Disasters

"A group of House Democrats on Wednesday urged federal officials to investigate the company that owns an Alabama pipeline that exploded this week."

"Beaches in the Southeastern U.S. took a tremendous beating last month from Hurricane Matthew. The U.S. Geological Survey has found that the storm washed over and damaged 15 percent of sand dunes on Florida's Atlantic Coast, 30 percent along Georgia's coastline and 42 percent of the dunes on South Carolina beaches."

"Several damaging Los Angeles-area earthquakes of the 1920s and 1930s, including the deadliest ever in Southern California, may have been induced by oil production during the region's drilling boom of that era, U.S. government scientists reported on Tuesday."

"An explosion and fire at a pipeline that delivers about one-third of the gasoline used on the East Coast is expected to raise prices at the pump and shows the fragility of a delivery system that is relied upon by tens of millions of people."

"Hundreds of thousands of Kanawha Valley residents, businesses and workers will receive up to $151 million in compensation from West Virginia American Water Co. and Eastman Chemical Co. for the effects of the January 2014 water crisis, under related class-action settlements made public late Monday afternoon."

"Colonial Pipeline Co shut down its main gasoline and distillates pipelines on Monday after an explosion and fire in Shelby, Alabama, killing a worker and sending five to the hospital - the second time in two months it had to close the crucial supply line to the U.S. East Coast."

"TOMS RIVER, N.J.—For most of the last century, modest one-story summer bungalows lined this private strip of road that dead-ends at Vision Beach. Then Sandy made landfall here on Oct. 29, 2012, obliterating them."

"One day, the sun might send a massive explosion of highly charged particles flying directly at North America. If a storm hits, some U.S. cities could be blacked out until the solar storm passes to protect electric grid transformers threatened by storm currents, grid officials explain."

"Washington state is grossly unprepared for a large earthquake and tsunami that may strike in the coming decades, putting it at risk for a humanitarian disaster, the Seattle Times reported on Sunday, citing a draft government report."

"More than 100 people were treated for respiratory problems after a chemical spill at an MGP Ingredients Inc facility on Friday generated a chemical cloud over the northeastern Kansas city of Atchison before authorities declared the threat over."