A student was found dead inside a campus building, UC San Diego police confirmed Monday.

The student was found in the student lounge area of the Medical Education and Telemedicine Building that holds classes and labs within the UC San Diego School of Medicine.

A campus police spokesperson told NBC 7 the death may be a suicide and that investigators were still on scene with San Diego County Medical Examiner officials.

The department was still open Monday. The building is located east of Villa La Jolla Drive off of Osler Lane.

If you or someone you care about needs immediate help, call the Crisis Hotline at (888) 724-7240. The phone lines are answered by trained professionals available 24/7; the call is free and confidential.

If you’re looking for a place to watch the women’s soccer match tonight with your fellow soccer fans, you’re in luck.

Petco Park’s Park at the Park will host a public viewing area for the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup match.

The United States will face off against Colombia Monday at 5 p.m. in their round 16 match-up.

The Park at the Park will be open to visitors throughout the day and will screen the match when it begins.

The Tailgate Lot will have discounted parking for those interested.

Police are investigating reports of shots fired near Lincoln Park.

The incident happened around 11:15 a.m. Monday near S 49th Street and Logan Avenue when San Diego Police said they received reports of several shots heard in the area.

When officers arrived on scene, they found shell casings on the ground on the street, they said.
There have been no gunshot victims and officers are interviewing witnesses, police said.

Harley Knox Middle School was placed on lockdown for a short period of time but that lockdown has since been lifted.

Officers are investigating.

Check back for updates on this breaking news story.

A 3-year-old girl died at a Pomona, Southern California, hospital after she was found unconscious in a vehicle on Father's Day during a hot afternoon in Pomona.

Authorities said the death appears to be a "tragic" heat-related accident. The child remained in the vehicle after other family members exited outside a home on Rancho Jurupa Place at about 5 p.m.

"When they returned home, everybody exited the vehicle and, as is sometimes common, they assumed that the other children had unbuckled the infant," said Sgt. Marcus Perez, of the Pomona Police Department.

It was not immediately clear how long the girl was inside the car. Family members took a nap as the child remained in the vehicle, parked in the blazing sun in the driveway during a day of 90-degree heat.

"The windows were up, it was a very hot day," said Perez.

Authorities do not suspect foul play, Vasquez said.
 

Los Angeles County Jail can be a dark and dangerous place, with little hope for real rehabilitation for the more than 17,000 inmates in the system.

But once a week in cell block K6G at Men's Central Jail, the non-profit Strindberg Laboratory comes in to teach theater to prisoners, letting inmates put on real stage plays while behind bars.

The theater program is run by husband and wife actors Michael Bierman and Meri Pakarinen. They started the program three years ago to give a voice to the voiceless.

"There's a great need to speak in the jails. Because obviously when you are in incarcerated circumstances-- to have a voice, to be able to express yourself," Bierman said.

After actors are released from custody, many continue attending theater workshops in a donated rehearsal space on Skid Row.

Forty-seven-year-old Marshall May says he'd dreamed of being an actor all his life, but it wasn't until he went to jail that he got his chance. Now that he's free, he's performing with the Strinderg Lab on stages all around Los Angeles.

May says the program has been a life line, despite criticism from some of his friends back on the cellblock.

"'Oh child, you know you're not gonna do this. What do you think, you're gonna be on the Academy Awards next year?'  All kinds of negative stuff. However, anything to get away from the negativity and do something positive," May said.

The program has allowed 37-year-old Luca Taoatao to follow his dreams of becoming a costume designer. He says he was skeptical when he first met the directors behind bars.

"I said, why is someone going to want to spend time with us?  Why? They're not getting paid. Is something wrong with them?" Taoatao said.

But for the first time in his life, he's showing up and following through with something because the group is depending on him, he says.

Bierman is expanding the program to hire actors off Skid Row. His dream is to merge LA's haves and have-nots by introducing unlikely performers to new audiences.

"If you look at the history of acting - until the studio system came up everybody who was an actor was a vagabond," Bierman said.

The Strindberg Lab actors will perform their play "The Birds" next weekend at the Sidewalk Studio Theater in Burbank. If you'd like to donate or learn more about the program visit their website: strindberglaboratory.com.

A majority of farmers and others holding some of California's strongest claims to water have missed a deadline to confirm they stopped pumping from rivers and streams, state officials said Monday.

Data show less than a third of the farmers, water districts and communities affected by California's broadest mandatory cut on record responded to the order by the State Water Resources Control Board.

The order applied to 277 century-old rights to water from the Sacramento, San Joaquin and delta watersheds in the agriculture-rich Central Valley.

Some of those rights holders are challenging the cuts in court so they can keep irrigating crops and taking care of livestock.

Water rights enforcement manager Kathy Mrowka said she was still reviewing the response data and didn't have an immediate explanation for why it lagged.

The senior water rights holders who didn't respond to the water board were expected to take about 200,000 acre feet of water over the summer, a small sliver of the state's total water use.

She previously said entities that ignore the water board would be the first to face inspections and enforcement. The punishment for taking water is $1,000 a day and $2,500 per acre foot, enough water to fill an acre of land one foot deep.

Some people that have not responded to the board may not be illegally taking water because the streams and creeks to which they hold rights have dried out.

Those ordered to stop diverting from waterways have other options, including tapping groundwater, buying water at rising costs, using previously stored water or leaving fields unplanted.

Regulators have already ordered thousands of other entities with less secure claims known as junior water rights to stop pumping. Only about a third of them have confirmed they stopped diverting water, although the ones that did respond are among the biggest water users.

An SUV driver who swerved to avoid hitting a dead cat in the middle of a Brooklyn street wound up hitting the gas pedal, flying over a curb and across three lawns before crashing into a man and then plowing into a house, taking out a light pole along the way, witnesses and authorities said. 

"She tried to avoid hitting that cat and she just lost it," said witness Stephan Lamour, who watched the wild ride unfold through his Canarsie neighborhood. "Instead of the brakes, she pressed the gas." 

A family eating lunch inside the house where the SUV landed on the stoop were startled by the crash. 

"We heard a large screech, tires, then there was a loud boom," said Marvin Kipp.

"The house was shaking. The house was shaking, I wanted to see what was going on," said son Aubrey Kipp. 

Aubrey and Marvin called police and ran outside, where Lamour run over and helped put the SUV in park. Together, the neighbors checked on the driver and the man hit by the car, who had been walking door to door deliver fliers for a decorating service.

"I thought he went through the window and I said, 'What's he doing on the floor?'" said Lamour. 

With so many children in the neighborhood and on the first day of summer when so many residents were doing yard work, neighbors said the crash could have been much worse.

"It looked pretty nasty, but thank God it's good now," said Lamour.

Neither the driver nor the man hit suffered life-threatening injuries, said police. The crash remains under investigation. 

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has been diagnosed with an advanced, aggressive form of cancer, he announced Monday.

Hogan, 59, revealed he has B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma during a press conference Monday, describing the diagnosis as "shocking news to me" but appearing determined to fight his illness. He said he was diagnosed just days ago.

"I won't just beat this disease, I will fight it and beat it and be a stronger governor when we get to the other side," he said.

Hogan's revelation came five months to the day after he was inaugurated as governor. He said he told his family the tough news on Father's Day, and was surrounded by them in Annapolis when he made his public announcement shortly after 4 p.m. Monday.

He said he has tumors that have spread through his abdomen and are pressing up against his spinal column.

"On a stage [of cancer], we're not quite sure yet," he said. "It's at least very advanced stage III, if not stage IV."

Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma is cancer that originates in the lymphatic system, the body's disease-fighting network, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Hogan said he was diagnosed after finding a lump under his chin while shaving. "They found 12 more of these things in my neck," he said.

He said he had "20 or 30" more tumors in his core and groin area, adding he has been having many tests and procedures and that his team of doctors are treating his case aggressively.

The governor says his doctors have told him he has a good chance of beating the disease and he will soon be taking time off to undergo aggressive chemotherapy due to the fast-growing nature of his cancer. 

"As far as the treatment, they want to be as aggressive as possible...." he said. "They’re going to put me in the hospital for four days and shoot me with intense chemotherapy in intensive care."

He also said he expects to lose his hair as a result.

"Most likely I'm going to lose my hair -- I won't have these beautiful gray locks," he said. "I may trim down a bit."

He said he didn't know how it started or how long he has had the illness.

"It just hit me in a very short period of time," he said.

The governor appeared nervous at the start of his his press conference, but seemed to become more upbeat and confident as he went on. He cracked jokes but said, "It's a tough time to go through."

Hogan said he plans to work as much as he is able, describing himself as a workaholic. He was greeted with laughter when he said that if he halved his work hours, he would still be working more than any other governor.

"I’m going to miss a few meetings but I’ll have every capacity to make decisions," Hogan said. He said Lieutenant Gov. Boyd Rutherford will step up "even more," as will his cabinet.

"The fact is, I'm just like the more than 70,000 people diagnosed with lymphoma every year who fight it, beat it and continue to do their jobs at the same time," Hogan said.

Hogan said he has energy and not much pain, but not much of an appetite, either.

"I've been feeling fine," he said.

After spending the last seven weeks at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia undergoing stem cell therapy for her cancer, Leah Still is finally headed home, she and her father Devon Still announced in an Instagram post on Friday.

After her cancer went into remission two months ago, the Cincinnati Bengals defensive tackle, said his daughter suffered a setback earlier this month. On Friday, the Stills were told that Leah was all set to go home.

Last June, 5-year-old Leah was diagnosed with stage-4 neuroblastoma, a rare form of cancer in young children.

Still has shared his daughter’s progress online with his more than 464,000 Instagram followers.

Three extreme-skydiving enthusiasts accused of parachuting off of the World Trade Center in September 2013 were found guilty Monday of reckless endangerment, reckless endangerment of property and BASE jumping — all misdemeanors — but were acquitted on felony charges of burglary, the most serious offense.

James Brady, 33, Marko Markovich, 28, and Andrew Rossig, 34, were in New York State Supreme Court to hear the verdict.

“In the nearly two years since this BASE jump occurred, the three men who parachuted off One World Trade Center have yet to acknowledge the dangerousness or cost of their actions,” District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance said.

The three extreme-skydiving enthusiasts are expected to be sentenced in August.

At 3 a.m. on September 30, 2013, the men entered 1 World Trade Center and climbed up 104 flights of stairs to the tower's communication ring, Vance said. They then picked up equipment left by Brady, who worked as an iron worker at the construction site, and parachuted off of the building one by one.

Upon witnessing one of the skydivers land on the streets below, a manager at a local bagel shop called 911.

Following a joint investigation between the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, the NYPD and the Port Authority Police Department, the defendants were arrested in March 2014.

A judge refused to toss out the felony charges against them in November 2014, saying they displayed "inexcusable self-indulgence."

The New Yorkers pleaded not guilty to felony burglary, reckless endangerment and other charges in the leap, which was captured in a YouTube video. The stunt raised questions about security at the then-unfinished skyscraper.

The parachutists acknowledge making the jump. They said that they didn't imperil anyone and that the charges are overreaching by embarrassed authorities.

But the judge said they created a "substantial risk" of injury to people below.

Too many vinyl records stored on the second floor of a San Diego building caused a collapse that damaged a popular thrift store.

Thrift Trader in the city's Hillcrest neighborhood suffered significant damage when the second floor collapsed overnight.

San Diego Fire-Rescue received the call at 4 a.m. and immediately taped off the sidewalk outside of the business, located on University Avenue near Normal Street, and a nearby parking lot out of concern for pedestrians.

Officials say the mezzanine was overloaded with vinyl records, causing the collapse of that higher floor.

No one was in the building at the time off the collapse.

"It's scary but obviously it's very fortunate that this happened when no one else was around," said University Heights resident Jeff White. "I wish them a lot of luck in getting it back together again, because obviously that's a lot of damage."

The building was red tagged after the incident. The owner told NBC 7 he will contact the city's structural engineers to determine what needs to be done so the business can reopen.

The wildfire blazing for four days in a Southern California national forest has already cost $5 million and is only 21 percent contained, officials said.

Firefighting crews working in very high temperatures have dug in along a closed-off stretch of Highway 38 in San Bernardino National Forest, where the fire was burning timber across more than 27 square miles, according to the emergency management team handling what's being called the Lake Fire.

The fire stretches from Highway 38 to the San Gorgonio Wilderness's high peaks, and from the Pacific Crest Trail west toward Angelus Oaks, said Sunday's official update, which noted that the fire's perimeter seemed to be burning slowly or at low-intensity in areas including Anderson Peak and Hell For Sure Canyon.

Just under 2,000 firefighting personnel have been called in to fight the fire, which flared up Wednesday in the Barton Flats area, not far from the resort town of Big Bear. They would continue to work in a heat advisory until 7 p.m. Sunday, officials said.

Five hundred structures remained threatened by the wildfire Sunday night. This fire is being spread by heavy fuels and steep slopes.

Smoke from the fire has been seen at the Grand Canyon, and smoke continued to impact the area nearby, sullying air quality, officials said.

The U.S. Forest Service was coordinating with Cal Fire and the San Bernardino County Fire and Sheriff's departments in managing the fire.

San Diego officials have announced a program called “Vision Zero” Monday, with the goal to to make the city more pedestrian and bike-friendly and eliminate traffic deaths by 2025.

“We have a traffic fatality rate in San Diego that’s greater than our murder rate," exclaimed Jim Stone, Executive Director of Circulate San Diego.

Juniper Aavang was killed in March as her father pushed her in a stroller through a crosswalk at the intersection of Catalina and Cannon in Point Loma.

A prime example of why Stone says it's time to slow traffic down on city streets.

The idea is part of a plan he and city leaders will announce Monday, hoping to reduce traffic deaths to zero by 2025.

“We know that if someone is hit by a car going 40 miles per hour they have a 20 percent chance of surviving a crash. So we want to slow things down to a safer speed."

Allison Street next to La Mesa City Hall provides a blueprint of sorts. Diagonal parking lines reduce the size of the street. Stone says studies show smaller streets help slow traffic. Then there's the crosswalk with lights on the ground and signs that alert drivers when someone crosses. The curb extension also provides better visibility.

“They can see cars coming but more importantly the cars can see them coming,” Stone said about the curb extensions. “So it’s a great way to improve pedestrian safety."

The cost to get the changes going would be approximately $15 million, according to Stone.

The focus will be on eight major corridors in San Diego. Streets like University, Market and El Cajon, where Stone says studies show one-third of the city’s serious crashes happen.

“We don’t have to remake all the streets we need to focus on the streets with highest rate of collision."
Not all intersections have to have extravagant build outs with curb extensions.

Stone says high visibility crosswalks that are nothing more than a can of paint and high visibility crossing signs can help reduce accidents. He also notes education and traffic enforcement is key.
 

Officials investigating a fatal rollover on Interstate 805 Sunday say the driver who was killed in the crash did not like to wear a seatbelt.

A Ford Expedition traveling northbound on I-805 went up an embankment near Market Street just before 7:30 p.m. Sunday.

The 44-year-old man behind the wheel was ejected in the crash. His passenger, a woman who identified herself as his girlfriend, was able to get herself out of the car.

Emergency personnel performed CPR on the driver but the man was pronounced dead at the scene.

California Highway Patrol Sgt, Rick Rodriguez said the victim was not restrained at the time of the crash.

“Her boyfriend didn't like wearing a seatbelt and that's something we stress. Accidents do occur,” Rodriguez said.

CHP officials aren't sure if it was excessive speed or steering that caused the vehicle to lose control.

The victim’s girlfriend told NBC 7 the couple had just left a Father’s Day family gathering.
 

Walmart is removing all items bearing the Confederate flag from its stores, the nation's largest retailer announced Monday.

"We never want to offend anyone with the products that we offer," the Arkansas-based retail giant said in a statement released Monday. "We have taken steps to remove all items promoting the confederate flag from our assortment — whether in our stores or on our web site."

In the statement, Walmart said that "at times, items make their way into our assortment improperly — this is one of those instances." The statement did not detail which of the items was deemed improper.

The announcement comes hours after South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley called for the Confederate battle flag to be permanently removed from the grounds of the state house in Columbia.

"It is my hope that by removing a symbol that divides us, we can move forward together in harmony, and we can honor those nine blessed souls who are now in heaven,” she said, referring to the victims of last week's massacre at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.

Authorities have called the shooting a hate crime. A white supremacist website that may be linked to the shooter, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, displayed images of Roof apparently holding the Confederate flag.

Calling the battle flag "a deeply offensive symbol of a brutally oppressive past,” Haley — flanked by Republican senators Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott — said that “the fact that it causes pain to so many is reason enough to remove it from the capitol grounds.”

A new plan that may change the way airplanes and other air traffic arrives at local airports got its first public airing Monday night. 

As part of a proposal to improve the flow of air traffic into Southern Californian airports, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is looking to change air traffic procedures to a satellite-based system.

In lieu of this change, the U.S. Department of Transportation and FAA held a meeting in Logan Heights about the Draft Environmental Assessment for the Southern California Metroplex project.

"Satellite has a number of advantages it makes a safe system even safer it makes a system more efficient and throughout the country we’re seeing significant environmental benefits from the use of this type of policy," said Ian Gregor, a spokesman for the FAA. 

The Metroplex proposal, which encompases several Southern California airports, is meant to increase the efficiency of the way planes come in to those airports primarily by switching them over to the FAA’s Next Generation Air Transportation System, NextGen.

“Many of the current air traffic procedures in Southern California are decades old,” the release said. 

The procedures in place are safe, but rely on ground-based navigation aids instead of satellite-based procedures. Those aids limit the possible flight paths coming into the airport.

The changes in flight plans will be made mostly at altitudes of 8,000 feet or higher and will have a minor impact on paths below then, said an expert that reviewed the full plans. 

"I hope that we find out that we have less traffic coming over our houses and that they would go in different directions like they used to, they used to do that but there was less traffic then," said Point Loma resident Louis Moody. 

Satellite-based procedures let planes take a more direct route, altitude and spped coming in. The project will also expand how many entry and exit points planes have when coming in and out of the plane, creating more on- and off-ramps in the sky.
 

A dog died after it was left in a car for five hours, as temperatures inside reached 135 degrees, and now its owner has been arrested on suspicion of animal cruelty, according to El Cajon police.

On Friday afternoon, a concerned citizen told deputies a distressed pit bull terrier was trapped in a silver Volkswagen Jetta in the El Cajon Courthouse parking lot. Sheriff’s deputies found all the windows rolled up and the doors locked.

Wanting to save the animal, they broke a window, but it was too late. The dog had died, police said.

As El Cajon police officers took over the investigation, they say discovered the temperature in the Jetta was about 135 degrees, though it was 95 degrees outside.

The owner, 46-year-old Victoria Williams, had left the dog in the car for about five hours as she attended to a court matter, according to police.

Williams, a Brawley resident, was booked into the San Diego County Jail on the animal cruelty charge. She has since bailed out, and it's unclear if she's obtained an attorney.

A necropsy will be performed on her pet to determine an exact cause of death, but police believe it died from excessive heat exposure.

The suspect wanted in a string of recent attacks on Asian women in Manhattan has been found dead of an apparent suicide inside a basement on the Upper East Side, law enforcement sources said.

The suspect, 25-year-old Tyrell Shaw, apparently hanged himself and was found in an elevator shaft on the 700 block of Madison Avenue, according to the sources. The body was positively identified as Shaw's. 

He's believed to have been dead for several days, the sources said. It wasn't immediately clear how the body was discovered, or how he managed to access the building and the elevator shaft. 

A manager of an Italian restaurant next door said he saw police leave the buillding with a body at around 6 p.m. 

A woman who works in an office inside the building said a stench had wafted from the near the elevator in the last few days. 

"This morning it smelled horrible. It still smells bad, and the lights are on in the basement," said Karen Bennet. 

Police said the suspect began attacking Asian women earlier this month in Chinatown. In the first case, on June 10, he asked a 35-year-old woman, "Who is the president of the United States?" police say. When she didn't respond, police say, he walked away, then returned with a white plastic bag containing a hard object and hit her in the face.

About four hours later, a 29-year-old Asian woman was walking down Park Avenue near East 30th Street when the suspect walked past her and waited at the corner, police say. He hit her in the face with the bag when she reached the corner; she was treated at a hospital and released.

Two days later, on June 12, the same suspect attacked a 34-year-old woman walking near Second Avenue and East 60th Street. As in the earlier cases, he walked up to her, armed with the white bag containing the hard object, and bashed her in the forehead. She also was treated at a hospital.

The woman in that case said the man spoke to her, saying, "All Asian girls doesn't talk to me," the victim told NBC 4 New York. She said he complained he could never get their phone numbers; she said she ignored him.

"And then, just after next second, he just hit my face," the woman said.

She said she chased the man after the attack, but stopped when she realized she was covered in blood. The woman needed 10 stitches to close a gash above her eye. She said the wound is so painful that she can't work.

The most recent attack was last Monday, when police said the suspect tried to strike up a conversation with a 41-year-old Asian woman on Mulberry Street. She ignored him and he left, but returned, this time with a gray bag containing a hard object, and whacked her in the face with it.

None of the victims were seriously injured in the attacks.

Police had also briefly investigated whether Shaw was the man who allegedly followed two women for about an hour a few days before the first attack, but sources later said it didn't appear those cases were connected to the pattern.

Authorities were also investigating whether Shaw was the man who wrote online that he decided to begin his violent onslaught because he wanted "to give all Asian Women a legitimate reason to hate" him.

The writer of the blog said he would begin attacking women after following two women in SoHo and being rejected by other Asian women. He said he was growing frustrated after talking to nearly 1,500 Asian women in less than a year. 

"By starting an independent civil war where I will hit over a million Asian Women in the face with a stick will change history," the blogger wrote.

The same person wrote in a post dated June 17: "Inform NYPD they could stop searching for me because I’m going to commit suicide. Actually, I’ve already tied a noose to the bottom of an elevator and I’m going to wait until someone pushes a button so that its not considered a practical suicide. This is actually murder. Thank you. I love you." 

In an earlier post dated June 7, the person wrote: "Truthfully, I feel so much better after hitting an asian Woman in the face with a steel rod. It was the greatest achievement of my life. 

"Heres my plan: Every Asian Woman by herself must be hit in the face. I may even take a photo before hitting them. The reason is because I don’t think Asian Women like me and that specific one or two or three may have never met me. So I think its brilliant to give all Asian Women a legitimate reason to hate me," the blogger wrote. 

In the post dated June 17: "I just couldn’t understand why Asian Women didn’t find me attractive. Suddenly, I assumed the ones that I am attracted to use cocaine so I decided to play a game. Bash Asian Women in the Nose so that they could stop sniffing cocaine and give me a chance. At first I thought I could get away with 1 Million Noses, but at 6th victim I felt a little discouraged. I didn’t even expect to bash The Dry cleaning lady in the mouth. She went overboard with the verbal abuse. That was actually my day off from playing the Nose Game. Yeah, thats what I’ll call it 'The Nose Game.' She asked for it."

Shaw has been arrested 10 times in the city since 2006 for an array of offenses, including credit card theft, criminal trespassing and burglary, records show. The sources say he has been involved in four prior domestic cases; three of them involved arguments with family members and one stemmed from a fight with a girlfriend.

Police have also encountered him several times when responding to reports of an emotionally disturbed person; in April, they responded after he was running into oncoming traffic on 10th Avenue, putting himself and others in dangers, law enforcement sources say.

The woman who works in the building where Shaw was found recognized him in a photo shown to her by NBC 4 New York. Karen Bennet said a co-worker found Shaw hiding inside a closet last October; he had apparently been squatting there for about six months. When the co-worker threatened to call police, Shaw fled, Bennet said.

He was captured on the building's security camera, and the building upgraded its security cameras afterward, Bennet said. 

In his debut as the permanent anchor of "NBC Nightly News," Lester Holt thanked viewers for their loyalty and support for the program.

"Tonight, this program has a new name, and I'm honored to say, a new anchor," Holt, who had been subbing for Brian Williams since his predecessor's suspension in February, said at the end of Monday's show. "Your loyalty and viewership during this difficult time has been appreciated by all of us on this program."

NBC announced last week that Williams will not return to his job as "Nightly News" anchor more than four months after he was suspended for misrepresenting his experiences as a journalist, but will serve as a breaking news anchor at MSNBC.

Holt took over that position permanently. He is the first African-American to be the sole anchor of a network evening newscast. 

Holt thanked Williams during Monday's broadcast "for his kind words of support."

Earlier in the day, Holt received a flurry of congratulations from his colleagues and his family as he was getting ready take over the "Nightly" anchor chair.

He was surprised by his wife and two sons on NBC's "Today" show as they all celebrated his achievements and his 15 years at NBC. 

Even NBC Chicago’s Stefan Holt appeared live from Chicago on the show to congratulate his father.

“So happy for you dad, so proud and excited for this new opportunity,” he said.

“It’s funny looking at Stefan because if you had asked my which Holt would someday be a network news anchor of a nightly show I would have thought Stefan,” Lester Holt replied. 

Holt’s family said they’re excited to have him home on the weekends now and they’re looking forward to the new journey.

“What we do sometimes takes a lot of time from family, we’ve got to answer that bell and they’ve been by me, my strength and my rock and they’ve been very supportive in this period of uncertainty,” he said.

This TV station is owned by parent company NBCUniversal. 

A Marine veteran is skateboarding 2,426 miles across the country, to South Carolina in hopes of shedding light on veteran suicides.

Sean Delaire will make the trek alone and with a large backpack filled with camping supplies. He’s planning on skateboarding from the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, where he graduated recruit training, to the only other Marine recruiting depot in the U.S., in Beaufort, S.C.

Delaire served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 2007 to 2011. He said he had a veteran friend who died of suicide and wants to raise awareness on the topic.

“It’s something that people just don’t know about,” he said. “I don’t want other people to feel alone.

He said that after he served in the military, he battled depression and turned to alcohol to cope.

But then skateboarding helped him through his emotions, he said.

“You got to have something to take your mind off it,” he said. “A lot of vets feel like they have to tough it out.”

Delaire plans on embarking on the cross-country trip soon, once he does some “practice runs” on his skateboard while carrying his oversized pack.

He plans to return to San Diego by plane.

“Once I get there I’m packing it up and going home,” he said.