Two men and an elderly woman were injured in a house fire that happened in Seabrook Monday, firefighters said. The Seabrook Volunteer Fire Department received reports about a fire at a home located at the corner of South Heron Drive and Albatross Drive around 2:10 a.m. Firefighters said the house has severe damage throughout and the fire initially appeared to have started in the kitchen. According to Assistant Fire Chief Nathan Douglas, one man was critically burned and taken by Life Flight to Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston. A second man was taken by ground ambulance to HCA Healthcare Houston Clear Lake Hospital. An elderly woman in the house was also taken by ground ambulance to Clear Lake, Douglas said.  

VIDEO/PHOTOS: Arson is looking into what started a fire at another abandoned building. The latest fire started around 3:30 a.m. Monday at a vacant home on W. Travis Street and NW 24th Street on the West Side. When firefighters arrived, they found the home fully engulfed in flames. They immediately put their focus on preventing the fire from spreading the neighboring homes. The home was a total loss. No injuries were reported. In the past week on the East Side, there have been five suspicious structure fires that are under investigation for arson.  

The San Antonio Fire Department responded to a heavy house fire on the East side of town. The incident happened at around 11:28 p.m. on the 900 block of S. Pine Street. Upon arrival, firefighters found heavy smoke and fire in the home. They went into a defensive operation and managed to get the fire under control. Firefighters were able to go inside and continue to fight the fire. According to fire officials, the home was empty, and no gas or electricity was hooked up. Battalion Chief says that this is a continuation of the fires in the area. The house suffered major damages. The cause of the fire is under investigation. No injuries were reported.  

VIDEO/PHOTO: A fire Sunday afternoon caused significant damage to the Chicken Oil Company hamburger restaurant in Bryan. The fire was reported just before 5:30 p.m. shortly after it closed for the day. S. College Avenue near Old College Road was closed as fire crews worked to try and save the popular eatery. No injuries have been reported. Videos and photos sent to KBTX by eyewitnesses show flames and thick smoke pouring out of the building as firefighters arrived on the scene. It took a little more than half an hour for firefighters to bring the fire under control at 6:10 p.m. An investigation is ongoing to determine was started the fire. It's unclear the extent of the damage but firefighters were able to keep it from being a total loss.  

Three Rusk County fire departments battled a structure fire that started when flames from a brush pile got out of control Sunday afternoon. According to a post on the Rusk County Office of Emergency Management Facebook page, the Kilgore Fire Department, the Crims Chapel Volunteer Fire Department, and the New London VFD responded to the fire, which occurred on a property on the north end of Rusk County. "Unfortunately, a brush pile quickly became out of control due to the wind and spread to the house," the Facebook post stated. No injuries were reported. "We can't stress enough to be careful burning," the Facebook post stated.  

Some good progress was made against Texas wildfires over the weekend. Friday, ten fires were still burning across the state but Monday morning that's down to three fires -- two of those at least 80% contained. The Big Hippo Fire in Cottle County has burned 60 acres and containment is at 80 percent while the Adrian Fire in Nolan County is 90 percent contained after blackening more than 500 acres. A third, Reynolds Bend Fire, Throckmorton County has burned 200 acres and is 40% contained, according to the Texas A&M Forest Service.  

PHOTOS: Arson is looking into what started a fire at another abandoned building. The latest fire started around 3:30 a.m. Monday at a vacant home on W. Travis Street and NW 24th Street on the West Side. When firefighters arrived, they found the home fully engulfed in flames. They immediately put their focus on preventing the fire from spreading the neighboring homes. The home was a total loss. No injuries were reported. In the past week on the East Side, there have been five suspicious structure fires that are under investigation for arson.  

The Durham Fire Department joined the hijinks on April Fools Day with a Friday morning post that drew strong reactions from basketball fans. The department took to social media to share seemingly real designs of a new fire engine with an unmistakable paint color – Duke blue. The post said: One of our Fire Trucks is going to look a lot different! As many of you know, we recently got seven new engines that will soon be in service. We also have four more Sutphens on order, and one of them is Engine Company 2 which protects Duke. Considering Duke is playing in the Final Four tomorrow, we decided today was a good day to announce that the new Engine 2 will be coming in a "Duke Blue" color scheme! We're so excited to see it out in Durham soon!" As of 1:50 p.m. Friday, the joke has seen over 400 reactions on Facebook. The Chapel Hill Fire Department was quick to react on Twitter with two tweets. The first read, "What is that saying? Oh, yes, ‘Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.'"  

Hoosiers needing emergency assistance can now text 911 in their native language and have their plea for help immediately translated for a police, fire or ambulance dispatcher. The Indiana Statewide 911 Board recently announced it has partnered with INdigital to translate text-to-911 messages into English from 108 different languages. "We've already seen the benefits of texting to 911. It allows people in sensitive situations to communicate with law enforcement, and now we are removing the language barriers to those services," said State Treasurer Kelly Mitchell, chairwoman of the Statewide 911 Board. Indiana in 2014 was one of the first states to launch text-to-911 services. All 92 counties were connected to the system by 2016.  

VIDEO/PHOTOS: The Hawks on Friday unveiled a new mural at Atlanta Fire Rescue Station 16, where 16 Black firefighters first integrated the city's department in 1963. Several of those history-making firefighters were on hand for the occasion, as was Hawks legend Dominique Wilkins and current players John Collins and Skylar Mays. The station, on Joseph E. Boone Blvd. in the Washington Park neighborhood, also will feature a new basketball hoop that the Hawks installed. Part of the effort, the team said, was to encourage neighborhood youths to stay active and feel connected to their community through the fire station. "It's meaningful to connect the youth to the fire department because it's more than just a station, it really is a hub of a community," Hawks Vice President of Corporate Social Responsibility Andrea Carter said.  

Just days after the BA.2 strain of coronavirus achieved world dominance, international health officials are already turning their attention to a new, mutant variant believed to be even more transmissible – XE. XE is a combination of the first form of omicron to spread across the globe, BA.1, and so-called "stealth omicron," the subvariant BA.2, that is now dominant. The highly transmissible XE strain was first detected in the United Kingdom on Jan. 19, according to the WHO document, and there have been more than 600 documented cases in the UK since. Preliminary findings suggest that XE may be about 10% more transmissible than BA.2, which is considered 50-60% more transmissible than its omicron predecessor, according to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert. How deadly XE turns out to be is still a question mark when it comes to XE as health experts continue to monitor the subvariant's spread.