Associated Press | In one room, a ghastly photo wall of bloody, uncensored images showcases the mob's greatest hits.
In another, visitors are taught to load a revolver. And for when a gun just won't do, an oddball collection of household items — a shovel, a hammer, a baseball bat and an icepick — show the creative side of some of America's most notorious killers.
On the 83rd anniversary of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, Sin City honored one of its earliest relationships with the grand opening of a museum dedicated to the mobsters that made this desert town. There are tommy guns, money stacks and a bullet-riddled brick wall from the 1929 massacre that saw Al Capone seize control of the Chicago mob.
Associated Press | After more than two decades of drilling in Antarctica, Russian scientists have reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake hidden under miles of ice for some 20 million years—a lake that may hold life from the distant past and clues to the search for life on other planets.
Reaching Lake Vostok is a major discovery avidly anticipated by scientists around the world hoping that it may allow a glimpse into microbial life forms, not visible to the naked eye, that existed before the Ice Age. (...)
"It's like exploring another planet, except this one is ours," Columbia University glaciologist Robin Bell told The Associated Press by email. (...) "There is no other place on Earth that has been in isolation for more than 20 million years," said Lev Savatyugin, a researcher with the AARI. "It's a meeting with the unknown."
Associated Press | U.S. citizenship is
priceless to some, worthless to others. But now the State Department has
a dollar figure: U.S. citizenship is worth $450. (...)
It's also getting more
expensive if you want to keep your U.S. citizenship and need a passport
to prove it. The application fee for a passport is jumping by 27
percent, from $55 to $70 with a 100 percent increase, from $20 to $40,
in the passport security surcharge.
In
addition to the increase in the application fee, the department will now
charge $82 - up from nothing - to add new pages to a U.S. passport. It
says the fee is needed to offset the cost of the pages, the time spent
affixing the pages into the passport book, endorsing the passport and
performing a quality-control check.
Experts say the neogothic clock tower - one of the world's most recognizable landmarks - is gently leaning to one side. Documents recently published by Britain's Parliament show that the top of its gilded spire is nearly 18 inches (nearly half a meter) out of line.
The 315-foot (96-meter) tower is leaning in the northwest direction at an angle of 0.26 degrees, according to a report from 2009 that was recently obtained by the Sunday Telegraph through a Freedom of Information request.
But there's no cause for alarm, experts said. It would take thousands of years before the London landmark's tilt matches that of the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
Associated Press | A prolonged heat wave in the central U.S. has fostered the growth of a dangerous form of algae in lakes and ponds, threatening swimmers and livestock and scaring away tourists during the busy summer season.
Blue-green algae are actually bacteria that produce toxins harmful to humans and livestock. It flourishes in warm, stagnant, sunlit water, and this year's heat wave combined with Oklahoma's worst drought since the Dust Bowl have created what one water official called a "perfect storm" for its growth.
Officials have issued a series of warnings, telling boaters and swimmers at lakes in northeast Oklahoma, southern Kansas and Nebraska to avoid contact with the toxic gunk. The issue attracted national attention earlier this month when Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe blamed a respiratory illness on a swim in Grand Lake in Ketchum Hollow.
Associated Press | The government has made a change in its policy for patting down young children at airport checkpoints, and more are promised.
Airport security workers will now be told to make repeated attempts to screen young children without resorting to invasive pat-downs, the head of the Transportation Security Administration said Wednesday. The agency is working to put that change in place around the country, and it should reduce, but not eliminate, pat-downs for children, an agency spokesman said.
MSNBC / Associated Press — The House voted Wednesday to toughen regulations on pilot training, qualifications and work schedules, a response to a fatal crash in upstate New York in February and other accidents involving regional airlines.
The bill, which was approved 409-11, would require all pilots that fly for a passenger-carrying airline to have an Air Transport Pilot certificate, effectively raising the number of flying hours an entry-level airline pilot must have from the current 250 hours to 1,500 hours.
The bill allows the FAA to credit course work at specific flight training schools toward the requirements for receiving an Air Transport certificate. The schools had expressed concern that would-be pilots would skip the schooling to concentrate on accumulating flying time.
Figures just released from the government, while a bit dated, show that airline prices in the first three months of this year rose nearly 5% from a year earlier. And that doesn't include baggage fees and other extras that airlines charge.
But if you take a step back, air travel still looks like a bargain. Average fares are 25% lower than they were in 1999 after adjusting them for inflation, the government says.
The numbers were contained in a report issued Wednesday by the Transportation Department. The average domestic fare in the first quarter of 2010 rose to $328. Since 2001, the average price for the first quarter was higher only once — in 2008, when it hit $333.
MSNBC (AP) | PAYERNE, Switzerland — An experimental solar-powered plane landed safely Thursday after completing its first 24-hour test flight, proving that the aircraft can collect enough energy from the sun during the day to stay aloft all night.
Pilot Andre Borschberg eased the Solar Impulse onto the runway at Payerne airfield about 30 miles southwest of the Swiss capital Bern at exactly 9 a.m. (3 a.m. EDT) Thursday.
Helpers rushed to stabilize the pioneering plane as it touched down, ensuring that its massive 207-foot wingspan didn't scrape the ground and topple the craft.
The record feat completes seven years of planning and brings the Swiss-led project one step closer to its goal of circling the globe using only energy from the sun.
Philadelphia Inquirer (AP) | Gasoline prices rose over the weekend in the region and nationally, AAA Mid-Atlantic said Monday.
While pump prices rose an average 2 cents per gallon for the country as a whole—to $2.74 a gallon—the average in Southeastern Pennsylvania rose just a penny, to $2.76 per gallon. In South Jersey, the average rose 3 cents to $2.56, the auto club said.
