>> certainly could have been a bigger mess than it is today as it's been suppressed. >> a tractor-trailer catches fire causing a major headache for drivers on highway 17. it is 4:30. good morning. i'm jon kelley. >> i'm laura garcia-cannon. south bound lanes of highway 17 are closed as crews clean up what's left of a big rig fire. >> the fire happened near the redwood estates exit and spread from the cab to the hillside. damian trujillo is live there with all of the latest. what's happening out there? >> reporter: jon, we're here at bear creek road on highway 17 as far south as you can get now. those big rigs behind me, they are parked on the fast lane of

southbound highway 17. they can't go anywhere. the accident is about three miles south of here, as you mentioned at redwood estates. a big mess overnight as the santa cruz mountains. the call came in last night a. truck carrying non-flammable liquid somehow caught fire. no one was injured but the accident really made things difficult for people trying to get to and from santa cruz. the northbound lanes opened early this morning, and just about a half hour ago the chp officer on the scene told me it will be another couple of hours before the southbound lanes are open. a tow truck is standing by but they still have to get all of the debris cleared from the roadway. the good news is there was no hazardous material on the burning rig. >> these vehicles are designed to carry in this case inert liquid nitrogen. what it did is the fail-safe mechanisms went into effect allowing the vehicle to stop and

not roll back as well as the venting system. however, there were none in this case, it's an inert gas so there was no real threat of explosion. >> reporter: there are several other big rigs lined up near the site waiting since last night to get through and there's no way they can turn around. you can see why. these big rigs are exactly what they are, big, so getting turned around on highway 17 is impossible, so what they have to do is stand by, spend the night in the rigs and wait for the highway to open. we hear it may be about to open soon but i was told it won't be a couple of hours before that happens. we'll keep you posted. live at the base of the santa cruz mountains. damian trujillo, "today in the >> we'll keep checking back. mike inouye is following the traffic conditions. >> good morning. damion says his update is maybe a couple of hours, that could be a huge issue in toward los gatos

and santa cruz. this is the south bay moving. highway 17 south, bear creek road, that is as he said the last portion of southbound 17 you can access out of los gatos. the big rigs are stopped, very windy road and they can't turn around. if you're in a passenger vehicle and familiar you can use bear creek to summit and past the incident. if you're not familiar with the area stick with us and we'll update you and let you know when the lanes do open. there are conflicting reports but he sees cars getting off the road. that's what's going on now. the northbound side, however, is open. also in oakland we're following an incident closing 580 at the mckarther exit east 580 exiting away from the bridge. there is police activity at san pablo so we're tracking that. the traffic flow was stopped for

a bit. i'll check to see if it's reopened. back to you. >> thank you. 4:34. we have continuing coverage of the deadly officer-involved shooting. officers in martinez are returning to work this morning one day after the death of officer kenyon youngstrom. he was shot on 680 tuesday morning after pulling over a driver for an obstructed license plate. his family took him off life support last night. news of his death is hitting students especially hard at oak brook elementary, the school where one of youngstrom's four children is said to attend. >> his family would pick me up and go to church on wednesdays. a real friend. his dad was a real cool dude. hate that he lost his father. >> officer youngstrom is the

223rd chp officer to be killed in the line of duty since 1929. he was just 37 years old. the motive behind the shooting is not clear but we're learning bout the alleged gun man. 38-year-old christopher lacy was a computer programmer who lived for many years in sausalito. he moved to a rural area about a year and a half ago. lacy's neighbors say he was very private. >> the only information he would give up is he had been raised in oregon and every time they steered the conversation to anything about him, he'd change the subject. so he didn't want any one to know about him. >> lacy was shot and killed after he alleged opened fire on officer youngstrom. they found a submit handgun, two clips of ammunition and a knife in his car. his only other run-in was a dui arrest in 2006. >> we have new details about

last month's fire at the chevron refinery a. flash fire was discovered and put out about ten minutes before the more significant blaze. chevron submitting a 30-day report to officials yesterday, the report detailing the flash fire, air quality data and emergency response actions. it also includes an event timeline with starts with the discovery of a leak three hours before the major blaze. >> an australian man will not serve time for a jet ski accident. tyson was overcome in the courtroom as the judge only sentenced him to probation with the chance to actually wipe that off his record in one year. he pled no contest to negligent homicide in the death of kristin. he was driving fast and not looking when he slammed into the jet ski and into her.

he must pay the family $78,000 in restitution. >> ohio, madame secretary, casts all 188 votes for the president and the next president of the united states, barack obama. >> and with that president obama is now officially renominated as the democratic national convention in north carolina. of course he was the only democrat on that ballot. the president will accept the nomination tonight, wrapping up the convention. last night former president bill clinton argued that president obama was handed a bad hand and needs more time to fix the economy. tracie pottses that story. >> reporter: the democrats' most popular living president bill clinton making the case to re-elect barack obama. >> no one could have fully repaired all of the damage that

he found in just four years. >> reporter: defending health reform. >> are we better off because president obama fought for health care reform? you bet we are. >> reporter: he attacked what he called lies about medicare cuts and welfare reform and condemned mitt romney's plan to reduce the debt and boost the economy. >> we simply cannot afford to give the reins of government to someone who will double down on trickle down. >> in a surprise appearance president obama joined clinton on stage. the president speaks tonight. vice president biden did a walk through. his speech and all today's events moved inside amid the threat of severe weather dampening the democrats' final day. and we're still waiting to see what changes may happen here today to accommodate this last-minute change of venue. unfortunately, there are

thousands of people who had tickets to the stadium who now won't be able to attend. tracie potts, nbc news, charlotte, north carolina. >> very interesting. >> it was big last night. 4:39. christina loren has our weather, as we head to the weekend. >> hey, good morning. a lot of people talking about the active weather, thunderstorms rolling to the south and east bay yesterday. this morning we have showers on the radar yet again. good thursday morning or as we like to say friday eve. a beautiful start to the day. 4:39. the clouds are lowering, we're not going to see a lot of fog. we have a lot of action out, we are tracking showers from carmel to gilroy. we're going to continue to see showers for the first part of the day, and that means you might need to grab that umbrella. especially in the south bay. not everybody's going to see the showers. we'll time it out, tell you

where we expect all of the action throughout the day. that's my next report. we want to check with mike. we have serious slowdowns. you can't move on 17. >> that's true, they stopped traffic. we'll show that. wanted to follow with the incident in oakland, this is the maze. if you're traveling away from the maze you have construction heading to the maze. away from the maze, 580 is at macarthur boulevard. in fact, it's still closed from san pablo to market. 580 to market street it is closed because of police activity going on there. so that will continue as far as we know for at least a half hour. 580 itself is open through the area. we're going to jump all the way down to the santa cruz mountains. southbound side of 17 is still closed at bear creek road because of an overnight truck fire. it has to be cleared.

traffic is rerouted over to submit. if you're not familiar with the area i would recommend that you wait. may be a couple hours. damion is on the scene and will let us know. through san jose, a live look what things are like for 101 northbound and under the interchange, no problems for the flow here. across the bay, let's take the san mateo bridge. the taillights over the high rise, no problem there. back to you. >> this morning at&t says no, it is not responsible for those blackouts plaguing the oakland police department's radios, contradicting findings from last month's internal city investigation that reportedly found at&t's cell sites were interfering with oakland's system and endangering officer safety. at&t says it's finished testing all 16 of its sites and result

shows its cellular signal did not cause that. it will try to help the department pinpoint a cause. >> up next, arizona's immigration law will take effect. how the hispanic community is responding. >> more money for prisons, less for education. the new report that argues that california is short changing students. >> for a family of ducks, we'll show you incredible video.

>> new this morning, the latino community is reacting to a federal judge's decision to allow arizona's tough immigration law to take effect. the court ruling will allow a portion of sb 1070 to take effect. the so called show me your papers clause can be enforced. it allows police to ask about immigration status if the person is stopped for other reasons and the officer suspects the person is in the country illegally. the governor applauded but the leaders in the hit spannic community are concerned. >> this is a blow to the hispanic community. the decision that was handed

down just means another opportunity for civil rights to be violated. >> i know the world is watching but i know our state and local officers are up to the task. >> if proven a person's civil rights are violated, the judge can reverse the ruling. >> 4:46. a berkeley law firm suing in and out burger claimingdi discrimination claiming it maintains hiring practices that discriminate based on race, color and age. the suit was filed on behalf of two african-american men from oakland over the age of 40 who applied at bay area restaurants but were not hired. in and out denied the claims saying it hires from local communities and its stoof reflects the demographics of the community. >> former alameda supervisor nadia lockyer is facing legal trouble this morning. the estranged wife of the state treasurer is charged with felony drug and child endangerment.

investigators say police were called to a home in orange county where she was visiting with her son. officers reportedly found meth and drug paraphernalia in the home. lockyer resigned as a supervisor back in april after a out into a former boyfriend that exposed their affair and addiction issues. bill lockyer filed for divorce two months ago. >> investors seem optimistic ahead of tomorrow's jobs numbers. a quick check of the markets early with courtney reagan live at cnbc world headquarters. good morning. >> good morning to you, laura. futures are a bit higher after a missed session on wednesday. we're getting right now the you're bean central bank is leaving the key interest rate unchanged. this is a big one and we've been waiting for this. the ecb is widely expected to launch a new stimulus program

buying up bonds in order to drive rates lower in those nations. so the governments more easily pay their bills. european markets are higher. we'll get data here on private jobs, unemployment filings and the u.s. services sector, the dow rising 11 points to 13,047, the nasdaq slipping 5 to 3069. that's where we'll open. nokia and google roll out their new phones on wednesday. today samsung's turn. the company is hosting an event in a few hours. the ceo is expected to unveil a new version of the kindle fire tablet which is nearly a year old. others have amazon showing off an apple tv-like device or docking station to allow to you transfer from the kindle fire to the tv or we're not sure what the big event is going to be about but i'm sure we'll all

know very soon. >> everybody excited. thank you very much. >> apple does know how to keep us hanging on. 4:49. the weather's not waiting for us. rain is going to keep going. >> how do they do that. we know what's coming. >> geniuses, aren't they. good morning to you. you don't have to be a genius to know the weather has dramatically changed over the past couple days and is going to continue to be active. i want to talk about how active it was in the south bay. waking up inç santa rosa, we h showers from san francisco all the way down through gilroy yesterday. look at this, 800 to 100 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes yesterday. we had dime size hail and brief heavy downpours, precipitation up to .05 inch. the first part of the day will be active.

we'll keep that thunderstorm chance in the mix until 5:00 p.m. we want to make sure everybody is aware of that. still getting that action as we have a lull, right now it's starting to pick up. we have a thunderstorm cell here just to the south of san jose that will make its way into los gatos, nothing heavy, very isolated. likely becoming more widespread between the time of about 8:00 to 10:00. 67 degrees. not too shabby, 79 degrees. a tropical feel out there, you can try to do your hair but it's going to fall flat. 87 degrees as we head throughout your friday, saturday, sunday temperatures are nice and seasonal. we're so close to the weekend now you can taste it. >> thanks so much. 4:50. a new report out finds money spent on california prisons

could be hurting millions of students. researchers from california-based common sense says state spending on prisons increased by 1300% since 1980. spending reached 9.2 billion last year. spending on higher education continues to decline resulting in fewer classes. >> i had a student in tears. we've lost half of our section. half. >> the report will be out today. you can access it by heading to our website and search california common sense. >> still ahead, line drive to the head. the shot that sends oakland a's pitcher straight to the hospital. tough to watch. we'll let you know how he's doing. >> a family of ducks caught in the middle of a busy freeway.

>> we give you a live look outside, checking that morning traffic. mike inouye will be along to till us in, a lot on highway 17.

>> good morning. welcome back. a live look from north carolina, the dnc floor, the calm before tonight's party. bill clinton brought the house

down last night. tonight vice president joe biden and of course president obama coming up to officially accept everything going down there. should be fun. 4:55 now. one of the oakland a's, this is tough to watch, one of the oakland a's is in the hospital this morning after he was hit right in the head by a line drive. mccarthy was on the mound. my gosh. unbelievable. that was in the fourth inning yesterday when he was drilled. macarthury did not lose consciousness but remains in the hospital. it looked like it caught him on the back of the head. he was able to walk off on his own power so, so far it looks good but for safety reasons. man, a big tough skull. >> the way those balls are hit. let's check the morning commute. how are we looking? >> a lot happening though it's very early.

light volume overall. pretty standard flow but we had an earlier incident that has cleared. here this has not reopened. closed at bear creek road. still working on the cleanup, southbound lanes are not opened. damian trujillo will continue to give us updates. may be a while so. if you're not familiar with bear creek and summit road stay away from the area. this is not completely clear but moving, west 580 out of the altamont pass. a live look shows you things on the east bay, oakland, no problems for the nimitz. and a look at the 101, very light. back to you. >> you're a mother of triplets, you understand how hard it is to get around. >> holding hands. >> family of ducks now an

internet sensation after this goes viral. >> a photographer flying over a highway in toronto and you see them in the center, a mother duck and her eight ducklings. the wind knocks them off their little webbed feet there. takes about a minute for them to dart, stay with me. >> dancing in harm's way. they make it across. no doubt some heart beats. >> mine was beating. yeah. happy to see a happy finish. we'll be back after this.

>> reporter: i'm damian trujillo live at the base of the santa cruz mountains where southbound 17 remains in a sigalert. the latest is coming up. >> and we've got showers on the radar this morning, also