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  • All the celebrities who showed up at the 2026 Winter Olympics

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    All the celebrities who showed up at the 2026 Winter Olympics

    Well, Hannah Percy, can you believe you’re here? No, I can’t believe it at all. What’s the most surreal thing that’s happened so far? Meeting Snoop Dogg. Yeah, that was pretty surreal. That was very surreal. What was that like for you? Uh, I’ve never met *** celebrity before, so definitely *** unique experience. Like he’s just *** regular guy, but like he’s famous. But yeah, he was as cool as I’ve ever imagined, and there’s so much like attention on you guys when you get here too. Is that *** little different? Yeah, I’ve never had this many people like wanna video me ever in my life, so many cameras. What does it feel like that something has such *** big goal is actually happening? I can’t believe I’m reaching this humongous goal in my life at only 18. I, I feel like I’m like the youngest person on the bordercross team here, and so it’s just, it’s very surreal, and I don’t even, I haven’t even taken time to process how I’m feeling yet. I think you’re having *** good time. I’m definitely having *** good time. I will remember this forever.

    All the celebrities who showed up at the 2026 Winter Olympics

    Updated: 9:59 AM PST Feb 19, 2026

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    From Usher to Snoop Dogg to George Clooney, here are all the celebrities who’ve been spotted in Milan for the 2026 Winter Olympics.

    Snoop Dogg

    At Team USA Welcome Experience on February 3

    Martha Stewart

    At Milano Ice Skating Arena, giving commentary with Snoop Dogg and figure skater Ilia Malinin.

    Myles Garrett

    At Livigno Snow Park on February 12, cheering on his girlfriend, Chloe Kim, a snowboarder who won a silver medal.

    Flavor Flav

    Flavor Flav attends the Skeleton Mixed Team on day nine of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic games

    Mariah Carey

    Arriving in Milan on February 2

    Shaun White

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Stanley Tucci

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Michelle Yeoh

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Monique Coleman

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Maggie Rogers

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Usher

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Katherine LaNasa

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Sunghoon

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Gracie Gold

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Jeff Goldblum

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Benito Skinner

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Donatella Versace

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Adam Rippon

    At the Opening Ceremony red carpet on February 6

    Charlize Theron

    Delivering a speech at the Opening Ceremony on February 6

    Vittoria Ceretti

    Presenting the Italian flag during the Opening Ceremony on February 6

    Sabrina Impacciatore

    Performing at the Opening Ceremony on February 6

    Matt Rogers, Cleo Abram, and Bowen Yang

    At Team USA Welcome Experience on February 7

    Marisa Tomei

    At the opening night of OMEGA House on February 7

    George Clooney

    At the opening night of OMEGA House on February 7

    Jake Paul

    In the stands on February 9, cheering on his fiancée, Jutta Leerdam, a Dutch speedskater.

    Simone Biles

    At Milano Ice Skating Arena on February 13

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  • Contributor: A Senate war powers resolution on Venezuela actually could curb Trump

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    President Trump seemed angry after the Senate voted last Thursday to pass a war powers resolution to the next stage, where lawmakers could approve the measure and seek to curb the president’s ability to wage war in Venezuela without congressional authorization.

    Trump said that day that five Republican senators who supported bringing the measure to a vote — Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Rand Paul (Ky.), Josh Hawley (Mo.) and Todd Young (Ind.) — “should never be elected to office again.”

    Why should he get so riled up about this, to the point where he could put his own party’s control of the Senate at risk in November? Even if this resolution were to pass both houses of Congress, he could veto it and ultimately be unrestrained. He did this in 2019, when a war powers resolution mandating that the U.S. military cease its participation in the war in Yemen was passed in both the Senate and the House. Many people think that such legislation therefore can’t make a difference.

    But the president’s ire is telling. These political moves on the Hill can get results even before the resolution has a final vote, or if it is vetoed by the president.

    The Trump administration made significant concessions before the 2019 resolution was approved by Congress, in an attempt to prevent it from passing. For instance, months before it was approved, the U.S. military stopped refueling Saudi warplanes in midair. These concessions de-escalated the war and saved tens of thousands of lives.

    A war powers resolution is an act of Congress that is based on a 1973 law of the same name. That law spells out and reinforces the power that our Constitution has allocated to Congress, to decide when the U.S. military can be involved in hostilities.

    The U.S. military raid in Caracas that seized Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, is illegal according to international law, the charters of the Organization of American States and the United Nations, as well as other treaties to which the United States is a signatory. According to our own Constitution, the government violates U.S. law when it violates treaties that our government has signed.

    None of that restrained the Trump administration, which has not demonstrated much respect for the rule of law. But the White House does care about the political power of Congress. If there is an expanded war in Venezuela or anywhere else that Trump has threatened to use the military, the fact that Congress took steps to oppose it will increase the political cost to the president.

    This is likely one of the main reasons that the Trump administration has at least promised to make concessions regarding military action in Latin America — and who knows, possibly he did make some compromises compared with what had been planned.

    On Nov. 5, the day before the Senate was to vote on a war powers resolution to halt and prevent hostilities within or against Venezuela by U.S. armed forces, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and White House counsel had a private briefing with senators.

    They assured lawmakers that they were not going to have a land war or airstrikes in Venezuela. According to news reports, the White House counsel stated that they did not have a legal justification for such a war. It is clear that blocking the resolution was very important to these top officials. The day after that meeting, the war powers resolution was blocked by two votes. Two Republicans had joined the Democrats and independents in support of the resolution: Murkowski and Paul. That added up to 49 votes — not quite the needed majority.

    But on Thursday, there were three additional Republicans who voted for the new resolution, so it will proceed to a final vote.

    The war powers resolution is not just a political fight, but a matter of life and death. The blockade involved in the seizure of oil tankers is, according to experts, an unlawful use of military force. This means that the blockade would be included as a participation in hostilities that would require authorization from Congress.

    Since 2015, the United States has imposed unilateral economic sanctions that destroyed Venezuela’s economy. From 2012 to 2020, Venezuela suffered the worst peacetime depression in world history. Real (inflation-adjusted) GDP, or income, fell by 74%. Think of the economic destruction of the U.S. Great Depression, multiplied by three times. Most of this was the result of the sanctions.

    This unprecedented devastation is generally attributed to Maduro in public discussion. But U.S. sanctions deliberately cut Venezuela off from international finance, as well as blocking most of its oil sales, which accounted for more than 90% of foreign exchange (mostly dollar) earnings. This devastated the economy.

    In the first year of Trump sanctions from 2017-18, Venezuela’s deaths increased by tens of thousands of people, at a time when oil prices were increasing. Sanctions were expanded even more the following year. About a quarter of the population, more than 7 million people, emigrated after 2015 — 750,000 of them to the United States.

    We know that the deadly impact of sanctions that target the civilian population is real. Research published in July by the Lancet Global Health, by my colleagues Francisco Rodriguez, Silvio Rendon and myself, estimated the global death toll from unilateral economic sanctions, as these are, at 564,000 per year over the past decade. This is comparable to the worldwide deaths from armed conflict. A majority of the victims over the 1970-2021 period were children.

    The Trump administration has, in the last few days, been moving in the direction of lifting some sanctions to allow for oil exports, according to the president’s stated plan to “run Venezuela.” This is ironic because Venezuela has for many years wanted more investment and trade, including in oil, with the United States, and it was U.S. sanctions that prohibited it.

    Such lifting of sanctions would be a big step forward, in terms of saving lives of people who are deprived of food, medicine and other necessities in Venezuela, as a result of these sanctions and the economic destruction that they cause.

    But to create the stability that Venezuela needs to recover, we will have to take the military and economic violence out of this campaign. There are members of Congress moving toward that goal, and they need all the help that they can get, before it’s too late.

    Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and author of “Failed: What the ‘Experts’ Got Wrong About the Global Economy.”

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    Mark Weisbrot

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  • Why bald eagles may hold clues in bird flu fight

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    A spike in wild bird flu cases across Iowa has researchers watching migration patterns, testing carcasses, and swabbing beaks daily at the State Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory in Ames. Since 2022, more than 30 million poultry and wild birds have died from highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in Iowa.As the virus settles into a fall-and-winter cycle, one species is drawing particular interest from scientists: the bald eagle. Despite frequently scavenging infected carcasses, adult bald eagles appear to be surviving at higher rates than many other birds. Researchers believe understanding why could help unlock new insights into the disease.Hearst sister station KCCI spoke with Rachel Ruden, the state wildlife veterinarian for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, about what’s driving the latest outbreak — and why the nation’s symbol may be key to understanding it.Q: What are researchers seeing with bird flu in Iowa right now?Ruden: We had a spike back in September. We saw Dubuque impacted heavily and parts of central and north central Iowa, then things went quiet through October and November. After the first week of December, we started getting reports of sick and dead geese again. What’s interesting is southern Iowa has been impacted pretty heavily. In the past, south of I-80, we really didn’t see mass mortality events related to HPAI.Q: How has bird flu changed since it first appeared in Iowa?Ruden: We were first impacted with highly pathogenic avian influenza in March of 2022. Prior to that, it was not a virus that circulated in our wild bird population in North America or South America. It was in other parts of the world.In March of 2022, it arrived during spring migration — a vulnerable time in terms of birds nesting and producing young. Now we’ve really seen it transition into this fall and winter pattern, oftentimes late fall into winter. Q: Which species are being hit the hardest?Ruden: The animals that have been impacted have primarily been Canada geese. They’re a numerous winter resident. They also do their fall migration in mid-December. So those birds bring virus from other parts and they flyway.Other things that we see very commonly are red tail hawks because these are raptors, a bird that is likely scavenging on carcasses of dead geese. That is also why there is public concern about bald eagles. Q: Many people worry about bald eagles scavenging dead geese. What are you finding?Ruden: I have been testing bald eagles since late 2024. Evidence shows that they’ve been exposed and actually survived that exposure. In adult bald eagles, 70% have had antibodies. That’s a good indicator of resilience in that population. Q: Why are bald eagles so important to this research?Ruden: We can learn a lot and maybe leverage that for therapeutics. That disparity in deaths amongst raptor species that might be scavenging on the same sick birds … if one tends to die and one tends to live, that’s interesting, so I would love to push that further.Q: Does that mean bald eagles are immune to bird flu?Ruden: We’ve seen hatch-year eagles — younger birds — that are more vulnerable, similar to what we see in young swans or other juvenile birds. But adult eagles appear to have a much higher survival rate.Q: How does this affect Iowa’s poultry industry?Ruden: Iowa leads the country in egg and poultry production, so there’s always concern. Early in the outbreak, the impact was significant. But improved biosecurity and better surveillance have made a big difference. This season, only two poultry sites have been affected so far, even with widespread bird flu activity in wild birds.Q: What should people do if they find a sick or dead bird?Ruden: The best step is to contact your county conservation department or a local wildlife professional. They’ll decide whether testing is needed and notify our lab if it could help research. If a dead bird is on private property, people can safely remove it using disposable gloves and double-bagging it before placing it in the trash.Q: Is bird flu a concern for human health?Ruden: Human cases in the U.S. have primarily been linked to poultry or dairy workers with close, prolonged exposure. There’s no known transmission from wild birds to humans in casual encounters. Still, people should avoid handling sick birds and use basic precautions if removing a dead one.Q: What’s next for bird flu research in Iowa?Ruden: We’re still learning. Bird flu is now a global phenomenon, and there’s always a risk of reintroduction. The goal moving forward is to use what we’re observing — especially species that survive exposure, like bald eagles — to guide future research. That takes time and funding, but every test helps us better understand what we’re dealing with.As outbreaks continue to shape Iowa’s wildlife landscape, researchers say one thing is clear: bird flu is no longer a one-time event, but a recurring reality — and the answers may be soaring overhead.

    A spike in wild bird flu cases across Iowa has researchers watching migration patterns, testing carcasses, and swabbing beaks daily at the State Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory in Ames. Since 2022, more than 30 million poultry and wild birds have died from highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in Iowa.

    As the virus settles into a fall-and-winter cycle, one species is drawing particular interest from scientists: the bald eagle. Despite frequently scavenging infected carcasses, adult bald eagles appear to be surviving at higher rates than many other birds. Researchers believe understanding why could help unlock new insights into the disease.

    Hearst sister station KCCI spoke with Rachel Ruden, the state wildlife veterinarian for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, about what’s driving the latest outbreak — and why the nation’s symbol may be key to understanding it.

    Q: What are researchers seeing with bird flu in Iowa right now?

    Ruden: We had a spike back in September. We saw Dubuque impacted heavily and parts of central and north central Iowa, then things went quiet through October and November. After the first week of December, we started getting reports of sick and dead geese again. What’s interesting is southern Iowa has been impacted pretty heavily. In the past, south of I-80, we really didn’t see mass mortality events related to HPAI.

    Q: How has bird flu changed since it first appeared in Iowa?

    Ruden: We were first impacted with highly pathogenic avian influenza in March of 2022. Prior to that, it was not a virus that circulated in our wild bird population in North America or South America. It was in other parts of the world.

    Mark Vancleave

    Angel, a 26-year-old bald eagle from Wisconsin that was too gravely injured to be returned to the wild, serves as “ambassador” to visitors at the National Eagle Center in Wabasha, Minn., on Wednesday, July 9, 2025.

    In March of 2022, it arrived during spring migration — a vulnerable time in terms of birds nesting and producing young. Now we’ve really seen it transition into this fall and winter pattern, oftentimes late fall into winter.

    Q: Which species are being hit the hardest?

    Ruden: The animals that have been impacted have primarily been Canada geese. They’re a numerous winter resident. They also do their fall migration in mid-December. So those birds bring virus from other parts and they flyway.

    Other things that we see very commonly are red tail hawks because these are raptors, a bird that is likely scavenging on carcasses of dead geese. That is also why there is public concern about bald eagles.

    Q: Many people worry about bald eagles scavenging dead geese. What are you finding?

    Ruden: I have been testing bald eagles since late 2024. Evidence shows that they’ve been exposed and actually survived that exposure. In adult bald eagles, 70% have had antibodies. That’s a good indicator of resilience in that population.

    Q: Why are bald eagles so important to this research?

    Ruden: We can learn a lot and maybe leverage that for therapeutics. That disparity in deaths amongst raptor species that might be scavenging on the same sick birds … if one tends to die and one tends to live, that’s interesting, so I would love to push that further.

    Q: Does that mean bald eagles are immune to bird flu?

    Ruden: We’ve seen hatch-year eagles — younger birds — that are more vulnerable, similar to what we see in young swans or other juvenile birds. But adult eagles appear to have a much higher survival rate.

    Q: How does this affect Iowa’s poultry industry?

    Ruden: Iowa leads the country in egg and poultry production, so there’s always concern. Early in the outbreak, the impact was significant. But improved biosecurity and better surveillance have made a big difference. This season, only two poultry sites have been affected so far, even with widespread bird flu activity in wild birds.

    Q: What should people do if they find a sick or dead bird?

    Ruden: The best step is to contact your county conservation department or a local wildlife professional. They’ll decide whether testing is needed and notify our lab if it could help research. If a dead bird is on private property, people can safely remove it using disposable gloves and double-bagging it before placing it in the trash.

    Q: Is bird flu a concern for human health?

    Ruden: Human cases in the U.S. have primarily been linked to poultry or dairy workers with close, prolonged exposure. There’s no known transmission from wild birds to humans in casual encounters. Still, people should avoid handling sick birds and use basic precautions if removing a dead one.

    Q: What’s next for bird flu research in Iowa?

    Ruden: We’re still learning. Bird flu is now a global phenomenon, and there’s always a risk of reintroduction. The goal moving forward is to use what we’re observing — especially species that survive exposure, like bald eagles — to guide future research. That takes time and funding, but every test helps us better understand what we’re dealing with.

    As outbreaks continue to shape Iowa’s wildlife landscape, researchers say one thing is clear: bird flu is no longer a one-time event, but a recurring reality — and the answers may be soaring overhead.

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  • 22-year-old Latin musician and influencer is killed as she sits in a parked car in Northridge

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    A 22-year-old influencer and Latin musician was killed in an ambush-style shooting in Northridge in the early hours of Saturday morning, authorities said.

    Maria de la Rosa was fatally shot when multiple rounds were fired at several people sitting in a car parked on Bryant Street near Tampa Avenue, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.

    Witnesses described seeing two men approach the vehicle around 1:25 a.m. Saturday, police said. De la Rosa was transported to a hospital, where she succumbed to her injuries.

    No further information was available on the suspects or whether the others inside the car were wounded.

    De la Rosa released her first song, “No me llames” (“Don’t Call Me”) in August under the name DELAROSA. The most recent post on her Instagram account, which has more than 40,000 followers, shows her with an electric guitar in a recording studio and is captioned “Ocupada cocinando en el Stu,” meaning “Busy cooking in the Stu[dio],” alluding to the upcoming release of more music.

    Many people left messages expressing grief for the loss of the young performer in the comments, including several figures in the Latin music community such as music producer Jimmy Humilde and Juan Moises, the lead singer of Los Gemelos de Sinaloa.

    In a message in Spanish, music producer and engineer Times J Martinez wrote that she was a young and talented musician.

    “Me duele que alla sido con violencia,” he wrote, or “It hurts that it happened with violence.”

    The motive for De la Rosa’s shooting is unknown, and so far no arrests have been made, police said. Anyone with information is asked to contact Valley Bureau homicide detectives at (818) 374-9550. Anonymous tips can be left at (800) 222-8477 or at the Crime Stoppers website.

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    Clara Harter

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  • L.A.’s famous ‘Hobbit Houses’ have a new owner. He calls himself the ‘King of Storybook’

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    In the architectural age of minimalism and millennial gray, a wild and whimsical antidote made of old clinker bricks and jumbled shingles sits on a quiet street at the edge of L.A. and Culver City.

    Formally, the spellbinding property is named the Lawrence and Martha Joseph Residence and Apartments, named after the Disney artist and his wife who obsessively spent three decades building it. But locals call them the Hobbit Houses — fitting, since they look straight out of a J.R.R. Tolkien novel.

    The complex looks comically out of place amid Culver City’s commercial corridor along Venice Boulevard. It’s surrounded by modern apartment buildings, boxy and inoffensive, built to blend in with today’s taste.

    A bathroom in one of the Hobbit houses in Culver City adorned in glass tiles and ornate fixtures.

    Amid that urban blur, the Hobbit Houses beg for your attention.

    An electric lamppost flickers, mimicking fire. The tree in the front yard features a face, with eyes and a nose. The homes are filled with quirky leaded glass windows, uneven angles and heaps of wood shingles, resembling a thatched straw roof.

    This year, the property hit the market for the first time. Offers poured in, and it sold to perhaps the most fitting possible buyer outside Bilbo Baggins himself: real estate agent Michael Libow.

    At $1.88 million, Libow didn’t have the highest bid. His main qualification was that he owns and lives in one of the finest examples of Storyboook style in the region: the Witch’s House, a medieval-looking masterpiece that is more befitting a “Hansel and Gretel” adaptation than the streets of Beverly Hills.

    The broker, seeing his connection to the style, promoted Libow to the seller, an out-of-state bank trust. The Hobbit Houses were his.

    Michael Libow peers through a heavy wooden door of a Hobbit house that he purchased in early 2025.

    Michael Libow peers through a heavy wooden door of a Hobbit house that he purchased in early 2025.

    “It’s like a companion piece to my own home,” Libow said. “It’s a little oasis in a city that’s been overdeveloped.”

    Now that he owns both, Libow has declared himself, tongue-in-cheek, the “King of Storybook,” and said he intends to protect the property and be a spokesperson for the style.

    “This is my legacy: bringing a little bit of joy to as many people as I can,” he said. “It’s about preservation, but it’s also about bringing a sense of awe and wonder to the world.”

    The Hobbit Houses are one of Southern California’s finest examples of Storybook architecture, a fantasy style that fittingly emerged in L.A. in the 1920s around the start of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Inspired by cinema setpieces and centuries-old European cottages, architects designed playful homes with turrets and gables on the outside and nooks and crannies on the inside. When done well, the finished product looks lifted from a fairy tale.

    A cat digs around on the roof of a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    A cat digs around on the roof of a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    Disney artist Lawrence Joseph built the Hobbit Houses from 1946 to 1970. Over the years, the property developed a lore all its own. He rented out spare units to Hollywood tenants such as actor Nick Nolte and dancer Gwen Verdon, and the place also housed one of the men who kidnapped Frank Sinatra’s son (authorities found most of the ransom money Sinatra paid, $240,000, in one of the units).

    Lawrence died in 1991, and his wife, Martha, got to work protecting the property. She obtained landmark status in 1996 and donated an easement to the Los Angeles Conservancy, ensuring that it can’t be remodeled or torn down.

    The property, which includes nine units across four buildings, needed some work when he bought it, so Libow and his property manager, Ben Stine, have spent the last few months playing a developer’s version of “Minesweeper,” trying to make small improvements for the tenants — electric work, a tankless water heater — without disrupting anything protected by the L.A. Conservancy easement.

    The Hobbit Houses came with a 15-page report detailing all the things protected on the property: not just the buildings themselves, but also the facade, landscape features and the interiors, including the custom furniture that Lawrence carved himself. Even the wallpaper can’t be touched.

    “Protections within a structure are very unusual. I’ve never seen anything like it,” Libow said.

    Detail of the flooring inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    Detail of the flooring inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    That means for renters, much of the furniture is included with the rent. The latest vacant unit — a two-bed, one-bath with a den — includes bar stools and a rocking chair that Lawrence carved.

    The house is wrapped in clinker brick, a term for when clay bricks are set too close to the flames when being fired in a kiln, giving them distorted shapes and colors. Such bricks were sometimes trashed in older architectural eras, but these days, they’re prized for the unique look they bring to buildings, and perfectly natural for Middle Earth architecture in Culver City.

    Inside, Lawrence’s sailing background shines through with nautical-themed interiors. A ship’s wheel serves as the chandelier, hanging above vertical-grain boat-plank floors that lead to a galley-style kitchen with a curvy bar.

    “The idea behind Storybook is to have something fanciful and whimsical, which involves movement rather than rectilinear rooms,” Libow said. “There’s barely a right angle on the entire property. Everything’s amorphous in shape.”

    Detail inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    Detail inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.

    There are no knobs to be found; doors open with hidden latches and levers. A built-in fold-down desk pops out in the living room. In the master bedroom, a “cat door” slides open to provide easy access for felines that hang around the property.

    The nine units range from 200 square feet to 1,200 square feet. The vacant unit, which spans around 1,000 square feet, hit the market a few months ago for $4,500 per month.

    It’s a high price for the neighborhood — most two-bedroom apartments nearby fall in the $3,000 range — but interested renters still swarmed.

    “These aren’t your typical tenants that need four walls and a sink. We get a lot of people in the creative industry,” Libow said. “You’re renting a lifestyle here.”

    Libow said like his own home, which serves as a regular stop for Hollywood tour buses, the Hobbit Houses are a regular resting point for people walking through the neighborhood.

    “Construction workers will walk by on their lunch to look at the turtles in the pond. It’s a break from reality, even if just for a minute,” he said.

    Michael Libow outside one of his Hobbit houses in Culver City.

    Michael Libow outside one of his Hobbit houses in Culver City.

    Libow and his property manager spend a lot of time on the grounds, looking for projects or small improvements they’re allowed to make under the conservancy. But for Libow, who bought it as a collector’s item as much as an investment, it’s a labor of love.

    “It’s not the most functional style of architecture, but it is the coolest,” he said. “It’s weird, but I’m weird myself. I connect with weird.”

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    Jack Flemming

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  • 6-7 becomes word of the year. What does it mean?

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    6-7 becomes word of the year. What does it mean?

    Today’s class is in session and we’re learning to speak fluent gin alpha. Our instructors, PE teacher Aidan Worzea. Be in the middle school, um, we got 900 kids here. Uh, we have over 50 in every PE class here, so I’m constantly around them. Hadley. He did get on that one. I’ll give you that one. Today’s lesson translating the ever evolving middle school dictionary. Do you agree with what’s on the board so far? He did like kind of *** good job. According to Mr. Worzea, the top tier terms are locked, rage bait, hu, and their ultimate favorite, 67. So I give the 67 there. 67 is the most. Um, I hear clock it now recently *** ton. I see clock it and before you can even instruct once you say 6, you know it’s 7 and they’re going to interrupt. What does it? Mean? I believe it came from *** basketball player, the Ball family, LeAngelo Ball, I think, came up with the song of it, um, and then I heard that it was, they asked how tall was he? and they’re like, I don’t know, maybe 6 or 7. I think it really like popped off when like *** kid, Mason said 67. Just when you thought you had those, the kids hit you with *** new 1, 41, the opposite hand motion, and then bop. That’s like someone who’s had multiple girlfriends or boyfriends. It’s like, you’re *** bop. Got it. Don’t be *** bop. And then there’s Italian brain rock. Characters. So if you look up, there’s like burper Bata bump, shore. Um, ballerina cappuccino and perhaps the strangest one, it’s just like something people like to say like they’ll just like go around and be like, stop digging in your *** twin, which means nothing. random stuff on the internet. Huzz is *** new one as well. I hear it. I got some mixed emotions, but what I think it means is like crush. Maybe next week I’ll be told *** new one from one of the students, but uh. Uh, I learned from them and, uh, right now this is the main ones that I’m hearing for sure. Translation, just smile, nod, and clock it. Any advice for parents? I would say just if you’re hearing some of these different words, let’s make sure we kind of ask the meeting, um, because we don’t want our kids to go around, uh, saying things that they don’t know the meaning of it, um, and also that the meeting is, you know, good, something we want to be sharing out for sure.

    A new internet slang meme taking over children’s vocabulary, 6-7, is now Dictionary.com’s 2025 Word of the Year.The meme is pronounced “six seven,” not “sixty seven,” like most would think, and has become a cultural phenomenon for Gen Alpha. Children have been saying the two numbers together with a hand gesture that someone would use to weigh two options. The phrase has gone viral on TikTok, with many people confused about its meaning. However, the meme itself has no real meaning and is said in a variety of ways. “It’s part inside joke, part social signal and part performance,” Steve Johnson, director of lexicography for the Dictionary Media Group at IXL Learning, said to USA Today. “When people say it, they’re not just repeating a meme; they’re shouting a feeling. It’s one of the first Words of the Year that works as an interjection – a burst of energy that spreads and connects people long before anyone agrees on what it actually means.”The meme started when Skrilla released his song “Doot Doot,” where he raps, “6-7, I just bipped right on the highway.”From there, people began using the lyrics “six seven” from the Skrilla song as background audio in videos. One video in particular that went viral said NBA player LaMelo Ball plays basketball like he’s 6 feet, 2 inches tall instead of his height of 6 feet, 7 inches.After that one video went viral, 6-7 became all the rage for the kids, and now it is being said everywhere.

    A new internet slang meme taking over children’s vocabulary, 6-7, is now Dictionary.com‘s 2025 Word of the Year.

    The meme is pronounced “six seven,” not “sixty seven,” like most would think, and has become a cultural phenomenon for Gen Alpha. Children have been saying the two numbers together with a hand gesture that someone would use to weigh two options.

    The phrase has gone viral on TikTok, with many people confused about its meaning.

    However, the meme itself has no real meaning and is said in a variety of ways.

    “It’s part inside joke, part social signal and part performance,” Steve Johnson, director of lexicography for the Dictionary Media Group at IXL Learning, said to USA Today. “When people say it, they’re not just repeating a meme; they’re shouting a feeling. It’s one of the first Words of the Year that works as an interjection – a burst of energy that spreads and connects people long before anyone agrees on what it actually means.”

    The meme started when Skrilla released his song “Doot Doot,” where he raps, “6-7, I just bipped right on the highway.”

    From there, people began using the lyrics “six seven” from the Skrilla song as background audio in videos. One video in particular that went viral said NBA player LaMelo Ball plays basketball like he’s 6 feet, 2 inches tall instead of his height of 6 feet, 7 inches.

    After that one video went viral, 6-7 became all the rage for the kids, and now it is being said everywhere.

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  • Strong surf, winds wash out Ponce Inlet jetty walkway months after repairs

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    Strong surf, winds wash out Ponce Inlet jetty walkway months after repairs

    THE PONCE INLET JETTY HAS NOW BEEN WASHED AWAY. TAKE A LOOK AT THIS PHOTO THAT SHOWS THE AFTERMATH OF THE ROUGH SURF AND HIGH TIDE ALONG THE VOLUSIA COUNTY COAST. YOU SEE THE ROCKS AND THEN THE WOOD JUST TOSSED ALL AROUND HERE AS WESH TWO SPENCER TRACY EXPLAINS, THIS WASHOUT COMES AFTER MONTHS OF REPAIR. LINDSAY. THE HIGH SURF IS CLEARLY VISIBLE. CHECK OUT THE WAVES, JUST HOW BIG THEY ARE, AND I THINK THE BIGGER PICTURE IS SHOWING THOSE WAVES CRASHING AGAINST THAT JETTY WALKWAY. AND THAT’S WHERE YOU CAN SEE THE DAMAGE TO IT. AND WE’VE HEARD FROM SOME FISHERMEN THAT TELL US IT’S AFFECTING THEIR LIVELIHOOD, THAT THEY’RE NOT ABLE TO GO OUT THERE RIGHT NOW. AT THIS MOMENT, WE KNOW THE COUNTY STAFF BUILT THIS TEMPORARY WOODEN WALKWAY, MUCH TO THE DELIGHT OF THE FISHERMEN WHO FREQUENT THE AREA. A COUNTY SPOKESPERSON SAYS THE WALKWAY WAS DAMAGED RECENTLY AND CLOSED, BUT THESE CONDITIONS HAVE TAKEN THE WHOLE THING. THE COUNTY PLANS TO EXTEND THE CONCRETE JETTY, BUT IT’S A LENGTHY PROCESS REQUIRING FEDERAL APPROVAL FROM THE ARMY CORPS OF ENGINEERS. IT’S JUST ONE EXAMPLE OF HOW THIS NASTY WEATHER IS IMPACTING THE COAST. WE LIVE IN IN DAYTONA BEACH SHORES ON THE RIVER, AND MY HUSBAND’S BEEN IN THAT HOUSE SINCE THE 70S AND NEVER HAS THE WATER BEEN THAT HIGH. WHEN THERE’S NOT A STORM, A HURRICANE. SO SWIMMING IN THE WATER ALONG VOLUSIA SHORELINE WAS PROHIBITED YESTERDAY AS THE COUNTY WAS UNDER A DOUBLE RED FLAG WARNING. THAT’S ALL BECAUSE OF THE STRONG RIP CURRENTS AND AS WELL AS A SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT OF DEBRIS. THEY’RE ASKING PEOPLE NOT TO TOUCH SEAWEED THAT WASHES UP, SAYING IT PLAYS AN IMPORTANT ROLE IN RENOURISHMENT. THE COUNTY SAYS ONCE THE WEATHER GETS BETTER, THAT’S WHEN THEY PLAN TO HAVE CREWS GO OUT THERE AND REPAIR THAT JETTY. BUT AS YOU CAN SEE RIGHT NOW, THAT’S DEFINITELY NOT HAPPENING TODAY. AS YOU CAN SEE, THE RIP CURRENTS ARE STILL REALLY STRONG. AND AS WE WERE HEADING INTO THE INLET, OFFICIALS TOLD US THAT RIGHT NOW THEY’RE UNDER A RED FLAG WARNING. SO THEY’RE STILL URGING PEOPLE NOT TO GO IN THE WATER AS IT CAN BE DANGEROUS. I’M COVERING VOLUSIA COUNTY IN PONCE INLET.

    Strong surf, winds wash out Ponce Inlet jetty walkway months after repairs

    Updated: 9:34 AM EDT Oct 12, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    The Ponce Inlet jetty walkway, which reopened in May, was washed out to sea Saturday morning due to high surf and windy weather along the coast.The whole section of the jetty had been getting clobbered by high surf for a few days.It had been closed following Hurricane Milton and reopened in May.The county had finished work on the wooden portion of the walkway in time for Memorial Day, bringing smiles to the faces of fishermen who frequent the area.However, the high surf conditions and wind washed it out to sea Saturday morning.The county said it had been closed since Hurricane Imelda damaged it a little more than a week ago.Many people have been asking why not drive pilings into the ground and make the whole thing concrete?The short answer is that this walkway has always been temporary.The county plans to extend the concrete deck, but has to get plans approved by the Army Corps of Engineers before work can begin.A county spokesperson said staff will be out clearing debris once conditions improve.

    PONCE INLET, Fla. —

    The Ponce Inlet jetty walkway, which reopened in May, was washed out to sea Saturday morning due to high surf and windy weather along the coast.

    The whole section of the jetty had been getting clobbered by high surf for a few days.

    It had been closed following Hurricane Milton and reopened in May.

    The county had finished work on the wooden portion of the walkway in time for Memorial Day, bringing smiles to the faces of fishermen who frequent the area.

    However, the high surf conditions and wind washed it out to sea Saturday morning.

    The county said it had been closed since Hurricane Imelda damaged it a little more than a week ago.

    Many people have been asking why not drive pilings into the ground and make the whole thing concrete?

    The short answer is that this walkway has always been temporary.

    The county plans to extend the concrete deck, but has to get plans approved by the Army Corps of Engineers before work can begin.

    A county spokesperson said staff will be out clearing debris once conditions improve.

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  • News Analysis: Why the Gaza ceasefire puts both Netanyahu and Hamas at political risk

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    JERUSALEM — Thursday’s ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas delivered a jubilant moment in one of the darkest periods of the decades-old conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. But for both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas, the deal could be the poison pill that spells their downfall.

    Netanyahu, who with a combined total of 17 years in office is the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history, now must contend with a day-after in Gaza that looks very different from the vision he used to woo allies and keep his opponents at bay.

    Hamas, on the other hand, faces a war-ravaged populace that was weary of its rule even before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack; two years later, with more than 67,000 killed, many more wounded and most of the Palestinian enclave in ruins, most Gaza residents are enraged at what they view as the militant group’s reckless gamble.

    Daily life continues in war-torn Gaza as Palestinians in Deir al Balah wait on Oct. 9, 2025, for the Israel-Hamas ceasefire to take effect.

    (Ali Jadallah / Anadolu / Getty Images)

    The deal, which President Trump produced after weeks of consultations with — not to mention intense pressure on — Israel and a raft of Arab and Muslim nations, brings about some measure of victory that both sides can claim, namely the swap that will see all remaining Israeli hostages in Hamas captivity exchanged for thousands of Palestinian prisoners and detainees.

    Netanyahu and Hamas both trumpeted it as an achievement.

    “This is a diplomatic success and a national and moral victory for the State of Israel,” Netanyahu wrote Thursday on X, crediting the breakthrough to “steadfast resolve, powerful military action,” along with Trump’s efforts.

    Hamas, meanwhile, said in a statement that the deal was a result of the “steadfastness of the Palestinian people” and its “Resistance,” a reference to the Palestinian factions.

    Yet those victories could hardly be called complete.

    Netanyahu had promised Hamas would not only be defeated but also vanquished, with its arsenal removed. He has also made it his long-running mission to ensure no Palestinian state arises — something he hoped to achieve by conquering Gaza and annexing the West Bank.

    Women in head coverings wave green, white, black and red flags and a sign that says Stop War, Stop Genocide

    Students and supporters of the Jamaat-e-Islami political party gather to express their solidarity with Palestinians during an anti-Israel protest in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Oct. 9, 2025.

    (Aamir Qureshi / AFP/Getty Images)

    Instead, the Israeli military has stopped its offensive with the fate of Hamas’ weapons still unclear, and Trump recently said he will “not allow” Israel to annex the West Bank.

    Also, Trump’s 20-point plan not only put the kibosh on the notion of deporting Gaza residents but also encouraged them to stay. And Netanyahu was forced to accept the prospect of a Palestinian state only a few days after a fire-and-brimstone speech at the United Nations rejecting any such thing.

    Already, the coalition he relies on to remain in power is showing fractures, with extremist figures representing settler interests expressing their anger that Netanyahu didn’t stay the course and continue fighting.

    His opponents, meanwhile, see the conflict’s end as their chance to oust him. And his critics among Israeli voters — elections are slated for October 2026 — are not only set to reject him at the ballot box, but also excise anyone associated with his leadership.

    At the so-called Hostage Square in Tel Aviv on Thursday, Israelis demonstrated some of that rage. When Benny Gantz, an Israeli opposition leader who served in Netanyahu’s Cabinet until last year walked through the crowd, hecklers shouted at him “to go home,” accusing him of claiming a success he had not earned.

    “When the war began, Gantz joined Bibi and saved him instead of bringing down his government,” said Einat Mastbaum, a 50-year-old Hebrew teacher, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname. Those actions, she said, kept Netanyahu’s government in place and prolonged the hostages’ ordeal.

    Udi Goren, 44, whose cousin Tal Haimi was killed Oct. 7, 2023, said Israel needed new faces to effect change many Israelis demand after this war.

    “Now is the time for us — Israelis and Palestinians — to support a better future, to draft a new narrative for ourselves,” he said. “After what we’ve been through these past two years, we don’t want this to happen again.”

    A woman in a blue shirt holds her palms together to her face, surrounded by a jubilant crowd

    Einav Zangauker, in a blue shirt, the mother of hostage Matan Zangauker, celebrates as people react to news of the Israel-Hamas peace deal at the so-called Hostage Square in Tel Aviv on Oct. 9, 2025.

    (Chris McGrath / Getty Images)

    Yet it would be foolish to discount Netanyahu, a consummate politician in Israel’s political landscape who has proved time and again his ability to gauge the national mood and rebound from setbacks, including a prolonged corruption trial he has successfully postponed throughout the war, and an warrant from the International Criminal Court.

    Though his claim of totally defeating Hamas falls short, he can still rightly point to having left Israel the indisputable hegemon in the region, whether by decimating the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah or by dealing a crippling blow to Iran. If the deal’s implementation continues smoothly, he may also manage to extend normalization agreements to other Arab nations, including Saudi Arabia. Polls, meanwhile, show he’s recovered his popularity after taking a hit in the days after the Oct. 7 attack.

    And the deal “will boost him,” said Dahlia Scheindlin, a public opinion researcher in Israel.
    “It will make him look like he’s the only one in the country who could work so well with Trump.”

    “He’s much more popular today than he was five days ago,” Trump said at the White House.

    Hamas’ situation appears more complicated. It has said it will play no role in Gaza’s future governance — a key Israeli and American demand. But its main rival in the Palestinian Authority, which governed Gaza until Hamas prevailed in elections in 2006, is viewed by many Palestinians as hopelessly corrupt, not to mention downright traitorous because of its security coordination with Israel, which has seen authority forces attack anti-Israel Palestinian resistance groups and activists.

    At the same time, the notion of Hamas having any power seems untenable.

    “They dragged all of Gaza into the fire. Our homes, our jobs, our futures were all destroyed because of reckless decisions,” said Nidal Laqqan, 37, a former merchant from Khan Yunis who has been displaced for the last two years.

    He said that many people he knows feel the same way.

    “People are angry. This was an uncalculated adventure,” he said. “We need a new Palestinian leadership that puts our interests first. No more military steps taken without thinking of the people who will pay the price.”

    Special correspondent Bilal Shbeir in Deir al Balah, Gaza Strip, contributed to this report.

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  • Helicopter crash critically injures 3, shuts down highway in California

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    Helicopter crash critically injures 3, shuts down highway in California

    UPDATES. ANY VEHICLES IMPACTED? I DO NOT HAVE THAT INFORMATION AT THIS TIME. DO WE KNOW IF THIS WAS A CRASH OR WERE THEY TRYING TO MAKE AN EMERGENCY LANDING? DO WE HAVE ANY IDEA? I DON’T HAVE THAT INFORMATION EITHER. SORRY. AS FAR AS TRANSPORTS, JUSTIN, YOU MENTIONED, CAN YOU SPEAK TO ANYTHING ABOUT VICTIMS AND THINGS LIKE THAT? YEAH. SO, JUSTIN, SYLVIA, JUSTIN. SYLVIA. CAPTAIN, PUBLIC INFORMATION OFFICER, SACRAMENTO FIRE. OUR UNITS WERE DISPATCHED AT 708 FOR A VEHICLE EXTRICATION ASSIGNMENT. THAT’S ONE ENGINE, ONE TRUCK, AND A BATTALION CHIEF, AS WELL AS AN AMBULANCE. FURTHER UPDATES CAME IN FROM MULTIPLE CALLERS REPORTING A HELICOPTER HAD CRASHED IN THE MIDDLE OF HIGHWAY 50. AT THAT POINT, WE WERE GETTING INITIAL REPORTS THAT THERE WERE VEHICLES INVOLVED. HOWEVER, AFTER WALKING THE SCENE, THERE ARE NO ADDITIONAL VEHICLES INVOLVED. THE ONLY THREE VICTIMS ON SCENE WERE ABOARD THE AIRCRAFT. THAT’S GOING TO BE A PILOT, A NURSE AND A PARAMEDIC. TWO FEMALES AND A MALE. THEY WERE TRANSPORTED TO LOCAL HOSPITALS. WE COULD NOT OVERWHELM UC DAVIS WITH THREE CRITICAL PATIENTS ALL AT ONCE. THEREFORE, WE CONTACTED UC DAVIS AND ASKED THEM FOR DESTINATIONS FOR THESE PATIENTS VICTIMS. I SHOULD SAY. THEY WERE TRANSPORTED IN CRITICAL CONDITION. SO THAT’S KIND OF WHERE WE’RE AT FOR THE FIRE SIDE OF THINGS. I WOULD LIKE TO ADD THAT THERE WAS ONE VICTIM THAT WAS TRAPPED UNDERNEATH THE HELICOPTER. WE ONLY HAD ONE ENGINE ON SCENE AT THAT POINT. OTHERS WERE TRYING TO MAKE ACCESS TO THE SCENE. THAT ONE PERSON THAT WAS TRAPPED, THE CAPTAIN, IMMEDIATELY SEQUESTERED THE HELP OF JUST CIVILIANS THAT WERE STANDING AROUND. THEY WERE ABLE TO LIFT PART OF THAT HELICOPTER OUT AND GET THAT VICTIM OUT, SO WE COULD GET THEM LOADED INTO THE BACK OF AN AMBULANCE AND TRANSPORTED OFF SCENE. WE HAVEN’T BEEN DOWN THERE. CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT YOU SAW? THE SCENE. ANYTHING LIKE THAT. SO THE SCENE BASICALLY LOOKS LIKE A HELICOPTER UPSIDE DOWN THAT HAS CRASHED IN THE FREEWAY. THERE’S A PRETTY LARGE DEBRIS FIELD AROUND THAT AT THIS POINT. THE LUCKY PORTION FOR US, I’D SAY, IS THE FACT THAT THE HELICOPTER DID NOT CATCH ON FIRE, BECAUSE THEN WE WOULD HAVE AN ADDITIONAL PROBLEM TO THAT. WHEN WE OPERATE ON THESE FREEWAYS WITH ANY TYPE OF FIRE RISK. WE DON’T HAVE FIRE HYDRANTS. SO ALL THAT WATER WOULD HAVE TO BE BROUGHT IN. AND IT BEING JET FUEL THAT’S LOADED INTO THESE AIRCRAFTS WOULD HAVE BEEN VERY HOT AND VERY INTENSE FIRE. SO FORTUNATELY WE DID NOT SEE ANY, ANY PART OF THAT. WE’RE EXTREMELY LUCKY THAT THERE WERE ONLY THREE VICTIMS. IT’S UNFORTUNATE THEY’RE IN CRITICAL CONDITION, BUT THEY ALL OF OUR AMBULANCES WERE OFF SCENE WITH TRANSPORTATION AND CARE BEING PERFORMED ON THESE VICTIMS WITHIN 20 MINUTES OF THE INCIDENT, YOU DESCRIBED THAT THEY WERE IN CRITICAL CONDITION. CAN YOU GIVE US ANY IDEA? I MEAN, WERE THEY WERE THEY ALERT WHEN YOU GUYS FOUND THEM? I MEAN, I KNOW YOU MENTIONED SOMEBODY BEING PINNED UNDER THE HELICOPTER. WHAT WAS AS MUCH AS YOU CAN SAY ABOUT THEIR PHYSICAL CONDITION WHEN YOU GUYS ENCOUNTERED THEM? THE ONLY THING I CAN SAY IS THAT THEY ARE IN CRITICAL CONDITION AT THIS POINT. IT’S UNKNOWN ON THE EXTENT OF THE INJURIES. WE WILL HAVE TO FOLLOW UP WITH THE LOCAL HOSPITALS TO SEE WHAT KIND OF CONDITION THEY’RE CURRENTLY IN. YOU MENTIONED NO CARS INVOLVED WHEN THE HELICOPTER CRASHED, BUT WERE THERE ANY SUBSEQUENT, YOU KNOW, CARS SLAMMING ON THEIR BRAKES AND CRASHING INTO EACH OTHER BECAUSE OF WHAT HAD JUST HAPPENED IN FRONT OF THEM? DO YOU KNOW? THAT’S SOMETHING THAT’S UNKNOWN TO US? THE ONLY THING THAT WE CAN SAY IS WHEN WE GET SOMETHING OF THIS MAGNITUDE, WE REALLY NEED TO FOCUS IN ON A VICTIM COUNT. BECAUSE IF WE’RE STARTING TO ASK FOR 20 OR 30 AMBULANCES, THOSE AMBULANCES ARE GOING TO BE COMING FROM QUITE A DISTANCE. SO WE REALLY NEED TO FOCUS IN ON GETTING HOW MANY PEOPLE ARE ACTUALLY INVOLVED IN THIS VEHICLE ACCIDENT OR THIS EXCUSE ME, HELICOPTER ACCIDENT THAT COULD HAVE CAUSED VEHICLES. LUCKILY, THERE WERE JUST THREE CRITICAL THAT WERE TRANSPORTED WITHIN 20 MINUTES. CAN YOU DESCRIBE MORE OF THE CHALLENGES YOU GUYS FACE TRYING TO GET ONTO THE FREEWAY? OBVIOUSLY, YOU GUYS ARE COMING FROM THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION. TRAFFIC. TRAFFIC IS THE BIGGEST THING FOR US. EVERYONE’S JUST BOUND UP. THERE’S NOWHERE FOR THEM TO GO, ESPECIALLY IN A CONSTRUCTION ZONE. MAKES IT RATHER DIFFICULT FOR OUR LARGE APPARATUS TO NAVIGATE AROUND. BUT THAT’S WHERE WE GOT TO COME UP WITH THESE PLANS RIGHT AWAY. SO WE ENDED UP USING THE ONCOMING LANES, GETTING ON 59TH STREET TO ACCESS THAT ACCIDENT, BECAUSE ALL TRAFFIC FROM THERE HAD CEASED. AND CHP WAS A HUGE HELP TO US TO STOP ALL THAT TRAFFIC. SO OUR FIRST RESPONDERS COULD REALLY GET IN THERE AND START PERFORMING WHAT THEY NEEDED TO DO. WOULD YOU SAY US SAYING THAT THE HELICOPTER CRASHED ONTO THE FREEWAY IS THE BEST WAY TO DESCRIBE IT? DO WE KNOW IF THEY WERE TRYING TO MAKE AN EMERGENCY LANDING? WHAT’S KNOWN ABOUT THAT? THAT’S ALL UNKNOWN. IF YOU LOOK AT IT FROM JUST A BYSTANDER POINT OF VIEW, IT LOOKS LIKE IT CRASHED BECAUSE IT’S UPSIDE DOWN. BUT TO SAY FROM A PROFESSIONAL VIEW THAT IS NOT IN OUR LANE, THAT’S SOMETHING THAT AVIATION EXPERTS NEED TO NAVIGATE THROUGH. SO FEDERAL OFFICIALS ARE OBVIOUSLY WILL BE INVOLVED IN THIS INVESTIGATION. WHAT’S THE NEXT STEP WHEN IT COMES TO EITHER CLEANING THIS UP OR INVESTIGATING? ARE YOU ABLE TO SPEAK TO WHAT THE NEXT STEPS NOW WILL LOOK LIKE? I CAN’T SPEAK TO THAT. I CAN JUST SPEAK TO THE FIRE SIDE OF THE RESPONSE AND THE MEDICAL TRANSPORTATION SIDE. THANK YOU GUYS. YEAH. CAN WE FOLLOW YOU GUYS DOWN THERE OR. YEAH. JUST GO AHEAD AND TURN AROUND BEHIND US. OKAY. YOU’VE BEEN LISTENING TO A NEWS CONFERENCE RIGHT NOW. THAT WAS JUSTIN SILVA FROM THE SACRAMENTO FIRE DEPARTMENT EXPLAINING WHAT HAPPENED THIS EVENING INVOLVING THIS HELICOPTER THAT CRASHED SHORTLY AFTER TAKING OFF FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. HE SAYS THE CALL INITIALLY CAME IN ABOUT 708 TONIGHT, AND THEY INITIALLY THOUGHT THEY HAD A VEHICLE WITH PEOPLE THEY NEEDED TO EXTRICATE. BUT WHEN THEY GOT ON SCENE, THE HELICOPTER, THEY THEY REALIZED IT WAS A CHOPPER. IT WAS NOT A VEHICLE. AND THERE WAS SOME HEROIC ACTIONS TONIGHT BECAUSE WE UNDERSTAND ONE OF THE THREE PEOPLE ABOARD THAT CHOPPER WAS PINNED UNDER THE CHOPPER, AND THE SAC FIRE CAPTAIN GOT BYSTANDERS FROM THE AREA TO LIFT THAT HELICOPTER OFF OF THAT VICTIM. AND THERE WERE TWO WOMEN, A MAN WHO WERE TAKEN TO THE HOSPITAL IN CRITICAL CONDITION. WE BELIEVE THAT IS A PILOT, A NURSE AND A PARAMEDIC. AND SO THREE PEOPLE HAVE GONE TO THE HOSPITAL IN CRITICAL CONDITION. ALL RIGHT. WE WANT TO SHOW YOU A TRAFFIC MAP BECAUSE THIS IS STILL HAVING SUCH A MAJOR IMPACT ON TRAFFIC RIGHT NOW. YOU CAN SEE WESTBOUND TRAFFIC IS IS MOVING ALONG JUST FINE, BUT CARS ARE STILL STOPPED ON THE ON THE EASTBOUND LANES. AND ONE OF THE QUESTIONS THAT WE HAVE HAD IS HOW LONG THEY’RE GOING TO NEED TO KEEP THE WRECKAGE OUT THERE, BECAUSE A LOT OF TIMES THE AVIATION INVESTIGATORS NEED TO LOOK AT EXACTLY THE CRASH SITE AS IT HAPPENED TO KEEP ALL OF THAT EVIDENCE PRESERVED AS LONG AS POSSIBLE. WHEN YOU’RE TRYING TO NAVIGATE THAT, ALONG WITH THE IMPACT ON TRAFFIC, YOU KNOW, IT COULD BE REALLY DIFFICULT FOR THEM TO FIGURE OUT WHAT’S GOING TO TAKE PRIORITY. AND SO WE KNOW WE’VE HAD VEHICLES THAT HAVE BEEN JUST STUCK THERE ON HIGHWAY 50 FOR HOURS NOW AS THIS WE SAW THE CARS POINTED IN EVERY DIRECTION AS DRIVERS WERE TRYING TO GET OFF THE FREEWAY. SOME OF THEM TURNING AROUND IN THE LITTLE BIT OF SPACE THEY HAD DRIVING IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION, JUST TRYING TO REACH AN AVAILABLE EXIT. WE KNOW EVEN FROM PEOPLE WHO CALLED OUR NEWSROOMS OR FRIENDS WHO HAVE BEEN TEXTING US, IT TOOK SOME OF THEM HOURS TO BE ABLE TO FIND THEIR WAY THROUGH ALL OF THIS TRAFFIC. AND LET’S SHOW YOU SOME VIDEO. WE HAVE HERE. PAULA CLEMENT SENT THIS TO US WHERE YOU COULD SEE THE TRAFFIC RIGHT THERE, AND YOU COULD SEE SMOKE THAT APPEARS TO BE COMING FROM THE SCENE. BUT YOU AND I WERE TALKING ABOUT THIS WITH OUR EXCLUSIVE PICTURES FROM LIVECOPTER3. IT DOES NOT APPEAR THAT THIS HELICOPTER CAUGHT FIRE AT ALL. AND WHAT I’VE BEEN ABLE TO DIG UP ABOUT THESE PARTICULAR CHOPPERS. IT’S AN H 130, BUT THEY HAVE. A CRASH RESISTANT FUEL SYSTEMS ON THEM, AND THEY ARE DESIGNED TO PREVENT POST-CRASH FIRES BY CONTAINING ANY FUEL. AND IT WAS SOMETHING THAT THE NTSB ACTUALLY RECOMMENDED IN 2016, BECAUSE A YEAR EARLIER THERE WERE TWO CRASHES WHERE THEY SAY THE VICTIMS SURVIVED THE CRASH, BUT THEY ENDED UP BURNING. SO THE NTSB MADE A RECOMMENDATION IN 2016 FOR THESE CHOPPERS TO GET THESE PARTICULAR SYSTEMS ON BOARD. AND WHAT YOU’RE SEEING RIGHT HERE, WE DON’T KNOW IF THAT SMOKE OR IF THAT IS THIS FIRE SUPPRESSION SYSTEM THAT KEPT THIS HELICOPTER FROM CATCHING FIRE. WE CERTAINLY SAW IN SOME OF THE VIDEOS THAT HAVE BEEN POSTED FROM THE SCENE WHAT LOOKS LIKE THAT SUPPRESSION SYSTEM IS COMING UP IN WHITE VERSUS WHAT WOULD NORMALLY BE SEEN FROM A FIRE, WHICH WOULD BE BLACK SMOKE. AND WE HEARD FROM JUSTIN SYLVIA HOW GRATEFUL THEY WERE THAT THEY WEREN’T DEALING WITH A FIRE, BECAUSE IT IS, AS HE WAS SAYING, REALLY DIFFICULT FOR THEM TO GET WATER INTO A SITUATION LIKE THIS. AND WITH THE KIND OF FUEL THAT’S ON BOARD, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN EXTREMELY DIFFICULT TO DEAL WITH. IN ADDITION TO THE IMPACT ON THOSE VICTIMS. SO THIS IS A LOOK RIGHT NOW FROM LIVECOPTER3. AND YOU CAN SEE AGAIN, THE VERY SLOW, TEDIOUS OPERATION OF GETTING ALL OF THESE CARS REMOVED FROM THE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50. AGAIN, NOT ABLE TO OPEN UP OFTEN, YOU KNOW, IN AN ACCIDENT SITE YOU CAN OPEN UP ONE LANE, MAYBE TWO, AS THEY MOVE THE DEBRIS OVER. IN THIS CASE, THEY CAN’T DO THAT. AND SO THEY’RE JUST CARS ARE JUST CRAWLING OFF. OKAY. SO WE HAVE OUR REPORTERS AT THE SCENE AND LET’S GET TO KCRA 3’S CATALINA ESTRADA WITH WHAT SHE’S SEEING. YEAH. CURTIS, WE JUST MADE IT HERE ON SCENE. I REALLY JUST WANT TO GIVE YOU A LIVE LOOK AT WHAT’S HAPPENING. WE’RE RIGHT NEXT TO HIGHWAY 50, AND YOU CAN SEE HERE THE DEBRIS ON THE FREEWAY. YOU CAN SEE THAT HELICOPTER THAT CRASH IN BETWEEN THE TAIL AND THE FRONT PART OF IT. AND THERE’S A LOT OF DEBRIS JUST AROUND THIS AREA. AND YOU CAN ALSO SEE CALIFORNIA HIGHWAY PATROL’S HERE WORKING TO CLEAR THE AREA. THEY’RE ACTUALLY STARTING TO LET PEOPLE THROUGH. YOU CAN SEE SOME CARS DRIVING ALONGSIDE THAT BORDER SIDE OF THE FREEWAY. RIGHT NOW. THEY’RE STARTING TO LET THESE PEOPLE GO BECAUSE THEY’VE BEEN STUCK HERE FOR HOURS. YOU CAN SEE RIGHT BEHIND US HERE. THESE VEHICLES ARE AT A COMPLETE STOP. THEY HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO MOVE AS CREWS RESPONDED TO THIS CRASH. THAT HAPPENED A COUPLE HOURS AGO. YOU CAN SEE SOME OF THOSE VEHICLES RIGHT NOW STARTING TO DRIVE ALONG THE FREEWAY HERE ON HIGHWAY 50. I CAN COUNT ON THIS SIDE AT LEAST THREE CHP VEHICLES. THERE’S ALSO CHP MOTORCYCLE OFFICERS ON HERE. AND ON THE OTHER SIDE YOU CAN SEE THE BIG LIGHTS OF ALSO MORE LAW ENFORCEMENT OVER ON THE OTHER SIDE. SO IT’S A REALLY BIG AND ACTIVE SCENE HERE. REALLY IMPRESSIVE. JUST TO SEE THE DAMAGE OF THIS HELICOPTER CRASH ALONG THE SIDE HERE WHERE WE’RE AT, THERE’S A COUPLE PEOPLE THAT YOU KNOW ARE ALSO WHO LIVE RIGHT HERE NEARBY AND ARE SEEING ALL OF THIS UNFOLD. IT’S IMPORTANT TO MENTION WE ARE IN A SAFE AREA. WE’RE NOT IN DANGER HERE WHERE WE’RE STANDING, BUT YOU CAN COMPLETELY SEE, YOU KNOW, THE DESTRUCTION LEFT BY THIS CRASH OVER ON THIS SIDE. AND THE POLICE OFFICERS REALLY AT WORK TRYING TO, YOU KNOW, LET PEOPLE THROUGH AND ALSO PICK UP THIS DEBRIS THAT’S LEFT HERE AS THEY CONTINUE TO RESPOND TO THIS. RIGHT NOW, YOU CAN SEE THOSE VEHICLES STARTING TO DRIVE AWAY. SO WE MIGHT SEE THAT TRAFFIC CLEAR UP HERE PRETTY SOON. FAMILIES ARE STARTING TO GET BACK IN THEIR VEHICLES AND DRIVE AWAY. SO VERY ACTIVE SCENE THAT WE’RE SEEING OUT HERE. OF COURSE THIS IS JUST DEVELOPING. THIS IS JUST UNFOLDING. SO A LOT OF THINGS MORE INFORMATION WILL PROBABLY BE GETTING IN THE NEXT COUPLE OF MINUTES. OF COURSE WE’RE GOING TO STAY ON TOP OF THAT. ALSO TALKING TO PEOPLE OUT HERE TO SEE WHAT THEY SAW. AND WE’LL MAKE SURE TO BRING THAT TO YOU AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. LIVE IN SACRAMENTO CAROLINA ESTRADA KCRA THREE NEWS. BACK TO YOU GUYS. CAROLINA, WILL WE HAVE YOU? JUST A QUICK QUESTION ABOUT WHERE THEY’RE GETTING THE TRAFFIC OFF THE FREEWAY. I KNOW THIS IS ALL RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF THAT FIX 50 CONSTRUCTION ZONE. IS IT ONE OF THOSE SORT OF SEPARATED LANES? YOU KNOW, THEY’VE BEEN SHIFTING THE LANES AND MOVING TRAFFIC AROUND. ARE THEY ABLE TO ACCESS ONE OF THOSE NOW TO GET THE CARS OFF? EDIE THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT’S HAPPENING. I CAN ACTUALLY SHOW YOU HERE. WE’RE GOING TO SEE ONE OF THOSE COUNTY VEHICLES OVER ON THIS SIDE. IF OUR PHOTOJOURNALIST ALAN HELPS ME SHOW, YOU CAN SEE THAT WHITE VAN THAT YOU’RE GOING TO SEE HERE, THAT’S ACTUALLY A COUNTY VEHICLE. WE’RE GOING TO SEE IT DRIVE ON TO ONE OF THOSE AREAS WHERE THEY HAVE BEEN SHIFTING THE LANES HERE ON THE FIXED 50 PROJECT ON HIGHWAY 50, YOU CAN SEE THOSE VEHICLES AND THOSE OFFICERS DIRECTING THEM WITH LIGHTS OVER TO THAT AREA. AND THAT WAY THEY CAN GO AROUND WHERE THIS HELICOPTER CRASH AND GET OVER TO THE OTHER SIDE. SO THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT THEY’RE DOING. THEY MOVED UP THE THOSE SHOULDERS AND THEY’RE LETTING PEOPLE OFF OF THE FREEWAY. SO WE’RE GOING TO START SEEING ALL OF THIS CLEAR UP HERE VERY SOON. THEY’RE DOING IT ONE BY ONE VERY SLOWLY, OBVIOUSLY MAKING SURE THAT EVERYONE IS ABLE TO TO GET OFF THIS AREA PRETTY SAFELY, SAFELY. BUT THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT’S HAPPENING. YEAH. SUCH AN INTERESTING APPROACH. THEY’RE ABLE TO PRESERVE THE CRASH SITE AND STILL CREATE THAT SPACE FOR PEOPLE TO GET OFF THE HIGHWAY. CAROLINA, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THAT VANTAGE POINT. ALL RIGHT. SO TO RECAP INFORMATION WE LEARNED JUST A FEW MINUTES AGO. AND IT’S INCREDIBLE INFORMATION THAT THREE PEOPLE HAVE SURVIVED THIS CRASH. THEY ARE IN CRITICAL CONDITION. AND ONE PERSON WAS ACTUALLY TRAPPED UNDERNEATH THE HELICOPTER. AND BYSTANDERS CAME IN AND HELPED THE FIRE DEPARTMENT LIFT THAT HELICOPTER UP OFF OF THAT VICTIM AND GET THAT PERSON OUT. AND SO WE KNOW THAT THREE PEOPLE ON BOARD ARE IN CRITICAL CONDITION, AND ALL OF THEM ARE IN THE HOSPITAL RIGHT NOW. AGAIN, THOUGH, THE IMPACT ON TRAFFIC CONTINUES. THE WRECKAGE WILL BE OUT THERE FOR QUITE SOME TIME. SO WE WILL CONTINUE TO POST UPDATES ON OUR APP, WHICH IS THE KCRA APP, AND ON OUR WEBSITE, KCRA.COM, AND WE’LL HAVE MUCH MORE FOR YOU ON OUR NEWSCAST LATER TONIGHT AT 10:00 ON MY58 AND 11 HE

    Helicopter crash critically injures 3, shuts down highway in California

    Updated: 12:40 AM EDT Oct 7, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    Crews are responding to a medical helicopter crash on Highway 50 in Sacramento on Monday night, according to the California Highway Patrol. CHP traffic logs indicate the crash was reported just after 7 p.m. on eastbound Highway 50 just east of 59th Street in California’s capital city. Watch aerial video from Hearst sister station KCRA below:The Sacramento Fire Department said three people were in critical condition following the crash. There was no patient on board, the fire department said, but there was a pilot, nurse and paramedic on board.Sacramento fire said one person was trapped under the helicopter after the crash. A group of around 15 bystanders rushed in to help first responders lift the helicopter off the trapped person, officials said. Caltrans traffic cameras show a large amount of backups on Highway 50 due to the crash. The eastbound side of the highway is expected to be shut down for some time, and some lanes of westbound Highway 50 could be affected.Other photos from drivers showed a small plume of smoke rising from the area where the crash occurred, but Sacramento Fire said no fire sparked from the crash.Sacramento Councilmember Lisa Kaplan shared a photo of the crash, showing long traffic backups in the area.This story will be updated.

    SACRAMENTO, Calif. —

    Crews are responding to a medical helicopter crash on Highway 50 in Sacramento on Monday night, according to the California Highway Patrol.

    CHP traffic logs indicate the crash was reported just after 7 p.m. on eastbound Highway 50 just east of 59th Street in California’s capital city.

    Watch aerial video from Hearst sister station KCRA below:

    This content is imported from YouTube.
    You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.

    The Sacramento Fire Department said three people were in critical condition following the crash. There was no patient on board, the fire department said, but there was a pilot, nurse and paramedic on board.

    Sacramento fire said one person was trapped under the helicopter after the crash. A group of around 15 bystanders rushed in to help first responders lift the helicopter off the trapped person, officials said.

    Caltrans traffic cameras show a large amount of backups on Highway 50 due to the crash. The eastbound side of the highway is expected to be shut down for some time, and some lanes of westbound Highway 50 could be affected.

    helicopter crash highway 50

    Other photos from drivers showed a small plume of smoke rising from the area where the crash occurred, but Sacramento Fire said no fire sparked from the crash.

    Sacramento Councilmember Lisa Kaplan shared a photo of the crash, showing long traffic backups in the area.

    helicopter crash highway 50

    This story will be updated.

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  • Helicopter crash shuts down traffic on Highway 50, injuries reported

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    Helicopter crash shuts down traffic on Highway 50, injuries reported

    HELICOPTER CRASH HAS SHUT DOWN EASTBOUND HIGHWAY 50. THIS IS VERY CLOSE TO STOCKTON BOULEVARD AND NOT FAR FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. THIS IS A LIVE LOOK AT A CALTRANS CAMERA SHOWING JUST SOME OF THE BACKUP TRAFFIC IS ACTUALLY BACKED UP IN BOTH DIRECTIONS. THE CHP SAYS NOBODY WAS ON THE GROUND HIT, BUT THERE ARE INJURIES FOR THE PEOPLE WHO ARE IN THAT HELICOPTER, WHICH WE BELIEVE HAD JUST TAKEN OFF FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. KCRA 3’S ANDRES VALLE IS LIVE IN THE AREA. ANDREAS, WHAT ARE YOU SEEING? YEAH. KURTIS EDIE WE JUST GOT HERE. WE’RE ON THE OVERPASS OF 48TH STREET. LET ME SHOW YOU WHAT WE’RE SEEING RIGHT NOW. WE BELIEVE WHERE THAT HELICOPTER DID. CRASH IS ON THE EASTBOUND LANES OF TYLER PAN OVER TO WHERE WE’RE SEEING A LOT OF THOSE FLASHING LIGHTS, WHERE WE SEE FIRST RESPONDERS ARE AT WHAT WE SEE RIGHT HERE. THIS TRAIL OF RED LIGHTS ARE. THOSE LANES ARE HEADING WESTBOUND AS OF RIGHT NOW. WE CAN ALSO SEE THAT THE FAR LEFT LANE OF THE WESTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50 ARE CURRENTLY BLOCKED OFF BY FIRST RESPONDERS AS WELL. BUT THE TRAIL OF WHITE LIGHTS OUT THERE TOWARDS THE DISTANCE, THOSE ARE THOSE EASTBOUND LANES WHERE TRAFFIC IS AT A COMPLETE STANDSTILL AS FIRST RESPONDERS ARE WORKING TO FIGURE OUT EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. OF COURSE, CLEAR ANY DEBRIS, CLEAR ANY OF THE ROADWAYS FOR THIS INCIDENT? AGAIN, THAT JUST HAPPENED. WE DO HAVE A LOT OF PEOPLE OVER OVERLOOKING THIS OVERPASS WATCHING THIS WITH US. YOU CAN HEAR A LOT OF THOSE SIRENS AS WELL AS OTHER EMERGENCY CREWS ARE TRYING TO GET INTO THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50. WHAT I CAN TELL YOU, TO WHICH I DON’T KNOW IF OUR CAMERA CAN PICK IT UP. IT’S SMOKY IN THIS AREA AS WELL. SO MORE THAN LIKELY, WHEN THAT CRASH, THAT IMPACT HAPPENED, THERE WAS A FIRE BECAUSE THERE IS A LOT OF SMOKE, AT LEAST IN THE AIR RIGHT NOW. BUT THIS IS A LOOK OF HIGHWAY 50 HEADING WESTBOUND. THIS IS THE TRAIL OF THOSE RED LIGHTS. THIS IS WHERE THE TRAFFIC IS LOOKING LIKE. AND AGAIN, ON THOSE EASTBOUND LANES WHERE WE’RE SEEING A LOT OF THOSE FLASHING LIGHTS, THAT’S WHERE WE BELIEVE WHERE THE HELICOPTER COULD HAVE CRASHED ON THOSE EASTBOUND LANES. AS EDIE AND CURTIS JUST TOLD YOU, WE CAN CONFIRM THAT NOBODY WAS HIT ON THE GROUND. BUT WE ARE DEALING WITH INJURIES FROM THAT HELICOPTER AS WELL. IF YOU’RE JUST JOINING US LIVE RIGHT NOW ON AIR, IF YOU HAVE TO COMMUTE INTO THIS AREA, YOU REALLY JUST WANT TO AVOID THIS ENTIRE STRETCH OF SACRAMENTO. USE THOSE SIDE STREETS IF POSSIBLE. THERE’S FOLSOM BOULEVARD AS A GOOD ALTERNATIVE ROUTE. WE’RE RIGHT NEAR THAT UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER AS WELL. BUT AGAIN, THIS IS AN AREA WHERE YOU WANT TO COMPLETELY AVOID. THIS IS VERY ACTIVE. THIS IS THIS IS ALL UNFOLDING AS WE ARE BRINGING THIS TO YOU LIVE ON AIR RIGHT NOW. BUT AGAIN, WE CAN CONFIRM THAT A HELICOPTER DID CRASH WHAT APPEARS TO BE ON THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50, HIGHWAY 50, AT A COMPLETE CLOSURE. AS OF RIGHT NOW, YOU CAN STILL GET THROUGH THOSE WESTBOUND LANES OF U.S. HIGHWAY 50. AS OF RIGHT NOW. BUT AGAIN, TRAFFIC IS STILL EXTREMELY SLOW, WITH THAT FAR LEFT LANE BEING BLOCKED OFF AS WELL. GUYS. YEAH WE CAN DEFINITELY. IT’S A GREAT VANTAGE POINT THERE WHERE YOU CAN SEE EMERGENCY RESPONDERS ON BOTH SIDES OF THE FREEWAY. WITH THE EASTBOUND LANES COMPLETELY SHUT DOWN FOR THIS EMERGENCY. WE HAVE A PHOTO FROM SACRAMENTO CITY COUNCIL MEMBER LISA KAPLAN SHOWING THE CRASH FROM OVERHEAD. SHE SAYS SHE WAS ACTUALLY IN A SACRAMENTO COUNTY SHERIFF’S HELICOPTER FLYING ON FOR AN UNRELATED REASON. WHEN SHE WAS ABLE TO TAKE THIS, TO BRING US THIS PERSPECTIVE OF THAT DISASTER UNFOLDING RIGHT NOW. AGAIN, WE KNOW THAT THERE ARE INJURIES ON THAT HELICOPTER, AND WE WANT TO SHOW YOU THE TRAFFIC CONDITIONS RIGHT NOW, WHICH WE JUST SHOWED YOU FROM THE GROUND OUT THERE. BUT YOU CAN SEE RIGHT NOW THERE ARE MAJOR BACKUPS RIGHT NOW FROM WHAT THE CHP COMMUNICATIONS PAGE IS SAYING. I MEAN, IT IS PURE GRIDLOCK. THEY’RE HAVING A TOUGH TIME GETTING AN AMBULANCE TO THE SCENE. THEY DIDN’T HAVE A PLACE TO SEND THE CARS, SO THEY ARE WORKING ON THAT. BUT WE DO BELIEVE THIS HELICOPTER TOOK OFF FROM UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. AND I WANT TO SHOW YOU FLIGHT RADAR, BECAUSE RIGHT HERE, AS I ZOOM IN RIGHT IN THE CENTER OF YOUR SCREEN RIGHT THERE, THAT RED AREA THAT IS THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER, AND THERE WAS A HELICOPTER THAT TOOK OFF AT ABOUT SIX MINUTES PAST THE HOUR. AND I’M GOING TO HIT PLAY ON THIS. AND YOU SEE THIS HELICOPTER IS JUST MOVING EVER SO SLIGHTLY. AND THEN IT ARE ABOUT TWO MINUTES LATER. AND THEN FROM THAT PICTURE THAT WE SAW, WE DO SEE THAT QUICKLY WITHIN JUST A COUPLE OF MINUTES, WE HAVE HELICOPTERS RACING TO THE SCENE FROM BOTH THE SACRAMENTO POLICE DEPARTMENT AND THE SACRAMENTO SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT. THIS RIGHT HERE IS THE THE SACRAMENTO SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT HELICOPTER, WHICH WE BELIEVE WOULD BE THE HELICOPTER THAT COUNCIL MEMBER LISA KAPLAN WAS ON WHEN SHE SNAPPED THAT PHOTO. SO THIS RIGHT HERE IS FROM ABOUT 714. AND YOU CAN SEE THE HELICOPTER IS CIRCLING THE SCENE AND WITNESS ACCOUNTS. ALSO LET US KNOW THAT THEY SAW THIS HELICOPTER, WHICH WOULD BE THE PAINT JOB THAT WOULD BE ON THOSE REACH HELICOPTERS, THOSE AIR MEDICAL SERVICES FLYING VERY LOW AND THEN AGAIN CRASHING ONTO HIGHWAY 50. SO AGAIN, TRAFFIC IMPACTED IN BOTH DIRECTIONS ON THE WESTBOUND SIDE. IT’S BECAUSE OF THE FIRST RESPONDERS WHO ARE JUST ACROSS THE FREEWAY FROM THE ACTUAL CRASH. AND YOU CAN SEE THOSE LIGHTS THERE KIND OF IN THE MIDDLE OF YOUR SCREEN. TRAFFIC IS ABLE TO GET BY ON THE WESTBOUND SIDE. BUT, YOU KNOW, EVEN IN THE BEST OF TIMES, THIS AREA OF HIGHWAY 50 IS UNDER A MASSIVE CONSTRUCTION PROJECT. THE 650 PROJECT HAS SHIFTED LANES AND IMPACTED TRAFFIC FOR FOR QUITE SOME TIME. AND YOU CAN SEE THE BARRIERS SET UP ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE SCREEN. TRAFFIC IS OFTEN DIFFICULT TO GET THROUGH. EVEN UNDER IDEAL CONDITIONS, SO TRAFFIC AGAIN BACKED UP ON THE WESTBOUND SIDE BECAUSE OF THE FIRST RESPONDERS THERE THAT ARE IN THE SO-CALLED FAST LANE. AND THEN THE CRASH ITSELF IMPACTING TRAFFIC COMPLETELY ON THE EASTBOUND SIDE. AND CURTIS, WHAT YOU WERE SAYING IS THAT THERE’S NO WAY TO MOVE THOSE CARS, SO THEY’RE NOT EVEN ABLE TO GET SOME OF THE EMERGENCY CREWS IN IN THE COMMUNICATIONS PAGE FROM THE CHP, THEY WERE SAYING AT 725 THAT THERE’S NO WAY OF CLEARING THE TRAFFIC. THEY’RE JUST TOO MANY VEHICLES THERE ON THE SCENE. AND SO THEY WERE WORKING TO CLEAR AT LEAST ONE LANE TO GET AN AMBULANCE THERE. OF COURSE, THIS IS VERY CLOSE TO THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER, WHICH WE BELIEVE THAT CHOPPER JUST TOOK OFF FROM. AND THEY’RE TRYING TO GET AN AMBULANCE THERE TO RESCUE THE PEOPLE WHO WERE IN THAT CHOPPER WHO ARE INJURED. WE DO KNOW THAT THERE ARE INJURIES ON THAT CHOPPER, SO THEY’RE TRYING TO GET TO THE PEOPLE WHO ARE IN THERE TO GET THEM BACK TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM. THE CHP IS NOW ESTIMATING THAT THE ROAD IS GOING TO BE CLOSED FOR 60 TO 90 MINUTES. AT THIS POINT, AND THEY HAVE SET UP A COMMAND CENTER NEARBY. BUT THEY DO BELIEVE THAT NORTHBOUND 99 TO EASTBOUND 50, THAT TRANSITION, THAT’S ALL GOING TO BE SHUT DOWN AS THEY WORK THIS SCENE. WE WANT TO GO BACK OUT TO ANDRES VALLE, WHO IS UP ON THE 48TH STREET BRIDGE OVERLOOKING THE TRAFFIC SITUATION. AND IT’S A GOOD VANTAGE POINT TO REALLY SHOW YOU THE IMPACT ON TRAFFIC RIGHT NOW. ANDRÉS. YEAH. SO LET’S BRING YOU BACK OVER TO WHAT WE’RE LOOKING AT RIGHT NOW, WHICH IS THIS STREAM OF RED LIGHTS THAT YOU SEE RIGHT HERE. THIS IS THOSE WESTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50. THESE ARE STILL MOVING, BUT THEY’RE MOVING EXTREMELY SLOWLY BECAUSE ON THE FAR LEFT LANE, THAT’S WHERE WE ALSO HAVE THOSE EMERGENCY CREWS AS WELL. THERE ARE TRAFFIC TO MOVE TO THE FAR RIGHT LANES. BUT AGAIN, WHAT YOU SEE ON THE LEFT SIDE OVER HERE WHERE WE SEE ALL OF THOSE FLASHING LIGHTS, THOSE ARE THOSE EASTBOUND LANES WHERE TRAFFIC IS AT A COMPLETE STANDSTILL. THAT’S WHERE WE BELIEVE THIS HELICOPTER MAY HAVE CRASHED. I CAN’T MAKE IT OUT FROM MY VANTAGE POINT, BUT IF YOU CAN MAKE IT OUT FROM WHAT YOU’RE SEEING FROM OUR PHOTOGRAPHERS, ZOOMING IN AGAIN, WE’RE TRYING TO ZOOM IN THROUGH THESE, THROUGH THE GUARDRAIL OF THIS OVERPASS TO GIVE YOU, LIKE, THE BEST LOOK OF WHAT WE’RE ACTUALLY SEEING OUT HERE. BUT WE HAVE A DECENT AMOUNT OF LOOKIE LOOS, AS I LIKE TO CALL THEM, OVERLOOKING THIS OVERPASS, STOPPING BECAUSE THEY HEARD ABOUT THE NEWS. THEY’RE WATCHING OUR COVERAGE RIGHT NOW OF WHAT IS GOING ON, BUT IT IS A MESS. SO AGAIN, IF YOU DO HAVE TO MAYBE HEAD OUT IN THIS DIRECTION, YOU WANT TO AVOID HIGHWAY 50 AT ALL COSTS. USE THOSE SIDE STREETS LIKE BROADWAY. IF YOU’RE SOUTH OF 50. IF YOU’RE NORTH OF 50, USE FOLSOM BOULEVARD TO GET TO AND FROM EAST SACRAMENTO OR ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE CITY AS WELL, BECAUSE AGAIN, WE JUST KNOW THAT WE KNOW THAT THAT HELICOPTER DID CRASH ON HIGHWAY 50, AND FIRST RESPONDERS ARE WORKING TO GET TO THOSE PEOPLE WHO ARE INJURED. WHAT WE DO KNOW SO FAR AS WELL IS THAT NOBODY WAS HIT ON THE GROUND. THEY’RE MAINLY FOCUSED ON TRYING TO GET AID TO THOSE PEOPLE THAT WERE IN THE HOSPITAL, OR I SHOULD SAY IN THE HELICOPTER, AND GET THEM TO THE HOSPITAL AS WELL. BUT AS YOU CAN SEE FROM THE TRAFFIC HERE, IT’S LOOKING PRETTY ROUGH. AND AGAIN, THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50 COMPLETELY SHUT OFF AS FIRST RESPONDERS ARE WORKING TO, YOU KNOW, FIGURE OUT WHAT EXACTLY HAPPENED IN THIS AREA. AND AGAIN, WE’RE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED TO AND PRESENT TO PRESENT THAT TO YOU ON AIR. WHEN WE FIRST ARRIVED, ABOUT 15 MINUTES AGO, WE NOTICED A LOT OF SMOKE IN THE AIR AS WELL. SO MORE THAN LIKELY THERE WAS POTENTIALLY A FIRE WHEN THAT HELICOPTER DID CRASH. BUT THIS IS WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE AS OF RIGHT NOW. GUYS. THANK YOU SO MUCH. IT’S A GREAT VANTAGE POINT. THERE, ANDRÉS, AND GREAT INFORMATION FOR US. WE KNOW THAT, YOU KNOW, FROM WHAT CURTIS HAS BEEN ABLE TO SEE AND WHAT THEY CALL THE CAT, THEY ARE TRYING TO GET SOME OF THE TRAFFIC MOVED OFF THE FREEWAY SO THEY CAN GET THE EMERGENCY RESPONDERS IN. AND IT LOOKS LIKE WE’RE SEEING ONE TRUCK MOVING ON FROM THE SCENE NOW. HAVE YOU BEEN ABLE TO SEE ANY MOVEMENT THERE ON THE EAST SIDE OF OF HIGHWAY 50, BEING ABLE TO CLEAR OUT SOME OF THAT TRAFFIC? I HAVE NOT THEY BASICALLY HAVE IT AT A COMPLETE STANDSTILL. EDIE WHAT LOOKS LIKE WHAT JUST DROVE AWAY WAS JUST A FIRE TRUCK. SO THAT LOOKED LIKE TO BE A SACRAMENTO FIRE TRUCK LEAVING THE AREA AS OF RIGHT NOW. BUT FOR THE MOST PART, ALL OF THOSE EASTBOUND LANES, ANYBODY WHO’S STUCK IN THAT AREA IS BASICALLY TRAPPED. AND LIKE WHAT YOU MENTIONED EARLIER, THIS IS A PORTION OF HIGHWAY 50 THAT IS HEAVILY UNDER CONSTRUCTION. WITH THAT FIX 50 PROJECT. SO WHETHER YOU’RE STUCK IN THOSE THOSE CHANGE LANES WHERE, YOU KNOW, YOU HAVE THAT BARRIER, WHERE YOU GET TRANSITIONED INTO THOSE DIFFERENT LANES WHERE YOU CAN’T GET OUT, YOU’RE KIND OF JUST STUCK THERE UNTIL THESE CREWS ARE ABLE TO CLEAR ANY FORM OF LANES. BUT AGAIN, THEIR MAIN PRIORITY RIGHT NOW IS FOCUSING ON THOSE PEOPLE THAT WERE INSIDE THAT HELICOPTER, BUT ON AGAIN, ON THOSE WESTBOUND LANES, EVEN THE FAR LEFT LANE RIGHT HERE, WHAT WE’RE SEEING WHERE THE STRING OF RED LIGHTS, THOSE BRAKE LIGHTS, IS THAT THEY’RE PUSHING PEOPLE TO THE FAR RIGHT, THREE LANES TO STILL HAVE SOME ROOM FOR THOSE CREWS THAT APPEAR TO BE WHERE THE FAR LEFT LANE IS RIGHT NOW, RIGHT JUST ACROSS THE MEDIAN FROM THE THE MAIN GROUP OF OF FIRST RESPONDERS. ALSO VERY INTERESTING INFORMATION, ANDRES, ABOUT THE SMOKE THAT YOU SMELLED AND OBSERVED WHEN YOU FIRST GOT THERE ON THE SCENE. DID YOU SEE ANY FLAMES OR ANYTHING ELSE THAT WOULD INDICATE WHERE THAT HAVE COME FROM? NO, THAT WAS ONE THING I NOTICED TOO, IS I DIDN’T SEE ACTIVE FLAMES ON THE HIGHWAY. BUT IT WAS EXTREMELY SMOKY. I MEAN, THE SMOKE IS STILL IN THE AIR RIGHT NOW, BUT IT’S VERY MUCH CLEARING OUT. AND THAT’S PROBABLY BECAUSE OF THE SLIGHT BREEZE THAT WE’RE SEEING OUT HERE. BUT YOU LOOK AROUND, YOU CAN STILL SEE KIND OF A BIT OF A HAZE. I KNOW THE CAMERA CAN’T REALLY MAKE THAT OUT BECAUSE WE’RE MAINLY FOCUSED ON THESE FLASHING LIGHTS THAT WE SEE ON THE HIGHWAY, BUT THAT’S SOMETHING THAT DEFINITELY A LOT OF THE PEOPLE ON THIS OVERPASS HAVE NOTICED AS WELL. I WAS SPEAKING BRIEFLY TO A PERSON WHO SAID THAT HE HEARD ALL THE SIRENS, AND THAT’S WHAT BROUGHT THEM OUT HERE. THEY WERE A COUPLE STREETS DOWN, SO WE HAVE A DECENT AMOUNT OF PEOPLE OUT HERE PULLING OVER ASKING US WHAT EXACTLY IS GOING ON. AND OF COURSE, THEY’RE SHOCKED TO KNOW THAT A HELICOPTER DID CRASH ON HIGHWAY 50, RIGHT? I MEAN, RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE. THAT’S, YOU KNOW, ON BOTH SIDES, YOU’VE GOT RESIDENTIAL NEIGHBORHOODS, ELMHURST, EAST SACRAMENTO. SO A LOT OF PEOPLE LIVE RIGHT IN THAT AREA. AND EVEN IF THEY’RE NOT DIRECTLY IMPACTED BY THE TRAFFIC, FROM WHAT YOU’RE REPORTING, ANDRES, I WOULD ASSUME THAT THEY MAY HAVE AS WELL SMELLED THAT SMOKE. CERTAINLY, WE COULD TELL THAT THE SHERIFF’S HELICOPTER HAS BEEN OVERHEAD. YOU KNOW, INCLUDING OUR LOCAL CITY COUNCIL MEMBER, LISA KAPLAN, WHO HAPPENED TO BE FLYING WITH THE SHERIFF’S TEAM WHEN THEY OBSERVED THIS ACCIDENT. SO A LOT OF PEOPLE WOULD CERTAINLY BE, TO SOME DEGREE, AWARE OF WHAT’S GOING ON THERE ON HIGHWAY 50. ALL RIGHT. WE ARE LEARNING A LITTLE BIT MORE INFORMATION. THIS HELICOPTER HAS BEEN IN USE A LOT TODAY. IT APPEARS THIS MOST RECENTLY CAME FROM RED BLUFF. AND LANDED THERE AT UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER AT 636. IT SHOWS THAT THIS FLIGHT WAS ABOUT 46 MINUTES LONG. BUT LOOKING AT FLIGHT RADAR HERE, IT LOOKS LIKE THERE HAVE BEEN A NUMBER OF FLIGHTS GOING BACK TO EVEN AFTER MIDNIGHT. I’M COUNTING ONE, TWO THREE, FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN FLIGHTS. SO THIS HELICOPTER HAS BEEN HEAVILY USED TODAY. AND IF WE COULD GO BACK TO THE COMPUTER I HAVE IN FRONT OF ME THAT SHOWS YOU THIS PARTICULAR FLIGHT, THERE’S A PICTURE OF THIS HELICOPTER HERE. IT IS KNOWN AS RAGE FIVE, WHICH IS A REACH AIR MEDICAL CHOPPER. AND IT SHOWS HERE AT SEVEN MINUTES PAST THE HOUR, JUST TAKING OFF FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. AND AS I PUT THIS INTO MOTION, WITHIN A MINUTE, IT DISAPPEARS FROM THE RADAR HERE. AND THAT’S WHEN WE BELIEVE IT DID CRASH RIGHT THERE. YOU SEE, IT DISAPPEARED. THIS IS AT 709. IT’S GONE FROM THE RADAR. AND THEN IMMEDIATELY WE SEE THE SACRAMENTO SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT AS WELL AS THE SACRAMENTO POLICE DEPARTMENT, HELICOPTER RACING TO THE SCENE WHERE THEY START CIRCLING. WE KNOW AGAIN FROM WITNESS STATEMENTS THAT IT FOR FOR WITNESSES. IT JUST LOOKED LIKE THEY WERE FLYING UNUSUALLY LOW. THAT’S WHAT THEY FIRST NOTICED WITH THIS HELICOPTER. AND THEN OF COURSE WITNESSED THE CRASH. AND RIGHT ON HIGHWAY 50 THERE WOULD HAVE BEEN A, YOU KNOW, A NUMBER OF WITNESSES AT THAT TIME OF NIGHT. SO AT THIS AT THIS POINT, WE’RE WE’RE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT IF THE AMBULANCE HAS MADE IT RIGHT THERE ON SCENE, BECAUSE WE DO BELIEVE WE HAVE AT LEAST TWO PEOPLE WHO ARE ON THAT. THAT’S THE TYPICAL FLIGHT CREW FOR A MEDICAL HELICOPTER. AND SO WE KNOW THAT THERE ARE INJURIES. SO WE’RE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT IF THE AMBULANCE HAS BEEN ABLE TO MAKE IT THROUGH ALL OF THIS TRAFFIC. IT IS SO CLOSE TO THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. ONCE THE AMBULANCES GET THERE, THEY’RE ABLE TO GET IT BACK, GET THE PATIENTS BACK TO THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER WHERE THEY COULD BE TREATED. WHAT YOU’RE SEEING RIGHT NOW IS THE TRAFFIC MAP, WHICH SHOWS IT IS JUST GRIDLOCK THERE. AND THOSE FOLKS TRYING TO HEAD EASTBOUND, YOU CAN SEE THAT THEY’RE NOT ABLE TO MAKE IT VERY FAR AT THIS POINT. THE FOLKS WHO ARE HEADED WESTBOUND, IT’S VERY SLOW, BUT THEY ARE MAKING IT PAST THE THE CRASH SITE. SO I’M JUST TOLD WE ARE OBVIOUSLY LAUNCHING LIVECOPTER3 TO GET A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE FOR YOU AS WELL. SO WE WE HOPE TO BRING THAT TO YOU, IF NOT DURING THIS CUT IN RIGHT NOW, THEN FOR OUR LATE NEWS TONIGHT AT TEN AND 11. YEAH, SIGNIFICANT IMPACT ON TRAFFIC FROM THE TRAFFIC CAMERA THERE. YOU CAN SEE THE CARS GETTING THROUGH. SO THAT’S WESTBOUND TRAFFIC WHICH IS IMPACTED AS WE’VE BEEN SHOWING YOU BETWEEN THE FIX 50 CONSTRUCTION AND THE EMERGENCY RESPONDERS WHO ARE ACROSS THE MEDIAN FROM THE CRASH SITE, THERE’S BEEN A SIGNIFICANT IMPACT ON THE WESTBOUND TRAFFIC. BUT AT LEAST CARS ARE ABLE TO GET THROUGH. IT’S BACKED UP AND SLOW BEHIND THE ACCIDENT. BUT YOU KNOW TRAFFIC IS MOVING ON THAT SIDE. BUT ON THE EASTBOUND SIDE, NOT AT ALL. AND FOR SOME OF THOSE CARS, THE ONES THAT YOU SEE RIGHT THERE, THERE IS JUST NOWHERE FOR THEM TO GO. THEY ARE STUCK UNTIL THEY’RE ABLE TO OPEN UP A LANE. SO ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CRASH SITE IS WHERE ANDRES VALLE IS RIGHT NOW. LET’S GO BACK TO HIM WITH WHAT HE IS SEEING. YEAH. SO GUYS, WE MOVED A LITTLE BIT CLOSER DOWN TO THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50. SO I HAVE TYLER ZOOM IN THROUGH THE GUARDRAIL HERE AND SHOW YOU KIND OF WHAT WE’RE SEEING, BECAUSE WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE IS WE STILL HAVE ALL OF THOSE EMERGENCY CREWS BLOCKING THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50, BUT IT LOOKS LIKE EMERGENCY CREWS ARE DRIVING IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION ON HIGHWAY 50. SO MORE THAN LIKELY TO GET TO THIS AREA WHERE THAT HELICOPTER DID CRASH ON THOSE EASTBOUND LANES. BUT THOSE WESTBOUND LANES ARE MOVING REALLY SLOWLY. THAT’S THE STRING OF THOSE RED BRAKE LIGHTS THAT YOU’RE SEEING ON THE RIGHT HAND OF YOUR SCREEN. AS WE LOOK FURTHER DOWN, IT LOOKS LIKE I SEE A PERSON WITH A FLASHLIGHT ON THESE MIDDLE LANES. THIS IS AN AREA OF HIGHWAY 50 THAT DEALS WITH A LOT OF THAT CONSTRUCTION FROM THAT 650. SO THIS IS WHERE THAT LANE CHANGE HAPPENS. AND SO IT LOOKS LIKE SOMEBODY IS FLASHING A LIGHT THERE. IT LOOKS LIKE TO BE A FIRST RESPONDER. BUT AGAIN WHAT YOU SEE OUT THERE TOWARDS THE DISTANCE BEYOND THOSE FLASHING LIGHTS IS THOSE WHITE LIGHTS. THOSE ARE THE LIGHTS OF CARS TRYING TO HEAD EASTBOUND ON 50. AND THEY’RE COMPLETELY STUCK RIGHT NOW ON THE HIGHWAY BECAUSE OF THIS CRASH WITH THE HELICOPTER. AND JUST TO RECAP, IF YOU’RE JUST JOINING US LIVE ON AIR RIGHT NOW, WE DO KNOW THAT A HELICOPTER DID CRASH HERE ON HIGHWAY 50. WE BELIEVE IT’S THOSE EASTBOUND LANES. THAT’S WHY THEY HAVE IT COMPLETELY BLOCKED OFF. WE KNOW NOBODY WAS HIT, AT LEAST ON THE GROUND, BUT WE KNOW THAT WE’RE DEALING WITH INJURIES FROM THE PEOPLE THAT WERE INSIDE THAT HELICOPTER. AND WE’VE SEEN FIRE TRUCKS LEAVE THIS AREA. WHEN WE FIRST ARRIVED ON SCENE, WE SAW A WHOLE LOT OF SMOKE AS WELL. WE DIDN’T SEE ANY FLAMES COMING FROM THE HIGHWAY, BUT WE ARE DEALING WITH KIND OF THAT HAZE. MORE THAN LIKELY. THERE WAS SOME FORM OF FIRE SPARKED WHEN THAT HELICOPTER DID CRASH ON THOSE EASTBOUND LANES OF HIGHWAY 50 AS OF RIGHT NOW. BUT AGAIN, IF YOU’RE JUST JOINING US AND YOU NEED TO GET THROUGH THIS AREA, YOU’RE GOING TO NEED TO USE THOSE SIDE STREETS. BROADWAY IS A MAIN ARTERY. IF YOU’RE SOUTH OF HIGHWAY 50, IF YOU’RE NORTH OF HIGHWAY 50, FOLSOM BOULEVARD IS YOUR BEST ACCESS POINT. AGAIN, WE’RE SHOWING YOU THE VIEW FROM THE OVERPASS OF 48TH STREET RIGHT NEAR THAT 48TH STREET LIGHT RAIL STATION. BUT AGAIN, IT’S LOOKING LIKE TO BE A VERY LONG CLOSURE FOR THE REST OF THE EVENING. GUYS. YEAH, IT CERTAINLY DOES. THIS WOULD BE, YOU KNOW, AS YOU’RE POINTING OUT, WITH SOMEONE OUT THERE WITH A FLASHLIGHT, INVESTIGATORS WOULD CERTAINLY BE OUT THERE. THIS WOULD BE A TWO PRONGED OPERATION IN TERMS OF JUST PRESERVING THE SCENE. ONE, OBVIOUSLY, GETTING TO THE PEOPLE WHO NEED URGENT MEDICAL ATTENTION. AND THEN ALSO THEY’LL BE BRINGING IN THE FAA OR NTSB, THE PEOPLE OUT TO LOOK AT THE CRASH SITE. THEY WOULD HAVE TO PRESERVE THE CRASH SITE FOR EVIDENCE. OF COURSE, THEY WOULD WANT TO KNOW EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED WITH A MEDICAL TRANSPORT HELICOPTER CRASHING ONTO A FREEWAY. AND THIS AT THIS POINT, THOSE VEHICLES HAVE NOWHERE TO GO AND THEY DON’T WANT THEM DRIVING THROUGH THIS CRASH SCENE WHERE THEY’RE GOING TO BE INVESTIGATING. AND SO THOSE VEHICLES THERE THAT ARE TRYING TO GET EASTBOUND ARE STUCK ON THE ROAD. AND AT THIS POINT, WE DON’T KNOW OF ANY SORT OF PLAN TO GET THEM OFF THAT ROAD. SO THEY’RE JUST STAYING THERE IN PLACE. WE HAVE LAUNCHED LIVECOPTER3, WHICH IS WORKING TO GET TO THE SCENE RIGHT NOW. SO WE HOPE TO BRING YOU AN AERIAL VIEW IN JUST A COUPLE OF SECONDS. BUT WHAT WE DO KNOW IS THIS WAS A REACH MEDICAL CHOPPER. AND THIS CHOPPER HAD JUST TAKEN OFF A FEW MINUTES AFTER THE TOP OF THE HOUR, ABOUT 705, AND IT DIDN’T MAKE VERY FAR LOST CONTROL. AND IT ENDED UP CRASHING THERE RIGHT ONTO HIGHWAY 50, WHICH IS WHERE WE KNOW THAT THERE ARE PATIENTS WHO ARE IN THAT HELICOPTER WHO ARE INJURED. WE’RE TRYING TO FIGURE OUT IF THEY HAVE BEEN LOADED UP INTO AN AMBULANCE, AND IF THEY HAVE BEEN ABLE TO BE TRANSPORTED BACK TO UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER, WHICH IS THE CLOSEST TRAUMA CENTER TO GET TREATED FOR ANY INJURIES THAT THEY THEY HAVE, YOU KNOW, ANDRES MENTIONED SMELLING THE STRONG SMELL OF SMOKE. THERE WAS ALSO A BURN UNIT RIGHT THERE AT UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER THAT IS IN CLOSE ASSOCIATION WITH THE FIREFIGHTERS INSTITUTE, AND THEY WORK TOGETHER ON THAT. AND SO ONE OF THE BEST BURN CENTERS IN THE ENTIRE WORLD IS RIGHT THERE AT UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER. BUT WE DON’T HAVE ANY INDICATION AT THIS POINT. THERE WAS SMOKE. WE DON’T THERE WEREN’T REPORTS OF FLAMES, BUT LIVECOPTER3 IS OVERHEAD RIGHT NOW. SO TOGETHER WE’RE GOING TO GET OUR FIRST GLIMPSE OF THIS LIVE PICTURE. AND THERE IT IS. YOU CAN SEE THE CHOPPER. IT IS RIGHT THERE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD. IT DOES LOOK LIKE WE HAVE CONSIDERABLE DAMAGE. EDIE DOES IT LOOK LIKE TO YOU? IT’S ON ITS SIDE. YES, IT LOOKS LIKE IT IS ON ITS RIGHT SIDE. RIGHT THERE. CURTIS, I’M GOING TO LEAVE YOU ON THE SET FOR A MINUTE AND JUST KIND OF WALK OVER. I CAN GET A BETTER VIEW OF WHAT IS GOING ON. YOU CAN SEE RIGHT THERE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SCREEN OF THAT HELICOPTER, YOU CAN SEE WE HAVE THE MEDICAL SYMBOL, AND IT DOES LOOK LIKE THAT HELICOPTER IS ON ITS SIDE. IT IS A EUROCOPTER. YOU COULD TELL IT’S A EUROCOPTER BECAUSE THE BACK OF THAT HELICOPTER HAS THAT CIRCLE WITH ONE OF THOSE TURBINES, AND THAT IS INDICATIVE OF A EUROCOPTER, BUT IT APPEARS THAT WE HAVE DAMAGE TO THE TOP OF THAT HELICOPTER AND A LOT OF DEBRIS RIGHT THERE ON THE ROAD, WHICH GIVES YOU AN IDEA OF WHY THEY CERTAINLY CAN’T LET ANY TRAFFIC THROUGH AT THIS POINT. IT IS A FULL BLOCKAGE OF THE ROAD AT THIS POINT. SO WE DO KNOW PEOPLE WERE ON BOARD. IT DOESN’T LOOK LIKE ANYBODY IS TRYING TO REMOVE ANYBODY FROM THAT HELICOPTER AT THIS POINT. SO WE’RE HOPING THAT THAT MEANS THAT THEY HAVE BEEN LOADED INTO AN AMBULANCE AND ARE OFF TO THE HOSPITAL AT THIS POINT. I MEAN, YOU LOOK AT THIS RIGHT NOW, CURTIS, AND THERE IS JUST EXTENSIVE DAMAGE TO THIS HELICOPTER. WHEN WE HAD GOTTEN THE WORD FROM WITNESSES THAT THEY HAD SEEN THE HELICOPTER COMING IN, FLYING VERY LOW, I HAD HOPED THAT MAYBE IT WAS WHAT YOU WOULD CALL A HARD LANDING, RIGHT WHERE YOU WOULDN’T HAVE AS MUCH DAMAGE. BUT THIS DAMAGE IS REALLY EXTENSIVE. AGAIN, A BIG DEBRIS FIELD. I’M LOOKING FOR SIGNS OF FIRE AND ANYTHING THAT WOULD BE CHARRED. AND I’M NOT SEEING THAT. CURTIS. NO, YOU SEE A LOT OF PIECES OF DEBRIS. AND IF YOU LOOK RIGHT INTO THE CHOPPER THERE, IT LOOKS LIKE WE’RE SEEING A SEAT. BUT NO, I’M NOT SEEING ANY FLAME. ANY SIGNS THAT THERE WERE FLAME? ANYTHING IS CHARRED. BUT YOU COULD UNDERSTAND IF A HELICOPTER DID MAKE A CRASH LIKE THIS. YOU PRESUMABLY WOULD HAVE SOME SMOKE TO SOME DEGREE, BUT IT DOESN’T LOOK LIKE IT CAUGHT FIRE. AND AND BURN. THE STRUCTURE OF THAT HELICOPTER ITSELF. BUT YOU CAN SEE THAT THAT DEBRIS FIELD IS PRETTY MUCH COVERING ALL OF THOSE LANES. YEAH, YEAH. THIS WAS A THIS WAS A MAJOR CRASH HERE. SO YEAH, YOU CAN SEE THAT EVEN WITH EMERGENCY CREWS, THERE’S AN AMBULANCE, BY THE WAY. EDIE RIGHT THERE. THE THE LEFT PART OF YOUR SCREEN THERE. AND THE BOTTOM, IT LOOKS LIKE THERE IS AN AMBULANCE. SO WE KNOW AN AMBULANCE HAS MADE IT TO THE SCENE. PERHAPS OTHER AMBULANCES HAVE MADE IT TO THE SCENE AS WELL. BUT THAT WAS TO THE BOTTOM LEFT OF YOUR SCREEN WHERE YOU SEE WHAT APPEARS. SOME CRIME TAPE THERE AND THE VEHICLES THAT ARE CLEARLY BLOCKING THE THE ROAD. RIGHT. THAT’S. YEAH, EXACTLY. AND AS YOU POINTED OUT, CURTIS, NO ONE RIGHT AT THE HELICOPTER ITSELF. THERE’S AT THIS POINT NO OPERATION THAT WOULD BE DEALING WITH ANY, ANY VICTIMS THERE AT THE SCENE. SO IT LOOKS LIKE, YOU KNOW, A LOT OF EMERGENCY RESPONDERS STANDING BACK. AND AGAIN, PERHAPS IN POSITION TO PRESERVE EVIDENCE. CLEARLY KEEPING, YOU KNOW, THE TRAFFIC AND DRIVERS AWAY FROM, FROM THIS CRASH. SO AS WE LOOK FROM LIVECOPTER3 ON THE RIGHT SIDE THERE OF THIS CRASHED HELICOPTER ON THE LEFT SIDE OF THE SCREEN, YOU’RE SEEING A PICTURE FROM THE EAST LOOKING BACK WEST, WHERE YOU COULD SEE ALL OF THOSE FIRE TRUCKS AND PATROL CARS GUARDING THE SCENE RIGHT NOW, WHICH NO DOUBT WILL BE AN EXTENSIVE INVESTIGATION AS THEY TRY TO FIGURE OUT WHAT CAUSED THIS, THIS MEDICAL HELICOPTER TO GO DOWN. NOW, ONE THING I WANT TO POINT OUT, EDIE IS LOOKING AT THE EXTENSIVE HISTORY OF HOW THIS HELICOPTER HAS FLOWN TODAY. WE DON’T KNOW IF THEY WERE PICKING UP A PATIENT OR IF THEY WERE DROPPING OFF A PATIENT PRIOR TO THIS CRASH. WHAT I CAN TELL YOU IS THAT THIS HELICOPTER SEEMS TO HAVE DONE A LOT OF WORK IN REDDING THIS MORNING. IT FLEW FROM MCCLELLAN TO REDDING, AND THEN AFTER FIVE, IT FLEW FROM REDDING REGIONAL AIRPORT TO RED BLUFF, LANDING IN RED BLUFF AT 517. AND THEN AT 550, IT WENT STRAIGHT FROM RED BLUFF TO THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER, AND AMBULANCES. THE AMBULANCE OUT NOW. SO THAT HELICOPTER LANDED AT THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER AT 636. AND THEN I HAVE INDICATION FROM FLIGHT RADAR THAT THE HELICOPTER TOOK OFF FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER AT ABOUT 705, AND WITHIN 3 OR 4 MINUTES, IT DISAPPEARED FROM THE RADAR. OKAY. WE HAVE A PHOTO NOW FROM JENNIFER WEST. JENNIFER, THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR PROVIDING THIS PHOTO FOR US. AND AGAIN, ANOTHER LOOK AT JUST. VERY MAJOR CRASH HERE. THE CHOPPER CLEARLY ON ITS SIDE. AND THERE’S JUST SO MUCH DAMAGE TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THAT CHOPPER AS WELL. AND LOOK AT THE FIREFIGHTERS THERE BECAUSE WE HAVE FIREFIGHTERS ON BOTH SIDES OF THAT HELICOPTER. AND IT LOOKS LIKE THEY ARE IN THE POSITION WHERE THEY WOULD BE WORKING ON PATIENTS. SO IF THIS IS WHAT WE THINK IT IS, THERE IS A PATIENT ON THE SIDE OF THE CHOPPER CLOSEST TO US AND ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CHOPPER, AND AT THIS POINT, WE DON’T KNOW THE CONDITION OF AT LEAST WHAT WOULD BE TWO PEOPLE. I WILL SAY THAT FROM OTHER SITUATIONS LIKE THIS THAT WE HAVE COVERED, IT WOULD BE PRETTY COMMON FOR THERE TO BE A PILOT, AND THEN FOR THERE TO BE AT LEAST TWO MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS ON A FLIGHT LIKE THIS, THAT THAT WOULD THAT’S JUST FROM FROM THE NATURE OF OTHER CASES THAT WE’VE COVERED LIKE THIS. YOU WOULD HAVE A CREW OF A FEW PEOPLE. SO WE’RE ZOOMING IN CLOSER FOR THE FIRST TIME, WHERE YOU COULD SEE SOME OF THE DEBRIS THERE ON THE ROAD. IT’S VERY DARK, BUT WE’RE LOOKING AT THIS LIVE TOGETHER, TRYING TO MAKE OUT, YOU KNOW WHAT THIS DEBRIS IS FROM THAT HELICOPTER. IT JUST I JUST SEE A BUNCH OF SMALL PIECES. SO AS THIS HELICOPTER CRASHED TO THE GROUND, IT JUST LOOKS LIKE SOME PIECES JUST SHATTERED, YOU KNOW, AND SPREAD AROUND THIS PARTICULAR AREA. BUT IT DOESN’T LOOK LIKE WE HAVE ANY PATIENTS ON SCENE AT THIS POINT. NOT AT THIS POINT. ALL RIGHT. WE’RE GOING TO TAKE A BREAK AND LET OUR REPORTER OUT THERE ANDRES VALLE GATHER INFORMATION. OF COURSE, WE ARE HOPING TO BRING YOU FOR OUR NEWS TONIGHT AT TEN AND 11. MORE INFORMATION ABOUT HOW MANY PEOPLE WERE ON BOARD AND EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED. OKAY. REAL QUICKLY, I JUST GOT SOME INFORMATION HERE FROM THE CHP WHERE THEY’RE SAYING THEY’RE NOW CHANGING THE SIGNS IN THE AREA TO SAY ALL LANES ARE BLOCKED AND TRAFFIC MUST GO TO HIGHWAY 99. SO ANYBODY TRYING TO GET EASTBOUND ON 50 TONIGHT, IT’S PROBABLY NOT GOING TO HAPPEN. SO IT LOOKS LIKE THEY’RE WORKING ON GETTING SOME OTHER DETOURS IN PLACE. I KNOW YOU COULD GO DOWN SOUTH ON 99 AND, YOU KNOW, CUT OVER AND MAYBE BYPASS ALL THIS AND GET BACK ON HIGHWAY 50 WELL, EAST OF THIS ACCIDENT. BUT HIGHWAY 50 IS SHUT DOWN AND ANY TRAFFIC NEEDS TO DIVERT SOMEHOW AND TRY TO GET ONTO 99 AND TRY TO GET AROUND THIS CRASH. SO AGAIN, TAKING A LOOK AT AT THE WRECKAGE ITSELF AND THIS IS JUST IT REALLY QUITE A SHOCK WHEN YOU WHEN YOU TAKE A LOOK AT THE AT THE CRASH. THERE IT IS REALLY. INCREDIBLE THAT THIS DID NOT YOU KNOW, END UP WITH MORE CASUALTIES HITTING ANY CARS OR OTHER TRAFFIC. AND EVEN ONCE THEY WENT DOWN THAT CARS DIDN’T CRASH INTO INTO THE HELICOPTER. GO AHEAD. YEAH. SO WE SEE A FIREFIGHTER LOOKING INTO THE WRECKAGE RIGHT THERE. BUT THIS IS WHAT WE KNOW AT THIS POINT. THIS REACH HELICOPTER TOOK OFF FROM THE UC DAVIS MEDICAL CENTER SHORTLY AFTER 7:00 TONIGHT. AND WITNESSES DESCRIBED THAT IT SEEMED TO LOSE CONTROL. IT CRASHED RIGHT HERE IN THE MIDDLE OF EASTBOUND HIGHWAY 50. FROM AN IMAGE WE SAW JUST MOMENTS AGO, IT LOOKED LIKE WE POSSIBLY HAD AT LEAST TWO INJURIES TO PASSENGERS, TWO PEOPLE ON BOARD, I SHOULD SAY THAT FIREFIGHTERS WERE TENDING TO. AND HIGHWAY 50 IS SHUT DOWN AS THEY INVESTIGATE THIS SCENE. ALL RIGHT. WE ARE GOING TO FOCUS ON OUR COVERAGE FOR OUR NEWS TONIGHT AT TEN AND 11. BUT WE ARE GOING TO CONTINUE TO POST UPDATES ON OUR APP. THE KCRA APP, AND OUR WEBSITE, WHICH IS KCRA.COM. SO YOU CAN GO TO EITHER OF THOSE SOURCES FOR UPDATED INFORMATION. AND WE’LL BE BACK HERE WITH AN UPDATE FOR YOU AT 10:00 ON MY58. THANKS FOR JOINING US. WE’RE

    Helicopter crash shuts down traffic on Highway 50, injuries reported

    Updated: 8:25 PM PDT Oct 6, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    Crews are responding to a helicopter crash on Highway 50 on Monday night, according to the California Highway Patrol. CHP traffic logs indicate the crash was reported just after 7 p.m. on eastbound Highway 50 near 59th Street.Watch live video from LiveCopter 3 below:Caltrans traffic cameras show a large amount of backups on Highway 50 due to the crash. The eastbound side of the highway is expected to be shut down for some time, and some lanes of westbound Highway 50 could be affected.CHP said there were injuries involved, but it’s unclear at this time how many people were injured and the extent of their injuries.Officials have not confirmed what kind of helicopter crashed, but a photo shared by a witness showed what appeared to be a red medical helicopter. Other photos from drivers showed a small plume of smoke rising from the area where the crash occurred.Sacramento Councilmember Lisa Kaplan shared a photo of the crash, showing long traffic backups in the area.This is a developing story. Stay with KCRA 3 for the latest.See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

    SACRAMENTO, Calif. —

    Crews are responding to a helicopter crash on Highway 50 on Monday night, according to the California Highway Patrol.

    CHP traffic logs indicate the crash was reported just after 7 p.m. on eastbound Highway 50 near 59th Street.

    Watch live video from LiveCopter 3 below:

    This content is imported from YouTube.
    You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.

    Caltrans traffic cameras show a large amount of backups on Highway 50 due to the crash. The eastbound side of the highway is expected to be shut down for some time, and some lanes of westbound Highway 50 could be affected.

    helicopter crash highway 50

    CHP said there were injuries involved, but it’s unclear at this time how many people were injured and the extent of their injuries.

    Officials have not confirmed what kind of helicopter crashed, but a photo shared by a witness showed what appeared to be a red medical helicopter. Other photos from drivers showed a small plume of smoke rising from the area where the crash occurred.

    Sacramento Councilmember Lisa Kaplan shared a photo of the crash, showing long traffic backups in the area.

    helicopter crash highway 50

    This is a developing story. Stay with KCRA 3 for the latest.

    See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

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  • California police saw an illegal U-turn. But they couldn’t issue a ticket to the self-driving Waymo

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    Police in Northern California were understandably perplexed when they pulled over a Waymo taxi after it made an illegal U-turn, only to find no driver behind the wheel and therefore, no one to ticket.The San Bruno Police Department wrote in now viral weekend social media posts that officers were conducting a DUI operation early Saturday morning when a self-driving Waymo made the illegal turn in front of them.Officers stopped the vehicle, but declined to write a ticket as their “citation books don’t have a box for ‘robot’.”“That’s right … no driver, no hands, no clue,” read the post, which was accompanied by photos of an officer peering into the car.Officers contacted Waymo to report what they called a “glitch,” and in the post, they said they hope reprogramming will deter more illegal moves.The department’s Facebook post has generated more than 500 comments, with many people outraged that police didn’t ticket the company. People also wanted to know how police got the car to pull over.But San Bruno Sgt. Scott Smithmatungol said they can only ticket a human driver or operator for a moving violation, unlike parking tickets that can be left with the vehicle.A new state law that kicks in next year will allow police to report moving violations to the Department of Motor Vehicles, which is figuring out the specifics, including potential penalties, the Los Angeles Times reports.Waymo spokesperson Julia Ilina told the LA Times that the company’s autonomous driving system is closely monitored by regulators. “We are looking into this situation and are committed to improving road safety through our ongoing learnings and experience,” Ilina said.Waymos currently operate in Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Francisco and in areas south of the city, including the suburb of San Bruno.“It blew up a lot bigger than we thought,” Smithmatungol said of the viral post to The Associated Press on Tuesday. “We’re not a large agency like San Francisco.”San Bruno has about 40,000 residents and a sworn police force of 50 officers, he said.Waymo is owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet.See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

    SAN FRANCISCO —

    Police in Northern California were understandably perplexed when they pulled over a Waymo taxi after it made an illegal U-turn, only to find no driver behind the wheel and therefore, no one to ticket.

    The San Bruno Police Department wrote in now viral weekend social media posts that officers were conducting a DUI operation early Saturday morning when a self-driving Waymo made the illegal turn in front of them.

    Officers stopped the vehicle, but declined to write a ticket as their “citation books don’t have a box for ‘robot’.”

    “That’s right … no driver, no hands, no clue,” read the post, which was accompanied by photos of an officer peering into the car.

    Officers contacted Waymo to report what they called a “glitch,” and in the post, they said they hope reprogramming will deter more illegal moves.

    The department’s Facebook post has generated more than 500 comments, with many people outraged that police didn’t ticket the company. People also wanted to know how police got the car to pull over.

    But San Bruno Sgt. Scott Smithmatungol said they can only ticket a human driver or operator for a moving violation, unlike parking tickets that can be left with the vehicle.

    A new state law that kicks in next year will allow police to report moving violations to the Department of Motor Vehicles, which is figuring out the specifics, including potential penalties, the Los Angeles Times reports.

    Waymo spokesperson Julia Ilina told the LA Times that the company’s autonomous driving system is closely monitored by regulators. “We are looking into this situation and are committed to improving road safety through our ongoing learnings and experience,” Ilina said.

    Waymos currently operate in Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Francisco and in areas south of the city, including the suburb of San Bruno.

    “It blew up a lot bigger than we thought,” Smithmatungol said of the viral post to The Associated Press on Tuesday. “We’re not a large agency like San Francisco.”

    San Bruno has about 40,000 residents and a sworn police force of 50 officers, he said.

    Waymo is owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet.

    See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

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  • Tri-Valley is one of the fastest growing regions in the Bay Area

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    Since the 1970s, the Tri-Valley region of the Bay Area has seen significant growth. In places like Dublin and San Ramon, the population has tripled. Meanwhile, other cities in the region have seen their populations double. The Tri-Valley is nestled into the Diablo Mountain Range and is made up of the cities of Pleasanton, Livermore, Dublin, San Ramon and Danville and the surrounding communities. “We saw a growth that changed the community,” said Alameda County District 1 Supervisor David Haubert. “We literally saw Dublin change.”Haubert and his family moved to Dublin 25 years ago. They raised their daughters there and were active in the community, including joining the school board. Haubert went on to become the mayor of Dublin before becoming a county supervisor. “When I left as mayor in the city of Dublin, I said, ‘We’ve seen a lot of great things to happen. But, I want you to know our best days are yet to come.’ Dublin has continued to progress, I say we have even greater days yet to come,” Haubert said. Some of the reasons people are choosing to move to the Tri-Valley include the open spaces, great school districts, and cheaper housing costs. Nearly 10,000 single-family homes have been built in the Tri-Valley in the last 15 years. Developer Trumark Homes currently has approvals for more than 1,500 homes in the Tri-Valley, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. One of Trumark’s biggest developments is Francis Ranch in Dublin. That development has 573 homes under construction. And as the population has grown, communities have seen their demographics shift as well. “Twenty years back, there were not that many people from the South Asian community,” said Prasad Ramakrishnan. Ramakrishnan moved with his family from Fremont to San Ramon two decades ago. He still commutes to Silicon Valley for work, but was drawn to the open spaces and parks in the Tri-Valley.Ramakrishnan is on the board of the Indian Community Center and says the diversity of San Ramon is one of the reasons he’s grown to love the city so much. According to census data, 23% of residents in San Ramon identify as Indian, including Ramakrishnan.”It doesn’t matter where you’re from. All of us are humans, let’s all get together. San Ramon creates that kind of an environment where you have people from different ethnic backgrounds kind of coming together,” Ramakrishnan said. “We celebrate Diwali, we celebrate Christmas, we celebrate the Muslim functions.”But of course, growth doesn’t come without growing pains. Many of those pains can be found along the highways. “680 is the only real highway from here to South Bay. These are called bedroom communities, and then they work in the South Bay. Giving them an easy way by which to get there would be a nice thing,” Ramakrishnan said. However, Haubert is betting on a future without so many people having to commute outside of the Tri-Valley for work. “I truly believe businesses will locate here,” Haubert said. “I understand that’s often the decision of the CEO. So a lot of CEOs live in Silicon Valley, but a lot of future CEOs live in the Tri-Valley. That’s my belief.”See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

    DUBLIN, Calif. —

    Since the 1970s, the Tri-Valley region of the Bay Area has seen significant growth. In places like Dublin and San Ramon, the population has tripled. Meanwhile, other cities in the region have seen their populations double.

    The Tri-Valley is nestled into the Diablo Mountain Range and is made up of the cities of Pleasanton, Livermore, Dublin, San Ramon and Danville and the surrounding communities.

    “We saw a growth that changed the community,” said Alameda County District 1 Supervisor David Haubert. “We literally saw Dublin change.”

    Haubert and his family moved to Dublin 25 years ago. They raised their daughters there and were active in the community, including joining the school board. Haubert went on to become the mayor of Dublin before becoming a county supervisor.

    “When I left as mayor in the city of Dublin, I said, ‘We’ve seen a lot of great things to happen. But, I want you to know our best days are yet to come.’ Dublin has continued to progress, I say we have even greater days yet to come,” Haubert said.

    Some of the reasons people are choosing to move to the Tri-Valley include the open spaces, great school districts, and cheaper housing costs. Nearly 10,000 single-family homes have been built in the Tri-Valley in the last 15 years.

    Developer Trumark Homes currently has approvals for more than 1,500 homes in the Tri-Valley, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

    One of Trumark’s biggest developments is Francis Ranch in Dublin. That development has 573 homes under construction. And as the population has grown, communities have seen their demographics shift as well.

    “Twenty years back, there were not that many people from the South Asian community,” said Prasad Ramakrishnan. Ramakrishnan moved with his family from Fremont to San Ramon two decades ago. He still commutes to Silicon Valley for work, but was drawn to the open spaces and parks in the Tri-Valley.

    Ramakrishnan is on the board of the Indian Community Center and says the diversity of San Ramon is one of the reasons he’s grown to love the city so much. According to census data, 23% of residents in San Ramon identify as Indian, including Ramakrishnan.

    “It doesn’t matter where you’re from. All of us are humans, let’s all get together. San Ramon creates that kind of an environment where you have people from different ethnic backgrounds kind of coming together,” Ramakrishnan said. “We celebrate Diwali, we celebrate Christmas, we celebrate the Muslim functions.”

    But of course, growth doesn’t come without growing pains. Many of those pains can be found along the highways.

    “680 is the only real highway from here to South Bay. These are called bedroom communities, and then they work in the South Bay. Giving them an easy way by which to get there would be a nice thing,” Ramakrishnan said.

    However, Haubert is betting on a future without so many people having to commute outside of the Tri-Valley for work.

    “I truly believe businesses will locate here,” Haubert said. “I understand that’s often the decision of the CEO. So a lot of CEOs live in Silicon Valley, but a lot of future CEOs live in the Tri-Valley. That’s my belief.”

    See more coverage of top California stories here | Download our app | Subscribe to our morning newsletter | Find us on YouTube here and subscribe to our channel

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  • A U.S. veteran spoke out against his wrongful arrest by ICE. Now he’s being accused of assault

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    George Retes Jr. grew up in Southern California, and when he turned 18, he decided to serve in the U.S. Army, he said, because he wanted to be part of something bigger than himself.

    After a tour of duty in Iraq, Retes moved back to Ventura County this year to find a job and spend more time with his wife and two young children. In February, he began working as a contracted security guard for Glass House Farms at its cannabis greenhouses in Camarillo. Then, on July 10, everything changed as ICE raided Glass House — one of its largest immigration raids ever — while he was trying to get to work.

    Federal officers surrounded Retes and pushed him to the ground. He could hardly breathe, he said, as officers knelt on his back and neck. He was arrested, jailed for three days and was not allowed to make a phone call or see an attorney, according to the Institute for Justice, a public-interest law firm that is representing him.

    President Trump’s Department of Homeland Security never charged Retes with a crime. But after he wrote an op-ed about his experience this month, DHS started issuing new accusations against him — saying he was arrested for assault during the raid, which the 25-year-old veteran has denied. Retes said he never resisted, and now is being targeted for retaliation because he spoke out about an arrest he sees as unlawful.

    “My whole point in sharing my story, I’m trying to warn as many people as possible,” he said in an interview this week. “It doesn’t matter if you’re [politically] left, right, if you voted for Trump, hate him, love him, it doesn’t matter. This affects all of us.”

    On July 10, Retes was headed to work around 2 p.m., and the narrow road leading to the farm was logjammed, he said. He weaved his compact white Hyundai forward, past parked cars and protesters, determined to make it to his shift.

    He stopped short when he came upon a line of federal officers who blocked his path to the farm. Retes, 25, wearing shorts and a hoodie, got out of his car and tried to tell the federal agents that he worked at the farm.

    Agents ignored him, he said, and instead told him to get out of the way. So he got back in his car, and as he tried to back up, agents began lobbing tear gas canisters toward the crowd to disperse them. Retes began hacking and coughing as the gas seeped into his car and federal officers began pounding on his car door. He said they gave him instructions to move that were contradictory.

    The agents smashed his car window, pepper sprayed him, pulled him out of the car and arrested him, he said. He was handcuffed, and after his three days in jail, he was released without any explanation.

    In his Sept. 16 opinion piece for the San Francisco Chronicle — entitled “I’m a U.S. citizen who was wrongly arrested and held by ICE. Here’s why you could be next” — Retes detailed his ordeal. He has begun to take legal action to sue the U.S. government under the Federal Tort Claims Act. More than 360 people were arrested in the raid, including numerous undocumented immigrants, and one person died.

    “I served my country. I wore the uniform, I stood watch, and I believe in the values we say make us different. And yet here, on our own soil, I was wrongfully detained,” he wrote. “Stripped of my rights, treated like I didn’t belong and locked away — all as an American citizen and a veteran … if it can happen to me, it can happen to any one of us.”

    Homeland Security officials did not respond to a request for comment or answer questions about their claim of assault.

    Previously, an unnamed spokesperson for Homeland Security said he was released without a charge, and his case was being reviewed, along with others, “for potential federal charges related to the execution of the federal search warrant in Camarillo.”

    A day after Retes’ opinion piece was published, the agency said Retes “became violent and refused to comply with law enforcement. He challenged agents and blocked their route by refusing to move his vehicle out of the road. CBP arrested Retes for assault.”

    The agency denied that U.S. citizens were being wrongfully arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The post stated that operations were “highly targeted.”

    “This kind of garbage has led to a more than 1000% increase in the assaults on enforcement officers,” the agency said.

    Retes said he was astounded to learn the agency’s latest claims about July 10 — moments that were captured on video. He says DHS officials are lying.

    “I was in shock,” he said. The agency had “an opportunity to say ‘OK, what we did was wrong, we’ll take responsibility.’ … It’s crazy that they’re willing to stand 10 toes down and die on a hill of lying and say I assaulted officers.”

    Anya Bidwell, his attorney and senior attorney at the Institute for Justice, said it is significant that the government chose to respond only after his piece was published.

    “When people in this country stand up to this government, this government responds with fury,” Bidwell said. “They’re trying to impose their own version of reality. It’s so important for people like George to say, ‘I know who I am and I know what happened to me, you can’t just frame it as something that it’s not.’”

    In an aerial video that captured the initial confrontation, Retes is seen driving up to the line of agents. He steps outside of his car and remains by the driver side as he tries to reason with the agents. About 20 seconds later, he gets back in his car as the agents press forward. Within seconds they surround his car, at the same time pressing protesters back as they begin to lob tear gas canisters.

    Inside his car, Retes starts to record on his phone. He’s backing up slowly, at an angle, until tear gas makes difficult to see where he’s going, he said.

    “I’m trying to leave!” he says as agents bang on his car. There’s a loud crack as they break his car glass window. “OK I’m sorry!”

    The agents pepper-spray him and detain him. One video posted online shows a group of agents surrounding Retes, who is face down on the road. Another agent hops in his car and drives it forward and off to the side of the road.

    Retes said one agent knelt on his neck and another on his back. He was taken to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles, and he was kept in a cell with a protester who was also arrested. While in jail, he said, he missed his daughter’s third birthday.

    After he was released, Retes said he was suspended from his job without pay for two weeks because of the arrest, and when he came back, his regular shifts were no longer available. Staying on would make it difficult to see his family, so he had to leave, he said.

    He also had to spend about $1,200 getting his car window fixed and detailed from the tear gas, he said.

    Despite the Trump administration’s actions, Retes said his faith in the government and accountability for justice remains steady. Just like when he joined the Army, he said, he still hangs on to a sense of unity to stand up for the country’s values.

    “I still believe justice can be restored — that’s why I’m standing up and speaking out,” he said. “I think it’s important now more than ever for us to be unified and standing up for our rights together. Especially when they have the audacity to try to lie, especially to the public.”

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    Melissa Gomez

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  • Sara Jane Moore, whose attempt to assassinate President Ford shocked the nation, dies at 95

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    Sara Jane Moore, the former psychiatric patient who tried to assassinate President Ford during an era of astonishing violence and upheaval in California, died Wednesday at a nursing home in Franklin, Tenn.

    Moore, who retreated to North Carolina after serving 32 years in federal prison but then was jailed again late in life, was 95. News of her death was confirmed by Demetria Kalodimos, executive producer at the Nashville Banner, who developed a relationship with Moore over the last two years. A cause of death was not reported, but Kalodimos said Moore had been bedridden for about 15 months after a fall.

    As shocking as Moore’s attempt to kill the president was, it seemed a little less so during the frenetic 1970s.

    It was 1975 in San Francisco. Charles Manson was on death row, kidnap victim-turned-accomplice Patty Hearst had just been arrested, and a very young governor named Jerry Brown was in his first year in office.

    Moore chose this moment for a shocking crime in an era nearly defined by them — on Sept. 22, 1975, she tried to assassinate Ford in front of the fashionable St. Francis Hotel.

    She was the second would-be assassin to confront the 38th president in the space of a month.

    Her bullet missed, thanks to the quick reflexes of a former Marine standing next to her.

    The attempt came just 17 days after a Manson follower in a nun’s habit, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, pointed a gun at Ford in Sacramento. It was never clear whether she tried to pull the trigger.

    News accounts of the time portrayed Moore as an enigma. They emphasized her supposedly conventional past. She was described as an average housewife and mother whose conversion to radical politics seemed an unlikely twist. She herself insisted she had been a relatively normal suburbanite before joining the leftist underground.

    It wasn’t true. Moore’s entire adult life had been punctuated by mental health issues, divorces and suicide attempts. Many people who knew her described her as unstable and mercurial.

    Born Sara Jane Kahn on Feb. 15, 1930, in Charleston, W. Va., Moore had been an aspiring actress and nurse before finding work as a bookkeeper. She married five times, was estranged from her family, and abandoned three of her children. A fourth remained in her care at the time of the attempted assassination. Her erratic behavior had cost her jobs, and she had been treated for mental illness numerous times.

    This history led some, including Ford himself, to conclude that she was “off her mind,” as the former president said in a 2004 CNN interview.

    She was in her mid-40s, divorced and living in Danville, outside San Francisco, when she went to work in 1974 as a bookkeeper for People in Need. The organization had been set up to distribute food in response to ransom demands by the Symbionese Liberation Army, the extreme leftist group that had kidnapped Hearst in early 1974 and shortly after engaged in a furious gun battle with Los Angeles police, one of the longest shootouts in U.S. history.

    Moore’s ties to other radical organizations were murky. She would later cast herself as a sought-after FBI informant who had come to live in fear of some unspecified threat. Its source was either from the government or her radical brethren, depending on the interview. Authorities downplayed this, saying her occasional calls to agents and local police officers were unsolicited.

    Hearst had been arrested a few days before the assassination attempt. The day before, the 45-year-old Moore had been detained by San Francisco police officers who seized a gun from her. She made a vague threat and the Secret Service was alerted, but agents concluded she was not dangerous and released her.

    Moore immediately bought a .38 caliber revolver.

    Wearing polka-dot slacks, she went to the hotel where Ford was speaking to the World Affairs Council. She waited outside, and raised her arm to fire when the president emerged at 3:30 p.m. Oliver Sipple, a disabled former Marine standing next to her, saw the weapon and deflected her arm just as the gun went off.

    The bullet went over the president’s head, ricocheted and injured a taxi driver. The president’s security detail rushed to the airport, and Ford was whisked out of California as fast as possible.

    After her arrest, acquaintances said Moore was very concerned that people would assume she was mentally ill. She alluded often to her political motives for trying to kill Ford. Reporters eagerly interviewed her to learn more, but she never seemed able to clearly explain her political agenda.

    Her lawyers were preparing a defense related to her mental condition when she abruptly pleaded guilty, against their advice. She was given a life sentence with a possibility of parole. Moore’s attempt prompted Senate scrutiny of presidential security.

    “Am I sorry I tried?” Moore said at her sentencing. “Yes and no. Yes, because it accomplished little except to throw away the rest of my life, although I realize there are those who think that’s the one good thing resulting from this. And no, I’m not sorry I tried, because at the time it seemed a correct expression of my anger.”

    Moore made headlines briefly again in 1979 when she escaped fbriefly from the Federal Reformatory for Women at Alderson, W.Va., by climbing a 12-foot fence.

    Otherwise, her prison years were uneventful. She was reported to fill her time with needlepoint and bookkeeping duties, and was paroled in 2007 at the age of 77 from a low-security federal facility for women in Dublin, east of San Francisco. Her parole was essentially grandfathered by federal rules that have since been tightened.

    “It was a time that people don’t remember,” Moore told NBC’s “Today” show in 2009. “You know we had a war … the Vietnam War, you became, I became, immersed in it. We were saying the country needed to change. The only way it was going to change was a violent revolution. I genuinely thought that [shooting Ford] might trigger that new revolution.”

    In 2015, Moore was interviewed remotely by CNN, her location only listed as North Carolina.

    Moore was jailed again in early 2019 when she was detained at JFK Airport for traveling outside the country without telling parole officials. Friends said she had become ill in Israel, forcing her to stay longer than she intended. She was released six months later.

    Moore maintained that she had not been influenced by Fromme’s assault on Ford. Fromme was paroled in 2009 and moved to upstate New York, largely disappearing. Both women were depicted in the Stephen Sondheim musical “Assassins,” which won a Tony Award in 2004.

    Sipple, who deflected the shot, was lauded as a hero but later sued several newspapers for invasion of privacy. He said media reports that he was gay had ruined his family relations, but he lost the case. He died in 1989.

    Subsequent attacks on public figures would eclipse Moore’s crime. Three years later, San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone were assassinated. John Lennon’s murder came two years after that, and John Hinckley Jr.’s shooting of President Reagan a few months later.

    Ford, who died of natural causes at age 93 in 2006, was said to be nonplussed by Moore’s attempt on his life. But other members of his entourage saw it as consistent with the place and time.

    Asked by the San Francisco Chronicle to sum up the event, Ford’s press secretary Ron Nessen, who was with him when he was targeted, framed it this way: “It was the ‘70s in San Francisco and California.”

    Leovy and Marble are former Times staff writers.

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    Jill Leovy, Steve Marble

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  • Thousands of redheads celebrate their strands at a festival in the Netherlands

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    The southern Dutch city of Tilburg is seeing more color than usual this weekend, as thousands of redheads from all over the world gather in the Netherlands for a once-a-year festival to celebrate their flaming locks.The 2025 edition of the Redhead Days festival includes music, food trucks and workshops tailored to particular needs of redheads, from makeup explainers to skin cancer prevention.Organizers expect the three-day event to draw several thousand attendees from some 80 countries.Elounda Bakker, a Dutch festival veteran of 15 years, played cards with a group of redheaded friends from across the world who meet together every year at the festival.”I came out of curiosity mostly, just to see what it would be like not to stand out in the crowd,” said Bakker, 29. “It was really an interesting first experience and I just keep coming because I met some really nice friends here.”Magician Daniel Hank traveled six hours from Germany to join the festivities, now proud to flaunt the hair that made him the target of bullying when younger.”I think it’s really easy to recognize me because there are not that many people with a red beard, there are not many guys with long red hair,” he said.The festival is free and open to all, with the exception of the group photo on Sunday. That event is restricted to “natural” redheads.The 2013 edition set a Guinness World Record for the “largest gathering of people with natural red hair” with 1,672 people posing for the group photo.The tradition emerged two decades ago when Dutch artist Bart Rouwenhorst put out a call for 15 red-haired models for an art project in a local newspaper. He got 10 times the response he was expecting and brought the group together for a photo.The project got so much attention, Rouwenhorst organized a similar meetup the following year and has continued to oversee the festival as it has expanded into the multiday event it is today.”The festival is really amazing because all the people, they resemble each other and they feel like it’s a family,” he said.

    The southern Dutch city of Tilburg is seeing more color than usual this weekend, as thousands of redheads from all over the world gather in the Netherlands for a once-a-year festival to celebrate their flaming locks.

    The 2025 edition of the Redhead Days festival includes music, food trucks and workshops tailored to particular needs of redheads, from makeup explainers to skin cancer prevention.

    Organizers expect the three-day event to draw several thousand attendees from some 80 countries.

    Elounda Bakker, a Dutch festival veteran of 15 years, played cards with a group of redheaded friends from across the world who meet together every year at the festival.

    “I came out of curiosity mostly, just to see what it would be like not to stand out in the crowd,” said Bakker, 29. “It was really an interesting first experience and I just keep coming because I met some really nice friends here.”

    Magician Daniel Hank traveled six hours from Germany to join the festivities, now proud to flaunt the hair that made him the target of bullying when younger.

    “I think it’s really easy to recognize me because there are not that many people with a red beard, there are not many guys with long red hair,” he said.

    The festival is free and open to all, with the exception of the group photo on Sunday. That event is restricted to “natural” redheads.

    The 2013 edition set a Guinness World Record for the “largest gathering of people with natural red hair” with 1,672 people posing for the group photo.

    The tradition emerged two decades ago when Dutch artist Bart Rouwenhorst put out a call for 15 red-haired models for an art project in a local newspaper. He got 10 times the response he was expecting and brought the group together for a photo.

    The project got so much attention, Rouwenhorst organized a similar meetup the following year and has continued to oversee the festival as it has expanded into the multiday event it is today.

    “The festival is really amazing because all the people, they resemble each other and they feel like it’s a family,” he said.

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  • Whale of a catch: Potential record-setting 64-pound white sea bass hooked by 13-year-old boy

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    When 13-year-old Julian Her returned to school for the first day of class, the Northern California eighth-grader had a thrilling tale to tell about his summer vacation.

    Her wrote his name into local fishing lore and potentially the record book as he landed a 63.7-pound white sea bass while on a family trip to Tomales Bay, about 30 miles southwest of Santa Rosa, on Aug. 10.

    “I feel like a star,” Her, a student at Riverside Meadows Intermediate School in Plumas Lake, said about his myriad interviews with friends and media alike.

    “The thing that’s been cool about catching this fish is so many people come up to you and ask you, “Where did you catch this fish?” Or they say, “That’s an amazing fish.”

    The youngster weighs only about 15 pounds more than his famous catch. His previous best was a 10-pound catfish he snagged in May, according to his father, Rinna Her.

    “I feel like a star,” Julian Her, a student at Riverside Meadows Intermediate School in Plumas Lake, said about his myriad interviews with friends and media alike. Here he is with a previous catch on May 29.

    (Courtesy of Rinna Her)

    “I don’t know how to describe it at the moment,” said Rinna Her, who lives with his wife and three kids in Rio Oso. “It was so fun, a once-in-a-lifetime moment, and I think we know that my son, myself or anyone in the party will never catch a fish like that again.”

    The Hers are documenting their trophy fish and attempting to verify its status with the Florida-based International Game Fish Assn.

    To verify a record catch, the IGFA asks applicants to document their catch, weigh the fish on certified scales on solid ground and save and submit the tackle.

    The fish was initially weighed at Bodega Tackle in Petaluma on Aug. 10. The shop is helping the Hers complete documentation and certification.

    If the IGFA accepts the claim, Julian’s catch would break the previous junior world white sea bass record of 59 pounds, set in 2002. The 63.7-pound haul would also set the junior class record for that fishing line strength.

    Bodega Tackle manager Angelina Love said white sea bass is a common catch in Tomales Bay.

    The shop has also seen its share of massive fish, including when store owner Ken Brown hooked a 202.6-pound bluefin tuna in 2022.

    What made the latest big haul so special, however, is the angler.

    “There’s been a lot of attention,” Love said. “People have been asking who’s the kid who caught the giant sea bass.”

    Thirteen-year-old Rio Oso resident Julian Her caught a 63.7-pound white sea bass while fishing with family on Aug. 10.

    Thirteen-year-old Rio Oso resident Julian Her with his father, Rinna, on a fishing trip on Oct. 10, 2021.

    (Courtesy of Rinna Her)

    The temperatures on Aug. 10 hovered in the high 50s to low 60s for the better part of the day, making for ideal fishing weather, Rinna Her said.

    Father, son and three other visiting family members arrived at 5 a.m., looking to catch area halibut.

    Sometime around noon, Julian’s rod, held in the boat by a holder, began to dip.

    The youngster, who was eating a sandwich, was alerted by his uncle that he had a bite.

    Julian initially struggled to hold on, leading members of the fishing party to believe he was fighting an area bat ray.

    It wasn’t until Julian’s uncle helped the youngster reel in the monster fish that they realized it wasn’t a ray.

    “I’m thinking, ‘I don’t know if this is real, I didn’t know if it was real,’” Julian said. “Did I really pull that massive sea bass in?”

    The fish was eventually dragged onto the boat, photographed and then taken to be weighed.

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    Andrew J. Campa

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  • Short-term home rentals are dropping in L.A. ‘The rules are too much’

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    For the last four years, Katherine Taylor rented out her Westside guesthouse on Airbnb. She came to rely on the extra income at a time when it felt like everything was getting more expensive.

    But this spring, she took the listing down.

    “I’m out,” Taylor said. “The rules are too much. All these new regulations kept popping up, and it felt like it was only a matter of time before I got fined.”

    Across the L.A. region, many people who rent out their homes for income seem to be changing their preferences. Short-term rentals are much more lucrative than longer stays, but the steady turnover often creates headaches for landlords, and increasingly they are in the crosshairs of local ordinances, including the risk of fines.

    Because of this and other factors, short-term rental registrations have dipped over the last year.

    Last July, there were 4,228 active Home Sharing registrations in the city of L.A., according to the Planning Department. This July, there were 3,972 — a 6% decrease.

    Short-term rental software platforms show a decrease in listings as well, to varying degrees. In analyzing a sample set of short-term rentals in the L.A. metro area, Hospitable estimated a 44% drop in listings year over year, with steady declines each month. AllTheRooms reported a 13% drop in Airbnb listings across L.A. County over the same stretch.

    The data sources vary, since companies have different access to listing data. AirDNA reported an 8% increase in Airbnb and VRBO listings in the L.A. metro area over the last year, but noted a decrease since January fueled by big drops in fire markets: a 56% decrease in Altadena, 36% decrease in Pacific Palisades and 25% decrease in Malibu.

    Expert opinions differ on the cause of the drop-off, but the fires are definitely a factor. Thousands of homes burned down in the Palisades and Eaton fires, taking many rentals off the market. But in the wake of the disaster, many short-term rentals were converted to mid- or long-term rentals to house fire victims.

    Other hosts are opting for mid-term rentals — stays of longer than 30 days but less than a year — independent of the fires.

    “The short-term rental space got stuck. Regulations hit, and people are finding that the next best option is mid-term rentals,” said Jesse Vasquez, an entrepreneur who runs a mid-term rental summit every year.

    Vasquez said L.A. is the best market for mid-term stays because so many people visit the city for extended periods with no permanent plans: travel nurses, students, digital nomads or people working on long-term projects such as films or construction.

    He said mid-term rentals rake in about 15% to 20% less than short-term rentals, but in exchange, homeowners deal with less turnover. If a three-bedroom, two-bathroom house in a popular neighborhood can make around $10,000 per month as a short-term rental, it could still bring in $8,000 per month as a mid-term rental, Vasquez said.

    Last year, Airbnb Chief Executive Brian Chesky identified mid-term stays as a “huge growth opportunity” for the company, and said such bookings make up 18% of the company’s business compared with 13% to 14% before the pandemic.

    Mark Lawson used to rent out his San Fernando Valley home on VRBO for weekend stays, but last year he set the parameters to only accept bookings of 30 days or more.

    “I got tired of having someone new in the house every few days,” he said.

    Short-term rentals have long been contentious. While advocates say sites such as Airbnb and VRBO offer income for homeowners and options for tourists, critics claim home-sharing removes long-term rentals from a market in the midst of a housing crisis.

    To prevent L.A.’s housing stock from being converted into short-term rentals, Los Angeles in 2018 passed the Home-Sharing Ordinance, which regulates short-term rentals by restricting hosts to renting out only their primary residences and requiring them to get a license.

    The regulatory framework worked — somewhat. Listings dropped 70% from 2019 to 2023, though much of the drop could be attributed to the pandemic. Last year, the restrictions spread to unincorporated areas in L.A. County, which previously weren’t subject to the rules.

    But despite the new requirements, thousands of hosts still operate without a license, or fake their registration numbers, due to lack of enforcement.

    Last year, a report from the L.A. Housing Department said that as of October 2024, there were an estimated 7,500 violations of the Home-Sharing Ordinance, but only 300 citations. So in March 2025, the L.A. City Council approved a slew of recommendations to beef up the ordinance even more, arming the city with a war chest of new enforcement tools.

    The plan calls for 18 staffers to monitor violations and increased fines based on the square footage of the rental: $1,000 for rentals less than 500 square feet, up to $16,000 for homes greater than 25,000 square feet. The fines double and quadruple on the second and third violation, respectively.

    The recommendations even call for city staffers to go on spy missions in illegal rentals. Under the proposed plan, Housing Department staff would use prepaid cards to book home-sharing rentals and stay in homes to gather evidence that they’re operating illegally.

    However, two months later, the city’s $14-billion budget scaled back spending for many city departments. As a result, no new enforcement officers have been hired, and many of the plans have yet to be implemented.

    But simply the threat of higher fines and stricter enforcement has had a chilling effect.

    “Talking to our customers, regulation is the biggest factor in short-term rental inventory decreasing,” said Derek Jones, Hospitable’s vice president of sales and partnerships. “L.A.’s ordinance combines all the strict rules from other markets around the country.”

    Jones said the potential for $1,000 fines — now able to be doled out without a warning beforehand — are causing some hosts to remove listings from the market out of fear, since the fines far exceed the nightly revenue brought in by the average listing.

    “Housing is expensive already, then you add high penalties and zoning that limits supply,” Jones said. “All that put together, it creates a market where housing investors are cautious to invest. And that proved to be the case this year.”

    Taylor is one such investor. She specifically bought her Westside home because it had a guesthouse she could rent. But she found herself frustrated by the maximum days she could rent it annually under the Home Sharing Ordinance — 120 days.

    Her space was larger than 500 square feet, so under the new rules, it could be subject to a $2,000 fine for the first violation, $4,000 for the second, and $8,000 for the third. Ultimately, she decided it wasn’t worth the hassle.

    “I’ll keep an eye on how the city is enforcing the rules. Maybe I’ll try it again someday,” she said. “But for now, it’s gonna stay empty.”

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    Jack Flemming

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