Hundreds flee Aleppo

Hundreds flee Aleppo

BEIRUT

Hundreds of residents left a formerly rebel-controlled suburb of the Syrian capital of Damascus Wednesday, as government and Russian forces prepared to open corridors out of the contested city of Aleppo in the hopes of facilitating an exodus from its rebel-held quarters.

Aleppo’s besieged eastern quarters experienced relative peace for the second consecutive day in the run-up to the hoped-for evacuation Thursday, after weeks of bombardment left the area in ruins. Russia’s military has promised two corridors will be opened for militants to flee to the neighboring rebel-held province of Idlib, between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m, while other corridors will allow civilians to move to government-held areas.

Signs not good for Mars landing

ARMSTADT, Germany

The European Space Agency lost contact with an experimental Mars probe shortly before its planned landing on the red planet Wednesday. Scientists said that wasn’t a good sign for the Schiaparelli lander, but it was too soon to give up on the craft.

ESA successfully put Schiaparelli’s mother ship, which will analyze the Martian atmosphere, into orbit. But several hours after the lander was supposed to have touched down at 1448 GMT, there was no firm word on its fate.

“The signal (from Schiaparelli) went through the majority of the descent phase but it stopped at a certain point that we reckon was before the landing,” Paolo Ferri, ESA’s head of operations, said at mission control in Darmstadt, Germany.

“To conclude more on this, because there could be many reasons for that, we need more information,” he said. “It’s clear that these are not good signs.”

Explosion rocks Portland district

PORTLAND, Ore.

Apowerful natural gas explosion rocked a busy Portland, Ore., shopping district Wednesday, injuring eight people and igniting a fire that sent a huge plume of smoke over the heart of the city.

Three firefighters, two police officers and three civilians were hurt, and one of the firefighters was still in surgery late Wednesday for a broken leg, fire Chief Mike Myers said at a news conference. None of the injuries appeared to be life-threatening.

A building that housed a bagel shop and a beauty salon in the popular NW 23rd Street shopping district was reduced to rubble, and its smoldering roof was splayed across the road.

Missing-boy case

NEW YORK

Revisiting a crime that shattered a bygone era’s sense of safety, prosecutors on Wednesday launched their second bid for a conviction in one of the nation’s most influential missing-child cases, the 1979 disappearance of Etan Patz.

After a jury deadlock last year, suspect Pedro Hernandez is back on trial in a case that eluded investigators for decades, ratcheted up Americans’ consciousness of missing children and now centers on whether a chilling confession was true.

Whopper of a lobster

HAMILTON, Bermuda

Hurricane Nicole may have brought more than wind and rain to Bermuda. Two fishermen are crediting the storm with bringing in an enormous 14-pound spiny lobster.

Charter boat captain Matthew Jones tells The Associated Press he and one of his workers, Tristan Loescher, were fishing off the shoreline on Friday, the day after the storm blew through the island. Jones says Loescher thought he had a snapper on the line after it somehow got wrapped around a mooring. When Loescher went in closer to investigate, he instead spotted the huge crustacean.

Associated Press

Jones says it’s one of the biggest lobsters he’s ever seen. Loescher held up the lobster for pictures before releasing it back into the water.

Jones says spiny lobsters are known to head to shore before storms.

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NBA’s Derrick Rose cleared in rape lawsuit, poses with jury

LOS ANGELES (AP) - NBA star Derrick Rose and two friends were cleared Wednesday in a $21.5 million lawsuit that accused them of gang raping his ex-girlfriend when she was incapacitated from drugs or alcohol.

Jurors in Los Angeles federal court reached the verdict in less than four hours after concluding there was a lack of evidence to support the woman’s claims and dismissing her account as unbelievable.

“It felt like she was playing us,” said a juror who would only give his first name as Jared. “The second her lawyer started questioning her, she would start crying. I mean, granted, that could be realistic, but I feel l’m pretty good at reading people, and I felt as if it was false.”

Jared was among several jurors who spoke to reporters outside the courthouse, none of whom gave their full names.

Rose remained stoic as the verdict was read and later thanked jurors and posed for photos with them in the lobby, draping his left arm around each one who wanted a souvenir of the Knicks point guard as one of his lawyers snapped photos on their phones.