Friday, July 31, 2009 CHICAGO: A fire at a chemical plant has forced the evacuation of a Texas town of 72,000 people after it released a massive plume of toxic orange smoke that could be seen for miles Thursday, officials said.No serious injuries were reported as a result of the fire, but officials called for the mass evacuation after the smoke blanketed much of Bryan, Texas, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) northwest of Houston. Ten people were hospitalized with respiratory problems, local media reported. "The fire department has not been able to put it out for the safety of the firefighters," city spokesman Kendall Kessel told foreign news agency. "They're just letting it burn so it could take hours to completely burn out."
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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