(NEW YORK) — More than 70 million people in 23 states from California to Connecticut are under flood, heavy snow, blizzard and high wind alerts on Friday as multiple storms move across the country.
By Friday morning, more than 4 inches of rain had already fallen in Northern California, pushing rivers over their banks.
Heavy rain is expected to move into Southern California Friday morning with flooding possible north of Los Angeles in Santa Barbara. Rain will continue in Los Angeles into the evening and will begin to taper off on Saturday.
A flash flood warning was issued for northwestern San Luis Obispo County in southwestern California and will remain in effect until Friday 10 p.m. local time.
Between 2 to 5 inches of rain has fallen in many areas of California, with local amounts upward of 7 inches in the mountains. An additional 4 to 8 inches of rain are possible throughout the day.
There is the potential for especially dangerous flooding by late Friday morning, according to the National Weather Service.
A flash flood warning was in place Friday morning for central Santa Cruz County in Northern California due to heavy rain falling in the San Lorenzo River near Big Trees. The river was rapidly rising and is expected to be in a major flood stage.
But California is not done with rain after this storm. More rain is expected in Northern California over the weekend and into next week.
Heavy snow fell near Redding, California, on Friday shutting down parts of Interstate 5. Some of the heavy snow from the California mountains will move into the Rockies, where a winter storm warning and an avalanche watch have been issued.
Locally, the Rockies could see 1 to 2 feet of snow, with the Sierra Nevada Mountains seeing additional 3 to 4 feet this weekend.
Snow for Midwest and Northeast as well
Part of the western storm will move east over the weekend, bringing blizzard conditions to the Upper Midwest and the Northern Plains.
In the East, a separate storm system is moving from the Great Lakes into the Northeast with heavy, wet snow.
A winter weather advisory is in place in Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, where some areas could see several inches of snow overnight. New York City could see up to an inch of snow by Saturday morning.
To the south, severe thunderstorms are possible with damaging winds, few tornadoes and large hail. Oklahoma and Arkansas will be in the bull’s-eye on Saturday.
On Sunday, severe weather will impact an area from Mississippi to Georgia, including Jackson; Birmingham, Alabama; and just south of Atlanta. Damaging winds and hail will be the biggest threat.
(NEW YORK) — The three men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery have filed appeals against their hate crime convictions.
According to court documents filed on March 3, Gregory McMichael and William Bryan argue that race did not factor into their decisions to chase and shoot Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, on Feb. 23, 2020.
Travis McMichael’s appeal focuses on whether the streets where Arbery was shot were controlled by the county.
Arbery was killed in Brunswick, Georgia, after Travis and Gregory McMichael saw Arbery jogging in their neighborhood and chased after him.
The McMichaels say they believed Arbery had been responsible for several trespassing incidents in the neighborhood.
Bryan joined the chase in his own truck, blocking Arbery from escaping, and recorded video of Travis McMichael shooting Arbery after a brief struggle.
Travis McMichael and his father Gregory were sentenced to life in prison on the federal hate crime charges.
Bryan was sentenced to 35 years.
After Travis McMichael shot Arbery, Bryan told investigators he heard Travis yell a racist epithet as Arbery lay dying on the pavement. While it is not illegal to use racial slurs, “these slurs can provide you with evidence as to why a defendant did what he did,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Bobbi Bernstein said in court.
FBI analyst Amy Vaughn also testified that she found a digital onslaught of messages and online posts from the three men in which they allegedly routinely used racial slurs to describe Black people and advocated violence against them.
Gregory McMichael’s legal team has argued that McMichael chased Arbery because he believed Arbery was the person seen in security footage trespassing on properties in the neighborhood.
“The fact that Mr. Arbery was Black was merely a characteristic shared with the person seen on the security footage, a fact of no greater import to Gregory McMichael’s calculus than Mr. Arbery’s biological sex, the shorts he was wearing, his hairstyle, or his tattoos,” the appeal read. “Mr. Arbery’s race was only relevant because it matched the race of the man on the home security footage.”
During the trial, evidence from Bryan’s alleged Facebook posts and past texts also presented a repeated history of racist, demeaning comments against the Black community and use of racial slurs.
Bryan and his legal team argue that’s not enough to convict him under hate crime charges.
“Evidence that a criminal defendant has previously espoused racist views is the most prejudicial evidence imaginable, and for good reason is almost never allowed in criminal trials,” Bryan’s appeal read. “There was no evidence presented that Bryan intended to deprive Arbery of his right to use a public roadway, and none that he acted with conscious intent because of Arbery’s race or color.”
(NEW YORK) — A series of rail cars that Norfolk Southern recently put into service have been discovered to have defective, loose wheels.
These defective wheel sets were involved in one of the several recent derailments Norfolk Southern has had, including the most recent one in Springfield, Ohio.
Norfolk Southern first identified the defective wheels during the cleanup at Springfield — the day after the derailment — on March 5.
Norfolk Southern determined that this “specific model and series of railcars had loose wheels, which could cause a derailment,” the company confirmed in a statement to ABC. “The investigative team identified these wheels as coming from a series of recently acquired cars from a specific manufacturer.”
The catch comes as the company already faces intense scrutiny for its string of high-profile derailments and other incidents.
The company said they “immediately notified” the NTSB and the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) once they found the issue “and began inspecting other cars from this series on our network” which led them to discover additional cases of “unusual wheel movement.”
Norfolk Southern issued orders to take the cars with these wheels out of service until the wheelsets could be replaced, and are removing the model and series from service for inspection. The company also says they notified the manufacturer and “worked urgently” to inform the rest of the railroad industry since these wheelsets are not proprietary to Norfolk Southern.
“Norfolk Southern will continue to investigate this matter and take appropriate action,” the company said in their statement.
The Association of American Railroads has now issued guidance to pull relevant cars off the tracks and inspect them — and to immediately replace suspect wheelsets with new ones.
“A member railroad has experienced three loose wheels” in cars that are of “new builds,” their advisory, reviewed by ABC, said.
An AAR spokesperson confirms to ABC that the “member railroad” they refer to is indeed Norfolk Southern.
The spokesperson called this an “uncommon defect” as well as one that “demanded urgent action.”
“This is a voluntary, proactive step aimed at ensuring equipment health and integrity,” the spokesperson said.
AAR’s advisory says to “inspect and remove from service” the wheelsets mounted by National Steel Car between August 2022 and March 2023.
“These wheelsets are at an increased risk of an out of gage derailment,” AAR’s advisory reads. “All cars included in this advisory must be inspected for the wheelsets in question and reported as outlined below. Any cars, loaded or empty, found so equipped must have the NSC-T mounted wheel sets removed immediately as directed below. If available, replace suspect wheel sets with new wheel sets.”
“Yesterday, Norfolk Southern identified loose wheels on a series of cars that presents an increased risk of an out of gage derailment. Today, AAR through its committee structure took expeditious action and has issued an advisory to stop cars with these wheels from use and interchange until those wheel sets can be replaced,” the spokesperson said.
ABC News has reached out to National Steel Car for comment.
(WRIGHTSBORO, N.C.) — A car has crashed through the terminal of Wilmington International Airport after driving through a fence and onto the airport’s tarmac on Thursday night, according to a statement from airport officials released late Thursday.
According to local outlets, the car breached the fence line at the airport and drove onto the tarmac. The car then reportedly retreated from the tarmac and the driver was engaged by police.
The car ultimately ended up inside the terminal after crashing through doors and windows and the driver was subsequently detained by police.
“This evening, an automobile breached the airport. No one from the public was injured. New Hanover County Sherriff’s office responded swiftly, detained the individual, and is coordinating with partner agencies,” read a statement from Wilmington International Airport. “The airport is open and had minimal impact to operations. ILM expects to be fully operational by the morning.”
Photos from the scene showed a vehicle with significant front-end damage inside the terminal of the airport with broken glass and debris covering the floor of the airport terminal.
Authorities have not released the identity of the driver or give further details on exactly how the suspect was able to breach the fence of the airport.
Charges are expected to be filed in this case and the investigation into the incident is ongoing.
Clara McMichael and Amanda Maile contributed to this report.
(BURNINGTOWN, N.C.) — Four people are alive after a medical helicopter that was transporting a patient crashed in Macon County, North Carolina, on Thursday evening, according to Warren Cabe, Director of Macon County Emergency Services.
Three crew members were transporting a patient from a medical facility in Murphy, North Carolina, to Mission Hospital in Asheville when it crashed in Burningtown at around 7 p.m., according to Director Cabe.
Three of the people on board were transported to Mission Hospital with minor to moderate injuries, Cabe said. One other person on board was transported to Angel Medical Center in Franklin, North Carolina.
While there was no fire, the helicopter sustained “severe damage,” said Cabe.
A section of Middle Burningtown Road will be closed until at least late day on Friday as investigators sift through the wreckage and work to determine the cause of the accident, authorities confirmed.
The Erlanger Health System spokesperson said only preliminary details were available but that this is the first crash in the LIFE FORCE program’s 34-year history, according to ABC News’ Asheville affiliate WLOS.
According to LIFE FORCE Air Medical, the company began operating out of Andrews, North Carolina, in August 2017 when it opened a base at the Western North Carolina Airport, WLOS said. LIFE FORCE operates two air-bus helicopters out of the base.
Authorities will continue processing the scene on Friday to determine the cause of the accident and the investigation is ongoing.
The failing septic tank buried behind Mautree Burke’s home causes sewage to rise to the surface of her backyard. — USDA
(NEW YORK) — After years of dealing with unsanitary wastewater conditions in and outside of their homes, some residents in the predominately African American Black Belt region of Alabama allege the state agency tasked with distributing funds to fix faulty septic systems has been slow to repair tanks and sewage lines.
Some residents have reported wastewater rising from the ground into their yards and entering their homes through pipes. This has been an ongoing problem for decades in the area, according to the Center of Rural Enterprise and Environmental Justice (CREEJ). Now, residents and multiple organizations are taking action to try and clean up their community.
CREEJ joined the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Southern Poverty Law Center to file a complaint against the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) on Monday alleging the state agency is withholding funds, particularly from Black communities, that can be used to install and maintain water sanitation systems for those who need it the most.
“This complaint is incorrect and misleading,” Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey’s office told ABC News through a statement. “I suggest checking out the facts: https://alabamawaterprojects.com/“.
The director of the ADEM, Lance LeFleur, denies any racial bias in the allocation of funds.
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“I will tell people day in, day out, we do not, in any way, have any discrimination in this department,” LeFleur told ABC News. “The results are what matters. That’s what counts.”
The results that LeFleur is referring to are the $157 million he said the ADEM has committed to the Black Belt region, which is an area where a majority of the residents are African American and has some of the highest poverty rates in the country, according to experts from the University of Alabama. That’s 34% of the total funds the ADEM currently has for wastewater management for the entire state, he said. According to LeFleur, the Black Belt makes up 10.6% of Alabama’s total population.
According to LeFleur, Alabama is expected to receive up to $1 billion for failing infrastructure in Alabama, partly through President Joe Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure bill but the state would need about $3 billion to fix all of their infrastructure issues, according to LeFleur.
But LeFleur said the money they’ve allocated so far hasn’t been implemented yet and plans on where to use it are still in development. LeFleur estimates about half of the homes in the Black Belt use their own septic systems, as opposed to a centralized system.
Currently, at least 30,000 homes have failing systems in the region and the ADEM has only been able to work with about 150 – 200 homes to install working systems in the last year, according to LeFleur.
Mautree Burke, 26, who said she lives on land in rural White Hall, Alabama, that was once used as a campsite for civil rights marches in the 60s, said she hasn’t seen any of that aid and is struggling to keep raw sewage from spewing over that same land.
She said wastewater is coming from a failing septic tank buried in her backyard and this is a problem many residents in her town are dealing with. Some residents don’t have a septic tank, but only pipes that carry wastewater from their houses directly into their yards, according to Burke.
“Sometimes, it’ll get clogged,” Burke said when describing an issue with a neighbor’s home, which she said has pipes. “And they’ll sometimes try to go unclog it with a stick or a pole so it can try to run again. And I’ll tell you this, who wants to do that?”
Burke lives in the Black Belt region in a home with her husband, three children and mother.
The region, which spans across several states in the South, was named for its black, fertile soil. The dense earth renders many existing wastewater systems ineffective, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Burke said her family can’t afford to pay the $10,000 – $15,000 she estimates it would cost to fix a crack in her 30-plus-year-old septic tank.
“That would help us tremendously,” Burke said when asked how a working septic tank would improve her and her family’s lives. “We wouldn’t have to worry about the system backing up or sewage coming into the house. The kids, they don’t go into the backyard, but they would be able to play more outside.”
The founder of CREEJ, Catherine Coleman Flowers, said she grew up in the Black Belt and had to deal with failing septic tanks in her home growing up.
“I mean, we live in the United States of America, for God’s sake,” Flowers told ABC News. “Nobody in this country should have sewage running back into their homes, or not be able to have it adequately treated, so that they can live in a healthy and safe environment.”
Flowers alleges the ADEM has the funds to alleviate Alabama’s septic system problem through Alabama’s Clean Water State Revolving Fund, but it is withholding the funds from the majority African American Black Belt region of Alabama. A claim, which the agency denies.
“I know there is people around here who care,” Burke said. “But I would say put their selves in our shoes that’s dealing with this situation. They’re taking like baby steps. They’re not in like a big hurry to do anything.”
(NEW YORK) — A member of a threatened owl species couldn’t resist the chance to join vacationers aboard a cruise liner, evading capture for weeks.
A “wayward” burrowing owl hitched a ride on the Royal Caribbean International’s Symphony of the Seas and remained on board for two weeks, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conversation Commission said on Facebook.
Throughout its stay, the owl made his presence known to other guests by perching on exit signs, resting on railings and peaking through planters, according to the state wildlife agency.
Biologist Ricardo Zambrano was brought on board after receiving a call from the ship’s environmental officer.
During the one-hour window of time between passengers disembarking and new passengers arriving for the next cruise to Mexico, Zambrano placed mist nets around the owl’s perch of choice, according to FWC.
The third attempt of capture was the charm. As the owl sat on a balcony on the 10th floor, crew members standing below made noise to distract it while Zambrano snuck up behind the bird of prey and safely netted it from the railing, the agency said.
“After the amazing rescue, the cute little stowaway was safely assisted with the disembarkation process,” the conservation commission wrote. “He had nothing to claim in customs.”
The owl seemed to be in good health but was transported to the South Florida Wildlife Center as a precautionary measure.
Burrowing owl populations around the world are decreasing, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species. The owl species is listed as endangered in Canada and threatened in Mexico, according to the Burrowing Owl Conservation Network.
In the U.S., the burrowing owl is listed as endangered in Minnesota, threatened in Colorado and Florida and as a species of concern in Arizona, California, Montana, Oklahoma, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming, according to the network.
(NEW YORK) — The Manhattan district attorney’s office has informed former President Donald Trump of his right to testify before a grand jury investigating his role in a payment to porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 presidential election, sources familiar with the matter tell ABC News.
In New York, potential targets of investigations are, by law, given the chance to appear before the grand jury hearing evidence.
So-called “cross notice” was given to Trump in recent days, the sources said, and could be a sign that District Attorney Alvin Bragg is moving toward a charging decision.
“The Manhattan District Attorney’s threat to indict President Trump is simply insane,” a Trump spokesperson said in a statement. “President Trump was the victim of extortion then, just as he is now. It’s an embarrassment to the Democrat prosecutors, and it’s an embarrassment to New York City.”
In recent weeks ABC News has reported on the witnesses who have appeared before the grand jury, including former Trump associates Kellyanne Conway, Hope Hicks and Michael Cohen.
The district attorney has been probing whether Trump falsified business records in connection with a $130,000 payment made to Daniels before the 2016 election, which prosecutors allege was to keep her from talking about a long-denied affair, sources familiar with the matter have told ABC News.
(NEW YORK) — The mother of a missing 11-year-old girl asked a distant relative if he could help smuggle them away from their home because she was in a bad relationship with her husband and wanted a divorce, according to a search warrant obtained by ABC News.
Diana Cojocari, 37, and her husband have been charged after they took three weeks to report her daughter, 11-year-old Madalina Cojocari, was missing.
Cellphone data reviewed by police showed that Diane Cojocari contacted and had extensive communication with her distant relative, Octavian Cebanu, according to police. Cebanu made multiple phone calls to phone numbers belonging to unidentified targets who are involved in drug and narcotic trafficking investigations, police documents show.
Police conducted a canine search of Diane Cojocari’s car, during which the dog alerted to narcotics inside the passenger-side door. Police believe the car may have evidence of narcotics, drug paraphernalia or evidence of trafficking, according to the documents.
Several items were found inside the door, including a Moldova Agroindbank debit card belonging to Diana Cojocari; Madalina Cojocari’s Romanian and Moldovan passports; Diana Cojocari’s Romanian passport; and miscellaneous education and work certificates, according to the warrant.
On Dec. 15, 2022, Diana Cojocari went to her daughter’s school and told administrators that the 11-year-old had been missing since Nov. 23, 2022, according to authorities. Police were then alerted and responded to the school.
Diane Cojocari told police she last saw her daughter when she went to bed on Nov. 23, according to the warrant. Diane Cojocari said she then had an argument with her husband, Christopher Palmiter, that night and the next morning he left to drive to his family’s house in Michigan. When she went to check on her daughter the next day, she noticed she wasn’t in her room, the warrant showed.
Diane Cojocari said she waited until Palmiter, who is not Madalina’s birth father, returned to ask him if he had seen her daughter. He said he did not and asked her if she knew where the daughter was, according to the warrant.
A school official had attempted a home visit with a school counselor to check on the girl since she had not been to school for four days, the warrant said. No one answered the door and the official left a truancy packet.
Due to their failure to report that the 11-year-old was missing for three weeks, Cojocari and Palmiter were arrested on Dec. 17. They have both been charged with a felony.
The last confirmed public sighting of Madalina Cojocari was on Nov. 22, the FBI’s Charlotte bureau said. Bureau investigators released a video in December they said showed the girl getting off a school bus at her usual stop in Cornelius, a suburb north of Charlotte.
In December, police said the parents “clearly” knew more than they have been telling investigators.
(ATLANTA) — Protesters in Atlanta say they are hoping to reignite the energy from the 2020 racial reckoning during a rally they are calling their National Day of Action Against Police Terror on Thursday.
Across the country, anti-police brutality and racial justice activist groups will be hosting marches, teach-ins, and demonstrations against what they say is the militarization of police forces at the in-construction Atlanta Public Safety Training Center that critics are calling “Cop City.”
To culminate a weekslong effort, organizers will be holding a rally and march Thursday at 6 p.m. at the King Center, a center focused on nonviolent civil disobedience, in Atlanta.
Protesters argue the facility is “supporting the police narrative as opposed to finding alternatives to [policing]. Less people with guns, more actually interacting with the community,” Kamau Franklin, founder of Community Movement Builders and one of the lead organizers of #StopCopCity, told ABC News.
The #StopCopCity campaign is an effort to try and disrupt the construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, which will be used for specialized training for both law enforcement and fire department service workers.
The center will include an “auditorium for police/fire and public use,” a “mock city for burn building training and urban police training,” an “Emergency Vehicle Operator Course for emergency vehicle driver training,” a K-9 unit kennel and training, according to the center’s website. The first phase of the training center is scheduled to open in late 2023.
The facility is intended to “boost morale, retention and recruitment of our public safety personnel” as well as “give us physical space to ensure that our officers and firefighters are receiving 21st century training, rooted in respect and regard for the communities they serve,” according to former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.
The facility was approved last year with widespread support from local lawmakers, both Republicans and Democrats, and across all racial and ethnic lines.
But groups including the Movement for Black Lives, Black Voters Matter, Community Movement Builders and others are calling on Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens to “end the lease with Atlanta Police Foundation,” the organization behind the facility. The organization’s board members include representatives from major corporations, banks and companies.
Dickens recently created a community task force “to seek further community input and expert recommendations on key issues” amid the unrest, according to a press release from his office.
The training site has been at the center of yearslong tension between police and protesters.
Demonstrators argue that the center is further militarizing the police and may lead to more instances of police brutality and violence.
“Training is a misnomer,” Franklin said, pointing to the hundreds of hours of training that police convicted in murders are required to have received.
“We’ll continue to uplift and talk about the people who’ve been murdered by the police in the Black community, and how policing doesn’t work,” Franklin said.
Other demonstrators argue that the center’s construction will take over parts of the Weelaunee Forest, which Franklin says is “one of the most significant urban forests in the U.S., which borders a Black working-class neighborhood in Southeast Atlanta.”
Criticism over the new facility began initially with concerns that the city would need to tear down trees in one of Atlanta’s largest remaining green spaces. Across the city, signs that read “Defend the Atlanta Forest” sprung up in yards. The environmentalist movement Defend the Atlanta Forest is one of the groups leading protests against the facility.
The center is expected to cost $90 million and take up over 85 acres, with the “remaining portion of the 265-acres property as greenspace,” according to the center’s website.
Tensions came to a head with the fatal police shooting of Manuel Esteban Paez Terán in January, who was shot and killed by police as they raided the campground occupied by environmental demonstrators who had allegedly been camping out for months to protect the forest.
Officials say the protester fired the first shot at a state trooper, who was injured. Other law enforcement officers returned fire, hitting the man. There is no body camera footage of the incident. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is investigating the incident.
On March 5, more than 30 people were arrested after authorities say a group of “agitators” launched an attack on officers using fireworks, large rocks and Molotov cocktails following a music festival.
Twenty-three of the 35 protesters arrested Sunday were charged with felony domestic terrorism. Most of those protesters were from out of state, and one was from Canada and another from France.
No officers were injured during the incident, though police said that “the illegal actions” of protesters “could have resulted in bodily harm.” According to representatives from the racial justice organizations, the incident was not connected to the music festival and demonstration being held nearby.
The mayor’s office and the Atlanta Police Foundation has not responded to ABC News’ requests for comment. Atlanta Police officials directed ABC News to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, which declined to comment.
