You know that sinking feeling you get when you notice you're about to run out of gas? The 65-year-old pilot of a Cessna flying to Hawaii got that feeling times a million somewhere over the Pacific last night. He radioed in his problem to the Coast Guard, and they talked him through a successful crash-landing just 13 miles off the coast of Hawaii last night. more ›

U.S. Coast Guard received a distress call around 9:45 on Tuesday night from the Midnight Star, a 61-foot fishing vessel. The boat sank in 90 feet of water and left six people in the chilly Pacific. more ›

An F-18 fighter jet went missing around 10:30pm on Wednesday night approximately 70 miles south of San Diego and 40 miles west of Ensenada, Mexico, reports myFOXla. The jet was flying on a mission from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar with another aircraft when the pilots lost contact. more ›

The Ventura County Fire Department has said a camper reported seeing hundreds of gallons of oil seeping onto the beach around 8:30 a.m. Tuesday morning, reports KTLA. Authorities believe the spill is coming from a nearby oil field and were working to identify the exact source. more ›

A man who was suspected to be drunk jumped off the Venice Pier early this morning, prompting a Coast Guard search by air and water. The man has been identified as 29-year-old Brian Patrick Dunn of West Hollywood. When he jumped in around 2:30 a.m., he was not wearing a life vest. That, combined with a high surf advisory bringing in rip currents and 6 to 8 foot waves, has authorities worried. more ›

Yesterday evening, the local United States Coast Guard Sector entered a new era of public information by launching a blog. This is "a revolution on how we deal with information management and the new social media, or some people call it, Web 2.0.," Admiral Thad W. Allen sternly said in a video. "We are not living in the same information environment we grew up in, it's critically important that senior leaders of the United States Coast Guard understand what technology is doing today, how it is changing, how we must change with it." more ›

A small plane was reported as being seen hitting the water yesterday approximately 25 miles off the coast between Oceanside and San Clemente Island, according to abc7.com. The Coast Guard says as of this morning, "rescue boats have yet to find survivors or bodies." Three rescue boats and a helicopter were in use early this morning as part of the search for survivors. "Federal Aviation Administration officials believe the plane took off from San Diego's Montgomery Field," but no confirmation has been made about the aircraft, its origin, destination, or passengers. more ›

In a bizarro case that looks like a business deal gone bad, but plays more like a conspiracy theory gone right, a software programmer and his marketing guru partner sailed for San Clemente Island on Saturday to seal a "lucrative" deal with a secret government agency and he never returned. more ›

Seattlest watches as a S.L.U.T. is born and Seattle Flickr users go nuts over a local art installation. A restaurant critic demands a Diner's Bill of Rights over a gnat next to her drink, and, in lieu of a Portlandist, Seattlest debates with itself over the identity of the Northwest's crown jewel. Seattlest also joins the guys from Fantagraphics for an ill-fated gun party in the woods. more ›

A Word or 20: No network or cable channel has made a compelling reason to stay inside this Memorial Day Weekend and watch TV. Tonight - Friday - May 25, 2007 Cubs @ Dodgers (Prime, 7:30 p.m.) The Henry Rollins Show (IFC, 8:00 p.m.) Steve Buscemi pushes new films Interview and Delirious, and discusses his years as a firefighter and working at Ground Zero. In a 'Letter' to Michael Chertoff Rollins reflects on the... more ›

The LA Times has nominated five books in each of nine different categories for the 2007 Los Angeles Times Book Prizes. In the weeks leading up to the Festival of Books where the winners will be announced, LAist will take a quick look at each category and will wax poetic on a few favorites (or least favorites) along the way. The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast by Douglas Brinkley... more ›

"You're trying to sell a historical period drama to a country like America, you don't want a big, fat, 250 pounds, red haired guy with a beard. It doesn't let people embrace the fantastic monarch he was, because they're not attracted to the package. Heroes do not look like Henry VIII. That is just the world we live in."
--WENN/IMDB

Let's take a look back at a week that raised this Zen koan: if Kevin Federline got into a wrestling ring with a wrestler, who would you root for? more ›

Today the LA Times reports that Evergreen International, one of the world's biggest shipping lines, has agreed to pay a $25 million fine for rigging their filtration systems so they could dump waste oil into the ocean rather than bringing it to shore, violating international and US laws. The agreement clearly states that the charges relate to violations made from 1998-2001. But we can't help wonder, since one of the big guys was once successful with their tricky "magic pipes," as government investigators called them, if it might be possible that some shipping company's dirty deeds are responsible for the mystery oil slick that killed more than 700 seabirds along the California coast in January. Apparently Evergreen's practices included painting pipes to hide wrench marks, wiping off telltale oil, and instructing crew members to lie about what they knew if questioned by Coast Guard officials. Now that's slick.

more ›

Alone the Long Beach or Los Angeles ports would be the largest in the U.S. Together, they handle more than 1 million cruise passengers and $200 billion in trade annually, including half the petroleum products used in the Western U.S. more ›