A wildfire burning at mile 47 of the Sterling Highway near Cooper Landing has been responded to by dozens of firefighters from across the Kenai Peninsula. Kenai Peninsula Emergency Manager Brenda Ahlberg reported that the fire was reported at 5:30 p.m. and grew to approximately two acres in size. "It is spreading towards the north into the Chugach National Forest. They've got some really good suppression activities going on and a lot of resources both on the ground and in the air," Ahlberg said in an interview. "...We are not anticipating any type of evacuation alerts" Ahlberg reported that no homes or properties are in danger, and that multiple crews had responded to assist with fire suppression efforts.  

VIDEOS: A raging fire at a waste management facility sent thick, black smoke into the sky for hours Tuesday in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The fire is out, but officials say one person was found dead Wednesday morning. CBS2's Elijah Westbrook has learned the fire claimed the life of a person who first responders believe was a missing employee. It took firefighters more than 10 hours to get the massive fire under control. Neighbors said they were stunned at how intense the fire was. One family said they didn't feel comfortable staying in their home because of how close they were to the fire, and felt like they had no choice but to stay at a hotel. "I was sleeping, then all the smoke came out and we came running out of the house like crazy," witness Jorge Rodriguez told CBS2. "It's crazy. It could have been worse. You never know," another person added.  

People lined the streets of Kutztown for the long-anticipated return of a hand pumper used to fight fires in the mid 1800's. "Joel Bates built approximately 27 hand pumpers between the 1820's and 1850's," says Jeremy Bellois, history buff formerly of Kutztown Fire Company, who currently runs with Allentown Fire Dept. "This is one of about 8 still known in existence, and this is the only one in original, unrestored condition." "Through a 15-year project through a couple members and historians, we were able to locate a collector out of Conway, New Hampshire who had it in his museum at the Fryeburg Fairgrounds," says Bellois. Kutztown bought the pumper from Philadelphia early on. It remained here until the mid 1970's. It was then stored at the Kempton Farm museum; after that its whereabouts were a mystery.  

AT&T on Tuesday announced the launch of its new location-based routing to automatically transmit wireless 9-1-1 calls to the appropriate 9-1-1 call centers on a nationwide basis. AT&T can quickly and more accurately identify where a wireless 9-1-1 call is coming from using device GPS and hybrid information to route the call to the correct 9-1-1 call center, also known as public safety answering point or PSAP. AT&T says that this new location-based routing initiative, launched in partnership with Intrado, is the first-ever of its kind. The carrier says that the "Locate Before Route" feature will allow AT&T to identify where a 911 call is coming from within 50 meters of a device's location. Today, 68% of adults don't have a landline in their homes. When the first 9-1-1 systems were established over 50 years ago, communication technology was drastically different, as landline phones dominated the market. Now, 80% of 9-1-1 calls come from a mobile device.  

A young man is breathing a little easier after nearly losing an engagement ring to a vehicle fire on Monday. According to Williamson County Fire Rescue, fire crews were dispatched to a car fire off I-840 on Monday afternoon. Fire-Rescue crews arrived to find the vehicle fully involved and quickly moved to stop the flames. Monday afternoon, Brooklynn Stevens and her high school sweetheart, Myers Hart, were driving a rental car when they heard a loud pop. Myers pulled off to the side of the road to check the car. He realized the car was on fire. "There was a loud bang. I think the coolant reservoir blew and it shot the hood up and spewed fluid everywhere and then it went up in flames," Myers said. "Her friend knew about it and we looked at each other and said, ‘the ring is in there and we couldn't get it out," Myers said by that point all they could do was pray the ring would make it through the fire.  

The steady increase in COVID-19 cases this past month is not disconcerting to Americans, as they are less worried now about the coronavirus than they were at the start of the year, and fewer are social distancing. Fewer than one in three U.S. adults (31%) say they are "very" or "somewhat worried" about getting COVID-19, statistically similar to the 34% recorded in mid-February when cases were steeply declining after the omicron spike. Americans' current worry level is the lowest Gallup has recorded since July 2021. These data are from a Gallup survey conducted April 15-23, when COVID cases in the U.S. were steadily increasing following a massive falloff of the omicron variant spike. Cases have continued to climb gradually in the weeks since the survey, but the latest increases pale in comparison to the massive spike recorded during the winter.