Turkey sentences 8 people to prison terms in deadly 2024 cable car accident

ISTANBUL (AP) — A court in southern Turkey sentenced eight people on Monday to prison terms over a 2024cable car accidentin the coastal resort of Antalya that killed one passenger and injured seven.

Four of the defendants were convicted of causing death and injury through negligence and were sentenced to 7½ years each, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported. The other four were sentenced to between three years and four months and five years for the same offense.

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In the April 12, 2024 accident, one of the cable car gondolas hit a pole and burst open, sending its passengers plummeting to the rocks below. The cable car system then shut down, leaving 174 people stranded in their gondolas high above ground — some for nearly 23 hours — before they were rescued.

The cable car carries tourists from Konyaalti Beach to a restaurant and viewing platform at the summit of the 618-meter (2,010-foot) Tunektepe peak. The accident happened during the Eid al-Fitr holiday marking the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Most of the defendants in the case were employees were employees of ANET, a subsidiary of Antalya Metropolitan Municipality that operates the cable car in the Mediterranean city.

byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 22, 2026

Turkey sentences 8 people to prison terms in deadly 2024 cable car accident

ISTANBUL (AP) — A court in southern Turkey sentenced eight people on Monday to prison terms over a 2024cable car accidentin the coastal...

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Woman’s body found in northeastern Japan after bear attacks police officer

A woman’s body was found by authorities in northeasternJapan’s Iwate prefecture, shortly after a police officer was injured in abearencounter while searching for a missing person in the area.

The 56-year-old officer suffered wounds to his arm and face after coming across the animal near a stream on Tuesday.

He remained conscious while being taken to the hospital, local authorities said on Tuesday. Authorities believe thebearwas an adult. A short distance away, the search team later found the woman’s body.

A hunter accompanying the team shot and killed the bear, an adult measuring about 1.3m.

Mainichi Shimbunreported that the police officers were searching for the driver of a vehicle found on a road with its engine running late Monday afternoon when the bear attacked the officer.

If the death is officially confirmed as abear attack, it would markJapan’s first such fatality of 2026, following a series of incidents in recent years. The details of whether the injuries on the woman’s body were in line with bear attack could not be ascertained.

The last bear attack occurred on 3 November last year in Yuzawa, in neighbouring Akita prefecture, according to the environment ministry.

Bear encounters inJapanhave become increasingly dangerous, with 13 deaths recorded nationwide since April last year, including several in Iwate alone. Hundreds were injured. Five people were killed in bear attacks between July and October last year in the prefecture – four of them in October alone, the government data shows.

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The attacks had left the residents in the area scared, especially in Iwate and Akita prefectures and in fact it was reported at the time that they were carrying bags with bells to scare off the animals.

Japan had deployed its Self-Defence Forces (SDF) to the Akita prefecture to help contain an increase in the deadly attacks, as bear sightings in the region jumped sixfold to over 8,000 last year till November.

The Japan Tourism Agency was planning to subsidise up to half the cost of installing protective fences around its open-air baths at traditional inns and hotels following the rise in bear sightings near popular tourist areas.

In Akita, residents said at the time that bears were increasingly straying into villages and near shops in sparsely populated rural areas. Experts noted that this is likely driven by dwindling natural food supplies.

They say bear attacks usually rise in autumn before hibernation, but climate change and a shortage of their usual beech nut food may be pushing them into towns.

Experts also warn that Japan’s bear population – now more than 50,000 across brown and black species – has outgrown the country’s mountainous habitats, with climate change, rural depopulation, and declining hunter numbers worsening the crisis.

Japanese black bears, found across much of the country, can grow to around 130kg, while the larger brown bears that inhabit the northern island of Hokkaido can reach weights of up to 400kg.

Japan reinstated bear population control measures in 2024 after years of protection, but efforts are hampered by a shortage of hunters, now fewer than half the number in 1980 and mostly elderly.

Despite limited resources, authorities culled over 9,000 bears in 2023-24 and more than 4,200 between April and September last year, including over 1,000 in Akita prefecture alone.

byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 22, 2026

Woman’s body found in northeastern Japan after bear attacks police officer

A woman’s body was found by authorities in northeasternJapan’s Iwate prefecture, shortly after a police officer was injured in abearenc...

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FBI investigating deaths, disappearances of staff at government labs

The FBI is leading the effort to look for possible connections into the cases of 10 missing or deceased scientists and staff who worked at sensitive nuclear or space technology laboratories, according to senior law enforcement officials.

In a statement Tuesday, the FBI confirmed it is "spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists. We are working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state and state and local law enforcement partners to find answers."

But those close to the various investigations into the disparate cases have said they see no links between them.

President Trump mentioned concerns about it last week.

"I just left a meeting on that subject, so pretty serious stuff," Mr. Trump told reporters Thursday. "Hopefully, coincidence... but some of them were very important people, and we are going to look at it."

Social media has recently lit up with theories about the disappearances and deaths, which occurred over three years and involved several researchers and other staff with ties to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory. Speculation has swirled about whether there's some kind of plot to harm U.S. nuclear or space programs.

Those involved in the various cases, however, have said that what underlies these deaths and disappearances is not a spy-thriller plot, but something more personal and tragic.

Retired Major General William Neil McCasland, 68, waslast seen at his homein Albuquerque, New Mexico, in late February. His wife, Susan McCasland Wilkerson, said in a Facebook post that it "seems quite unlikely that he was taken to extract very dated secrets from him." Her husband retired from the Air Force more than 12 years ago.

McCasland's disappearance has sparked significant online speculation about potential connections to classified military programs and UFOs because of his past role as the commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory on the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. He's one of four current or former employees at sensitive sites who've gone missing in New Mexico over roughly the last year.

The FBI's role has evolved since last week, when a well-placed government source told CBS News on April 16 that the FBI was not investigating the disappearances and deaths as part of a suspicious pattern. Rather, the Department of Energy, which oversees NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory, was looking into it.

FBI spokesman Ben Williamson described the issue last week as a "developing situation."

"The FBI is aware and providing all assistance requested," he said. "Usually what happens is we are not the lead in cases like this unless local authorities request."

FBI Director Kash Patel signaled the stepped-up involvement on Sunday, telling Fox News, "The FBI is going to be spearheading the effort, collectively with our partners at the Department of Energy and the Department of War."

In a statement to CBS News, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said the agency is paying attention to fears the cases may be linked.

"NNSA is aware of reports related to employees of our labs, plants, and sites and is looking into the matter," a spokesperson for NNSA told CBS News.

Current and former Energy Department officials acknowledged the pattern is "eyebrow raising" and that department staff and its contractors at the National Laboratories do indeed risk becoming the targets of foreign espionage. But one former staffer said they have seen no evidence of any link in these cases.

"People do just die. Strokes, heard disease, suicide, mugging, it happens," the former DOE official said.

The facilities in question combined employ more than 20,000 people, many of whom work in administrative and support roles and do not have access to secret information.

"If you attach 'nuclear weapons facility' and some sketchy sounding job title, it could conceal how mundane someone's job may be," the former DOE official said.

CBS News interviewed several energy security and law enforcement experts. None saw an obvious link between the cases.

"The deaths and missing persons cases are scattered across several years at different and only loosely affiliated organizations," said Joseph Rodgers, the deputy director of the Project on Nuclear Issues at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "If all of the scientists were working on one project or weapons system, then I'd be more suspicious."

Scott Roecker, vice president for nuclear materials security at the Nuclear Threat Initiative, who worked on nuclear security issues for the U.S. government for more than 15 years, said the current war in Iran may factor into people's thinking.

"If you were looking at a foreign adversary, Iran might come to mind because of the Iranian nuclear scientists who have been assassinated," Roecker said.

"But we're not like Iran. We have thousands of scientists. We have a robust infrastructure. So there would be nothing strategic Iran could achieve by taking out 10 or 20 of our nuclear scientists, as tragic as the individual deaths might be," Roecker said.

Of the 10 that have garnered speculation online, one scientist disappeared while hiking in California, five died, and four people ranging from a general to an administrative staffer went missing in New Mexico over the past year. One of the five was anMIT professor killed at his doorstepby a former Portuguese classmate who was later determined to be the Brown Universitymass shooter.

New Mexico disappearances

McCasland, the retired general, left home in February without his phone, any wearable devices or his prescription glasses. All he had with him were a pair of hiking boots, his wallet, and a 38-caliber revolver.

Search and rescue teams led by the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office and aided by state and federal agencies deployed drones and K9s in their efforts to find him. A gray U.S. Air Force sweatshirt found a mile and a quarter east of his home was picked up by investigators on March 7, but otherwise there's apparently been no trace of him.

His disappearance sparked swirling speculation online that McCasland was taken against his will in part because of his work consulting for a non-government group that was probing the government's UFO files.  His wife acknowledged in the Facebook post that he had a brief association with a community of people pushing for the government to release files about UFOs, but she dismissed any notion that his disappearance was connected to that.

"Neil does not have any special knowledge about the ET bodies and debris from the Roswell crash stored at Wright-Patt," she wrote in jest in the Facebook post, referring to conspiracy theories about aliens being found in the desert.

"Though at this point with absolutely no sign of him, maybe the best hypothesis is that aliens beamed him up to the mothership. However, no sightings of a mothership hovering above the Sandia Mountains have been reported," she wrote.

The FBI has been assisting local law enforcement in the search for McCasland, according to the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office.

"Investigators have so far uncovered no evidence of foul play," according to an official in Bernalillo County, which includes the Albuquerque metro area. The official added that the investigation is ongoing.

Albuquerque area officials are also searching for 48-year-old Steven Garcia, who disappeared last August. Garcia reportedly worked as a property custodian for the National Nuclear Security Administration's Kansas City National Security Campus in Albuquerque.

A couple of hours' drive north of Albuquerque, local police have been investigating the disappearances of two employees at Los Alamos.

Melissa Casias, 53, worked at Los Alamos for years and was last seen walking alone on a highway wearing a backpack, according to a family member who has reviewed the surveillance footage.

"Melissa was an administrative assistant and did not have high-level clearance," said her niece, Jazmin McMillen.

"I'm happy to see Melissa's case getting attention but I haven't seen any evidence linking her to any of the other cases," said McMillen, who organized family search parties and has reviewed multiple pages of police documents related to the case.

In May of last year, Anthony Chavez, 78, who had also held a job at Los Alamos, went missing. Los Alamos police are asking for the public's assistance in finding him.

A California hiker

The disappearance of an accomplished scientist in California has garnered almost as much speculation in media reports as McCasland's in New Mexico.

Monica Jacinton Reza, a 60-year-old aerospace engineer who worked on rocket engines, disappeared on June 22, 2025, while hiking in Los Angeles County.

AFacebook pagedevoted to the search for her includes pictures of her and asks for experienced hikers to help scour the rough terrain.

Murders and other deaths

Investigators say MIT ProfessorNuno Lureiro, an expert in fusion and plasma physics, was shot and killed at his home in the Boston area last December by Claudio Neves Valente, a jealous former engineering classmate who had studied in the same program with Lureiro two decades ago. Valente, who had spent time at Brown University's engineering program also carried out a mass shooting on campus thatkilled two studentsand wounded nine others just one day before he shot and killed Lureiro.

Carl Grillmair, a Caltech astrophysicist, wasshot to deathon his front porch in Los Angeles County in February. An obituary for Grillmair said he was the recipient of the 2011 NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal and numerous NASA Group Achievement Awards. A 29 year old man charged with his murder was released from prison last December by a judge using an "unnecessary prosecutions" law.

The body of Novartis researcher Jason Thomas was recovered from a Massachusetts lake last month, three months after Thomas was reported missing. His wife told NBC News he was distraught following the death of both of his parents last year.

NASA's Frank Maiwald died July 4, 2024, at 61 in Los Angeles.

Michael David Hicks, a physicist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, died in July 2023 at the age of 59.

CBS News reviewed obituaries, statements from family members and law enforcement findings and found no links between any of the deaths.

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byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 21, 2026

FBI investigating deaths, disappearances of staff at government labs

The FBI is leading the effort to look for possible connections into the cases of 10 missing or deceased scientists and staff who worked...

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NBA playoffs 2026: Raptors' Immanuel Quickley out for Game 1 vs. Cavaliers with strained hamstring

The Toronto Raptors will be without starting point guard Immanuel Quickley as they begin their first-round NBA playoff series versus the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Quickley is out for Saturday’sGame 1with a strained right hamstring he suffered in Toronto’s final regular-season game last Sunday against the Brooklyn Nets. He did not play the second half of that matchup after playing 17 minutes in the first half.

The six-year veteran missed eight games from late March to early April due to plantar fasciitis in his right foot. There’s no indication the foot condition led to his hamstring injury, though it’s a possibility.

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Quickley, 26, was the Raptors’ leading 3-point shooter this season with 476 attempts. His 37% rate was second among Toronto scorers to Brandon Ingram’s 38% (on 353 attempts). He was the team’s fourth-leading scorer, averaging 16.4 points per game with 5.9 assists, 4 rebounds and 1.4 steals.

As it applies to the matchup with the Cavaliers, Quickley would have been the primary defender on Donovan Mitchell. Jamal Shead will replace Quickley in the Toronto starting lineup and thus draw the defensive assignment on Mitchell, who led Cleveland in scoring with 27.9 points per game.

Scottie Barnes is regarded as the Raptors’ best defensive player, but will likely be occupied with checking James Harden (20.5 points per game) throughout the series.

byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 21, 2026

NBA playoffs 2026: Raptors' Immanuel Quickley out for Game 1 vs. Cavaliers with strained hamstring

The Toronto Raptors will be without starting point guard Immanuel Quickley as they begin their first-round NBA playoff series versus th...

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No cuddles, but lots of care: How a Paris-area wildlife hospital keeps rescued animals wild

MAISONS-ALFORT, France (AP) — Awildlifehospital in a southeasternParissuburb is a place of no cuddles but lots of care. It helps injured, sick and orphaned animals — often victims of human activity and increasing urbanization — heal so they can return to their natural habitat.

France Wildlife Hospital

Last week, a female fox cub was found alone in a garden on the city's outskirts, with no sign of her mother nearby. Now a team of volunteers takes care of her around the clock.

“We’ll make sure she’s eating well,” animal caretaker Valentin Delon said. “If that’s not the case, we might provide supplemental bottles to ensure she gains enough weight.”

Over the past year, the Wildlife Veterinary Hospital in Maisons-Alfort has taken in more than 10,400 wild animals, including a wide variety of birds and European mammals such as foxes, deer andhedgehogs.

Like the little brown-furred cub, the animals can easily capture a caretaker's heart — but bonding with humans is not an option when the goal is to eventually return them to the wild.

Caring for a fragile fox cub

The baby fox was found by residents who own hunting dogs. Estimated to be about 2 weeks old, she was far too young to survive on her own.

At the Maisons-Alfort hospital, veterinarian Julie Piazza carefully examined her and aside from a minor injury, possibly caused by a wild animal or a dog’s bite, she was found to be in good health.

The cub was fed artificial milk — a product matching the composition of animal-produced milk — and because of that, her abdomen was swollen, Piazza said.

"That’s common in a young one that has had a disruption in its diet,” she added.

Once healed, the animals are transferred to outdoor enclosures and aviaries to prepare for a reintroduction into their natural environment.

Delon, the caretaker, says that “any kind of imprinting” — measures that attach the animals to their caregiver long-term — must be avoided.

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“So we don’t cuddle them, we don’t talk to them,” she said. "There’s really a distance to maintain for their own good in the end, so they can be released later.”

Because she is just a cub, once she grows sufficiently, the baby fox will first be transferred to a rehabilitation center and placed with other foxes in an enclosure.

“We can’t just release her into the wild like that,” Delon said. “She really needs to go into an enclosure first, and then gradually we’ll open the door so she can come and go while still being fed. Then we’ll gradually reduce the food, and that’s how we achieve a truly gradual release.”

Juveniles are especially vulnerable

The hospital ran by the Faune Alfort group is the only facility in the greater Paris area that treats a wide range of wild species. Some 86% of its patients are birds.

Last week, there was a swan with a broken wing, injured hedgehogs, dozens of ducklings often found on balconies and elsewhere without parents, and lots of pigeons that are treated just as carefully as rarer birds.

Elisa Mora, head of communications for Faune Alfort, a nonprofit group running the Maisons-Alfort hospital, said a record 200 admissions were reported in a single day last summer. The hospital is mostly financed by donations from individuals and charities, and relies on volunteers to help feed and care for the animals.

April to September is the "juvenile period when wild animals reproduce” and the admissions peak, Mora said.

“Wild animals are already vulnerable, but juveniles even more so,” she said. Those too badly injured or unable to return to the wild have to be euthanized.

Bringing a response to human impact

Veterinarian Jean-François Courreau launched Faune Alfort in 1987, inspired by students willing to better treat wild animals. Six years later, the idea turned into a proper hospital, hosted by the National Veterinary School of Alfort, established in the 18th century.

“It’s hard to stand by helplessly in front of an animal in distress without being able to do anything," Courreau said, adding that it's his duty to help as a vet.

When people find a wild animal in distress, they think “I can’t do anything, and the animal is going to die," he said. "So when they know a care center exists and that they can bring the animal there, it’s a huge relief.”

The vast majority of animals brought to the hospital — as many as 60% to 80% of admissions — are victims of road collisions, animals caught in barbed wire or injured by people using gardening tools or agricultural machinery, among other causes.

byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 21, 2026

No cuddles, but lots of care: How a Paris-area wildlife hospital keeps rescued animals wild

MAISONS-ALFORT, France (AP) — Awildlifehospital in a southeasternParissuburb is a place of no cuddles but lots of care. It helps injure...

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Why The Independent’s evidence from last September is a problem for Starmer

As he set out his defence to the House of Commons,Sir Keir Starmerwas asked multiple times by MPs, including the Conservative leaderKemi Badenoch, aboutThe Independent’sfront page story on 12 September last yearthatPeter Mandelsonhad failed security vetting.

More damaging still are the WhatsApp messagessent by this publicationto the then director of communications in Downing Street, Tim Allan, raising the issue on 11 September.

This has been described by a number of civil servants and senior politicians as the “smoking gun” in the entire scandal, because it is at odds withthe prime minister’s own assessment.

Sir Keir claimed that he, his ministers and Downing Street only found out about the security vetting failure last week. But doubt has been cast on this claim becauseThe Independentinformed Downing Street’s most senior communications official months before.

Added to that, it raises serious questions about what the prime minister was told in September by his then director of communications.

In normal circumstances, these issues are raised through the system and lead to investigations into the truth. Most crucially, they should have raised a red flag with the prime minister.

But it seems that nothing happened and the warnings were ignored.

This is no small thing. Lord Mandelson spent months as the UK’s ambassador to Washington.

He was the most important UK diplomat in the United States at a time when Britain was grappling with a difficult president in the White House.

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As ambassador, he would have been party to a huge amount of information, some of it designed to be seen only by those who have passed the highest level of security vetting.

When the prime minister sacked him last September, he accused Lord Mandelson of lying to his officials during that process and said he had fired him when the full extent of his relationship emerged with the paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Then, crucially, in February, Sir Keir told journalists: “Security vetting, carried out independently by the security services, which is an intensive exercise that gave him clearance for the role. You have to go through that before you take up the post. Clearly, both the due diligence and the security vetting need to be looked at again.”

But this took place months afterThe Independentinformed No 10 of the failure.

On Monday, the PM insisted that he should have been told last year that his former man in Washington had failed security clearance. But, of course, Downing Street was told this byThe Independent.

Last week, Sir Keir said he was “furious” when he found out and that it was unacceptable he was not told.

Within hours, he had fired the most senior civil servant in the Foreign Office, Sir Olly Robbins. That, Sir Keir has been very clear about, was because he was aware of the recommendation not to give Lord Mandelson security clearance and did not inform the prime minister.

But Sir Keir still faces a key question, one which was summed up by the mother of the House, the long-time Labour MP Diane Abbott, who is currently suspended from the party and sits as an independent.

She cornered him in the Commons to ask: “It’s one thing to say, as [Starmer] insists on saying, ‘Nobody told me, nobody told me anything, nobody told me’. The question is, why didn’t the prime minister ask?”

byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 21, 2026

Why The Independent’s evidence from last September is a problem for Starmer

As he set out his defence to the House of Commons,Sir Keir Starmerwas asked multiple times by MPs, including the Conservative leaderKem...

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Kathrine Switzer, the First Woman to Run the Boston Marathon, Recalls Being 'Attacked' During Famous 1967 Race (Exclusive)

Kathrine Switzer faced physical and verbal attacks during the 1967 Boston Marathon, but refused to quit the race

NEED TO KNOW

• Her historic run led to the inclusion of women in the Boston Marathon starting in 1972

• Switzer continues to empower women globally through her nonprofit 261 Fearless and celebrates her legacy in running events

When Kathrine Switzer stepped up to the start line at the Boston Marathon in 1967, she knew she had done everything she could to train for the moment.

The then-20-year-old Switzer, a Syracuse University student, had spent months working alongside cross-country assistant coach Arnie Briggs, logging hundreds of miles in preparation for the big day to prove that she could do it.

Nearly 60 years later, ahead of the 2026 Boston Marathon, Switzer caught up with PEOPLE to talk about her experience and share what made her keep going even after she "was attacked in the race."

While no woman had ever officially run the Boston Marathon, Switzer was determined to be the first. Leading up to the race, Switzer tells PEOPLE she didn't hide the fact that she was a woman.

At her coach's advice, she registered for the race and signed up as K.V. Switzer, the name she had been using since she was 13, inspired by journalists who signed their work with their initials. She paid the entry fee, and on race day, her coach picked up the bibs for everyone in their group.

Despite hoping to wear "really cute maroon shorts" and a matching top, she ultimately had to wear a sweatsuit due to the cold weather and sleet, which she was used to after months of training in Upstate New York.

As she looked down to pin her bib, reality set in when she saw her name, K.V. Switzer, next to her number, 261.

"I wasn't disguised," she emphasizes. "I didn't have a hood up. I had on a sweater, a sweatshirt, and sweatpants because it was really freezing."

Switzer and all the runners were then pushed into the starting area, and the race officials checked off her number. She recalls thinking to herself, "Well, there's no problem, obviously."

"The guys all knew I was a girl, and were thrilled," she says. "They were coming over to me and said, 'Wish my wife would run,' or 'I wish my girlfriend would want to,' and 'You're going to go the whole way?' The gun goes off, and I felt great."

However, just a few miles in, she caught the eye of the press truck, and they immediately started "screaming at the driver to slow down" so they could ask her questions.

Soon after, however, she heard someone from the running board shouting at her, saying, "What's going on?"

"He's just shouting at me. All of a sudden, somebody pushed him and came running down the street after me, and I didn't see that," she shares.

Before she knew it, she was being accosted by the race manager, Jock Semple, who tried to remove her bib and kick her out of the race.

"I heard him at the last minute because of his leather shoes, and at the moment I turned, he was right in my face, screaming at me, 'Get the hell out of my race!' with his hand on my shoulder," she recalls.

"He said, 'Get the hell out of here and give me those numbers!'" she adds.

Switzer jumped back and turned to get away from him, but Semple pulled on the back of her shirt and grabbed at her race bib, tearing off the top corner.

"Arnie, my coach, who knew him well, they used to run together, started screaming, 'Jock, leave her alone. She's okay, I've trained her,'" Switzer recalls. "He said, 'You stay out of this,' and he pushed Arnie."

Her boyfriend at the time, Thomas Miller, was a 235-lb. All-American football player who had decided to run alongside Switzer. When Miller saw what was going on, "he clipped the official and sent him flying."

"I went, 'God, we killed him!'" she remembers. "Because he smashed him really, and so I saw him going through the air, and then I took off down the street, and Arnie said, 'Run like hell!' "

Switzer and Briggs eventually caught up to the press truck, which she says accelerated and "knocked over half the photographers." While members of the press had initially been kind to Switzer, they then started screaming at her.

"'When are you going to quit? What are you trying to prove? You're a Suffragette!'" she recalls them yelling. "Really, really aggressive stuff, and I said, 'Listen, I'm trying to run, just leave me alone, I'm trying to run.' "

As the press prodded her and questioned her intentions, she finally replied, "I'm not saying anything to you guys. If you want to cover the race, you'd better get up there with the leaders. I'm in the race, I'm staying in it. On my hands and my knees if I have to, I am finishing."

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The people on the press truck didn't believe her, but they drove off to capture the front of the race.

"Arnie said, 'Are you serious?' I said, 'I'm very serious. Everybody's always telling women that they can't do things, and when they try them, then they do something like this, so no wonder they can't do things. I'm going to finish the job.' "

With that in mind, despite the adrenaline, her coach told her that they needed to slow down, get in control, and finish the race.

"Time went on, and I was so angry at this official, and then while I was on Heartbreak Hill, I let it go," she tells PEOPLE. "I said he's a product of his time. I'm not going to convince him of anything. I'll finish the race. That probably won't convince him, but Ihaveto finish the race."

Around three to four miles away from the finish line, Switzer says she noticed a few women on the sidelines. Many of whom were watching her with their arms folded.

"But," she emphasizes, "one of them went down on her knees and was holding onto the fence, and she goes, 'Come on, honey, do it for all of us!' "

That moment made her realize that the race was bigger than her.

"I said, 'My God, if I just give them the opportunity, maybe they'll run,'" she says. "Physically, I felt great, but mentally I felt like I had so much work to do. I could see it: the years ahead. If I'm really serious about this, it's going to be hard, but it's worth doing. So, we'll do that. I crossed the finish line and said, 'Okay, time to get to work.' "

And that she did.

Many of the people who covered the race were convinced it would be Switzer's last. She remembers one of them saying, "This is just a one-off deal, you'll never run another marathon, right?" to which she replied, "One day you're going to hear about a little old lady who's 80 years old training in Central Park and drops dead. It's going to be me. I am running forever."

While change took time, it happened nonetheless.

After the marathon, the AAU banned women from competing in races against men, as women had not previously been explicitly excluded. Five years later, however, in 1972, women were officially allowed to compete in the Boston Marathon.

Switzer finished third in the 1972 Boston Marathon, and Semple, the same man who tried to stop her, presented her with her trophy.

Switzer, now 79, tells PEOPLE that she continues to run 30 to 40 miles a week. Her experience with the Boston Marathon led to her creating women-only events because they could be nonintimidating and welcoming, and women "really responded."

Through her global nonprofit, 261 Fearless, Switzer continues the mission she first set out on, building a worldwide community that uses running as a vehicle to empower women of all backgrounds to realize their strength — physically, mentally and socially.

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of running the Boston Marathon, Switzer ran the race again in 2017 to help raise money for her charity and her nonprofit.

"It was one of the happiest days of my life, actually. It was the first time that women were fifty-fifty. At the finish line, waiting for me with a medal, I could see Joann Flaminio from the top of Boylston Street, the first woman president of the Boston Athletic Association. It was a momentous occasion," Switzer shares.

The whole experience was "so much fun."

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE'sfree daily newsletterto stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

"I stopped 13 times on the course. Everybody had a sign. Women were holding little girls and saying, 'Please kiss my little girl,'" she remembers. "Everybody out there knew about it. They'd say, 'There goes Kathrine.' I didn't have Kathrine on my shirt or anything, but the fact that they knew the history and were appreciative of it, rather than scorning it."

In this year's race on April 20,Switzer's261 Fearlessrunners are sponsored byAvon. Switzer previously served as Avon's Global Running Ambassador and helped expand the brand's international running programs, including the Avon International Running Circuit, the largest women's running series in the world at the time, which raised awareness and funds for breast cancer and other critical causes affecting women.

Switzer has transformed the landscape of athletics for women and hopes to continue that legacy by showing women how running can serve as a vehicle to empower and unite.

"When I'm running, the guy next to me is a different race from me, doesn't speak English, the person on my right, I don't know their gender, and we don't care. As long as they can run, we're running together," Switzer says. "At the end, we hug each other,all stinking and sweating. I would give my life for them during that time. We will never see each other again after some time. It's a phenomenal feeling."

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byVaclavien Pynzarien

in

April 20, 2026

Kathrine Switzer, the First Woman to Run the Boston Marathon, Recalls Being 'Attacked' During Famous 1967 Race (Exclusive)

Kathrine Switzer faced physical and verbal attacks during the 1967 Boston Marathon, but refused to quit the race NEED TO KNOW ...

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