Texas:

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi began his three-day visit to the US, arriving in Dallas, Texas, on Sunday, where he was warmly welcomed by members of the Indian diaspora and the Indian Overseas Congress (IOC).

Taking to his social media, the Congress leader shared the pictures of his welcome and wrote, “I am truly delighted by the warm welcome I’ve received in Dallas, Texas, USA, from the Indian Diaspora and members of the Indian Overseas Congress.”

“I eagerly look forward to engaging in meaningful discussions and insightful conversations that will further strengthen the bond between our two nations during this visit,” he added.

This is Rahul Gandhi’s first trip to America since the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The Congress leader will be in Dallas, Texas, on September 8 and in Washington, DC, on September 9-10.

Earlier, announcing Rahul Gandhi’s visit, IOC chief Sam Pitroda said that the Indian diaspora, including NRI residents, technocrats, business leaders, students, media fraternity and even political leaders, are eager to welcome the Congress MP and are looking forward to having an interaction with him.

“There are lots of events planned with a variety of people because they also have interest in the states where Congress party runs governments, particularly the tech cities like Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Pune. We see great interest in conversation with business and technological community,” he further informed.

“We look forward to a very successful visit and look forward to welcoming Rahul Gandhi to the US,” Pitroda said on a concluding note.

He also said that he was ‘bombarded’ with questions about Rahul Gandhi’s US visit from various quarters, and this video message was apparently to inform them about the Congress leader’s short but highly anticipated trip to the US.

Notably, Rahul Gandhi, after the 2024 Lok Sabha results, has been creating good momentum and garnering people’s support with his views on many issues of public interest. Political watchers anticipate his US visit to be more newsworthy and stir larger controversy back home this time.

Rahul won elections from two Lok Sabha constituencies – Rae Bareli and Wayanad, however, he chose to retain the former and leave the latter for his sister, Priyanka Gandhi.

In June this year, he was appointed the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha after getting a nod from the Congress Working Committee (CWC).

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A 16-year-old high school student in Texas died after collapsing during a cross-country meet.

According to The Cinco Peso Press, the school newspaper at Chisholm Trail High School in Fort Worth, Angel Hernandez, who had finished first in a three-mile race, lost his life on October 13.

Teachers at the school conveyed the heartbreaking news to students during their classes, revealing that Mr Hernandez had passed away at a hospital following the race.

One of his teammates, Alejandro Bailey, told the paper, “As the moment was happening all any of us could think about is that hopefully he could pull through this and that we needed him. I was trying to focus on just trying to stay strong for him.”

Mr Bailey also remembered his dear friend and said that he “was like family to the team.”

Chisholm Trail head coach Joe Gifford told MileSplit that “after crossing the finish line, Mr Hernandez collapsed. It’s what you’d expect from a kid at the district championships after running a PR.”

Initially, Mr Hernandez was assisted to the water station by one of his teammates, but unfortunately, he fell back down.

“When the firemen arrived, Angel [Hernandez] was not breathing and they did all they could do to resuscitate him and they transported him to the hospital,” Gifford added. 

Cross country coach Randall Durant, in his statement after Mr Hernandez’s death, said, “Every conversation you had with Angel, he was kind of like an old soul a little bit which means he was mature. He was always interested in what you were doing and what you had to say, and not always just about himself. He was very in tune with other people.” 

A cave diver known for his record-breaking dives and contributions to scientific research has died while exploring one of the deepest underwater caves in the United States. According to The Independent, Brett Hemphill was the president of a non-profit organisation called Karst Underwater Research (KUR). He was 56 years old and had an illustrious career as a cave explorer. He spent over 25 years smashing diving records and collecting scientific data. 

Mr Hemphill’s body was recovered on Sunday, days after the 56-year-old had gone missing during an expedition with his colleague Andy Pitkin. He was last seen on video tying off a guideline at approximately 570 feet before the team became separated. Mr Hemphill never resurfaced from the cave, the KUR said in a statement, as per The Independent. 

Two divers then began exploring the Phantom Springs Cave in West Texas on October 4. The KUR said that it suspected that Mr Hemphill was stuck over a mile inside an underwater cave, and so multiple recovery divers travelled “thousands of miles” to assist in the search. 

“All cave recovery divers are self-supported – there are no organizations that fund those efforts. Cave diver recoveries are logistically difficult and this one is especially so,” the statement said.

Divers then finally recovered Mr Hemphill’s body from the cave on Sunday, four days after he divided underwater. His colleague Any Pitikin issued a statement through the research centre to announce that his body had been found and recovered. “Please allow us some time to come to terms with his loss, as up until now we have been focused on the recovery,” the statement said.

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The 56-year-old had a passion for discovery at a young age, having explored an undiscovered section of a cave during a youth dry cave excursion, according to his biography on the KUR website. From there, he went on to lead several exploration groups and broke a number of underwater diving records. 

According to People Magazine, Mr Hemphill broke the United States deep underwater cave record at Weeki Wachee Springs in the state of Florida in 2018. In 2014, his team also made the deepest connection between two underwater caves in the United States, the Weeki Wachee and Twin Dees caves.

The 56-year-old even explored and researched caves in cities across the globe, including the Bahamas, Cay Sal Banks, Dominican Republic and the Yucatan Peninsula, according to his profile on the research centre’s website.

Billionaire Elon Musk has expressed concern over a video showing streaming across the US border with Mexico into Eagle Pass, Texas. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Mr Musk demanded “preventive action” while claiming that about two million people are entering through the US border every year. This comes as an overwhelmed city of Texas declared an emergency on the issue, according to New York Times (NYT). Texas’ Mayor Rolando Salinas said 7,200 people have illegally crossed the border in the previous week, with 2,500 on Monday alone.

“Strange that there is almost no legacy media coverage of this. About 2 million people – from every country on Earth – are entering through the US southern border every year. The number is rising rapidly, yet no preventive action is taken by the current administration,” Mr Musk said in his post.

Strange that there is almost no legacy media coverage of this.

About 2 million people – from every country on Earth – are entering through the US southern border every year.

The number is rising rapidly, yet no preventive action is taken by the current administration. https://t.co/EF7HTS1ktT

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 20, 2023

He reacted to a video that showed thousands of migrants standing under the bride at Eagle Pass, waiting to cross into the US. One of the clips also showed them casually walking towards the US border.

The arrivals included a large number of people from Venezuela. The substantial increase has put additional strain on local governments in California, Arizona and Texas. The lone shelter provider in Texas failed to accommodate the sudden surge in the number of migrants and many were released onto the streets of the city, said the NYT report.

“They are walking around the streets. The hospital is getting swamped also,” Mr Salinas told the outlet, adding that the situation is similar to what the city experienced in 2021.

Eagle Pass has a US Customs and Border Protection processing facility which opened in 2022 with a capacity for 1,000 people.