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Orioles’ Heston Kjerstad ‘stoked, excited, relieved’ to be called up; Ryan Mountcastle ‘feels a lot better,’ won’t go on IL

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

It took Heston Kjerstad exactly two years to make his professional debut after the Orioles drafted him in 2020. He needed less than that to climb all the way up.The Orioles called up Kjerstad, ranked by Baseball America as the organization’s fifth-best prospect, to the major leagues Thursday, the team announced. He made his way to Baltimore when first baseman Ryan Mountcastle exited with left shoulder discomfort he suffered on a swing in the first inning against the St. Louis Cardinals.Kjerstad was pulled in the fifth inning of Triple-A Norfolk’s game Wednesday evening and was told after by Tides manager Buck Britton of his promotion.“This is something I’ve worked for my whole life,” Kjerstad said. “To finally be here and be in the moment, it’s been awesome so far.”Kjerstad’s promotion came amid a flurry of other roster moves Thursday, one of which wasn’t placing Mountcastle on the injured list. Manager Brandon Hyde said be...

NASA in new report says UFO sightings nothing much, but promises to treat the phenomena with scientific rigor

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

UFO or UAP, to NASA it’s worth studying.The space agency has concluded that reports from of the objects formerly known as UFOs are likely nothing, but that it is taking the phenomena seriously.It’s dong so to not only lend its reputation and resources to the study of unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP) but appointed a director to head the agency’s work in the field.“At present, the detection of UAP is often serendipitous, captured by sensors that were not designed or calibrated for this purpose, and which lack comprehensive metadata. Coupled with incomplete data archiving and curation, this means that the origin of numerous UAP remain uncertain,” the federal space agency wrote in a 33-page report concluding its year-long investigation into the strange flying objects.“The importance of detecting UAP with multiple, well-calibrated sensors is thus paramount,” the report stated, adding elsewhere that “NASA, by lending its name to UAP studies, is already helping to reduce ...

Former SDSU employee tests positive for tuberculosis

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A former employee at the San Diego State University Aztec Shops tested positive for tuberculosis, the university confirmed on Thursday.According to the university, the County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency notified the school of the case, prompting them to notify individuals who might have been exposed to the employee from Feb. 22 to June 22 of this year."As people who become ill with TB may be sick for months before they are diagnosed, potential exposure windows can be long, and are shared out of an abundance of caution," SDSU said in an email Thursday to the campus community.No-cost testing has been organized for employees at the Aztec Shops who have been identified as close contacts. At this time, there have been no additional cases reported.Possible exposure occurred primarily at the Charles B. Bell Jr. Pavilion, according to HHSA. No classroom spaces were impacted with the exposure, according to the university. American Red Cross calls on San Dieg...

Former North Carolina Sen. Lauch Faircloth dies at 95

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Former U.S. Sen. Lauch Faircloth of North Carolina, a onetime conservative Democrat who switched late in his career to the Republicans and then got elected to Congress, died Thursday. He was 95. Faircloth, who served one Senate term before losing to then-unknown Democrat John Edwards in 1998, died at his home in Clinton, said Brad Crone, a former campaign aide and close friend. Years after an unsuccessful Democratic bid for governor in 1984, Faircloth switched to the GOP and ran in 1992 against U.S. Sen. Terry Sanford, a longtime friend and former political ally. Faircloth pulled off the upset, attacking Sanford as a big-spending liberal and benefiting politically from Sanford’s health problems in the campaign’s final weeks.While in the Senate, the millionaire businessman and Sampson County farmer was known as one of the most partisan senators, blasting Bill and Hillary Clinton and calling for the dismantling of Cabinet departments and other federal agencies. He...

Striking Hollywood writers, studios to resume negotiations next week

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Contract talks that could end Hollywood’s writers strike are set to resume next week, studios said Thursday.The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents the industry’s studios, streaming services and production companies in union negotiations, said in a statement that they had reached out to the Writers Guild of America on Wednesday and the two sides agreed to resume negotiations next week.Leaders are still working out the details, the statement said, and no further specifics were provided.“Every member company of the AMPTP is committed and eager to reach a fair deal, and to working together with the WGA to end the strike,” the statement said.There are no talks yet planned to settle the actors strike.Writers have been on strike for 4 1/2 months over issues including pay, job security and regulating the use of artificial intelligence. A previous attempt to restart talks fell flat. The two sides had a handful of meetings in m...

California lawmakers sign off on ballot measure to reform mental health care system

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers are casting the final votes on hundreds of bills Thursday before the legislative session ends at midnight.Approved bills will go to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who will have until Oct. 14 to decide whether to sign them into law, veto them or let them become law without his signature.The state Legislature almost never overrides a veto from the governor, no matter what political party is in charge. Here’s a look at what lawmakers have voted on:MENTAL HEALTH SYSTEMSenators on Thursday signed off on putting two proposals before voters next March that would help transform the state’s mental health system and address the state’s worsening homelessness crisis. A measure by Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin would allow the state to borrow $6.38 billion to build new treatment beds and housing. A proposal by Sen. Susan Eggman would overhaul how counties pay for mental and behavioral health programs. Irwin’s proposal still needs a fi...

As captured fugitive resumes sentence in the US, homicide in his native Brazil remains unsolved

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — When the Brazilian prosecutor in charge of a homicide case targeting Danilo Cavalcante saw footage of the 34 year-old crab-walk out of a U.S. prison last month, he thought the fugitive might try to head home, where he stood to receive a considerably lighter sentence.Cavalcante fled Brazil in 2018, several months after allegedly shooting a man whose family members said owed him money. Today, Cavalcante faces life in a U.S. cell for the brutal killing of his girlfriend.“I thought he wanted to escape to Brazil,” Tocantins state prosecutor Rafael Pinto Alamy told The Associated Press on Thursday. “He would have to comply with the prison rules here, which are much more lenient.”A court hearing in Cavalcante’s Brazilian homicide case has been set for Oct. 11. The case is expected to go to a jury, probably next year, Alamy and Cavalcante’s lawyer told the AP.Brazil does not deliver life sentences. Even had Cavalcante been sentenced to the maximum 30 years, Alamy...

AP PHOTOS: Satellite images show flood devastation that killed more than 11,000 in Libya

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

DERNA, Libya (AP) — Images taken by satellite show the physical devastation from a flood that killed at least 11,300 people in the eastern Libyan city of Derna. Two dams above Derna burst early Monday under the pressure from rain dropped by a storm. The pent-up water swept blocks of low-lying downtown Derna out to the Mediterranean Sea. Many said they heard loud explosions as the dams exploded. A flood several meters (many feet) high rolled down a mountainside into the city. Images made about 400 miles above the earth’s surface show that the storm left a brown layer of mud and dirt across the city.Untold numbers are buried under mud and debris that includes overturned cars and chunks of concrete. The death toll soared to 11,300 as search efforts continue, Marie el-Drese, secretary-general of the Libyan Red Crescent, told The Associated Press by phone Thursday.She said that an additional 10,100 had been reported missing. Health authorities previously put the death toll in Derna at 5,...

Author Deesha Philyaw has a 7-figure deal for her next two books

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Prize-winning fiction writer Deesha Philyaw, who struggled to find a publisher for what became her acclaimed debut “The Secret Lives of Church Ladies,” has a 7-figure deal for her next two books. Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, announced Thursday that it had signed up Philyaw and will publish her novel “The True Confessions of First Lady Freeman” in 2025. Mariner calls the book a “biting satire” of the Black church and “a deeply provocative” story about family, friendship and “sexual agency.” Philyaw, who attended several different churches as a child, is centering the novel around a megachurch leader.“In writing True Confessions, I really wanted to explore the narratives that 40- and 50-something Black women sometimes tell ourselves – as well as the narratives told about us – regarding our desires and aspirations,” Philyaw said in a statement.Her second book for Mariner, “Girl, Look,” is billed by the publisher as a ...

California lawmakers to vote on plan allowing the state to buy power

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:11:51 GMT

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers were scheduled to vote Thursday on whether to give Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration permission to buy massive amounts of electricity, a move aimed at avoiding blackouts by shoring up the state’s power supply while jumpstarting the West Coast’s fledgling offshore wind industry.Five companies paid roughly $750 million last year to lease areas off the California coast to build wind turbines. Collectively, those projects could generate enough electricity to power 3.5 million homes, helping the state avoid blackouts during extreme heat waves that have routinely strained the electrical grid of the nation’s most populous state.But so far, the state’s largest utility companies have not been willing to commit to buying power from projects like those because it would cost too much money and take too long to build. In addition to building the wind turbines, the projects will require improvements at the st...