(NEW YORK) — The first all-Black Mount Everest expedition team, Full Circle Everest, has reached the summit of the highest mountain on Earth, and their excitement can be felt from thousands of feet below.
The seven climbers who reached the summit include Manoah Ainuu, Eddie Taylor, Rosemary Saal, Demond “Dom” Mullins, Thomas Moore, James “KG” Kagami and Evan Green.
According to the team, their success nearly doubles the number of Black climbers who have climbed the mountain, which stands at more than 29,000 feet high.
“I am deeply honored to report that seven members of the Full Circle Everest team reached the summit on May 12,” said Full Circle Everest leader Philip Henderson. “While a few members, including myself, did not summit, all members of the climb and Sherpa teams have safely returned to Base Camp where we will celebrate this historic moment!”
This trek lures hundreds of climbers each year, but few Black climbers have made the trip. For these climbers, the treacherous climb represented the barriers Black communities face in accessing outdoor sports and spaces.
They hope to inspire the next generation of Black athletes, climbers and mountaineers to take themselves to new heights.
“My big goal with this project is to help demystify the process of climbing your Everest; it doesn’t necessarily need to be Everest,” Abby Dione, a member of Full Circle Everest, told ABC News.
Similarly, Eddie Taylor, another climber on the team, also hopes to be an inspiration for future outdoor sports athletes.
“Everest is still gonna be hard. It’s still going to be this big mountain, but it’s going to be something that you don’t feel like it’s unattainable.
The team tracked their journey on Flipgrid, as people from all across the world cheered on the history-making team.
The team was led by local Sherpa climbing guides, who help hundreds of mountaineers up Everest. The Full Circle Everest team said they could not have made this historic climb without their guidance.
(WASHINGTON) — The Food and Drug Administration and Abbott Nutrition have agreed on a plan to resume operations at its infant formula facility in Sturgis, Michigan, the company announced on Monday.
While the news will be welcomed by frustrated dealing who are struggling find formula on shelves, it still could be several more weeks before they see relief.
According to Abbott, the agreement with the FDA lays out “the steps necessary to resume production and maintain the facility” but remains subject to court approval. Abbott said that once the FDA gives it the official green light, it could restart operations at the site within two weeks and that it would take six to eight weeks after that before the product is back on shelves.
“Our number one priority is getting infants and families the high-quality formulas they need, and this is a major step toward re-opening our Sturgis facility so we can ease the nationwide formula shortage. We look forward to working with the FDA to quickly and safely re-open the facility,” said Robert B. Ford, chairman and chief executive officer of Abbott.
It’s estimated that Abbott Nutrition is one of only four companies that controls 90 percent of the market. The industry was already dealing with supply chain issues when federal inspectors found evidence of a deadly bacteria at the Sturgis plant and shut it down.
Abbott maintains that there is still no evidence linking its formula to four infant illnesses, which included two deaths.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(MYRTLE BEACH, S.C.) — Investigators in South Carolina have made a significant break in the case of a teen who went missing in 2009 while vacationing for spring break.
A suspect in the disappearance of Brittanee Drexel, who disappeared in 2009 after traveling to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, for spring break, has been arrested and charged with her murder after her remains were found in a wooded area in Georgetown County, South Carolina, last week, authorities announced at a news conference Monday.
“In the last week, we’ve confirmed that Brittanee lost her life in a tragic way, at the hands of a horrible criminal who was walking our streets,” said FBI special agent in charge Susan Ferensic.
Drexel was last seen on the night of April 25, 2009, as she was leaving a friend’s room at the Blue Water Resort to walk back to the hotel where she was staying — about a mile-and-a-half walk down the busy Myrtle Beach strip, ABC Rochester station WHAM reported.
She was about halfway to her destination when she is presumed to have disappeared, investigators believe, based on surveillance footage from cameras on 11th Avenue and Ocean Boulevard.
The suspect, Raymond Moody, 62, allegedly buried Drexel’s dead body, said Georgetown County Sheriff Carter Weaver. Her remains were found less than 3 miles from a motel where Moody had been living at the time of Drexel’s disappearance, Weaver said.
Moody is being held without bond at the Georgetown County jail and is expected to be charged with rape, murder and kidnapping — in addition to a charge of obstruction of justice that he was initially brought in for, said Jimmy Richardson, solicitor for Horry and Georgetown Counties.
Authorities did not answer reporters’ questions on how Drexel’s remains were found or what in the investigation led them to believe Moody was a suspect. In 2012, he had been identified as a person of interest in the disappearance, but there was not enough evidence to name him as a suspect, officials said.
Investigators believe Drexel was held against her will and killed.
Drexel’s parents, Dawn Pleckan and Chad Drexel, were in attendance at the press conference. There, they asked for privacy and thanked investigators and volunteers for their work over the past decade.
“This is truly a mother’s worst nightmare,” Pleckan said. “I am mourning my beautiful daughter Brittanee as I have been for 13 years. But today, it’s bittersweet. We are much closer to the closure in the piece that we have been desperately hoping for.”
Drexel would have been 30 years old on Monday, WHAM reported.
ABC News’ Joshua Hoyos contributed to this report.
Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
(LAGUNA WOODS, Calif.) — One person was killed and five were wounded in a shooting at a church in Laguna Woods, California, on Sunday, authorities said.
Four were critically hurt and one person suffered minor injuries from the shooting inside the Geneva Presbyterian Church, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office tweeted. All victims are adults and range in age from 66 to 92 years old, the sheriff’s office said.
A group of churchgoers detained the suspect and hogtied his legs with an extension cord and confiscated two handguns from him before more people could be shot, according to Jeff Hallock, undersheriff at the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.
“That group of churchgoers displayed what we believed exceptional heroism, heroism and bravery in interfering or intervening to stop the suspect,” Hallock said.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Department said later Sunday that it had arrested a suspect who was described as an Asian man in his 60s.
The man was taken into custody and two firearms were recovered at the scene, authorities said.
The suspect was identified Monday in Orange County jail records as 68-year-old Las Vegas resident David Chou. He has been charged with one count of murder and five counts of attempted murder and is being held on $1 million bail, jail records show.
Investigators are working to determine whether he has any connections to the church or its congregants.
“The Presbytery of Los Ranchos is deeply saddened by a fatal shooting that occurred at a lunch reception honoring a former pastor of the Taiwanese congregation that nests at Geneva Presbyterian Church in Laguna Woods,” Tom Cramer, Presbytery head of staff, said in a statement Sunday. “Please keep the leadership of the Taiwanese congregation and Geneva in your prayers as they care for those traumatized by this shooting.”
The suspect opened fire at a lunch banquet at the church following a morning service, Hallock said.
The shooting was reported at about 1:26 p.m. local time, authorities said.
Hallock said a motive and whether the suspect had an intended target is unknown.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the FBI are en route to assist local officials.
There were 30 to 40 people inside the church when the shooting began, officials said.
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — The city of Buffalo, New York, is grieving following a mass shooting at a Tops supermarket that left 10 people dead and another three wounded on Saturday.
Resident Myles Carter was just a few blocks from the scene that day, and the sounds of his neighbors crying out in agony over the news has been replaying in his head since the attack.
“It’s a heart-wrenching sound,” Carter told ABC News. “I heard that sound over and over and over again, for a long period of time.”
The attack, which authorities are calling a racially motivated hate crime, left the predominantly Black community shaken, residents say, but they remain strong in their efforts to take care of and protect one another in the face of white supremacy.
“We just need to go ahead and make plans to take care of ourselves because it is clear that these elected officials aren’t going to do it,” said Shaimaa Aakil, a community advocate in Buffalo.
A 180-page document believed to have been written by alleged shooter Payton Gendron describes racist motives behind the shooting, including “replacement theory,” a white supremacist belief that non-whites will eventually replace white people because they have higher birth rates.
In the document, he allegedly said he planned to attack the supermarket because it’s located in a predominantly Black neighborhood. It’s one of the only grocery stores available in the area, residents told ABC News.
In response, people working with community fridges, funds and food drives are stepping up to ensure that residents are cared for following an attack intended to erase them.
Residents say some non-Black community members are offering to get groceries for their Black neighbors, while some are stepping up as security for places of worship and community centers.
Taking care of each other is something Buffalo residents know how to do well, according to Herbert L. Bellamy Jr., a Buffalo native who lives down the road from Tops.
Bellamy, who also is president of Buffalo Black Achievers, said the neighborhood-grown efforts bring him comfort, knowing the community he knows and loves is taking care of itself.
“We’re a close-knit community, so we’re in touch with everyone,” Bellamy said. “We’ve worked hard to develop that neighborhood. Things like this can be a huge setback for our community, with a food desert and people not being able to shop for food.”
And though the community’s resilience is shining in this moment, others say they are tired of having to be resilient. They say real change needs to come from this moment.
“We shouldn’t be responding to this,” said Carter, who is also a local social justice activist. “We’ve got to fix the problems so that we don’t have to have a community response.”
The attack not only signaled the country’s radical alt-right movement, but also highlighted the way white supremacy has permeated the community’s basic functions, Carter said.
Residents ABC News spoke with say the fact that there are limited places to buy affordable, healthy food in a predominantly Black part of a highly segregated city highlights longstanding issues of race.
“Don’t let them make you believe that this is a one-time issue, an isolated event,” Aakil said. “A lot of elected officials right now are going to imply that this is not a problem that’s bred here, that he is from four hours away. But Buffalo has a really deep problem with segregation.”
The tragedy has spurred a city-wide movement against racism as locals call on leaders and citizens alike to address white supremacy in communities and institutions across the country.
“You feel it even though you’re not here,” Carter said. “If white supremacy can do this in the heart of liberal Buffalo, New York — we got a Black mayor. We have Black people on our common council. We’ve got Black people in our Erie County legislator.”
If it can happen there, he said, “it can happen anywhere in America.”
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — Law enforcement officials say the Buffalo, New York, supermarket shooting has underscored their long-held fear that someone could be radicalized online, have access to guns, take inspiration from prior attacks and then carry out an act of murderous violence against a soft target, like a grocery store.
Ten people — all of whom were Black — were killed in Saturday’s mass shooting in Buffalo in a rampage authorities are calling a “racially-motivated hate crime.”
The 180-page document believed to have been written by the Buffalo suspect, 18-year-old Payton Gendron, includes praise for the 2015 mass shooting at a Charleston, South Carolina, church where nine Black parishioners were gunned down.
Evidence points to the Buffalo shooting being a calculated, racially-motivated execution by a teenager who appeared to have been targeting Black people, according to multiple sources and a review of FBI cases and testimony. The hate-filled document apparently written by Gendron includes the radical notion that white people are being replaced in the U.S.
The teen gunman allegedly wanted a race war and livestreamed the attack in an apparent effort to spur others to kill minorities, sources said.
Law enforcement has had mounting concerns about so-called lone wolf killers — and white supremacists have been chief among them, sources said.
The FBI has warned that this trend has been increasing in violence: the 2015 Charleston church massacre targeting Black parishioners claimed nine lives; the 2018 mass shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue killed 11 people; and the 2019 mass shooting at an El Paso Walmart, targeting Hispanics, took 23 lives.
According to the FBI, domestic extremists — many of them racially motivated — have killed more people in the U.S. than any other group since 9/11, including internationally-inspired terrorists.
“Over the last several years the U.S. has experienced a sustained level of violence by individuals who self-connect with extremist causes — primarily through the consumption of online content — and who, independent of a terrorist or extremist organization, will go out and engage in mass casualty, violent attacks,” said ABC News contributor John Cohen, a former top official in the Department of Homeland Security.
Cohen noted several conditions that have converged to create this dangerous environment: the polarization of discourse in the U.S. where some people view those who disagree with them as the enemy; public figures mimicking violent extremists’ words; and an online ecosystem “saturated with conspiracy theories and other information” published with “the intention of sowing discord and inspiring violence.”
“Those are the conditions that have all come together to make … the most volatile, complex and dynamic threat environment I’ve experienced in 38 years,” Cohen warned. “It’s those dynamics that have law enforcement very concerned that this is a trend that not only will continue, but get worse.”
There’s also the pandemic factor. A bulletin from Orange County, California, authorities last year highlighted the impressionable nature of young people who’ve been largely isolated during the pandemic and are “radicalized online by racially motivated violent extremist propaganda.”
In Gendron’s document, he claimed he settled on his beliefs through what he found on the internet and that there was little to no influence on his beliefs by people he knew in person. The person Gendron said radicalized him the most was the gunman who attacked two mosques in New Zealand in 2019, killing 51 people.
Gendron has been arraigned on one count of first-degree murder and is due back in court on May 19.
As the investigation continues, Sunday worshippers at predominantly Black churches in New York City can expect to see additional police patrols. The shooting caused police to move resources to Black churches “to provide a visible presence in the event of any copycat but moreover to provide an air of protection and safety who go to the larger houses of worship,” the NYPD said.
The NYPD said there is no known threat to New York and described the shift of resources as a precaution.
ABC News’ Jack Date, Alex Mallin and Quinn Owen contributed to this report.
Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — Payton Gendron, the 18-year-old who allegedly gunned down 10 people — all of whom were Black — at a Tops grocery store in Buffalo, New York, would have continued his rampage had he not been stopped, Buffalo Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told ABC News.
“We have uncovered information that if he escaped the [Tops] supermarket, he had plans to continue his attack,” Gramaglia said. “He had plans to continue driving down Jefferson Ave. to shoot more Black people … possibly go to another store [or] location.”
Authorities are calling Saturday’s massacre a “racially motivated hate crime.”
“This was well-planned … by a sick person,” Gramaglia said.
Evidence points to Gendron self-radicalizing when the pandemic began, spending inordinate amounts of time engrossing himself on hate posts on social media, according to a senior law enforcement source briefed on the case.
Law enforcement assessed that in May 2020, the teen watched a 17-minute video of the gunman who attacked two mosques in New Zealand in 2019, killing 51 people.
In recent months and weeks, some of the items Gendron posted on social media became increasingly violent in tone, a senior law enforcement source said.
FBI Director Christopher Wray called the shooting a “hate crime and an act of racially motivated violent extremism” on a Monday call with state and local partners, according to a source familiar with the phone call.
“The FBI is committed to thoroughly and aggressively investigating Saturday’s attack,” Wray said, according to a source familiar with the call. “Racially motivated violence will not be tolerated in this country.”
Gendron underwent a mental health evaluation after he expressed a desire last June to carry out a murder-suicide. But he was still able to legally buy the semiautomatic rifle police said was used in the attack because no criminal charges resulted from his encounter with New York State Police.
Gramaglia told ABC News the nature of Gendron’s threat last June was “generalized” and included nothing specific.
Officers responded to the shooting scene within one minute and when they approached the suspect, the teen put his assault rifle to his neck, according to the commissioner.
The commissioner praised the responding officers who he said deescalated the situation and convinced the gunman to drop his weapon, saving countless lives.
Multiple high-capacity magazines were recovered on Gendron and in his car, the commissioner said. While he declined to say what evidence pointed to additional shooting plans, the commissioner said investigators have been going through his phone and other electronics.
The teen is from Conklin, New York, which is 200 miles east of Buffalo.
Police determined Gendron arrived in Buffalo on Friday via license plate reader and other evidence, the commissioner said. Police are still working to determine where he stayed overnight before Saturday’s attack.
Shonnell Harris Teague, an operations manager at Tops, said she saw Gendron sitting on a bench outside of the store on Friday afternoon. She said he was there for several hours with a camper bag on his back, dressed in the same camouflage outfit he wore Saturday.
She said Gendron entered the store Friday evening, and appeared as if he was bothering customers. Teague asked him to leave and he did so without an argument.
The next time Teague saw him was on Saturday as a mass shooting unfolded at her store. She escaped out of the back when she saw Gendron.
“I see him with his gear on and his gun and how it was all strapped on. … I seen all the other bodies on the ground. … It was just a nightmare,” she said.
Gendron has been arraigned on one count of first-degree murder and is due back in court on May 19.
Meanwhile, a Buffalo man, Joseph Chowaniec, has been charged with making terroristic threats after he allegedly referenced the supermarket shooting during threatening phone calls to a pizzeria and a brewery on Sunday, the Erie County District Attorney’s Office said.
“This crime will not be tolerated — especially as we are actively investigating the Jefferson Avenue shooting as a domestic terrorism incident,” Erie County District Attorney John Flynn said in a statement.
Chowaniec, 52, was arraigned on Monday and is set to return to court on May 20.
ABC News’ Pierre Thomas, Luke Barr and Miles Cohen contributed to this report.
(HOUSTON) — A fight between two groups of people led to a shooting Sunday that left two men dead and three others hurt at a busy Houston flea market, where thousands of people were shopping, authorities said.
The incident unfolded around 1 p.m. at the popular Sunny Flea Market held at the Tia Pancha Center in North Houston, according to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office.
All five people shot were involved in a fight and several are suspected of allegedly pulling guns and firing, sparking panic and causing innocent bystanders, including children, to run or dive for cover, the sheriff’s office said.
Deputies responding to the call found two men dead at the scene and three others critically wounded.
“A busy Sunday at the flea market with thousands of patrons when this incident went down,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement. “For now, it appears the wounded were all likely participants in the altercation.”
The sheriff’s office emphasized that the shooting was “not a random act of violence.”
“There is a lot of people … just trying to come out and enjoy the flea market, have something to eat and something to drink, so it’s very tragic,” said Maj. Susan Cotter, of the Harris County Sheriff’s Office.
No innocent bystanders were injured, Cotter said.
Two pistols were recovered at the scene, officials said.
Two possible suspects were detained at the scene and a third possible suspect was among those critically injured and taken to a hospital, according to the sheriff’s office.
The investigation is ongoing. One man who was uninjured was arrested for his alleged role in the shooting and charged with tampering with evidence, the sheriff’s office said. He was identified by the sheriff’s office as 27-year-old Angel Flores-Lopez.
Sheriff’s office investigators are combing over video and interviewing witnesses in an effort to identify the shooters, and determine what prompted the fight and shooting.
Family members of one of the men killed identified him as Juan Romero, 29, according to Houston ABC station KTRK-TV.
Romero’s sister, Yeraldi Romero, told KTRK that her brother went to the flea market to enjoy his Sunday, like any other weekend. She said her brother was with their cousin, who was one of those wounded and hospitalized.
“This tragedy happened and I don’t know why,” Yeraldi Romero said. “He always made everyone laugh, very happy, joyful, so it just really hurts because he’s my older brother and I look up to him. It’s very hard.”
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — The relatives of 86-year-old Ruth Whitfield, the oldest victim slain in this weekend’s mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, were overcome with emotion at a news conference on Monday.
Ruth Whitfield was a loving wife of 68 years, a devoted mother of four children and a beloved grandmother, her family said.
She was among the 10 people, all of whom were Black, who were gunned down in a mass shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York. Authorities are calling Saturday’s massacre a “racially motivated hate crime.”
Through tears and hugs, her family gathered on Monday to speak to reporters alongside attorneys including civil rights attorney Ben Crump. One family member broke down and sobbed multiple times during the news conference.
Ruth Whitfield went to visit her husband every day in the nursing home where he’s lived for eight years, one of her sons, Garnell Whitfield, a former Buffalo fire chief, told reporters.
He said he doesn’t know how to tell his father that his primary caretaker is gone.
“There’s nothing we can do that’s going to take away the hurt, take away these tears, take away the pain, take away the hole in our hearts. Because part of us is gone,” he said. “For her to be taken from us and taken from this world by someone that’s just full of hate for no reason … it is very hard for us to handle right now.”
He went on, “What I loved most about my mom is how she loved us, how she loved our family unconditionally. How she sacrificed everything for us.”
Daughter Robin Whitfield said, “My mom was my best friend. We went fishing together, we went camping together.”
To the shooter, she said, “How dare you?”
Daughter Angela called her mother an “86-year-old powerhouse. She was beautiful, she was immaculate and she loved us.”
Garnell Whitfield added: “We’re not just hurting — we’re angry … this shouldn’t have happened. We do our best to be good citizens … we believe in God, we trust him, we treat people with decency and we love even our enemies.”
He called out U.S. leaders for not protecting them and said he’s speaking out in hopes of contributing to positive change.
“We need help. We’re asking you to help us, help us change this. This can’t keep happening,” he said.
Garnell Whitfield told ABC News on Sunday that his mother went to the nursing home nearly every day. It was important to her to be “taking care of him, making sure he was well cared for by the staff, washing, ironing his clothes, making sure he was dressed appropriately, making sure his nails were cut and clean and shaved,” he said.
Even as her own health began to weaken, Ruth Whitfield still tried to visit her husband each day, taking days off only when she felt too debilitated to make the trip, her son said.
After suffering “a very difficult childhood,” Ruth Whitfield “was all about family” when she became a mother, Garnell Whitfield said.
“And she rose above it, and she raised us in spite of all of that, being very poor,” he said. “She raised us to be productive men and women.”
Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
(BUFFALO, N.Y.) — Payton Gendron, the alleged gunman who shot fatally 10 people in Buffalo, New York, on Saturday, would have continued his rampage if he had not been stopped, Buffalo Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia told ABC News.
“We have uncovered information that if he escaped the [Tops] supermarket, he had plans to continue his attack,” Gramaglia said. “He had plans to continue driving down Jefferson Ave to shoot more black people … possibly go to another store [or] location.”
Gendron, wearing military fatigues, body armor and a tactical helmet, allegedly shot four people in the parking lot of a Tops supermarket around 2:30 p.m. Saturday, three fatally. He proceeded inside the store where he was confronted by a retired Buffalo police officer working security, police said. The gunman then proceeded to shoot nine more people inside the store, police said.
All 10 victims who died in the attack were Black — six females and four males ranging in age from 32 to 86, law enforcement officials said. One of the wounded victims was Black while the two others were white, officials said.
The three survivors were hospitalized with non-life-threatening gunshot wounds, authorities said. Four of the shooting victims were store employees; the others were customers.
