Disasters

"JEFFERSON COUNTY, Colo. -- Families driven from their homes by a fast-moving wall of fire Monday evening said they stayed longer than was safe because authorities told them that the smoke they were smelling was from a controlled burn that was being monitored."

"ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- Federal offshore drilling regulators on Wednesday approved Shell Oil's spill response plan for exploratory drilling in the Beaufort Sea, drawing strong criticism from environmental groups that claim oil companies cannot clean up oil in ice-choked waters."

"A future on Earth of more extreme weather and rising seas will require better planning for natural disasters to save lives and limit deepening economic losses, the United Nations said on Wednesday in a major report on the effects of climate change.

"TOKYO -- One of Japan’s crippled nuclear reactors still has fatally high radiation levels and hardly any water to cool it, according to an internal examination Tuesday that renews doubts about the plant’s stability."

"Total says wind is blowing gas away from flare on Elgin platform – but there is a high risk of explosion if two come into contact."

"LONDON -- A gas cloud has encircled Total's Elgin Franklin platform in the North Sea after failed attempts to shut a problematic production well caused a leak, an RMT union official said, based on eyewitness accounts from workers on nearby rigs."

"There is a particularly sensitive accusation reverberating through online discussion boards and social media in Japan: that Emperor Akihito's speech on the one year anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami was censored on TV for his comments about the nuclear disaster at Fukushima."

"NEW ORLEANS -- After months of laboratory work, scientists say they can definitively finger oil from BP's blown-out well as the culprit for the slow death of a once brightly colored deep-sea coral community in the Gulf of Mexico that is now brown and dull."