Video released early Monday by New Orleans police shows a possible suspect in the Mother's Day gunfire that wounded 19 people during a neighborhood parade.
The grainy surveillance video shows a crowd suddenly scattering in all directions, with some falling to the ground. They appear to be running from a man who turns and runs out of the picture. The person is wearing a white T-shirt and dark pants. The image isn't clear but police say they hope someone will recognize him and notify investigators.
Still pictures of the suspect have been posted on YouTube, police said.
Police believe more than one gun was fired in the burst of Sunday afternoon violence — the latest to flare up around a celebration this year — and they have vowed to swiftly track down those responsible. Detectives were conducting interviews, collecting any surveillance video they could find and gathering evidence from the scene. Cell phone video taken in the aftermath of the shooting shows victims lying on the ground, blood on the pavement and others bending over to comfort them.
Police also say the reward for information leading to arrests and indictments in the case is $10,000.
At least three of the victims were seriously wounded. Of the rest, many were grazed and authorities said that, overall, most wounds were not life threatening. No deaths were reported.
The victims included 10 men, seven women, a boy and a girl. The children, both 10 years old, were grazed and in good condition.

It's not the first time gunfire has shattered a festive mood in the city this year. Five people were wounded in January after a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade, and four were wounded in a shooting in the French Quarter in the days leading up to Mardi Gras.
"The specialness of the day doesn't appear to interrupt the relentless drumbeat of violence," Mayor Mitch Landrieu said at a news conference outside a hospital where victims were being treated Sunday night.
Mary Beth Romig, a spokeswoman for the FBI in New Orleans, said federal investigators have no indication the shooting was an act of terrorism.
"It's strictly an act of street violence in New Orleans," she said.
As many as 400 people came out for the second-line procession — a boisterous New Orleans tradition — though only half that many were in the immediate vicinity of the shooting, Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas said. Officers were interspersed with the marchers, which is routine for such events.
Police saw three suspects running from the scene. No arrests had been made as of late Sunday.
Outside the hospital Sunday night, Leonard Temple became teary as he talked about a friend who was in surgery after being shot three times during the parade. Temple was told the man was hit while trying to push his own daughter out of the way.
"People were just hanging out. We were just chilling. And this happened. Bad things always happen to good people," said Temple, who was at the parade but didn't see the shootings.
Second-line parades are loose processions in which people dance down the street, often following behind a brass band. They can be planned events or impromptu offshoots of other celebrations. They trace their origins to the city's famous jazz funerals.
A social club called The Original Big 7 organized Sunday's event. The group was founded in 1996 at the Saint Bernard housing projects, according to its MySpace page.
The neighborhood where the shooting happened is a mix of low-income and middle-class row houses, some boarded up. As of last year, the 7th Ward's population was about 60 percent of its pre-Hurricane Katrina level.
The crime scene was about 1.5 miles from the heart of the French Quarter and near the Treme neighborhood, which has been the centerpiece for the HBO TV series "Treme."
Sunday's violence comes at a time when the city is struggling to pay for tens of millions of dollars required under federal consent decrees to reform the police department and the city jail.
Shootings at parades and neighborhood celebrations have become more common in recent years as the city has struggled with street crime, sometimes gang-related.
In January, police said a feud resulted in the drive-by shooting that wounded five people about 30 minutes after a parade had passed by on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The next month, four people were shot following an argument in the French Quarter during the last weekend of partying before Mardi Gras. Arrests were made in both cases.
Police vowed to solve Sunday's shooting, too. Serpas said it wasn't clear if particular people in the second line were targeted, or if the shots were fired at random.
"We'll get them. We have good resources in this neighborhood," Serpas said.

07:03:00

                                            Annie Idibia nee Macaulay, a Nollywood actress and the wife of millionaire singer 2face Idibia has openly denied her pregnancy weeks after suffering a sad miscarriage.
According to sources in the know, the actress who got pregnant way before her traditional wedding ceremony lost the pregnancy due to marriage planning stress and other medical conditions.
As we speak, the actress has lost a 2-month-old pregnancy to miscarriage. 

06:04:00

PepsiCo is ending its relationship with rapper Lil Wayne over what the company calls an "offensive reference to a revered civil rights icon" -- 14-year-old Emmett Till, who was killed nearly 60 years ago.

The rap superstar, featured in the song "Karate Chop" by Future, says: "Beat that p---- up like Emmett Till."

Till, a 14-year-old black youth, was killed in Mississippi in 1955 for allegedly whistling at a white woman. He was beaten to the extent that his face was unrecognizable when his body was discovered. He was identified by a monogrammed ring belonging to his father.

Mountain Dew, a brand of PepsiCo, said Friday its relationship with the rapper would end.

A Mountain Dew spokesman told CNN, "We do not plan any additional work with Lil Wayne moving forward. His offensive reference to a revered civil rights icon does not reflect the values of our brand."

The spokesman declined to comment on the company's previous relationship with the artist.

Sarah Cunningham, publicist for Lil Wayne's record label, Young Money, issued the following statement to CNN: "I can confirm that due to creative differences, we mutually decided to part ways. It was amicable."

Till, a Chicago teenager who was visiting relatives in Mississippi in 1955, was arrested at gunpoint and severely beaten. One of his eyes was gouged before he was killed by a single gunshot to the head. The teen's body was tied to a large fan before being dumped into a river.

Members of the Till family could not be reached for comment Friday by CNN, but the Rev. Al Sharpton said he has set up a meeting next week between PepsiCo officials and members of the family.

In a statement to CNN, Sharpton said that the situation was a "teaching moment for Lil Wayne, corporate America and the family of Emmett Till ... more than a condemnation of any one artist, it is an affirmation of Emmett Till and a call for more sensitivity about what we say and do in our culture."

09:08:00

      It is a familiar part of flying. As you taxi towards the runway, a crackly voice is heard over the intercom. The pilot’s brief summary of the route, flight time, and weather conditions are designed to inform but also to reassure. The familiar refrain tells passengers the plane is in safe, human hands and they can relax and enjoy the flight.
But the phrase “this is your captain speaking” may soon become a thing of the past, thanks to a new generation of robotic, passenger aircraft that will take to the skies by themselves.
“We believe that unmanned aircraft are the next big transformation in the aviation industry,” says Doug Davis, director of the unmanned aircraft programme at New Mexico State University.
Of course, the military already know this.  Automatic landing systems have been used for years to help pilots drop F-18 aircraft on to the narrow landing strips on top of aircraft carriers. Then there is the rise of drone warfare.  These planes are still flown remotely by pilots on the ground, but most have the capability to follow a predefined flight path and even land themselves if they get into serious trouble or the link between the ground is broken.  The next generation, such as the US Navy’s X-47B, will be even more advanced, with onboard intelligence that will allow it to adapt its course and fly with only minimal input from a pilot.
Pilots: Numbered
The path to this automated future began almost 100 years ago with the introduction of the first autopilot. These systems – designed to keep a plane on a steady, pre-programmed heading and altitude – introduced the first automation into the cockpit, allowing the pilot to step away from the controls.
Over the next century, this trend gathered pace, packing modern aircraft with sophisticated electronics, which often relegate the human to a passive observer. In fact, in some modern aircraft the pilot is only needed to taxi the aircraft to the runway. Everything else from take-off to landing can be automated.
“The technology is here,” says Missy Cummings, an ex military pilot who is now associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s department of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
She points to the rise of so-called fly-by-wire technology, which has replaced the mechanical link between the pilot and the plane’s engines and control surfaces with computer signals sent down a copper wire.
“Any fly-by-wire plane can be an [Unmanned Aerial Vehicle],” she explains. “The controls are digital, not analogue, everything is done electronically so you don’t need a person in there to push a hydraulic actuator.”
To prove the point, technology company BAE Systems recently flew a converted Jetstream aircraft – known as “The Flying Test Bed” – with no pilot in UK air space. The trial flights did have people on board, allowing a human to take control in an emergency. But, for the large part, it flew itself.
But while it is one thing to conduct test flights with pilots on hand in case of an emergency, it is quite another to pack 350 passengers on to plane and send them on their way across the Atlantic with no one at the front. As a result, autonomous flight technology is likely to be adopted in stages.
Already, we are in an era when planes are flown by just two pilots, down for a peak of around five a few decades ago. In the near future increasing automation will mean that number drops to one.  And then the next stage could see planes piloted from the ground, like military and scientific craft. 

09:05:00

Concern over the possibility of broader war in the Middle East grew Monday in the wake of reported airstrikes on Syrian military installations.

The reported strikes killed 42 Syrian soldiers, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Monday, citing medical sources. It said 100 people remained missing.

The Syrian government warned Sunday's apparent strikes -- which followed one last week attributed by Syria to Israel -- "opens the door wide for all the possibilities."

Syrian ally Iran warned of a "crushing response" while Russia called reports of Israeli involvement "very worrying."

But an Israeli general who commands forces on the Syrian border said "there are no winds of war," according to the Israel Defense Forces website.

The heightened tensions come amid questions over possible chemical weapon use in Syria and international debate over how to respond to the country's bloody civil war, in which more than 70,000 people have died in more than two years of fighting.

On Monday, a U.N. official spoke of strong suspicions that rebels, not Syrian government forces, have used chemical weapons.

Details of reported strikes

Syria claimed Israeli missiles struck at its military facilities on Sunday.

According to the state-run SANA news agency, Israeli missiles struck a research center in Jamayra, a facility in Maysaloun and what the news agency described as a "paragliding airport" near Damascus.

The blasts prompted terrified residents nearby to run for cover.

"Everything kept exploding over and over again," said Anna Deeb, whose family lives just over a mile away. "We could hear gunshots, we could hear people screaming. ... We didn't know what to do, and there was a problem with us breathing because the smoke was too much."

Syria says the attack followed another Israeli airstrike late last week.

Israel has not confirmed or denied that its forces were involved in any attacks inside Syria, but a U.S. official told CNN's Barbara Starr on Monday that Israeli forces conducted Sunday's strike, as well as one last week.

Sunday's strike targeted a research facility in a mountainous area near Damascus and weapons that were to be transferred to Hezbollah, according to the source.

The earlier strike, which U.S. officials had previously said happened Thursday or Friday, targeted Fateh 110 missiles stored at the Damascus airport, the source said.

Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal al-Mekdad told CNN the attacks amount to a declaration of war by Israel.

"The details are not clear on what happened," al-Mekdad told CNN. "Did they fire missiles? ... It is not clear for me, because I don't know how it happened, and of course it is worrying, but Israel will suffer the same."

09:00:00

Popping and locking are the kinds of things you expect from the set of a Jennifer Lopez music video. Not gunshots.
J.Lo and Pitbull were filming a clip for "Live It Up" at the Fort Lauderdale Beach Park Sunday night when the shots were heard nearby. The Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reports that the singer was secured in her car immediately as Fort Lauderdale police were called to investigate the incident in a parking long just north of the set.
According to the newspaper, no evidence of a shooting was found, and there were no witnesses or injuries.
"Entertainment Tonight" host Rob Marciano happened to have been on set conducting an interview with the 43-year-old star when the incident occurred.
"BREAKING: Gunshots fired on Fort Lauderdale Beach DURING my JLo interview. No kidding. Security scrambled her away," he tweeted, adding a few minutes later, "Can hear and see ambulances converging ~400 yards down the street."
Apparently, things on the video shoot went back to normal rather quickly, as Lopez's boyfriend and choreographer Casper Smart tweeted thanks to his girl, his dancers, and other crew members early Monday morning.
Omg! has reached out to J.Lo's reps for comment.

08:55:00

Shocker! Once again, Chris Brown and Rihanna have parted ways, romantically speaking -- so said Brown during a recent interview with Australian radio show The Kyle and Jackie Show.

The "Don't Wake Me Up" crooner, who turned 24 on Sunday, May 5, was detailing his multiple birthday celebrations (in L.A., Las Vegas and NYC) when he was asked about his chronically on-again, off-again love Rihanna, 25.
"Imma do it solo," he said, citing his erstwhile girlfriend's touring schedule, compounded by his own full slate. "I mean, at the end of the day, shawty doing her own thang, she on the road. It's always gonna be love. I'm a grown man, just gotta fast forward."
The love's certainly not gone, he reiterated, but personal and professional commitments make the relationship too difficult right now, he said. "I'm always gonna love that person. I cant be focused on wife-ing someone that young. I need to be the best Chris Brown I can be," he explained.Indeed, Brown reunited with his other on-and-off love, Karrueche Tran, during his birthday bash in Hollywood last Friday -- but, alas, according to an onlooker, "He didn't appear to be paying much attention to her and was partying around a lot of girls."
Adds a source close to Rihanna of the latest split: "Of course tomorrow they could be all over each other again, but for now she's done and just living her life and touring. It's how it always is."
This article originally appeared on Usmagazine.com

08:52:00