5 dead after hot air balloon hits power lines in New Mexico
Five people died after a hot air balloon they were riding in hit power lines in New Mexico’s largest city and the gondola crashed to the ground, police said Saturday.
The crash happened around 7 a.m. on Albuquerque’s west side, police spokesman Gilbert Gallegos said. No identities have been released but fire officials said three men, including the pilot, and two women died.
Four of them were pronounced dead at the scene, and the fifth person died after being taken to the hospital in critical condition, Gallegos said.
The multi-colored balloon skirted the top of the power lines, sending at least one dangling and knocking out power to more than 13,000 homes, Gallegos said.
The gondola fell about 100 feet and crashed in the median of a busy street, catching on fire, the Federal Aviation Administration said. Bystanders frantically called out for a fire extinguisher to put out the flames and prayed aloud, video posted online showed.
The envelope of the balloon floated away, eventually landing on a residential rooftop, Gallegos said. The FAA did not immediately have registration details for the balloon but identified it as a Cameron 0-120.
Authorities haven’t determined what caused the crash. The National Transportation Safety Board sent two investigators to the scene Saturday who will look into the pilot, the balloon itself and the operating environment, said spokesman Peter Knudson. A preliminary report typically is available in a couple of weeks.
Gallegos said hot air balloons can be difficult to manage, particularly when the wind kicks up.
“Our balloonists tend to be very much experts at navigating, but sometimes we have these types of tragic accidents,” he said.
Albuquerque is a mecca for hot air ballooning. The city hosts a nine-day event in October that draws hundreds of thousands of spectators and pilots from around the world. It is one of the most photographed events globally.
While accidents aren’t common, they do happen. Since 2008, there have been 12 fatal hot air ballooning accidents in the United States, according to an NTSB database.
In 2016 in Texas, a hot air balloon hit high-tension power lines before crashing into a pasture. All 16 people on board died.
The United States estimates that up to 900,000 people in Ethiopia’s Tigray region now face famine conditions amid a deadly conflict, even as the prime minister says there is “no hunger” there.
The hunger crisis in Tigray is the world’s worst in a decade, and the new famine findings are “terrifying,” the head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, Samantha Power, said Friday, adding that millions more people are at risk.
The new estimate more than doubles the warning issued earlier this month by the United Nations and aid groups that more than 350,000 people face famine conditions in Tigray.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, the Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2019, in an interview aired last week with a state-affiliated network expressed concern that outside aid to Tigray
Famine in Ethiopia:
might end up supporting the Tigray fighters, recalling a similar situation during Ethiopia’s devastating famine in the 1980s.
“There is no hunger in Tigray,” the prime minister told the BBC.
TSA self-defense classes: The Transportation Security Administration will once again offer self-defense classes to flight attendants and pilots as the airline industry deals with a surge in cases of unruly passengers and sometimes violent behavior on flights.
The return of the classes comes after the coronavirus pandemic prevented crew members from receiving the training for more than a year.
The Federal Aviation Administration has documented more than 3,000 reports of unruly passengers on flights so far this year. It has initiated investigations into 487 of those cases.
The training is designed to help crew members
handle tense and violent situations with passengers. Crew members learn how to “identify and deter potential threats, and if needed, apply the self-defense techniques against attackers,” the agency said.
In the Mideast: Angry demonstrators clashed with Palestinian security forces for a third day Saturday during a protest in the West Bank over the death of an outspoken critic of the Palestinian Authority who died while in custody.
Hundreds gathered in the city of Ramallah to chant slogans against President Mahmoud Abbas, two days after Abbas’ forces beat activist Nizar Banat shortly after his arrest.
The protesters held Palestinian flags and posters of Banat, and called on Abbas to quit.
On Thursday, demonstrators had set fires, blocked the streets of the city center and clashed with riot police in
Ramallah. Palestinians also chanted against the Palenstinian Authority at Banat’s funeral in Hebron and masked gunmen fired shots into the air.
Hundreds rallied against Abbas after Friday prayers at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque.
Tropical weather: The first hurricane of the eastern Pacific season formed Saturday and forecasters said it was growing stronger, potentially bringing heavy rainfall while advancing northwestward off the Mexican coast.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Hurricane Enrique’s maximum sustained winds had risen to near 85 mph Saturday and were expected to reach Category 2 force by Sunday. The storm’s core was predicted to stay at sea while moving parallel to the coast over the next several days.
Enrique was centered about 215 miles south of Cabo Corrientes, south of Puerto Vallarta, and it was
headed to the west-northwest at 7 mph.
The Hurricane Center said Enrique could bring 6 to 12 inches of rain, with isolated maximums of 18 inches to coastal parts of Colima, Michoacan and Jalisco states.
Commemorative coin: Britain’s Treasury has unveiled a new special edition coin to commemorate the life of Prince Philip, who died in April at the age of 99.
The Treasury said Saturday that the design of the 5-pound coin had been approved by Philip in 2008.
Though it is legal tender, the coin will not be entering general circulation.
Philip was married to Queen Elizabeth II for 73 years. The other side of the coin features the 95-year-old monarch.
The coin has been launched on what is Armed Forces Day in the U.K. Philip had a distinguished naval career.