(DALLAS) — A monster winter storm is fueling the worst travel day of the year — with more than 4,000 flights canceled Thursday morning as of 10 a.m. per FlightAware. This is the most flight cancellations in a single day this year.
Dallas Fort Worth International Airport was forced to suspend all departing and arriving flights on Thursday for at least a few hours due to ice and snow, according to the FAA.
“DFW confirms our runways are not operational while being treated for snow and ice,” the airport tweeted Thursday morning. “We anticipate reopening the first runway within the next hour.”
The airport currently holds the No. 1 spot for flight cancellations out of any airport in the world, with around 1,000 flights canceled Thursday.
Major U.S. airline hubs such as Chicago O’Hare International, Austin-Bergstrom International, and Dallas Love Field are also getting slammed by the arctic blast.
Austin-Bergstrom International and Dallas Love Field have already canceled more than 70% of their operations.
“Heavy snow and freezing rain is forecast today from Texas to New England,” the FAA warned. “Severe weather could impact parts of the South. Check with your airline for flight status.”
Southwest and American fliers are expected to see the most disruptions, with the airlines canceling almost 30% and 20% of their flights, respectively.
They have both issued winter weather waivers that allow passengers to change their flight with no penalty as the storm barrels across the nation.
Airports in the Northeast are bracing for flight disruptions Friday as the storm makes its way into the I-95 corridor.
This week’s storm is the latest travel nightmare in just a few weeks.
Last weekend thousands of fliers dealt with more than 5,000 flight cancellations as strong winds and heavy snow pummeled the East Coast.
At the start of the year, winter weather and the surge in omicron cases left many holiday-goers stranded for days.
Steve Agee reprises his role as John Economos from The Suicide Squad in HBO Max’s new hit spin-off Peacemaker.
For the series, Agee’s character graduates from being that superhero movie staple “the guy in the chair” to a gorilla-chainsawing secret agent, helping John Cena’s titular character tackle an alien invasion.
“I’m so stoked that we get to develop this guy,” Agee tells ABC Audio.
“You know, he was a pretty flat character in Suicide Squad, so it’s great for a number of reasons. I get to step out from sitting behind a computer and kill gorillas and get a body count going,” he adds with a laugh.
From its opening moments, the series went viral, thanks to an absurd opening dance number featuring all of its characters that runs at the start of each episode. Set to Finnish band Wigwam‘s 2010 track “Do Ya Wanna Taste It,” Agee explains that the opening put the group, first formed in 1968, back on the map — along with Cinderella, Hanoi Rocks and other bands writer/director James Gunn laced into Peacemaker‘s soundtrack.
“Wigwam is still a band, they’re still together,” Agee points out. “Their tour manager [recently had] fired them. Three days later, our show drops with, like, the greatest opening sequence of all time and kick-starts this band into full gear…[Now] they’re touring again. This has been a huge boost for them.”
Agee adds, laughing, “It’s been a boost for us! That opening number…it’s the thing I get asked most about. It’s like, ‘What was that like and how long did you have to rehearse?’ Yeah, it comes out of left field, man.”
The sixth episode of Peacemaker just debuted on HBO Max.
Halsey will complete their acting transition with the recently announced National Anthem movie. The movie’s cast was unveiled Thursday and the “Without Me” singer says they are “So honored and excited” for the opportunity.
National Anthem also stars Halsey’s “bestie,” Euphoria‘s Sydney Sweeney, as well as Paul Walter Hauser and Simon Rex, reports Deadline. The movie, from Bron Studios, will be the directorial debut of Tony Tost.
According to the movie’s synopsis, National Anthem is about “a gritty hunt for a valuable rare Lakota Native American Ghost Shirt. Some are hunting for fortune, others for personal freedom, while others simply want to return it properly to its home. No longer will the marginalized be ignored — all must learn to survive or else.”
No information is available yet concerning Halsey’s role in the movie or when it is expected to arrive in theaters.
Back in 2020, Halsey had announced another project with Sweeney — TV’s The Player’s Table. No word on if that project is still moving forward.
(ATLANTA) — Gay and lesbian adults are more likely to have been vaccinated against COVID-19 than heterosexual adults, federal officials said Thursday.
A new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found 85.4% of gay and lesbian Americans above age 18 had received at least one vaccine dose as of October 2021.
By comparison, 76.3% of heterosexuals reported receiving at least an initial dose by the same date.
Additionally, gay and lesbian adults were more likely to be concerned about COVID-19 and to believe in the safety and efficacy of vaccines.
“We know that the prevalence of certain health conditions associated with severe COVID-19 illness, such as cancer, smoking, and obesity, are higher in LGBT populations, and access to health care continues to be an issue for some people in the LGBT community,” Dr. A.D. McNaghten, a member of the CDC’s COVID-19 Emergency Response Team and corresponding author of the study, told ABC News. “We wanted to see if vaccination coverage among LGBT persons was the same as non-LGBT persons.”
For the survey, CDC researchers collected data from the National Immunization Survey Adult COVID Module between Aug. 29, 2021 and Oct. 30, 2021.
The data also showed that bisexual and transgender adults had similar vaccination rates to heterosexual adults with 72.6% of bisexual adults fully vaccinated by the end of October, as were 71.4% of transgender adults.
When it came to race/ethnicity, gay white men and lesbian white women had higher rates of vaccination at 94.1% and 88.5%, respectively, receiving at least one dose compared to heterosexual white men and women at 74.2% and 78.6%, respectively.
Hispanic gay men also had higher COVID vaccination rates at 82.9% compared to 72% of Hispanic heterosexual men.
However, Black and Hispanic lesbian women had lower rates of vaccination at 57.9% and 72.6%, respectively, compared to Black and Hispanic heterosexual women at 75.6% and 80.5%, respectively.
McNaghten said the disparity between the percentage of white gay men with at least one vaccine dose and Black lesbian women with at least one dose is “alarming.”
The survey also found that gay, lesbian and bisexual adults were more likely to believe in the safety and protection of vaccines than heterosexual adults.
A total of 76.3% of gay and lesbian adults said they were “completely” or “very” confident in the safety of COVID vaccines, as did 70.4% of bisexual adults. Comparatively, only 63.9% of heterosexual adults said they felt the same way.
Additionally, 90.8% of gay and lesbian adults and 86.8% of bisexual adults said COVID vaccines are “very” or “somewhat” important to protect themselves compared to 80.4% of heterosexual adults.
Transgender and nonbinary adults, on the other hand, were confident about vaccine protection but not safety, with 83.2% saying they believed vaccines were necessary to protect against COVID, but only 62.8% saying they believed the shots are safe.
The researchers found 56.8% of gay and lesbian adults and 51.3% of bisexual adults were “very” or “moderately” concerned about COVID compared to 48.1% of heterosexual adults.
The authors note there are limitations of the study including that participants self-reported their vaccination status and potentially selected a sexual orientation category they didn’t identify with because they didn’t see an option that fit them.
But McNaghten says it is vital to make sure the LGBT population is vaccinated. She added that further studies are needed to figure out why there are differences by gender and race/ethnicity among gay and lesbian men and women.
“Additional research could help determine if these differences are associated with socioeconomic or health care access issues, and if there are factors influencing vaccine uptake or vaccine hesitancy within specific groups,” she said.
In the study, the authors said it is important to include sexual orientation and gender identity when collecting data on vaccination status to help eliminate disparities.
(WASHINGTON) — A man who was arrested for parking his car illegally, for failure to obey and assault on a police officer, has returned and parked his Chevy Tahoe once again in front of the Supreme Court building Thursday, Capitol Police said in a tweet.
Dale Paul Melvin of Kimball, Michigan, was outside of the Supreme Court, when he was arrested in October also for illegally parking and refusing to leave, Capitol Police had said in a statement at the time.
U.S. Capitol Police say Melvin used some “concerning language” on public social media postings shortly before he showed up in font of the Supreme Court, a statement released by the agency said.
“Our officers and agents are focused on our critical mission,” said USCP Chief Tom Manger. “I applaud them for their keen observation and for not taking any chances when it comes to safety and security.”
Capitol Police says after some discussion the 58-year-old was not arrested and agreed to leave the area.
Melvin told Capitol Police in October: “The time for talking is over.” He then had to physically be removed from the car after speaking with Capitol Police investigators, authorities said.
Capitol Police said roads are back open after witnesses saw Melvin hold up a letter, then promptly drive away after he parked his car illegally in front of the Supreme Court.
Roads around the Supreme Court and U.S. Capitol are clear, police said.
(NEW YORK) — Days after two police officers were killed by a suspect using an illegal gun, President Joe Biden headed to New York City Thursday to meet with Mayor Eric Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul and to announce new actions targeting gun violence that the White House says builds on his “comprehensive strategy” unveiled last June.
“Enough is enough because we know we can do things about this,” Biden said in afternoon remarks from NYPD headquarters. “But for the resistance we’re getting from some sectors of the government and the Congress and the state legislatures and the organizational structures out there — you know, Mayor Adams, you and I agree, the answer is not to abandon our streets, that’s not the answer.”
“The answer is to come together, the police and the communities, building trust and making us all safer. The answer is not to defund the police, it’s to give you the tools, the training, the funding to be partners, to be protectors and community needs you,” Biden said to applause. “Police need to treat everyone with respect and dignity.”
Senior administration officials said on a call with reporters Wednesday evening that Biden is visiting New York City “because it is a community where they continue, like many other cities across the country, to experience a spike in gun violence.”
Traveling with Attorney General Merrick Garland, Biden’s trip intends to highlight a set of new actions from the Justice Department which includes directing all U.S. Attorney’s Offices to increase resources dedicated to district-specific violent crime strategies, and increasing personnel and other resources to strengthen task forces that target the illegal flow of guns up the East Coast, similar to the one that was used in the recent fatal shooting of two NYPD officers.
Biden said the Department of Justice will also take steps “today” to prioritize federal prosecutions of those who “criminally sell or transfer firearms that are used in violent crimes” and launch a National Ghost Gun Enforcement Initiative to help bring cases against those who use so-called “ghost guns” to commit crimes.
“If you commit a crime with a ghost gun, not only are state and local prosecutors gonna come after you, but expect federal charges and federal prosecution as well,” Biden said Thursday.
The president introduced the new initiatives at a meeting on gun violence prevention before of heading to Queens with Garland, Adams and Hochul to discuss community violence intervention programs with local leaders.
“I’ll keep doing everything in my power to make sure that communities are safer, but Congress needs to do its part, too,” Biden said in prepared remarks. “Pass universal background checks, ban assault weapons and high capacity magazines, close loopholes to keep out of the hands of domestic abusers weapons, repeal the liability shield for gun manufacturers.”
He also offered a word for the families of the fallen NYPD officers to begin the meeting.
“Detective Wilmer Mora and Jason Rivera are the who and what law enforcement ought to be,” Biden said, calling the stolen glock the suspect allegedly used “really a weapon of war.” “I’ve spoken to their families, and their loss for the city is also a loss for the nation.”
After a series of mass shootings at the start of his presidency last year and facing pressure to act, Biden issued a half dozen limited gun control executive actions in April, which included actions on “ghost guns” and pistol-stabilizing braces.
The president is limited in his authority to act alone on gun control reforms and is continuing to call on Congress to act legislatively, though after months of negotiations, the most recent talks on gun reforms failed in September.
On Thursday, Biden will ask them to reach a bipartisan agreement on an appropriations bill that includes $300 million to expand community policing and $200 million for evidence-based community violence interventions.
(WASHINGTON) — The United States said Thursday it had intelligence that showed Russia is planning to create a video depicting a fake Ukrainian attack, that it could release in order to justify its own invasion of Ukraine.
One of a number of options Russia has been allegedly planning, U.S. officials said, was to “stage a fake attack” against Russia or Russian-speaking people.
“As part of this fake attack, we believe that Russia would produce a very graphic propaganda video, which would include corpses, and actors that would be depicting mourners, and images of destroyed locations as well as military equipment,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said.
The United States took the rare step of making this intelligence public in order to dissuade Russia from moving forward or, if it did move forward, to make it more difficult for it to spread disinformation after the fact, according to Jon Finer, the principal deputy U.S. national security adviser.
“We don’t know definitively that this is the route they’re going to take,” Finer said in an interview with MSNBC.
“But we know that this is an option under consideration,” he continued, “that would involve, you know, actors playing mourners for people who are killed in an event that they would have created themselves, that would involve the deployment of corpses to represent bodies purportedly killed in — people reportedly killed in an incident like this.”
The U.K. said later Wednesday that it had conducted its “own analysis of the intelligence,” and that it had “high confidence that Russia is planning to engineer a pretext blaming Ukraine in order to justify a Russian incursion.”
“This is clear and shocking evidence of Russia’s unprovoked aggression and underhand activity to destabilize Ukraine,” Britain’s foreign secretary, Liz Truss, said.
It is not the first time in recent weeks that the United States had accused Russia of “fabricating a pretext” to justify invading Ukraine.
The Kremlin on Wednesday denied the new allegations.
“This is not the first such promise,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, according to the Russian state news agency TASS “Earlier, similar things were also voiced. But nothing ever occurs.”
Last month, the White House said the U.S. had intelligence that Russia had prepositioned a group of operatives in eastern Ukraine in order to create a “false-flag operation” there. The administration said the group was trained in urban warfare and the use of explosives.
A spokesperson for the White House’s National Security Council declined to say whether those the United States is accusing of being involved in creating a fake video were part of this same group.
The U.S. believes Russia has already recruited the people who’d be involved with the fake “attack” video and that “Russian intelligence is intimately involved in this effort,” according to the senior administration official.
The U.S. thinks that “the military equipment used in this fabricated attack will be made to look like it is Ukrainian or from allied nations” – and that it was “possible” that Bayraktar drones, which Ukraine has, would be used to make it look like Ukraine carried out the attack, according to the official.
U.S. officials have repeatedly said, as recently as Wednesday, that they do not believe Russia’s President Vladimir Putin had yet decided whether to invade Ukraine.
But if he did want to move forward, the senior administration official said, one trigger could be Russia recognizing separatist regions in Ukraine as independent, rather than as part of Ukraine. Russia’s parliament is advancing legislation that would do so.
The U.S. believes that if Russia formally recognized the regions as independent, Russia could then release the video showing a fake Ukrainian “attack” – that it could portray as in response to the independence recognition – or Russia could just invade without releasing the video, according to another administration official.
“In line with its previous interventions, Russia would portray its actions as defending ethnic Russians and coming at the request of a sovereign government for assistance,” the senior administration official said.
ABC News’ Matt Seyler, Patrick Reevell and Christine Theodorou contributed to this report.
The sophomore effort from the band, led by 13 Reasons Why actor Dylan Minnette, will arrive March 25. It includes the previously released song “I Don’t Want to Talk,” as well as a just-premiered tune called “Especially You,” which is available now for digital download.
“It’s about when you’re in the early stages of a relationship and you get so worried that the other person’s mind will change at the flip of a switch,” Minnette says of “Especially You.” “It’s about stressing over the smallest things for no reason, but it’s definitely self-aware about the fact that I’m doing this all to myself.”
Tell Me That It’s Over follows Wallows’ 2019 debut, Nothing Happens, which features the hit Clairo collaboration “Are You Bored Yet?”
Wallows will launch a North American headlining tour in support of Tell Me That It’s Over in April.
Here’s the Tell Me That It’s Over track list:
“Hard to Believe”
“I Don’t Want to Talk”
“Especially You”
“At the End of the Day”
“Marvelous”
“Permanent Price”
“Missing Out”
“Hurts Me”
“That’s What I Get”
“Guitar Romantic Search Adventure”
After revealing earlier this week that her dream is to record with Rihanna and Adele, Megan Thee Stallion also has a 15-time Grammy nominee on her collabo wish list.
“Me and Jazmine Sullivan would definitely have some stuff to talk about,” the Glamour Woman of the Year honoree tells Billboard. “We’ll have the girls crying, we’ll have the girls screaming, we’ll have the girls dancing, we’ll have the girls sipping wine, [and] sitting in the backyard sipping cognac.”
She adds, “The men better go run and hide if me and Jazmine Sullivan do an EP. We need to get that in the works.”
The “Hot Girl Summer” star has been on fire over the past year, earning two Grammy nominations, and promoting several companies, including Coach and Popeyes, as well as starring in a Frito-Lay Super Bowl commercial.
Megan also signed a production deal with Netflix in 2021. She also graduated from Texas Southern University with a Bachelor of Science degree in health administration in December, and despite her busy entertainment career, the “Savage” rapper says she’s still committed to opening a health facility in her Houston hometown.
“I’m definitely manifesting that I will get these buildings together to open up my assisted-living facilities. I already manifested my Netflix deal, so you will see the results of my manifestations from that,” Megan says. “Whatever I say I’m gonna do, I definitely always do it.”
The second season of truTV’s Fast Foodies is here, allowing fans to watch the exciting combination of celebrities, cooking and, of course, fast food. If that wasn’t enough to grab your attention, star Justin Sutherland teased to ABC Audio, “Everything’s just taken up a notch this season.”
Sutherland, who’s one of the chefs tasked with recreating the celebrity guest’s favorite fast food and giving it a five-star remix, dished, “The celebrities that we’re having this season just run the gamut from athletes to top-end actors.” Among those he name-dropped were Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Baron Davis.
In addition, Sutherland says his fellow chefs have gotten into the swing of things. “I think we’re all doing way better food, not that last year’s food wasn’t good, but we just we know the format. We’re comfortable with each other,” he remarked.
And while he is responsible for fancying up fast food for his celebrity guests, one must wonder which drive-thru Sutherland likes to visit the most. “I love a beef and cheddar from Arby’s,” the Iron Chef champion revealed, noting that it’s his go-to when he’s “hung over and, like, you can’t stomach a lot of food.”
Sutherland also has a penchant for a particular condiment from a famous fried chicken chain. “I will put KFC gravy on anything,” he admitted. “Sometimes I will get [an] Arby’s beef and cheddar and then go across the street and get just a side of gravy from KFC. And then I call it a slutty French dip, and then just sit in the parking lot and shamefully shovel this gravy and make sure nobody’s looking.”
Fast Foodies season two airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on truTV.
![Megan Thee Stallion wants to record with Jazmine Sullivan: “We’ll have the girls crying…screaming [and] dancing”](https://s3.amazonaws.com/syndication.abcaudio.com/files/2022-02-03/Getty_MeganTheeStallion_020322.jpg "Megan Thee Stallion wants to record with Jazmine Sullivan: “We’ll have the girls crying…screaming [and] dancing”")
