Southeastern United States

When Rick McKee, the editorial cartoonist of the Augusta Chronicle newspaper, set out to capture the historic and severe drought that is afflicting the Southeast, he did not draw parched rivers or shriveled crops or brown lawns: He drew an oafish, bloated hulk of a boy holding up a straw to slurp up water from a smaller boy's water fountain. Above the larger boy, a sign reads "Atlanta," above the other, "Everybody else."

Despite fears that the planet is heating up, temperatures in the Southeastern United States have actually fallen 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last 30 years, according to a federal study released Saturday. The data is contrary to the widely held theory that pollution in the atmosphere has already made temperatures start to rise. "It's cooling and getting wetter," George A. Maul said. "This is quite different from what the computer models suggest should be going on with global warming."

Five weeks after the first of two hurricanes annihilated a third of his harbor, New Orleans port director Gary LaGrange is trying to resurrect one of the nation's busiest trade gateways with a skeletal crew forced to live on an old cargo ship. This week, LaGrange left the King Kennedy, the vessel that has been his home since Hurricane Katrina swept ashore, to tell the Senate Finance Committee in Washington how the densest concentration of ports on any U.S.

Windy and dry weather raised the threat of wildfires across the Southeastern United States, where flames have already charred thousands of acres of forest and brush. Residents of 60 homes near the western North Carolina town of Wilkesboro were placed under an evacuation order as a large forest fire raced through the area. Florida Gov. Jeb Bush declared a state of emergency.

WHERE THERE'S WATER, there are mosquitoes. And where there are mosquitoes, there is disease -- even diseases we thought we had eliminated long ago. In New Orleans, the floods caused by Hurricane Katrina were just the beginning. The waters are teeming with parasites and bacteria as well as deadly chemicals, bringing the danger of dysentery, severe infection and life-threatening diarrhea.

When Rick McKee, the editorial cartoonist of the Augusta Chronicle newspaper, set out to capture the historic and severe drought that is afflicting the Southeast, he did not draw parched rivers or shriveled crops or brown lawns: He drew an oafish, bloated hulk of a boy holding up a straw to slurp up water from a smaller boy's water fountain. Above the larger boy, a sign reads "Atlanta," above the other, "Everybody else."

In the center of this river port, known for its turbulent history of conflict between blacks and whites, there is a place where the old ideas about race and the South don't make sense anymore. Drive east from the Mississippi along Union Avenue, just past the studio where a then-unknown Elvis Presley showed up one day to record a song, and you'll come to an in-between place known as Midtown. Here, there are no ethnic or racial majorities.

Tropical Storm Maria formed Friday out in the open Atlantic, but it posed no threat to land, forecasters said. The 13th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season had top sustained winds of 50 mph, up from 40 mph earlier Friday. Its center was about 1,070 miles southeast of Bermuda. It was moving toward the northwest at about 12 mph. "It should stay out in the open Atlantic," said Lixion Avila of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Thunderstorms rolled across the South with tornadoes, heavy rain and pounding hail, killing one person, knocking out power and causing street flooding. Two mobile homes were destroyed at Mary Esther, Fla., as the storms swept across the Florida Panhandle. At least 6,400 homes and business were without power near Mobile, Ala., said an Alabama Power spokesman.

WHERE THERE'S WATER, there are mosquitoes. And where there are mosquitoes, there is disease -- even diseases we thought we had eliminated long ago. In New Orleans, the floods caused by Hurricane Katrina were just the beginning. The waters are teeming with parasites and bacteria as well as deadly chemicals, bringing the danger of dysentery, severe infection and life-threatening diarrhea.

More than 120 Gulf of Mexico oil and gas platforms were still shut down Saturday, and nearly 60% of the gulf's normal daily oil production remained blocked from the market because of evacuations related to Hurricane Katrina, a federal agency said. After surveying 56 energy companies, the Minerals Management Service reported that 122 of the 819 staffed platforms in the gulf were shut down, blocking 897,605 barrels -- or 59.8% of the gulf's normal daily production of 1.5 million barrels.

President Bush on Thursday promised the hundreds of thousands displaced by Hurricane Katrina that the government would be with them "for the long haul," and Congress voted to provide $51.8 billion in emergency funds to finance the relief and reconstruction programs. Despite the expanded efforts, which increase total federal spending on the emergency to $62.3 billion, partisan rancor undermined attempts to project a spirit of unity.

Police officials threatened Wednesday to resort to forced evacuations by the end of the week to clear out residents who had not left, pointing to environmental tests warning of dangerous bacteria levels in the floodwaters. As health authorities joined New Orleans and Louisiana officials in urging the city's estimated 10,000 holdouts to leave their homes, Bush administration officials said they would earmark $51.8 billion in new funding to speed help to victims of Hurricane Katrina.

Tropical Storm Maria formed Friday out in the open Atlantic, but it posed no threat to land, forecasters said. The 13th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season had top sustained winds of 50 mph, up from 40 mph earlier Friday. Its center was about 1,070 miles southeast of Bermuda. It was moving toward the northwest at about 12 mph. "It should stay out in the open Atlantic," said Lixion Avila of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

Freezing rain and sleet coated parts of the Southeast with a layer of ice Saturday, canceling hundreds of airline flights, knocking out power to thousands of customers and shutting down sections of every interstate highway in the metro Atlanta area. Three weather-related traffic deaths were reported, two in Georgia and one in South Carolina, police said.

Hurricane Florence fizzled early Saturday, bringing heavy rains and gusty winds to the Gulf Coast but relatively little of the destruction the once-powerful storm threatened. Daybreak brought relief from a tense night for hundreds of thousands of coastal residents from Louisiana to Florida and allowed some to ridicule the storm they had feared just hours earlier. "It was a wimp," declared a seasoned New Orleans morning disk jockey.

To judge by reports out of Washington, Congress is hotter than the Fourth of July weather about international trade. The Senate is considering a bill that would raise tariffs or impose quotas the moment a U.S. industry complains of injury from imports. The House, at the urging of major U.S. companies, has already passed a bill that would penalize countries that restrict access to their markets while enjoying a trade surplus with the United States.

After Hurricane Ivan pummeled a wide swath of land along the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday, some U.S. insurers swamped by the third major hurricane of 2004 might find their profits gone with the wind. Analysts at Fitch Ratings say Ivan could be the second-costliest hurricane in U.S. history. Ivan, the latest hurricane to strike the U.S.

Thunderstorms rolled across the South with tornadoes, heavy rain and pounding hail, killing one person, knocking out power and causing street flooding. Two mobile homes were destroyed at Mary Esther, Fla., as the storms swept across the Florida Panhandle. At least 6,400 homes and business were without power near Mobile, Ala., said an Alabama Power spokesman.