Save her husband and son. I kept thinking this isnt how my life is supposed to end. How her will to survive and to save her family led to one incredible rescue. Well i guess it would be nice new details about the shocking death of George Michael. His boyfriends tragic discovery finding the singer dead in his bed on Christmas Morning. And the newly released pictures showing the star in one of his final public appearances as fans pay tribute to the man and his music. cause i got to have faith i got to have faith sending him back to the top of the charts. I got to have faith good morning, america. Dan and i want to thank you for joining us on a tuesday morning. Theres so much mystery surrounding the death of pop superstar George Michael. We want to take another look at that newly released photo. One of the singers final public appearances looking different. He had withdrawn from public life in recent years but weve seen it all over social media. Celebrity tributes pouring in overnight. Well have more on this story coming up but its pretty remarkable to see whats happening with his music. I got in the car and they were having a George Michael marathon. I suspect this will last for quite a bit. He does look different in that picture. A lot to talk about on that story. However we start with the chaos at the malls. This happened across america on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. There were fight, fireworks explosions and even police in riot gear storming stores. Many of the incidents caught on camera as you can see and abcs Adrienne Bankert is here with much more. Adrienne, good morning to you. Reporter good morning, dan. On one as you said the busiest shopping day of the year as people are returning Christmas Gifts and taking advantage of all those megadeals what seems to be something orchestrated online with fake fights breaking out all over the country. Across the country, mall mayhem. Violence and chaos breaking out in more than a dozen shopping hot spots monday. One of the busiest days of the holiday season. Please, please. Reporter in new jersey panicked shoppers fleeing for the exits at the jersey gardens mall after a loud noise during a food court fight was mistaken for gunfire. They just yelled shooter. Somebody is shooting then we just after that everybody ran. Reporter armed police swarming the scene and several injured in the rush to evacuate. From a mall melee in illinois. Go, go, go. Reporter to this tennessee mall brawl caused by fireworks igniting in a store. Immediately people started screaming and then we looked around and saw the flood of people running towards the exit and so just got up and took off with them. Reporter Police Investigating whether social media was used to plan these disturbances. The crowd began to circle our officers so our officer has to call for help. They had rifles in the mall and they had batons to get people out of the mall. Reporter in aurora, colorado, a social media post told people there would be a fight at the mall. Certainly makes you want to order things online. Not clear who was behind them or if all these are related and as you can expect youll see more security today at malls in your city. Dan and paula. Adrienne, great point. Order online and stay safe. Winter storms wreaking havoc and leaving hundreds of miles of highway hut down on whats going to be one of the busiest travel days of the year and its only going to get worse because as rob marciano is standing by to tell us there is more snow and cold on the way. Yes, there is. Still talking about Christmas Day blizzard. It had slowed down run into pockets of cold air and had scenes of this, icy conditions and center of the low into canada but the tail end across the deep south. We are not quite done with this just yet. Overnight, the storm system that blasted the Northern Plains with heavy snow and ice on christmas moving east creating a holiday week travel nightmare. In new england freeze be rain creating icy roads. Cars overturned in New Hampshire and springfield, massachusetts. On the onramp it was very slippery and i was watching cars slide into each other. Reporter winds over 60 Miles Per Hour ripping the roof off this barn in vermont. In the Northern Plains residents still digging out from that massive christmas blizzard. Im on the second story and the snow is right there. Reporter over 20 inches of snow and fierce winds causing near whiteout conditions blanketing roads and forcing 500 miles of interstate across the dakotas to shut down. Its pretty much buried. Reporter in north dakota cars and homes literally snowed in. Also trapped by the wicked weather, thousands at airports around the country. We went up to our gate and when we find out theres a 3 1 2hour delay. Reporter more than 3500 flights delayed monday. Almost 400 canceled. Some stranded travelers forced to spend the night. On the warm side of the system we have foggy conditions from atlanta down across the gulf coast and might see more travel delays and the front moves through. Not much colder throughout it. 10 to 20 Degrees Higher in the northeast. Our next system comes in thursday, a coastal low and this may bring snow just to the outside of the big cities. More on that throughout the morning. Dont come back until you have something nice to say. Ill work on that. Speaking of not having nice things to say, politics. It started so civil, the postelection relationship between president obama and president elect trump but now it has evolved into a nasty back and forth. Donald trump unleashing a new twitter blast after president obama said he would have beat trump in the election. Abcs mary bruce at the white house covering it all. Good morning. Reporter good morning. Yeah, for weeks theyve put on a public good face but this morning more signs that honeymoon is over. The president and president elect are now squaring off clashing over Foreign Policy and who could have beaten whom. This morning its current versus future president. In an interview president obama says he could have taken on trump. I am confident in this vision because i am confident that if i had run again and articulated it i think i could have mobilized a majority of the American People to rally behind might. Reporter trump is not buying it firing back saying mrez said that he thinks he would have won against me. He should say that but i say no way. Trump later added the world was gloomy before i won. There was no hope. Now the market is up nearly 10 and christmas spend something over a trillion dollars. It began as a cordial enough transition. Very, very good man. Thank you. Reporter but now that escalating tension coming at trump has been openly critical of the obama administrations Foreign Policy. Objecting to a recent decision to allow the u. N. To pass a measure condemning israel for building settlements. Now trump slamming the u. N. Tweeting the organization has such Great Potential but right now its just a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time. Trump also taking to twitter overnight to defend his familys embattled charitable foundation, amid an investigation into its spending. Saying that unlike most foundations it never paid fees, rent, salaries or any expenses. 100 of the money goes to wonderful charities announcing days ago hes shutting down the foundation in an effort to disentangle from potential conflicts but the new York AttorneyGenerals Office says it cannot legally dissolve until that investigation is complete. Now, trump has already paid a penalty to the irs after it was discovered his foundation made an improper campaign contribution. Closing the foundation is just a first step. He has yet to explain how hed distance himself from his business empire. He promised those in a press conference but later postponed it. Dan and paula. More to come. Mary, thank you. Lets bring in chief political analyst matthew dowd who is in austin this morning. Hey, matthew, good morning. Reporter good morning. So president obama seems to have picked this latest fight by saying he would have beaten trump in the election. Why do you think he did this especially after he took such great pains to ensure civility after the election . Reporter well, one, i think he absolutely stated a thing he believes to be a fact that he thought he would win in this. I think a lot of these things are a bit like the hunger games where everybody has these alliances but as you get closer to the end then people start going after each other. The interesting thing to me in all of this is that the people that are more upset than trump and his supporters are Hillary Clinton and her supporters, the fact that barack obama would say i would have won this race but for the fact Hillary Clinton lost it i would have won it. It made them angry. Matt, first and foremost, im sorry about your detroit loy yons. Oh, my gosh. We had the Green Bay Packers ahead. Theres a new poll out, majority of americans optimistic about what will happen and the numbers are up from last year. The stock market up. Trump taking credit for it. Does he have a point . Well, the only point i think he has is that there was a bunch of people that predicted the stock market would tank after the election if donald trump had won. Obviously that didnt happen and is up in the course of this but donald trump is going to be fun da mentally judged what happened after the inauguration. Whats the unemployment rate, whats the gas prices and stock market . All of that will be judged on a barometer starting on january 20th. Thats how he will be judged in his presidency. As we lead up to the 20th, what are the potential consequences for america if this relationship between trump and obama continues to go south . Well, it certainly isnt going to be what happened with george w. Bush and barack obama where george w. Bush faded away and never said anything. My guess is we are looking ahead to whats going to happen on january 21st. I think barack obama is going to be very assertive and very aggressive in taking on donald trump. All right, less than 25 days until the inauguration. Matt dowd, thanks again and its not over yet for your lions. No, beat the packers. All right, matt, sounds good. We want to move to security stepping up in times square for new years eve. New fears have been heightened in the wake of the terror attack in berlin and Law Enforcement saying no specific threat but not taking any chances and abcs linzie janis is right here in times square this morning all the way on top of that iconic building where the ball will drop. I think we can see you, linzie. Good morning to you. Reporter good morning, paula. Its a bit windy up here. Were getting an up close look at the ball that will drop here on new years eve. 1 Million People are expected to gather for the festivities and after that wave of terror attacks at home and abroad, there will be an army of Law Enforcement here to try and keep people safe. With new years eve just five days away, the nypd has begun ramping up security around times square surrounding streets barricaded, officers in Tactical Gear armed with rifles. The vigilance in response to a joint security bulletin released late last week expressing concern about unaffiliated lone offenders and homegrown violent extremists targeting the event. Law enforcement still on high Alert Worldwide in the wake of the deadly truck attack in berlin that killed 12 and left dozens more injured. In light of what weve experienced in this country and the attacks that weve witnessed overseas, Law Enforcement has to take every situation seriously. Reporter according to the security document there is no specific, credible threat against the times square new years eve 2017 celebration. But the presence of a large number of spectators represents opportunities for a masscasualty event. In times square, close to a million revelers expected to count down the new year. Meaning security will be the citys top priority. People need to be able to recognize the warning signs, the behaviors that a person who is a threat exhibits. They need to report those individuals to Law Enforcement. Reporter and Law Enforcement officials across the country are asking anybody attending festivities on new years eve to be extremely vigilant and, dan, in case you were wondering this ball, 12 feet across, it has more than 2500 waterford crystals. This ball drop tradition has been going since 1907. And it will continue this year. Linzie, thank you very much for your reporting this morning. Want to turn to a different kind of security concern this morning. This one outside of detroit. It involves a massive sinkhole that opened up on Christmas Eve. More than a dozen homes had to be evacuated. People running out with their Christmas Gifts in hand. Abcs eva pilgrim is on the story from frazier, michigan. Eva, good morning. Reporter if you look at this fence you can see that the brick home is leaning at an angle. It appears to be sliding, a sinkhole pulling it in. Families anxiously waiting to see how big the sinkhole gets and what it takes next. This morning a state of emergency in fraser, michigan, a sinkhole threatening this entire neighborhood. Were a small town, Something Big has happened. Reporter it devoured everything above it. Authorities concerned it will grow. Homes, hanging in the balance. So far 22 families evacuated including sow alba who woke up early Christmas Eve to the sound of splintering brick. Loud noises, cracking throughout the evening. It got progressively greater like, boom, boom, boom. Reporter neighbor derek and his father running over to help grabbing whatever they could. We kept running in and out as much as we could until the Police Officers told us we could no longer go in because it was too dangerous. Reporter this issant a new problem. In 2004 a massive sinkhole opened on the same road. Shutting it down for nearly ten months. But this new sinkhole even larger and Officials Say it could take even longer to fix. Authorities blaming it on a collapsed sewer pipe 45 feet under the ground. Residents being urged to stay away. Let these people get their jobs done. A devastating situation dont want it to become a tragedy. Reporter engineers are now working to figure out a way to get some of these families back to their homes but say that could take as much as two weeks. Dan and paula. Eva, thank you. We want to move to the mystery behind the shocking twitter hoax. You may have seen it falsely reporting that Britney Spears had died. It was sony musics account that was hacked causing a whole lot of confusion online. This morning new questions about who is behind it all and why they did it. Abcs Mara Schiavocampo has the story. Reporter the two tweets caused a massive uproar. The first claiming a pop sensations death. Britney spears is dead by accident, we will tell you more soon. Then just seven minutes later, rip, britney. 1981 to 2016. Spears spokesperson immediately denying the news telling cnn britney is fine and well. There have been a few internet clowns over the years who have made similar claims about her death but never from the official sony music twitter account. Hackers in particular like to boast. They like to show off that they are able to get in and shine a light on a companys susceptibility to this. Reporter bob dylans twitter also spreading the false news writing, rest in peace, Britney Spears. Bob dylans case zone was handling his twitter account so these celebrities, theyre not the ones driving the tweets. They have social media managers. So you have a lot of people with access to passwords. Reporter certain characteristics of this latest hack appear to suggest a connection to ourmine. A group that has previously been linked to hacks on marvel and netflix. They claim they are merely a Security Group whose goal is to make sure online accounts are secure. For its part, sony says their twitter account was compromised. This has been rectified. Sony music apologizes to Britney Spears and her fans for any confusion. Now, spears later posted several photos of herself making silly faces showing she is just fine and isnt taking any of this too seriously. A tip, dont use the same password for every social media account. We hear it over and over again but thats what will keep you safe. We have a fein note from the world of sports. Paula, check this out. A rookie making his debut with the Houston Rockets bringing back the underhanded free throw known as the granny shot. You dont see this often. Chinanu onuaku told Sports Illustrated he knows people are going to make fun of him but, quote, i dont really care what people think. Apparently he struggled with free throws in college and his coach encouraged had him to go underhand and it worked. Hey, you know what, if itll bring up your shooting percentage how do you shoot yours. I miss every time. Maybe you should try the granny. I probably should if i had as much intestinal ford today as that man has. I bet you rob has never. I have but theres nothing sexy about an air ball. Whatever you need to do to get it in, you do it. Sexy snow heading into the northwest. This is the good news of this system. Winter storm warnings getting pounded by it. Sun valley, big sky in mt. Hood, as well. Another storm that brings one to two feet and several inches of time for your tuesday trivia brought to you by carmax hi everybody. We have some showers moving through the area so watch for that as youre headed out. Roads ar