Federal officials order grounding of some Boeing 737 Max 9 jetliners after plane suffers a blowout
Federal officials on Saturday ordered the immediate grounding of some Boeing 737 Max 9 jetliners until they are inspected after an Alaska Airlines plane suffered a blowout that left a gaping hole in the side of the fuselage.
The required inspections take around four to eight hours per aircraft and affect about 171 airplanes worldwide.
Alaska Airlines said in a statement that of the 65 737 Max 9 aircraft in its fleet, crews had inspected the paneled-over exits as part of recent maintenance work on 18 planes, and those were cleared to return to service Saturday. Inspections for the remaining aircraft were expected to be completed in the coming days, the company said.
An Alaska Airlines jetliner blew out a portion of its fuselage shortly after takeoff 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) above Oregon late Friday, forcing the pilots to make an emergency landing as its 171 passengers and six crew members donned oxygen masks.
No one was seriously hurt as the depressurized plane returned safely to Portland International Airport about 20 minutes after departure.
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Hezbollah, Israel trade heavy cross-border fire as Blinken seeks to prevent regional escalation
BEIRUT (AP) — Israel and Lebanon-based Hezbollah traded fire Saturday in one of the heaviest days of cross-border fighting in recent weeks, a day after the militia's leader urged retaliation for the targeted killing, presumably by Israel, of a top Hamas leader in Lebanon’s capital.
Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said that if his group didn't strike back for the killing Tuesday of Saleh Arouri, Hamas' deputy political leader, all of Lebanon would be vulnerable to Israeli attacks.
With the risk of regional escalation, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken kicked off an urgent Middle East diplomatic tour, his fourth since the Israel-Hamas war erupted three months ago.
“It is absolutely necessary to avoid Lebanon being dragged into a regional conflict,” the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said in Beirut during his own Middle East tour.
Hezbollah said it launched 62 rockets toward an Israeli air surveillance base on Mount Meron and scored direct hits in its “initial response” to Arouri's killing. It said rockets also struck two army posts near the border. The Israeli military said about 40 rockets were fired toward Meron and that a base was targeted. The army’s chief spokesperson, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said the rockets caused no casualties in Israel.
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Cumbersome process and 'arbitrary' Israeli inspections slow aid delivery into Gaza, US senators say
CAIRO (AP) — At Egypt’s Rafah border crossing, lines of hundreds of trucks carrying aid wait for weeks to enter Gaza, and a warehouse is full of goods rejected by Israeli inspectors, everything from water testing equipment to medical kits for delivering babies, two U.S. senators said Saturday after a visit to the border.
Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Jeff Merkley pointed to a cumbersome process that is slowing relief to the Palestinian population in the besieged territory — largely due to Israeli inspections of aid cargos, with seemingly arbitrary rejections of vital humanitarian equipment. The system to ensure that aid deliveries within Gaza don’t get hit by Israeli forces is “totally broken,” they said.
“What struck me yesterday was the miles of backed-up trucks. We couldn’t count, but there were hundreds,” Merkley said in a briefing with Van Hollen to a group of reporters in Cairo.
The U.S. has been pressing Israel for weeks to let greater amounts of food, water, fuel, medicine and other supplies into Gaza, and the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution on Dec. 22 calling for an immediate increase in deliveries. Three weeks ago, Israel opened its Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza, adding a second entry point for aid after Rafah.
Still, the rate of trucks entering has not risen significantly. This week, an average of around 120 trucks a day entered through Rafah and Kerem Shalom, according to U.N. figures, far below the 500 trucks of goods going in daily before the war and far below what aid groups say is needed.
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Trump downplays Jan. 6 on the anniversary of the Capitol siege and calls jailed rioters 'hostages'
NEWTON, Iowa (AP) — Former President Donald Trump, campaigning in Iowa Saturday, marked the third anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol by casting the migrant surge on the southern border as the “real” insurrection.
Just over a week before the Republican nomination process begins with Iowa's kickoff caucuses, Trump did not explicitly acknowledge the date. But he continued to claim that countries have been emptying jails and mental institutions to fuel a record number of migrant crossings, even though there is no evidence that is the case.
“When you talk about insurrection, what they’re doing, that’s the real deal. That’s the real deal. Not patriotically and peacefully — peacefully and patriotically," Trump said, quoting from his speech on Jan. 6, before a violent mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol as part of a desperate bid to keep him in power after his 2020 election loss.
Trump's remarks in Newton in central Iowa came a day after Biden delivered a speech near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, where he cast Trump as a grave threat to democracy and called Jan. 6 a day when “we nearly lost America — lost it all."
With a likely rematch of the 2020 election looming, both Biden and Trump have frequently invoked Jan. 6 on the campaign trail. Trump, who is under federal indictment for his efforts to overturn his 2020 loss to Biden, has consistently downplayed or spread conspiracy theories about a riot in which his supporters — spurred by his lies about election fraud — tried to disrupt the certification of Biden's win.
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Senior Biden leaders, Pentagon officials unaware for days that defense secretary was hospitalized
WASHINGTON (AP) — Senior Biden administration leaders, top Pentagon officials and members of Congress were unaware for days that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had been hospitalized since Monday, U.S. officials said Saturday, as questions swirled about his condition and the secrecy surrounding it.
The Pentagon did not inform the White House National Security Council or top adviser Jake Sullivan of Austin’s hospitalization at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, until Thursday, according to two administration officials. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.
The Pentagon’s failure to disclose Austin’s hospitalization for days reflects a stunning lack of transparency about his illness, how serious it was and when he may be released. Such secrecy, at a time when the United States is juggling myriad national security crises, runs counter to normal practice with the president and other senior U.S. officials and Cabinet members.
Still, President Joe Biden spoke with Austin on Saturday, and expressed confidence in him, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly about internal discussions and spoke on condition of anonymity.
In a statement issued Saturday evening, Austin took responsibility for the delays in notification.
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Snow hinders rescues and aid deliveries to isolated communities after Japan quakes kill 126 people
WAJIMA, Japan (AP) — Rescue teams worked through snow to deliver supplies to isolated hamlets Sunday, six days after a powerful earthquake hit western Japan, killing at least 126 people. Heavy snowfall expected in Ishikawa Prefecture later Sunday and through the night added to the urgency.
After Monday’s 7.6 magnitude temblor, 222 people were still unaccounted for, and 560 people were injured. Hundreds of aftershocks have followed, rattling Noto Peninsula, where the quakes are centered.
Taiyo Matsushita walked three hours through mud to reach a supermarket in Wajima city to buy food and other supplies for his family. The home where he lives with his wife and four children, and about 20 nearby homes, are among the more than a dozen communities cut off by landslides.
Power was out, and in a matter of hours, they couldn’t even use their cell phones, he told Jiji Press.
“We want everyone to know help isn’t coming to some places,” Matsushita was quoted as saying by Jiji Press. “We feel such an attachment to this community. But when I think about my children, it’s hard to imagine we can keep living here."
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Fear of violence looms over a contentious Bangladesh election as polls open
DHAKA (AP) — Voters in Bangladesh began casting their ballots Sunday as polls opened in an election fraught with violence and a boycott from the main opposition party, paving the way for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Awami League to seize a fourth consecutive term.
Authorities said at least 18 arson attacks were reported across the country since late Friday, with 10 of them targeting polling places. Four people died Friday in an arson attack on a passenger train heading toward the capital, Dhaka. The incidents have intensified tensions ahead of the parliamentary elections that the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its allied groups said they would shun.
Campaigning in the South Asian nation of 169 million has been marred with violence as at least 15 people have been killed in recent months. Hostilities reached a boiling point in late October, after a massive rally in Dhaka by the BNP saw clashes with police.
As the election neared, authorities blamed much of the violence on the BNP, who they accuse of seeking to sabotage the election. On Saturday, detectives arrested seven men belonging to the BNP and its youth wing for their alleged involvement in the passenger train attack. The opposition party denied any role in the incident, and say they are being blamed by authorities who want to discredit their “peaceful and nonviolent movement.”
On Sunday morning, Hasina and her daughter voted amid tight security at Dhaka City College, as other citizens lined up outside to cast their ballot.
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A California law banning the carrying of firearms in most public places is blocked again
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A new California law that bans people from carrying firearms in most public places was once again blocked from taking effect Saturday as a court case challenging it continues.
A 9th Circuit Court of Appeals panel dissolved a temporary hold on a lower court injunction blocking the law. The hold was issued by a different 9th Circuit panel and had allowed the law to go into effect Jan. 1.
Saturday's decision keeps in place a Dec. 20 ruling by U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney blocking the law. Carney said that it violates the Second Amendment and that gun rights groups would likely prevail in proving it unconstitutional.
The law, signed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, prohibits people from carrying concealed guns in 26 types of places including public parks and playgrounds, churches, banks and zoos. The ban applies regardless of whether a person has a concealed carry permit.
Newsom has positioned himself as a leader on gun control and says he will keep pushing for stricter regulations.
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Nearly 3,000 pages of Jeffrey Epstein documents released, but some questions remain unanswered
NEW YORK (AP) — For nearly two decades, journalists, police detectives, FBI agents, lawyers and amateur sleuths have pried into the depraved world of Jeffrey Epstein.
Yet even after the release of thousands of pages of court records in recent days, some questions about the millionaire pedophile remain unanswered. The documents have gotten a lot of attention, but they shed little new light on the financier’s habitual sexual abuse of underage girls.
More than anything, the public is still fascinated with the possibility that some of the rich and powerful men in Epstein's social circle were also involved in the abuse.
Here's a look at what we know — and what we don't — about Epstein and his crimes:
JETSETTER TO CONVICT
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Winter weather batters both US coasts; Sierra snow shuts down I-80; East Coast storm into Monday
BOSTON (AP) — Winter weather battered both U.S. coasts Saturday as New Englanders braced for an even more potent mix of snow and freezing rain through the weekend and a Sierra Nevada storm packing heavy snow shut down a stretch of interstate and briefly knocked out power to tens of thousands in Reno, Nevada.
Winter storm warnings and watches were in effect throughout the Northeast, and icy roads made for hazardous travel as far south as North Carolina.
The National Weather Service said it was a “major winter storm” that would continue into Sunday evening, with up to a foot (30 centimeters) of snow in parts of New England and pockets of rain/freezing rain in the central Appalacians.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said she expected two-thirds of her state to get 8 inches (20 centimeters) of snow or more, “fortunately missing some of our more populated areas downstate, the Long Island and New York City.”
“If they get anything beyond rain, it’ll be just a wintry mix of 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5 centimeters), but really for our Southern Tier ... it’s going to be the first major snowstorm of the year and we’re ready for it,” she told Spectrum News.
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