ap-breaking
1 Swiss, 1 American die on Everest in year s 1st casualties
KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) A Swiss climber and an American have died on Mount Everest in the season s first casualties on the world s highest mountain, expedition organizers Thursday.The Swiss climber, Abdul Waraich, 41, scaled the peak before having difficulties, said Chhang Dawa of the expedition organizer, Seven Summit Treks in Nepal.Abdul successfully reached the summit but began experiencing issues during his descent, he said. We sent two additional Sherpas with oxygen and food. Unfortunately, the Sherpas couldn t save him.U.S. national Puwei Liu, 55, also died at the highest camp on the mountain at South Col. He had reached the climbing feature named the Hillary Step, located between South Col and the summit, but had to return because of snow blindness and exhaustion.With the help of support team members and additional oxygen, he was brought back to the camp at South Col but died on Wednesday evening, the organizers said.No other details were given on the dead climbers and when the bodies would be brought down. Bad weather conditions has forced climbers to descend to lower altitudes for now.Carrying bodies down the icy and slippery slopes from the highest altitudes is a difficult task that takes lots of time, several Sherpa workers and is generally very costly.Nepal and China both canceled climbing seasons last year on the 8,849-meter (29,032-foot) high mountain. China is allowing only Chinese climbers on the north side of the mountain this year.Nepal allowed foreigners to return this year and the government issued permits to 408 climbers to attempt to scale the peak during the popular spring climbing season.The month of May usually has the best weather for climbing Everest. Scores climbed to the summit this week and more are expected to make their attempts later this month once the weather improves.
2 planes collide midair above Denver, no one injured
DENVER (AP) Two small airplanes collided in midair Wednesday near Denver, leaving one aircraft nearly ripped in half and forcing the pilot of the other to deploy a parachute attached to the plane to land safely. Remarkably, no one was injured, officials said.Both planes were getting ready to land at a small regional airport in a Denver suburb when they collided mid-morning, according to the National Transportation Safety Board and South Metro Fire Rescue.Every one of these pilots needs to go buy a lottery ticket right now, Arapahoe County Sheriff s Deputy John Bartmann said. I don t remember anything like this especially everybody walking away. I mean that s the amazing part of this.June Cvelbar told the KUSA TV station that she witnessed the collision while walking in Cherry Creek State Park.I saw two planes in the sky. I saw a larger green plane, which I thought was a tow plane, along with what I thought was a glider being towed by it. I heard a noise but didn t realize that the two planes had collided, she told KUSA in an email.Cvelbar said she saw the green plane fly off and shortly after saw the smaller plane deploy its parachute. She said she initially thought it was a training exercise.When I realized that the small plane was going down I ran toward it. The pilot and his passenger were up and about, Cvelbar said.The pilot was the only person aboard a twin-engine Fairchild Metroliner that landed at Centennial Airport despite suffering major damage to its tail section. The plane is owned by a Colorado-based company called Key Lime Air that operates cargo aircraft.A pilot and one passenger were on the other plane, a Cirrus SR22 single-engine plane that unleashed a red and white parachute to float to a safe landing in a field near homes in Cherry Creek State Park, Bartmann said.It was not immediately known who owned the Cirrus plane, he said.The National Transportation Safety Board said in a tweet it was sending staff to investigate the incident. Key Lime Air will cooperate with the investigation, the company said in a statement.
Ur as pitches Dodgers past Seattle 7-1 for back-to-back wins
LOS ANGELES (AP) Julio Ur as pitched seven stellar innings of two-hit ball, Matt Beaty drove in three runs and the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Seattle Mariners 7-1 on Wednesday night for their first back-to-back victories in 25 days.
Max Muncy homered for the second straight game for the defending World Series champions, who opened a nine-game homestand by sweeping this two-game interleague series and interrupting their 3 1 2-week stretch of mostly terrible play.
Ur as (5-1) bounced back superbly from last weekend in Anaheim, where he took his first loss since 2019. The hero of the Dodgers championship-clinching victory retired Seattle s first 13 hitters and yielded only two singles and a walk, striking out six.
Beaty had a two-run double in the fourth, and he added an RBI single during the Dodgers four-run fifth in a rally that began with Muncy s two-run homer.
Justin Dunn (1-1) pitched three solid innings before coming apart in the fourth for Seattle, which finished a five-game road trip with four straight defeats. Dylan Moore had an RBI single for the Mariners, who managed just two singles in their 11th loss in 16 games.
The Mariners are thrilled to say goodbye to Ur as, who is 2-0 against Seattle this season with 17 strikeouts and just three hits allowed over 14 innings.
Mookie Betts got the game s first hit with a two-out double in the third, but the Dodgers didn t rally until Justin Turner and Muncy opened the fourth with walks.
Beaty eventually drove them both home with a bases-loaded double to right, chasing Dunn. The Dodgers versatile backup has 14 RBIs in his seven May starts, and he s 5 for 7 with 11 RBIs this season with the bases loaded.
Ty France poked a one-out single through the left side to break up Ur as perfect game bid in the fifth, and he scored on Moore s short single.
Muncy reached base four times and scored three runs. He singled and eventually scored on pinch-hitter AJ Pollock s single in the seventh.
SLUMP BUSTER
Los Angeles was 13-2 on April 17 before its skid began the next day. Before the Mariners arrived at Chavez Ravine, the Dodgers had lost 15 of 20 and fallen into third place in the NL West, the division they ve won for eight consecutive seasons.
TRAINER S ROOM
Dodgers: 3B Edwin R os will miss the rest of the season after surgery to repair a partially torn labrum in his right shoulder. R os was batting .078 this season while clearly struggling with his swing. ... RHP Dustin May had Tommy John surgery Wednesday. The promising redhead won t pitch again until the summer of 2022 at the earliest.
UP NEXT
Mariners: Chris Flexen (3-1, 3.78 ERA) is listed as their starter for Thursday s home series opener against Cleveland, but manager Scott Servais refused to comment pregame on several reports claiming Logan Gilbert, the Mariners top pitching prospect, will be promoted to take the start in his major league debut.
Dodgers: After a day off, Clayton Kershaw (5-3, 2.62 ERA) will open a three-game series against the Marlins. The ace has thrown 13 innings of scoreless, four-hit ball with 20 strikeouts in his last two starts against Miami, both in 2019
The Latest: China gives Bangladesh 500K vaccine doses
DHAKA, Bangladesh China delivered 500,000 doses of Sinopharm vaccine as a gift to Bangladesh on Wednesday to help it cope with a shortage.Bangladesh, a nation of 160 million people, is in desperate need after India banned exports of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines produced by the Serum Institute of India because of its own devastating surge in infections.Chinese Ambassador to Bangladesh Li Jiming formally handed over the Sinopharm vaccines in Dhaka on Wednesday. Bangladesh has already approved the Chinese vaccines after the World Health Organization has recently listed the Sinopharm for emergency use globally.Bangladesh received about 7 million doses from the Indian institute, but its deal had called for 30 million doses to be delivered by June.Bangladesh already suspended administering the first dose of vaccines. Some few hundreds of thousands of people are due their second dose but would be left out if new doses do not arrive soon.Bangladesh has attempted to diversify its vaccine sources, asking the United States for 4 million doses from its stock and signing a deal with Russia to produce Sputnik-V vaccines locally in Bangladesh.___THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:Public service jobs in the US are increasingly thankless and exhausting, a situation worsened by pandemicVariant detected in India may spread more easily, but testing to track and understand it better has been slowA boom in pet ownership has veterinarians backlogged and burned outFollow more of AP s pandemic coverage at https: apnews.com hub coronavirus-pandemic and https: apnews.com hub coronavirus-vaccine___HERE S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:CANBERRA, Australia Qantas Airways has pushed back its forecast resumption of international travel to late December.The Sydney-based airline previously said international travel would restart in late October, based on the government s forecast on vaccine availability for Australians. However, the Australian government forecast Tuesday that international travel will remain at low levels until mid-2022 and vaccines won t be widely available in Australia until the end of 2021.We will keep reviewing these plans as we move towards December and circumstances evolve, Qantas said in a statement Wednesday .Australia bans its citizens from leaving the country except under limited circumstances to prevent them from bringing home infections.The only exception is New Zealand. The two countries last month introduced a quarantine-free travel bubble that recognized their success in containing the virus.Qantas said it was optimistic more travel bubbles would open once Australia completes a vaccine rollout and other countries are in similar positions.___NEW DELHI India has confirmed 4,205 more deaths, setting another daily record and taking its official COVID-19 toll past 250,000 as it battles a ferocious surge in infections.Around 370,000 new cases were added in the last 24 hours, pushing India s total past 23 million, according to the health ministry. The figures are considered vast undercounts due to insufficient testing and records among other factors.On Tuesday, authorities warned that nearly 90% of districts in the country are seeing a high positivity rate, sparking fears the virus is spreading fast into rural areas.India s recent surge has been blamed on more contagious variants as well as government decisions to allow massive crowds to gather for religious festivals and political rallies.Even though daily cases have shown very early signs of flattening, experts have cautioned authorities to not let down their guard. With nearly 4 million cases still active, health care systems remain strained with limited hospital beds, oxygen and medicine.Many states have imposed their own restrictions to curb infections, and the southern state of Telangana became the latest to announce a 10-day lockdown on Tuesday. Calls and pressure for a nationwide lockdown have been mounting.___SALEM, Ore. Oregon lawmakers have passed a bill to give tenants who are struggling with financial hardships due to the pandemic more time to pay past-due rent.Currently tenants have until July, but the legislation will extend the deadline to next Feb. 28. The bill already passed the Senate and now goes to the governor.The measure protects renters from the long-term impact of not making payments on time by barring such information from being reported to consumer credit agencies or being used in consideration of future rental applications. The measure also bars landlords from screening out applicants based on pandemic-era evictions.In March, more than 17% of Oregon renters in a U.S. Census survey reported being behind on rent payments.___COLUMBIA, South Carolina South Carolina parents can opt their children out of wearing masks in public schools.Gov. Henry McMaster issued the executive order, citing widespread access to coronavirus vaccines for adults across the state.It goes against all logic to continue to force our children especially our youngest children to wear masks against their parents wishes, McMaster said in the statement Tuesday.The order also bars state and local government agencies from requiring people to show proof of vaccination in order to receive government services or access public buildings and facilities.The governor s order also limits local governments from issuing mask ordinances based on his prior emergency declarations related to the pandemic. Those governments will have to find justification for such mask rules within their own ordinances.___TORONTO Canada s largest province says it will stop giving out first doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine due to concerns over blood clots.Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. David Williams says the decision has been made out of an abundance of caution because of increased instances of a rare blood clotting disorder linked to the shot.AstraZeneca is restricted in some European countries because of a potential link to extremely rare blood clots. In Canada, at least 12 cases have been confirmed out of more than 2 million doses given and three women have died.Ontario says it has 49,280 doses of the shot remaining in the province out of over 707,000 received. Health officials are awaiting results of a clinical trial in the United Kingdom looking at giving a different vaccine for the second dose. That would allow people who got AstraZeneca first to be given Pfizer or Moderna for their second dose.