Water cuts in US West to hammer farmers; new wildfires ravage West; Tropical Storm Fred on Florida track
Associated Press, CNN
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Today is Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021. Let’s get caught up.
Here are today’s top stories, celebrity birthdays and a look back at this date in history:
TOP STORIES
First water cuts in US West supply to hammer Arizona farmers
CASA GRANDE, Ariz. — A harvester rumbles through the fields in the early morning light, mowing down rows of corn and chopping up ears, husks and stalks into mulch for feed at a local dairy.
The cows won’t get their salad next year, at least not from this farm. There won’t be enough water to plant the corn crop.
Climate change, drought and high demand are expected to force the first-ever mandatory cuts to a water supply that 40 million people across the American West depend on — the Colorado River. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation’s projection next week will spare cities and tribes but hit Arizona farmers hard.
Keep scrolling for a link to the full story and more top headlines:
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Wildfire bears down on Montana towns as West burns
LAME DEER, Mont. — A wildfire bore down on rural southeastern Montana towns Thursday as continuing hot, dry weather throughout the West drove flames through more than a dozen states.
Several thousand people remained under evacuation orders as the Richard Spring Fire advanced across the sparsely-populated Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation.
Meanwhile, the Dixie Fire — which started July 13 and is the largest wildfire burning in the nation — threatened a dozen small communities in the northern Sierra Nevada even though its southern end was mostly corralled by fire lines.
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Power outages hit Dominican Republic as TS Fred weakens
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Tropical Storm Fred swept into the Dominican Republic on Wednesday, then weakened to a tropical depression after nightfall while dumping heavy rains that forecasters warned could cause dangerous flooding and mudslides there and in neighboring Haiti.
Some 300,000 customers were without power in the Dominican Republic and more than a half million were affected by swollen rivers that forced part of the aqueduct system to shut down, government officials reported.
After a quiet month of no named storms in the region, Fred became the sixth of the Atlantic hurricane season late Tuesday as it moved past the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico on a forecast track that would carry it toward Florida over the weekend.
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Click on the links below for full version of today’s top stories. Keep scrolling for a look back at this day in history and today’s celebrity birthdays:
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IMAGE OF THE DAY
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TODAY IN HISTORY
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO …
AP Photo/Michael Probst
A man rides his bike on a small road in the outskirts of Frankfurt, Germany, early Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021.
AP Photo/Darryl Webb
Will Thelander, a partner in his family’s farming business, looks into a dry irrigation canal on his property, Thursday, July 22, 2021, in Casa Grande, Ariz.
NOAA/NESDIS/STAR GOES via AP
This satellite image provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shows a Tropical Storm Fred in the Caribbean as it passes south of Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic at 8am EST, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021.
AP Photo/Matthew Brown
Firefighters watch a hillside burn on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation, Wednesday, Aug 11, 2021, near Lame Deer, Mont. The Richard Spring fire was threatening hundreds of homes as it burned across the reservation.
AP FILE
2007 — Tiger Woods captures the PGA Championship to win at least one major for the third straight season and run his career total to 13. Woods closes with a 1-under 69 for a two-shot victory over Woody Austin.
AP FILE
2011 — Tiger Woods misses the cut at the PGA Championship at Atlanta Athletic Club. With one final bogey for a 3-over 73, Woods finishes out of the top 100 for the first time ever in a major. He is 15 shots behind Jason Dufner and Keegan Bradley.
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2012 — Rory McIlroy breaks the PGA Championship record for margin of victory that Jack Nicklaus set in 1980. McIlroy sinks one last birdie from 25 feet on the 18th hole to give him a 6-under 66 for an eight-shot victory. McIlroy closes out a remarkable week by playing bogey-free over the final 23 holes of a demanding Ocean Course at Kiawah Island, S.C.
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2012 — The U.S. men’s basketball team defend its title by fighting off another huge challenge from Spain, pulling away in the final minutes for a 107-100 victory and its second straight Olympic championship. The victory by the men’s basketball team gives the United States its 46th gold medal in London, the most ever by Americans in a “road” Olympics.
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2016 — Katie Ledecky caps off one of the greatest performances in Olympic history with her fourth gold medal and second world record, shattering her own mark in the 800-meter freestyle. Ledecky is the first woman since Debbie Meyer swept the three longer freestyle events at the same Olympics. Meyer took the 200, 400 and 800 at the 1968 Mexico Games.
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2017 — Usain Bolt ends his stellar career in excruciating pain. The Jamaican great crumples to the track with a left-leg injury while chasing a final gold medal for the Jamaican 4x100-meter relay team at the world championships in London. Having to make up lots of ground on the anchor leg, Bolt suddenly screams and stumbles as he comes down with the first injury he has experienced at a major competition.
AP FILE
2018 — Brooks Koepka wins his first PGA Championship, playing poised and mistake-free golf down the stretch amid ear-splitting roars for Tiger Woods and a late charge from revitalized Adam Scott. Koepka becomes the fifth player to win the U.S. Open and the PGA in the same year.
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Actor Bruce Greenwood is 65.
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Actor Cara Delevingne (DEHL’-eh-veen) is 29.
AP
Actor Casey Affleck is 46.
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Actor George Hamilton is 82.
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Actor Imani Hakim is 28.
AP
NBA All-Star Khris Middleton is 30.
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Actor Lakeith Stanfield is 30.
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Actor Leah Pipes is 33.
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Actor Maggie Lawson is 41.
AP
Rock singer-musician Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits) is 72.
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Actor-comedian Michael Ian Black is 50.
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Jazz musician Pat Metheny is 67.
AP
International Tennis Hall of Famer Pete Sampras is 50.
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Actor Peter Krause (KROW’-zuh) is 56.
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Actor Rebecca Gayheart is 50.
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Pop musician Roy Hay (Culture Club) is 60.
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Rapper Sir Mix-A-Lot is 58.
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Actor Yvette Nicole Brown is 50.
Library of Congress
In 1867, President Andrew Johnson sparked a move to impeach him as he defied Congress by suspending Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, with whom he had clashed over Reconstruction policies. (Johnson was acquitted by the Senate.)
AP
In 1909, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, home to the Indianapolis 500, first opened.
AP
In 1939, the MGM movie musical “The Wizard of Oz,” starring Judy Garland, had its world premiere at the Strand Theater in Oconomowoc (oh-KAH’-noh-moh-wahk), Wisconsin, three days before opening in Hollywood.
AP
In 1964, author Ian Fleming, 56, the creator of James Bond, died in Canterbury, Kent, England.
AP
In 1985, the world’s worst single-aircraft disaster occurred as a crippled Japan Airlines Boeing 747 on a domestic flight crashed into a mountain, killing 520 people. (Four people survived.)
AP
In 1994, in baseball’s eighth work stoppage since 1972, players went on strike rather than allow team owners to limit their salaries. (The strike ended in April 1995.)
AP
In 2000, the Russian nuclear submarine Kursk and its 118-man crew were lost during naval exercises in the Barents Sea.
AP
Ten years ago: Tiger Woods missed the cut at the PGA Championship at Atlanta Athletic Club with a 3-over 73, finishing out of the top 100 for the first time ever in a major.
Jane Flavell Collins
In 2013, James “Whitey” Bulger, the feared Boston mob boss who became one of the nation’s most-wanted fugitives, was convicted in a string of 11 killings and dozens of other gangland crimes, many of them committed while he was said to be an FBI informant. (Bulger was sentenced to life; he was fatally beaten at a West Virginia prison in 2018, hours after being transferred from a facility in Florida.)
Pool, The Post-Crescent
Five years ago: A judge in Milwaukee overturned the conviction of Brendan Dassey, who was found guilty of helping his uncle kill a woman in a case profiled in the Netflix series “Making a Murderer,” ruling that investigators coerced a confession using deceptive tactics. (The ruling was later overturned by a federal appeals court; the U.S. Supreme Court would decline to hear the case.)
AP
Five years ago: Katie Ledecky won her fourth gold medal of the Rio Olympics, shattering her own mark in the 800-meter freestyle.
AP
In 2017, a car plowed into a crowd of people peacefully protesting a white nationalist rally in the Virginia college town of Charlottesville, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer and hurting more than a dozen others. (The attacker, James Alex Fields, was sentenced to life in prison on 29 federal hate crime charges, and life plus 419 years on state charges.) President Donald Trump condemned what he called an “egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides.”
AP
One year ago: President Donald Trump again pressed Congress to steer future coronavirus funding away from schools that did not reopen in the fall. Seattle’s school board voted unanimously to begin the academic year with remote teaching only.
AP
One year ago: Appearing together for the first time as running mates, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris put aside their one-time political rivalry to deliver an aggressive attack on the character and performance of President Donald Trump; because of the coronavirus, their appearance came in a mostly empty high school gym in Delaware.
Seth Wenig
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo prepares to board a helicopter after announcing his resignation, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, in New York. Cuomo says he will resign over a barrage of sexual harassment allegations. The three-term Democratic governor's decision, which will take effect in two weeks, was announced Tuesday as momentum built in the Legislature to remove him by impeachment. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
Evan Vucci
President Joe Biden gestures as he takes questions from members of the media after speaking about the bipartisan infrastructure bill from the East Room of the White House, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, in Washington. Vice President Kamala Harris listens at left. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Francois Mori
Lionel Messi waves after arriving at Le Bourget airport, north of Paris, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. Lionel Messi finalized agreement on his Paris Saint-Germain contract and was flying to France on Tuesday to complete the move that confirms the end of a career-long association with Barcelona. (AP Photo/Francois Mori)
Salvatore Cavalli
A volunteer leaves for some rest after trying to control fire in the Municipality of Blufi, in the upper Madonie, near Palermo, Sicily, Italy, as many wildfires continue plaguing the region. Sicily, Sardinia, Calabria and also central Italy, where temperatures are expected to reach record hights, were badly hit by wildfires. Climate scientists say there is little doubt that climate change from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas is driving extreme events, such as heat waves, droughts, wildfires, floods and storms. (AP Photo/Salvatore Cavalli)
Eraldo Peres
Supporters of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro cheer with a Brazilian flag as protesters in opposition to the president hold flowers to give to soldiers from a military convoy that paraded by Planalto presidential palace and parked outside the Navy headquarters in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. The convoy paraded by the palace on Tuesday, the day of a key congressional vote on a constitutional reform proposal supported by Bolsonaro that would add printed receipts to some of the nation’s electronic ballot boxes. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)
Andrew Harnik
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y. walks off the Senate floor and pumps his fists as the Senate approves a $1 trillion bipartisan cornerstone of the Biden agenda to the House, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Marcio Jose Sanchez
Toronto Blue Jays first baseman Vladimir Guerrero Jr. commits a fielding error allowing two runs to score on a fly ball from Los Angeles Angels' Jo Adell during the fifth inning in the first baseball game of a doubleheader Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, in Anaheim, Calif. (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)
Ajit Solanki
Homeless people await their turn to get COVID-19 vaccine during a special vaccination drive at a shelter for homeless people in Ahmedabad, India, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. (AP Photo/Ajit Solanki)
Charles Krupa
Boston Red Sox relief pitcher Hirokazu Sawamura yells after Tampa Bay Rays' Austin Meadows lined out to left to end the top of the sixth inning of a baseball game at Fenway Park, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, in Boston. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)
Elaine Thompson
Texas Rangers' Jonah Heim scores as Seattle Mariners catcher Tom Murphy drops the ball after the tag during the fifth inning of a baseball game Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)
Riccardo De Luca
Pope Francis speaks on a cell phone, given to him by his aide Piergiorgio Zanetti, at the end of his weekly general audience in the Paul VI hall at the Vatican, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021. (AP Photo/Riccardo De Luca)
Colin E. Braley
Kansas City Royals' Salvador Perez is doused with water following the team's 8-4 win over the New York Yankees in a baseball game at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, Mo., Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. Perez hit two home runs in the game. (AP Photo/Colin E. Braley)
Jeff Chiu
San Francisco Giants' Kris Bryant, middle, celebrates with LaMonte Wade Jr., left, and Mike Yastrzemski after the Giants defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks 8-7 in a baseball game in San Francisco, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
Jorge Saenz
Farmers, Indigenous and bus drivers march to various government offices as they protest for government assistance in downtown Asuncion, Paraguay, Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2021, amid the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP Photo/Jorge Saenz)
Michael Probst
Trains are parked outside the central train station in Frankfurt, Germany, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021. Train drivers of the German GDL union asking for higher wages started a strike two hours after midnight. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
