Bridgewater official under investigation for alleged financial misconduct

BRIDGEWATER -- The chairman of the town's Board of Finance has resigned from the board in the wake of reports he has been fired from his place of employment and is under investigation for alleged possible misdeeds.Gregory Buchholz was terminated two weeks ago from his investment adviser position with Raymond James Financial Services Inc. in Southbury, a company spokesman, Anthea...

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San Bruno Fire Pictures: "Hell on Earth" in California

Photograph by Jeff Chiu, APA firefighting plane dumps retardant onto the San Bruno fire, which engulfed several northern California blocks on September 9.Though the gas flow was stopped and the fire mostly contained by late Thursday, extinguishing street gas-line fires is notoriously tough, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Until the source of the gas is found, the pressure of...

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Giant Underwater Plume Confirmed—Gulf Oil Not Degrading

Christine Dell'AmoreNational Geographic NewsPublished August 19, 2010A giant plume from BP's Gulf of Mexico oil spill has been confirmed deep in the ocean—and there are signs that it may stick around, a new study says.Many scientists had predicted that oil-eating bacteria—already common in the Gulf due to natural oil seeps—would process much of the crude leaked fromBP's Deepwater...

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"Firecane" Myth Busted—No Danger on Katrina Anniversary

                                                               Brian Handwerk                                              ...

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Not a "firecane": A storm rages as debris from Hurricane Andrew burns in Homestead, Florida, in 1992.Photograph by Raymond Gehman, National Geographic With the Gulf oil spill largely gone, at least at the surface, you can rest easy that the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's Gulf Coast landfall won't be marked with a "firecane" or "black rain"—and it never would have been.Flaming hurricanes and...

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Walking Into the Stone Ag

On the third day of an international conference in France of experts on prehistoric rock art, National Geographic Digital Media senior producer Andrew Howley makes his first visit into caves adorned with images painted 13,000 years ago. By Andrew HowleyTarascon-sur-Ariège, France--Today the laptops were shut and the projectors powered down, as the participants in the IFRAO conference on prehistoric...

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Given Money, Schools Wait on Rehiring Teachers

As schools handed out pink slips to teachers this spring, states made a beeline to Washington to plead for money for their ravaged education budgets. But now that the federal government has come through with $10 billion, some of the nation’s biggest school districts are balking at using their share of the money to hire teachers right away. With the economic outlook weakening, they argue that big...

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