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Photos: Extreme weather surges around the world

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

The first two weeks of July have seen a striking surge of wildfires, extreme heat, flooding, and drought across the globe. Tornadoes have hit Denver, Chicago and Boston, while five people – including two children – died after being swept away by flash flooding in Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, smoke from Canadian wildfires continues to choke cities in the Northeast, while a massive swath of states in the southern half of the country remain under heat warnings.The extreme weather is not isolated to the U.S. Much of Europe has been afflicted by a heat wave named Cerberus, the multi-headed dog that guards the underworld of Greek myth. Spain, Switzerland, Lebanon, and Greece are also battling wildfires. India, Pakistan, and Japan have been hit by devastating floods and landslides, and people are being forced to ration water due to a drought in Costa Rica.PHOENIX, ARIZONA – JULY 16: In an aerial view, a billboard displays the temperature that was forecast to reach 115 degrees Fahrenheit ...

Trevor Gott feels his pitch command ‘is the best’ it has been in his career

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

Trevor Gott’s career trajectory started fast, plateaued even faster and has gone up and down a few times since. The right-hander might be in a good spot now — so good the Mets were willing to take on the salary of another pitcher to get him in a trade with the Seattle Mariners — but it was only two years ago that he was in Triple-A, trying to figure out how to use all of his pitches effectively again.Gott came to the Mets in a trade with the Mariners right before the Mets went on a six-game winning streak a few weeks ago. With the club desperately trying to get back into the Wild Card race, some bullpen bolstering was badly needed. He checked all of the boxes for the Mets with five pitches that he could command.“I feel like my command is the best it’s been in my career with all of my pitches,” Gott told the Daily News.It wasn’t always this way. It took an entire year in Triple-A to figure out how to do that again.Less than two years after th...

Colorado teen accused of trying to go to Iraq to fight for the Islamic State group

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

By COLLEEN SLEVIN (Associated Press)DENVER (AP) — An 18-year-old from suburban Denver who allegedly planned to go to Iraq to fight for the Islamic State group was arrested last week as he tried to board a flight to Turkey.Davin Daniel Meyer of Castle Rock, who was arrested Friday, has been charged with attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Colorado announced late Monday.Meyer’s lawyer did not immediately return a telephone message or email seeking comment. According to his arrest affidavit, law enforcement began investigating him in June 2022 when someone who knew him contacted the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office. The person said they were concerned because, after following white supremacist ideology, Meyer, then 17, had turned to Islam and was frequently watching and listening to “radical Islamic sermons online.” The FBI was notified by the sheriff’s office, it ...

Orioles introduce first-round pick Enrique Bradfield Jr., adding another young talent to ‘healthy’ organization

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

In the wake of his lowest top draft pick as Orioles general manager, Mike Elias quipped that the organization’s continual promotions of its top prospects would soon begin to hamper its status as the majors’ top-ranked farm system.But Tuesday, as he and the Orioles officially introduced the player chosen with that No. 17 selection — Vanderbilt outfielder Enrique Bradfield Jr. — Elias said he believes Baltimore could meld that recognition with its rise at the major league level.“I’ve used the word ‘healthy’ a lot, but to me, that’s how I would describe the state of the Orioles organization right now,” Elias said. “We’ve got a young, talented major league team that’s not going anywhere, and then we’ve got a historically good group in the minor leagues that’s coming and now, we’ve got guys like [Bradfield].“We want to keep picking down here. That’s the goal. Hopefully, we’re...

US soldier who fled to North Korea was facing disciplinary action after time in South Korean prison

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

By HYUNG-JIN KIM, KIM TONG-HYUNG, TARA COPP and LOLITA C. BALDOR (Associated Press)SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — An American soldier facing military disciplinary actions fled across the heavily armed border from South Korea into North Korea, U.S. officials said Tuesday, becoming the first American detained in the North in nearly five years.Two U.S. officials said the soldier detained was Pvt. 2nd Class Travis King, who had just been released from a South Korean prison where he’d been held on assault charges and was facing additional military disciplinary actions in the United States.King, who’s in his early 20s, was escorted to the airport to be returned to Fort Bliss, Texas, but instead of getting on the plane he left and joined a tour of the Korean border village of Panmunjom, where he ran across the border. At a Pentagon press conference Tuesday, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin did not name King, but confirmed that a U.S. service member was likely now in North Korean...

Damian Lillard trade to Miami is complicated, even for third-party Nets

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

The Miami Heat alone do not have the assets to pull off a Damian Lillard trade.No matter how many times you try in the NBA Trade Machine, there’s no straight-up deal that sends Lillard from Portland to Miami that results in an acceptable haul for the Trail Blazers.It’s not because Tyler Herro isn’t a talented basketball player. The former Sixth Man of the Year is coming off a respectable second consecutive season averaging 20 or more points per game.Portland’s backcourt, however, is already accounted for in No. 3 overall pick Scoot Henderson and emerging scoring guard Anfernee Simons.The Trail Blazers simply do not need Herro, even more so considering Shaedon Sharpe’s emergence as a legitimate NBA starter.Portland is not trading the most important player in its franchise’s history in a deal that doesn’t make basketball sense — even more so when you consider Miami only owns two tradable first-round picks, and their next-most attractive ...

Virginia finalizes guidance on transgender students, including rolling back some accommodations

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s administration said Tuesday that it has finalized new policies on the treatment of transgender students, guidance that will direct school districts to roll back some current accommodations and increase parental notification requirements about certain discussions involving gender identity. Youngkin said the guidelines, which have been sharply criticized by LGBTQ+ advocacy groups since they were first unveiled last year, will empower parents while prohibiting discrimination and creating a safe learning environment. “This is about doing what’s best for the child,” Youngkin said in an interview with The Associated Press. “And oh, by the way, also recognizing that we need to ensure the privacy and dignity and respect of all children and all parents in the school system. And that’s what I think we have … very carefully constructed here.” The Republican governor’s administration first advanced the proposed changes in Sep...

Louisiana lawmakers overturn governor’s veto on gender-affirming care ban for transgender minors

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana’s Republican-dominated Legislature overturned Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards’ recent veto of a ban on gender-affirming care for transgender minors on Tuesday.Louisiana, where the ban is scheduled to go into effect Jan. 1, 2024, will join 20 other states that have enacted laws restricting or banning gender-affirming medical care, which includes puberty-blockers, hormone treatment and gender-reassignment surgery. Most of those states face now lawsuits, and in some places the bans have been temporarily blocked by federal judges. Like statehouses across the country, for the last three months Louisiana lawmakers have heard and held debates over gender-affirming care — something that has been available in the United States for more than a decade and is endorsed by major medical associations. Discussions over the ban were marred by misinformation, swarmed with religious arguments and saw hours of emotional testimony from the LGBTQ+ communityAt one point,...

B.C. port strike back on after union rejects deal, saying four-year term is too long

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

VANCOUVER — The union representing British Columbia’s port workers has rejected a mediator’s tentative agreement that had ended strike action last week.  Rob Ashton, the president of the International Longshore Workers Union Canada, says in a statement that its caucus does not believe the deal can protect jobs “now or into the future.”Ashton also says the four-year agreement is “far too long” given the uncertainties in the industry and the economy overall.He says workers were going back on picket lines at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.The BC Maritime Employers Association says ILWU Canada rejected the deal without sending it to a full membership vote. The 13-day strike that ended last Thursday involved about 7,400 port workers at more than 30 port terminals and other sites across the province.The employers group says the rejected deal was “fair and comprehensive,” with hikes in wages and benefits above the 10 per cent increases workers had receive...

Exec tells first UN council meeting that big tech can’t be trusted to guarantee AI safety

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:15:49 GMT

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The handful of big tech companies leading the race to commercialize AI can’t be trusted to guarantee the safety of systems we don’t yet understand and that are prone to “chaotic or unpredictable behavior,” an artificial intelligence company executive told the first U.N. Security Council meeting on AI’s threats to global peace on Tuesday.Jack Clark, co-founder of the AI company Anthropic, said that’s why the world must come together to prevent the technology’s misuse.Clark, who says his company bends over backwards to train its AI chatbot to emphasize safety and caution, said the most useful things that can be done now “are to work on developing ways to test for capabilities, misuses and potential safety flaws of these systems.” Clark left OpenAI, creator of the best-known ChatGPT chatbot, to form Anthropic, whose competing AI product is called Claude. He traced the growth of AI over the past decade to 2023 where new AI systems can beat military pilots in air fi...