Author: rpnadmin

Federal safety investigators said in a new preliminary report that they found no indication that engine failure caused the fiery crash of a plane on a skydiving outing last month in Missouri that killed all 12 people aboard, including several very experienced jumpers. The report issued Thursday by the National Transportation Safety Board also did not flag any other serious safety or mechanical failures that could have led to the crash, which happened just after takeoff on a clear day. The NTSB released the findings based on initial inspections of the badly damaged wreckage and flight records. The report said…

PUEBLO, Colo. — A wildfire burning southwest of Denver has forced the evacuation of thousands of residents and destroyed more than 160 structures by Friday as erratic winds pushed the blaze across two Colorado counties. The Aspen Acres fire is one of about 40 uncontained large blazes burning mostly in the West, fueled by months of dry weather and a record lack of snow this past winter in some places. Fire personnel were scooping water from the Pueblo Reservoir to fight Aspen Acres fire, which expanded overnight by 17 square miles (44 square kilometers) which brought it up to nearly…

Police departments across the country are deploying drones, curfews and social media monitoring to head off so-called “teen takeovers” before they can disrupt Fourth of July weekend celebrations marking the nation’s 250th anniversary on Saturday. The gatherings, often organized through social media flyers, have repeatedly turned volatile in cities nationwide in recent months, prompting law enforcement agencies to intervene before crowds even assemble rather than wait for chaos to unfold, Fox News reported Friday. In Falmouth, Massachusetts, police have increased staffing and are using drones to monitor beaches, aiming to break up large gatherings before they become dangerous, according to…

Officials from Grand Canyon National Park are looking for a man they say broke a headpiece created by an indigenous artist that was on display. On June 17, the suspect was inside the Arizona park’s Desert View Watchtower. At some point between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m., he climbed onto handcrafted furniture to try to take a photo and fell as the furniture tipped. He knocked the headpiece off the wall while trying to steady himself, park officials said Wednesday. The piece, created in the 1930s by late Hopi artisan Fred Kabotie, hit the floor and broke into multiple pieces,…

An appeals court ruled Friday that President Trump’s administration can reinstall its interpretive panels at the site of President George Washington’s home in Philadelphia. The signs would be in the same area where the Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 4, 1776. A National Park Service spokesperson did not immediately return messages asking when the panels could go up. The new educational panels were designed to replace ones put up in 2010 that told the story of how nine slaves lived in the home along with George and Martha Washington in the 1790s, when Philadelphia was briefly the nation’s…

DEARBORN, Mich, — A shooting altercation between two groups of young people at a shopping mall in Dearborn, Michigan, left two people dead and a third injured Friday, police said. The shooting at Fairlane Town Center sent mall patrons scrambling, including a person who was hit by a vehicle outside the mall while attempting to flee, Dearborn Police Chief Issa Shahin said. People believed to be linked to the fight were being questioned at the police station, but no one was immediately taken into custody, he said. Shahin said the altercation was not a random act: The two groups knew…

The U.S. death rate dropped to its lowest level on record in 2025, according to provisional data the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released this week. The CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics reported that 3,094,593 total deaths occurred in the U.S. last year. The nation’s overall age-adjusted death rate was 689.2 per 100,000 people, a 4.6% decrease from 2024’s rate of 722.1 and the lowest figure recorded in U.S. history, according to the agency. The death rate fell across all age groups and for both sexes. The age-adjusted rate stood at 811.1 per 100,000 for males and 582.9…

A plan to build the world’s largest data center complex next to the Manassas National Battlefield Park is dead — killed by homeowners, preservationists and a string of court defeats. QTS Data Centers confirmed Thursday that it formally withdrew an April 30 appeal to the Virginia Supreme Court after “careful consideration” of ways to keep the 2,100-acre PW Digital Gateway alive. County officials and fellow developer Compass Datacenters previously withdrew after a three-judge panel of the Virginia Court of Appeals unanimously upheld a circuit court ruling that the Prince William Board of County Supervisors failed to give homeowners the legally…

Festivities commemorating the 250th anniversary of American independence from Great Britain kick into higher gear across the United States on Friday as celebrations are balanced with efforts to stay safe as much of the country bakes under extreme heat. President Trump will travel to South Dakota to deliver a speech and watch fireworks at Mount Rushmore. And in a novel twist, there will be a ball drop in New York City’s Times Square at midnight to usher in the July Fourth holiday with much the same revelry that is typically reserved for New Year’s Eve. The activity culminates in the…

Massachusetts lawmakers are working to reconcile competing versions of an immigration bill, and the most contentious unresolved question is whether people can sue individual ICE agents in state court over alleged constitutional violations during civil immigration enforcement — a remedy that would not be limited to illegal immigrants. The provision is part of the PROTECT Act, a package restricting state and local cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. The state Senate passed its version of the bill 37-3 in May, building on a House bill that passed 134-21 in March, and the two chambers are now working through a conference committee…