Things To Do In SW Florida

“Nightmare Fuel Wildfire,” a bombastic stage show at Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights event, was awarded an IAAPA Brass Ring Award during a ceremony in Las Vegas on Sunday.

“Nightmare Fuel” was named the winner in the category of most creative Halloween production. The show, performed exclusively at the after-hours event at Universal Studios theme park, featured music, dance, fire acts, aerial stunts and illusions centered on the dark realm of sleep. It was the highest-rated show in the history of Halloween Horror Nights, IAAPA said.

The Brass Ring Awards traditionally have been announced during the IAAPA Expo at Orange County Convention Center in November. The ceremony shifted to an event dubbed IAAPA Honors 2024, held at the Venetian in Vegas this year. A handful of awards were shared last fall, including to Orlando-based Skyline Attractions, which won for new product with a cost of less than $3 million for its P’Sghetti Bowl roller coaster design.

IAAPA is the shorthand for International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions, a trade group based in Orlando. read more

Because the Federal Reserve increased interest rates many times in 2023, conservative investments offered good returns in comparison with prior years. Investors were able to buy money market funds, CDs and Treasury bills that offered returns exceeding 5%.

Many observers have expected the Fed to start reducing interest rates in 2024, which would reduce returns for the most conservative investments. However, because inflation is still a concern, it now seems as though the Fed may not be anxious to start reducing interest rates.

If the Fed does hold off reducing interest rates, it is likely returns associated with money market funds, CDs and short-term federal investments such as Treasury bills will remain pretty high. In 2023, the stock market recovered from its fall in 2022, and many investment analysts feel that many stocks are fully priced, and that the returns in the stock market in 2024, on average, will not match those in 2023.

What options are attractive to investors in 2024? One is highly rated corporate bonds. The returns of high-grade corporate bonds are approximately 5% now, and as I indicated in a recent column, many mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs) hold long-term bonds with unrealized losses. read more

DEAR TRAVEL TROUBLESHOOTER: I recently took a Western Mediterranean cruise with my family, which included flight arrangements made through Norwegian Cruise Line. On the morning before our scheduled departure, we tried to check in online, but the first leg of our flight was not showing up on the Delta Air Lines app.

We contacted the NCL air department, and a representative said they needed to reissue the outbound tickets and send us new air confirmations. She told me to go to the airport in the morning and resolve the situation at the Delta check-in desk.

When I arrived at the airport, the agent could not find our reservation. At this point, Delta only had four seats remaining on the flight, so I purchased the tickets to avoid missing the rest of the flight and the cruise.

I have asked NCL to reimburse us for the $1,796 we had to spend. NCL asked us to file a claim with AON, the travel insurance we had purchased through NCL, but AON has turned down our claim. We’ve also disputed the charge on our credit card, but lost. read more

By DAVID KOENIG and MICHELLE CHAPMAN (AP Business Writers)

JetBlue Airways and Spirit Airlines are ending their proposed $3.8 billion merger weeks after a federal judge blocked the the deal, saying it would hurt consumers who depend on Spirit’s lower fares.

JetBlue said Monday that even though both companies still believe in the deal, they were unlikely to meet the closing conditions required in the agreement before a July 24 deadline.

JetBlue’s new CEO, Joanna Geraghty, called the merger “a bold and courageous plan intended to shake up the industry status quo” and speed JetBlue’s growth.

“However, with the ruling from the federal court and the Department of Justice’s continued opposition, the probability of getting the green light to move forward with the merger anytime soon is extremely low,” Geraghty said in a memo to employees of New York airline. She said uncertainty over the merger’s fate was distracting the airline from its effort to return to profitability.

Spirit CEO Ted Christie said he was disappointed that the airlines could not combine and create a new challenger to the nation’s four biggest airlines but said he is confident that Spirit — which has been losing money since the pandemic started — can succeed on its own. read more

SpaceX is set to hit a milestone in human spaceflight as it aims to bring up another four passengers to the International Space Station.

The Crew-8 mission with three NASA astronauts and one Roscosmos cosmonaut will be riding in the Crew Dragon Endeavour when it launches atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Pad 39-A targeting liftoff at 11:16 p.m. with backup windows on Sunday at 10:53 p.m. and Monday at 10:31 p.m.

The first-stage booster is flying for the first time and will attempt a recovery landing at nearby Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Landing Zone 1, which could mean one or more sonic booms might be heard in parts of Central Florida.

Space Launch Delta 45’s weather squadron forecasts only a 40% chance for good conditions on Saturday, though. That improves to 70% if delayed to Sunday and 60% if delayed until Monday.

Once they launch, they will mark 50 humans flown to space among SpaceX’s four Crew Dragon spacecraft, with only one repeat flyer among the 50. Endeavour was the first to ferry passengers when it launched on the Demo-2 mission in May 2020 carrying up astronauts Bob Behken and Doug Hurley. read more