Fire | featured news

Thirty-eight people were feared dead after a fire raged through an isolated psychiatric hospital north of Moscow on Friday, killing some patients in their beds and others who were trapped by barred windows. Most of the patients died in their sleep inhaling the fumes as they were likely sedated by prescribed medicine, a police source told the RIA Novosti news agency.

Chrysler has issued an unusually dire warning to some owners of its Dodge Challenger muscle car warning them to park the vehicles until it can make repairs due to a risk of fire. According to Chrysler, the wiring harness is the source of the problem due a batch of potentially mis-wired electrical components.

A shipyard worker who set fire to rags aboard a nuclear submarine because he wanted to go home was sentenced to a little more than 17 years in federal prison Friday for the blaze that transformed the vessel into a fiery furnace, injured seven people and caused $450 million in damage.

At least 16 people were hurt and a popular wine bar was destroyed by an apparent natural gas explosion and ensuing fire at an upscale shopping district in Kansas City, Mo., Tuesday evening.

SANTA MARIA, Brazil (Reuters) - Relatives of the 231 people who died in a Brazilian nightclub fire demanded answers on Monday as to how it could have killed so many people, while police questioned the club's owner and members of the band whose pyrotechnics show allegedly caused the tragedy.

A fire leaves more than 200 people dead in Santa Maria, Brazil. Rafael Romo reports.

The explosion, triggered by the rupture of a 20-inch gas main, occurred near Sissonville just before 1 p.m., Kanawha County Fire Coordinator C.W. Sigman said. Kent Carper, president of the Kanawha County Commission, said flames had been shooting 50 to 75 feet into the air before the fire was extinguished. "It sounded like a Boeing 757. Just a roar," he said. "It was huge. You just couldn't hear anything. It was like a space flight."

A fire in a clothing factory apparently caused by arson killed 14 people in southern China on Tuesday, state media reported.

The garment factory in Bangladesh where a weekend fire killed at least 112 people had been making clothes for Wal-Mart without the giant U.S. retailer's knowledge, Wal-Mart said. Wal-Mart said the Tazreen Fashions Ltd. factory was no longer authorized to produce merchandise for Wal-Mart but that a supplier subcontracted work to it "in direct violation of our policies."

At least 112 people were killed in a fire that raced through a multi-story garment factory just outside of Bangladesh's capital, an official said Sunday.