The Jim Bakker Show

Up to 6.6 magnitude quake off Greece and Turkey kills two

By Vassilis Triandafyllou and Tuvan Gumrukcu

KOS, Greece/ANKARA (Reuters) – A powerful earthquake killed two people on the Greek holiday island of Kos in the early hours of Friday, sending tourists fleeing into the streets, and causing disruption in the nearby Turkish tourist hub of Bodrum.

A Turkish and a Swedish tourist, aged 39 and 22 years, died when the roof of a popular bar collapsed, Greek police said. Kos’s port was put out of action and, across the strait, a small tsunami damaged vehicles parked near Bodrum’s shore.

On Kos, around 115 people were injured, including tourists of various nationalities — 12 of them seriously. More than 350 people visited hospitals in Turkey, though most had only light injuries.

The quake struck at 1:31 a.m. (2231 GMT), and many of Kos’s tourists spent the rest of the night in the open as a precaution, hotel owners said.

“All of a sudden it felt like a train was going right through the room,” said Vernon Hausman, a German holidaying on Kos.

“I told my son: ‘Looks like an earthquake, so let’s get the hell out of here.'”

Greek authorities said the 12 people seriously injured on Kos included tourists from Turkey, Sweden and Norway; four were transferred to Crete and three to Athens.

One person was in a critical condition, while a Swedish tourist lost a leg, the director of the hospital in Crete told Greek Skai TV.

“LUCKY ESCAPE”

Turkish and Greek authorities put the magnitude at 6.3 and 6.6 respectively and reported several aftershocks, with one estimated at 5.1. The U.S. Geological Survey located the epicenter of the main quake in the Aegean Sea, 10 km (6 miles) SSE of Bodrum and about 16 km ENE of Kos’s main port.

Hotel owners in Bodrum told Turkish broadcasters that some tourists were checking out.

“It was a lucky escape and it could have been much worse,” said Issa Kamara, a 38-year old personal trainer at the Maca Kizi hotel in Bodrum’s smart Turkbuku area.

Constantina Svynou, head of the hoteliers’ association in Kos, told Greek state television that many visitors had spent the night outside their hotels.

“There are about 200,000 tourists on the island, we are at the peak season. Our first reaction was to calm the tourists, following basic rules and evacuating hotel buildings,” Svynou said, adding that there had been no injuries at hotels.

Reuters video footage showed residents and tourists walking along the streets of Kos’s main town among collapsed walls and debris. Long, wide cracks appeared in the asphalt on the quayside, which is near a tourist strip of cafes and bars.

“It was terrible … our bed was shaking from the left to the right,” said Jara, a 26-year-old Dutch tourist. “Everything was going crazy.”

Kos’s airport remained operational and Greek Deputy Shipping Minister Nektarios Santorinios flew there. But he said the main port was out of action.

“Passengers on ferries have been rerouted to the islands of Nisyros and Kalymnos,” he told Greek SKAI TV.

TIDAL WAVE

Police said most of the damage in Kos had been to older buildings.

A seismologist told Greek TV that there had been a tidal wave about 70 cm (28 inches) high.

Turkey’s emergency authorities warned against aftershocks, but said there had been no casualties or major damage there. Some power cuts were reported, and a minaret in the town of Islamkoy was said to have collapsed.

The broadcaster CNN Turk said that, in Bodrum, 60 vehicles had been dragged along by the water. It also showed boats listing in a harbor. Several store owners told the broadcaster NTV they had suffered flood damage.

Turkey said it would evacuate around 200 of its citizens from Greece by boat.

President Tayyip Erdogan said the fact that no lives had been lost in Turkey was a sign that “the measures we took have been effective”.

Turkey’s location between the Arabian tectonic plate and the Eurasian plate renders it prone to earthquakes.

In October 2011, more than 600 people died in the eastern province of Van following a 7.2-magnitude quake and powerful aftershocks. In 1999, two massive earthquakes killed about 20,000 people in Turkey’s densely populated northwest.

The same year, a 5.9 magnitude quake killed 143 people in Greece.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu in Ankara, Renee Maltezou, Michele Kambas and George Georgiopoulos in Athens, and Sandra Maler in Washington; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

Venezuela opposition leaders wounded in anti-government march

Riot security forces release jets of water from their water cannon on demonstrators during riots at a march to the state Ombudsman's office in Caracas, Venezuela May 29, 2017. The banner reads "The favorite Ron". REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

CARACAS (Reuters) – Two Venezuelan opposition leaders were wounded on Monday by security forces dispersing protests in the capital Caracas against President Nicolas Maduro, according to one of the leaders and an opposition legislator.

Maduro’s adversaries have for two months been blocking highways and setting up barricades in protests demanding he call early elections and address an increasingly severe economic crisis that has left millions struggling to get enough to eat.

Fifty-nine people have died in the often violent street melees, which Maduro calls an effort to overthrow his government.

“We were ambushed,” said two-time presidential candidate Henrique Capriles, who accompanied protesters in an effort to march to the headquarter of the government ombudsman’s office but was blocked by security forces.

“This government is capable of killing or burning anything,” Capriles said in a press conference.

He said 16 others were injured in the march, adding that he would file a complaint about the issue with state prosecutors.

Legislator Jose Olivares, who is a doctor, tweeted a picture of a bruise on Capriles’ face that he said was the result of a soldier hitting him with a helmet during the clashes.

During the same march, opposition deputy Carlos Paparoni was knocked to the ground by a water cannon sprayed from a truck, requiring that he receive stitches in his head, Olivares said.

The Information Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Reporting by Corina Pons, writing by Brian Ellsworth; Editing by Andrew Hay)

Driver indicted in deadly Times Square attack, crash

FILE PHOTO: A vehicle that struck pedestrians and later crashed is seen on the sidewalk in Times Square in New York City, U.S., May 18, 2017. REUTERS/Mike Segar

By Gina Cherelus

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A grand jury has indicted the driver charged with killing a young woman and injuring 22 people when he careened through three blocks in New York City’s crowded Times Square, prosecutors said on Wednesday.

Richard Rojas, 26, is scheduled to be arraigned on the indictment on July 13.

Authorities say Rojas drove his Honda sedan down Seventh Avenue on May 18, made a U-turn and mowed down pedestrians on the packed sidewalk for three city blocks before crashing. Alyssa Elsman, an 18-year-old woman from Michigan, was killed.

The driver was subdued by onlookers and police as he tried to flee on foot.

The charges in the indictment were not immediately made public. Rojas, who did not appear at the Wednesday hearing, was previously charged with second-degree murder, vehicular homicide and multiple counts of attempted murder.

His defense lawyer, Enrico Demarco, declined to comment after the brief hearing.

Rojas, who served in the Navy, told the New York Post in a tearful jailhouse interview last week that he had unsuccessfully sought psychiatric care, and said he had no recollection of the incident.

He was believed to be under the influence of some intoxicating substance, a police source has told Reuters, while law enforcement officials told ABC News he was apparently high on synthetic marijuana.

Rojas has had numerous run-ins with the law over the past decade, according to Navy and public court records. He has had at least four prior arrests, two for drunken driving, and one earlier this month for allegedly threatening another man with a knife outside his apartment in New York City’s Bronx borough.

While serving in the Navy in 2013, he spent two months in a military jail in South Carolina, though records do not indicate why.

Of the 13 attack victims Bellevue Hospital received, nine have been released, the health provider said in a statement on Wednesday. One of the remaining patients is in critical condition, another is in serious condition and the other two are in fair or good shape, it said.

The last of six victims sent to Mount Sinai West and Mount Sinai St. Luke’s hospitals was released on Tuesday, a spokeswoman said.

(Additional reporting by Laila Kearney; editing by Jonathan Oatis and David Gregorio)

Tornadoes tear path of destruction through Louisiana, at least 20 hurt

By Bryn Stole

BATON ROUGE, La. (Reuters) – Six tornadoes tore through New Orleans and other parts of Louisiana on Tuesday, injuring at least 20 people as the storm roared across highways and streets, leveling trees, power lines and homes.

Governor John Bel Edwards declared a state of emergency throughout Louisiana, while search and rescue teams scoured the landscape for survivors.

“The width of the devastation was unlike any that I have seen before,” Edwards told a news conference. “When you see it from the air you’re even more impressed that so few people were injured and that nobody’s life was lost.”

The Louisiana National Guard said it was conducting search-and-rescue operations, looking for injured people who may be stranded, and assessing damage.

The storm system battered New Orleans and suburban Baton Rouge, marking the fourth time in a year the state has been jolted by natural disasters.

A string of tornadoes struck in February 2016 and four people died in widespread floods in March. Louisiana was then devastated by major flooding in August, when more than 60,000 homes were damaged or destroyed in 20 parishes, or territorial districts, marking the state’s worst disaster since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu told reporters that one twister carved out a swath of destruction about two miles (3 km) long and about half a mile (1 km) wide, affecting an area that holds 5,000 properties.

“It’s devastating and a lot of families have lost everything that they have,” Landrieu said.

Edwards estimated the number of injured at 20, some of them he termed “not life-threatening, but very serious.”

Storm reports on the National Weather Service website said some 29 people suffered injuries.

One person was injured and about 200 cars damaged at a National Aeronautics and Space Administration assembly building in New Orleans, but flight hardware for NASA’s new heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and Orion capsule appear to have escaped damage, associate administrator Bill Gerstenmaier said.

Nearly 7,800 customers were without power in the New Orleans area by early Wednesday, according to Entergy New Orleans Inc <EYNOO.PK>.

Nancy Malone, communications director for the Red Cross of Louisiana, said damage was reported in about six parishes, where the Red Cross was assisting first responders.

“While this was not expected, communities in southeast Louisiana have been affected numerous times in the last 12 months,” Malone said. “Here we are again.”

(Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus, Mike Cooper and Irene Klotz; Writing by Daniel Trotta; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and David Gregorio)

New York train crash injures more than 100 commuters

Emergency Vehicles gathered around train crash in NYC

By Jonathan Oatis

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A New York City train derailed at a downtown Brooklyn terminal during Wednesday’s morning rush hour, injuring more than 100 commuters in the metropolitan area’s second major rail accident since late September.

Emergency crews swarmed Atlantic Terminal after the Long Island Rail Road train went off the tracks inside the busy transportation hub at 8:20 a.m. local time, the New York City Fire Department said.

While none of the injuries were life-threatening, at least 11 people were sent to the hospital, Deputy Assistant Chief Dan Donoghue said at a briefing at the crash site. Between 600 and 700 people were on the train, he said.

The train, arriving from the Queens neighborhood of Far Rockaway, failed to stop on time. Traveling at a fairly slow speed, it derailed after striking a bumping block, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said at the briefing.

About 103 people were injured, the fire department said in a Twitter message. The front two cars of the six-carriage train were severely damaged. The station’s partitions and bumping block, which prevents railway vehicles from going past the end of a section of track, were also damaged.

Passengers said the blood and chaos following the derailment was frightening.

“There were people crying,” said Aaron Neufeld, a 26-year-old paralegal who commutes on the rail line daily. “I saw some bloody faces.”

Neufeld, who was riding in the second car, said the train appeared to be approaching normally until it crashed, knocking passengers on top of one another and shattering glass windows.

“Bags went flying,” he said. “People were thrown to the ground.”

The engineer was probably responsible for failing to stop the train before it hit the bumper, said Tom Prendergast, chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the agency that runs the railroad.

The train was traveling between 10 and 15 miles per hour as it approached the bumper, he said, which is standard.

“At that speed, it’s pretty much the locomotive engineer’s responsibility to stop the train,” Prendergast said as he stood beside Cuomo at the briefing. Investigators will interview the engineer, the conductor and brakeman to determine the cause of the accident, he said.

There were no major service disruptions for other Long Island Rail Road lines at the terminal, an MTA official said.

Earlier, officials said crews were working to restore service at the terminal by the evening rush hour.

In late September, a New Jersey Transit train crashed into a terminal in Hoboken, New Jersey, killing one woman and injuring 114 people, including the engineer.

Cuomo, who has made infrastructure improvements a centerpiece of his agenda, said Wednesday’s incident was minor in comparison. The most serious injury in the crash was a broken leg, he said.

“There was extensive damage in Hoboken,” Cuomo said. “That train was coming in much faster, did much more damage.”

The U.S. Federal Railroad Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said they were sending investigators to the scene.

The Long Island Rail Road is the United State’s largest commuter rail system, serving more than 330,000 passengers a day, according to the American Public Transportation Association.

Atlantic Terminal, which also connects commuters to nine city subway lines, is one of the busiest New York stations.

(Additional reporting by Gina Cherelus, David Shepardson and David Ingram; Writing by Laila Kearney; Editing by Frank McGurty and Lisa Von Ahn)

Islamic State claims suicide car bombs that killed at least 23 east of Mosul

A man wounded in a bomb attack in Kokjali, receives treatment at a hospital in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil,

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Islamic State claimed three suicide car bombs that killed at least 15 civilians and eight Iraqi policemen on Thursday in an eastern suburb of Mosul, according to a military statement.

The attacks targeted Kokjali, a suburb that the authorities said they had retaken from the jihadists almost two months ago.

A military spokesman said the car bombs went off in a market.

The U.S.-backed assault on Mosul, the jihadists’ last major stronghold in Iraq, was launched by a 100,000-strong alliance of local forces on Oct. 17. It has become the biggest military operation in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

Islamic State militants retreating from the military offensive have repeatedly shelled areas after they are retaken by the army, killing or wounding scores of residents fleeing in the opposite direction.

Four Iraqi aid workers and at least seven civilians were killed by mortar fire this week during aid distribution in Mosul, the United Nations said on Thursday.

“People waiting for aid are already vulnerable and need help. They should be protected, not attacked,” said Lise Grande, U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Iraq.

“All parties to the conflict – all parties – have an obligation to uphold international humanitarian law and ensure that civilians survive and receive the assistance they need.”

Elite army forces have captured a quarter of the city but the advance has faced weeks of fierce counter-attacks from the militants.

The authorities do not release figures for civilian or military casualties, but medical officials say dozens of people are wounded each day in the battle for Mosul.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; editing by Ralph Boulton)

Thousands evacuated from Aleppo after deal over besieged villages

Evacuees from a rebel-held area of Aleppo arrive at insurgent-held al-Rashideen, Syria

By Angus McDowall and Ellen Francis

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Thousands were evacuated from the last rebel-held enclave of the Aleppo on Monday after a deal was reached to allow people to leave two besieged pro-government villages in nearby Idlib province.

In bitter winter weather, convoys of buses from eastern Aleppo reached rebel-held areas to the west of the city, and more buses left the Shi’ite Muslim villages of al-Foua and Kefraya for government lines, according to a U.N. official and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group.

The United Nations Security Council agreed a resolution calling for U.N. officials and others to be allowed to monitor evacuations from east Aleppo and the safety of civilians still there.

The Syrian ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar Ja’afari, denounced the resolution as propaganda, saying the last of the rebels were leaving and Aleppo would be “clean” by Monday evening.

The recapture of Aleppo is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s biggest victory so far in the nearly six-year-old war, but the fighting is not over with large parts of the country still controlled by insurgent and Islamist groups.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said 20,000 civilians had been evacuated from Aleppo so far.

Nearly 50 children, some critically injured, were rescued from eastern Aleppo, where they had been trapped in an orphanage, the United Nations said.

The evacuation of civilians from the two villages had been demanded by the Syrian army and its allies before they would allow fighters and civilians trapped in Aleppo to depart. The stand-off halted the Aleppo evacuation over the weekend.

“Complex evacuations from East Aleppo and Foua & Kefraya now in full swing. More than 900 buses needed to evacuate all. We must not fail,” Jan Egeland, who chairs the United Nations aid task force in Syria, tweeted.

INTENSE COLD, LONG WAIT

Ahmad al-Dbis, a medical aid worker heading a team evacuating patients from Aleppo, said 89 buses had left the city. “Some evacuees told us that a few children died from the long wait and the intense cold while they were waiting to evacuate,” he told Reuters.

For those still in rebel-held Aleppo, conditions were grim, according to Aref al-Aref, a nurse and photographer there.

“I’m still in Aleppo. I’m waiting for them to evacuate the children and women first. It’s very cold and there’s hunger. It’s a long wait,” he told Reuters. “People are burning wood and clothes to keep warm in the streets.”

Photographs of people evacuated from Aleppo showed large groups of people standing or crouching with their belongings or loading sacks onto trucks.

Children in winter clothes carried small backpacks or played with kittens. One older man, in traditional Arab robes and headdress, sat holding a stick.

Evacuees from a rebel-held area of Aleppo arrive at insurgent-held al-Rashideen, Syria December 19, 2016. REUTERS/Ammar Abdullah

BUSES BURNED

On Sunday, some of the buses sent to al-Foua and Kefraya to carry evacuees out were attacked and torched by armed men.

That incident threatened to derail the evacuations, the result of intense negotiations between Russia – Assad’s main supporter – and Turkey, which backs some large rebel groups.

The foreign and defence ministers of Russia, Iran and Turkey will hold talks in Moscow on Tuesday aimed at giving fresh impetus for a solution in Aleppo.

At stake is the fate of thousands of people still stuck in the last rebel bastion in Aleppo after a series of sudden advances by the Syrian army and allied Shi’ite militias under an intense bombardment that pulverised large sections of the city.

They have been waiting for the chance to leave Aleppo since the ceasefire and evacuation deal was agreed late last Tuesday, but have been prevented from doing so during days of hold-ups.

In the square in Aleppo’s Sukari district, organisers gave every family a number to allow them access to buses.

“Everyone is waiting until they are evacuated. They just want to escape,” said Salah al Attar, a former teacher with his five children, wife and mother.

CAMP IN TURKEY

Thousands of people were evacuated on Thursday, the first to leave under the ceasefire deal that ends fighting in the city where violence erupted in 2012, a year after the start of conflict in other parts of Syria.

They were taken to rebel-held districts of the countryside west of Aleppo. Turkey has said Aleppo evacuees could also be housed in a camp to be constructed in Syria near the Turkish border to the north.

For four years the city was split between a rebel-held eastern sector and the government-held western districts. During the summer, the army and its allies besieged the rebel sector before using intense bombardment and ground assaults to retake it in recent months.

A Reuters reporter who visited recaptured districts of Aleppo in recent days saw large swathes reduced to ruins, with rubble everywhere and sections of the famous Old City all but destroyed.

Traders began to return to their stores in the Old City to see if they could be fixed up.

One merchant, Jamal Deeb, said: “We are all here to see what the situation is like, and to consider reconstructing the stores. We do not want to leave things as they are, hand in hand we want to rebuild everything once again.”

Assad is backed in the war by Russian air power and Shi’ite militias including Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement and Iraq’s Harakat al-Nujaba. The mostly Sunni rebels include groups supported by Turkey, the United States and Gulf monarchies.

East of Aleppo, several villages held by Islamic State have been captured by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a coalition of militias backed by the United States that includes a strong Kurdish contingent, the Observatory said.

The advance is part of a campaign backed by an international coalition to drive Islamic State from its Syrian capital of Raqqa.

(Reporting by Angus McDowall, Humeyra Pamuk, Stephanie Nebehay, writing by Giles Elgood, editing by Peter Millership)

Nearly 100 killed, more than 500 injured as massive quake hits Indonesia

Rescue workers and police remove a victim from a collapsed building following an earthquake in Lueng Putu, Pidie Jaya in the northern province of Aceh, Indonesia

PIDIE JAYA, Indonesia (Reuters) – Nearly 100 people were killed and hundreds injured in Indonesia on Wednesday when a strong earthquake hit its Aceh province and rescuers used earth movers and bare hands to search for survivors in scores of toppled buildings.

Medical volunteers rushed in fading evening light to get people to hospitals, which were straining to cope with the influx of injured.

The Aceh provincial government said in a statement 93 people had died and more than 500 were injured, many seriously.

Sutopo Nugroho of Indonesia’s national disaster management agency, said a state of emergency had been declared in Aceh, which sits on the northern tip of Sumatra island.

“We are now focusing on searching for victims and possible survivors,” said Nugroho. His agency put the death toll at 94.

People walk near a collapsed mosque following an earthquake in Meuredu, Pidie Jaya in the northern province of Aceh, Indonesia December 7, 2016 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/ Irwansyah Putra/via REUTERS

Aceh was devastated by a massive earthquake and tsunami centered on its western coast near the provincial capital, Banda Aceh, on Dec. 26, 2004. That tsunami killed 226,000 people along Indian Ocean shorelines.

Officials urged people to sleep outdoors as twilight fell, in case aftershocks caused more damage to already precarious buildings.

President Joko Widodo was expected to visit the area on Thursday, his deputy told media.

Wednesday’s quake hit the east coast of the province, about 170 km (105 miles) from Banda Aceh. Nugroho said Aceh’s Pidie Jaya regency, with a population of about 140,000, was worst hit.

Many victims had suffered broken bones and gashes and had to be treated in hospital corridors and hastily erected disaster tents, a Reuters witness said.

Injured people receive medical attention in an emergency tent at a hospital following an earthquake in Sigli, Pidie regency, in the northern province of Aceh, Indonesia December 7, 2016 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Irwansyah Putra/via REUTERS

Television showed footage of flattened mosques, fallen electricity poles and crushed cars.

A Red Crescent volunteer said health workers were struggling.

“There aren’t enough medical staff,” the Red Crescent’s Muklis, who like many Indonesians uses one name, told TVOne.

Nugroho said more than 1,000 personnel, including military officers and volunteers, had been deployed to help in disaster relief.

A medical officer checks the condition of an injured child at a hospital following an earthquake in Sigli, Pidie regency, in the northern province of Aceh, Indonesia December 7, 2016 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Irwansyah Putra/via REUTERS

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake struck just after 5 a.m. (2200 GMT Tuesday) at a depth of 17 km (11 miles). No tsunami warning was issued.

At least five aftershocks were felt after the initial quake, the disaster management agency said.

The region suffered massive destruction in 2004 when a 9.2 magnitude quake triggered a tsunami that wiped out entire communities in Indonesia and other countries around the Indian Ocean.

Indonesia was the hardest hit, with more than 120,000 people killed in Aceh.

(Additional reporting by Fergus Jensen in JAKARTA and Reuters stringer in PIDIE JAYA; Writing by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Paul Tait, Robert Birsel)

Soccer plane in Colombia crash was running out of fuel

Rescue crews work at the wreckage of a plane that crashed into the Colombian jungle with Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense onboard near Medellin, Colombia,

By Julia Symmes Cobb and Brad Haynes

LA UNION, Colombia/CHAPECO, Brazil (Reuters) – The pilot of a LAMIA Airlines plane that crashed in Colombia, virtually wiping out a Brazilian soccer team, had radioed that he was running out of fuel and needed to make an emergency landing, according to the co-pilot of another plane in the area.

The crash on Monday night killed 71 people. Six survived, including just three members of the Chapecoense soccer squad en route to the biggest game in their history, the Copa Sudamericana final.

Avianca co-pilot Juan Sebastian Upegui said in a chat message with friends that the LAMIA pilot told the control tower at the airport in Medellin that he was in trouble.

Priority had already been given to a plane from airline VivaColombia, which had also reported problems, Upegui said. Reuters confirmed the audio message, which local media played on Wednesday, was from Upegui.

After reporting being low on fuel, the LAMIA pilot then said he was experiencing electrical difficulties before the radio went silent.

“Mayday mayday … Help us get to the runway … Help, help,” Upegui described the pilot as saying. “Then it ended … We all started to cry.”

Relatives of Brazilian journalist Guilherme Marques, who died in a plane accident that crashed into Colombian jungle with Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense onboard near Medellin, mourn during a mass in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, November 29, 2016. REUTERS/Pilar Olivares

The BAe 146, made by BAE Systems Plc, slammed into a mountainside. Besides the three players, a journalist and two crew members survived.

One survivor, Bolivian flight technician Erwin Tumiri, said he only saved himself by strict adherence to security procedure, while others panicked.

“Many passengers got up from their seats and started yelling,” he told Colombia’s Radio Caracol. “I put the bag between my legs and went into the fetal position as recommended.”

Bolivian flight attendant Ximena Suarez, another survivor, said the lights went out less than a minute before the plane slammed into the mountain, according to Colombian officials in Medellin.

Of the players, goalkeeper Jackson Follmann was recovering from the amputation of his right leg, doctors said.

Another player, defender Helio Neto, remained in intensive care with severe trauma to his skull, thorax and lungs.

Fellow defender Alan Ruschel had spine surgery.

Suarez and Tumiri were shaken and bruised but not in critical condition, medical staff said, while journalist Rafael Valmorbida was in intensive care for multiple rib fractures that partly collapsed a lung.

Investigators from Brazil have joined Colombian counterparts to check two black boxes from the crash site on a muddy hillside in wooded highlands near the town of La Union.

Bolivia, where LAMIA is based, and the United Kingdom also sent experts to help the probe.

HOMAGES PLANNED

The plane “came over my house, but there was no noise,” said Nancy Munoz, 35, who grows strawberries in the area. “The engine must have gone.”

By Wednesday morning, rescuers had recovered all of the bodies, which were to be sent to Brazil and Bolivia. All of the crew members were Bolivian.

A Colombian air force helicopter retrieves the bodies of victims from the wreckage of a plane that crashed into the Colombian jungle with Brazilian soccer team Chapecoense onboard near Medellin, Colombia, November 29, 2016. REUTERS/Jaime Saldarriaga

Forty-five of the bodies have been identified, Colombian officials said.

Soccer-mad Brazil declared three days of mourning.

It was a bitter twist to a fairy-tale story for Chapecoense. Since 2009, the team rose from Brazil’s fourth to top division and was about to play the biggest match in its history in the first leg of the regional cup final in Medellin.

Global soccer greats from Lionel Messi to Pele sent condolences.

In the small city of Chapecó in remote southern Brazil, black and green ribbons were draped on fences, balconies and restaurant tables. Schools canceled classes, and businesses closed.

“It’s a miracle,” Flavio Ruschel, the father of Alan Ruschel, told Globo News as he prepared to fly to Colombia. “I don’t think I’ll be able to speak, just hug him and cry a lot.”

Black banners hung from a cathedral downtown and wrapped around a 14-meter statue of one of the town’s founding explorers.

Outside the team’s Conda stadium, a group of hardcore fans put up a tent and promised to keep vigil until the bodies of their idols returned to the city.

“We were there for them in victory, and we’re here for them in tragedy, rain or shine,” said fan Caua Regis. “Like family.”

The club is planning an open wake at their stadium, a city official said.

A homage was also planned for later on Wednesday at the stadium in Medellin of Atletico Nacional, which had been due to play Chapecoense in the regional final in the evening.

The Colombian team wants the trophy to be given to Chapecoense in honor of the dead.

“As far as we are concerned,” the team said, “Chapecoense will forever be the champions of the Copa Sudamericana Cup 2016.”

(Writing by Helen Murphy and Andrew Cawthorne; Additional reporting by Anthony Boadle and Daniel Flynn in Brazil; Editing by Kieran Murray and Lisa Von Ahn)

U.N. aborts plan to evacuate patients from Aleppo – Blames ALL parties

A Civil Defence member stands as a front loader removes debris after an air strike Sunday in the rebel-held besieged al-Qaterji neighbourhood of Aleppo, Syria.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The United Nations has abandoned plans to evacuate patients from besieged rebel-held east Aleppo which it had hoped to accomplish during a three day lull in fighting last week, blaming all parties to the conflict for obstructing efforts.

“The evacuations were obstructed by various factors, including delays in receiving the necessary approvals from local authorities in eastern Aleppo, conditions placed by non-state armed groups and the government of Syria’s objection to allowing medical and other relief supplies into the eastern part of the city,” U.N. Under-Secretary-General for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator Stephen O’Brien said in a statement on Monday.

O’Brien said no patients and family members were evacuated during the three-day Russian unilateral ceasefire last week which ended on Saturday with a resumption of air strikes and a surge in ground fighting.

“I am outraged that the fate of vulnerable civilians – sick and injured people, children and the elderly, all in need of critical and life-saving support – rests mercilessly in the hands of parties who have consistently and unashamedly failed to put them above narrow political and military interests,” he said.

The U.N. has been unable to access east Aleppo since July, when Syrian government and allied forces put the eastern part of the city under siege.

(Reporting by Lisa Barrington Editing by Jeremy Gaunt)

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