Players in three states set to get that jackpot more than a half a Million Dollars, leaving the rest with us with 564 million reasons to be bummed out today, today, february 12th 2015. From nbc news this is today with matt lauer and savannah guthrie, live from studio 1a in rockefeller plaza. And good morning, everyone. Welcome to today on a thursday morning. So many people are shocked and saddened about bob simon. So many of us looked up to him as a journalist. It is a terrible story. It is our top story, the tragic accident that has stunned our people all across the country. Awardwinning journalist bob simon killed in a car crash right here in new york city. This morning, he is being remembered as one of the most respected people in this deal. Willie is here. This was a gut crunch. Bob simon admired by those who only knew his work. Some say he may have been commuting home last night. A tragic end to the life devoted to covering some of the most important stories for the past 50 years. This morning fans and loved ones are paying tribute to beloved cbs newsman bob simon. Im bob simon. According to police, a town car simon was riding in hit another car, stopped at a red light on manhattans west side highway, spinning into the center divider. Both simon and the driver lad to be cut out of the car. Simon was pronounced dead on arrival at a nearby hospital. A tearyeyed scot pelley reported the news of simons death on wednesday night. Our 60 minutes colleague bob simon was killed this evening. Reporter Anderson Cooper who worked with simon at 60 minutes called same anwarior poet. Bob was over the last five decades, one of the best, in my opinion, the best at telling a story, writing a story and making it simply unforgettable. Reporter bob simon was a native new york a scholar and a fixture on cbs news for a century. Simon and his team were captured by iraqi forces while reporting during the gulf war in 1991 and held for 40 days. This is a story that could have ended another way but its had a happy ending. Reporter over the course of his career simon received a number of honors including 27 emmys. His latest report airing on 60 minutes just this past sunday. Overnight, fans and colleagues sharing their grief online. Katie couric tweeting heartbreaking news about sob simon of 60 minutes a brilliant reporter someone i admired deeply. Late night host seth myers tweeting gutted to hear the news about bob simon. An absolute master of his craft. Bob simon was 73yearsold. Simon was survived by his wife francois and daughter tanya, a producer at 60 minutes herself. The longtime executive producer called bob same an reporters reporter and pointing to the obvious added tragedy that hes survived so much out in the field only to lose his life on the west side highway in manhattan. If you were walking by a tv and you saw him start to introduce a story, you sat down and got comfortable because you knew it was going to be perfectly told. Yeah he was a master at it for sure. Willie thank you so much. Lets go to washington where congress is debating president obamas formal request to authorize u. S. Military force in the war against isis. We are learning more about a request to save the life of Kayla Mueller while she was being held captive by the terror group. Nbc National CorrespondentPeter Alexander has all the white house information. Reporter we will have that in a moment. First for a little context here. This is the first time in more than a Decade Congress is reconsidering the extent of the president s powers to target terrorists. President obama warned yesterday if left unchecked, isis could threaten the u. S. Homeland as well as americans abroad. Resolve from the president as the nation collectively mourns the death of 26yearold american aide worker Kayla Mueller. We are going to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group. Reporter and few revelations this morning. Nbc news Andrea Mitchell claims they asked the family for another prisoner in exchange for kayla. The white house didnt approve the trade. Innics kaylas syrian boyfriend omar who was with her when she was captured in 2013 later tried to kes rescue kayla, claiming he was her husband. That attempt failed. Now, president obama is pushing congress for the power he insists he needs to defeat isis. Isil is on the defensive. Ilittle i sill is is going to lose. I am convinced the United States should fought get dragged back into another prolonged ground war in the middle east. Reporter but Congress Remains divide. They say the proposal may be too limiting. My biggest concern is this authorization doesnt enhance the president s ability to defeat and destroy isis but rather restricts that. Reporter and democrats fear it gives the president power to go too far. The challenge is defining what is the combat troop operations so that you dont have an openended check. Reporter Deputy National securitied a core ben rhodes. Were united. We dont need Grounds Forces like we had in iraq and afghanistan, but were determined to get the job done with our military and Coalition Part first. Reporter at the urging of kaylas family the white house denied reports that kayla was married off to an isis sxhander during her time in captivity. Officials here in a rare statement said those reports are quote speculative and unproven at this time. Matt savannah. Peter alexander at the white house, thank you. Police in North Carolina are investigating the motives of the murders of three young muslims in chapel hill. Were they prig i triggered over hate or Parking Spaces . Reporter good morning, matt the people at this condo complex have a huge outpouring of grief t. Victims were highly regard and their murders seem so senseless at the university of North Carolina an emotional vigil wednesday night. A huge crowd of mourners remembering the three young lives cut short. The victims were all muslims raised in america. 23yearold deah barhararaar bara akat. And her disastersister razan. 46yearold Craig Stephen hicks, a neighbor of the barakats turned himself into police and was charged with first degree murder. The father insists the killings were religiously motivated. We are hoping to get justice here but in anyway you look at it its just a hate crime. Reporter but police and the suspects wife say the murders were sparked by a dispute over a parking space at the condo. I cant say with my absolute belief that this incident had nothing to do we are lidgegion or faith. Religion or faith. Reporter that investigation into that continues. Mark potter thank you. Lets turn to natalie. A major announcement from the russian president this morning. Probably a break through after marathon talks. Prugs president Vladimir Putin says ukrainian troops and separatist versus agreed to a ceasefire. Fill neely is in london with the latest. Good morning. Reporter good morning, natalie natalie, after 16 hours of negotiation tarp called extremely difficult, there is a deal and doubts about it. The deal seems unlikely t. Key points are a ceasefire from sunday morning, heavy weapons to be pulled out of Eastern Ukraine in two weeks and a commitment no more than that for all foreign troops to be withdrawn. However, germany warning this morning that this is not a comprehensive solution. Its not a break through. And there is a lot of work still to be done. There are issues unresolved for example, how exactly is ukraine to get control again of its International Border and remember this is a rehashed version of a deal six months ago that wasnt worth the paper it was written on and collapsed very quickly. So no one also is really sure. Is this enough for Vladimir Putin . What is his end game . So there is a deal many thought would be unlikely t. Big question is will it stick . It certainly is the big question. Bill neely in london thank you. Now to a story we have been following for three years t. Captain of the cruiseship that crashed and killed 32 people sentenced to 16 years in prison. But some families of the victims say that is not enough. Nbcs katie kir is in italy with the latest. Good morning. Reporter good morning, he wont have to go to prison immediately. He will be able to stay free throughout his appeals process. That can take more years. Now this trial from the start was surreal to say the least, held pence a local courtroom, a local theater instead of a courtroom t. Child theatrics pence only matching the venue. Standing on the stage of a local theater a. Panel of three judges literally held the high ground as they delivered the captains fate. 16 years in prison ten for multiple counts of manslaughter five for causing a ship wreck and one for abandoning ship in the plush red velvet seats below the prosecution and defense but no skatino. The captain who broke down during a hastily thrown together final plea to court was a noshow for sentencing. The concordia western aground and capsized in january, 2012 killing 32 people. It took two years for salvageers to upright and haul away the ghostly cruiseliner and twothirds of that time for the trial of the man at its helm. I remember moments of it. They come to me in flashes. Survivors were not satisfied. Somebody that is sorry doesnt leave the ship and go look for dry socks while people are dying on the ship. Two minutes of his small life for asking me how i feel . Reporter ultimately skatino was a unconvincing to his judges as he was to his passengers. Now, skatino maintained from the start he actually fell into the lifeboat when the ship suddenly lifted to its side. Now hell be fined 30,000 euros for each of the passengers that sued. Well into the millions. As for the theater, Authorities Say they were trying to accommodate what they thought would be record crowds. It remained largely empty throughout natalie. A strange venue. Thank you. Officials in Northern California are warning train commuters that they may have been exposed to the measles. Public Health Officials say someone was diagnosed with the disease after riding Bay Area Rapid transit three days last week. Up to 50,000 people may have been exposed. The highly contagious virus has affected more than 100 people in california since december afternoon. A Dramatic Police chase in dallas. Police had been chasing the robbery suspect when he tried to squeeze between two vehicles be you the karzai lently rammed into them. A mother and her boyfriend jumped outs of one of those vehicles ran over to the car and roughed up the suspect t. Woman says she was worried about her son who was also in the car. She and her boyfriend held the suspect down until police arrived. And it is a dream come true for a few lucky People Holding the winning ticket. Three tickets were a Perfect Match . Theyll split the 564 million jackpot t. Tickets were sold in North Carolina texas and puerto rico. This is the first time a jackpot winner has been sold outside the continental states and just because you didnt win the jackpot doesnt mean you didnt win a smaller prize, so here are the numbers for you once again, 11 13 25 39 54 with a powerball number 19. It sounds like a career highlight. Heeding the numbers. I was expecting them to roll out. Mark is over here taking a ticket out of his wallet. When was the last time you were in texas . I have a smaller prize. Three winners did win a Million Dollars, they matched the numbers, not the powerball. Few got that call me. Thank you. Its another day of snow in parts of the northeast. We are about to dip into the temperatures here . Thats right. Right behind that this weekend, something our friends in new england do not want to hear another major storm developing. Right now, we got this clipper coming across light snow from chicago into the northeast. It pushes fairly quickly off the secondary system developed. We are looking boston one to two inches. Cape cod twotofour. The arctic air is the big story. By tomorrow morning, it will be 4 below in buffalo. Cincinnati 13. Roanoke into the teens tomorrow. Saturday morning it moderates a bit. Heres the system we are worried about, a secondary storm will develop along the coast saturday evening tapping into atlantic moisture. A heavy area of snow. So potential blizzard for new england going into sunday. Winsd of 55 miles per hour. Dangerous cold and wind chills. The european model calling much of maine, picking up 2feet of snow. Boston another foot to a footandahalf. The american model backs off of that a bit. But its still a fair amount of snow folks. And because of the, all the snow of rooves there are big, big worries of roof collapse in residential and businesses all throughout the region. Thats whats going on. You drop 40 grand on a new set of wheels, then. Wham a minivan tbones you. Guess what your Insurance Company will only give you 37thousand to replace it. Depreciation they claim. How can my car depreciate before its first oil change . You ask. Maybe the better question is why do you have that Insurance Company . With Liberty Mutual new car replacement, well replace the full value of your car. See Car Insurance in a whole new light. Liberty mutual insurance. Good morning, im meteorologist bill henley. Clouds are here scattered snow showers on the way. No accumulation. Temperatures will be too warm. But that changes this afternoon. Cold wind will kick in and well be down to 12 degrees tomorrow morning. A high of just 22 tomorrow afternoon. Bitter cold friday. Light snow saturday. And an inch or two is possible. Followed by very cold air on sunday with frigid winds blowing. 18, the high. Turning a bit colder monday morning. And thats your latest weather. All right, al. Thank you very much. Blink, you might blink and miss it. Netflix house of card was briefly up yesterday. Briefly. Some were wondering if this is a marketing ploy. Season three, savannah mentioned of the awardwinning house of cards appeared on netflix wednesday more than two weeks before it was supposed to be released. So this sent social media into a tailspin much like that awkward spin i just made as we are ready to bin him watch on all things related to the house of cards. Okay. So the viewing stations all set up i guess, people were sending out messages saying this is not a drill. Let me swipe to some of the things here this is funny, erin from buzzfeed heres what she had to say, house of cards season 3 is up on netflix and a a completely unrelated note ill be home sick from work tomorrow t. Episodes were removed from the streaming site in less than 30 minutes. Netflix sent out a Statement Due to a Technical Glitch some underwood fans got a sneak peek. He will be back on february 27th. So house of cards confirming the news as well. This is walk. Theres always a leak. All 13 episodes will launch february 27th. So thats the official date. Again, 30 minutes is up and people went bananas. So we ask you today, was this a marketing stunt or a glitch . Heres what you had to say on today. Com survey. 85 believe it was a marking stunt i wish them what will they get out of it . They got two minutes from us. Well done. Well played my man. Well played. Crafty. Tamron thank you very much. Coming up, amy pascal speaks up for the First Time Since she describes it getting fired from sony. What she is saying about the controversial emails and hacking about the president and Angelina Jolie. Plus the widow of american sniper chris kyle in tears on the witness stand while the defense uses kyles own words to strengthen its case. We will be live with the latest at the [ female announcer ] Business Travel isnt just about the going. Its also about the going home. And being connected all along the way. Whether youre working or recharging do Business Travel on your terms. Acela. Take off. Your teens see fifty shades of things made with love are the best things. And thats exactly why avocados from mexico are grown with love, all year round. All your life youre told to tame your curls. 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