Divers pulled three people alive from inside an overturned cruise ship and searched for other survivors Tuesday, state media said, giving some small hope amid an apparently massive tragedy with well over 400 people still missing on the Yangtze River.
Fifteen people were brought to safety and at least five people were confirmed dead after the Eastern Star capsized in Hubei Province during a severe storm Monday night with 458 people aboard, the official Xinhua News Agency said. The cruise was from Nanjing to the southwestern city of Chongqing, and many of those aboard were elderly.
“Looks like we are in trouble,” tour guide Zhang Hui, 43, recalled telling a colleague. In an interview with Xinhua from his hospital bed, he said rain pounded the ship, seeping into cabins, and that heavy listing sent bottles rolling off tables before the ship suddenly went all the way over.
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Rescue workers stand on the capsized ship, center, on the Yangtze River in central China’s Hubei province Tuesday, June 2, 2015. The small cruise ship sank overnight in China’s Yangtze River during a storm, leaving nearly 450 people missing, state media said Tuesday. (Chinatopix via AP)
Recovery teams were resuming the search early Tuesday for 12 people who are missing after a rain-swollen river in Central Texas carried a vacation home off its foundation, slamming it into a bridge downstream.
The hunt for the missing picked up after a holiday weekend of terrible storms that dumped record rainfall on the Plains and Midwest, caused major flooding and spawned tornadoes and killed at least eight people in Oklahoma and Texas. More than 1,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed in Texas, and thousands of residents are displaced.
Authorities were also searching for victims and assessing damage just across the Texas-Mexico border in Ciudad Acuna, where a tornado Monday killed 13 people and left at least five unaccounted for.
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Lucas Rivas looks into the flooded Whole Earth Provisions Company on Lamar Street after days of heavy rain on May 25, 2015 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Drew Anthony Smith/Getty Images)
Irish voters have resoundingly backed amending the constitution to legalize gay marriage, leaders on both sides of the Irish referendum declared Saturday after the world’s first national vote on the issue.
As the official ballot counting continued, the only question appeared to be how large the “yes” margin of victory from Friday’s vote would be. Analysts said the “yes” support was likely to exceed 60 percent nationally when official results are announced later Saturday.
Gay couples hugged and kissed each other amid scenes of jubilation at counting centers and at the official results center in Dublin Castle, whose cobblestoned central square was opened so thousands of revelers could sit in the sunshine and watch the results live on big-screen televisions.
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
The Conservative Party swept to power Friday in Britain’s parliamentary elections, winning an unexpected majority that returns Prime Minister David Cameron to 10 Downing Street in a stronger position than before.
Cameron went to Buckingham Palace, where he was expected to tell Queen Elizabeth II that he has enough support to form a government.
That brings the election to a much-quicker-than-expected conclusion. Polls ahead of Election Day had shown Conservatives locked in a tight race with the opposition Labour Party, raising the possibility of days or weeks of negotiations to form a government.
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
The charges handed down against three former allies of Gov. Chris Christie in the George Washington Bridge traffic scandal provide mixed news for the Republican governor as he tries to regain momentum in support of an expected presidential bid.
Christie appears to have been cleared of any allegations that he personally participated in a scheme to shut down access lanes to the George Washington Bridge in September 2013. But the charges brought by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey still hit close to home: His former deputy chief of staff, Bridget Kelly, and his former top appointee to the authority that controls the bridge, Bill Baroni, have both been indicted. David Wildstein, another ally, pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy.
The charges also return focus to a famously bruising political style associated with Christie’s administration. The documents unveiled Friday paint the trio as vindictive and petty bullies who plotted — and then covered up — a scheme to gridlock the town of Fort Lee to punish its Democratic mayor for not endorsing Christie’s re-election bid.
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Shelter, fuel, food, medicine, power, news, workers — Nepal’s earthquake-hit capital was short on everything Monday as its people searched for lost loved ones, sorted through rubble for their belongings and struggled to provide for their families’ needs. In much of the countryside, it was worse, though how much worse was only beginning to become apparent.
The official overall death toll soared past 4,000, even without a full accounting from vulnerable mountain villages that rescue workers were still struggling to reach two days after the disaster.
Udav Prashad Timalsina, the top official for the Gorkha district, where Saturday’s magnitude-7.8 quake was centered, said he was in desperate need of help.
Police say 18-month-old twin boys drowned in a southwestern Arizona canal after their stroller rolled into the flowing water when their mother stopped to bat away a bee.
Yuma police said 26-year-old Alexis Keslar jumped into the steep-sloped canal Friday but couldn’t rescue the boys because the deep water was moving too fast.
Police on Tuesday issued a statement detailing how the twins ended up in the canal and said the Yuma County medical examiner determined that the deaths were accidental drownings.
President Barack Obama on Saturday declared his refusal to refight the Cold War battles while Cuban President Raul Castro rallied to his defense, absolving Obama of fault for the U.S. blockade in a stunning reversal of more than 50 years of animosity between the United States and Cuba.
“In my opinion, President Obama is an honest man,” Castro said – a remarkable vote of confidence from the Cuban leader, who praised Obama’s life and his “humble background.”
Turning the page on the longstanding U.S. policy of isolation, Castro and Obama were expected to meet later Saturday on the sidelines of the Summit of the Americas – the first substantial meeting between a U.S. and Cuban president in more than five decades.
A man stabbed his wife to death after he slapped one of their seven children for playing videogames and she confronted him about it, police said Friday.
Goodyear police said the children witnessed at least part of the Thursday night attack, and a 14-year-old daughter called 911 to frantically plead for help.
The husband also called 911 after the attack, reportedly crying “hysterically,” apologizing and saying he’d lost his mind and stabbed his wife, police said in a court document.
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This law enforcement booking photo from the Maricopa County, Ariz., sheriff’s office shows John Leo Davis. Police in Goodyear, Ariz., say Davis is accused of fatally stabbing his wife after she confronted him about slapping one of their kids for playing video games. According to police, the couple’s seven children were in the family home Thursday, March 26, 2015, when the mother, identified as Michele Davis, 35, was killed. A 14-year-old daughter witnessed the stabbing and called 911. The husban | ASSOCIATED PRESS
Criticism of 47 Republican senators’ letter to Iranian leaders escalated Friday, and one of the lawmakers expressed misgivings about writing directly to an adversary to raise doubts about President Barack Obama’s nuclear negotiations.
Several newspapers that had endorsed the senators’ elections were harshly critical. A handful of conservative commentators and former GOP aides joined legions of liberals in calling the letter ill-advised.
Republican Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, who may face a tough re-election next year, defended the letter, but added, “If there was any regret, tactically, it probably would have been better just to have it be an open letter addressed to no one.”
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Rescue workers stand on the capsized ship, center, on the Yangtze River in central China’s Hubei province Tuesday, June 2, 2015. The small cruise ship sank overnight in China’s Yangtze River during a storm, leaving nearly 450 people missing, state media said Tuesday. (Chinatopix via AP)
Lucas Rivas looks into the flooded Whole Earth Provisions Company on Lamar Street after days of heavy rain on May 25, 2015 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Drew Anthony Smith/Getty Images)
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Keslar twins
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James' World 2 