned the beach hazard statement expires tomorrow night. But guess what? It goes up a factor to a high surf warning by Friday night and Saturday. So it only ramps up after that. It only ramps up quite a bit. So if you are going to be near the coast, or just don't be near the coast, but if you have to be near the shoreline, just watch. From a very, very safe distance. Yeah, be incredibly careful. Yeah, because all those areas are typically dry and safe. No longer the case. As we take a look here at the forecast model, keep an eye on these bright colors. That's indicating the incoming swell. You can see it approaching the Pacific Northwest down into northern and central California and some of that energy approaching southern California as well. Now, these areas, high surf advisories, high surf warnings, the areas in red, we have high surf warnings for Friday and to Saturday as we continue to move the maps around for the San Francisco Bay Area. That's from Friday 6 p.m. until Sunday morning. Four o'clock and then down in Southern California, they get some of the energy, but it's not a high surf warning. It's a high surf advisory from Friday right on into the weekend. Here's a look at the satellite. Lots of clouds over the Pacific Northwest today over portions of Northern California. Look at that big circulation out here in the Pacific. So this is the swell producer. And this also is a rain and wind producer over the next couple days. Right now, though, as you can see, not too much cloud cover out in Phoenix or out toward Las Vegas. Maybe a few clouds moving into portions of Nevada in the San Francisco Bay Area, partly to mostly cloudy skies. We're watching the weather up in the Pacific Northwest as well. This was a view in Seattle showing you the cloud cover out there, 60 degrees for an afternoon high. Out toward the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco maxed out actually a mild 71. Started out with some sunshine this morning, but clouds steadily marching in throughout the day. And in Southern California, Los Angeles in the upper 70s, 79 degrees. The bulk of their rainfall will be for tomorrow morning. And then in Phoenix, 86 degrees, picking up on some scattered high clouds. So here's a setup with the winds. Some areas, some parts of the state under a wind advisory. It's a southerly wind, as you can't pick out. And those wind speeds do accelerate into your Friday morning. So we could have gusts in some spots around 30 to 40, maybe topping 40 miles an hour. And remember, this is a rain producer. So we're going to be talking about some rain as early as tomorrow for portions of the west. These numbers really go up as another system wants to come on board over the weekend. So here we go. Rain for Seattle, for Medford. Rainfall develops for San Francisco. And then chances of rain showers for Fresno and then Los Angeles. They have the rainfall. The bulk of it will be for tomorrow morning with a chance into the afternoon hours. Also in the mountains, we do have a winter storm warning in place, as you can see here, for the west slopes of the Sierra with the snowfall coming down. Even out toward El Dorado County, a winter storm warning in place from Friday into Saturday. Maybe upwards of 10 to 20 inches, at least a general. Here we go with the updated model. Here we go with that rainfall coming on board in Seattle and Medford for the Bay Area. Some rain showers in Southern California. Tracking some rain possibilities in Phoenix. It looks like a very busy map. This is your Friday. And then into the weekend, a secondary system wants to come on board, as you can see, by Saturday night and into Sunday as another cold front kind of races into the area. So it remains cooler, remains unsettled and windy over the next few days. Lots of rain clouds on these panels showing up here over the next few days for Friday and into the weekend. Southern California, the bulk of the rainfall is for tomorrow. And we are tracking those rain chances out in the Phoenix area. Now, let's just keep in mind, this is just. This is just the beginning of what could be a very active weather as we do approach Thanksgiving. Yeah, a long stretch of wet weather. Okay, Mark, thank you. Appreciate it. Still to come here on West Coast Wrap tonight, a pile-up crash in Arizona leaves a dozen people injured. What we're learning tonight about the victims. We're tracking the only undecided U.S. Senate race following last week's midterm elections. The most recent update to Alaska's ballot count boosted the Democrat Mary Peltola's lead. You can see here she's ahead by about 4,000 votes over incumbent Republican Senator Dan Sullivan. She's still short, though, of 50 percent support. If no candidate reaches that 50 percent threshold, Alaska's ranked choice voting system will be triggered to ultimately determine the winner. Today, Attorney General Todd Blanche announced more than 350 arrests, including a man from California's Central Valley, following a worldwide Eighteen-month-long operation that targeted opioid and fentanyl sales on the dark web. Law enforcement partners from around the world worked together on this initiative, codenamed Operation Tornado. On the dark web, drugs are trafficked through encrypted online marketplaces that allow buyers and sellers to conduct transactions without face-to-face contact. Among the 354 people arrested, 35-year-old Jonathan Gonzalez from South Bakersfield. He could face life in prison accused of selling narcotics across the U.S. Working alongside our domestic and international partners, we identified prolific dark net vendors, attributed online identities to real world offenders, traced illicit financial transactions, and dismantled key elements of the infrastructure that enabled these networks to operate. Authorities say they seized more than 12,000 pounds of narcotics and also confiscated more than 200 firearms, along with 38 pill presses used to manufacture those counterfeit prescription drugs. Well, tonight we continue to follow the controversial debate that's been reignited here in the West over the death penalty. We're hearing more criticism now from crime victims and advocates about California Governor Gavin Newsom's decision to commute the sentences of all 548 inmates on the state's death row. For more, let's bring in KTVU's Heather Holmes, who is here with more on this decision, and it's faced backlash on a number of different fronts. It certainly has, but today we're hearing from victims' families. Criticism of the governor's plan It is growing amongst many victims' families with them speaking out today. They strongly are against the move, saying that they feel justice is being obstructed. They gathered in Sacramento to share their anger, including Colleen Isaacson. Now, her husband, Keith Andrew McCade, was 24 when he was shot and killed back in 1992 outside a restaurant that the two owned. A former employee was later convicted and sentenced to death for the murder. And Isaacson was left on her own with two young children. Today, she said Newsom's decision undermines the importance of her husband as well as other victims. I remember thinking, this guy that I knew, who knew my children, who knew me, was never getting out, changing. Keith doesn't get to come home. Now several organizations including California District Attorney's Association and the California State Sheriff's Association were also there today in Sacramento in support of victims. And in Southern California, a similar gathering in Santa Ana. Steve Herr lost his son, private first class Samuel Eleazar Herr in 2010. Samuel's neighbor Daniel Wozniak shot and killed him when he was 26 years old. Herr expressed disappointment at what he says is a lack of compassion for victims. In one fell swoop, he overruled thousands of jurors, hundreds of judges, the California appellate courts, the California state Supreme Court, and most importantly, most importantly, he overruled the people's will of California. Now, the commutations come just a month after the California Parole Board adopted a new rule allowing certain prisoners sentenced to life without parole to be considered for parole after 25 years. That new regulation is currently being challenged in court. Now, Governor Newsom has been staunchly against the death penalty throughout his political career. In a letter justifying the commutations, Newsom wrote that he believes the death penalty cannot be fairly applied and has resulted in the conviction of innocent people. Death row inmates who have been convicted of more than one felony will require the approval of the California Supreme Court for their sentences to be commuted. Alex, that's about. Nearly 400 of those prisoners who would need that extra approval. Most of them do. Yeah. Yeah. And no update yet on when the Supreme Court may take up this issue. Yeah. But obviously, we're going to continue to follow to see what the California Supreme Court has to say about this decision from the governor. Heather, we appreciate it. Thank you. Much more to come here on West Coast Wrap after this quick break. Well, we're hearing from the NFC West huddle crew on their biggest takeaways from the NFL's trade deadline this week. Here's KTVU's Bailey O'Carroll on the moves the 49ers made. They do, I think, still have some good years left in them. They also have a lot of just years in the NFL that they can pull from to sort of help those young guys. And the Niners have made it clear they are all in on this season, maybe, maybe possibly the season after. But the Niners are all in on this year. They're making that clear yet again by the moves they have made at the trade deadline. And you can watch NFC West Huddle every week on the Fox Local app. Well, a Bay Area Olympic skating star is now breaking the ice for Life magazine as the massive publication returns to print after nearly 20 years. Here's Alyssa Liu once again mesmerizing audiences on the ice after winning the individual and the group gold medals this year in Milan. In her cover story for the magazine, she says she's not competing in the upcoming season, but confirms that she has a plan. The gold medalist is the first of five life stars featured on the cover as the quarterly magazine returns to print November 23rd. Tonight, an investigation is underway in Tucson, Arizona, following this nine-vehicle chain reaction crash that left at least 12 people injured. It happened this morning along eastbound Interstate 10. According to the Arizona Department of Public Safety, one of the vehicles involved was a commercial vehicle. That driver was cited for failure to control a vehicle to avoid a collision. Well, Microsoft trying tonight to resolve a widespread outage that knocked down a slew of its platforms today, including Outlook. Nearly 130,000 users are having trouble accessing their Outlook email, according to outage tracker Down Detector. Thousands of others reported problems with the Teams platform. The AI assistant called Copilot and wider Microsoft 365 services. The Washington-based company has restored Teams, but the Outlook issue is still affecting some Microsoft 365 users. Microsoft says a number of servers were, quote, unexpectedly unavailable due to a failure during automated health checks. Here is a live look tonight at Seattle. A beautiful shot of the Space Needle there. You're watching West Coast Wrap. In the Bay Area today, immigration advocates held a rally outside of a superior courthouse in Martinez. The Contra Costa Immigrant Rights Alliance organized this rally following reports of escalating activity by ICE over the last week across that region. Well, tonight there are growing calls for the release of a University of San Francisco nursing professor who's being held by federal immigration authorities. We brought you this story last night, and now we've learned there are more than 21,000 signatures on Change.org calling for the release of Professor Anne Luwany, who's been detained ever since September 16th. Immigration and Customs Enforcement says Luwany came to the U.S. legally in 2007, but overstayed her visa. Her family says she's the primary caregiver for her elderly father, who's battling cancer, and now she's being held in a detention center in Louisiana. Attorneys are petitioning for Luwany's release, but her relatives say they don't know if or when the matter is going to be heard due to a case backlog. Central Valley Congressman Josh Harder has reached out to the Department of Homeland Security's Secretary Mark Wayne Mullen and did so last month, trying to secure her release. He told us he hasn't heard back. In a statement that was given to KTVU, ICE wrote in part, quote, We will not apologize for defending the homeland. This is exactly what the American people voted for. Joining us to talk more about immigration enforcement in this country and where things stand right now is Jessica Vaughn, the director of policy studies for the Center of Immigration Studies. Appreciate the time tonight. Let me first get your perspective on the case we just spoke about here a moment ago, this USF nursing professor who was taken into custody. What do you think this case tells us about? The priorities when it comes to immigration enforcement for this administration. Well, this is a puzzling case in the sense that it's not clear to me why she never took steps before to get her immigration status in order. Why didn't her employer sponsor her and so on? But what it says about the Trump administration's priorities is that not only are they going to be targeting those who are arrested for crimes, who are here without status and Or who have violated their status and committed other crimes, but they're also going to make sure that people who have had their due process and have been told that they're not able to stay here, have been issued a removal order by an immigration judge and who don't leave, those people are going to be targets as well. And so if you're here in defiance of a removal order. When you don't have a path to legal status, you could find yourself in this same situation and be getting arrested. So that should be a warning, really, to a lot of people. Yeah. You know, let me ask you about just sort of the political climate here around immigration policy, because after the Republicans suffer those sweeping losses in the midterms, we heard from the president. He said during a 60 Minutes interview just a few days ago that maybe. This immigration crackdown that's been unfolding during his second term has been too tough. But then he named Stephen Miller as his chief of staff, who was the architect of this hardline immigration agenda. And we've also continued to see reports about ICE agents making arrests in many places, you know, airports, courthouses, just in businesses here. Do you think that the president may actually shift the administration's approach to immigration enforcement now that Democrats will be in control of Congress? Well, I'm sure that Democrats in Congress are going to try to impose some kind of guardrails on immigration enforcement. They should be expecting that. But I don't think that they are going to take their foot off the gas in terms of trying to maintain a high level of deportations of people who are in the country illegally. We experienced a record surge in illegal immigration under the Biden administration. And so the Trump administration is trying to remedy that and work as quickly as they can to try to increase deportations to get people out of the country who shouldn't be here. Yeah. I don't think that's going to change. We'll have to see what happens in this lame duck session, whether the Republicans are able to funnel even more money to immigration enforcement. Certainly the border security is not going to change. I think it's going to really most of the action or resistance to the Trump immigration policies could come from some of these states that formerly were very cooperative. Texas and Georgia and a few other places where ICE is not going to have the same kind of cooperation that it had before. And that could really. Put the brakes on some of these initiatives, and that's why you're seeing the Trump administration really try to get as much as it can done before the end of the year. Yeah, that's interesting. So we have to keep an eye out for kind of a shift in immigration policy at the state level now that we you know, now that the midterms are over. Really appreciate the perspective tonight. Thank you so much for taking the time. Jessica Vaughn, director of policy studies for the Center of Immigration Studies. Thank you so much for coming on. We appreciate it. All right, we want to get back now to the weather situation here in the west and the dangerous conditions that are developing. Along California's coastline here, take a look at the rough surf that was crashing into the beach in Pacifica earlier today. You can see those waves just sort of pummeling the shoreline here. The turbulent conditions are expected along the coasts of several western states for the next several days. We are expecting very dangerous conditions. I want to bring back in KTVU Chief Meteorologist Mark Tamayo, who is tracking all of this. Mark, we have a high surf warning along many parts of the coastline here in the west. How unusual is it to have this kind of a warning in place? Well, you know, maybe a handful of times a year, if that. But usually we're talking about beach hazard statement, which is in effect right now for portions of the West Coast. But, yeah, we do have high surf advisories. And, yeah, that's kind of the upper echelon in terms of the warnings, a high surf warning, which will begin Friday and into a Saturday as a power outage. powerful swell head towards our coastline. Graphically, we can show you this with the forecast model. Thanks for showing you all those bright colors, Alex. You can see all those bright colors spinning into our northwest. At least you can see the approach of the coastline. So that's basically on track with the incoming swells for Friday and into Saturday. And that's a lot of energy approaching the shoreline. So as a result, the places that are typically safe. Are not so safe and we're worried about coastal erosion because we've been talking so much about king tides, Kelvin waves, water levels are already inflated. And then when you add all that force to those inflated water levels, that's a huge concern coming up, setting up for Friday. Yeah. So we're talking about when these large waves are crashing ashore and you already have. The higher sea levels to begin with, we're talking about waves that are going to be potentially pushing well, you know, farther on shore, potentially causing more damage. I think that's the key concern. So it's not only going to be more coverage of the beach area that's typically dry, but it's just the force of those waves hitting piers, hitting the hillsides or just near the coastline with that erosion threat. Showing you this, in fact, you know, just to give you a little. Add some perspective to this. You can see in terms of the difference between advisory and a warning. And, you know, we do have, in fact, this was out towards the Mavericks area as we talk about that right now. And I will say, you know, a place like Mavericks, this is off the San Mateo County coastline in the Bay Area offshore. And they could have waves approaching 30, 40 feet as we head into Saturday. And so with that, that's the challenge for the surfers, or almost it's the, they also want to go out there to try to challenge their big wave riding skills. We did a story talking about just, there's actually a safety crew on jet skis. There's an individual on a cliff. watching with binoculars, and they all have radios. And so when a surfer falls, there are going to be multiple set waves behind them. And so that could lead to just they could be unconscious. They could need a lot of help. And so they're all in coordination. It's about five or six individuals that go out there near Mavericks, the Mavericks safety crew. In fact, this individual fell, and he had to be rescued. Yeah, I can't imagine. But this is just a reminder that, look, you know, if you're heading toward the coast And you're getting in the water here with these kinds of... This kind of surf conditions, you don't have a safety crew with you. Right. That's a very good point. And these are very dangerous conditions. And I will say people who know about the dangerous conditions, they might just say, hey, they're smart enough to know I'm not going out there. It's just beyond my limits. So, you know, I think that's You know, if you're a casual beach visitor or a professional surfer, these are things that can impact everyone. And it's not just a big wave approach. It's not just a beach hazard statement, which is scary in itself. But you're going up a couple levels to the highest level, and that's a high surf warning. This is as serious as it gets. And the timing on all this, how long do we expect these large swells to continue? Friday and into Saturday, and then it backs off on Sunday. But essentially a good portion of the West Coast, we're talking about either a high surf advisory or a high surf warning. And so in general. It's big everywhere, but the highest wave is expected. You can see this is kind of just a comparison, a high surf advisory, 20 to 24 feet. I'm not going to be close to a 20-foot wave. I don't want anything to do with waves that size. Yeah, and a breaking wave height with a high surf warning, which we've been talking about, going up above 25 feet. So that's what the National Weather Service uses to determine whether they issue an advisory or a warning. All right, so wherever you are on the West Coast, be careful if you're anywhere close to the water. Yeah, exactly. Mark, we appreciate it. Thank you so much. All right, much more to come here on West Coast Rap tonight. Let's give you a live look at the Las Vegas Strip. There you go, traffic moving along there. This is the site of this year's Las Vegas Grand Prix. After the break, we'll have a look at some of the preparations getting underway for next weekend's big event. Well, here is a live look at the Las Vegas Strip tonight, where preparations are underway for the Las Vegas Grand Prix. It's one of the biggest events in Formula One. You can see plenty of barricades and stands have already gone up in this area, and there are going to be a lot of road closures as well, in effect, all around the Strip. This is the fourth time Las Vegas has hosted this event. Officials discussed the scale of holding this kind of a race earlier today. Over the past three years, we have gained valuable experience in managing this event. While we have not experienced any significant incidents, we never become complacent in our preparedness, and our commitment to public safety remains our top priority. This is one of a number of different events Las Vegas has hosted recently. They've hosted the Super Bowl, the NFL Draft, the WNBA Finals, the Stanley Cup Final, and multiple All-Star Games, all within the last eight years. Well, longtime sportscaster and Tucson, Arizona native Dan Hicks has died at the age of 64 after battling what's being described as an acute illness. His wife, Hannah Storm, made the announcement earlier today on social media. Hicks was the leading voice for 35 years at NBC Sports and was known as one of the most dynamic play-by-play announcers in sports, calling golf, swimming, and Notre Dame football. Hicks leaves behind his wife and three daughters. In Santa Cruz, California, hundreds of people headed to the coast today to catch a glimpse of a whale that washed ashore along Cowell Beach. The whale was alive when the first reports came in this morning, and experts say the whale was still breathing at that point. But a few hours later, the fin whale, estimated to weigh up to 30,000 pounds, died on the shoreline. One expert with the UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab says evidence suggests it was suffering from a long-term We carefully watched the animal this morning for two hours or so, looking at breaths, counting respirations, watching the animal and then determined it passed away around 1015 this morning. A specific removal timeline remains unclear, but low tide in this area is about is about six. Well, just happened a short time ago. The high tide will be reached just after two o'clock in the morning. So when workers decide to move, the whale remains to be seen. A group of parents and teachers all rallied outside of Google's office in Boulder, Colorado today. They're challenging the company's new bundled AI product changes for schools. The groups involved here were the Colorado chapters of the Distraction-Free Schools Policy Project, Schools Beyond Screens, and Fair Play. Members say while technology is helpful, it can distract and detract from the development of basic learning skills if it's not closely How are our kids going to learn how to learn? How are they going to learn how to think for themselves? How are they going to become great critical thinkers? Children learn through friction and so they have to try things and they have to work hard and they have to fail. And when we just add in AI that kind of gives them the answers for them, they don't have that chance. Google sent our Fox affiliate a statement that says, in part, we are updating our approach to controls for schools to address feedback we've heard from educators. This includes turning off Gemini by default until schools decide which services to enable. Much more to come here on West Coast Wrap. After the break, we're taking a deeper dive into the NFL teams across the West and what to expect this weekend. That includes America's Game of the Week. We'll have a breakdown of that. Plus, we'll tell you about a major injury to one of the league's top wide receivers. Some tough news for LA Rams fans. Star wide receiver Puka Nakua is officially on injured reserve. This comes just a day after Rams head coach Sean McVay told media that Nakua would not go on IR. The wide receiver is battling an MCL injury and will miss at least four games. But McVay says that Nakua will miss extended time. The Rams are now preparing for an NFC West matchup against the Arizona Cardinals. Nakua's absence certainly is going to be felt, but Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald says the goal is to play at a high level, and that remains the same. We just go out there and play ball. That's all we can do. Keep trying to get the ball back to the offense, trying to get as many three-and-outs as we can, turnovers if possible. So that's the mindset every week, no matter who's down or what it would not be. We just want to go out there, play our game, and try to play at a high level. All right this Sunday in Las Vegas we will see the number one draft pick and Heisman winner make his first official NFL start. Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Fernando Mendoza is taking over after former starter Kirk Cousins was traded to Minnesota at the trade deadline this week and it's a tough game ahead for Mendoza with the Raiders facing off against the Seattle Seahawks with one of the best defenses in the league. Mendoza says preparation is key. While Seahawks head coach Mike McDonald is not underestimating the rookie. You're losing caught by Tucker for all picks. Obviously, we're going to watch his plays and lean on our information we had from coming out of the draft process. But put our best foot forward. And I think really focusing on our details and making sure that we're aligned and on the same page. And we're executing at a high level and then going to the game. Make the best adjustments we possibly can as the game starts to unfold. This is a new experience. It's great. It's against a fantastic opponent. However, I have so much trust in the coaching staff, in the front office, and my teammates and the leaders of the team to go out there and best support everybody's 111 so we can do our job with the best ability. All right, a big start coming up for Mendoza this weekend. Meantime, the San Francisco 49ers and the Dallas Cowboys face off this Sunday. It's America's Game of the Week on Fox. The 7-1 49ers are on the road in Texas looking to pick up another win in the NFC. 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy is continuing to show why he is a legitimate candidate for MVP this season. On Sunday, the quarterback reached 100 passing touchdowns and helped to lift the team to a dominant win over the Las Vegas Raiders. This Sunday will be Purdy's first time playing at AT&T Stadium. He says there are always some learning curves when you're playing at a new venue, but he's excited to knock this one off the list. Obviously, play clock is huge. The shot clock, you know, looking at... Uh, even like where the, uh, down in distance is if, you know, sometimes the marker can be a little hard to see from where we're out in the field. So looking up and seeing where that's at a Dallas in general, just, you know, obviously going back with the history of the Niners and Cowboys, like it's, I'm extremely excited to go there on the road and play and, and, uh, feet feel that energy of the game. Um, so overall, man, I'm extremely excited. It's always fun to go to a new NFL stadium for me. In year five, obviously, I haven't played in all of them, but I always look forward to the new environments. It should be a fun one in Texas coming up this Sunday. All right, an injury update here from the NBA. Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry is going to miss some time on the court. He suffered an oblique abdominal tear at last night's loss to the Houston Rockets. An MRI exam revealed the injury, which sometimes can take longer than two weeks to heal. Warriors head coach Steve Kerr says the concern level for him is high. Much more to come here on West Coast Raft tonight. A library in Utah attracted a large crowd after the break. The pop-up performance that packed this quiet space. New video shows hundreds of people packing into the lobby of a library in downtown Salt Lake City. Fox's Amy Day has more now on this special performance that turned a quiet place to study into a multi-story concert venue. It's hard to imagine this beautiful space completely filled with people but that's exactly what happened last Thursday night and still they're feeling the impacts of that viral sensation Nathaniel Young playing his music right here at the Salt Lake Public Library. Really what the Salt Lake City Public Library is about is connecting people. So connecting people to information, the book that they're looking for, but also to one another. Incredible. When Nathaniel played the first note, there was such a hush in the library. It was probably like the quietest it's ever been. Hundreds of people filling every last open spot here in the lobby of the main library this past week. Many coming to see the man with over a million followers play in person. I like to experience things more in real life than in reels. And so I just took the tracks to the library, and then I got a really good spot, like, on the stairs so I could see him head-on. I actually even met the guy, too. He was cool. Cameron Lamont, also a musician with a following online known as Cam the Man, says he even asked Nathaniel to collab sometime. Ski lift or something like that. Play some nice guitar while he plays some, like, awesome saxophone. Maybe some Careless Whisper or something like that. Gosh, it was crazy. Gabrielle Grubaugh runs the salon located inside the library's lobby. It was just silent, like no one was talking, there was not even, I mean you could hear a pin drop was how crazy silent and it is never like that here. I heard people whispering saying, I haven't been here since I was a kid, I've never been here and so to get people inside the library is really neat. Librarian Valeria Ashley says it brought a whole new crowd into this special space. Thursday night was so magical. Yeah, it was a great way to engage young adults in the city and to show them how relevant a public library is for them today. Salt Lake Public Library Director Noah Baskett says they saw a 500% increase in library card applications that night. It was between 2,600 and 2,800 people that attended. So to our best records, it was the busiest hour in the library's history. And it all started with a simple request. We just reached out to him. We had no idea he was playing up in Vancouver. We didn't have any connection, but we just reached out and he said, yeah, I'd be happy to come to Salt Lake. Does November work? So it just took one email and we were able to generate that kind of support. Reporting in downtown Salt Lake City, Amy Ney, Fox 13 News, Utah. Wow, what a special performance at the local library. All right, that does it for West Coast Wrap Tonight. We appreciate you watching.