Monthly Archives: <span>December 2016</span>

Facebook Drone Crash Caused by Wind Gusts, Wing Failure

Federal investigators say Facebook’s unmanned aircraft crashed while landing because strong winds broke a wing. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said Silicon Valley-based Facebook wants a fleet of high-flying aircraft that can be deployed to send internet signals to remote parts …

2015 California Train Crash Caused by Truck Driver Fatigue

Acute fatigue and lack of familiarity with the area likely caused the driver of a work truck to turn onto train tracks where the vehicle and its trailer were struck by a Southern California commuter train, killing the engineer and …

Another Sentencing in Indiana Home Blast Insurance Fraud

A woman who was one of five people charged in a deadly Indianapolis, Ind., house explosion faces the possibility of up to 50 years in prison when she’s sentenced Tuesday. A Marion County judge heard victim-impact testimony Monday during the …

Deadly Wreck Prompts Call for Better Limo Safety

Cars converted into stretch limousines often lack life-saving safety components such as side-impact air bags, reinforced rollover protection bars and accessible emergency exits, according to a special grand jury that looked into a limousine crash that killed four women leaving …

Ex-Nanny for Penguins Player Gets 5 Year Sentence for Arson, Insurance Fraud

The former nanny of Pittsburgh Penguins player Chris Kunitz was sentenced Tuesday to five years in federal prison for setting fire to her rental residence and then filing fraudulent insurance claims for the contents. The public defender for Andrea Forsythe, …

West Virginia Will Get $87M More for Flood Recovery

Congress has approved $87 million more in federal funds to help West Virginia recover from deadly flooding over the summer, according to state lawmakers. The funding is from the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery …

Crushed Kentucky Miner Not Wearing Safety Device

Federal investigators have concluded that a worker crushed to death by a machine at a Kentucky coal mine wasn’t wearing an emergency shut-off device, and that his managers had not provided a way to securely attach it. Managers at Webster …

What’s Next for State Farm After Hurricane Katrina Fraud Verdict is Upheld

Earlier this month, a whistleblower lawsuit verdict against State Farm was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court rejected a challenge filed by State Farm on a lower court decision. The decision, according to Dan Himmelfarb, a Wash. …

Records Show West Virginia Flooded With Painkillers

Drug wholesalers shipped 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills to West Virginia in just six years, a period when 1,728 people fatally overdosed on these two painkillers, according to an investigation by the Charleston Gazette-Mail. That amounts to 433 of …

Ram, Durango Gearshifts Investigated for Rollaway Risk

The U.S. auto safety agency has opened an investigation into complaints that another 1 million Fiat Chrysler vehicles can roll away after the owners shift transmissions into park, a problem similar to the one being blamed in the death of …