"More than 200 people have been hospitalized with breathing difficulties in Tennessee as wildfires scorched the Southeast. Over 30 large fires have burned more than 80,000 acres in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama and Kentucky, according to the US Forest Service."

"On April 17, 2013, an explosion and fire at the West Fertilizer Company plant in West, Texas, killed 15 people and injured hundreds. It also destroyed more than 150 buildings around the plant. Among these were the West Intermediate School for 4th and 5th graders, located about 550 feet (170 meters) away from the fertilizer plant, and West High School, about 1,150 feet (350 meters) away."

"Evacuations are now taking place in five North Carolina mountain counties as nearly 20 wildfires totaling more than 10,000 acres continue to spread."

"Are the many hog and poultry farms of eastern North Carolina creating 'fields of filth,' as two groups of environmental activists put it last summer? And if they are, what happens when a hurricane comes along and dumps a foot and a half of water on them?"

"Oklahoma’s oil and gas regulator plans to shut some disposal wells and reduce the volume of others as its initial response to Sunday’s earthquake near the oil hub of Cushing."

"The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said on Friday it had opened an investigation into the Colonial Pipeline Co accident in Helena, Alabama, which killed one worker and seriously injured four others."

"An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.0 struck near Cushing, Oklahoma, on Sunday damaging several buildings and prompting evacuations, but there were no reports of injuries, authorities said."

"When the remnants of Hurricane Matthew threatened the coastal lowlands of South Carolina, 335,000 people fled for higher ground. Marquetta Goodwine stayed put."

"FONDTOUTANU, Haiti — There is no food, so along the road through the mountains there are children begging for something to eat. Most of the trucks rumble past with donations for somewhere else. But one stopped here the other day with sacks of rice, beans and dried herring, setting off a stampede."

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