Stocks edged higher in morning trading on Wall Street Wednesday as investors count down to the end of the worst year for the S&P 500 since 2008.

The S&P 500 rose 0.1% as of 10:12 a.m. Eastern. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 12 points, or less than 0.1%, to 33,257 and the Nasdaq rose 0.2%.

Bond yields fell. The yield on the 10-year Treasury, which influences mortgage rates, slipped to 3.84% from 3.85% Tuesday.

Investors are in the middle of a mostly quiet and holiday-shortened week. Markets were closed on Monday for the observed Christmas holiday and there are no major economic reports expected this week.

Stocks were mostly restrained. Health care and technology companies had some of the broadest gains. Eli Lilly rose 0.5% and Microsoft rose 0.8%.

Tesla rose 2.3% as it rebounded from steep losses it suffered after reports Tuesday that it temporarily suspended production at a factory in Shanghai.

U.S. crude oil prices fell 1.8% and weighed down energy stocks. Hess fell 2%.

Southwest Airlines shed 2.5% as the carrier's dramatic trouble with flight cancellations continued.

The Chinese government announced late Tuesday that it will start issuing new passports, a major step away from anti-virus travel barriers that likely will bring a flood of tourists out of China for next month’s Lunar New Year holiday. China has already said it will drop most of its COVID-19 travel restrictions next month.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbed 1.6%, while the Shanghai Composite index dropped 0.3%.

Markets in Europe were mixed.

Wall Street remains on edge and will likely continue dealing with volatile trading as the Federal Reserve continues its fight against stubbornly hot inflation. The Fed and other central banks have been raising interest rates to stifle borrowing and slow spending in order to tame inflation. The strategy, though, risks slowing the economy too much and bringing on a recession.

The Fed has already raised its key interest rate seven times this year and is expected to continue raising rates in 2023.

A winter storm moving into the mid-Atlantic combined with the pandemic to continue frustrating air travelers whose return flights home from the holidays were canceled or delayed in the first few days of the new year.

More than 1,900 U.S. flights and more than 3,300 worldwide were grounded as of early Monday, according to tracking service FlightAware.

That follows Sunday's cancellations of more than 2,600 U.S. flights and more than 4,400 worldwide. And on Saturday there were more than 2,700 U.S. flights canceled and more than 4,700 worldwide.

A winter storm is expected to bring as much as 10 inches of snow for the District of Columbia, northern Virginia and central Maryland through Monday afternoon.

The cancellations, coupled with more than 5,000 flight delays on Monday, just add to the despair felt over the weekend by holidays travelers trying to get home.

"It was absolute mayhem," said Natasha Enos, who spent a sleepless Saturday night and Sunday morning at Denver International Airport during what was supposed to be a short layover on a cross-country trip from Washington to San Francisco.

Saturday's single-day U.S. toll of grounded flights was the highest since just before Christmas when airlines began blaming staffing shortages on increasing COVID-19 infections among crews.

A winter storm that hit the Midwest on Saturday made Chicago the worst place in the country for travelers throughout the weekend. About a quarter of all flights at O'Hare Airport were canceled Sunday.

Denver's airport also faced significant disruptions. Enos, who was flying on Frontier Airlines, didn't learn that her connecting flight home to California was canceled until she had already landed in Denver. Then it was a rush to find alternative flights and navigate through baggage claims packed with stranded and confused travelers, amid concerns about the spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant of COVID-19.

"It was a lot of people in a very small space and not everybody was masking," said the 28-year-old financial analyst. "There were a lot of exhausted kids and some families were so stressed out."

In Michigan, the authority that runs Detroit International Airport said crews were working around the clock to remove snow and maintain the airfield. Atlanta's airport authority advised travelers to arrive earlier than usual because of high passenger volume, potential weather issues and pandemic-fueled staffing shortages that could lengthen the time it takes to get through security gates.

And thousands of miles from the closest snowstorms, Hawaiian Airlines said it had to cancel several flights between islands and across the Pacific due to staffing shortages.

Southwest Airlines said it was working to help customers affected by about 400 flights canceled around the country Sunday, about 11% of its schedule. The Dallas-based airline anticipates even more operational challenges to come as the storm system pushes into the Eastern seaboard.

Delta Air Lines said Sunday it was issuing a travel waiver for planned flights this week out of mid-Atlantic airports in Baltimore and Washington in preparation for forecasted winter weather.

American Airlines said most of Sunday's canceled flights had been canceled ahead of time to avoid last-minute disruptions at the airport.

SkyWest, a regional carrier that operates flights under the names American Eagle, Delta Connection and United Express, grounded more than 500 flights Sunday, about 20% of its schedule, according to FlightAware.

Airlines have said they are taking steps to reduce cancellations caused by workers affected by the pandemic. United is offering to pay pilots triple or more of their usual wages for picking up open flights through most of January. Spirit Airlines reached a deal with the Association of Flight Attendants for double pay for cabin crews through Tuesday, a union spokesperson said.

Airlines hope that extra pay and reduced schedules get them through the holiday crush and into the heart of January, when travel demand usually drops off. The seasonal decline could be sharper than normal this year because most business travelers are still grounded.

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AP Airlines Writer David Koenig contributed to this report.

A Southwest Airlines employee was taken to a Dallas hospital on Saturday after being assaulted by a passenger at Love Field Airport, according to the airline.

A female operations agent was "verbally and physically" assaulted by a female passenger as a flight from Dallas to La Guardia Airport in New York City was boarding, Southwest told CNN in an email. The employee was transported to a local hospital and released on Saturday evening, according to the email. She is at home resting, the airline said.

"Southwest Airlines maintains a zero-tolerance policy regarding any type of harassment or assault and fully support our employee as we cooperate with local authorities regarding this unacceptable incident," the email said.

Southwest said the passenger was taken into custody by local law enforcement. CNN has reached out to the Dallas Police Department for more information but has not heard back.

The incident is one among many verbal and physical attacks on flight staff that have been reported during the COVID-19 pandemic. Flight crews have reported 5,114 unruly passenger incidents since the start of 2021, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. FAA data shows more than 70% of incidents were over masks.

The incidents have ranged from shouting to spitting and physical altercations with airline staff.

In May this year a Southwest Airlines passenger who allegedly punched a flight attendant was fined more than $26,000, the FAA said.

The agency announced earlier this month it had fined 10 violent airline passengers a total of nearly $250,000.

It was business as usual at the airport for Jared and Kristi Owens who were on their way to Las Vegas, Nevada. It wasn't until check-in at the Southwest counter that the couple realized one of their bags was overweight because of a special additional traveler. "They put it on the scale and this bag is basically like 5, 5 and a half pounds overweight. Really quickly we are like, 'oh, we have got to rearrange some stuff.' Opens it up and literally, there's our dog coming out of my boot, coming out of my boot with his head bopping up," Jared said. Icky, the family's tiny Chihuahua, had hidden inside Jared's boot.Watch the video above to see the full story.

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HAS THEIR TARPSP U ALREADY. WE ARE TRACKGIN A LOT IN THE TROPICS, BUT OUR SIGHTS ARE SET ON NICHOLAS. SO WE DO HEAV A TROPICAL STORM NOW IN THE GULF YOU CAN SEE THAT WE ARE NOTHE T CONE BUT WE’RE STILL GOING TO SEE RAIN OUT OF THIS. SO TROPICAL STORM. NI TROPICAL STORM. CHOLAS IS MOVING NORTH-NORTHWEST AT 14 MILESN A HOUR. IT HAS SUSTAINED WINDS OF 40 MILES AN HOUR. NOW, THERE’S TWO SCENARIOS THAT WE COULD SEE OUT OF THIS. OF COURSE, WE WATCH THESE MODELS CLOSELY AND I LIKE TO SHOW YOU THEM. THIS IS THE EUROPEAN MODEL. IT’S A GLOBAL MODEL FAIRLY RELIABLE. IT SHOWS NICHOLAS MOVING NORTH SLOWLY AND TNHE MAKING LANDFALL IN TEXAS AND THEN SOMEATWH CALLING SO IT WOULD STILL BRING RAIN TO US. IT WOULD BE A REALLY BAD SCENARIO FOR PLACES LIKE HOUSTON AND GALVESTONT I WOULD DUMP A LOT OF RAIN OVER THEM. BUT THIS IS THE OTHER MODEL THE EUROPE. EXCUSE ME, THE AMERICAN MODEL. IT’S THE GFS MODEL. IT HAS BEEN REALLY RELIABLE THIS SEASON. IT SHOWS THIS MOVING NTHOR MAKING LANDFALL, BUT THEN TURNING EAST QUICKLY AND THAT’S A WORST OUT. THAT’S A WORSE OUTCOME FOR US. THAT WOULD BRING US EVEN MORE RAIN. TO OUR AREA THROUGH MIDWEEK EVEN INTO THURSDAY. SO HERE’S A LOOK AT RAINFALL OVER THE NEXT SEVEN DAYS PERHAPS OVER 10 INCHE MS,AYBE UP TO 12 INCHESF O RAIN FOR PLACES LIKE HOUSTON GALVESTON EVEN OVER TOWARDS THE LAKE CHARLES AREA RFO US. WE COULD SEE ATHNYING FROM SAY AROUND AN INCH AND A HALF OF RAIN FOR WASHINGTON PARISH AND THEN DOWN TOWARDS SAY HMAOU GALLIANO, MAYBE MORE LIKE FIVE INCHES OF RNAI RAIN. WE DO NOT NEED SO DO BE PREPARED. PERHAPSP U TO FIVE INCHES OF INRA. IT ALL DEPENDS ON EXACTLY WHAT THE STORM DOES AND AS YOU SAW MODELS DON’T HAVE A GOOD GRIP ON IT RIGHT NOWWO T DIFFERENT OUTCOMES, BUT AS NICHOLAS CONTINUES TO ORGANIZE AND STRENGTHEN THE GULF OF MEXICO. WE’LL GET A BETTER IDEA ON EXACTLY WHAT THIS STORM IS GOING TO DO HOW FAST IT’S GOING TO MOVE HOW QUICKLY IT WILL TURN EAST AND FROM THERE. WE’LL BE ABLE TO GET A REALLY GOOD GRIP ON JUST HOW MUCH RAIN WE COULD SEE BUT IN THE MEANTIME, I WANT TO GIVE YOU A HEADS UP DO PREPARE FOR SOME HEAVY RAIN ON THE WAY. THERE’S A LOOK AT NICHOLAS RIGHT NOW ALREADY BRINGING RAIN TO PARTS OF THE COAST. WE’RE ALREADY SEEING RAIN HERE. YOU CAN SEE THAT WE’VE SEEN OFF ANDN O SHOWERS AND HEAVY RAIN THROUGHOUT THE DAY GRAND ISLE SEEING RAIN RIGHT NOWAM SE FOR GALLIANO AND TTHA CONTINUES UP TOWARDS LAFITTE AND THEN SOME OTHER SHOWER ACTIVITY OVER TOWARDS HOUMA THAT EXTENDS EVEN UP INTO PORTISON OF THE NORTH SHORE THOUGH NOT A WLEHO LOT OF RAIN THERE. SO WE’RE GOING TO CONTINUE TO SEE OFF AND ON SCATTERED RAIN OVERNIGHT TONIGHT THEN TOMORROW A BIT. MORE RAIN STILL SCATTERED OFF AND ON THROUGHOUT THE DAY TOMORROW FOR MONDAY, BUT THEN BY TUESDAY, THAT’S WHEN WE’LL SEE MORE RAIN. YOU CAN SEE THAT HERE NOTICE THAT. SEEDS SCATTERED SHOWERS, MAYBE EVEN SOME THUNDERSTORMS ON OUR MONDAY AND THEN AS WE HEAD INTO TUESDAY WATCH THIS LOOK AT ALL OF THAT RAIN THAT WE ARE EXPECTING ON TUESDAY. SO RAIN CHANCESRE A GOING TO BE ELEVATED OVER THE NEXT COUPLE OF DAYS MONDAY THROUGH THURSDAY EX

Tropical Storm Nicholas forms, expected to bring heavy rain to Gulf Coast

Updated: 11:42 PM EDT Sep 12, 2021

Tropical Storm Nicholas has formed and is expected to increase our rain chances this week. Nicholas is in the Southwestern Gulf. The storm is expected to move along the Texas Coast and approach Houston by Tuesday night. Nicholas will gradually strengthen as it moves northward but is forecast to still stay at tropical storm strength before making landfall. Southeast Louisiana is not in the cone, but Nicholas will push tropical rains toward that area. Southeast Louisiana could see up to 5 inches of rain while parts of southwest Louisiana could see over 10 inches. Impacts to Southeast Louisiana will include increased rain chances later in the week. Watch the video above for the full story.

Tropical Storm Nicholas has formed and is expected to increase our rain chances this week.

Nicholas is in the Southwestern Gulf.

The storm is expected to move along the Texas Coast and approach Houston by Tuesday night. Nicholas will gradually strengthen as it moves northward but is forecast to still stay at tropical storm strength before making landfall.

Southeast Louisiana is not in the cone, but Nicholas will push tropical rains toward that area. Southeast Louisiana could see up to 5 inches of rain while parts of southwest Louisiana could see over 10 inches.

Impacts to Southeast Louisiana will include increased rain chances later in the week.

Watch the video above for the full story.