Spain: Oil tanker’s risk of splitting reduced

A salvage company managed Monday to turn a damaged tanker so that its ruptured hull no longer faces the waves – reducing the risk the ship will split and spill the nearly 20 million gallons of fuel oil that remain on board.

But as tugboats continued to pull the ship southwest, away from Spain, and the salvagers sought a port at which to do repairs or transfer the oil to another vessel, Portugal warned it would not allow the crippled ship into its ports.

The tanker has leaked additional fuel into the rich fishing grounds off Spain’s northwestern coast, said Lars Walder, spokesman for the Dutch SMIT salvage company.

The amount of the additional spill was not immediately known.

New England: Workers struggle to restore power

Gusting winds Monday sent ice-weakened trees crashing down across New England, frustrating crews as they worked to restore power to thousands of darkened homes in the wake of a weekend nor’easter.

Schools were closed in parts of the region, and two highway deaths were blamed on icy conditions in Maine. In Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York, thousands of residents were still without electrical power Monday evening.

In Torrington, Conn., Mayor Owen Quinn said Monday that 10 people whose homes had lost power were sent to a hospital with carbon monoxide poisoning after they apparently failed to properly vent their kerosene heaters.

South Carolina: Kentucky escapees linked to crime spree

Two inmates who escaped from a Kentucky jail earlier this month are on a cross-country crime spree and have been linked to two abductions, the latest a 44-year-old South Carolina woman, authorities say.

The escaped inmates also are suspects in the abduction of a Kentucky man as well as a burglary here and numerous car thefts, police said.

A videotape confirmed Alice Louise Donovan of Galivants Ferry was abducted Thursday from a Wal-Mart parking lot in Conway, authorities said Sunday. She remains missing.

The inmates, Branden Basham and Chadrick Fulks, also are suspected of abducting James Hawkins, 42, of Hanson, Ky., taking him 40 miles north to Indiana and leaving him bound to a tree, authorities said. Hawkins struggled for hours before freeing himself and summoning help.

Basham, 21, and Fulks, 25, escaped Nov. 4. Basham was serving a five-year sentence for writing a bad check and Fulks was awaiting trial on robbery charges, authorities said.

Pittsburgh: Zoo handler crushed during elephant walk

A 3-ton elephant crushed its handler to death Monday while being taken for its morning walk at the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium.

The accident happened before the zoo was to open.

Two zookeepers were walking the 18-year-old female African elephant and her 3-year-old calf when the 6,200-pound adult stopped, said Barbara Baker, zoo president and chief executive.

When one of the keepers, Mike Gatti, 46, tried to get the animal moving, it hit him and knocked him to the ground, she said. The animal then pinned Gatti with her head, crushing him, she said.

Officials called the incident unprovoked. Other handlers were able to get the elephants back to their holding area.

Baker said the elephant would not be destroyed because it is an endangered species.