May 26, 2020 9:32 am
BANGKOK (AP) – As Brazil and India struggle with surging coronavirus cases, a top health expert is warning that the world is still smack in the middle of the pandemic. Those comments from Dr. Mike Ryan of the World Health Organization are dampening hopes for a speedy global economic rebound. A U.S. travel ban takes effect Tuesday for foreigners coming from Brazil. On top of that, the South American country got a warning from the U.N. health agency not to reopen its economy before it can perform enough tests to control the spread of the coronavirus. India reported a record single-day jump in new infections for the seventh straight day and Russia had a record number of daily coronavirus deaths.
May 26, 2020 4:21 am
O’FALLON, Mo. (AP) – Missouri’s health director has issued a dire warning after photos and video showed Memorial Day weekend revelers partying close together: The coronavirus is still here, and the spreading of illnesses could have “long-lasting and tragic” results. One video on social media shows a crammed pool at Lake of the Ozarks, with people lounging and playing close together, without masks. The lake draws people from as far away as Arkansas and Iowa. It’s especially popular with travelers from St. Louis city and county, which combined account for more than half of Missouri’s confirmed cases and more than two-thirds of the state’s 685 deaths.
May 26, 2020 4:17 am
NEW CASTLE, Del. (AP) – Joe Biden has marked Memorial Day by laying a wreath at a park near his Delaware home. It was the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee’s first public appearance in more than two months. Biden and his wife, Jill, placed a wreath of white flowers tied with a white bow, and bowed their heads in silence at the park. It was a low-key, unannounced appearance, and there was no crowd waiting for him. Yet the appearance was a milestone in a presidential campaign that has largely been frozen by the coronavirus outbreak. Biden wore a mask, unlike Trump at his public events.
May 26, 2020 4:14 am
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – Four Minneapolis police officers who were involved in the arrest of a black man who died in police custody were fired Tuesday. The firings come a day after a bystander’s video showed the man pleading that he could not breathe as a white officer knelt on his neck and kept his knee there for several minutes after the man stopped moving. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey announced the terminations on Twitter, and said the firings were the “right call.” Monday’s death of George Floyd was under investigation by the FBI and state law enforcement authorities. It drew comparisons to the case of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man who died in 2014 in New York after being placed in a police chokehold. (Photo: CNN)
May 26, 2020 4:13 am
WASHINGTON (AP) – Two GOP governors are offering up their states to host the Republican National Convention, a day after President Donald Trump demanded assurances from North Carolina’s Democratic governor that the convention can go forward in August despite coronavirus fears. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp sent an open plea to Trump on Tuesday to consider his state as an alternate site. Kemp’s offer was followed by one from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, The convention is set to gather more than 2,500 delegates and thousands more guests, press and security officials. Plans have been underway for more than a year to hold it in Charlotte.
May 26, 2020 4:12 am
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) – Stormy weather is threatening to delay SpaceX’s first astronaut launch. A SpaceX rocket is scheduled to blast off Wednesday from Florida, carrying a Dragon capsule with NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken to the International Space Station. It will be the first time astronauts launch from the U.S. in nine years and a first for a private company. Forecasters put the odds of acceptable weather at 40%. But that doesn’t include the need for favorable conditions all the way up the U.S. and Canadian coasts and across the sea to Ireland. The Dragon’s emergency escape system can kick in, if necessary, all the way to orbit.
May 26, 2020 4:09 am
Jimmy Cobb, a percussionist and the last surviving member of Miles Davis’ 1959 “Kind of Blue” groundbreaking jazz album, has died. His wife, Eleana Tee Cobb, announced on Facebook that her husband died Sunday at his New York City home from lung cancer. He was 91. Born in Washington, D.C., Cobb was a drummer on the “Kind of Blue” jam session headed by Davis that also featured Cannonball Adderley and John Coltrane. It is the best-selling jazz album of all time. Cobb says he and his bandmates knew the album, released on Aug. 17, 1959, would be a hit. It has sold more than 4 million copies.
May 26, 2020 4:08 am
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) – A U.S. biotechnology company has begun injecting a coronavirus vaccine candidate into people in Australia with hopes of releasing a proven vaccine this year. A Novavax official says 131 volunteers will get an injection in the first phase of the trial testing the safety of the vaccine and looking for signs of its effectiveness. About a dozen experimental vaccines are in early stages of testing or poised to start. It’s not clear that any will prove safe and effective. But they use different methods and technologies, increasing the odds one might succeed. Novovax expects the results of the Australian trial to be known in July and it’s making more doses in anticipation the vaccine will work.
May 26, 2020 4:06 am
MOSCOW (AP) – The Russian military says one of its helicopters has crash-landed on an airfield in the far eastern Chukotka region, killing four people. The Defense Ministry said the crash Tuesday involving a Mi-8 helicopter may have been caused by a technical malfunction. áThe region’s governor says three crew members and a technician on board died in the crash. It’s the second fatal incident with a military Mi-8 helicopter in a week. On May 19, another Mi-8 crash-landed near the town of Klin, 90 kilometers (56 miles) from Moscow, killing all three crew members. The Mi-8 is a multipurpose, medium twin-turbine helicopter, originally designed in the Soviet Union and now produced by Russia.
May 26, 2020 4:03 am
PITTSBURGH (AP) – Authorities in western Pennsylvania are investigating vandalism of a Pittsburgh war memorial on the eve of Memorial Day. The statue of a World War I doughboy in the city’s Lawrenceville neighborhood was splashed with red paint during the night. Public Safety Director Wendell Hissrich said vandalizing a memorial was wrong on any day but was “incomprehensible” on Memorial Day. He vowed that city police “will vigorously investigate this crime.” Police spokeswoman Cara Cruz said Monday that investigators are reviewing “all available video footage” from the area. She also said that arrangements are being made to clean the memorial.
