New York Gov. Kathy Hochul learned of her father's death during her ongoing visit to Israel while trying to show support for the Jewish state, and slipped a note grieving her loss into Jerusalem’s Western Wall holy site on Thursday. 

Hochul, a Democrat, learned her father, John Courtney, 87, died overnight from a brain hemorrhage in Florida. The news came on her second day in Israel amid its war with Hamas. 

While at the Western Wall, Hochul appeared to wipe away a tear before placing a handwritten note with prayers for Israel and for her father into a crack in the limestone wall.

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"I pray for my father, who cherished his visit to this Holy Land, and who passed during the night," Hochul’s handwritten message read, the New York Post reported. 

Her father's death came as Hochul met with Israeli leaders and displaced families impacted by Hamas' deadly Oct. 7 cross-border attack on Israeli civilians. Israel has since declared war on the terrorist group. 

More than 1,400 people in Israel have been killed and roughly 200 others were abducted and taken into Gaza by Hamas. Gaza's Health Ministry said Thursday that 3,785 Palestinians have been killed and nearly 12,500 others have been wounded since the outbreak of the war.

Hochul met with Israeli families displaced by the conflict and heard painful stories from families of American citizens taken hostage by Hamas and from Israelis who have been wounded during the fighting. She also held meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. Michael Herzog, and Israeli President Isaac Herzog, reiterating New York's solidarity with Israel.

A nonprofit organization is funding travel costs for Hochul and her staff, and the state is covering the costs for her security detail, according to the governor’s office.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Several days before a Norfolk Southern conductor trainee was killed by a metal beam protruding from a parked railcar on the next track, workers at a U.S. Pipe facility noticed the beam was hanging off the top of the car but never told the railroad about it, federal investigators say.

The National Transportation Safety Board released those details this week in a report on the interviews it conducted after Walter James Griffin was killed near Bessemer, Alabama, on Dec. 13. Investigators won't release their final report on the death until later.

The accident happened as Griffin's train was passing another train that was in the process of picking up several cars that had been parked on a siding, including ones loaded with scrap metal from U.S. Pipe's nearby facility. The beam struck Griffin in the head as it smashed into the locomotive he was riding in and injured the conductor sitting behind him with broken glass.

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The death was one of the incidents the NTSB cited when it announced it would conduct a broad investigation into Norfolk Southern's safety practices after a fiery derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. That February derailment prompted a national reckoning on rail safety and calls for reforms.

NTSB investigators interviewed the crews of both trains and U.S. Pipe workers and reviewed security videos in the days after the Alabama accident.

Video taken on Dec. 7 showed a piece of metal hanging off the top of the railcar at U.S. Pipe's facility. At one point, a worker there even put up caution tape around the railcar because of the metal hanging off of it. But that caution tape was gone before Norfolk Southern's crew arrived to pick up the car.

"This incident was a tragedy, and our thoughts remain with Mr. Griffin’s family, friends, and colleagues. We’re continuing to work closely with the NTSB as they complete their investigation," the railroad said in a statement. It declined to answer questions about the accident because of the ongoing investigation.

U.S. Pipe officials didn't immediately respond to a message Wednesday.

Griffin's family sued Norfolk Southern in the spring over his death. That lawsuit remains pending.

Norfolk Southern is one of the nation's largest freight railroads, operating in the eastern United States.