CBS News
Olympic swimmer Cullen Jones almost drowned as a kid. Now, he’s a swim lesson advocate.
Olympic gold medalist Cullen Jones always loved the water, the type of kid who played in the tub until he was pruney — but he wasn’t always a swimming pro. In fact, a near-drowning experience as a child is what shaped him into the swimmer and swim lesson advocate he is today.
At 5 years old, he got stuck underwater after going down a ride at a water park with his parents.
“TV and theater, they always dramatize when someone drowns or nearly drowns — ‘help, help, help!’ — And what we learned is that that’s not usually the case. It’s usually silent, especially when it comes to young people. They go underwater, and then, unfortunately, you never hear from them again. And the same thing almost happened to me,” he told CBS News. “I hadn’t had swim lessons (and) didn’t know what to do.”
After being underwater for almost 40 seconds, young Jones had to be resuscitated by a lifeguard.
“I was traumatized. I didn’t realize it that day … but the next time I was by a pool, my mom noticed that I was a little more timid, and it took five different teachers before I started feeling comfortable to actually start putting my face underwater, floating and starting to actually do the forward progression in the water,” he said.
Fast forward to the 2008 Olympics, where Jones won a gold medal in the 4×100-meter freestyle relay, becoming the first African American to hold a world record in swimming. In 2012, he brought home even more swimming medals.
Now, an ambassador with pool supplies retailer Leslie’s, Jones works to make sure other young people don’t experience what he did as a kid.
“You need to teach your children to swim,” he said. “It is not OK just to have them in the shallow end … The best thing for us to do is to give them the tools to be successful around the water. And the best way to do that is to give them proper swim lessons. It is not just a great sport … but it’s also a life skill, and we want to make sure that all parents and guardians understand that.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention blame around 4,000 deaths each year on accidental drowning. Earlier this year, the health agency reported a nationwide surge in these deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic, noting rates were disproportionately worse for Black people.
Drowning is also the leading cause of death for children ages 1 to 4 and the second leading cause of unintentional death for children in the 5 to 14 age group, according to the CDC.
“It’s really disheartening to see the effects that COVID has had, especially on the U.S. population around drowning,” Jones said, but adds there are ways to stay safe.
Here are his top tips:
Pool safety tips
Learn to swim: Learning to swim benefits both kids and adults, Jones said.
“If there is one parent in the family that knows how to swim, there’s an 88% chance that that child will learn to swim. And not to mention, you give that child an 88% more of a chance to be safer around the water,” he said. “I don’t care how old you are, how young you are, the pool is for you. Please come out. Go be safer around the water. It doesn’t matter your age. It’s a life skill we need to prioritize at any age.”
Red Cross swimming courses are one of many programs that teach children to swim across the U.S.
But Jones recognizes there are “a lot of families out there that can’t afford to have formal swim lessons,” noting Leslie’s has teamed up with the Boys and Girls Club and Red Cross to raise money to help other people learn to swim. The fundraising efforts continue through Oct. 31 both online and in stores across the country.
Check for clean water: Just because it’s clear and blue, does not mean it’s clean, Jones said.
“Take it from someone who spends a lot of time in water, that is not the case. You want to make sure that your pool water is safe and healthy,” he said.
Keep the area safe: With so many distractions today, Jones said to “make sure that you’re securing the area if you have a pool, especially at home.”
Many children who drowned at home did so during times they were not expected to be in the water, according to the American Red Cross. In some cases, children were out of sight for less than five minutes and in the care of one or both parents when they slipped into the pool and drowned, the agency said.
Jones suggests Coast Guard-approved floatation devices, pool covers and alarms — adding his 5-year-old son has already put his own safety measures to the test.
“This kid will figure out how to get outside — he loves the water that much. But I can turn my head at any moment, so it’s important for me to have my gate up. It’s important for me to have that alarm. Trust me, I’ll be honest, it saved me a couple of times where I’ve turned around and he was already out the back door.”
The Associated Press contributed reporting.
CBS News
Bryan Kohberger’s lawyers ask judge to ban death penalty in Idaho murders case; victim’s mother says “he deserves to die”
Attorneys for a man charged in the stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students asked a judge to take the death penalty off the table Thursday, arguing that international, federal and state law all make it inappropriate for the case. But a victim’s mother who attended the hearing said the suspect “deserves to die.”
Bryan Kohberger is accused of the Nov. 13, 2022, killings of Ethan Chapin, Xana Kernodle, Madison Mogen and Kaylee Goncalves. Investigators said they were able to link Kohberger – then a graduate student at nearby Washington State University – to the crime from DNA found on a knife sheath at the scene, surveillance videos and cellphone data.
When asked to enter a plea last year, Kohberger stood silent, prompting a judge to enter a not guilty plea on his behalf. Prosecutors have said they will seek the death penalty if he is convicted. In September, Kohberger was booked into jail in Boise, where his trial was moved the week before.
During a pre-trial motion hearing, Kohberger’s defense team made a broad range of arguments against the death penalty, saying in part that it does not fit today’s standards of decency, that it is cruel to make condemned inmates sit for decades on death row awaiting execution and that it violates an international treaty prohibiting the torture of prisoners.
Kai Eiselein / Getty Images
But 4th District Judge Stephen Hippler questioned many of those claims, saying that the international treaty they referenced was focused on ensuring that prisoners are given due process so they are not convicted and executed without a fair trial.
Prosecutors noted that the Idaho Supreme Court has already considered many of those arguments in other capital cases and allowed the death penalty to stand.
Still, by bringing up the issues during the motion hearing, Kohberger’s defense team took the first step toward preserving their legal arguments in the court record, potentially allowing them to raise them again on appeal.
The judge said he would issue a written ruling on the motions later.
Victim’s parents attend hearing
Kristi and Steve Goncalves, the parents of Kaylee Goncalves, attended the hearing. Afterward they said the details of the case show the death penalty is merited.
“You’ve got four victims, all in one house – that’s more than enough,” Steve Goncalves said.
Kristi Goncalves said she talked to the coroner and knows what happened to her daughter.
“If he did anything like he did to our daughter to the others, then he deserves to die,” she said.
Steve Goncalves told “48 Hours” last year that “there’s evidence to show that she awakened and tried to get out of that situation,” saying “she was trapped” based on the way the bed was set up.
Kaylee Goncalves/Instagram
Kohberger’s attorneys have said he was out for a drive the night of the killings, something he often did to look at the sky.
His trial is scheduled to begin next August and is expected to last up to three months. The Goncalves family said they have rented a home in Boise so they can attend.
Goncalves’ family said in the spring that they were frustrated by how long it has taken the case to progress through the judicial system.
“This case is turning into a hamster wheel of motions, hearings, and delayed decisions,” the family said in a statement.
CBS News
Israeli soccer fans attacked in Amsterdam, with five reportedly hospitalized and dozens of suspects arrested
Amsterdam — Antisemitic rioters “actively sought out Israeli supporters to attack and assault them” after a soccer match in Amsterdam, authorities in the Netherlands said Friday, with police reporting five people hospitalized and 62 detained after a night of violence between. The police did not mention the nationality of any of those injured or arrested after the scenes of chaos in the Dutch capital.
Israel’s government said it was helping coordinate flights home for Israeli fans caught up in the violence.
Israel was “doing everything to ensure the safety and security of our citizens who were brutally attacked in the horrific anti-Semitic incident in Amsterdam,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “It was decided that it was not necessary to send a professional rescue mission to the Netherlands. Instead, the effort will be focused on providing civil aviation solutions for the recovery of our citizens.”
Israel’s airports authority said the first of two planes being sent to bring citizens of the country home had departed from Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv and was expected to arrive in Amsterdam within a few hours.
X/ iAnnet via REUTERS.
Dutch leaders also condemned the violence against the Israeli fans as antisemitic.
The attacks on fans of soccer club Maccabi Tel Aviv came after a Europa League soccer match between their team and the local Amsterdam team Ajax, but there had been clashes between the Israeli fans and locals before the game, too.
The violence erupted despite a ban on a pro-Palestinian demonstration near the soccer stadium imposed by Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema, who’d feared clashes would break out between protesters and supporters of the Israeli club.
The violent clashes reportedly occurred around midnight local time, with numerous fights and acts of vandalism in central Amsterdam.
There were clashes before the game, too, as Maccabi fans were among hundreds to march through central Amsterdam in a pro-Israel demonstration, during which flares were lit and Palestinian flags hung on some streets were reportedly torn down amid chants of “death to the Arabs.”
Mouneb Taim/Anadolu/Getty
In an earlier statement, Netanyahu’s office had said that the prime minister ordered two “rescue planes” to be sent to Amseterdam to evacuate Israeli citizens, but that decision was later reversed. Netanyahu’s office also barred any members of the country’s military from flying to the Netherlands for an indefinite period.
“The harsh pictures of the assault on our citizens in Amsterdam will not be overlooked,” Netanyahu’s office said, adding that Israel’s government “views the premeditated antisemitic attack against Israeli citizens with utmost gravity.”
Netanyahu’s office demanded the Dutch government take “vigorous and swift action” against those involved.
Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof said on social media that he followed reports of the violence “with horror.”
“Completely unacceptable antisemitic attacks on Israelis. I am in close contact with everyone involved,” he added, saying he’d spoken with Netanyahu and “emphasized that the perpetrators will be tracked down and prosecuted. It is now quiet in the capital.”
In a post on the social media platform X, Israeli President Isaac Herzog Israel denounced the attacks as a “pogrom,” referring to the historic racist attacks on Jews in Russia and eastern Europe, and said they were reminiscent of the Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas on Israel that sparked Israel’s ongoing wars in Gaza and Lebanon.
The Israeli Embassy in Washington said on X that “hundreds” of Maccabi fans were “ambushed and attacked in Amsterdam tonight as they left the stadium following a game,” according to AFP. The embassy blamed the violence on a “mob who targeted innocent Israelis.”
Geert Wilders, the far-right nationalist lawmaker whose Party for Freedom won elections in the Netherlands last year and who’s a staunch ally of Israel, reacted to a video apparently showing a Maccabi fan being surrounded by several men.
“Looks like a Jew hunt in the streets of Amsterdam. Arrest and deport the multicultural scum that attacked Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters in our streets. Ashamed that this can happen in The Netherlands. Totally unacceptable,” Wilders said.
A Qantas plane made an emergency landing Friday due to what the airline said was a “contained engine failure” soon after taking off from Sydney Airport, sparking a grassfire on a nearby runway and causing several flights to be diverted.
The Qantas flight, QF520, was bound for Brisbane and was circling for a “short period of time” before landing safely back at Sydney Airport, Qantas Chief Pilot Captain Richard Tobiano said in the statement.
There was no initial word on the number of people on board.
DAVID GRAY / AFP via Getty Images
“Qantas engineers have conducted a preliminary inspection of the engine and confirmed it was a contained engine failure,” the airline said. “While customers would have heard a loud bang, there was not an explosion.”
The Reuters news agency explains that in a contained engine failure, the engine’s parts stay inside the protective housing meant to keep them from flying out. If they do, they could cause severe damage to the main body of a plane.
Airservices Australia, the government’s aviation regulator, said the engine failure caused “a grass area adjacent to the runway to catch fire” that was swiftly extinguished by firefighters.
DAVID GRAY / AFP via Getty Images
The Airservices’ National Operations Management Centre enacted a 47-minute ground stop at Sydney Airport to ensure the plane could land as quickly as possible, the regulator said in a statement, adding that no one was hurt.
Reuters reports that the airport said all its runways had re-opened by Friday afternoon after the parallel runway had been closed for inspection because of the fire.
The aircraft is a 19-year-old Boeing 737-800, Reuters said, citing Flightradar24. That type of twin-engine passenger plane is designed to be able to fly using only one engine in an emergency, Reuters noted.
Passenger Georgina Lewis said she heard a “bang.”
“One of the engines appeared to have gone. The pilot came on 10 minutes later to explain that they had a problem with a right-hand engine on takeoff,” she told local outlet Channel Nine.
Another passenger, Mark Willacy, a journalist with Australia’s national broadcaster ABC, said the plane struggled to get airborne following the “loud bang” noise.
“That big bang as the wheels were leaving the ground and the shudder, that was like nothing I have ever felt,” he told ABC. “When we landed, there was a lot of applause and cheering amongst the passengers.”
Tobiano said his staff members were “highly trained” to respond to such emergency situations.
“We understand this would have been a distressing experience for customers and we will be contacting all customers this afternoon to provide support,” he said in the statement. “We will also be conducting an investigation into what caused the engine issue.”
Customers were being moved to alternate flights, Qantas said.
Eleven domestic flights were cancelled and four diverted to other airports, a Sydney Airport spokesperson said.
Bryan Kohberger’s lawyers ask judge to ban death penalty in Idaho murders case; victim’s mother says “he deserves to die”
Late gun safety activist’s message lives on in billboard
Israeli soccer fans attacked in Amsterdam, with five reportedly hospitalized and dozens of suspects arrested
Bryan Kohberger’s lawyers ask judge to ban death penalty in Idaho murders case; victim’s mother says “he deserves to die”
Late gun safety activist’s message lives on in billboard