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Southwest says it expects normal operations to resume Friday

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Southwest says it expects normal operations to resume Friday


DALLAS (AP) — Southwest Airways mentioned it expects to return to regular operations Friday after slashing about two-thirds of its schedule in latest days, together with canceling one other 2,350 flights Thursday.

Airline executives advised workers that crew scheduling this week— a significant explanation for the meltdown — has been mounted.

Southwest is struggling to recuperate after being overwhelmed by a winter storm that left tons of of pilots and flight attendants stranded out of place to function flights.

It’s doubtless that way over 1 million passengers have been affected. Southwest has canceled greater than 13,000 flights since its meltdown started on Dec. 22. Its planes have 143 to 175 seats and have been doubtless almost totally booked across the Christmas and New 12 months’s holidays.

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Different airways are again to full energy. Delta, American and United collectively canceled round 30 flights by late morning, in response to tracker FlightAware.

Southwest’s cancellations amounted to 58% of its schedule, barely higher than in earlier days. The Dallas service accounted for greater than 95% of all canceled flights in the USA on Thursday.

Southwest has acknowledged that it has insufficient and outdated expertise that may go away flight crews out of place when unhealthy climate strikes. However firm executives advised workers that issues with crew-scheduling have largely been mounted.

“Proper now it seems to be like a reasonably clean operation as we head into this transition (Thursday) to permit us to renew operations on Friday at our regular schedule, which is a giant step up,” Chief Working Officer Andrew Watterson advised workers by video Wednesday evening.

BLEEPED PROFANITY: A Southwest passenger finds his bag at discovering his bag at Chicago Halfway Worldwide Airport on Wednesday. (Source: WBBM/CNN)

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The airline has declined requests to make executives accessible for remark and didn’t present an replace about operations on its web site. Its important public outreach has been to submit video statements by CEO Robert Jordan and its chief industrial officer.

Jordan faces a disaster simply 11 months after he turned CEO, changing longtime chief Gary Kelly. Southwest had 88 planes and seven,000 workers when Jordan joined 35 years in the past. Now it has greater than 700 planes and greater than 60,000 workers.

Chatting with reporters a month in the past at Southwest headquarters in Dallas, a relaxed and jocular Jordan spoke in glowing phrases concerning the airline’s tradition and customer support. He outlined 5 priorities, together with modernizing the airline’s expertise for scheduling pilots and flight attendants.

“I do assume the size and the expansion of the airline acquired forward of the instruments that we now have,” he mentioned. “No fault of anyone — takes funding — and we’ll get all this achieved.”

Jordan didn’t give a timeline or greenback determine for that funding, or clarify why the airline had not already achieved the work. However his feedback concerning the airline’s archaic crew-scheduling system appeared to foreshadow one of many main causes of the present meltdown — the shortcoming to get pilots and flight attendants in place when there’s a disruption to the operation.

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“We now have lots of crews shifting everywhere in the nation,” he mentioned then. “In the event that they get reassigned — they should go to a special metropolis or totally different flight than they thought, or they get reassigned to a brand new resort — any person must name them or principally within the airport chase them down and inform them what their re-route seems to be like.

“So at our measurement and scale, that’s simply not OK.”

The federal authorities is investigating what occurred at Southwest.

A girl should cancel her marriage ceremony after her flight to Belize was canceled. (Credit score: CNN Newsource)

Southwest added a web page to its web site particularly for stranded vacationers, and it invited prospects to submit receipts for sudden bills. The airline mentioned it could contemplate reimbursing “cheap” bills for meals, resort rooms and alternate transportation incurred between Dec. 24 and Jan. 2. Shopper advocates criticized using the phrase “cheap” as too obscure.

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1000’s of consumers have been unable to succeed in the airline this week, as Southwest’s telephone system was overwhelmed. Pilots and flight attendants additionally reported being placed on maintain for hours.

Buyers seem to assume that Southwest may lastly be getting a deal with on the disaster. The corporate’s shares rose greater than 3% in afternoon buying and selling, however they remained down 8% for the week.

The airline has not given an estimate for a way a lot income it has misplaced and the way a lot additional price it’ll incur – Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and a few members of Congress are demanding that Southwest pay stranded vacationers for resort rooms, meals and substitute flights they booked on different airways.

One indication of the value tag: Southwest mentioned a disruption in October 2021 price it $75 million. That meltdown was far smaller, leading to about 2,000 canceled flights over a four-day stretch. Again then, as this week, Southwest’s answer was to chop its schedule to stabilize the operation.

Southwest has been essentially the most worthwhile U.S. airline to this point this 12 months, incomes $759 million in web revenue by September.

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Raymond James airline analyst Savanthi Syth mentioned Thursday that she nonetheless expects the corporate to submit a small revenue within the fourth quarter, however that some shoppers are prone to swap from Southwest to different airways over the following few months when reserving journey.



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Illinois

FDA announces recall of oysters sold in Illinois, other states due to norovirus concerns

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FDA announces recall of oysters sold in Illinois, other states due to norovirus concerns


CHICAGO (CBS) — The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday warned stores and restaurants around the country not to sell or serve oysters from British Columbia, Canada, that may be contaminated with the norovirus.

Illinois was among the states where the oysters were sold. They were also sold in Arizona, California, Colorado, D.C., Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Kentucky, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania.

The oysters were sold as Fanny Bay, Buckley Bay, and Royal Miyagi.

The oysters were harvested between Dec. 1 and Dec. 9 from growing areas BC 14-8, Landfiles (LF) # 1413888, 1409240, 1402294, 1409454, 1402193, 1402293, 1402060, and growing area BC 14-15, LF # 249854.

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Symptoms of norovirus include diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, and stomach cramps. A fever may also develop.

Restaurants and retailers that have the oysters should throw them away, or return them to their distributor to be destroyed. The FDA also advised that shellfish can be a source of pathogens more generally, and the risk of cross-contamination of food processing equipment and the food processing environment must be averted.

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Roger Stone urges Trump to sue Illinois governor for calling him a “rapist”

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Roger Stone urges Trump to sue Illinois governor for calling him a “rapist”


What’s New

President-elect Donald Trump has been urged by former adviser Roger Stone follow up on his settled defamation lawsuit against ABC News by suing Democratic Illinois Governor JB Pritzker for calling him a “rapist.”

“I certainly hope the president will file this lawsuit and based on the precedent set by his lawsuit against ABC, I believe that he would get a judgment against JB Pritzker,” Stone said in a text message to Newsweek on Wednesday.

Newsweek reached out for comment to the offices of Trump and Pritzker via email on Wednesday.

Why It Matters

ABC News recently agreed to apologize and pay $15 million toward Trump’s future presidential library to settle a defamation lawsuit against the network and anchor George Stephanopoulos for incorrectly saying on air that a jury found Trump civilly liable for rape.

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A jury found Trump civilly liable last year for sexually abusing former Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll in the 1990s and defaming her by denying that an assault took place, although the judge presiding over the trial later said that Trump’s actions met “the meaning of ‘rape’ in common modern parlance.”

Former Trump adviser Roger Stone is pictured on the left, while Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is shown on the right. President-elect Donald Trump is featured in the inset image. Stone on Wednesday urged Trump to…


NICK OXFORD/AFP; Oleg Nikishin; Craig Barritt/Getty Images for Clinton Global Initiative

What To Know

While sharing an article on former Democratic Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich calling for Trump to sue Pritzker, Stone wrote the following on X, formerly Twitter, earlier on Wednesday: “President Trump should sue billionaire Governor JD [sic] Pritzker who falsely called him a rapist.”

Pritzker referred to Trump as an “adjudicated rapist” on multiple occasions while acting as a surrogate for the Democratic presidential campaigns of President Joe Biden and later Vice President Kamala Harris over the summer.

“Donald Trump is a convicted felon, an adjudicated rapist and a congenital liar,” Pritzker said during a speech in June. “He’s a racist, sexist, misogynistic narcissist who wants to use the levers of power to enrich himself and punish anyone who dares speak a word against him.”

What People Are Saying

Blagojevich—an outspoken Trump supporter since being granted clemency by the then-president in 2020 after serving several years in federal prison on corruption charges—called for Trump to follow up his ABC suit by taking similar legal action against Pritzker in a post to X on Monday.

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“Now that Trump successfully won his defamation case against ABC for calling him a ‘rapist,’ when will he sue Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker for repeatedly lying & calling him the same thing?” Blagojevich wrote.

What Happens Next

While it is unclear whether Trump intends to file a lawsuit against Pritzker, the former and future president has seemingly started a legal revenge campaign against critics and perceived political enemies before his inauguration on January 20.

Trump filed a lawsuit on Monday against retired pollster J. Ann Selzer, the Des Moines Register and its parent company Gannett for what he alleges was “brazen election interference” for publishing a poll that showed Harris with a narrow lead in The Hawkeye State shortly before the election.



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Prosecutors rest case in corruption trial of ex-Illinois House speaker Michael Madigan

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Prosecutors rest case in corruption trial of ex-Illinois House speaker Michael Madigan


The prosecution rested its case in the federal corruption trial of former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan on Wednesday.

The trial has been going on for several weeks as jurors have heard from former aides, business executives, elected officials, and others about Madigan’s power and influence in state government and his alleged schemes to benefit himself and his allies. 

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Attorneys are still expected to give their closing arguments in the coming days before jurors will be left to decide on a verdict.

The charges

Madigan, the longest-serving legislative leader in American history, was charged in a 23-count indictment for bribery, racketeering, wire fraud, and other crimes.

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He’s been accused of using his influence as Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives and as head of the state’s Democratic Party to amass more power and benefit his private tax law practice.

Among other schemes, Madigan is accused of using his influence in government to pass legislation favorable to certain companies like Commonwealth Edison, the electric utility company, in exchange for benefits like no-show jobs and internships for his allies.

“When Madigan saw an opportunity to enrich himself, he took it,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Streicker told the jurors.

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Madigan has denied wrongdoing. 

His longtime confidant Michael McClain is also standing trial, though he was already convicted in a separate but related bribery conspiracy case last year involving ComEd.

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Secret recordings

Prosecutors have played secret recordings made by witnesses like former Chicago Ald. Danny Solis, who led the powerful Zoning Committee.

During more than 23 hours of testimony, Solid told jurors that federal agents approached him in 2016, and he agreed to cooperate to avoid prison time for admitted wrongdoing, including bribery. He met with Madigan about projects in his ward as the former speaker sought business for his tax firm.

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Defense attorneys argued Solis was an unreliable witness for past financial wrongdoing and misspending campaign funds.

Solis said Madigan’s influence would be helpful to him, so he wanted to “curry favor” with the powerful speaker by introducing him to real estate developers whom he could recruit as clients.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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Crime and Public SafetyMichael MadiganNewsIllinois PoliticsIllinois



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