Alaska

According to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office District of Alaska, Kepueli Talaiasi was on a flight from Phoenix, Arizona to Anchorage on Monday.

While on the flight, he is accused of “intentionally” engaging in sexual contact with a 16-year-old girl who was next to him on the flight.

In protecting the waters, Obama used a 1950s-era law called the Outer Continental Shelf Act that allows presidents to limit areas from mineral leasing and drilling. Environmental groups said Obama's use of the law meant the incoming administration of Republican President-elect Donald Trump could not simply reverse the action but would have to fight it in the courts.

The ban affects federal waters off Alaska in the Chukchi Sea and most of the Beaufort Sea and in the Atlantic from New England to Chesapeake Bay.

Alaska State Troopers say fatalities occurred in the wreck Tuesday near Iliamna (ill-ee-AHM'-nuh), but they didn't know how many. They say rescue personnel are taking injured passengers to the clinic in the small community.

Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Allen Kenitzer says in an email to The Associated Press that the plane crashed on takeoff at Eastwind Lake, 1 mile north of Iliamna. He says the aircraft was a De Havilland DHC-3 Turbine Otter on floats, and the cause of the crash is not yet known.