A small aircraft plunged onto a highway in Laredo, Texas, igniting a blaze on Tuesday night, sparking panic as bystanders abandoned their vehicles to desperately try to shatter the cockpit window and rescue those trapped inside.

According to police reports, six individuals were aboard, resulting in one fatality. The incident occurred shortly after 10 p.m., as confirmed by Jose Baeza, an investigator from the Laredo Police Department.

At present, authorities have not reported any injuries among motorists on Loop 20, the affected highway, which is currently shut down in both directions.

Footage circulating online depicts the aircraft lying on its side, having collided with a highway barrier.

Zayra Garza, who works as an esthetician, encountered the chaotic scene while she was driving her coworkers home.

She began shooting video as she approached the scene and then stopped her vehicle across from the crippled jet, which was on fire.

She saw someone inside the plane trying to break the cockpit window to escape.

Soon, people got out of their vehicles to try to smash the window from the outside.

Garza’s husband jumped out of their vehicle to help and Garza then saw the door of the plane open.

She said three people who looked to be teenagers rushed out, followed by someone who appeared to be a pilot.

Another member of the crew tried to pull from the plane a person who seemed to be unconscious .

“It looked like part of a movie. I was in shock,” Garza said.

“What was worrying me was the fire,” she said. “I was concerned that it could have just exploded at any time.”

Robert Thurman, the father of actress Uma Thurman and a distinguished figure in Tibetan Buddhism, has passed away at the age of 84.

Renowned for being the first Westerner to receive ordination as a Tibetan Buddhist monk directly from the Dalai Lama, Robert’s groundbreaking achievement is highlighted on his official website.

In an illustrious academic career, he served as the Je Tsongkhapa Professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies at Columbia University, a position he held for 30 years before retiring in 2019.

Robert instilled Buddhist values in Uma from a young age, with a significant part of her childhood spent in Almora, a town in northern India known for attracting Western Buddhists due to its proximity to Tibet.

Tibet House US, the nonprofit organization Robert co-founded alongside figures like Richard Gere at the Dalai Lama’s suggestion, announced his passing on Tuesday.

‘We are deeply saddened to announce that Robert A.F. Thurman , prominent American Buddhist scholar, co-founder of Tibet House US, author and translator whose teachings shaped countless lives, died Tuesday morning, June 16, in Woodstock, New York,’ the organization posted to Instagram.

Uma Thurman’s father Robert Thurman, a monk and renowned scholar of Tibetan Buddhism, has died at the age of 84; the father and daughter are pictured in May 2006

Robert raised Uma a Buddhist, with two years of her childhood spent in Almora, an Indian town famed as a hub for western Buddhists; the pair are raised in 1993

Invoking the Sanskrit mantra: ‘Om Mani Padme Hum,’ the statement noted that the ‘Thurman family requests privacy at this time.’

Born in New York in 1941 to a stage actress and a news editor, Robert Thurman was in a grisly accident while changing a tire that left him with a glass eye at the age of 20.

Jolted into life-changing action, he divorced his heiress wife, dropped out of Harvard and traveled rough through Turkey and Iran before reaching India.

There, he converted to Buddhism and trained under the 14th and current Dalai Lama, who was by then already in exile in India after Mao Zedong’s crackdown on Tibet.

After three years of ascetism as a monk, Robert resumed the enjoyment of worldly pleasures and married the Swedish-German model Nena von Schlebrügge, with whom he welcomed four children including a daughter with the Sanskrit name Uma.

However his attachment to his religion remained intact, and thus part of Uma’s childhood was passed in Almora, an Indian town whose landmarks include a ridge known as Hippie Hill for its popularity among bohemian western Buddhists. 

‘There’s been a lot written about my upbringing, making it sound as if it were some hippie-dippy childhood, but that’s totally absurd,’ she insisted to the Irish Examiner.

‘There’s an assumption that because someone is a Buddhist, they are a leftie loose cannon, unusually weird, and that’s complete baloney! I was brought up in academic housing, I went to school, my father was a professor. It was all extremely normal.’

Robert worked not only as a professor but also as a writer and translator, producing an English version of a classic Mayahana Buddhist text called the Vimalakirti Sutra. 

He became a vigorous and charming promoter of Tibetan Buddhism in America, and in 1987 he joined forces with a number of his coreligionists including Richard Gere and composer Philip Glass to found Tibet House US.

As his daughter became a movie star, Robert’s own work vigorously promoting Tibetan Buddhism to the west achieved greater prominence.

In 1997, the year Uma’s movies Gattaca and Batman & Robin were released, Robert was named one of Time magazine’s 25 most influential Americans.

A democratic socialist is on the verge of becoming the next mayor of Washington, DC, even as President Donald Trump has threatened to impose federal control over the capital.

Early results indicate that mayoral candidate Janeese Lewis George is leading with just over 50% of the votes. Her closest competitor, former city council member Kenyan McDuffie, trails behind at 36%, with more than 60% of the ballots counted.

Voters faced a decision: support Lewis George, a candidate reminiscent of New York City’s Zohran Mamdani, which could provoke a Republican President intent on challenging DC’s Home Rule, or opt for McDuffie, a more centrist Democrat favored by business and restaurant leaders.

McDuffie, who previously identified as an independent, rejoined the Democratic Party to pursue his mayoral ambitions.

The electorate chose to send a message to the President by leaning towards Lewis George.

‘I wouldn’t like it,’ Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office, when asked about the prospect of a Lewis George win. 

‘Maybe we take back Washington and run it on a federal basis. We won’t put up with it,’ he said. 

Speaking to supporters from U Street’s Howard Theatre, part of the historic ‘Black Broadway,’ Lewis George took a veiled swipe at Trump’s comments Tuesday night. 

D.C. Council member Janeese Lewis George waves at an Election Night party at Howard Theatre Tuesday after early returns showed her garnering more than 50 percent of the vote to be Washington, DC’s next mayor 

On Thursday in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump said he ‘won’t put up with’ the election of democratic socialist DC mayoral candidate Janeese Lewis George

‘If there was ever any doubt. Let it now be laid to rest. It is the people of DC who elect the mayor of DC,’ the democratic socialist said to cheers. 

If Lewis George remains above 50 percent, she wins the Democratic primary outright. 

If she dips below, some votes from less popular candidates will be reshuffled, as DC has implemented a ranked-choice voting system starting this cycle.

Still, Lewis George remains in a strong position to win.  

As in liberal California, many voters in DC use mail-in ballots and can postmark them as late as Election Day. 

Returns were delayed for hours after polls were supposed to close at 8 pm ET on Tuesday. 

Whoever wins the Democratic mayoral primary is a shoo-in for the general election due to the city’s overwhelmingly Democratic voter base. 

In the 2024 presidential election, for example, the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, won 90.3 percent of the vote to Trump’s 6.5 percent. 

The last time the capital city had a Republican mayor, it was still the party associated with President Abraham Lincoln, with Republican Sayles Jenks Bowen serving as mayor from 1868 to 1870.      

Former DC Council member, the more moderate Kenyan McDuffie, was considered Janeese Lewis George’s biggest rival. The Democrat turned independent turned Democrat was backed by business and restaurant industry leaders 

DC mayor hopeful Janeese Lewis George participates in an interview on Election Day on Tuesday 

Trump would have to go to Congress to strip away DC Home Rule. 

The District of Columbia Home Rule Act of 1973 allows DC residents the right to elect a mayor and a 13-member city council. 

Because DC is a federal district and not a state, the nearly 700,000 tax-paying residents don’t get to elect members of Congress. 

Still, Congress ultimately gets to decide what local laws go into effect and must approve the DC budget. 

Historically, Republicans in Congress have attempted to meddle in policies supported by the city’s liberal voters – including abortion funding, marijuana legalization and firearms restrictions. 

A statehood movement in DC has taken root, with a Democrat-led House of Representatives passing a statehood bill in 2021, but it went nowhere in the Senate, with national Republicans largely against granting DC statehood because it would all but guarantee two Democratic senators and a Democratic US House member.   

DC’s current Democratic Mayor, Muriel Bowser, decided to bow out after three terms, despite not being term-limited. 

She served through all of Trump’s first term and will end her tenure as Trump hits the two-year mark of his second. 

Bowser has maintained a stable relationship with the Trump administration during the President’s second term.

While they clashed during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, she’s ensured DC’s autonomy by making concessions such as paving over the large Black Lives Matter street mural on 16th Street NW directly in front of the White House.    

She also walked a delicate line when Trump ordered the National Guard onto DC streets, praising the anti-crime initiatives while criticizing Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s actions. 

CHICAGO (WLS) — Barack Obama’s journey from obscurity to the presidency is often described as rapid and remarkable by those close to him. However, well before his groundbreaking presidential bid, some associates already saw the potential for greatness in him.

During his U.S. Senate campaign, Obama remarked, “Indeed, I may lack personal wealth or a renowned surname, but what I possess is an unyielding passion.”

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Obama’s fervor for politics was evident even before 2003, when he was merely a state senator with aspirations for the U.S. Senate.

David Axelrod, who played a vital role as the chief strategist for Obama’s presidential run and later served as a senior advisor, recounted a prediction from political activist Bettylu Salzman. She observed Obama during his days as a community organizer in the early ’90s.

Axelrod recalled, “She mentioned, ‘He’s organizing this voter registration drive, yet I have a strong sense he might become the first Black president of the United States.’”

SEE ALSO | Obama Presidential Center set to open this week on South Side | LIVE Updates

But Obama’s political rise began with baby steps. The first: getting elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996. After serving two terms, he challenged incumbent Congressman Bobby Rush and lost the 2000 primary by a humbling two-to-one margin.

“And many people would have quit at that point, and he could have easily done that and folded up his tent, and he came he came back from that,” said former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

And what a comeback it would turn out to be, starting when Obama hit the campaign trail in 2003 in the race for U.S. Senate.

“The main thing you get out of this is the opportunity to enjoy a wonderful day and shake some hands and talk to voters and hopefully they start remembering your name over time,” Obama said.

Obama would win the 2004 Democratic Senate Primary shortly after that getting a life-changing invitation.

“The next senator from the state of Illinois, Barack Obama,” said Sen. Dick Durbin as he introduced Obama.

Obama gave the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention that summer in Boston.

“And as he started to speak, you could see more and more people paying attention, and then people are up on their feet, and I looked around, I saw people with tears rolling down their cheeks,” Axelrod said.

“There is not a liberal America and a conservative America; there is the United States of America,” Obama said.

That speech transformed Obama into a political superstar.

“I’d say he hit a grand slam homerun, he has the passion, he has the commitment, he spoke to the American public,” said then-Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley.

“If you look at all the speeches in terms of that have hit it out of the ballpark, from Jesse Jackson to Barack Obama, it’s always been a speech of unity,” said Political Consultant Del Marie Cobb.

Durbin frequently campaigned with Obama, and in late 2006, said he offered him some advice.

“So, I sat down with him. I said, ‘You ought to run for president. You’re young enough. If you lose, you’ll have another chance, but you got something special, buddy, and I want to help you do it,’” Durbin said.

Obama launched his presidential campaign in February of 2007 on the steps of the old historic state capital in Springfield. His candidacy offered hope with the slogan, “Yes, we can.”

Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel served as Obama’s chief of staff and says Obama was the change people were looking for.

“Almost every president scratches the itch that the predecessor leaves,” Emanuel said.

On election night, Obama hosted a watch party in Grant Park, attended by an estimated 240,000 people who witnessed history as America elected its first Black president.

“We are and always will be the United States of America,” Obama said.

“That’s one of the nights I’ll never forget, and just the joy and feeling a part of that,” Duncan said.

Many of those ABC7 spoke to see the opening of the Obama Presidential Center as a crowning moment for his legacy. Obama who, as a candidate made famous the phrase “Yes, we can,” will now be the former president who can once again tell people “Yes, we did.”