(NEW YORK) — A busy series of northern lights activity will soon come to a peak as the sun reaches its solar maximum stage in the coming months.
Several regions in the United States were treated to a multicolored light show earlier this week due to an increase in solar storm activity. The Aurora Borealis display stretched as far south as Arizona, Mississippi and Texas on Monday, images show.
The event followed other viewings in the U.S. in May and January. Opportunities to see the northern lights are expected to increase in the coming months.
How are the northern lights created?
Every 11 years, the sun’s magnetic field reaches its solar maximum, in which the number of solar flares is at its highest, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather and Prediction Center.
The northern lights occur when atoms and molecules in Earth’s atmosphere clash with a solar flare, which causes the atoms in the upper atmosphere to glow, creating a spectrum of color in the night sky.
Earth is currently approaching the peak of Solar Cycle 25, in which more sunspots with intense magnetic activity are expected, according to NOAA. Impactful space weather events are possible throughout 2024.
The current cycle is expected to peak between November 2024 and March 2026, according to NOAA. Northern lights activity will be heightened during this time, scientists say.
After the solar maximum is over, the sun’s magnetic field equalizes and returns to normal.
Where can the northern lights be seen?
The northern lights are visible — typically at the poles — as the solar flares travel through space and into Earth’s magnetic field. In the U.S., the northernmost states, such as Maine and Alaska, have the best viewing opportunities.
The lights can be seen closer to the equator depending on the strength of the geometric storms. But the further south you go, a more reddish hue is visible rather than green. This is because the curvature of the Earth causes the particles to interact higher in the atmosphere.
The Space Weather Prediction Center advises star-gazers to get away from city lights and travel to the darkest location possible for the best viewing.
Typically, within an hour or two of midnight tends to be the best time, according to NOAA.
It is notoriously hard to predict when an Aurora Borealis will occur, scientists say. Often, auroras can occur with just a 30-minute warning, according to the Michigan Technological University. Researchers typically use satellites to measure the speed and density of solar wind to forecast when conditions are favorable for the northern lights to occur.
On Thursday, the northern lights may be visible from Fairbanks to as far south as Unalakleet, Talkeetna and Tok in Alaska, according to the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, Geophysical Institute website, which tracks the phenomenon.
Intense geomagnetic storms can potentially disrupt navigation systems by interfering with radio and GPS signals, as well as electrical power networks, due to the subatomic particles that bombard the Earth, according to NOAA.
(WASHINGTON) — Republicans are stepping up their efforts to change Nebraska’s electoral vote process to winner-take-all — a move that would benefit former President Donald Trump in an expected close November election in which a single vote could make a key difference in the Electoral College.
The winner-take-all electoral change could be pivotal if the Republican-leaning state allocates all of its five electoral votes solely to Trump instead of dividing them with Kamala Harris.
Nebraska split its electoral votes in 2020, with President Joe Biden flipping the 2nd District, which includes the Democratic stronghold of Omaha.
Trump endorsed the winner-take-all system in April.
Pressure continues to grow on state lawmakers to as the state’s full federal delegation, all Republicans, and other national GOP figures continue to push for the change.
But amending Nebraska’s electoral college process is not simple.
Gov. Jim Pillen, a Republican, would have to convene a special legislative session. Pillen released a statement on Friday saying he would not call a session unless GOP legislators show they have 33 votes needed to break an expected Democratic filibuster.
Yet, state senators are not confident they have the votes; State Sen. Tom Berwer told the Nebraska Examiner he anticipates the group to come shy with 30 or 31 votes. That is a reason why Trump-ally Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina have been brought in to make the case. Graham flew to Nebraska Wednesday to meet with key stakeholders.
“I went and talked to some senators as the Governor. Senator [Pete] Ricketts and the Governor asked me to come out and to the caucus. I guess that’s what you call it, about the state of the play in the world and the consequences of the next election on a foreign policy front,” Graham told ABC News on Thursday.
“I hope they will allow winner-take-all. [Splitting electoral votes] was created in ’92 to help Clinton. Trump’s going to win the state by 20 points. You know, I told the conference, I’ve never seen so many challenges and threats to our country as I do now. I think she would make things worse,” he said, referring to Harris. “I was glad to go out and talk about the world as I see it, and I hope the people in Nebraska that this may come down to a single electoral vote,” he added.
Ricketts told reporters at the U.S. Capitol later on Thursday that he encouraged Graham to go to Nebraska to push for winner-take-all. “I think Senator Graham is a great spokesperson for it, he is very savvy about why we need to make sure that all of our voters have an opportunity to have their voices heard on what the other states are doing,” he said.
All five members of Nebraska’s federal delegation — all Republicans — joined together on Wednesday night, penning a letter to vouch for the change. The letter — signed by GOP Reps. Mike Flood, Don Bacon, Adrian Smith and Republican Sens. Deb Fischer and Ricketts — said the state should “speak with a united voice in presidential elections.”
“We need a President that will represent all of us, from Omaha to Scottsbluff and everywhere in-between. Senators and Governors are elected by the state as a whole because they represent all of the people of Nebraska equally, and the state should speak with a united voice in presidential elections as well. After all, we are Nebraskans first, not members of Nebraska’s three congressional districts,” the letter reads.
Kate Heltzel, a spokesperson for the Nebraska legislature outlined the legislative process that would need to unfold in order to implement the change.
“A senator would introduce a bill once the special session convenes, which likely would be referenced to the Government, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee, which would then hold a public hearing. If the bill is advanced by the committee, it would move to the floor of the Legislature and would need to advance through three rounds of debate before final passage. There is no set time frame for how long a special session lasts — that is up to the senators after it begins — except that the process requires a minimum of seven days for a bill to move from introduction to final passage, based on constitutionally required layover days between rounds of debate, etc.”
Some members mentioned to the Examiner that Trump himself may begin to make calls on the matter. ABC News is awaiting a response from Trump campaign.
However, if Pillen does call a special session, and members are able to break a filibuster, changes can be enacted quickly. According to Nebraska’s deputy secretary of state, Cindi Allen, “If winner-take-all is passed by the legislature before the election, barring any challenges, winner-take-all would go into effect.” This applies to any time in the election cycle. Even after early voting starts on Oct. 7. The secretary’s office confirmed that if there are no legal challenges, the Nebraska legislature could push the change through at the very last minute, on Nov. 2 or 3, for example.
Kate Heltzel, a spokesperson for the Nebraska legislature, sees more of a gray area.
“Some argue that the rule cannot be changed after general election voting begins in Nebraska. In-person early voting begins 30 days before an election, or Oct. 7 this year. Others contend that the only requirement is that the law be changed before Electoral College members cast their votes in December. To my knowledge, the attorney general has not officially weighed in on the issues, so I don’t have a definitive answer,” she wrote.
ABC News’ Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
(SAN FRANCISCO) — When a California resident began to question the price of his electricity bill every month, he realized an up to 18-year-old mistake was costing him well over his personal usage.
Ken Wilson, a Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) customer who has lived alone in an apartment complex in Vacaville since 2006, told ABC News’ San Francisco affiliate he started to notice his bill rise a few months ago.
In an effort to lower costs, Wilson told the outlet he tried to cut back on usage and purchased a device to help monitor how many watts his appliances use.
“Even after I turned off my breakers, I kept going outside to check my meter to see if it was still running and it was still running,” Wilson told ABC7.
“I couldn’t believe it,” he added.
Wilson said he contacted PG&E about the issue and they sent a representative to his apartment to check his meter, who confirmed his suspicions were not unfounded.
The utility company released a statement to ABC News saying Wilson had been paying the electricity bill for the apartment next to him “since potentially 2009,” three years after he had moved in.
“Our preliminary investigation has found the meter number for the customer’s apartment was being billed to another apartment since potentially 2009,” a spokesperson for PG&E said.
PG&E owned up to the mistake and maintained the company is “committed to rectifying the situation with the customer,” the statement said.
Since he’s had the same agreement with PG&E since he moved into the complex in 2006, Wilson told ABC7 and other media outlets he believes the costly mistake has been going on longer.
“We sincerely apologize for the oversight and regret any inconvenience caused by the duration of this issue,” the spokesperson added.
In an update to CBS News’ Sacramento affiliate, Wilson said PG&E fixed his meter so that he would only be paying his share of electric usage and that he was credited $600 to his account with the company.
PG&E also urged fellow customers who are worried about their usage and billing to verify their meter is correct by comparing the meter ID number on the electric panel to that on their monthly bill.
Michael Siluk/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — The Uncommitted movement, the pro-Palestinian group critical of the Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza, announced Thursday that it will not endorse Vice President Kamala Harris, but also does not recommend a third-party vote in November.
The group made the announcement as Harris campaigns Thursday in Michigan, home to sizable Arab American and Muslim populations that could hold outsized sway this year in the crucial swing state. The movement was founded to push voters to vote “uncommitted” on primary ballots rather than punch a ticket for Biden to register their discontent with his tight support for Israel amid the bloody war in Gaza.
The group said in a statement that “Harris’s unwillingness to shift on unconditional weapons policy or to even make a clear campaign statement in support of upholding existing U.S. and international human rights law has made it impossible for us to endorse her.”
Still, the group added that it “opposes a Donald Trump presidency, whose agenda includes plans to accelerate the killing in Gaza while intensifying the suppression of anti-war organizing” and “is not recommending a third-party vote in the Presidential election, especially as third party votes in key swing states could help inadvertently deliver a Trump presidency given our country’s broken electoral college system.”
“We urge Uncommitted voters to register anti-Trump votes and vote up and down the ballot. Our focus remains on building a broad anti-war coalition both inside and outside the Democratic Party,” the group said.
The statement comes before Harris campaigns in Detroit, where she’ll both rally with supporters and hold an event with Oprah Winfrey.
Uncommitted has remained a thorn in the Democratic Party’s side since the war in Gaza kicked off last year following Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel, which killed about 1,200 people, according to Israeli officials. The Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health said more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the Israel-Hamas war began.
The group repeatedly criticized Biden, and Uncommitted votes in Democratic primaries raised concerns about cracks in the president’s base of support, even before a ruinous June debate tanked his campaign. Uncommitted netted more than 100,000 votes in the primary in Michigan, where Trump won by about 11,000 votes in 2016.
The movement has demanded that Harris meet with Palestinian-American families who have lost family members in Gaza, as well as support an immediate cease-fire (which she has done) and an arms embargo on Israel (which she has said she opposes). Uncommitted activists also waged a sit-in at the Democratic National Convention after the party refused their demand to have a Palestinian speaker make an address.
The Harris campaign has said she will continue to meet with leaders from Palestinian, Muslim, Israeli and Jewish communities.
Harris, for her part, has sounded a more empathetic tone than Biden about the civilian death toll in Gaza but has insisted on Israel’s right to defend itself and refused to make the kind of policy shifts from Biden that the Uncommitted movement sought.
Harris’ campaign sounded a similar note in a statement, with a spokesperson vowing that she would “work to earn every vote, unite our country, and to be a President for all Americans” and “will continue working to bring the war in Gaza to an end in a way where Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self-determination.”
Uncommitted organizers have also remained vociferously opposed to Trump, who has bear-hugged Israel and used “Palestinian” as a slur.
The war in Gaza has loomed large in Michigan given its electorate and tight statewide margins.
A super PAC affiliated with Republicans is running ads in Michigan ZIP codes with heavy Muslim or Arab populations highlighting Harris’ support for Israel and second gentleman Doug Emhoff’s Judaism, a seemingly back-handed attempt to hurt support for the Democratic ticket there. Harris’ campaign is also running digital ads targeted to heavily Arab neighborhoods in and around Detroit emphasizing her statement that she “will not be silent about human suffering in Gaza.”
In a sign of how contentious the war has been, critics of the administration’s approach to Gaza have been in turn critical of each other.
“Translation: We can’t endorse Kamala, even though we’d like to, because the community we claim to represent would tear us apart. So instead, we’re going to publicly state that we don’t support her while also not endorsing any alternative, effectively helping her win,” Abandon Harris, another group that wants the U.S. to take a tougher stance in its relationship with Israel, said in a statement.
Still, Michigan Democrats touted Uncommitted’s statement, particularly urging against third-party votes, as the best-case scenario for Harris given that the policy shifts they were asking for would have been difficult for the vice president to swallow.
Jim Ananich, the former Democratic state Senate leader in Michigan, dubbed the statement “close to a win.”
Josh Hovey, a Michigan communications strategist, added that “the best case would have been a full endorsement because the margin of victory will likely be very close again this year and Harris needs to win this state if she’s going to win the Electoral College.”
But “this is the second-best scenario and sends a message to Harris that they need her to do more on this issue while also recognizing that her victory is the one that is most likely to result in the U.S. taking a stronger approach to addressing the humanitarian crisis,” Hovey added.
(NEW YORK) — Israel had a hand in the manufacturing of pagers that exploded on Hezbollah operatives this week, with this type of “supply chain interdiction” operation having been planned for at least 15 years, a U.S. intelligence source confirmed to ABC News.
The CIA has long been reluctant to employ this tactic because the risk to innocents was too high, the source said.
Planning for the attack involved shell companies, with multiple layers of Israeli intelligence officers and their assets fronting a legitimate company that produced the pagers, the source confirmed to ABC News, with at least some of those doing the work unaware of who they were actually working for.
Israel’s hand in the manufacturing was first reported by The New York Times.
One to two ounces of explosives and a remote trigger switch to set off the blast were planted in the pagers, according to the sources.
The last two days of explosions in Lebanon, triggered remotely with explosives inside pagers or walkie-talkies, have killed at least 37 people and wounded 2,931, according to Lebanese Health Minister Firass Al-Abyad.
The conflict between Hezbollah and Israel grew wider on Thursday, with Israel launching strikes on Lebanon and Hezbollah returning fire.
ABC News has reached out to BAC Consulting — the Hungary-based company contracted to produce the pagers on behalf of Gold Apollo in Taiwan — but neither company has responded to our repeated requests.
The pagers were never in Hungary and the company was “a trading intermediary, with no manufacturing or operational site in Hungary,” a spokesperson for the Hungarian government told ABC News on Wednesday.
In a speech Thursday, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said the group’s top leadership had old pagers, not the new ones used in the attack, which were reportedly shipped in the last six months. The group has begun a full investigation into the explosions.
“Not all of the pagers had been distributed and some of them were turned off,” Nasrallah said.
“Over two days, the enemy wanted to kill at least 5,000 people. … The enemy knew that the pager devices numbered 4,000,” he added.
Avishek Das/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — After waiting six months — and losing $4 billion on paper — former President Donald Trump faces a potential windfall from his social media company.
Half a year after the public company behind Trump’s Truth Social platform went public, the “lockup” agreement that prevented Trump from selling any of his 115 million shares expired on Thursday afternoon.
Beginning to sell his shares could allow Trump to profit handsomely from his stake in the company — which is currently valued at approximately $1.7 billion — but it could crater the stock for the company’s diehard supporters, many of whom invested their money in the company as a sign of their support for the former president.
At the same time, holding onto the investment would be a financial leap of faith for Trump, whose shares comprise a large percentage of his net worth but have lost billions of dollars in value over the last six months.
Asked about the choice last week, Trump vowed not to sell.
“They’re worth billions of dollars, but I don’t want to sell my shares,” Trump said. “I’m not going to sell my shares. I don’t need money.”
Trump’s choice comes amid new financial pressures and a significant reshuffling of his financial portfolio.
While Trump’s net worth has grown to $4.3 billion according to the most recent Forbes estimate, the former president owes over $560 million in civil judgments, which he is actively appealing. The majority of his personal wealth — once built on the namesake properties that shot him to fame — now stems from his shares in his social media company, Trump Media & Technology Group, which have fallen more than 70% since the company went public.
Analysts, meanwhile, have expressed concern about a further decline if Trump loses the November election.
Shares in Trump Media closed at a new low of $14.70 Thursday ahead of the lockup provision expiring, though the company enjoyed a 25% surge last week after Trump announced his plan to hold his shares.
“When he’s promised to do something, he’s kept his word,” said Jerry Dean McLain, a shareholder who purchased a hundred additional shares after Trump’s pledge. “He’s loyal to his followers — to his people — so I don’t have any reason not to believe him.”
‘Nothing like this’
Trump turned to the idea of creating his own social media company in the months following his ban from Twitter and other social media companies after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Truth Social launched in 2022, billing itself as a beacon for free speech on the internet with larger plans to expand into streaming.
“All of a sudden, I went from being No. 1 to having no voice,” Trump said about the benefit of Truth Social. “I’m not going to let that happen again.”
Despite multiple roadblocks — including a dispute with the company’s cofounders and its special purpose acquisition company paying a fine to settle fraud charges with the Securities and Exchange commission — the social media company went public in March.
Shares in the public company peaked at $66 in April, with analysts comparing the company to so-called “meme stocks” like AMC and GameStop, whose share prices surged based on investor enthusiasm rather than financial metrics.
By the summer, Trump Media’s stock price lingered around $30 before slumping to the teens in September, which some experts still believe is overvaluing the company, which only brought in $836,000 in revenue last quarter — a 30% decline from a year earlier. Based on the company’s cash per share, the stock is overvalued by 1,000%, according to University of Florida finance professor Jay Ritter.
With the company losing millions of dollars, reporting limited revenue, and offering an unproven business model, the stock’s performance has frequently tracked with Trump’s personal wins and losses. When Trump was convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records in New York, the stock declined 14% in after-hours trading following the verdict. Shares then surged as much as 30% early trading on the Monday after Trump survived an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania.
“It’s much more of a speculative half-proxy for the former president’s reelection prospects and half kind of a long shot early-stage opportunity to get in on a potential new tech company and social media platform,” said Tyler Richey, an analyst at Sevens Report Research.
While it’s not unusual for a company’s stock price to fluctuate based on its corporate leadership, Trump’s relationship to the value of his company stands alone, according to Mike Stegemoller, a finance professor at Baylor University. Trump is the platform’s most notable user, he attracts new members to the platform, and he is the company’s largest shareholder.
“Publicly traded corporations … are somewhat dependent on personalities, but nothing like this,” said Stegemoller. “You’re getting this asset that generates cash flows, and you’re coupling that with a personality that’s pulling revenue to that asset.”
In regulatory filings, the company has acknowledged the risk of being tied to the former president. If Trump were to sell his shares or begin using another social media platform, the company’s stock value could suffer.
Trump, for his part, has vowed to continue posting on Truth Social.
“I love it. I use it as a method of getting out my word,” Trump said last week regarding the platform.
‘A much more profitable deal’
The lockup agreement that’s kept Trump from selling off his shares in the first six months is an arrangement that’s often used by public companies to prevent company leadership from taking actions that could affect the stock price, according to Ritter.
Trump’s 115 million shares means he owns more than half of the company, so selling those shares — which Trump would have to disclose within two days in a public filing — could trigger a massive selloff and tank the company’s stock price.
“As soon as folks know he’s getting out in any large amount, I would imagine shares would fall,” said Stegemoller.
According to Stegemoller, Trump’s announcement last week that he would not sell his shares is reasonable — not only because Trump likely wants the company to succeed, but also because selling his shares too rapidly could cost him money. Because he holds so many shares, Trump would be unlikely to fully offload them all before the stock price plummeted, forcing him to sell his remaining shares at a lower price.
Alternatively, Trump could slowly sell some of his shares, arrange a deal with a buyer, or use the shares as collateral for loans. Selling some of his shares would allow Trump to still own a controlling interest in the company while diversifying his portfolio, according to Stegemoller.
“Selling slowly over time in order to pull money out of his investment is a much more reasonable deal for him, and a much more profitable deal for him, too,” Stegemoller said.
Although Trump has publicly declared that he plans to hold his shares, executives in the company could consider selling their holdings, which could also impact the stock price.
“They might want to get out as quickly as possible, and rather than sell their shares gradually, it might be a rush for the exit,” said Ritter.
‘I’m not leaving’
Trump has suggested that the company’s sluggish stock performance is partially due to speculation about him stepping away from the company — a notion he tried to dispel last week.
“People think that I’m leaving. That’s why they’re down,” Trump said regarding shares in the company. “It’s different if I leave, but I’m not leaving. I love it.”
And some analysts believe the expiration of the lockup provision could prove to be a turning point for the company.
According to Richey, a recent spike in trading volume and other metrics suggest that the stock price might be reaching a bottom, while Trump’s decision to hold his shares could reassure investors.
Speculation about Trump’s chances of winning in the November election could also help the stock price.
“There’s still money in the markets supporting a Donald Trump win if you’re using the stock price as a proxy for the election outcome,” Richey said.
(WASHINGTON) — Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign said on Thursday that it did not use any materials that the FBI said Iranian hackers gathered from email accounts associated with former President Donald Trump’s campaign and sent to President Joe Biden’s campaign before he left the race.
Trump’s campaign on Wednesday demanded more information from Harris’ campaign including that it disclose the materials it received and whether it was used.
A Harris campaign official told ABC News that “the materials were not used.” The campaign declined to comment on whether or not they would comply with the Trump campaign’s request to disclose what they received.
Over the summer, Iranian hackers sent unsolicited emails to individuals associated with then-candidate Biden that “contained an excerpt taken from stolen, non-public material from former President Trump’s campaign as text in the emails,” according to information released by the FBI and other U.S. intelligence agencies on Wednesday.
The contents of those excerpts are not yet clear.
The FBI said there was no information indicating that the recipients of the information replied to the hackers’ messages.
The White House said Biden only learned Wednesday about the Iranian hackers sending what the FBI called “stolen” information from the Trump campaign to individuals associated with his campaign.
“We learned about the statement yesterday, and the president has been made aware of it now,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Thursday. “You’ve seen us take actions to hold accountable those who week to undermine confidence in our democracy, and we will continue to do so.”
Harris’ campaign said Wednesday that it has cooperated with law enforcement and the investigation into the messages and said it was “not aware of any material being sent directly to the campaign.”
“A few individuals were targeted on their personal emails with what looked like a spam or phishing attempt,” Harris campaign spokesperson Morgan Finkelstein said in a statement Wednesday.
Trump’s campaign said hackers are interfering to help Harris and Biden “because they know President Trump will restore his tough sanctions and stand against their reign of terror.”
Iran’s Mission to the United Nations called the intelligence agencies’ findings “fundamentally unfounded, and wholly inadmissible.”
ABC News’ Selina Wang, Jack Date and Luke Barr contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — A witness got emotional recounting the day of the doomed Titan submersible dive while testifying Thursday during the U.S. Coast Guard’s hearing into the deadly implosion.
Renata Rojas, a banker who had previously gone on a dive to the Titanic on the experimental vessel, was volunteering and assisting the surface crew during the 2023 expedition when the submersible catastrophically imploded on a deep-sea voyage to the shipwreck site, killing five people, including OceanGate founder Stockton Rush.
The hearing took an approximately 10-minute break on Thursday during Rojas’ testimony so that she could compose herself before discussing the June 18, 2023, dive.
“They were just very happy to go,” Rojas recalled of the passengers, crying during her testimony. “That’s the memory I have. Nobody was really nervous. They were excited about what they’re going to see.”
Rojas testified that beyond issues with a dinghy, there was nothing unusual about the day of the dive — everything was done on time and they had “wonderful weather.”
She said the submersible went into the water on schedule, around 9:15 a.m. local time. She said she was waiting to hear updates on the dive after breakfast a couple hours later, but they had no update on the communications with the sub.
There was a loss of communication with the Titan at approximately 10:47 a.m. local time, according to the Coast Guard. The sub was expected to surface at about 3 p.m. local time, the Coast Guard said.
Rojas said there didn’t seem to be anything of concern until about 5 or 6 p.m. local time.
“Usually they’re allowed at least an hour in the bottom. Could it be possible that if they were in front of the bow, everybody begged in the sub to take another hour?” she said. “Like if it was me in the sub, I probably would have said, ‘Please give me another hour.’ You have to take that into account.”
After three hours of searching the surface for the sub, per OceanGate loss-of-communications protocol, the surface ship Polar Prince contacted the Canadian Coast Guard at 7:10 p.m. local time, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
Debris from the Titan was found after a four-day search.
In addition to Rush, those killed in the implosion included French explorer Paul Henri Nargeolet, British businessman Hamish Harding, Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son, Suleman.
Rojas said she had saved “for a long time” for her own expedition to the Titanic. She said she didn’t think it would ever happen until she was connected with OceanGate.
She said she signed up in 2016 or 2017 to go on a dive in 2018, though didn’t go until July 2022. She said OceanGate had to make a new carbon-fiber hull and the COVID-19 pandemic caused delays.
She said she knew the submersible was experimental but felt safe.
“I knew what I was doing was very risky. I never, at any point, felt unsafe by the operation,” she said.
Asked if any OceanGate employees or past employees ever brought up safety concerns to her, Rojas said there was one who told her she wouldn’t get in the sub.
“This is never really sold as a Disney ride,” she said. “This is an expedition where things happen, and you have to adapt to change. That was, at least for me, it was very clear.”
She said as a passenger, she felt she was given the opportunity to voice any safety concerns, though never did personally.
“I knew the risk that I was taking, and still decided to go,” she said.
She said she understood that the sub was not classified by a certification society.
“It was similar to the Apollo program — they tested by doing,” she said. “Neil Armstrong didn’t ask somebody, ‘Is this vessel classed?’ before he went to space. He just got in and went.”
“For me, it was the drive of exploration,” she said. “Exploration requires risks.”
Rojas had done several dives with OceanGate, including a 2016 dive to the Andrea Doria shipwreck on OceanGate’s Cyclops 1 submersible. She said she paid $20,000 to go on it.
David Lochridge, the former director of marine operations for OceanGate, testified on Tuesday that Rush was difficult to work with during that Andrea Doria dive. Lochridge said Rush, who was piloting the sub, ended up getting the vessel stuck in the wreck and panicked. Lochridge said Rush was behaving unprofessionally and refused to relinquish control until Rojas, with tears in her eyes, yelled at Rush to give Lochridge the “effing controller” that piloted the vessel.
Lochridge testified that Rush threw the PlayStation controller at his head and one of the buttons came off, though he said he was able to repair it and get them back to the surface.
Rojas refuted part of Lochridge’s testimony on Thursday, saying, “He must have gone on a different dive. Nobody was panicking, nobody was crying, and there was definitely no swearing and yelling.”
She said Rush put the controller on the floor at Lochridge’s feet, and she did not see it broken.
Rojas, an experienced scuba diver, said she went on other dives with OceanGate until the Titan was ready to go to the Titanic. She recounted a 2015 meeting with Rush.
“He told me a sub had not been made, that he had plans to make a sub to go to Titanic,” she said. “It was going to take time, but he wanted me to go out on other expeditions, and, you know, kind of test the waters of how they did things.”
She said she enjoyed being a mission specialist — what OceanGate called its paying customers.
“It was fun. I was learning a lot. I was working with amazing people,” she said. “Some of those people are the very hard-working individuals that were just trying to make dreams come true.”
Rojas is the first mission specialist to testify during the two-week hearing, which started on Monday. Another, Fred Hagen, is scheduled to testify on Friday.
“We all want to find out what happened,” Rojas said at the close of her testimony on Thursday.
“What we have all gone through — it’s still raw,” she said, crying. “Nothing is going to bring our friends back. I hope that this investigation creates an understanding that with exploration, there’s risk. And without taking that risk and the exploration, the world would still be flat. I hope that innovation continues so that we can make the oceans accessible to people like me.”
(NEW YORK) — Conservationists in Latin America, home to some of the most important ecosystems in the world, are persisting in their environmental work despite political challenges that can sometimes stand in the way and the dangers they face, multiple experts told ABC News.
Central and South American countries are facing some of the most significant environmental challenges in recent history. Drought is widespread throughout the region — especially in Uruguay, northern Argentina and southern Brazil, according to a 2023 report by the Global Drought Observatory.
In Mexico, water pollution adversely impacts indigenous groups, according to a 2021 paper published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. In Brazil, deforestation, in the form of illegal logging as well as land clearing for agriculture, is widespread, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
Fire activity in Brazil and Bolivia has reached levels not seen in over a decade as a prolonged drought parched landscapes in both countries, according to NASA’s Earth Observatory. The Amazon rainforest, the Cerrado tropical savanna and the Pantanal wetlands are currently experiencing record-breaking wildfires as a result of these conditions, according to officials in that country.
The lives of conservationists working in Latin America are often in danger as they work to alleviate these crises, Isaac Nahon-Serfaty, a communications professor at Ottawa University who has studied mining in southern Venezuela, told ABC News.
In 2023, nearly 200 land and environmental conservationists were killed worldwide, according to a report by Global Witness, an international NGO that fights against natural resource exploitation, conflict, poverty, corruption and human rights abuses. The vast majority of the deaths — about 85% — occurred in Latin American countries, mostly in Colombia, Brazil and Mexico, the report found.
Many conservationists will avoid working in high-conflict areas due to the danger, Mauricio Bianco, vice president of Conservation International Brazil, an environmental nonprofit, told ABC News.
In Venezuela, speaking out against Nicolás Maduro, who has served as president since 2013, can bring severe consequences, Nahon-Serfaty claimed.
Virgilio Trujillo Arana, a 38-year-old Indigenous Uwottuja man who had spoken out against illegal mining in the Venezuelan Amazon, was fatally shot in 2022. While unsolved, the murder was seen as an attempt to silence those who demonstrate against Maduro’s agenda, Nahon-Serfaty said.
Maduro’s administration did not comment on Arana’s death at the time, but the United Nations warned about the violent groups that control gold mines in the country.
The U.N. Fact-Finding Mission on Venezuela recommended that the allegations made by Indigenous peoples of the State of Amazonas regarding violent attacks against their leaders “should be seriously investigated.”
Environmental threats, meanwhile, not only affect the natural ecosystem. They also impact the watersheds and food systems and, therefore, the economy as well — making it difficult for residents in the region to thrive, Rachael Garrett, a professor of conservation and development at the University of Cambridge, told ABC News.
“It’s a huge public health toll on people living in these areas. It’s devastating for biodiversity,” Garrett said. “So there is not really any part of life that it won’t impact.”
Researchers and conservationists are able to make the biggest difference before the loss occurs — before the drought sets in, the forests and the Indigenous peoples within are lost and the wildfires spark, Garrett said. The race against time motivates them, because the consequences can be irreversible in a short amount of time, she added.
“We can make a difference very quickly,” Garrett said. “We have to persist, because the consequences of not doing so are so catastrophic.”
Conservation groups have to focus on strengthening and protecting delicate ecosystems as well as Indigenous groups who are facing extinction — before the tipping point occurs, Bianco said.
These groups must also prioritize the restoration of forests and the management of agricultural land in a sustainable way, he said.
While government involvement is necessary for policy change, conservation groups in Latin America have learned to lean on Indigenous and local communities as well as grassroots organizations to accomplish their work at the project level, according to Bianco.
Even with government protections and policy in place, a sense of “lawlessness” makes it nearly impossible for them to be enforced, Garrett said. It has been difficult to track progress in these regions due to a lack of transparency, as governments in places like Brazil and Venezuela often do not release any or accurate information on the state of the environment, according to Garrett and Nahon-Serfaty.
Environmental crime is the third-largest area of criminal activity in the world, according to the FBI. Illegal activity associated with timber and wildlife trafficking, fishing, waste trade, pollution and animal cruelty generate up to $280 billion per year worldwide.
Earlier this week, Brazil’s Minister for the Environment and Climate Change Marina Silva said current punishments for environmental crimes such as arson are inadequate during an appearance on Bom Dia Ministro, a publish service program. Lula’s administration has advocated for harsher punishment for environmental crimes.
Some governments in Latin America have displayed a disdain for protecting the environment in recent years, multiple experts told ABC News.
Multiple times during the administration of Jair Bolsonaro, who served as president of Brazil from 2019 to 2022, key government officials were caught on tape talking about the ways in which they planned to deceive the public, Garrett said. In 2020, Brazilian Environment Minister Ricardo Salles was recorded during a cabinet meeting advising fellow lawmakers to use the COVID-19 pandemic as a distraction from regulations protecting the Amazon rainforest from deforestation, according to Reuters.
“We need to make an effort while we are in this calm moment in terms of press coverage, because they are only talking about COVID, and push through and change all the rules and simplify norms,” Salles was heard saying in the recording of the ministers’ meeting, released by the Brazilian Supreme Court.
In a statement issued by Brazil’s Environment Ministry, Salles said, “I have always defended de-bureaucratization and simplifying norms, in all areas, with good sense and all within the law.”
“It’s part of this whole general new set of rules that politicians play by these days where they feel like there are no consequences for doing the wrong thing,” Garrett said in regard to the Bosolnaro administration’s pro-deforestation agenda.
Salles resigned in 2021 amid a probe into illegal logging in the country. It is unclear whether Salles has or will face legal consequences in the probe.
In Venezuela, initiatives to mine for gold, diamonds and other minerals in the southern part of the country, made first by former President Hugo Chávez and reinforced by Maduro, wreaked havoc on the Venezuelan side of the Amazonian jungle, said Nahon-Serfaty. To the north, oil spills into the Caribbean Sea are common due to the lack of regulations, he added, with a spill from the refinery in El Palito reported last month.
When corruption is embedded into a political system, it plays an invisible role in almost every decision those in power make, Garrett and Nahon-Serfaty said, especially when institutionalized through campaign financing systems and the individual agendas of the policymakers.
It can be near-impossible to pinpoint the root of the issue in these types of regimes, Garrett said.
“Corruption is one of this very insidious problems that is extremely difficult to deal with because you can’t study it,” Garrett said. “It’s hidden, and it can be institutionalized.”
It will be important for governments and authorities in Latin America to enforce environmental policies going forward, Bianco said.
The global spotlight will be on Brazil going into next year as it gears up to host COP30, the 2025 United Nations Climate Change Conference.
Brazil was one of the countries with the weakest decarbonization pledges, going into COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, in 2021. The country has since ramped up its pledges under Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s presidency in the years since, with new climate targets aiming to cut emissions by 48% by 2025 and 53% by 2030.
In Mexico, the use of environmental technologies to improve water and waste infrastructure is expected to grow in the coming years to ease the strain of drought. The country is also implementing federal regulations to reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas sector.
Those doing the work to achieve even more ambitious climate and environment goals must continue, despite the difficulties, Garrett said.
The Amazon creates an entire ecosystem of rainfall that much of southern Brazil and surrounding countries rely on, Garrett said. As deforestation creates a feedback loop of decreased rainfall and increased drought, the water system is threatened and the risk of severe wildfires heightens, driving indigenous communities out and placing food and water security at risk for all who rely on it.
“I can’t think of any better way to spend my own life than trying to help prevent these irreversible harms that will take away from the world of opportunities that future generations have to experience a healthy climate and biodiversity,” Garrett said.
(CODY, Wyo.) — A 60-year-old woman was walking off-trail in Yellowstone National Park when she suffered burns from scalding water in a thermal area by Old Faithful, park officials said.
The woman was walking with her husband and their dog in a thermal area near Mallard Lake Trailhead on Monday afternoon “when she broke through a thin crust” over the extremely hot water, suffering second-degree and third-degree burns to her leg, the National Park Service said.
The woman, who was visiting Yellowstone from New Hampshire, was taken to a park medical clinic and later flown to a hospital for further treatment, officials said.
Her husband and dog were not hurt, park officials said.
“Visitors are reminded to stay on boardwalks and trails in hydrothermal areas and exercise extreme caution,” Yellowstone National Park said in a statement. “The ground in these areas is fragile and thin, and there is scalding water just below the surface.”
Park spokesperson Linda Veress urges visitors to “follow the beaten path.”
“In thermal areas, boardwalks take you to amazing places, protect the park, and keep you safe,” Veress told ABC News. “People have been severely burned and killed after leaving the boardwalk or reaching into hot water.”
Pets aren’t allowed on boardwalks or hiking trails, or in thermal areas, park officials noted.
The incident is under investigation, park officials said.
