'Start Here': Notre Dame Cathedral burns, redacted Mueller report expected this week

It's Tuesday, April 16, 2019. Let's start here.

1. Notre Dame en feu

Massive crowds in the heart of Paris watched in horror on Monday as a massive blaze nearly destroyed the world-renowned Notre Dame Cathedral.

"Some of them are singing, some of them are holding candles -- a lot of people are in tears," ABC News' David Wright reports from Paris.

The main structure of the cathedral was saved, and the two iconic main towers remained intact, a fire official told reporters late Monday.

French President Emmanuel Macron promised the country would rebuild the iconic cathedral.

"Across the centuries, we have expanded it and improved it," Macron said. "We will rebuild this cathedral together."

2. Dropping soon: Mueller report remix

The Justice Department said Attorney General William Barr will release a redacted version of special counsel Robert Mueller's report on Thursday.

Sources familiar told ABC News that the White House has been briefed on the report, but only in broad terms focused on logistics and timing. White House sources said advisers close to the president are concerned about more examples of obstruction of justice and whatever former White House counsel Don McGahn told Mueller during more than 30 hours of interviews.

"There are very few people that know the specifics of the report," ABC News' John Santucci says on today's podcast. "Our understanding is, no one in the White House has been given a detailed road map."

3. Battle taxes

Democratic presidential hopefuls are releasing their tax returns amid a congressional battle to access Donald Trump's, setting a standard for transparency in the 2020 race.

"Big picture, these Democrats are saying, 'Fine, it's all out there now. Ask those questions, ask personal details, and we want to be able to do the same of the president,'" Deputy Political Director MaryAlice Parks says on "Start Here."

After being criticized for releasing only his 2014 returns in the last presidential election cycle, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., released 10 years of returns on Monday, revealing he earned more than $1 million in adjusted gross income in 2016 and in 2017, all the while railing against the richest 1% of Americans.

But Sanders isn't the only wealthy Democratic hopeful: Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and her husband reported a combined 2018 income of almost $2 million.

4. Personal. Safety.

Samantha Josephson, 21, was killed in Columbia, South Carolina, after she ordered an Uber and got into the wrong car.

Now, weeks after her death, her parents are urging ride-share services and state lawmakers to update safety measures to prevent similar incidents.

"Her parents now see ... their tragedy as the opportunity in their daughter's name to help change the way people take responsibility for their personal safety and also change this one industry that's now a part of so many of our lives," "Nightline" Co-anchor Byron Pitts says on the podcast.

Lyft announced on Monday the company would add "continuous criminal background checks," an expansion of its background-check process, which now will monitor potential criminal activity on a daily basis, and "enhanced identity verification" to prevent identity fraud.

Uber has not announced updates to its security platform since Josephson's death, although stricter measures may not have prevented her killing because the suspect was impersonating an Uber driver. A spokesperson for Uber said the company has been using continuous criminal background checks since last year and has used its own real-time identification verification system for two years.

"Start Here," ABC News' flagship podcast, offers a straightforward look at the day's top stories in 20 minutes. Listen for free every weekday on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn or the ABC News app. Follow @StartHereABC on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram for exclusive content and show updates.

Elsewhere:

'His hateful and inflammatory rhetoric creates real danger': Hours after Rep. Ilhan Omar says threats on her life have increased following public attacks by Donald Trump, the president of the United States of America publicly attacks her again.

'On the weekends I am not scrolling through trying to see what content journalists are writing': AOC talks about why she quit Facebook.

'A very serious situation': Parents in a section of Brooklyn suffering from a huge measles outbreak are suing the mayor of New York City after he ordered mandatory vaccinations.

From our friends at FiveThirtyEight:

Can Julian Castro rally Latino voters?: Next year, the country's pool of eligible voters is expected to include more Latinos than African Americans for the first time. But more than 10 years after black voters proved pivotal in nominating and electing the first African American major party presidential candidate, a Latino candidate has never come particularly close to winning the Democratic or Republican presidential primaries.

Doff your cap:

At the heart of this mysterious tale, ahem, is a very good dog.

Oil rig workers rescued a pup found swimming in the Gulf of Thailand some 137 miles offshore after spotting it paddling near the rig on Friday. The dog swam toward the rig's platform and clung to a pole, Vitisak Payalaw, an offshore planner for Chevron Thailand Exploration and Production Ltd., told ABC News.

The workers used a rope to rescue the shivering dog, which they named Boonrod, which means "the dog rescued by merit."

Payalaw said he plans to adopt the dog when he returns to shore later this month.