Bird strike likely caused New York City helicopter crash in Hudson River: NTSB
Police and firefighters work on the site after a helicopter crashed in the Hudson River on April 10, 2025, in Jersey City, New Jersey. All six people on board were killed when a helicopter plunged into the Hudson River off of Lower Manhattan. (Photo by Andres Kudacki/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — A bird strike likely caused last year’s tourist helicopter crash in New York City’s Hudson River that killed all six people on board, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
The more than 2,000 pages of information released by the NTSB is not the final report and does not state the probable cause, but the documents show the chopper slammed into multiple large birds before the crash.
The birds hit the rotor blades and the horizontal stabilizer, according to an analysis by the Smithsonian Institution’s Feather Identification Lab. Samples of “mixed species” of birds were found, including Canada Geese and black-backed Gull. Canadian Geese can sometimes weigh more than 10 pounds each.
Videos showed the rotors flying off the helicopter as it plummeted to the water.
The chopper crashed into the Hudson in April 2025 while carrying a pilot and a family from Spain: Siemens executive Agustin Escobar, his wife Merce Camprubi Montal, and their three children.
One witness told ABC News she watched the helicopter “fall out of the sky” from her apartment window.
“I heard five or six loud noises that sounded almost like gunshots in the sky and saw pieces fall off, then watched it fall into the river,” she said.
The Nashville International Airport in Nashville, Tenn., March 11, 2024. (Joe Hendrickson/Getty Images)
(NASHVILLE) — Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee wants to honor Dolly Parton in a big way.
Lee said he spoke with Parton’s team about renaming Nashville International Airport in honor of Dolly, which would create “a lasting tribute to her indelible legacy and the generations of people she inspired across Tennessee and around the world.”
Parton’s team “expressed their appreciation for the extraordinary outpouring of support to honor Dolly,” according to Lee, and they are “touched by the idea and open to continuing the conversation.”
“Dolly Parton’s extraordinary life is forever woven into the fabric of our state,” Gov. Lee said in a statement. “From her rural mountain home in East Tennessee to global stages, Dolly carried the Volunteer Spirit with her. At a place where Tennessee welcomes the world, it is fitting that Nashville International Airport would bear the name of our state’s favorite daughter and greet travelers with the enduring legacy of Dolly’s music, generosity, faith, and kindness.”
Lee’s proposal will be addressed at the Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority’s meeting on Sept. 17.
MNAA President Doug Kreulen said in a statement, “Dolly’s remarkable legacy reminds us that what makes Nashville special is our ability to welcome people from every walk of life. She understood that dignity, kindness and opportunity should never be defined by where you come from or your socioeconomic status.”
Kreulen added, “At BNA, we share that commitment. Whether you are boarding a private aircraft or taking your first flight, you deserve to be welcomed, respected and served with the same level of care. That spirit is what defines BNA and it is a fitting reflection of the values Dolly shared with Tennessee and the world.”
A change.org petition created by Lydia Popovich and Dan Dion in January 2025 to rename the airport after Parton has received tens of thousands of additional supporters since her death on Aug. 25. Since it was created, it has received more than 155,000 signatures.
The petition calls on Lee and Tennessee lawmakers Todd Warner, Bob Freeman and Fred Atchley to make the change.
Warner shared a response to the petition on Wednesday, writing, “Yes I will definitely introduce legislation to rename the BNA airport Dolly Parton International Airport! Thanks, TW.”
A Beechcraft C90 King Air (Marko Hannula/Getty Images)
(RUIDOSO, N.M.) — All four people on board a small medical plane were killed when the flight crashed near Ruidoso, New Mexico, early Thursday, according to a local official.
The Beechcraft King Air 90 had departed from Roswell Air Center and was headed to Sierra Blanca Regional Airport when it crashed around 4 a.m. local time, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
“All four individuals have been confirmed deceased at the scene,” Jason Burns, the manager of Lincoln County, where the Sierra Blanca Regional Airport is located, said at a news conference.
The crash was in a remote, wooded area, according to FlightRadar24. Fire officials, law enforcement and other agencies responded to a fire associated with the crash in the Capitan Mountain area, Burns said.
“Our hearts and prayers go out to the families, loved ones, friends and colleagues of those who lost their lives,” Burns said.
The National Transportation Safety Board and FAA will investigate, the FAA said.
The Colorado River, located two miles from the entrance of Arches National Park, is viewed on October 3, 2023 near Moab, Utah. (George Rose/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Colorado River basin and its two largest reservoirs — Lake Mead and Lake Powell — are facing potentially record-low water levels in the coming months due to a snow drought that impacted much of the West over the winter season, projections from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation show.
The 24-month study released by the Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees water resource management, on Friday indicates that Lake Mead could reach a record-low level of 1,036 feet of elevation in 2026.
Lake elevations indicate how much water is inside a reservoir. The Bureau’s scenario analysis looks at the end of month elevations for both Lake Powell and Lake Mead, and they make a future projection based on the probable inflow.
The previous low at Lake Mead was recorded in 2022, when levels dropped to around 1,040 feet.
Lake Mead could again approach these critically low levels over the next several months and years, according to the Bureau. This would depend on both the climate conditions as well as the response to those conditions, Dave White, director of the Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation at Arizona State University, told ABC News.
Lake Powell is also projected to drop to a new record-low level in the coming months, surpassing the previous record of around 3,520 feet set in 2023. The amount of water flowing into the lake between April and July is forecast to be around 800,000 acre-feet, the lowest flow on record and only 13% of the average for that period, Cody Moser, senior hydrologist at the Colorado River Basin Forecast Center, said during a webinar on May 7.
Lake Mead and Lake Powell are the largest reservoirs in the U.S. Together, they store about 80% of the water supplies in the Colorado River system, Mark Squillace, professor of natural resources at the University of Colorado, told ABC News.
More than 40 million people rely on the river system for water, according to the Bureau.
Apart from actual water supplies, one of the biggest concerns for hydrologists is whether enough water remains in the reservoirs to operate hydropower systems. Another 2.5 million people are supplied by hydropower conducted in the Colorado River’s hydroelectric facilities, such as the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams.
The minimum surface elevation needed to generate power at the Hoover Dam is 1,050 feet, according to the Bureau. Anything below that is considered “inactive pool,” and a “dead pool” exists at 895 feet in elevation.
A “dead pool” is when water won’t flow to a dam and is too low to flow downstream.
Record low snowpack was followed by a heat wave in March that served as a “knockout punch” for lack of runoff leading to the reservoirs, Jon Meyer, assistant Utah state climatologist, told ABC News.
“We’ve been monitoring how the dismal thin snowpack melts travel down through the watersheds, and how much reservoir recharge and stream flow we can expect this year,” Meyer said. “It is just exceedingly underperformed a normal situation.”
But this isn’t a situation caused by one bad snow year, Arizona State University’s White said, adding that the Colorado River system is operating under an increasingly warmer, drier climate.
The West had been dealing with a decades-long megadrought before atmospheric rivers in the winters of 2023 and 2024 inundated the region with enough moisture to cause extreme flooding and alleviate drought conditions. This is further evidence of hydroclimate whiplash — the rapid shift between wet and dry conditions — that has resulted from anthropogenic climate change, the experts said.
“This is a multi-decade-old drought, and then on top of that multi-decade-old drought are the impacts of climate change, which predominantly translate into higher temperatures, more variable precipitation, and drier soils and higher [water] demand,” White said.
The most recent low reservoir levels occurred in 2022, in which Lake Mead’s water levels reached a record low of around 1,040 feet, according to the Bureau of Reclamation.
After that year, reservoir levels rebounded slightly due to aggressive conservation measures, especially from the lower basin states — Arizona, California and Nevada, White said.
The Colorado River system is integral for supplying water, power and watering the agricultural feeds that sustain the rest of the country, Erica Fleishman, director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute said.
But the river system is over-allocated, according to Fleishman. The water rights were established during a period of the 20th century in which levels were “unusually high,” she noted.
“The Colorado River is emblematic of what the entire West is seeing this year with limited water supply and ramifications for hydropower generation, for irrigation, for water quality,” Fleishman said.
The Bureau is anticipated to issue a record of decision with the operational guidelines for 2027 and 2028, as well as a framework for 2029 through 2036.
The lower basin states have submitted an allocation plan for consideration, but there is not yet a consensus plan among all of the states, including the upper basin states, according to White.
“I think it’s fair to say no one is happy with it,” he said.
