The pilot of a small plane who threatened to intentionally crash into a Walmart in Mississippi has landed in a field, local media reported on Saturday.
Earlier, the police department in Tupelo, Mississippi said they had been talking directly to the pilot and had evacuated the Walmart and a gas station.
Tracking data from Flightradar24.Com shows how the pilot flew around in circles over tupelo for hours before landing.
The Daily Journal, citing multiple sources, said the plane was down in Ashland, a sparsely populated part of Mississippi, and the pilot was still alive.
An image on social media from the Starkville Daily News showed a small plane in a field.
For the second time in a week, Nasa on Saturday aborted an attempt to launch its giant, next-generation rocketship, citing a stubborn fuel leak that the space agency said could delay the debut mission of its moon-to-Mars Artemis program by at least several weeks.
Preflight operations were called off for the day about three hours before the 2:17 p.m. EDT (1817 GMT) liftoff time targeted of the 32-story-tall Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and its Orion capsule from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The uncrewed test flight, aimed at launching the capsule out to the moon and back, was to have marked the inaugural voyage of both the SLS and Orion a half-century after the last lunar mission of Apollo, the forerunner of the Artemis program.
The countdown was scrubbed after Kennedy Space Center technicians made several failed attempts to fix a “large” leak of supercooled liquid hydrogen propellant being pumped into the rocket’s core-stage fuel tanks, agency officials said.
The initial launch try on Monday was likewise foiled by technical problems, including a different leaky fuel line, a faulty temperature sensor and cracks found in insulation foam.
Mission managers proceeded with a second launch attempt on Saturday once the earlier issues had been resolved to their satisfaction. Nasa had reserved another backup launch time, for either Monday or Tuesday, in case a third try was needed.
But after a review of data from the latest difficulties, Nasa concluded the hydrogen leak was too tricky and time-consuming to finish troubleshooting and fix on the launch pad before the current launch period allotted to the mission expires on Tuesday.
The delay means the earliest opportunity to try flying the rocket again would come during the next launch period that runs Sept. 19-30, or during a subsequent October window, an associate Nasa administrator, Jim Free, told reporters at a late-afternoon briefing.
He said the postponement also would involve rolling the spacecraft off the launch pad and back into its assembly building at some point, under space center “range” rules limiting how long a rocket may remain at the tower before liftoff.
Launch-day delays and technical snags are not uncommon in the space business, especially for new rockets such as Nasa’s Space Launch System, a complex vehicle with a set of pre-liftoff procedures that have yet to be fully tested and rehearsed by engineers without a hitch.
On average, the odds of scrubbing a launch on any given day for any reason, including foul weather, are about one-in-three.
The last-minute setbacks on the launch pad come at the tail end of a development program more than a decade in the making, with years of delays and billions of dollars in cost overruns under Nasa’s respective SLS and Orion contracts with Boeing Co and Lockheed Martin Corp.
MOON TO MARS
Apart from its technical challenges, Artemis I signals a major turning point for Nasa’s post-Apollo human spaceflight program after decades focused on low-Earth orbit with space shuttles and the International Space Station.
Named for the goddess who was Apollo’s twin sister in ancient Greek mythology, Artemis aims to return astronauts to the moon’s surface as early as 2025, though many experts believe that time frame will likely slip.
Twelve astronauts walked on the moon during six Apollo missions from 1969 to 1972, the only spaceflights yet to place humans on the lunar surface. But Apollo, born of the U.S.-Soviet space race during the Cold War, was less science-driven than Artemis.
The new moon program has enlisted commercial partners such as SpaceX and the space agencies of Europe, Canada and Japan to eventually establish a long-term lunar base of operations as a stepping stone to even more ambitious human voyages to Mars.
Getting the SLS-Orion spacecraft launched is a key first step. Its first voyage is intended to put the 5.75-million-pound vehicle through its paces in a rigorous test flight push.
Tens of thousands of passengers travelling to the United Kingdom from the French port of Calais faced up to six hours of delay on Saturday night in the latest disruption to hit the border between France and Britain this year.
Tense arguments over queue jumping erupted and passengers started directing traffic themselves amid an apparent absence of staff to control the flows of cars during one of the busiest days of the year.
One passenger, Elizabeth Goodfellow, said that 16 lanes of traffic were being channelled into seven French border control posts, causing substantial delays.
Crossings between Calais and Dover have been complicated ever since Britain left the European Union in 2022.
Port officials on both sides say that stepped-up border controls planned for 2023 risk adding to the time each vehicle spends at checkpoints.
In July, tens of thousands of passengers travelling from Dover to France faced massive delays amid British claims of insufficient French staff on hand to check passports of departing travellers.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency on Thursday visited the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine and said experts would maintain a continued presence at the facility.
Rafael Grossi, who visited the plant for several hours, also said he would continue to worry until the situation at Zaporizhzhia had stabilised. Both Russia and Ukraine say they fear a possible radiation disaster as a result of shelling that the two sides blame on each other.
“We are not going anywhere. The IAEA is now there, it is at the plant and it is not moving – it’s going to stay there,” Grossi told reporters.
“We’re going to have a continued presence there at the plant with some of my experts.”
Those experts, he said, would provide what he called an impartial neutral technically sound assessment of what was happening on the ground.
“I worried, I worry and I will continue to be worried about the plant until we have a situation which is more stable, which is more predictable,” he said.
Local residents presented Grossi with a petition and documentation of damage caused by shelling in the area.
Ukraine and Russia accuse each other of creating a risk of atomic catastrophe by shelling the plant, where the situation has been unravelling in recent weeks.
Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva maintains a 13-percentage-point lead over President Jair Bolsonaro, but the far-right incumbent has narrowed his leftist rival’s advantage ahead of the October election, according to a poll published on Thursday.
The survey by Datafolha showed Lula with 45% of voter support against 32% for Bolsonaro in the first round of the election scheduled for Oct. 2, compared to 47% and 32% respectively in the previous poll.
In an expected second-round run-off, Lula would get elected by 53% of the votes versus 38% for Bolsonaro, a 15 percentage point gap, down from 17 two weeks ago, the poll showed.
For political analyst Sergio Praca, the results of the second round results could swing either way.
On the streets, people’s opinions are torn. While some, such as storekeeper Raimundo Pereira, see Lula as the clear winner, others like taxi driver Sergio Praca would like to see Bolsonaro remain in power.
Datafolha interviewed 5,734 people in person between August 30 and Sept. 1. The poll has a margin of error of 2 percentage points.
Argentina’s Vice President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner was threatened by a man with a gun late on Thursday, in what one government colleague described as an assassination attempt, but she was not harmed and no shots were fired.
The incident took place at the entrance of Fernandez de Kirchner’s Buenos Aires home, where hundreds of protesters have gathered in recent days to support the former president, who is in the midst of a corruption trial.
A police spokesman told Reuters that an armed man had been arrested near the residence and “a weapon was found a few meters from the scene.” He said the man could be of Brazilian origin.
Television footage had shown that no shots were fired after the man pointed a gun at Fernandez in the middle of a crowd. The media noted that the man appeared middle-aged.
The Clarin newspaper reported that the gun was loaded, citing official sources. Reuters could not independently confirm this.
Government and opposition leaders, as well as politicians from other Latin American countries, expressed solidarity with Fernandez de Kirchner, who has been a divisive political figure and served as president for two terms between 2007 and 2015.
Taiwan’s shooting down of a drone off the Chinese coast that buzzed a Taiwanese-controlled island was the most “appropriate” thing to do after repeated warnings, and China should exercise restraint, Taiwan Premier Su Tseng-chang said on Friday.
On Thursday, Taiwan’s military for the first time shot down an unidentified civilian drone that entered its airspace near the tiny Lion islet, which is part of the Kinmen islands that sits next door to China’s Xiamen city, after the government vowed to take tough measures to deal with an increase in such intrusions.
The incident came after Taiwan had repeatedly complained of harassment by drones coming from China and flying right up close to the Kinmen islands, which have been taking place as Beijing stages military drills around Taiwan.
At least two videos of recent drone trips have circulated widely on Chinese social media, in one of which Taiwanese soldiers were seen throwing stones at the craft. Chinese forces have been exercising near Taiwan since early last month, following the visit to Taipei of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, which infuriated Beijing.
New York State Governor Kathy Hochul, New York City Mayor Eric Adams, and law enforcement officials addressed public safety at a news conference Wednesday ahead of new gun laws going into effect in New York State.
“I’m proud to announce that the changes to the law will go into effect this week, most of them taking effect tomorrow, which is why we’re meeting today, “ said Hochul, speaking at a press conference Wednesday. “And these will strengthen the background checks and the gun safety training requirements, prohibit concealed carry in secure, sensitive locations, and require permit renewals every three years instead of five years.”
The changes to the law follow the U.S. Supreme Court decision in June that said there was a constitutional right to carry weapons in public. The court’s conservative majority threw out the gun-license laws of New York and other states for denying some people those rights.
In July, lawmakers in New York state’s Democratic-controlled legislature passed a law overhauling licensing requirements and creating a long list of “sensitive locations” where possessing a gun would be a new felony.
The list included parks, schools, courthouses, public transit and bars. Only one location was singled out by name: Times Square.
On Wednesday, Adams said the city is posting signage around Times Square “informing people that the area is a gun-free zone… And then licensed gun carriers and others may not enter with a gun unless otherwise specifically authorized by law.”
Hochul also announced that the law to raise the age to purchase a semiautomatic weapon to 21 will go into effect on Sept. 4. She also said New York State will be the first state to require training for firearm permits.
Dangerously hot conditions once again took over most of Arizona on Wednesday, with temperatures from 41 to 44 Celsius, according to the National Weather Service (NWS).
The heat wave has physically and mentally impacted the unhoused community, who venture out each day to look for water and shade. Terry Price, who became homeless 16 months ago, cried while sharing her experience living on the streets during extreme weather conditions. “When you wake up in the morning and you’re like, ‘what do I do today?’ And then you think, ‘well, it’s hot. What can I do?’ You need food,” Price told Reuters.
Price says she is exhausted and fantasizes about being able to sit down in somebody’s yard to use the water hose.
Janné Croll is a Physician Assistant with Circle the City’s street medical team. On Wednesday, she made her usual rounds to local parks in Chandler. The first thing she did was offer water and information about the symptoms related to heat exposure.
“You know, we see people who are really struggling with the heat and that’s in the morning when it’s not even 43 or 46 Celsius out and it’s so dangerous. And we know that even with education, we’re going to lose people every year because the heat just, it comes upon you so quickly that you don’t even know what’s happening and then it’s too late,” Croll said.
For Brian Brewer, homeless for four years, the Arizona heat is like an oven that never turns off. “So imagine if that air conditioner never came on, right? You’re just in the heat all the time,” Brewer explained.
He was given electrolyte packets by Circle the City’s street medicine team, which he quickly added to water to hydrate himself.
“When these folks come out here and they give us some medical assistance and, you know, they, you know, cold water, you know, just whatever we need, things like that from day to day, basic stuff that, you know, we need. It’s really important,” Brewer said.
Belgium announced a series of measures to tackle soaring energy prices on Wednesday, including cuts to public buildings’ power consumption and a proposal to tax the excess profits of energy companies such as Engie and TotalEnergies.
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said heating in public buildings would be limited to 19 degrees Celsius and air conditioning use reduced. At the same time, the lighting of offices and monuments will be switched off at 7 p.m. Talks will continue to decide on turning off lights on highways and in cities at certain hours.
The federal government also said it would present by the end of September a proposal to tax the excess profits of energy companies.
“In our country, a tax on excess profits already exists in the nuclear sector. The aim of the (new) proposal is now to extend this measure to other companies in the energy sector, which profits are now very high,” De Croo told reporters after a meeting with regional political leaders.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which began at the end of February, forced Belgium to rethink plans to rely more on natural gas and stop using nuclear power entirely in 2025.
In July, it reached an initial accord with French utility group Engie to extend the lives of its two newest nuclear reactors, Doel 4 and Tihange 3, by 10 years.
The Belgian government on Wednesday also asked operator Engie to look into postponing the final shutdown of one of its two oldest reactors Tihange 2 to March 31, 2023, at the latest, though Engie said it was impossible.
The EU’s statistics office Eurostat said earlier this year Belgium had the highest energy inflation in the EU and that the government in Brussels has only tinkered with taxes and tariffs to alleviate consumer pain.
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