Monthly Archives: <span>April 2008</span>

University Officials in Kentucky Add Public Safety Enhancements

Murray State University officials expect emergency sirens to be operational on the Kentucky campus in about a month, part of an effort to enhance security procedures that can warn of violence or severe weather. President Randy Dunn said Murray State …

Federal Emergency Officials Visit Mississippi as River Reaches Crest

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Federal Emergency Management Agency officials prepared Monday to tour flooded areas along the Mississippi River to assess the damage. The river crested in Vicksburg on April 19 and was expected to reach its highest point …

Ohio Town Endures Four-week Flood

For the past month, Bob Norman has slept on his couch, waking every 90 minutes to make sure the pump in his basement is keeping floodwater from ruining his furnace. He’s not the only one losing sleep. Dozens of homeowners …

Sickened U.S. Pork Workers Have New Nerve Disorder

Eighteen pork plant workers in Minnesota, at least five in Indiana and one in Nebraska have come down with a mysterious neurological condition they appear to have contracted while removing brains from slaughtered pigs, U.S. researchers and health officials said …

U.S. Watchdog Critical of FDA Foreign Drug Oversight

U.S. authorities increased inspections of foreign drug plants last year but still checked only a fraction of sites that supply medicine ingredients to the U.S. market, a government watchdog is set to tell Congress Tuesday. Concern about Food and Drug …

Due to Dry Weather, Mass. Cities Asked to Stop Issuing Burning Permits

The sunny spring days may be a relief after this winter’s snows, but dry weather is also creating fire hazards across Massachusetts. On Saturday, 189 woodland brush fires burned more than 375 acres, sometimes threatening private homes. Now officials at …

Providence, R.I. Firefighters with Cancer to Get Disability Pensions

Providence, Rhode Island firefighters diagnosed with cancer will receive accidental disability pensions under a measure passed by the City Council. Firefighters with cancer will be presumed to have developed the disease on the job, but in order to receive the …

Mass. Law Limiting Liability for Brownfields Transforms Landscape

Growing up in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Henry Wainer remembers driving past the old Alden Corrugated Container Co. on trips out of the city. Then one day, the single-story cardboard box factory burned. The city bulldozed what remained and — in …

Insurers to Build Research Center for Natural Disaster Property Losses

A new state-of-the-art applied research facility will use science and technology to expand capabilities to create more durable homes and businesses and reduce the human, financial and societal costs of natural disasters. The Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS), …

Investigators Probing Cause of Colorado Blast

Insurance and fire investigators were examining the remains of a building in Breckenridge, Colo., to determine the cause of an explosion that leveled the two-story structure and injured a man. The man was in a second-story apartment in the building …