Things To Do In SW Florida

By STAN CHOE, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are climbing on Wall Street Monday and pulling near their records following last week’s roller-coaster ride.

The S&P 500 rose 1% and got back within 0.4% of its all-time high set earlier this month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 358 points, or 0.8%, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.4% higher just before noon Eastern time.

Cleveland-Cliffs helped lead the way with a jump of 24% after the steel company’s CEO, Lourenco Goncalves, said it would provide details soon about a potential deal with a major global steel producer that could mean bigger profits. He also said Cleveland-Cliffs has potentially found rare earths at sites in Michigan and Minnesota.

Such materials have thrust into the global spotlight after China put curbs on the export of its own rare earths, a move that President Donald Trump earlier this month characterized as hostile. Trump’s ensuing threat of higher tariffs on China triggered big swings for Wall Street, but the concerns eased a bit after Trump said such high tax rates are unsustainable. read more

By KELVIN CHAN and BARBARA ORTUTAY, Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — Amazon says a massive outage of its cloud computing service has been resolved as of Monday evening, after a problem disrupted internet use around the world, taking down a broad range of online services, including social media, gaming, food delivery, streaming and financial platforms.

The all-day disruption and the ensuing exasperation it caused served as the latest reminder that 21st century society is increasingly dependent on just a handful of companies for much of its internet technology, which seems to work reliably until it suddenly breaks down.

About three hours after the outage began early Monday morning, Amazon Web Services said it was starting to recover, but it wasn’t until 6 p.m. Eastern that “services returned to normal operations,” Amazon said on its AWS health website, where it tracks outages.

AWS provides behind-the-scenes cloud computing infrastructure to some of the world’s biggest organizations. Its customers include government departments, universities and businesses, including The Associated Press. read more

After a 35-year run of dishing out murder along with dinner, Sleuths Mystery Dinner Shows announced this weekend it will close its International Drive theater for good on Nov. 4

“We loved providing Orlando with laughs for over three decades and are grateful for all of our guests who came to play with us to help solve tens of thousands of murder mysteries,” the company posted on its social-media sites.

Manager Donna Ernbro said every effort had been made to keep the business — thought to be the longest-running mystery dinner theater in the country — going, and the decision to close was “heart-wrenching.”

“I think, really, it’s the economics of the world, the cost to keep things running,” she said. “If there was any way we could have carried on, we would have carried on.”

Members of Orlando’s arts community, many of whom have worked at the theater over the years, reacted with dismay.

“Very sorry to learn of the loss of yet another Central Florida theatrical organization that provided entertainment for many thousands of audience members and employment for many hundreds of artists,” wrote producer DJ Salisbury on Facebook. read more

SpaceX plowed ahead with a record 31st launch of one of its Falcon 9 boosters with another Starlink mission from the Space Coast on Sunday.

Watch Falcon 9 launch 28 @Starlink satellites to orbit from Florida https://t.co/EKWpwXAPP8

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 19, 2025

A Falcon 9 on the Starlink 10-17 mission carrying 28 satellites lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 40 at 1:39 p.m.

The first-stage booster made its fleet-leading 31st flight with a recovery landing downrange on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas stationed in the Atlantic.

Falcon 9’s fleet leader booster completes its 31st launch and landing pic.twitter.com/KVtZKi79nu

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 19, 2025

This was the 86th orbital launch from the Space Coast in 2025 with all but five coming from SpaceX.

The company touts reuse to bring down cost and last week landed a Falcon 9 booster for the 500th time. The first booster recovery came in 2015.

It has several more boosters approaching 30 launches, and has intentions to fly them as many as 40 times. read more

The queen is alive and well after getting a bit of work done and set to spend an extended holiday in Miami, bringing with her some award-winning entertainment.

Cunard’s Queen Elizabeth cruise ship arrived to PortMiami last week and will for the first time be calling Florida home for a long-term winter Caribbean sailing season.

The 2,081-passenger ship that debuted in 2010 has as its godmother the late Queen Elizabeth II. While she passed in 2022, her visage remains omnipresent on board among plaques, murals and paintings. Her namesake ship earlier this year underwent a three-week revamp bringing some updated spaces as well as a general polish to vessel.

For its Miami stay, the line has also brought on board a production of “Come From Away,” performed at sea for the first time. This winner of Tony and Olivier awards debuted in 2015 and is inspired by the true story of the town of Gander, Newfoundland and its role after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The town, which had a population of about 11,000, became the temporary home to nearly 6,600 air passengers and crew who came from 38 commercial flights that were grounded when airspace was closed over the U.S. and Canada. read more