Patrol: 5 women die in limo fire on bridge

Patrol: 5 women die in limo fire on bridge

san francisco

A limousine taking nine women to a bachelorette party erupted in flames, killing five of the passengers, including the bride-to-be, authorities and the mother of one of the survivors said Sunday.

The limo caught fire around 10 p.m. Saturday on one of the busiest bridges on San Francisco Bay, California Highway Patrol officer Art Montiel told The Associated Press. Five of the women were trapped, but the four other women managed to get out after the vehicle came to a stop on the San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, the patrol said.

Investigators haven’t determined what sparked the fire, but the patrol said the white stretch limo became engulfed in flames after smoke started coming out of the rear of the vehicle.

Building-collapse death toll tops 600

dhaka, bangladesh

More than 600 bodies have been recovered from the garment-factory building that collapsed April 24, police said Sunday as the grim recovery work continued in one of the worst industrial accidents ever.

Police said Sunday night that the death toll had reached 622. More than 200 bodies have been recovered since Wednesday, when authorities said only 149 people had been listed as missing.

The stench of decom-posing bodies remains amid the broken concrete of the eight-story Rana Plaza building, and it is anyone’s guess how many victims remain to be recovered.

An architect whose firm designed the building said Sunday that it had not been designed to handle heavy industrial equipment, let alone the three floors that were later illegally added.

Auction to feature space artifacts

amherst, n.h.

A New Hampshire auction house will soon accept bids on space and aviation artifacts, including an electrocardiogram of Apollo 11 Commander Neil Armstrong’s heartbeat taken when he first set foot on the moon.

Amherst-based RR Auction will take bids on the EKG, which registered a normal heartbeat, and other artifacts during an online auction from May 16 through May 23. Auction officials say over 85 lots of Apollo 11 material will be featured in the auction.

Malaysia’s coalition hangs on to power

kuala lumpur, malaysia

Malaysia’s long-governing coalition won national elections with a weakened majority to extend its unbroken, 56-year rule, fending off the strongest opposition it has ever faced but exposing vulnerabilities in the process.

The Election Commission reported that Prime Minister Najib Razak’s National Front coalition captured 133 of Malaysia’s 222 parliamentary seats Sunday, down slightly from the 135 it had before Parliament was dissolved.

What’s the buzz? Cabin has bees — lots

salt lake city

It was the biggest beehive that that Ogden beekeeper Vic Bachman has ever removed — a dozen feet long, packed inside the eaves of a cabin in Ogden Valley.

“We figure we got 15 pounds of bees out of there,” said Bachman, who said that converts to about 60,000 honeybees.

The honeybees had been making the enclosed cavity their home since 1996.

The homeowners called Bachman, owner of Deseret Hive Supply. Bachman used a vacuum cleaner to suck the bees into a cage.

“It doesn’t hurt them,” he said. “We caught the queen and were able to keep her. The hive is in my backyard right now and is doing well.”

Associated Press