Nightly News Full Broadcast - March 27

tonight, the Grim Discovery and the search for answers after the catastrophic bridge collapse in Baltimore, officials announced just moments ago that two bodies have been recovered after that massive freighter crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, making it crash into our team in the water where crews are still searching for at least four other missing presumed dead, including a father of six, the NTSB locates the ship's Black Box, the clues it may contain are Team Folk's coverage this night and also cheat the deadly Rampage stabbing in Illinois, at least four people died in multiple locations. suspect in custody spring storm threats up and down the east coast were following him only on

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that former senator and vice presidential candidate Joe Liberman died after suffering a fall what his family is saying tonight the disturbing incident during March Madness racial slurs allegedly hurled at the Utah women's team now the FBI prepares to join the investigation our team inside the chaos in Haiti the orphanage where women and children seek refuge and our exclusive NBC News report Will the United States allow more Haitian immigrants to flee violence to the states than we do?

I've learned this is NBC Nightly News with Lester Hol, good evening and welcome everyone tonight. Officials in Baltimore are assessing the enormous and urgent tasks ahead after yesterday's freighter crash and tonight's deadly collapse of the nearly 1,000-foot-long Francis Scott Key Bridge. The container ship remains lodged where it had a sickening break early yesterday after losing power and crashing into a bridge pylon. The ship's crew is still on board tonight unharmed, but everyone is missing. The highway workers are now presumed dead. Two of their bodies have been recovered. Remnants of the bridge they worked on still block Baltimore Harbor.

The entire scene is obscured today by a gloomy fog. Low visibility hampers the work of divers searching for victims. There are several new developments to report tonight including what we have learned about the victims also the ship's Black Box has been recovered a critical piece of the investigation we have also learned more about the ship's cargo Tom Yamama starts tonight with the latest from tonight what took seconds to collapse will now likely take weeks to investigate Key Bridge collapse remains too dangerous in many parts for divers to even enter the water, debris from sunken cars, shipping containers and bridge pieces littering the ground From the river tonight we travel to what remains of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, we are just outside the perimeter of the Disaster Zone approximately a quarter mile from where the collapse occurred and at sea level the first thing you notice is the monstrous size of that cargo ship, it is much more massive than the actual bridge structure.

Officials say the dolly of the ship that hit the bridge is stable and has more than 1/2 million gallons of fuel and 56 containers of hazardous material, but the Coast Guard says it is not a hazard. The cruise ship is cooperating with what we need there. They remain on board but off the ship Investigators ran into a problem, search and recovery efforts have been hampered by the weather here in Baltimore, it has been raining constantly all day, patchy fog and temperatures in the 40s, but in the water is even worse, drivers won't be able to see anything they see.

They will go to work filling them with their hands, once they reach a goal. Brian Hudson leads the FBI's underwater search and evidence response team. They are using sonar and remotely operated vehicles to scan these waters. What have your teams been able to see? Down there, how bad is it? Some of the debris is still moving. You are mainly finding lots of pieces of rubble rocks. We are looking for vehicles. So you are looking for the shape of a vehicle. Some of the missing buildings. The workers were inside their cars at the time of the collapse.

In fact, you can see the lights of their vehicles flashing on the bridge just before impact. It's going to be very, very difficult, I think, to find them, so I hope Jeffrey Pritzker is an executive at that construction company. He says the entire company is in mourning and still in shock. Did the message reach his employees that the ship was going to crash into the bridge? Do you know if they realized that? I don't know, I wasn't there, I can just tell you they were right in the middle of the bridge, right in the middle of the middle, so I doubt they heard anything straight or knew it was going to happen and then what you're saying is they could have been.

Caught completely by surprise, they may have been, he says a member of his crew miraculously survived and still can't talk about what happened among the missing. Miguel Luna, father of six children from El Salvador, is there at a presentation party for his grandson just this month and the mayor yir swazo Sandoval his brother excited saying that it is not easy to see the bridge now knowing that the iron monster is trapping To my brother and Tom we now have some late

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about some of the missing, what can you tell us? Yes, Lester, this just came in.

I just learned that divers have now located a red pickup truck submerged in 25 feet of water and recovered two victims who were trapped inside. Officials also announced that the mission here has now changed for the third time in less than 2 days. This is no longer a search and recovery mission, it is simply too dangerous to continue trying to find the victims. This is now called a salvage operation. Lester, okay, Tom Yamas, tonight, thank you and more than two dozen NTSB investigators are now assigned to the accident for what will be a long time. investigation into why this disaster occurred Tom Costello is now on the investigation ahead as the dolly remains trapped under tons of debris from the collapsed bridge.

NTSB crews were on board today. Gathering evidence and identifying key crew members to interview, investigators have already downloaded data from the ship. -called Black Box, which includes speed, position, power and throttle settings at 1:30 a.m. on Tuesday, which will help us begin to put together a timeline of events that occurred before the bridge attack. NTSP Chief Hamedy says investigators will also look at whether the ship received contaminated fuel that could have shut down its engines and lost power before crashing into the bridge. Engineering experts estimate that she hit with approximately 30 million pounds of applied force. A bridge like this, completed in the 1970s, was simply not made to withstand a direct impact on a critical support pier from a ship weighing about 200 million PB while the Key Bridge was built in 1970 standards those Standards changed after a fraer hit the Tampa Sunshine Skyway Bridge in 1980 killing 35 people today Bridge support structures must be protected with barriers such as reinforced islands on the new Tampa Skyway Bridge, if the bridge had been designed according to revised specifications that took into account ship collision conditions for that bridge, it would not have collapsed.

Nearly a dozen ships are tonight trapped inside the port and further out amid warnings that supply chains and livelihoods are at risk. We are concerned about the local economic impact with some 8,000 jobs directly associated with port activities. Michael Clark's business receives and empties containers from the port and then ships the cargo, now he is losing business. that goes to other ports right now we don't have any containers and we can't get in containers so immediately our business closed and Tom there's still a lot of urgency there tonight. Maryland officials, we understand, are already setting priorities for the port, yes, Maryland officials recently said they would quickly begin drawing up plans for a new bridge, but their priority now is to reopen the channel to the port and that will take quite some time.

Lester, it's okay, Tom Castello, thank you. you we will now move on to breaking news from Northern Illinois tonight police say there has been a deadly rampage with stabbings in several locations in the city of Rockford Maggie vesa is with us Maggie what do we know? Lester, a grim situation is developing as you I can imagine with the police talking about an attacker who stabbed nine people and killed four of them at multiple crime scenes in Rockford Illinois. At least one scene you can see, the video appears to be in the middle of a neighborhood. It's a massive response from authorities after multiple calls to 911.

It arrived around 1:15 today. In one case, the sheriff says a woman reported a home invasion and ran from the attacker, but she suffered stab wounds to her hands and face. We're told federal and city county authorities are investigating and have a suspect. in custody and they believe that person a man worked alone, they are not releasing that man's name at this time and they say they have no clear motive. They tell us that among the five survivors, one is in critical condition and the rest are stable. Local officials right now call this a senseless act of violence.

Maggie Vasa with the latest news tonight. Thank you. We are seeing some nasty spring weather. Heavy rain will hit the east coast until tomorrow. 16 million people from Florida to Maine are under flood watches. Three Ines of rain or more are possible. Heavy rain tomorrow along the East Coast will likely slow travel and have already postponed some MLB opening day games as desperation grows in Haiti. The Biden administration is under pressure to act. Alis barber went to Haiti and Ellison what. Are you learning Lester? Tonight we learned that more than 480 human rights organizations have called for or lobbied for a new designation of temporary protected status for Haitians in the United States, as well as a pause on deportations, but despite that growing pressure, Three US officials tell NBC News, the Biden administration has no plans to change course.

The violence in Port-au-Prince is relentless. Police and gangs fight in the streets of Haiti's capital as innocent people hide and run for cover. We traveled to the north of the country, where we are. more than 5 hours by car from Port Aen, at the gates of the Mission Life International orphanage and maternity center, you don't hear gunshots, you hear children laughing, playing, dreaming, what do you want to be when you grow up? She says she wants to be a doctor. outside the birthing center the mothers are waiting to register Sarah L is only 3 months old she is John's fourth child the first girl do you like brothers do you really like having a sister?

She tells us that she is a nurse but does not have a job. Right now she has a pharmacy, but nowadays it does not sell much and it is difficult to get supplies. You can see they have things here, but it's a little lacking, partly because most of the ports in this country are currently controlled by gangs and that means getting help to the people who need it most. Medical supplies to places like this. It is very difficult for all families here to find clean water or affordable food. It is a herculean task. Have you ever had a moment where you worried? that maybe you can't keep your children safe every day she tells me every day we pray that God keeps us safe it can be fixed because they say they don't want to live in a Haiti like this we need help they want help from the international community to restore security, but ultimately they tell us that the real change will come from the Haitians, we don't like people giving us fish, teaching us how to fish.

Jean tells me because Haitians can do it themselves. Ellison Barber NBC News and just tonight the sad news that former Connecticut senator and vice presidential candidate Joe Liberman has died at age 82. Here is Kelly O'Donnell, dedicated to public service and her deep personal faith. Joseph Lieberman was a four-term U.S. senator from Connecticut and a history man as the first Jewish American on a presidential ticket as Al Gore's running mate in 200,000 tonight. I am very proud to run as his candidate for Vice President and President of the United States. Senator Lieberman died this afternoon in New York.

A statement from his family said his death was due to complications. from a fall, a hawk on defense, his support for the Iraq war cost him among Democrats. Liberman became an independent, then founded the No Labels organization, and his friendship with John McCain was part of his break with the Democratic party. I'm here to support. John McCain, because the country matters more than the party, an Orthodox JewLiberian often attends critical votes in the Senate moved by faith and the desire to find common ground. Kelly O'Donnell reports in just 60 Seconds that the FBI prepared to investigate after a women's basketball team faced racial issues. threats during the NCAA tournament what we will learn next we return with outrage over an incident of racism directed at a team playing in the women's March Madness tournament Dana Griffin reports that racism is real and it happens and it is horrible what it was supposed to be An exciting start to the NCAA tournament turned into a shocking racist experience for the Utah women's basketball team Thursday as they walked from their hotel to a nearby restaurant, a vehicle drove by and the occupants of the vehicles the team manufactured yelled. various racial insults.

A group of black, white and Latina athletes were staying in Cordelane Idaho 35 minutes from the Spokane Washington Arena. Surveillance video shows the team inside the restaurant and then leaving, but not the actual incident after dinner, it happened again according to the police report, the drivers of two trucks. He revved his engines and shouted Coach Lynn Roberts addressed the incident Monday night after their loss to Gonzaga for our players and staff tonight. The controversial plan would charge cars $15 to drive into the heart of Manhattan, while trucks could be charged between 24 and $36. They say it aims to reduce traffic and pollution and could come into effect as early as June in our sold-out series and in the ski resort town where so many people with good jobs say they have been locked out of the housing market, so the city voted on whether to make a big change.

Shannon Petty's article has its results. I know we're a little overbooked today, so SI Sturm, a cancer nurse practitioner in Steamboat Springs. Colorado has spent more than three years in housing limbo, how many offers has it submitted in total, about a dozen, and how many of them have it received none, as remote workers and second-home buyers flocked to tourist communities since the beginning of the pandemic? Real estate agents here say house prices have almost doubled, averaging 1.8 million for a typical three bedroom house, you can't afford a house here, yes we would have two great jobs, good jobs, very happy in our careers, I think we are well compensated, but can't city officials simply say that they are at a critical point in housing where everyone from hourly workers to well-paid professionals are struggling to get a job? place to live?

Find a solution, although it is dividing the residents of this small town. We are building a poor neighborhood. Sounds great. but we are putting all the poor on one side of the city if we want a diverse and functional city where the people who work here can live here we need to take action on affordable housing now emotions were running high at a city council meeting that debated a proposal to build more than 2,000 apartments and single-family homes on a ranch purchased by the city's Housing Authority, the houses would be prioritized for local workers with restrictions on rental and sales prices, who can imagine living there?

Basically all spectrums of our workforce Jason Peasley heads the local Housing Authority, he says there's a lot more at stake than just affordability. I think we will continue to see a hollowing out of our middle class and the housing problem will continue to exacerbate the employment problems that we have where companies are restricting their growth and are unable to attract and retain employees, uh, and we will see our economy stagnate, But longtime residents like Jim Angle Ken say the proposed solution would create its own problems, it's an overreach, it's far beyond the scale of this city of 13,000 people. we can absorb we have a road into town a road out of town you feel it's too big it's too big most voters in Steamboat Springs seem to agree this week early results show they voted against the project leaving those trapped the outlet is still looking for a place to call home Piece by Shannon Petty NBC News Steamboat Springs Colorado that's Nightly News for this Wednesday thanks for watching I'm Lester Holt please take care of yourselves and each other good night thanks for watching stay up to date on news Breaking news and top stories in the NBC News app or follow us on social media