Strong winds, dry fuel spark concerns for wildfires in West Texas, New Mexico
ABC News
(NEW YORK) — Red flag warnings were issued Monday due to critical fire danger in West Texas, eastern New Mexico and the Oklahoma/Kansas/Colorado corner.
The combination of warm temperatures, gusty winds and low humidity could produce the potential for dangerous fire conditions across portions of the area.
With wind gusts reaching over 60 mph, alerts remain in effect from Colorado to Texas.
Relative humidity may only reach the low teens or even single-digits in these areas.
The public is urged to avoid the use of open flames or any activities that may generate sparks, according to the National Weather Service. In addition, people are asked to extinguish smoking material in vehicles since accidental ignitions have the potential to grow into dangerous wind-driven wildfires.
The warnings will remain in effect through Monday evening.
(NEW YORK) — Luigi Mangione, a person of interest in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was taken into custody on Monday in Pennsylvania, nearly one week after the “brazen, targeted” shooting outside a Midtown Manhattan hotel on Wednesday, police said.
Here is a timeline of the suspect’s whereabouts before, during and after the shooting:
Nov. 24
The killer entered New York City by bus on Nov. 24, when a surveillance camera at Port Authority Bus Terminal caught his arrival at 9 p.m., law enforcement sources told ABC News.
The inbound bus originated in Atlanta but it was not immediately clear where the suspect boarded.
He likely checked into a hostel on New York City’s Upper West Side that day and later checked out, sources said.
Nov. 30
The suspect likely checked back into the HI New York City Hostel on the Upper West Side on Nov. 30, sources said.
Dec. 4 at 5 a.m.
At 5 a.m., nearly two hours before the shooting, the suspect was seen in surveillance footage outside the hostel on the Upper West Side, holding what appears to be an e-bike battery.
6:15 a.m.
At 6:15 a.m., surveillance footage reviewed by police shows someone who appears to be the suspect leaving a 57th Street subway station near the crime scene, police sources told ABC News.
6:19 a.m.
New cleared CCTV video shows a man who appears to be the suspect walking west on 55th Street at 6:19 a.m. The video shows him stoop down as he appears to momentarily drop an object on the garbage before continuing to walk.
Before the shooting
Sometime before the shooting, the suspect is spotted at a Starbucks. The exact time is not clear.
6:29 a.m.
The suspect appeared to walk past a parking lot on West 54th Street at 6:29 a.m. — across the street some 50 meters from the site of the shooting.
6:44 a.m.
At 6:44 a.m., the masked gunman fatally shot Brian Thompson in front of the north entrance to the New York Hilton Midtown.
“The shooter then walks toward the victim and continues to shoot,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said. “It appears that the gun malfunctions, as he clears the jam and begins to fire again.”
The shooter fled on foot into an alley, where a phone believed to be linked to the suspect was later recovered, police sources said.
Time unknown
The suspect then fled north on a bike and rode into Central Park, police said.
Time unknown
After making his getaway on a bike, the suspect exited Central Park at 77th Street and Central Park West.
At 86th Street and Columbus Avenue, the suspect ditched the bike and took a taxi to the Port Authority bus facility at 178th Street.
Police believe he boarded a bus there and left New York City.
Dec. 9
On Dec. 9, the person of interest in the shooting — 26-year-old Luigi Mangione — was identified and taken into custody in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on unrelated gun charges, authorities said.
The man was on a Greyhound bus traveling through Altoona, sources said, when he got off and walked into a McDonald’s where a witness recognized him from the images of the suspect circulated by police.
Mangione, from Maryland, was in possession of a handwritten document “that speaks to his motivation and mindset,” NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said.
“It does seem that he had some ill will toward corporate America,” police said.
Mangione had a ghost gun capable of firing a 9 mm round and a suppressor, police said.
He was also in possession of a fake New Jersey driver’s license similar to the one the suspect used to check into a hostel in New York City before the shooting, she said.
Tisch praised the “good old fashioned detective work” of the NYPD and the “power of the public” that led to the arrest.
Police said they’re working to trace his movements from New York City to Pennsylvania.
John Kuklis, a clerk at the Horseshoe Curve Lodge in Altoona, Penn., is seen on “Good Morning America,” on Dec. 11, 2024. ABC News
(ALTOONA, Penn.) — Before he was arrested Luigi Mangione walked into the Horseshoe Curve Lodge in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on Monday looking for a room, according to the desk clerk who greeted him and noticed what he described as the man’s shifty behavior.
“He basically just walked in kind of cagey, just looking around, making sure he wasn’t being watched, asked if he could get a room here,” the hotel clerk, John Kuklis, told ABC News.
But that wasn’t the reason Kuklis had to turn the man away. They didn’t have a clean room available at that early hour, he said.
“I told him that he wouldn’t be able to get one right now, that our housekeeper hadn’t cleaned the rooms yet, that he had to come back at one o’clock. He asked if he could wait here. I told him no, because at the time, I didn’t know that I could just allow him to wait for, you know, half the day. And he said, ‘OK.’ And he turned around and just left. Didn’t say nothing. Never took his mask down,” Kuklis said.
Mangione’s arrival on Monday, the morning he was later arrested, came days after last week’s fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in Manhattan. Mangione faces a second-degree murder charge in connection with that killing. His defense attorney, Thomas Dickey, said he anticipates that Mangione will plead not guilty.
The Horseshoe Curve Lodge is roughly a 17-minute walk from the McDonald’s where authorities would later confront Mangione, and take him into custody. Rooms at that hotel cost around $60 a night, according to a review of online price quotes.
At first, Kuklis thought the young man might be a veteran just returned to civilian life — there are “a lot of vets that stay here,” Kuklis said, and thought that might perhaps be why the young man was acting somewhat circumspect.
He added, “When [vets] come back, they have — anybody that walks up behind ’em, or you feel a little shadow, or you hear a specific noise, you just kind of look over your shoulders, watch yourself, and he just, he was like, wouldn’t turn his head, but his eyes were constantly looking like, is there somebody coming behind me, watching his surroundings?”
Had Mangione been able to get a room, Kuklis said, he would have been asked to show ID — but that didn’t happen. Mangione has been charged with falsely identifying himself to police, according to a complaint filed in Blair County, Pennsylvania.
Tuesday, officers called the hotel, asking if the suspect had stayed there, the clerk said.
“They called this morning and asked if he had stayed here, I says, no,” Kuklis said, but mentioned to police the young man’s earlier attempt to book a stay. “The officer goes, ‘did he have a mask on? Did he ever take a mask off?'” Kuklis said, realizing in real time to the officer, “No, he never did take the mask off.'”
“Next thing I know there’s three Logan Township police cars pulling in the parking lot. I’m like, holy crap” Kuklis said. “We pulled up our surveillance stuff, they go, ‘Yeah, that’s him.'”
Looking back, Kuklis said he “didn’t even realize” that furtive young man might have been carrying the very weapon allegedly used to gun down the CEO. “I mean, theoretically, I guess he could have just pulled it out and shot me.”
(LOS ANGELES) — Much-anticipated rain could be headed to drought-stricken Southern California this weekend — but rainfall also brings the threat of landslides in the wake of Los Angeles County’s devastating fires.
Rain and mountain snow are expected in Southern California on Saturday and Sunday.
Rainfall rates are expected to be light, up to 1 inch over the course of the weekend.
But thunderstorms are possible; lightning could spark new fires and the thunderstorms would cause heavier rainfall.
Heavy rain over the vulnerable wildfire burn scars would be extremely dangerous because it could lead to landslides.
The extreme burn scars are the result of the Palisades and Eaton fires, which erupted on Jan. 7. The wildfires ripped across the LA communities of Pacific Palisades and Altadena, destroying neighborhoods, claiming more than two dozen lives and forcing more than 100,000 people to evacuate.
“We’ve never seen a burn scar in an urban area of this scope and magnitude,” LA City Council member Traci Park said Tuesday.
“I normally pray for rain. God knows, we generally need it,” Park said during a news conference. “But right now, let me point out the obvious: The burn scar of the Palisades Fire not only sits feet from the ocean itself, but already on hillsides that are already prone to slide, and which have already absorbed a tremendous amount of water from firefighting, broken pipes and melted pools.”
“Adding water to this mess and saturated, unstable hillsides is the last thing we need,” she continued. “But we already know at some point, it’s going to happen. And let me remind folks burn scars don’t absorb water at a normal rate. They simply add to the risk of floods, landslides and debris flow.”
LA Mayor Karen Bass issued an executive order on Tuesday to shore up the burn areas ahead of the rain.
“This is to prevent additional damage to areas already ravished by fire, and also to protect our watershed, beaches and ocean from toxic runoff,” Bass said during the news conference. “The action plan I have directed our city Public Works bureaus to implement includes the installation of barriers, debris removal and diverting runoff from our stormwater system and into our sewer system where it can be treated.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday that he’s deploying specialized debris flow teams to Southern California ahead of the rain.
Among the state resources will be more than 400 California Conservation Corps members who’ll “be working on watershed protection at firestorm burn scar areas to place silt fencing, straw wattles, and compost socks to act as physical barriers to filter contaminants found in rainwater runoff,” the governor’s office said. “More Corpsmembers will be trained to augment capacity in the coming days.”
More than 80 California National Guard service members are also headed to the scene “with 2 dozers, 1 excavator, 1 loader, 4 dump trucks and other engineering assets to haul 527,000 cubic yards of materials in local debris basins,” the governor’s office said.
