Federal investigators were unable to determine the cause of a fatal small-plane crash that killed Dave Rathbun, 52, of Hermantown, on Feb. 24, 2023, when the aircraft he was piloting crashed into the frozen St. Louis River near Grassy Point in West Duluth.
In its final report last month, the National Transportation Safety Board said Rathbun’s 2016 Cirrus SR22 rapidly descended before striking the frozen river nose-down “for reasons that could not be determined based on the available evidence.”
Investigation of the wreckage revealed no “preimpact mechanical malfunctions,” and the autopsy, hampered by the severity of his injuries, found “mild to moderate” narrowing of coronary arteries by plaque but “no other significant natural disease was identified,” the report said.
The autopsy on Rathbun’s body determined the cause of death to be “multiple blunt force injuries” and that it was an “accident.”
Rathbun, an engineer at Cirrus Aircraft for 26 years, was the plane’s only occupant.
According to the NTSB, Rathbun took off from the Duluth International Airport to reposition his plane to the Richard I. Bong Airport in Superior, Wis., where it was stored.
It was flying at an altitude of 1,300 feet on a 4-mile approach for runway 14 at the Bong Airport when it “suddenly pitched down about” 30 degrees and crashed into the river, leaving a 300-foot trail of debris, the NTSB said. The crash happened at 4:07 p.m. — just 4 minutes after he took off.
Dozens of volunteers are needed to rake yards and bag leaves for seniors and people with disabilities in Washington County.
Rake a Difference Day, sponsored by the nonprofit Community Thread, will be Oct. 26, Nov. 1 and Nov. 2.
Last year, Community Thread organized more than 225 volunteers to rake 298 bags of leaves for 39 homeowners. Volunteer groups included families, Scout troops, Rotary clubs, school groups, companies and neighborhood associations.
People interested in volunteering can call 651-439-7434 or visit communitythreadmn.org.
By MICHAEL PHILLIS, JEFF AMY and BRITTANY PETERSON
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — Nearly a week after Hurricane Helene brought devastation to western North Carolina, a shiny stainless steel tanker truck in downtown Asheville attracted residents carrying 5-gallon containers, milk jugs and buckets to fill with what has become a desperately scare resource — drinking water.
Flooding tore through the city’s water system, destroying so much infrastructure that officials said repairs could take weeks. To make do, Anna Ramsey arrived Wednesday with her two children, who each left carrying plastic bags filled with 2 gallons (7.6 liters) of water.
“We have no water. We have no power. But I think it’s also been humbling,” Ramsey said.
It also damaged water utilities so severely and over such a wide inland area that one federal official said the toll “could be considered unprecedented.” As of Thursday, about 136,000 people in the Southeast were served by a nonoperational water provider and more than 1.8 million were living under a boil water advisory, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Electrical contract worker Matthew Tipton looks over the remnants of a waterline serving Asheville, N.C., downstream from North Fork Reservoir, a main source of water for the city, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, after the line was destroyed during Hurricane Helene in Black Mountain, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Reginald Klemz, right, fills a container of fresh water from a tanker with the help of volunteer Julie Koenke in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
People carry bags of fresh water after filling up at a distribution site in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
The remnants of a waterline serving Asheville, N.C., is piled up downstream from North Fork Reservoir, a main source of water for the city, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, after the line was destroyed during Hurricane Helene in Black Mountain, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Lindsay Rust carries a jug of fresh water after filling up at a distribution site in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Workers hand out fresh water at a distribution site in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
A backhoe is used to clear debris left by Hurricane Helene that washed away a road and destroyed a waterline for the city of Asheville Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, in Black Mountain, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Volunteers stage water for citizens in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Volunteers stage water for citizens in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Asheville, N.C. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
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Electrical contract worker Matthew Tipton looks over the remnants of a waterline serving Asheville, N.C., downstream from North Fork Reservoir, a main source of water for the city, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, after the line was destroyed during Hurricane Helene in Black Mountain, N.C. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Western North Carolina was especially hard hit. Officials are facing a difficult rebuilding task made harder by the steep, narrow valleys of the Blue Ridge Mountains that during a more typical October would attract throngs of fall tourists.
“The challenges of the geography are just fewer roads, fewer access points, fewer areas of flat ground to stage resources” said Brian Smith, acting deputy division director for the EPA’s water division in the Southeast.
After days without water, people long for more than just a sponge bath.
“I would love a shower,” said Sue Riles in Asheville. “Running water would be incredible.”
The raging floodwaters of Helene destroyed crucial parts of Asheville’s water system, scouring out the pipes that convey water from a reservoir in the mountains above town that is the largest of three water supplies for the system. To reach a second reservoir that was knocked offline, a road had to be rebuilt.
Boosted output from the third source restored water flow in some southern Asheville neighborhoods Friday, but without full repairs schools may not be able to resume in-person classes, hospitals may not restore normal operations, and the city’s hotels and restaurants may not fully reopen.
Even water that’s unfit to drink is scarce. Drew Reisinger, the elected Buncombe County register of deeds, worries about people in apartments who can’t easily haul a bucket of water from a creek to flush their toilet. Officials are advising people to collect nondrinkable water for household needs from a local swimming pool.
“One thing no one is talking about is the amount of poop that exists in every toilet in Asheville,” he said. “We’re dealing with a public health emergency.”
It’s a situation that becomes more dangerous the longer it lasts. Even in communities fortunate enough to have running water, hundreds of providers have issued boil water notices indicating the water could be contaminated. But boiling water for cooking and drinking is time consuming and small mistakes can cause stomach illness, according to Natalie Exum, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
“Every day that goes by, you could be exposed to a pathogen,” Exum said. “These basic services that we take for granted in our everyday lives actually do do a lot to prevent illness.”
Travis Edwards’ faucet worked immediately after the storm. He filled as many containers as he could for himself and his child, but it didn’t take long for the flow to weaken, then stop. They rationed water, switching to hand sanitizer and barely putting any on toothbrushes.
“(We) didn’t realize how dehydrated we were getting,” he said.
Federal officials have shipped millions of gallons of water to areas where people also might not be able to make phone calls or switch on the lights.
Power has been restored to about 62% of homes and businesses and 8,000 crews are out working to restore power in the hardest hit parts of North Carolina, federal officials said Thursday. In 10 counties, about half of the cell sites are still down.
The first step for some utilities is simply figuring out how bad the damage is, a job that might require EPA expertise in extreme cases. Ruptured water pipes are a huge problem. They often run beneath roads, many of which were crumpled and twisted by floodwaters.
“Pretty much anytime you see a major road damaged, there’s a very good chance that there’s a pipe in there that’s also gotten damaged,” said Mark White, drinking water global practice leader at the engineering firm CDM Smith.
Generally, repairs start at the treatment plant and move outward, with fixes in nearby big pipes done first, according to the EPA.
“Over time, you’ll gradually get water to more and more people,” White said.
Many people are still missing people, and water repair employees don’t typically work around search and rescue operations. It takes a toll, according to Kevin Morley, manager of federal relations with the American Water Works Association.
“There’s emotional support that is really important for all the people involved. You’re seeing people’s lives just wiped out,” he said.
There’s often a “blind faith” assumption that drinking water won’t fail. In this case, the technology was insufficient, according to Craig Colten. Before retiring to Asheville, he was a professor in Louisiana focused on resilience to extreme weather. He hopes Helene will prompt politicians to spend more to ensure infrastructure withstands destructive storms.
And climate change will only make the problem more severe, said Erik Olson, a health and food expert at the nonprofit Natural Resources Defense Council.
“I think states and the federal government really need to step back and start looking at how we’re going to prepare for these extreme weather events that are going to be occurring and recurring every single year,” he said.
Edwards has developed a system to save water. He’ll soap dirty dishes and rinse them with a trickle of water with bleach, which is caught and transferred to a bucket — useable for the toilet.
Power and some cell service have returned for him. And water distribution sites have guaranteed some measure of normalcy: Edwards feels like he can start going out to see friends again.
“To not feel guilty about using more than a cup of water to, like, wash yourself … I’m really, really grateful,” he said.
Phillis reported from St. Louis. Associated Press writer Rebecca Santana contributed from Washington.
The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment
The average sequel to a huge commercial success doesn’t try much of anything. Director Todd Phillips knows this. He is, after all, the director of all three “Hangover” movies.
Surprise! “Joker: Folie à Deux” is a lot of things, but a pro forma sequel it is not. This genuinely nervy jukebox musical (?) (!), very nearly a rebuke of the 2019 billion-dollar smash starring Joaquin Phoenix, feels like its own thing, considerably less derivative and more fully realized than the first one. And it’s sure to outright alienate millions who dug the earlier film’s grinding intensity and morally queasy vigilante spirit.
That one threw several New York-as-hellhole movies, from “Death Wish” to “Taxi Driver” to “The King of Comedy,” into a trash compactor and out came the “Joker” script, made screenworthy by Phoenix, giving his all. It arrived three years into a U.S. presidential administration full of daily reminders of what celebrity worship can lead to. The time was right for a truly nasty foray into Gotham, and into the head-space of pathological party clown and aspiring comedian Arthur Fleck, whose perpetual victimization could only lead to carnage.
“Joker: Folie à Deux” makes Fleck pay the piper. It’s a comeuppance with musical numbers. Returning screenwriters Scott Silver and director Phillips begin with Fleck behind bars at Arkham State Hospital, struggling with his warring personality disorder, the tormented abuse survivor Fleck in one corner, and Fleck’s now-notorious alter ego, Joker, in the other.
Fleck’s lawyer (Catherine Keener) is working up an insanity defense for his upcoming murder trial, to be prosecuted by DA Harvey Dent (Harry Lawtey). Life in Arkham is no life at all, and Phoenix appears to have undergone even more severe weight loss in the name of his craft this time, all the better to suggest a broken, undernourished soul. Then, one day, Fleck spies Lee Quinzel, Arkham’s newest resident played with dark relish by Lady Gaga. She’s first seen leading a music therapy class. She fixes him with a gaze that says: I’m a huge fan of your work. It’s love at first sight, and a spiritual marriage of two crazy kids whose mutual ambitions of greatness are, to quote Rodgers and Hammerstein, bustin’ out all over.
Bustin’ out of Arkham, at least temporarily, Fleck and Quinzel paint the town, wreak some havoc and imagine themselves as a musical duo for the ages. In the stylistic vein of the film version of “Chicago,” the “Joker” sequel frames its production numbers as sung-through and sometimes danced-through interior monologues — sometimes realistic, sometimes fantastic, often a little of both. Gaga is excellent throughout, and this time Phoenix isn’t the whole show. Gaga’s original songs fold naturally into the film’s stream of standards, ranging from Jacques Brel (“If You Go Away”) to Rodgers and Hart (“Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered”) to, inevitably, “The Joker” (“The Roar of the Greasepaint — the Smell of the Crowd”). Quinzel imagines herself a Gotham Judy Garland; at one point, this pair of born entertainers become Sonny and Cher knockoffs, hosting their own variety hour.
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The storyline is spare to the point of invisibility this time, reportedly revised with input, musical and otherwise, from Gaga and Phoenix as production commenced. In the later courtroom sequences, in Gotham’s trial of the century, Fleck represents himself, apparently channeling Foghorn Leghorn; in Arkham, the inmates are always watching cartoons, with particular emphasis on that skunky predator Pepé Le Pew.
Daringly, the sequel forces Fleck to reckon with all he has wrought, and the rabid nature of his acolytes. Quinzel sees these bloodthirsty fans as crossover potential for her own aspirations to domestic terrorism with style. With the film’s canny reliance on the Great American Songbook, and the clever way composer Hildur Guðnadóttir interpolates themes such as the Carpenters standard “Close to You” into the background music, “Joker: Folie à Deux” is the arresting duets album Gaga never got to do with Tony Bennett.
So who’s up for a strange, disarming musical? As much as I hated the first one, this one works for me. Phillips’ second go at this malignant universe hews more closely in concept to Dennis Potter’s “Pennies From Heaven” than the classic Old Hollywood MGM titles either shown (at one point, our lovebirds watch the Fred Astaire/Cyd Charisse gem “The Band Wagon”) or musically referenced. There’s not much narrative propulsion this time, no steady build to Fleck’s righteous, Travis Bickle-y revenge. What we get is more interesting, and confrontational: A schism of a man, Lady Macbeth-ed by a heat-seeking, fame-hungry songstress devil, forced to face the music and the fallout of his own criminal celebrity.
The title “Joker: Folie a Deux” sounds like a joke, though it refers to a clinical psychiatric definition of shared psychological delusion, or “double madness.” By the time Zazie Beetz (Sophie, Fleck’s romantic obsession) and Leigh Gill (Gary, Fleck’s only friend) testify in court, it’s clear Phillips and company aren’t kidding. They probably know their movie’s not just simply not for everyone, but it’s not even for most of the first film’s champions. Given the frightening degree to which the 2019 “Joker” saga gave audiences what they wanted, can a morning-after mea culpa find any takers in 2024?
“Joker: Folie à Deux” — 3 stars (out of 4)
MPA rating: R (for some strong violence, language throughout, some sexuality, and brief full nudity)
