Travelers rest on the ground while waiting for their flights at Los Angeles International Airport on July 1. (NPR/File)

The U.S. Department of Transportation rolls out a new website today that will allow air travelers to see what they're legally entitled to when an airline cancels or significantly delays their flight. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told NPR in an interview  that this summer's air travel chaos is prompting the action.

Officials at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport expect 1.6 million passengers to travel through ATL during the five-day Labor Day weekend beginning Thursday.

Delta pilots plan to use the busy weekend to picket at ATL and elsewhere across the country. A spokesman for the company’s pilots union, Reed Donoghue, said that the intent isn’t to disrupt, but rather to send a message to Delta management.

• “It’s very likely that over the holiday weekend, our passengers will be on flights where either a Delta pilot or a Delta flight attendant is actually working on their day off to keep the operation running,” Donoghue said.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock campaign in Cobb County on Aug. 31. (Riley Bunch/GPB News)

Stacey Abrams and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock are far from strangers. But, just two months out from the November midterms they hadn’t yet campaigned together. Both appeared at the Democratic convention in Columbus over the weekend, but their speeches were several hours apart. On Wednesday, they shared the stage.

• “We had a warmup in 2018, we proved ourselves in 2020, and because we're Southern, we sent them two U.S. senators in 2021,” Abrams said. “But folks think Georgia has done what it's going to do, that it was a fluke...The job's not done until the election is won.”

The Democratic party is itching to prove that Georgia is far from a Republican stronghold. Abrams is in the thick of a rematch against Republican incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp while Warnock is up against Trump-backed Republican football star Herschel Walker.
 

The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services is disbursing $80 million in funding — the largest-ever federal funding pool set aside for health insurance navigators to aid people in getting insured. (File)

Three organizations in Georgia will receive about $2.7 million dollars this year to hire and support “certified navigators,” agents that help uninsured people understand and get enrolled in a marketplace health insurance plan.

The marketplace opened in 2013 as part of the Affordable Care Act, which became law during the Obama administration. Since 2020, enrollment in a marketplace insurance plan in Georgia has almost doubled, with over half a million people enrolled this year.

Cathy Hawkins works for the Georgia Primary Care Association, which represents the state’s federally qualified health care centers. This year it has $2.5 million dollars from the grant to spend on expanding its navigator program statewide. 

• “Without navigators, you won't have as many consumers enrolling — period,” Hawkins said.

The pandemic pushed millions of U.S. workers to join the ‘Great Resignation,' according to a new study. (Pexel)

During the so-called "Great Resignation," workers are leaving their jobs in search of better pay and working conditions. But where should they look for greener pastures? According to a new report from Oxfam, not Georgia. The report finds the state ranks near the bottom of the list when considering its low minimum wage, lack of union protections and new abortion ban. GPB's Peter Biello spoke with Kaitlyn Henderson, the author of the Oxfam Report.

• "...We look at 26 different policies for all 50 states, plus D.C. and Puerto Rico," she said. "So we're looking at everything from what the minimum wage is, to what the tipped wage is, to whether there is paid leave in the state. Are there accommodations for pregnant workers? And is the right to unionize protected? And what kind of rights to organize exist at the state level?"

Georgia band The B-52's and R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe are part of Lineham's collection of posters and ornaments at his Dragon Con exhibition. (Matthew Lineham)

Atlanta's Dragon Con attracts gamers, comic book aficionados, movie buffs and anime fans from around the globe. The annual convention was founded in 1987 and runs from tonight through Monday in five downtown hotels featuring exhibitor booths, celebrity photo ops, cosplay and more.  

Matthew Lineham is a Dragon Con exhibitor and New York-based artist who creates images of new wave artists. His work is inspired by stained-glass church windows and the colorful clothing and personalities of bands from the MTV era, including Athens, Ga. groups R.E.M. and the B-52's.

• "When I thought of their song 'Rock Lobster,' I could already think of exactly what it would look like with them at a beach," he said of his B-52's poster. "And it's kind of like an old-school psychedelic beach party poster from the 1950s or something. And visually, it just made perfect sense."

The St. Simons Island Lighthouse was first lit on September 1, 1872 and still serves as an active aid to navigation. (Orlando Montoya)
 

One of Georgia’s beloved lighthouses turns 150 years old today.

And the non-profit group that takes care of it plans to bathe it in light as part of a big sesquicentennial celebration, when a design company projects an animated light show on the outside of the white tower.

The St. Simons Island Lighthouse opened in 1872 to replace an earlier lighthouse that was destroyed during the Civil War. The 104-foot beacon serves ships entering the Brunswick harbor as one of only two Georgia lighthouses, along with Tybee Island’s, that remain active aids to navigation.

Sandy White is the education and volunteer director for the Coastal Georgia Historical Society, which runs the lighthouse.

• “Lighthouses symbolize home,” White said. “It’s such an iconic symbol of the community.  You see it on logos from the county that we live in, Glynn County, to local dentist offices and construction companies.”