California

Aftershocks felt across quake-rocked state

Aftershocks from strong earthquakes last week continued to ripple throughout California over the weekend.

A magnitude 5.0 earthquake struck 129 miles off the coast of the Northern California city of Eureka at 2:27 a.m. Sunday, just south of the epicenter of a 7.2 magnitude quake Tuesday night that prompted a tsunami warning for coastal areas from British Columbia to the Mexican border.

A 3.9-magnitude quake rumbled nearby about five hours later Sunday. The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department received no immediate reports of damage.

In the wake of two quakes in the Southern California desert, a 5.2 quake around Anza and a 4.9 temblor near Yucaipa, several so-called micro earthquakes between 2.6 and 1.0 shook the area Saturday night, experts said.

“It’s typical that we’ll have aftershocks and they will continue for some time,” said California Institute of Technology seismologist Anthony Guarino.

Since the 7.2 quake rocked the Juan de Fuca plate off the coast of Eureka, there have been 15 temblors stronger than 3.0 in the area, including a 6.7 quake Thursday night, Guarino said.

New Jersey

Police search for missing plane

Police were searching Sunday for a small plane missing near the Sussex, N.J., airport.

The Cessna 182 took off from the single-strip airport headed to Bridgeport, Conn., Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters said. The plane was only 4 miles south of the airport when the radar showed the pilot starting to turn back.

The plane then disappeared from the radar about 7:30 a.m, Peters said.

Only the pilot was believed to be aboard. No further information was immediately available.

Weather at the airport was overcast early Sunday morning, but visibility was good below the clouds, airport manager Paul Styger said.

State police were leading a search through the hilly woodlands around the airport, while a helicopter and volunteer pilots searched from the air.

Pennsylvania

Son shoots father after pleading for mother’s life

A man who had recently left a mental health facility killed his wife after an argument and was shot to death by one of the couple’s two sons, police said.

“I really can’t put into words the tragedy this is for the boys that are involved in this,” Penn-ridge Regional Police Chief David Mettin said.

The teens were awakened Saturday by their parents arguing at their home in Bucks County, north of Philadelphia, said Mettin and prosecutor Diane E. Gibbons.

“They came out of their respective bedrooms, they saw that their father had a knife to the throat of their mother,” Gibbons said.

The youths got two unloaded shotguns from the house and confronted their father, Andrew Detwiler, “told the father to leave, to get out, to leave Mom alone,” Mettin said.

However, Detwiler grabbed one of the shotguns, went to the garage to load it and returned to the house, where he fired through a window and hit his wife, Suzanne Detwiler, on a deck outside, they said.

The 15-year-old, who had loaded his shotgun, then shot his father as he was bending over his wife and raising his gun again, the authorities said.

The boy, who ran to a neighbor’s house in tears, won’t be charged, Gibbons said.

The boys’ names were not released because of their ages.

Gibbons said Detwiler, 44, had voluntary committed himself for mental health treatment but signed himself out sometime last week.