January 31, 2022 4:08 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) – Federal investigators are vowing to put a collapsed bridge in a Pittsburgh park “under a microscope” as they examine evidence. That includes video from a municipal bus that plummeted along the span, prompting rescuers to rappel down a ravine and form a human chain to reach a few occupants. Officials said 10 people, including some first responders, were evaluated and treated for minor injuries Friday morning, and three people were taken to local hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries. Federal officials on Saturday said they would examine the bridge’s “entire history” from design and construction, to maintenance and repair and all work up until the day of the collapse.
January 31, 2022 4:06 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) – The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation says the bridge that collapsed in Pittsburgh last week showed deterioration during a September inspection that wasn’t bad enough to require its closure. PennDOT spokesperson Alexis Campbell said Monday that state and federal laws and the ongoing investigation mean her agency won’t release the full inspection report. The Forbes Avenue bridge over Fern Hollow Creek in Frick Park collapsed early Friday. Five cars and a municipal bus plummeted into a ravine. A team from the National Transportation Safety Board used cranes on Monday to lift the Port Authority Bus out of the ravine. No one died in the collapse. (Photo: WPXI)
January 31, 2022 2:55 am
State Police in Washington say a SWAT situation near Claysville on Sunday ended late in the day. The situation began around eight o’clock Sunday morning when various law enforcement agencies and emergency responders were called to a home in the 100 block of Clarke Road for reports of a man barricaded inside. Several roads around the area were blocked off until late Sunday afternoon when State Police tell us the situation was resolved. No further details were immediately available.
January 30, 2022 8:19 am
CONROE, Texas (AP) — Former President Donald Trump is dangling the prospect of pardons for supporters who participated in the deadly Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol if he returns to the White House. “If I run and if I win, we will treat those people from January 6th fairly,” Trump said Saturday night during a rally in Conroe, Texas. “And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly.” The offer represents an attempt by Trump to further minimize the most significant attack on the seat of government since the War of 1812. Participants smashed through windows, assaulted police officers and sent lawmakers and congressional staff fleeing for their lives while trying to halt the peaceful transition of power and the certification of rival Joe Biden’s victory.
January 30, 2022 8:17 am
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — At President Joe Biden’s lowest moment in the 2020 campaign, South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn came to him with a suggestion: He should pledge to put the first Black woman on the Supreme Court. After some cajoling, Biden made the promise at a Democratic debate, a move Clyburn credits with turning out the Black support that helped Biden score a resounding victory in the South Carolina primary and ultimately win the White House. Two years later, the hoped-for vacancy on the court has arrived with the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer. Biden is standing by his pledge. And Clyburn, the highest-ranking Black member of Congress, has another ask. “Judge (Michelle) Childs has everything I think it takes to be great,” Clyburn said. As the lobbying begins over filling the open court seat, Clyburn is harnessing his history with Biden and his stature as the No. 3 House Democrat to make a forceful case for his preferred choice, U.S. District Judge J. Michelle Childs, a jurist from his native South Carolina. It’s a campaign he’s making in public and in private, helping elevate Childs to an emerging short list of Black women who could soon make history. In addition to Childs, early discussions about a successor include California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger, as well as Ketanji Brown Jackson, a former Breyer clerk who is now on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Biden is also looking at U.S. District Court Judge Wilhelmina Wright from Minnesota and Melissa Murray, a New York University law professor who is an expert in family law and reproductive rights justice.
January 30, 2022 8:12 am
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea on Sunday fired what appeared to be the most powerful missile it has tested since President Joe Biden took office, as it revives its old playbook in brinkmanship to wrest concessions from Washington and neighbors amid a prolonged stalemate in diplomacy. The Japanese and South Korean militaries said the missile was launched on a lofted trajectory, apparently to avoid the territorial spaces of neighbors, and reached a maximum altitude of 2,000 kilometers (1,242 miles) and traveled 800 kilometers (497 miles) before landing in the sea. The flight details suggest the North tested its longest-range ballistic missile since 2017, when it twice flew intermediate-range ballistic missiles over Japan and, separately, three intercontinental ballistic missiles that demonstrated the potential to reach deep into the American homeland.
January 30, 2022 8:11 am
BOSTON (AP) — Gusty winds and falling temperatures plunged the East Coast into a deep freeze as people dig out after a powerful nor’easter dumped mounds of snow, flooded coastlines and knocked out power to tens of thousands. Dangerous wind chills fell below zero in many locations across the region on Sunday after the storm dumped snow from Virginia to Maine. Philadelphia and New York had plenty of snow, but Massachusetts bore the brunt of the storm, with the town of Sharon getting more than 30 inches of snow before the storm moved out. The wind continued raging as over 100,000 lost power, mostly in Massachusetts, hampering crews’ ability to work on overhead lines. No other states reported widespread outages. Winds gusted as high as 83 mph on Cape Cod in Massachusetts. It scoured the ground bare in some spots and piled the snow into huge drifts in others. Coastal towns flooded, with wind and waves battering North Weymouth, south of Boston, flooding streets with a slurry of frigid water, according to video posted on social media. Other videos showed a street underwater on Nantucket and waves crashing against the windows of a building in Plymouth.
January 30, 2022 8:01 am
PITTSBURGH (WPXI)— A team of more than a dozen investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board arrived in Pittsburgh late Friday. Their mission: comb through the debris field left behind to find out why the bridge at Frick Park crumbled. On Friday evening the crew peered out over what once was a bustling thoroughfare for people in the city’s eastern neighborhoods. A crash reconstructionist is on the way and that the team first needs to map the entire area. The NTSB is in charge of investigating significant events related to transportation and infrastructure, finding out how and why incidents happened, preventing them from happening again and to document the scene. The investigator in charge, Dennis Collins, said they will coordinate with local agencies, map the scene and then start removing concrete, steel and vehicles left in the ravine. While too early to tell what happened in this case, Collins described the investigation as “removing layers of an onion.” He said engineers will start by looking for signs of stress in the materials of the bridge, signs of fracture, signs of deterioration and even signs of rust. Collins said every collapse is different and they will not know anything until they get into the debris. NTSB officials said they aim for 12-18 months to complete an investigation but it could be longer depending on the difficulty.
January 30, 2022 1:23 am
Several fire companies were called out to a structure fire in Nottingham Township Friday night. Fire engines from Valley Inn, Finleyville and North Strabane responded to a garage fire on Rocky Lane. The garage was located about 20 yards from a house and fire fighters had the fire under control in about an hour. Water used from fighting the fire caused slick roads and salt trucks were deployed. There were no reported injuries. (Photo credit: North Strabane Twp. Fire Dept. Facebook Page)
January 29, 2022 9:37 am
BANGKOK (AP) – The army takeover in Myanmar a year ago that ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi unexpectedly aborted the ongoing restoration of representative democracy in the Southeast Asian country after decades of military rule. But at least as surprising has been the level of popular resistance to the seizure of power, which has blossomed into a low-level but persistent insurgency. Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, the commander of Myanmar’s military, seized power on the morning of Feb. 1, 2021, arresting Suu Kyi and top members of her government and ruling National League for Democracy party, which had won a landslide election victory in November 2020.
