September 6, 2023 5:11 am
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has arrived in Kyiv on an unannounced visit, hours after Russia launched its first missile attack in a week against the Ukrainian capital. Blinken’s trip Wednesday aimed to assess Ukraine’s 3-month-old counteroffensive and signal continued U.S. support for Kyiv’s efforts to drive out the Kremlin’s forces after 19 months of war. Some of Ukraine’s Western allies have expressed concerns over the pace of the counteroffensive’s progress. Washington officials said possible alternative export routes for Ukrainian grain will also be discussed following Russia’s exit from the Black Sea Grain Initiative and its frequent bombardment of port facilities in the Odesa region from where most grain is transported abroad.
September 6, 2023 5:09 am
GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. weather agency says Earth endured its hottest Northern Hemisphere summer ever measured with a record warm August capping a season of brutal and deadly temperatures. Last month was not only the hottest August scientists ever recorded by far with modern equipment. It also was the second hottest month measured, behind only July 2023. That’s according to the World Meteorological Organization and the European climate service Copernicus. August was about 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, warmer than pre-industrial averages — the warming threshold that the world is trying not to pass.
September 6, 2023 5:08 am
HONOLULU (AP) — Lawyers for residents and business owners of the Hawaiian town devastated by last month’s fires on Maui told a court that cable TV and telephone companies share in responsibility for the disaster. The attorneys made the statements Tuesday, saying the companies allegedly overloaded and destabilized some of the power poles. The lawyers said the cables were attached in a way that put too much tension on the poles, causing them to lean and break in the winds on Aug. 8 when flames burned down much of Lahaina, killing at least 115 people and destroying more than 2,000 structures.
September 6, 2023 5:07 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio has been sentenced to 22 years in prison for orchestrating a failed plot to keep Donald Trump in power after the Republican lost the 2020 presidential election. Tuesday’s sentencing caps one of the most significant prosecutions over the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Tarrio’s sentence is the longest so far among more than 1,100 Capitol riot cases. Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and former Proud Boys leader Ethan Nordean each received 18 years for their Jan. 6 convictions. Tarrio’s defense attorneys asked for no more than 15 years in prison, and told reporters after the hearing that they will appeal.
September 6, 2023 5:04 am
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Philadelphia’s mayor says the city’s police commissioner, Danielle Outlaw, will step down this month to take a leadership position with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Outlaw leaves after a turbulent three years on the job that spans the country’s recent clashes over race and policing. She leaves as Mayor Jim Kenney’s two terms in office wind down. Outlaw, the first Black woman to run the 6,000-member police department, came to Philadelphia from Portland, Oregon. Democratic mayoral candidate Cherelle Parker is praising Outlaw’s tenure while acknowledging there will be a sea of Monday morning quarterbacks second-guessing her decisions.
September 6, 2023 5:02 am
KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. (AP) — Authorities have moved and expanded the search area for a convicted murderer who escaped from a suburban Philadelphia prison last week. That came after 34-year-old Danelo Cavalcante was spotted on a trail camera at one of the nation’s premier botanical gardens. Cavalcante has been spotted five times since he escaped Thursday morning from the Chester State Prison. The most recent siting came Monday night at Longwood Gardens, where surveillance video captured him walking with a duffel bag, backpack and hooded sweatshirt. That sighting led officials to move the search area farther south after they determined that Cavalcante had likely slipped through the original perimeter, but they said his movements show he’s feeling the pressure of the massive search.
September 6, 2023 4:53 am
BELLE VERNON, Pa. — (WPXI) – The Belle Vernon Area School Board voted 8-1 to hire Timothy Glasspool as the district’s next superintendent. The decision was viewed by some parents and community members as controversial. Several parents and community members spoke out during the meeting, concerned with Glasspool’s past. He was the Plum School District Superintendent during a teacher-student sex scandal in 2015. Three teachers pleaded guilty to having sex with students. Glasspool resigned in 2017 and was hired as superintendent a year later at Penncrest School District in Northwestern Pennsylvania. Glasspool declined to answer questions from reporters, speaking only during the meeting, briefly. Glasspool is set to begin in his new role on Oct. 2. His contract runs through June 2027.
September 6, 2023 2:44 am
Washington County District Attorney Jason Walsh announced the arrest of a Monongahela man after he allegedly beat his girlfriend and mother over the Labor Day weekend. Wayne Fedrick, 52 is accused of the September 2 beatings after Carroll Township Police, backed up by Monongahela Police found victims Heather Ferguson and Madlynn Fedrick beaten and bloodied in and around their Grant Road residence. Ferguson met police and alerted them to Fedrick lying on the floor of the home. A search of the home found Wayne Fedrick passed out in a bed in the basement of the home with his clothes covered in blood. Police arrested Fedrick and during his transport to jail, Fedrick admitted to being intoxicated and not remembering the incident. Fedrick is in the Washington County Jail facing charges of attempted homicide, aggravated assault, simple assault and reckless endangerment. His preliminary hearing is scheduled for September 13.
September 5, 2023 1:51 pm
PLUM, Pa. — (WPXI)-The Safety Division of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) finds public utility equipment didn’t cause a house explosion in Plum in 2022. The findings of this explosion were issued less than a month after another home exploded in Plum, killing six and damaging at least a dozen homes. The 2022 explosion happened at Hialeah Drive. Five people were hurt, one home was destroyed and several others damaged. In its investigation, PUC said pipeline safety engineers conducted many interviews, examined evidence and property records and monitored service restorations and repairs around the explosion site. PUC said the safety division “has not found any evidence” that public utility caused the explosion and found “no incitations of natural gas migrating through the soil around the incident site.” The focus of any further review of this incident involves the interior of the residence, which is outside the scope of the PUC’s jurisdiction and is subject to investigation by other agencies. This explosion is one of three in recent history in Plum. In addition to the 2023 explosion, there was one in 2008. That explosion happened along Mardi Gras Drive in Plum, killing a man and seriously injuring a 4-year-old girl. The National Transportation Safety Board investigated and discovered it was caused by a two-inch gas line that was damaged and then failed five years later after it corroded.
September 5, 2023 5:17 am
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — President Joe Biden says he doesn’t think an auto workers union strike is going to happen and tells a crowd gathered in Philadelphia for a Labor Day parade he’s celebrating union jobs. The Democratic president was at the Tri-State Labor Day Parade on Monday. This Labor Day comes against the backdrop of increasingly emboldened U.S. unions and a potential strike by 146,000 United Auto Workers union members. Biden tells reporters he doesn’t think the UAW members will strike. Biden likes to say he’s the most pro-union president ever. The president has used executive actions to promote worker organizing and has authorized federal funding to aid union members’ pensions.
