Tuesday, August 25, 2009 SANTA BARBARA: A small airplane made an emergency landing into oncoming traffic on a coastal freeway and collided with three vehicles, but no one was injured, authorities said.The Piper PA-24 Comanche with a pilot and his wife aboard was bound for Santa Barbara Airport when the pilot told air traffic controllers he had no fuel remaining and landed at about 10:30 a.m. on the southbound side of U.S. Highway 101, about one mile northeast of the airport, Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said.The pilot, Kris Sean Michel, told investigators he had tried to land with the flow of traffic but could not control the plane and came down amid oncoming traffic, the California Highway Patrol said in news release.The plane's tail hit a Chevrolet Suburban while it was still in the air, hit a Honda Accord just after landing, then was struck by a Volkswagen after it had come to rest, the CHP said.A total of nine people were involved in the accident but none were hurt. A passenger in the Suburban asked to be taken to the hospital, but he was examined and quickly released, the CHP said.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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