15 Apr 2024

‘Vanished’: 25 years since Nathan Edberg’s vehicle was found abandoned in Vadnais Heights, search for answers continues

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Nathan Edberg has been missing for more years than the time he and his family had together.

“We’ve lived longer without him than with him. That was a hard milestone to cross,” his mother, Jackie Edberg, said Monday, the day after the 25th anniversary of his disappearance.

Edberg was 21 when he was last seen at a bar in White Bear Lake on April 14, 1999, and his vehicle was found abandoned in Vadnais Heights.

“Our investigators haven’t stopped looking for him,” the Ramsey County sheriff’s office said in a post Monday on Facebook. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension also brought attention to his case on social media on Sunday.

Jackie Edberg said it took her a long time, but she’s come to the difficult conclusion that her oldest child is likely deceased; he would have contacted her if he could.

That his body was never found makes her feel “more than likely he was a victim of a crime,” she said. “… He just seems to have vanished.”

On the night of his disappearance, Edberg’s pickup truck was found in a ditch near Interstates 694 and 35 with its lights off and doors locked. “Nothing was recovered from the scene that appeared out of place — it just appeared as a car in a ditch,” said Miles Kensler, a Ramsey County sheriff’s office crime scene/cold case investigator, on Monday.

Kensler hasn’t been able to find evidence to determine if Edberg met with foul play, if he left on his own, or “if he passed away somehow where we weren’t able to locate him,” he said.

Investigator still asking for tips

There have been no confirmed sightings or attempted communication from Edberg, investigators say.

“This case has always been open and active and we’ve been looking at it,” said Kensler, who’s been assigned to the case for the past eight years. “… I feel like I’m missing that one puzzle piece of information and that once I get it, everything’s going to make sense.”

Kensler is asking anyone, even if they talked to law enforcement previously, or “even if you don’t think it’s an important thing” but it “sticks out in your memory, please contact law enforcement and let us know.” The sheriff’s office can be reached at 651-266-7320.

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There was initially a helicopter search, foot searches with a large amount of staff and a canine cadaver search, Kensler said of what happened before he took over the case.

In his time, Kensler said he’s coordinated two canine cadaver searches, conducted two organized visual searches, and carried out two metal detecting searches, but they all came up empty.

His regular drive to work takes him by the area, “so I’m thinking about the case every day,” Kensler said.

Jackie Edberg calls Kensler to check in once a month to see if he has any updates.

“I have children of my own and you look at your kids and you think to yourself, ‘What would you do if you were in that situation?’” Kensler said. “I want to be able to solve this for her.”

Wallet, pager left behind

Edberg was temporarily living with his cousin in St. Paul and stopped by his mom’s house in Vadnais Heights, where he grew up, the day he was last seen.

“I’m very, very grateful that I was able to talk with Nathan, hug him, say, ‘I love you, honey,’” and hear him say it back, Jackie Edberg said.

He went to Decoy’s Grill and Bar at U.S. 61 and Fourth Street in White Bear Lake, which has since closed. Edberg previously worked at the restaurant, so he knew the staff, his mother said.

The last confirmed sighting of Edberg was when he left the bar. Investigators don’t know for certain if Edberg was driving.

“It’s hard to know how the vehicle ended up in the ditch, but two of the tires were flat,” Kensler said. “I imagine the ditch was probably wet, and it was one of those situations where you get in and you can’t get out.”

Edberg’s pager was in his vehicle and Kensler tried to download information from it, but there hadn’t been any pages in the last couple of months before he disappeared — the investigator thinks the pager wasn’t active.

Edberg’s wallet was found at the bar and it appeared he forgot it, Kensler said.

Law enforcement collected fingerprints from the wallet, with the presumption that most of them are Edberg’s, and they’ve run them through an FBI database in the event that authorities came into contact with him since, but they haven’t had a match.

‘God’s will’

When Edberg disappeared, “it was traumatic and trying” for a long time, said Jackie Edberg, who has three other children.

Nathan Edberg is shown in an age-progressed photo produced in 2023. (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)

Time has marched on. Nathan Edberg’s youngest sister, for example, was 8 at the time and is now a 33-year-old veterinarian.

“We don’t have a grave site to go to, we don’t have a conclusion to know exactly how one remembers this anniversary,” Jackie Edberg said. “… I think it took my family a long time to consider the idea that he is deceased because he was a charming, personable, good kid that loved his family. I just don’t think he’d walk away and not contact us.”

He was facing difficult times — his girlfriend broke up with him, he wasn’t working and his parents had separated — but Jackie Edberg doesn’t believe Nathan would have hurt himself. He had an appointment scheduled for the following week with a therapist and was talking about going back to college in the fall, thinking about studying law enforcement.

“The only thing I can do is is realize that this is God’s will and that every life will have adversity,” Jackie Edberg said. “This life is just a path to get to the next life. I have to believe that there’s a plan, God’s plan. … It gives me comfort because if you believe in heaven, if you believe in an afterlife, then I believe I will see and be with my son again.”

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15 Apr 2024

Vikings tight end T.J. Hockenson calls for change after low hit that took him out

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Vikings tight end T.J. Hockenson has thought about the particular play probably more times than he can count.

He remembers flying head over heels after Detroit Lions safety Kerby Joseph launched into his right knee during a game on Christmas Eve. He remembers feeling dejected after learning he had suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament as well as a torn medial collateral ligament. He remembers being disgusted after seeing the same exact thing happen to Los Angeles Rams tight end Tyler Higbee a couple of weeks later.

Now, as he works his way through the recovery process, Hockenson is asking the league to do something about it.

“Obviously I wasn’t too happy about it,” he said. “That’s not a fun one to take.”

The particular play in question occurred when Hockenson hauled in a reception over the middle of the field, then instantaneously absorbed a low hit from Joseph, who led with the crown of his helmet. Talking to reporters for the first time since it happened, Hockenson went as far as saying he would have rather suffered a head injury from a high hit than a knee injury from a low hit.

“I would have had a normal offseason getting ready,” he said. “I’ve had a concussion. It took me a week. I’m just looking at it from that pure timetable.”

Though he said he doesn’t think Joseph was intentionally trying to hurt him on that play, Hockenson made it clear that he thinks the league should take a look at what exactly is permissible at the point of attack. He noted offensive players aren’t allowed to cut block outside of the tackle box. He doesn’t understand why defensive players are allowed to do something similar in open space.

“It’s tough,” Hockenson said. “It really is.”

What does he think a good solution would be?

“That’s not my job to necessarily look into that,” Hockenson said. “I’ll leave that to the league.”

Asked if there was a world in which he would be ready to play in 2024 by Week 1, Hockenson stopped short of making any guarantees related to the recovery process. He finished last season with 95 catches for 960 yards before being taken out on Christmas Eve.

“I think anything is possible,” he said. “I’m definitely not going to put a timeline on it.”

He had successful surgery to repair the anterior cruciate ligament a few months ago after waiting for the medial collateral ligament to heal on its own. He since has been able to get back into the weight room and is waiting for clearance to start running again.

“That’s coming,” Hockenson said. “To be able to integrate myself onto the field is going to be huge.”

As he reflected on his recovery process so far, Hockenson spoke very highly of Tyler Williams, who serves as the vice president of player health and performance, and Matt Duhamel, who serves as the director of rehabilitation.

“They really do care,” Hockenson said. “I was doing a lot of rehab down in Nashville, and those guys came down and sat around and watched. That’s huge. That doesn’t happen everywhere.”

There’s still a long road ahead of Hockenson as he works his way back to 100 percent. In the meantime, as much as he’s hoping the NFL takes a look at the particular play that put him in this position, he’s proud of the way he has handled the situation so far.

“I’ve learned a lot about myself,” Hockenson said. “The dark times make the bright times better.”

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15 Apr 2024

IAEA warns that attacks on a nuclear plant in Russian-controlled Ukraine put the world at risk

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By MICHAEL WEISSENSTEIN (Associated Press)

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Russia and Ukraine on Monday traded blame before the United Nations Security Council for the attacks on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, which the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said have put the world “dangerously close to a nuclear accident.”

Without attributing blame, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said his agency has been able to confirm three attacks against the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant since April 7.

“These reckless attacks must cease immediately,” he told the Security Council. “Though, fortunately, they have not led to a radiological incident this time, they significantly increase the risk … where nuclear safety is already compromised.”

The remote-controlled nature of the drones that have attacked the plant means that it is impossible to definitively determine who launched them, Grossi told reporters after the meeting.

“In order to say something like that, we must have proof,” he said. “These attacks have been performed with a multitude of drones.”

Zaporizhzhia sits in Russian-controlled territory in southeastern Ukraine and has six nuclear reactors.

Fears of a nuclear catastrophe have been at the forefront since Russian troops occupied the plant shortly after invading in February 2022. Continued fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces — as well as the tense supply situation at the plant — have raised the specter of a disaster.

Ukraine and its allies on Monday again blamed Russia for dangers at the site, with the United States saying, “Russia does not care about these risks.”

“If it did, it would not continue to forcibly control the plant,” U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood told the Security Council, which met at the initiative of the U.S. and Slovenia.

Russia, for its part, said Ukraine was to blame for the attacks.

“The IAEA’s report does not pinpoint which side is behind the attacks,” Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said. “We know full well who it is.”

“Over the last few months, such attacks not only resumed,” Nebenzia said, “they significantly intensified.”

Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.N., Sergiy Kyslytsya, called the attacks “a well-planned false flag operation by the Russian Federation,” which he alleged Russia had designed to distract the world from its invasion of its neighbor.

The Zaporizhzhia facility is one of the 10 biggest nuclear plants in the world. Fighting in the southern part of Ukraine where it is located has raised the specter of a potential nuclear disaster like the one at Chernobyl in 1986, where a reactor exploded and blew deadly radiation across a vast area.

Neither Russia nor Ukraine in recent months has been able to make significant advances along the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line crossing eastern and southern Ukraine. Drones, artillery and missiles have featured heavily in what has become a war of attrition.

Russia and Ukraine have frequently traded accusations over the Zaporizhzhia plant.

The most recent strikes did not compromise the facility, which is designed to withstand a commercial airliner crashing into it, the IAEA said.

The plant’s six reactors have been shut down for months, but it still needs power and qualified staff to operate crucial cooling systems and other safety features.

15 Apr 2024

Boeing pushes back on whistleblower’s allegations and details how airframes are put together

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By DAVID KOENIG (AP Airlines Writer)

Boeing is defending the integrity of the fuselages on two of its largest planes, which have come under criticism from a whistleblower who warns that panels on the outside of one of the planes could eventually break apart during flight.

Two Boeing engineering executives went into detail Monday to describe how panels are fitted together, particularly on the 787 Dreamliner. They suggested the 787’s carbon-composite skin is nearly impervious to metal fatigue that weakens conventional aluminum fuselages.

Their comments during a lengthy media briefing served as both a response to news reports last week about the whistleblower’s allegations and a preemptive strike before he testifies to a congressional panel on Wednesday.

The whistleblower, Boeing engineer Sam Salehpour, said excessive force was applied to fit panels together on the 787 assembly line, raising the risk of fatigue, or microscopic cracking in the material that could cause it break apart.

The Boeing officials described how sections of a fuselage are brought together, shims are added to fill gaps, holes are drilled and cleaned, and fasteners attached to apply “pull-up force” that 99% of the time results in margins no greater than .005 inches (0.127 millimeters) apart — the width of a human hair, they said. A gap problem was discovered in 2019 between two panels, which led to design and assembly changes, they said.

Boeing conducted testing replicating 165,000 flights with no findings of fatigue in the composite structure, Steve Chisholm, Boeing’s vice president of structural engineering, said. The average 787 makes 600 flights a year, he said.

The company said planes already in use are proving safe. Chisholm said 671 Dreamliners have undergone the intensive inspections for 6-year-old planes and eight have undergone 12-year inspections with no evidence of fatigue in the composite skins.

Cracks have been found on metallic parts, including a piece above where the wings join the fuselage, and Boeing issued inspection guidelines for those parts, the officials said.

The 787 Dreamliner is a two-aisle plane that has often been used on international flights since its debut in 2011. The composite material makes the plane lighter, contributing to better fuel efficiency.

A series of battery fires briefly grounded the planes. Deliveries of the aircraft have been stopped at times because of questions about gaps between fuselage panels that were wider than Boeing’s standards allowed, the use of unapproved titanium parts from a supplier in Italy, and flaws in a pressure bulkhead.

The Federal Aviation Administration must inspect and approve each 787 that rolls off the assembly line before it can be flown to an airline customer.

The whistleblower Salehpour claims that after he raised safety concerns about the 787, Boeing transferred him to work on an older widebody plane, the 777. He told the Seattle Times that he saw workers jumping on fuselage panels to get them in alignment, which Boeing disputes.

The New York Times reported that the FAA is investigating Salehpour’s claims. The FAA, while not commenting specifically on Salehpour, said it investigates all safety reports.

Boeing says it is “fully confident” in both planes.

Salehpour is the latest in a line of Boeing whistleblowers to come forward, often alleging retaliation for raising safety concerns. The company said it encourages employees to speak up about problems.

Lisa Fahl, the vice president of engineering for Boeing airplane programs, said employee reports have “exploded” — with as many reports in January and February as were filed in all of 2023 — “which is what we want.”