gshc2020.com

The jet went down on Friday near the Miramar airbase in San Diego. “The pilot ejected, was transported to a local medical facility in stable condition for evaluation and treatment of non-life-threatening injuries,” the Marine Corps said in a statement.

Recommended Stories

• list 1 of 3US Senate’s Fauci hearing renews COVID origin debate but reveals little
• list 2 of 3US proposes cuts to Colorado River use for Arizona, California and Nevada
• list 3 of 3Trump administration to dismiss Reflecting Pool charges against David Hearn

Aerial video from a news helicopter showed a plume of black smoke rising from the wreckage in a dirt field, with multiple military and firefighting vehicles and people standing nearby. What appeared to be white flame retardant covered the ground, and at least one person was spraying the wreckage with a fire hose.

Candace Hadley, a spokesperson for San Diego Fire, said firefighters were on scene to respond to a vegetation fire that sparked near the crash site. She referred additional questions to Marine Corps Air Station Miramar.

The base used to host the Navy fighter pilot training school depicted in the original Top Gun movie and was known as “Fightertown USA” in its heyday. The school was relocated to Naval Air Station Fallon in Nevada in 1996 after the base was transferred to the Marine Corps.

The US Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force together have more than 630 F-35s, according to a 2024 analysis by the Government Accountability Office. The F-35B is one of several versions, and has an engine designed for short takeoffs and vertical landings. A single F-35B costs about $109m. The report estimated that the overall F-35 programme will cost roughly $2 trillion after the military buys more than 1,800 more jets and operates them for decades to come.

At least seven other military aircraft have crashed in the United States this year, according to the Flight Safety Foundation’s Aviation Safety Network database.

The most serious incident involved a B-52 bomber that crashed shortly after taking off in California’s Mojave Desert in June, killing all eight people on board. %!s()

It marked his second time at the festival, having played in 2018, and came after a rocky start to the month. On July 9, the musician pulled out of Cowboys Music Festival after sharing a vulnerable post earlier that week in which he addressed being called an “industry plant.” Fellow artists, celebs and fans responded with their support of the musician, including SZA, Lauren Jauregui, Alyssa Milano, and more. 

Onstage at Lolla, he appeared to put that all behind him, delivering a full throttle and very sweaty set. In an epic moment during the fest, the star brought up a fan from the swell of the crowd, Katie from Michigan, and handed her his guitar and pick. The duo launched into fan-favorite song “Fleabag” with Katie helming the ax, delivering a high-voltage performance that ended with Yungblud jumping off the stage to high fave and embrace more fans. The singer closed with Idols ballad “Zombie.”

The singer born Dominic Harrison drew a massive crowd to his set on the Bud Light stage. And among his fans are fellow musicians. He performed with Black Sabbath for what turned out to be Ozzy Osbourne’s final concert and performed a tribute to him at the MTV VMA Awards last September. He then teamed up with Aerosmith for a collaborative EP last November, and he released a new version of “Zombie” featuring the Smashing Pumpkins earlier this year. While he played a couple hours before the Pumpkins took the same stage as headliners on Friday, they did not join him for the song. Instead, Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan joined Yungblud last night during his Lollapalooza after show at the Riviera.

Trending Stories

Touring on his fourth and latest album, he highlighted songs from it, beginning with opener “Hello Heaven, Hello.” He paid tribute to Ozzy and Black Sabbath with “Changes” and also nodded to his Aerosmith collab with a performance of “My Only Angel.” It was a raucous return to form, which his fervent fans welcomed, in light of his previous nixed shows.

Editor’s picks

In an interview with Rolling Stone’s Music Now in January, he addressed that he had previously canceled some shows to consciously take better care of himself. “I always get myself checked after every tour I do, especially after this year. I have a tendency to run and run until the wheels fall off,” he said. “I think that’s how I’m built. It was the first time that I had medical advice. They were like, you got 18 months touring coming up. We think you should knock a couple gigs on the head at the end of this year. And I’m pretty grateful for that, to be honest, because it’s been such a mental year to be able to have the time to actually comprehend it and process it in my head. I go back out on tour in January and it runs till mid-’27 now. So I think it’s important to take that time and really process what’s going on and be grateful for it.” %!s()

Soldiers in the Guard’s Counterdrug Program and members of the 10th Civil Support Team learned to use the system, built by Anduril, to spot and target drones.

The system combines different highly sensitive sensors and software with advanced recognition technology. The system includes WISP, the Long Range Camera Tower, the Pulsar frequency sensor and Lattice software.

The system tracks drones in real-time and feeds data gathered from diverse sensors into a single channel for military personnel to evaluate.

In addition to being able to distinguish between drones, birds and other objects in the atmosphere, the system leverages sophisticated artificial intelligence capabilities that allow it to pinpoint the potential locations of hostile drone operators.

Deterring Hazardous Materials

The 10th Civil Support Team is the Guard’s response unit for biological and chemical attacks and frequently performs national security-related missions.

Lt. Col. Wes Watson, director of the Commander’s Action Group for Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems, said that the unit is concerned with drones being used to drop hazardous materials.

"CSTs have been exploring ways to defeat this delivery mechanism [drones] for years and would be vital in the response to a downed drone suspected of carrying a WMD [weapon of mass destruction],” Lt. Col. Wes Watson, director of the Commander’s Action Group for Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems, said in a statement.

MORE FOR YOU

Guardsmen spent two weeks of intensive training learning to use the detection system and plan to deploy it to provide security at large-scale public events.

“From our groundbreaking work in our Counterdrug program to the recent acquisition of an Anduril system as a byproduct of FIFA prep, we are getting after the challenges here with law, policy and domestic employment," Maj. Gen. Gent Welsh, adjutant general of the Washington National Guard, said in a statement.

The Guard troops plan to continue training with the new technology alongside federal agency partners including the FBI and Department of Homeland Security to gain further expertise in using it to detect drone threats within the United States. %!s()

“The FIFA Forward Enterprise project was intended to provide a basis for further strengthening our FIFA Member Associations and our sport worldwide, especially in those countries where support is most needed. And more so, as we said from the outset, to do this only if a majority of the FIFA Member Associations were in support and always subject to a consultation process with them, the FIFA Council, the Confederations and wider stakeholders,” Infantino said in a statement on Friday.

“Having listened carefully to all the views, it has become clear that the project has created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place,” he continued. “Our purpose has always been — and will always be — to unite and improve. As a result, this proposal will not proceed.”

The proposed plan would have consisted of FIFA setting up a new entity, FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), that would bundle soccer associated money-making operations while a significant stake would be sold to private investors. 20 percent of the company would have been sold to Thrive Capital, an invest group run by Joshua Kushner, the brother of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Backlash was immediate, with European soccer body UEFA saying on Thursday that if the plan went through, it would boycott FIFA events, including the World Cup. Three of the four semi-finalists of the 2026 men’s World Cup hailed from Europe, including this year’s champion, Spain.

Earlier this week, U.K. Prime Minister Andy Burnham released a statement online that read, “football does not belong to investors. It belongs to the people who fill the stands and who stand on the touchline week in, week out, rain or shine. The World Cup is not a product. It is the greatest competition in world sport, and it was never anyone’s to sell. Dress the deal up however you like. Once you have sold a piece of it, you have sold out.”

Infantino’s statement continued, “Moving forward, my intent is to bring all interested parties back together in the coming days and weeks in the spirit of shared interest in our game, and with the objective to continue growing football everywhere, particularly in those countries that mostly need our support.”
%!s()

Sure, there were some boos inside MetLife Stadium near New York when the two men walked across the turf to present the trophy and medals to Spain and Argentina players on July 19.

Recommended Stories

• list 1 of 4Infantino’s senior adviser resigns over ‘bad’ FIFA World Cup plan
• list 2 of 4FIFA defiant over World Cup investment plan: ‘nobody is selling football’
• list 3 of 4UEFA members vote to boycott FIFA if Infantino’s World Cup plans pursued
• list 4 of 4FIFA belongs to ‘no individual or institution’, blasts former boss Blatter

Still, that 104th and final game capped the biggest-ever tournament seen as a vindication for the FIFA president – a consensus success on the field and a financial bonanza for global football. Infantino could look ahead to his likely re-election coronation next March.

The sunny scene must now feel an age ago since Infantino caused a seismic rift in global football.

The intensifying fallout has threatened the 56-year-old Infantino’s job after he seemed untouchable until this week.

Did Infantino have any choice but to abandon FIFA World Cup investment plan?

Infantino’s misstep was inviting private investors, led by Joshua Kushner, to buy a stake in future profits from World Cups and all FIFA events. The ensuing backlash – which included pledges by European nations to boycott FIFA events and claims from senior staff that Infantino deceived everyone – led Infantino to announce Friday that he was abandoning the plan.

“Having listened carefully to all the views, it has become clear that the project has created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place,” he said in a statement.

Infantino left New York City last week with letters pledging election support from about 200 of FIFA’s 211 national member federations who vote for their leader every four years.

Now, even after scrapping his divisive investment project, his support remains unclear at best.

What would the private investment plan have done to for FIFA?

Infantino’s proposal would have created a subsidiary – known as FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) – for the money-making parts of the not-for-profit football body’s work: running tournaments like the World Cup, selling broadcasting and sponsorship, tickets and hospitality.

Private equity and petrostate sovereign wealth money has been normalised in European club football, yet it still seems unthinkable to many observers in the context of the World Cup. Football’s ultimate prize is seen as being about glory, not money, and fans have long believed it belongs to them.

FIFA proposed raising $4.2bn from investors buying a stake of about 20 percent in FFE, based on an equity valuation of $20bn. The “anchor investor” would have been Thrive Eternal, launched by Joshua Kushner, whose brother Jared Kushner is a son-in-law of Trump.

FIFA’s 211 member federations – already effectively the owners of the governing body as a nonprofit association under Swiss law – were offered $20m each. The deadline to accept was September 19.

The members already are due $10m each from FIFA over the next four years, funded largely by its record $15bn revenue over 2023-26 tied to the World Cup that just ended.

FIFA says under FFE, that would have doubled to $20m each, then rise to $22m each through 2034, and $24m to 2038.

That’s a huge sum for tiny football federations in places like Andorra, Montserrat and Papua New Guinea. Deep-pocketed football powers like England, Spain or France have other priorities.

Who were the main opponents of Infantino’s plan for FIFA and World Cups?

Some FIFA vice presidents, some of its top executives, all the European football federations, the football bodies of Asia and North America, Britain’s prime minister, the global group of national leagues, a lot of fans worldwide.

Essentially, everyone.

Infantino was looking increasingly friendless on Friday. His senior adviser, former Goldman Sachs banker Carlos Cordeiro, resigned and called it a bad deal. FIFA chief operating officer, Kevin Lamour, gave a stinging statement to The Associated Press news agency in defence of colleagues that all but invited his boss to fire him.

A key move Thursday was European football body UEFA pledging to boycott all FIFA competitions until Infantino dropped the plan.

Europe’s teams routinely dominate and win FIFA trophies like the men’s World Cup and Club World Cup, which are its biggest revenue earners.

They collectively feared that private investors would seek – and demand – value from more games and bigger competitions that threaten the balance of global football.

That could jeopardise attention and revenues for club football, including the UEFA Champions League.

Fixture calendars are already congested, elite players are at their limits, broadcast and sponsor money is not unlimited.

All are angry that Infantino seems not to have consulted anyone while planning the project over the last year, when he was so focused on spending time in Trump’s orbit. Even Trump said Friday he had not spoken with the FIFA chief on his plan to sell stakes in the tournament.

Did Infantino have any support for his plans for FIFA and World Cups?

Infantino’s traditional support base in Africa, which has 54 of the 211 voting members, had been neutral about the offers of game-changing money for many of them.

The 10-nation South American group CONMEBOL said on Friday it had received the proposal and would evaluate the issue “with the rigour it demands”. CONMEBOL is led by FIFA’s vice president, Alejandro Dominguez of Paraguay, who is relying on Infantino expanding the 2030 World Cup to 64 teams.

That would give more games to minority cohosts Argentina, Paraguay and inaugural 1930 World Cup host Uruguay, who currently are set to get just one game each of the 104. The rest are in Spain, Portugal and Morocco.

What happens now for Infantino in his role as FIFA president?

The UEFA-led resistance succeeded in stopping the sell-off plan. Will that satisfy Infantino’s opponents to allow him to remain in office?

Does Infantino have the credibility to stay in office after interventions Friday by Lamour and Cordeiro that surely would make most presidencies untenable?

November 18 is the deadline for candidates to enter the next presidential contest, exactly four months ahead of the March 19 vote in Rabat, Morocco, where FIFA has its African headquarters.

Infantino was re-elected unopposed in 2019 in Paris and 2023 in Kigali, Rwanda. FIFA statutes allow him one more four-year term in office.

The FFE spinoff seemed a way to create a commissioner-like role for Infantino beyond 2031, likely paying much more than his current annual salary and bonus deal of more than $6m.

It would take 106 votes to ensure a majority in a contested election. Continents surely do not vote uniformly en bloc, but most of Europe’s 55, plus CONCACAF’s 35 and Asia’s 46 would be a solid base.

Speculation on a likely direct challenger typically lands on Paris Saint-Germain’s Qatari president Nasser Al-Khelaifi and the Canadian FIFA vice president, Victor Montagliani.

Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa, the AFC’s longtime president from Bahrain, narrowly lost the FIFA presidential election to Infantino in 2016, so may decide to run again.

All such talk seemed fanciful until this week, despite long-term unease with Infantino’s style and previous attempts to force through unpopular projects.

The talk has never seemed more likely to become action. %!s()