Explosions

A series of explosions on the grounds of Nicaragua's main military hospital rocked Managua on Wednesday night. The explosions, at 10:57 p.m., touched off a series of fires on a hillside that could be seen from all over this capital. State security police and ambulances rushed to the scene as patients were evacuated from the Alejandro Davila Bolanos Hospital. There was no immediate word on casualties but one doctor was quoted as saying that the inside of the hospital was badly damaged.

An explosion tore through a Moscow apartment building before dawn today, causing injuries and forcing police to evacuate the 12-story structure, Russian news agencies reported. Authorities said the blast might have been caused by a gas leak. The explosion occurred about 4 a.m. in a fourth-floor unit.

For the second time in three years, Mumbai suffered a major terrorist attack Wednesday as three explosions rocked India's financial capital, killing at least 21 people, wounding more than 140 and spreading fear and panic across the sprawling city. The blasts, detonated over an 11-minute period beginning at 6:54 p.m. just as commuters were heading home or out for dinner, apparently were timed for maximum damage and publicity. But several analysts said that the explosions' relatively low intensity, the choice of targets and the fact that more people weren't killed suggested that this was the work of local militants and not a major Pakistan-linked group, such as the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba, which India blames for the 2008 attack on Mumbai that killed 166 people.

A mysterious and dangerous gasoline leak into sewers in the San Fernando Valley forced more than 200 residents temporarily from their homes Saturday. The leak produced highly flammable vapors that caused several minor explosions and forced dozens of firefighters into a daylong battle to try to dilute the fumes. No injuries resulted from the explosions, and only minor damage was reported in three homes when flames erupted near sewer lines, officials said.

A Nigerian oil pipeline punctured by thieves exploded, killing more than 100 villagers scavenging for fuel, witnesses said Saturday. They said the explosion happened Thursday in the southeastern community of Onicha Amiyi-Uhu, north of the Abia state capital, Umuahia. Word of the disaster emerged slowly because many survivors apparently feared prosecution for theft and sabotage, said Emmanuel Ijewere, president of the Nigerian Red Cross.

BP, one of the world's largest oil and gas companies, could face a criminal inquiry over an explosion last March at its Texas City refinery that killed 15 people and injured 170 others, a spokesman for the Department of Labor said. "A verbal referral has been made to the Department of Justice," said Alan Belsky, the Labor Department spokesman. He said the U.S.

A federal grand jury is investigating a 2000 El Paso Corp. natural gas pipeline explosion that killed 12 people and has subpoenaed internal company documents, the company said. There was no indication whether the probe is a criminal investigation, but the involvement of the U.S. attorney's office suggests that it may be. The U.S. attorney's office in Albuquerque declined to comment.

Rescuers battled a raging fire and a rock slide in search of 20 trapped coal miners, and the death toll rose to at least 80 from a powerful methane blast in Donetsk, Ukraine. Dozens of weeping relatives waited at Zasyadko mine headquarters for word on the fates of their loved ones. Cries and sobs broke out as officials called out names of miners found dead. Some people fainted. About 360 miners scrambled to the surface after Sunday's blast, which occurred at a depth of about 3,300 feet.

Making an already dicey environmental cleanup even worse, a canister once used as part of a fighter jet's ejection seat blew up this week at a notorious hazardous waste storage facility in Rialto, injuring two contract workers, officials said Thursday. Occupational Safety and Health Administration investigators descended Thursday on the 20-acre compound in the San Bernardino County community. The site, once operated by Denova Environmental Inc.