"A lot of dead dolphins continue to wash ashore along the Gulf Coast and now a lot of sea turtles — most of them rare Kemp's ridleys — are washing up dead too, federal officials said Thursday."

"More than 900,000 households remained without electricity on Friday after the strongest aftershock to hit since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan rocked a wide section of the country’s northeast."

"U.S. officials say the nation’s health system is ill-prepared to cope with a catastrophic release of radiation, despite years of focus on the possibility of a terrorist 'dirty bomb' or an improvised nuclear device attack."

"The 2011 Atlantic hurricane season will be above average in activity and there is a more than 70 percent chance of at least one major hurricane hitting the U.S. coastline, Colorado State University forecasters predicted on Wednesday."

The Japanese nuclear disaster is a reminder that the storage of spent fuel in temporary facilities across the United States may be a disaster waiting to happen.

"Japanese officials took some solace Wednesday in halting leaks of radioactive water from the nation's crippled nuclear plant. But in Washington, internal e-mails from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission revealed doubts within the organization about procedures for U.S. plants in a Fukushima-style event."

"GATLINBURG, Tenn. -- Crews on Tuesday recovered the bodies of two workers from the rubble of a wastewater-treatment plant wall that collapsed earlier in the day, while officials continued to investigate what caused the breach that released sewage into a rain-swollen river at Great Smoky Mountains National Park."

Bill Poovey reports for the Associated Press April 5, 2011. [27]

Five top executives at Transocean, the company that owned the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig that exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico, gave up some $250,000 of the $898,282 in bonuses they received this month. The firm had been criticized for claiming a "best year" in safety of operations after 11 people died on the rig. One quarter of the bonus amount was explicitly tied to safety.