F-16s intercept plane during Obama visit

F-16s intercept plane during Obama visit

SOUTH BARRINGTON, Ill.

Two F-16 fighter jets intercepted a plane flown by a 75-year-old woman after it entered restricted airspace during President Barack Obama’s recent visit to Chicago, federal officials said Thursday.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command told The Daily Herald that the jets were summoned when air- traffic controllers couldn’t contact the pilot Wednesday afternoon. The president was in Chicago for a fundraiser celebrating his 50th birthday.

The jets intercepted the Kitfox Model 2, a kit airplane, piloted by Myrtle Rose of South Barrington, a Chicago suburb. Rose turned the plane around and returned to Mill Rose Farm Airport, NORAD spokesman Lt. Michael Humphreys said.

With such temporary flight restrictions, “there are no lines drawn in the air. It’s sometimes a little hard to tell where you’re at,” NORAD spokeswoman Stacey Knott told the newspaper. “Typically, it’s just a mistake.”

Va. Tech locked down over report of gun

BLACKSBURG, Va.

A report of a possible gunman at Virginia Tech on Thursday set off the longest, most extensive lockdown and search on campus since the bloodbath four years ago that led the university to overhaul its emergency procedures. No gunman was found, and the school gave the all-clear just before 3 p.m., about five hours after sirens began wailing and students and staff members started receiving warnings by phone, email and text message to lock themselves indoors. Alerts also were posted on the university’s website and Twitter accounts.

Clinton: 2,000 dead in Syrian crackdown

WASHINGTON

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Thursday accused the Syrian government of killing more than 2,000 of its own citizens during its ongoing brutal crackdown against opposition protesters as the Obama administration moved to further isolate President Bashar Assad and his inner circle. The administration is unhappy with Assad’s actions in trying to quell the 5-month-old uprising.

Police: Child-slaying suspect heard voices

NEW YORK

The man accused in the kidnapping and dismemberment killing of an 8-year-old New York City boy told detectives his victim put up a struggle and that afterward he was hearing voices telling him “to take his own life for what he did,” according to court papers made public Thursday. Police say Levi Aron made the remarks last month around the time he directed them to a trash bin where he dumped a red suitcase containing body parts. As the interrogation wore on, Aron told them, “I’m famous,” the papers say.

Entire police force resigns in Mexico city

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico

An entire 20-man police force resigned in a northern Mexican town after a series of attacks that killed the police chief and five officers over the last three months, state officials said Thursday.

The officers’ resignation Thursday left the 13,000 people of Ascension without local police services, Chihuahua state chief prosecutor Carlos Manuel Salas said. State and federal police have moved in to take over police work, he said.

The mass resignation appeared to be connected to a Tuesday attack by gunmen that killed three of the town’s officers, Salas said.

McCartney: I’ll go to police over hacking

LONDON

Former Beatle Paul McCartney said Thursday he would contact police over his ex-wife’s claim that the couple had been spied upon by a British newspaper.

In comments to U.S. television journalists delivered via videolink from Cincinnati, Ohio, McCartney said that he would be in touch with law enforcement as soon as he was finished with his summer tour.

Associated Press