Dozens of Long Island High School Students Injured After Bus Strikes Overpass: Police
April 9, 2018 by admin
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A charter bus carrying dozens of New York high school students returning from a spring break trip in Europe Sunday night struck a bridge overpass on Long Island, seriously injuring several passengers and mangling the entire length of the top of the bus.
The crash happened shortly after 9 p.m. Sunday on the Southern State Parkway in Lakeview, according to New York State Police. The westbound lanes of the roadway were open, but the eastbound lanes between exits 17 and 19 were closed for hours until it reopened about 5:30 Monday morning.
All 44 people, including the driver, on board the bus when it crashed were injured, police said. Two people suffered serious injuries, five more suffered moderate injuries and the rest suffered minor injuries, state police said.
Video shows teenagers sitting and standing outside of the white damaged bus, some draped in blankets, as firefighters inspect the wreckage. Multiple ambulances and fire trucks responded to the scene.
The bus that slammed into a bridge overpass on Long Island was bringing students home from JFK after a spring break trip, police say. Katherine Creag reports.
(Published 29 minutes ago)
The 38 students, ranging from 16 to 18 years old, from various Long Island high schools, along with five chaperones, had just returned from John F. Kennedy International Airport and were heading to a shopping mall in Huntington Station to meet up with parents, police said.
Police said the driver was being evaluated and did not seem to be familiar with commercial vehicle restrictions on the parkway.
The minimum clearance on the parkway is 7 feet, 10 inches and accidents involving vehicles striking overpasses are not uncommon on the parkway. In 2017, there were reports that an electronic alarm system would be installed on the parkway to warn drivers of vehicles too high for the overpass.
NBC 4 New York reached out to the New Jersey-based bus company, Journey Bus Line, for comment, but calls were unsuccessful. The trip was organized by a private tour company, EF Tours, according to police. Calls requesting comment from the tour company also rang unanswered.
The investigation into the wreck is ongoing.
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Missiles Strike Air Base in Syria After Chemical Weapons Attack
April 9, 2018 by admin
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At least 14 military personnel were killed in the strike, including three Syrian commanders and several Iranians who were housed at the base, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The Russian Defense Ministry said two Israeli F-15 fighter jets had carried out the strike with eight guided missiles from Lebanese air space, state news agency RIA Novosti reported, while pro-regime Syrian media said some 20 missiles were fired. Pro-regime Syrian media said the direction of the strikes indicated Israel might be behind the attack.
The Israeli army declined to comment, in line with its policy of neither confirming nor denying airstrikes in Syria.
The attack comes a day after world leaders condemned an alleged chemical-weapons attack late Saturday on civilians in a rebel-held town in Eastern Ghouta outside Damascus. President
Donald Trump
said Syria would pay “a big price” for the alleged attack and vowed Sunday a “strong, joint response” with his French counterpart,
Emmanuel Macron.
It wasn’t clear whether Monday’s strikes were a direct response to the chemical attack. Pentagon officials said the U.S. hadn’t launched any strikes against Syria.
But the T-4 air base, also known as Tiyas, isn’t a chemical weapons facility and Israel has accused the Syrian regime of allowing Iran to set up a base there to supply the Lebanon-based Hezbollah militia with weapons. That suggests that the Israelis used the opportunity to strike amid global outrage over the Syrian regime’s chemical attack on civilians, analysts say.
An official at Iran’s United Nations mission didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about Iran’s presence at the base or possible Iranian casualties. Iran has denied trying to set up military bases in Syria but also has said it would remain in the country as long as Syrian President
Bashar al-Assad
requires an Iranian presence.
Israel for years largely stayed neutral in the Syrian war, launching airstrikes only against weapons convoys bound from Iran to Hezbollah. But backed by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah, Mr. Assad is emerging victorious in his country’s civil war and Israel fears Tehran will establish weapons factories and military sites in Syria to attack Israeli territory.
Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu’s
posture has shifted in recent months and his air force has repeatedly hit sites in Syria, raising the prospects of a wider regional war.
Current and former Israeli officials didn’t acknowledge responsibility for the strike but many publicly supported the move, with some calling for Mr. Assad’s removal.
“We have clear interests in Syria and we set red lines,” Yoav Galant, construction minister and a member of Israel’s security cabinet, told the national broadcaster Kann. “We will not allow weapons to be transferred from Syria to Lebanon and we will not allow an Iranian entrenchment.”
“It’s pretty clear who attacked,” Retired Maj. Gen. Amiram Levin, former head of the Israeli military’s northern command, told Army Radio. “We must make one hand [with the U.S.], perhaps also the Europeans, and remove Assad from power in Syria.”
Israeli officials had earlier reacted negatively to the chemical attack in Syria. Defense Minister
Avigdor Lieberman
on Sunday warned that Israel would have to act alone in the Middle East, given the signs in recent weeks that Mr. Trump aimed to pull U.S. troops from the Syrian conflict.
Syrian media said loud explosions were heard in Homs after jets entered Syria from Lebanon. Footage on social media early Monday appeared to show planes crossing loudly through the airspace of Lebanon. Lebanese officials weren’t immediately available for comment.
Amos Yadlin,
former head of Israeli military intelligence and an air force general, said he couldn’t confirm the Syrian strike was conducted by Israel. But, if it was, he said the strike would have achieved two goals.
“On the one hand you cope with the Iranian activity in Syria,” Mr. Yadlin said in an interview. “And it’s a very important message against using chemical weapons.”
Mr. Yadlin, who is now executive director at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies, said the T-4 base wasn’t a chemical weapons facility or a site used to mount chemical weapons attacks. But it was definitely an Iranian-related base, he said.
Some missiles hit the maintenance section of the base, damaging a number of drones, Syrian pro-regime media reported.
Israel in February said the site targeted Monday was an air base operated by Iran and its proxies, after the Israeli army shot down an Iranian drone that it said had originated at the base.
It then launched major airstrikes on targets in Syria, drawing antiaircraft fire from Syrian batteries that in turn shot down an Israeli fighter jet.
The downed jet was the first time in more than 30 years that Israel has lost a fighter aircraft, and heightened concerns that the Israeli military would be drawn into Syria’s protracted conflict.
Israel in September also targeted a facility in Syria that was believed to be a factory where the regime produced chemical weapons, according to former Israeli officials.
The U.S. blacklisted 271 employees of that facility, the Scientific Studies and Research Center located near Masyaf, after a sarin gas attack in April last year that killed nearly 100 people, many of them women and children.
— Nour Al Akraa, Dov Lieber, Asa Fitch, James Marson and Dion Nissenbaum contributed to this article.
Corrections Amplifications
It wasn’t clear whether Monday’s strikes were a direct response to the chemical attack. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that the strikes were on Sunday. (April 9)
Write to Sune Engel Rasmussen at sune.rasmussen@wsj.com and Rory Jones at rory.jones@wsj.com