Teen becomes youngest to sail around the world

hTeen becomes youngest to sail around the world

PORTSMOUTH, England — The world’s youngest round-the-world sailor has returned to Britain after charting some 28,000 miles.

Thousands cheered as 17-year-old Mike Perham arrived Saturday in Portsmouth.

A Guinness World Records representative has certified Perham is now the youngest person to sail around the world with some assistance. He was 16 when he set off in November and turned 17 in March.

Perham tried to complete the challenge nonstop in his 50-foot racing yacht called Totallymoney.com, but technical problems forced him to be assisted.

Shuttle nears rendezvous

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Space shuttle Discovery’s astronauts steered closer to the international space station for a linkup today while checking their ship for any signs of launch damage.

The routine survey began early Saturday evening and was expected to last well into the night.

NASA officials say no fuel tank debris was observed hitting Discovery during Friday’s midnight liftoff. But the shuttle’s most vulnerable areas — the wings and nose — still needed to be checked with lasers and cameras on a boom attached to the robot arm.

Mandatory evacuations

LOS ANGELES — A growing wildfire sending massive billows of smoke into the sky north of Los Angeles nearly tripled in size Saturday, injuring three residents, knocking out power to homes and prompting evacuations in a number of mountain communities.

Mandatory evacuations were extended Saturday into neighborhoods in the canyons on the northwestern edge of Altadena, Glendale, La Crescenta and Big Tujunga Canyon, Forest Service spokesman Bruce Quintelier said. It was unclear how many residents were ordered to leave.

Bombs kill 18 in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Bombs struck a cafe in Baghdad and remote communities in northern Iraq on Saturday, killing at least 18 people, as the visiting Iranian foreign minister warned that Iraq’s instability affected the whole region.

The blasts came just over a week after suicide truck bombers devastated the foreign and finance ministries in Baghdad, killing about 100 people and dealing a blow to confidence in the Iraqi government’s ability to protect the people as U.S. forces scale back their presence.

Police think boy is dead

OAKLAND, Calif. — The foster parents who held vigils pleading for the safe return of a missing 5-year-old boy with cerebral palsy have been arrested on suspicion of murder, Oakland police said Friday.

Louis Ross and Jennifer Campbell, who is the boy’s aunt, were being questioned by investigators in the case of Hasanni Campbell, who disappeared Aug. 10 after Ross said he briefly left the boy outside his car in the parking lot of an upscale Oakland neighborhood shoe store where Campbell works.

The couple were arrested separately within an hour of each other, police spokesman Jeff Thomason said.

“This is not a missing persons case anymore. This is a homicide investigation,” Thomason said late Friday outside police headquarters in downtown Oakland. “We are talking to the people responsible. We do believe Hasanni Campbell is dead.”

7 found slain in Georgia

BRUNSWICK, Ga. — Seven people were found slain and two critically injured Saturday at a mobile-home park built on the grounds of a historic plantation in southeastern Georgia, police said.

Glynn County Police Chief Matt Doering called it the worst mass slaying in his 25 years of police work in this coastal Georgia county. He wouldn’t say how the victims died.

At an afternoon news conference, Doering declined to say whether police believe the killer was among the dead or remained at large. No arrests had been made.

Associated Press