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(LONDON) — At least three people were killed and four others were critically wounded in a shooting at a Copenhagen shopping mall on Sunday, authorities said.
Police responded to reports of a shooting at the Field’s shopping center in Denmark’s capital just before 5:30 p.m.local time on Sunday. A boy and girl, both 17-year-old Danish citizens, and a 47-year-old Russian man were killed when a gunman opened fire there, according to Copenhagen chief police inspector Søren Thomassen.
As of Monday, four people — two Danish and two Swedish citizens — remain hospitalized in critical but stable condition. Several others suffered minor injuries while fleeing the mall, Thomassen said.
The suspect — a 22-year-old man with a history of mental health issues — was arrested at the scene, according to Thomassen. The man was expected to be arraigned in a Danish court on Monday on preliminary charges of murder.
The deadly shooting remains under investigation. While a motive was unknown, Thomassen said the victims appeared to have been randomly targeted and the gunman was believed to have acted alone. There was also nothing to suggest terrorism, he said.
“There is nothing in our investigation, or the documents we have reviewed, or the things we have found, or the witnesses’ statements we have gotten, that can substantiate that this is an act of terrorism,” the police inspector told reporters during a press conference Monday.
(BATTLECREEK, Mich.) — One person is dead after an accident during the “pyrotechnic portion” of an air show in Michigan, police said.
The incident occurred Saturday shortly after 1 p.m. at the Battle Creek Field of Flight Air Show and Balloon Festival, held at Battle Creek Executive Airport.
Chris Darnell, 40, died while driving a race truck dubbed the Shockwave Jet Truck during the air show, police said in an update Saturday evening. The accident is under investigation.
Dramatic video by attendees of the air show captured the truck racing two aircraft on the runway before the accident occurred. A small fire behind the truck can be seen as the vehicle slides past a large fireball and crashes.
“Oh boy, we’ve got an incident here with our Shockwave out here at Air Show Center,” the announcer can be heard saying following the accident.
The Battle Creek Fire Department, Battle Creek Police Department and Federal Aviation Administration responded to the scene, police said.
Police have not released any further information amid the investigation.
The remainder of Saturday’s air show was canceled “out of respect for the incident that has occurred,” Battle Creek Field of Flight said in a statement. Saturday evening’s activities were scheduled to resume at the festival, which runs through Monday.
Shockwave, a custom-built race truck, is owned by Darnell Racing Enterprises, based in Springfield, Missouri. ABC News has reached out to the company for comment.
The truck, which was equipped with three flame-shooting jet engines, was capable of racing at over 350 mph, according to its owners. It frequently appeared at air show and drag racing exhibitions across the country.
Darnell was involved in motorsports “his entire life,” according to a bio on Darnell Racing’s website, and worked with his father in the business.
In a Facebook post Sunday, Neal Darnell described his son as a “family man” who leaves behind a wife and two daughters.
“We have lost our youngest son Chris in an accident doing what he loved; performing with Shockwave,” Neal Darnell wrote. “Chris so loved life and his huge air show and drag racing family.”
(HALTOM CITY, Texas) — Two people were shot and killed and four others injured, including three police officers, Saturday night in Haltom City, Texas, police said.
Sgt. Rick Alexander of Haltom City police said during a briefing that the three officers did not suffer any life-threatening injuries, as one officer was hit in the right arm, finger and leg, a second male officer was hit in both legs and a third officer was hit in the upper thigh.
At a press conference on Sunday, Alexander identified the three injured cops as Cpl. Zach Tabler, and officers Tim Barton and Jose Avila.
An elderly female had called 911 and police arrived at the residence, where officers returned fire during the incident, Alexander said. The elderly female sustained non-life-threatening injuries. A woman was found dead in the home and a man was found dead outside, Alexander said.
Officers said the elderly female’s call was crucial because they entered a situation where the gunman ambushed them.
“If they wouldn’t have been prepared, this situation could have turned out a lot worse,” Haltom City Police Chief Cody Phillips said. “There could have been several officers deceased over not being able to respond correctly.”
Alexander identified the suspected gunman as 28-year-old Edward Freyman. Police said they returned fire, forcing the suspect to flee. He was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said.
Freyman had a military style rifle and a handgun near him, according to the Haltom City Police Department.
The relationship between the victims and the shooter is not yet known, but officers confirmed that the three people — the two deceased and the suspected shooter — knew each another.
“The main concern is getting the scene secure, trying to get to our officers, be able to get them out of harm’s way while also trying to keep containment on the suspect,” Alexander said, WFAA reported.
The Texas Rangers are taking over the investigation.
ABC News’ Izzy Alvarez and Teddy Grant contributed to this report.
(HOUSTON) — A 5-year-old child was killed in a drive-by shooting on Sunday that also injured an 8-year-old in a Houston neighborhood, Houston Police said.
Police received several phone calls around 1 a.m., saying there was a shooting in the city’s Greenspoint area, but when they arrived, they didn’t find anything, Asst. Chief Chandra Hatcher told reporters early Sunday.
About 15 minutes later, officers got word that two children arrived at an area hospital with gunshot wounds. The 8-year-old child is expected to fully recover from their injuries, Hatcher said.
Both children were reportedly in a car at a stop sign when a person in another vehicle began shooting, witnesses told authorities. Their mother reportedly drove them to the hospital.
Police are investigating the incident and looking at footage from surveillance cameras to aid in the investigation. A suspect is not in custody, police said.
Authorities are unsure if the two children were the intended targets.
“We do not know a motive,” Hatcher said.
Police described the suspect’s vehicle as dark-colored and added that there may have been two people in it.
“If anyone knows information, please come forward and please continue to pray for the family of the deceased child and the injured 8-year-old,” Hatcher said.
(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department should not avoid prosecuting Donald Trump in relation to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack if a prosecution is warranted, Rep. Liz Cheney said in an interview with ABC News’ “This Week” co-anchor Jonathan Karl.
While bringing charges against the former president — who may challenge President Joe Biden in 2024 — would be unprecedented and “difficult” for the country, not doing so would support a “much graver constitutional threat,” Cheney said Wednesday in an interview at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library that aired Sunday on “This Week.”
“Are you worried about what that means for the country, to [see] a former president prosecuted? A former president who was a likely candidate; who may in fact be running for president against Biden?” Karl asked Cheney.
“I think it’s a much graver constitutional threat if a president can engage in these kinds of activities, and the majority of the president’s party looks away; or we as a country decide we’re not actually going to take our constitutional obligations seriously,” Cheney said. “I think that’s a much, a much more serious threat.”
“I really believe we have to make these decisions, as difficult as it is, apart from politics. We really have to think about these from the perspective of: What does it mean for the country?” she said.
‘Absolutely confident’ in Hutchinson’s testimony
The Wyoming Republican told Karl she was “absolutely confident” in Cassidy Hutchinson’s startling testimony last week during a surprise hearing by the House’s Jan. 6 committee, which Cheney vice-chairs.
“She’s an incredibly brave young woman,” Cheney said of Hutchinson.
On Tuesday, the former aide to Trump’s White House chief of staff Mark Meadows testified that she was told Trump was verbally aggressive with Secret Service agents and lunged for the steering wheel of his vehicle after learning he was not going to the Capitol after his rally on Jan. 6, 2021.
Hutchinson said Tony Ornato, a Secret Service agent and Trump deputy chief of staff, told her as much not long after the incident that same day. Hutchinson’s account has drawn significant attention and push-back from Trump.
“What Ms. Hutchinson testified to was a conversation that she was part of with Mr. Ornato and which Mr. Engel [a Secret Service agent] was present, where they detailed what happened in the limousine,” Cheney said.
“Do you have any evidence other than Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony to corroborate what she said happened in that presidential motorcade?” Karl asked Cheney.
“The committee has significant evidence about a whole range of issues, including the president’s intense anger,” Cheney responded.
“I think you will continue to see in the coming days and weeks additional detail about the president’s activities and behavior on that day,” Cheney added.
In a statement to ABC News, the Secret Service said agents were prepared to give sworn testimony to the panel. A source close to the Secret Service did not dispute to ABC News that Trump was angry with agents in the car but said he did not reach for the wheel or lunge at Robert Engel, the lead agent on his detail.
Hutchinson also claimed that Trump knew his supporters were armed on Jan. 6 ahead of a march on the Capitol.
Trump on Tuesday worked to dismiss and downplay Hutchinson’s testimony, posting on social media that “I hardly know who this person … is, other than I heard very negative things about her (a total phony and ‘leaker’).”
“She is bad news!” he added.
Speaking with Karl, Cheney said the House committee “is not going to stand by and watch her [Hutchinson’s] character be assassinated by anonymous sources and by men who are claiming executive privilege. And so we look forward very much to additional testimony under oath on a whole range of issues.”
Criminal referral over witness tampering?
Cheney said during last week’s hearing that some witnesses had told investigators Trump aides attempted to influence their testimony before the panel. Hutchinson was among those to receive messages about protecting the former president, sources later told ABC News.
“Witness tampering is a crime. Are you making a criminal referral to DOJ on this?” Karl asked.
“We’ll make a decision as a committee about that,” Cheney replied.
“Do you have any doubt that [Trump] broke the law and that he is guilty of criminal violations?” Karl asked Cheney. (Trump insists he did nothing wrong.)”It’s a decision that we’ll make together as a committee,” Cheney said of referring any potential criminal conduct to the Justice Department.
“There’s no question that he engaged in high crimes and misdemeanors. I think there’s no question that it’s the most serious betrayal of his oath of office of any president in the history of the nation. It’s the most dangerous behavior of any president in the history of the nation,” she said.
“It’s possible there will be a criminal referral?” Karl asked.
“Yes,” Cheney said, adding that the Justice Department “doesn’t have to wait” for the panel to make a referral and that the committee could issue “more than one criminal referral.”
Damaging Trump ‘not the goal’ of hearings
Cheney has emerged as perhaps her party’s most vocal and most famous anti-Trump voice, drawing praise from Democrats and derision from many conservatives. Last year, she told ABC News that she would “do everything that I can to make sure” Trump “never gets anywhere close to the Oval Office again.”
“Have these hearings gotten you closer to that goal — making him toxic and not a viable candidate?” Karl asked in the new interview.
“That’s not the goal of the hearings,” she said.
“It’s crucial for the country to make sure that he’s never anywhere near the Oval Office again,” Cheney continued.
“The goal of the hearings is to make sure that the American people understand what happened; to help inform legislation, legislative changes that we might need to make,” she said. “I think it’s also the case that there’s not a single thing that I have learned, as we have been involved in this investigation, that has made me less concerned.”
“There’s no question: A man as dangerous as Donald Trump can absolutely never be anywhere near the Oval Office ever again,” Cheney said.
With looming primary, Cheney doesn’t ‘intend to lose’
Cheney was one of 10 House Republicans to vote to impeach Trump in 2021 for inciting the Capitol riot. Of that group, four are not running for reelection and Rep. Tom Rice of South Carolina was defeated in his May primary by a Trump-endorsed opponent.
Cheney will face Trump-backed candidate Harriet Hageman in early August. The former president won a greater share of the vote in Wyoming in 2020 than in any other state.
“You said recently the country is now in a battle: We must win against the former president trying to unravel our constitutional republic. What will it mean for that battle if you lose the Republican primary in Wyoming?” Karl asked Cheney.
“Well, I don’t intend to lose the Republican primary in Wyoming,” Cheney said.
“How important is it that you win, for that larger battle?” Karl asked.
“I think it’s important, because I will be the best representative that people of Wyoming can have,” Cheney said.
“The single most important thing is protecting the nation from Donald Trump. And I think that that matters to us as Americans more than anything else, and that’s why my work on the committee is so important,” she said.
“It’s so important to not just brush this past and say, ‘Okay, well, that’s in the past,’ but it informs whether this sort of toxin of Trump’s belief that he can put himself above the Constitution and put himself above the law — whether or not we successfully defeat that. And I think it’s very important that people know the truth. And that there are consequences,” Cheney said.
Cheney thinks GOP ‘can’t survive’ a Trump 2024 bid
Cheney said the Republican Party “can’t survive” if the former president runs for the White House again and wins the GOP nomination for 2024.
“I think that he can’t be the party nominee. And I don’t think the party would survive that,” Cheney said. “I believe in the party, and I believe in what the party can be and what the party can stand for. And I’m not ready to give that up.”
“Those of us who believe in Republican principles and ideals have a responsibility to try to lead the party back to what it can be, and to reject, and to reject so much of the toxin and the vitriol,” she added.
“I think it’s important also to remember that millions of people, millions of Republicans have been betrayed by Donald Trump. And that is a really painful thing for people to recognize and to admit,” she said.
“But it’s absolutely the case and they’ve been betrayed by him, by the ‘big lie” — referring to Trump’s continued baseless claims of election fraud — “and by what he continues to do and say to tear apart our country and tear apart our party, and I think we have to reject that,” Cheney said.
She said she has not “made a decision” about running for president in 2024.
“I’m obviously very focused on my reelection. I’m very focused on the Jan. 6 committee,” she said, with public hearings expected to resume later this month. “I’m very focused on my obligations to do the job that I have now. And I’ll make a decision about ’24 down the road.”
“But I think about it less in terms of a decision about running for office and more in terms of as an American — and as somebody who’s in a position of public trust now — how do I make sure that I’m doing everything I can to do the right thing, to do what I know is right for the country, and to protect our Constitution?”
(VADNAIS HEIGHTS, Minn.) — The bodies of three young children and their mother were pulled from a Minnesota lake during a two-day search in what is being investigated as a possible triple murder-suicide, authorities said.
Law enforcement responded to Vadnais-Sucker Lake Regional Park in Vadnais Heights Friday afternoon in response to a welfare check requested on the woman and children, the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.
The woman’s car and items including the children’s shoes were found at the scene, prompting responding deputies and officers to close the park and begin searching the area and water, the sheriff’s office said.
The first child was pulled out of the lake around 7:30 p.m. Friday and declared dead following life-saving measures, authorities said. The second child was located around midnight and declared dead. Responders continued to look for the remaining child and woman until 3 a.m.
Ramsey County Sheriff Water Patrol searching Vandnais Lake—family members running to scene—being kept back by police. The medical examiner has arrived. We’re waiting for an update. @kstppic.twitter.com/kZPUfce7wu
The search resumed at 6 a.m. Saturday. The woman was located around 10:40 a.m., and the third child about 20 minutes later, the sheriff’s office said. Both were declared dead.
All three children — two boys and a girl — are believed to be under the age of 6. The Ramsey County Medical Examiner will release the names of the four found and their manner and cause of death at a later date.
“There is nothing more tragic than the loss of children,” Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher told reporters Friday, saying that the responders would be searching “long into the night.”
Distraught family and friends had gathered outside the police perimeter while the search was underway Friday, ABC affiliate KSTP in Saint Paul, Minnesota, reported.
The welfare check at the lake is believed to be connected to another death investigation in a nearby city in Ramsey County, the sheriff’s office said. On Friday morning, Maplewood police officers and firefighters responding to the report of a possible suicide in a residential area found a man dead at the scene.
After responding to that report, authorities then began searching for the mother and three children, ultimately tracking the mother’s cellphone to the lake, Ramsey County Undersheriff Mike Martin told reporters during a briefing Saturday.
“Our hearts go out to the families involved here and their friends,” Martin said. “Our goal was to find the children and the mother and to return them to their families, and we’re glad that we were able to do that.”
No further information was released on the connection between the two death investigations.
If you are struggling with thoughts of suicide or worried about a friend or loved one, help is available. Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 [TALK] for free, confidential emotional support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
(UVALDE, Texas) — Pete Arredondo, the embattled police chief of the school district where 19 children and two teachers were killed in a shooting, is resigning from his city council post, city officials said.
A local newspaper in Uvalde, Texas, first reported Arredondo’s decision to resign, which city officials later confirmed.
Arredondo, the police chief for the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District, served as incident commander during the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School on May 24. He has faced criticism and calls for his resignation as chief from parents and the Uvalde community over the police response and delay in breaching the classrooms where the gunman carried out the attack.
Arredondo was elected to the Uvalde City Council in early May and sworn in days after the school shooting. He told the Uvalde Leader-News on Friday he plans to resign from his city council post, according to the local newspaper.
Following the report’s publication, the city of Uvalde said it had not seen a letter of resignation or spoken to Arredondo. The Uvalde city manager’s office told ABC News Saturday afternoon that the city council had just received his written resignation. The city called his resignation “the right thing to do.”
In his resignation letter obtained by ABC News, Arredondo said that “it is in the best interest of the community to step down as a member of the City Council for District 3 to minimize further distractions.”
“The Mayor, the City Council, and the City Staff must continue to move forward to unite our community, once again,” he continued.
Arredondo and his representatives have not responded to ABC News’ requests for comment.
The news comes after the Uvalde City Council last week denied Arredondo’s request for a leave of absence from future meetings, in an effort to be more transparent following criticisms of law enforcement’s handling of the shooting.
Arredondo has not been present at three meetings since he was sworn in, including a heated hearing on Thursday during which families of victims demanded more information on what happened that tragic day.
The school district placed Arredondo on administrative leave last week, effective immediately, amid multiple ongoing investigations into the shooting.
Arredondo defended the police response in a rare interview with The Texas Tribune last month.
“Not a single responding officer ever hesitated, even for a moment, to put themselves at risk to save the children,” Arredondo told the paper. “We responded to the information that we had and had to adjust to whatever we faced.”
He added, “Our objective was to save as many lives as we could, and the extraction of the students from the classrooms by all that were involved saved over 500 of our Uvalde students and teachers before we gained access to the shooter and eliminated the threat.”
He also told the paper he did not consider himself the commanding officer on the scene that day.
During an emotional school board meeting last week, parents and community members called for Arredondo’s resignation. Several argued that law enforcement should be held partly accountable for the tragedy due to what was described as inadequate decision-making.
Nineteen law enforcement officers waited 77 minutes in the hallway outside the classroom containing the gunman, after Arredondo wrongly believed that the situation had transitioned from an active shooter to a barricaded subject, law enforcement has said.
Arredondo testified last week for almost five hours during a hearing on the shooting held during an executive session by the Texas state House of Representatives. A special Texas state Senate panel is also currently conducting a probe into the shooting.
The Uvalde district attorney is also investigating the shooting, and the U.S. Justice Department is reviewing the law enforcement response.
ABC News’ Julia Jacobo, Teddy Grant, Samira Said and Aaron Katersky contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Attending the World Cup in November? The Department of Homeland Security will be on hand to help make sure the soccer tournament is safe and secure, according to a senior department official.
“We are committed to working closely with Qatar to make sure the world can enjoy a safe and secure World Cup,” Rob Silvers, the under secretary for strategy, police and plans at DHS, told ABC News in an interview. “We’re are going to be providing security support to our partner and we’re going to be doing that in a range of ways.”
Silvers said he is headed to Qatar this week to shore up those security partnerships.
One of the ways is by providing Transportation Security Agency (TSA) personnel to provide baggage screening support for people attending the matches.
“We’re going to host a delegation from Qatar at a U.S. airport to show them our airport security practices here because obviously they are expecting a large number of visitors and we want to help them on that front,” Silvers explained.
The department has experience with large scale sporting events domestically, with the U.S. Secret Service taking the lead on security every February at the Super Bowl.
The Secret Service will be on sight helping out the Qataris at the World Cup.
“We’re going to have our Secret Service providing support on protective details and on major event security coordination,” Silvers said.
Silvers also explained they are providing cyber resources through the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)
The DHS official told ABC News there is no credible threat to the World Cup but “it’s a large and prominent gathering, and we should always be prepared from a security perspective.”
(NEW YORK) — As the largest migrant caravan this year makes its way through Mexico toward the United States, numerous organizations on both sides of the border are trying to support the several thousand immigrants seeking asylum.
For people like Estefanía Rebellón, who runs a school within a shelter for migrants in Tijuana, the work is personal.
“When I was 10 years old, my parents had to travel to the United States from Colombia to seek asylum,” Rebellón told ABC News. “I know what it’s like to be transported from your home to a completely unknown place.”
Rebellón runs a school called Yes We Can, which provides free education to children five days a week while their families are preparing to cross the border into the United States.
This week, the Supreme Court voted to overturn the Trump administration’s “Remain in Mexico” policy, known formally as the Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP, which required migrants seeking asylum and traveling through Mexico from a third country to return to Mexico while awaiting their court dates. The Biden administration has rarely enforced the policy and has said it seeks to end it.
Far more consequential has been former President Donald Trump’s policy called Title 42, which allows border officials to turn migrants seeking asylum away due to the health risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the American Immigration Council, over 1.8 million people have been expelled as a result.
Recently more than 50 people died in an alleged migrant smuggling operation in San Antonio, Texas, in what Homeland Security Investigations has called the deadliest incident of human smuggling in U.S. history.
Willie, a third-generation coyote, the colloquial term for a person who smuggles migrants across the U.S.-Mexico border, says that he has no qualms about his profession.
“Nothing in this life is safe,” Willie, who asked to be referred to by a pseudonym, told ABC News’ Maria Elena Salinas. “Right now, [there are] people who are helping their families and have thanked me for it.”
“For some it’s illegal. For us it’s legal,” he added of his illegal activities.
In Deming, New Mexico, 35 miles from the U.S. Mexico border, Ariana Saludares runs a pop-up shelter for migrants called Colores United.
Some who are dropped at her shelter have applied for asylum and are legally awaiting their claims; others have requested humanitarian parole. The shelter, which receives around 50 migrants twice a week, runs out of a number of local hotels.
Saludares says that, while she would love to have a permanent space for a shelter, the local hotels she operates out of are her only option.
“There’s no other space that’s available to us,” said Saludares. “We hope that will change one day, but we can’t wait. We need a shelter. And we need it now.”
Benny Jasso, the mayor of Deming is specifically concerned that removing Title 42 would mean an influx of migrants that he says the city cannot handle.
“What I’m concerned with is, are we going to be able to process them?” he told Salinas.
“We do not have the volunteer base right now to establish a shelter.”
He says that Deming currently receives no federal resources to help house the asylum seekers they receive.
What might be a concern to some, like added safety risks, are not a concern for Deming’s police chief Clint Hogan.
“We don’t have any issues… at all,” he told Salinas during an interview.
Marisa Ugarte is the founder and executive director of the human rights non-profit Bilateral Safety Corridor Coalition, based in California.
Ugarte has helped people such as “Maria,” who is a survivor of abuse at the hands of people who promised to smuggle her safely across the border.
“Maria,” who is using a pseudonym due to safety concerns, was brought from El Salvador to Sonora, Mexico, where instead of finding safety she says she was repeatedly drugged and raped.
She finally managed to escape and fled to a shelter where she was helped by the workers, who encouraged her to make the trip to the U.S.
“Thank God I’m okay, even though I almost died,” “Maria” told Salinas. “But God never abandoned me.”
Maria was taken to meet Ugarte, who helped her obtain asylum in the U.S. For Ugarte, who has supported countless women in similar situations, the notion that people immigrating to the U.S. should do so the proverbial “right way,” waiting for whatever legal means are available at the time, is flawed.
“What is the right way?” she said. “If you’re running from violence and from dying, what is the right way?”
(NEW YORK) — World UFO Day is an annual affair that has captured the interest of many enthusiastic alien believers and recognized globally with parades, scientific discussion, and occasionally pointy tinfoil hats.
It takes place every July 2 to commemorate the anniversary of the alleged 1947 Unidentified Flying Object crash in Roswell, New Mexico. The original report hailed the crashed object as a “flying disk.” Later, the U.S. Army called it a UFO accident, but ultimately, the Pentagon claimed it was a balloon wreck. To this day, many don’t accept that account and have urged the government to declassify information.
Since 2001, people worldwide have celebrated the day, but it takes various forms. Science museums, restaurants, and entire towns hold their own events to commemorate the day.
Some Ufologists, or UFO researchers, voice concern with how the day is observed. Instead of the tinfoil hat-wearing that has been documented at past parades, those such as Ronald James hope for “meaningful discussions and awareness,” to come out of the day. James is the media relations director of Mutual UFO Network, a nonprofit which investigates reported UFO sightings around the world.
“We think anything that brings awareness to the topic is good, but we also again are dedicated to the scientific understanding of the subject,” James told ABC Audio. “World UFO Day is absolutely awesome, just because it’s bringing attention to the whole topic.”
The official World UFO Day goal is “to celebrate the existence of UFOs and extraterrestrial life”, according to the event’s website. One of the proposed actions to celebrate is to “watch the sky together and spot strange objects flying around,” which is exactly what one branch of MUFON plans to do. The Missouri MUFON Chapter is holding a “sky watch” Saturday at 7 p.m. in Kansas City, to locate potential UFOs.
According to a poll by the Pew Research Center, 65% of Americans believe that aliens exist. Earlier this year, the House of Representatives held a hearing on UFOs and the possible vulnerabilities they generate. This was something that MUFON’s 4000-plus members advocated for since its founding in 1969 and was the first time the House had done so in 50 years.
“We were happy that the hearings happened. MUFON was in Washington,” James said. “We were involved in helping to push this forward and we’re actually in Washington a lot right now dealing with politicians.”
For those living in Roswell, New Mexico, the site of the alleged crash that sparked this all, awareness is just a slight part of the celebration. Ufologists will speak about their take on the government’s role in investigating alleged UFO sightings, but more so, the day is an economic opportunity presented by their annual UFO Festival, which now marks 75 years since the Roswell incident.
This year, its festival will take place Friday through Sunday and will feature a parade, concert, speakers, food, tours, and more, making it the biggest celebration of World UFO Day anywhere, with a history that spans long before World UFO Day became a global phenomenon.
