Newspaper Says Video of Prince William, Kate Should Halt Royal Rumor Mill

Commuters walk past copies of the Evening Standard featuring a picture of Britain's Catherine, Princess of Wales, on the front page at subway station in London, Britain, March 12, 2024. REUTERS/Hollie Adams
Commuters walk past copies of the Evening Standard featuring a picture of Britain's Catherine, Princess of Wales, on the front page at subway station in London, Britain, March 12, 2024. REUTERS/Hollie Adams
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Newspaper Says Video of Prince William, Kate Should Halt Royal Rumor Mill

Commuters walk past copies of the Evening Standard featuring a picture of Britain's Catherine, Princess of Wales, on the front page at subway station in London, Britain, March 12, 2024. REUTERS/Hollie Adams
Commuters walk past copies of the Evening Standard featuring a picture of Britain's Catherine, Princess of Wales, on the front page at subway station in London, Britain, March 12, 2024. REUTERS/Hollie Adams

Prince William and his wife Catherine have been filmed at a farm shop near their Windsor home, The Sun newspaper reported — the first footage of Kate since she had abdominal surgery for an unspecified condition two months ago.
The newspaper published a short clip late Monday that appeared to show William and Kate smiling as they walked together, carrying shopping bags. It said the footage was taken on Saturday in Windsor, west of London.
The Sun quoted Nelson Silva, who said he filmed the video, as saying, “Kate looked happy and relaxed. They look happy just to be able to go to a shop and mingle.”
The couple’s Kensington Palace office did not comment.
The palace has said Kate, 42, will return to official duties after Easter. That's likely to be once her children go back to school on April 17.
The Sun plastered its front page with “Great to see you again, Kate!” It said it had decided to publish the footage “in a bid to bring an end to what the Palace has called the 'madness of social media.'”
Feverish and at times fantastical speculation has swirled about the princess's condition during her absence. The palace has not disclosed details, but said it is not cancer-related.
Kensington Palace released a photo of Kate and her children George, Charlotte and Louis on March 10 to coincide with Mother’s Day in the UK But the move backfire when The Associated Press and other news agencies retracted it from publication because it appeared to have been manipulated, fueling even more conjecture.
Kate issued a statement acknowledging she liked to “experiment with editing” and apologizing for “any confusion” the photo had caused.



3 Climbers Fell 400 Feet to their Death. One climber Survived and Drove to Pay Phone

The Okanogan County Search and Rescue team responds to a climbing accident in the North Cascades mountains in Washington on Sunday, May 11, 2025. (Okanogan County Sheriff's Office via AP)
The Okanogan County Search and Rescue team responds to a climbing accident in the North Cascades mountains in Washington on Sunday, May 11, 2025. (Okanogan County Sheriff's Office via AP)
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3 Climbers Fell 400 Feet to their Death. One climber Survived and Drove to Pay Phone

The Okanogan County Search and Rescue team responds to a climbing accident in the North Cascades mountains in Washington on Sunday, May 11, 2025. (Okanogan County Sheriff's Office via AP)
The Okanogan County Search and Rescue team responds to a climbing accident in the North Cascades mountains in Washington on Sunday, May 11, 2025. (Okanogan County Sheriff's Office via AP)

A rock climber who fell hundreds of feet descending a steep gully in Washington's North Cascades mountains survived the fall that killed his three companions, hiked to his car in the dark and then drove to a pay phone to call for help, authorities said Tuesday.

The surviving climber, Anton Tselykh, 38, extricated himself from a tangle of ropes, helmets and other equipment after the fall Saturday evening. Despite suffering internal bleeding and head trauma, Tselykh eventually, over at least a dozen hours, made the trek to the pay phone, Okanogan County Undersheriff Dave Yarnell said, according to The Associated Press.

The climbers who were killed were Vishnu Irigireddy, 48, Tim Nguyen, 63, Oleksander Martynenko, 36, Okanogan County Coroner Dave Rodriguez said.

Authorities haven't yet been able to interview the survivor, who is in a Seattle hospital, said Rodriguez, so much is still unknown of the fall and Tselykh's journey.

Falls like this leading to three deaths are extremely rare, said Cristina Woodworth, who leads the sheriff’s search and rescue team. Seven years ago, two climbers were killed in a fall on El Capitan at Yosemite National Park in California.

The group of four were scaling the Early Winters Spires, jagged peaks split by a cleft that is popular with climbers in the North Cascade Range, about 160 miles (257 kilometers) northeast of Seattle. Tselykh was hospitalized in Seattle.

The group of four met with disaster that night when the anchor used to secure their ropes was torn from the rock while they were descending, Rodriguez said. The anchor they were using, a metal spike called a piton, appeared to have been placed there by past climbers, he said.

They plummeted for about 200 feet (60 meters) into a slanted gulch and then tumbled another 200 feet before coming to rest, Yarnell said. Authorities believe the group had been ascending but turned around when they saw a storm approaching.

A three-person search and rescue team reached the site of the fall Sunday, Woodworth said. The team used coordinates from a device the climbers had been carrying, which had been shared by a friend of the men.

Once they found the site, they called in a helicopter to remove the bodies one at a time because of the rough terrain, Woodworth said.

On Monday, responders poured over the recovered equipment trying to decipher what caused the fall, Woodworth said. They found a piton — basically a small metal spike that is driven into rock cracks or ice and used as anchors by climbers — that was still clipped into the climbers' ropes.

“There’s no other reason it would be hooked onto the rope unless it pulled out of the rock,” said Rodriguez, the coroner, noting that pitons are typically stuck fast in the rock. Rodriguez added that when rappelling, all four men would not have be hanging from the one piton at the same time, but taking turns moving down the mountain.

Pitons are oftentimes left in walls. They can be there for years or even decades, and they may become less secure over time.

“It looked old and weathered, and the rest of their equipment looked newer, so we are making the assumption that it was an old piton,” Woodworth said.

Rock climbers secure themselves by ropes to anchors, such as pitons or other climbing equipment. The ropes are intended to arrest their fall if they should slip, and typically climbers use backup anchors, said Joshua Cole, a guide and co-owner of North Cascades Mountain Guides, who has been climbing in the area for about 20 years.

Generally, it would be unusual to rappel off a single piton, said Cole, adding that it is still unknown exactly what happened on the wall that night.

“We eventually, if possible, would like to get more information from surviving party,” Woodworth said.

The spires are a popular climbing spot. The route the climbers were taking, said Cole, was of moderate difficulty, and requires moving between ice, snow and rock.
But the conditions, the amount of ice versus rock for example, can change rapidly with the weather, he said, even week to week or day to day, changing the route's risks.