Wing of Delta plane strikes runway at LaGuardia Airport during landing
Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — The wing of a Delta plane struck the runway as it was coming in for a landing at LaGuardia Airport on Sunday evening, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
At approximately 10:10 p.m. on Sunday, the plane’s “left wing struck the runway while landing” and the pilots then “executed a go-around,” according to the FAA.
A go-around is a safe, routine maneuver where the pilot discontinues the landing approach and returns the aircraft to an altitude to safely make another landing attempt.
The plane, a CRJ-900 aircraft, was traveling on its regularly scheduled service from Jacksonville, Florida, to New York City, according to Delta.
On air traffic control audio, the controller told the pilot, “Somebody saw some sparks from one of your wings, you guys feel anything?” The pilot responded, “We didn’t, but we’ll check it.”
The flight was operated by Endeavor, the same regional carrier as the Delta plane that crashed while landing in while landing in Toronto in February. The plane in that incident was also a CRJ-900.
The 76 passengers, two pilots and two flight attendants on board Flight 4814 were unharmed, with no injuries reported, according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which oversees the three major New York City area airports.
“We apologize to our customers for the experience,” Delta said in a statement.
The airline said the plane has been taken out of service while maintenance teams evaluate and did not indicate when the aircraft will return to flying.
The incident also did not cause an impact to airport operations, according to the Port Authority.
The FAA is continuing to investigate the situation.
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order calling on his administration to determine “the equivalent of a reciprocal tariff with respect to each foreign trading partner.”
“In other words, we’re going to customize the reciprocal tariff based on individual trading nations, and that will depend on their profile,” a senior administration official said on a call with reporters previewing the action.
This means the administration plans to impose tariffs on other countries that match the duties they impose on American products. The senior official says this allows the U.S. to “customize” the tariff to each trading partner based on their actions.
Trump previously announced tariffs on China, Mexico and Canada. While the 10% tariffs on China have been imposed, Trump paused the 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico. Trump has also announced 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum that are expected to take effect next month.
Many economists warn tariffs will likely raise the prices of goods for consumers, worsening inflation that already rose faster than expected in January.
As for reciprocal tariffs, the administration official outlined five types of actions it will take into account in determining the reciprocal tariffs for trading partners.
They include tariffs imposed on U.S. products; unfair, discriminatory or extraterritorial taxes imposed by trading partners, including a Value Added Tax; cost to United States businesses, workers and consumers, including subsidies and burdens and regulatory requirements; exchange rates; as well as any other practice that USTR determines is an unfair limitation.
Key players in this action will include the commerce secretary and United States Trade Representative, in consultation with the treasury secretary and Homeland Security secretary. Trump has nominated Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick to lead the Commerce Department and attorney Jamieson Greer to be the U.S. Trade Representative.
Officials stressed the benefit of addressing this on a case-by-case basis, saying it “it opens the door for each country to basically correct the unfair trade practices that they’re engaging in.” But they did not rule out also pursuing a flat, global tariff either given the “national emergence we have with respect to the trade deficit.”
Asked for a timeline for when these tariffs might be implemented, the administration official seemed to suggest it would happen on a rolling basis, starting first with countries that have the highest deficits with the US.
“I think this will be done in what I have called in the past, in Trump time, which is to say, very rapidly, should be a matter of weeks, in a few months, but not much longer than that. We move quickly here,” the official said.
The reciprocal tariffs could hit developing countries the hardest — including India, Brazil and Southeast Asian countries.
There are many outstanding questions about the implementation of such tariffs.
One question is how Trump may continue to use these tariffs as a starting point for negotiations with world leaders. Officials said they hoped that the move would spark discussions between nations, saying the president would be willing to bring down tariffs if other countries do as well.
(LOS ANGELES) Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said he’s asked the court to deny the Menendez brothers’ habeas corpus petition, which aims to get a new trial or the case tossed out.
Erik and Lyle Menendez filed the habeas corpus petition in 2023 for a review of new evidence not presented at trial.
Two new pieces of evidence are at the center of the petition.
One is a letter Erik Menendez wrote to his cousin Andy Cano eight months before the murders detailing his alleged abuse from his father. The cousin testified about the alleged abuse at trial, but the letter — which would have corroborated the cousin’s testimony — wasn’t found until several years ago, according to the brothers’ attorney.
The second piece is allegations from a former member of the boy band Menudo, Roy Rossello, who revealed in 2023 that he was raped by the brothers’ father, Jose Menendez.
Hochman explained that the standard for a successful habeas petition has multiple requirements: You must show that it’s new evidence; you must show thats it’s timely and the evidence could not be discovered at the time of the trial; you must show you didn’t engage in a delay by the time you learned of the evidence and brought your motion; the evidence must be credible; and the evidence must be admissible.
Hochman argues the letter to Cano is not credible evidence.
“If this letter truly existed, the defense counsel would have absolutely used it at the trial because it would help corroborate” testimony from Cano and Erik Menendez, Hochman said.
Erik Menendez at his second trial testified for seven days about graphic descriptions of his sexual abuse from ages of 6 to 18 and also talked about the sexual abuse his brother experienced from their father, the district attorney said.
Asked who he disclosed to, Erik Menendez said he told Cano when he was 12 or 13 years old.
Cano — who died in 2003 — testified in the 1990s and relayed that same information: that Erik Menendez mentioned abuse six years before the murders and that was the only communication they had about the sexual abuse, the district attorney said.
That letter was never discussed at either of the two trials, Hochman said.
Erik Menendez claimed he didn’t know about the letter until a 2015 Barbara Walters special published it, but this habeas motion was not filed until 2023, Hochman said.
The defense in this habeas motion argued that to resolve this case jurors had to decide if the brothers were sexually molested by their father — but the jury never had to resolve that question, Hochman said. Instead, the jury had to determine if the brothers conspired to kill their parents, if they killed them, what their state of mind was, and if they did so, if they acted in self-defense, Hochman said.
Hochman said Rossello’s claims fail the admissibility standard for the habeas petition because the brothers didn’t know about Rossello’s allegations until recent years, so it couldn’t have influenced their state of mind during the crime and “couldn’t play a role in self-defense or premeditated murder.”
The brothers were convicted in 1996 of the 1989 murders of their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez.
Lyle and Erik Menendez, who were 21 and 18, respectively, at the time, admitted to gunning down their parents in the family’s Beverly Hills home. The defense claimed the brothers acted in self-defense after enduring years of sexual abuse by their father, but prosecutors alleged they killed for money.
Lyle and Erik Menendez were sentenced to two consecutive life prison terms without the possibility of parole.
Besides the habeas corpus petition, the brothers have been pursuing two other paths to freedom.
One other path is through resentencing, which Hochman said his office will deal with in the coming weeks.
In October, then-LA County District Attorney George Gascón announced that he was recommending the brothers’ sentence of life without the possibility of parole be removed, and they should instead be sentenced for murder, which would be a sentence of 50 years to life. Because both brothers were under 26 at the time of the crimes, they would be eligible for parole immediately with the new sentence.
The DA’s office said its resentencing recommendations take into account many factors, including rehabilitation in prison and abuse or trauma that contributed to the crime. Gascón praised the work Lyle and Erik Menendez did behind bars to rehabilitate themselves and help other inmates.
Weeks after Gascón’s announcement, he lost his race for reelection to Hochman.
Hochman said in January that he was still reviewing the facts of the case and hadn’t yet decided if he’s in support of the brothers’ bid for freedom. He said he was reviewing thousands of pages of confidential prison records, trial transcripts and court filing, as well as speaking to all the prosecutors and defense attorneys involved.
The brothers’ next resentencing hearing is on March 20 and 21.
The third path to freedom is through clemency.
The brothers submitted a request for clemency to California Gov. Gavin Newsom. In November, Newsom said he’d defer to Hochman’s “review and analysis of the Menendez case prior to making any clemency decisions.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s plane experienced a mechanical issue while en route to Munich, Germany, on Thursday, according to a State Department spokesperson.
The plane turned around returned to Joint Base Andrews before Rubio continued his travel to Germany and the Middle East on a separate aircraft, the spokesperson added.
Rubio is now safely en route to Munich on a smaller aircraft, according to the State Department.
Rubio is headed to Germany to attend the Munich Security Conference and to participate in the G7 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, according to the State Department.
He will then travel to Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to meet with senior officials, according to the agency.
“Secretary Rubio’s engagements with senior officials will promote U.S. interests in advancing regional cooperation, stability, and peace,” the State Department said of the trip, adding that the Israel-Hamas ceasefire and hostage deal will be a priority.
