‘The entire shoulder seems to have collapsed’: New videos show initial response to sinkhole on I-80 in New Jersey
New Jersey State Police
(MORRIS COUNTY, NJ) — Drivers riding on Interstate 80 spotted an unexpected present the morning after last Christmas — a sinkhole just feet away from where cars were passing by in suburban New Jersey.
“Look at how far it goes under there,” a man says in police video footage obtained by ABC News on Friday. “They may have to shut the whole [expletive] road down.”
It was a prediction that turned out to be true.
Ever since the sinkhole was spotted along one of the busiest highways in the Northeast on Dec. 26, 2024, parts of I-80 have been closed to drivers on and off.
The closures have angered local business owners and caused congestion on detour routes that frequently paralyzes the streets of Wharton along with surrounding communities in Morris County.
The formation of the sinkhole was quickly linked to the region’s mining heritage, with the collapse of an abandoned mineshaft under I-80 identified as the cause. Additional sinkholes have popped up in the time since December’s collapse.
The video footage, which was recorded by a New Jersey State Police trooper and released in response to a request filed by ABC News under New Jersey state law, shows two drivers standing steps from the sinkhole in shock.
“We just went by and were like, ‘holy [expletive],’” one man tells the trooper while steam appears to be rising from the sinkhole in front of them.
“I’ve never seen nothing like this,” another man says.
Within a few minutes, troopers shut down two of the eastbound lines of the highway.
“The entire shoulder seems to have collapsed,” a trooper says over his police radio.
This stretch of I-80 is frequently used by both local commuters along with long-distance drivers traveling between the New York metropolitan area and Pennsylvania, Upstate New York or the Midwest.
Commuters impacted by detours were encouraged to ride New Jersey Transit trains since the agency has a station in Mount Arlington, west of the area where the sinkholes formed, but rail service is currently suspended due to a strike by engineers.
In a press release issued Friday, the New Jersey Department of Transportation announced that two eastbound lanes on I-80 may reopen as soon as May 21, with the entire highway slated to reopen by June 25.
(TABLE ROCK, SC) — Three teenagers are accused of causing a massive fire that ignited in a South Carolina state park after failing to extinguish cigarettes while on a hiking trail, officials said.
The teens — Nyzaire Jah-Neiz Marsh, 19, Tristan Tyler, 18, and Isaac Wilson, 18 — were arrested Tuesday on charges in connection with the origin of the Table Rock Fire, the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
The teens were among several hikers who had been evacuated from Table Rock State Park in Pickens County on March 21 after first responders discovered the rapidly growing wildfire while searching for a missing hiker, the commission said.
They were questioned about the origins of the fire, and investigators “obtained evidence that they allege identified these subjects as suspects in the origin of the Table Rock State Park fire,” the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
According to the arrest warrant affidavits, “the suspects took part in smoking activities on a hiking trail at the state park and did not extinguish their cigarettes in a proper and safe manner, which officials allege led to the ignition of the Table Rock Fire,” the South Carolina Forestry Commission said.
The three teens are charged with one count each of negligently allowing fire to spread to lands or property of another, a misdemeanor, the commission said. They were booked and released on $7,500 bonds. Online court records did not list any attorney information for them.
If convicted, they face up to 30 days in jail or a $200 fine.
A fourth suspect, a juvenile, was also charged with one count of the same offense and released into the custody of his parents, the commission said.
The Table Rock Fire has burned more than 13,000 acres total in South Carolina and North Carolina since igniting on March 21, the South Carolina Forestry Commission said Tuesday. It was 30% contained as of Tuesday morning.
Fire crews responded from multiple states to help battle the blaze, which prompted the evacuation of more than 1,400 homes and businesses on Thursday.
The South Carolina Forestry Commission issued a burning ban for all counties on March 21 due to the elevated wildfire risk.
The following day, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster declared a state of emergency to support the response to the Table Rock Fire.
(BOSTON) — A Massachusetts woman is on trial again for the death of her police officer boyfriend, after a jury was unable to reach a verdict in the initial murder trial last year.
Karen Read is accused of killing her boyfriend, John O’Keefe, a Boston police officer, in January 2022. The prosecution alleges that, following a night of drinking in Canton, Read struck O’Keefe with her SUV outside of a private residence, then left the scene. An autopsy found that he died of hypothermia and blunt force injuries to the head.
Read’s defense attorneys have long centered on allegations that the defendant was the subject of a cover-up.
Read has maintained her innocence. She pleaded not guilty to charges including second-degree murder, vehicular manslaughter while operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol and leaving the scene of a collision causing death.
During opening statements Tuesday in Norfolk County Superior Court in Dedham, special prosecutor Hank Brennan focused on numerous accounts Read has given in interviews with the media, in which he claims Read makes a series of “admissions.” Brennan announced his intent to present Read’s numerous statements to the media as important evidence in the Commonwealth’s case.
“You are going to hear from her own lips, and many of her statements, her admissions to her extraordinary intoxication. Her admissions to driving the Lexus. Her admissions to being angry at John that night,” he said.
Brennan directed the jury’s attention to a clip of the defendant’s interview from October 2024.
“I didn’t think I ‘hit him,’ hit him,” Read said in the interview. “But could I have clipped him, could I have tapped him in the knee and incapacitated him?”
Brennan told jurors they will see a host of video and DNA evidence during the trial, including what he said is DNA of O’Keefe’s hair recovered from Read’s bumper.
He also pointed to evidence pulled from Read’s Lexus, which he said will show that the defendant’s vehicle reversed at least 70 feet around the time of the alleged murder. Brennan repeatedly highlighted the broken taillight identified on the defendant’s vehicle as evidence that her Lexus struck O’Keefe.
Defense attorney Alan Jackson asserted in his opening statement that Read did not cause the death of O’Keefe.
“There was no collision with John O’Keefe,” Jackson repeated three times.
Jackson said the assertion that O’Keefe was struck by Read’s Lexus SUV is “contrary to science.”
“John O’Keefe did not die from being hit by a vehicle, period,” Jackson said.
Jackson promised to show the jury that the police investigation on which the Commonwealth has based its case is “riddled with errors.”
He made numerous references to personal relationships that investigating officers held with witnesses in this case, including Boston police officer Brian Albert, who owned the residence where O’Keefe was found dead on the lawn.
The attorney also criticized the involvement of former Massachusetts State Police Trooper Michael Proctor, the lead investigator in the case. Jackson introduced Proctor as “a longtime family friend of the Alberts who has been disgraced by his own agency,” alluding to his dismissal by state police.
“You’ll see from the evidence in this case that this case carries a malignancy, one that is spread through the investigation,” Jackson said. “It’s spread through the prosecution from the very start, from the jump, a cancer that cannot be cut out, a cancer that cannot be cured, and that cancer has a name. His name is Michael Proctor.”
The attorney promised to show the jury personal text messages between Proctor and his high school friends, in which he made vulgar and sexist comments about Read. Jackson then alleged that Proctor admitted in the same text conversation to seizing the defendant’s cell phone without her permission and searching her phone for nude photos.
Proctor’s family responded to Jackson’s opening statement, calling it “yet another example of the distasteful, and shameless fabrication of lies that embodies their defense strategy” in a statement to ABC Boston affiliate WCVB.
“Jackson is under no oath to tell the truth; he does not have to speak in truths,” the statement continued. “The defense team continues to do anything to deflect from facts of the case and continues to use inappropriate analogies like casting someone as a cancer. We wholeheartedly believe the truth will prevail in this case, and justice for Officer John O’Keefe and his family will be achieved.”
The Commonwealth’s first witness, Timothy Nuttall, a Canton firefighter and paramedic who administered medical aid to O’Keefe, testified that he heard Read say, “I hit him,” at the scene.
“She said, ‘I hit him, I hit him, I hit him,'” Nuttall said. “I remember it very distinctly.”
In his cross-examination, Jackson focused on the witness’ ability to accurately recall details from that morning.
Jackson pointed to an inconsistency between Nuttall’s testimony in Read’s first trial, where he stated that Read said, “I hit him,” twice, and his statements Tuesday in court, where he now claims she repeated the statement three times.
“So your memory is clearer today, now, as you sit here, than it was a year ago, when you testified it was two times?” Jackson asked.
“Yes, sir,” Nuttall said with a nod.
The next witness, Kerry Roberts, testified that she saw Read point to an abnormality in the taillight of her SUV the morning that O’Keefe was found and that she recalled seeing a piece missing.
Roberts will resume her testimony on Wednesday. The trial is expected to last six to eight weeks.
Hours before the proceedings began on Tuesday, roughly two dozen protesters supporting Read gathered near the courthouse. Judge Beverly Cannone ordered a 200-foot no-protest zone around the courthouse in the interest of ensuring a fair trial.
A man “lingering and filming” within the buffer zone was arrested Tuesday morning after police say he ignored multiple requests to leave the zone, Massachusetts State Police said. The Arlington man was expected to be arraigned Tuesday on a trespassing charge, police said.
ABC News’ Nadine El-Bawab contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — A New York county legislature candidate has been missing for almost a week, according to the Nassau County Police Department.
Petros Krommidas, 29, a Democrat running for the Nassau County legislature’s 4th District, was last seen on April 23 in Baldwin, New York, police said.
Police said Krommidas was last seen wearing a camouflage print sweatshirt and gray sweatpants and is believed to be in the area of Long Beach, New York.
“Please keep searching. We need to find him,” Krommidas’ sister, Eleni-Lemonia Krommidas, said in a statement on Tuesday.
According to his family, Krommidas parked his car by the Allegria Hotel in Long Beach, locked his vehicle, grabbed his towel and walked onto the beach to exercise, “just as he had done many times before,” around 10:30 p.m. on April 23.
Krommidas was “always in great shape, and has many future plans,” including participating in a triathlon, his family said in a statement on Monday. He also was “not a stranger to cold water training,” his family said.
He was reported missing on April 24, with the family saying it is “completely out of character” for Krommidas not to respond to messages.
On April 24, police found Krommidas’ towel, clothes and phone left on the beach, officials confirmed to ABC News. Since then, the search efforts have continued, but the family is also encouraging the public to help by walking along the beaches — specifically areas between Long Beach, Lido Beach and Jacob Riis Park — during high tide.
“Every pair of eyes helps. Every step along the beach matters. Thank you for being part of bringing Petey home,” the family said.
Just two days before his disappearance, Krommidas spoke at a meeting for the Nassau County Young Democrats.
Police said anyone with information regarding Krommidas’ whereabouts should contact the Missing Persons Squad at 516-573-7347.
