ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Pat Murphy was quick with a quip for the pilot crew of the charter flight that brought the Milwaukee Brewers to Florida on Sunday for World Series Game 3.
“Hey, thanks, guys. I didn’t know Quinn threw a knuckleball,” the Brewers manager said Sunday after the plane encountered a little turbulence.
GJ Priester, an uncle of Brewers pitcher Quinn Priester, was captain of the flight on a United Airlines Boeing 737. Alex Priester, a cousin of the right-hander, was first officer.
“Our flight was smooth as heck all flight and right when we came in, it really got a little knuckleballish,” Murphy said, holding his right hand out and shaking it like a bouncing plane.
Murphy said the Brewers had five charter flights to bring all the family members and employees to the games at Tropicana Field. The Brewers held a 2-0 lead over the Tampa Bay Rays going into Game 3 of the best-of-seven series on Monday.
“The landing was a little rough,” Brewers reliever Aaron Ashby said light-heartedly. “Certainly a cool thing. I guess we’re in good hands.”
GJ Priester was hired by United Airlines in 1995 and is a member of the family that founded Priester Aviation, which arranges charter flights.
Dwight Schmidt, father of New York Yankees pitcher Clarke Schmidt, piloted the team’s family charter flights during the 2024 World Series.
Quinn Priester has not pitched for the Brewers since last year's NL Championship Series. The 26-year-old started the season on the injured list because of right thoracic outlet syndrome and made eight minor league injury rehabilitation appearances from April 22 through June 8.
He had season-ending surgery on June 22 with Dr. Gregory Pearl, who removed a rib to create space around nerves.
See AP’s full MLB coverage here
Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy speaks during a World Series baseball media day, Thursday, Oct. 22, 2026, in Milwaukee, ahead of Game 1 between the Milwaukee Brewers and the Tampa Bay Rays. (AP Photo/Kayla Wolf)
FILE - Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Quinn Priester throws against the Los Angeles Dodgers during the second inning in Game 1 of baseball's National League Championship Series, Oct. 13, 2025, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis, File)
A rain-soaked swath of the Southwest U.S. endured additional flooding as crews in New Mexico scoured evacuated neighborhoods Sunday for dead animals, downed power lines and other hazards left behind by receding floodwaters and at least one tornado.
With more showers and thunderstorms moving through, the National Weather Service issued a flood watch for much of the Four Corners region — the meeting point of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah. The area has experienced unusually heavy rain since Wednesday that caused rivers to surge, flooding homes and forcing water rescues.
“The soils are very saturated right now, so it’s not going to take much rain for at least the small creeks and streams to overflow,” said Kris Sanders, a meteorologist at the weather service office in Grand Junction, Colorado.
A tornado touched down in Santa Fe, New Mexico, around 7 p.m. Saturday, and forecasters were trying to confirm whether twisters also struck elsewhere in the state, said meteorologist Scott Overpeck with the weather service office in Albuquerque. He did not have damage estimates.
Michelle Vialpando spotted a tornado from her patio in the Aldea de Santa Fe neighborhood, facing north towards Los Alamos. She had just gotten home from work and stepped outside to look at what she called “crazy” storm clouds when she noticed the twister.
“I was pretty surprised at what I was seeing and just started snapping photos,” Vialpando wrote Sunday via Facebook. “I was literally in shock. I’ve lived in Santa Fe my entire life and have never seen anything like that before.”
In the Farmington area of New Mexico, local officials said swollen rivers were receding but that many people remained evacuated and hundreds were without power.
San Juan County, New Mexico, did not have official figures on the number of homes damaged or how many people were evacuated, but officials were not aware of any deaths, spokesperson Devin Neeley told The Associated Press.
“It’s a pretty active disaster zone,” he said.
About 4 feet (1.2 meters) of water flooded the home of county Sheriff Shane Ferrari. He said the area’s situation was stable Sunday, but he and other residents were trying to clean up.
Officials in the hard-hit county urged patience and caution Sunday. Water could be contaminated with chemicals and raw sewage, and gas and propane lines could be broken, among other hazards.
“The public is anxious to get back in,” San Juan County Fire & Rescue Chief David Vega acknowledged at a news conference. “But I want the public to know there are still hazards out there.”
Undersheriff Cory Tanner said officials were going from house to house to check for hazards — a process that could take days to complete.
Zach and Abigail Flatt started putting together go-bags after receiving evacuation orders on their phones Thursday evening. Their home in Bloomfield, New Mexico, sits on the San Juan River, and Zach drove along the banks watching the water rise at an alarming rate.
“In 30 or 40 minutes it had jumped about four feet,” Zach recalled Sunday. “After I saw that big jump, and how close it was to going over the banks, I said we've got to get out.”
By the time the family was loaded into the car, water was coming up over the tires. They found a hotel room with their two children, ages 2 and 4, and watched via webcams as at least 18 inches (.45 meters) of water inundated their property, washing away 22 of their 24 chickens.
“We watched stuff just float away, off the porch into the front yard,” Zach said.
In the Shiprock, New Mexico, area of the Navajo Nation, wastewater facilities and water holding ponds were damaged by flooding, causing sewage releases into the San Juan River, according to Navajo Tribal Utility Authority Shiprock District Manager Wilfred Franklin Jr. Officials didn't know Sunday how much sewage made it into the river.
New Mexico's congressional delegation on Sunday urged President Donald Trump to declare an emergency for the state to release federal assistance funding.
In Colorado, teams were doing welfare checks and aerial scanning to understand the extent of the destruction from flooding in Archuleta County. It was still unknown how much damage was caused, but the sheriff, Mike Le Roux, called it catastrophic. As of Sunday evening, there were no reports of injuries or loss of life, said Vicki Shaffer, a spokesperson with the Colorado incident management team.
The flooding is just the latest from two months of on-and-off heavy rain in the region caused by tropical moisture coming ashore from the Pacific. After months of drought, other recent deadly flooding struck the Grand Canyon and other areas of New Mexico.
Forecasters said El Niño, the natural and temporary warming of parts of the Pacific, was likely to blame for the latest storm's unusually heavy rainfall.
Associated Press writers Anna Wilder in Austin, Texas, and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed.
The Animas River on Saturday was still closed on Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, in Durango, Colo. (Jerry McBride/The Durango Herald via AP)
Floodwaters surround trailers at the Fun Valley Family Resort campground and RV part in South Fork, Colo., early Friday, Oct. 23, 2026. (South Fork Fire Rescue via AP)
Rafters make their way down a closed Animas River Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, in Durango, Colo. (Jerry McBride/The Durango Herald via AP)
