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SANTIAGO, Chile, Dec. 31 (UPI) — The start of Chile’s new cherry export season is delivering strong results in the United States, where exporters are pursuing a strategy to expand consumption during the Northern Hemisphere winter.

Although the season formally began in December, the first shipments were sent Oct. 20 due to an early harvest, and figures so far are positive, Claudia Soler, executive director of the Cherries Committee of Fruits from Chile, told UPI.

Soler said that as of Dec. 22, Chile had exported 18,282 metric tons of cherries to the United States, about 20,150 tons, representing a 63% increase compared with the same period last season.

The United States is the second-largest destination for Chilean cherry exports after China, with shipments exceeding 3.9 million 5-kilogram boxes in 2024.

Chilean exporters, together with U.S.-based companies, are now working to boost consumption among American consumers, taking advantage of the earlier start of the season for the premium fruit.

Soler said the largest retail chains began promotions Dec. 15.

“They are very important to generate early-season momentum. This year, in particular, we are starting promotions much earlier,” she said.

“In the United States, a significant volume of domestic cherries is consumed during the summer — close to 40 million 5-kilogram boxes. That means there is enormous potential, because the market is still not fully aware that cherries are available during the winter season,” she said.

“We are seeking to increase visibility, awareness and consumption of Chilean cherries during the winter months,” she added, positioning the fruit as an option available from December through February.

“It is a delicious, healthy and premium snack. To achieve this, work is being done both with retailers through in-store promotions and e-commerce platforms, and directly with consumers through social media, traditional media and influencer partnerships,” she said.

North American apple grower and distributor Honeybear Brands, one of the largest importers of Chilean cherries, told Portal Frutícola it expects to import between 125 and 150 cherry shipments this year through the ports of Washington state and Philadelphia, helping to reduce logistics costs and improve stock availability.

Chuck Sinks, Honeybear Brands’ president of sales and marketing, said the company is receiving “slightly better sizing than last year, with good flavor and consistency.”

“We only bring in Chilean fruit. We feel it is a superior product compared with other growing regions in South America,” he said, noting that older consumers account for the bulk of demand.

“Buyers tend to be over 55 years old, live in two-person households and a large share of purchases come from households with annual incomes of around $100,000 or more,” Sinks said.

Chile is the world’s leading producer and exporter of cherries. In 2024, exports totaled $3.091 billion. For the 2025-26 season, production had been forecast at 131 million boxes, equivalent to 655,000 metric tons, compared with 625,000 metric tons in the previous season.

However, initial downward adjustments are being made due to weather conditions.

“According to an internal analysis conducted by the Cherry Committee in late November, exports were revised down by between 10% and 15% compared with the October estimate,” Soler said.

She said the previous season was challenging in terms of profitability due to a combination of factors. Still, “we believe that in China, the United States and other key markets for Chile, there remains significant room to grow consumption.”

According to the Monthly Trade Report from the studies department of Chile’s Subsecretariat for International Economic Relations, the new fresh cherry export season began in November, with shipments totaling $300 million that month, nearly tripling exports from November 2024, which reached $106 million.

STATESVILLE, N.C. — A business jet crashed Thursday while trying to return to a North Carolina airport shortly after takeoff, killing all seven people aboard, including retired NASCAR driver Greg Biffle and his family, authorities said.

The Cessna C550 erupted into a large fire when it hit the ground. It had departed Statesville Regional Airport, about 45 miles north of Charlotte, but soon crashed while trying to return and land, the North Carolina State Highway Patrol said.

Flight records show the plane was registered to a company run by Biffle. The cause of the crash wasn’t immediately known, nor was the reason for the plane’s return to the airport in drizzle and cloudy conditions.

Biffle was on the plane with his wife, Cristina, and children Ryder, 5, and Emma, 14, according to the highway patrol and a family statement. Others on the plane were identified as Dennis Dutton, his son Jack, and Craig Wadsworth.

“Each of them meant everything to us, and their absence leaves an immeasurable void in our lives,” the joint family statement said.

Biffle, 55, won more than 50 races across NASCAR’s three circuits, including 19 at the Cup Series level. He also won the Trucks Series championship in 2000 and the Xfinity Series title in 2002.

NASCAR said it was devastated by the news.

“Greg was more than a champion driver; he was a beloved member of the NASCAR community, a fierce competitor, and a friend to so many,” NASCAR said. “His passion for racing, his integrity, and his commitment to fans and fellow competitors alike made a lasting impact on the sport.”

The plane, bound for Florida, took off from the Statesville airport shortly after 10 a.m., according to tracking data posted by FlightAware.com.

Golfers playing next to the airport were shocked as they witnessed the disaster, even dropping to the ground at the Lakewood Golf Club while the plane was overhead. The ninth hole was covered with debris.

“We were like, ‘Oh my gosh! That’s way too low,’” said Joshua Green of Mooresville. “It was scary.”

The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration were investigating.

The Cessna plane, built in 1981, is a popular mid-sized business jet with an excellent reputation, aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti said. It has two engines and typically seats six to eight passengers.

In 2024, Biffle was honored for his humanitarian efforts after Hurricane Helene struck the U.S., even using his personal helicopter to deliver aid to flooded, remote western North Carolina.

“The last time I spoke with Cristina, just a couple of weeks ago, she reached out to ask how she could help with relief efforts in Jamaica. That’s who the Biffles were,” U.S. Rep. Richard Hudson, a Republican from North Carolina, said.

Wadsworth was Biffle’s friend and helped him with odd jobs, including delivering supplies to places hit by Hurricane Helene, roommate Benito Howell said.

“He didn’t know how to say no,” Howell said of Wadsworth, who had worked for several NASCAR teams. “He loved everybody. He always tried to help everybody.”

The joint family statement also spoke about Dutton and his son Jack, saying they were “deeply loved as well, and their loss is felt by all who knew them.”

With 2025 almost over, there have been 1,331 U.S. crashes this year investigated by the NTSB, from two-seat planes to commercial aircraft, compared to a total of 1,482 in 2024.

Major air disasters around the world in 2025 include the plane-helicopter collision that killed 67 in Washington, the Air India crash that killed 260 in India, and a crash in Russia’s Far East that claimed 48 lives. Fourteen people, including 11 on the ground, died in a UPS cargo plane crash in Kentucky.

Joe Root avoids being given out for one after review shows an edge behind drops just short of Australian wicketkeeper Alex Carey, with England 42-3, still 329 runs behind Australia’s first innings score of 371 on day two of the third Ashes Test in Adelaide.

FOLLOW LIVE: The Ashes third Test – day two

Available to UK users only.

USC’s starting quarterback is returning for another season in 2026.

Jayden Maiava made it official Tuesday as the school announced that he had re-signed with the program for the upcoming season, his third with the Trojans.

Maiava led USC to a 9-3 record in his first full season as starter after taking over the job during the final month of the 2023 season. He threw for 3,431 yards, 23 touchdowns and eight interceptions. He also added six scores on the ground.

That strong performance led to questions of whether Maiava might declare for the NFL draft. Some prognosticators viewed Maiava as one of the better potential quarterback prospects in a draft especially thin on passers.

Instead, Maiava will run it back at USC, where the Trojans are set to return most of their dynamic 2025 offense in 2026 — the exception being their top two wideouts Makai Lemon and Ja’Kobi Lane, who both declared for the draft. USC announced earlier this week that it had re-signed No. 1 running back Waymond Jordan and receivers Tanook Hines and Zacharyus Williams for the 2026 season.

Maiava’s return now turns the attention to five-star backup Husan Longstreet, who will have a decision to make about his future at USC. It’s unclear if Longstreet would be willing to wait another season behind Maiava.

Gov. Pete Wilson challenged President Clinton on Thursday to make California a test market for a tamper-proof federal identification card designed to keep illegal immigrants from receiving public benefits or getting jobs in the United States.

Later, a Wilson aide said one option might be a national identification card that would be carried by every legal resident of the United States, including U.S. citizens.

Wilson’s news conference at U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service offices at Los Angeles International Airport was billed as the forum for a “major announcement regarding immigration.” In fact, Wilson’s statement expanded on his Aug. 9 program by only a small step–the proposed California test–while raising even more questions about his plan for the proposed identification card.

The governor acknowledged to a reporter that it probably is impossible to come up with a foolproof card because counterfeiters could fake birth certificates, passports or other documents that would be needed to get the card.

Wilson left unclear just who might have to possess the card: just foreign nationals living in the country legally or all U.S. citizens?

Asked who would have to carry the card, Wilson said: “Those who are applicants for employment and those who are applicants for benefits.”

Later, Wilson aide Dan Schnur said one possibility that arose during policy discussions in the governor’s office was a national identification card issued to all U.S. citizens and legal residents.

“A universal card is one option, but we’re not looking at it as an absolute condition,” Schnur said in telephone calls to reporters.

The form and scope of any card would be worked out in negotiations with the Clinton Administration, he said.

There have been periodic proposals for a national ID card, but they have always run up against strong opposition on civil liberties grounds.

Wilson was quoted by the Santa Monica Outlook while running for the U.S. Senate in 1982 that a proposed national identification card was “a lousy idea” because it would create a massive new bureaucracy. He also said he had some philosophical objections to the concept.

Schnur had no comment on that report, but he said conditions have changed greatly since the passage of immigration reform in the late 1980s and the heavy influx of illegal immigrants into California in recent years.

Thursday’s billing of a major new initiative drew a dozen television cameras and perhaps a score of reporters, a big turnout for any political event in Los Angeles. Although it turned out that Wilson’s statement was more of an expansion on a previous proposal than a major new initiative, the session did give the governor a platform for responding to critics of his Aug. 9 announcement.

Wilson said an identification card is the key to the enforcement of any of the sanctions written into federal law against employers who hire illegal immigrants for jobs in the United States. Without it, such sanctions are unenforceable, he said.

“Until we deal with the problem of document fraud, anyone proposing additional employer sanctions is simply blowing hot air,” Wilson said after examining stacks of phony passports, Social Security cards and other false documents confiscated by the INS.

Critics, including potential Democratic gubernatorial challenger Kathleen Brown, have said Wilson’s plan cracks down on illegal immigrants but not on the employers who also violate the law by hiring them.

Last week, Brown, the state treasurer, endorsed a national tamper-proof Social Security card that would have to be presented to a prospective employer before the cardholder could be hired.

In his lengthy Aug. 9 letter to Clinton, Wilson called on the federal government to compensate California for the cost of services to illegal immigrants, called for stricter enforcement of the California-Mexico border, and said children born on U.S. soil to undocumented immigrants should not automatically become U.S. citizens or be eligible to attend public schools in California.

Wilson made no mention of stronger enforcement against employers. He proposed an identification card as something that foreign nationals in the country legally would present to qualify for state services.

Wilson said California’s modern holographic drivers licenses could be the model for a federal card, but a reporter wondered if even they could be forged, since a photographic blowup of one was among the fake IDs on display.

“You know, I don’t dispute the ingenuity of counterfeiters. . . . I think it is possible to stay technologically ahead of even expert counterfeiters,” Wilson said.

“The question really is not whether you’re going to have an entirely foolproof system, but whether you have one that works to achieve its major goal, which is to screen out the vast majority of counterfeit documents.”

Later in the day, Democratic state Chairman Bill Press chided Wilson for intervening with the INS in 1989 on behalf of a San Diego supporter, Anne Evans, whose hotels were under investigation for hiring illegal immigrants. At the time, Wilson was a U.S. senator.

Evans ultimately was accused of 362 violations of employer sanctions provisions and fined $70,000.

Schnur described Wilson’s letter, which sought a conciliation between the INS and Evans, as a routine constituent service.