Month: June 2023

LONDON (AP) — Speranza Scappucci will become principal guest conductor of London’s Royal Opera starting with the 2025-26 season. The 50-year-old Italian, a graduate of the Santa Cecilia Conservatory in Rome and the Juilliard School in New York, made her Royal Opera debut last year in Verdi’s “Attila.” The Royal Opera has not had a

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A fire in the engine room of a small cruise ship in Alaska’s Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve has prompted the evacuation of dozens of passengers and crew. The U.S. Coast Guard says no injuries were reported. The fire was extinguished. The fire on board the Wilderness Discoverer was reported

MONTREAL (AP) — Quebec is looking internationally for support as it struggles to battle more than 160 forest fires and federal officials warned Canada is track for its worst fire season ever. Quebec Premier François Legault says Quebec can fight around 30 fires and firefighters and other provinces are busy with wildfires in their own

SPRINGDALE, Pa. (AP) — A blast of air and dust from the implosion of two smokestacks at a shuttered coal-fired power plant in western Pennsylvania last week felled power poles and caused damage to nearby homes. But the demolition company is vowing full repairs. The implosion at the Cheswick Generating Station in Springdale, a borough

By MAURICIO MUÑOZ Associated Press LIMA, Peru (AP) — The lawyer for the main suspect in the unsolved 2005 disappearance of American student Natalee Holloway on Monday said his client has changed his mind and plans to challenge his extradition to the United States. Defense attorney Máximo Altéz announced the decision of Dutchman Joran van

By TERRY SPENCER Associated Press FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A Florida commission says the judge who oversaw the penalty trial of Parkland school shooter Nikolas Cruz should be publicly reprimanded for showing bias toward the prosecution. The Judicial Qualifications Commission said Monday that Circuity Judge Elizabeth Scherer sometimes allowed her emotions to overcome her

By MICHAEL R. BLOOD Associated Press LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two insurance industry giants have pulled back from California’s home insurance marketplace, saying that increasing wildfire risk and soaring construction costs have prompted them to stop writing new policies in the nation’s most populous state. State Farm announced last week it would stop accepting applications

DIANE JEANTET and DAVID BILLER Associated Press RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A year after the killing of British journalist Dom Phillips and Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira in the Amazon rainforest, loved ones are gathering in several Brazilian cities to honor their memory. Dozens of people showed up on Monday at demonstrations in Rio de

By CLAIRE RUSH Associated Press PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A federal trial over Oregon’s voter-approved gun control measure opened Monday in Portland, marking a critical next step for one of the toughest gun control laws in the nation after months of being tied up in the courts. The trial, which is being held before a